Goodbye Summer

My last post was at the end of spring and the beginning of summer when my parents were leaving for Michigan. Since then, Aaron and I took a quick trip to Colorado to visit friends and experience our first trip away from Rohan.  Rohan stayed with Nana and Bapa who flew down to Florida. In August I flew up to New Jersey to visit friends and their babies.  September we all flew up to Minnesota, Rohan stayed at his cousins house while we went up north for a couples weekend.  This vacation turned out to be an emotionally exhausting roller coaster ride.  Unfortunately we lost our friend Clayton Houff who was in a tragic motorcycle accident when he hit a deer on the way to meet up with us for dinner.  He will be remembered for his love for life, sense of humor and smile. At the beginning of October I flew to Michigan to help my parents organize their house.  It was a quick trip but I was able to see a good friend and catch up. 

Rohan has changed a lot since our last post.  He is a little parrot and mimics almost all that is said.  He has started to sing lyrics to songs, which is so cute.  He loves La La songs.  He dances and skips around to music.  He is still in music classes on Sundays and last week he sang in the class for the first time.  It's amazing to see how far he's coming in music class - the first class we went to he screamed his head off - now he's running around to the music and feeling the beat.  He is still trying to understand how to share and why he is not able to do everything he wants to do.  We have started "timeout" with Rohan and we think he knows now what it means, although when he is in timeout so are we because he won't sit in timeout by himself.  He is fearless at times and runs off to explore the world and other times he stays close, puts his hand up to mine and says "walk".  He loves to climb and run.  He has a girlfriend at daycare who have a love hate relationship that involves biting at times.  For a while he was the bitee and he finally was the biter - after all the times he was bit I didn't feel so bad when he was the biter.  He's still sleeping in his crib and hasn't tried to climb out yet.  We've found him in the morning with his shirt off and in his hamper, and he's taking off his diaper and peed all over the crib mattress.  Today my fear came true and he had stuck his hands in his poopy diaper and had poop remnants all over his hands. 90% of the time he can tell us when he has pooped "poopoo".  His eating habits are nothing to brag about - he loves chicken, meatballs, cheeseburgers, hot dogs, french fries and mixed veggies, snacks and cookies in between.  When he doesn't want to eat he won't so we are trying to go with the flow. His sleeping habits have been great - 12 hours a night of sleep with a few spells of nightmares. 

Its crazy to think that Rohan turns 2 in 6 weeks! The time does go fast!  It makes me realize how I need to blog more and document the little things Rohan does because when I don't it all mixes together.  Here is hoping I get better at that! 

Tis the SEASON

The "winter" season is coming to an end here in Southwest Florida.  Easter I believe is the end of the season when the snowbirds migrate back north.  This season has been a unique season for the three of us.  We were joined by my parents, Nana & Bapa, for four months.  I will not sugar coat it, it was an adjustment when they first moved down because we were used to them coming and leaving.  We had to get used to the fact they weren't leaving next week.  They were adjusting to retirement and we were adjusting to extra arms to help and hearts to love on Rohan.  Rohan has learned who Nana and Bapa are and he runs to the door when I tell him we are going to see them.  We were surprised by my friends, Andrea, Dayna and Vanessa in December for my 30th birthday.  I was surprised and I loved it and at the same time I couldn't stand it.  I wish I had known so I could have taken more time off for them.  We spent Christmas with my brother Mike down here and Rohan instantly took to him and his facial hair.  In February we took a trip over to the east coast of Florida to celebrate Rohan's Great Grandmas 91st birthday with Chicago family.  We also had our annual Meek/Sustad gang meet up.  We spent the day at the pool at Miland & Myrna Meek's, Rohan played with his cousins, and we finished the day off with a trip to Moes.  In March, Uncle Mike was back to visit for his birthday trip before my parents sent sail on their first cruise.  Amber spent a short time with us while she was on a business trip in Florida and it was neat to see Rohan warm up to her.  We will close out the season with my mom's friend Vivian (she married Aaron and I) visiting with my parents.  My parents will head back to Michigan in the beginning of April and closeout the season.  We will miss them being in our lives but will always remember the time they spent with us down here.  We were lucky to have them close by for four months and watch them enjoy the beginning of retirement while helping with Rohan.  Until next season - we look forward to their return to Florida.  

My dinner date...

There has been a growing trend since Rohan has been able to eat dinner with us.  I am always sitting by his side.  I am the one who is attending to his needs at the dinner table.  Rohan is always my dinner date. My dinner date eats before everyone else and is ready to leave as soon as his date gets her food.  He can sometimes be distracted with toys but he usually is on his way out of his dinner chair seconds after he has pushed all his food on the floor signally he is done.  My date puts me to work by chopping up all his food and making sure he stays entertained.  As fast as I pull apart his food he has it all stuffed in his mouth.  We take a break to take a few drinks and remind him to chew chew chew and we start all over again.  Making sure he doesn't get a hold of the glasses on the table or daddy's knife.  And Rohan almost always has his sippy-cup tether so we can eliminate the headache of sippy-cups thrown on the floor game.  My ear always strains to stay in touch with the adult conversation at the other end of the table but by the time I strain to make adult conversation, my dinner date has started throwing food on the floor or is bending backwards in his chair. Adult conversation over. With each mealtime I try again and again to multitask and I realize I need to give up wanting it all and cherish my time with my dinner date.  My dinner date will one day be taking me out to dinner.  

Tangents.

They are not kidding when they say being a parents is the hardest job because it is the one job that you are always doing.  You don't get to leave and sleep on it.  You are ON the job 24/7.  Constantly thinking, preparing, rocking, feeding, entertaining, worrying, changing (clothes & diapers), cleaning (bathing, butts, faces, highchairs, strollers, floors, houses, clothes, pacifiers, bottles, etc.), picking up (toys, from daycare, babies, etc), carrying (babes and diaper bags), organizing, making appointments, shopping (takes a lot of talent), and pushing (strollers, trikes, wagons etc). I enjoy being a mom but it is one hell of a job.  And no one knows what they are getting into until they jump right into it.  Some do it better and more smoothly than others... I am not one of them.   Maybe that is because it's my first try at it but I am still jealous of those moms who can pull it all off - or seem to anyway.

What I noticed before I was even pregnant was that our society needs to be more kind to one another and for some reason I had in my head that people are always kind to pregnant women and women with strollers (move out of their way, hold the door etc...).  HA! Not for this lady.  Yes there were few acts of kindness but honey when I would push my stroller at the farmers market no one cared a lick that I had a  newborn sleeping and needed to get in and out and MOVE OUT OF MY WAY and put down the last red pepper!  I guess because most of the people at my farmers market are over 60 and have forgotten what it is like to lug a baby around and push a stroller on little sleep when you really should be at home sleeping because the baby is sleeping but you need to get out of the house.  And then the men don't get it because unless you have been pregnant and have a mothers brain you JUST DON'T get it.  PERIOD.

Rohan is teething again.  His molars are coming through and those bad boys are ruthless - his gums are so swollen.  Between that and him waking up with what we think are night terrors the poor boy was helpless the other night.  We have been used to little to no crying at night it brought me back to the nights when it was every night that it seemed to never end.  It is hard to go back because in the moment it feels like it will never end.  As I kept telling myself this will end he will tire out (because our comforting him wasn't working either), Aaron kept giving ME the evil eye like how come you don't know what to do "MOM".  That brings me to another topic - moms are just supposed to know it all.  I mean we do know what works for our children... but why don't the dads know?  I'm not saying Aaron doesn't know what Rohan likes or how to take care of Rohan because he does he is a great dad.  But there is that extra something moms have when they say "try this, he needs this, give him this" that comes seconds before Dad knows. It is a blessing but it is also a curse sometimes because its always on us.

I started a new job this past week.  I have joined the Monday through Friday club.  I am adjusting. I am still tired but not EXHAUSTED as I was prior. I can still think at the end of the day, so far. I have already found out that making appointments will be quite the game.  I will be looking into crock-pot recipes. I am enjoying the time I have before bedtime with Rohan - time I lost before and will not be able to get back but I can try and makeup for it now.

My parents have been in Florida for a month now and it has been great to see them interacting with Rohan on a frequent basis.  They have been spoiling us with their helpfulness.  I'm not really sure how they will be able to leave after the next 3 months.  So we are taking advantage of all the time we can together.  No they are not here to babysit either.  They are adjusting to retirement together while enjoying time with their grandson and Aaron and I wouldn't have it any other way.  Rohan still enjoys daycare and all his friends there (mostly girls) and will be moving up to the toddler class in a short time.


To all the moms that came before me and to all the moms after me...you are beautiful hard-working people and basically we rule the world.