Dashel: 8 + 9 month recap

The last two months have been huge development wise for my little babe. I cannot believe that he will be 10 freaking months on the 16th. I honestly do not know where the time went. 

I can say that I have enjoyed every minute of him. He is a delight and his charming little baby smile is contagious. People definitely stop to admire him, little flirt.

-Climbing and standing are his new favorite things. He only crawls somewhere so that he can pull up and stand (and to follow around his big bro).

-Adores Oliver... like really really loves him.  

-He loves food (still) and has not become picky yet, thank goodness. Favorite food is yogurt, he's always completely willing to gobble that right up. I feel like he might be transitioning to more food and less breastmilk. We're still nursing every 3-4 hours but he will not nurse anywhere other than his nursery, so if we're out he will contently just take food. This does make me a little sad... but we're not totally there yet and he may surprise me and want to nurse until he's 2. You never know with these fickle little people!

-He waves 'hello' - so cute. 


-He's getting more blond hair - and it's curly be still my beating heart!

-He loves to bang on anything. "Boom Boom" are common words around our house.

-Loves to eat my hair. I have to wash it everyday now or else I find little leftover snacks in it. Charming.

-He has started to sleep better more frequently - this topic is a whole other post that I'm working on, so more of this later...


-He has 4 teeth (2 top & 2 bottom) and he is working on cutting 2 more bottom ones at the moment.


-He is starting to show some stubbornness and determination. With the genes in both of our families this was inevitable. He's a sweet little spitfire.


-He LOVES LOVES being outside! If I walk past our front door while I'm holding him and we don't go out he'll get fussy and look super offended. He's definitely a little nature boy.


-He loves when daddy comes home from work


-He still loves to snuggle. This is my favorite part.




Dashel,
You are so precious to me. I love seeing your personality change and develop. You love adventure and exploring new places, but you always come back to me for snuggles and kisses. I love seeing you watch your brother with fascination and excitement - I cannot wait until you can both really play together, I can tell that is what you're waiting for too. I feel privileged to be your mama. Your smile lights up my life. 
Love, 
mama

you win some, you lose some

I love nursing my baby. I'm providing for him something that only I can, I'm nourishing him and protecting him with the antibody rich goodness that he receives. For us it feels just right. But I'm not going to lie breastfeeding can be as frustrating as it can be beautiful. 

My little lovey refuses to take a bottle of expressed milk so leaving him is incredibly challenging. Most of the time this really isn't a big issue, he comes with me almost everywhere, but sometimes it just isn't appropriate or it isn't fair to him and his bedtime routine. When it came to my first baby I really didn't leave him a lot. At the time I had lost most of my friends (life changes, moves, marriage) so there weren't a lot of parties or reasons to leave him behind. Cody and I would go on dates every once in awhile but my first born was just fine with taking his bottle...easy. However, in not leaving him much he was incredibly attached to me and he still gets moody when I'm not around to put him to bed...a little annoying for my husband/babysitters.

This time around I had planned on doing things differently. I didn't want to leave Dash all the time, obviously, but I wanted him to be comfortable with other people being involved in his routine. I wanted the liberty to do things - especially with my friends since I am just starting to get some real gems in my life. And well, not taking a bottle kind of pushes that idea out the window. I have a time frame of about 2.5 hours (sometimes it can be pushed to 3, depending on how well he nurses before I leave) and that sounds like a lot of time. But once you start considering travel time and say the duration of a movie or the length of a party things start to get tricky - not to mention being anxious the whole time that he is going to randomly need to eat and having to rush back to do my mama job. 

It's easy to start feeling lonely and isolated. Sometimes I am with my children so much that I have to remind myself how wonderful a life I have and how incredibly grateful I am for it. But that is just the truth, I am grateful. I may have to sit out on some parties or miss out on dates with my husband or sometimes just feel frustrated that someone else is so dependent on my body. So right now I am losing some me time, but I have not lost, not in the least. 

So soon my baby will not need to nurse or have me rock him before sleep. Too soon following that he wont need me to dress him or make him lunch and then I know when the day comes that he doesn't need me much for anything I will wish that he was once again a little baby that needed to be nursed and held by only me. I'm not going to cry over missed events or dates when I have two beautiful children in my possession. I am a mom, this is my life.