2010 Junebugs

I'm posting this here for anyone who might not be active in our June 2010 Babies facebook group. The time has come for the 2012 edition of Secret Santa!

The Guidelines
1. The gifts must total at least $10.00. If you choose to spend more, that is up to you, but $10.00 is the minimum. (If you do decide to spend more than $10.00, please do it out of the kindness of your heart because you may only get a $10.00 package in return.)

2. All gifts must be mailed no later than December 10. This is to make sure that they arrive somewhere near the holiday.

3. Send me a reply to your assignment email when you ship your gift, so that I know it's been sent.

4. Do not sign up unless you are 100% sure that you will be able to participate.

5. Please keep your package a secret. Don't sign it. You can put your address on the package, of course...but gift receivers – do not go poking around the community to find the sender. That spoils the fun! After December 25, I will post a list of gift senders so that proper thanks can be given.

6. In the event that a gift sender backs out, I would like to have a back-up in place that would be willing to send out another package. So if you don't mind the possibility of sending 2 packages, then please let me know.

Please reply to this post with the following (comments are screened to protect your privacy):
1. Your mailing address
2. Whether or not you are willing to ship internationally
3. If you are willing to be a back-up (you will only be called upon if someone has to back out/doesn’t ship a gift)
4. Your email address, to receive your assignment
5. Your choice: do you want to receive a gift for you, or for your baby(ies)? (I will disclose your preference to your gift giver so everyone gets what they want.) If you want your gift giver to have the option of sending an outfit for baby, please comment with current length/weight/clothing size. If you want a gift for you, please include a few of your interests so your Santa can get you something you'll like!

If anyone is interested in co-facilitating this process by assigning half the pairs, let me know. That way I can send/receive a gift, too!

Currently Signed Up:
eclips1st
ochenpryatna
littlewoman
faceless_facade
abhorred_
junebeansprout
galebird
aloha_moira

I'm curious to know more about your weening experiences if you breast fed and have or are in the process of weening. I suspect Locke and I have begun. I never keep track of how many times he nurses because it's always felt like a lot, but a few months back he started consuming a couple ounces less of milk at daycare. My monthly cycle kicked back in during December and I've noticed all kinds of changes since then. One of the most difficult for me is breast feeding while PMS-ing. My plan has been to nurse for two full years and each time I hit the nipple sensitivity of PMS week I remind myself of the countdown. A couple weeks ago I got mastitis. Since it was Friday and I didn't want to be without drugs if things got bad I went to the doctor. She suggested that Locke had already weened himself and that's why I got sick. I'm still pretty sure it had a lot more to do with me being run down, but since then I've also seen how there could be some truth in the weening thing too. The amount I get from pumping is below three ounces, I'm exhausted and slugly, easily overwhelmed. The amount of sleep I get should be adequate (it used to be), but I'm sooo tired. I'm starting to suspect hormones and early weening causing a lot of these feelings. Locke still enjoys nursing but he doesn't ask for it as much as he used to. He likes it before dinner, at bedtime, at night when he wakes, about an hour of it before getting out of bed, and nap time. He'll nurse more often when he's bored or not feeling well. I don't feel like I absolutely have to make it the full two years, but I'll probably let Locke take the lead in that process. I'd love to be done pumping and I'm totally over being sucked on while I'm trying to sleep at night, but whatever. Two years isn't that much further away. So to those of you with experience, is this what weening feels like? Did you have weening depression? How long did it take your body to adjust? What things (if any) helped?

1. Baby Name and Age:
Luke, 18 months!

2. Weight/length/clothing size being worn:
30.5lbs, 37" tall, 3T.

3. Food!
Eats everything and anything. Like eggs, cheese, chicken, soup, peas, curry, fish, quinoa, apples, etc. Drinks a cup and a half of juice every day (to combat his constipation). Nurses about 3 times a day.

4. Sleep habits:
12-14 hours at night, sleeps through from when I go to bed until morning. He's mostly nightweaned, and when he does wake up at night he's pretty easy to resettle (help him roll over and he's good to go). Started phasing out his nap. Sometimes it's 30 minutes, other times it's 2 hours.. it keeps getting later and later.

5. Likes:
dancing, eating, playing hide and seek, playing on daddy's computer, vacuuming, washing tupperware in the sink, helping me with chores of all kinds

Dislikes:
Having to stop what he's doing

6. Milestones:
He's at around 40 words. Started putting together 3 word sentences.. "Where is dada?" "mama, go. bye-bye", etc. Knows where his nose, ear, eye, head, teeth, cheek, hand, foot, toes, knee, belly button, bum, and penis are. Can walk up and down stairs while holding the handrail.

7. What's driving you crazy, if anything?
Not much right now.

8. How are you doing in general?
Ok. Been working on my own health and I'm feeling loads better.

9. Anything else?



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I dunno if anyone else here uses zulily (one of those daily deals sites for kid/mama stuff) but they are having a good deal on Melissa & Doug toys and some similar wooden/educational toys right now. I bought a bunch of things for Ellie for Christmas - she's really into whacking things right now (argh) so I'm psyched about the little hammer bench toy.

Here's my link if anyone wants to use it: http://www.zulily.com/invite/jchretien411

just a quick picture of kaelin as a kitty cat last night on halloween. she went trick or treating with he younger cousin (three months but didn't get any candy we just showed her off) and her second cousins. </p>

Posted via LiveJournal app for Android.

I never get a chance to comment much, but I do read. Our babies are all growing so fast!

Here's a quick video of Kaelin playing with my glasses. I can't get it to embed. :(

http://s257.photobucket.com/albums/hh225/secretpicsofhmv/?action=view¤t=ff96b76c.mp4

Luke's 15 months tomorrow! How fast time flies! Here's a mini bastardized update (x-posted to personal journal too, sorry if you see this twice):

- 35" tall, still around 28.5lbs, size 8 shoes! has 16 teeth now. Only the 2nd year molars left and I'm hoping those wait until he's 2.
- Loves getting dressed, helping around the house (sweeping, washing the floor with a washcloth, putting stuff in his laundry hamper), going outside, toys that you can 'cook' with (someone's getting a toy kitchen for christmas!)
- Doesn't like bathtime anymore. He's terrified if we come near the tub. oh well, we hose him down quickly about once a week.
- Has some separation anxiety now - wakes up a few times per night again, and will actually snuggle now and then, where-as before he was all "Ew, mom, don't touch me"
- eating is hit and miss. Mostly eats lots of snacks. Loves meat, cheese, plums and cantaloupe. With the separation anxiety he's also upped the number of times he nurses per day. I tried to count and it was 9 before naptime, I stopped counting after that. LOL
- I got him a fork about 3 weeks ago and he's taken to it really well. After about 2 weeks he was a pro at it. :)
- Signs "milk", "more", and "all done". Doesn't really talk consistently other than mama, dada and kaka (kitty-cat).

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Lily is 15 months old today. The last month has been a bit of a roller coaster.

About two weeks ago I suddenly realized that she'd been having diarrhea for about three weeks. Sounds silly, but I was so focused on fighting that stupid diaper rash that I wasn't paying attention to the diarrhea other than the daily, "Damn diarrhea irritating the diaper rash."

I then had an epiphany where I tied her slow weight gain to the diarrhea and our family history of celiac disease. Could Lily have celiacs? Or, at the very least, a gluten sensitivity?

Many calls to relatives and doctors later, we decided to run a bunch of tests. Of course, the lab messed up her orders, pulling the order for her lead test from her 12-month checkup rather than the new order for the allergy panel, so we had to have blood drawn twice in the span of four days. That was a nightmare. But Lily got a new Elmo phone out of it.

We got the results of the blood work today, and it all came back normal. That doesn't, of course, mean she doesn't have celiacs, since a negative on that blood test is inconclusive. The advice is to continue on a gluten-free diet, since the diarrhea has cleared up since we took her off gluten and to see if she gains any weight at her 18-month visit. If she does, then we've found the problem. If not, we'll have to look at some other stuff.

So Lily and I are both gluten-free, since gluten is passed through breast milk and she drinks a ton of that.

Other than being tiny (16 pounds, 10 ounces at her sick baby visit last week — she goes for her well baby visit and shots next week — and around 27 inches tall), she's in great health and hitting milestones like nobody's business. She has a huge vocabulary (though her enunciation leaves much to be desired), runs, climbs, almost jumps.

She's very attached to her dolls and stuffed animals lately and spends a lot of time putting them to sleep and giving them kisses. Sometimes she attempts to strap them into her car seat, too.

As for me, I'm a ball of stress. Money is tight (as it always is) and I'm waiting to hear about a possible new job. I hate waiting and uncertainty. I want to know what the plan is!

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1. Baby Name and Age: Vincent 15 months and a few days

2.Weight/length/clothing: 23lbs, 31.5 inches. Wearing mostly 18month clothing and size 6 shoes. 

3. Food:He's finally starting to eat more but still not to the point that I want. We offer him three meals a day plus snacks but he usually only wants to nurse in the morning, then eats very little for lunch. He's good on dinner though so at least there's that and hey, solid poops haha

4. Sleep habits: Good for the most part. He almost always sleeps through the night now without any wakings but ONLY when he's in the bed with us. If we try to put him in his crib, or even if he's in our bed and we aren't there, he somehow knows and wakes up screaming. I don't get it.

5. Likes and dislikes: Blanket forts blanket forts blanket forts. Loves playing peek -a-boo with us, running, dancing, piggyback rides ,painting, still fascinated with going up and down the stairs only now he tries to walk them instead of crawl them. sometimes accidentally jumps and always seems amazed when he does it. CLIMBS ON EVERYTHING UUUUUUUUUUUGH. Dislikes not being able to climb on the chairs and onto the tables, that the  cat doesn't want to play with him all the time ever, and that baby gates exist.

6.Milestones: He's been walking marvelously for months now and is running as well. He babbles a lot but doesn't seem to be talking as much as other june babies seem to be. He can say mama, dada, kitty, uh oh, yah, and no.... but doesn't use them properly for the most part. He does sing now and dancings to his "song". Extremely clever, knowing to move things to have them work in the best way possible, and find ways into things you try to keep him out of. I feel like a bad mom though since I haven't been working on getting him to recognize animals or shapes very well so if you say " bring me the shark" He doesn't know to grab the shark toy, he just looks at you then goes back to whatever he was doing.

7. What's driving you crazy, if anything: It's not driving me crazy, but as previously stated, I feel like a bad mom some times. I play with him a lot but I don't feel like I'm teaching him all that I should be or something. We just play like chase, or hide and go seek, or peek-a-boo. I really need to work on helping teach him words and what things are.

8.What's making you smile: Most of the things he does. He loves running and hiding behind something then popping out at us and looooooooooooove chasing us around the house trying to catch us. He also will hide random places and wait for us to come find him. So cute!