Update from Mommy-land

1. I am officially a stay-at-home mommy

Today is the first day of school for most districts around here and it is starting to settle in that I am not going back to work. It is a very strange feeling. I was never one who expected to stay home once starting a family, but things change! And I am very lucky that we are in a place that allows me to be able to stay home with minimal worries. I know it is not a possibility for everyone who might want it to be.

2. The breast-bottle battle.

I have officially given up on all things breast feeding related. The last time I pumped was over a week ago and my supply is definitely dwindling. I don't know if I ever "announced" that we had given up on actual breast feeding a couple months ago. Before we were discharged we had gotten to 2-3 successful feedings a day by breast, but Charlie was never very good at it. As the weeks passed at home, it got worse and worse until one day we were both sitting there crying and I realized it just wasn't worth the stress any more. I continued pumping when I could, but decided to be done with that as well recently. After more than 6 months of trying, I feel like I gave it a valiant effort, but it just wasn't worth it any more. It was a very hard choice to make and came with many tears, but Charlie is doing really well with his soy formula, so I can't ask for more than that!

3. Charlie news

Charlie has been continuing his slow and steady progress in the land of 'solid' food. He takes his brown rice cereal two times a day fairly well. Some days are better than others. He cannot be tired at all, or he just refuses to have anything to do with eating from a spoon. We also started some sweet potatoes last week and he loves them! He takes 1-2 servings a day of those too. I think we might try some avocado later this week.

He has two little teeth on the bottom that are so close to popping through! Seeing how he has been chewing and drooling for weeks now, we knew something had to be moving around in there! He does not seem any more fussy than is typical (knock on wood!), so hopefully that means he is able to handle it ok.

His rash is completely cleared up. He finished his antibiotics a few days ago and they seem to have done the trick! We actually go back to the pediatricians on Thursday for our "6 month" check-up. I think that means more shots - - not fun! I will update you on how that goes later this week!

Chewing on the monkey

Chewing on the frozen teether

Chewing on daddy's nose