The Terrible Two's - I mean, 11 Months

Axel just turned 11 months old yesterday. I don't know of any better way to sum up this age other than I feel like I got caught with my head in the sand. How many times has this happened? I can hardly count. And yes, yes, I was warned. Many of you told us that once we finally understood our baby and got him on a good schedule and everything was nice and calm, he would change on us. So the big change now is that our sweet little perfect baby has now learned the importance of the whine and tantrum. I thought that was reserved for 2 year olds?!?! To paint the correct picture, he does not whine and throw tantrums all day long, but they are starting. I can see the wheels turning in that head of his, and I can almost imagine his thoughts: "Okay, if I crawl up to Daddy's feet and whine and cry and throw my arms and legs that shows him that I want to be picked up, he'll for sure pick me up. And if mommy takes away the electrical plug that I so badly want to shove in my mouth, all I have to do is cry like someone is hurting me and she'll unplug it and give it to me". So have the battles begun in our house.

I think my first clear realization that we need to start being firm with boundaries and discipline was when Axel was taking a bath a couple of days ago. Johan and I were both there, and he was playing with the telephone shower head that detaches and you can hold in your hand. I let him play with it, and turned the water on. He loved it and was spraying himself with it, drinking the water, etc. Then I said "Okay, bathtime is done" and took it away, and you would have thought that I had poured hot coals on him. For a split second I considered giving it back to him to quiet the tantrum but then I realized that from this point on, our "No" has to mean "No". So he didn't get it back and instead bath time was for sure over. And he eventually got over it. The changing table is another battleground. He'll be happy and laughing, playing, then once you pick him up and put him on the changing table, all hell breaks loose. How dare we interrupt his fun to change his diaper and his clothes?!?


I was talking to my friend Brittney about this yesterday. She said that she also thought this stage was really hard. Not only because the baby is establishing their opinions and independence, but because they can't talk and tell you what they want. It was nice, though, to hear that I didn't just have a maniac child and that other babies have gone through this stage as well. I think the worst thing as a mom is to tell someone that my 11 month old is throwing tantrums and they look at me like "Really? Mine never did that". That's why I always admit everything to Brittney, because I know she'll always make me feel like I'm not alone, whether it's true or not.

Last Sunday, my friend, Jessica, and I went to a swap meet where parents sold all sorts of baby/child items. It was a mom's paradise. Every baby item you could imagine at discount prices. I can confidently say we scored at that event. I came home with a large wagon with a canopy and fat wheels, perfect for the beach, a Kelty baby hiking backpack, a Radio Flyer tricycle, a baby bicycle seat, and some really nice wooden blocks and toys. Jessica found a really nice carseat with base, and also a baby hiking backpack. We were joking that this is our life now....getting excited about buying discounted baby items.

 Lately, Axel has been hating being in the stroller. He will sit in it for about 15 minutes when the whining starts. I usually have to bring a ton of snacks and toys. But I have realized that while he doesn't like walking in the stroller, he loves running with the stroller. I went jogging with him the other day, and he didn't make a peep the whole time! So this basically means that we will be losing a lot of weight if we want a peaceful walk. That afternoon after the swap meet, Johan and I tried out the backpack with Axel. We walked all the way down to a nursery to buy some potted herbs, and not a peep! Axel was so happy. It must be the freedom of being up so high and having a 360 degree view.

Those little things really make our lives so much more peaceful. Just having a quiet baby for a half hour really does lower your insanity levels.

On the positive side, Axel is a total love bug. After he's done with his crazy army crawling rants around the house, he will come up to you and lay his head on you and smile.

Another change has been bedtimes. He used to go to bed without a fight. It used to be bath, pajamas, nurse, sleep. Then we cut out the nursing because he didn't want it anymore, so it was just bath, pajamas, sleep. But lately, he'll cry and cry and cry when we put him in his crib. So I figured I can listen to him cry, or I can change up the bedtime routine. So I figured I'd add on another couple of minutes by reading a book, then I'll hold him face down in my arms and sing to him for a minute or so, then lay him in bed. Maybe he just wanted more time to calm down before bed? I don't know. Part of me doesn't want to cater too much to his demands, but the other part of me does want a peaceful baby. So I think from now on, this will all be an ongoing process of learning and deciding these boundaries. But I will admit that the extra bed time routines have been worth it to have a happy baby that quietly drifts off to sleep.

Life in North Park

My feelings about going back to work have changed drastically since my last entry regarding work. This morning, I was driving to work with an immense sense of joy and relief. I do feel kind of guilty at feeling this way after leaving my baby at home, but I am so happy at the setup we have that I think my guilt is unwarranted. It took a couple of weeks for me to feel comfortable not worrying about Lupe being capable of taking care of Axel the way I thought he should. But she continues to be a total blessing to us. Johan is still home with Axel on Mondays, and we both love that situation. Johan is such an amazing Dad.

Before Axel was born, one of the engineer moms at my work and I were talking about going back to work after having a baby. She told me that she thought that some moms were better moms when they stayed at home, and some moms were better moms after going back to work. I didn't really understand this at the time, but now I think I do. I think every mom is at her best when she is doing what she feels she was made to do. Some moms were made to be full time moms. And some moms also have other purposes outside of being a mom. I feel like since I get a couple of days each week to use my brain in ways that make me happy at work, I am so much more energized to be a good mom to Axel the days that I'm home. On the other hand, if I had stayed at my previous job where I was miserable, this would be a different situation and I would for sure be a full time stay at home mom!

Tomorrow we're going to put in an application for Axel's first school! We are thinking of putting him into a Montessori school that's a block away from my work. If we sign Axel up, he'll start in the fall, when he's 18 months old. At that time, I'll go back to work full time. I would love to hear if anyone has had any experiences with Montessori schools. Until then, we're hoping to stick to having Lupe as our part-time nanny.

Axel is crazy right now, but he is a pure joy to us. He is still army crawling and for the first time went from crawling to a sitting position. He is just starting to understand that he can crawl on his knees, but isn't totally there yet. He has started learning to pull himself up to a standing position and is climbing anything and everything that is 6" tall.....stairs, the guitar, the dishwasher, etc.

We had a Dr. appointment the other day. I was worried that he wasn't growing as much because he stopped nursing and drinking milk for a while. I took him to the doctor because I didn't know what to do. He weighed 23 lbs 3 oz and was 30 inches long. She said that since he was eating so healthy, I should just make sure he gets enough iron, protein, and calcium each day, along with water to not get dehydrated. A couple of days in a row he drank 10 oz or less, he just wouldn't have it. So he basically weaned himself. We were forced to switch to formula really fast since it was hard to thaw frozen breastmilk every time, plus, we were wasting it, having to throw it away since he wouldn't drink much of it. We had to try different methods to get him to drink his formula. We tried keeping the lights off and his room quiet so to not distract him, I tried letting distractions happen, we tried giving him a bottle in the car, nothing worked. Finally, Lupe told me that she was giving him his bottle in his crib. I tried it, and he took it! He'd just lay down and drink the whole 8 oz! So that's what we do now when he wakes from a nap, give him a bottle and let him be until he's done. Now he's taken a liking to formula, and he's finally starting to drink an entire bottle 3 times per day.

He's still sleeping like a champ. He naps twice per day, 1.5 to 2 hours per nap, then goes to bed around 6-6:30 pm and wakes up around 6:45 a.m. But he still only has his two lower teeth! He looks so funny because they're growing longer and longer like little bunny teeth.

He also wants to be everywhere we are. He'll play on his own in his bedroom, but then he'll make his way to the kitchen and beg to be picked up. He's also extremely bored with our house. We don't really have any baby toys. But this is because he gets bored with his toys so fast and he's more interested in real things in the house. So we usually give him some bowls or cooking utensils, the guitar, etc. to play with. He likes getting into the refrigerator because it's new for now. His favorite thing is to get into areas he wasn't able to before, like the dishwasher, the cupboards, or climb up the kitchen chairs. But after about a half hour of this, he's done with the house and we have to go outside. He likes to crawl around in the garden, and sometimes we'll go next door to Helen and Nia's grass yard and crawl around there. He loves our neighbor, Suzanne's, house, because she has clutter everywhere and it's so much fun to explore.

We recently decided that we wanted to sell our house. Our interest rate is pretty high, and our accountant has been telling us for years to get out of it if we can. We think that we can break even if we sell it, so we've been fixing it up to prepare. Johan has painted all the interior doors, the fence, and we had the house painted as well. But after all of this, the house looks pretty wonderful that we think we might want to stay! Plus, we do really love North Park. This sounds silly, but I feel like it keeps us young! It has character, and we have cool bars, cafes, restaurants, clothing stores, the zoo, the park, etc. that we can walk to or get to quickly. And so many of our friends live nearby that we can meet up at eachothers houses in minutes. Just yesterday I was going shopping and felt so liberated to be able to call up my girlfriends, Lisa and Natalie, and see if they wanted to go shopping with me. We ended up going out for lunch afterwards at Influx in Golden Hill and it was such a great spur of the moment afternoon with them. I love our friends. So we decided to try one more time to see if we can refinance, and it looks like there are some possibilities that we're waiting to hear back on. We will most likely want to move when Axel is at the kindergarten age, but that's years down the road. We'll see....

Johan and his friend, Doug, have been brewing beer as well. They made some good dark ale that was ready last week. Johan found a nice refrigerator/freezer on Craigslist that fit nicely in the garage, so he put the beer in a keg that the Kellers gave us, and put it in the fridge....perfect! Then he had another idea of making our side yard into a beer garden. He wanted to copy Garrett Keller's idea of drilling a hole through the fridge for the beer tap. But instead of stopping there, he wants to drill a hole in the side of the garage and install a tap out in the beer garden. So when we're sitting outside, we'll have beer on tap. I figure that it's a small hole that's easy to fill in afterward. Plus, I'm kind of excited at the thought of a beer garden. More on that to come....