Family Size

We had the talk last night.  Are we done, for sure, having kids??  I think we are.  Brendan is anyway.  I'm about 80% sure.  And when we were deciding on whether or not to have another after Ingrid, I was 80% sure I wanted one.  So...I think we're done. 

I have to wrap my mind around that one.

A few people I know are pregnant right now for number 3, and even though Otis is still a baby, I was a little envious when I found out.  Then I found out another friend is pregnant for number 2 and she got pregnant when her baby was Otis' age.  Sigh...I hate being pregnant, I'm remembering last summer how sick I was, how miserable I was in the heat even though I wasn't big.  How life seemed to stop while I laid on the couch for months at a time.  And let's not forget the whole three week hospital bedrest ordeal!  And yet I'm envious of pregnant women??  What's that all about?

We were dead set on having an only child, and I do have to say I'm glad we changed our minds.  Watching Ingrid be a big sister is amazing, she loves to make Otis laugh and talks baby talk to him.  Yesterday morning she got up and said "Where's my Otis boy?"  And Otis is nothing but smiles for his big sister, even though she's not gentle with him at all.  He gets smacked in the face by her foot or gets a hug that suffocates him, and all he does is gurgles and smiles like it's the best thing in the world.

So another one?  I could do it.  I loved this past six months with Otis.  Using the Moby, nursing him, sharing a bed with him.  He's now settling down for naps on his own, bedtime on his own, he can sit in his Bumbo for a half hour or so at a time, or on his play gym and be content while I get things done.  By the time another Bub would be here, he'd be walking and eating solid food and would be a toddler!  So yeah, I could do it.

But Brendan says he doesn't want to.  And I can see the pros of being done now.  I could finally lose all the weight I've gained birthin' babies.  Ingrid will be off to school soon and it'll be just me and the Fat Man.  We can sort of travel right now, we have a parent for each child so it makes it easier to keep an eye on them.  It's kind of like we have the best of both worlds--our kids each have a sibling and we still have a relatively calm household. 

It's just hard to say never.  I've heard women say they just knew when they were done, they knew their families were complete.  I don't have that gut reaction, I could still imagine another one.  But I also am enjoying our new life back in Milwaukee, the idea of buying a house and making it our home.  I don't really want to be pregnant for another one.  So, I guess we're done. 

Guess What??

Chicken Butt!

Haha, we got a book from the library last week called Chicken Butt.  Ingrid thinks it's funny to say "You know what?  heehee, chickbutt!"  I love toddlers' senses of humor.

But no, seriously, the guess what is for this--we're ready to try for #2!!  This weekend, the weekend of crabiness and yelling, we actually had a conversation about babies.  Brendan always thinks we should wait.  With Ingrid he wanted to wait until he was done with school, which I am so glad I would not agree to, seeing as Ingrid was almost one by the time he was actually done.  This time he wanted to wait until he got a job.  I said cool, it'll be this spring.  Then he decided to stay at his job another year, so I figured we could start now.  He kept saying later, later, in the fall.  Why?  Who knows. 

And I am always the one that says no, let's just go for it now.  Especially after having Ingrid at the time we did.  We thought Brendan would have one year of grad school left, and that it would take six months or so for me to get pregnant.  I have PCOS so I thought it would take forever.  With that thinking, we started trying the summer before Brendan's last year of school.  I got pregnant on the first try, and he had to stay in school an extra semester.  We lived with his parents and it was crazy, but you know what?  I wouldn't change it.  We had a great support system for the first few months, it made us really ready to move on from Milwaukee and try something new, and I honestly don't know how it would've been to be in our own place with a newborn.  It was nice to have his parents pop in upstairs every once in awhile.

So now, of course I was thinking the day he figured he'd stay another year that we could start trying for baby #2.  You know, I'll get pregnant this spring, have a baby in late winter, and then we can move with a 2 1/2 year old and a newborn next spring.  Instead of having a 2 1/2 year old and being insanely hugely pregnant...And saying that made Brendan realize, once again, that I'm right :)  So we're trying.  Hooray!

It's funny how much Ingrid picks up on things.  Every time we see a baby I say oh, don't you want a baby?  You could be a big sister!  You could be my helper and sing to the baby!  So after her nap today she says "Mama, I need to be a big sister.  I need to sing Rockabye Baby to the baby."  Ha!  I'm totally brainwashing my child into thinking she needs a sibling.  Hopefully she'll still feel that way if we get one!

Can You All Just Stop, Please?

Hey everyone, quit having babies!  I swear to god, the past couple weeks every single blog I follow has had a post saying Mama is preggo...Not that I'm not happy for you all, because I am!  But I'd be a whole lot happier if I were at least trying myself.

Brendan is in the process of applying for jobs.  He is stressed out.  He is only 90% sure he wants another one.  So, we are talking about baby #2 once he gets a job, maybe.  It's kind of driving me nuts, I want to just start trying now.  He's going to get a job, I mean, he's got a phd in chemistry.  He'll get a job!  So I'll just be a few months pregnant when we move, no biggie. 

Can you tell I have no patience?  Which is funny since my mind changes a lot about having another one.  It's pretty much set to baby #2 though, especially after the other day when Ingrid saw a baby in a stroller and was all like "hi baby!  hi baby!"  I can just imagine her with li'l bro or sis, being the big helper. 

So yeah, we're a few months away from even being able to try and it's driving me crazy.  We got lucky with Ingrid, she was our first try.  But I just have this feeling we won't be so lucky next time.  Which is silly, because I didn't think I could even get pregnant and we did right away--why not the second time around, too??  I'm an impatient worrywart, such a great combination...

So anyone who's pregnant, I am happy for you!  I'm just going to be crabby about it until it's my turn :)  Sorry.

Growing Up Too Quickly...

I feel like Ingrid is growing up too quickly.  Everything seems to have flown by.  She's not even two yet and already she's this little chatterbox who's singing full songs and telling us she needs to go to the bathroom.  Where'd my baby go?? 

She has been going on the potty all day today, no diapers except just now when I put her down for her nap.  We even went on a walk and she stayed dry and went when we got home!  We're totally following her lead, she just started to tell us she had to go, so we bring her.  And she goes.  And gets the hugest smile on her face, you can tell how proud of herself she is!  It's amazing!

And singing, oh man.  That kid loves to sing!  She likes the Five Little Monkeys song right now, and can sing pretty much every word.  And Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, although you can't understand half the words she says.  She gets the tune right, though. 

She also talks in full sentences and is pretty good at articulating her words.  Some kind of run together but mostly you can understand her. 

She's not a baby...

I am proud of her for doing all these things, for counting to 10 and saying her ABCs and reciting her books, but I feel like it's all happening too quickly.  I want to have a cuddly baby still!  She was so behind on crawling and walking, and then bam, she went full force from baby to preschooler!  At least that's how it seems sometimes.

But, because she's almost out of diapers and finally pretty much sleeping through the night (until her teeth want to bother her again I suppose) I feel ready for baby #2.  When we visited our friend and I had her baby and then had Ingrid hanging on me, I swore up and down I didn't want that and I was staying with one kid.  Yesterday those friends came over, and the baby is now 6 months old.  Ingrid went right up and said "Hi, cute baby!" and was all in her face.  I wanted to try out the mei tai I'd made so I strapped the baby in, and it felt so good!  And Ingrid was hanging on my leg but I was imagining it for real and it didn't scare me so much.  I know it would be hard, but I feel like I can see past the first few months of it being that way to when it would be a little easier as the baby grows, and as Ingrid grows. 

And then that baby will grow up too quickly and I'll sigh and wonder where the time went...

New Friends

When we moved here we started going to story time at the library. There was a mom there that had a little girl a little older than Ingrid. I would smile and say hi, and as the weeks went on we'd talk a little more each time. I saw the mom and her daughter at Whole Foods and finally introduced myself so at least I would be able to call her by her name instead of "hey you!" Then story time took a break and Ingrid's nap schedule changed and we didn't see them for a long time. When we did this summer, the mom was about ready to have baby #2, the first I knew she was even pregnant...I thought hmm, I should really get her number so we can hang out but she's got a new baby coming, we're probably moving soon. Why bother?

Well, fate threw us together again, this time at the post office. It's been five months since I've seen them, but the other day as I was mailing something I heard a mom say "Okay, let's mail the diapers!" I turned around because anyone mailing diapers is probably mailing cloth diapers, and of course I have to see who it is...It was the mom and her daughter! And the first thing out of my mouth was "I have to get your phone number so we can have playdates!"

She came over today and it was so fun. Her daughter, P, was kind of shy at first. She just stood there as Ingrid tried to get her to play with her kitchen stuff. P started to play, then walked away, which Ingrid didn't get. She physically grabbed P and turned her toward the kitchen! My little subtle girl...The girls warmed up to each other and played really well, and I got to chat with the mom. We have lots in common, which is something I'm finding that by living here I do tend to meet a lot of moms with similar ideas. I got to watch her with her baby, all wrapped up, napping as the mom swayed while we were having a conversation. Which of course made me want to get started on #2 so I could sway with a sleeping baby all wrapped up close to me.

P is adopted and we talked a lot about that. I always thought about adoption, thinking I wouldn't be able to get pregnant, but once I did have Ingrid, I stopped thinking about it. This family is so awesome, though, they have one adopted, one biological, and are starting to talk about adopting #3. It was really interesting to hear about the process from someone that's done it, hear about the wait, the paperwork, the reasons behind it. I just love that they choose to adopt even though they could have their own. It made me think about bringing another life to this earth just because I want one. Maybe I should go back to thinking about adoption if I want another so badly. That was always my main thing when talking about having one kid--there are so many people in this world, I don't really need to make another. I have love to give, doesn't matter where the kid comes from!

That is the thing I love about making new friends--as much as you have in common with someone, there are always differences. And differences are good--they make you think about why you believe what you do and either challenge you to think differently or confirm your beliefs. I'm glad I ran into her at the post office, I'm glad we exchanged numbers, I'm glad they came over today, and I'm glad I have the opportunity to meet new people!

Daily Life in the Liddle house

I feel like I've been missing for awhile. It just seems like nothing has been going on. Ingrid and I are home most of the time, as Brendan takes the car to work. It's been going well, the whole one car thing. I like to be home most of the time. I tend to get more stuff done that way.

Ingrid has been so cute lately, her vocabulary has exploded! She sings along to songs now, which is super adorable :) Life with her revolves around blocks (the best thing I got from swapmamas, for sure!) her play kitchen, and coloring. Those are the only three things she wants to do. Brendan and I have fun making the most ridiculous towers possible, which is more fun than I thought it would be.

I've been getting a lot of sewing done. I got a pattern for baby shoes and have now made three pairs. They were difficult to do the first time but now I think I have the hang of it. They look so cute, it's hard not to imagine a little baby wearing them...

Which of course brings us to our family and whether we'll expand it or not. Of course. I have been pro-baby #2 and talking about it probably too much. Asking Ingrid if she wants a baby brother or sister, as if she has any idea what that means! Looking through the baby name book, imagining what names would go well with Ingrid (Felix? Alister? Harriet?) Making baby shoes and thinking I shouldn't sell them but save them for my own child.

But, like last time, we're just not in the right place yet. According to Brendan...He is finishing up his fellowship and we are planning on moving in the next few months for his new job, wherever that may be. And we want to buy a house in the next couple years, too, so there are so many factors in our lives that are up in the air. I'm sure it's the sane, rational, adult thing to wait until we figure some of them out, but my hormones say otherwise.

*sigh*

We'll see. Story of my life. When are you moving? We'll see. Where are you moving? We'll see. What job will Brendan get? We'll see.

Damn You, Hormones!

Now that Ingrid's back to her normal-ish sleep patterns and sleeping through the night mostly, and taking naps, mostly, I'm back to wanting another wee one.  Why oh why does my mind just change ~poof~ like that??  Brendan and I talked about it again this weekend and we both were like hmm, maybe another would be nice.  When just days before Ingrid was screaming at 11pm and we were like NO MORE BABIES!!  Funny how hormones just kick in and whisper sweet nothings in your ear about soft, cute, cuddly, squirmy little ones with those big eyes and cute noses and little teeny tiny feet and you suddenly want to go get knocked up. 

*sigh*

Babies and Toddlers

I've been on the fence about having another one, right? The other day when we went to see our friend's new baby, I jumped over to the side of not having another...Not to say that I'll stay there, seeing as I was pro-one from the day Ingrid was born until she turned one. Then I thought it would be nice to have a brother or sister for her. Then we traveled on a plane and I went back to wanting only one. I change my mind easily, it sucks.

So Tuesday we went to our friend Heather's. She has a two month old, Olivia, and I was really excited to see how Ingrid reacted to her. Ingrid could've cared less, I don't think she realized it was another human. She was way more interested in the dog that was whining at the back door. When she did see the baby in the swing, she had a fun time taking the blanket off and then throwing it back on, watching it land on the poor baby's face. On a positive note, Olivia seemed to find this very entertaining and smiled the whole time.

The a-ha moment was when I was holding Olivia and feeding her a bottle. Ingrid came up to me and whined and cried and tugged on my leg. She tried to take the bottle out of Olivia's mouth, and did whatever she could to get my attention away from the baby. I know tons of moms do this, but I don't want to!! I hate having my attention drawn in six different directions! I love to be able to pay all my attention to Ingrid. I know I would just get used to it, much like I got used to nights of no sleep and other horrible things from having the first baby, but I really don't want to...

Knowing my personality, I think I would do much better just having one and doing it all for her than trying to spread myself out over two kids. People think because I was a nanny before having Ingrid that I must just love kids and want a ton of them, but they are wrong. I love kids, one at a time. I watched two little boys while I was pregnant. One went to school for most of the day, leaving me with the other. I had two hours after school where I had both boys and it was the hardest time ever. I watched them over a weekend and I thought it would take another week to recover. Most of the families I nannied for had one child. I like having only one child to take care of.

I have been reading this book, Parenting an Only Child by Susan Newman. I really like some of the things she has to say. She goes through debunking myths of onlies being too dependent, being lonely, being demanding, wanting siblings and feeling like something is missing since they don't have one. And she also goes into what to say to people that think you're crazy for only wanting one, and how to deal with your own feelings when you question your decision. It's been a great way for me to sift through all the thoughts I have about family size and why I have these hormonal shifts in either being happy with one or longing for another.

What I have figured out is this: I don't want another person, I want to just go back to when Ingrid was a baby for a day or two. I want to relive her being immobile and cuddly and wanting to be held all the time. I don't want that full time, though, just a day or two. Like how puppies are so cute and cuddly, but they grow to full grown dogs--I just want to pet a puppy, not buy one. Yes, I just compared my child to a dog :) So, I think I will just enjoy other people's babies and then go home and enjoy my one and only.

Baby Fever

Yesterday I went nuts cleaning and rearranging the furniture. I moved the dresser from Ingrid's room, which meant I had to put all her stuff somewhere else, I moved a couch, I organized closets. It was insane. During all this madness I came across three things that induced a severe case of baby fever.

Number one: a packet of pictures my friend had taken throughout my pregnancy. It starts at 14 weeks where I actually look better than I do now (sad but true...) and goes all the way to 38 weeks when I'm rockin' a bikini. I just love pregnant bellies! I have always had a flabby belly so being pregnant was the only time I've ever liked my shape, because I didn't have to suck it in!!

Number two: my journal from that year. It starts a few months before I got pregnant, when I was so worried I wouldn't be able to get pregnant, when I was talking about Clomid and adoption, when I was worrying over the timing with Brendan finishing school and all. Then there's the time when I was pregnant but didn't know it, to the day I simply wrote "4:30am, two blue lines. I'm pregnant. Holy s**t!!" And then throughout the pregnancy, feeling the baby move for the first time, finding out it was a girl, all the names we called her before settling on Ingrid. And finally up to the week before she was born where all I could think about was getting her the hell out of me so I could meet her already!!

Number three: teeny tiny baby clothes. I went through all her clothes to see what I wanted to keep and what I wanted to get rid of and all these memories just came flooding back from when she was that small. Oh, small babies, you are so cute! Ingrid is definitely more fun now than when she was a tiny lump of baby, but she was pretty darn cute as a four month old...

So all in all I'm having major baby fever. And yet at the same time I'm so excited for my etsy store having opened (and I got my first order!) that I can totally see just having Ingrid and starting to really focus on a business. It's a blessing and a curse that I can see the positives of most things, I swear to god.

Should There Be Another...

These are the things I will remember if we have another baby:

1. The first six weeks are hard and I will let the baby sleep wherever, whenever and not worry I'm forming bad habits.

2. I will wear the baby more than I wore Ingrid. I didn't know about wraps with Ingrid, we had a front pack and I used that instead of a stroller and when I wanted to get things done and she was fussy, but I will use a wrap and really WEAR baby #2. If we have one, this is all hypothetical :)

3. I will try to nurse. I have meds I'm on and I don't want to NOT be on them, but I never really tried to find out if there were similar meds that I could've nursed on. Formula sucks, I don't think it's evil, but BF would be so much easier I think.

4. I will try to cosleep. We had Ingrid in our room but I was so crazy about every single noise she made that I would jump up and check on her. We both slept better in separate rooms. Until just a few months ago when she started getting up every hour for a couple weeks--I would've loved to be cosleeping then so I could stay in bed and try to comfort her instead of getting up, walking to her room, rocking her, putting her down, walking back to my room, getting in bed, and then hearing her cry again.

5. I will for sure cloth diaper from day one. Now that I understand how much money those stupid disposables cost when you can get super cute cushy cloth ones, I can't believe I went a whole year using them!! I am such a convert!

I just read a blog carnival about cloth diapering and what you know now that you wish you'd known then and it just got me thinking of having a kid in general. There are so many things I wish I would've known when Ingrid was born. But that's a dumb reason to have another kid, right?

One Kid or Two?

The past couple weeks I have been extremely tired. Like falling asleep at 8pm tired, not being able to wake up even with the smell of coffee tired, taking a two hour nap with Ingrid tired. I thought it was just a medicine I had started, but after talking with a friend that is a nurse and familiar with this drug, she said fatigue isn't a side effect. So I started looking at other things that had been going on and thought "Oh crap, I've been tired like I was tired when I got pregnant."

Brendan and I were dead set on only having one child. A couple months ago we started talking about perhaps having another when Ingrid is at least 2. But we decided we'd think more seriously about it after we're done here in MI and we move and buy a house. So a baby is not in the near future for us. I would of course be happy if that were the case, but at the same time IT IS TOO SOON!! Ingrid isn't always sleeping through the night, she just started walking, she's still in diapers, she can't talk in sentences. She is a toddler but still a baby, you know?

So...a trip to Target and a negative pregnancy test later (I must just be tired) it really has me thinking about how many kids I want. I love Ingrid to death and she is so much fun and so cute and gives me so much happiness. I want to give her everything she needs and be able to travel with her and do fun things with her. But then I think of how much I like my relationship with my sister and I want that for Ingrid, too. And I think having another baby would be good because I have so much more experience now after Ingrid's first year that I could use for another one. And would another child really make it impossible to travel and do fun things as a family?

There are just so many things in my head and I keep going back and forth and it's silly, really, because we're not even there yet! We don't have to make a decision, I'm only 32, I still have a few childbearing years ahead of me. It just sucks to always have this on my mind. I liked it better when Ingrid was a baby and I was super sure I didn't want anymore.