First Haircut

Ben's hair was getting pretty unruly, curling over his ears and at the back of his neck, and kind of going whichever way it wanted at the front. So I took him for his first haircut last Thursday, 2/12. I felt a little sad already getting his baby hair cut, but the good thing is that my hairstylist didn't make him look drastically different. She just made it neater and evened out the length so that it would look less messy, but he still looks like a baby. I'm very happy with it. I think I was afraid he would come out looking like a big boy, and I'm not ready for that yet with him. I forgot to take official before-and-after photos that day, but I'm posting some of his pre-cut hair and some of his post-haircut look, along with a few photos from the actual haircut:

This doesn't look so bad, but he was really quite unruly.

He didn't do too badly. At the beginning, he kept trying to grab the scissors, so I had to hold his hands. When he started getting fussy partway through, I began putting puffs in his mouth, and he sat there and happily snacked.


Still doing okay...

Starting to get a little tired of it all now, but we're almost done!


Here's his new styling 'do. Not super easy to see in this shot, but here are a couple more:

A Few Minutes of Peace

I just put Ben down for his afternoon nap. His morning one took place while I was running errands with him and Rachel and was abbreviated - only about 45 minutes. He usually naps for a good hour and a half to 2 hours at a time, so I'm hoping he'll take a nice good long nap this afternoon.

Rachel is watching an episode of "dive, Olly, dive!" so I actually have a bit of quieter time to myself. (Considering that the TV is on in the background, quieter is relative, but it's still a little time to myself.) Some days it's hard to find that time. Rachel had no school yesterday, but she and Ben both slept in remarkably late for the two of them (just before 9am for him, about 9:10 for her), then we kept ourselves busy throughout the rest of the morning with the routine and reading books and doing a Valentine's Day craft for her grandma, who we were going to visit in the afternoon. She watched some TV in the afternoon then turned it off without my even asking (!). We had some lunch after Ben woke up, then went on our way to visit grandma.

The day actually went very smoothly considering that there was no school and, therefore, no outlet for her energy. I had gotten a good amount of sleep, which made me more patient and less irritable. James wonders if Rachel feeds off of me, either way I am. That makes sense. It always seems like she pushes things to the limit on the days when I'm least equipped to handle it. But yesterday she was great, and we had an enjoyable day with just the smallest amount of whining. Ben didn't fuss too much, either, and was really happy to see his grandma.

He's currently objecting to going down for a nap. Considering he only napped for about 45 minutes earlier while I shopped, I'm hoping he settles down and has a good nap this afternoon. Otherwise, Rachel's dance class tonight will seem like an ETERNITY. She's in "Dance-A-Rama I," which is a combination of ballet and tap. They stretch, then do ballet for about 20 minutes. Then they all run out to change to their tap shoes, and they work on tap for about 15 minutes. Last week, the parents got to go into the room and see what they'd been working on, since it was the end of the 5-week session. She starts a new 5-week session tonight; after that, there will be the recital class starting in March, with a recital in June. Let me just say that 8 little girls wearing tap shoes are noisy.

I seem to be very rambly today, so with that, I'm just going to kind of lamely wind down and get back to doing something else. Ooh, or I'll post photos of Ben's first haircut!

When Are You Going to Get Pregnant Again?

We were on our way to an errand earlier when Rachel said that she wanted a little sister. Then she asked "When are you going to get pregnant again?" I told her it was a little too soon still and that, even if I did get pregnant again, it may not be a sister. It could be a little brother.

She said "Or it could be a sister AND a brother."

And if that's true, may the Lord have mercy on us.

Anticipation Worse Than Reality

James has been in Arizona for a conference and gets back home late tonight. He left on Monday afternoon, and I was just dreading him being gone. It was the first time he'd be gone since Ben was born, and I wasn't sure how things would play out and if I'd be pulling all my hair out by the time he got back.

As with most things, the anticipation was much worse than the reality. Dinner on Monday night was a little much, since Rachel was doing her patented traveling-around-the-room-and-seeming-to-find-it-an-impossibility-to-keep-her-behind-planted-on-her-seat routine. Turning this way and that, kicking her chair (until I told her to stop), kicking her table (because I hadn't told her not to kick that, until I did), etc. Sometimes she about drives me nuts with behavior issues like that. I'm not sure where she gets such a high level of energy (certainly not from me) but hope that it's something that mellows out a little as she gets older. Or now would be good, too.

But other than that, bedtime has gone pretty well both nights; the house isn't too much of a mess; I've managed to mostly keep up with the dishes; I've been able to run errands and go to my Tuesday morning women's Bible study; and it really hasn't been miserable. Except for Monday night, when Ben had some trouble sleeping and his fussiness kept waking me up. But even then, he and I had that nice interlude at 1:30 in the morning, which helped.

And last night I actually slept from probably about 12:15 am until 6:45 this morning, and I don't remember waking up once during that time. I felt *so* much better than yesterday. It's amazing what one night of good sleep, even if it's a bit short, can do for my energy level and attitude.

I do miss James and how helpful he is, though, so while I'm happy that things have gone pretty well in his absence, I'm looking forward to his return and having him here with us again.

Sweet Sleep, Ye Still Elude Me

 

We've been letting Ben get himself back to sleep for the last couple of weeks.  On most nights, he wakes up a few times, fusses for a couple of minutes in a minor way, then quiets down and goes back to sleep on his own.  While it's good that he's getting himself back to sleep, the fact that he's still waking and fussing is waking me up, and I don't fall back asleep that quickly in general.  So this is totally kicking my butt.

The past 3 nights in particular have been rough, and my right eye had already started to twitch probably 4 days ago from tiredness, so Twitchy is still going strong.  Last night, I went to sleep at about 11:45, and Ben woke me up at 1:30.  I let him cry for a minute, but it started to get stronger and I could tell he wasn't going back to sleep easily on his own.  I figured his ibuprofen had probably worn off and his teeth were bothering him.

I went in to give him more medicine and a diaper change, then I took him over to the rocker hoping he'd lay against me and be lulled mostly back to sleep.  Instead, he put his forehead against mine, eyes wide open, and looked at me.  Much like the picture above, but not so crazed-looking.  I'd done that with him from the time he was a couple of months old, and he'd done it back a few times, but I would guess it's been at least 6 or 7 weeks since we last did that.

It was really sweet that he just did it out of the blue, and we sat like that for a minute or two, just looking at each other and enjoying the time.  Then I decided I needed to get him sleepy again or we'd never get any rest, so I nursed him and put him back to bed.  He promptly faceplanted and fell, presumably, right back to sleep.

If only I could do the same.

Movement and Sound

Ben's been a little Tigger for some time now, getting some serious air as he bounces along down the hallway.  But today he actually did some crawling.

He's also doing a lot of mimicking and Lori thinks that we can call it "dada" for his first word.  If you don't count the absolutely pitch perfect and chipper "Hi" he said more than a month ago that still kinda gives me chills of the freaked-out kind.