One

Poor Miss A had a fever at her birthday party, so she wasn't terribly interested in the cake. We didn't realize it til later, which is kind of weak, considering how feverish she looks in these photos. Oops.

Fortunately, she had several willing helpers when it came time to blow out the candle!

Happy (belated) first birthday, my little monkey!

364 Days

Yesterday was a big day for me. What's so special about January 11, 2010? Not much, really. But it was the last day I had to pump.* Ava will be one tomorrow (where has this year gone?) so not only was it the last day I had to pump, but it also means I've successfully breastfed two kids to their first birthdays. In a country where only 22% of babies are still breastfeeding at all (let alone exclusively) after 12 months**, this is quite an accomplishment. I'm pretty proud of us for making it.

Both Jonah and Ava have been pretty easy to nurse. Both had good latches from the beginning. Both gained weight well. And I have had a lot of success with pumping, something that a lot of women are not fortunate enough to have. I understand that nursing can be really challenging and that for some (many?), formula seems so much easier and more convenient. But for me, there was never any question that I would breastfeed for at least six months, and ideally, til one year.

It hasn't always been easy, though. When Jonah was six months old, I went back to work full-time at a new job and I wasn't able to pump as often as I had at my previous, part-time position. For much of the second six months of his life, I lugged my pump home every night, and pumped once after he went to bed. I sometimes pumped on the weekends, too. It was the only way I could maintain a supply commensurate with his demand!

Nursing Ava has offered different challenges. I have been blessed, until recently, with an amazing supply, so I never had to pump extra at night or on weekends. And after winning the Sling and Swaddle Journey contest, I had two pumps, so I was able to leave one at work all the time and depend on my old pump when I needed it at home. Since I telecommute one day a week, I've even been able, sometimes, to nurse her on that day instead of pumping.

When Ava was about 8 months old, however, I started to have some big problems with pumping. I'll spare the audience the gory details, but suffice it to say the pumping became painful and I had serious and legitimate concerns about my ability to continue to pump at all. After enduring several weeks of discomfort, I finally figured out what was wrong, and I've been able to pump without problems ever since. Although we did end up taking Ava on a trip that was supposed to be our first non-kid getaway as a result.

Not too long after that, Ava started to perform acrobatics while nursing. I can't tell you how many times I've told her, "Ava! You can’t take that with you, it's attached!" She wiggles, climbs, looks around, you name it--all while trying to nurse. It's a normal part of nursing an older baby, but it led to two things. First, it became really challenging to nurse her in public, because all that moving around tends to leave me exposed. Not cool. Perhaps worse, though, she now gets so distracted that she has been nursing for shorter lengths of time. This, coupled with a one-week business trip during which I pumped exclusively (along with working 15 hour days—how fun!), has led to a decrease in my supply. If it had to happen, though, it couldn't have come at a better time. We started Ava's transition to cow's milk about a week ago, and it's going really well. We've gradually increased the amount of cow's milk mixed in with her breast milk, and tomorrow she'll start getting cow's milk exclusively. We also started giving her milk in sippy cups instead of bottles. I'll still nurse her whenever she wants to nurse, which, unfortunately, still includes 4 or 5 AM at this point. And we'll go as long as she wants to.

Jonah weaned himself at just about 16 months old. At that point, he was only nursing every other day, in the morning. One morning, he woke up, I went and got him from his crib, and asked him if he wanted to nurse. He said no, and that was the end of it. I had such mixed emotions about it. I knew we would have another, so I knew I'd do it again, but it was such a huge milestone. That was when I truly felt like he transitioned from baby to toddler or even kid.

I'm not sure how long Ava will nurse. I'll be away from her for five days in March, and I wonder if she'll be interested when I get back. I'm sure it will be even more bittersweet, since we're not planning to have any more children. The funny thing is, when you let your child decide when to wean, you never know which time will be the last. I'll just have to cherish each time I nurse her as if it were going to be the last time I do it, as if it's something really special.

Because regardless of whether it's the last time, or the second-to-last time, or the 100th-to-last time, it is something really special.

*I'm traveling for work in March, and if Ava is still nursing at all, I will likely pump once or twice a day. But I will do it kicking and screaming.

**The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends breastfeeding continue for at least 12 months, and the World Health Organization recommends breastfeeding until age 2 or beyond.

Breaking News

I had this miserable day yesterday. Jonah the Tiger (seen here after our last day of bowling, at which he got his face painted--and I won the league) has been sick with the flu since I got home from Nashvegas Monday night. I'll give you one guess who stayed home with him (and Ava) three days in a row. It was a long three days. Yesterday's fun and games included all of us making a mad dash from the eating area at Costco to the bathroom, Ava trying to eat some paper, and me getting pushed by Jonah.

And then...Ava started walking.

She'd been working on it for a couple of days, taking one little step every now and then, and she'd been standing all on her own for a couple of weeks. But yesterday afternoon, she stood up, pivoted around on one foot, and then took two real steps forward before falling down.

She's been practicing ever since, and I could see how much better she'd gotten between this morning and this evening, when I got home from work. (Note: both these videos are from this evening.)

It's really amazing. At this age, Jonah still had another week before he would even start to crawl, and walking was more than 4 months away.

My streak would have continued if today was September 25

I realized that if I'm going to use the blog to track the kids' milestones, I'd better get to it. I know that pretty much everyone who reads this thing already knows about most of these, but this is for posterity, kids.

Ava is officially pulling herself up on anything and everything. She's also cruising. I hear that early walkers start around 8 months old, so she clearly won't hit that. But I wouldn't be surprised if she's walking before Jonah turns 3. She is also finally cutting her first tooth.

Jonah is potty trained!

After our disastrous attempt at potty training back in July, Matt started telling Jonah that he could have five (!) M&Ms if he peed in the potty. (Matt didn't consult with me before determining the quantity of M&Ms that a peepee was worth.) Jonah was still not interested—until we gave him an M&M to try! Once he knew what he was missing, he was pretty much potty trained in two days. It's been over a month now, and he's not even wearing a diaper for naps. He's also often dry overnight. I was terrified of potty training; I'm shocked and amazed at how easy it was.

Jonah has also started preschool, and he loves it. He's going to Pine Village Preschool, which is a Spanish-immersion preschool that just opened up a site in the South End. How we got to this particular school is a whole other story, but we're happy with it so far. And Jonah can already count to at least 20 in Spanish!

Ava and I attended Katie and Blythe's non-bachelorette party/non-bridal shower last weekend. We spent two nights on Block Island with them, Mom, Aunt Sally, and Blythe's mom, Adrienne. Ava had been a little sick, but she was a real trooper, and she was great the whole weekend. The adults had a lot of fun playing games and drinking wine after she went to bed.

Labor Day weekend, I flew down to Memphis for Tiffany's bachelorette party (and I held my own, even though I haven't done much partying lately!), and Matt drove ALL BY HIMSELF with both kids down to New Jersey for the weekend. I'm truly impressed that he did that. Personally, I find the idea of driving alone with two kids to New Jersey on a holiday weekend way more terrifying than the idea of taking care of them by myself for a few days.

We had a busy summer, and it's carrying on into fall. Hopefully I'll be able to keep up!

Quick Kid Update

Even though I have a few other thoughts percolating in my mind (gender identity and baby clothes, trip to Colorado, why I'm becoming an accountant), I decided to write a quick kid update. I realized that I've been trying to use the blog to track Ava's milestones, since I don't have a baby book for her, and I could miss a few if I don't get them in here pronto!

Miss A mastered the art of sitting up in early July, and the day before we left for Colorado (July 9), Emma and I observed her go from her belly to a sitting up position for the first time. She kept working on it while we were away, and now she's a master sitter-upper. In fact, when I go to get her after a nap (or check on her while she's falling asleep - it's kind of a problem!), she's usually sitting up.

Over the weekend, she pulled herself more or less up to standing in her crib. I know, yikes, right? It's too early! No photographic evidence of this yet, but for your reference, Jonah did not do this til he was almost four months older than she is. We're in trouble.

She saw the doctor for her six month check up yesterday, and she is growing growing growing! She is now 28 inches tall, taller than Jonah was at six months, and weighs 16 lb 11 oz.

About a month ago, we did one disastrous day of attempted cold-turkey potty training with Jonah. We took off his diaper and told him he was going to use the potty and wear big boy underpants from then on. Not only did he not use the potty, he refused to even wear the underpants. So he went commando under his shorts, wet himself once (and freaked out), and then peed like crazy during his nap, during which he wore a diaper. (We're not masochists.) Then he held it until bedtime. Clearly he can do it, but convincing him to even sit on the potty fully clothed is a battle. Good times.

Tonight, after both he and Ava went to bed, Jonah climbed into her crib and wound up the mobile, much to the delight of both of them. (This from a kid who, while he was sleeping in the crib, never climbed in nor out of it!) Mean Mommy went in, admonished him, and put him back in his bed.

Finally, in case you didn't know, I WON the Sling and Swaddle Journey! I'm so thrilled. My prizes arrived over the weekend, and I think the best one is the new breast pump. I'm actually looking forward to giving it a try. I can't believe I'm actually saying that!

Got milestones?

We're tired. And it's not because of a lack of food.

(Ava's first cereal: Friday, June 19, 2009.)

It's because we're 5.5 months old, and we really, really want to crawl.

On a side note, I do see some similarities between Ava and Jonah at this age. But I think his eyes were already brown. Hers still have a lot of blue, but some brown in the middle. I wonder how they will turn out?

Jonah's first cereal, mid-March, 2007

Back in the s(w)addle again

My Miracle Blankets arrived yesterday. It's so ironic that this happened now. As longtime readers (hi Mom!) know, I recently stopped swaddling Ava. It's not that I don't have love for the swaddle. When I was in the hospital after she was born, one of the things I most looked forward to about going home was swaddling her with the technique I learned for Jonah (the Super Swaddle) in our own stretchy blankets. I don't remember exactly when we stopped swaddling Jonah, but I think he was at least 5 1/2 months old.

But Ava wriggled her way out of the swaddle with considerably more ease than he did. When it was clear that the Super Swaddle was no longer enough to contain Ava, I was at a crossroads. One path was to stop swaddling. The other was to try the Miracle Blanket. But I didn't want to shell out when I had no idea if it would work (and when she'd only be swaddled for a few more weeks or months anyway), so when we implemented the Great Baby Move of 2009, we stopped swaddling her, thinking we'd do all the sleep transitions at once.

Enter the Sling and Swaddle Journey, and I find myself in a pickle. Do I go back three weeks, and start swaddling her again? Or do I let these fabulous blankets languish in a closet?

I figure, as long as I have them, I might as well take them for a test drive. It's only sleep, after all!

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Ava rolls, Jonah waves

We've had fun watching Ava practice her rolling the past several days. She decided to do the opposite of what most babies do, and she's been working on rolling from her back to her tummy for a few days. We had lots of close calls over the weekend, but she just couldn't get it done.

This morning, I put her down on her back and went into the kitchen to do a few things. When I came back into the living room, she was on her tummy. I asked Matt if he had turned her over, or if she had done it herself, and he said that he didn't do it, so it must have been her! We put her back on her back, pulled out the camera, and recorded her second roll from back to front for posterity:



Jonah was going to show us his back-to-front roll, too, but he got a bit camera-shy when it was time. :)