This week in pictures

There were too many pictures to post here, so go to this lovely link for a slideshow.

Craziness

For the past three days Xander and I have been gone by 9am and not gotten back until 4 or 5pm. And as crazy as it's been, I must admit that it feels great! I'm getting back to myself, slowly but surely. In the past week: went to a home birth circle meeting, had lunches with Deann and Maria and even Jonathan, been in classes every day, taught Sunday school and adult Hebrew, worked on a side research project at the American Jewish Archives, did errands, tutored someone, inherited Jonathan's cell phone since mine died (and he uses his work Blackberry most of the time anyway), visited with Elbie, gotten "kidnapped" by Maura at 8pm to go to dessert since the baby was asleep, and had a mini-party when Ari, Erin and Jeffrey came over to schmooze with Jonathan. Not to mention did many, many loads of laundry.

I also have like 40 pictures to sort through and upload, but that will happen later this weekend...

Success!

For FOUR DAYS IN A ROW, it's only taken a half hour to put Xander to bed! We start our ritual around 6:30 and he's out by 7, 7:15 latest! Jonathan and I even watched a movie the other night. It was kinda surreal, we kept waiting for the other shoe to drop and the monitor to broadcast screams. But it never did. He didn't wake up until 3:45am, and then he nursed with his eyes closed and went right back to bed. PLUS he now has a regular nap schedule. I want to send Elizabeth Pantley a huge bouquet of flowers.

Also, if you want to be amazed, watch this: Did You Know? Progress of Information Technology. Sony played it at their executive conference last year. On a completely different note, Savta recommended Ghost Riders by Sharyn McCrumb to me, and having read it, I pass on the recommendation to you. It was fun historical fiction about how the Civil War played out in the Appalachian mountains, like a sprawling Southern epic. It was set in both Civil War times and today with Civil War reenactors, with a ghost story to boot.

Kid creativity

The holiday of Purim is coming up, so in Sunday school we're doing Purim prep: during library we read books on Queen Esther and during music we sang Purim songs. There's a tradition that whenever the name Haman (the bad guy at Purim) is read/sung, you say Boo!! And when the heroes' names are read/sung, you cheer. Well, the music teacher and I decided to get creative and get them involved with every name. Whenever we sang Haman, we asked what they wanted to say and they said boo! They decided that Esther was huzzah! and King Ahasheurus was feast! (because he liked to party). Following on this logic, what do you think my 3rd grade class chose to shout for Mordecai's name? Any ideas? Can you guess it?

Peanut-pickle!!

Yeah, that was my reaction too. But hey, they were into it, so peanut pickle!! it was, and they shouted it with vigor.

All a boy needs is a blanket and his bear

Playing with bear, part one.

Bear-playing the second. What fierce concentration!

Playing peek-a-boo. It's his latest game, he moves the blanket over his face by himself.

Just kidding, here I am!

My favorite part of this video is the clicking sound - my mom is typing in California.

Five instances of marvelous goodness

1) Putting Xander to bed is going better. No crying, just a little whining now. It still takes hours, but last night he slept from 9pm to 6:30am STRAIGHT, not waking once. He likes the new CD (the lullaby one that my congregants in Mattoon gave us), and during his nap today he even cuddled his teddy bear (go Savta). The main good news is that he's stopped needing to nurse to go to sleep and can now be rocked or put in the bouncy chair. This is GREAT because now Jonathan can put him to bed too, not just me. Aside from the suggestions of all you wonderful people, I credit The No-Cry Sleep Solution: Gentle Ways to Help Your Baby Sleep Through the Night by Elizabeth Pantley. She speaks about the importance of routine, how to get a kid off of nursing-to-sleep dependence, how to encourage naps, etc. I highly recommend it!

2) This cracked me up: someone in my New Testament class invited me to join her study group. Sure, I said, and thanks for asking me. "Of course!" she replied. "You love Jesus more than anyone I know!"

3) I made a new radio station on www.pandora.com, of oldies music, based on the Beatles and Peter, Paul and Mary. It's really relaxing and the baby coos along with it.

4) I fit into pre-pregnancy clothes! At least most of them. Somehow I have a feeling that my hips will never go back, will they?

5) For my Valentine's present I now have a super-duper fast computer! Yay techie husbands. AND he wrote me a program - a new romantic message appears whenever my laptop boots up. Isn't that sweet? (I had wondered what he was doing on my laptop when I heard him say to Simcha, "Sweetheart, don't chew the laptop cord. If you eat it you're going to have serious fluff issues.")

Great video

I really liked this. It made me take a second (and a third, and a fourth) look at how technology has affected my life, and reminded me to be more grateful.

Louis CK on Conan O'Brien: Everything is amazing, why is nobody happy?

Help!

I give up, I'm appealing to the masses.

Once Xander goes down to sleep, he sleeps about 10 hours, usually getting up only once to nurse. I feel very lucky this is so. But the problem is going to sleep - it takes over two hours to put him down! At 7:30 we start with our bedtime routine of changing into PJ's, bedtime story, lullaby, nursing, and rocking. Then he falls asleep for five minutes, then is up again. And so on for two or more hours, til about 10pm. I've read two books on the subject and called the pediatrician, and all say that a baby's natural bedtime is early, between 7 and 8 if not earlier. Xander shouldn't be going down at 10pm every night! We've tried a lullaby CD, a bouncy chair, we've put a blow dryer in his room on the "fan" setting for white noise, and we're trying a pacifier tonight. Nothing works. Jonathan and I don't get any evening together, and we go to bed right after he does, totally frustrated.

Suggestions? We're trying to avoid letting him cry it out.

Because this serves as my online scrapbook, and one can never have enough pictures...

Going for a walk in the stroller.

At HUC.

Hi everybody!




Batya babysat while Jonathan and I went out to a movie last night. Xander and Carlie had a great time!

Introducing Xander to the wonder that is Elmo.

Snuggles!

Reading=eating at this stage in time.

Yummy books!

Xander participating in a Youth Interns meeting with Ben when I'm in class.

He seems very nonchalant for being about to be munched.

Checking out Alice's nose.

We visited Jonathan at work on Friday. The baby passed out when we got home. Notice the shirt - all of Jonathan's coworkers cracked up. :)

Jonathan made me put this one up.

Chocolate, visitors, and new clothing

Sandra and David sent over chocolate truffles for Valentine's Day. They are GOOD! They sent us two tins and one of them is already gone. As for the day itself, Batya volunteered to watch Xander so Jonathan and I get some time together. For the icing on the cake, for my V-Day gift I requested that Jonathan make my computer faster, so more RAM is on its way.

My college friend Alice is moving to Korea in a couple weeks, but she was in Ohio and stopped by to say hello. We schmoozed, ate yummy food, and caught up. I hadn't seen her since my wedding, so there was plenty to say.

And I realized I posted the pictures of Sarah and I shopping on Monday without telling you what we were shopping for: I now have knee-length boots! I've always wanted a pair, and Dillard's had a 70% off sale. One can't resist such numbers. We also went to the GAP outlet in Kentucky, and I picked up three new pairs of jeans for guess how much? $1.99 each. I'm telling you, my new wardrobe cost less than our lunch!