11.20.17

The day just disappeared!

First of all I couldn't fall asleep so I was up until 5 AM or a little later.  Miles woke near 8 but back to sleep so I didn't have to get up until about 8:20. I got Ella ready and Miles ready. We left for school. We left late and she missed singing.   I went to Giant Eagle for a few quick things on the way home.

I put everything away and noticed Ella's medicine was still in the measuring cup on the counter.  I forgot to give it to her.

I went to go work out but Miles was too clingy so then I decided to drive to the school and give her the medicine.  Too bad it's not a quick trip.

Miles fell asleep on the way home.  I thought I couldn't work out if he was in the garage since I didn't have a monitor. I went to get him to his crib. He was so tired. He nursed. He didn't go to sleep. He cried a bit before going to sleep. He rarely even cries at all.

I ate since I was starving. I had some snacks before nursing Miles. I grabbed a handful of teddy grahams from his snack cup and then a handful of animal crackers.

I worked out. I got a bit lightheaded. I only did 22 minutes of the 30 min workout. I was getting clammy and my head was foggy.  I cannot believe how hard Dirty 30 Extreme is.

I watched the last episode of Switched at Birth so now I'm done with that series.

I started to decorate a little but decided to save it for Ella.

I moved the tree from the middle of the foyer to the dining room. That was an easier to spot to put it since I could slide it.

I started to clean out the car behind Miles's carseat but then went to Ella's side. I got so much trash and 2 bags of various toys and things that need to be put away.  I didn't put them away but at least threw out the trash. I didn't vacuum. I guess I'll wait until I do the rest of the car.

 Miles woke up.  He was not happy when he woke up.

I fed him lunch. He ate a ton. He was hungry.   He wasn't done until 4:30 and then we went and got Ella.

Ella likes our candy cane decorations outside but she likes to put my scarves on the candy canes so they look like us!

I was so lightheaded again that I didn't cook. Plus I couldn't find the recipe I found before. I forgot to pin it. I could look for it but that adds time. I just made a frozen pizza and some chicken nuggets.   While it was cooking Ella put some more ornaments on the tree.  Miles tried but he kept taking them off instead.

 I pigged out.   I kept eating because I was lightheaded.   I still got lightheaded later.

I gave Miles a bath. He screamed bloody murder again. He always does. We tried a bath in the big tub with me too. That was worse than him in the little tub.  He will not sit. He gets his ankles in and cries.

While Dave held him he peed on the floor! 

 Ella put on her workout pants. They are so cute on her! She likes that they have pockets.

I went downstairs to clean up. I was interrupted for bedtime routine then I was back to cleaning up.   Finally I thought it was good enough in the kitchen and headed upstairs. I wasted a ton of time on facebook and wrote this post. Ella kept coming out of her room. She was quite awake. The downfall of napping at school.  At 11 I closed my laptop. 

Ella Says ... (September-December 2017)

I thought I was bad before but I really stopped documenting all the awesome things Ella says.

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Dave: Ella what are you doing?
Ella from upstairs: Opening Miles's birthday present

9/2
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"Come on Miles. Come on buddy. Try to keep up"
Miles was standing beside her at the table while she was getting out her sun catchers to paint.

9/6/17
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Miles is standing at back door pounding on it to go out.
I told him we aren't going out.
Ella walks over to him
Ella: Miles you can't go outside because my strawberries didn't grow.

Ella had a strawberry plant that Uncle Timmy gave her.
9/16
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Ella: I don't like preschool anymore
Me: Why?
Ella: because I don't want to play with Sydney anymore
Me: why?
Ella: because the other week I got mad at her
Me: why?
Ella. I was building a puzzle and went to move it and they all got mad at me
Ella: I don't want to play with Sydney anymore. I don't like preschool.

Poor Ella what she remembers and thinks she remembers. The frustrations of a 3 year old.
9/25
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Mommy I put on my bib because my dress was getting dirty. 

9/28
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Dave: Alright Ella it’s time to go upstairs and read
Ella: ok. I’ll leave my iPad down here. I’ll turn it off and put it on the red chair

9/28
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Ella learned shack during her reading. She didn’t know what it meant.
Dave: A shack is a small house
Ella: when we lived in California we lived in a shack.

Hahahahaha
11/12
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Me: OK. We have to leave in an hour so I have to go wake Daddy so I can get a shower.
Ella: I have a shower in my room
Me: But then who will watch Miles while I shower
Ella: I will.

Ella was trying to be so helpful.
12/24/17
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Ella was talking about a spider. Well she was walking around saying she was a spider.
Dave: Do you know how many legs a spider has?
Ella: 4
Dave: No
Ella: 5
Dave: No
Ella: 45
12-24

Focus

So many people keep talking about a word they pick for the year. I know a lot of people who picked a word for 2017 and even more are picking one for 2018. I wasn't going to pick one because ..meh.  But then I thought about it and then the word kept popping up into my head.  So I decided to pick one and post about it.

I keep doing 80 million things at once and just don't finish them all well enough. It's probably better to focus and actually finish a few things and leave some things never started!

There you have it. Focus!  Let's rock 2018!

12.1.17

I don't remember what they were looking at out there!

 I worked out with some friends. I logged in late so they were already started.

 Miles loves to sit in Ella's chair. He just also loves to stand.

 Miles discovered taking apart the diaper station.

 Miles tried to help with dishes.

 Miles helped move the cut broccoli to the bowl.

 If I didn't him  help, he whined and just ran all into my legs and I couldn't move.

I liked the broccoli but not the green beans.  This was a lot of work but worth it.

Icing Cookies Videos 12-21-17

I was icing cookies while holding Miles. I was struggling so I decided to share my struggle and do some instastories. I then saved them to my phone.

ALO 12.20.17-12.24.17

A Little Obsessed was released. It's 5 days of 30 minute workouts to prepare for 80 Day Obsession.  You should be able to stream it without paying for on demand. They have it before you have to pay until mid January.

They had 2 sneak peak weeks and I did most of the workouts both times so you may have seen some videos with some of those exercises.

12/20/17 I did Day 2 since Day 1 was missing on demand.

12/21 Day 1 since I already did Day 2

 12/22/17 Some interruptions. I'm referring to getting up to use my computer not to Miles all over me. If I was talking about Miles it would be constant interruptions.

12/23/17 - I was late to the zoom workout today so paused it to take our pic when everyone else was done. But I also had to pause it because high knees make me want to pee my pants. Even after going to the bathroom 30 seconds later during high knees I was going to pee my pants again #momproblems I thought I ate breakfast first. But partway through the workout I realized I hadn’t. Oops.

12/24/17 Workout done early on Christmas Eve or it wouldn’t have happened.

Overall I felt like some workouts could use more cardio. The workouts flew by. Some moves are easy and some are hard. I like the bands.

With ALO you are supposed to do timed nutrition. I did not successfully complete that any day. It's not even tricky but you need a pre-workout meal and a post-workout meal. I tend to fail at the pre-workout meal.  It wouldn't be hard in theory but I can't seem to pull of eating in the morning before getting Ella to school and the weekends were just all messed up.

Piyo Deluxe: Full Body Blast

I'm following a mix match of workouts for 2 weeks to prepare for 80 Day Obsession.  Today was Piyo Deluxe: Full Body Blast.  I own the Piyo DVDs but had never done it.
Wow that workout was tough.Looking back at my video I messed up at the beginning and went back with my left leg both times and my right leg none. Oops. Somehow she said right or left when swapping to an angle and I did the leg she said but then it messed me up! I might be sore uneven now! My shoulders are sore from push-ups 2 days in a row. I had trouble doing the snow angles ones because my arms didn't want to go up so high at first. I didn't record time lapse today so then I had to spend extra time trying to edit. It's at 1.5 speed!

This would be a workout I could do anywhere with just my sliders. Some workouts require weights and bands and loops and sliders or a combination of that.

Miles Videos 12-28-17

 We put new batteries in this dog today and Miles loved it.

Miles sat on the chair like this twice to ride it like a horsey.

Upper Fix Extreme 12-28-17

Push-ups are still so hard!  I dropped to my knees after 30 seconds when they were half range motion push-ups. Those are hard.   The 2nd round of it, I did stay on my toes for 45 seconds then dropped to my knees.

For hammer curls and concentration curls I used 15 and 10 lb weights instead of 10 and 5 lb weights!

Dolphins are challenging and I wish I knew how I looked doing them while I was doing them!

My shoulders are fatigued after this workout! 

In the back there that's our new elliptical machine. We opened the box then decided to pay someone to put it together for us!

Cleaning Time-lapse (12-27-17)

Our house was a disaster this morning. I spent time cleaning last night but not enough.  Then I had to buckle down to clean up the disaster so when my dad and brother visited, they had a place to sit and a place to eat. I also needed to clean so Dave had some room to cook.

I recorded a time-lapse video while I cleaned the family room for 45 minutes. During that time I also put laundry in (but cropped some of that time out of the video).

I wish I could time-lapse everything. It's so fun. Most rooms I don't have a spot to put the camera to see enough.

Once I did the family room, I went to clean the kitchen. During my kitchen cleaning and eating breakfast, the family room got pretty messy again. I took a picture an hour later and made it into a collage.

Timehop

I happened to look at time hop today and saw Miles in his green Christmas shirt. I thought too bad he wasn't wearing his green today or I could have done a comparison. But then I scrolled further and he had started the day in the red onesie last year so I could do a comparison!
I always say how he's slimmed down a lot but I didn't actually realize how much until this picture.

The onesie was quite big last year and it was tight today but it is the same 12 month onesie.

Here's a picture in it from 12-26-14

Merry Christmas

Here was our Christmas Card. Except it was mailed with our address. I didn't save a version before adding the address text. I tried to remove the text so it made it a little wonky.

It's our first Christmas in 5 years with family! It sure is nice. Ella sure likes it too!

Best Nine

You can get your best 9 pictures on instagram.  I did mine and my 2016.

I didn't do picture only so that it showed how many posts I had. My goal was 1 post a day. I did that in 2017!

Miles 15 Months Update

I tried hard to take pictures but most came out blurry. 

Stats:

• Weight: 25 lb 11 oz  -87th percentile  
• Height: 35.25" - 99.9th percentile 
• Head Circumference: 49.2 cm - 97th percentile
• Weight/Length Percentile: 16% 
• Diapers: Size 4
• Clothing: 18 pants. 18 mo or 2 T T-shirts.  2T-3T socks 
• Shoe Size: 6
• Teeth: 12

(stats using WHO)  Stats taken 1 day late.

Sleep
Miles wakes up a little after 7 daily. Some days he’s so quiet I don’t know her him until 7:30. There are days he’s awake for an hour in there and super pleasant. (Ella was a freak out cry immediately kind of girl.) Then he takes 1 nap a day. It’s mostly near 12:30. There have been a few times it was early and in the car. And sometimes we are out and about or busy and it’s closer to 2. He naps 2-2.5 hours daily. We start bedtime at 7:30 PM. Sometimes a bit later. But he’s super clingy and freak out most nights because he gets too tired.

Eating
Miles snacks in the morning upstairs while we are getting Ella ready. Then he has breakfast in the car on the way to preschool. Then we start lunch close to 10:30 sometimes 11. So that we are done eating by 12 or so for nap. He likes to eat right after nap. Then we get Ella and they snack in the car on the way home. They start dinner or snack immediately after getting home. The kids eat while I cook. Then they mostly don’t eat the actual dinner. He’s in his high chair most of the time we are eating. He has some dessert too. Then it’s almost bedtime.

Sample Schedule:
Start bedtime routine pretty close to 7:30.  Routine is Benadryl, diaper change, and sing him If You're happy and you know it while I put him in his scratch sleeves and sleep sack. Sometimes no singing though. Put on some ointments. Sometimes no ointments. Then I nurse. He falls asleep on me while nursing most of the time. Asleep by 8:30.   He sleeps all night. If I happen to hear him make noise in the night he goes back to sleep himself.  He wakes up anywhere between 7:30 and 8:10 for the day.  Often time he's awake for a bit pleasant in his room before I go in. Sometimes he makes noise so low it doesn't trigger the app but I can see he was awake an hour in there. Play a little, get Ella ready for school, drop Ella off, and he has a snack in the car. Sometimes he falls asleep on the way home and other times he doesn't nap until 2. 
He gets Benadryl before bed at night and before nap.

Special Moments:

On November 14, Miles woke up a couple times and went back to sleep on his own. I then went back to sleep. Once I even got my teeth brushed.  Then when he woke up the last time he was so quiet I thought he was going back to bed. He didn’t really. I just chilled in bed 10 minutes to a pleasant in crib baby. When I went in he was so happy. He never even cried.
On November 17, It was his second day in a row that he woke up 7:10 but was quiet and lied back down and I didn’t get him until 7:45. He was still pleasant.
On November 19, Miles was outside in the snow for the first time.
On November 20, Miles fell off the ikea step stool in the kitchen.  Miles peed on the floor in the bathroom after his bath!
On November 21, I noticed for the first time Miles had a twinkle in his eye.  He was up to no good.
On November 23, Miles spun himself on sit n spin for the first time.
Nov 24, 2017 at 5:25 PM On November 24, I note Miles definitely understands blowing on food. He has been for maybe a week. Miles opened front door himself.
Nov 25, 2017 at 10:47 AM On November 25, Miles ate at the table for the first time.  First time eating with plate, too. He fed himself with fork
On November 26, Miles did 2 somersaults down the steps. He had quite the fall.
On November 26, Miles has a diaper rash.
On November 27, he has a bad diaper rash. He cries so hard when I wipe!
On November 29, his diaper rash almost gone
On December 2, my parents babysat Miles while he was asleep.
On December 5, I noticed he had 3 new teeth. I didn't get a look of bottom right but probably a tooth there too (few days later confirmed there was a tooth)  His diaper rash was worse again.

Development:
He learned how to be a tricky bugger by not giving you stuff and laughing.
He also started the phase of dropping stuff on the floor on purpose just to see it happen and laughing about it.
He can clap, stomp, and yell hooray when singing if you're happy and you know it. 
He knows some body parts.
He started taking off his socks.

Communication:
He will sign more and all done. He has signed to eat a few times. He says a few words. Sometimes he says sentences and we have no idea what he's saying. Other times with context we know.   He's said "What's that?" and "Who's that?"   He has a happy squeal and a sad squeal but I don't even know how to write that.  He has an "I want it grunt." and an "I'm finally about to get it" exasperated panting. 

New Words
Sock  (Sa)

Still Saying
Caa (Clock)
Car
Ba (ball)
Ga (Globe)
Pap-Pap
Dada
Ella
Mama

Other Tidbits:
Likes
He likes to walk around.
He likes to be held on my left hip.
He likes to eat!
He likes to talk.
He likes to run over and try to hug Daddy.
He likes to play.
He likes Ella! He really likes to open her door in the morning and run in yelling her name and waking her up.
He likes Benadryl.
He likes to open kitchen cupboards and drawers and just take things out.
He likes to help give himself Benadryl and even suck the medicine out of the syringe.
He likes to try to get anything that he should not have.
He likes to play outside.
He likes to ride the horsey.
He likes turning on the light above the island. That switch is on the island and he can reach it.
He likes to play peek-a-boo.
He likes to play hide and seek.
He loves clocks and always points them out.
He likes to climb the stairs.
He likes to go down the stairs on his butt.

Dislikes
He doesn't like baths.
He doesn't like to sleep anywhere but his crib or his carseat.
He doesn't like anyone but Pap-Pap to feed him with a spoon/fork. (He has to feed himself otherwise.)
He doesn't like when people keep trying to feed him when he's full.

Fun Facts
Longest time sleeping: 13 hours 23 minutes  (increase)
Days with a sleep greater than 5 hours: 30  (all)
Days with a sleep greater than 6 hours: 30  (all)
(According to the internet sleeping through the night is considered sleeping 5-6 straight hours.)
Days with sleep greater than 8 hours: 30  (all)
Diapers used (from December 1-10): 5 per day 
Time spent nursing (from December 1-11): 0:47 per day  
Time spent sleeping (from December 1-11): 13:23 per day  
Doctor Visits: 0 
Illnesses: 0 (or 1? I find it hard to keep track)

Favorite Toys
stacking rings
books
balls
legos

Favorite Songs
If You're Happy and You Know it...

Favorite Books
100 first words. 
Pretty much all books except he doesn't like when I read him Diggers Go (that book is awful)

Favorite Foods
any sort of meat
fruit snacks
the m&ms on top of the rice krispie treats
ketchup
skittles
Swedish Fish

Other Tidbits
He doesn't go into his carseat as well. He's so opinionated. He makes it known what he wants. 

My Recovery
My knee is back to bothering me again.

There is probably more but I'm already 13 days late on this post.

21 Day Fix Extreme Results (Round 2)

I took the final pics a 2 days early because we were traveling.

Overall this round was better than the first because I didn't get lightheaded for many days in the middle. I didn't do any double workouts this time. I did miss 1 workout in 21 days.  I'm bummed I pulled the shorts up higher in the after pics. It makes it harder to tell the differences. 

21 Day Fix Extreme Week 2

Week 2 went better than Week 2 the first time around.  I was only a little lightheaded here or there this time around.  I didn't miss any workouts.  I did have more trouble sticking to the meal plan.  Its extra hectic around Christmas too. 
According to my weight app I lost 3.3 lbs in week 2.

Plyo Fix Extreme!


Upper Fix Extreme.  My shoulders get so fatigued after the first round.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jqH_lGGlbDo
Wednesday was Pilates but then we did Country Heat too. Miles was pretty good to put up with 2 workouts.

Lower Fix Extreme
Cardio Fix Extreme
Dirty 30 Extreme

Sunday was yoga.  I took some video for the purpose of screen shots to be able to compare form. The video is quite boring since it's at normal speed!

I still take pictures of my food but never seem to make the collages anymore.  I seem to stick to most of the same stuff.

I did have pizza and french fries during the week.  I hate every time I take pictures, my phone has the food pictures rotated so I have to go in and fix them. Above I did not!   Those are just 2 examples of food.

I never eat my orange.  I have been under on protein almost every day. I'm also under on fruit too but I'm getting better. These small apples I got are easy to grab and eat in the car so that's helpful.  I drank recover once or twice. I had one shakeology. 

15 Months Nursing and Counting (Miles)

I just recently came across my post like this when I was nursing Ella.  I read it and it made it out even worse than I remembered.  I thought I'd do another post about nursing this time.

I still nurse Miles. I'm trying to wean Miles.  There's a huge difference.

Miles nurses two times a day. Only 2. Ella nursed about 8.  Miles never had an interest in nursing like Ella did. Miles would only like to nurse in his room in his chair with his scratch sleeves on. So public nursing only happened when he was itty bitty.  In the past month he nursed in the morning and I just dropped that and he didn't care. He actually slept later after dropping the morning nursing session.

I keep postponing dropping the other nursing sessions. I'll do it like I did with Ella and do every other day for a week then drop a session. I started getting rid of bed time nursing first then nap time nursing last for Ella.  Miles falls asleep on me way more than Ella did so I've put it off. Miles is so so tired at night and freaks out when I'm changing his diaper. He knows nursing is the routine. I need a new routine. I anticipate being done with nursing in a month. With Ella I was done at 19 months and a week and it was 3 months of awful weaning.

It's still a love/hate relationship with nursing but it's not as much hate as it was before.

I don't see people this time around so I haven't heard comments on nursing one way or the other. Also if I do see people, they might not even know Miles still nurses since he never does when we are out.