Day 9...Doin' Fine

Today was pretty much a lazy day.  We didn't go anywhere but to check the mail.  Gabe had three naps today and the first two were relatively short, but still around an hour.  But the third one was better and I napped then too.  However, it was interrupted by my stupid cat.  I haven't mentioned "Evil Cat Max" yet, but he has been a source of much frustration every night...or should I say morning.  He sleeps on the bed with me, but every night at around 2 in the morning he wakes up and wants to play or prowl and it's REALLY annoying because he does it in my room.  He gets up and wants to paw at my bedside table or jump up on the windowsill and attack the blinds.  He'll do that every once in a while when Tim is here, but all it takes is Tim acting like he's going to throw something at him (a pillow...relax) and he stops and leaves for a while until he's ready to come back and sleep.  However, I guess I'm not as intimidating because I have to do that for usually at least an hour to get him to stop and it usually results in me throwing him out of the bedroom and closing the door.  But this is only a temporary solution because he just meows really loud and stands up and bangs on the door (literally).  Because our bedroom door is right next to Gabe's, I'm scared it will wake him up so I have to open the door and let him back in and the cycle begins again.  I would just ignore him, but when he paws my night stand, he almost knocks it over because it's not very stable, and he's knocked the lamp off before and I don't want him to ruin the blinds by jumping at them.  Then he'll come back on the bed and walk on my head or try to curl up next to me but it takes him forever to get comfortable so I usually end up pushing him away.  Eventually, around 4ish, he settles down and goes back to sleep.  Annoying!!!  He also tries to attack me at night.  Tim is the alpha in the house, and Max respects him so when Tim's around he doesn't try to attack me, but with Tim gone, Max thinks he's in charge, and just about every night right before bed, when I'm walking around, turning out the lights etc., Max gets that crazy look in his eye and I know he wants to bite me.  He's only bitten me once this week, when he leaped at me as I walked away from him and grabbed the back of my shin and bit me.  Mostly, he just jumps at me and acts like he's going to bite me.  He's done this ever since he was a kitten, except back then, he would dig his teeth into my arms.  And so he earned the nickname "Evil Cat Max".  It is well-deserved.

On a lighter note, I got the official call from Agora's HR department and was offered the teaching position.  Still don't know what grade/subject specifically, but I am officially hired!  I have new teacher training August 13-15 and Staff Development August 20-22.  I'm glad the trainings are not a week long, like I assumed they would be.  I was thinking about it today though...I won't have much time to prepare before school starts because I won't get any of my materials until training.  But for some reason I'm not stressed out.  I guess because there's nothing to do right now and I have a baby taking up all of my time which leaves no time to really worry about it.  I was told that all the lessons are actually done for you already, all you have to do is tweak them how you want.  If that is the case, this may be easier than I thought. :-)

Here is Mr. Gabe sitting with his teether.  This is where he played most of the day, and proved my and everyone's prediction right that he is going to be into everything!  (As most babies are, I hear). 

                                     
We use a small, white shelf to store his bibs and burp cloths for easy access, which was not an issue when he was littler and didn't move around.  But today, for the second time, he dragged himself over to it, and started pulling his bibs out and making a mess.  The shelf is not baby proof, as it is not attached to the wall, and could easily be pulled over, so we may have to come up with a different plan for it if this keeps up. :-)

Well, off to bed.  Tomorrow is my doctor's appointment with my friend Patty again to check my alignment and my wrist, which is hurting a lot more today.  And then Bunco tomorrow night!  Fun times ahead!
Good night!

Day 8...Today was Great!!

Today was a fabulous day!  It started off a little rough.  Not that rough, it's just I was trying to take Gabe's 8 month picture (can't believe he's 8 months old already!) and he was NOT cooperating.  He doesn't just sit still in the position I put him in anymore.  I put him on the couch because that is where I always have him for his monthly pictures, but he kept leaning forward, and would almost fall off!  So I put him on the ground, on a blanket in case he spit up, and he kept leaning down to grab the blanket.  He would look up at me and I'd try to take the picture but it only lasted a second and he'd get distracted by something and turn his head.  I don't really think I got a "good" one, like I would have liked but I got several weird ones.  Here they are so you can see what I had to deal with:

 Almost falling off the couch...

Not happy...

 Getting distracted by monkey...

 Trying to leave...

 Trying to make monkey leave...

 Not looking at Mommy....

 Getting bored...

This is pretty good, but still not looking at the camera. One more try I thought...

After this shot he spit up all over the monkey. Time to give up...

Now do you feel my pain???  I'm lucky I got one semi-decent picture!

 Gabe napped really well, though, including during my phone interview.  And I got the teaching job!  The interview was really easy; all of the questions he asked were ones I already answered at my last interview.  He said if I email him my clearances and certificate he'll forward them to the head of HR and he would be contacting me within the next week to make an offer.  John, my interviewer, said he wasn't sure which subject exactly I'll be teaching because they have to look at the numbers, but it will probably be Pre-Algebra or Algebra 1, which is perfect because I have experience teaching both, and that is my favorite!  I will be middle school, which is 7th and 8th grade and I don't know if I will have both grades or just one.  New teacher training is the week of August 13th and it will probably be in Mechanicsburg, which is an hour away.  I get reimbursed for any traveling, plus they provide a laptop, money for setting up my home office, an internet phone, and reimbursement for our internet service.  A friend of mine from the school I worked at this past year who got laid off applied and is starting the process with Agora too, so that would be cool if she worked there too.  She teaches English, so we probably wouldn't cross paths too much, but I'd probably see her at trainings and staff development.  :-)  I think I'm required to travel once or twice a year to meet with small groups of students, and will travel a few times a year for two-day trainings.  The school pays for half of the hotel room, and if you choose to have a roommate, it's free.

God is very good!  And His timing is perfect.  Of course, I interviewed with Agora last year at the beginning of the school year, but after the first face-to-face interview I got an email saying they were going with someone else.  I was about 6 months pregnant at the time and I'm pretty sure that is why they didn't hire me (which of course is illegal, and they could never admit to that), but now looking back I can see why it wasn't the right time.  I was trying really hard to get a teaching job because we really needed the money, but if I had actually gotten one, I probably would have had too much on my plate with the new baby, and God took care of us financially (as always).  Now, Gabe is older, has a routine, sleeps through the night, and I am in a good state emotionally to start teaching again.  I have learned my lesson from my last two teaching jobs to take it one day at a time, and even if I do end up hating it (which I'm not anticipating), I WILL stick it out till the end of the year.  There is no way I'm quitting mid-way through again.  I'm not sure what my salary will be exactly yet, because they pay based on experience, but I know it is on the lower end of what public school teachers get.  Tim has been saying that if I taught for 3 years, we could be out of debt and I could stay home!  That would be awesome.  If I like it though, I will keep teaching until I don't want to anymore.  The extra income would really help us save up for a house and for other fun things we want to do.  It would be nice to not work once Gabe starts school so I can be involved in that and maybe even home school him.  That is definitely an option Tim and I are looking at because the public schools are getting so bad.  Hey, he could go to Agora! :-)  I could be his math teacher! Haha!

We had a nice walk this afternoon before his nap and I noticed Gabe loves watching the cars go by.  He would follow every single one!  Here he is ready for our walk!

Tonight I met up with some ladies from church for ice cream, and that was really fun.  Gabriel got a finger in my ice cream as I was walking to the table, but luckily he doesn't know how to bring his fingers to his mouth to get the food, so he didn't actually eat it.  (Not that a tiny bit like that would have hurt him, but still...) Gabe was pretty tired because he slept from 1 to about 3 (Halelujah!) and didn't get a chance to sleep again before we left, but he stayed in a good mood the whole time.  He always enjoys being in new places.  He's still up and playing and I will feed him again soon and put him down for the night.
Tim called and said they got their work done early today, which was good because they were painting a house all day and it is in the 90's there so I'm glad they got done early.

Oh, and since I have been told twice now that I should pursue my thought of wanting to write a children's book, I have.  Actually, the book has been written for a while, I just got busier and didn't look into how to get it published.  I found a "subsidy" publisher today that will review my manuscript for free and then let me know how much I have to pay them to publish it.  They also offer illustration service and marketing to help it sell.  Depending on how much it costs I may use them or I may shop around some more.  To get it published by a big publisher, I have to have a literary agent.  But getting them to look at my manuscript and give me notes on it, is a huge plus.  So we'll see where that leads...

And this is how I got to end my day...no better way!

Day 7...We're in Heaven!

Gabe is doing such a good job at sleeping at night!  I didn't hear him until after 6 this morning but I didn't go in and I would hear him every once in a while, but he didn't get up till about 8.  Then he got two good naps.  We skipped the early afternoon nap because we were out and about, so when we got home, we played some until it was time for him to eat again, and then he went down for an hour and a half!!
I would like to start a Sunday School class for babies around Gabe's age in the fall at church, so I went today to the dollar store to see if I could find some things for the songs.  I found a few things, and there are a few garage sales this weekend that I'm going to check out that advertised on Craigslist that they have a bunch of baby and kid toys.  Our church currently offers no Sunday School for children or babies because no one was bringing their kids during that time, but this past year we've had several babies born, and some new people come that have babies, so I think it would be a good time to start a cradle roll of sorts.  Since our "nursery" has always been geared toward older children, we don't really have anything for babies.  Tim went out and bought a pack 'n play, a changing pad and a play mat, but we don't have anywhere for the babies to sit, so I'm thinking of getting used baby seats/bumbos for them to sit in.  So hopefully I can get everything I need in order to start the class at the end of the summer.
So Gabe has an obsession with straps and buckles.  Yesterday he was playing with the car seat straps, and every time I put him in the seat, he leans forward to try to get to the buckle.  He likes to chew on his high chair strap, and today he wanted to climb on and play with his swing straps.  The swing has a lock on the bottom to make it a stable seat, so I locked it and let him sit and play with the straps.  He's so silly. :-)
In other news, I have another job interview with the cyber school tomorrow!  It's a phone interview with a middle school math support teacher, which I think is like a department head, for a middle school math position.  He's going to call me around 10 in the morning, so hopefully Gabe will be taking his morning nap at that time.  If he wakes up at the time he's been waking up, it should work out.  If not, he'll just have to entertain himself for a little bit. :-)
Today wasn't too exciting...Gabe was better at entertaining himself without me having to be RIGHT there.  Right now he's enjoying moving his teether around on the blanket.  I wonder what's going through his head sometimes.
Tonight will be an early night for me since I have the interview tomorrow.  Another friend from church called and we'll be hanging out tomorrow afternoon, so that will be fun.  It's nice to know people care about me. :-)
TTFN!
P.S. I will post pics later!  I have to put them on my other laptop and I'm too lazy to go get it. :-)

Here he is in his cute overalls :-)

And here he is playing with the super fun straps on his seat!

Day 6...We Got This!

Today Gabe started his day at around 7:30.  He watched a little of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on TV but got bored pretty quick and wanted to play.  I pulled out the box of toys that I usually keep in the corner of the living room and pull random toys for him.  This time I decided to give him the whole box and see what happened.  I went into the kitchen (which is just behind the couch) for 2 seconds, turn around to see what he's doing, and I find this:

 He managed to dump ALL the toys onto the floor, plus take out the bottom of the cloth box (that is what his foot is on.  And he chose to play with the ball to the right, which was not in the box...
This was another bit of a cranky day.  I wish those darn teeth would just come so I can have my happy baby back!  I can see them at the surface on the top and bottom, and he is chewing and drooling more than ever so they are close, but they are making for a fussy baby, and I'm not used to that!  He only slept for 37 minutes for his first nap today, but his afternoon nap was much better: almost 2 hours.
A friend came over during his second nap and we were planning on having lunch at a park near my house, but it was really hot, so we ate inside and when Gabe woke up we went for ice cream, and then we hung out for a while at the house.  We enjoyed watching Gabe be his goofy self.  :-)  When she left I tried putting him down for another nap.  He was tired so he didn't fight it too much, but he also didn't sleep long.  I wasn't expecting him to, though, so I got him up and we played for a little bit. I was sitting on the couch and he was standing on my lap, and he looked over my shoulder and something caught his eye: his car seat!  He recently started liking to play with his car seat.  He really likes the straps, so I put him in front of it and he had a grand old time trying to climb in and chew on the straps.

 I needed to fix myself some dinner, so I put him on the floor to play with his little kitchen that his Uncle John and Aunt Melissa gave him (which he loves), and he would be fine until I'd peak over the couch to check on him and he'd look at me and cry.  Usually, he'll do that if I leave the room, but this time he just cried when he saw me...how nice.  He would look at me, cry and throw himself back on the boppy pillow.  But as soon as he got back to his toy, he was fine.  So I would have this:

 And then two seconds later, this:

He is so crazy, but I love him so much!  After he had his dinner, we went to Wal-mart and I put him in the front of the cart like a big boy!  He wasn't too sure about it at first, especially riding on the bumpy parking lot up to the entrance, but once we were inside he started to enjoy himself.  He was a little wobbly, and I had a hand on him as long as we were moving, but he would hang on to the bar, and he had fun.  I'm looking forward to going out to eat when Tim gets back and trying him in a high chair.  It's just such a habit to keep him in his car seat, but he's actually about to grow out of it (the weight limit is 22 lbs) and he's big enough to sit in a high chair.  He's growing up so fast, but it's exciting!

He is a handful, like I knew he would be when he became mobile, but he usually stays in one general area.  He can belly crawl but he doesn't go for very long.  I tried to see if he would follow me down the hall, but he just got frustrated.  He almost "real crawled."  He would put one knee forward and one arm and then fall down.  It won't be long at all until we're chasing him around!

I haven't heard from Tim today.  They started their actual work today so I'm sure they were very busy.

At some point I need to get the oil changed in my car.  I don't want to.  I hate getting things done on my car.  Tim is so good and usually does it for me, but he told me "it would be nice" if I could do it before the end of the month because we budgeted for it this month.  So I guess I'll do that probably Wednesday or Thursday morning.  I go back to see Dr. Patty on Friday and we're having lunch again, and then Friday night is Bunco Night at the church!  Angie and I are planning it and she's supposed to call me this week so we can iron out the details.
So stay tuned for all the fun ahead for the rest of the week! :-)

Day 5...Still Alive! :-)

Oh the joys of Sundays...Gabe's schedule always gets messed up on Sundays.  He got up at 8-something and so I decided to switch his first two feedings again and gave him cereal and fruit with a bottle so I could just give him a bottle at church, since that is easier.  I had to wake him from his morning nap to go to church, and he was tired but unable to sleep at church because it's just so uncomfortable in my arms. ;-)  I was planning on sitting towards the middle where Tim and I usually sit or even more towards the back because I knew I'd have to take him out eventually to feed him, but when I got there and was headed to my row, Angie's daughter, Tia, who has an almost two-month-old motioned for me to sit next to them on the SECOND row.  I did, and Gabe was fine during the singing (he always is..he loves the music) and during announcements, prayer time and communion he was a bit squirmy, and got a little upset when he saw Tia feeding her baby a bottle that is exactly like his.  He actually tried to grab it a couple of times.  During the sermon he started to get tired and fussy and it was almost time for him to eat so I took him out.  But there were lots of noisy kids in the nursery, and a family in the cry room trying to get their daughter to sleep, so I fed him in Tim's office and he wouldn't let me hold him so I put him on the floor for a little bit and then went out to the lobby and the people in the cry room weren't there any more so we sat in there for the remainder of the time and listened to the speaker.  Shelley wasn't preaching, it was a man who the church supports in Russia giving an update about the work there.  Gabe and I are used to the cry room. :-)  We go there every week.  One of his feedings almost always falls during service, and he's not a quiet calm baby anymore who will take his bottle and just fall asleep in your arms.  He is so active and now getting more vocal I feel bad keeping him in the service, and for some reason have a really hard time leaving him in the nursery.  If there aren't any other kids there I will sometimes leave him, but like today I could tell it was pretty busy and I just don't feel comfortable leaving him there when the nursery worker has her hands full.
After church he had a nice nap and then ate some yummy green beans and played.  I posted a video of him trying to stack his cups but getting very distracted and silly.  I used my laptop to record it and the camera is in the front so he could see himself on the screen and was totally not paying attention to me.  But it made for an entertaining video!  Next time I think I'll tape a piece of paper over the screen and maybe get a good video of his talent.  He had just done it very well right before I decided to record him.  The little stinker...
Later we skyped with Mimi, and she got to witness a temper tantrum.  He had got a hold of my camera, and was just looking at it, but then he put the string in his mouth and spit up at the same time, so I cleaned it off and said he couldn't have it any more and put it on the table, and he got really mad!  There was crying and flailing about and it was just so attractive.  He didn't get the camera back though!  He was doing it more because he was tired, so after a few minutes we hung up with Mimi and tried to go to bed.  I knew it was too late really for a nap because it was already 5ish and he still had two feedings to go.  He refused to sleep and wouldn't stop screaming so I fed him a bottle early, and tried putting him back down but that didn't work so I got him up and he played until GG saw me on Skype, so we Skyped with her (well, she saw and heard us, but her camera and microphone weren't working) until he got fussy again and I gave him a bath, fed him his last meal of Pears and Oatmeal and a bottle, and he went to bed with no problem.
I have been taking notes about when he eats and when he naps and for how long to see if I can figure out a pattern, but so far there hasn't been one because we keep having interruptions.  I wonder if this not waking up till after 8 thing is going to be a normal thing.  He actually wakes up a little after 6 but I go in and put the pacifier back in and he's asleep again.  He does definitely need a morning nap and afternoon nap, but it's after the 3rd feeding that's hard because it's really too late to be napping because it's so close to bed time, but he gets tired, so I have to try to keep him busy so he doesn't get cranky.  And he fights the nap if I try to put him down anyway.
Tomorrow I'm having lunch with a friend at a park, but I'm making sure it's at a good time for Gabe when he'll be awake and will make sure we're home for his nap.  Oh, and I gave him mangoes for the first time yesterday and he seemed to like them. 
Time for bed for this tired mommy so she can rest up for another fun day with her crazy boy!

Day 4...How Many More??

Today was good but a little tiring.  Gabe woke up at 6:30 and was ready to eat, so I fed him and he went back to bed pretty quickly, and slept till after 9!  So that was nice since I didn't get to sleep till midnight-ish.  But he was back to his normal 45-minute naps and refusing to sleep any longer than that, and he was Mr. Cranky Pants a few times today for no reason.  He also wanted me to be with him pretty much all the time.  Right now he's in his swing and is content with his pig toy, but pretty much all day if he was awake, I was holding him or playing with him, cleaning up spit up every few minutes because he does NOT sit still!  I am honored that he enjoys me so much, and I enjoy him, but being the ONLY one around to entertain him gets pretty exhausting.  Plus, my wrist has been hurting more today.  I've been trying not to use it as much, but I have to use both hands to pick up Gabe, and there's not many tasks that I can do with only one hand.
We went for a walk this afternoon and that was nice.  Gabe had fun looking at everything.  I put him in the big stroller without his car seat so he could sit up and face forward.  He enjoyed watching cars go by and just took everything in. 
Oh, and we had a couple of "fun" changing sessions.  When I was trying to change his clothes because he had spit up all over his first outfit, he kept trying to flip over to his stomach.  It was pretty annoying.  He succeeded a couple of times and would just sit there on his hands and knees and I'd flip him back over and fight to keep him on his back while I finished clothing him.  And then the last time I changed his diaper he did the same thing.  You know, it's really difficult to fasten a diaper when the child has his butt up in the air.  I actually raised my voice a little and he didn't like that, but it didn't stop him from trying to flip himself.  I eventually won, and stood him up and he was as happy as could be...weird child.
We have about an hour before bath time and bed time, and I think he's getting tired of his swing so I'm off to see how I can please him. :-) 
Oh, and nothing got done about my room...I just looked at all the stuff and thought, "There's no where else to put it!"  So I just left it and maybe will try again another day. :-)

 

And here's a fun video of Gabe practicing his tongue trick. :-)

                                   

Day 3

It is incredibly too late for me to be up writing this blog, but if I don't do it now it may never get written!  ;-)
Today was a fun day.  Gabe slept in!  He never sleeps past 7-ish and I heard him crying a little around 6:15 so I went in and gave him his pacifier and he was out until 8:30!  I couldn't believe it!  So the down side was that his feeding schedule was shifted, so I gave him cereal and fruit with a bottle first (normally I just give a bottle), and he was fine with that, and he actually went down for a nap around 10.  I was thinking he would wake up in plenty of time for us to leave  at 11:30 for an appointment.  But I had to wake him up. I had gone to see my friend who is a chiropractor on Monday for a weird bump on my wrist that sometimes hurts, and she said it's probably a harmless cyst that is apparently common in women between 20 and 40, and it will probably go away on its own.  But she had to check my spine and found that I was out of alignment in several places, so she adjusted me and wanted me to come back today to check everything, and then we went to lunch.  So that was fun.
And then tonight my crazy friend Angie came over and we experimented with cake pops.  My aunt Mitzi and Grandma bought some silicon cake pop trays while we were at Hilton Head and they were really cute, so they gave me one of the trays and I found a great website that had an awesome recipe for beach ball cake pops.  So with these pops, the directions said to dip the pops in white coating and stick in a styrofoam block to let them dry.  Well, of course I didn't have styrofoam, and hadn't bought any, so we were trying to think of another way to stand them up, and we got a shoe box, which ended up working well.  But I was telling Angie about how on the website they put the finished pops in brown sugar to make it look like sand, and that sparked all these other ideas in her: We should make a whole beach scene!  We should make stick figure people and blankets for the sand!  No, we should put OUR heads on other people's bodies and have us swimming in the ocean!  We decided on cute beach clip art people and here is how they came out:

 Since Angie is a brunette, she said I was the one in the bikini...it's sooo me! :-)  We sure did have fun making these, but I think I've had my fill of cake pops for a while...they are cute, but the perfectionist in me says they're too hard to get just right. 
Gabe missed out on all the cake pop fun because he had to go to bed, but it was a good day.  He got one less feeding than normal because he started so late, so I'm going to see if he wakes up for a bottle or if he is able to go without.  His eating/sleeping habits seem to be shifting and changing, and it's a huge guessing game trying to keep up with him and figure him out, but I'm trying to just go with it.  I have nothing planned for tomorrow so there should be no reason to wake him up from any naps or interrupt his schedule in any way.  What I should do is clean my room...what are the odds of that happening??? Haha...my goal is to declutter our room some time before Tim gets back.
Speaking of the hubby, he called this morning and said they're doing well, and their training started today.  He said he should be able to call in the mornings and give me updates, so I will report anything of importance that he tells me. :-)
And now it is off to sleepy land for me!  I will leave you with a super cute picture of my little dude. :-)