4 Months, Hallelujah!

As you can tell from previous posts, I have been eagerly anticipating this day for quite some time. Month 4 is the homeland, the light at the end of the dark, loud, sleep-deprived tunnel. Well, it hasn't been that drastic, in fact, just last night we got a nice reminder that Zayd is a baby and babies cry sometimes... for no reason. Regardless of any transformation, real or perceived, we have made it, and we couldn't have done it without a few critical items and people. I'd like to dedicate this post to those things and people.

So, here goes:

First, and foremost, we could not have made it without the help of family, my mom, dad, sister, even Faris, and Nick's family as well. They have all supported and helped us, both emotionally, physically, and whatever other way we have needed them, also my wonderful nanny, who has helped us discover things about Zayd and been so patient with him, even when he has had a "rough day."

This blog, it has been an outlet for my joy, frustration, obsessive picture taking, and endless stories of the details of our never dull life.

Breastfeeding, it has brought me much joy and elation and provided a safety net for Zayd and me when we are both about to lose it.

The hairdryer, which has offered instant relief in difficult situations, and rings forever in all of our ears...

The sling, it has given Zayd and me physical closeness when I have sometimes felt I didn't want to be so close, i.e. when he's screaming bloody murder in my ear after a long day of work.

The swaddle and bouncer, both aiding in his sleep which brings us all a little closer to our sanity.

Last, but not least, Zayd and his beautiful smile and spirited attitude (that's a euphemism, by the way). He makes all the sleep-deprivation, soiled clothes, budget restraints, and loss of freedom completely worth it. Our lives would be empty without him, and my hardest day now is a million times better than my best day before him! I LOVE HIM!

We don't know what the future holds for our little family. The near future will likely be one with lots of toy cars, trains, outings to the park, learning how to crawl, walk, and run. All I can hope and pray for is a long fulfilling life for Zayd and one where he knows how much he is loved. I pray every single day that he has the best childhood any child could ever wish for and that God will bless him every moment of every day of his life.

Here are some of his 4 month pictures. I don't really have his stats yet, because we don't have our 4 month doctor visit for 2 more weeks.

Weekend In Review

As we are approaching Zayd's 4 month birthday, I am beginning to understand why it is such a milestone. This weekend, we got a little taste. Zayd was very calm, and really only cried when he needed something, food, sleep, to change activity. We have slipped in the nightly sleeping department. He's starting to cry in the middle of the night, either because he has rolled himself over or for some other unknown reason, but he is like a different baby during the day. Whereas before, I denied that I would have a fussy baby, now I have started denying the fact that it would ever get better, and as I sit here writing this, I am feeling hopeful that maybe we have reached that magical 4 month milestone where, almost overnight we have a calm happy child who doesn't feel the need to cry when he's not eating or sleeping...

Friday, my stay-at-home mom day, started the weekend off on right foot. He woke up around 8, ate, then we went to Walgreens to pick up a few things, came home, and he went down for a 2 and a half hour nap. Then he ate again, and we packed up and went for a walk in the park, came back home and he slept another 1 hour and 40 minutes, which allowed me to take a nap (any day that I get to take a nap is a fantastic one!). He watched TV with me, played, laughed, and was all around fun. My wonderful mom kept him that evening, while Nick and I went to dinner and a movie, specifically, a quick philly cheesesteak and Avatar. Here are some pictures of the day.

Saturday was pretty uneventful. We were waiting all day for him to take a long nap so we could get out of the house, but it really never happened, so we took off anyway. The outing was still a success. We went for a walk and after trying to go to Cheesecake Factory with Mom and Faris, which I don't even know why we try anymore, the wait was 2 hours. We went to our old favorite, Whole Foods. It was the first time Zayd had been there with us. He loved it!

Sunday, we stayed in and played Super Mario Bros. for the Wii, then took a family trip to Sam's Club. This is all a really big deal for us, because we have had so many sketchy outings with Zayd that we just don't take him places anymore, but he did amazingly well, even in Sam's! He was just looking around and taking it all in. He fell asleep in the car, and we came home, ate, bathed him, and all crashed, another great weekend! Here are pictures of all of the above activities.

These after bath pictures make me want to squeeze him! He still goes to town in that thing, but this time he was calm enough after that we could take some pictures (photo credit goes to Uncle Faris and his iphone).

A New Phase of Sleeping

Just shy of his 4 month birthday, I feel like Zayd is changing drastically in front of our eyes! The most glaring recent change has been in his sleeping habits. We have enjoyed about 2 straight weeks of his sleeping through the night (with the brief exception of last Friday, when Nick was in New Orleans and Zayd decided to wake up screaming about 3 times in one night). He has also been pretty consistently taking good naps. The most shocking thing about this new phase is that he no longer wants to fall asleep being held. He has been almost always falling asleep on his own in the crib, within 5 minutes of being put down. We try not to let him cry for more than 5 minutes, and my mom won't let him cry for more than five seconds, but that's a different story. Well, last night, we encountered yet another change. At 12:30 a.m., we awoke to our little man talking in the night, and no, of course he wasn't really talking, but he was making all these wonderful sweet cooing noises, that are a little less wonderful and sweet at 1 in the morning after a long day of work. It seems he has perfected his little move and had flipped himself over to his back (yes, he sleeps on his tummy, another story for another time). Anyway, tickled at all the new sights, he just lays there smiling and talking as if it's the middle of the day. We rolled him over several times, then just decided to unswaddle him (something I thought we may never be able to do successfully), and he finally fell back asleep. Our theory was that the swaddle was facilitating his ability to roll over, but this morning at 6:45 a.m. we awoke once again to smiling Zayd on his back, unswaddled...

I guess we are going to have to teach the little guy to sleep on his back, something he should have been doing all along, or wake up every hour and roll him over until he learns how to roll himself. I'm thinking it's going to be the former. Wish me luck...

The Joys of Babywearing

As you may have noticed from prior entries, we have become huge proponents for babywearing. Don't worry, I'm not turning into one of those crazy organic people (you know, like Maggie Gyllenhaal's character on Away We Go, she doesn't use strollers because "why would you want to PUSH your baby away?!") but it really does wonders for the baby and the person carrying him or her, not to mention it's so much easier than navigating a stroller around a crowded area. One other major benefit is that anyone can do it. So, last weekend Dad offered to carry Zayd around in the mall while we shopped. Not only did they bond, but Dad was getting stopped by all kinds of women commenting on how sweet and cute Zayd was. So, of course my dad was strutting all around The Summit soaking it all in. We also laughed because my grandfather (my mom's Dad) used to carry me around when I was a baby to get attention from women. I guess they are more alike than we ever thought!

Here are some pictures of Dad trying out the Ergo carrier with Zaydo.

Happy 101

I am truly honored to be blogging my second award! This one was from Heather Lee. I love reading her blog because whenever I think I have it rough with one baby, I just think of her TRIPLETS, three times the insanity, three times the joy of being a new parent!

Happy 101 goes like this:
A. List 10 things that make you happy.
B. Try to do at least one of them today.
C. Tag 10 bloggers that brighten your day.
D. For those 10 bloggers who get the award, you then link back to my blog and create your own "makes you happy" list.

10. Finding a good deal on a great piece of clothing, either for me or for Zayd.
9. Sleeping in, or sleeping in general these days
8. Dinner with my family
7. Driving home from work (got that one from Heather)
6. Watching General Hospital and Desperate Housewives (preferably uninterrupted, but that doesn't really ever happen anymore)
5. Watching Zayd play in the bathtub
4. Reese's Eggs/Hearts/Christmas Trees (I remain to believe they have crack in them).
3. Fridays
2. Zayd's voice when he's babbling, especially in the morning.
1. Zayd's big gummy smile, especially when I can possibly catch it in a photo!

Since I really only follow about 10 people. I am not going to tag them. They all brighten my day. Blogging has been such a fun way to share the news in my life and peek in on other people's lives. It truly brightens my day!

Daddy's Day Off

Since today is a day off for Nick but not for me, he is at home with Zayd. So, I got up, got ready and headed out for work leaving my boys alone in the condo. Before I even got settled into work, Nick had Zayd taking his morning nap, and he stayed down for 2 hours! So far so good. I had told him that if the timing worked out and he felt brave enough that I would love for them to come out here and eat lunch with me. Well, before I knew it, they were in the car on the way over! It was wonderful to see both of them in the middle of the day. We went and got lunch while my girls hung out with Zayd. We joked that he would be getting really familiar with this place one day! He was cool and calm the whole time he was here, just looking around and enjoying the new sights. We even took some pictures of his first "dental visit."

 At first, I think he was a little frightened. That chair can be a scary place

Then he realized, it's just mommy, and he was all better... LOVE that smile!

So it seems like Nick is going to be okay at home with him after all. I had my doubts, but obviously, he can handle himself just fine.

Lessons Learned

Inspired by Mary Louis's post, I thought I would share a lesson I had to learn the hard way this weekend. My parents invited us to one of our favorite restaurants on Saturday night, Firebirds (In case you haven't noticed, we are creatures of habit. We tend to visit the same places over and over again). The last time we went it was a relative success, so we were feeling pretty good about it. My parents had gone to a movie (a far-reaching fantasy for us, these days), and we were meeting them at the restaurant at 6. Zayd was ready to eat by around 5, and while I was feeding him, I mentioned to Nick that if we wanted to bring a bottle we should probably go ahead and thaw some milk from the freezer. Now, I will admit that I was not sure that we were going to need the bottle or that I wanted to go to the trouble, so I am not putting this on him. Anyway, after some discussion, we decided he wouldn't need to eat until 8, and we'd surely be home by then... Well, we were on our way, and my parents said there was going to be a 30-minute wait. Well, that turned into a 45-minute wait, which did not agree with my child. He was progressively growing fussier and fussier, and it seemed that the only way to calm him down was going to be to feed him.

Great plan, only we had no bottle and our table was in a very central, well-lit portion of the restaurant... So, I had a couple of options: 1. Be THAT mom who nurses anytime anywhere (I did have a nursing cover with me), 2. let the child be hungry, thus fussy and stress us out on our only evening outside the house or 3. Find a place/way to feed him. Well, we opted for option 3, and it led us to the bathroom, which had no seats, except the white porcelain ones... I decided the handicapped stall was probably my best bet, so I started feeding the child, standing, in the handicapped stall, in the bathroom of a crowded restaurant. Of course, he acted like he hadn't eaten in 3 days, but was not able to fully enjoy his meal because every time a toilet flushed (which was about every 3 minutes or so, due to aforementioned busy-ness), it would startle him, and one time a door slammed and he erupted into a full out cry. I won't even mention the "business" that was going on in the next stall over. And, my favorite part of this little adventure was my mom who was frantically lining the toilet with toilet paper, thinking I would want to sit on the seat fully clothed to feed my child. I was not THAT desperate! It is amazing to me that having a baby makes you do things you never thought you would do, and it makes you become resourceful in ways you NEVER thought possible. Conversely, something about them makes you forget the basics that you never would have forgotten in your past life like "be prepared!"

So, needless to say, some lessons are learned the hard way, and for me bringing a bottle to any outing anytime is now among those hard lessons learned.

Gettin His Roll On

This early morning we found that Zayd had completely rolled over again, then when he woke up for the day, we watched the process. I believe the swaddle is helping him do his little tuck and roll move, because he only seems to do it when he's waking up.
Now, I'm not saying my child is some kind of developmental phenom, but this is a nifty little move.

Bath Time

I have previously mentioned how much Zayd loves bathtime. I have been trying to capture it on video, but I keep forgetting to take my phone in there, and it's not like I can just leave him and go grab it, so I finally remembered the other night and took some G rated video for your viewing pleasure.

The first few times we had him in his tub, he sat eerily still the whole time. I think he was too shocked by the water to make any moves. Now, he sits still for a bit, then explodes, arms and legs flailing, water splashing, like you've never seen. It's pretty adorable.

New Year's Tradition With a Twist

It has been a family tradition of ours to go to Pensacola Beach for New Year's. We have been doing it since my sister first moved down there almost 10 years ago. One of the only times I missed the celebration was the year I met Nicholas in Nashville (a story that has it's own post, which I am still working on). Anyway, since we were at home for Thanksgiving and Christmas, and since Zayd is now 3 months old, we thought it would be a good time to venture out. Believe me, we had our reservations, but we thought if other people can do it, so can we.

We decided that leaving first thing in the morning would be the best for everyone, so we got up on Wednesday and got everything together (no easy task), I fed Zayd, pumped some milk for the road, and we were off. Now, Zayd has been known to scream his head off in the car, so we were prepared for a miserable ride, but as usual, just when you think you know what they are going to do, they surprise you. He did really well, he pretty much slept, fussed a little, took his bottle peacefully, and he even sat quietly for part of the ride. It also helped that we timed our stops pretty well so that we could give him a break from the seat and change and burp him. Anyway, so we got there in pretty good time, and went straight to Jerry's Cajun (another family tradition). Thank God for my mom, if I haven't said that enough. She kept him pretty well under control while we were eating. We stayed at my parent's beach condo that night, and Zayd slept from 8 til about 6:30 in his pack n' play. I think that was because he was super exhausted from his stressful day. It was really strange sleeping in the same room with him. On the one hand, it was great, because he was right there, and I could hear him breathing the whole night (actually Zayd snores, which is pretty cute). But, on the other hand, I was nervous to even move all night because I was afraid to wake him.

We got up and walked on a path next to the beach and then walked out on the beach on Thursday morning. Zayd was nestled tightly in Nick's Ergo carrier, so he was pretty much asleep for his first encounter with the ocean, but I was super excited that he got to experience it for the first time at such a young age.

The next day was New Year's Eve. We were planning on staying at my sister's house since we were going to put all the kids to bed and go to a late dinner. Everything went smoothly with that, and we had a wonderful evening celebrating the New Year and my dad's birthday. We had a great dinner and then watched the "pelican" drop. It was pretty snazzy for a small town.
The rest of the weekend we spent lying around not doing much. My sister, mom, and I managed to go to a movie and go shopping, while the boys looked after the kids. Apparently, Zayd was acting a little crazy while we were at the movie, and the boys got so desperate that they gave him a bottle about 1 hour after I had already fed him, and put him in his pack n play crying with the hairdryer running at 7 o'clock. He eventually fell asleep, but then woke up ready for the world at 1:30 in the morning. And, guess who got to enjoy that? Me, of course! Incidentally, I heard him moving around a lot before he finally cried for me to get him, when I looked in he had rolled completely over, was facing the opposite direction that we had put him down in, and busted halfway out of his swaddle! There have been a handful of times that we have gone to get him and he's on his side, but that time he rolled all the way over!

I have to give credit to my bro, Faris because he took care of Zayd when we went shopping the next day (Nick was out for a couple of days with the stomach virus, I'll spare you the details on that). But Faris fed him (on time), changed him (for the first time in his life), and even put him to sleep (which usually only me or my mom can do with any success). I consider it a nice life lesson for my 19 year-old brother.

We had a good time, but we were pretty happy to get home. Zayd slept through the night the first two nights, but then woke up once the next two nights. I think he knew he wasn't in his house, because he has been doing much better since we got home. I was really glad he got to be on the beach and hang with his cousin Adam. Here are some pictures we managed to get over the weekend.

Me and Nick at Global Grill on New Year's Eve, the night before the stomach virus body snatched my husband.

Me, Mom, and Dima very excited to be without the kids, but also tired. My mom had been asleep for about 2 hours before our 9:30 dinner reservation.

The kids of the Pacha family, minus my brother Tarek.
My Mom and Dad. She thought this was going to be a picture of just her (she likes to do that every time we take pictures), but Dad thought otherwise.
The birthday boy! I have to give him the credit for Mom, D, and I getting to go to a movie and shopping. He insisted we go, when our husbands were less than enthusiastic about it.
Zayd and Cousin Adam. Adam is 7 months old, and Zayd 3 months and 1 week. Very soon, that will be a negligible difference in age, but now it seems like a lot. Anyway, they loved hanging out with each other.
This is what I like to call a "money shot." It was taken by me while my sister was making all kinds of crazy ridiculous noises.