New normal

things are calming down a little here and we are finally trying to get a daily schedule worked out. elliot will be 6 weeks old this saturday, so it's time for him to move out of the pack-n-play in our room and into his crib. it's time, but i'll miss being able to just walk a couple of steps to get him. next week we'll be working on getting him on a workable schedule. hopefully my thrush will be completely gone so that truly can happen. speaking of elliot, that child has almost tripled my laundry. he uses at least two or three outfits a day, and sometimes four blankets and a few burp cloths. part of that i guess is me not being able to reuse anything that touches my breasts, but geez, the laundry is out of control...

we've already been working on getting emily and ethan into a routine, and things are going okay, but not great. the biggest adjustment for them has been at meal times. it's been a struggle trying to get emily to eat what we eat. she used to have a great diet, but now it's horrible; it consists of peanut butter sandwiches, pizza, chicken nuggets, fries/tots, pasta and yogurt. she will eat some fruits, but NO vegetables!! i guess it's our fault, but we know we've totally lost control of her. ethan has begun to mimics her every move and now he's starting to change his eating habits. also, we've tried several different vitamins, but she won't take any. we've tried gummivites, flintstones and the liquid kind. any suggestions on handling a picky eater? i almost want to call in to dr. phil.

so anyway, that's about all. i guess we are doing okay!

Thrush

if you are a male reader, please know this post contains graphic information about a woman's body - mine. stop reading now if you a: don't want to be grossed out, or b: don't want mental images that may harm you forever...

okay, so we noticed a few days ago elliot had what looked like a yeast infection in his diaper area. we knew what a boy-type yeast infection looked like since ethan has had two in recent months. we pretty much were like, okay, so he has a yeast infection. we've been treating it with this VERY expensive, but effective stuff called triple paste that is OTC but you have to order it from the pharmacy. so that was about a week ago. well, just so happens about a week ago i began to have trouble nursing elliot. my nipples began to get really red and started to hurt like crazy when he latched on. i just assumed it was because he was nursing SO MUCH that they began to just get raw. well, that did happen (the rawness), but a few days ago i noticed my milk was pink - there you go, i was cracked and bleeding. i really thought i would throw in the towel and stop nursing. but i was so conflicted. he's so little still and i did not want to be a quitter. that's when i decided i would give him two more weeks to "right himself" before i made any rash decisions. turns out the reason for all the breast pain (i'm having stabbing pains in both breasts as well) and nipple soreness/cracking was because he has thrush and passed it to my breasts. FINALLY! a reason for the insanity. i'm now on some antibiotics - i know what you are thinking, antibiotics can cause a yeast infection, but i had to have some relief and antibiotics are the only thing (i guess) that clears up infection. **allow me to edit - i'm on an antifungal medication, not an antibiotic.** dan is picking up elliot's medication to treat his thrush this afternoon. hopefully within a few days i won't be crying every time i nurse him.

it's no secret with those of you who know me well i never wanted to nurse; not ANY of my kids. i ended up nursing emily for 13 months and ethan for 8. he self-weaned at 8 months. i don't now, or at any time have felt a desire to nurse. why do i do it? because of pride. some people in my life have guilted me into nursing by telling me how selfish it is NOT to nurse, and scream about all the benefits. well, i've never been convinced about all the benefits. i flat out told dan if we did have a third i would see how breastfeeding went and then I would decide whether or not to continue. why am i going on about this? because i want to quit, but i can't get over myself to do it. if elliot does not nurse well after all this thrush nonsense is over i'll feel better about quitting. what do i need from my friends? permission to quit. please, someone give it to me and tell me it's okay. but really, when i heal it won't hurt anymore and i won't want to quit (so much)... but if he continues to nurse all day long i'll have to quit for my sanity. i know, i'm rambling.

**to be fair to dan, i'd like to point out he has already told me he supports any choice i make. he's seen firsthand how hard things are and how time consuming it has been sitting in a chair for the majority of the day. he's told me several times i can quit whenever i want.

Finally, a breather

i have a couple of minutes, so i thought i'd post what's been going on. elliot is sleeping and the kids are watching a blue's clues episode and eating a new snack. hopefully i'll finish this before all h*ell breaks loose! :)

we are in our new house! actually, we've been here two weeks today. it's been mass chaos, but we are all still alive. at this point, dan and i are in survival mode. one of us is always dealing with a kid or two, or all three!

i've had a difficult time with elliot. he eats what seems like nonstop all day. one day i counted the hours i was nursing him when dan was at work and realized i nursed him all but 2 hours that day. he did sleep some that day, but not a lot. i'm at my wits end, so i'm trying a couple of new strategies. hopefully he'll right himself soon. i'd love some advice from any of you who has nursed a baby who eats constantly. if he were the only kid i had to take care of, the amount of time i spent nursing him would not be a big deal. but i can't sit around all day long feeding him. on the sleep front, i don't want to jinx anything, but so far he's a great sleeper. he sleeps from around 10:30 until around 2, and then sleeps again until 5:30 or so. i really hope soon he starts to skip the 2 and sleep until 5!!

we all love the new place. it's a little challenging dealing with all the new spaces, but we'll get used to it i'm sure. for example, last week i was sure emily was taking her nap, but instead she was in my sewing room playing with what she thought were bathtub crayons. but nooo...she was playing with some face painting sticks left over from the egg hunt. she came downstairs covered in black paint. at first i was only a little ticked off because i thought all she colored on was her shirt, but when i went upstairs i was very angry when i found she'd colored all over the carpet. she told me not to worry, the bathtub crayons were washable. well, when dan got home he cleaned up the mess with the steam cleaner. oh well, lesson learned; i'll never assume they are anywhere!! we have the video monitor hooked up so we can see the gameroom and the nursery. it's funny to watch them when they don't know we are!

well, blue's clues is over and i hear doors closing and giggling, which means they are in my room probably waking the baby. hopefully i'll get a minute sometime to finish my thoughts. i have a lot of other things to say! :)