Lately

As you may have noticed, my blog game is kinda weak this week (sorry about that) so I thought I'd do a quick catch up on all of the exciting adventures of the Sandmeier family!

Sleep Training/Daddy & Mommy's Baby-less Vegas Trip

Since Jackson was born, he's slept in our bed. When he was a tiny newborn, he'd begin each night in his Rock & Play next to our bed and then move into his Boppy (on our bed) after his first early morning nursing session. Anyway, when he turned about a month old, we ditched the Rock & Play and Boppy and he'd just sleep on top of the covers in the crook of my arm (which makes for much easier nursing sessions). Fast forward a year and nothing has changed.

Brandon has been saying since Day 1 that we need to crib train and stop letting Jackson sleep in bed with us but I was never on board (I love being able to snuggle all night with such a cuddly little baby!); however, Jax was starting to pull away from me in the night to lay on his stomach which set off a green light in my head that he was probably ready to sleep on his own. 

I just wasn't ready for him to sleep on his own. And the most selfish mom of the year award goes to..

While laying in bed on NYE, Brandon noticed that one of the major airlines was having a big $20.15 (one-way) sale to select destinations and made a comment about how we should take advantage and go somewhere. Long story short, none of the $20.15 times/days worked with our schedule but it put the idea into both of our heads of how nice it would be to go away for a weekend with just us. 

No changing diapers? No cutting food into bite sized pieces? No having to constantly hold a curious toddler up to the door so he can play with the locks/handle? Time alone with my husband? It sounded like a dream come true! (Don't get me wrong--being Jackson's mom is my favorite job ever but a nice little break to recharge sounded heavenly)

While Brandon was at work the next day, I began browsing travel sites for vacation packages and found an awesome one to Vegas that I decided to book and surprised Brandon with. When I told him the news, he was thrilled and immediately began looking at different shows to see (we're seeing Cirque du Soleil's Ka--we try to attend a different Cirque show every time we go on vacation and have seen the one in Orlando as well as Beatles Love in Vegas) while I scoped out the Groupons. 

The sad (for me)/hard part of taking this vacation? It was finally time to crib train Jax. 

We've tried crib training a few times in the past but it was never anything we really stuck to but knew that this time had to be different. So last Friday night, we began--and he actually did way better than we'd expected! I nursed him and then Brandon put him in his crib and stood by him, rubbed his back, and talked to him until he fell asleep. He slept for about an hour before waking up again which is when I went in and did the same thing (back rub/talking) for about 10 minutes--and then he slept for 3 1/2 hours! I felt invincible and wondered why we hadn't tried this months earlier!

That's when it happened.

I woke up at around 2am feeling incredibly engorged (I'm used to Jax "comfort nursing" on and off throughout the night) and felt a gigantic lump in my right breast. I figured it was the start of mastitis and began to panic. When Jax woke up again at around 3am, I brought him back into bed with us so I could let him nurse for awhile and hopefully kick whatever I had before it got worse. Long story short, I had a clogged milk duct (most painful thing EVER) that luckily never turned into mastitis but took a good 3 days to work out. 

On Saturday night, I went ahead and kept Jax in bed with us so he could nurse off and on again all night and promised Brandon we'd try sleep training again on Sunday night. And we did..

..but with the Pack n' Play in our room. 

He didn't seem to be able to get very comfortable in his Pack n' Play so we ended up moving him back into his crib on Monday night (where he kept waking up over and over). I'm pleased to announce that Jax is currently napping like a little angel in his room after fighting the urge to sleep, his crib, and me for 2 whole hours!

It's definitely going to take some time to get Jackson sleep trained but we're going to keep at it.. it'll definitely help Grammy & Grandpa out a bunch when they babysit him during our Vegas trip! Stay tuned for an even longer blog post regarding our experience with sleep training/my clogged milk duct (a story that I'm sure you're all dying to hear). 

Sunday night snoozing in the Pack n' Play.

Nap time on Monday--I'd nurse him until he was just barely awake, would lay him down, and then he'd jump up ready to play.. it was a looooong day.

It took two hours but I was finally able to get him to take a nap in his crib!

Out & About

Jackson is such a social little guy and loves to be around other little kids (he shrieks when he sees them--it's so funny!) so I make it a point to get us out of the house to play at least once a day. This week, we've taken several trips to the library, ran/jumped/slid around like mad at a toddler gym, climbed around at the park, and played around in the kids room at the place where Jax gets his hair cut. 

I sure do miss the newborn/tiny baby days but I do have to admit that this is such a fun stage--Jax has the most fun little personality and it's so fun to watch him play and explore! 

Doing his own thang post haircut.

He had such a fun time at the toddler gym and wanted to play with all the "big kids"--mommy got quite the workout in too by taking Jackson up and down the giant inflatable slide several times and by jumping (while holding Jax) in the bounce house.

We stayed with my parents on Thursday and discovered this awesome puzzle at my hometown library--it has all different types of locks and doors to open and close!

These girls were so sweet and patient--Jax was in heaven!

He thought he was pretty hot stuff in his little red car :) He drove, ate his cookie, and yelled at everyone we passed while we grocery shopping on Monday (and mom managed to run into only one display!).

Pinterest Fail

Last February, I designed cute little Valentines with a few of Jackson's newborn pictures and thought it'd be fun to do it again this year. I've seen those adorable pictures of babies with lipstick marks all over them and thought that'd be simple and adorable to do with Jax! This is what happened:

It looks like he's crying but he was actually doing his fake smile and had a hard time keeping his eyes open because of the flash.

If I'd had a better background, lighting, and actually knew how to use our Nikon, these might not have been so bad! I did get a couple decent shots (below) and may still work on editing them and making cards.. we shall see.

Hope you're having a wonderful week!