The One Where Noone Gets Any Sleep...

Last night was rough. To put it mildly, it SUCKED.


Cooper is sick. Sniffly, congested, can't breath, SICK. But last night we added another element to the mix. Uncontrollable crying and withering around. I knew he was hurting but I was having a hard time figuring out where and what (if anything) I could do about it. We tried tylenol. We tried a bottle. We tried a flashlight...(which sounds weird but Craig has this flashlight and is just Cooper size and when it's dark sometimes you can hand it to Coop and he flails it around and watches the light and chews on the end...). Anyway we tried all that we knew to try. Craig walked around with him. I cradled him. NOTHING. WAS. WORKING.


He would take his bottle for like 30 seconds and then stop and start to cry again. I thought maybe he was having trouble with the milk (because of all the freakin congestion) so we tried pedialyte. He would still only eat for like half a minute.

I had him propped in my lap on a pillow and all of a sudden IT ALL CAME UP. Like possibly everything he had ever eaten in his whole life, possibly everything anyone had ever eaten in their whole life...since the beginning of time...all PROJECTILE VOMIT style. We were soaked and covered and so was the bed.

I changed and changed the Coop, who had miraculously stopped screaming and was down to a whimper. Poor little baby, I knew he must be miserable. Anyway so we relocated to the couch and I tried just holding him against me which was actually working so me and him propped against the couch to try and get some much needed sleep. (By this time it was 3:00 am).

Craig comes and flops on the other couch, apple in hand...I'm like, "what are you doing, are you not going back to bed?" He was like "no, pretty much I have to get up in three hours I'll just stay up!" (See when I get delirious I get funny when Craig gets delirious he gets cranky and unreasonable).

So me and Coop are sitting there trying to sleep while Craig sits 3 feet away and munches on an apple...have you ever heard anyone eat an apple at 3:00 in the morning? Pretty much the most annoying sound ever...it's dead silence then CRUUUUNNNNCH...chew chew chew...CRUUUUNNNNCH...chew chew chew.

I cannot describe to you the absolute torture this caused my ears. It was worse than nails on a blackboard, it was worse than nails on jeans (bec!) and I'm pretty sure it was worse than if fifteen cows had been in my house, all mooing, all dying.

Finally the apple was gone. Then *then* he decided to go back into the bedroom...finally I think we'll get some rest. Now I'm trying not to move at all because I don't want to risk waking him up and starting this whole process over again.

Mercy cat jumps up on the coffee table and swipes the bag of cat treats that are lying there. CRAP! Now if a normal cat encountered a bag of treats it wouldn't be that bad. They might bat it around a little, play with it for a few seconds but then they would loose interest because, well they're a cat and a cat has the attention span of like, 2.8 seconds. But not Mercy cat, she is like a freakin ninja...with tools. She grabs the bag with her teeth and carries it to the floor. All the while I'm whispering "mercy...mercy...no...NO..." She ignores me and proceeds to use her teeth and front paws to rip into the bag...an effective, albeit SLOW, TORTUROUS way to open them. So I keep hearing *crinkle* rip rip rip *crinkle* rip rip rip until I almost entitled this post "the one where the cat gets the boot".

Then the crying starts again. AUGHGHTHTHGHGH. I try a nifty little hold called the collick carry that my brilliant mom showed me. This calmed him and as long as I had pressure on his tummy he was fine. The minute I layed him down he screamed but if I was holding him pressing on his tummy he seemed okay. So this is what we did. We pressed and we whimpered and we slept.

Poor little guy, I hope and pray that he feels better today. (Craig and my mom have him at the doctor right now).

And as for Craig and Mercy, no more cat treats and SO HELP ME IF I EVER BUY ANOTHER APPLE AGAIN.

DO YOU JUST WANT ME TO BEND OVER OR WHAT?!

Last night I was hit with a particularly hard case of delirium...is that a word? Anyway I was absolutely DELIRIOUS.

Craig, Cooper, Cooper's curious george doll and me were laying on the couch and Craig was trying to get comfortable so he was moving around and I thought he needed a pillow for his head so I'm like "do you want me to stuff curious george in you?" And he was like, "ummmm yeahhhhh what do you want me to do, bend over?!" And I'm like "WHAT?!" He's like, "you asked if I wanted you to stuff curious george IN me." (insert hilarious laughter here). "NOooooooo" I say, "I meant do you want me to stuff curious george in your head.....wait...I mean UNDER your head...as a pillow..." But Craig thought we just needed to go to bed because I apparently really needed some sleep.

So we're laying in bed and we're all watching Cooper's new projector thing that we got him for Christmas. (It plays lullabys and projects lights and scenes on the ceiling...very relaxing). So we're just laying there enjoying it and Craig was like "well is there anything else that you want to prop on my face?" I look over to see what he means and realize that I've flopped my whole hand across his face and it was just laying there...I guess I thought it was comfortable, I don't know...I didn't even realize I was doing it. (More hilarious laughter).

Then after the lullabys had stopped and the lights had went out we were almost asleep when I burst into a fit of giggles. "What? asked Craig, are you thinking about the curious george thing again?" "No....I (hehehehe) I was just thinking about (hahahaha) I was remembering aunt Trudy opening the enema at Christmas (AHAHAHAHAHAHA!) Do...(hehehe) do you remember that? Do you remember her UNWRAPPING it?!?! The look on her face when she saw the ritz box (hahahahahahahahahaha)" And Craig was like "Vaguely...but I don't remember it being that funny".

I continued to laugh myself to sleep...oh if every night could consist of happy thoughts about curious george and Christmas enemas...

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Cooper-month 7

Cooper...where do I even begin? This last month you have done more, learned more and tried more than in your whole life time combined! You seem to develop new skills and "do new tricks" each and every day! Every time I come home is extremely exciting because I just never know what to expect! All the time you are trying new things.

You can now roll over from side to side, although you generally stop in between rolls and flop your head down on the floor and then look up at us like "why am I in the floor and you're up there watching me?! PICK. ME. UP."

You say "dadada" constantly and it's so appropriate because he IS your very favorite person! Last night I got to your gran and grandpa frosty's first and you were *mildly excited* to see me. Enough to give me a small smile and then go back to playing. But when your daddy walked in the room anyone would have thought that you hadn't seen that man in a year because you lifted up your arms and you excitedly started clasping your fists together and you smiled and laughed and squealed and absolutely could not wait for him to pick you up! It was a "melt your heart" kind of moment. Even if you didn't do it for me...

You now say "hey" and "hi". When we walk in we say HEY and more often than not you mimic us in your adorable little voice HEYYY. I love to hear you talk. I could listen to your chatter all day, every day.

You are trying to crawl. Last night you were on the floor on your tummy and you were moving your arms and legs the right way but your belly was in the way. You looked like you were swimming, IT WAS HILARIOUS! I think very very soon you'll start to at least army crawl (you came so close last night) and after that there really will be no stopping you!

I have to do some MAJOR baby proofing very soon...

Oh you do this one thing where you grab both sides of our face and kind of give us a kiss. Except it's more like you try to eat our nose or chin or cheek...and I'm not entirely sure that it's out of affection...it's more like a war strategy...like maybe we're your prisoner and you're trying to make us talk...but all the same I LOVE IT! I'm a sucker for any kind of attention you pay us.

You can now sit up by yourself which is adorable and pretty handy too. You're still pretty unsteady and you do topple over but we can sit you up between us (me and your daddy) and you love it!

This past weekend we had Christmas with mema, grandma gilleland, brad, donna, crystal, brandy and dillon. You loved it! You would open a present, play with it, get cranky and then open another gift. You did seem a little over whelmed at times...and baby, you ain't seen nothing yet!

Tomorrow is Christmas eve and we'll go to grandma mincey's to open presents then to dipper dan's. Then on Christmas day we'll have santa presents, then presents from mommy and daddy then we'll have Christmas with nanny and poppop THEN we'll have Christmas with gran, frosty and aunt bec! WHAT A DAY!!!

The reason we celebrate Christmas is because God gave us Jesus. God sent Jesus to earth, to live and teach and finally to die. Jesus gave us the ultimate gift...he gave his life because that was the only way me and you and daddy and ANYONE could go to heaven. God gave us his Son, knowing that he had to make this sacrifice. And Jesus knew, even thousands of years ago that he was dying for us. For you, Cooper. He looked through time and saw your face and he said your name and I know that one day when you're old enough you'll ask him to live inside your heart. That's the reason that we celebrate Christmas. God gave us the gift of Jesus and Jesus gave us the gift of Salvation. We commemorate this by giving each other gifts. That's how tradition starts. This is the serious side of Christmas and it's the most important. Christmas is all about giving.

Santa Claus is part of the spirit of giving. Anyone who spends all year selflessly making thousands and thousands of toys and training reindeer surely deserves a shout-out! Santa spends all Christmas eve delivering toys to little boys and girls all around the world! What a wonderful feeling to be little and wake up Christmas morning and know that all around the world there is celebration and fun and OH MY GOSH AT THE PRESENTS! Santa is a part of Christmas, not the most important part but still a part!

Remember these things when you get older. Listen to your mommy, she is very wise...

I love you more than I will ever be able to tell you or communicate to you. It would be impossible to let you know just how much you have completed me and your daddy. We finally have our family. You, little one, you make everything happier, better and I absolutely don't know what we did without you! I am having more fun watching you grow, helping you learn and just showing you more love than I've ever felt in my entire life...

Cooper, Merry Christmas, baby!

Love,
mommy

Naughty Deer...

Merry Christmas from my aunt kathy and uncle rob...i asked them to email me pictures of the family to use for a project that i was doing...this is what i got...REALLY GUYS? REALLY?!?!

1 HOUR, 40 MINUTES TO GO...

until i get off...basically all im doing at the moment is killing time...riding the clock...looking busy. should we have to work the week before Christmas? my answer is no, unless of course you're in retail and then i think stores should have to stay open 24/7 until Christmas eve so all of us who have procrastinated all year long can finish their shopping...that is if we had any money to do it with...which we probably don't.

we had to pay for Craig's school the other day (which i had totally forgotten was due) and was kind of in shock and totally unprepared and i did not have $431. So trying to be the responsible self-reliant adult that i strive to be (insert eye rolls here), i called my credit card company to see if they could extend my credit limit so we could charge it...i was informed that i had sufficient credit for someone with my economic status...REALLY?! ARE YOU SURE?! because i think *I THINK* if i truly had sufficient credit then i wouldnt have called to try and get more...

and why does the internet always tell you this will work? every money saving article is always like "call the credit card company, they will work with you. they'll extend your credit limit. they'll take that late charge off. they'll reduce your interest rate..." SERIOUSLY INTERNET?! I FEEL LIKE YOU LIE TO ME...i mean maybe they would extend YOUR credit limit but maybe thats because you're apparently some kind of FINANCIAL ADVISOR since you're writing articles about it...but for me (joe-the-non-plumber) they feel that i have sufficient enough credit...

now we could have easily borrowed the money from my parents but they probably would have lent us cash to which i would feel compelled to pay back the next week when we got payed and really i had already planned to use that money for useful things like Christmas presents and...cheese...so i needed a financial lender who was willing to put up a credit card for us. so we called craig's mom and she charged it for us...yay for people with SUFFICIENT UNTAPPED CREDIT...

ANYWAY that was kind of a random tirade...like i said me: bored. and for some reason im not capitalizing or punctuating...is punctuating a word? hmmm im not sure...

so its almost a new year so we should all be making resolutions that we intend to keep but will probably break before january 2nd...i could write a whole book about resolutions that i need to make but i wont bore you...either that or im afraid that once i put it in writing i'll feel compelled to stick with it...

i was thinking maybe id like to win something this next year...a car would be nice...but seriously i was thinking i might enter lots of contests next year. like maybe at least one a day? contests are everywhere: internet, magazines, stores, etc. but anyway im thinking if i find at least one contest to enter a day (and blog about it) i would be bound to win SOMETHING. and if after 365 times of entering and not winning i think we can conclude that all of that is a scam...and that we've been lied to...

so anyway let me know what you think...or not...whatever...im going back to looking busy for...75 more minutes...

BABY STEPS...

So my grandma (whom I truly do love, although you might not believe it after this), decided that my Cooper needed shoes THIS weekend. She called on Saturday morning and asked what I was doing. The truth was I had planned on running to Gainesville to go shopping because I desperately needed to finish some Christmas shopping but I was on a pretty tight schedule because we had our Christmas Church supper that night (where Craig played santa claus and did an AWESOME job and handed out marshmallow guns to all the kids-woo hoo go craig!)

Anyway so it was going to be kind of a rush trip but then again any shopping trip with my grandma is a rush trip, just ask anyone who's ever been...Becca...Gretchen...mom...Trudy...you know it...you know it is. The woman is almost...73? I'm pretty sure that's how old but she can RUN like no one's business. She RUNS and gets exactly what she is looking for and then she's all like, "okay are you ready to go" and we're all like "ummmm we've only been here for fifteen minutes and the only store we've been to is Belk's so...noooooo we're not ready quite yet..."

So we loaded up, (me, grandma, Cooper and Bec, who let us know that she didn't even want to go but she didn't have a whole lot of choices...gee thanks...).

My grandma has this obsessive thing with Cooper's feet. She thinks they are in a constant state of icyness. She's always like "his feet are freezing", "cover his feet up" and "MY LORD, WHERE ARE HIS SOCKS?!" And I always say things like "he loves NAKIE FEET...let his toes breath" and then she just gives me a look like she wants me to die.

I just don't see the point in baby shoes. Sure they're cute but they serve no purpose. Does he walk? No. Therefore he doesn't need shoes! But I thought okay, what the heck, she wants to buy shoes, if it makes her happy, we'll buy shoes, how hard could that be...(famous last words)...


Okay this is the problem with my kid's feet: they are extremely FAT. And I kind of thought that they were long too, that is until I actually started trying to fit him for shoes. But they're not, they are actually just really fat and short...so kind of ball like...picture a really round foot shaped ball with long toes sticking out...

We tried shoes at target. We found nothing that fit however we did get a really good picture of Becca trying huge ladies pink fuzzy slippers on him. Grandma was not amused.


Next we went to the mall. We went to J.C. Penny's-no fat baby feet shoes. We went to Sears-nothing but long skinny toddler shoes. We had an interesting conversation:

-grandma: are you going to let him watch sesame street?

-me: sure, yeah, he loves t.v.

-grandma: (leaning closer): well let me tell you what I heard...

-me: (looking nervously at bec because WELL you just never know...)

-grandma: somebody at work told me that they called their daughter and said YOU BETTER NOT BE LETTING MY GRANDKIDS WATCH THAT SESAME STREET! because I heard that bert and ernie...well ya know...

-me: what?

-grandma: you know, bert and ernie...they're playin a different kind of family...

-me: WHAT?

-grandma (whispering): gay!

-me: grandma, I thing they're brothers.

-becca: yeah I'm pretty sure they're brothers.

-grandma: well...I don't know...I just wanted to tell you in case you don't want him watching that

-me: I'm almost positive they're brothers so yes, sesame street is fine...

-bec: (eyes rolling all over the place)

Back to the horrible shoe shopping...so it wasn't just that they weren't fitting every single shoe was a battle. Becca would hold Cooper suspended in air trying to keep his arms down. Grandma would hand me shoes and I would try to wrestle it onto his flailing foot not convinced in that moment that he wasn't spawned from an octopus...the kid hates shoes! He is apparently very ticklish on his feet and everytime I touched him it was like his.feet.were.on.fire.and.he.hated.his.mommy. So there was flailing and screaming and gnashing of teeth...wait maybe that's something else I'm thinking of...

ANYWAY so we find nothing! We hit every store imaginable that might have shoes that would fit him. I was soaked in sweet, this was hard work! Grandma was getting desperate, she even pointed out a shoe store who's name was oddly enough: SHOES, SHOES, SHOES! Grandma got really excited until Becca pointed out that it looked like all they had were high heeled shoes and other hooker apparel...

We finally made it to Belk's, grandma's mecca and the one place where she was positive they would surely have the right baby shoes for Cooper's feet. By this time mom and dad, who were doing some shopping of their own had joined us. We tried on more and more shoes. NOTHING. Finally she see's a rack off in the distance. "Look!" Her excitement was almost *almost* contagious. The last rack...off in the horizon...our last chance for our baby not to catch frostbite and end up like a three-toed angry old man...


They have a pair that GLORY HALLELUJAH, fits! They were actually pretty cute too! Augh, sweet relief, life is good again, I can stop tormenting my child and his toes! Grandma is elated. I flip the shoe over...$30.00...thirty...THIRTY LOUSY DOLLARS for a pair of shoes that he DOESN'T need and that he will only be able to wear for MAYBE a month..."grandma, $30.00 dollars is a lot of money...why don't we just wait..." She looks horrified...she looks defeated...she looks at my dad. He says, "$30.00 is extremely unreasonable for a pair of baby shoes." She put the shoes back. She consoled herself by buying two huge packs of baby socks and I promised that if it was really cold I would dress him in two pairs...This was Saturday afternoon.

Sunday morning: I get a wake up call. Grandma wants to know if we're up and tell us that she's coming down, she has something for Cooper. She gets there with an adorable pair of sneakers. They actually fit! She said she couldn't sleep at all on Saturday night so she got up super early and went to walmart. She said if she hadn't found any there she was going to get my dad to take her to Atlanta...

Grandma was so happy I didn't even have the heart to tell her that the characters on the side of the shoe were from Sesame Street...