Leaving on an airplane....

Nathalie sleeping at the Vegas airport.

I'm not going to be blogging that much on this trip. But I thought I'd regale you with our plane adventures.

I was scheduled to leave Columbus at 5:00 and arrive in to Tucson at 10:30 with a 2 hour layover in Vegas. But because of dust storms in Vegas, we were on the plane for an extra hour, waiting for our turn to land. Then at the Vegas airport, I found out that our plane to Tucson would be delayed because an airplane from Kansas was delayed (again because of the dust storm). So we left Vegas at 10:30. I admit that after the extra-long time on the plane, when I found out my plane was delayed in Vegas, I almost cried. I was able to put Nathalie down for a short nap in the airport and Emily passed out the minute I buckled her in on our plane to Tucson.

You do the math. 10:30 Vegas time is 1:30 Ohio time. It was only an hour flight but by the time we got back to the house, the girls and I were exhausted. They didn't sleep very well, but we're doing better now.

Did I mention that Matt had to stay and work for a couple extra days? I did the plane ride alone. We won't be doing that again!

3 times zones. two outfits, 6 diapers and cranky children later....

We made it to AZ. The first night Matt went home, my children woke up during the night. Nathalie cried for 1 hour in my arms, then woke up several times in the night. Emily woke up because Nathalie was crying.

We had a slight respite at my brother-in-law's house except that I slept with Emily and she spins around like an egg-beater at night. She got more rest than I did.

Yesterday we flew from OH to AZ. We were late getting to the airport, but made it in okay.

Sorry

We're traveling and I won't be posting for another few days. Hope you have safe travels!

Christmas is supposed to be a time of relaxing...but apparently I didn't get the memo. Matt finished his semester, I made curtains and a quilt (almost), it got cold, Nathalie got two teeth and Emily is adorable. Thought I'd include this picture of my beautiful baby and a video of my child prodigy. I was trying to get a picture of her with it half over her eyes and tongue sticking out but this is what I got instead. All she does now is stick her tongue out and make raspberries. She says "mamamamama" and "lalalalalal". And she crawls like a wildfool, pulls herself up and eats anything on the floor!

Emily loves to read. After two times of reading her a book, she can usually recite it back to me. One of her favorites is the The Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carl and she has it memorized. You can see her reading it Nathalie--who isn't paying attention at all.

Pretty awesome

This year Emily and I have been enjoying the lights people put up on their houses. We take "light" walks and go to our favorite houses to look at the lights. There are some houses around our neighborhood that really knock themselves out. This is one of them. Turn up your volume so you can hear it!

P.S. Do you see Emily dancing?

What's missing this year?

I've haven't been feeling the usual Christmas excitement. While part of that is due to the fact that I feel like there's so much to do before I go out of town, I can pinpoint the other reason for not feeling "Christmasey".

My Veggie Tales Christmas cd doesn't work anymore. Hopefully I'll be able to get the music from my sis when I go home. Nothing says Christmas like Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber.

I've been debating about writing this post. By nature, I'm a very reserved person. So this is personal to me. But in the hope that someone else can relate to this, I've decided to go ahead.

I've always been self-concious of my chest. Let's face it--the Voluptuousness Goddess didn't bestow her gifts upon me. As I've gotten older, I had appreciated my body type more and started to accept the way I am. But when I had Emily I thought, "This is my chance to prove that I can be feminine even without being voluptuous." I knew I wanted to nurse Emily full-time and from what I had read nearly every woman should be able to nurse full-time.

Apparently, I wasn't one of those "nearly every woman".

For some reason, my milk dropped off when Emily turned 5 weeks. I saw lactation consultants, I tried several different herbal methods and nursing more frequently. Nothing helped and until she was 1 year old, I supplemented with formula. For awhile, I cried about not being able to breastfeed. I felt like a failure. Something was wrong with me! Why couldn't I nurse full-time?

Fast forward 20 months to Nathalie. I had done my research this time concerning nursing and natural birth. I had set goals and knew much more. I was determined to breastfeed Nathalie full-time again. She was born and fewer than 2 minutes later, she was nursing. All went well for the first two weeks. Then I got mastitis two weekends in a row and ended up going to my OB for a series of antibiotics. Because of the mastitis my milk supply dropped. It never recovered. Again I tried the methods I had used before, and I also contacted La Leche.

Again, I felt like a failure. The La Leche League Website says, "Mothers throughout the ages have been able to produce plenty of milk for their babies." So if I lived 200 years ago, my babies would starve to death? I must be a terrible mother.

Nathalie and I are almost done nursing. At this point, we're nursing because I want to feel close. She doesn't want to anymore. I couldn't nurse a mouse full-time right now. I've been mourning the loss of nursing and that's what prompted this post. I won't make it to a year of nursing with Nathalie and as I struggle with the feelings of failure, I remind myself that my worth as a mother isn't determined by how well I can nurse, but by how well I can nurture.

Differences

Natalie at 7 months.

It's amazing to me how different Nathalie and Emily are--even at such a young age. We were very busy with work and school when Emily was this age, but I remember a few things. Emily was a calm baby. I could take her anywhere and she was happy to sit in her stroller. She loved to look at things and to be with us. She sat up and crawled early. She looked like me and Matt when she was a baby, but now that she's older she is almost an exact clone of Matt. She laughed sometimes and smiled frequently--but most of the time she was content to sit and play. If I had to choose one word for her as a baby it would be content. As a toddler, Emily loves to do the same things over and over. She has lots of energy but doesn't always like new things. She is still very smart and ahead of herself developmentally. She is emotional (welcome to the 2s!) and strong willed but content most of the time.

Emily at 7 months.

Nathalie is a different story. Nathalie is very vocal and very definite about her likes and dislikes and has been from the first week. I've never met a 7 month old with so much personality. She sat up and crawled early too. If she wants me to pay attention to her, she shrieks until I do. If she gets mad at Emily for taking a toy, she shrieks until Emily gives it back. If she likes something, she kicks and kicks her legs, giggles, smiles and says, "babababababa". They were both happy babies, but where Emily was content, Nathalie is a go-getter. She loves people. She loves new things. She hates to sleep. She doesn't like to sit in the stroller for too long (or the carseat, or my lap, or the floor, or the highchair...). She wants to move and do and be right smack-dab in the middle of whatever is happening. (Can you imagine her as a 2-yr-old? I better start saving up my energy now!)

Bundles

It's been chilly-willy for us lately. We went to a Christmas parade at night and it was COLD so I bundled Emily up. Then I found this cute hat when I was going through our outdoor clothes and put it on Nathalie for our walk today. I have some pretty dang cute girls. (Yes, I know it's a video of Emily but I forgot to turn it to picture and I only had one shot!)