Paint

Well this is awufl, but these are the last photos I took. The house looks totally different now. The crown is up, the cabinets are in, the bookcases are in, etc. I will try to update my photos this weekend! But this was last weekend...

playroom meeting dining room

living room and kitchen

upstairs hall

Our Childcare Journey

So I hadn't really gotten to share this...


I left off my story at us searching for a nanny. We had over 70 applicants to our posts on care.com and sittercity.com. Most of them worthless. It began with Nanny 1. Nanny 1 had great credentials but signed her emails "Ms. ____" which I already didn't like. I do not want grownups to refer to themselves that way to other grownups. Anyways, I already held my grudge and then Nanny 1 came in a smelled like smoke. She could have just turned around and walked right back out. (and yes, her profile said non smoker)


I loved Nanny 2. Nanny 2 was a few years younger than me, engaged, and had a 15 month old girl. We sat and talked to Nanny 2 for hours. When Nanny 2 left, I realized I wanted to be friends with Nanny 2, not hire her.


In the background of all this, there was Nanny 3. Nanny 3 wrote the most eloquent emails I have ever read. She was educated, retired, and away from her own grandkids. Perfect. I was DYING to meet Nanny 3. When I did, I was disappointed. Nanny 3 was very sweet but quite overweight. She could not get around very easily. Roman is wild now, I can't imagine in a short time when he can walk. My heart was broken that Nanny 3 did not live up to what I anticipated.


We had put a lot of stock in meeting Nanny 3. So we went back to the drawing board and interviewed Nanny 4. Nanny 4 originally wanted to watch kids in her own home, and then had written me back to tell me she had reconsidered. I LOVED Nanny 4. She was the whole package. A teacher, tired of teaching and financially able not to. Perky, warm, smart. Mother of a highschooler and college student. We offered Nanny 4 the job. She took a week to reply, only to say no, that she really just wanted to watch kids in her own home. REALLY?!?!?! Waste of time.


By the way this all took place over a month. Ugh.


So before Nanny 1, before before Nanny 1,my friend Elizabeth had said her friend was a nanny. She, now referred to as Nanny 5, has a son that is four months older than Roman. That made me very nervous and not very interested. Then, I honestly had forgotten about it. So Elizabeth reminded me and since nothing else had worked out, I made plans to interview Nanny 5 after our vacation.


While on vacation, hippie daycare called. They informed me of progress and I began to reconsider them. The money being one big reason. After vacation, we interviewed Nanny 5. I really liked Nanny 5, but I could not get over her son. And I was reconsidering having a nanny at all for financial reasons. I asked Nanny 5 if she would watch Roman until the hippie daycare opened. She had been offered another job and didn't want ours if it had the potential of ending in a matter of weeks. Fair enough.


That week I started working whenever I had someone to watch Roman. I spent Wednesday at home in tears most of the day. I had let myself be convinced that I could live with him going to Baptist East daycare until the hippie daycare opened. I guess I convinced myself. The entire day of crying and depression didn't seem very convincing. The next morning Elizabeth watched Roman. I told her about our decision and she really made me reconsider. She reassured me about her friend (Nanny 5) and her son. She really helped me see things clearly. I talked with friends and family and the load already began to lighten. I called and hired Nanny 5, LINDSEY, that night. That evening was filled with more smiling and laughter than Warren and I had seen out of each other for days.


So Lindsey started last week and things have been great! It is so relieving to have someone I trust and feel comfortable with watching Roman.

Big Scare

I am sure it is obvious by my lack of posting, but I went back to work. School hasn't started, and actually our first day tomorrow has already been cancelled due to power outages, but I have spent the past two weeks working in my room. This was my last weekend of freedom and when it began Friday night with Mad Men and enchiladas, I could never have guessed what was about to happen. We woke up at 3:30 am Friday night/Saturday morning depending on how you look at it. Roman was tossing and turning and being disruptive to our sleep. Warren kind of sat up and said his heart was "doing that thing again". About two years ago, after a (very) fun Halloween night, Warren woke up and his heartbeat was racing and irregular. It went away, no worries. It happened maybe two other times. After a Christmas party and after 4th of July. You can connect the dots here. However, us staying in with our five month old watching Netflix isn't exactly a crazy party. Usually :) This time was different; I could SEE his heart going crazy in his chest. Warren decided to go to the hospital. He does, after all, work in CARDIAC rehab at Baptist East. So we went, I stayed home with Roman.
He called around 6:00 to say he had been admitted. His heart was in A-Fib. Google it, I can't explain it. I got to the hospital around 9:00 and it was pretty uneventful. Finally around 1:30 he went into sinus (?), a.k.a. things went back to normal. They did another EKG and an echocardiogram. Warren, or his coworkers, or my bf's mom, head of cardiovascular services knew his doctor and/or everyone doing the tests. Though Warren couldn't manage to finagle a private room as an employee. Anyways, it was the weekend, and things are slow, so he had to spend the night. Our lovely friends Matt, Elizabeth, and Jeremiah came to visit last night. I left to go home to the baby. Then, the on call cardiologist sent him home this morning. He will see Dr. Mandola (?) a physio-electro (I made that up) specialist. He specializes in the heart's electrical system. Until then he is on heart regulatory meds and blood thinners.
That's the story, morning glory. He's fine now, just tired from sharing a room with an old man that had to be checked on frequently. We'll have to wait to find out the whats and whys.

Walls

For the past few weeks the house progress has been boooooring! They've been doing plumbing, electrical, and HVAC. But this week we got walls and siding!!! I love our cedar shakes!

Cloth Diapers

I am not really sure why, but it seems like I have been doing a lot of cloth diaper talk lately. So I thought I would lay this all out there for any friends currently or wanting to cloth diaper.
My lovely mother-in-law purchased this kit for me as a shower gift.

The kit consists of OsoCozy unbleached cotton prefolds. You get 36 small and 24 medium. It also contains Bummis Whisper Wrap covers. You get 4 small and 4 medium. Last, it includes a roll of Bummis diaper liners. The prefolds are amazing. I always have enough with the amount in the kit. I have been super pleased with the diapers. I also really like the Whisper Wrap covers. However, 4 is not enough. I have found you need 8 to keep from doing laundry everyday. I purchased these separately from Amazon. Many people prefer pocket diapers. I have used them, as you will read below. I prefer the prefolds because if it is just pee, you can change the diaper and reuse the cover. I think it is much easier.
Now when Roman was first born, none of the diapers from my lovely kit above would fit. So my darling sister-in-law sent these Bummis All in One pocket diapers. She sent them in a newborn size. This still would not fit for the first three weeks. So for the first three weeks, we used disposables. Then I went to the All in Ones. I used those until 2 months. Now, I have a giant baby, so they may last longer for other babies. While I was using the All in Ones, I used the Bummis liners from my aforementioned kit. They are biodegradable, so you just flush them right down the toilet. They were helpful since the pocket diapers do not hold up to stains as well as the prefolds. However, I do not use the liners with my prefolds.

Finally, I use Rockin Green detergent. It is a miracle product. I love it. It get the diapers so clean. I get the unscented. I tried scented and it's weird. Scent mixed with poop only smells like even weirder poop :)

First Food

Roman ate his first food over the weekend-bananas!

Windows and Doors and Tubs

The rough plumbing was done this week, which involves a lot of behind the scenes work. However, when I went today I was surprised to find exterior doors and (most) windows!

playroom and patio door
mudroom/driveway door

living room

Roman's/guest bathroom

master bathroom

master bedroom

Roman's bedroom

guest bedroom

Now I didn't take a photo of the front door. This is because surely the door there now is temporary. Our door is wood and black. The door on there right now is aluminum and white. Also the exterior doors have nickel hardware and it should be oil-rubbed bronze. Now the previous "mistakes" I found, were not really mistakes. They just did things one way and came back to adjust. I am hoping the doors came nickel and they are just going to come back later to switch to oil-rubbed bronze. Again, I am hoping!

Next week they are roughing in the HVAC and late next week, or early the following week, we will meet with the electrician to plan the lighting! Yay! Well I don't actually know why I say "yay" because I know I am going to be a pain in their butt in regards to getting what I want in budget. Anyways, that's it on the house for the holiday weekend!

Super Nanny

Our plan all along has been to go to the daycare at Warren's work. I visited last summer when I was pregnant and thought the preschool program was great. However, in the past few weeks I have been very seriously panicking about leaving my boy. I mean, with anyone. I have spent every day with him for four months and I cannot imagine not being with him. Don't get me wrong, I love my job. Honestly, my ideal would be to work part time. Which we can't afford and if we found a way, I doubt my boss would let me. So along comes childcare. I was freaking out and sporadically crying about leaving Roman anyways. And I got this image in my head of Roman crying in a crib all alone, as such....


This was breaking my heart. One day I was perusing facebook and saw that Mama's Hip had posted about a new childcare center being opened. It is supporting a national program called Lively Children. I read up on it and was OBSESSED. It is all about organic food, nurturing the baby, free play, home like atmosphere, only TWO babies etc. It was out of the way, but I didn't care. I got an appointment to meet with the director and so super excited. However, when I met with her I was terribly disappointed. She was really nice, but just kind of out of it. I mean she was an intelligent lady, and I think she would love on my baby, but I just couldn't imagine her running a daycare. She did not instill confidence in me and Warren. That said, we have not completely discounted this place, just sort of put it on the back burner.
I emailed my doula Kim, who always knows the right thing to say, and she definitely encouraged me. I decided that my invented crib crying fantasy was no reason to discount our original plan. So I went to Warren's work yesterday to check things out. I left Roman with Warren to be ogled by the nurses and stopped in the daycare. I had a lovely, reassuring chat with the manager. I had a smile on my face as I walked for her to show me the 0-6 month room. When I walked in I could feel my face drop. I had to will myself not to throw up. There were two adults and ten babies, a ratio I was prepared to accept. However, there was not one baby, NOT ONE, being played with. They were the most lifeless looking little things compared to my (and my friends) babies. Two babies were in cribs asleep. Two were in cribs staring at the ceiling. Two were in Boppies staring at a wall. One was getting a bottle without being cradled. A few were in swings staring into space. It was heart wrenching. I fought back tears and tried to get out of there as soon as possible. When I left I texted Warren not to ask how it was, that we would discuss later. I didn't want to cause a scene at his work. But when I walked in, Theresa and Kristen, his closest co-workers had funny looks on their faces and asked how it was. I just started crying. Kristen hugged me and I just cried.
Obviously, I got my ish together and moved on. So now we are looking for a nanny. We have a job posting on both sittercity.com and care.com. We have had one applicant I am very interested in already. So wish us luck!

Upstairs

Our contractor called yesterday to say that they were completely finished framing and had cleaned up. So we went to take a look...

living room, with fireplace in correct location

guest bedroom

Roman's bedroom

master bedroom

my closet, woot woot

master bath walking into closet

stairs

I think they are working on roughing in the plumbing and HVAC next. Less exciting.

Doctors and Bouncers

So Roman visited his new pediatrician, Dr. Corba, yesterday for his four month check up. I was super impressed at the adorable waiting room (though my photos are crap). The lighting was really soft and calming and the murals were adorable. Especially loved the apes hanging from the celing. I felt like I was inside of a children's museum!

Dr. Corba was amazing. When we met with him, he asked us what was going on with our vaccinations. We explained the story of Warren's sister and her reaction to the pertussis vaccine. As Warren was talking, Dr. Corba sort of furrowed his brow and was clearly weighing his options. He was going "Hmm. Hmm." with his head all nodding back and forth. After considering things, he agreed we should not get the DTaP. Later, he asked about how much Roman was eating. This, in my experience, is a trick question to get the doctor to scold you when you tell him how much your giant baby eats. I sort of frowned and didn't respond. He said it was ok and just to tell him. When I said around 40 oz. he also didn't criticize the amount I have been feeding Roman. Therefore, he is now wonderful in my eyes.
Also, wonderful was Roman. He got his shot and we had his bottle ready (crucial) and he took it and stopped crying immediately. He didn't cry the rest of the day, that strong boy!!!!

In other news, Roman's doorway jumper from Grandpa came yesterday. It is called Merry Muscles.

It is a Canandian product, and I thought the packaging looked about 40 years old.

But Roman loves it!