Levi is now rolling over. Our life is changing.

He started rolling over repeatedly today. I was cheering at first, now I am getting frustrated. Especially in regards to putting him to bed. He rolls over onto his stomach and doesn't know that he can just look to the side and not have to have his face in the mattress. He doesn't know that he can just push off and right himself once more. Ben had the great idea tonight to put him next to the crib wall where he can't roll over to his side... it's working so far, but he is still crying himself to sleep.

Yes, I do let my child cry himself to sleep, it's hard but it helps me stay sane.

Today we had more than half our poops on the potty! This was SOOOOOO exciting for me! Since last week was full of "failures" or what seemed like failures I felt like I was in heaven with my sweet boy going almost every time I cued him. He didn't pee on me once and held it until I could put him on his potty. It was truly a blissful EC day.

So yes, there is life after a potty pause :) It all came back and I am so thankful. Now if only he would sleep longer than 3-4 hours... it's killing me right now. Ben got up and took care of him at 4:45 after I had nursed him at 11:30 and then again at ... I don't remember, maybe 2 or 3... I don't understand.

Well, EC has been going a lot better. There are peaks and valleys with everything I think. I also think we are finally taking care of this diaper rash that's been hanging on for dear life. :)

Levi's had several poops in the potty, though they are not particularly substantial. He used to poop a lot more. Maybe that's because he is not in his growth spurt right now and isn't consuming quite as much. Life is much calmer when there is no growth spurt and Levi isn't constantly wanting to nurse me dry.

The diapers are getting better now that more poops are going in the potty, but I am still looking around for something I can use part time as he gets bigger. Not that he's bursting out of his FuzziBunz but his diaperaps are coming undone more and more often. Yes Lindsay, snaps do sound better.

I was also totally pumped that it made it up to 77 in our house. This makes the diaper free time much less stressful, I don't have to worry about him getting cold. I am probably more worried about him getting chilled than I am even if he pees on the carpet. There's my priorities folks.

I ordered a one side bumgenious today. Just one off of amazon. I hope it's not pink. I didn't really understand the process and I made it up to the checkout like 3 times each time thinking the price was way too much. Turns out they were trying to sell me 2 and then 3 of them... I don't know how that worked. By the end of it I was just hoping I would just order one. That's my advanced technical knowledge.

I started writing a song yesterday about Levi. The doctor said that I should write while I can because my feelings towards him will change as he grows. (He also probably knows that I will be way busier once Levi starts becoming mobile.) The song is basically about me feeling completely inadequate for this incredible task of parenting and the joy of watching a miracle like him right before my eyes.

We tried rice cereal these past two nights. Levi was not having any of it. I think for now I'm okay with that. We will revisit it again in a little while. :)

I'm sick of diapers!

Okay, so I am getting very fed up with my cloth diapers. I am so ready for just training pants or something, but we are not to that level yet. I will take pride in the fact that I have lasted this long. I heard of one mom only doing them for about a month and then quitting... So the bright side is that I've saved on about 4-5 months of diapers, some weeks more than others :)

The problems I am having though: FuzziBunz. They are soft and they wick away moisture and they are all in one with snaps and everything. The downside is that they don't hold much. And by much I mean more than an hour it seems. He overflows them all the time and I don't even leave him in them for that long. The other MAJOR downside is that they start to stink really badly. For some reason I can't get rid of the smell. I wash them with minimal detergent, I wash them in a soak cycle, I squeeze them outbefore I put them in the dryer... I am just really tired of them. Is there a good cloth diaper out there that won't stink and provides good leak protection?

My other ones are prefolds from Diaperaps. I like how the prefolds remain clean and the simplicity of just putting the diaper in the cover. I also feel it is important for Levi to feel the moisture after he pees, especially in the daytime. The prefolds are also great to put under him during his diaper free time. The only problem with them is the Velcro keeps rubbing up against his skin and making it red and irritated where it is attached. This is no fun for me or him.

Does anyone have any suggestions?

I love being able to take care of Levi. Sometimes I don't love it, but overall, it's pretty amazing.

Watching him grow and change feels like such a forever long process. I know it won't seem that way looking back, but I don't know that I can change those feelings right now.

ECing has been difficult lately. Last week I had several completely unsuccessful days. It seemed nothing landed in the potty, no pee, no nothing. But I don't see any reason for giving up. What, should I stop putting him on the potty altogether? I still have time, I am still able to. I am leaving him on the floor without a diaper now, we are working on a rash he has had for quite some time that doesn't seem to want to go away no matter how much lotramin I put on it. So maybe air will work.

He was doing so good a few weeks ago, I think I just need to step back and restore the bonds of communication. I need to think about his bodily rhythms and what he has been doing lately. What time has he been pooping? How often has he been peeing?

He's been waking up in the night again. I'm not sure if it's to nurse or because he is still teething. I nurse him in my barely conscious state and put him back to bed. Last night he woke up at 1 and at 4:45... I didn't change him at 1 but felt guilty about it at 4:45, what if he had pooped in his diaper earlier in the night and I made him sleep in it? What if he just wanted to be changed? In the middle of nursing I started stripping off his diaper. It was only wet and I felt a lot better. So I nursed him, put him on the potty and he didn't go, he must've gone right when he woke up. I put him back to bed. The plus side was that I got to spend more of the morning with just me and Ben because Levi then didn't wake up until about 8:30. It was nice, except Ben didn't get to see him that morning. I wonder how often that will be the case, that Ben won't get to see him in the mornings?

Well, that's my update for now. Still on the journey, still learning about my beautiful little boy and loving all of it.

Soon after I post about my EC potty failure Levi poops on the potty. It seems inevitable. I love my little one and how he always keeps me guessing.

Ben and I were talking about how he is such a good baby and pondering if it isn't because of my mothering style. I am not meaning to brag on myself, please don't get me wrong, but I think it's just the laid back approach. I think babies can really sense stress, it's human to sense stress and worry. I think it's important to make a decision not to worry or stress about, is he getting enough? Is he sleeping enough or too much or am I putting him on the potty too much or enough? None of those fears need to be feared. As mothers, we have been given by God a natural instinct to know what our child needs. If we have no idea what that is, we have the Holy Spirit to depend on. We are completely taken care of in these areas and worry is not something that has a hold in our lives.

I'm sure there are other factors to Levi being a good baby, such as his personality, but I can't help but also think that the attitude of the parent does play a valuable role.

Love you all!

Marcie said I needed to post :) So I think I will take the time for it.

I am still in the middle of reading "Diaper Free Baby" I will probably still be in the middle of it until Levi is potty independent. I'm not a fast reader and I just like to sit and think about what I am reading afterwards. That is why it is taking me so long to trudge through it.

I was just reading recently about a "potty pause" and what that meant. We are now in the middle of a potty pause. Levi has been having a tough time with teething. They said that developmental milestones can often result in a potty pause, or a setback in the training process. I haven't been able to catch hardly any pees or poops this week. He's been pretty fragile, so I've just been trying to be delicate with him. I imagine a mouth full of pain would make anyone cranky, so pottying has been on the back-burner so far.

Potty pauses can come when I child starts rolling over, crawling, teething. The best mindset in these types of situations is just to take a step back, give the child a break for a bit and then come back to it later. One woman scaled it back to pottying just once or twice a week. I'm still putting him on the potty, I just think the stress of life is too much for him to really think about it right now.

We've been waking up in the middle of the night this past week, I'm praying we will break this habit soon. I'm pretty delirious in the middle of the night. I've still been feeding him at those times, it seems the best way to calm him down and relax him.

Life has also been really busy this past week. I'm hoping that next week things will calm down and we will be at home bit more with less distractions. My lesson learned this week is not to say yes to everything. Since I am a mom I need to have fewer and more focused commitments. When I was single just a few years ago I came and went as I pleased and did whatever I wanted. When I got married I learned I needed to check with my husband first and scale back. Now, as I have become a mom I have learned those commitments need to be fewer and fewer. I'm happy for it though. Being a mom is far more fulfilling than those many things I used to pack my life with. I'm so grateful for my sweet baby and I pray that God blesses me with many more.

Well, I think I might have solved the problem of him waking up in the middle of the night. Levi likes it so hot that he is a sweaty mess when he wakes up. Seriously, I leave the space heater on all night and it becomes probably about 80 degrees in his room and he sleeps through the night. Any other time even when I put him in nice warm jammies he wakes up in the night and his little hands are cold. We have been leaving air and heat off and it winds up being somewhere between 68-70 degrees in our house at night. So I think it's a temperature thing. This is probably why he didn't sleep through the night at the other places we went... because Ben and I cannot sleep in 80 degree weather. Well, maybe we could, but it would not be pretty.

I am so glad for the spring weather! This has given us much more opportunity for diaper free time! He is peeing less now... maybe because he is sweating it all out! Ha! I have missed most of his poops these past few days, but that's okay, we have gotten a lot of pees. Some in the sink, some in the big toilet, some in his potty. I like to switch it up. The thing is, I'm not keeping track as much as I used to. EC is now just something that we do and it's not that big of a deal. If we need to go out, I put a diaper on him, if we are hanging out at home I can put him on the floor without a diaper while I read or cook or get on the internet. Our kitchen is probably the best place for that since we have wood floors and cleanup is a lot easier.

I have noticed that Levi's poops seem a lot runnier recently. Still the same color, just a lot more liquidy. Does that make sense? He doesn't seem to be sick or anything, so I don't know.

Another thing I have noticed and I don't know if this is good or bad, when I cue him he starts to grunt sometimes. Sometimes he pays no attention, then I know to take him off the potty if he doesn't pee within about a minute or two. The thing is, I don't want him to feel the pressure to push something out every time I put him on the potty. I am just giving him an opportunity to go. I have also noticed that I don't always have to cue him either. It's like he is becoming aware that this is what the potty is for... so that is good.

He usually has a good burp on the potty as well, which I feel like is a sign that he is relaxing and not holding anything in. So I think EC has mainly been a positive experience so far. Whenever it starts to feel difficult I just take a step back and breathe.

The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, PATIENCE, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness and self-control. I can only have this patience and love and gentleness through the Holy Spirit. He is my help and my salvation.

Well, we are back from the trip and pretty well settled in. The house was a mess yesterday and today is looking a little more orderly, it's just amazing to me how much laundry always needs to be done! I probably need to vacuum and dust and clean the bathrooms, but it was all I could do to get the kitchen cleaned and laundry folded. I did make it to the grocery store today and we went for a walk. So it was a productive day.

The traveling was difficult, but I think that's to be expected with a four month old. It would have been better if he could have used words like, "I need to pee" or "I'm hungry" or "I'm tired, I'm bored" But he didn't and so we had to just persevere through it.

I potty-ed him at rest stops as much as I could. The only problem is that McDonald's bathrooms are not always a comfortable place to potty your infant. Looking back I wish that we had just stopped at a picnic area and done it outside. I almost stuck him on a toilet while out in a Braum's parking lot, near the car on a patch of grass. The fresh air seemed so much nicer than the dirty tile in public restrooms. He had just had a screaming fit in the tiny bathroom with three other women in it. I couldn't do anything except wipe him up and put Desitin on his red little bottom. I hate diaper rashes. There was no way he was going to be able to calm down and pee in that tiny loud bathroom. So I just brought him out and nursed him.
Anyways, I almost pottyed him there but Ben said he didn't want to get a ticket. :)

Things like this are definitely a struggle. With him in the back seat I felt like our communication was next to nil. I think that made things more difficult.

He also slept a lot in the car so now I am guessing his sleeping patterns have been thrown off. He was sleeping through the night great, now he's waking up once or twice a night. This was not fun last night or the night before. : P

I am praying that we can get back to some sort of normalcy. I think I just need to really pay attention to what is going on with him.

He is also changing too. He is starting to enjoy toys. I have found that I can dangle a toy in front of him and it makes him stop crying... Miraculous!!! This was especially useful in the grocery store today. Instead of being inconsolable he laughed and played when I talked to him or gave him a toy. This is changing my life :)

I think he is really wanting to roll over and crawl. I think maybe his biggest problem right now is the size of his head. When he is on his tummy he picks up his head and his legs immediately go up as well. It's as though they are not heavy enough to keep his head in the air, so he has to arch his back. Hopefully he will gain some weight.