Well, we are currently not EC-ing at all. That's what happens when you get sick, you drop something. Probably when he gets better I'll start putting him back on the potty again. For now, we are taking a break and focusing on healing.

Yes, Levi came down with something, it might have been on Friday, might have been on Saturday, I'm not sure. By Sunday he was a sad little case. He either slept, cried, or nursed all day long. It wasn't until last night that I started putting saline drops in his nose and aspirating it. I tried aspirating it earlier but with not much success. I want to thank Marcie for suggesting the drops. We got a lot of snot out this morning! :)

The really sad part is that today is his birthday. I mean, it's a good day, don't get me wrong and I am so happy it is, but the sad thing is that he is sick! His daddy is sick too, so it's just not a good day all around. Plus it's overcast and rainy and being cooped up in the house all day is just not an ideal situation. Hopefully it will feel more like a birthday on Saturday when we have our big family party. I'm praying I won't get whatever the boys have, or else I will have some serious issues on my hands trying to make cakes on Saturday. ... yikes!

Anyways, there are days when I wonder if all of this is worth it. I hope it is. I will let you know. :)

learning new things

Yesterday Levi learned how to point with just one finger. :) He had been pointing with all four of his fingers, but yesterday as he watched me point at something he looked down at his hand, made sort of what looked like a sign language "K" and then pointed at it as well. These are the simple things in my life that bring laughter and joy to my heart. To watch him take it in, process it and then put it into practice... I love it.

I was also amazed that as I was having my quiet time yesterday he was crawling around and would come "visit" me and start to hit on my journal or take my pen, so I told him he needed to stop bothering me right now and go play with his book on the floor. I pointed at his book and explained to him that mommy needs to read her Bible right now and he needs to wait and go read his book. He looked over, pointed and then dropped to his knees and crawled over and started turning the pages of the book! He understood me! And he obeyed me! (Even more amazing) What an incredible child I have. I don't even care that he's not walking yet, he's obeying and that's way better in my opinion. He definitely knows the word "no" but now I think he's understanding that he needs to walk away from temptation.

Another new thing he's doing is that we have a collage picture frame in our hallway and he always wants to stop and look at it. He points to himself in it as well. He used to point with all four of his fingers and this morning he pointed with just one :)

I'm slowly realizing that I need to put more pictures up. :) and get more books.

Oh yes, and he peed on the potty this morning.

The stars aligned. Levi had two poops on the potty in 12 hours, one last night and then one this morning. I totally wasn't expecting him to actually go, I just thought, well, he might. It's helped to have a book available or to bring the potty out of the bathroom so he doesn't feel so isolated from everyone. (He loves just having people around, not always necessarily interacting with people, but just not to be alone.)

So I thought life was great, his poops were fairly solid, maybe we are out of that horrible mushy poops 5-times-a-day phase... and then I got a present during his morning nap. In his cloth diaper that doesn't just "shake out" of his diaper. ... Pride comes before the fall. I am always reminded that when I'm on top of the world, the bottom is just around the corner. :) But then we had a pee on the potty and that was cool.

Whatever.

Daylight Savings Time is killing me. Whoever freaking thought of the idea didn't have children who take regular naps and have regular bedtimes. I had Levi sleeping in until 7, everything was perfect and sunshine and roses and then evil DST came in and killed it all! So we are slowly pushing back naps and bedtime and trying to get him to sleep later, having to leave him in his crib to cry from 6-6:30 and then 6:30-7, so I think we might be able to push him back, but it's just a lot of unnecessary crying. Poor little fella didn't get the memo. I'm sure a lot of other babies didn't get it either. Oh well, this too shall pass.

Levi just gets better and better with each day. He becomes more curious, he learns to do more things (he can wave bye bye now) and just keeps getting cuter. I'm trying to talk to him in full sentences as much as possible. It's tempting with him to speak in simple terms and one word sentences, but I kind of think it would help his language skills if I spoke to him as though he were an adult and he could be used to the English language in that way. I ask him if he needs to go potty, I talk to him about how he doesn't need to poop in his diaper but he needs to poop in his toilet and it will be cleaner that way. He usually just looks at me with his big brown eyes and smiles. And I laugh.

I probably laugh too much at him. He does naughty things and it's all I can do to keep from bursting out sometimes. He really loves to reach his chubby little fingers around my computer and press the buttons on the keyboard. It's funny and frustrating at the same time. That's probably when he thinks his name is "No"

EC-ing has been a bit discouraging lately. I have to keep reminding myself that it's a process. It's not a one-time, one-day and-you-have-it-all-figured-out potty training experience. It's just being aware of his needs, his patterns, etc. That's been kind of hard with him being sick lately. Yesterday I woke up to bad diarreah, both at 6 am and then at 7. Washing out two diapers first thing in the morning is never really that appealing. That's usually when I curse cloth diapering. The rest of the time I love it.

I think we just need some more diaper-free time. We need to step back and not take ourselves too seriously.

Hope you are all enjoying your babies as much as I am!