ILX Parenting 5: I'm a big kid now

for most of our family's life our kids have shared rooms. for a year all three shared a room. this coming year the teen will have her own room & the others will share again. it's been good

Right now Evie is very enthusiastic about sharing a room with her sister but obv that will change once the sister becomes a physical reality.

In the USA we have five bedrooms (yay Midwest) and all kids have own rooms but moving back to Europe obv changes everything though we'll have a three bedroom, an improvement from the past when we all lived in a 90m2 apt

As an only child I can't speak to sharing a room with a sibling (although I did share a room with my mom at various points in my childhood) but if we were to have another child (we are not, fyi) they would definitely share a room.

The obvious ulterior motive here is eventually being able to turn the baby's room into an office/music room/guest room.

We are genuinely contemplating turning a coal cellar into a bedroom (yes we have a coal cellar), although not necessary at the moment.

I've just had a crash course in cloth nappies as well. It's a minefield! But I now feel a lot more equipped.

Bless all of you who go the cloth diapers route. Sometimes I think, "How would it have worked if we had gone with cloth diapers?" and then I laugh and/or cry depending on how much poop and/or laundry I'm dealing with at the moment.

I cry about all my money that's gone into pampers. Absolutely cry.

Our (new) washing machine broke almost two weeks ago, it took the repair people a week to get out here to look at it, they had to order a part that won't be in until the end of the week and it will be at least another week after that before they can come and install it. Our landlord, may the universe rain blessings upon him, has offered to reimburse us for drop off service but I still feel better taking Ivy's clothes to the laundromat myself (especially since I can get them all in one triple load and the drop off place charges extra for unscented detergent). Anyway I think I mostly just want sympathy.

I'm so sleepy.

yeah for all their warts we are about that cloth diaper life

I'd be willing to pay up to three times more than whatever pampers cost now to not ever have to deal with cloth diapers.

yeah the laundry thing is not fun and it's a big outlay at the start but otherwise you are just turning cash into landfill plastic (no judgement, just something that irks my skinflint sensibility).
*Apparently* you at least get fewer poosplosions because it's more contained than Pampers which just let it turn into a 3-piece-suit of shit if you're not careful (no elasticated waist).

Anyway I have zero experience with either so who knows

we have a compostable diaper service. its p awesome

The only time we had a serious blowout is when Ivy was coming off antibiotics for an ear infection, and I heard things happening in the diaper region, but I was like "Let me give it a minute to make sure she's done before I change her" and the next thing I knew we were both covered in poop. Unfortunately this happened right after our washer broke but fortunately we were home.

"Let me give it a minute to make sure she's done before I change her"

Every single time I've thought this, without exception, we've had an up-the-back number.

Poop shorts poop shorts poor shorts

I know right? But the alternative is a bare butt poop event and that's no good either.

Pooooooop.

In my limited experience, bare-butt poop into a waiting or already-soiled diaper is way easier to clean up than a back bomb

That's true, especially when the up-the-back event involves my clothes.

Xposts to N/A...if you don't have space keep B2 with you and Sarah until s/he is ready for big bed times.

And when it comes to big bed time heed my words: never underestimate the appeal of a bunk bed to anyone under 10

Only if the older kid gets the top bunk. Speaking from bitter experience :(

We started off our two together, when Molly was around 18 months. It was a complete and utter nightmare, bedtime was hellish. Basically if Aidan was in the same room as her she wouldn't settle, and he wanted to be with her, sleeping in her bed. In the end we sacrificed the spare room so they had a room each. Aidan hated it as he just wanted to be with her but she settles SO much better without him there.

It's kind of scary when they start becoming really more fully aware of things and more fully able to communicate, like suddenly you have this extra fully sentient being watching you all the time and wondering what you're doing and asking you about it.

A couple of days ago for the first time, Ivy reached up to me to get me to pick her up and I kind of freaked out because it was the first time she attempted to communicate something specific to me (You, food lady. Yes, you. Pick me up) as opposed to just generally to the world (I'm hungry this sucks WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA). BABIES ARE A FUCKING TRIP, Y'ALL.

Aw.

Her main means of communicating with me is still just trying to claw my eyes out.

aw, she speaks the same language as my boys

D has started doing this amazing thing where he softly rubs up against your cheek and, when the cuteness takes over and you turn to kiss the top of his head, he head-butts you. He does this CONSTANTLY. It somehow manages to be adorable (if painful).

J isn't nearly so slick, he just rears back and snaps forward like a crazy person trying to hurt you. This also manages to be adorable. Babies ruin your critical faculties, I'm finding.

(also: your face)

bc of all the head trauma no doubt (and sleep deprivation)

OTM to all of it

Fun parenting moment of the day: I fell asleep on the couch trying to work. When I woke up, I found potatoes in my hair. Then I went to get my haircut. When I came home, I found a barf stain on my shirt and a little puddle of baby barf in my bra.

Thank heavens I work from home as I am not fit to go out in public.

Note: the barf did not happen while I was getting my hair cut. It happened this morning and I didn't notice it until later.

Her main means of communicating with me is still just trying to claw my eyes out.

― Jeff, Wednesday, July 2, 2014 4:14 PM (31 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

aw, she speaks the same language as my boys

D has started doing this amazing thing where he softly rubs up against your cheek and, when the cuteness takes over and you turn to kiss the top of his head, he head-butts you. He does this CONSTANTLY. It somehow manages to be adorable (if painful).

J isn't nearly so slick, he just rears back and snaps forward like a crazy person trying to hurt you. This also manages to be adorable. Babies ruin your critical faculties, I'm finding.

― Star Gentle Uterus (DJP), Wednesday, July 2, 2014 4:21 PM (23 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Wait til they get big enough to kick you in the balls when you're holding them.

Yeah, at age three, they are made of about 90% elbows and knees.

D has started doing this amazing thing where he softly rubs up against your cheek and, when the cuteness takes over and you turn to kiss the top of his head, he head-butts you. He does this CONSTANTLY. It somehow manages to be adorable (if painful).

J isn't nearly so slick, he just rears back and snaps forward like a crazy person trying to hurt you. This also manages to be adorable. Babies ruin your critical faculties, I'm finding.

Also, the adorableness makes you laugh, and they like you laughing, so they do it even more. We made the mistake of saying 'bump' every time Ella headbutted something, so now she does it on purpose, pretty brutally.

They are sociopaths at that age, for real. If they were full-sized people they'd be extremely dangerous.

finally got my youngest potty-trained. this is a good feeling.

We made the mistake of saying 'bump' every time Ella headbutted something, so now she does it on purpose, pretty brutally.

We made the same mistake but instead of 'bump' we say 'coconuts'.

xp: of course this meant a really long walk to find the bathroom last night at the fireworks because she WOULDN'T just go in her pull-up. I guess I anticipate a lot of long walks in my future.

Ugh today sucked.

D has a hydrocele which his surgeon told us to keep an eye on, even though his surgeon expects it to go away. He was inconsolable earlier today; we thought it was gas or hunger pains and my wife wanted to change him before feeding him. She took the diaper off and saw that his scrotum was swollen, which set off a panicked trip to the emergency room with a screaming baby. We could get him quiet for a few moments but then he'd start screaming again.

While waiting for the doctor to examine him, I was able to feed him. While I was feeding him, he farted several times. After that, he was happier than fuck.

The swelling has basically gone down independently of all of this drama and it's now unclear that anything was actually wrong with him other than being hungry and gassy.

Can't wait for these dudes to talk tbh

glad he's ok

poor little D!

So harrowing! I'm glad he's okay, too, and hope you and the mrs have recovered as well.

wait so nut sacks can get bloated with farts? that's also terrifying

We don't know what caused the bloating. My wife has a theory that it happened because she ran out of baby wipes and used a face wipe on him when changing his diaper. It also could have happened because the AC shut itself off in the room where he was and no one turned it back on (because I wasn't home) and it was a heat reaction. Or it could have been that he had so much gas that his bloating manifested itself terrifyingly. We don't know.

Babies are so terrifying. Glad this seems to have settled down.

Oh your poor wife. I'm almost sure it wasn't the face wipe. They are pretty much the same thing!

oh man, Dan. If it's any consolation, I feel like every first-time parent goes through those moments of full on panic that then turn out to be over nothing. We certainly had our share.

operating without a frame of reference is a bitch.

the second time around you're like ehhhh I'm tired it'll probably be okay wake me up if there's any blood

well in fairness, he was screaming bloody murder and it looked like he was smuggling a racquetball in his crotch; I think the concern was warranted

so is the hydrocele still there?

we found dealing with circumcision aftermath p terrifying, that's all I got in that dept.