I blog {finally}, therefore I am no longer a crappy blogger

Seriously, If Amanda Bynes can retire on Twitter at 26 only to un-retire a few months later, I figure, so can I. And I'm way more interesting than Amanda Bynes. I mean, the chick hasn't been in a movie since she was like 12. Nobody cares.  OK, moving on.

Don't judge me. I was depressed, remember?

Here's what you've missed. Hold on tight. It's real exciting.

Mama -
I'm off the Prozac. This was huge. The side effects of the anti-depressants were, well, depressing. I had night sweats so serious that I'd wake up in the middle of the night thinking I'd wet the bed (don't act like this has never happened to you) and need to change my pajamas. Sexy, right?

Or how about how the anti-d's made me a borderline narcoleptic? The kind where I'd sit down for two seconds, pass out and wake up thinking it was the next day. This makes for super responsible parent as I'm sure you can imagine. "Mommy, can we juggle knives?" "{Snore}".

The truth is, I was just feeling a lot better. My anxiety was gone and I was able to NOT sweat the small stuff. Pun intended. It feels good to have my shit together. I mean, sure, come 5pm, we're all a little crazy. But it's nothing two glasses of wine can't fix. Keep calm and drink on.

Daddy-
Eric has been super busy on the campaign trail and also working on his new Solar company. He traveled to Hong Kong a couple of months ago. In true CMCP {Cheapy McCheaper Pants} style, he spent more time trying to book his ticket for a decent price than he actually spent on the ground in Hong Kong. God, I love that guy. He leaves again in a few weeks for China.

When he's here, we split almost all of the work evenly. It's one of the perks of having a work-from-home husband. It's also the result of having a super-competitive husband. When he's gone and I have to get all three kiddos up, dressed, fed and to school before 8 am, I seriously get home at 8:05 and fist pump my ass off. It sucks when he's gone. But I also like to feel like I'm stepping up my game.

Rylan-
Ry could not be doing better than she is in Kindergarten. She's reading. And spelling. A lot. The other day I caught her sounding out F-U-C-K. Eeek. No more spelling out our curse words. Seriously, the time has come. What's a mom to do now!? She's doing after school cheer and spring soccer. Loves to draw and play with her baby brother. She's also getting super sassy...a trait I'm certain she didn't pick up from me and most likely borrowed from one of the other girls in her class. Because I am perfect. Duh.

Best Buds

Learned to ride a bike...huge.

Sawyer-
In March, Sawyer turned 4. With a few {a lot} of behavioral issues, we seem to be getting back on track. Wow. Boys really are so different than girls. And whoever dubbed the two's as "terrible" hadn't met Sawyer at age 3. We got him signed up for soccer. This, after he'd spent weeks "playing" on Rylan's team with the girls - gotta love a boy with an older sister. Once it was his time to shine he, well, kinda choked. It was one of those {cringe} moments.

Me:"Sawyer, get out there and play with your team!"
Sawyer {in tears}: "Mom, they're not letting me score."

Apparently, he doesn't come from a family of soccer players.
Me: "Sawyer, they're not just going to give you the ball and LET you score. You have to work for it honey."

Sawyer: "No thanks mom. I'm just gonna sit on the sidelines and eat oranges and wait to run through the tunnel at the end of the game. Do you know what the snack is gonna be?"

FML

Coach Beach could have died.

Shit. Our little athlete gamer. For Christmas, we got the kids a Nintendo Wii. We always said we'd never raise gamers. Within one night, Sawyer had memorized all the dances to Just Dance 3. Double shit.

I actually think we've turned a corner. We're working with him on lots of positive reinforcement and encouragement. Oh, and we put his ass in preschool for two FULL days a week in addition to the two half days he was already going. Yeah, made him someone else's problem. Oh, whatever, you totally would have done the same thing.

See. Totally under control.

Proof that he's not destined to play video games for the rest of his life.

 Super Hero Birthday Party

 Saxon-

Saxon Cash turned one a few weeks ago. Our little slow poke is still not crawling or walking. We started physical therapy in January. We go 90 minutes a week. We're working on strengthening his core and so far have seen really positive results. After 1 week of therapy, he was sitting up on his own. He's this close to crawling now. But he's still just my lazy little guy that is happiest when he's being held. A lot of my friends have asked if there was any diagnosis or why he had this gross motor skills delay. No one really knows how it happened, although, I'm guessing it has something to do with the fact that if he cries for something, his odds are pretty good that 1 out of the 4 other people in the house will jump up and get it for him. There was never a whole lot of motivation to do it on his own. But he's progressing in all other areas right on track. The doctor had given us a referral to a neurologist to rule anything else out but even when he handed it over, he said "I don't think you need to go." So we haven't.

I have to tell you that I seriously cannot imagine not having Sax. He might be the sweetest baby that I've ever met.

Susie Cakes excitement. It happens at any age.

The first of three kids to eat the cupcake on their birthday.

We survived our first year with three. Barely.

Ok so that was a seriously freaking long hiatus. Who knew having 3 under 6 you'd have zero time to sit down and blog?...let alone just sit. Not to mention the fact that one of us has been sick since the beginning of sick season. I actually think we may have whooping cough...although not enough to take us to the doctor and pay the co-pay {who's the cheap one now?}. Yesterday, Saxon threw up on me at the park. It went down my shirt and in my pants. I had to go home and change everything. Bra. Underwear. I know, you're jealous. I haven't dealt with this much barf and spot treatments since college.

Anywhoo, now that you've been updated. I promise to do a better job at keeping up. Blogging once every 8 months is about as lame as you can get. I'm a work in progress. Bare with me.

Hope and Change. No, seriously. I swear.

As Summer comes to an end and we face some big changes ahead in the Fall, I thought it appropriate that I update y'all on the happenings of the Beach fam. So, here it goes...

#1 {Rylan}
Sweet Ry turned 5 last week and heads into Kindergarten after Labor Day. Eeek! So excited for her and this humongous new journey. At first, it made me feel old...but then a good friend reminded me that since I basically got knocked up right out of college, I'm actually quite young to have a 5yr old. In fact, I'm so young, I could even be mistaken for an elementary school-er. Ok, maybe not THAT young. But you get the gist.

She's swimming like a fish. Loves Rapunzel and Mary Poppins. Starts soccer in the fall. And is fascinated by hair feathers, nose rings and temporary tattoos. Sound familiar?{FML}.

#2 {Sawyer}
I'm thrilled to report that Sawyer Colt has finally figured out that poop goes in the potty and not his pants. I potty-trained the un-potty-trainable. It only took a year. And a shit-load of m&ms. Pun intended. I am super-mom. Hear me roar. Next step: peeing standing up and learning to "aim."

He is also swimming. Another huge step. The confidence Mike O'Brien gave Sawyer in just one day of lessons was amazing. In 10 days, he turned Sawyer into a mini Phelps. In fact, I'm pretty sure Swim-to-Mike had something to do with potty training him too.  I think I'll keep Mike's number close for when it's time to teach him how to ride a bike with no training wheels . The guy's a freaking genius. {And in case you're keeping track, this absolutely means that I won the swimming lesson argument and Eric lost. Neener. Neener. Neener}.

Sawyer will start preschool 4 days a week come Fall. He's moved to room 2 {The "big boy room" as he's dubbed it} and each day he becomes more of a little man and less of a little boy.

#3 {Saxon}
Sax is busy being a baby. You know, sleeping {through the night}. Crying {usually between the hours of 5:30-6:30pm}. Pooping {Duh}. He giggles and laughs. And talks and sings. He's got no teeth yet but if it were possible to chew your finger off with just your gums, this kid could do it. So I'd say he's close. And most of the time he just sits there and watches the crazy happening right in front of him. He has these great big eyes and if he could talk I think he'd be saying "WTF did I get myself in to here? These people are nutso."

Mommy {The crazy one}
Speaking of nutso, {and this is where I try to make you laugh while writing about a serious issue because I've learned to deal with uncomfortable topics with humor. I'm a work in progress} I realized recently that my post-partum depression returned {like a freaking tornado}. Boom. It hit me like a ton of bricks. And it was a few weeks ago when I was at the park and could barely pull myself off the park bench to push the kiddos on the swings that I realized something was wrong.

I was treated for PPD after I had Rylan when she was about 8 months old and I'd just stopped breastfeeding. With Sawyer, I was very ready for it to return and thank God it didn't because, as a baby, that kid was enough to make you need a sedative on his own. No depression required.

With Saxon, I thought I was out of the woods. I stopped breastfeeding when he was 8 weeks and didn't notice it then. People often asked me, "how is it with three kids?" and I would give them my standard answer: that I struggled more with two kids, 18 months apart, then I have with 3.

But somewhere along the line I started to have high highs and really low lows. And then the high highs were fewer and far between. And I was just low. And even though I was sleeping. Laughing. and loving being a mom. I just didn't feel like myself. I felt like I was just going through my day, waiting to get to my next sleep.

I went and saw my doc and she confirmed what I already knew. I'm a headcase. No, she actually told me that I am susceptible to PPD because of my previous history. She wrote me an RX for Prozac and the rest is history. I felt better almost instantly. I struggled with the thought of being a "pill popper" the rest of my life but then got over it real quick when I was actually able to pull my head off my pillow and blog again. One day at a time, I guess.

I'm still teaching spin 4 days a week. It's been challenging and {at times} hard, given my schedule and the nature of my state-of-mind. But it's also been hugely rewarding and a way for me to clear my head and make some money again. You know, so I can spend it on really expensive swim lessons and huge cars that I don't need.

Oh, I also decided to be uber-practical {considering my full-time "job"} and get hair extensions. I'm very lucky that my hair stylist is also a very good friend and she offered to give me extensions as part of a training she went through. I've always wanted extensions but didn't want to come out looking like Britney after she'd had a rough night {think barefoot, sipping a frappucino and walking out of a public restroom. Eww.} I'm happy to report that I look NOTHING like that. In fact, they're awesome and look super natural. And considering that since I stopped breast-feeding my hair is basically falling out in clumps and balding {think Britney the night she shaved her head} I actually think the extensions were a necessity. At least that's what I told Eric.

The Big 5 Yr Old. A "Tangled Swim Party". Obv.

The Fish

Gorg

Kamikaze Sawyer

These people are crazy

But at least they can make me laugh

If Rapunzel had the stomach flu,

she barfed all of her accessories in our house

See. Told ya.

Because every Prozac-taking SAHM should have hair like this. Duh.

And, yes, Sawyer thinks he's Zoolander.

 

www.teachmykidstoswimforfree.com??

About three years ago, Eric and I had the brilliant decision {must have been after a night of heavy drinking} to dump the majority of our savings into our house and build a swimming pool. Seemed like a good idea at the time. An investment. Fast-forward to today and we often find ourselves saying, "well if we lose it all, at least we can still work on our tan poolside." Or "you think the kids would want pool water for dinner?" Or "Instead of college, can we just send the kids to the backyard?" Honestly, it wasn't our smartest move. But we did it and we love it. No looking back. We spend most weeknights and weekends hanging by the pool with our closest friends. We love having people over. And Eric has spent the last 2 summers saying that HE was going to teach the kids to swim. Riiiight.

That's right. Our kids can't swim. Not sure how that happened. It's been on the ever-growing list of things to do but somehow just keeps falling to the bottom. Pun intended. I decided this is the year they HAVE to learn. Rylan is almost 5 and the majority of her friends can swim. We just had some friends in from out of town last weekend and my kids sat on the step in the shallow end and watched in envy as these two kids completely showed them up in their own pool and swam circles around them. It sucked.

Here's the problem. I'm married to a man who has a "just throw them in the deep end and see what happens" mentality. That's his idea of teaching them how to swim. Let's let them drown and maybe that will teach them a lesson or two. It's about as good an idea as building the pool itself. As a result, Eric's not really into paying a butt-load of money to get them swimming. Plus, we spent all the money on the gorgeous pool so we can't afford to get them lessons anyway, remember?

Just last weekend he forced Sawyer in to the pool kicking and screaming and proceeded to use the infant swim technique on our 3-yr old. You know the one where you count 1-2-3 and then blow in their face and the baby's natural reaction is to hold their breath and then you dunk? Yeah, it worked when Rylan was 7 months. Well, Eric apparently missed the memo that this is an infant swim technique and decided to try it on Sawyer. Eric blew in his face. Sawyer looked at him like "WTF was that?" and before he knew it he was dunked under water, mouth open and coming up choking, gasping for his life. "No, daddy, pweease" he screamed in between dunks while myself and our friends in from out of town drank beers on the side of the pool. "Does Eric know that only works on infants?" Shanna said. Apparently not.

Seeing as how Eric's infant swim techniques aren't working on our 3 and 5 yr old, here are some other options I came up with:

1. Swim2Mike/Pete/Julie/The bank
This is my type of approach. 2 weeks all-intensive-balls-to-the-wall learn how to swim or your money back. They spend 10 days {m-f for two weeks} with your kid at your own pool for 20 minutes a day. At the end of 2 weeks your kid is a regular freaking flounder. Only problem? It's $360/kid {Total for Ry and Sawyer: $720} Now, for me, this is something I would put in the "worth it" category. Eric's response? "You must be out of your fucking mind. Where's Rylan? I'm throwing her in the deep end." Seriously, he thinks it's ridiculous. Me? I love the idea that it's guaranteed and that they're actually learning to swim, not float on their backs if they fall in. Real swimming. Eric reminded me {like he does so frequently when I talk about spending obscene amounts of money} that I'm spoiled and from La Jolla. Seriously, what does that have to do with anything? We're talking about the safety of our children. Ok, now he says I'm just being dramatic.

2. Waterworks/Blue Buoy
Another option that he found slightly less repulsive. Buy a package of classes {in our case 12 for $259}. Take the kids to the pool facility. Give them a 20-minute semi-private lesson together with a female instructor who's "firm." They'd take 2 lessons each week for 3 weeks and we'd re-evaluate at the end of the sessions and see if we needed more. My guess is that we would. Eric says if they're not still swimming at that point, he'd throw them in the deep end and they'd be better able to work on the whole not-drowning thing. Why is he trying to kill our kids? Problem with option #2 is that I wasn't able to find an opening for a T/TH or W/FRI class that starts after 4pm and is with a woman who is "firm." Why does she need to be "firm"and why does it need to be a woman? Well, I don't think Ry would be very comfortable with a male instructor. Remember, Daddy has already tried to drown her on numerous occasions. The trust level has dwindled. And if it's a woman who's not "firm" then it's basically like taking lessons from me...and we've seen that I'm no better at teaching them then Eric.

Me: "Rylan, want to learn how to swim today?"

Ry: "Not today mommy"

Me: "Ok, time to go inside. Mommy wants a glass of wine."

See? A "firm" female instructor is just the ticket. Except both facilities are booked through summer. So they'll learn next year Eric says. FML.

3. A friend
We've had a few people say "I can teach your kids to swim for free." Of course{no surprise here} Cheapy Mc-Cheaper pants loves this idea but I honestly don't think that the kids will be receptive to learning from someone that they know. We need someone that's gonna lay the smack down on them. No bullshit. Swim or you're grounded until high school approach. Our friends are just too nice. And if they tried to be mean, our kids would see right through it.

This brings us back to square 1. We're up shit creek and don't know how to swim. Which brings up another important point. Sawyer is still crapping his pants. Maybe if Swim2Mike/Julie or Pete could potty train him too, then I'd really be willing to fork out the big bucks. Alas, think they'd work for semi-good wine??

The backyard before...

The backyard after...

The non-swimmers...



Halle{freaking}lujah

I know. You don't have to say anything. I know. I've been neglecting the blog. I'm sorry. I've had writer's block {aka: Saxon}. But I'm back. And I'm coming back in a big way. Why, you ask? Because Saxon slept through the night last night.

For those of you wondering what this means, I'll spell it out for you. It means I can drink again. No, seriously. I know I talk a lot about drinking. And you probably think I drink more than I do. But drinking when you have a newborn is seriously about as fun as squirting lime juice in your eyes. Let me be clear. When you are waking up every 3 hours to feed a newborn, you're already waking up feeling hungover - no booze needed. For the past 11 weeks, I stagger out of bed in the morning looking like a scene from Hangover 2. I do not joke.

I've had zero desire to indulge because why add insult to injury? It's ironic because if there is ever a time to hit the bottle, it's when you have a newborn. But it's really a bad idea. I even decided to push back my 30th birthday party {yup, turned the big 3-0 last week} because getting home from a huge birthday bash only to be woken up by a screaming tiny human sounded like an awful way to ring in this huge milestone. "So, yeah, we'll celebrate when Saxon is sleeping through the night" is what I told everyone.

Now, if you know me, you know that I have serious control issues. As a result, I've sleep-trained all three kids. Yes, that's right. I'm a 'Babywise' mom. I realize that Babywise is like Sarah Palin. Moms either swear by it and think its tactics will be life-changing. Or Babywise foes will tell you that following its methods could give your kids brain damage. Look, at the end of the day, Rylan and Sawyer sleep 12 hours a day and still take a 2 hour nap at ages 4.5 and 3 {respectively}...the jury is still out on Sawyer's mental health - but I'll save that for a different blog post. Middle child. First boy. There are a lot of things working against him besides Babywise.

So how did I do it? Well, we start at 2 weeks old. Before that it's feed on demand. The first two weeks are awful for a Type-A mom. No control. No schedule. Just balls-to-the-wall-I'm-a-slave-for-you-type parenting. So after 2 weeks you start baby on a feed-play-sleep every 3 hour routine. It sounds crazy. But if you're like me, it's great because you're establishing a fool-proof routine. Here's what our day looks like:

8am: Wake and feed {keep awake}
930am: Nap
11am: Wake and feed {keep awake}
1230pm: Nap
2pm: Wake and feed {keep awake}
330pm: Nap
5pm: Wake and feed {keep awake}
8pm: Feed and straight to bed
11pm: Dream feed {feed baby while he/she's asleep and then say your prayers that baby sleeps all the way through until 8am}

In the beginning the baby will naturally wake at 2am and 5am to eat. But as time goes on and the baby learns to sleep longer periods of time, the goal is that he/she will sleep through the 2am and 5am feedings. Do you hear that? {angels are singing}.

Now sometimes babies need a little "help" so-to-speak to drop one or both feedings. This is when the critics will tell you that you're on the fast-track to years of therapy for your kid. Both my boys needed the "help." I think Sawyer would still be eating at 2am if I hadn't forced him to drop that feeding years ago. Saxon was the same way. So 2 weeks ago {and right about the time I made the decision to go back to teaching spin at 6am 3 days a week- I know, brilliant, right?} I decided it was time.

Saxon woke up at 2am like clockwork but instead of feeding him I gave him a pacifier and he went back to sleep. It wasn't actually as easy as that. There were tears involved. From both of us. But the next night, he went right through until 4:30. Yahooo!! The night after that he made it until 5am. So, if you're still with me here, we were now feeding him at 11pm and 5am. Ahh, I can taste that 3rd glass of wine on my lips. 6 hours in a row is magical.

Our next goal was getting him to drop the 5am feeding. And I didn't want to force this one. I really hoped I had one of those kids that would do it on his own. Rylan was like that. She slept through the night at 6 weeks. Overachiever. She may look like Eric, but she's all me folks. So last night when Saxon slept through his 5am feeding Eric and I didn't know what to do with ourselves. Of course we were awake. That first night when they sleep through a feeding, you never do too. We just sat there at 5am watching the monitor waiting for him to wake. He didn't. We're morons.

The last feeding to drop is the "dream feed." And this one is the scariest one, in my opinion. You've just got your kid to sleep from 11pm - 8am without waking up. Why mess with a good thing? What if you don't feed at 11 and he wakes at 5? Truth is, after a week of ensuring the baby can go from 11-8, dropping the dream feed is magical. You know why? Because then your baby is sleeping 12 hours from 8pm to 8am and you're off the wagon telling the Babywise critics to suck it.

That brings us to today. Saxon is 11 weeks old and sleeping straight through from 8pm-8am {with 11pm dream feed}. Next week we'll tackle dropping the dream feed. One week at a time. Tonight Eric and I are off to see Hangover 2 and will throw back a couple to celebrate.

Cheers!

The Potty Diary

I've never claimed to be really good at anything related to parenting...but one area where I'd surely be considered "slow" is in the potty training department. I suck. No really. I'm awful. I have no idea what I'm doing and I usually resort to doing all of the things that they tell you never, under any circumstances, to do.

So, with all that we have going on, I should have been thrilled when Sawyer went pee pee on the potty for the first time at school last week. Actually, I was thrilled. Was I really going to get away with not having anything to do with {screwing up} potty training? Was this why I was paying Sawyer's preschool enough money to put him through one year at private university? I've always said that I would pay big bucks to have someone come to our house and potty train my kids. I even googled it. This person doesn't exist.

So here we are, one week later, Sawyer only wants to wear underwear...he's peed on the potty numerous times. So I should be celebrating, right? I'm not. You know why? Because I'm on 24-hour poop watch.

See, with Rylan, she knew not to poop in her pants. I don't blame her. It's truly disgusting if you think about it {though I suppose going in a diaper is only slightly less repulsive}. Ry would just hold out long enough until we put her diaper on before nap or bed time. Genius! As a result, I never had to stalk her and play poo poo police...aka, give her a massive complex about pooping on the potty or in her pants.

And then there's Sawyer. Sweet #2 has a problem with, well, going #2. Actually, the problem is that he'll go anywhere but the potty. I don't get it. If you can sit and pee, what's so scary about sitting and pooping? And it's precisely the reason I {and by I, I mean, his teachers at school} didn't train him to pee standing up. I thought that would just further confuse the situation. If he pees standing up, will he poop standing up too? I've clearly given this a ton of thought.

We've known his "signs" now for a while. When he has to "go"...he hides. He's so certain of the "feeling" that now he just says "mommy, I'm hiding." So, this should be an easy transition, right? Wrong.

So we set out on mission. 1. Buy new underwear {the ones that I'd bought him a year ago for Christmas were so tight around his legs, they were cutting off the circulation. Wishful thinking that he'd be potty trained last Christmas I guess.} 2. Buy a "poo poo present." 3. And then come home, poop on the potty and sing kumbaya. Yeah, not so much.

Here's what actually happened. We picked out the underwear {Spiderman and Lightning McQueen, in case you're wondering.} Picked out the "poo poo present" {Buzz Lightyear gun}. Came home. Put the present on the shelf and waited. About 20 minutes later {and once I was in the middle of breast feeding Saxon and completely tied down} I heard, "Mommy, I'm gonna hide." {Fuuuuuuck!} I immediately de-latch #3, jump over the couch and make a bee-line for Sawyer. He immediately screamed in fear of mommy running full-force towards him and proceeded to run away from me, crying and literally shitting his pants in fear. Meanwhile, the baby is screaming and about to roll off the couch. Sawyer is crying and hiding on the other side of the dining room table and I'm yelling, "No, Sawyer, don't poop!" I'm pretty sure I did everything they tell you NOT to do in the "Everybody Poops" parent handbook.

After I settled him down, I was shocked that he actually had managed to hold it. So we sat back down. I started feeding the baby again and watched as Sawyer sat there in agony. Now I was concerned because, not only was he going to poop his pants, he was going to poop his pants on my couch. As I begged and pleaded for him to "just try and sit on the potty," he insisted that he no longer had to go. Yeah, ok. Sure buddy.

About five minutes later, he made a run for it. But not to the potty. He ran to the closet. I ran after him. Both of us screaming, I scooped him up and ran into the bathroom. It was too late. The Spiderman underwear were ruined after only 30 minutes of wear. Sawyer was crying. Saxon was crying. Mommy was crying. He sat on the potty devastated. I sat there with the tub of wipes and antibacterial hand soap and explained that accidents happen and that it was ok.

Sawyer called Eric on the phone and told him what happened and how he wasn't going to get the "poo poo present." Just as we were hanging up, I heard the slightest "plop." Sawyer's face lit up. "Mommy! poo poo came out." We looked. He was right. The smallest poop you'd ever seen had gone in the toilet.

"Dammit," I thought. Now I have to give him the damn present for a fluke poop. He was thrilled.

Fast forward to now and he's actually gone a few times, though, not every time. I'm still living in a constant state of poop anxiety. I need to let it go. It's freaking everyone out. And between hoping that Sawyer DOESN'T poop and making sure that Saxon DOES, it's all I'm freaking doing these days.

He did go at school and now school has deemed him "potty trained" so we save $50 a month on tuition. I guess I really was paying a potty training guru and just didn't know it. Now who can I pay to come clean it up when he has an accident?

Baby, 1. Mommy, 0.

It would be fair to say that I've been on the front lines of newborn baby war these last three weeks. Don't get me wrong, I knew what I was getting into since I've done it before...but holy baby Batman! It's just taking me a while to find my newborn mojo, I suppose.

I've literally sat down to blog about the current state of our house {insanity} dozens of times but have found that I only have about two minutes between breastfeeding, crying {me, included} and someone asking for "more juice" {Eric, included} that all my thoughts are cut short.

So, in honor of these two free minutes, I thought a "you know you have a newborn" Top 10 list would be appropriate:

You know you have a newborn when:

10. You pour the breast milk into the bottle without the drop-in and are totally unfazed by the puddle of milk at your feet {thanks Dede}

9. In a contest between you and Pamela Anderson on who has the most ridiculous boobs, you win in a landslide.

8. You don't leave your bedroom {let alone your house} without sunglasses on.

7. You'd welcome a trip to the dentist or OBGYN for just 30 minutes of "alone" time

6. You'd risk a cell phone ticket for talking while driving because the car is now the only place where the baby will sleep and you can chat for longer than 2 minutes

5. You want to marry your Keurig

4. You unload baby and stroller from the car, lock the doors, head into the market, finish shopping and leave the store to find that you left the passenger door wide open.

3. You wake up at 3 am mid-walk to the nursery and wonder if you're coming or going

2. You just remembered that you had to pee this morning...but it's now 5pm

1. You blog one-handed

PS. To all my friends who have checked in on me to make sure I haven't drowned myself in the bathtub, thank you. This too shall pass. Big hugs.

The Saxon{ater}

We did it! He's here. Well, actually, he arrived on March 25, 2011. So he's been here for 12 days. And that's how long it took me to get my shit together to sit down and write about it. Phew. Switching to zone defense, NOW!

So here's how it went down. On Thursday afternoon we went to El Torito to watch the SDSU NCAA Tourney game {aka, witness my bracket go down the toilet.} I ordered what I thought would be the most "mild" thing on the menu. Taquitos. To my surprise, these bad boys came smothered in hot sauce. Oh well. Down the hatch. At this point, I was eating everything in sight. I figured maybe my effort to order something less-spicy would pay off. It didn't. In fact, I'm pretty sure it had something to do with putting me in to labor.

At about 3:30 am on March 25, I woke up with strong-enough-to-make-your-eyes-bleed heartburn. Standard, at this point. I expected it. What I didn't expect were the contractions I started having about 5 minutes later. And then they didn't stop. So I started timing them and, sure enough, they were regular. Every 5-7 minutes. So we got the bag packed. Got the kids dressed. Called the doc. She said to head to L&D since it was my 3rd baby and she was going to induce me the next day anyway {see Ricki, it all worked out.}

Then we hopped in the car and Eric did what any super-cool-under-pressure husband would do...he drove like a complete jackass. Taking speed bumps at 20 miles an hour. Weaving in and out of traffic. The kids thought they were at Disneyland. "Weeee!" Mind you, both of their schools are literally about 2 blocks away. I think Eric envisioned delivering the baby in the Yukon and since we have a very strict never-look-below-the-knees-while-wife-is-in-labor policy he was determined to get me to the hospital asap.

We got to Hoag. Got hooked up to the monitors. Nurse checked me. I'm still 2 cm. {FML} For those of you with no idea how this whole watermelon vs lemon thing works, you have to be 10 cm dilated to push the baby out. 2 cm is nothing. In fact, my guess is that most women with multiple children walk around for the rest of their lives 2 cm dilated. Really. Sneeze and be 2 cm dilated. Shit.

So Eric and I did what we do best. We started making the nurse laugh. There was no way we were getting sent home. We turned on the charm and Megan the nurse ate it up. An hour later when I was 2.5 cm dilated {FML, again} she came in to tell me that my doc said "go ahead and break her water." Yes! Amazing. Love my doc. So they did. And about an hour after that I was 4 cm. Ok, getting somewhere.

Then they hooked up the pitocin. And the contractions started coming on strong. For about 3 hours I laid there until I had to tell Eric to stop playing inappropriate You Tube clips because laughing with gnarly contractions wasn't working for me. I begged for my epidural. And then lost my spot in line because the woman next door was 6 cm and I was, just guess...still a 4. Bitch. {FML, cubed.}

45 minutes later. Epidural in. And I'm ready to rock and roll. They upped my pitocin dosage to a-freaking-lot and at 4pm I was ready to push. But I didn't. My doctor was stuck in traffic. So I sat there. My nurse actually told me not to move for fear the baby would come out. {Lovely visual, I know.} Finally, at 4:30 the doc arrived and after 5 pushes, he was out. All 8lbs, 4oz of him...and a week early too. Biggest baby yet. Rylan was 6.13 and Sawyer was 6.7.

Saxon Cash Beach. He's just been an awesome kid thus far {but since I put it in writing, I'm sure he'll make me take it back at some point.} In the hospital we actually had to ask the nurse if he was ok because he was sleeping so much. I know, right? Crazy. He spends his days eating, sleeping and, well, pooping. Typical.

Here he is. Someday, I'll invest in a camera that doesn't take blurry pictures.

Saxon Cash Beach. 3.25.11

And, in case you're wondering, I 100% brushed my hair and put on make-up after I delivered and before I took pics. I was tired of having hospital pics of myself where I looked like I was just beaten over the head with a baby. So, yeah, bring on the smoke and mirrors.

"Beach Party of 5, please don't come to our restaurant for a couple of years"

I mean, come on with the cuteness!

Heading home. Me: "Do we have to?"

Let the real fun begin!