Mt. Rainier

Aaron is off climbing Mt. Rainier this weekend. He summitted 3 years ago going the Paradise-Camp Muir-Ingraham Glacier route. This time he is doing the White River- Camp Shurman-Emmons Glacier route which takes an extra day.

Living in the shadow of Mt. Rainier during high school enticed me to do the climb. However, we didn't live nearby during the pre-kid freedom days. Now with 3 little ones, risking life and limb doesn't sound so good. Maybe when the kids are older.

Summit day for Aaron is tomorrow. We'll be driving down to meet him, spend the night and do some hiking in the park the next day. Thankfully the weather is wonderful this weekend. Pray for safety and continued good weather!

I am so proud of my man!

Is this really possible???

STOP THE PRESSES!
Ethan made it through an entire feeding period with NO SPIT UP!!!

YES!

And he was very happy this morning, too, playing, talking and smiling.

Thank you Lord! What a simple pleasure of life, not having spit up all over you, your floor and the baby!

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In other news...
The other day Micah decided he wanted to make his own Baby Einstein video. He decided what music to use (Beethoven's 5th) and what toys he wanted to use. He made a list of all the toys and taped it to the wall. I was the cameraman, but he directed and starred in the show. Joel was the unintentional "co-star". Once I figure out how to upload videos I will post it here.

My Favorite Things

I've been thinking about this post for awhile. After having three babies I guess I can self-qualify myself as some sort of expert in this area. These are some products that I wish I would have bought 5 years ago for baby #1. So in honor of my two friends, Karen and Susan, who are soon to be mommies of 3, here they are...

(photo taken from website)

1. Ergo Carrier

I love love love this carrier! It is so comfy that you *almost* don't notice that your baby is strapped to you. The weight is carried on your hips instead of your shoulders. The Bjorn would tug and pull on my neck/shoulders. It gave me a headache. I even used the Bjorn Active, which has a hip support belt. With the ergo I have none of the headaches. Now, granted, nothing is perfect, but this is the best of them all, hands down!

The sitting position for the baby is more natural than the bjorn. With the bjorn they are hanging by their cr*tch. Wereas in the ergo, baby is snuggled up next to you on your chest. Ethan loves it, so much so that he can be crying and when I strap him on he goes right to sleep.

I didn't start using this until Ethan was 4 months old. Until baby has good head control you need to use an infant insert, which I didn't buy. I used a baby bjorn for 0-4 months. Even when he was that small it still gave me headaches.

When baby is older you can also wear him on your back. It also has a zipper pocket for keys and a sun shade to pull over baby's head. Did I mention that I love this carrier? It makes going anywhere possible with 3 kids. They are pricey, but what's the price of freedom? I have seen them on Craig's List too.

2. Skip*Hop Diaper Bag

I wish I would have bought this bag 5 1/2 years ago. (Can you believe Micah is 5 1/2??? I can't!) It is compact yet roomy. There is room for 3 sippy cups on the outside. There are zippered pockets that only go halfway down so you can put your wallet in there and not lose it in the bottom of the bag. It has special straps so you can attach it to a shopping cart. It can also be worn as a messenger bag... and its manly enough for hubbie to carry it too! It has just kept me organized.

I have another diaper bag made by Rowdy that I also like. It is a new company and the zipper broke, so I can't exactly recommend it.

3. Peg Perego Pliko (or P3 ) stroller

I think I wrote about this earlier. I still like this stroller immensely. Compact yet has all the features of a large stroller.

4. Nursing Shawl--Hooter Hider

If you own a sewing machine, can hem a rectangular piece of fabric and insert a piece of boning.... you could be rich! This simple item makes nursing in public SO much easier! The boning makes it easy to see baby yet covers up all the essentials.

I must add that my dear friend Sarah graciously lent me two of the four items above. THANK YOU SO MUCH!

What's your favorite baby item/gadget??

Weekend

Hope everyone had a fun fourth weekend! Friday we went to a new park that was really fun. If you are local it is a new playground at Grass Lawn. There is a merry-go-round, three boulder climbing walls, a water-play fountain and a very cool swing. Later that day we went to a BBQ with some friends and watched fireworks. Ethan's first fireworks! He loved it. Although he was more interested in watching all the people than the show. The two older boys had a good time as well. Micah even tolerated the noise pretty well! Usually he doesn't like loud noises whatsoever. Maybe he is outgrowing that now.

Today we went on a hike at Cougar Mountain and found two letterboxes. Ethan tried out the backpack for the first time. He was okay until we stopped at our first letterbox. He got uncomfortable and couldn't sleep. I didn't want to carry him the whole way without the front carrier so Aaron lovingly ran back to the car and got it for me! Ethan snuggled up as soon as I strapped him on and went right to sleep. I must say that I love the Ergo carrier. That should be a post in itself.

The area where we hiked is full of old mine shafts. We had to get a picture:

Facebook

So I finally joined Facebook. I guess its like MySpace for grown-ups? Just what I needed--more ways to waste time. I draw the line at twitter. Like anyone wants to know that I'm cleaning up after 3 boys--'cause that's what I spend most of my time doing.

In other news, looks like summer decided to come here to the PacNW, finally. It ain't called June gloom for nothing, that's for sure!

Update on Ethan

So I need to post some pictures. I just have not had time to download any pictures! It doesn't help that the amount of pictures on the camera keeps growing. I need some sort of blue tooth device for my camera where I just set it beside my computer and whamm-o they instantly appear on my computer.

Anyway....Ethan is now 7 months. He has two bottom teeth, he can sit alone and roll over both ways pretty proficiently. Between 5 and 6 months he only gained 1 ounce. He had a cold, so the doctor suspected it was because of the sickness that he wasn't gaining weight. She said to watch his reflux and come back in 6 weeks. Well after 3 weeks I had had enough and I took him in last week. He was throwing up (none of this dainty spit-up) about 5-6 times every feeding. I was changing clothes about 1-2 times a day because they were drenched, not because I got spit on once. Let's not even talk about Ethan's clothes. Sometimes as I held him, he would spit up and it would miss my shoulder and back completely and land on the floor a foot or more away. And the stains on the carpet are just lovely now that he's eating carrots and such.

In 3 weeks he had gained 6 ounces. Which is better, but not great. He's now on Prevacid, which doesn't come in a syrup form. It comes in these tablets that dissolve on your tongue, and you're not suppose to chew them. Yah, try telling that to a teething 7 month old! So I would have to split the tablet in half for his dose, which would crumble into powder. I had to guess as to how much "half" was and save the rest for his next dose. Then I had to dissolve it in water. Half would stay in the syringe and not budge. Ugh. So if you're still reading this....it was just hard.

Enter the marvelous compounding pharmacy which saved the day! We have to pay out of pocket for this service, but it makes my live MUCH easier. The compounding pharmacy makes Prevacid into a syrup and even added watermelon flavoring. He's been on the syrup for 2 days now and I already see a difference. He's been much happier (except for teething) and spitting up MUCH less.

I'm just praying that he will start gaining weight. He is a long and lean baby. 90% for height and 25% for weight. When he was born he was 100% for weight (10 pounds); so you can see how much he has fallen on the growth curve. Right now he only weighs 16 pounds. That's what Joel weighed at 2 months!

Look at what we came home to...

I let out a small yelp. Okay, maybe a large yelp. He just sat and stared at us for a few minutes before taking off. I've seen this critter in our neighborhood before, but never this close. He was less than ten feet from us.

This is not a picture I took. I was too startled to do anything but warn the boys not to go too close because racoons can be dangerous. I guess I warned a little too sternly because Joel wouldn't go in the backyard because "the wacoon was out there".

The first thing Micah said when he saw it? "Hey, I thought racoons were nocturnal animals!"