A day in life without photos

Most days, I am without a doubt glued to some kind of image-capturing device. Whether it's my smart phone, digital camera, or anything else we have in the house, I usually snap at least one photo of any of my favorite subjects (which my friends on twitter or instagram will attest that it's either food or my son, usually the latter). Today was not one of those day. Today, my camera was on my desk at home and my iPhone was tucked away in my purse while Daniel and I enjoyed the company of my mom's visit.

We enjoyed a much-welcome break in the heat wave we've been experiencing throughout Southern California and visited a local mall for lunch and some light shopping. She bought Daniel two adorable new outfits for when he fits 12 months and wanted to buy me an outfit too... I just couldn't bring myself to let her. Not that I didn't want the new clothes, because God KNOWS I do. I've just been feeling so blah about myself lately and I want to change that. Physically, I'm not where I want to be post-baby and I'm not ready to buy any new clothes for this body I'm not happy with. I did let her buy me a few things from a couple local Asian markets (food and such) and we ran into our old manager and assistant manager from the San Diego store she works for and I used to work for. Our old manager is now the DM for Los Angeles while the assistant manager is now the head honcho at the store we went to today. Manager met the baby a couple times since we've seen him around, but DM met him for the first time (and truthfully, I haven't seen him since I quit 7 years ago). As strange as it is knowing my mom is a grandmother, he said it's even weirder to know that I'm a mother now. Ha! He then proceeded to fill my son's precious ears with such blasphemous ideas, such as giving me attitude like I had when I was a 20 year old. Psh.

Hahaha. What an interesting day it turned out to be with that reunion.

When we got back to the humble abode, we just enjoyed watching Daniel have a happy day, smile and laugh and basically be the most adorable human being on the planet. I was supposed to go to San Diego with her tonight to spend some time with my family while Gary is away... until she found mold growing on the wall in the back of the cabinet next to the dishwasher this morning. Half of the kitchen is on the living room floor, where my brother would have slept while Daniel and I snoozed in the guest room he's currently occupying. Plus, a construction zone with potentially harmful mold spores floating around is no place for a 9 month old.

Photo courtesy of my brother's Facebook

I'm hoping that is fixed by next weekend, so we can visit them like I wanted to. I'm looking forward to my good friend Stacy's gender reveal baby shower, I'm rooting Team Blue hardcore but would welcome another future girlfriend for Daniel if that's the case! Haha! (just kidding, Stacy!!!) I have several things to share with her, including a modest stash of prefolds I'll be lending her until my next baby go-round, as well as a test drive of our small collection of baby carriers. It's always nice to be able to touch and feel and see a product before you actually purchase something. I think this is especially true for quality baby carriers, as they're usually an investment.

And with that, I turn off my music-fueled me time to join my sweet prince in our family bed.

Wednesday

He really does the most adorable, random things.

You know you're a mom when...

My heart.

Product review plus some: ERGObaby Carrier System

Image from http://www.ergobaby.com

We're Baby Carriers 'R' Us! No, really!

When Daniel was first born, I had no idea about the idea or huge cultural trend behind baby wearing, but we were naturally drawn to it like so many of the other childrearing practices we decided to do with little to no outside influence. Before he was born, I went on maternity leave and received so many wonderful gifts from my colleagues, including a Moby Wrap. As comfortable with it as I am now, I looked at this 6 yards of fabric and said to myself "I'm supposed to wrap my child to me using this?". It was at least two months before I got the courage to try it, and we haven't looked back! I couldn't get over how cute he looked wrapped up all warm and cozy to me and how comfortable it was to wear him like that.

For those first two months of his life, we used the Baby Bjorn Air that my in-laws bought for us and let me just say this right now: that thing was a lifesaver. While there are many reasons for parents to  not front-carry, one of them being it's too over-stimulating for the baby and though we wore him tummy-to-tummy 90% of the time we used it, we front-faced Daniel quite a bit and he seemed to really enjoy it (but that is just the kind of baby he is). My one gripe with the Baby Bjorn that I didn't find to be the case with my Moby Wrap, is that after about an hour or so, the small of my back would be strained. Ouch! So for the second month of his life (we didn't use anything for 2 weeks, then our in-laws were in town for 2 weeks and they held him all the time...), we used the Baby Bjorn exclusively before I finally figured out how to use the Moby.

On Either Side of the Dividing Line

Since my dear Daniel was born going on 5 months ago, it has been increasingly difficult for me to even remember (or want to, for that matter) what my life was like without him. He seems so much a part of me every day that life without him is truly inconceivable. With that said, as he gets older, there are things I miss about the days before he was born. The biggest of that (very) small list being: sleep.