2018, August: Idaho Falls Mom's Blog!

I'm incredibly proud to be a contributor for the new Idaho Falls Mom's Blog, which launched today! I'm hopeful it will be a great motivator for my writing, but also a way to meet local moms. I'm useless at meeting new people and this group should force me to be social - it already has once when we took our headshots (which look amazing, btw). Writing a post or two each month for the mom's blog means I will definitely be neglecting this site - so check out my posts over there. I plan to write about ARTitorium stuff, crafting with a toddler, and general parenting topics (next post - potty training!).

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2016, September: 100 Words

Declan reached 100 words today. (Realistically, he probably reached this number much sooner, since there are undoubtedly words that he uses at daycare that I haven't heard yet.) It's been a fascinating journey to experience. At his 15-month doctor appointment he had maybe five words. Now, at 19 months, he has at least 100. His speech has exploded with new words arriving almost every day. He knows colors, shapes, animals, vehicles... and SpongeBob, embarrassingly. (The full list of his first 100 words is below.) 100 words is a lot, but a long way from being enough for effective communication. This progression, and Declan's frustration when he cannot make us understand what he wants, has me thinking a lot about language development and about how many words would be enough? I've followed the Nieder family blog / Facebook page for many years now. I discovered them long before I had a kid, long before we even thought that children might be in our future. I don't re...

Bye Bye, Baby

We said goodbye to the bottle tonight. Which means no more baby bottles in this house ever again! We’ve been getting rid of baby stuff for a while now. In March we donated/sold the stroller, baby car seat, high chair, and play pen, and I’ve been happily ditching a bag or two of baby clothes every few weeks. I haven’t felt sad or sentimental about any of it. I love getting rid of stuff (I am married to a hoarder , after all), and I do not miss the baby stage since I found it so damn hard. But something about the end of the bottle gave me pause. I had such trouble feeding both of them, from my breastfeeding woes with Declan to Ophelia’s failure to gain weight , that the bottle has been a huge focus in our lives for over four years. When Declan was our only child, I never understood all of the parents bemoaning how quickly time was passing. I just didn't feel it. Once Ophelia arrived, however, all of that changed. Time now flits away without a care and I feel like I'm missing...

2015, September: Plagiocephaly, aka Declander the Amazing Helmet Boy

Declan started wearing a helmet last Friday. We knew he had a wonky head - for the first four months of his life he always slept in the exact same position - but we were hoping he would grow out of it. I knew I was supposed to be doing something about it (wedging him to sleep on the other side somehow), but it was enough of a celebration just to get the kid to sleep that I couldn't deal with anything else. At four months old he started rolling and would sleep in a variety of positions, but unfortunately the damage had been done. At his four month check-up the pediatrician said it wasn't too bad and that we should just keep an eye on it. At six months, however, a different pediatrician said "hmmm. We should probably have a specialist take a look." The specialist came from Salt Lake City and said that Declan had a moderate case of plagiocephaly (wonky head) due to slight torticollis (weak neck muscles on one side). Now that he's holding his head up fine and sitt...

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