Showing Off

I got the video of Reese rolling over a lot faster than I thought I would. We had Finding Nemo on while we were playing with our sea creature stuffed animals and when I put her on her stomach she was a rolling over machine. I secretly think she was trying to get a better view of the tv, but hey whatever works. When I tried to tape her from the front she would look at me and then just lay there, she's too smart to perform, so I had to take the video from the side. Anyways, here she is in all her rolling over glory.

WE ROLL OVER!!

Footage of said milestone coming as soon as I catch her on camera. She did it twice today but as soon as I got the camera out to tape her, her sixth sense kicked in and she went limp. Hopefully it won't take as long to get this as it did to get a photo of her smiling.

All Smiles

Sometimes life is going so well that you don't even feel the need to strangle T-Com when the internet goes out for the 9 billionth time; life is just that way for us right now and I'm loving it. It may have taken three months but I finally have all my energy back and I'm getting things done at a ridiculous pace. I feel like someone flipped a switch and I'm no longer constantly tired and struggling just to make it through the day, instead Reese and I are on a roll getting things done and it's a nice change considering how long the list is of things we need to get taken care of before we go on vacation in two weeks. I think this weekend was the turning point in the battle of motivation, Reese and I went on a Mother-Daughter outing to the mall in Koblenz since Nate was working 12 hour night shifts all weekend and sleeping the majority of the day. When we came back from a long day of shopping, which by the way Reese was totally into, we set to work getting the multi-purpose guest room all set up and then boxing up some baby stuff that Reese had outgrown. That was actually a really sad task because as I looked at the little pink turtle jammies that she had worn home from the hospital I realized how much she had grown in the last three months and how much she had changed in other ways as well. Then Sunday night after Reese went to bed I went down to the basement and organized all our boxes in preparation for the other boxes I was going to be bringing down, you have to admit it takes a pretty motivated person to organize a basement. Now we're just taking a break from our final steps of getting things done and I'm quite proud of myself. I look around and my house looks the way I want it to, granted I still need to hang some picture frames and eventually I want to paint the hallway, but our house is a home now and it feels nice.

Puppy Princess

Jaeger is all about comfort to the point that she'll randomly go off and find what she deems to be the most comfortable location in the house to sleep which last night happened to be a pile of old blankets and a big pillow that was sitting in the entry way.

Usually she just naps on the blanket that she commandeered from me or one of the throw pillows on the couch, but every once in awhile, when I toss the throw pillows on the floor for whatever reason, she'll act like true royalty and leave her post on the couch to go lay on the massive pile of pillows. It's quite entertaining to watch her scale a wobbly pile of pillows in order to mount her throne. You also have to be careful in the evening if you get up and leave for a second Jaeger will slide in and steal your spot almost everytime. As I'm typing this Nate got up to get something to drink and came back to find Jaeger laying on the pillow he was using, oh and she is refusing to get up despite his threat to aly on her. Now as you can imagine Jaeger's desire to be in the most comfortable position often leads her to try and lay on Reese's quilt or mat or anything else that she knows she's not supposed to be on. The other day as I was feeding Reese I looked up to see Jaeger slowly twisting herself into the perfect position in Reese's boppy pillow. She looked so cute that I just let her stay there.

Now since I'm already on the subject of Jaeger I'll continue to say that her and Reese are getting along very well. Reese has gotten to the point that when she sees Jaeger she'll smile and Jaeger will try and cuddle up next to Reese when she's playing on her playmat. Jaeger is also very helpful when it comes to watching Reese, a few times now I've left Reese in her swing asleep while I go try and get somethings done and when I leave I'll jokingly tell Jaeger to babysit Reese. Well if Reese starts crying while I'm gone Jaeger doesn't like the noise so she'll come find me. That's a pretty good babysitter if you ask me.

Somedays

As I was reading through my friends' blogs this evening, Mark's comments on being a temporary stay at home dad made me think about my own experiences at home with Reese over the past nearly 3 months. I never thought that being home with Reese would be that much work, I mean I didn't think it would be easy but I definitely didn't think everyday would be filled with attempts at accomplishing things. Like Mark, I assumed I would be able to get everything done that I needed to while Reese was sleeping because I had witnessed my mom do it while babysitting my niece numerous times before. However I'm learning that it's not as easy as she made it look.

Most days my living room is littered with toys (both dog and baby) and blankets and other random objects, the dishes don't always get done right away and that last load of laundry always seems to sit in the dryer for a day or so before I go down and get it out. We've been living in this house for a month and a half and there are still things that don't yet have a place and a room full of things to be put in the plastic bins and stored. It seems that whenever I get going on a project or even simply washing the dishes, Reese decides that she doesn't want me to leave the room and I don't care what people say I'm completely incapable of cleaning with her strapped to me in the baby bjorn. Somedays she'll play quite contently alone on her playmat while I pick up the living room, and somedays she'll sit in her bouncer chair and watch me cook or do the dishes as long as I pretend I'm the star of a cooking show and describe everything I'm doing to her in detail, somedays she'll even take an afternoon nap for more than a half hour. Then there are the days, which are the majority of the time, when I just can't take my eyes off of her because I realize how fast time is going bye and how someday she won't need or want me by her side. So in the mean time I just consider myself lucky to have a husband who helps out so much and doesn't mind the days when he comes home to a frozen pizza and a sinkful of dishes. I know I'm not supermom and I don't expect I ever will be, but Reese is happy and the way she looks at me makes me realize that I don't need to be.