Pool time!!

Growing up in Florida, summer time meant pool time! So naturally I want Ben to be accustomed to the pool and water. So I ordered a cloth swim diaper for him. It got delayed in shipping and I happen to go to a consignment shop $5 bag sale and found a cloth swim diaper to add to my bag! Not to mention for $10 I got about 15 outfits for him to grow into! Anyhow back to pool time...

I found the most adorable baby pool at Target. It's shaped like a crab, it has some shade, isn't too big, and when he gets bigger it can also be hooked up to the hose and spray water! Pretty cool for $14! So we got it home and I set it up on the deck, changed Ben into his swim diaper and it was time for some pool time!

Mom, I'm not too sure about this... this water is kinda cold.

It's too bright so I'm going to rock my shades in the pool like the big kids.

This pool thing isn't too bad, but I think the shades are a little too big for me. Don't I look cool though?!

We'll keep playing in the pool, when he can sit up on his own I think he will really enjoy it. He didn't once scream at me for making him sit in the water so I think we are of to a great start!

On another note, doesn't he have a cute Buddha belly?! Who would've thought that less than 3 months ago he weighed only 5 pounds 14 ounces?

Full Time Cloth Diapering

So over the weekend we accomplished a lot. Lots of cleaning and putting the house back in order after finishing the crib. I organized all Ben's clothes by size... This little man has a lot of clothes thru the 6 month size. I packed up the newborn sizes and with how quickly he is growing I will probably soon be pulling out the 3-6 month size to replace to 0-3. WOW!

Also this weekend we were a full time cloth diapering family for the first time!! My routine has been to switch him to cloth while he's home after school but switch him back to disposable at night. I had heard and read so many things about leaking at night I had been hesitant to cloth diaper overnight. But I am happy to report that Ben was in cloth ALL weekend starting at 5:30pm when he got home from school until this morning when he left for school. We had no leaks or messes! I even changed him while we were out and about, at Taco Mac and at church. No problems.

I am now sold even more on cloth and we managed to save ourselves at least 24 diapers over the weekend and a savings of about $4 over two days which now that I know I can go overnight with cloth the savings are just going to get better. Plus the box of diapers from Sams will last longer meaning less trips to Sams (Costco doesn't sell Pampers -BOO! and Ben had a bad reaction to Huggies). The more we use cloth diapers the more we will save! PLUS it is helping the environment by not tossing so many diapers into the trash. PLUS it is so much better for Ben's bum to not be in disposables all the time. So all the people out there that haven't tried the new modern cloth diaper, you should check it out, they are really easy to use and so cute on babies bums.

We also ordered Ben a cloth swim diaper over the weekend (we'll see how well it works and maybe get a second). He loves bathtime so much that we may venture into having a little kiddie pool and having pooltime as well. I'm hoping we get the goldfish one but if not it will still be cute. (You tell them you need a boy one and they pick one from their in-stock stash to send you).



The website I order cloth diapers from did a national survey about cloth diapering perceptions. It is interesting, I agree with many of the findings.

I am happy to be part of the 9% of the population that use cloth diapers (even if for us it is part time)!

I'll leave you with a couple of pictures. I couldn't believe the picture I got of Craig and Ben, he gave me such a cute smile (you can see the light blue Bumgenius diaper peeking out from the onesies) and Ben got dressed up for church and even wore shoes for the first time.

Operation Finish the Crib is COMPLETE!!

Last night when I got home our #1 goal was to get the crib done. So we cleaned out the room, Craig drilled the holes for the mattress spring, we brought the base into the room and attached all the sides (this thing is going nowhere quickly- talk about sturdy!), attached the mattress spring assembly (THANKS TINA!!), then made the bed! Here's what it looks like in the room before we added everything back.

We still need to get drawer pulls but that's easy to take care of this weekend. Then we went and got Ben who was napping in the family room and placed him in it.

He stayed asleep, for a little while. He then woke up and I fed him his last meal for the night (around 9:30pm), changed him for bed, swaddled him up (he likes his hands free) and he slept in his new crib until 5am. Which was a pretty good sleep for our little man, all week he had gotten up around 3 or 4 every night.

I got a good 6 hours straight of sleep and feel great today about all we accomplished last night and now we have a weekend to enjoy it!

Operation Finish the Crib!

I told Craig this morning that this weekend is dedicated to "Operation Finish the Crib", to which he replied, why does there need to be an "Operation". Which I answered with "Because what we've been doing isn't working and it needs to get DONE!"

I know we are both working and little man arrived early and the crib was not as far along as we had hoped it would be before he got here. The backup plan of having the cradle his dad built and Craig slept in as a baby has worked nicely but I'm ready to have my room back so I don't hear every movement Ben makes...

On May 2nd the crib was complete, well at least the pieces were done and I sanded them all that week while Craig was in Puerto Rico...

Then it sat in the nursery unstained for weeks...

Then finally we picked out a stain and got super excited about finishing it and got the base and the front and back done and then stalled out with the sides. The sides have been sitting in the nursery with one coat of stain all week. We had every intention of doing the second coat of stain on Tuesday and then poly 1 on Wednesday and poly 2 on Thursday and then reassemble crib, add mattress support, air out baby's room and put it back together. Then Ben would start sleeping in there on Saturday or Sunday... WELL, not so much. The soonest he will be in there is Monday. And since everything that was in that room is all over my house I am not having our friends over like I had hoped.

So wish me luck with "Operation Finish the Crib" and hopefully on Monday night Ben will be sleeping in his own room!!

The Budding Artist!

Ben has had 2 very impressive days at school this week... This week's theme at school is Fun in the Sun (which is a little ironic because we haven't had much sun- mostly rain this week)

Tuesday night I had noticed some yellow paint or something on his fingernails, when I got to school I realized why he had yellow, he had been a very artistic boy and had painted a sun yellow, he didn't stay between the lines but maybe he's an outide the box thinker. ;)



Then they told me he may have a little green on his feet because they had done some more artwork...

My little man at 10 weeks old he has some big feet as you can tell, but shoes still don't fit him because they are long and narrow (like mine).

I may be a little biased but I have to say I am pretty impressed with Ben's talent!

No time to do it all...

Ben's crib is still a work in progress. Craig has done an amazing job building it and then we took our time picking out a stain and now that I'm back to work we are slowly getting it stained. The base and the front and back are done (2 coats of stain, 2 coats of poly). Now we're working on the drawers and the sides. I am really hoping that this weekend we will be able to graduate Ben to the crib in his room. Plus I'll be able to get the house put back together since everything for him is all over the house.

Once this is done my goal is to make his gator quilt. It will be so cute. Then after that I am going to follow along with this blog and make a quiet book. I remember playing with one at my grandmother's house growing up and I can't wait for Ben to have his own. I remember the zippers, tying shoes, buttons, and matching up items. Hope I get all this done before his first birthday! May be ambitious but I CAN DO IT!