So, um, I think I may be pregnant...

I know, right?! This is my first post in months, and I drop the baby bombshell? However, I'm not really sure if I am KTFU or not. It's waaaay to early in the game to know. Let me start from the beginning...

C is now 13 months old. We had always talked about having kids two years apart, so the time to start trying is now. I looked at my chart the other night and realized I should be ovulating any day--so we went for it. There were a lot of tears (more on that later) and questions about if this is right for us now, but in the end we said it was. And we DTD. I was having ovulation pain that whole day, so I'm pretty sure the timing was right. The pain was still there the next day, so we DTD again. (The timing on this started with ovulation day--Nov. 14th.) Here I am two days after our last TTC session, and I'm still in pain. I never cramp this much--expect for when I knocked up the first time. Now, I know it's still too early to tell, but I just have this feeling. If I'm not pregnant, then I need to see a doctor because of the pain.

So, now I begin the two week wait. We shall see....

Smartipants are a Dad's Dream Cloth Diaper

My first in depth cloth diaper review will be of our favorite diaper: Smartipants. In the words of my husband, "If I could marry a cloth diaper, I'd totally marry Smartipants!!" No joke. I was a little weirded out.

But yes, these are the best. We only have 6, out of 15 cloth diapers total, so my husband gets a little mad when we run out. Hey, don't yell at me, buddy! As I told him last night, if he wants more then he can buy them. (Well, he doesn't really yell, but he does get frustrated when we use our last one. And buying cloth diapers is addicting, so it's great that he supports it, right?)

On to why these are the best. First of all, they are a one size diaper that should last your baby from 7-35 pounds. Our baby girl is 17 pounds, and right now she's on the second row of snaps. I only use one size diapers because I'm not about to spend twice as much on cloth during the diapering years. One and done.

Secondly, they created the Smart Sleeve. This is basically like a pocket diaper, but instead of opening on one end only, both ends are open. In other words, it's genius! One of the draw backs to cloth diapering for me and my husband is the part where we have to touch the gross wet (or even worse, poopy) inserts. With the Smart Sleeve, you don't touch the insert. At all. Just throw the diaper into the washing machine, and the insert comes out during the wash. For real! I was kind of a skeptic when I first heard this, but I was amazed. The inserts, in my machine, come out during the pre-rinse.

The Smart Sleeve also makes stuffing the diapers a breeze, which is why my husband really loves these diapers. Just put the insert in one side, and pull it through from the other side. Super easy and fast! When we stuff diapers, my husband only stuffs the Smartipants. He refuses to stuff the others because they are "harder." So, I get stuck stuffing the other brands, and by the time I'm done he's off spending quality time with baby girl. Time is precious. Would you rather spend it stuffing diapers or spending time with loved ones?
Only one insert comes with the diaper. If I had one complaint, it would be that I wish a smaller insert was also included. Since we are only on the second row of snaps, the insert kind of hangs out of the back a bit. Nothing major, but we just have to make sure it's tucked in. However, we've never had a leak, so I really shouldn't complain!

Ok, now on to the second awesome selling point for us: price. You can buy one diaper for $14.95. That's like five dollars cheaper than the competitors! But wait, it gets better. The Smart Start 3-Packs are on sale for $36.95 until Father's Day. That's about $12 a diaper! Are you kidding me?

So what are you waiting for? Seriously, you have to try this diaper. We haven't had any leaks, and my husband loves them. If you are trying to convince your better half to hop on the cloth diapering train, then this is the perfect diaper. Heck, it's the perfect diaper no matter what!

Even baby girl loves her Smartipants!

**If I sound like a paid advertisement, then that's because we really love this product! Smartipants did not hook us up with free diapers--we paid for all of them.**

Time for Change

Well, an RN from my doctor's office called and said I have a vitamin D deficiency. I now how to take big pills and get outside more, so hopefully this will help my "depression" or whatever it is. You are probably thinking, "but it's summer! Why are you not outside all the time??!" I'm very fair skinned, so I burn very fast. I even burn while sitting in my car! I just walk to my mailbox and I can feel my freckles popping out. So, I stay in the shade with baby girl. I've had so many sunburns in my life, and I'm very paranoid about skin cancer.

Also? It's been crazy hot here. Like, it's not even fun being outside with this crazy heat. And it's been stormy. I totally plan getting on our butts to the pool at least once a week, so hopefully the weather starts cooperating!

As for the title of this post, I think I am going to change this blog a bit. I don't like the direction it is going. I've been reading a lot of mom blogs lately, and frankly, I don't really understand the point. Mom blogs seem like a popularity contest, and for what? Reading a story about little Timmy using the big boy toilet? Why do I care about that? I have my own life, and I need to concentrate on my family. I don't need to get lost in other's dramas and personal affairs. (Ok, I'm going to stop here and say I'm not putting anyone down for reading mom blogs or writing them. I totally and completely understand if you are addicted to them! As for me and my life right now (which is totally filled with unnecessary drama), the best thing is for me to back off.)

So, what is this blog going to be about now? Well, it'll be about my new adventures in cloth diapering. Cloth diapering for dummies, if you will. Also, I love crafts. I feel like Martha Stewart when I accomplish something, so I'll post my work and how-to's so others can feel like Martha as well (it really is a great feeling!).

Other than that, it will kind of be an advice/helpful blog. There's no need to know exactly what we did over the weekend--I have my boring family blog for that! So there you have it. I hope all five of my readers don't mind!

Therapy Thursday: PPD, Exhaustion, or a New Normal?

I had my annual check-up yesterday, and when my doctor asked how I was doing, I broke down crying. Something I've been doing a lot. I told her my husband wanted me to talk about postpartum depression, and so we did. She also gave me a questionnaire/test--I was one point shy of "severe depression." So, she suggested I go to counseling, and she also gave me a prescription for Zoloft. However, I'm still nursing, and I plan on doing so for a year, so I'm not entirely comfortable taking meds just yet. So my question to myself is, am I really suffering from PPD, or is it just plain old exhaustion? Let me back up and explain my symptoms and history.

The first six weeks of C's life were great. I didn't feel like PPD would make an appearance, but I did have bouts of exhaustion and crankiness (what new mom doesn't?). The main source of my stress? Breastfeeding. I can't even tell you how many tears I shed over breastfeeding during those first six weeks. I will go into details about this in a later blog, but let's just say it was rough. I made it past the most difficult weeks, and now BF'ing is a breeze--mostly.

I was so proud of being a great new mom that enjoyed every minute with her baby girl, and then a traumatic event occurred (for me anyway). C developed a subgaleal hematoma six weeks after being vacuumed at birth. I seriously thought she was dying. It was the worst feeling in the world, and one of the scariest times in my life (the other being the day I thought I was miscarrying.) I became an uber paranoid mom after that day. I started obsessing over every little thing that could be wrong with her: Was that bump on her head there yesterday? Is her head shape normal? Does she have brain cancer? She hasn't pooped in four days, does she has neuroblastoma? My fears went on and on and on, and they still do. I can't stop worrying about her. Is this PPD, PPA, or Post Traumatic Stress? Or is it a normal reaction to what happened that day?

I thought it was normal until a few weeks ago. While eating out, Mr. McG's parents offered to fly us out to California to see our soon to be new nephew, and I straight up went into a panic attack. And then I started crying right there at the table. I should have been ecstatic to go on a free vacation to a state I've never been to before--all so we can meet the newest member of our family. Instead, I envisioned the plane crashing, or getting in a car wreck in California, or something bad happening to C in our hotel. My mind went crazy. That's when Mr. McG got really concerned about me.

However, I'm still inclined to think it's just exhaustion. Here's why: Baby girl has been getting up 2-3 times a night for the past three weeks. It's been absolutely horrible. She's 7.5 months now, so we thought that was long behind us. We thought wrong. I need my sleep. Seriously, I'm a crazy person without it. So, why would I want to start taking medicine that could get in my breast milk and get passed on to my baby girl if all I really need is sleep??

School is out now, baby girl is starting to sleep through the night again (we upped her food intake two days ago), and it's summer. I'm hoping I just need sleep. Lots and lots of sleep. So Mr. McG and I are going to have a weekend devoted to just that.

I don't feel comfortable popping pills just because my doctor can prescribe them for me. It's a shame that depression medication is dispensed like candy now a days as a way to cope with feeling blue. (I totally understand that people do need medication, but I seriously doubt half the people taking anti-depressants really need them.) Hopefully sleep will make me feel better, and if it doesn't, then I'll fill my prescription and see a counselor. Actually, I might just see a counselor anyway. Mental floss is a good thing!

Don't talk about your winkle!

A couple of months ago, while we were standing in the check out line at BRU, I noticed the baby in front of us was playing with a Winkle. (If you have a 2-3 month old baby, go get one. Now! It's awesome.) I was so excited to see another baby with a winkle, so I told the mom, "Oh, my baby LOVES playing with her winkle!!" The mom looked at me like I was absolutely crazy and didn't say a word. She then inched her cart forward to get some distance in between us. I looked at Mr. McG and I was crushed. Why was this woman being so rude? The dad then came back and put a winkle, with tags on it, in the cart and took the tagless one away. So the one the baby had been playing with? Totally not theirs yet. So the mom had no idea that toy was called a winkle--thus thinking I was a perv. I was mortified! I was also disgusted they let their baby chew on a toy from a store without washing it first, and then return it back to the shelf.

Lessons learned from that trip: 1) Don't talk about your baby's winkle to other people without making it very clear what you are talking about, and 2) Don't let your baby suck or chew on anything straight from the store.

And here's a picture of C playing with her beloved winkle when she was three months old:

Head Issues

I don't know if I have postpartum depression, but some days (ok, most days) it seems like I have postpartum anxiety. I worry about C constantly. For real. The majority of my worrying came after an incident when she was just 6 weeks old.

When she was 6 weeks, I noticed a puffy spot on her head. It jiggled when you touched it. I immediately freaked out--I thought her brain was bleeding or swelling. I was home by myself, couldn't get a hold of her doctor, and was thinking the worst. So I rushed her to the ER, and Mr. McG met me there. The whole way there I kept thinking she was going to die. This probably sounds really dramatic, but that's what was running through my mind. After a brain ultrasound and talks with the doctors and neurosurgeon (scary, right?!), they discovered it was a subgaleal hemorrhage that was a result of the vacuum used at delivery. They weren't sure why it developed six weeks later because it usually occurs hours after birth. The bleed eventually went down, but since then I've been crazy obsessed with the shape of her head. Crazy being the key word, according to my husband. I really can't stop obsessing about it, and when I think back to how I thought I was losing my baby girl I cry. I was absolutely terrified.

In these pictures you can see the puffiness. We outlined it with a marker to track the progress and make sure it wasn't getting bigger.

You can see the spot under the white V on hubby's shirt.

Ok, now let's move on to today. I'm still obsessing over her head, but I think I have reason to! As you can see in the picture below, the right side (on the pic) is bulging out. The doctor said it's fine and normal, and is attributing it to her laying on her back. But her back isn't flat! It's normal. And this side isn't going down at all. So I'm freaking out again. I'm tired of everyone thinking I'm crazy about this, but I'm taking her to the doctor again and even thinking about getting a second opinion. What do you all think? Am I just being paranoid? Click on the picture to make it bigger so you can see what I'm talking about.

How to make a momma mad

I'm sure we all have one--an extended family member that plays favorites, and you aren't the one on the awesome end. It pisses you off. You then ignore it. But then something happens, and it pisses you off again. Well, today, my aunt pissed me off for the last time.

I should start with some back stories. My aunt (who's rich) completely plays favorites to my twin cousins, who are only two years younger than me. They go on vacation with her every year (she has a condo in Florida and they get to use it. My family? Not so much.), she's bought them Coach purses, and she's always doing things or getting things for them. Oh yeah, she even got them a car! I've just gotten bath towels for my wedding and she split my $70 pack n play with another aunt for my baby shower. Really, rich aunt?? So, yes, she totally plays favorites, and I'm sick of it.

Back in December, my aunts and cousins came over to my house to make Christmas cookies. Baby girl was just six weeks old, so I was completely exhausted. We also had a health scare with her just a couple days before: we took her to the ER for a head injury resulting from her being vacuumed at delivery...six weeks later! (More on that later, but let's just say I thought she was dying.) So needless to say, I was mentally and physically exhausted. They were supposed to arrive at 9, so I got up at 7. What time did they show up? 11!! Did they give me a courtesy call to say they'd arrive later? Of course not. They didn't even apologize! So I was pretty pissed. I'm a new mom, and sleep is very precious. I could have had two more hours of precious, precious sleep! I kept my cool for the most part until they did something that really ticked me off, and it was the straw that broke the camel's back. I kind of lost it. Like, I went bat shit crazy on their asses. I started crying, yelling, slamming doors....yeah, crazy. But remember I just had baby girl SIX weeks ago! Hormones were still raging. And I was sleep deprived.

So fast forward to yesterday. We went to a family function, and my aunt was there. She asked what was new with baby girl, and Mr. McG said that she's learned to scream. Rich aunt replied, "She takes after her mommy!" Hubby tried to ignore the rude remark by saying, "Yeah, she'll be a soprano like her mommy. Her screams get really high!" Aunt responds with, "Just like her mommy!" I. Was. Pissed! I rolled my eyes and walked away. Hubby left too. She also made a similar comment on Christmas Eve.

So I'm done trying to please this woman. I didn't do anything to her at all before my meltdown in December, and yet I was never on her good side. Whatever. My cousins can have her. She's the one that's bat shit crazy. As my mom (her sister) said after I told her what happened: "she's off her meds!"