What makes a friend?

This question (in not so many words) was posed today on an internet message board I frequent. Is it crazy to think that these women that I talk to everyday (albeit via the internet) but whom I've never met are my friends? I've been told they aren't my friends by people in my life because I "don't really know them." They could be some crazy psychos for all I know.

My answer is no, I don't think it's crazy at all. We've been there through for each other through some very tough things, we've been able to talk to each other about things that we wouldn't talk to anyone else about. We know each others kids, husbands, jobs, and lives in general. We've celebrated our ups in life and cried with each other through our downs. But again many of us have never met each other.

So are my friends limited to my best friend who knows me better than anyone so much so that she knows what I'm thinking? Or my husband because of the intimacy that we share? Or my crazy coworker who can piss me off sometimes but who I know loves me and my son and I her and her son? Or any of my other friends "in real life"?

Or can these wonderful ladies also be my friends, because of all the reasons that I stated above?

I don't know about everyone else, but I count them among my friends even if I "don't really know them."

Love, warm fuzzies, hugs and police work,
Nessa

Quote of the Blog: (2 today!)
"A friend is someone who understands your past, believes in your future, and accepts you just the way you are." -Unknown

"Truly great friends are hard to find, difficult to leave, and impossible to forget.-Unknown

For serious kid...

Sleeping like that cannot be comfortable.

I mean, I know you're a baby and all and you're bones aren't completely formed yet so you have the flexibility of a career Romanian gymnast, but still sleeping in that position? I like that you're even hanging onto the little lamb ear for stability!

I really don't have anything else today, just that. When my kid does sleep...it's in some weird position.

Quote of the Blog: "People who say they sleep like a baby usually don't have one." - Leo J. Burke

The New Parent's Guide to Practicality

I try to be helpful. As helpful as I can be with my limited experience in pretty much everything. You know the saying about the person that "knows a little bit about everything and a lot about nothing"? That's me. Being that I've been a mom for 5 months now and managed to keep my child alive for all this time (pretty damn good if you ask me), I've gotten the occasional question and been sought out for advice by friends and acquaintances. Yes...really. I'm more than happy to share my experience and what has worked for me in the off chance that it may actually work for someone else and then I get to be hero of the day. Perhaps I'll go down in the Motherhood Hall of Fame...but probably not. So here are a few practical things that I have learned along the way. These are the things that work for me, that are logical to me, that I think can work for others that think like me. Take it or leave it...just a crop-dusting (if you will) of information straight from the brain of Nessa.

1. Generic is your friend. I'm a practical person and I still fell prey to the gimmicks of the big companies. "If you don't spend a shitload of money on Pampers/Huggies/Similac/Enfamil/etc., then you don't love your baby as much as other people do." Such crap. As with anything else...check the labels! Give them a try, if it doesn't work for you and your baby then try something else. That's one of the coolest parts about being a parent to me, finding out what works for your baby! A little cost comparison example, a large can of Similac costs approx. $25.00 give or take a few dollars, the same size can of Walmart's Parent's Choice Advantage (the same thing as Similac save for miniscule amount difference of two ingredients) costs $11.88. A 36 pack of Pampers newborn diapers costs $8.99 and 50 pack of Target's Up&Up newborn diapers costs $6.29. Hmmm...which do I buy? Sidenote: Now I will say that I have found that I prefer Pampers Sensitive wipes to any other...so I splurge on those. See? I'm not completely anti-brand name! But I do have a solution for brand name lovers...see the item below.
2. If you do buy brand name, see if that item is available on Amazon.com and if you can use Subscribe and Save for that item. It will save you an unbelievable amount of money! For example, I previously used Pampers Sensitive diapers before switching to Up&Up diapers for Jax. For a box of 180 diapers retail price was $41.99, with Amazon's Subscribe and Save the same box cost $28.00 (no tax, no shipping charges). Pretty darn good. You sign up with Amazon Mom and choose your items that have the subscribe and save option, then when you go to check out, you choose whether you'd like to get another package of the item (or however many packages you want) every month, 2 months, or 3 months (I think that's the increments...don't quote me). Then it automatically charges you and ships the item to you at each increment. You can cancel it at anytime, even after your first. So you buy size 1 diapers and the next month your little chunker is already ready for size 2's? Cancel that subscription and start a new one for size 2's. It's that easy. You can use this for diapers, wipes, formula, baby food, and even household items that you replace frequently like dog food, detergent, etc. Go explore.
3. This next one is for the anxiety ridden mother like myself. I researched and read studies and thought and considered and reconsidered over lots of things. But the thing that scared me the most was that my child would fall prey to SIDS while I slept and there would be nothing that I could do for him. I had heard during my pregnancy about something called the Angelcare Movement Monitor. But I decided no, that I needed to be rational. That was overkill, I needed to just follow the advice given (like putting nothing in the crib but a fitted sheet over the mattress no blankets, having a fan running in the room where he slept, dressing him comfortably for the temperature in the room). Well a week after Jax was born, I was sleep deprived only getting about 4 hours a day broken up. The most I ever got at one time was 2 hours because I "HAD" to make sure he was breathing constantly. My OB scolded me at my follow-up appointment for not getting sleep and when I broke down and told her the reason, she told me to a) go home and go to sleep for at least 4 hours straight and b) get an Angelcare moniter. So I went home, Chris promised to watch Jax non stop and I got 5 glorious hours of sleep. Had another rough night of sleeping due to my need to get up and check on Jax. Then woke up and immediately went to Babies R Us and bought the Angelcare Deluxe Movement Monitor. I have slept wonderfully and worry free every night since, unless I had a fussy baby. It's a must have for worriers like myself. Oh and it also has a sound monitor and a room temperature monitor so it's completely practical. too!!
4. Crib bedding sets are a stupid waste of money. "Why?!", you ask. "They're so cute!", you say! "Screw you, it's my money and I'll buy whatever I want!", you exclaim suddenly finding yourself offended. Once again remember this is my blog and therefore you're in my world and in my world crib sets are stupid. That's the rule. Because your baby is only supposed to sleep on a sheet...nothing else. No blankets, no cute cushy bumpers, no pillows, none of it! So tell me what is the point?! Oh right...to look cute. Well call me crazy but I don't even make my own bed and I use pillows and blankets and all that...so why would I spend time to make my kids bed up with crap he can't use?! I didn't spend a lot (a whopping $70) on my crib set but if I had to do it over again, I'd just buy sheets and a cute matching crib skirt for decoration. Spend that money to do up the room, a neat paint job with a mural or wall decals, pictures, knick knacks for shelves, whatever just not stuff for the crib!
5. Don't clutter up the house with useless baby equipment. That pack n play I just had to have? Kid has yet to ever sleep in it, it's only been used for a changing table. And I should have known not to get it, because you can't use the monitor in it so of course I wouldn't want him to sleep in it. Where does he nap when downstairs? In the swing, wonderful piece of equipment! Some people have the opposite experience. You may have to do trial and error. Notice I didn't say what equipment not to buy because you really should try whatever you can and yes that can get expensive at first (see help for that below). But say this is your first child and he hates his swing, get it out of there, put it in the garage, but don't sell it. Now you have your next child and you see that swing, you pull it out of the garage, he loves it. Not a waste of money in my book. But if it's not working for now, put it away, don't leave it out to trip over in the off chance that maybe he'll learn to like it!
6. Used baby equipment and clothes...it's a personal choice. Some people aren't comfortable with it whether it's from a stranger or their own neat freak sister. That's fine stop here and move on. For those of us that say, "Hell yeah just give it a good washing!", read on. Craigslist, ebay, and Once Upon a Child (or some other baby and kids consignment store) will be your best friend. You get what you can from friends and family but let's be honest there are some things they don't have or there are some things of theirs that you just don't want. That swing that your Aunt Judy used with your cousin 15 years ago may be very clean and look brand new and work just fine but ewwwwwww it has a creepy clown face on it! Or maybe you just had something specific that you wanted, like that cute little lamb swing. Give the consignment store a try, no luck, search the specific item you want on craigslist, you may find one or more than one in your area. For example, my swing came from a lovely woman whose little boy HATED it, sat in it twice and screamed his head off. So I got my $150 swing for $80 because a baby's butt was in it 2 times...I can handle that. I've gotten lots of clothes in wonderful condition off of ebay, from Once Upon a Child, and from craigslist sales for a fraction of the original cost. No different than your best friend handing you a bag of clothes, you wash them first and then gladly parade your baby around in his "new" cute clothes! How much can you save...well I've found clothes that just came out that season at Once Upon a Child quite a few times...so $8-$14 dollars for a Carter's sleeper (depending on sales) or $3 at OUaC?
7. Bottles are the bane of your existence until you find "the right one" for your baby. I'm not saying that I have all the answers...but do yourself a favor and try cheap ones first and maybe just a bottle at a time until you find the right one. After 5 months of using all sorts of different bottles and nipples and countless dollars down the drain...my kid loves plain old...cheap ass...plastic Gerber bottles. The kind that come in packs of 3 and cost about $2-$3 a pack. Yup...Gerber bottles...headdesk.
8. There are some conveniences that may be worth the extra money to you. Want to do cloth diapering? More power to you...look into a diaper service and see if it would be worth it to you to let them launder for you! Honestly, I researched it because I was interested in cloth diapers (no one else was though, so there goes my once a year attempt at being green) and it wasn't much more expensive than buying disposable diapers and you don't have to wash them! For me that convenience is not having to make a bottle on the go. I buy a case of Similac ready to feed formula that come in 8 ounce bottles...the same thing they give you (if you choose to formula feed) when you leave the hospital in the 2 oz bottles. They don't have to be refridgerated and they don't go bad for quite some time. They go in his diaper bag and all I have to do when I'm out and about is unscrew the safety sealed cap and put a nipple on it and it's feeding time! No baby bottles to carry, no need for an extra bottle of water to have on hand, no need for those formula dispensers. That is a convenience well worth the cost and really worth it when I use all those coupons that Similac still sends me. I'm pretty sure Enfamil has a similar product.

I'm ending this post with a product rave...Infantino Vibrating Teether...yes I said vibrating. It comes in the shape of a bunch of grapes or a strawberry. Your cranky teething baby bites down on the soft exterior and it vibrates his poor sore little gums. Jax loves it, therefore I love it. Just like how I've learned to love Barefoot Contessa because Jax does...but I draw the line at Barney and Yo Gabba Gabba...not in my house...it's not gonna happen.

That's all I've got for now. I'm sure I'll pop out some more pearls of wisdom but for now I'll go back to focusing on keeping my baby alive!

Love, warm fuzzies, hugs and police work,

Nessa

Quote of the Blog: "My practicality consists in this, in the knowledge that if you beat your head against the wall, it is your head which breaks and not the wall...that is my strength, my only strength." -Antonio Gramsci

Hey I'm back less than a month later!

Just to show off my kid though...boo everyone hates cute squishy babies with big cheeks right?!

Well as you can see Jax is growing like a weed. He got to be the muse for a hot, young, up and coming photographer named Leslie McCarroll. I think she did an awesome job despite her protests that her skills suck...forgive her...she's slightly delusional.

There should be more cuteness to follow as Jax shared the cuteness stage with her precious baby boy, Boston. We almost got sucked into a blackhole of cuteness.

Alright I'm done saying the word cute or some variation of said word.

That's all for now...stay tuned for more...later sometime.

Love, warm-fuzzies, hugs and police work,

Nessa

Remember the Elephants

Hey yall, I haven't posted in quite sometime. And truth be told, I don't know when I'll be able to post again after this, really I haven't had much to say. Well, today I do.

This is a post that I have stolen from a friends blog. I tried to summarize, to paraphrase, to do whatever I could to shorten it and get the point across, but I couldn't. The entire story and message is so important to me.

And to the OP (if you're reading this), I'm sorry to steal your post but you know how important the message is to me and how much love I have for you and LO. So I hope you'll forgive my plagarism. ((hugs)) for all the ones you've given me!

"Friday, January 15, 2010

Women and Elephants Never Forget...

There are few events in my life that the great Dorothy Parker hasn't perfectly summed up.

I love elephants. I remember seeing an IMAX movie when I was younger about these amazing animals, and the thing that struck me, even then, was their ability for compassion and empathy. When a member of their community is ill, they patiently wait for them to heal. When one is falling behind, they all slow down so their lagging member can catch up. And when a mother elephant loses her baby, they stand in a circle around her and allow her all the time she needs to grieve and mourn. They don't hurry her along, or push her to abandon the body. They stand in a circle and gently touch her with their trunks, a silent show of unwavering support.

Elephant mothers will stand with their babies for weeks, not eating or drinking, just holding them close and letting the reality that they are gone slowly settle in. And they are allowed that time by their family members.

We don't do that. Humans I mean. We do not rally around the bereaved, or allow the members of our community to mourn on their own time. We push, we prod, we offer helpful statements like "it's for the best" or "things happen for a reason." Grief is like some embarrassing condition - a cold sore or an unseemly rash - and we hasten to hide it from view.

In this time of heartbreak - for I am heartbroken, even as I start to emerge from the grief and accept the fact that this whole process did not, somehow, manage to kill me - all I want is for the people in my life to stand around me and put their hands on my back, and let me take the time to heal. I begin to realize we are not, as a society, capable of such a thing.

Women and elephants never forget...and I will try to remember how this feels the next time someone in my life has suffered a loss. I will try to be the circle of support they need. "

So please, everyone who reads this, remember the support that these wild animals can muster and give to their grieving friends and family. Please remember this when you know someone who experiences any kind of loss be it a pet, a job, a friend, a family member, or a baby.

Please Remember the Elephants.

Love, warm fuzzies, hugs and police work,
Vanessa

Alright I'm back...

I've been gone for so very very long but now I'm back from outer space (sorry couldn't help myself!). Alright so in the time I've been gone, I haven't touched my book (it pains me to admit), I've had a baby and managed to keep him alive for over 2 months now (go for 3! I should be given an award or something), and I've been off work long enough to come to the conclusion that I'm a great stay at home mom and if only Chris made more money I could totally do this for the rest of my life!

But as I do not have that option I must go back to work on Thursday...in 2 days...and it sucks. And you know the suckiest part...I'm going to get to work and people are going to ask, "Hey are you glad to be back?!" NOOOOOO! Why would you even ask me that?! Yes I want to be back here taking verbal beatings for a living as opposed to at home caring for and playing with my precious son.

But on the upside I'm going part time in January, though I'll still be working full time hours. I just need more flexibility in my schedule. Hopefully we'll be able to reduce and streamline our budget and I'll be able to work the minimum amount of hours soon. As with everything, we'll just have to see.

I wish had some awesome job that I could do completely from home, that would be awesome. Or even having the type of job where I could take Jackson with me to work. I had always wanted to have some kind of shop. The type where I could be behind the counter (with maybe 1 employee) and have Jax in a playpen next to me. Then I could tend to him when needed. But I don't know what kind of shop I would have, nor do I have the money or the ability to get the money to start said shop.

Ugh I'm rambling now...I'll stop before I start losing what few followers I have!

Warm fuzzies, hugs and police work,
Nessa

Quote of the blog: "I rambled all the time. I was just like that, like a rollin' stone." -Muddy Waters

Oh the places we go...

What have I been doing the past 15 weeks that has kept me sooooooo busy? Not a damn productive thing...other than growing a baby. And my how baby has grown! Wish I had a recent belly pic to add to this post but unfortunately I got nothing.

Oh let's run through the resolutions. Have a baby this year, so far this is well under way. Lose weight, a little counterproductive to the aforementioned resolution, so it's been scrapped until after the baby comes! What else have we got? Save money, mmmmm...somewhat, I've gotten better about budgeting, but I need to work on really reigning in the spending and fast! And finally...my book...le sigh.

Oh, book. How I love you and oh how I fail you time and time again. I have not written on it in longer than I care to share. It doesn't help that I see the file everyday and still choose not to open it. It deserves love, focus, and attention. All things I don't have to give it right now. If it was a dog, I'd give it to a loving family. But since I can't do that, it will just have to live on the proverbial back burner in my mind. Sad boo!

I got nothing else, sorry for crappy updates but not like anyone's reading this anyway!

Warm fuzzies, hugs and police work,
Nessa

Quote of the Blog: "The brightest future will always be based on a forgotten past; you can't go forward in life until you let go of your past failures and heartaches." -Unknown