Happy 1st Birthday, Benjamin Gregory

Has it really been a year already? In some ways, it has flown by and in others, it feels like time slowed down and creeped along (specifically months 1-4 when we weren't sleeping). We just had a wonderful birthday party for Benji with family, and it was a smashing success. A big thank you to our family who helped so much make the day special. I know Benjamin won't remember his first birthday, but I will. In some ways, it was a celebration for Bizzy and I to say, "Look, we made it a year! We survived and made this adorable boy." We had a photographer come and take pictures of the party so that we could have beautiful memories of the party and all the people there who love Benji.



To catch up on who Benjamin is at this point in time, here are a few of his stats.

Weight: 22 pounds 4 ounces
Height: 30 inches...Bizzy is convinced that the nurse measured him short
Head Size: 18.5 inches
Feet: BIG-he is wearing a size 4 right now
Words: No official words yet; although, Bizzy had a dream where Benji's first words were "Nana here?"
Likes: Dancing to his tractor's music, snuggling on the couch during "snack-time," PUFFS, any type of ball or rolling toy, any kind of dog, trains, bubbles, belly-dancing in his car seat, being outside, riding on his red race car, and watching airplanes
Dislikes: Diaper changes, cleaning up after meals, being taken away from anything he wants, carrots, and the ice maker
Favorite foods: It changes weekly, but at the moment, he loves sweet potatoes, cheese, bananas, yogurt, and whole wheat waffles
Mobility: He is cruising all over the place and he stands by himself until he realizes he isn't holding on to anything and then immediately drops. We think he will be walking in the next month or so especially since he is in a Gymboree class with a bunch of little walkers.
Signs: Ben knows the sign for milk, eat, more, puff, all done, dog, and airplane (kind of)

                                       Here are some pics from his birthday party:

Animal Safari Theme

Ben tried to sleep through his party

                                        Eliza looking beautiful

 Sisters!

 Tablescape

 Had to wake Benji up to join his party...making his big debut

 My precious one year old boy

He was excited to see everyone!

Benji got a new red convertible for his birthday. Won't happen at 16, buddy. 

 All the fam..we are a big group!

Bissmeyer clan

Granny, Nana, and Pops (Ben decided to eat his loafer)

We love this boy. 

Hey! Look at me! It's my birthday. 

 "Hmm, interesting."

"Let me try it..."

 "Mom! What did you feed me?!"

Garry and Kate

This would have been super cute if Benji had looked less bored

 Nana and balloons :)

Love this picture! Classic Benjamin. 

 We achieved 1 picture with Benjamin and Eliza together. Success. 

Auntie Melynda with Benji

 Standing by himself like a big boy

Four generations of strong women

 Benji loved his train table and trains from Granny and Nana/Pops

My favorite picture of the day. 

Ok, second favorite. 

Thank you to everyone for their love and support this past year. We could not have survived the sleepless nights without you, and it brings tears to my eyes knowing how much Benjamin is loved by all of you. 

Benjamin, you have brought such purpose and meaning to my life. I can only imagine what this next year will bring. Happy birthday, my precious baby boy. I love you to the moon and back. 

Ready for a close-up

Here are a few adorable photos of our little man. Enjoy!

Spoiler Alert: Motherhood is Hard

Every day, I am thankful that I have the opportunity to be a stay-at-home mom for Benjamin. While money may be tighter than it would be if I worked, I think the trade-off is completely worth it. My life revolves around this little man, and for now, that is how it should be. While I wouldn't trade staying at home with Ben for anything, there are times that it can be isolating. There have been times that I felt like I didn't have anything interesting to say about any topic other than breastfeeding, pooping, sleep schedules, or developmental milestones when out with someone other than Bizzy. And since the moment Ben was born, I discovered that motherhood is flippin hard, ya'll! That should really be the sub-title to that book What to Expect When You're Expecting.

Every single day, I am faced with decisions about Benji's well-being and safety, and there is always a desperation to make the RIGHT choice and do things PERFECTLY. And as any mother would tell you, that hardly every happens; thus, there is an overwhelming sense of mommy guilt associated with most days. Lying in bed at night, I replay scenarios where I could have NOT dropped the toy train on my darling baby's head (just a totally hypothetical scenario...).

Breastfeeding also brings its own set of issues and struggles along with it.
Recently, I've had some issues with low supply, blocked ducts, and Ben's great nursing strike of 2013. There is nothing that has gotten my blood pressure soaring as quickly as attempting to feed Benjamin in the middle of the night and having nothing coming out. He started screaming and I was panicking and my internal monologue was something like, "I can't feed my baby. I can't feed my baby. IcantfeedmybabyIcantfeedmybabyIamtheworstmotherintheworldahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh."
The worst. Then came the week where Ben refused to nurse and I was fairly certain that he would never eat again and again, I felt like the worst mother in the world.

Compounding the problem, I've started trying to pump again so that we can get Benji on a bottle, but the pump has failed to work for me now that I haven't used it in over 6 months, so more stress piles up. Anyway, I was starting to lose it a little bit until I posted something on facebook about my struggles and asked for any advice. I was overwhelmed from the responses from other mommies giving me their advice and telling of their own personal struggles. Even if I am not able to make pumping work for me with any of the advice given, the take-away message was priceless: you are not alone. Motherhood is definitely not for sissies. So I want to thank all my mommy family and friends who came to my rescue and helped me realize that motherhood isn't about perfection. Just having someone say, "Dude, that was hard for me too" quiets that crazy, frantic internal monologue in my head a little.

I also want to give a shout-out to my mom and sister who are the best mothers I have ever known. They continually guide and teach me through their quiet strength and unwavering love.

Put Your Hands Together

It has been a long time since the last blog post, but with the holidays and our increasingly mobile 9 month old, things have been a little hectic. Ben has been changing with leaps and bounds lately. He is crawling, pulling up on anything and everything, throwing balls, and, most recently, clapping!

This past Friday, Ben and I were playing and I was trying to get him to clap and he just sat there staring at me like I was crazy. I guess he needed a little process time because later that evening, Bizzy and I were playing with him and after I leaned over and tickled him, he looked up at us, laughed, and clapped his hands. I think it brought tears to both Bizzy and my eyes. We all sat there clapping for about 20 minutes. Definitely one of my top Benjamin moments so far. Now Benji is clapping a lot and I love it every. single. time.

Here is a video of our little man clapping...

Watch out World--Ben is Mobile

Benji is officially on the move! He has started army crawling, and he is getting pretty darn fast. He is incredibly cute about it, of course, because he crosses his little ankles as he begins pulling himself across the floor. He hasn't quite figured out that it might be easier to actually use his legs to propel himself, but he is getting there. :)

Of course, Bizzy and I want to see him crawl as much as possible, but Ben doesn't do it on command or when you want it most, so we have studied his movements, much like Jane Goodall, and we discovered the things that motivate him to move the most....
They are listed in order of importance to Ben and that importance is directly linked to the speed at which he will crawl towards the object:
1. Redford (hyper-speed army crawl with an unflappable determination)
2. Cellphones (very fast crawling with a fixed plan of attack)
3. Cords of any kind (Unrelenting determination here--just when you think he forgot about them....)
4. Shoes/feet, which he immediately puts in his mouth..gross. ( Slow and steady towards these beacons of obvious chewing potential)
5. Anything that is not a baby toy or you don't want him to have (Meandering crawl which soothes you into the delusion that he is just exploring until BAM- he has Red's chew toy in his mouth.)
6. Sanctioned baby toys (Not so much of a crawl here, but he will propel himself a little bit if the toy is super cool; otherwise, he is going to pretend like he no longer has functioning arms or legs and will scream until you place it in his hands)

I wanted to have a super cool video of Benjamin moving to add here, but it seems that the video camera is crawling kryptonite. As soon as I pull it out, Ben goes dead-weight....maybe one day I will have evidence!

Kidding aside, Ben is learning so quickly and becoming such a little man full of personality. I am so thankful that I am able to stay home with him and that I get the opportunity to watch him grow and turn into the absolute coolest boy EVER. No overstatement here. Just the other day, I was lying on the floor with him as he played with a toy and he ended up flipping it over and making a loud noise on the wood floor. He immediately turned to look at me with big eyes and we both started laughing. It was such a small and seemingly insignificant moment, but I know that I could have missed it. So, a big shout-out of thanks to my hubby who is "bringing home the bacon" for this one-income family. His job allows me to stay home with our baby boy, and it also allows him the flexibility to come home around 3:30 most days. We are very lucky indeed.

Here is a photo montage of Red trying to escape Ben's laser-like tracking skills:

Happy Halloween!

Boo, ya'll! We had a very low-key Halloween this year since Benjamin is technically a little young to enjoy trick or treating, and our neighborhood didn't start until 6:00 which is Benjj's bedtime....so Bizzy and I had no good excuse to collect candy with our 7 month old. We were forced to eat the candy out of our own bowl that was supposed to go to the kiddies in the neighborhood. The sacrifices we have to make for our children :) We did get to go "trunk or treating" last week while we were in Durham, but I am going to devote a blog to that trip separately...coming soon.

I did dress Ben up in his skeleton outfit during the day Wednesday, and we took a trip to Target so that everyone could enjoy seeing the cuteness. I didn't want to deprive the world. He was the cutest little skeleton EVER. He did go on a quick hike around the neighborhood with his daddy right before bedtime.

After we put our scary skeleton to bed, Bizzy and I had dinner outside in front of the house to await the trick or treaters. With baby monitor in tow, we handed out candy in between bouts of searching for the elusive twix bars hidden in our bowl of candy. We just couldn't seem to give any of those away to the kiddos...they kept disappearing. All in all, this was a fabulous Halloween, and I can't wait until Benji can toddle around the neighborhood next year.

Some pics of our super scary Halloween baby :)

Headline: "Baby Skeleton Eats Polar Bear" 

My handsome fellas

Learning to Eat

Benji has officially started eating solids and it has been both exciting and slightly heart-breaking at the same time. On one hand, I am thrilled that he is ready to enter the world of "big boy" foods and he seems to be quite the natural little eater....go figure, right? On the other hand, my baby boy is growing up so quickly and it is a little sad to see that happen so fast.

Our pediatrician told us we could start feeding him solids at 4 months, but that was just too young in my opinion. He wasn't really exhibiting the signs of wanting to eat food, and at four months old, we were only finally getting his digestive system in a regular and normal routine. So Bizzy and I waited until Benji got his 6 month shots and checkup to attempt feeding him. I have been breast-feeding him exclusively since he was born, so I was really terrified that once he tasted solids, he wouldn't want breast-milk anymore. But once he tried peas, that fear was alleviated. He was really excited to get the spoon in his mouth, but once the peas hit his tongue, he grimaced and expelled it quickly.

 Getting ready for his first meal

 The first bite...

 Bit of a messy eater

"What is in my mouth?!? Get it out!"

Ben's first attempt at eating wasn't an overwhelming success but as we continued on with other foods, he has become more and more of a natural eater. Oatmeal made with breast-milk is his favorite thing so far. He will scream when I finish his little bowl until I make some more for him. We have tried carrots and he tolerated them, but they have given him some very interesting/horrifying poops, so we might be taking it easy with the carrots from now on. I think the next thing on the menu is squash. We want Benjamin to eat his vegetables so we are holding off on fruits for the time being because if he is anything like his momma, he is going to have a massive sweet tooth and vegetables will no longer seem appetizing.