Boys and Birth

              Tonight while Lincoln was in his bath he did the funniest thing, and it spurred on a blog post in my head. He was just playing around with his bath wash rag and started making this grunting face while using the rag to wash his bottom area, then he looked at me while making said noises and pulled the rag up from under the water, pulled it up on to his chest, and said "look ma, I had a baby" or something to that effect, I died laughing, needless to say. But was honestly very happy that he gets the concept of the thing, I told him that boys do not have babies and they do not come out of a butt, but other than that I let him play his little story out.Since Lincoln was almost 3 when his little brother was born, we spent some time prepping him for the arrival of the new baby. We watched birth videos together and talked about what happens, so that he would not be scared when the time came.
              See the thing is, I WANT my boys to grow up being completely comfortable around birth. If our society is EVER going to change the way we view birth- to birth WITHOUT fear- being the main goal, then we also need to help change this perspective in our men. So many men and women, really, look at birth as a scary, awkward, gross, weird, event that they would rather not even witness. But being present in that moment for your significant other, and for the new baby is so important. If my boys grow up viewing birth as natural, magical, special, life-changing, powerful, beautiful, and perfect in and of itself, then they can become the daddy-doula that his wife will some day need. He will be able to encourage her one day, and if I can help raise a few boys that see it as the way it should be, then I will have done my job to help change the world.
             

Check out these pics from Asher's birth last year. Lincoln's presence during my labor was so calming and helped put things into focus for me. I loved looking into his eyes and knowing I was about to give him a sibling, and that he could be there for that special moment was priceless! We should all do our part to help raise the future men of the world and encourage them to view birth as the normal process that it is!

These amazing photos were taken by Marnie Urso! Thank you again lady, I seriously look at them all the time and feel so happy! <3

The subject of parenting:

I will come back to it. I am trying my hardest, and some days are wonderful and magical and some days I feel like I am in my own personal little hell. That is the honest truth, I do my best and am learning on a daily basis. The end. :)

Reasons I suck at parenting....

 If you go by the books, sometimes I really do just suck at being a parent. Maybe I am just having an off day and needed to vent through this blog post, but I can pin point so many wrong things I do with my parenting its not even funny. Some of them, I will defend. I do not think all of these are necessarily horrible things, but most are common parenting guidelines that are set up that I just do not have for my boys. 

Well, here we go. Try not to hate me after you read this blog post. 

• I let my kids jump on the bed. (really, why not?) 
• I have a wild child, I do not reign him in. I let it blossom, and sometimes wonder if that is the worst thing I can do for him.
• The thing is I am not structured AT ALL. Like no way, totally laissez faire, run free children, type of parenting. I do have some specific guideline for them to follow but find it is hard when not in our own space to stick to these guidelines, and since I struggle with the whole discipline issue I can not seem to get Lincoln to adhere to these guidelines. The biggest one being him running outside with out me knowing and being somewhere at the neighbors house before I even realize!
• I sometimes laugh when Lincoln gets hurt, like if he was doing something I had just told him was not a very smart choice because he could get hurt then.... boom he gets hurt. I know, malicious, I am not making fun of him, just... well I have no explanation for this one. Just isnt very nice. 
• Sometimes I dont pay good enough attention to my kids, I have my head stuck in a book or am on stupid fb and realize that the reason the kids are being uber ridiculous is cause....well...I NEED TO BE PAYING BETTER ATTENTION TO THEM. 
• Sometimes, I use the playground as my babysitter. You gotta realize, I get NO BREAKS AT ALL, from being with my boys. I am not living with my Zack yet, so I get real tired of the constant go go go all day with them, so we go to the playground and while, yes, I am totally paying attention to Lincoln, I also can use this time to chill out and read my book or just relax. 
• My husband and I disagree on many aspects of our parenting together, which makes things worse. 
• I encourage my son to jump off the highest ring of the tower he climbed at the playground. While the other moms were freaking out when their kids jumped from halfway up the tower, I saw Lincoln climb to the very top, give me a look like he wanted to jump, and I said go for it!!! I watched him get crazy mad air, and knew yeah there is a chance he could get hurt but this boy has gotta learn not to be afraid and to take chances, and have fun, and if it hurt too much he would not do it again. 
• I sometimes loose my temper and react to my children with words or actions I should not. I struggle and battle with this everyday, to be the best parent I can be. To figure out just how in the hell I am really supposed to parent. I hear back and forth back and forth about how "Oh, you have to use spanking and time out because it is what gets them in line, and they will not listen to you if you dont do this", and then from others "Never ever spank a child or put them in time out it will affect them for the rest of their life and you will scar them, they will think you dont love them". Honestly battling with myself on these two its like I have multiple personality disorder and I am sure Lincoln is getting whiplash from it trying to figure out how mommy is going to react! 
• I do not make my kids eat their plates all clean. If he does not wanna eat it then fine, Ill save it for later. 
• Lincoln loves him some Mcdonalds Chicken nuggets, and I know they are horrible for him, yet I still let him eat there. Shame on me. 
• During my efforts to get Asher to nap twice everyday I have no idea what to do with Lincoln... so I will put on a netflix movie and he sits in the bed with us. I encourage him to play in the room but he gets bored and runs off into the house without me, and its not ok for him to do this since we are living with other family right now. 
• I have a temper and am pretty sure I have passed that down to Lincoln, just him watching me react to different situations if he sees me get angry at something its like he mimics me, " UGH, really!!!" I will hear him say a few hours later. Ashamed. At least its not curse words he is getting from me... He picked up a bad one from daddy though! Just from our speaker phone conversations!
• Sometimes I feel like I am going to loose it and want to grab all my hair and pull it out of my head. Usually this is when both children are hanging on me and grabbing and whining at the same time. I try all I can to be lovey and show them the attention they deserve but sometimes I am just pooped out and want some ME time! 
• I told Lincoln it was ok for him to pee outside in the woods. I created a monster with that one, yep. 
• My children do not know the meaning of quiet time, no matter what I try to teach or show them. Especially in the mornings. 
• I am NOT a clean freak, struggle with keeping a tidy room and have inevitably passed this one down too. We do have clean up time, but Lincoln gets pissed when I start singing that song. ha
• Ok, noticed almost all these pertain to my oldest, and that in itself should tell you something.  

 Ok, the end for now. Will add more once I can think of them or accidentally add to my list of things I suck at.


I promise I am going to do a post soon of the reasons why I RULE at parenting. LOL. 

On being 9 months.

If my baby could speak...... this would be his blog post update on being 9 months old.

Asher, tell us how you like being 9 months old, and what kind of things your discovering now!
                         
                        Well, being 9 months is such a happy carefree time in my life. I got my momma around and I am happy boy. My big brother makes me laugh when he does silly faces at me or makes goofy noises, but sometimes he picks on me and it does not feel good, so I cry for my mommy. I just started showing two teeth sprouting through my gums (top front right, and bottom front right) on the same day, the day I turned 9 months, and BOY does it hurt. I have to constantly chew on my finger to try and ease the hurties from it.  My favorite thing to do is explore all over the place, to stand up on everything, and to taste it with my mouth. I am even starting to stand up alone without holding on to anything! I also LOVE to climb some stairs, as soon as mommy isnt looking, or if she is in the potty, I am already up two or three stairs, hehehe. 

               Let's talk about food- well, I like to taste and try new things, but my main food is still mama milk. I have tried some things like: bananas, cucumbers, avocado, sweet potato, potatoes, apples, strawberries, watermelon, wheat toast, and cheerios. I do not eat everyday, usually only when I wanna play around with some food and soothe my gums on something! But I am growing so big and healthy just from mommy, yay! I take two regular naps throughout the day, one usually around 11 the other around 3, then bedtime at 8 and sleep till around 8 or 9 am with a few times to wake up and comfort nurse, I LOVE sleeping in between mommy and my big brother, they make me feel safe. 

                Other things I really LOVE right now: Uncle Z- he is just so interesting to sit and watch, the doggies, anything with water, watching and learning, and playing with my toys, and being near my mommy all the time. 

                I am very ticklish, especially on my chunky legs. 

                I do not like getting my clothes or diaper changed. 

                I wake up and cry a lot of times at night, probably to make up for my lack of crying during the day. 

                I am still a super chill little guy but I am starting to find myvoice. 

                I mimick the words you say to me. I like to say mama, go-go, hi, and lots of babbles!  

                I cant wait to walk and catch up to my big brother. 

NOW FOR THE PICS! ~pEaCe OuT: *Asher baby*

                

Big Boy Undies!!!!

I just want to (officially?) announce that Lincoln is finally a potty user. I guess 3 years, and 4 months was the perfect amount of time that my son needed to prepare himself for this event in his life. Not that everyone really cares or wants to know this, but I am proud of him. We struggled with potty using for over a year. I started too early with him and tried to insist to everyone that he was ready. But honestly I thought he was ready back then, just cause he could explain the whole thing, but he did not care to do it in practice. We tried every trick in the book! In the end it took a few good weeks of hard hard work trying to gently lead him into being diaper free. What won him over finally was when we went to target to fill a basket full of "POTTY PRIZES" and he got to pick a potty prize every time he used the bathroom. We did that for about 2 weeks, now he is doing it all on him own for the sheer joy of it. *On a side note, I am not really keen on the word potty trained, but it was more of a learning process and in the end the result it the same: I am so proud of my big boy using the potty! (I am writing this blog while he is having his morning potty time, an is announcing to me the sizes of his doos)