A Day In The Life Of A Stay At Home Mom

Breastfeeding and Weaning

2010-02-25T13:00:00.000-05:00

One of my favorite parts of motherhood has been nursing my daughter. Breast feeding had been an argument between my husband and I throughout my pregnancy. He wanted me to breast feed our daughter, and I did NOT. I wasn't even remotely interested in trying. To me it sounded gross, sexual, and just plain weird! My mother breastfed my younger brother and I, and after talking to her I still did not want to try. When I was 6 months pregnant my husband and I went to childbirth classes at the hospital. I received a small book on breast feeding, and one night I decided to see what all the hype was about.

Everyone always told me that it was "best for the baby", but I had no idea why. I learned about the bonding experience, the antibodies that get passed on from mother to baby, convenience, and the fact that making milk helped to get you back to your pre-pregnancy weight faster. I decided that I would give it a try, but told my husband I couldn't guarantee anything. I knew a lot of mothers who weren't successful with nursing, so I didn't want my husband to get his hopes up. I wasn't even sure if I wanted to succeed at it! All I knew is that I would try, for my daughter's sake.

I'm not going to lie and give you that "breastfeeding is so natural" speech. The truth is, nursing is hard work and it takes a lot of patience and practice for both mom and baby. There were times in the beginning that I wanted to give up, but I kept trying for my daughter. I wanted what was best for her, and it was saving us a lot of money since we didn't have to buy formula. It's especially hard on a mother because your partner cannot help out with feedings. A newborn baby needs to eat every 2-3 hours round the clock. Since we are the ones with the boobs, we're the ones up with baby every 2 hours. It was rough, I had never been so tired in my whole life. By the time I would wake her up, nurse her, and get her back to sleep I had about 30 minutes to sleep myself before waking her for the next feeding.

Within a few weeks I was completely hooked. My daughter Kayla was a fast learner, and by the time she was a week old we had it down. I enjoyed feeding her, and I felt important. I felt like she needed me, and it was an amazing feeling. I decided to nurse her until she was 6 months old, and then wean her. Six months came and went, then 7, 8, 9, and finally 12. I couldn't believe I had made it to the one year mark. The La Leche League recommends breastfeeding for a child's first year of life, however there aren't many moms that make it that far. Kayla still showed no signs of wanting to stop, and I wasn't ready either.

Finally, at 14 months old I decided to wean her. I lasted 2 whole days before breaking down and nursing her again. I can't even begin to explain how hard it was on me. I walked around crying almost non-stop, and every time I looked at her it was the only thing I could think about. It's kind of funny, considering I was so against nursing in the first place. My husband kept reminding me of the things I would now be able to do, like whiten my teeth, drink caffeine, and eat spicy foods again, but somehow these things just didn't seem important anymore. We decided (when I say we I mean Kayla and I) to go a bit slower, so that it would be easier on both of us. I would nurse her only once a day, then slow down to once every other day. We've been doing this for about a week, and it's been much easier on both of us.

Tonight was our last nursing session. I'm incredibly sad, but I know that it's time. She didn't seem to want to nurse, and she even asked for a bottle instead of the boob at bedtime. That stung a little! It also made me laugh. She's growing up fast! I definitely don't think she was ready the first time we tried to wean, but doing it gradually has worked out for both of us. Thinking about the fact that tonight is the last time brings tears to my eyes, and I know I have a rough few days emotionally in front of me, but time heals wounds.

I feel so lucky to have been able to give her a great start at life by nursing her. Did you know that her FIRST sickness was a cold at 13 months old? That's simply amazing! The bond that my daughter and I have is indescribable, and I know that it will only get stronger in the years to come.

Quick and easy recipes

2009-10-03T20:35:00.013-04:00

Another responsibility of the stay at home mom's job is cooking. As most of you know, it's extremely difficult to plan gourmet dinners while juggling kids, laundry, and other housework. My husband and I have gotten our fair share of take-out food, but that gets expensive, fast! Now, I'll be the first to admit how spoiled I was growing up. My amazing mother would go work her 9-5 job and then come home and make dinner for my father, brother, and myself. I never had to learn how to cook until I got married. My poor husband settled for a lot of grilled cheese and peanut butter and jelly sandwiches at first. Slowly I learned some new recipes and would try my hardest to put a decent meal on the table. I am by NO means an expert at cooking, but I have learned to enjoy it and I look forward to trying new recipes.

Here you can find a list of recipes that are generally easy and are not time consuming. I've collected these recipes from numerous places, and tweaked them a little bit to my liking. As I find new ones I'll post them here, so check back often! Enjoy!

Impossibly Easy Ham and Cheese Pie

Ingredients:

2 eggs

1/4 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1/2 cup Bisquick

1 cup of milk

4 green onions, chopped

1 cup of shredded cheese (whatever you prefer)

1 and 1/2 cups of chopped fully cooked ham

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Grease the bottom and sides of a 9 inch pie pan. Sprinkle chopped ham, shredded cheese, and chopped onion in pie pan.

In a separate bowl, mix remaining ingredients and whisk with a fork until blended. Pour batter into pie pan.

Bake for 35-40 minutes, or until a knife inserted in the center comes out clean.

Enjoy!

Tip: My husband and I polished off this dish in one sitting, so if you are cooking for more than 2 people I suggest doubling the recipe :)

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Crock Pot Chicken Casserole

Ingredients:

1-2lbs of chicken breasts
2 cups of shredded cheese of your choice
1 can of condensed cream of mushroom soup (I use Cambell's lower sodium)
1/3 cup of milk
1 cup of chicken flavored stuffing mix
garlic powder
onion powder

Directions:
Spray crock pot with non-stick spray. Rinse and trim fat from chicken breasts. Place chicken on the bottom of the crock pot. Sprinkle chicken breasts with garlic and onion powder.

In a bowl, mix mushroom soup and milk. Whisk until blended with a fork and then pour mixture over chicken breasts.

Top with cheese and stuffing mix (stuffing mix should be dry, not prepared).

Cook on low for 3-6 hours depending on your crock pot. Mine can cook chicken on low in 2-3 hours. Adjust your time accordingly. Serves 2-3 people.

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Cheesy Chicken Alfredo

Ingredients:
1-1 1/2lbs of chicken breasts
1 egg beaten
3/4 cup of Italian seasoned bread crumbs
1 medium tomato, chopped
1 cup of sliced mushrooms
1 jar of cheesy alfredo sauce
1 cup of shredded mozzarella cheese

Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Dip chicken in egg, then bread crumbs and coat fully. Place chicken in a greased 13x9 pan and bake for 20 minutes.

While chicken is baking, sautee mushrooms in skillet with olive oil until done.

Remove chicken from oven and cover with 1 cup of cheesy alfredo sauce. Top with mozzarella cheese, tomato, and mushrooms.

Bake an additional 10 minutes or until chicken is fully cooked. Serves 2-3 people.

Tip: To save time, exclude the mushrooms. The recipe is just as delicious!

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Cheesy Tomato-Beef Bake

Ingredients:
1lb lean ground beef
1 teaspoon of chili powder
1 cup of sour cream
1/2 cup of mayonnaise
1 cup of shredded cheddar cheese
2 tablespoons of chopped green onion
2 cups of Original Bisquick mix
2 or 3 medium tomatoes, thinly sliced
3/4 cup of chopped bell pepper

Directions:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Spray 13x9 inch pan with cooking spray. In a skillet, cook beef and chili powder until ground beef is thoroughly cooked. Drain.

In a small bowl, stir sour cream, mayonnaise, cheese and onion until well mixed.

In a medium bowl stir Bisquick mix and cold water until soft dough forms. Press dough in bottom and 1/2 inch up sides of the pan, using fingers dipped in Bisquick mix. Layer beef, tomatoes and bell pepper on dough. Spoon sour cream mixture over top; spread evenly over vegetables to cover.

Bake uncovered 25 to 30 minutes until edges of dough are light golden brown. Serves 4.

* This dish requires a bit more time than some of the other recipes I have posted (because of the chopping of veggies and browning the ground beef). However, I still wanted to include this one because it's so declicious!

Enjoy!

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Child Passenger Safety

2009-09-11T22:38:00.003-04:00

"Child safety seats reduce the risk of fatal injury by 71 percent for infants (under 1 year old) and by 54 percent for toddlers (age 1 to 4 years old)."

(NHTSA's National Center for Statistics and Analysis, 2007 data.)

This is a subject often overlooked by most parents, yet it is one of the easiest ways to help ensure your child's safety. You buy a car seat for your child, install it, and never think twice about it. Most parents probably don't even read the manual that comes with the car seat. Did you know that 3 out of 4 car seats are installed incorrectly? It seems so easy right? Just strap it in with the seat belt and you're good to go. WRONG.

I have been a Nationally Certified Child Safety Seat Inspector for the past four years. During this time I have checked and installed over a thousand car seats. I can honestly tell you that in the four years I have only come across a dozen or so seats out of the thousand, that have been correctly installed by parents themselves. I've come to find this volunteer work extremely rewarding, and I plan on continuing it for years to come.

So how do you tell if your seat is installed correctly? Without looking at your seat personally I can't guarantee anything. However, I can give you a few pointers. The biggest mistake I've seen throughout my four years so far is that seats are never installed tight enough. I've climbed into cars before and put my hands on the seat only to find that i can move it clear across the whole back seat of the car! If the vehicle was involved in a crash, what do you think would happen? If I can move the seat with my bare hands, surely the child would NOT be safe. The way to check if your child's seat is tight enough is to grab the seat at the point where the child safety seat meets the seat of your vehicle. Try to move it back and forth, it should move no more than 1 inch from side to side. If you have any doubts or questions about this, get your child's seat professionally checked! Another common mistake for an infant seat is to have the seat installed at the incorrect angle. Infant and Convertible seats have angle indicators on them for a reason. A newborns neck muscles are not yet developed enough to hold up their head, therefore if the seat is not installed at the proper angle the child can suffocate to death if their head falls forward. This is not uncommon and has happened too many times. These are just a few of the millions of mistakes that can be made while installing a seat. Don't take any chances, get your child's seat professionally checked. If you don't it could cost you your child's life!

So how do you get your child's seat checked? You can find your local child safety seat inspection stations here:
Find a location

Want to become a Nationally Certified Child Safety Seat Inspector?
Get certified

Find the most recent Child Passenger Safety recalls here:
Child Passenger Safety Recalls
Please make sure that you have the latest recall list, as it is updated periodically.

Sleeping through the night

2009-09-03T12:43:00.000-04:00

This subject may be one of the most difficult aspects of parenthood. We adults could sleep forever if we didn't have schedules to keep, why can't our kids do it too? I know that every child is different, and something that works for one parent may not work for another. Hopefully by sharing my story I may be able to help someone else by giving them some new ideas to try. I'm going to tell you how my husband and I got our daughter to sleep through the night (9-13 hours straight) at 2 months old.

I am a nursing mother, and I had been told that breastfed babies were not able to sleep though the night. Breast milk is digested much easier and faster than formula, therefore breastfed babies needed to eat more often. The first two months of Makayla's life were very hard at night. She would sleep anywhere from 3-4 hours at a time. My husband worked a 7:30-4:30 job, so when she woke at night I had to get up with her. He was more than willing to get up, but I knew he needed his rest. It definitely took a toll on me. I was miserable, irritable, and the bags under my eyes never seemed to go away.

Our first mistake was not having a bedtime routine. Consistency is the key. I cannot say this enough! We decided that our routine would begin with a bubble bath using Johnson's bedtime bath. It has a wonderful calming scent that Kayla remembers each night we run her bath. I'm not too sure how much this actually calms her, because she adores bath time. She screams and splashes us and laughs at her accomplishment. We try to keep her calm, but often give in to her sweet laughs and smiles. After this we dry her off and play her lullaby's while we dress her. We start with the same song every time so she knows it's her bedtime. Also, the ONLY time she ever gets a pacifier is at nap or bed time. We give this to her while we're dressing her to calm her down. Finally, lights go out and I nurse her. Sometimes she falls asleep, sometimes she doesn't. I then rock her for about 5 minutes. She goes into her crib regardless if she is asleep or awake. We always place her on her back, but she is a tummy sleeper at heart. Her lullaby's play until the end of the playlist on the Ipod.

Sounds easy right? It took about 2 full weeks to get her used to this routine. We use this routine wherever we go. It must look ridiculous that my husband and I lug around her Ipod docking station and favorite blankets, and bubble bath, but it really does make a difference! We have not had any bedtime problems in the past 8 months *knock on wood* at home or on vacation.

Now I know that you're all hating me thinking that my baby slept through the night right away with this routine. We had to teach her that this was bed time and that meant sleep time. At first she would wake after her normal 3-4 hours. When this happened one of us would sneak in the room and pop the pacifier that had fallen out back into her mouth (after doing the sniff test to see if she needed a diaper change). She would immediately roll over and go back to sleep. We had to do this for about a week once a night, and then she finally got it. Did she fuss at all? A few times she would moan a little here and there, but no crying. My husband and I do not believe in the cry it out method, especially at only 2 months old. I am in no way judging anyone that has used this method. I believe that you do what works for you, and everyone is different.

The first time she slept 9 hours straight I woke up every hour looking at the clock. I couldn't believe that she was still sleeping! I even crept in and checked on to her make sure that she was still breathing. The rest, as we say, is history! Each night she started sleeping longer and longer, on her own. We no longer needed to run in to give her a pacifier. She had taught herself how to go back to sleep on her own if she woke at night. I bet some of you are thinking that she needed to eat and that's why she woke up. If she had continued to wake up after putting the pacifier in her mouth a few times I would have fed her. My goal was not to starve our daughter, but to teach her to sleep. I made sure that she was fed every 2-3 hours during the day to make up for the lost nighttime feeding. I also checked with our pediatrician first to make sure that this would be ok. She gave us the green light, and we got to work!

I believe that part of our success came from giving her the pacifier only at sleep time. When she woke at night, we would put it back in her mouth and leave the room. I would say that being consistent with her bedtime routine is what really helped her understand what bedtime meant.

I wanted to share this story with everyone because I know how hard it is when your child does not sleep though the night. It's exhausting, and when you are that tired it's hard to focus on any part of your life. I remember being so tired that I couldn't imagine making dinner. For the first 2 months I barely did any house work because I spent all my free time (Makayla's nap time) sleeping. Getting a good nights rest is best for everyone. I know that what worked for us may not work for everyone, but hopefully it can give you some new ideas to try if your child is not sleeping through the night.

Good luck and if you have any questions about our bedtime routine please feel free to ask me!

Introduction

2009-09-02T14:23:00.001-04:00

First of all, let me introduce myself. My name is Melissa and I am 27 years old. Originally from West Chester PA, I am now living in Newark Delaware with my husband Russell, our daughter Makayla, and our fat black cat Lexi.

On December 24th 2008 I began my journey as a first time mother. That's right, our daughter was born on the morning of Christmas Eve. She turned out to be the best Christmas present I could ever imagine! We weren't expecting Makayla to arrive until December 30th or later, since most babies take their time coming out. Weighing in at 6lbs 9oz and 20 inches long, she was the most beautiful sight I had ever seen. From that day on my husband and I have endured hardships and struggles, but most important of all we have enjoyed raising our daughter and all of the beauty and love that came with her.

My husband and I had discussed daycare options while I was still pregnant. Luckily we were both on the same page when it came to that subject- we agreed that I should be a stay at home mom instead of returning to the corporate world. I knew this would be an adjustment, but I was ready for the challenge. My job would be to take care of the home, cook dinners, clean, shop, and take care of our daughters' every need.

The first couple of months were a little tough. I was not used to being alone in the house all day with a newborn who didn't do much other than sleep, cry, eat, and poop. Now don't get me wrong, there was no where else I would have rather been than home with my daughter, but it was definitely an adjustment. I missed adult interaction with a passion. My husband would come home from work and be dying to see Makayla, and I would be dying to see him and have some adult conversation that didn't involve "baby talk." As Makayla grew older her wonderful personality began to develop. We would have so much fun together. I got to witness her first smile, the first time she sat up, the first time she crawled. We explored new foods together, read stories, and played like there was no tomorrow. We struggled with nap time routines, constipation, and teething troubles. The entire experience has been life changing, and I don't know what I would do without my little best friend. I look forward to each and every day with her, and I never want this time to end!

I decided to start this blog to share my experiences with motherhood. I have many stories, recipes, and advice for anyone who is interested in reading. I hope you enjoy reading and if you have any feedback please feel free to contact me at Friday524@gmail.com.