Poor Ben

Ben woke up so happy today. Every morning from about 8am - 9am, he has his own happy hour. He is wide awake, talks and coos and wants to play. Josh and I hated taking him to get his shots when he was in such a happy mood this morning.


Ben had his two month checkup today. He weighs 11 lbs 4 oz. and he is 21 3/4 inches long. That puts him in the 35th percentile for weight and the 10th percentile for height. The doctor is not concerned and says his growth is fine. The doctor also supported my (unstructured) attitude regarding Ben's sleeping pattern and (lack of) routine. Other than that, Ben had reached all of the appropriate milestones and the doctor has no concerns of developmental problems now or after the surgery. Ben also received his immunizations. Today he had IPV (polio), Hib (meningitis), DTaP (Tetanus, Diptheria, and whooping cough), PCV (pneumonia and meningitis), and HepB (hepatitis B). He really didn't cry much. He squealed and squeaked as he was getting the shots (the pacifier helped), but as soon as I picked him up he was fine, and he slept for most of the day. As his Tylenol was wearing off he got a little crabby, but after the second dose he was really out.


I used my new wrap today as we ran a couple of errands after lunch. I would say it works well for short trips or for around the house and farm. However, after I took him out of it and put him back in later it was so stretched out I needed to take the whole thing off and tighten it, which is not convenient in a parking lot. I'm still very happy with it, but I still need a good carrying solution for shopping and running errands.

Babywearing

I am trying to decide what kind of sling or wrap I would like to use. I have a ring sling right now, but the fabric is way too stretchy and Ben shifts too much after a while. I'm thinking about a Moby sling, a Hotsling, a Maya wrap or just making my own wrap using a long piece of fabric. I can't really tell what the difference is between a Moby wrap and five yards of fabric. I've spent way too much time today researching my options and I still can't decide what I really want. There are some good deals on eBay, but I don't know what I want. I think I would wear Ben on the front most of the time and I want something I can nurse in, but I'm not sure how much I would really nurse with him in the sling. I also want something I can carry him in for quite a while. For those of you who aren't familiar with the types, here's what I'm talking about:

Ring sling (This is more like the one I have. I want a Moby because it would be more breathable, less stretchy, and easier to adjust than mine though.):


Hotsling (These seem like the easiest to use.):


Wrap (This is what I'm leaning towards because it's essentially a long piece of fabric. I also like that it crosses both shoulders. It seems like this would be easier on my back.):


and if I had $150 to blow, I'd buy a Beco Butterfly carrier:


I think for now, I'm going to keep an eye out at Children's Orchard where the first sling came from, and try to make my own wrap with fabric. There is a babywearing group in Springfield where I could try out different ones, but their next meeting is right around the time of Ben's surgery. We have a Snugli too, but it kills my back and I don't feel like I can get it tight enough. I brought my ring sling to LLL yesterday and I got some help getting Ben a little more comfortable in the sling. I also watched at least a dozen videos on you tube today about different ways to use a ring sling and we tried a few of them out while walking around the field and watching Josh clean out the pond.




I can't believe how many expressions and emotions Ben is already showing!

There is also an online contest to win a baby carrier here!

Cloth Napkins and Baby Comparing

I love using cloth napkins. Josh and I have for as long as we've been together and we go through very few paper towels thanks to the eight cloth napkins I bought two years ago. By this point, they're a little tattered and at least half have disappeared thanks to to dogs, so I bought replacements today at the Help Give Hope garage sale. The sale is on North Kansas Expressway in Springfield, in the Town and Country shopping center. It was dimly lit, unorganized, and somewhat picked over, but I'm sure if you had a lot of time, then you could probably find something you need. It's going on next week too. Click on the link for dates and times. I bought 17 cloth napkins at a dime each:


Ben and I had lunch at the Smoothie Cafe with Karen and coffee with my McGregor friends at the Mudhouse. (The Mud Lounge is temporarily closed due to problems with their liquor license.)

While there, another friend of mine brought her baby, one week younger than Ben. And so it starts... baby comparing. I want so badly to not compare Ben to any other baby, but at the same time it's fun to compare and discuss what we're going through right now. Her son has been sleeping in his crib, in his own room since he was four weeks old. He sleeps 6-8 hours most nights and has a routine and schedule. Wow, I was impressed.

Ben has no kind of schedule. I couldn't tell you how many times he nurses or how many diapers he goes through. I tried to keep track but kept forgetting and usually made it up at the end of the day on my chart. He slept through the night once, in our room. Although I said horrible things about cosleeping before I had Ben, he now sleeps in the bed at least half of the time and in the Pack N Play next to the bed otherwise. We don't really have normal bedtimes or wake-up times and I'm worried my pediatrician is going to recommend we get on a schedule at our two month appointment on Monday.


Although my friend's structure is impressive, it really doesn't fit where we are right now. By the time I go back to work this fall, I'll need to have something a little better figured out. But I can't imagine trying to make Ben eat at certain times or not letting him eat other times. When my friend Katy wrote a post about her child's schedule, or lack thereof, I didn't even consider that anyone with a baby under three months could even consider being on a schedule.


The bottom line is - as long as the kid is healthy and safe, everyone should feel free to parent how they choose and not worry about what they "should" or "should not" be doing. I've got my goals of eventually getting Ben to sleep in his own room, when the time's right for him. In my teaching experience I have worked with about 200 kids, and by the time they are pre-teens, you can't tell whose parents carried them hours each day, let them cry it out in the crib, or ground organic flour for their teething biscuits. It all evens out in the end, and I'm not going to feel bad about anything I'm doing. I'm just going to do what's best for our family and our situation.

tummy time

It is recommended that babies spend about thirty minutes a day on their tummies while not asleep. This is so they can strengthen their back and neck muscles and develop motor skills to prepare for rolling over and crawling. It also prevents babies from having flat heads from sleeping on their backs.


Many of my friends have told me tummy time was stressful or difficult because their babies would get fussy so quickly. So far, as long as Ben is not hungry or fussy, he seems to enjoy it. We “talk” and play with the toys on our cool tummy time mat from Dody. It has a little Boppy he can prop himself up on and the whole thing looks like a lilly pad.



He is holding his head up more and more, and I can see him getting stronger all of the time. I can’t believe how much he’s changed already.

shop at home first

Today was a beautiful day! We took a walk outside to check on the flowers. They survived the freeze, but I'm not sure they will last much longer with the dogs running through them.



As I have started my stockpiling project, storage and organization has become the new focus. I worked on the laundry room cabinets and the hall linen closet. My first thought was developing a long-term system which means keeping everything up high and out of toddler reach. I pulled most everything out from under the kitchen and bathroom sinks and divided the toiletries and cleaning products, then tried to group by smaller categories. In the linen closet, Josh has a shelf and I have two. In the laundry room cabinets I grouped by category / room - bathroom, kitchen, laundry, dusting, outdoors, and there are several odds and ends like light bulbs and spray paint in there too.

before



after




The idea is now that everything is organized and grouped, I will know not to stockpile anymore of certain things unless they are next to free. Also, as we need things, we can easily find them and not purchase them again. (Hence the "shop at home first" title.) The next biggie is the food. I'm going to need some plastic tubs to conquer that, though. And maybe a label maker. The long term plan is to store extra food in the basement after I get into canning.

The towels and toilet paper are now under the bathroom sinks. They are much safer than toilet cleaner for a kid to get into.

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We did some double coupon deals at Dillons, then stopped by mom's Bunko group to meet everyone.

*Coupon tip of the day - Price Cutter on Republic Road doubles coupons up to and including 50 cents, but not the one in Ozark (I called them.) Dillon's doubles coupons up to and including 50 cents AND if the coupon is between 50 cents and less than $1, they will round it up to $1. This resulted in quite a few deals, but it took forever to hunt for the items that matched the coupons.*

Ben was pretty fed up by the time we got home, but he calmed down after a diaper change and nursing.

Coupon deals at Walgreens and Wal-Mart 04/05 ads

Great Wal-Mart deals here, and Walgreens deals here.

Here's my loot for today.



Wal-Mart deals ($26.25 in coupons)
(go to link above or just ask for more details on which coupons I used)
2 Trial size Old Spice bodywash, FREE
Bisquick biscuit mix, FREE
Crunch N' Munch, FREE
2 Bars of Johnson's kids soap, FREE
4 Four-packs of Hawaiian Rolls, 44 cents each
2 Bottles of Kraft salad dressing, 8 cents each
2 Bags of Halls cough drops, 44 cents each
2 Bags of Sweet Tarts, 88 cents each
3 Rolls of Viva Paper Towels, 54 cents each
2 Bags of blueberry muffin mix, 33 cents each
Aveeno lotion, 97 cents
Box of Cocoa Puffs, $1.23
10 packages of Kotex, 20 cents each

Walgreens deals ($43.66 in coupons, rebates and sales)
Edge shaving gel, FREE (after register rewards)
Skintimate shaving gel, FREE (after register rewards)
2 Cans of Oust disinfectant, FREE (after mail-in rebate)
3 Boxes of Cinnamon Toast Crunch $1.83 each
3 Cans of Swanson Chicken Broth 68 cents each
2 Cans of Gillette shaving gel, 99 cents each
Physician's Formula Organic foundation, 99 cents (after mail-in rebate)
6 Seasonings, 50 cents each
3 Bags of potting soil, 99 cents each
2 3-packs of Schick Quarto razors, $2.40 each

I purchased $102.31 worth of products for only $32.40 (after rebates), equaling a %68 savings! Once again, I am proud of purchasing only things we need and will use. Many of these things (potting soil, foundation, a couple of the spices) were things I would have bought this week no matter what, and I am thrilled to find deals for each of them. Tomorrow we're going to try Dillons or Price Cutter because they double coupons. It takes an incredible amount of time in the store for me to do this because I don't have a great system yet, but it's getting easier.

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I've been eating dairy again for the past several days, and it's hard to say if there's any difference in Ben. Because we went a couple of days without his Zantac, he was really fussy anyway, so I can't tell if the dairy has been a factor. We were able to get our prescription refilled today and he's been a much happier baby.

I actually left him with my parents for the first time tonight. It's crazy to think I haven't left him for more than thirty minutes (with Pam, while I walked down to the DMV), since he's been born. It was good for me, though. I enjoy my book club group, albeit a very strange mix of women. I didn't read much of the book, but we spend most of the time visiting about things other than the book anyway. I got to choose our next book - Animal Vegetable Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver. I've started it but haven't finished it yet. I will be sure to write about it once I've finished it.

Ben received some gifts at book club too. Dody gave him the adorable "Ask Me About My Compost Pile" and "I Can't Read" onsies and the awesome socks that look like shoes. The outfit, pants and teeth ring are from another teacher friend of ours.

extreme couponing

So I took couponing to the next level this week and added Wal-Mart. Because I had several coupons to use before they expired at the end of this month, it turned out to be quite a large shopping trip, but the rest of this month will most likely be pretty small. Again, I only bought things that we could stockpile in our pantry or cabinets or freeze, and only things we would ordinarily buy at some point.

I was originally going to itemize everything like I've done before, but that seemed a bit too daunting.

CVS



Walgreens



Wal-Mart (The old lady in line behind me was so excited to see how much I saved with my coupons. She kept saying how proud she was of me.)



Overall, my out of pocket was $157.83 and the original price of all of this was $284.41, so with sales and coupons I saved $126.58 or 45% of the original price! That's not bad considering how many "staple" items I was able to buy. I didn't buy a single item I didn't have a coupon for except for Ben's security blanket. I even had a coupon for my socks ($1 off any No Nonsense brand item, and I found the socks on clearance so they were only $2 for the pack!)

Here's the best of my purchases, and feel free to ask if you want to know how much anything else was or where the coupons were from.

Free - Diet Dr. Pepper (go here to get your free coupon, can be used anywhere)
Mentos Gum - $0.28 / pack ($1.00 off coupon from All You Magazine - March)
Halls Cough Drops - $0.18 (after $1.00 off coupon from the newspaper ads, I think)
Grands Biscuits - $0.50 (on sale at Wal-Mart for $1, then coupons from newspaper ads)
Glade Oil Warmers - $0 (I had two buy one get one free coupons and the check-out guy said I could use them both, so they were both free. I'm not sure if he was supposed to do that, though.)
Reynolds Foil $0 (Walgreens has an in-store add, plus the add from the paper makes it free)

The rest were various combinations resulting in the following:
4 4-packs of toilet paper for $2 each
6 things of deodorant for $0.99 - $1.24 each
4 large bottles of shampoo for $1.49 - $2.24 each
4 packages of Pillsbury fridge cookies for $1.83 each
6 boxes of Quaker granola bars for $1.50 each

I bought a KC Star at Price Cutter and it was definitely worth it. I believe they have twice the coupons of the Springfield News-Leader, especially for food. Some were duplicates, but then I just bought twice as many of that item if it was a good deal. I've also started taking a Sharpie and writing how much I paid for an item on the item. I think this will help me remember how much I spent the first time, so I can aim for that price when replacing it. We are lucky to have plenty of storage cabinets above our washer and dryer and a nice pantry, or this could get out of hand. I would still like to install some additional shelves in the laundry room, but I'm not going to have another coupon trip this large for a while.

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Mom noticed I didn't put any pictures of Ben up today. We visited great-grandma Hebbert today, but I'm going to write about that tomorrow with pictures, so here's Ben and daddy on the couch.

so I might be the cheapest friend you have

Couponing Week 3!



All of that for $0.68!
(That's $58.83 worth of merchandise originally. I've explained how below. It's all about matching sales with coupons and rolling store credits from one week to the next.)

CVS deals for the week of 03/22:
Excedrin $7.99 - $2.00 coupon - $2.00 ECB = $3.99
Cascade Action Pacs $4.99 - $1.00 on sale - $0.50 coupon = $3.49
Nabisco Wheat Thins (2 boxes) $5.88 - $1.00 on sale - $1.00 coupon = $3.88
Dawn Ultra $3.99 - $1.00 on sale - $0.50 coupon = $2.49
Glade Spray (2 cans) $3.78 - $1.89 BOGO coupon - $1.00 ECB = $0.89
Sure Deodorant (2 things) $5.98 - $1.00 coupon - $2.00 ECB = $2.98
Aveeno Shaving Cream $4.79 - $2.00 coupon - $2.00 ECB = $0.79
Original cost of all items = $37.40 - $18.89 in coupons / sales = $18.51
$18.51 - $13.00 in ECB's from last week - $5/$30 purchase in-store coupon = $0.51!
(I actually spent $7.51 out of pocket and I have $7.00 in ECB's to spend next week.)

Walgreens deals for the week of 03/22:
Frosted Flakes (4 boxes) $16.95 ($3.99/box) - $6.95 sale - $2.00 RR = $8.00
Hunts Tomato Sauce $0.99 - $0.60 coupon = $0.39
Colgate Toothpaste $3.49 - $2.50 Walgreens coupon - $1.00 coupon = $0.01 overage
Original cost of all items = $21.43 - $ coupons / sale =
$8.38 - $8.17 in RR's from last week = $0.17!
(I actually spent $2.17 out of pocket and I have $2.00 in RR's to spend next week)

ECB = Extra Care Bucks = $ off your next purchase at CVS
RR = Register Rewards = $ off your next purchase at Walgreens

The next step is getting a subscription to the Kansas City Star and start couponing for more grocery items as well as the weekly pharmacy deals.

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Ben actually slept more last night than he has thus far! He slept for four hours straight, woke to nurse, then slept another three hours. I felt so rested this morning. It was amazing.




We had lunch with aunt Katy and dinner with Dody and Clifford with coupon shopping and the library in between. We were both a little worn out after such a big day.

couponing level 2

Today Ben and I went couponing again and this time we added CVS to our list of stores. Walgreens and CVS are two of the main stores for serious couponers because they both give coupons for cash off your next purchase. So, here's our loot today:



We bought four Cadbury eggs (3 made it into the picture this time), two bottles of dish soap, a box of nursing pads, deodorant, a toothbrush, floss, toothpaste, mouthwash, four cans of Pringles, shampoo, conditioner, styling product, two glade candles, two glade oil refills, two boxes of fig newtons, a bottle of body wash and two tubes of lipstick. I used the $10 off my next Walgreens purchase coupon from last week and spent $34.23 out of pocket and received $20 off our next purchase between the two stores. So, my net spending was $14.23 for all of that! I know few people have time to go through and do all of this, but it's like a game to me. I recognize that I'm buying lots of the same types of products (toiletries mainly), but I'm not always going to have time to do this and we'll be stocked for quite a while after I'm over this phase.

Ben did well on our shopping day, but he was a little crabby off and on because he's got serious eye goop. The pediatrician gave him a prescription for eye drops that should clear it up in the next five days, but trying to give him eye drops three times a day in addition to the reflux medicine twice a day is tough. It does seem that the reflux medicine is working pretty well, though. We've certainly been sleeping better the past few days.

Ben's looking pretty rough with the eye goop but it should hopefully clear up soon.


Today I also had to box up the first three of Ben's outfits because they are too small. He also went from newborn to size one diapers. I kept the last unused newborn diaper and Josh doesn't really understand why. I can't believe he'll be a month old on Wednesday.

first trip to Target

Yesterday we made our first trip to Target because I desperately wanted at least one pair of non-maternity jeans to wear. I've lost most of my baby weight already, but my body has changed so much, I may never be able to wear my prepregnancy clothes again. The second we walked in the door, Ben needed a diaper change, so I went into the large and strange "family bathroom" with the stroller and disinfected everything before I changed him. He then began screaming so I nursed him to calm him down. I hoped it would be a five minute "snack," but I stood there and nursed for about twenty minutes. In that time, Josh managed to go through the electronics department, men's clothes, shoes and books in that amount of time. Ben was still cranky when we left the restroom, but I passed him off to Josh and quickly grabbed an armload of jeans in a variety of sizes and found a decent pair that will work fine for now. When Josh met back up with me, he mentioned how easy it would be to pick up women while pushing Ben around in the stroller "if he were a lesser man." Right... I've never worked so hard to get one pair of jeans.

These pictures are from before we left. Ben's wearing an adorable outfit from Dody.

first time out of the house

We actually made it out of the house today! We went to Wal-Mart in the morning, came home to eat, and went to Sam's in the afternoon. Although I was completely exhausted by the time we were done at Sam's, it was great to finally be out of the house. This is also the first day we haven't taken any pictures of the boy. I'm sure that won't last long.

baby clothes

I can't believe how obsessed with baby clothes I've become. Ben already has a way better wardrobe than anything I've ever had. I'm sure he owns more clothes than he could possibly wear before he'll grow out of them. Today I tried to put a sweater and jeans on him, but until his umbilical cord falls off, I think we're going to have to stick to sleepers and snap up outfits.