Family Reunion

At the beginning of August we went out to Grandma's house for a little family reunion. A lot of family was able to come from other states that we don't get to see very often - namely Uncle Jeff and his family and Uncle Mike and his family. It was so nice getting to hang out with everyone. Bradley gets so shy around big crowds - especially when he just wakes up and I get excited to show him off and I bring him into a room full of people - not good! He gets a little freaked out. It took him a while to get used to all the people on the first day but after that he had a blast! And it was his first night away from home - and what do you know - he slept great! And that was even the first night that he slept completely unswaddled (and in bed with me, which I loved). Kevin is so funny because we were trying to figure out how to sleep with Bradley in the bed - Kevin moves a lot and we were both worried that he would roll over on him, and I wasn't smart enough to bring his pack-n-play so Bradley definitely had to be in the bed. So Kevin suggested he sleep on the floor, which he was fine with because he likes sleeping on the floor. Then he got ALL excited when he saw that we had a box fan in the room. He said, "Oh this is perfect! I can turn the box fan on high and sleep right in front of it - just like I used to do when I was a kid!" It was so cute :) So he did just that, and even was happy when he woke up in the morning. I understand his excitement, I love those things that just take you right back to childhood :)

We had so much fun spending time with family, playing games, and catching up. I'm sad I don't get to see them more often.

Here's Mr Bradley with Uncle Jeff - it took a while for him to warm up to Uncle Jeff :) probably because he was the first person Mr Bradley saw when I brought him into the room full of people and he got scared (my fault) - but by the end they were great friends! :)

Mr Bradley with his Great Grandma. He sure loves his Great Grandma!

Playing pool in the basement.

We hope we get to see everyone again soon, it was great getting to spend time together! We miss you already!!

Softball

Another year of softball is over :( We have so much fun every year. This year I was especially nervous because I missed out last year and was pretty out of practice at the beginning of the season - even though I think the first game I did my best out of all the games.

The season high -

About half way through the season we played the toughest team in our league - they always end up in first place and are very hard to beat. At that time we were undefeated and so were they - so the pressure was on! We were behind most of the game, we had a bad couple of innings in the beginning and were trying to play catch up the whole game. By the last inning we were down by 4 runs - 5 to 9. We ended up getting some people on base, got a couple home and it was getting close. I was base coaching 3rd and was enjoying watching everyone round the bases :) Then we get down to the wire - bases loaded, 2 outs and we're tied 9 to 9. And guess who's up? Heidi! I was thinking "Great, and we were doing so well..." I can't handle pressure and I hadn't been hitting well all night so I was not expecting much - I just kept thinking, "Ok, we can go into extra innings and still have a chance, at least we're tied". I hit in right field and the second baseman knew it and was catching every single one of my balls. I decided I'd try to let the pitcher walk me, because he had been doing that to many people, but when the first pitch was a strike I decided I needed to start swinging. So I swung... I hit the ball, but it didn't go very far, it was in the in-field heading in between 2nd and 1st and the second baseman looked like she was right on it. I put my head down and ran as fast as I could to 1st - getting there a split second before the ball did!! - Kevin was on 3rd and ran home and we won! It was so exciting! Definitely the highlight of the season for me :)

Season low -

I'm tempted to say when I probably had a small concusion, but that wasn't it. One of the last games I collided with 2 big guys at 2nd base - one guy took out my feet so I started falling, smacked my face into the other guys hard head, then fell to the ground and smacked it once again in the dirt. I layed there crying for a while (wuss! There's no crying in baseball!! :) ) But I didn't want to stop playing so I toughed it out the rest of the game - luckily no balls came my way because I was pretty dizzy. I had a pretty strong, pounding headache for about 3 days - not to mention the huge bruise I got on my thigh from falling. BUT - that was not the low point - because we won that game :) We actually won all our games - up until the last game... we lost 3 to 5 - THAT was the low point. I did terrible and we should have beat them, but we lost and it was sad. The one thing that makes me feel a little better is that we still got 1st place, even though we didn't get our perfect season.

I'm sad it's over, I look forward to it every year and it seems like the Fall league hasn't been working out because of everyone's schedules so I'm sad about that.

Until next year I guess...

Happy Birthday to me :)

I had a wonderful birthday. I did just what I love doing - hung out with my family! I took work off so that I could sleep in - which was great, then Kevin and I had a nice day hanging out with Mr Bradley, then Mom, Bill, Tammy, Mindy, Scott and the kids came over for dinner, cake and ice cream - and of course games! I can't believe I'm 27! As a funny - but not so funny - side note. People still tell me how young I look all the time - yes, yes - I'll appreciate it when I'm older (how much older until that happens again? :) ) I went and subbed on a softball team the other night that Mindy and Tammy play on. I didn't want to go because it was a 9 o'clock game and lately I'm in bed by then! But they had asked me several times and it never worked out with Bradley's schedule, and since he would be asleep before I left I figured I could do it. Then we get there and they didn't even need me, so I was just the designated hitter - which was kind of annoying but who was I to complain. Mindy thought it was dumb so she went up to the coach and told him "You have to play her, I made her come, even though it's past her bed time" jokingly.

So then this guy comes up to me later and says, "So, Mindy is your mom?" Uhh... NO!

Mindy was not too happy! That would make me way younger and her way older, and as Tammy kindly pointed out - that would make Mindy a grandma! :)

Yes, fine - I hear I could pass for 18, 19 quite a bit - but to be the daughter of my sister who is 2 years older than me? That's pushing it, don't ya think? Crazy man...

Funny video

I just thought I'd post this because I think it's so funny :)

He thought it was pretty funny too :)

So so sleepy...

So I've been meaning to post for a while but it seems like every spare second I get I seem to (almost unconsciously) make my way over to my bed to rest :) Mr Bradley has always been a great sleeper, when he was a baby I would have to wake him all the time in order to get all his feedings in. Then when we went to on demand feedings he would only wake up once a night to nurse and go right back to sleep. For some reason, about when he turned 7 months, that changed. Now we are having sleep issues!

Ever since Mr Bradley was born Kevin and I have held him/walked him/rocked him to sleep - which was never a problem, I actually love it! But I guess when you have to do it 10 times a night, it wears on you a little. THEN when he wakes up the second you put him in his crib - no matter how long you were holding him to make sure he was in DEEP sleep - then it becomes impossible! We obviously can't hold him all night long. Many people are saying "We told you so" to me. They warned me not to hold my baby all the time and not to cuddle him to sleep every night. But I couldn't help it! He's just so darn cute and cuddly!! :)

About a month ago I realized that I had 3 goals that I needed to work on - getting Bradley out of his swaddle at night and for naps, getting him moved to his own room, and getting him to learn to sooth himself to sleep. At least I've done 2 of the 3 :) Moving him to his nursery was also really hard on me. The night we did it I was so sad, Kevin kept having to console me. I thought I would be going in there to check on him every hour to make sure he's ok. Turns out we've been going in there about every hour - not to check on him but to get him back to sleep :) Oh well, I guess I would have been doing it anyway!

After a couple weeks of him sleeping terrible we decided we needed to do something. I bought a book and picked a night to start one of the "no cry sleep solutions". I just can't bear to hear him cry - I keep telling Kevin "Is it the worst thing in the world that he just wants his Mommy and Daddy? How can we deprive him of that!?" But I came to realize that no matter what strategy we used - there was going to be some crying involved. The one I decided to try - you sit by the crib consoling him until he falls asleep, you can offer words like "It's sleepy time" and stroke his face every now and then to calm him, but can't pick him up - then you wait. The book said some babies take 10 minutes to fall asleep, some take over an hour. I thought - considering my son is as stubborn as can be - it'd be more like 2 hours. Guess how long... GUESS!

4 1/2 HOURS - PLUS! I don't know how much longer he would have gone, but I couldn't take it any longer after 4 1/2 hours, I don't know how I made it that long! So that whole night left me feeling defeated and scared to try anything else. I think being in the room made it worse on him, I think he refuses to go to sleep as long as we are there so we might just have to leave - I haven't decided on checking in on him or not. I just want to do what's best for him and sometimes not knowing what that is makes me feel like a terrible Mom :(

Anyways, now I'll work on all my other posts to get you up-to-date on everything else that's been going on - and don't worry, you'll hear much more about the sleeping...

Swim Lessons!

Bradley had swimming classes during the month of July. Connor was also in the same class so it was fun getting to spend more time with him. Before the classes Bradley had never been in a pool, so he was a little stiff at first :) but he got used to it. He has this thing he does with his legs - he does it all the time laying on the floor and he did it almost every time in the water when he was on his back - he'd stretch them out and cross them - he looked like he was just lounging, we kept trying to uncross them and get him to kick but he didn't want to do that while he was on his back :)
Somehow he always seemed to end up playing with the same boat, he was so good - he'd really kick his feet and try to move towards the boat.
Daddy was able to make it to every single class with us - we had so much fun. In the first class they had us dunk them - I chickened out! I just couldn't do it. Every class I would try get up the courage to do it and then I'd wuss out and get scared. I wanted to so badly because I think the earlier you do it the more used to it they'll be. I stated my concerns to the teacher and he reassured me that it was not required at this level - so luckily Bradley still passed :)
At one of the last classes though Kevin finally did it, he did a couple of practice - almost dunks - and I was so tense! I kept reaching out to grab him :) Afterwards he choked a little bit but was totally fine. Kevin tried to get me to do it on the last class but I didn't want to ruin his last class for him, he was having so much fun! His favorite part of all was splashing, he'd get his face soaked but somehow it was a surprise every time the water hit him in the face - it was so funny! :)

Teething Baby

The best part of eating for a teething baby is rubbing the spoon across those sore gums. When Mommy's not helping out and doing it for you - improvise :)

We're sure seeing this head shaking motion a lot now - when anything is in his mouth he'll shake his head back and forth so that it rubs on his gums :) sweet sweet baby! (No little teeth bumps yet though)