gah!!!

   I am SO sorry that I pretty much skipped the entire month of April on here! Let's just say I've had a lot on my hands here lately. I am going to configure my account so that I can write posts from my e-mail and hopefully I'll be able to keep up with it a little bit better that way! Anyway, I'm just going to go ahead and jump right into all of the updates for around here!
   For starters, Jack is about to be 9 months old! 9 FREAKING MONTHS!!! In 6 days! I really underestimated just how fast time goes by when you have a baby. But the thing is, the older they get, the faster it goes by (although I'm sure by the time he's a teen I'll think otherwise). So let's see if I can cover EVERYTHING that has happened in the past month that I was absent from here...
   Jack now has a grand total of 4 teeth! Two on the bottom and two on the top! His favorite food is broccoli. He no longer eats ANY jarred food or cereal. He doesn't like being spoon fed unless it's yogurt, cream of wheat, or grits. Haha. He has perfected his Army-style low crawl, can pull himself into a standing position while holding onto things now, can walk while holding our fingers, claps when we say "Yay!" or he is proud of himself, and he waves "Hi" and "Bye" to EVERYONE!
   Also, he is still breastfed, although not as often. He gets a couple of bottles of formula every day now. If you look at his "growing up..." chart, you can see that his weight for months 6, 7, and 8 are all VERY close. His doctor and I weren't sure if it was related to his reflux or what, but I started to notice before he turned 8 months that he was spending less time nursing because he was so easily distracted! The less time a baby spends nursing, the less nutrients they receive. This means he was pretty much getting the foremilk (the more watery part of the milk) and less hindmilk (the fattier, nutrient rich part of the milk). This can in turn damage your supply.
   So once I noticed that, I decided to go ahead and switch him to mostly formula when he turned 8 months old. Since we started doing that, he is sleeping better at night, less fussy, and seems much more alert, aware, and talkative. You might be wondering, "why not just pump?" Well, I have been. My supply has been pretty damaged from how he was nursing over the past few months and although I could get it back up, I just don't have enough time to chase after him all day long, keep up with the house, work (more about that in a bit), and pump. I have only been getting about 0.5-2oz each time I pump, where I would normally get 3-4oz. I'm extremely proud of myself for exclusively breastfeeding him for 8 months, but pretty sad that I wasn't able to continue that until a year old. So yeah... a pretty bittersweet situation!
   And yes... I mentioned work in the paragraph above. That's right, I have a job! Granted, it's only part time and it's at night, but I LOVE it! I'm working downtown at a place called Rude Awakening Coffee House. Yes, I have worked there in the past. It's my home away from home! I love it there! Also, Zach got a job too! He now works for a landscaping company in a town about 45 minutes away from our house. He's been loving it. Although we certainly don't get to see each other as frequently now! But we're working on that.
   Anyway, I had better get off here! It's pretty late and I have a good bit of cleaning and laundry to do before I can actually go to bed... oh joy! Haha. Good night!!!