The Zarski Household Update

This week is flying by and Asher is getting bigger and bigger with each passing day. We're out of almost all of our 3-6 month clothes now. I need to do some serious closet pruning. It's so tempting to buy new, cute clothes in bigger sizes, but knowing that he will only be in them for 2-3 months at the most helps keep my debit card in my wallet and my eyes away from Zulily. We've got so many things already that should last him awhile longer, thanks to our wonderful baby shower gifts and a plethora of outfits from both Grandmas in a range of sizes. They love spoiling him!

We're not quite crawling yet, but I'm sure any day now Asher is just going to take off across the living room. He "inchworm" crawls and sometimes moves in a circle or backwards.

In light of this quickly approaching development, I was able to talk John into letting me get a new rug for our living room. I found a great one on overstock.com that matches almost too well. It came yesterday! I also put away the baby swing that we haven't used in months and our living room looks so much bigger now! It's crazy how such a small change can really brighten up a room.

Suki likes to incessantly LICK the couch, so we have to protect it with a million throw blankets to avoid wet spots everywhere. Pugs are weird. I'm also going to replace the pillows and throws with ivory ones to keep the focus on the rug. Thanks to my sis, April, for the suggestion! :)

I also finally got around to covering all of our outlet plugs with safety covers. Yay! Next is the cabinet safety latches, but we still have a little time for those. They require some drilling, it looks like, so I'll be recruiting John for some help there. You don't want to see what I can do with a drill.

After our disastrous doggy-poo incident (happened twice more after that first morning, yuck!), I took Sumo to the vet and it turns out his gastrointestinal issues are stress-related. Our furry friend seems to still be upset from his recent boarding and/or still having a hard time adjusting to Asher having taken away some of his attention from Mommy (that's me!). I'll admit that I haven't been paying enough attention to him since we first brought Asher home, so I am making it a priority to give him some extra love. I've been getting him more involved when I am sitting with Asher, too, so that he warms up to him - and it's working! He's been letting Asher pet him more than ever and has been licking him like crazy (he likes to search out delicious dried hypoallergenic spit-up; but who can blame him? Yum!).



We have a new sleep routine going on due to some serious growing! I put Asher down around 7:30pm and he is up like clockwork between 10:30 and 11 for a bottle. It coincides with John getting home from work, so I almost wonder if Asher has recognized that pattern and wants to see his daddy. (Too much "crazy mommy" on that one? My baby is a genius? Sorry.) He'll stay up for about 45 minutes or so and then is back down until around 8:00am. I'm happy that we're getting that extra bottle in and also that he gets to see his dad a little more! When wedding season starts to taper off soon, he'll get more daddy time during the day with John not having to spend so much time at our shop.

I snapped this is NC on our vaca, but he has picked the habit back up starting a few days ago.
{ Love the Honest Co. dipes, BTW. Post to come soon on that. }

While on the sleep subject, Asher has started sleeping on his side, which is going to be a tremendous help for correcting his "flat head". This morning, though, he woke up with extremely puffy eyes! From a quick Google search, it seems pretty normal for when they start sleeping on their tummies/sides and should resolve quickly, but I am going to keep a close eye and definitely mention it to the doctor at our next appointment. Has anyone else had this happen?

The swelling had started to subside at this point, (like 1 hour after waking, but you can still see it a little on his right eye. :(

I've been gathering ideas for 6 month (half birthday!!) photos of Asher. So far I am thinking of having him wear a denim overall outfit with no shirt underneath for one outfit, a cute Mudpie chevron and giraffe coverall that I purchased before he was born (perfect fit now!), a onesie/leg-warmer from Kakabaka on Etsy, and of course some bare-bottomed baby pics :). I have my eyes on the CUTEST newsboy set with vest, bow-tie, and hat, but can't justify spending $75+ on a one time wear outfit. I'll have to save that sort of thing for 1 year pics. Maybe I'll just get the hat. And bow-tie. And vest. Ha! Any cute ideas? I'm all ears!

I'm kind of excited, I am going to attempt a semi-pro photo shoot with him on my own... we'll see how it goes and if I'm not pleased I'll have our photog. on speed dial. :) I'm sure we'll try to fit in a session with her anyways, but I'm going to challenge myself to get some professional looking photos on my own. I've ordered a 5 in 1 reflector because I think even lighting is one of the things I am missing when I don't use a flash, but I LOVE the look of natural light. I also have been looking at backdrops and some other fun props... I'm going to try and get a post together showing my "behind the scenes" with tips for taking pics yourself and FINALLY getting together some info on photography including my equipment, tips, etc. So look out for that in about a month!

We've introduced sweet potatoes now and all seems to be going well! I really need to get to the grocery store and pick up some more of those Happy Baby and Sprout food pouches. We're doing great with the stage 1 pouches right now and bananas are easy enough to mash up in the mornings, so I'll wait to make homemade baby food that until the "fun" combinations can begin!

So that's our week so far and now I need to stop procrastinating, for real! As usual, here are some more cute pics! :)

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Happy { Belated } 4th

You may have noticed that I have been M.I.A. for the past week. We were on VACA! Well, as much of a "vacation" as you can have driving 12 hours away with a 5 month old. ;) On our last day there, I came down with a serious cold, perhaps even the flu, so now I am fighting a sinus and ear infection that has led to laryngitis. Ugghhh. I WILL BLOG ON!

We went to John's parents' (Asher's Nonna and Grandpa's) North Carolina house for a week. John's brother's family went, as well, with their 3 kids so the house was full of life! In fact, the entire street was full of life as John's aunts and uncles all have houses there, too, so the whole week was filled with family, family, family. It was wonderful seeing everyone and many were meeting baby Asher for the first time. He loved every minute of it! Well, except for the drive...

I have so much to share from our week and will be breaking it down into several posts because there is just SO MUCH. Today, I'm going to share our wonderful family vacation pictures and July 4th pics. Asher was out by 8pm, so this year wasn't as exciting for him as future firework-filled Independence Days will be. But we were still festive!

Then, be on the lookout for these topics later this week:

Traveling with Baby + Packing Checklist
Babywearing for Outdoor Activities
10 Days Without Cloth Diapers
5 Month Update - Photos & Developments
Photographing Fireworks

Hopefully I can kick this bug quickly and get back to my frequent blog posts. There is always something to talk about in the world of baby!

Without further ado, here are some pictures from our family vacation to NC:

Our first day in the mountains, we broke out our Stokke MyCarrier for our visit to Chimney Rock. A complete review with more details and more pictures is soon to come, but I will say that this carrier was ideal for an outdoor activity such as this. Asher was 110% secure in the Stokke carrier and that made me feel much better about taking him 2280 feet in the air!

 

My white shorts are a Zulily steal!

Stokke MyCarrier with Bib Accessory

Asher's camera onesie was purchased from Kakabaka on Etsy

The next few days were full of rain (on and off, but mostly on) so they were spent visiting with all of the aunts, uncles, cousins, second cousins.... and Asher was in heaven. We also went downtown and checked out the shops and restaurants a bit.

The sun stayed out long enough for us to take the Smokey Mountain Train Ride. It was loooong... but still a fun time. I'm so glad that Asher was exposed to trains so that he has some idea of why I often say, "Chug a chug a CHOO CHOO!"

{ We had an impromptu outfit change for Asher on the train ride home, so that's why there are two outfits going on in these train pics. }

My yellow shirt was a Zulily steal!

 

We decided to visit an indoor (covered) farmer's market to escape the heavy, heavy rain that eventually started and did not stop for the rest of the week...

Lillebaby Carrier - Complete review and detailed pics coming soon!

Now, 4th of July - still raining - complete with my first attempt at night photography using a tripod and remote. I think I'm in love! I'm going to have to play around with this awesome technique some more!

John wore the Stokke carrier with ease. It easily converted from my size to his.

What a fun vacation! I can't wait for next year when Asher will be running around with his little cousins. Oh - they grow so fast!!!

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