National Public Saftey Telecommunications Week

Today is the last day of National Public Safety Telecommunications week. I had originally wanted to post about this on Monday...

Marathon Monday.

But something caught me off guard, being that I work as an emergency dispatcher, I follow many feeds online for Police/Fire/EMS and when I saw a post come through about a bombing at the finish line of the Boston Marathon, I thought, no way... that can't be true!

The last time I felt that way, was September 11th.

And just like then, this too would turn out to be no joke.

Thursday and Friday I was attending classes at the NH Fire Academy. As I was getting ready Friday morning, I had the news on to hear about the shootout and the officials placing Watertown, MA and surrounding communities on lock down. Driving up to the Fire Academy, there were signs on the highway, saying to avoid Boston area, check media.

All through the class, I kept my phone on and checked periodically at breaks for updates, hoping that they would find the suspect and this chapter would be over. But they wouldn't find the suspect until Friday evening, Ben and I were glued to the news broadcast. I was hoping that no other lives would be lost to this tragedy.

Well the subject has been apprehended, and I think Boston and most of New England breathed a sigh of relief. I had several friends in the lockdown area (as well as several who participated in the Boston Marathon) and I was so thankful that none of my friends were impacted (at least physically).

On top of all this, a fertilizer plant in West, Texas caught fire and exploded, decimating neighborhoods, and killing several people, mostly first responders.

A week were we are supposed to acknowledge dispatchers/call takers/telecommunicators for all the hard work they do, is marred by several tragedies.

I don't do this job for the recognition, I do this job, because I wanted to help people. This profession is not for all, it takes someone with the right mix.

I am thankful for the first responders who worked quickly to identify and apprehend the suspects. I can only imagine how stressful and tense those situations must have been. I mourn for the loss of the innocents, and the MIT police officer. May they rest in peace knowing that the first responders worked diligently to get the job done.

We are Boston Strong.

I would also like to take a moment to say thank you to my dispatcher friends for the jobs that you do. It's not easy work, you don't get paid nearly enough for the amount of stuff (crap) you have to deal with, but you do make a difference, and know that no matter what, you are the calm voice in the dark.

6 month update

I've been such a neglectful blogger. But with all the changes in my life, mostly baby and house, something had to give, and it seems like this blog was it. I am hoping that I can started updating on a more regular basis, than say once in 5 months!

Brenden is doing super, at his 6 month well baby check-up, he weighed in at 18 pounds 5 ounces (he was 8 pounds 12 ounces at birth). And continues to meet all of his milestones.

It's amazing to see how much changes in such a little amount of time. First it was this:

And now it's this:

I love chubby baby legs!

He's really developing his own personality and it's funny to be with him. I love that I have a job that enables me to spend most of my time with him - oh but how I miss him when I do have to work.

Brenden started solids about a month ago, he seems to really be enjoying trying new foods. Pretty much the only things he really is fussy about is food and napping. I guess he really is my kid then!

On Monday, I discovered that he is cutting his first tooth! Poor little man, he was in so much pain with it. It's hard to hear that painful cry of your baby. 

My little guy has a sensitive side, he sympathetic cries. Which I discovered while we were attending a mommy group, and there were other little babies there that were fussy, he was playing with his toys, heard the other babies crying and immediately started crying too. It was hilarious, I couldn't stop laughing. He also cried, when I injured myself, and I was crying/yelling out in pain.... again it made me laugh.

Brenden has been sleeping thru the night since about 2.5 months... (knocking on every wood source I can find!) with only a few nights since that he wakes up. Mostly it's due to an environment change, like when we moved into the new house, or some other big change (cutting teeth).

He is really a great baby.

At his 6 month well baby check, the doctor asked me how long I planned to continue pumping, she was thrilled that I made it 6 months. I said that I have good days and bad (when it comes to pumping) but that ideally my goal is to pump for a year and have enough frozen to get him through cold/flu season next year. But that I make mini-goals of 3 months at a time.

Although exclusively pumping is working for us, it's not for everyone, it's a lot of hard work and dedication. I wouldn't be able to do as much as I've done if it wasn't for my husband's love and support. He's been amazing through all of this. But I know it was important for both of us, that our baby have breast milk.

I had a full supply of milk come in, so much that we had to go out and buy a deep freezer at Thanksgiving time. Sadly a local mother passed away in December, she had twin boys who were born a week after Brenden and the twins were not doing well on formula. So her family put out a call for donor milk, by some reason, I found out about this and was able to donate milk to the twins. It came at a perfect time, because my freezer was full and I had no clue what I was going to do with all of the milk. I have since donated to the boys one other time, easily totaling over 2000 ounces of milk to them. I am extremely happy that I was able to do this especially given the fact that Brenden never took to nursing.

I've also become a resource for other moms, both in person and online for mom's who are looking for information about exclusively pumping. I am so grateful to the moms who helped me, it's nice to be able to share information and give back to others.

Also, several of my friends are now pregnant. So it looks like Brenden is going to always have some friends to play with (and LOTS of potential girlfriends!)

My life seems perfect right now. I am so content.

Oh I have a blog?

A while back my brother mentioned that I hadn't blogged in quite a while... I didn't even realize till just now it had been since OCTOBER! Seesh... it's overused, but where does the time go?

Oh that's right, I have a 6 month old, and a new house.

You heard that right my bloggy friends, not only did we just have a baby, we decided that buying our first home was a good idea as well! In all honesty, we would have liked to have purchased our house before Brenden was born, but it just wasn't in the cards, we are so thankful that we waited, as the house we did purchase is just perfect for us and our family!

Of course me being the super awesome person (blogger) that I am, I do not have a single picture of my house. (fail!) What is nice is that it's located only 12 minutes from my old apartment - which made moving SO easy.

We moved St. Patrick's Day weekend, and we are still trying to unpack and get settled.

We've found that everything is twice as difficult with a baby. It seems as though once you get into a good groove the baby knows it. I swear, he's out to get us!

Ben and I couldn't be more happier with our house, we are closer to my work, closer to daycare, closer to my friends. It's a win/win for everyone! We've been told that we live in a really nice neighborhood, which after walking around, I would tend to agree! And we've seen many little ones around.

The space! I love how much space we have! Although in a few years I am sure I will be complaining that it's not enough. But we went from a 2 bedroom apartment to a 3 bedroom oversized ranch. It has a beautiful deck off the back of the house, overlooking the river, we have a neat little fire pit and what I envision will be a great evening hang out spot (fire pit with some Adirondack chairs) down by the river.

It's a house that needs a little work, but it's work that we can do while we live there, which is what we wanted.

Hopefully once we get a little bit more settled we'll be able to have some sort of open house where our friends can come and see our new place.