Albatross -- Week 4 Recap

Once upon a time, there was a softball team. This team was young, and strapping, and energetic, and... happy. We were happy. And occasionally victorious.

But the season ended, and we went back to our young/strappy/energized lives, and we felt like something was missing. Some team members wisely realized that this something was softball, for Pete's sakes, and went on to play on other teams... or coach... or simply and patiently wait it out until the next season could arrive.

But the rest of us... ah, the rest of us. We grew restless in the off-season, and we sat around and stared at the walls, and thought: Where did we go wrong? What can fill this hole in our hearts? What can soothe the savage beast that roars just under our young and strapping and energetic flesh? Ah! I know! We must need a baby!

So babies we conceived, and babies we had. Boy babies, girl babies... well, girl baby anyway. And those of us who did not have babies? We got married, or engaged, so that some day we could have babies without that pesky social stigma.

And the babies are cute, and the spouses wonderful, but gol' if they don't take a lot of energy to maintain. The diapers! The crawling! The screaming! (And that's just the husbands! Yuk, yuk.) And all that energy has to come from somewhere, and I hate to say it, but... I fear it has come from our defense. Let's face it, we're not the impenetrable wall, the well-oiled machine, the sheer tour de force we may have been a mere 24 months ago.

So there's that. Not to mention the injuries plaguing our marriage- and baby-wracked bodies, and we're a sorry heap of humanity indeed. But! Does the Phoenix not rise from its own ashes?? Does the airline industry not pull itself up by its own plucky bootstraps after the terror of September 11?? Does Terry Mulholland not make a miraculous annual September comeback?? Oh, dear, I've gone too far.

So! We cobble together a team of brothers and sisters and aunts and uncles and in-laws and outlaws. Of K(C)aras and Watsons and Vanyos and Gronaus and Ryans and Pats and Joels and people whose nicknames could be K-Matt and... er, one guy named Scott Pudwell. And we drag these pathetic, lost selves to the ballpark every week, and we smile and we feel happy to be out under the lights on a beautiful late-summer evening, and we HIT. Holy Moses, do we hit!! We hit and we run and we run and we hit and THAT, my friends, was a beautiful thing. And you can keep your silver and your gold and your league trophies and your first basemen who can do the splits and your sluggers wearing jazz pants... I will content myself with the Beauty.

See ya next week. :)

Albatross Week 3

Apologies from Meg: this entry was written last Friday but due to red tape surrounding the Labor Day holiday, is just being published today.

A guest blog by the President of the United States of America, GWB.

My fellow Albatri,
A great tragedy has occurred, and I'm not talkin' about the horrors down in the great state of New Orleans... nor am I talkin' about the umpiring at last night's games, although that was an atrocity-ness of pretty epic proportions as well. No, friends, I'm talking about the fact that our Albatross was slaughtered twice despite playing some damn decent ball.

As I was flying over Roseville Central Park field #4 last night, on my way to flying over the disaster in Missisississsippissis... I mean, down south there, and I WAS planning to get out of my helicopter and walk around the area that Hurricane Katariney hit, but it's darn scary down there, I mean, there are so many PEOPLE and they're all starving and dehydrated and someone said something about SEWAGE, and there's just so much WET that I think I'll probably just fly over it all instead; I'm sure I'll be able to see it just fine from the chopper, you know? Heh heh.

Anyways, so I'm flying over Roseville and there, below me like a beacon on a cool fall evening, what did I see? I saw A Thousand Points of Light, my friends. I saw Karen "Trashtalker" Smiley fallin' flat on her face pickin' up a ball.. and comin' up laughin'. I saw Cara "I can't believe I'm finally getting rid of 'Wuertz' and trading it in for 'Christopherson'; is there no justice??" Wuertz throw her glove up to her face in a self-protective maneuver and pluck a screaming line-drive right out of thin air. I saw four home runs, all by fellows named Joel. I saw Crazylegs Watson turning a good solid Texas-league single into a TRIPLE, by God.

And yet there has been slaughter, and it warn't real pretty, but I'm dern proud of y'all and I want y'all to know it. Eight runs in each game, well, that's nothing to sniff at. The tragedy which I aforementioned, er, afore? Let it not hinder your steadfastness in your fight against the Axis of Evil, i.e. Teams Who Might Not Belong in a C/D League. Hang in there and keep havin' a good time. So I have just one word for y'all's next week's games: STRATEGORY.

Sincerely,
GWB

Anecdotes from the 1/2 Story

50% goose down, 50% giggling husband
So I trudge upstairs on Saturday night after a lovely evening shower (nothing like showering at night for a good clean night's sleep!), anxiously anticipating crawling into freshly-laundered sheets and resting my head on freshly-laundered pillowcases. I'd sent Joel up ahead to make the bed with said sheets, a task which included the sometimes-onerous task of putting the duvet cover back on the comforter. And I'd taken a nice, long shower so I knew he'd have plenty of time to get the bed made.

So I round the corner at the top of the stairs, only to see Joel's upside-down head peering at me from INSIDE the duvet cover.

"This is harder than it looks," he says, still upside-down.

Yup, he'd crawled inside the duvet cover, comforter in hand, to try to make the dang things fit together... and thought it might work to push the corners in with his toes while holding the opposite corner with his hands... and gotten lost amid the yards and yards of white and blue fabric.

I'm not really sure how he got out -- I was laughing too hard.

Whoops, there goes gravity
Argh! I dropped the baby last Wednesday. OK, she actually fell but it was totally my fault so I'm calling it a drop. I had her upstairs while I was changing clothes after work, and she's so FAST I didn't want her just crawling around up there because the stairs are right around the corner, and very steep. So I put her on the bed... bad idea. I turned away for seriously one second and THUMP she'd slipped right off the edge, forehead first. She screamed like a banshee -- fortunately, everything I read said that if she was screaming that loud she was probably totally fine. Thank goodness Jean the Nurse was coming over and was able to proclaim Lucy concussion-free almost immediately. Man, what a terrible moment in a mother's life. Lucy has bonked her head on much harder surfaces before -- she tips over in her crib a lot, and toodles right into walls sometimes, but this was the first time she'd actually fallen. Well, lesson learned.

The slow and steady climb

For those of you concerned about my health these days, I just went and sat on the postal meter we have here at work that can weigh up to 150 lbs and which I think I'm the only one who knows about, and I believe I have gained at least two and possibly three pounds! (It's hard to tell, there wasn't time to remove my shoes (which are not real heavy) before someone came into the hallway.) So everyone be proud of me, okay?

Albatross Game Recap - Week 2

Well, it wasn't real pleasant for the Albatross out there last night. We managed not to score one whole run in two entire games -- of course, it helped that the games were only 5 innings long apiece, since we keep getting slaughtered.

Aside: I really prefer the term "slaughter rule" to "10-run rule" or, in our case, "15-run rule". It just has a much more dramatic ring to it, don't you think?

We didn't really get off to a good start, I have to say -- despite my best efforts at being All Things to All People, it wasn't really feasible for me to work a full day, run home/change clothes/pack diaper and food bags, pick up Lucy, run up to happy hour for a friend going on a leave from work, and still make it to the game on time. I got to the game OK but then had to make the 200-yard dash from the parking lot to the field, toting:
- Lucy in her stroller
- Lucy's diaper/toy/blanket bag
- Lucy's pack-n-play (for you nonparents, the sucker weighs about 40 lbs, I think)
- my bat bag (which was holding four bats)
- a large brown paper grocery bag containing Lucy's food
- a large brown paper grocery bag containing the waffle fries I hoped to eat for dinner
- my purse

That's a LOT for one three-months-pregnant person to carry, don't you think? I assure you it is. Anyway, I get there pretty much RIGHT at game time. And one of our girls hasn't arrived yet, and the rest of our teammates, bless their hearts, are sort of standing around with lost-puppy-dog looks on their faces. It was like gazing at nine very large, bipodal and significantly less-hairy Hobos. Who could blame them? I've been such a control-freak, they were probably petrified of the unleash of sarcasm they might receive for trying to take charge. I will have to do more to reassure them that will not happen. :)

Somehow we managed to bat, and get out in the field, and thank GOODNESS for the two random "extra girls" who showed up, since Becky injured her quads; we were miraculously able to at least put some warm bodies out there. And I have to say, our defense wasn't dreadful at all -- several nice plays were made. And a few people actually got hits, which unfortunately did not materialize into runs. But after I got home and put a very sleepy Lucy to bed, I cracked into the fresh new Sports Illustrated that had appeared in my mailbox that afternoon, and I was reminded how much I really do love sports. The rush of adrenaline from a sudden sprint, the feeling of fresh outdoor air in your lungs, the highs and the lows -- it really lets you know you're alive.

Anyway, I finally got to talk to Joel (he's been up in Brainerd for three days at a company conference) and Lucy was a doll this morning and we had a great thunderstorm and the world is new. AND it's Friday!

You know you've spent too much time being pregnant when...

So I saw this headline at yahoo! news:

Stewart Appears in Court in Breach Suit

And the first thing I thought was: "What on earth kind of suit was he wearing? How do you wear a suit upside-down??"

Right. I need to get a LIFE.

Late August

Oi, it's been a crazy couple weeks here!

We're over the initial shock of the REAL PREGNANCY... I think... and are now swinging into our late-summer routine. My parents and my aunt rented a cottage on a lake in Wisconsin a couple weeks ago and we spent 4 nice days with them -- and then they kept Lu for an extra three days! It was a really, really nice break (her first overnight babysitters) and I wish I could say I was delighted to get her back on Saturday, but instead her return unleashed this overwhelming feeling that I am trapped in this life I have chosen and that I'm going to be miserable forever... obviously, I have some trouble with long-range vision.
I talked to my mom -- she promised that when they get to be adults, it's all worth it and so I guess I can manage another 18-20 years of misery. Just kidding... kind of. Lu's at a tough stage where she is realizing there are choices and options out there (carrots or strawberries? crawl or toodle? dog food or mom's shoes?) and yet she still can't make her wishes known. So there's a lot of whining, spurts of crying, bursts of wiggling. And my hormones rage on.

This week's been better. A little more energy and a lot more food have been keeping my spirits up. But it is a struggle, realizing that when I'm done with a long day (or week) of work, I don't have the option of crashing out on the sofa with a bowl of cereal, or even perusing my own mail. I am selfish and those little pleasures used to be vital to my happiness... but happiness is a luxury I just can't afford right now. So we downshift into survival mode, and away we go. See you on the other side!

12-week checkup!

So the new little one is fine. Heart pumping away. Cute photo of the Old Little One from a couple weekends ago at the Science Museum.

So, any big plans this weekend?

You know how, when you're pregnant, some foods make you nauseated? Well, they do. And while I'm apparently out of the food-aversion stage, I seem to have developed an aversion to a few choice phrases, which unfortunately happen to be favorites in the cubicle inferno where I spend 40 hours a week.

"Any big plans this weekend?" Arrrgh! Do you really want to hear how I plan to sleep until 7:00, shuffle downstairs, pee, let out the dog, feed the dog, try to encourage the very-sad-looking dog to eat his food, c'mon boy, go get it! Retrieve the baby, make a bottle, try to encourage the very-sleepy-looking baby to drink her bottle, c'mon, Lucy, yummy milk! I mean, really, this is blindingly boring for ME, and it's MY life. You do not want to hear about it, trust me.

As I type this, I realize that you, dear reader, are probably thinking it'd be hilarious to say to me "So, any big plans this weekend?"... and so you will. And just know that you are VERY original. :)

Photos from last weekend

Or, rather, photo. More to come, I hope.

Wha-wha-wha-WHAAAAAT!!??!

A lesson in life.

Part I
Most of you will have some knowledge of what's been going on with me the last month or so. Positive pregnancy test on July 6, ultrasound on the 7th -- nurse practitioner tells us there is a sac but "no baby" and my body will pass the tissue on its own. Fast forward one month: I'm still tired all the time, and my body has passed a whole lot of nuthin'. I'm getting anxious, especially after repeated calls to said nurse practitioner have told me nothing except "sometimes it takes a month... there's no risk in just waiting it out... blah blah blah."

Part II
I am finally able to speak to my Real Doctor on August 3. She tells me to make an appointment to see her on Friday the 5th, just to do a quick check before we schedule the D&C. So she checks me, and says, extremely calmly: "Okay, I'm going to sneak you into an ultrasound to check one more thing. Don't leave here today without seeing me again."
So I go into the ultrasound, and the tech works me up. As soon as the screen pops up, she starts laughing. Laughing. So I demand to know what in my uterus could POSSIBLY be so hilarious, and she says:
"There's a very alive baby in there."

What.

WHAT.

WHAT!?!?

"Look, the heart's just beating away. Look!"

Well, she might have said more after that. I was far too busy trying to come up with variations on the three or four mild expletives in my vocabulary... well, I know I wore "HOLY CRAP" and "OH MY GOD" right out. There were kleenexes and tears and sniffles and finally my doctor (who I swear was lurking outside the door the whole time) finally busted in with a HUGE grin on her face. She hugged my leg and wished me well and told me to start taking vitamins and to make my prenatal appointments. The tech printed me out a bunch of ultrasound photos and when I asked HOW that nurse practitioner could have missed a whole PERSON inside of me, she explained that that is what happens when you have someone who's not an ultrasound tech, doing an ultrasound. Job security for those techs, I tell you what.

I headed up to the front desk, where the receptionist (who is there every time I am in) was all "What can I do for you?" and I said "Well, I need to schedule many, many OB appointments because apparently I'm pregnant!" With a dramatic flair I tossed the photos on her desk. You should have heard the squealing! She called over a couple other nurses or assistants to collude on the best way to tell Joel... and to round up as many free baby-product samples as they could find. I tried to tell them that with an 11-month-old at home, my house is already overrun with baby products and that presenting Joel with "a rattle" would in NO way make him think there was another one on the way -- on the contrary, he would most likely think "Hmm, Meg must really want me to hold this... rattle."

Part III
Now, what I love about my clinic is that everyone there is almost more excited than I am. I think they specialize in infertility, so they take a viable pregnancy as The Best News Ever. When you've got five medical professionals with such obvious delight in their eyes, faces, and voices... well, it's impossible not to join right in. So whereas a month ago, I was not taking the thought of having another baby as particularly good news, on that day, hit with such a walloping blow, well all I could do was grin.

Part IV
I drive home in shock, pick up Lucy from day care (the big sister!! Manny Tanner!!) and get home in time to catch Jean also arriving at our house as we all go away from the weekend. I quickly scribble "Daddy, I'm going to be a big sister!" on the back of one of the u/s photos and attempt to press it into her teeny fist so she can hand it to Joel when we get inside. It doesn't *quite* work that smoothly, but there are several seconds of stunned silence when the news is broken. And then large, silly grins. And maybe a tear or two.

And the fun begins! ...

Welcome to Suburbia

We bought a mini-van!! YESSS! We are so, so excited. I've complained enough, I think, about how PAINFUL it's been to squeeze into the Corolla (which in addition to being a SUBCOMPACT car is also excruciatingly dirty, which of course is no one's fault by my own) for road trips... and no longer. It's a 2005 Mazda MPV, it's silver... it's pretty.

I feel like I haven't seen my baby for three days... softball on Monday and car-shopping Tues. and Wed. Just terrible. I'm sure she hasn't started walking independently or grown another tooth or anything, but I have to say I haven't fed her anything other than her bottles and Cheerios since the weekend. It's Thursday. Yikes. (I mean, she is GETTING other food, I just haven't been the one putting it in her mouth.) I looked at her standing up in her crib this morning and I think she's grown about three inches in the last week. She is exiting Baby County and entering Toddler Land, and it's happening really fast.

Long trip to IL planned this weekend for the Ryan Family Picnic (31st annual, I think?). The Ray Ryans are supposed to be wearing lime green. I know Lucy is set, but Joel and I might be doing some last-minute shirt-shopping.

Unrelated items

Dang the phone for ringing, I forgot what I was going to write.

I did want to say that at certain stoplight intersections in the Twin Cities they are introducing cameras that supposedly will take pictures of people running red lights and then mail citations to the offenders. If the fundamental point is that red-light-running is dangerous and a crime, doesn't it completely defeat the purpose when you mail the tickets?? Shouldn't they send out a squad car to find the person immediately to stop them in their tracks? Because wherever they were going in such a hurry, I guarantee by the time that ticket arrives in the mail, they either got there on time, or were late, and it's OVER, and they're swearing they'll never run another red light, ever, never again.

So I'm wearing my happy heels today. Not real comfortable, but real, real cute. Black heels with black & white bows at the toes. I wore them earlier in the week, or maybe last week, and went home that day without a single compliment! Shocked to the core, I had to wear them again sooner than usual, just to make sure the previous outing was an anomaly. Indeed, it has proven as such, because the gawking and fawning has resumed. It's nice to have balance restored to the universe.

Hell's Hairdo

Is anyone watching that show Hell's Kitchen? I happened to see about 15 minutes of it last night, and for those of you who haven't seen Lucy recently, you can get a rough approximation of what her hair currently looks like, by taking a quick gander at Jessica.

LOL!!

Love letter for a Monday morning

Dear Joel,
Thank you for totally, totally rocking. For hollering at me to come into the room when Lucy finally decided to crawl, so I wouldn't miss it. For hugging me when she looked at us to see if she should laugh or cry about the huge fuss we were making. For letting me nap when Lucy wouldn't. For doing the dishes, the vacuuming, the dusting, the laundry. For cutting and blending up pears ALL ON YOUR OWN for the baby. For sitting through the Christian-Bale-a-thon that was this weekend's rented movies. For being so sweet and cute and sorry when you A. ripped the antenna off the car backing out of the garage with the garage door only 2/3 up, and B. called me when I was 1/3 of the way to work this morning because you left your wallet in my car and needed me to drive it back home to you. For teaching Lucy to say "uh-oh." For always thinking of me first.
I love you,
your Beefy

I don't know how they do it.

Joel had an unexpected business trip come up so he's in Harrisburg, PA for about 30 hours, returning today. Once again I am floored by the shock of being a single mom -- it is IMPOSSIBLE. Now, I realize I'm spoiled by a husband who's home every evening right on time, and who does so much cleaning and housework and baby-care. But even given that, I have to say I had a really hard time of it last night with Lu.

We got home after work and she wanted to eat right away. Par for the course -- so I whipped up her bottle, which she drank most of, quickly, and we moved on to cereal, fruits and veggies. Well. That lasted through about 3/4 of the cereal (mixed with pureed banana). All of a sudden, she starts grabbing for the spoon. Great! I think... she wants to feed herself! Well, no... she grabs the spoon and FLINGS it. And grabs a fistful of the cereal mess. And then flings that. And it's on her hand, making it all goopy, so she flails her hand a bit to get rid of it. So there's banana in her hair. All over the chair. Everywhere. On her dress. What a mess. I confess.

Right. So we try green beans -- to the same effect, accompanied by screaming. And she's shrugging one shoulder, and I'm thinking: ear infection? teething? Who even knows. So we toodle around the kitchen, and this makes her happy, and we leave green-bean handprints on the stove and the cupboards and we collapse on a heap in the living room until Jean comes over to save me.

Which she does, of course, with flying colors (she even bought dinner!). Which of course is SUPER AWESOME but I feel so pathetic for needing help so badly! I mean, tons of people do this alone, with four or five or more kids, and I'm sure they're just as tired, and why am I such a wuss??

At this point, the idea of having more kids is really and truly more than I can bear. Because I feel like Lu is pretty well-behaved for a baby. But I cannot even conceive (pun acknowledged) of going through this again... and again(??)... especially having the older one(s) to have to amuse too.

Or maybe she's not that "easy" of a kid. How am I supposed to know? I have NO experience with babies until now. She sleeps great, and has eaten just about everything we've given her. I guess those shouldn't be the only measures. Maybe she should be able to entertain herself a bit better... it does seem to be a theme with our dependents (Hobo is extremely needy and clingy too). I need some objectivity on this. Or maybe it's the subjectivity of an experienced mom to tell me it's going to be okay. I need something! Maybe ice cream.

Fun With People-Food!

Now that the Pants is nearing a year (a year!! My heavens, can you believe it!?!), we're incorporating more and more "table scraps" into her diet.
("And it's about damn time," Lucy adds.)
She ate chunks of Joel's burger at Champp's (or is it Chammp's? Chaamp's?) on Thursday, she chanked on a french fry at Chili's* on Friday; on Saturday, she was gumming some well-cooked buffet corn, and she ate almost an entire fork-mashed mango on Sunday and she just could not be more delighted with herself. (That mango was feasty by the way -- I kind of hated to see it go!)
The most fun part for me has been: I can buy produce!! I've spent all of my grownup years so far attempting to buy fresh fruits and veggies, and much to my dismay they almost always rot away before anyone eats them. Joel's too much of a "prepackaged-food" guy (lord love his poor arteries) to ever pick up an apple and eat it, and though I try I generally end up following his sodium-packed lead. But now Lucy and her Tummy of Steel are in town, and I'm steaming green beans, shredding spinach, ripening mangoes and peeling apples to my heart's content. I even whipped her up some "cantaloupe cereal" on a whim at the Gronaus' yesterday -- of course, as a result I'm changing poopy diapers at an alarming rate, too.
The tough part is finding a balance -- I tend to make a large quantity of something, and then she's eating nothing but carrots for a week straight. But I really can't complain; she's devoured everything we've given her.

She's still in "Toodle Town" -- hanging on for dear life and walking all over the place. I can't really say she's getting any better at it. Oh, and the "baby gibberish" has picked up, both in quantity and variety (i.e. less "dadadadadada, abababababa" and more "digividada. op op wog?"). So that's interesting. Happy Monday!

* I know, it looks like we're eating out a lot. This has been an anomaly and we are planning to have more home-cooked food soon... very soon. As soon as softball ends. Really. :)

The Return of the Albatross!

OK, we are managing a co-rec softball team in Roseville this "Fall." ("Fall" because the season goes Aug. 18-Sept. 22 -- hardly autumnal!!) It's Thursday night doubleheaders at 6 & 7 or 8 & 9. We still have a few openings for guys and girls, subs and regular players, so if you want in, please call me or email me!

Dream Interpretation Needed!

Okay, so I was IN the new Batman movie, but we knew it was a movie, and we were running after Batman but I think we were just following him, not chasing him, down a stairwell on the outside of a tower and then I was at work and my whole office was accusing me of making some REALLY inappropriate joke -- like something about a Cambodian prison and a couple other things that really offended people, but nobody told me they were offended until the boss like announced it, and it was a holiday like Christmas and everyone was handing out candy but I couldn't eat any because I was so sick about making people mad and I really thought the joke was funny and just a joke but nobody else did and I was surprised and then we were at a Ryan family gathering and we were looking at big old houses but they were close to a swamp and maybe going to fall in, and then we were sort of in a candy shop in a theme park like Disney World and we walked out of this huge building and got in a tram or carriage and were sitting there and this bronze death-star but smaller floated down and started shooting at people and one of the blasts went right between our feet and then it started machine-gunning at people and I thought "well, it was only a matter of time" and we started to run back into the building but I couldn't run very fast and I was afraid I was going to get shot, and Lucy wasn't in the back of the tram but I remember thinking, what if she was, would I have gone back and grabbed her? And I hope I would have!!

So that was my dream this morning. What do you think it means? :) :) :)

Here we go, loopty Lu!

I feel like we're rounding a corner with our little miss... I am just not exactly sure what the immediate future brings. Eventually, I suppose, she'll dine on chicken nuggets and macaroni and cheese and jell-o like many little American kids today... it's just hard for me to see the transition as it happens. For the trees... or whatever.

We're still having "liquid issues" -- she hurls her bottle or sippy-cup after just a few sips. So we mix the formula with cereal just to get it in her... but we could use some advice on how to get her to take liquids. Oh, right, I was going to call the doctor. Hm. Well, we're working toward people-food too. She really jaws at just about anything we put in her mouth, so we've experimented with cut-up strawberries, pickle bits, and various other whole foods. Last night I threw some of our dinner (surprisingly good "chicken Stove Top florentine") into a blender and spooned it to her -- our first go with a meat product that actually looked like a meat product when it started. Anyway, she gulped it down, green color and grainy texture notwithstanding. She still only has those two bottom teeth, but she manages to smack those gums around enough to get the food down, I guess.

I gave her a pickle slice the other day and while she didn't eat it, she held on to it for a good 20 minutes, clenched in that little fist. Hobo had a bead on it, though, and managed to extremely gingerly remove it from her grip and devour it himself. I was amazed at how gently (yet determinedly!) he took it from her -- I am hoping theirs will be a symbiotic relationship in the future!

Light-hearted Weekend Round-up!

Hi gang. As promised! It was a gorgeous weekend... to stay inside! Hot, hot, hot (though I don't think it even hit 100... it just seemed kinda muggy). I got a lot of rest on Saturday, and that evening we dressed Lu up and took her out to a friend's birthday party -- SO fun to see all the kiddies (there were at least 10 kids there) running around and playing.
Sunday morning I took Lucy to Cub, where not one but TWO strangers commented on her hair! What the heck! It's just baby hair -- fuzzy, blond, thick, spiky, baby hair. Okay, so maybe I see their point.

We're running into *some* difficulty with our little Pants these days... she's getting, well, kinda whiny. And fussy! She gulps at her bottle but then throws it away vehemently... and then bawls! She NEEDS A CHEERIO and then tosses them all at Hobo. And cries. We just don't know WHAT she wants, most of the time.
I read "What to expect the first year" and THOSE 10.5-month-old babies are all speaking ENGLISH practically... should Lu really be able to say "baba" for bottle, or point to what she wants?? Because she is eons away from that right now. I'm also a *little* concerned that she can't get herself up to sitting from her tummy yet. I think she gets mad that she can't do it, because she's reaching and twisting and squirming and I feel so bad for her! It's very frustrating, not to mention exhausting.

We did buy her a little walk-behind car-toy on Sunday -- she loved riding on it and can sort of toodle along behind it. I think she was surprised to be able to walk attached to something that wasn't Mom or Dad, so maybe it'll open some new doors for her. Poor Hoot!

One day at a time...

Hi everyone --
Well, I hope I didn't make too many people uncomfortable with my last post. It is a very personal thing, of course, and it would be much better to be able to talk about it in person with everyone, but it's the kind of thing that it's good to have support for, while you're going through it. When something similar happened to us two years ago, it was very, very difficult... often because we weren't sure who to tell, or how, and as the weeks went on and life just went on as normal, we couldn't figure out how to bring it up, because it just seemed to really bring down a room, you know?

Do you even want to talk about it?
Of course! You know, I love to talk. When this happened before, and we started to talk to some people about it, I was shocked to discover how frequently this does actually happen. And I thought, man, if someone had only shared their story with me, this experience wouldn't have been half as heartbreaking for me. So I'm game.

Are you feeling okay?
So far, yes. As I mentioned, I was surprised by how NOT ready I am for a second child. The first miscarriage I had, I was emotionally devastated because we wanted a baby so badly. But now all I have to do is look at that little blond head with a Cheerios stuck to her lip and realize how lucky we are to have such a beautiful, healthy baby.
Of course, as I see some friends adding to their families, I think of the (questionable) fun it would have been to have the kids so close together. I worry about when it will feel more "right" to try again. But these are small concerns.
Physically, it has not run its course yet, so my body still kind of thinks it's pregnant. The thought of food still gags me, and I do get tired very quickly.

So, was it, like, a molar pregnancy? A tubal pregnancy? A blighted ovum? Why does Joel keep saying "an egg without a yolk?"
I finally talked to the nurse and she said it's a "blighted ovum." An egg was fertilized (gross!) and my hormone levels were through the roof (hence the tireds and nausea), but there was just no baby forming.

It's so awkward to bring it up! What do I say?
I think this would work: "Hey, I heard the news... how are you doing?"

Is it really a big deal? You seem to be playing it off like it's nothing.
It is a big deal... it's my coping mechanism working overtime to convince me otherwise. :) You think of "what might have been" and even though it's just a blip on a radar screen, it becomes part of your personal history, which will always be a part of you. Plus, I admit I'm a little afraid of the physical pain I still have to go through yet. I would really feel better if that part was over (were over?).

As always, thanks for reading! I promise to have a much more light-hearted "weekend round-up" later today! Much love...

Not ready... and thank God.

Well, kids, for those of you only semi-in-the-loop, it's been a rollercoaster of a last couple weeks, believe me you. I was crying a lot, exhausted a lot, not eating well... why? why? why? Well, it turns out, I was *slightly* pregnant... (!!!) but not.

Long story short: I took a home pregnancy test on 7/6 morning and it came out very, very positive... and I was SHOCKED TO THE CORE. Now, if you'd have asked me beforehand, I would have said "Sure! We could handle another one!" but I was not ready, I am not ready... which we discovered too late... we thought.

So Joel and I went to the doc 7/7 to have an ultrasound to determine how far along I was (since I haven't had a period since November 2003) ... which they determined was about 7 weeks... but it turns out I'm just growing an "empty sac": a pregnancy, but not a baby. So technically I am, or will be, going through a miscarriage -- the nurse expected that my body get rid of the sac on its own in the next couple weeks, though if it doesn't I will have to have a D&C. As always, we will burn that bridge when we come to it.

Anyway, I am relieved beyond belief. Finally, an explanation for the bizarre feelings (physical and mental) I've been having for the past month. I mean, you ain't seen rampaging hormones unless you seen me in the last few weeks. I feel like I have a new lease on life. Now, I don't know how YOU get through things like this, but I believe that God has a plan and I really feel like this is what was meant to happen. And for that, I am extremely grateful.

The Flat-Butt Follies

We knew it was going to be miserable. So miserable, in fact, that we tried to dress it up and give it a name and fool ourselves into believing it was going to be something, ANYTHING other than what it was, which was grueling, exhausting, and ... zzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

Oh! Sorry. Conked out there for a sec. I was talking about our 4th of July weekend -- a lovely, near-perfect-weather, three-full-days away from work, with our baby, enjoying the enjoyments of rural Minnesota.

We set off in a *bit* of a tizzy, from St. Paul on Friday evening. We'd both snuck out of work just a little early, and we thought we could get quickly packed and then just pick up Lucy from day care on the way out of town. Well... Joel got home first and couldn't find my packing list. Or perhaps, couldn't quite interpret my handwriting. So we had the car packed to the gills and I was going "have we packed towels yet?" and he had no idea.

But let's back up. When you have a three-day weekend with more than three destinations planned, it sure would help to have some sort of idea of what to expect when you got there, right? But this is what we knew:
1. Friday night: Driving 3 hours up to Brandon, to Joel's p's lake. Sleeping in the trailer.
2. Saturday A.M.: Driving 1.5 hours to Cushing, to Adam's p's lake.
3. Sunday P.M.: Driving 10 minutes to Motley to visit with family friends. Then driving 2 more hours up to Bemidji, for Joel's "family reunion."
4. Monday P.M. Driving 4.5 hours back home to St. Paul. Sleeping in our own beds.

You'll note that several vital bits of information are missing here, i.e., where we were sleeping Saturday and Sunday nights. And when you don't know where you're sleeping, it's REALLY hard to know:
a. whether or not there will be any refrigeration available for the copious amounts of baby food it is necessary to lug about for a spirited 10-month-old
b. whether or not the following will be necessary to cram into your Toyota Corolla:
- tent
- pillows
- blankets
- air mattress with cumbersome pump
- cooler (well, that was sort of covered in the refrigeration thing)
c. whether or not there will be coffee available IMMEDIATELY UPON AWAKENING. Oh! Sorry. Didn't mean to yell.
d. whether or not there will be any adult food available upon your arrival, and whether or not said food will have been sitting out in the sun for the previous two days.
e. whether or not you will be changing your extremely rolly and squirmy baby's diaper in any of the following places:
- the floor of a trailer
- the wooden slats of someone's deck
- a sand volleyball court
- the grass
- a table in the middle of a SubWay.

So we packed EVERYTHING we could into the poor, creaking, starting-to-rust-out Corolla. And we drove. And drove. And drove.
And then we'd get out of the car and Lucy would want to walk, walk, walk. And eat, eat, eat.
And I was pretty much too exhausted to enjoy any of the time spent with my friends (it was great, gals, really! Sorry I could barely keep my peepers open), or converse with Joel's family (I nodded and smiled a lot -- heck, Grandpa gets away with it!).

So that was our weekend. Would a van have helped? Possibly. Would detailed phone calls with our actual hosts (rather than relying on second- and third-hand info) have helped? Possibly no -- they probably would have thought we were mental control-freaks who can't just "go with the flow."

YOU go with the flow with a 10-month-old, a tick-infested mongrel and a rusted-out Corolla. Call me when you're done picking Cheerios out of your toe-cracks. But leave a message, 'cuz I"ll be napping.

Back in Action

Whoa, I am so sorry, I haven't written in over a month. In my defense, it's been a horrible month:
- almost 40% of my team at work has quit
- we've had water in our basement, a busted garage-door opener, and the washing machine keeps getting unbalanced and jogging across the floor
- my company's been bought out
- I've stopped nursing and my hormones are whacked!
- one of my dearest and most tolerant friends called me on the carpet for not making her a priority
- my softball teams were in gynormous slumps
- I had a birthday

I spent a couple weeks building up to almost a week of crying on and off. Joel was, of course, an angel as always. Go Bonser.

Things are looking up, though -- it's a three-day weekend, and we've been looking at some newer houses in which, when we have people over, they don't all have to stand up crammed elbow-to-eyeball in the kitchen, and it's fun to have dreams! Plus Lucy is keeping us in stitches. She lays on her stomach and "spins" by walking her hands around in a circle -- can't seem to get those hips up into the air, though! She "toodles" now, too -- walking around, holding tightly to our hands. Yelling all the way. She also feeds herself Cheerios -- (and woe to the parents whose muddled brains can't decipher that the "oat-based puff ring cereal" described in BabyTalk magazine actually means "Cheerios or any generic substitute" -- Corporate America is SUCH a thorn in my side!).

Cheerio time is one of the best times of the day. Lu watches as Joel or I spread a very moderate handful of O's on her highchair tray. Then she carefully selects the most worthy O and works it into her mouth, where she has finallly learned to let go of the O so it can actually be eaten. (For weeks she'd just touch it to her lip and look at us triumphantly -- "I'm doing it!! I'm eating!!" No, honey, no, you're not.) When she's full, then one O goes in her mouth, and one goes to Hobo, constantly lurking on the floor beneath. He's delighted.

This morning, she gave us another little hint of fun-to-come. So, it's bottle time -- I fill 'er up and put the bottle right on her tray so she can two-fist it right into her mouth. Buuuut... her little jammy sleeves are covering her hands. And she can't get a grip on the bottle. But would she let me roll up her sleeves? No, way, Jose!! You could just see her stubborn little one-track mind working: "This is MY bottle, I feed MYSELF, I am HUNGRY and I am going to get it in my mouth RIGHT NOW SO STAND BACK." Hoo-ee, you should have heard the hollering. Finally had to firmly grab her flailing little arm to wrestle her sleeve up. Of course it was fine, then -- she jammed it into her mouth, sucked it down in about 5 minutes, and went on with her happy morning.

And Joel and I stared, and watched visions in our heads of future t-ball games, dance recitals, skinned knees, bruised shins, and tears. Lots and lots of big ol' crocodile tears.

Now that Miss Lu is sitting up by herself, playtime is getting much more fun! She will sit for hours on the floor, completely absorbed in her toys and the magic of gravity. It's amazing how the simplest toys are the ones she gets the most joy out of. We have a set of eight "stacking cups" that nestle into each other, but for some reason that tidy little pyramid of organization is intolerable to the 8-month-old mind. Lu takes one look at the neatly-stacked set and, very deliberately (and in one swift motion), lifts them off one or two at a time and throws them aside. And then moves on to something else, until she notices that you have re-stacked them... and then she methodically destroys the stack again.

We went to see the new Star Wars movie over the weekend (thumbs up!). The instant Yoda appeared on screen, though, I thought "WELL! We know what Lucy's going to be for Halloween!" I heard Joel snickering, so I leaned over and he whispered "It's Lucy!" Great minds... Unfortunately I spent the next 10 minutes trying to figure out what I was going to make the ears out of and I missed some plot points. But the movie was still good.

The Baby!

Criminy, you know what? She is not such a baby anymore. The second bottom tooth came in earlier in the week... she's learning how to scoot herself backward on her hands and knees (and we look away for 15 seconds and HOW did she get under the couch?!?)... she's talking up a storm (I SWEAR she looked at Hobo yesterday morning and said "dog!")... it's going too too fast. Thank you Gramps & Gram Ryan for her new "cell phone" -- it is her favorite toy right now and her whole face lights up when "it's for you, LuLu!".

Yesterday evening she wore 1/2 a Cheerio as a mustache for about 15 minutes. Riotous.

Sorry!

I am so sorry it has been SO LONG since I posted... I never actually know if anybody is reading these or not, since Alison is my only regular commenter (THANK YOU AL!), but if you have been checking, and you have been bored to tears by my lack of entries, just know that I was out of town over the weekend and I have been on JURY DUTY all week (I feel the need to CAPITALIZE JURY DUTY because if I was speaking it, I would certainly do so in that extra-loud, semi-incredulous, overly-dramatic faux-Seinfeldesque way I have) and therefore incommunicado.

I feel like "incommunicado" might be one of those things that isn't really a word or means the opposite of what I want it to, but people use it anyway to sound cool and nobody really knows for sure what the right word is in the first place. (If you know what the right word is, please comment and put me out of my misery.) I can think of a couple other words that are sort of like that... "empathy/sympathy," "flammable/inflammable," and "nonplussed."

I had an AWESOME reunion with some high school friends in Chicago* over the weekend. I hadn't seen Nick in about 5 years, and I hadn't talked to Estelle in close to 11 years, and it was amazing just to pick right back up with them. Golly, they are hilarious. It was amazing to reconnect with them and hit it off so well.

*I can say this because we did actually go within the Chicago city limits. I have started referring to where I grew up as "Illinois" instead of "Chicago" since I never actually lived within the city limits and I started feeling like it was kind of misleading to say I'm "from Chicago." And for a while I thought I was cooler than other Minnesotans for being "from Chicago," which was, in retrospect, obviously my bad, and plus I got tired of having to retract my Chicagoness when people would ask if I actually lived in the city when the closest my address ever got was Skokie.

Poetrism

OK, listen up people, I do NOT write poetry, as a rule. But I wrote this a while ago, and I just found it, and I really like it so I wanted to share it.

Frosted Donettes
by Meg Gronau

I cannot think of a snack less lovely
Fake plastic frosting
Hardly passes for chocolate
Fake yellow cake
A half-step up from the kitchen sponge
My husband uses to wash the dishes
While I am at practice
Or book club
Or working late
Or shopping
He bought me a package of Frosted Donettes
Printed “August 08” – is that the 8th day of August
Or August 2008? I wonder
He says he was thinking of me
I cannot think of a snack more lovely

Zzzzz...

I forgot my "mothers milk" tea (which purportedly will increase your milk supply) at home so I'm drinking "cozy chamomile" hoping it will work as a placebo. The label says it's "so delicate and soothing." It's Monday morning, though, so I'm pretty sure if I get soothed any more, I'll drift off to sleep.

Chinese Jumprope

One day not long ago in the cosmic sense of things, but quite a long time ago in the life of someone who’s under 30, “on” was born.

The day of the week, the time of year, and the geographic location are all irrelevant, though it was probably in Winona, Minnesota, which I have long claimed is some kind of Nexus of the universe, or is it a Lexus of the universe? Well, Winona is certainly not a Lexus of anything, except maybe of smallish cities in the southeast corner of Minnesota. Yes, Winona may actually BE the Lexus of that.
Winona, Minn. is kind of like that “center of gravity” attraction at Knott’s Berry Farm where it’s a house you walk through, and because the walls and floors are tilted funny, they can do optical illusions where you sit on a chair balanced on a wall, or tall people look short and whatnot. Winona is, or was when I lived there, this small little jewel box of buzzing activity and mountains nestled in a prairie state, where it’s safe to walk yourself home from a bar at 2 AM and where phone numbers only have 5 digits. Special things, crazy things, magic things happened there. Including the birth of “on.”

If you’ve ever been in a social situation where suddenly you’re the funniest cat in the room, you’ve been “on.” You feel a little giddy, like you just took a DayQuil, and everything that comes out of your mouth is gold, Jerry, comedy gold. Unless you happen to drool on yourself, though when you’re “on” even a little drool can’t quell your imminent popularity.

The cosmic reverse of “on,” is called, believe it or not, “off.” “Off” can bring down a whole party, and the worst part is, it’s contagious! First one joke falls flat, then the awkward silences start piling up, and suddenly you’re driving home before dessert even started, wondering why you ever thought you were friends with these people in the first place and considering deleting their numbers from your cell phone.

Oh, right, this blog is supposed to be about the baby, right?
Babybabybaby. There.

Quote for the Day

I'm reading Lorna Landvik's Patty Jane's House of Curl and one of the characters says this, and it was really good for me to read today:

"Is it every man and woman's curse to want it all and only get ten percent of it? Or do we ask too much? Are we too selfish to see the beauty of our every days, to revel in our every hours, blinded as we are by what everybody else has?"

Count your blessings, peeps. Life is short.

On a completely different note, I have adjusted my time zone settings THREE TIMES and they are never right. I feel like I'm posting from Madagascar.

It's Not a Bruise, It's a Contusion!

Hi gang.
Guess who grew a tooth yesterday! And on her 8-month birthday too. It's the COOLEST!
"Where is it?"
In her mouth, people.
Just kidding. Bottom right. Her right. Which is your left, if you're facing her and sticking your finger in her mouth.

One Year Ago

This post was originally going to be titled "Eight Months Ago" since it's Lucy's 8-month birthday today. (Can you even believe it? The months are whizzing by my head, like softballs thrown by Upper Competitive League girls against whom I have no business playing. But I do.)

But I have nothing interesting to say about Lucy being 8 months old, and i found this little ditty I wrote a year ago when Joel and I were driving to Chicago for the weekend. Or something.

OK, so it's not quite been a year since I wrote this. But I just found it! And I kind of like it, though like everything else I write, it's unfinished. Here goes:

May 21, 2004
8:19 PM
Just east of Mauston, WI
25.5 weeks pregnant

I told myself I was going to start writing. I tell myself this several times a year, though this is the first writing I’ve done in about 12 months. As they say, starting is the hardest part.

Occasionally, I find myself feeling retrospective about pregnancy and parenting. Though I don’t see how I can be “retro” anything about something I am in the middle of experiencing, or, respectively, something I haven’t even started to experience.

Which is interesting. My sister called me on Mothers’ Day this year. My own mother refused to wish me a happy Mom’s Day, saying I didn’t quite qualify … whereas Jean maintained that I am the only one caring for this kid right now. Which is true, I guess. And really, how can you argue that parenting begins only at birth? From the moment you see those two pink lines on the HPT, you are changed forever. You are instantly protective of your middle region, shying away from balancing laundry baskets on your hipbones (if you are lucky enough to still have hipbones when you discover you are pregnant), instantly eschewing the “sucking in your stomach” reflex of every American woman over the age of 14. The first three months of pregnancy are a quick primer on some of the perils of parenting. Your body is the vessel in which another body is growing, and yet you have no control of how it will go. The risk of miscarriage is so great in the very beginning … and there’s nothing you can do about it. It’s a terrifying and beautiful juxtaposition. Some of my friends who have young children tell me how they have to start “letting go” of their little munchkins bit by bit. First, they learn to walk without holding your hand, and the next thing you know they’re paying their own car insurance. But the truth is that the letting go begins right away. All you can do is do your best.

Many of us are control freaks. We were probably the first generation of American women who were raised to believe that we could be whatever we wanted to be when we grew up. And unfortunately, we extrapolate that to mean that we can control every bit of our lives. But you know what? Things go wrong. Cars break down, gutters need replacing. Perfectly good husbands get crabby.

Pants at 7 months. Photo by Peg Speth. 

New funny thing she does!

We're feeding Lucy dinner last night: oatmeal, carrots and peaches, I think. She's ravenous, since she refused to eat much of her previous two bottles of milk. Which means that I have exactly three seconds from the time I deposit one spoonful of glop into her mouth, until the next spoonful arrives lipside, before she starts to squawk.
Now, she's always been good about opening her mouth for the spoon. But last night she started, in Joel's words, "taking it to the next level" by kind of, well, trying to open her mouth sideways as well. Urgh! It's so hard to describe. So here's an exercise:
Open your mouth wide (as you would if someone were spoon-feeding you).
Pull the muscles of your lower lip sideways, kind of large-mouth bass-like.

That's what she was doing. I'm not sure if she thought she could get more food that way, or what, but it was soooo funny.

Softbaaallllll!

It was kind of an exhausting weekend at our house. We didn't have any set plans, or even goals in mind (like "re-roof the house" or "paint the bathroom" or "flush the toilet"), and although sometimes this unstructured approach works well, sometimes we just end up waking up Monday morning with sorted piles of dirty laundry and Dorito crumbs between our toes.
One of the toughest parts about spring weekends is the unpredictability of the weather. It could have been 80 and sunny, or it could easily have snowed. Or it could do both, within about three hours. This weekend was kind of sneaky, with the previous week all lovely and warm, and us waking up on Saturday to happy sunshiny... and 35 degrees. Yipes! And Lucy just wasn't herself this weekend -- crying uncontrollably but then refusing to eat... waking up at 4 AM... it just wasn't the same Lucy we've grown to know and REALLY APPRECIATE in the last couple of months. Well, she started the weekend with SIX POOPS on Friday, and it was kind of downhill from there. We think she might be teething or something. Poor hoot. But otherwise she's really an angel. She sat and watched Jean and Joel and I hit softballs at each other on Sunday (only occasionally commenting on our respective swings), and she *did* wolf down anything we tried to feed her that didn't come in a bottle -- go figure.

My good deed for the weekend was taking Hobo and the Watsons' chocolate lab Sonja for a walk on Sunday morning. The first two blocks were the toughest, with Hobo in full-bore pulling mode and Sonja chomping madly on her leash. We did settle into a nice pace, though, until the LAST two blocks when we came upon a ceramic Cocker Spaniel in a neighbor's yard. Holy buckets, for a ceramic dog, she sure whipped Hobo and Sonja into a frenzy. I wound up at the Watsons' front door with one leash around my ankles and my left elbow pinned behind my ear.

So here it is Monday morning and due to the unsettled weather and my aching hips and shins I am wearing the closest thing to pajamas, a decidedly anti-springy black-on-black ensemble guaranteed to make me look as though I've dropped those last 5 pounds of baby weight, which I assure you I most certainly have NOT dropped and I'll thank you not to mention it again.

Softball starts tonight. Can't wait!!

I wrote this last Friday and never posted it.

...And it hardly seems worth it to post it now. But I'm gonna.
I have The Vapors greatest hits CD in my player at work right now. Who? You ask. You know, the one-hit '80s wonders who gave us the classic "Turning Japanese." Anyway, it's actually a pretty good pop CD! It starts with "Turning Japanese," and features a rousing "Waiting for the Weekend" (perfect for Friday!) and something called "Jimmy Jones" which, with their British accents, sounds like "Jimmy John's" which is a chain sandwich place whose quality products and chipper staff make me very happy.

An Exercise In Futility

So Joel's in Atlanta this week on business, giving me the perfect opportunity to prove my Superwomanness. Perfect mom, perfect housekeeper, perfect dog-owner, perfect marketing client service specialist for creative services... I can't wait!

This morning I leap out of bed at 5:23 on the nose, bound and determined to get a fresh start on the day. OK, it was less of a leap and more of a drag, since I'd already hit snooze twice, but ONLY twice and not three times like normal. And I hadn't actually snoozed since the alarm first went off, because Hobo was scratching his freshly-shaven (shaven?) neck and shaking the entire bed in the process. But! Just got to get Lucy and myself dressed in identical pink ensembles and trot out the door!

After deciding TO make coffee (cons: it takes a couple minutes, and there's only me drinking it so it will have to be a very small pot, and I'll have to remember to turn it off ... pros: I NEED COFFEE), and letting Hobo out, and feeding him, and building a bowl of oatmeal with sprinkles for myself, Lucy starts to cry. "Thank goodness," I think, because it means she hasn't smothered in the night, which is always good because it freaks me out a little how she can go from wide-awake at 7:57 PM, to rubbing-her-eyes-with-her-little-fists at 7:59, to placed in her crib at 8:00 and making not a single peep until 5:50 AM. It's just not natural.

So I quick grab the paper from the front walk and then fill up the sink with hot water to wash the dishes with, because I'm Super Mom!! and I let Hobo out again, but there are still some adorable hacking noises coming from the baby's room, so I go in and feed her. These morning feedings are the BEST -- no fussing, no fighting, just businesslike eating. Plus then I don't feel like I have two overstuffed balloons popping out of my chest wall.

It's 6:10 by the time we're done, so I lay Lucy back in her crib (it's still dark in her room, thanks to the quilts we've clipped over the windows because those super-cute dragonfly curtains do NOTHING to ward off sunlight and we haven't had a free moment to purchase proper shades) and turn on her little bubbling musical fishy thing. I hop in the shower, then get dressed and hair-gelled and toothbrushed and I hear the music turning on and off in the crib so I know Lucy hasn't smothered.

"Yo, mom, about this diaper!"

Right! I strip Lucy of her jammies and soggy Pampers and select an outfit that doesn't match mine AT ALL; in fact it barely matches itself, and pry her into it. I haul the exersaucer (her "office") into the kitchen and put Lucy in it, and I realize I have no lunch packed, nor have the dishes washed themselves yet. Strange, and I also have no lipstick on. And it's 6:45, the time I'm supposed to be walking out the door. ARGGH! I cannot imagine how single parents manage. At all.

Anyway, it's Wendy's for lunch for me, and I'm guessing the dishes will still be there when Joel gets back tomorrow. I CAN'T WAIT.

Deceiving the Baby

Well, I guess it starts now and ends with "Really, honey, I WANT to be in a nursing home..." ...the necessary lies we tell our offspring.

Tried to feed Lucy some peas last night. They were delightful peas, really, quite sweet and a palatable shade of green. But she wanted NOTHING of it. I have never really seen her NOT open her mouth for food before, but there she was, determinedly ignoring the spoon poised in front of her adorable little lips. And crying of course, because she could see the box of yummy rice cereal right on the table. So we mixed up a batch of what Joel likes to call "breastmilk cereal" (the phrase has a nice rhythm about it) and then clandestinely spooned the peas into the mixture. And, of course, she gobbled it down in her usual way.

Lucy was, in Joel's words, "up to her elbows in grandparents" over the weekend. My mom and dad came in on Thursday to play day-care on Good Friday, and on Sunday we helped Joel's sister Jamie move into her new townhouse, so Gramps and Gram Gronau got their time in too. It was a fun weekend, and Lucy was a dutiful sweetheart. She even slept through the night last night. YESS!

We just have to do this 12 more times until school starts

Well, we've hit the 6-month mark... 1/12 of the way to 1st grade! Amazing. Joel found a "ticklish spot" on Lucy's tummy the other night -- he *zrbrts* her there and she lets out these pealing giggles. It's awesome.

Had her 6-month checkup yesterday, and here are her vitals:
Head: 16.5" (45th%)
Weight: 16# (50th%)
Height: 26.5" (75th%)

Amazingly, she's showing no ill effects following this round of immunizations. No fever, no crabbies, and she ate and slept just wonderfully last night.

We're really getting to see some wonderful parts of her personality. She's so interested in everything we do now -- last night I was carrying her in one arm and a glass of water in my other hand, and she just stuck her hand right in the water. (Note to self not to carry her and hot coffee simultaneously.) She sits up so eagerly when it's time to eat her "dinner" (rice cereal and carrots last night) and she opens her mouth so wide when that spoon's coming in.

Day after tomorrow, we're leaving for a week in Puerto Rico. I am very nervous about vacationing with Pants at this age -- she's so much more active and demanding than she was in Orlando in December.

Ooops! Gotta run...

Things TO Feel Guilty About

So I got the latest issue of BabyTalk magazine in the mail yesterday, and they had an article called "103 Things Not To Feel Guilty About."

Once again, we are bombarded with this culture of entitlement. Maybe we wouldn't be going down the tubes as a society if people weren't encouraged NOT to feel guilty about ANYTHING. Maybe a little dose of guilt keeps us in line.

Some of the "things" mentioned in the article:

#31. Choosing to bottle-feed.

I REALIZE that I am a Nursing Nazi. But I think a little bit of guilt is in order for mothers who do not give breastfeeding their very best shot. Could you have tried harder to make it work? Could you have toughed it out and made it work? I don't think formula-feeders are bad parents, and I know sometimes it's necessary... but I know if I quit breastfeeding today, I would feel guilty. And I think that's all right.

#42. Using a video to keep your baby entertained... so you can shower or eat a little lunch.

Now, I'm ALL about getting some "me" time, even though I spend all day at work. But I feel like I SHOULD have some guilt about that. Today it's one Disney video -- tomorrow, could an hour of CSI: Miami really hurt? See, it's a slippery slope.

I mean, what's next? Don't feel guilty about not using the car seat every single time you drive with your kid? Don't feel guilty about shaking your baby that one time you were REALLY mad? Don't feel guilty about drinking and driving just once or twice? Alls I'm saying is, a little guilt is not a waste of time. It makes us reflect on our actions and keeps us in check, so that we know better or try harder next time. So the next time we have an opportunity to choose one course of action or another, we choose the one that's better for our baby, better for our neighbors, better for society as a whole.

Lacto-ingestion Parental Summoning Specialist

Joel's being transitioned into a new job within his company. His new title is Key Relationship Support Specialist. Which bumps me out of the lead for Stupidest Title In Our Household. I'm a "Client Service Specialist for Creative Services."

In other news, after three years of solid service in the Gaseous Excrement department, Hobo has been promoted to Quadriped Halitosis Specialist.

You Gotta Have a Fiddle in the Band

So Lucy's been on amoxycillin for a few days now b/c of her bronchitis. She seems to be about a zillion times better -- she's back smiling and making new noises all the time. Anyway, to get the medicine into her mouth with a minimum of spilling, we've been spoon-feeding it to her. She loves the novelty of eating with a spoon, and it's so cute how she opens her mouth so wide with each bite. Usually to feed her, we just sit her in her high chair. We've been using the chair for several months -- the seat reclines way back so she's been able to sit in it since she was very little. Well, recently we've been sitting the chair almost straight-up since she's been getting such good head- and upper-body control. So this morning, she started leaning forward for the spoon! Meaning she's really sitting up, all on her own. This seems like a big milestone to me, because I *think* that once she can sit up, we won't absolutely need a special baby chair any time we want to put her down for a sec.

Also this morning, I was trying to think of a goofy song to sing to Lucy as I was getting ready in the kitchen (so she wouldn't realize I was getting MY stuff ready rather than actually playing with her). And somehow I came up with "If you're gonna play in Texas, you gotta have a fiddle in the band..." well unfortunately those are the only words I know to that song. So I stopped there, and then out of the bathroom comes Joel, booming the next line: "That lead guitar is hot but not for Louisiana man..."
WHAT!?!? Mr. "I Don't Know Any Songs and I HATE Country Music" knows ALL the words to "If you're gonna play in Texas."

Today we're getting rid of the wagon (donating it to, I hope, some reputable charity), which happens to be the car I learned to drive in. Sad.

Life, ALTAFIED

So my company renamed itself ALTAFI (www.altafimarketing.com) and we had the big renaming launch yesterday -- the office was decked out in lime green, and they brought in subs and cake and there were some contests and whatnot. It was pretty fun actually. :) Anyway, the point of this is there was a happy hour after work yesterday at a local restaurant and when I got in my car at 5:30pm to drive home I peek at my cell phone and I see I have FOUR missed calls, which is a LOT, and one new message so I'm dialing in and I can't get the message to play and finally I do and it's Jean saying "Oh hey, someone got shot in your neighborhood just now." So I see that the other THREE messages are from Joel (who was just supposed to pick Lucy up at 4:45 and go home) so I start to freak out and I call home and the conversation went something like:
Me: "Omigod what's wrong??"
Joel: "Oh, I have SO much to tell you! Well Randy Moss got traded..."
Me: "WHAT!?!? I need these stories in DESCENDING order of importance, please. Now!!"
Joel: "Are you at home now?"
Me (forgetting that I had CALLED HIM at home): "You're not HOME!!? Where ARE you?!?!"
Joel: "Well got called into a meeting right at 4, and let me read you this letter..."
(long letter-reading ensues... phrases like "your position has been eliminated, we have a new opportunity for you... should you choose not to accept it, your employment will be terminated...)
Me: "OK, well that doesn't sound so bad. Now who got shot?"
Joel: "Oh, a Ramsey county police officer."
Me: "Like right by our house?? Like can I even get home?"
Joel: "Oh, no, up north of Lake Phalen" (which is like three MILES from us)
Me: OK, so you still have a job, nobody's dead, and you're just sitting at home?
Joel: Right.

ARRGH! Well anyway. He had gotten a little more worked-up about the job thing than was maybe merited -- the phrasing of "eliminated" and "terminated" were just HR mumbo-jumbo (we think), and it's all going to be OK. Phew!

Her Second Cold :(

Or maybe just an extension of the first one.

Yup, we have a very sick little Hoot on our hands. Oh, but she's a brave little panda, pushing out those smiles through the snuffles and coughing fits. Joel ran out through the snowstorm on Sunday morning to pick up a new bulb-suctioner (and it came with an ear-wax removal device which I have been forbidden to use -- MUAHahaha!!), so we happily sucked boogers all day yesterday. Or rather, Joel and his p's did -- I was closing my show.

In other Father-of-the-Year news, you know what Joel said the other day? I was whining about being away from him and Lucy, again, because of the show, and he said that he was so grateful for all the extra time he got to spend, one-on-one, with Lucy. How many other fathers, he asked, get to spend all this time alone with their kid? If mom's around, mom tends to hover. Joel said he was so lucky to have that extra daddy-daughter alone time.

How the HECK did I get so lucky?? Seriously. Counting our blessings...

NOW EASIER TO COMMENT!

Hey! Listen up! It's easier to comment now. Please give it another try. :)

Louise Erdrich

When I was pregnant, I read Louise Erdrich’s The Blue Jays Dance. It was an OK book. But it made me realize that I am not the woman I thought I would be.

I had visions of becoming Louise Erdrich – an herbal-tea-drinking jogger with a home in the country, a vegetable garden and a sensitive musician husband with gorgeous hair.

Instead, I live in the city, work in a cube, drink coffee every morning, and my husband watches a LOT of television. We never play cards in the evening. We never sit around listening to music.

I recognize and, on the surface, envy the beauty of Louise Erdrich’s life. Her life is something out of a picture book, a hand-hewn scrapbook decorated with pressed leaves and photos of sunrises. But it is not my life. And my life, while more commercialized and less picturesque, is just as beautiful.

Grabby-hands Gronau

Hi again. Lucy learned a new trick! She's now grabbing everything within reach of her stubby little arms. You wouldn't imagine that simply picking things up could cause such joy, but think about it -- say your WHOLE LIFE you had no opposable thumbs and could only bat at things... and then one day you learn to close your hand around something -- well, you'd be picking things up right and left, all day long too.

I'm making a bold prediction, by the way: I think she's left-handed. Joel is doing his best to thwart this, possibly because I think he fears it'll be harder to teach her to swing a golf club correctly from the left side since neither of us is a lefty.

Last night we had reservations at White Castle (really!) for Valentine's Day. It was super fun and just perfect. They had tablecloths on the tables, and candles, and waiters all dressed up, taking our orders. Tons of fun. Lucy kept grabbing the sandwich boxes and throwing them on the floor -- she thought it was hilarious. She also held on tight to the mylar-balloon string and stared up at the floating shiny red heart above. It was like magic to her. So it's like magic to us too.

Her First Cold!

So I went to pick up Lucy from daycare on Friday, and she just didn't look like herself... pale, kind of sad of eye... anyway, she had her first cold! Sneezy, boogery, a little coughy all weekend. Poor little hoot. It wasn't that bad, though; she just slept a little more than usual. It didn't seem to affect her appetite at all, and she never did get much of a fever (it stayed under 101). All in all, we all survived and she's almost back to her old tricks again.

If I look fresh and so delicious, Don't expect me to do the dishes.

Hey there -- well things are crazy busy this week. My show opens tomorrow night and I'm terribly nervous, not even to mention very harried with work and stuff. I apologize for not posting as much as I'd like.

All I have are some random musings. I apologize for their incompleteness.

--> One minute I'm holding her, and I find myself fighting off a wish to have someplace to GO tonight. Thirty minutes later I am laying her down to sleep, wishing it wasn't bedtime yet. What is UP with me? Why do I have these terrible mixed feelings?

--> So I started reading Vicky Iovine's book "The Girlfriends Guide to Motherhood: The First Year" and I think I might be reading it about 6 months too late. It's totally mostly about "surviving the first month" with the new baby and obviously, we are WELL past that point. What I really need is "How to make it from month four through twelve". I mean, who's got time to read a BOOK when you have a brand new baby??

--> And I'm starting to get the impression that I might actually BE one of the Breastfeeding Nazis. I don't know, I guess when all the books and doctors and nurses said your should breastfeed for a full year, I just took their word for it. I am astounded that so many people give up so quickly. I mean, I know it's not easy, or convenient, to keep nursing after a few months, but I guess I think it's worth it. I mean, I'm not certain how much longer I'll be able to nurse (working and being in the show are certainly taking their toll on my supply)... but I want to try, and it sure would help to have an ally or two.

Anyway, as I said, just rambling.


Come see

A Chorus Line

!

www.bloomingtoncivictheatre.org

A tribute to the costumes:

http://www.beatgreets.com/view.pd?i=187180001&m=1387&rr=y&source=bgeg999

Bliss.

Went to visit the Dalys' new bambina yesterday. Wow, there is just nothing like a brand-new, perfect baby. She is really very pretty and you can tell C&P are just totally blissed-out. :) So fun.

Lucy's been great the last few days -- she gazes at us with those big blues and we just melt into big puddles. The other morning, Joel and I got up at like 8:00 and she was still sleeping, so we crept into her room and watched her wake up. She saw our faces and let out this big, gummy grin... oh, man, there is nothing cooler.

Nursing has been going better, too -- my new trick is, I put my free thumb into her free hand and we squeeze each other back and forth. It seems to really comfort her and let her focus on eating. I'm still not allowed to speak while she's nursing though -- I don't know if it's the noise or the vibration in my chest but she gets SO MAD! It's really endearing, actually, and it's nice to be forced to simply be quiet and enjoy the time together.

The other night I'm feeding her in her room, and Joel comes over to see how it's going. Lucy hears his voice and pulls off to turn and look at him, then she grins and chomps back on. It was so funny, so sweet.

Taking some half-days this week was THE BEST idea. I didn't get panicky at rehearsal, thinking "I COULD BE SLEEPING!" and I got some extra quality time with the Pants, which rocked. The one stinker was using vacation time to get laundry and dishes done... but at least it got done.

Tuesday Blues

Hey all. Lucy was up screaming for several hours last night. She was in bed by 8 but howling at 9, crying at 10:30 when I got home, bawling again at 11, screaming at 3 and I'm not sure she stopped at all until I got up to feed her at 5:30. It was horrid. And then at 6AM she's sitting in her high chair, grinning and stretching and completely pleased with herself. ARGH!

Gassy? Just wanting to be held? That's all we can think of. Our deepest apologies to Ellen, sleeping in the next room.

OK, I've had several complaints on not being able to comment. Yes, you do have to set up a profile first. But it only takes like a minute.

1. Click on the "comments" on the post you'd like to comment on.
2. Click on Post A Comment.
3. Now, if you don't HAVE a user name/password at blogspot.com you will have to make one first. So scroll down under "No Blogger Account?" until you see the blue box that says "Get One Now". Click on that and fill out the five boxes, being sure to follow the directions at right.
4. Make sure to check "I accept the Terms of Service".
5. Click "Continue"

Then when you want to comment AGAIN, you can do so with the user name and password you just created.

Let me know if you have further problems.

4-month Checkup

Took Lucy to her new doctor this morning for her 4-month checkup and shots. Shots of tequila would have been more welcome but we'll take what we can get.

It's about 30 below today, so of course everything is more of an ordeal. Lucy keeps kicking off her socks, and she hates her hat, and her sweater keeps bunching up around her neck, and the sun's in her eyes -- argh! I was so discombobulated that when I got to the office I realized I'd thrown our house cordless phone, as well as my cell phone, into my purse. Nice.

The great news is that she's healthy as pie. She weighs 14.5 lbs (75th percentile), is 25.5" long (90th%) and her head is 15.5" (50th%). She was an angel for the doc and all smiles when I dropped her off at day care. She's been sleeping really well all week too -- waking for a feeding but otherwise sleeping through.

R.I.P. Ozzi June 9, 1991 - January 12, 2005

My parents had to put Ozzi down yesterday. She was 13 years old and she was just the sweetest little black-and-white beagle mix you'd ever meet.

Memories:
Dad chasing her out of the house with a broom
The old guy in the meadow asking if she was having puppies (she was so fat!)
Her velvety ears
The time she ate an entire box of Fannie May candies from under the Christmas tree
The time she ate an entire Easter basket
Cutting her toenails (nightmare!)
Feeding her spaghetti

Rest in peace, Ozzer.

Getting in the Swing

We had a great weekend with Miss Pants. Jean babysat on Saturday night so we could go to my company's holiday party. I think bedtime was a bit nerve-wracking for Jean but it SURE was nice to be out with Joel! As a bonus I won six golf balls and an approach wedge (apparently it's a club, well it looks like one anyway) at the party.

Lucy is so fun these days. Full of grins and adorable looks. She's learning to like being on her tummy more, now that she can hold her face off the floor with her arms (it's too much trouble, apparently, to turn her head to the side, which is what *I* generally do when I'm laying on my stomach). We put her in her crib for a nap on Saturday and went to check on her three hours later and she was just sitting there, all wide-eyed. Hilarious.

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Please feel free to comment on any of the posts here... it lets me know that SOMEONE is reading this. Say hi, ask questions, mock me, whatever. Just click on the "0 comments" link below whichever post you're responding to. Thanks!

What a difference a day makes!

Just when I'm at The End Of My Rope and I think I'm not going to make it another day... Lucy goes and sleeps through the night. Amazing! I actually feel alive this morning, not at all the sodden lump of pasty flesh I was yesterday. And her smiles this morning -- oh, she's such a wonder.
The "nursing strike" seems to have been short-lived (thank goodness I didn't have rehearsal last night, so she HAD to nurse). I'm trying a lot of different things to increase my milk supply (it's been a bit low the last couple days), including eating oatmeal, drinking fenugreek tea, drinking dark beer... anyway we'll see how it goes. The beer part, at least, I enjoyed thoroughly.
Went to visit the new Watson twins across the street -- they are such little bundles! We got to hold them, and Lucy was very curious about who these new little wigglers were. It's hard to believe they're almost a month old.

Ouch.

Well, we're experiencing some serious backsliding in the sleeping department. It started a couple days before Christmas and has been getting pretty crummy, to be perfectly honest. Acid-reflux has been suggested as a cause, but the Zantac ("baby z") we've given her hasn't really helped at all. It probably is something digestive, though. Last night we tried her sleeping in her car seat so she could be more upright, and she did sleep slightly better... waking at 11:00 PM for a feeding (but refusing to nurse, isn't that great?) and then at 3:30 AM for a diaper change, but then having to be awakened at 6:30 AM to go to day care. There seems to be very little rhyme or reason.
Joel thinks it may be that her room is simply too cold. We run a space heater in there and try to keep her well-wrapped, but again she did sleep better all bundled in her car seat. So right now we're at trial and error. Lots and lots of error.

A Christmas Miracle!

Nine nights of sleep! Yep, Miss Lucy's been sleeping through the night for the last week and a half. Sure, we get an occasional 3 or 4 AM wakeup, but at least twice we've* put her down at 8PM and she wakes up after 5AM. It is HEAVENLY. I've even managed to learn to pump before I go to bed (around 10PM) to avoid waking up in a puddle of breast milk. Rock and stinkin' roll!
So the main difference really has been putting her to bed at 8:00. We'd been unwittingly keeping her up until 10 or 11, which was apparently wreaking havoc on her little sleep-wake cycle. Anyway, it's much easier on us to put her down at 8; even if she cries for 40 minutes (which is about the max) we can easily re-Nuk her or give her a top-off feeding when we're NOT trying to get to sleep ourselves.

*And when I say "we" I mean Joel. He is some kind of miracle-worker with putting her down.

Sleeping Through the Night! ... And Starting Day Care

We had a kind of rough weekend with Lucy -- she can be so happy and gorgeous and then we do one little thing, like put her down, or shift her position and she is screaming. Saturday Jean and I caught a matinee of "Sweeney Todd" at Bloomington Civic Theatre (it was phenomenal, by the way) and I was gone for almost 5 hours, which was way longer than I would have liked. On Sunday JG and I went to visit his parents in Monticello. It was lovely; I got a fabulous nap in and Lucy was an angel, PLUS Donna made a ham for lunch. Mmmmm. Anyway, on the way home we had time to devise a Plan for Lucy's overnights. See, the trouble is, we have this perfect Plan A to make it though the night.

Plan A: We put Lucy down to bed at 10 PM and she sleeps until 7 AM.

Right. You can see where the problem might be with that. So Plan B is put into effect, and when Joel and I are between sleeping and waking, we can never quite read each others' minds as to what Plan B is.

OK, so on Sunday night we decided that we'd put her down at 8:00 and then when she cries for an hour or more, we won't be trying to sleep at the same time. So I fed her at 7:30, put her in bed at 8, and she did cry... for about 40 minutes. We turned in at 10:30 and I woke up at 4:30, bursting... but the Pants stayed sleeping until 5:30!! It felt like a real victory, even though it may be the only time it ever happens.

So that was actually a surprisingly good start for the work week. This morning Joel dropped her off at Dee's daycare. Dee only has one other child there this morning, and Dee's mom was coming over later to meet Lucy. Joel felt really good about the whole thing, but did mention that Dee had to practically kick him out of the house. I want to call, but I am afraid I'll break down if I hear Lucy screaming in the background.

Three Months Old!

Yesterday was Lucy's three-month birthday. I can't believe how fast the time has flown. Developmentally, I understand that she's doing just fine. She pretty much holds her own head up all the time now. We've started putting her in the front carrier, facing forward, which she just loves. She's been drooling a lot for the last week, so she may be starting to teethe, though I understand that that first tooth might not crack for three or four more months. She's just learning to grab at things more purposefully too.
We think she's got a touch of acid-reflux; she isn't vomiting but has some ferocious burps and is usually crabby right after feeding (not like her!). She's taking baby Zantac twice a day but I'm not sure it's helping.

Last night was NOT good for mommy; Lucy was up at midnight and again at 2:00. That second waking she had completely drenched her diaper and all four layers of clothes and blankets she was wearing; she then screamed through her entire diaper/costume change and into the feeding. Grrr. So I got about 4.5 hours of sleep. I'm so glad it's Friday.

Back to Work

It was inevitable -- I went back to work on Wednesday, December 1. And I have to say that I'm taking it better than I expected. I haven't even cried... almost to my disappointment in myself.
My group at work has been so sweet; Marnie brought donuts and McDonald's breakfast, and Kim made a huge welcome-back sign. It really meant a lot to me and has made the transition so much easier.
My dad came up to watch Lucy this week; we start day care on Monday the 6th. It's been great having him up, and he is just so cute with Lucy. Plus it's probably better for my psyche to make only one transition at a time: getting myself out of bed this week; working on Lucy next.

Good Intentions

A funny thing to watch is childless couples visiting your new baby. The women coo and google over the baby, the men mumble about fantasy football... and eventually someone asks the visiting male if he wants to hold the baby.

And then the fun starts.

Most of the couples we know are also young, married within the last few years, and probably planning to have kids eventually. So the woman is always TERRIBLY excited to see what parenting is like, and the guy's not totally opposed to the idea... but...

The look that passes across the man's face is generally something like this:
"CRAP, a baby. I'm so glad it's not mine, sure maybe I'd like one someday, oh no now I'd better show some interest in this little person or my wife will be upset, oh NO just don't ask me to hold it DO I HAVE TO HOLD IT OH MY GOD YOU ARE PUTTING IT IN MY ARMS WHY WHY HELP WHY?!?!?"

It's hilarious.

Lucy's Birth Story

People keep asking for her birth story, and while I'm delighted to keep telling it, I'd like to have it written down someplace in case my delight wanes.


Lucy’s Birth Story
At my 39-week checkup (Wednesday, August 25), the doctor told me to take walks, so I was determined to squeeze in a walk every day. Walking had been getting more and more difficult since about month #6, but it seemed to be getting easier now that premature labor was out of the question.
Saturday, August 28
Jean came over and the four of us (Jean, Joel, Hobo and me) went for a nice walk. I was feeling contractions at random when we’d walk, but nothing to write home about.

Sunday, August 29
Joel and his p’s and I went to the State Fair, hoping that the greasy food and a bit of fresh air would moooove the process along. We ate:
French fries
A “blooming onion”
Cheese curds
A nut-roll
A funnel cake
Hot dogs
Cotton candy
Yum. Joel was nervous about me going into labor at any moment, and I was having mild contractions every once in a while. It rained a lot but I was grateful to be outside, moving around.

Monday, August 30
Kristine, the other prego woman at work, didn’t come to work today. Something’s up, but everyone claims she just isn’t feeling well. A cold or something. Balderdash! I KNOW she’s having her baby!!

Tuesday, August 31
Confirmed. Bob (Kristine’s boss) walked by, and Jessica asked “hey, what’s up with Kristine?” and Bob paused, glancing right at me, and I knew.
Me: “Bob, she’s having her baby, isn’t she? You can tell me, I can take it. It’s okay.”
Bob: “Yes.”
Me: *BIG SIGH*

Yeah, that part about me being OK? A dirty LIE. I could be found in my cube for the rest of the day, crying. I JUST WANT TO MEET MY BABY!!

I’ve been timing contractions since Monday. They’ve been as frequent as 5 minutes apart, but usually more like eight minutes, and often I’ll go 20 minutes or an hour without one. They don’t hurt at all really.

Wednesday, September 1
Joel and I are awake almost all night last night timing. We had bedded down in the guest room, because I knew I’d be up and couldn’t face the stairs from our bedroom to the bathroom. The contractions were keeping me up, but the good news is that my cell phone has this awesome stopwatch feature so all I have to do is roll over to the nightstand and hit the button. Of course, now, on top of being crabby from no baby, I’m also cranky from no sleep.

I have a doc appt, 40-week checkup, at 3:30pm and I CANNOT WAIT. The contractions are five minutes apart almost regularly, but when I go in I’m only dilated to one. Though that “one” allows the doc to go in and be “a bit more aggressive,” as she puts it. It’s also known as “stripping the membranes” and in retrospect I’m a little surprised she didn’t exactly ask before doing it. I ask how long she thinks now.
Doc: “Well, if what I just did, worked… a couple days.”
Me (being sneaky): “Well, today is a day. So, like, tomorrow?”
Doc (seeing right through me): “Like a couple days.”
Me: “Rats.”

Well, since I’ve essentially been told that I’ll be pregnant for another two months, I decide I’d better keep my 5:00 haircut appointment. Contracting all the way, I call to see if Aubrey can squeeze me in at 4:00, since the doc appt in its entirety took less time than it took me to type that last paragraph. Aubrey’s open, so I truck down to the Highland neighborhood. I time all the way through the haircut and then head over to Jean’s house for a little dinner.

I arrive at 5:00ish and Jean and Jan are making a feast!! BLTs with fresh tomatoes, fresh sweet corn… something wonderful for dessert… it’s all my favorite foods. But the contractions are now starting to get worse, and the 5-minute barrier is being breached with some regularity. So I wolf down everything I can, knowing that if these contractions continue I might not get to eat again until I give birth, and that might be another couple months, as we previously discussed. At 6:30 I decide I can’t take it anymore and I call the hospital… they say to wait one more hour and then to go in. Though I believe I could drive myself home, I enlist Jean and Jan’s assistance and they drive me. At 7:30 Joel and I call the hospital and they tell us to come on in. I shower and Joel packs about 14 bags, and we arrive at the hospital around 8:30 PM.

When they check me, I’m STILL only dilated to one. Damn! But at least I’m 75% effaced. They keep me for a couple hours, and Joel and I watch the Twins game, joking and enjoying ourselves. At 10:30 they send me home with some Vistaril (a sedative) and tell me to try to get some rest. Joel and I drive back home, stopping at White Castle. Mind you, I’m still contracting.
White Castle Worker (WCW): ThankyouforstoppingatWhiteCastlewouldyouliketotryournewfishsandwich?
Joel: I’ll have four cheeseburgers… and some chicken rings…
WCW: How many rings?
Joel: Six. Noooo… nine.
WCW: OK, that’ll be four cheeseburgers and nine –
Joel: And two more cheeseburgers. And –
Me: WILL YOU JUST FREEKING ORDER!?!?

Back home, we climb into bed, not realistically thinking we’d be getting any sleep. The Vistaril makes me really drowsy, though, and I sort of nod off for a bit…

11:30 PM. I get up to go to the bathroom, and my water breaks. I holler to Joel, he calls the hospital, and we’re on our way again.

We arrive at the hospital, and as soon as I step out of the car the first REALLY bad contraction hits. I lean hard on Joel as he helps me up, and we stumble into the maternity ward again.
A nurse behind the desk says “Not having the best day, huh?” and I think “You nincompoop, this IS the best day, because I’m having my baby!” But I’m in too much pain. We go back into Room 5, and they have to check me to make SURE my water really broke. I’m still only dilated to 2, so they have me turn on my side and cough so they can try to get some of the stuff that’s coming out of me, in order to test it. Gross.

The nurse asks if I want to labor in the tub. I thought this option was ruled out because my water had broken, but apparently not. I also thought that because I was positive for Group B Strep, that I'd have to have the IV in me the whole time for the antibiotics. Also not the case. I climbed into the tub and somewhere around this time I realize that we forgot to grab my contacts on the way out the door the second time. Damn! So I'm stuck in my glasses, which probably come off when I'm in the tub. And for those of you who don't know me that well, I'm REALLY blind without my glasses. So in the tub I keep grabbing on to Joel and pulling him closer so I can get his face in focus. I remember the nurse kept calling me "Megan" but here I am, naked and writhing in the tub, so I kept asking Joel to tell her to call me Meg. At some point Joel runs outside to move the car and grab the overnight bag, since we'd abandoned the car in the turnaround when we returned to the hospital. The nurse is so wonderful; she holds my hand and talks me through the horrid contractions. The pain is unbelievable; nothing could have prepared me for how badly it hurt. I'm in the tub for about 45 minutes and I'm getting so uncomfortable that I keep flipping around; first laying on my back in the tub, then sitting up, then kneeling; it is so awkward. I stumble back into bed and they check my cervix; dilated to a "stretchy 8"!! I'd gone from a 2 to almost 9 in only 45 minutes.

Well, that sends the nurses into a bit of a tizzy. They hadn't called the doctor yet; they hadn't started my IV yet; basically nobody thought I'd go that fast, since it had taken me eight hours to go from a one to a two. The nurse asks me if I want something for the pain. "Whaddaya got?" I ask.

Nubain was what they had. Before I went in the tub, I remember thinking, "well, I was insane for thinking I'd be fine without pain meds; I need something! But even now, the thought of an epidural needle in my back is just too much. I couldn't have gone that route and, as it turns out, there was no time. It takes them several tries to get my IV in; the other nurse keeps apologizing because, she says, I "have wonderful veins! I don't know why I can't get it in!" I'm starting to get nervous; will I get the antibiotics in time? How fast is this baby coming??

Meanwhile the contractions are more and more intense all the time. The breathing exercises had stopped working while I was in the tub; now I'm howling in agony. Someone gives me a washcloth to bite on; that helps. At about 2:30 AM I start having an irresistable urge to push. Not an urge, though -- more like, I just started to push, almost like a reflex. Up to this point it had been all I could do just to get through each contraction; now that I need to push, it's so wonderful to be able to take some action to deal with the pain. When I tell the nurses I need to push, they, surprisingly, tell me "don't fight what your body is telling you to do." This astounds me; everything I'd heard and read said that I would be told NOT to push. But push I do.

That was one thing I wish I'd had more instruction on; how to push. The nurse coached me through it, but I felt a little unprepared for that part. At some point I am given oxygen; Joel says I may have been hyperventilating a little. I KNEW we should have practiced that breathing some more!!

I push for an hour; at 3:34 AM Lucy comes into the world, screaming, with a full head of brown hair. "Is it really a girl?" I ask. What a beauty. What a miracle.

8 lbs., 7 oz.
19.75 inches long

TO BE CONTINUED...

Election Day Blues, November 2, 2004

Election Day! The plan today was for me to get an early-bird-special oil change for the Corolla, then vote, then hit PetCo, Target, Cub Foods and Babies R Us, and make it home for a nice afternoon nap.
All of this was, of course, thwarted by Miss Pants, who slept from the ending of her 5:30AM feeding until approximately 10 AM. Yay for sleeping for 5 hours, Boo for my errands! Finishing her 10:30 feeding by 11 meant I missed the early-bird, no great shakes due to my irrational fear of Jiffy-Lube. Actually it’s not all that irrational; the guys there are terribly nice while they’re pushing $500 worth of unnecessary services on me. Of course, for all I know they ARE necessary – what the heck do I know about transmission flushing???
I did manage to vote, after spending ½ hour dressing Lucy for cold rain and loading her into the Bjorn – the same half hour, it turns out, in which the weather switched from cold rain to beautiful warm sunshine. Undaunted and very cozy warm, we ventured out in search of the local polling place. We learned that the East Side Rec Center is NOT the same thing as the East Side Community Center, but nevertheless managed to do our civic duty. Setting a good example for the kids right from the start!

Took a nice three-hour nap in the afternoon; Joel got home at 5:30 and decided that we didn’t really need to go to PetCo just tonight. He visited Alley Joel and then went out to vote himself, then retired to the couch, which is where he lays as I type.

I’m starting to get a little stir-crazy; it’s VERY difficult to take walks during the day with both Lucy and the dog, and it’s futile to guilt JG into an evening walk, especially now that it’s dark at 5:30. I get a little cranky without exercise. Also, I’m sure that I’m a bad parent for craving the routine of going to work every day, and I know that I should be grateful for every minute I have at home with the little munchkin, but it’s just difficult for me not to be super-busy all the time.

But golly she sure is beautiful!! She’s smiling a lot these days, and she loves to lie on her back and watch me or Joel make silly faces. She does a lot of grunting and, well, I guess the baby magazines would call it cooing, but it’s really more like barking. Anyway, it’s great fun. If you shake a toy or something above her face, and then move it, she’ll follow it all over with her eyes and head, and she holds up her own head most of the time, though frequently with a wavy bobble.

The Pants Is Two Months Old

The Ryan clan stopped by on Saturday, Oct. 30 for a little meet-the-Pants party. Lucy met her great-grandma Nana (Dorothy Ryan) for the first time, as well as:
Uncle Dan
Mike & Shannon Ryan and Shaedon
Peggy & Randy Holndoner and Liam and Ellen
Uncle Jim & Aunt Mary
Mary and Tom Fuller
Uncle Tom and Aunt Kathi Ryan
Uncle Larry & Aunt Betty
Bridget and Dan Fors and Megan
Uncle Ralph and Aunt Rosemary Karner
Aunt Margie
Molly Gorski and Joey and Jimmy
Mary Hagerty and Dan Harden
Uncle Gary and Aunt Norine Polidori