I Want a Sick Day

Somehow I managed to catch a cold in August. This quickly led to the unpleasant realization that I no longer have "sick days." Which I am a firm believer in. When I'm sick, I'm whiny and lazy and prefer to avoid people (partially because I know whininess and laziness are annoying) and lay in bed until I feel better. I did manage to spend a chunk of the day in bed. Unfortunately today we ran out of diapers. And the last thing I was going to do was pack Baby E up and take my sick self out of the house. So I asked Dh to get some. Seems simple, right? Like the kind of thing you do for your spouse when she is sick. If only to get away from the whining. Ha ha Too bad Dh doesn't have an empathetic bone in his body. I knew it when I married him, so I'm not complaining. I'm just saying. Ha ha Besides, where is he right now? Safeway, getting some diapers. He's a good husband, he just likes to complain an awful lot.

* * *

There's the oddest thing about Dh's mother. The week before last we went to visit Dh's parents. I can count on one hand the number of times she held Baby E. We were there for four days. I know she's excited about Baby E's existence. When Dh mentioned that we were thinking about visiting, she emailed us saying "Yes please come!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" And I am not exaggerating the number of exclamation points. When we arrived she showed me cute clothes she found for Baby E at yardsales. But she barely touched Baby E.

Almost every time she did hold the baby, Baby E cried. Baby E is a happy baby, as has already been established. She's amazingly chill (which is very convenient for me). So the crying was frustrating for M-i-l I'm sure. Especially since as soon as I appeared in Baby E's line of sight she usually started smiling at me. Now, M-i-l has six kids. She has spent plenty of time around babies. Yet she seems to have forgotten everything she knew. When Baby E cried, M-i-l held her and looked vaguely perplexed. Sometimes she tried shushing. That was as involved as she got. Dh wanted to boss her - "Get up, walk around, rock her! You know these things!" - but he restrained himself. It was just so odd; neither Dh nor I know what to do about it.

She just emailed asking if they can come this weekend, and part of me wants to say, "Erm, no thanks." Can I give in to that impulse? I'm sick and my bathrooms haven't been cleaned. (See how whiny?)

* * *

Early this morning I had a first. I woke from a pleasant dream involving Dh...and I woke up really happy, if you know what I mean. I toyed with the idea of waking Dh to make my dream a reality, but decided against it. [Which turned out to be wise. When I told him about it this afternoon, he said I should only wake him up in the middle of the night for that kind of thing on the weekend. *pout* He's no fun. Ha ha]

* * *

My parents offered to fly me and Baby E out to New York at the end of September. I'm really excited about it! Well, not the flying part. I hated flying when it was just me. Throw in Baby E, and well, that sounds suspiciously masochistic. And yet, sign me up. My dad hasn't even seen her! And neither have my siblings (though only three of them are still at home). I want Baby E to know them all, and smile at them. Especially my dad. He is acting tough, like he doesn't care a bit; my mom says he is faking, and I guess she would know.

And have I mentioned my parents are flying me, Dh, and Baby E out to Florida for Christmas? Yes, apparently a baby is really useful for scoring free plane tickets. Ha ha That is, of course, the primary reason Dh and I had a baby. For the plane tickets. I'm KIDDING.

The plane tickets are a latent function.

Baby E Rocks the House!

Great Scott!



Sweetness Personified



"Don't bother me. I'm eating."

The Siennafication of Fashion

Is anyone else dissatisfied with the turn we are taking? Fashion this fall annoys me. Why does Sienna Miller hold so much sway? The chick cannot dress! And yet everywhere I look are the unhappy manifestations of her influence.

Leggings. They're crappy. They're ugly. They make most people look bad. I could wear leggings; I refuse to do so. I remember the 80's. And so should Sienna.

Big, Ugly Purses. The link will take you to a purse named after Sienna. Blech. I want those sassy little tweed purses to come back in. Way cooler.

Tunic Tops. I just got done being pregnant - why would I want to wear fake maternity shirts?

The only thing I like about fashion right now is the shirtdress. I want to get me this one as soon as possible.

Sienna, give me a call. I think there's still hope for you. We can go shopping, and I'll find you some cute clothes that don't make you look a) homeless, b) like you just rolled out of bed, and c) like your stylist is seriously having the last laugh.

Ugh

It's been a rough couple of days. Tuesday for reasons unknown Baby E just fussed, fussed, fussed. Yesterday was her 2-month checkup, codephrase for SHOTS, so of course yesterday had lots of fussing as well. She kept doing this shrieking cry, even after I gave her a little Tylenol. But I did at least get a few smiles out of her before she went to bed.

My boss offered me a part-time position working from home. So I said, Yes thank you! I just started last Thursday. It's basically perfect. I told Kevin I don't have more than 2 hours per day, he said that's fine. One of the guys brought over my nice, new work computer, so I don't have to use our crappy old e-machine anymore. So far, I've been working about an hour and a half a day (Tuesday & Wednesday: zero time...). I like this. It's nice to use my brain in this way. And it's nice to earn a little money so we don't have to live on rice and beans. (When I said that to Dh, he said, "What's wrong with rice & beans? I think we should eat them more often." He was one hundred percent serious. Ha ha)

I had a dream that Dh was scratching me while holding me very tightly so I couldn't get away. He thought it was funny, but I was getting really pissed. I was yelling at him to stop, but he just kept doing it. Then I woke up (partially), and punched Dh in the ribs! From his side of the bed, in a very droll voice, he said, "Well, that was interesting."

Happy Baby

Yay for Baby E!

Baby E is two months old today. Huzzah for her! She is developing more and more control over her neck and hands. She tries to talk a lot (it is so much fun). Lots of smiles. Sometimes she morphs into Fussy McFuster though.*

I realized that since Baby E is in bed asleep by 9 (9:30 at the latest), we can get a babysitter to just sit in our quiet house and we can go to a late movie or whatever! So that is what we are doing tonight! We're going to see Pirates.

And apparently there are some evil eyes pointed at me because Baby E sleeps so well. Ha ha Believe me, I am very grateful that she is an easy baby. There are a couple things that I've done to help her, though:

1. Swaddling. At first she would fuss through the entire swaddling process, then be quiet as soon as it was done. Now she usually quiets down when I start to swaddle her, like she knows what's happening and that it will feel nice once I'm done. On the rare occassions when Baby E naps without being swaddled, she doesn't sleep as long or as deeply.
2. Naps. During the first 6 weeks of Baby E's life, napping was very erratic, and not just because Baby E was a newborn. I didn't know how to put her down for a nap, or how long, or anything. Then I read Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child and learned that a baby under 4 months of age shouldn't be up longer than 2 hours at a time or the baby becomes overtired. Through a process of trial and error, I learned that Baby E does best when put down for a nap after being up for about an hour and thirty minutes. This has helped her sleep better at night because then she's not overtired from being up too much during the day.**

So Wednesday night, Baby E went to bed at 8:30. I went to bed a little after 11. 4 am I woke up to the sound of the smoke alarm intermittently beeping. No, it was not the battery, because our smoke alarms are hooked up to our electricity, and only have batteries as backups. And no, there was no fire. The smoke alarm is just retarded. I tried to fiddle with it, get it to stop, it never stopped beeping for longer than 5 minutes, then it would start back up. By 5:15, Baby E was still asleep and I was uncomfortably engorged and wide awake thanks to that stupid alarm, so I pumped for a while (5 oz in 6 minutes! the only advantage to being engorged!). 5:30 Baby E woke up. The entire time I nursed her, the smoke alarm beeped every 39 seconds (I timed it - nothing else to do while nursing in the semi-dark!). Baby E was back in bed by 6:30, and by this point I was so tired, I slept through the smoke alarm beeping until Baby E woke back up at 9:30 am. The point of the story is, Baby E slept from 8:30 - 5:30, and then 6:30 - 9:30. And I could have had a wonderful night's sleep if that bloody smoke alarm hadn't kept beeping!!!!!! It was like the smoke alarm knew how long Baby E would sleep, and just wanted to F me up. Grr...I couldn't get the blasted thing to stop. When Dh came home for lunch at 1 pm, he was able to disconnect it. Yeah, it beeped all morning. Stupid piece of crap.


*I call Baby E Fussy McFuster. Dh made a face when he heard me say it the first time, and then he said it himself a few minutes later. Try it. Just say, "Fussy McFuster." It's fun to say. You'll see.

**And some clarification: Sometimes Baby E sleeps great (yesterday morning - 3 hour nap), and sometimes not (yesterday afternoon - catnaps). Sometimes she just fusses for like 2 1/2 hours. Ugh. Sometimes she sleeps great at night (9:30 pm - 5 am last night!) and sometimes not (last Friday - woke up every half hour from 3 am on - that sucked!!!!).