Friday, October 31, 2008

End of October...

The weather is turning too cold to take my babies outside. Especially here, this winter wonderland we found just 5 miles up a mountain. I think that the geese have flown to Florida anyway, so goodbye to our number one outdoor activity for the past month: feeding stale bread to possessive geese. We are stuck inside these walls and I am left considering which walls we could turn into windows.

My daughter will be four months old soon, but she's been sporting size six month clothes for weeks. Endearing is the only word that begins to describe her, with that riveting grin and fluffy hair. Sometimes when I change her clothes she just starts to laugh because she is so ticklish. She watches Haven like he has endless wisdom to give. He watches her like he's got endless love.
The elections are in a few short days. As I dubiously rose the topic of politics in various conversations, I found that some people think the words American, Republican and Christian are synonomous. This disturbs me. I have also found that some people care as fiercely about politics as I care about God. Interesting. I believe I've chosen who to cast my vote for, but I am both easily swayed and cynical. Both candidates are so good at looking sincere and patriotic. I guess that's part of the job.

Oh, today is Halloween. I just realized. I never celebrated Halloween as a child, unless you count dressing as Queen Esther for Halleluia Night. But that's another post and I have a feeling most of my readership could tell similar stories.

Monday, October 20, 2008

Bring it on, people.

Editor's Note: Wow! Thank you for a remarkable response to this post. I appreciate the time each of you spent to talk to me about your views. Dave and I had a great time reading over the comments and looking up various topics online. The countdown is on and it's time to make a decision. Thank you so much! ~ Jen



It's 2 weeks until election day and I am an undecided voter. There are things I like about each of them, there are things I dislike about each of them. If you're passionate about one candidate or the other, here's your chance to try to win another vote for him.

Issues that matter the most to me:
  • Health care for Americans
  • Limitations on abortion
  • Education for Americans
  • Environmental preservation
I'd also love to see poverty abolished, but I'm not sure that's the government's job in a capitalistic nation.

Anyway ... I don't promise to tell you who I choose and feel free to comment anonymously.

Sunday, October 19, 2008

mama bear gone loco

Me: What's that noise? It sounds like something got into the garage.

Dave - riveted by The Office: It's nothing.

(loud banging, too loud for a mouse or a cat or a raccoon....)

Dave - standing by the front window: It's a bear trying to get to the garbage in the garage.

I look out the window to see, literally, the Mother Bear hauling it's gigantic body down our driveway. It had been slamming its body against our garage door, trying to break it down. I'm just happy I wasn't down there doing laundry at the time.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

There were three in the bed and the little one said, roll over, roll over...

As the mother of two, I've developed a new level of confidence. Equipped with knowledge that comes from, though minimal, experience, I feel I can parent Maiya with an ease I did not have with Haven. This confidence led me to spill to a couple of new friends that Maiya sleeps with us at night.

For those of you without children, this is not information one usually divulged unless it is to a close friend with a baby, both of whom are in desperate need of a good night's sleep. Even then the fact is practically whispered.

The best part of admitting to other parents that we cosleep is finding that many people do the same, they just keep it on the down low. Hush hush. We don't tell the doctor and we don't tell most of our friends. Once I spilled, though, these new friends told me about their own co-sleeping ventures, the guilt and glory of it.

I decided to do a little research. I picked through a few websites to find out about the perks of cosleeping. I already knew what most American sleeping "experts" say about it: it's dangerous, lazy on the parent's part and sets the child up for poor sleeping habits. Since my son sleeps great through the night in his own bed and has since he was about 1, I don't subscribe to these anti-cosleeping beliefs.

I found some pretty awesome stuff about cosleeping! I read that when a mom and baby sleep together they go through sleep patterns simultaneously. So when mom sleeps deeply, so does baby. Also, the baby takes cues from mom's sleep pattern. If she breathes deeply, the baby mimics. I don't know how much of this is scientifically proven, but I tried this yesterday morning before Maiya woke. When I took a deep breath she immediately followed with her own!
Cosleeping in other cultures in completely normal. Moms in South America are probably keeping it to themselves when they put their baby in a crib. Interesting fact (which I found in one of my textbooks) is that in countries where cosleeping is the norm, there are far fewer reports of sleeping troubles than there are here in the US.

To me, cosleeping during the early months makes perfect sense. As the baby is learning to trust, mom and dad are always present. Then, as he or she gets older and starts to develop a sense of autonomy it seems like a logical time to gradually transition to independent sleep. Of course, as in most areas of parenting, this transition is easier said than done. I realize cosleeping isn't for everyone, but it works for us. Haven slept with us until he decided to make his first initial in our bed (sleeping horizontally between us, forcing us to the far edges of the bed). When it's time to move on, we'll move on, but for now, we 're enjoying our little cuddly girl in our bed.

Wednesday, October 08, 2008

8 Things on my 28th Birthday.

1. We have 2 cars, the nice newer of which I get to drive and our older, paid off one Dave gets to drive. While I love the security of driving a car that isn't going to break down, I have a special place in my heart for our older car. I guess it makes me feel young or carefree or something.

2. In the fall I like to leave a pot of simmering apple cider on the stove so that my house smells like Autumn. It reminds me of going to Lindsay's house (well, her parent's house) and feeling cozy and happy.

3. I am giving up on bangs because in 90% of the pictures of me from the past 5 years my bangs are covering at least one of my eyes. I don't keep up on haircuts enough to manage bangs and I accept that.

4. As some of the leaves fall from the trees around our house I can start to see our lake again and in the daytime it looks likes diamonds coming through the forrest.

5. I'm so glad I grew up in a family with four kids. I love the concept of big families but from where I stand it sounds daunting to have my own. I guess getting through those early years is the most challenging.

6. I hope we get rid of our bearded dragon soon (any takers?). He smells, has a growth and is generally grumpy ... but endearing like Oscar the Grouch.

7. We've lived in our house almost a year! Congrats to us for making it!

8. I believe this year is going to be amazing in a simple, contented way.

Monday, October 06, 2008

It's time

to tell you the story of Maiya's homecoming. Three months have past, and I can laugh about it without crying. Again.

Throughout my pregnancy, I looked forward to the hospital stay that would follow Maiya's birth. I longed for the three or four days of rest. The image of the nurses at my beckon call and the plan to stay in bed kept me going on some of those hot summer days. I was ready to live up my hospital stay. Yes, I thought it would be like a vacation.

Maiya's birth was smooth. The c-section was painless (unlike Haven's) and I was so calm that I watched the doctor stitch my incision in the reflection in the operating room light. She came out, cried, was healthy and Dave accompanied her to the infant room as I recovered. I watched the clock for the hour I had to sit in the recovery room, and then pestered the nurse until she brought me my baby. She was amazing, tiny, and precisely what I wanted in my arms. Beautiful. Haven and my sister came later to meet Maiya, everyone was happy and lovey. That was Wednesday.

Thursday was holding Maiya, a few visitors, resting, eating and a walk to the bathroom.

I cannot explain what hit me on Friday, but I decided I had to go home. Had to. Hospital Vacation was over. I asked the doctor if I could leave. Lucky for me, he said, "In my country some women go home two days after a c-section. You have to promise me you won't do anything but lay down for a couple of days if I do release you." Yes, of course, yessir, you got it. He signed my release papers. Truth be told, I could have used another night in the hospital. I missed Haven and Dave, though, and I wanted to be together. I didn't just want to be together, we had to be together. I guess I can tell you what hit me on Friday: hormones of the post-pregnancy type.

It was about 6:00 PM and Dave came to the hospital with Haven for what was planned to be a brief, pre-bedtime visit.

"Let me just see if they'll let me go now." I got out of bed, which requires the upper body strength of a he-man after a c-section, and limped to the nurse's desk. When I got to the desk I asked if I could leave. I realized then that I had failed to mention to anyone except that one doctor my plans to leave two days early.

"Oh, really? You can't stand us anymore?" Her attempt at a joke was lost on me.

"I just miss my son."

"Aw, how old is your son?"

"Seventeen months." And the waterworks came then. They were unstoppable, and apparently motivating. It was like with my first sob the entire office was moved to action.

"Okay! We'll get you out of here. Let us just do the paperwork we need to do..."

I cried my way back to the room. The nurse came in a moment later to say they would do a blood test on Maiya before we could go.

Haven was ready for bed. The crankier he became, the more Dave held him, and then, the more an odor began to fill the room.

"Oh my gosh." Dave set Haven on the floor to find poop on his own shirt and up Haven's back. "Great." He settled in to clean it all up and discovered we had no diapers. We asked the nurse for a diaper and about fifteen stinky and sticky minutes later they produced a few diapers from the pediatric ward. Unfortunately, they had no clean t-shirt for Dave. So, as we waited for Maiya's blood test results Haven ran through my hospital room in a t-shirt and a borrowed diaper, alternating between crankiness and abundant curiosity. Maiya slept soundly in the little crib.

Dave packed up all of our things, not quite sure why I had to go home tonight, but wise enough to not question it too much. I limped around the room picking up a couple things to give the impression that I was helping, but mostly, the tears continued to flow and blocked my view. I saw Dave dressing Maiya and realized she was not going to wear the coming-home outfit I packed for her. This made the crying worse.

A nurse came in, and with one glance at our little guy, at me, (and probably one whiff of Dave) she said, "I'll see if we can get those results quickly."

Maiya was finally released and Dave hauled everything out to the car. When we were all finally in our seat belts and ready to leave, I was still crying and Haven was whining. "Can we just have fun, please?" Dave said.

This image of us will stay in my mind. It's funny. Well, it's funny now, now that my emotions are slightly less eruptive.

Wednesday, October 01, 2008

Snapshot.


Maiya loves eye contact. Sometimes she's fussy simply because she wants somebody close, looking at her, focussing on her. She gives an amazing reward when she gets that attention; her smile. She's not too fond of the Bumbo seat and would rather sit in the bouncer or, especially, in somebody's arms. She now loves to wiggle her body on the floor and listen to all of the noise her big brother can make. She loves the outdoors. An amble out to the deck will calm her instantly. We went to feed the geese at the lake yesterday, and she smiled and smiled as she listened to the geese squawk. She absolutely loves the front carrier. It's another instant calmer. She has captured our hearts with her complete dependance and I-know-what-I-want personality.




Haven suddenly and completely loves trucks. We bought him a big Tonka dump truck this weekend and he cannot get enough of it. It sits next to him at meals, it waits in his room while he sleeps. It's not a ride-on truck, but he flips up the back and scoots around on it. He loves real trucks and yells "tu! tu!" repeatedly in the car, regardless of my response. He also likes songs with hand motions and knows all of the motions for the Wheels on the Bus. He learned (and I relearned) a bunch of preschool songs at story time at the library. He puts two words together occasionally, but regardless of the size of his ever-growing vocabulary, he gets his point across! At night, he kisses everybody then walks into his bedroom. He loves Elmo - Elmo's theme song, Elmo on TV, Elmo in a book, Elmo in a store, Elmo on his shirt - he is a total Elmo boy.
My baby is a toddler and turning into a little boy. I and think about it with pride and awe.

Our days are split between story times, play groups, naps and walks outside. When Daddy comes home we celebrate, we eat and we play. This is the first time in my life that I realized each day is hauntingly similar, but I don't find myself craving something more exciting.