Well, Gavin is asleep for the night and it's not even 4 p.m. yet. We're in California right now and the adjustment between California and Michigan time has not been easy-peasy. Neither has been sleeping on an airplane or irregular bedtimes. But Gavin is a trooper so far. And by "trooper" I do not mean toting a gun and Army crawling through the woods as a part of some kind of baby militia. Gavin's a lover, not a fighter. Unless we're talking fighting bedtime, which he does occasionally, but sleep has a strong pull and exhaustion has a long reach. So that's why he's asleep now during what is still the middle of the day for most mortals. Mind you, I don't think he'll stay asleep. Once Lisa and Brenden come home he'll likely wake up. Once Lisa's husband comes on he'll wake up for sure because Alan is not a quiet guy and he likes his TV loud and retarded (i.e. cage match shows and hockey games).
You know, I can't help but wonder if it's cruel to drag my son across the country just because my best friend and her son live out here. We got in last night, so he hasn't had much time to adjust. And I wouldn't say he's having a horrible time. It's just kind of crummy here and there. It's hard to be a baby. It's way harder to be a tired baby. The more tired he is the more he's clinging to Stacy. She's taken to calling him Velcro. Personally I would say something like Gorilla Glue would be more apt. Velcro is rather easily separated without irreparable damage, and that is not how Gavin sees things at the moment. I can tell it's starting to wear Stacy out, but it's kind of hard to be of any assistance. If I could I would just pretend to be her for awhile to give her a break, but Gavin would totally see through that.
Gavin was really, really good on the airplane, sleeping the majority of the time. He was sprawled out across our laps with his head on Stacy and his feet on me. Stacy nodded off for a little while but I did not. I could not. I was way uncomfortable. I would someday like to be rich enough to fly first class, please. Cramming yourself into coach with a baby is not living large, to say the least. Because sleeping on an airplane doesn't provide for a rest free of ambient noise and random movement, Gavin woke up a couple of times. Squeaking seats/tray tables were a big problem. And I don't mean squeaking as in mouse, I mean squeaking as in this is the sound you hear as the door to a haunted house swings open in front of you. Somebody needs to get some WD40 up in this bitch for real.
I'd like to say thank you to the kind people who sat behind us and smiled and made faces at Gavin as we waited for take off. Thank God for people who aren't assholes around babies. I know that lots of people complain about babies on airplanes and Lord knows most people don't want to sit next to an infant, but come on, people. No need to be jerks. No one was rude to us or anything, but all of the parents I know who fly with kids are so anxious and scared that their kid is going to make a noise or pull the hair of the person in the seat in front of them (Gavin wanted to do this very badly) or throw up or take a dump or whatever kids do on the airplane that there's very little time to enjoy what's going on. Mind you, I have never been a "relax and enjoy the flight" kind of person. I don't understand that. "Ahh, finally I am shoehorned into a seat in steerage where I won't be able to move for the next five hours and God help me if I have to pee because the guy in the aisle seat is stone-cold asleep with his headphones on and where I can't even get a drink of water without whipping out my credit card and plopping down $3 (thanks, Spirit!) and where I'll at times find myself secretly hoping the plane will crash just to get it over with sooner." It's not a roller coaster, it's an airplane. It's like a Greyhound bus in the sky. There's a reason you don't hear bus drivers tell passengers to relax and enjoy the ride.
I've finally decided what my favorite thing about having a kid is: family restrooms. I loathe public restrooms (while, of course, being thankful they exist, don't get me wrong) and now that I have a baby, all I have to do is wheel is stroller in there with me and I have a big private bathroom all to myself where I don't have to listen to the indelicate nature of random women's digestive systems as I try desperately to relax enough so that I can pee and get the hell out of there (after washing my hands, of course. Don't be gross). The family restrooms at the Detroit airport are remarkable cleaner than the ones for the masses, too. Granted, one of them smelled very strongly of pee but I just kept telling myself that it was just baby pee and that somehow made it okay. Or okay enough, anyway.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Monday, June 28, 2010
June 28: Crib of death (not a baby heavy metal band)
Well, it's official. Gavin hates me. You should have heard him screaming just minutes ago when Stacy tried to leave to go to work. You would've thought that he'd just watched me split her head open with an ax. "Take him away from me, he's breaking my heart," she said. But as soon as I put him down on the changing table his crying only escalated. Finally I told her that she had to put him down for his nap before she left because it was pretty obvious that he and I weren't going to get very far. Once he was back in her arms his crying stopped and the look on his face said, "Yes. This is what I wanted. Everything is okay now."
I know I shouldn't take it personally, and mostly I don't. Stacy, after all, is the keeper of the hoots. She and Gavin are very hormonally connected or whatever. But you'd think that Gavin and I didn't spend every day for the last 5 months together. I'm thinking a lot of dads or co-moms know what I'm talking about. He still gets super excited to see me and stuff. He just would rather be in Stacy's arms at all times so-help-him-god-forever-and-ever-amen. "If it's any consolation," Stacy told me, "I find it kind of annoying."
In other great news, our crib has been recalled. YES! First the Tylenol, now this. I hate the fact that we got a drop-side crib, by the way. TOTALLY my fault since I did all of the crib research and decided what one to buy. But I went with the information I had, which was not, "Oh, hey, by the way, this crib is going to malfunction and kill your son." It's not like they put that on the box. The best part of the recall is that they're not going to, like, give us our money back or anything. They're going to send us a "repair kit" to immobilize the drop-side. Now, this is all well and good, but the Consumer Product Safety Commission says we should stop using the crib immediately and find an alternate safe place for our child to sleep. And the repair kits should be available to send out in the next few weeks. They're really sorry for the inconvenience, though. "Whoops, our bad! We don't like dead babies," pretty much sums up the company's website.
In other sorry-ass baby related news, there's apparently a young (and dumb) mother in Florida who's getting all kinds of grief after posting a photo on Facebook of her baby smoking a bong (the baby is not actually smoking, just kind of holding it with his or her mouth on the top). It's a sad picture, actually. Besides the obvious, what concerns me about the photo is the disarray surrounding the baby. Wires and cords galore and I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say that the carpet is probably not exactly clean. Lucky baby, if by "lucky" we mean "unlucky" (you know, opposite day). And remember, folks, Florida is a state that bans gay and lesbian people from adopting because of how unfit they are as parents. Maybe the bong baby girl can adopt some of the kids languishing in state custody. I mean, as long as she's not gay or something.
I know I shouldn't take it personally, and mostly I don't. Stacy, after all, is the keeper of the hoots. She and Gavin are very hormonally connected or whatever. But you'd think that Gavin and I didn't spend every day for the last 5 months together. I'm thinking a lot of dads or co-moms know what I'm talking about. He still gets super excited to see me and stuff. He just would rather be in Stacy's arms at all times so-help-him-god-forever-and-ever-amen. "If it's any consolation," Stacy told me, "I find it kind of annoying."
In other great news, our crib has been recalled. YES! First the Tylenol, now this. I hate the fact that we got a drop-side crib, by the way. TOTALLY my fault since I did all of the crib research and decided what one to buy. But I went with the information I had, which was not, "Oh, hey, by the way, this crib is going to malfunction and kill your son." It's not like they put that on the box. The best part of the recall is that they're not going to, like, give us our money back or anything. They're going to send us a "repair kit" to immobilize the drop-side. Now, this is all well and good, but the Consumer Product Safety Commission says we should stop using the crib immediately and find an alternate safe place for our child to sleep. And the repair kits should be available to send out in the next few weeks. They're really sorry for the inconvenience, though. "Whoops, our bad! We don't like dead babies," pretty much sums up the company's website.
In other sorry-ass baby related news, there's apparently a young (and dumb) mother in Florida who's getting all kinds of grief after posting a photo on Facebook of her baby smoking a bong (the baby is not actually smoking, just kind of holding it with his or her mouth on the top). It's a sad picture, actually. Besides the obvious, what concerns me about the photo is the disarray surrounding the baby. Wires and cords galore and I'm going to take a stab in the dark and say that the carpet is probably not exactly clean. Lucky baby, if by "lucky" we mean "unlucky" (you know, opposite day). And remember, folks, Florida is a state that bans gay and lesbian people from adopting because of how unfit they are as parents. Maybe the bong baby girl can adopt some of the kids languishing in state custody. I mean, as long as she's not gay or something.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
June 24, 2010: Baby toss
Having an 11-month-old is all about picking shit up off the floor. Well, not actual shit. That hasn't happened. Yet. I'm sure it's only a matter of time. I've heard some pretty harrowing potty training stories in my time. In fact, my mom would be happy to regale you with tales of terrible things my twin sister and I did as babies involving actual shit. Clearly we were babies who were bored and left unattended for far too long. Whether you call it artistic or autistic, all I can say is it was, undoubtably, all Laura's idea and I was coerced into participating. My mom says she really hopes Gavin does the same thing, wanting, I think, some kind of karmic retribution. I hope he doesn't, not only because that's gross, but also because that is a totally fucked up thing to do.
No, the shit I'm talking about is the trail of destruction left in Gavin's wake. Right now, for example, on the floor in the living room is his demonically-possessed animal puzzle, a stack of children's books, and his walker. This begins a trail, which leads into the hallway and then to the kitchen, of Tupperware lids, an elephant-face funnel, and various pots and pans. In the past week I cannot tell you how many times I have tripped over the tea kettle.
In his room I am always picking up books. He likes to pull all of them off of the shelves -- and for a baby he has a lot of books. He doesn't just throw them around, he actually looks at them and as his dexterity gets better he enjoys books more and more ("Wow, this book has more than two pages?"). We have a very book-centered household. Stacy and I have hundreds of books and are big book nerds (we don't have cable, for example), so the fact that Gavin likes his books so much is quite wonderful. But I have long since stopped trying to put them back on his shelves in any discernible order. Not that I ever had any illusion of keeping his books alphabetized or anything. But when we first brought him home he was too tiny to rearrange his bookshelf and it was all neat and tidy. Granted, I much prefer the books being used and enjoyed, but I also have to shift my standards for neatness. It's also very clear that the books Gavin loves the most are the ones in the most ruinous condition. He's hard on his books. In fact, his first favorite book, called very succinctly, Sounds, had to go to book heaven (a.k.a. the recycling center). If Sounds had been a person he/she would have no doubt been quadriplegic due to extreme spinal damage. Moreover, internal injuries were widespread (the individual board book pages peeling apart) and would have necessitated some pretty heavy duty artificial life support (i.e. glue that wouldn't have fared well in a baby's mouth). That's just no quality of life for a book.
Gavin is also in the "throw it on the floor" stage. In his hands everything might as well be a wet bar of soap. It doesn't matter what it is. If you give him a sippy cup he might drink out of it, but he definitely will hold it over the edge of his highchair tray and open his hand, following its trajectory to the floor. There was a time when he was content to hold something at the grocery store. Just giving him a box of baby cereal to hold was enough to keep him content (watching, of course, for the many teachable "not for mouths" moments). He still wants to hold things at the store, except he only wants to hold them as long as it takes to throw them out of the cart and onto the floor. This is not very gratifying for the person pushing the cart. This same scenario plays out on the changing table. A toy no longer distracts him and keeps him still. Not even a previously forbidden object like the container of diaper rash ointment or a hairbrush do the trick. He just calmly extends his arm and opens his hand, letting the object drop while not even looking at it, instead he looks at me like, "A jar of calendula cream? You're going to have to do better than that to keep me from getting my hands in my dirty diaper and/or plunging off the changing table to my death."
I am especially nervous to see how Gavin's projectile fever will play out on the airplane we'll soon be taking to California. (Actually, "projectile fever" conjures up a much different, and far more disgusting, image than a child throwing his toy monkey on the ground. It actually reminds me of this article in a parenting magazine I read recently about a mother's trials and tribulations flying alone with her three kids, one of whom was a baby with a rotovirus that didn't make itself known until after takeoff. And it kept announcing itself again and again). He was quite good on our flight to Florida at Christmas, but back then he could just barely sit up by himself. Now he's a boy with the motto: "G-O!" Plus this flight is much longer. Oh, and since we're flying Spirit, we can't sit together unless we pay extra. At least, we can't be guaranteed that we'll sit together, because they randomly assign seats to people who don't pay. NICE. And yes, Spirit is the airline that charges for checked and carry-on bags and tries to sell that shit as "an improved customer service experience" with a video on their website of their asshole CEO crammed in an overhead bin. Thankfully the carry-on policy doesn't kick in until August, so it won't apply to us. Still, that's some bullshit right there. So, yeah. Spirit and I are in a fight right now. If it wasn't so important to Stacy to have a direct flight we'd totally be taking Southwest. United also flies non-stop to LA, but price-wise it's hundreds of dollars more than Spirit. Basically United has coolers lined up in the jetway where passengers deposit things like kidneys and plasma in order to pay for their flight. But hey, if you wanted to carry a cooler containing your liver onto a Spirit flight they'd charge you an extra $30. I'm surprised they aren't charging us extra for us to bring Gavin as carry-on. It would actually be cheaper to check him.
No, the shit I'm talking about is the trail of destruction left in Gavin's wake. Right now, for example, on the floor in the living room is his demonically-possessed animal puzzle, a stack of children's books, and his walker. This begins a trail, which leads into the hallway and then to the kitchen, of Tupperware lids, an elephant-face funnel, and various pots and pans. In the past week I cannot tell you how many times I have tripped over the tea kettle.
In his room I am always picking up books. He likes to pull all of them off of the shelves -- and for a baby he has a lot of books. He doesn't just throw them around, he actually looks at them and as his dexterity gets better he enjoys books more and more ("Wow, this book has more than two pages?"). We have a very book-centered household. Stacy and I have hundreds of books and are big book nerds (we don't have cable, for example), so the fact that Gavin likes his books so much is quite wonderful. But I have long since stopped trying to put them back on his shelves in any discernible order. Not that I ever had any illusion of keeping his books alphabetized or anything. But when we first brought him home he was too tiny to rearrange his bookshelf and it was all neat and tidy. Granted, I much prefer the books being used and enjoyed, but I also have to shift my standards for neatness. It's also very clear that the books Gavin loves the most are the ones in the most ruinous condition. He's hard on his books. In fact, his first favorite book, called very succinctly, Sounds, had to go to book heaven (a.k.a. the recycling center). If Sounds had been a person he/she would have no doubt been quadriplegic due to extreme spinal damage. Moreover, internal injuries were widespread (the individual board book pages peeling apart) and would have necessitated some pretty heavy duty artificial life support (i.e. glue that wouldn't have fared well in a baby's mouth). That's just no quality of life for a book.
Gavin is also in the "throw it on the floor" stage. In his hands everything might as well be a wet bar of soap. It doesn't matter what it is. If you give him a sippy cup he might drink out of it, but he definitely will hold it over the edge of his highchair tray and open his hand, following its trajectory to the floor. There was a time when he was content to hold something at the grocery store. Just giving him a box of baby cereal to hold was enough to keep him content (watching, of course, for the many teachable "not for mouths" moments). He still wants to hold things at the store, except he only wants to hold them as long as it takes to throw them out of the cart and onto the floor. This is not very gratifying for the person pushing the cart. This same scenario plays out on the changing table. A toy no longer distracts him and keeps him still. Not even a previously forbidden object like the container of diaper rash ointment or a hairbrush do the trick. He just calmly extends his arm and opens his hand, letting the object drop while not even looking at it, instead he looks at me like, "A jar of calendula cream? You're going to have to do better than that to keep me from getting my hands in my dirty diaper and/or plunging off the changing table to my death."
I am especially nervous to see how Gavin's projectile fever will play out on the airplane we'll soon be taking to California. (Actually, "projectile fever" conjures up a much different, and far more disgusting, image than a child throwing his toy monkey on the ground. It actually reminds me of this article in a parenting magazine I read recently about a mother's trials and tribulations flying alone with her three kids, one of whom was a baby with a rotovirus that didn't make itself known until after takeoff. And it kept announcing itself again and again). He was quite good on our flight to Florida at Christmas, but back then he could just barely sit up by himself. Now he's a boy with the motto: "G-O!" Plus this flight is much longer. Oh, and since we're flying Spirit, we can't sit together unless we pay extra. At least, we can't be guaranteed that we'll sit together, because they randomly assign seats to people who don't pay. NICE. And yes, Spirit is the airline that charges for checked and carry-on bags and tries to sell that shit as "an improved customer service experience" with a video on their website of their asshole CEO crammed in an overhead bin. Thankfully the carry-on policy doesn't kick in until August, so it won't apply to us. Still, that's some bullshit right there. So, yeah. Spirit and I are in a fight right now. If it wasn't so important to Stacy to have a direct flight we'd totally be taking Southwest. United also flies non-stop to LA, but price-wise it's hundreds of dollars more than Spirit. Basically United has coolers lined up in the jetway where passengers deposit things like kidneys and plasma in order to pay for their flight. But hey, if you wanted to carry a cooler containing your liver onto a Spirit flight they'd charge you an extra $30. I'm surprised they aren't charging us extra for us to bring Gavin as carry-on. It would actually be cheaper to check him.
Friday, June 18, 2010
Week 24 Day 5: The waking life
Apparently Gavin has decided that the best way to spend his last day with me as a stay-at-home mom is to sleep through it. Dude slept in until past 7 a.m. this morning, which I must admit was quite wonderful. But I put him to sleep for his morning nap around 9 a.m. and he didn't wake up until noon. NOON! I actually went into his room to check on him, make sure he was still alive. It's like he has mono or something. Or suddenly turned into a teenager. Especially since he turned right around and went down at 2:30 for his afternoon nap and continued to sleep until 4. Maybe he just couldn't bear the thought of this being our last official day together as a crime fighting duo.
It is kind of sad, really. I mean, it's not like we're not glad to have Stacy off for the summer and home. Gavin, in fact, still prefers her when he has the choice between the two of us. I suppose this should hurt my feelings, like, "Dude, I can't believe that after all of our bonding time together you're throwing me under the bus" (a dumb, overused expression and quite a horrible thing if you think about it, especially since a friend of mine literally saw a woman get thrown under a bus in Detroit last week. Besides, Gavin can't even pick me up let alone throw me. So I'm safe for now. Give him a few years, though, and I have no doubt that he could scale the Empire State Building with me tucked in his armpit à la King Kong or some shit. Thankfully he is a bear, not a gorilla so I'm safe on that front). Honestly I don't blame him. Stacy's got the hoots. It's like, hey, driving an ice cream truck might be fun, but if you've got the choice between an empty truck or a truck filled with ice cream, the choice is pretty clear. Provided the freezers were working and stuff. Otherwise you'd have all of this melting ice cream and you'd either have to give it away or eat it as fast as you could and then you'd probably feel sick, plus the floor of the truck would be all sticky and yellow jackets would be dive bombing that shit and the whole thing would no doubt be really stressful and not fun at all it turns out. But Stacy's freezers are working, so we're cool. Let's not get carried away here.
By the way, we call the ice cream truck the "music truck," a trick we picked up from our friend Rosemary whose four-year-old daughter has yet to catch on. We plan to keep this up for as long as possible. And why wouldn't a truck just drive around neighborhoods playing music for people? Totally normal, kid. Totally normal life.
Stacy actually ended up coming home a little bit early today since it was her last day and all. She said she waited as long as she could because she didn't want to crash our party, not realizing that it was, to Gavin anyway, a slumber party in the most literal sense.
We took Gavin to the library because Stacy had yet to see him in action there and it was just too hot to play outside. At the library a child, perhaps 7-years-old, jumped on top of me, using my back as a springboard to escape the clutches of a slightly older girl as I sat on one of the little couches watching Gavin play on the floor with the Duplo blocks he so badly wanted to put in his mouth. His mother, who was sitting on the other couch, looked up briefly from the library newsletter she was studying intently to say, "Sorry." She then yelled at her son regarding the girl, "Stop smothering her." Sound parental advice for a 7-year-old. Maybe he calls her too much and hates it when she spends time with her friends. It's something that he should really learn to control now before he grows up and Destiny's Child writes a song about him. Watch and learn, Gavin. Watch and learn.
So. What now? My life as a full-time mom has come to an end. Stacy's home for the summer, then we both start work again in the fall. I'll be with Gavin Tuesdays and Thursdays, but on MWF he'll be in daycare learning how to be a juvenile delinquent I'm sure. His chances of being bitten in the face by another child will also rise exponentially, which is how it should be. It's a scary world out there and he's gotta learn that eventually. I'm kidding. Note to his future daycare cohort: "Please don't bite my son. Seriously. Grow up." Of course, there's always the chance that my son could be the biter, which will inevitably be blamed on the fact that he has no father and is being raised by a couple of sex perverts (not the term Stacy and I use for ourselves, mind you. But there certainly are people out there who feel that way).
I actually can't believe it all went by so fast. Gavin's practically in college now. Full ride scholarship, of course. We're very proud of him.
As for the blog, don't worry, I'm not going anywhere. Just not necessarily five days a week, Monday through Friday. Whatever you do, don't cry. Because, seriously, why would you? I just said I'm not going anywhere. And even if I were, you need to pull it together. I've got a child to raise here. I don't have time to coddle you.
It is kind of sad, really. I mean, it's not like we're not glad to have Stacy off for the summer and home. Gavin, in fact, still prefers her when he has the choice between the two of us. I suppose this should hurt my feelings, like, "Dude, I can't believe that after all of our bonding time together you're throwing me under the bus" (a dumb, overused expression and quite a horrible thing if you think about it, especially since a friend of mine literally saw a woman get thrown under a bus in Detroit last week. Besides, Gavin can't even pick me up let alone throw me. So I'm safe for now. Give him a few years, though, and I have no doubt that he could scale the Empire State Building with me tucked in his armpit à la King Kong or some shit. Thankfully he is a bear, not a gorilla so I'm safe on that front). Honestly I don't blame him. Stacy's got the hoots. It's like, hey, driving an ice cream truck might be fun, but if you've got the choice between an empty truck or a truck filled with ice cream, the choice is pretty clear. Provided the freezers were working and stuff. Otherwise you'd have all of this melting ice cream and you'd either have to give it away or eat it as fast as you could and then you'd probably feel sick, plus the floor of the truck would be all sticky and yellow jackets would be dive bombing that shit and the whole thing would no doubt be really stressful and not fun at all it turns out. But Stacy's freezers are working, so we're cool. Let's not get carried away here.
By the way, we call the ice cream truck the "music truck," a trick we picked up from our friend Rosemary whose four-year-old daughter has yet to catch on. We plan to keep this up for as long as possible. And why wouldn't a truck just drive around neighborhoods playing music for people? Totally normal, kid. Totally normal life.
Stacy actually ended up coming home a little bit early today since it was her last day and all. She said she waited as long as she could because she didn't want to crash our party, not realizing that it was, to Gavin anyway, a slumber party in the most literal sense.
We took Gavin to the library because Stacy had yet to see him in action there and it was just too hot to play outside. At the library a child, perhaps 7-years-old, jumped on top of me, using my back as a springboard to escape the clutches of a slightly older girl as I sat on one of the little couches watching Gavin play on the floor with the Duplo blocks he so badly wanted to put in his mouth. His mother, who was sitting on the other couch, looked up briefly from the library newsletter she was studying intently to say, "Sorry." She then yelled at her son regarding the girl, "Stop smothering her." Sound parental advice for a 7-year-old. Maybe he calls her too much and hates it when she spends time with her friends. It's something that he should really learn to control now before he grows up and Destiny's Child writes a song about him. Watch and learn, Gavin. Watch and learn.
So. What now? My life as a full-time mom has come to an end. Stacy's home for the summer, then we both start work again in the fall. I'll be with Gavin Tuesdays and Thursdays, but on MWF he'll be in daycare learning how to be a juvenile delinquent I'm sure. His chances of being bitten in the face by another child will also rise exponentially, which is how it should be. It's a scary world out there and he's gotta learn that eventually. I'm kidding. Note to his future daycare cohort: "Please don't bite my son. Seriously. Grow up." Of course, there's always the chance that my son could be the biter, which will inevitably be blamed on the fact that he has no father and is being raised by a couple of sex perverts (not the term Stacy and I use for ourselves, mind you. But there certainly are people out there who feel that way).
I actually can't believe it all went by so fast. Gavin's practically in college now. Full ride scholarship, of course. We're very proud of him.
As for the blog, don't worry, I'm not going anywhere. Just not necessarily five days a week, Monday through Friday. Whatever you do, don't cry. Because, seriously, why would you? I just said I'm not going anywhere. And even if I were, you need to pull it together. I've got a child to raise here. I don't have time to coddle you.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Week 24 Day 4: India.Babie
Gavin's Aunt Laura is a huge Bollywood fan (and will be quick to tell you that she has been long before Slumdog Millionaire) and so when she saw a poster for the A.R. Rahman Jai Ho Concert World Tour she sent me an email that said, "Needless to say, HOLY SHIT I WANT TO GO!!" And since the concert is on Stacy's birthday and Stacy also wants to go, we are going. I have little choice in the matter. And so today Laura, Gavin, and I headed out to the sari shop Laura had seen the poster at to buy tickets. She did not know the name of the shop, only that it was next to a grocery store she'd been to previously. The store was closed when we got there so we looked around in the Indian grocery store where Laura bought a bootleg DVD of some Bollywood movie I have, of course, never heard of and where I thrust random grocery items into Gavin's hand for a photo op. Thankfully Laura had her camera phone since I neglected to bring mine. Then we had lunch first at the smallest Indian restaurant I have ever been in. Laura and I split the lunch special, Gavin ate green beans and peach oatmeal baby food that I brought along. He also ate bits of naan we tore off for him as well as his O's, organic Cheerio-like cereal. He was a very, very good boy and was quite popular among the waitress and the other three or four people in there having lunch, too. He got and gave lots of smiles. He did, however, leave a lot of O's and naan shrapnel on the floor under his highchair. It's too bad we didn't take Henri with us.
After lunch we headed back to the clothing shop which was, indeed, now open. The man behind the counter was very nice and quite enthusiastic about his shop. Both he and Laura wanted me to buy Gavin a little traditional Indian suit. I declined, although Laura has already dictated that when Gavin needs a suit I should either get him that or go to one of the shops near her in Hamtramck and get him a brightly colored suit that usually only black boys wear. It's a shame, really, that so many white folks dress their sons in such drab formal wear. I mean, what better age to pull off an electric purple suit? No navy blue for {ITAL my} son, that's for sure.
The shop owner thought Gavin was very cute and asked us if we'd seen the video online of the little baby doing a Latin dance on a kitchen table. We hadn't and he urged us to look it up when we got home. He was very excited about it. And so I looked it up and, sure enough, it's all over the place online. The baby is quite a good dancer, though, in my opinion, far too young to be standing on a kitchen table. That's just not safe.
On the way home Laura insisted that we stop at Doc Sweets' Candy Co. in Clawson even though I told her that Gavin needed to get home for his nap. But noooooooo. She had to have her candy. Gavin was a trooper and Laura got her Zagnut bars, but once Gavin and I got home there was trouble. He nodded off in the car which is often not a big deal, today, however, he apparently decided that his 10 minute snooze en route was plenty of rest and certainly a fine substitution for us usual 2 hour-ish afternoon nap. I put him to bed at 2:30 and he cried for an hour. Not full-throat "my life is hell" screaming. Not for the full hour anyway. But there were unhappy sounds of varying intensity until he got quiet a little after 3:30. Stacy got home at 4 and he woke soon after that. Not the kind of rest a baby needs around here.
Suffice to say, he was pretty cranky in the late afternoon and when Stacy tried to put him to bed early he lost his mind. I voted for reprieve since he was acting tired, but not sleepy, which only resulted in him channeling his energies into screaming and fighting sleep rather than drifting off. He came out in the living room and played for awhile, pushing his walker around and then pushing this green canvas box we have in the living room for his toys around the floor. It was only after he seemed to be ramping up to manic that we decided to slow things down and Stacy put him back to bed. After an hour of crying he finally slept.
Tomorrow's my last day of stay-at-home-momhood. We're going out with a bang. It's going to be AMAZING but I don't want to spoil it (a.k.a. I have no idea what we're going to do).
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Week 24 Day 3: Waffle, yeah...
Grandpa Mike came over today with the dogs, Louie and Charlie. His dogs are kind of insane, especially Louie, a pug, but still sweet. Gavin loved them, though. He was so excited, squeaking and squawking and jumping up and down. Much like Louie, in fact. Grandpa Mike and the dogs were going to the Detroit Humane Society, where Louie and Charlie both came from, to meet their potential new brother, a chihuahua-mix named "Rocket," no doubt named after the Def Leppard song because of how chihuahuas are notorious hair metal fans.
Damn it, now that song is stuck in my head. And I have no idea what they're saying after, "Rocket, yeah..." It sounds like "Lady lie-dy loo." Probably that's it exactly.
Grandpa Mike also brought some early birthday presents for Gavin. Not sure what the hurry was, exactly, but Gavin now has a circus animal shapes waffle maker. Because that's what every one-year-old needs. Well, we never did get a wipes warmer, so maybe this thing can work in his room after all. I'm kidding. It's a very sweet gift and my dad is excited to make waffles for Gavin. I have never been excited to make waffles for anyone in my life, but making food for Gavin is often very gratifying. Not always, mind you. But he's open to a lot of new things right now. I know once he's a toddler that all shuts down and he will subsist on a diet of white bread and American cheese slices, but for now he's a little foodie.
Gavin and I did, indeed, go to get the van's oil changed as I said yesterday we would. It was very exciting for him. Okay, probably not true. But it was a new experience. As for me, I always feel like the guys at the oil change place try to sell you every service they offer by telling you the various fluids in your engine "look dark," and I do my best not to look like a sucker. Except today. Having never taken the van in to get the oil changed before (Stacy has always done it because she is the one who used to drive it all the time) I couldn't find the latch to pop the hood. "Unlock the door and I'll do it for you," the guy said. And so I did and in reached his very dirty and very greasy hand and arm too close for comfort to my bare leg (I was wearing shorts. I wasn't naked or anything. Because I'm sure you needed me to clarify) and pulled the latch located much lower than I would have expected it. And then I didn't know my own license plate number. "And that, Son, is how you look like a sucker at the oil change place."
In mobility news, Gavin is walking on his own, just a couple steps at a time. Before he's only walked when prompted by me or Stacy. Otherwise he'll scale the edges of furniture and crawl or use his walker. But today he was standing up holding onto the leg of his crib and he wanted to be in front of the nursing chair where I was sitting. And so he just let go. And stood there for a moment, before taking one then two steps to get to the chair. He did the same thing from the chair to the bookcase.
When Stacy came home from work today we hung out together with the bear in his room. The two of them were playing "monster baby," in which Gavin "attacks" the grown-up who is prone on the ground. Watching them roll around together was adorable. Gavin was cracking up. Stacy and I are both so in love with him. I can't even imagine a more beautiful little boy.
So apparently I'm going to be rich. Or at least raking in the dough. That's according to a Channel 4 story from Click On Detroit about mom bloggers. I'm not sure what the point of their story is. Are they encouraging moms to get out on the blogosphere (a stupid term) and get they blog on? Or is it more of a "Believe it or not there are actually people who want to hear what mommy-brained ladies have to say. Aren't women cute?" thing. Oh, TV news, with your finger on the pulse of fluff pieces. Thank goodness there isn't anything actually going on in the world worth knowing about. Blog on, ladies!
Damn it, now that song is stuck in my head. And I have no idea what they're saying after, "Rocket, yeah..." It sounds like "Lady lie-dy loo." Probably that's it exactly.
Grandpa Mike also brought some early birthday presents for Gavin. Not sure what the hurry was, exactly, but Gavin now has a circus animal shapes waffle maker. Because that's what every one-year-old needs. Well, we never did get a wipes warmer, so maybe this thing can work in his room after all. I'm kidding. It's a very sweet gift and my dad is excited to make waffles for Gavin. I have never been excited to make waffles for anyone in my life, but making food for Gavin is often very gratifying. Not always, mind you. But he's open to a lot of new things right now. I know once he's a toddler that all shuts down and he will subsist on a diet of white bread and American cheese slices, but for now he's a little foodie.
Gavin and I did, indeed, go to get the van's oil changed as I said yesterday we would. It was very exciting for him. Okay, probably not true. But it was a new experience. As for me, I always feel like the guys at the oil change place try to sell you every service they offer by telling you the various fluids in your engine "look dark," and I do my best not to look like a sucker. Except today. Having never taken the van in to get the oil changed before (Stacy has always done it because she is the one who used to drive it all the time) I couldn't find the latch to pop the hood. "Unlock the door and I'll do it for you," the guy said. And so I did and in reached his very dirty and very greasy hand and arm too close for comfort to my bare leg (I was wearing shorts. I wasn't naked or anything. Because I'm sure you needed me to clarify) and pulled the latch located much lower than I would have expected it. And then I didn't know my own license plate number. "And that, Son, is how you look like a sucker at the oil change place."
In mobility news, Gavin is walking on his own, just a couple steps at a time. Before he's only walked when prompted by me or Stacy. Otherwise he'll scale the edges of furniture and crawl or use his walker. But today he was standing up holding onto the leg of his crib and he wanted to be in front of the nursing chair where I was sitting. And so he just let go. And stood there for a moment, before taking one then two steps to get to the chair. He did the same thing from the chair to the bookcase.
When Stacy came home from work today we hung out together with the bear in his room. The two of them were playing "monster baby," in which Gavin "attacks" the grown-up who is prone on the ground. Watching them roll around together was adorable. Gavin was cracking up. Stacy and I are both so in love with him. I can't even imagine a more beautiful little boy.
So apparently I'm going to be rich. Or at least raking in the dough. That's according to a Channel 4 story from Click On Detroit about mom bloggers. I'm not sure what the point of their story is. Are they encouraging moms to get out on the blogosphere (a stupid term) and get they blog on? Or is it more of a "Believe it or not there are actually people who want to hear what mommy-brained ladies have to say. Aren't women cute?" thing. Oh, TV news, with your finger on the pulse of fluff pieces. Thank goodness there isn't anything actually going on in the world worth knowing about. Blog on, ladies!
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Week 24 Day 2: Mr. P.B. Cups
My dad is getting another dog. He already has two, a pug named Louie and a pug-mix named Charlie, though Charlie technically belongs to my little sister Amanda who lives with him. My dad emailed me a Petfinder listing for a little Chihuahua mix named Rocket. "Wait," I emailed back, "Are you really thinking about getting a 3rd dog?" His response: "Sure. I had five kids..." This, in my opinion, is not a rational response. Having five kids was, I think, crazy (mind you, I don't wish that any of my siblings didn't exist. I mean, the cat's out of the bag now anyway). I've always thought so but especially now that I have one of my own. So using a crazy decision you made to rationalize a crazy decision you're about to make doesn't wash. Granted, getting a third dog is a lot less nuts than having a fifth kid. Although truth be told, Amanda was a "surprise," a.k.a. "accident." A happy accident for me because here we are 19 years later and she frequently babysits Gavin.
It's hard to believe but my tenure as a full time stay at home mom is so quickly coming to a close. This is Stacy's last week teaching and then she's off for the summer. Gavin and I have our last full time day together on Friday. So let's make this week count, people! Tomorrow, for example, I am planning on getting the oil changed in the van. Pedal to the metal of life is what I always say.
"Uncle" Jamie called and invited us to visit her at Detroit Comics so Gavin and I swung by and he tore apart the Ugly Dolls display. He has a knack for destruction. Though this, as destruction goes, was very gentle destruction. Basically he just made a mess. A mess we left for Jamie. But she didn't mind. She loves to to clean up. Okay, that's probably not true. But she's the one who invited him, not me.
Before the comic shop we went to Ace Hardware because I'm trying to teach Gavin to be a man. Okay, not true (I mean, true in the sense that he is a little boy and our goal is for him to grow up to be a happy, well-adjusted, man with superior hygiene, but false in the sense that I think inhaling fertilizer fumes at Ace will make him "manly"). I just had to return something since I am forever going to the hardware store without taking measurements beforehand.
We also stopped at CVS (of course) and while we were there Gavin decided to do a little shopping of his own while my head was turned. He grabbed himself a package of Resse's Peanut Butter Cups, his Aunt Laura's favorite. He was very pleased with himself, as you can see by the picture. Sorry, Laura (who came over after work and actually fed Gavin for the first time), we didn't buy them. Gavin isn't supposed to have peanut butter until he's like, 20, or whatever the allergy guidelines are now. And anyway, we'd rather his first PB experience not be via Reese's. Most likely it'll be via ants on a log or a piece of doorstop bread slathered with natural "stir the oil in so it goes all over your counter" peanut butter. I am ever so hopeful that he will take after Stacy in the cuisine department. Stacy eats very well, super healthy. Me, well, we're working on it. Kind of.
Naps have been a breeze this week. Today there was no crying. At all. Nothing. I rocked him then put him in his crib where he promptly rolled over onto his stomach with his knees tucked under and his butt in the air and goes to sleep. It's almost too good to be true. I'm waiting for the catch, the fine print, the hidden service fees. Actually, I know what the catch is -- this will only last so long and then he'll grow and change and all sleeping bets are off. But for now I'll take it.
====]
(Gavin just reached over and clawed the keyboard and the above is his contribution. I'm not sure what it means. Probably gang related. And no I was not blogging in lieu of watching my son. Stacy is home and he is attended. But also fast.)
It's hard to believe but my tenure as a full time stay at home mom is so quickly coming to a close. This is Stacy's last week teaching and then she's off for the summer. Gavin and I have our last full time day together on Friday. So let's make this week count, people! Tomorrow, for example, I am planning on getting the oil changed in the van. Pedal to the metal of life is what I always say.
Before the comic shop we went to Ace Hardware because I'm trying to teach Gavin to be a man. Okay, not true (I mean, true in the sense that he is a little boy and our goal is for him to grow up to be a happy, well-adjusted, man with superior hygiene, but false in the sense that I think inhaling fertilizer fumes at Ace will make him "manly"). I just had to return something since I am forever going to the hardware store without taking measurements beforehand.
We also stopped at CVS (of course) and while we were there Gavin decided to do a little shopping of his own while my head was turned. He grabbed himself a package of Resse's Peanut Butter Cups, his Aunt Laura's favorite. He was very pleased with himself, as you can see by the picture. Sorry, Laura (who came over after work and actually fed Gavin for the first time), we didn't buy them. Gavin isn't supposed to have peanut butter until he's like, 20, or whatever the allergy guidelines are now. And anyway, we'd rather his first PB experience not be via Reese's. Most likely it'll be via ants on a log or a piece of doorstop bread slathered with natural "stir the oil in so it goes all over your counter" peanut butter. I am ever so hopeful that he will take after Stacy in the cuisine department. Stacy eats very well, super healthy. Me, well, we're working on it. Kind of.Naps have been a breeze this week. Today there was no crying. At all. Nothing. I rocked him then put him in his crib where he promptly rolled over onto his stomach with his knees tucked under and his butt in the air and goes to sleep. It's almost too good to be true. I'm waiting for the catch, the fine print, the hidden service fees. Actually, I know what the catch is -- this will only last so long and then he'll grow and change and all sleeping bets are off. But for now I'll take it.
====]
(Gavin just reached over and clawed the keyboard and the above is his contribution. I'm not sure what it means. Probably gang related. And no I was not blogging in lieu of watching my son. Stacy is home and he is attended. But also fast.)
Monday, June 14, 2010
Week 24 Day 1: Stair master
I think we should start with the breast milk custard. Wait, let me back up. I should preface that by saying this weekend was one of much culinary experimentation. On Stacy's part, mind you, not mine. She's always puréeing something so that Gavin can eat it and trying new things out on him. Healthy things, mind you. Gavin eats such healthy food that his poo is probably healthier than anything you can get from McDonald's. Not that I'm willing to test that theory. Still. So over the weekend Stacy made a remark about how it was a shame that Gavin couldn't drink cow's milk because she would really like to make some custard for him because she thought he would really like it. The first thing out of my mouth was, "Why don't you just use breast milk?" Honestly, I don't even know if I was being serious or not. But Stacy was all for it.
What I've learned about cooking with breast milk: it isn't the same consistency or density as cow's milk. It also smells terrible. In my opinion. I can't help but associate breast milk with baby vomit and I do not like the smell of vomit for some strange reason. Fresh breast milk doesn't smell bad, but the stuff that's been frozen and then thawed does, especially if heated. Needless to say, I didn't eat any of the custard. But Gavin did and liked it very much. Stacy also tried it, and deemed it a success more or less. So maybe there will be more breast milk custard in Gavin's future. Though I wouldn't be sad if that weren't the case.
Stacy also made a strange, viscous pudding-like substance made out of purple cauliflower blended with tofu. The hue of the resulting foodstuff was a greyish lavender. I fed him some of this concoction for lunch today and he gobbled it down. It feels very strange to spoon feed your child something that looks so much like a desert and yet is so, so far away from being a desert. Then again, I've been to Japan and tasted traditional Japanese deserts. So this stuff could totally be a desert in Japan.
Also on the menu: turnip greens. Very healthy, but they taste like weeds. Not a stand-alone food in my opinion. Or Gavin's. They were rejected -- via tears and gagging -- when administered alone, but mixed with yogurt they were welcomed with an open mouth.
In elevation news Gavin can now climb stairs. We went to Stacy's brother David's house, two-story duplex, over the weekend and Gavin took to the stairs like he'd been born on them. We didn't let him climb the stairs unsupervised, of course. In fact, one of us stayed right behind him with our hands around but not quite touching his waist. Because getting up is one thing. As David said, "All babies are born able to get down the stairs." It's the surviving the fall part that's the trick.
And fall he did, but not down the stairs. He fell headfirst into the empty bathtub, something I have been predicting for weeks now. See, he likes to throw things into the bathtub and then reach in and get them. His height poses a problem here because to get something out of the tub he has to lean way in, basically resting his little pelvis against the side of the tub with his toes barely touching the ground. He's a top-heavy little dude so I always discourage this game. Unfortunately Stacy does not and he was in the bathroom with her while she was blowdrying her hair and went after a washcloth and bam! He was fine, though a little shaken up. After all the empty tub does have a pretty loud echo when you drop, say, a bottle of shampoo, not to mention a child headfirst into it. But as Stacy said, he fell slowly, kind of sliding into the tub rather than doing a back flip which is why he's fine.
In sleeping news, Gavin went down for both his naps today without a single whimper or tear. I put him in his crib, he flipped over onto his stomach and pulled in his knees so his little butt was in the air and turned his head away from me, both times exactly the same. And when Stacy put him down tonight he cried for maybe 30 seconds. I'm not sure what's changed except for the fact that he's older now. Weeks make a huge difference at this age. Also I think he's kind of gotten used to a certain pattern and knows what to expect at bedtime. I have been very consistent about his bedtime routine which features rocking to Sade's song "Skin" for 4 minutes and 12 seconds, and then putting him in his crib when "The Safest Place" starts, and then quietly leaving the room. I can't say I'm enormously thrilled with the music, but if you're going to pick music to fall asleep to, Sade is a pretty apt choice.
What I've learned about cooking with breast milk: it isn't the same consistency or density as cow's milk. It also smells terrible. In my opinion. I can't help but associate breast milk with baby vomit and I do not like the smell of vomit for some strange reason. Fresh breast milk doesn't smell bad, but the stuff that's been frozen and then thawed does, especially if heated. Needless to say, I didn't eat any of the custard. But Gavin did and liked it very much. Stacy also tried it, and deemed it a success more or less. So maybe there will be more breast milk custard in Gavin's future. Though I wouldn't be sad if that weren't the case.
Stacy also made a strange, viscous pudding-like substance made out of purple cauliflower blended with tofu. The hue of the resulting foodstuff was a greyish lavender. I fed him some of this concoction for lunch today and he gobbled it down. It feels very strange to spoon feed your child something that looks so much like a desert and yet is so, so far away from being a desert. Then again, I've been to Japan and tasted traditional Japanese deserts. So this stuff could totally be a desert in Japan.
Also on the menu: turnip greens. Very healthy, but they taste like weeds. Not a stand-alone food in my opinion. Or Gavin's. They were rejected -- via tears and gagging -- when administered alone, but mixed with yogurt they were welcomed with an open mouth.
In elevation news Gavin can now climb stairs. We went to Stacy's brother David's house, two-story duplex, over the weekend and Gavin took to the stairs like he'd been born on them. We didn't let him climb the stairs unsupervised, of course. In fact, one of us stayed right behind him with our hands around but not quite touching his waist. Because getting up is one thing. As David said, "All babies are born able to get down the stairs." It's the surviving the fall part that's the trick.
And fall he did, but not down the stairs. He fell headfirst into the empty bathtub, something I have been predicting for weeks now. See, he likes to throw things into the bathtub and then reach in and get them. His height poses a problem here because to get something out of the tub he has to lean way in, basically resting his little pelvis against the side of the tub with his toes barely touching the ground. He's a top-heavy little dude so I always discourage this game. Unfortunately Stacy does not and he was in the bathroom with her while she was blowdrying her hair and went after a washcloth and bam! He was fine, though a little shaken up. After all the empty tub does have a pretty loud echo when you drop, say, a bottle of shampoo, not to mention a child headfirst into it. But as Stacy said, he fell slowly, kind of sliding into the tub rather than doing a back flip which is why he's fine.
In sleeping news, Gavin went down for both his naps today without a single whimper or tear. I put him in his crib, he flipped over onto his stomach and pulled in his knees so his little butt was in the air and turned his head away from me, both times exactly the same. And when Stacy put him down tonight he cried for maybe 30 seconds. I'm not sure what's changed except for the fact that he's older now. Weeks make a huge difference at this age. Also I think he's kind of gotten used to a certain pattern and knows what to expect at bedtime. I have been very consistent about his bedtime routine which features rocking to Sade's song "Skin" for 4 minutes and 12 seconds, and then putting him in his crib when "The Safest Place" starts, and then quietly leaving the room. I can't say I'm enormously thrilled with the music, but if you're going to pick music to fall asleep to, Sade is a pretty apt choice.
Friday, June 11, 2010
Week 23 Day 5: Little bruiser
I got an email from my sister Christine that said, "I had a dream last night where I had to carry Gavin about 20 miles in the heat and I was scared he was going to get sick. Strangely, his hands turned into penguin flippers and he explained to me, in great detail, that he could swim home. He then asked me why he wasn't allowed to eat McDonalds."
Woah. And no, Christine doesn't do drugs. I'm glad to see that she went to extreme lengths to take care of my son in adverse conditions. But I am really glad that Gavin is not secretly a penguin. I've been to the Detroit Zoo Penguinarium. The smell is not pleasant. She is right about one thing, however. When Gavin wants to know why he isn't allowed to eat McDonalds I am totally going to Christine, a committed vegan, to explain it to him.
Gavin scraped his face today in a sidewalk mishap. Stacy had wandered over to a neighbor's house with him while my sister Amanda and I were getting ready to go to the grocery store (a fun family outting). And when I say "wandered over" I mean exactly that. Amanda and I were ready to leave but couldn't find her and Gavin anywhere. She told me she'd be right outside but then she wasn't. In any case, while she was over there she let him crawl around on the grass, but he's a quick little bugger and he took off toward the walk way and went over the single cement step to the sidewalk. It was a very, very minor scrape, but I have to say I did not like seeing blood on my boy's face. He cheeks are so, so soft and beautiful. I want no harm to befall them. He seemed really unfazed when they came home, smiling at me and Amanda. I think he's gonna make it. I've been told that boy babies get hurt more than girl babies. I don't know if that's actually true, but Gavin certainly is a daring little bear.
So yeah, we went to the grocery store. As a family. That's how we roll. I know, I know. We have a child now. We need to slow it down. It's not good for him to have such wild and crazy moms. He's a baby in the fast lane.
I woke up this morning to a story on NPR about Jackie and Scott Miller, a mother and her gay adopted son. It was a StoryCorps interview between the two of them. The love they had for each other is so evident. "I worry that you'll never know how deeply I love you and how scary it is sometimes to imagine life without you," Scott tells his mom, who is 73. Jackie replies, "That's something I can't make better for you. And I don't doubt that it will be tough, but you'll be OK. The thing that's been wonderful, Sweetheart, is that we spend a lot of time together, and you'll have those memories." I got all choked up. Granted, I almost always do when I hear NPR's StoryCorps pieces, but I can't help but think this one had a deeper impact on me now that I'm a mom and, by some accounts, the mom of an adopted son (though I certainly don't feel that way, DNA says otherwise). I really hope that Gavin and I have a relationship like Scott and Jackie's when I'm an old lady. And that I'll have such a good attitude about what will happen when I'm gone.
Lisa sent me a link to a video of a little boy climbing out of his crib with the message, "Don't show this to Gavin." The kid in the video is pretty adorable, I must say. And he does remind me of Gavin, although this kid is twice Gavin's age. The video title is "Adam Ernest climbs out of his crib for the first time," though I kind of doubt this is the first time. And if it is, who the hell is taping this and why don't they try to stop him? I mean, he does fall, after all. He isn't hurt, but if that was my kid I wouldn't wait to see what happens once he got his leg was swung over the rail. Just saying. Perhaps even more bizzare is just how many "kid climbs out of crib" videos there are on YouTube. Alongside the Adam Ernest video alone there are 18 listed. There's also a video called "Toddler dunks head in toilet" in which a one-year-old does, well, just that while someone obviously older than him, possibly his mother, films him and laughs. WTF? It speaks poorly of our society that this video has over 400,000 views. However, society is somewhat redeemed by the fact that the two highest rated comments for this video are, "If you dont want him to dunk his head in the toilet.....stop filming and grab him!" and "are his parents retarted?"
Woah. And no, Christine doesn't do drugs. I'm glad to see that she went to extreme lengths to take care of my son in adverse conditions. But I am really glad that Gavin is not secretly a penguin. I've been to the Detroit Zoo Penguinarium. The smell is not pleasant. She is right about one thing, however. When Gavin wants to know why he isn't allowed to eat McDonalds I am totally going to Christine, a committed vegan, to explain it to him.
So yeah, we went to the grocery store. As a family. That's how we roll. I know, I know. We have a child now. We need to slow it down. It's not good for him to have such wild and crazy moms. He's a baby in the fast lane.
I woke up this morning to a story on NPR about Jackie and Scott Miller, a mother and her gay adopted son. It was a StoryCorps interview between the two of them. The love they had for each other is so evident. "I worry that you'll never know how deeply I love you and how scary it is sometimes to imagine life without you," Scott tells his mom, who is 73. Jackie replies, "That's something I can't make better for you. And I don't doubt that it will be tough, but you'll be OK. The thing that's been wonderful, Sweetheart, is that we spend a lot of time together, and you'll have those memories." I got all choked up. Granted, I almost always do when I hear NPR's StoryCorps pieces, but I can't help but think this one had a deeper impact on me now that I'm a mom and, by some accounts, the mom of an adopted son (though I certainly don't feel that way, DNA says otherwise). I really hope that Gavin and I have a relationship like Scott and Jackie's when I'm an old lady. And that I'll have such a good attitude about what will happen when I'm gone.
Lisa sent me a link to a video of a little boy climbing out of his crib with the message, "Don't show this to Gavin." The kid in the video is pretty adorable, I must say. And he does remind me of Gavin, although this kid is twice Gavin's age. The video title is "Adam Ernest climbs out of his crib for the first time," though I kind of doubt this is the first time. And if it is, who the hell is taping this and why don't they try to stop him? I mean, he does fall, after all. He isn't hurt, but if that was my kid I wouldn't wait to see what happens once he got his leg was swung over the rail. Just saying. Perhaps even more bizzare is just how many "kid climbs out of crib" videos there are on YouTube. Alongside the Adam Ernest video alone there are 18 listed. There's also a video called "Toddler dunks head in toilet" in which a one-year-old does, well, just that while someone obviously older than him, possibly his mother, films him and laughs. WTF? It speaks poorly of our society that this video has over 400,000 views. However, society is somewhat redeemed by the fact that the two highest rated comments for this video are, "If you dont want him to dunk his head in the toilet.....stop filming and grab him!" and "are his parents retarted?"
Week 23 Day 4: Drool, tears, and snot
I have baby drool, tears, and snot in my armpit. But hey, just another day in the life. Thug mama life. Or something. This bodily fluid tableau is the result of soothing an angry Bear to sleep this evening. Stacy had already tried to soothe him once. Twice if you count putting him to bed initially. Things were rough. There was a lot of crying. And hollering. And screaming, even. And to think I had just told Stacy that he didn't cry at all when I put him down for his afternoon nap. Apparently he was saving it up. In any case, by the time my turn to soothe him came I was wearing a tank top and what usually results gets absorbed into the shoulder of whatever shirt I'm wearing now resulted in a steady stream flowing down my back. And it was cold. And it really grossed me out at first, but I had bigger, sadder things to contend with at that moment so I tried to psych myself into believing that it was just my own sweat. Like maybe I'd just been running really hard. Because that's something that happens to me. (That is not something that happens to me.)
But the moral of the story is: he's asleep! Thank God. Now somebody get me a towel...
I've gotten two calls in two days from someone at A Place For Mom. The lady was asking for someone named Susan so I hope it really was a wrong number and not Gavin trying to get an early jump on his inheritance (he's going to be very disappointed). Hopefully Gavin never needs to call a place like that because both of his moms live until a ripe old age yet never lose control of their physical or mental faculties.
Gavin pinched my nipple really, really hard this morning. Not a nice way to wake up. But he's so used to manhandling Stacy's nipples that I don't think he thought about the fact that mine have not been through baby spring training and are therefore not up to being handled like a cow udder. Gavin was in bed with us because Stacy almost always brings him into our bedroom for his first nurse of the morning. It's quite a nice routine, I must say. I like waking up next to Stacy and Gavin, even if that means that I have occasionally awoken to feel a tiny hand slap my face or have a tiny fist clenching my hair. But this morning I was sleeping without a shirt on (I know, I know. Too much information! But it was really warm in our room! And I'm trying to set the scene for this little story I shouldn't in my good mind be relaying in the first place). I don't do well with sleeping when it's too hot. In any case, Gavin apparently noticed this lack of attire and BAM. Almost makes me wish I was one of those girls who has to wear a bra to bed (no, it doesn't).
One of my favorite websites is Awkward Family Photos and if you haven't checked it out you really are missing out on the meaning of life. Or close to it. In any case, there were three photos I saw yesterday that really summed up parenting. This one reminded me of my childhood, not because of any co-toileting escapades, but because the woman looks a lot like my mom and this is a view of her I saw often as a child. She was always reading a book and she could tune out nearly anything while reading. I suspect that Gavin will have similar memories of me since I read as much as I can. Sometimes I read when I'm hanging out with him. Not to ignore him, mind you, but if we're in his room he'll often play quietly with his toys and I'll read a few pages of a book. For awhile I felt guilty that I did this thinking I should be taking in every second of his babyhood and/or interacting with him, naming the color and shape of everything he picked up, for example ("Oh, you have a piece of dog food. Brown. Circle. Not for mouths"), but today proved to me that I've been doing the right thing by not micromanaging his playtime. I had to take him to an appointment today and I brought some toys to occupy him and he was so, so good, playing by himself (under direct supervision, of course) for a good length of time. Certainly longer than one could ever expect of a 10-month-old. As for the reading part, I think sneaking a page or two at a time of a book while I watch him is okay. It helps compensate for the lack of grown-up conversation I get in a day. And thankfully I am not one who tunes the whole world out while reading. Stacy is another story. Once while she was reading one of the Twilight books she was so engrossed that she didn't notice Emma, my sister's 60+ lb. greyhound who used to live with us, standing right next to her by the back door asking to go out. Emma is super polite and not a barker so when Stacy ignored her she waited until she couldn't wait any more and took a dump on the kitchen floor right next to Stacy's chair. But it wasn't until I came home who knows how much later and said, "What's that smell... Jesus, God, Honey, what in the hell is wrong with you?" that she even noticed. So Stacy's reading habits are really a liability as far as babysitting is concerned.
But the moral of the story is: he's asleep! Thank God. Now somebody get me a towel...
I've gotten two calls in two days from someone at A Place For Mom. The lady was asking for someone named Susan so I hope it really was a wrong number and not Gavin trying to get an early jump on his inheritance (he's going to be very disappointed). Hopefully Gavin never needs to call a place like that because both of his moms live until a ripe old age yet never lose control of their physical or mental faculties.
Gavin pinched my nipple really, really hard this morning. Not a nice way to wake up. But he's so used to manhandling Stacy's nipples that I don't think he thought about the fact that mine have not been through baby spring training and are therefore not up to being handled like a cow udder. Gavin was in bed with us because Stacy almost always brings him into our bedroom for his first nurse of the morning. It's quite a nice routine, I must say. I like waking up next to Stacy and Gavin, even if that means that I have occasionally awoken to feel a tiny hand slap my face or have a tiny fist clenching my hair. But this morning I was sleeping without a shirt on (I know, I know. Too much information! But it was really warm in our room! And I'm trying to set the scene for this little story I shouldn't in my good mind be relaying in the first place). I don't do well with sleeping when it's too hot. In any case, Gavin apparently noticed this lack of attire and BAM. Almost makes me wish I was one of those girls who has to wear a bra to bed (no, it doesn't).
One of my favorite websites is Awkward Family Photos and if you haven't checked it out you really are missing out on the meaning of life. Or close to it. In any case, there were three photos I saw yesterday that really summed up parenting. This one reminded me of my childhood, not because of any co-toileting escapades, but because the woman looks a lot like my mom and this is a view of her I saw often as a child. She was always reading a book and she could tune out nearly anything while reading. I suspect that Gavin will have similar memories of me since I read as much as I can. Sometimes I read when I'm hanging out with him. Not to ignore him, mind you, but if we're in his room he'll often play quietly with his toys and I'll read a few pages of a book. For awhile I felt guilty that I did this thinking I should be taking in every second of his babyhood and/or interacting with him, naming the color and shape of everything he picked up, for example ("Oh, you have a piece of dog food. Brown. Circle. Not for mouths"), but today proved to me that I've been doing the right thing by not micromanaging his playtime. I had to take him to an appointment today and I brought some toys to occupy him and he was so, so good, playing by himself (under direct supervision, of course) for a good length of time. Certainly longer than one could ever expect of a 10-month-old. As for the reading part, I think sneaking a page or two at a time of a book while I watch him is okay. It helps compensate for the lack of grown-up conversation I get in a day. And thankfully I am not one who tunes the whole world out while reading. Stacy is another story. Once while she was reading one of the Twilight books she was so engrossed that she didn't notice Emma, my sister's 60+ lb. greyhound who used to live with us, standing right next to her by the back door asking to go out. Emma is super polite and not a barker so when Stacy ignored her she waited until she couldn't wait any more and took a dump on the kitchen floor right next to Stacy's chair. But it wasn't until I came home who knows how much later and said, "What's that smell... Jesus, God, Honey, what in the hell is wrong with you?" that she even noticed. So Stacy's reading habits are really a liability as far as babysitting is concerned.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Week 23 Day 3: Rock out with your [socks off]
My pregnant neighbor is outside smoking, absentmindedly rubbing her belly. They're having a girl. Due really soon. They must be so excited.
Speaking of excited, the best thing to happen all day was getting this photo of my son rocking out in his stroller. Brad, the man behind Baby 2 Momz, made it for us. I plan to have it blown up and framed. I'm not going to lie, I'd love it if Gavin became an ax-man. Laura wants him to be a drummer, but I'm hoping he'll pick up the guitar even if that does mean an inevitable annoying obsession with Jimi Hendrix during his adolescence.
Speaking of annoying (I'm going to try to use this segue as much as possible), one of Gavin's new party tricks is to try to pull his bib off while I'm feeding him. I am not sure what his objection is, but he is certainly quite adamant about it. Some of his bibs have snap or Velcro closures and he can tear those off Hulk Hogan style, but he also has some over the head bibs that he can't and boy does this piss him off. As you can imagine, trying to feed a child who has either flipped his bib over his face or has his hands and arms a-flailing in front of his face in a desperate attempt to escape from bib hell is next to impossible. The probability of him bumping the spoon with his hand and then rubbing said food into his eyes is very high. I try to be as patient as possible, tucking his bib back down, gently taking his hands away from his face so I can get a spoon in there. But it's hard. I've explained to him that there are some non-negotiable items in his life and that this was one of them. And I've told him that these items apply to all people in the house, not just him. It's just that he's usually the only one impacted by these items. They include, "When you have poop in your pants you have to change your pants" and "When you have food on your face and hands you have to wash your face and hands." It's only logical that people who get lots of food on their hands and faces every time they eat have to wear a bib. Someone suggested just feeding him in his diaper and I have done that before on a really hot day. Unfortunately he was eating some weird Japanese green Stacy had pureed up for him and it stained his chest green. Going bibless also exposes his high chair straps to food contact and those things aren't easy to take out and clean. I think it might be time for a painter's smock. Something that he can't tear his way out of so easily.
Gavin needs more kids his age to play with when we go to the community center. He's at that age where toys become infinitely more desirable if another child is playing with them. So Gavin did a lot of toy snatching today at Kids Zone and the kids were old enough to know that that wasn't cool and they didn't care that he was just a baby, they were playing with that T-Rex figure first and they'll be damned if some little bald boy who can't even walk yet is going to take it and put it in his mouth. Fair enough. There was one little girl there, probably about 4-years-old, who Gavin was managing to really piss off. Not only did he try to snatch her T-Rex, he then tried to use her to pull himself to a standing position, which meant grabbing onto her jacket and yanking. She did not like this, either. Mind you, I stopped him very quickly. I even nipped the T-Rex heist in the bud. But there's only so much I can do. I think it's safe to say that Gavin probably extinguished any future dating possibilities with this girl.
While we were playing a woman walked in with two kids and made a bee-line toward me with a look on her face that said, "Hey, I know you!" But I didn't recognize her at all. But then she asked if I knew her husband Steve and it all became clear to me. She is a friend of a friend and someone I haven't seen for several years. But we got to talking and she's pretty cool and now we're Facebook friends so it's official. I should mention that Gavin tried to pick pocket her, lifting her cell phone right out of her pocket, and yet she still had nothing but nice things to say about him. Her three-year-old son is so, so cute. I don't exactly want Gavin to hurry up and turn three or anything, but seeing a her son made me excited about when Gavin will be that age and how he might be.
So I have a new favorite blog now and I am sharing it with you even though you will undoubtably drop my blog like a pile of hot rocks as soon as you read it. Mimi Smartypants will be your go-to gal for funny musings about parenting and the odd ephemera of life from now on. I understand. I've been left for worse.
Speaking of annoying (I'm going to try to use this segue as much as possible), one of Gavin's new party tricks is to try to pull his bib off while I'm feeding him. I am not sure what his objection is, but he is certainly quite adamant about it. Some of his bibs have snap or Velcro closures and he can tear those off Hulk Hogan style, but he also has some over the head bibs that he can't and boy does this piss him off. As you can imagine, trying to feed a child who has either flipped his bib over his face or has his hands and arms a-flailing in front of his face in a desperate attempt to escape from bib hell is next to impossible. The probability of him bumping the spoon with his hand and then rubbing said food into his eyes is very high. I try to be as patient as possible, tucking his bib back down, gently taking his hands away from his face so I can get a spoon in there. But it's hard. I've explained to him that there are some non-negotiable items in his life and that this was one of them. And I've told him that these items apply to all people in the house, not just him. It's just that he's usually the only one impacted by these items. They include, "When you have poop in your pants you have to change your pants" and "When you have food on your face and hands you have to wash your face and hands." It's only logical that people who get lots of food on their hands and faces every time they eat have to wear a bib. Someone suggested just feeding him in his diaper and I have done that before on a really hot day. Unfortunately he was eating some weird Japanese green Stacy had pureed up for him and it stained his chest green. Going bibless also exposes his high chair straps to food contact and those things aren't easy to take out and clean. I think it might be time for a painter's smock. Something that he can't tear his way out of so easily.
Gavin needs more kids his age to play with when we go to the community center. He's at that age where toys become infinitely more desirable if another child is playing with them. So Gavin did a lot of toy snatching today at Kids Zone and the kids were old enough to know that that wasn't cool and they didn't care that he was just a baby, they were playing with that T-Rex figure first and they'll be damned if some little bald boy who can't even walk yet is going to take it and put it in his mouth. Fair enough. There was one little girl there, probably about 4-years-old, who Gavin was managing to really piss off. Not only did he try to snatch her T-Rex, he then tried to use her to pull himself to a standing position, which meant grabbing onto her jacket and yanking. She did not like this, either. Mind you, I stopped him very quickly. I even nipped the T-Rex heist in the bud. But there's only so much I can do. I think it's safe to say that Gavin probably extinguished any future dating possibilities with this girl.
While we were playing a woman walked in with two kids and made a bee-line toward me with a look on her face that said, "Hey, I know you!" But I didn't recognize her at all. But then she asked if I knew her husband Steve and it all became clear to me. She is a friend of a friend and someone I haven't seen for several years. But we got to talking and she's pretty cool and now we're Facebook friends so it's official. I should mention that Gavin tried to pick pocket her, lifting her cell phone right out of her pocket, and yet she still had nothing but nice things to say about him. Her three-year-old son is so, so cute. I don't exactly want Gavin to hurry up and turn three or anything, but seeing a her son made me excited about when Gavin will be that age and how he might be.
So I have a new favorite blog now and I am sharing it with you even though you will undoubtably drop my blog like a pile of hot rocks as soon as you read it. Mimi Smartypants will be your go-to gal for funny musings about parenting and the odd ephemera of life from now on. I understand. I've been left for worse.
Tuesday, June 8, 2010
Week 23 Day 2: "Uncle" Jamie
Just to clarify things for everyone, "Uncle" Jamie is a girl. Well, she's probably too old to be considered a girl, but calling her a woman sounds way too 5th grade "our changing bodies" filmstrip (sorry, Jamie). We call her "Uncle Jamie" because my sister Laura signed their Christmas card to us "Aunt Laura and Uncle Jamie" as a joke and that has just kind of stuck. Since Jamie is Laura's girlfriend her relationship to Gavin isn't as immediately clear as Laura's, so calling her "Aunt Jamie" felt premature and yet Uncle Jamie works fine for us. My best friend's mother saw a photo of Gavin posing with Jamie and Laura on Facebook and was very confused by the whole Uncle Jamie thing. She even went so far as to ask my friend if Laura's girlfriend was a tranny (she didn't use those words. She was much more reserved and tasteful, but that's not my style). It had not occurred to me that anyone would come to that conclusion, but Jamie is a unisex name (kind of) and Jamie doesn't exactly dress in pink taffeta and sequins. Neither do I for that matter. Not that there would be anything wrong with that. With Jamie wearing taffeta, I mean. Or if Jamie was a trans-boi or whatever kids are calling it these days.
I neglected to mention yesterday that on our walk yesterday - you know, the one where we saw camels - Stacy and I had a pretty in depth discussion about whether or not we want to have a second baby. Her answer is unequivocally yes. Mine is a barely equivocal no. Probably this means that Stacy is a real woman and I am not since women are supposed to want babies, babies, babies. Stacy and I aren't necessarily in direct opposition, however. If I'm not 100% on board then she wouldn't want to do it. Having Gavin was a must for her. If I would have said that I didn't want any children she would have left me and found someone who did. But having a sibling for Gavin is not a deal breaker for her. So. That's where we're at. There's a possibility I could change my mind (not a huge one, but it's there). There is really no possibility that Stacy will change her mind. You know how women are. Once they get their heart set on something... To be continued for sure.
Monday, June 7, 2010
Week 23 Day 1: Two mommies, yes
Gavin took and a half steps on Saturday. This is a new record. He did them in little bursts. Four quick steps. Pause. Four more. Pause. Like in the middle of walking three feet toward me he was all, "Hmm, where was I going again?" Then one and a half as he fell into me. It was very exciting. And terrifying, of course. But as the song goes, "Baby, he was born to walk."
Speaking of steps, we've fallen a few steps back when it comes to putting Gavin to bed, and so we're going through sleep training hell again, albeit on a much smaller level. There's just been a lot of crying at bed time. He doesn't like it when we stop rocking him and put him in his bed. He'd rather us just hold him, thank you very much. But he's a giant dude, and our backs can only take so much. So we're having to let him cry it out a bit each time he goes to sleep. Thankfully it's tapering off. Each time there is less crying. I am not worried (Stacy is a little bit).
I've been sent several links today to stories about a studying finding that kids of lesbian parents are better off than the sad offspring of heteros. According to CNN, "Children from lesbian families rated higher in social, academic and total competence. They also showed lower rates in social, rule-breaking, aggressive problem behavior." Now why would that be? Well, some of the theories are that lesbians don't typically have kids by accident and since their pregnancies are planned they are typically older and more prepared mentally, emotionally, and financially to have a kid.
It's interesting, too, that this particular study started in 1986, which means it tracked lesbian parents for the past 24 years. Things may not be where we want them, but 24 years is an eon in terms of the gay rights movement. And yet this study found that discrimination or other kids being assholes about the whole two mom thing didn't really negatively impacted them. The kids of lesbian parents still come out ahead of their hetero-raised peers. Considering that's what I've been most worried about -- how Gavin will weather the assholism of other kids as he gets older -- this makes me hopeful that over the next 24 years kids won't care or notice so much because having two moms won't be so unusual or taboo any more.
Mind you, I haven't read the study or anything, so I don't know how well designed it was or how accurate its measures, but I still find the whole thing very heartening. There are plenty of folks out there who think that homos need to stay as far away from children as possible and that two women raising children together is an affront to God or whatever. This kind of thinking is in large part why I can't be a legal parent to my own son in the state of Michigan (and in many other states). In the CNN story about the study they quote Wendy Wright, president of the Concerned Women for America, a group that is very far-right and outspokenly anti-gay. She trots out the whole "a kid needs a mother and a father or he/she will be fucked up for life" line. This isn't necessarily true, of course. I mean, sure, there are kids out there with great opposite sex parents who love each other and love their kids. But there are plenty of kids out there with a mother and a father who are assholes. What a kid needs is loving parents who are doing their best. Gavin is lucky because he has that. So what if one of us doesn't have a penis?
I have to admit, though, before we had Gavin there was a little doubt in my mind about having a boy. Granted, there was doubt in my mind about having a girl, too. But at least with a girl we didn't have to make day-one decisions about her genitals. Before we knew we were having a boy -- hell, before we were even pregnant -- I became obsessed with penises. Specifically my potential unborn son's penis. I asked everyone I could think of about their opinions, especially guys I knew. No surprise, people have very strong opinions about this subject. I was always leaning toward not circumcising, but I agonized over whether or not that was the right decision. But the more research I did, the more confident I became that not cutting his little baby penis was the right one. But I definitely had nightmares of my teenage son lamenting that his lesbian moms (read: opposite of penis experts) ruined his life by making the wrong decision about his junk. I am not so worried about this now, though. I'm sure he'll find other, better reasons to claim we ruined his life. Just like any other teenager with any other parents, gay or no.
Speaking of steps, we've fallen a few steps back when it comes to putting Gavin to bed, and so we're going through sleep training hell again, albeit on a much smaller level. There's just been a lot of crying at bed time. He doesn't like it when we stop rocking him and put him in his bed. He'd rather us just hold him, thank you very much. But he's a giant dude, and our backs can only take so much. So we're having to let him cry it out a bit each time he goes to sleep. Thankfully it's tapering off. Each time there is less crying. I am not worried (Stacy is a little bit).
I've been sent several links today to stories about a studying finding that kids of lesbian parents are better off than the sad offspring of heteros. According to CNN, "Children from lesbian families rated higher in social, academic and total competence. They also showed lower rates in social, rule-breaking, aggressive problem behavior." Now why would that be? Well, some of the theories are that lesbians don't typically have kids by accident and since their pregnancies are planned they are typically older and more prepared mentally, emotionally, and financially to have a kid.
It's interesting, too, that this particular study started in 1986, which means it tracked lesbian parents for the past 24 years. Things may not be where we want them, but 24 years is an eon in terms of the gay rights movement. And yet this study found that discrimination or other kids being assholes about the whole two mom thing didn't really negatively impacted them. The kids of lesbian parents still come out ahead of their hetero-raised peers. Considering that's what I've been most worried about -- how Gavin will weather the assholism of other kids as he gets older -- this makes me hopeful that over the next 24 years kids won't care or notice so much because having two moms won't be so unusual or taboo any more.
Mind you, I haven't read the study or anything, so I don't know how well designed it was or how accurate its measures, but I still find the whole thing very heartening. There are plenty of folks out there who think that homos need to stay as far away from children as possible and that two women raising children together is an affront to God or whatever. This kind of thinking is in large part why I can't be a legal parent to my own son in the state of Michigan (and in many other states). In the CNN story about the study they quote Wendy Wright, president of the Concerned Women for America, a group that is very far-right and outspokenly anti-gay. She trots out the whole "a kid needs a mother and a father or he/she will be fucked up for life" line. This isn't necessarily true, of course. I mean, sure, there are kids out there with great opposite sex parents who love each other and love their kids. But there are plenty of kids out there with a mother and a father who are assholes. What a kid needs is loving parents who are doing their best. Gavin is lucky because he has that. So what if one of us doesn't have a penis?
I have to admit, though, before we had Gavin there was a little doubt in my mind about having a boy. Granted, there was doubt in my mind about having a girl, too. But at least with a girl we didn't have to make day-one decisions about her genitals. Before we knew we were having a boy -- hell, before we were even pregnant -- I became obsessed with penises. Specifically my potential unborn son's penis. I asked everyone I could think of about their opinions, especially guys I knew. No surprise, people have very strong opinions about this subject. I was always leaning toward not circumcising, but I agonized over whether or not that was the right decision. But the more research I did, the more confident I became that not cutting his little baby penis was the right one. But I definitely had nightmares of my teenage son lamenting that his lesbian moms (read: opposite of penis experts) ruined his life by making the wrong decision about his junk. I am not so worried about this now, though. I'm sure he'll find other, better reasons to claim we ruined his life. Just like any other teenager with any other parents, gay or no.
Friday, June 4, 2010
Week 22 Day 5: Funeral arrangements
Gavin did not end up going to the funeral service. He used up his morning nap time crying and by the time we would have needed to leave for the funeral he and Stacy were both quite frazzled. Needless to say, the idea of trying to get Gavin to sit quietly through an Episcopal church service had seemed challenging enough before he pulled his no-nap baby stunt. Not that I can blame him. When I was a kid I hated going to church and would do just about anything to get out of it. Still, it would have been nice to have Stacy there next to me.
In the program (is that what it's called?) there was a bio of my grandpa that listed his hobbies and worklife and info about his family. The second to last sentence was, "He recently was blessed with a great grandson, Gavin." I like this very much.
Stacy and Gavin did come to the luncheon afterward, which was also at the church. After the service everyone was so sad and lot of people were crying and though I didn't cry very much it was still sad times all around. So when I saw Gavin and Stacy I really lit up. I was actually in another part of the church trying to call her because I didn't think she'd come and when I finally gave up and went over to where I'd left my family there they were. A miracle, indeed.
Gavin was adorable and served to make people smile just like he did at the viewing. Stacy had him dressed in his navy blue dress pants and a navy blue plaid button down shirt. He looked very sharp. Unfortunately, while I was eating lunch with him on my lap he peed his pants. This shouldn't have been a problem since he pees his pants all day long, but for some reason there was a wardrobe malfunction that resulted in damp pants on his part. I didn't notice at first and at one point I handed him over to Stacy and a couple minutes later felt like the front of my pants were a little damp. Sure enough there was pee on my pants and it wasn't mine. Pee that wasn't mine was also now on Stacy's skirt. Thankfully Stacy and I did not have sartorial casualties as a result, but Gavin needed a costume and a diaper change stat. Unfortunately, the only auxiliary pants we had for him to change into was a pair of grey sweatpants. Classy. Totally the look we were going for. Later my mom was showing him off to friends and relatives and I totally wanted to butt in and say, "We did not dress him in sweatpants for a funeral. He peed through his slacks. These are his emergency pants." I somehow managed to refrain.
After the lunch Stacy took Gavin home and I went with my sisters to the cemetery where there was a military honors service for both my grandpa and my grandma. She died in 2004 and for whatever reason there wasn't a military service then even though she was in the Navy. Grandpa was a marine. Even though I am a peacenik, the whole thing was very moving. And thankfully the marines and the naval officers present only had to fold their flags once. At my Grandpa Mitch's funeral years ago the two officers folded the flag and unfolded it and folded it again so many times that it took awhile before I realized that they weren't enacting some kind of OCD military ritual, they were messing it up. In fact, while they did finally present the flag to my aunt, they went up to her after the funeral and asked if they could please fold it again because they did not feel it had yet been done right. For all I know they ended up being there all night.
After the funeral we went to my grandpa's house where the family gathered and many people drank. Gavin and Stacy joined me once again and Gavin repeated his one-man cuteness show. He is a consummate professional. Granted, he has an early bedtime so we couldn't stay late, but by then I was exhausted myself. And I expect to be exhausted for quite some time.
In the program (is that what it's called?) there was a bio of my grandpa that listed his hobbies and worklife and info about his family. The second to last sentence was, "He recently was blessed with a great grandson, Gavin." I like this very much.
Stacy and Gavin did come to the luncheon afterward, which was also at the church. After the service everyone was so sad and lot of people were crying and though I didn't cry very much it was still sad times all around. So when I saw Gavin and Stacy I really lit up. I was actually in another part of the church trying to call her because I didn't think she'd come and when I finally gave up and went over to where I'd left my family there they were. A miracle, indeed.
Gavin was adorable and served to make people smile just like he did at the viewing. Stacy had him dressed in his navy blue dress pants and a navy blue plaid button down shirt. He looked very sharp. Unfortunately, while I was eating lunch with him on my lap he peed his pants. This shouldn't have been a problem since he pees his pants all day long, but for some reason there was a wardrobe malfunction that resulted in damp pants on his part. I didn't notice at first and at one point I handed him over to Stacy and a couple minutes later felt like the front of my pants were a little damp. Sure enough there was pee on my pants and it wasn't mine. Pee that wasn't mine was also now on Stacy's skirt. Thankfully Stacy and I did not have sartorial casualties as a result, but Gavin needed a costume and a diaper change stat. Unfortunately, the only auxiliary pants we had for him to change into was a pair of grey sweatpants. Classy. Totally the look we were going for. Later my mom was showing him off to friends and relatives and I totally wanted to butt in and say, "We did not dress him in sweatpants for a funeral. He peed through his slacks. These are his emergency pants." I somehow managed to refrain.
After the lunch Stacy took Gavin home and I went with my sisters to the cemetery where there was a military honors service for both my grandpa and my grandma. She died in 2004 and for whatever reason there wasn't a military service then even though she was in the Navy. Grandpa was a marine. Even though I am a peacenik, the whole thing was very moving. And thankfully the marines and the naval officers present only had to fold their flags once. At my Grandpa Mitch's funeral years ago the two officers folded the flag and unfolded it and folded it again so many times that it took awhile before I realized that they weren't enacting some kind of OCD military ritual, they were messing it up. In fact, while they did finally present the flag to my aunt, they went up to her after the funeral and asked if they could please fold it again because they did not feel it had yet been done right. For all I know they ended up being there all night.
After the funeral we went to my grandpa's house where the family gathered and many people drank. Gavin and Stacy joined me once again and Gavin repeated his one-man cuteness show. He is a consummate professional. Granted, he has an early bedtime so we couldn't stay late, but by then I was exhausted myself. And I expect to be exhausted for quite some time.
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Week 22 Day 4: Good Bear ambassador
Today was Gavin's first ever funeral. Or part one of a funeral, I guess. My grandpa's actual funeral is tomorrow. Today was the viewing. Gavin was a very good boy. I think the informal nature of a viewing helped a lot since we could let him crawl around a little bit -- not near the casket or anything, of course. But in the basement of the funeral home there is a little lounge area where we played ball with him and hung out with my sisters. The picture of Gavin and Grandpa that I took last month was blown up to an 8x10 and put among the other photos of Grandpa. I am glad there were so many pictures of him there because the body in the casket didn't look like him at all. I realize that once I'm dead I don't have any control over the situation, but I really, really, really do not want to have a viewing. I do not want to be embalmed, slathered in face-putty, and put on display. So Gavin, if you're reading this years down the line, please take note.
The fact that I have a baby is a little weird to some of my extended family, I think. The gay thing is not their favorite either, though, so this just compounds that. But no one was rude or hostile or anything. Gavin is really cute no matter what you think of his two-mommy family so he's a pretty good ambassador for the homosexual lifestyle. Ha. I kid. But seriously, he is an ambassador of good will that crosses ideological lines. Having him there was a good tension breaker, too, because he's just so full of life and so happy. It helped my mom and my Aunt Bunny to get some Gavin hugs. And my sisters, too. He was ooohed and ahhhed over by a lot of old ladies, as well. At one point my mom was holding him and one woman asked how old he was. I said, "Ten months," and she said, "Are you the mother?" and I pointed at Stacy who was standing on the other side of my mom and said, "We both are." She said, "Oh, okay," in a that-is-slightly-surprising-but-not-at-all-shocking-I'm-totally-hip-to-these-things-it-is-the-90's-after-all kind of way.
There are insane monkey sounds coming from Gavin's playpen right now. Mind you, Gavin is asleep in his room and his playpen is out here in the living room. He has this zoo animals sound puzzle that is, I do believe, possessed. When you take a piece out and put it back in you hear the sound of the animal. The elephant makes an elephant sound, the lion roars, etc. The monkey makes the most insane screeching sound I have ever heard, as does the zebra for that matter. The problem with the puzzle is that you don't have to put the pieces back in place for it to emit animal sounds. If the pieces are left out of the puzzle, which they often are since Gavin's not really great about cleaning up after himself unlike most 10-month-olds, the sounds fire randomly seemingly triggered by nothing. I've noticed that sometimes I'll hear a crazy zebra hoot when I turn off the lights, for example, or parrot sounds when I walk by the puzzle on the floor. At times you don't have to do anything at all. Like right now, all I'm doing is sitting here. But that doesn't stop the animals from randomly yammering. Definitely not a toy you want to keep in your kid's room at night.
Tomorrow is the funeral, at a church then the cemetary. I am not looking forward to it. Hopefully Gavin will make everything more bearable once again.
The fact that I have a baby is a little weird to some of my extended family, I think. The gay thing is not their favorite either, though, so this just compounds that. But no one was rude or hostile or anything. Gavin is really cute no matter what you think of his two-mommy family so he's a pretty good ambassador for the homosexual lifestyle. Ha. I kid. But seriously, he is an ambassador of good will that crosses ideological lines. Having him there was a good tension breaker, too, because he's just so full of life and so happy. It helped my mom and my Aunt Bunny to get some Gavin hugs. And my sisters, too. He was ooohed and ahhhed over by a lot of old ladies, as well. At one point my mom was holding him and one woman asked how old he was. I said, "Ten months," and she said, "Are you the mother?" and I pointed at Stacy who was standing on the other side of my mom and said, "We both are." She said, "Oh, okay," in a that-is-slightly-surprising-but-not-at-all-shocking-I'm-totally-hip-to-these-things-it-is-the-90's-after-all kind of way.
There are insane monkey sounds coming from Gavin's playpen right now. Mind you, Gavin is asleep in his room and his playpen is out here in the living room. He has this zoo animals sound puzzle that is, I do believe, possessed. When you take a piece out and put it back in you hear the sound of the animal. The elephant makes an elephant sound, the lion roars, etc. The monkey makes the most insane screeching sound I have ever heard, as does the zebra for that matter. The problem with the puzzle is that you don't have to put the pieces back in place for it to emit animal sounds. If the pieces are left out of the puzzle, which they often are since Gavin's not really great about cleaning up after himself unlike most 10-month-olds, the sounds fire randomly seemingly triggered by nothing. I've noticed that sometimes I'll hear a crazy zebra hoot when I turn off the lights, for example, or parrot sounds when I walk by the puzzle on the floor. At times you don't have to do anything at all. Like right now, all I'm doing is sitting here. But that doesn't stop the animals from randomly yammering. Definitely not a toy you want to keep in your kid's room at night.
Tomorrow is the funeral, at a church then the cemetary. I am not looking forward to it. Hopefully Gavin will make everything more bearable once again.
Wednesday, June 2, 2010
Week 22 Day 3: Cat scratch fever
I just went in to Gavin's room to check on him and soothe him back to sleep because he woke up crying several hours after his 7 p.m. bed time. He was standing up, holding onto the crib railing and wailing, which is not unusual, except he was holding on to the railing on the wrong side of the crib, facing the wall rather than facing out into his room. According to Stacy he has done this before, but I have never seen it. He's just so tired and so disorientated and unhappy he doesn't know which way is up. He just wants a mom to come help him fix it. And it made my heart break a little bit seeing him like that. Poor dude. He is sleeping again and hopefully will sleep through until morning. And by morning I have my fingers crossed for 6 a.m. or later. These 5 a.m. mornings are killing me.
Today was a bloody day for Bear, I'm afraid. The cat and I are to blame for two separate incidents. Although I had an elephant as my accomplice (isn't that always the case?).
Jota (a.k.a. Jasper) is a really good cat as far as cats go. People are always telling us how good natured and mellow he is. And it's true. (He's also rotund, but that's beside the point here.) The problem is that even though he's a nice cat, he also has all of his claws. We trim them often (he's very good about this, even purring as we do it), but they're still claws. Gavin and Jota get along well. Gavin is obsessed with Jota and Jota tolerates Gavin's over-exuberant attention and even invites it. But sometimes you don't want your ears pulled or two little doughy fists grabbing hold of your furry stomach pudge and squeezing with all of their 10-month-old might (and that's actually a lot of might. Gavin is strong. Bear is a very apt nickname). And since Jota can't say, "Knock it off," most of the time he just removes himself from the situation, but he sometimes resorts to his claws or jaws, though even in the case I am currently reporting, never in eviscerate mode.
Today Jota was especially comfortable curled up on the make-out chair in the living room (called the "make-out chair" because Henri, who has issues of his own, is not allowed on the couch when people are sitting on it, but he is allowed to share the chair with a person, though it should be noted that no one makes out with the dog in this house, unless you count Henri tongue-kissing Gavin). So this morning when Gavin crawled over to the chair and pulled himself up and proceeded to pull fur or tug ears or whatever it is he did, Jota chose the "fight" side of the fight or flight quandary and pulled a total Freddy Krueger, scratching Gavin on both sides of his head from behind his ears to his temples.
Now I was sitting right there in the living room, but it all happened so fast and was partially obscured by the playpen. So I heard Gavin start to cry and whisked him away from the cat thinking that Jota had scratched his hand. Jota has scratched Gavin's hands multiple times because Gavin's hands are small, fast-moving objects. Jota's favorite. It was early morning and rainy to boot, so it was pretty dark in the living room, so I took Gavin into the bathroom to inspect him and get his scratches disinfected and washed. But the only wound I saw on Gavin's hand was on his thumb, and it didn't look like a cat scratch (it is, I strongly suspect, actually caused by thumb-sucking with teeth). Puzzled, I turned Gavin toward me and said, "Where are you wounded, Child Bear?" And I saw it right away. Jota didn't break the skin exactly (a wee bit of blood in a small portion of the deepest scratches), but Gavin is allergic to Jota (as am I. As is Stacy. But we are crazy) so the scratches all puffed up pretty good making it look worse than it was. I got him cleaned up and chances are good they'll fade really quickly, but needless to say, Jota and I are not on speaking terms right now. Jota is also off the babysitting list, making the chances of Stacy and I going on a date any time soon even slimmer.
As for his other injury, that was my fault. And the elephant's. See, we have this elephant funnel that Gavin really likes to play with, though it's not a toy. We never give it to him unsupervised or anything, but sometimes he likes to hold it when he's in his high chair before he starts eating the first course (no toys allowed while eating, though I make an exception for the puffs appetizer course since the whole point of the puffs is to keep him busy and distracted while I prepare the rest of his grub). So today I put him in his hair chair and he was holding the funnel, no big deal. I strap him in and then go to slide on the tray, being careful that his hands are out of the way so I don't pinch his fingers. Unfortunately I do not make sure the elephant funnel is out of the way. Indeed, it was not. The tip of the trunk was in his mouth so when I slid the tray on, "Wham!" I forced the funnel into the roof of his mouth. Before he even started crying, and it only took a second, I knew that must have hurt. And boy did he cry. In fact, cry isn't even the right word for the wounded animal sounds that came out of my little boy. He was, quite plainly, hysterical. I put a baby washcloth under cool water and placed it in his mouth. Sure enough, when I took it out there was blood. Not much blood, mind you. About as much as you might find when you nick yourself shaving. But still, he was bleeding and it was all my fault. The bleeding stopped relatively quickly and he was soon eating his lunch like nothing happened (although he did have those little cry hiccups intermittently throughout the meal). But I felt awful. And now the cat isn't speaking to me. At least he can't kick me off the babysitting list.
Today was a bloody day for Bear, I'm afraid. The cat and I are to blame for two separate incidents. Although I had an elephant as my accomplice (isn't that always the case?).
Jota (a.k.a. Jasper) is a really good cat as far as cats go. People are always telling us how good natured and mellow he is. And it's true. (He's also rotund, but that's beside the point here.) The problem is that even though he's a nice cat, he also has all of his claws. We trim them often (he's very good about this, even purring as we do it), but they're still claws. Gavin and Jota get along well. Gavin is obsessed with Jota and Jota tolerates Gavin's over-exuberant attention and even invites it. But sometimes you don't want your ears pulled or two little doughy fists grabbing hold of your furry stomach pudge and squeezing with all of their 10-month-old might (and that's actually a lot of might. Gavin is strong. Bear is a very apt nickname). And since Jota can't say, "Knock it off," most of the time he just removes himself from the situation, but he sometimes resorts to his claws or jaws, though even in the case I am currently reporting, never in eviscerate mode.
Today Jota was especially comfortable curled up on the make-out chair in the living room (called the "make-out chair" because Henri, who has issues of his own, is not allowed on the couch when people are sitting on it, but he is allowed to share the chair with a person, though it should be noted that no one makes out with the dog in this house, unless you count Henri tongue-kissing Gavin). So this morning when Gavin crawled over to the chair and pulled himself up and proceeded to pull fur or tug ears or whatever it is he did, Jota chose the "fight" side of the fight or flight quandary and pulled a total Freddy Krueger, scratching Gavin on both sides of his head from behind his ears to his temples.
Now I was sitting right there in the living room, but it all happened so fast and was partially obscured by the playpen. So I heard Gavin start to cry and whisked him away from the cat thinking that Jota had scratched his hand. Jota has scratched Gavin's hands multiple times because Gavin's hands are small, fast-moving objects. Jota's favorite. It was early morning and rainy to boot, so it was pretty dark in the living room, so I took Gavin into the bathroom to inspect him and get his scratches disinfected and washed. But the only wound I saw on Gavin's hand was on his thumb, and it didn't look like a cat scratch (it is, I strongly suspect, actually caused by thumb-sucking with teeth). Puzzled, I turned Gavin toward me and said, "Where are you wounded, Child Bear?" And I saw it right away. Jota didn't break the skin exactly (a wee bit of blood in a small portion of the deepest scratches), but Gavin is allergic to Jota (as am I. As is Stacy. But we are crazy) so the scratches all puffed up pretty good making it look worse than it was. I got him cleaned up and chances are good they'll fade really quickly, but needless to say, Jota and I are not on speaking terms right now. Jota is also off the babysitting list, making the chances of Stacy and I going on a date any time soon even slimmer.
As for his other injury, that was my fault. And the elephant's. See, we have this elephant funnel that Gavin really likes to play with, though it's not a toy. We never give it to him unsupervised or anything, but sometimes he likes to hold it when he's in his high chair before he starts eating the first course (no toys allowed while eating, though I make an exception for the puffs appetizer course since the whole point of the puffs is to keep him busy and distracted while I prepare the rest of his grub). So today I put him in his hair chair and he was holding the funnel, no big deal. I strap him in and then go to slide on the tray, being careful that his hands are out of the way so I don't pinch his fingers. Unfortunately I do not make sure the elephant funnel is out of the way. Indeed, it was not. The tip of the trunk was in his mouth so when I slid the tray on, "Wham!" I forced the funnel into the roof of his mouth. Before he even started crying, and it only took a second, I knew that must have hurt. And boy did he cry. In fact, cry isn't even the right word for the wounded animal sounds that came out of my little boy. He was, quite plainly, hysterical. I put a baby washcloth under cool water and placed it in his mouth. Sure enough, when I took it out there was blood. Not much blood, mind you. About as much as you might find when you nick yourself shaving. But still, he was bleeding and it was all my fault. The bleeding stopped relatively quickly and he was soon eating his lunch like nothing happened (although he did have those little cry hiccups intermittently throughout the meal). But I felt awful. And now the cat isn't speaking to me. At least he can't kick me off the babysitting list.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Week 22 Day 2: Rest in peace Great Grandpa Chuck
In his obituary it says, "Cherished Grandfather of 10 and great grandfather of one." That one, obviously, is Gavin. I'm really glad that Grandpa got to meet Gavin and that I have this picture to show Gavin when he is older. I don't think I ever met any of my great grandparents with the exception of my mom's Grandma Charbonneau who may have held me when I was a baby as I have a fuzzy memory of a picture that might not actually exist.
Obviously this is a very sad time and to top it off I now need to figure out what to do with a 10-month-old at a funeral. Thank goodness Stacy will be there, too. I reckon she'll be doing a lot of wrangling.
Funerals really aren't good places for kids because dead people are boring. I say that not to be disrespectful. It's just that funerals are largely about reflecting and saying goodbye and comforting others. Not exactly strong suits for a kid in his or her kid-centered world. I remember at my Grandma Lucy's funeral being up near the casket (it was the first dead body I had ever seen. I think I was probably 10 or 11 but can't really remember) with my dad and my brother Brian, who is four years younger than me. My Grandpa Mitch, who has been dead for many years now, came up to the casket, looked at his wife and said as he choked up, "Doesn't she look beautiful?" And Brian, without missing a beat, said, "Yeah, too bad she's dead." He meant no harm. To him it was just a statement of fact. And yeah, he was old enough that he probably should've known better, but this is my family we're talking about.
Gavin had crap naps today. His first nap was too short and tumultuous for both of our own good. And his second nap he woke up less than an hour into it screaming. I went in and soothed him and he fell back asleep, but no more than 20 minutes later he was up and screaming again. Stacy had a staff meeting after school today so I knew she would be home not at her usual 4:15 but more like 6:15 and I feared that Gavin's nap may well be a loss at only 2:45. I didn't know what I was going to do with a crabby baby for three hours. but when I went in to get him it was clear he wasn't done sleeping. I rocked with him a bit and he nestled his head into my shoulder and began sucking his thumb. And because he's heavy and there's only so much rocking I can do while standing up and because I was desperate for him to sleep I sat in the rocking chair in his room (and by "sat" I mean put my butt on the edge of the seat and leaned back so that I could be as prone as possible since there is no headrest) and he fell asleep with his head on my chest. I managed to get another full hour of sleep out of him this way. I dozed a bit myself, in fact. Because he's a pretty sweaty kid and I'm a sweaty lady, the spot where his head met the crook of my arm was literally soaked by the time he woke up. His hair was all matted like he'd just gotten out of the tub. But while he was asleep his head was turned to the side with his face pointed just a little bit up at me and I got to watch his sleeping face, which is so beautiful and something I hardly ever get to see any more. Best part of my day. Best part of my life, even.
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