You know, I suppose there is one good thing about the whole daycare crisis thing. And that’s that I finally get to bust out my bento box stuff. For a few months now, I have been collecting bento box tools. I kinda have a thing for the irresistible cuteness of stylized bento boxes.
File this under, "really?!": Last night my parents told me that they aren’t going to be able to watch Baby Girl— At all. They have a huge construction project going on at their place and they said they can’t keep coming down to watch the baby like they've been doing for months. So now, rather than putting Baby Girl in daycare next month, she’ll be going in next week. Awesome. I can’t even begin to say how this messes us up. But I can’t let this get me stressed out. I really have other things I need to focus on. One of the main things is getting the dog back on track with his training. Until Saturday, we were doing really well with the training. Then Aaron had to come and completely mess things up. I went out on Saturday (late morning to midafternoon) and asked him to make sure to take him out before he goes to bed (noon-ish). What does he do? Ignores what I asked him to do. So the poor dog pooped and peed all over his bed, inside his crate. This pissed me off because now the damn dog thinks doing his business inside his crate is okay. F**K me! Aaron, of course didn’t think that would be the case and wondered why I was so mad. That is, until he started ‘going’ inside his crate again. Hu-f***ing-zah! So now we’re back at square one with having to take him out every three hours till he gets back into the swing of things. Once again, Aaron doesn’t think it’ll be hard. No, of course not. That’s because he’s not the one doing the training. I am. He just comes home, maybe takes him out for like, five minutes. Then tells me, “he didn’t do anything,” or “I can’t get him to ‘go’ outside” and puts him back in his crate. Oh wait, it gets better, he outright doesn’t bother to take the dog out if it’s raining. The jerk actually purposely let him go on his pad inside, rather than once again— adhere to my strict orders on when to take him out— because it was raining outside. WHAT?! Meanwhile, I’m once again getting mad because this sets him back some more. Tell him that the rain isn’t going to mean he won’t have to go to the bathroom. I swear, sometimes it’s like I am living with another child. Oh and don’t even get me started on the behavior. He completely lets the dog get away with anything. I constantly correct behavior and am left wondering why nothing seems to stick. Case in point, he just lets the dog nip at feet and pant legs. This doesn’t fly with me. He also lets the dog take the lead during walks. Nope. I absolutely keep him at my side (side holding the leash) and keep the leash short to keep him from taking over. I know what you’re thinking, I sound a little militant with the training. And you would be dead on. I am strict. I would much rather be strict now than have to train a dog out of bad habits. Sigh... I swear sometimes, I just want to tell people to piss off so that I can cuddle with Baby Girl on the couch and watch Peppa Pig.
Oh what a wonderful thing it is to wake up to a puking child, especially when it's three in the morning and she is right next to you, on your bed! Yep, this was the scene on Tuesday morning. The little one wasn't in the mood to eat the previous evening and was feeling a little cranky so I wasn't surprised to get a 3:00 wake-up call from the monitor. Luckily, Aaron is wonderful and answered the call. After unsuccessfully trying to get her to fall back asleep he brought her over to me. She fell asleep within a few minutes. I drifted off too because the next thing I know Aaron is waking me up in a panic. The baby puked. Awesome! We finished cleaning her, the bed, the mattress and ourselves, just in time for my alarm to go off. Sweet! The rest of the day wasn't much better. Baby Girl had exploding diapie issues and more puking! She even managed to get vomit in the vent on the oven door, so that Aaron had to open the thing up and clean inside it. I didn't even know those opened like that. Last night she slept most of the night. I got a 4:00 wake up call. But she seemed okay. I brought her over to our bed (so should have listened to the voice in my head that said, 'don't do it.') and about ten minutes later, ta-dah! The difference was that at least this time around, I was awake. She looked at me, gave me a sad face and blech... I ended up wearing most of it. And the bit that did land on the bed, I scooped up before it got to do any damage. So there I was, child on one arm, a vomit laden hand stretched out, reeking of sour milk (or good cheese), all the while trying to wake Aaron up. Of course the part that made it funnier is that during the cleaning process, she had an explosion in the diapie. Ahhh... fun.
Yep. The Baby Girl took her first two unassisted steps on Wednesday afternoon. Of course I’ve only heard about it. My parents called me to tell be about it a moment after it happened. By the time I got home she wasn’t the slightest bit interested in walking. She was in a huggy mood. Normally I look forward to cuddles, but this was big news damn it, I wanted to see her do her impression of a drunken college student but nope. I guess I’ll have to wait.
The other bit of good news is that she’s sprouting more teeth. She now has a top front tooth and its neighbor is on the way. And judging by how far she likes to cram her fingies into her mouth, I’d say there are a few molars threatening to break through- Poor thing.
Exciting as this all is, it’s also fascinating and disgusting at the same time. I’m not a scientist but I think we should really study the make-up of baby drool. I’m willing to bet there’s money to be made with whatever gives baby drool that amazing elasticity. I mean, this stuff hangs, and hangs but never seems to break. I'm also fairly certain that if the mood really struck her, Baby Girl could probably swing the stuff around to get to out-of-reach items around the house. Gross…
On the 19th baby Girl will be 10-months old. I have been nursing since day one but alas, I've come to the decision to start weaning her off. I didn't come to this decision randomly. I've just noticed that since she started solids a few months back, the milk level has dropped significantly and it's time to start supplementing with formula. I ran this by the pediatrician and she seemed to agree with me that it's time.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not going to be stopping outright, I have to do this gradually, but it made me think about how much I'm going to miss nursing and the bonding time. I don't know, perhaps it's the fact that she is showing so many signs of growing up that it's making me a little emotional. I love her to bits but holy cow is she getting big fast.
Sigh... still 10 months, that's not a bad run. :D
Holy crap I need a moment to breathe. I have been running on fumes for only heaven knows how long now. I think it’s high time I got a break.
Recap Time: I have been working like a mad woman with more responsibilities and a staff of none. Yaaaaay… I am department of one and they have absolutely no intention of hiring anyone for me! The other shitty part is that the place is getting increasingly unstable financially. Needless to say, I’m putting my resume out there. What kills me also is that they have sent me on a few overnight business trips. The last one was a week-long trip. Yeah that sucked ass! It wasn’t even any place fun. I basically got to stay in a hotel and go from meeting to meeting. So once I got back here I was up to my eyeballs in catch-up work to do.
The Baby Girl is getting positively huge. She’s not only crawling now but she’s also finding out that she really doesn’t need to have a kung fu grip on things with both hands to stand up. Needless to say, the gate is going up before next weekend.
We hit a kind of bittersweet milestone in our lives. My father retired. My father has been the superintendent of an apartment building since 1991. But because of his job, we have also all lived in that same apartment since then. I loved the town we lived in and now, they’re no longer there. While I’m happy that my parents have now officially moved into their new place, and ours (they stay with us for a few days during the week to watch Baby Girl), I kind of miss the New Rochelle apartment. It’s been home for so long and now it’s no longer there. Odd. What really threw me off was deleting the number I’ve had listed as “Home” on my cell phone. It just didn’t feel right.
And yes, you guessed it. With them moving out, that also means that we have been pitching in as much as possible. Oh yes, I will have stuff in the trunk of my car. I should probably get it out of there.
Oh hey, there have been wonderful bright spot in all of the craziness. Baby Girl had her first Halloween. I had every intention of taking her out. She had other plans though. I got about ten minutes of her in her little sheepie costume; just long enough to take a few pictures. She then went into a meltdown. She was too tired and hot and wanted the costume off. So we stayed in and handed out candy. Ah well. I did try. Still, it was fun. I like the fact that there are a ton of kids in the neighborhood and they pretty much cleaned us out. I have never had that happen. I love it. The other cool thing was that I got to meet a lot of the parents from the neighborhood. Normally I just get to see them when I drive by but this time I actually got to introduce myself to a good number of them. 
So, what was my costume this year? Let's go with "homocidal maniac. They look just like everybody else."
I actually wanted to break away from my normal vampire and go with Zombie. But I thought about it a bit and decided against it. I didn't want to get all made up properly and then have to immediately take it off for making the baby cry. But next year... 
Later this month, Aaron and I are going to be taking our first family trip to see my family in California. I am really looking forward to it. I’m not sure how I’ll feel about traveling afterwards, but for now, I have a game plan and I’m keeping my fingers crossed. The trip is kind of a big anniversary gift package. The first part is the whole thing was a kind of surprise ticket to see Rock of Ages. Loved it! The unfortunate part was that it was on Saturday. Yep the day of the freak snow storm.
And while I din't actually mind clearing the snow, I really regretted it when later on on Sunday night, I was in pain in places I didn't know I had. Awesome. :D
Sure, I still have no idea what we were thinking when we decided to begin the house buying process at the same time as our due date, but the good thing is, we have a big goal to work toward.
Both Aaron and I grew up in the Bronx and as much as we love the borough we call home, we don't want Baby Girl growing up here. The area has changed so much from when we were little, and the school system, well, it just doesn't come close to the area we're most likely going to be moving to. Not to mention, I want her grow up having a back yard.
So yes, we're very close to closing on the house. God willing, we'll be closing in March. We'd like to have it closer to the end of March, but who's to say. At the moment we're waiting for the new contract to be drawn up with all the changes we want, and waiting on the mortgage. We've done the inspection and the appraisal is supposed to happen this coming week.
I have to say though, the whole process is daunting and exciting. Aside from the fact that we're very like to going to be moving into our new home in just a few weeks, we're going to be taking on a whole new set of challenges. As if we didn't have enough on our plates, right? HA! Ah well, it's all for Baby Girl so it's all good.
Luckily, the fun part has been the shopping. We've started looking onto the big items we're going to need. Namely, furniture and the few appliances. I think I may have to see the place one last time before we make a final decision on the items we're going to get.
Yaaaaaaawwwwwwnnnnn... so very sleepy, but happy.
Ever since the Baby Girl came into the world, I have been on a strange roller coaster. I go from being completely elated, to about to pass out from exhaustion, to crying my eyes out after wondering what she's dreaming about. I am SO not kidding. But behind all of this is the Baby Girl, who is absolutely more perfect and lovely than I could have ever imagined.
Tuesday January 19th: I woke up at 5:00 am to start getting ready. We were told to show up at the hospital at 10 am. Pretty much as soon as we got to the hospital we were moved into the prep room. I got strapped up to baby monitors and poked full of holes. They couldn't find my friggin vein for the IV. It took them five tries before they gave up and got a specialist. She got it in one shot. At about one-ish they moved me to the OR, the epidural wasn't as bad as they said it would be. I felt a pinch, pressure, heat and then my legs went. So odd. I started getting a little anxious when I saw my doctor come in with his doctor posse and no Aaron. I outright told them we couldn't start without Aaron. Luckily he was just getting his scrubs on outside. He sat in a stool beside me the whole time. After he sat down I heard them say they were starting. Everything went smoothly from there. I asked the nurse to give me an alcohol pad to breathe since the smell of burning skin was making me a little nauseous.
The, just like that, I heard the most wonderful little sound in the world; Baby Girl's cries. I went from a kind dream-like state of mind to being so overjoyed my eyes immediately filled with tears. I couldn't focus fast enough. All I could do is scan the damn room till I got a quick glimpse of her. I think if I could have I would have gotten up from the operating table and walked over to her right at that moment. Aaron held my hand like he said he would. Then it happened, he got an unfortunate look at what was happening on the other side of the blue curtain. As they were putting me back together, they tilted the OR table back a touch so when he looked over he said he just saw parts that belong on my inside. He thinks he even saw my liver. I kind of felt bad for him. I saw the look on his face and even though his face was partially covered, I knew he was turning new and exciting shades of green. They called Aaron over to cut the cord, he hesitated a bit but did it.
They brought her over to me and I was done. I'd like to say I remember seeing Aaron's expression but all I could focus on was her. I remembered Aaron saying, "Here she is." But beyond that, everything everyone said was a blur. I know she reacted to my voice. As unhappy as she was to be out of her former home, she did stop crying and fussing for a moment and looked around when she heard my voice. They took a few photos and then took her to clean her up further. I told Aaron to stay with the baby. After he left, my doctor told me about a few things that happened and what they were doing. Blah, blah, blah.
Aaron followed and stayed with her as long as he could, then came back to find me in the recovery room. While waiting in there, I got to hear a little bit of what was going on during a vaginal birth from one of the delivery rooms down the hall. Now, till this point I wasn't exactly sure how I felt about having to have had a c-section. But after hearing the lady screaming her head off, yeah, I'm cool with having to deliver this way.
So that was the delivery. Exciting ain't it?
Once in my room, room 644 in Lawrence Hospital, I got to relax and feel nothing for a little while. I was kind of out of it for a little while but anxious to see the baby. Once I got to see her, I just couldn't stop staring at her. She was just too damn cute.
Every day since then has brought something new. She changes ever so slightly every day and it's just amazing. Her smell is the best thing I have ever experienced. There are times when I will just sit there smelling her while she sleeps. Aaron occasionally takes one of her blankets or outfits and puts it on his head to sleep.
Sigh... I never knew that love could actually get better. :D
