I had like 340 pictures to go through to bring you this selection. It’s getting harder now that Thane has started moving and having opinions. Also drooling. Actually, the best pictures in this sequence are of Grey at Starbucks. There was this plush brown chair next to the window that somehow brought out his eyes.
http://tiltedworld.com/brenda/pictures/May2009/index.html
Here’s a sneak peak:
Thane’s 6 month checkup was on Wednesday. He passed with flying colors. Two important things. First, the stats:
Height: 27 inches (65th percentile)
Weight: 17lbs 13 oz (50th percentile) (Editor’s note: This increases by roughly a pound per minute when carrying in his carseat)
Head circumference: 17.25 inches (50th percentile)
So he’s right on average for his age — a little tall.
Second, he is supposed to now get real food that he’s allowed to feed himself. Sniff sniff. MY BABY! He is too wee for real food! He has no teeth! And he’s my BABY! He’s not allowed to do this “growing up” stuff!
Also, apparently now is the age to start applying discipline, with limits, etc. I hadn’t realized how much I liked the innocence of a child who couldn’t be expected to know better.
So I went to the doctor for me today. About a fortnight ago I got this cough. It’s really kind of a funny cough — it tickles my throat all the time, but I can go for quite a long spell without coughing, especially when I’m not talking much. But when I get a coughing fit, I find myself coughing every 5 minutes for even hours at a time; this barking, irresistible impulse.
I ignored it.
Saturday, I spiked the fever and slept the day out. I felt better on Sunday, so despite the remaining cough I figured I was better! Yay better! You know how coughs are sometimes trailing indicators.
But by the end of the day yesterday, I was so darn wiped out I had to admit: I’m not better.
I hated taking the time to go to the doctor. Yesterday I had Thane’s 6 month checkup. (More later on that — all it well.) Then I had Grey’s open house for preschool. (See also: more later.) I pump twice a day. I visit my sons at lunch almost every day. There have been sick days and paranoid days and doctor’s appointments and dentist appointments. And I just didn’t want to spend any more time on all that. (I’m very fortunate to have plenty of sick time TO take, I just don’t like to bunch it all together, you know?)
Then when I got to the doctor, the eyebrow was raised when I said how long I’d been sick. She looked at my chart, and noticed that I’d completely blown off my prescribed well-grownup cholesterol tests etc. (In my defense I went to take them once, only to discover that they were 12 hour fasting tests. Then I gave up.)
“You need to take CARE of yourself” she said censoriously. If I had a dollar for every time I’d heard that, I could pay for all-day preschool. It’s hard to be the mom. There are these stacks of things that need doing. You can only defer laundry so long before you run out of super-hero undies. (Note: I have purchased sufficient super-hero undies that this extremis only arrives after about 16 days if there aren’t an undo number of accidents.) We only have so many sippy cups AND counter space, so the dishes really do have to happen periodically. And people get grumpy if their bills don’t get paid after a week or two. And let’s be clear here — my husband pulls his weight. But even with two oxen in the harness, the furrows just don’t all get plowed before the sun sets. If you push off the chores because it’s a fantastically beautiful Sunday in spring, then you better not pull the “oh and I think I have pneumonia” crap on Thursday. (And by the way, chest x-rays confirm it’s not pneumonia. It’s bronchitis.)
I find myself in this untenable position of trying to do what needs to be done, do those things which make life worth the living, and making the compromises in my own life to permit it to happen. Then I get called on the carpet for my martyr syndrome and told that it is somehow self-indulgent of me to make choices like toughing it out when I’m sick because I’d rather have that sunny Sunday than an afternoon lying in bed drinking tea. There’s this aura of disapproval around how much I try to do.
I have been accused of martyr syndrome. I do admit that sometimes I get caught up in a martyred attitude of “look how selfless I am!” but I think I’ve done that less and less lately. These days it’s a more intentional and aware tradeoff. I have come to realize that at this time of life, it’s just not going to be about me. I’m not going to get to read many books cover to cover. I’m not going to get to stamp cards while listening to baseball every week. There isn’t going to be this big reliable block of time that is all about what I want to do. But this won’t be forever. And there are the moments of grace when suddenly there ARE two hours available for wine-dark seas. Someday, my boys will be readers too and time I now spend wiping bottoms and putting away onesies will be time I can instead spend reading on the couch with my guys.
I don’t resent the choices I’m making (most of the time). We’re having an awesome time together as a family, but because our boys need so much attention, there is more corporate time and less individual time. That’s ok.
I do resent being told that I should feel guilty about not having time for myself. I resent the implication that I’m making up how much there is to do, or doing work that doesn’t really need doing.
Grey is still very much processing his grandfather’s death. There’s a certain spot on our commute home that must remind him of Michael, because he often talks about him as we pass it. This was last night’s conversation:
Grey: Mommy, is Papa STILL dead? (Sounding aggrieved that Papa hasn’t gotten over this “dead” thing yet.)
Mommy: Yes Grey, Papa is still dead.
Grey: When he going to stop being dead?
Mommy: Not in this world as we know it, Grey. (Note: I know too much about theology. The less confusing answer is that he isn’t, but I believe in the resurrection and the life everlasting, so I go with confusing.)
Grey: Why he dead?
Mommy: Well, he had lived his life. He was a baby, then he was a boy, then he was a young man, then he was a grownup, then he was an old man. Then he got sick and he died. (Subtext: don’t worry, kiddo. Neither you nor we are going anywhere soon, God willing.)
** pause for thinking **
Grey: I have an idea! (He holds up his finger to show that yes! An idea!)
Grey: We could make a ROBOT Papa!
Mommy: **nearly drives off the road giggling**
If only we could make a Robot Papa, son. You’ll just have to make do with your memories.
Usually at lunch I head across the bridge to daycare. It’s maybe a mile and a half. Four stoplights. It takes longer than you think it should, but I get to daycare in under 10 minutes, spend 15 minutes with the boys and head back. It’s a nice interlude in my day.
On Monday, they closed the bridge for repairs. I can’t really argue. It needed it. The bridge was built in the 1800s and is made out of a metal mesh. You can see under your tires to water — by design. It wobbles when you cross it. It’s hardly confidence-inspiring. It will probably be closed for a month. Right now I have a great view of the construction and there is a very large hole in the approach to the bridge. Your stimulus dollars at work.
This is all well and good, but it makes that trip to daycare longer. This is compounded by the fact that the NEXT bridge up the river is ALSO under construction and has been for ages. This I consider to be bad planning. Finish one first THEN move on to the next bridge.
So what do I do at lunch?
My options are:
1) Walk to daycare. Tempting in the nice weather. Will take longer than the budgeted amount of time.
2) Drive to daycare. I’m trying various alternate routes to see which one is least obnoxious.
3) Use lunch to go check out preschools. This is probably what I should do instead of hanging out with my three year old peeps.
I keep deciding to do one. Then changing my mind. Then changing it again. I have half an hour until it’s time to go, and I still have no idea which one I’m going to do!
I’m working on this query that has so far taken 25 minutes and isn’t done yet. (Which would be why I’m working on it.) I wonder if it will be done before it’s time to go! Working on performance always takes forever because every time you test it, by definition it takes a long time!
UPDATE:
I walked. It was lovely. It’s about 15 minutes each way. (You can still cross the bridge on foot.)
And the query took 38 minutes and 33 seconds. While it was running I rewrote it. It now takes less than three seconds. I could probably file it down further if I spent some time on it.
Thane’s six month doctor’s appointment isn’t until next week, but no one has informed him that he should continue acting like a 5 month old until then. Thane has changed vastly last month to this month. He’s certainly started to move. He’s still trying to put together all the pieces for crawling. I kept encouraging him yesterday, informing him of the 6 month press deadline, but he hasn’t quite gotten to the first crawling stage. Watch this space, though, because it’s not far off. What he is doing is moving by way of rolling, waving his body, and going around and around like the hands of some chubby, cute clock. And oh does he WANT to move.
Which brings us to milestone two: having very strong opinions. One of the milestones in “What to Worry About: The First Year” is objecting when a toy is taken away. Babies don’t notice when they lose a toy. Proto-toddlers do. (The most hilarious/frustrating stage is when they want a toy, you give it to them, they throw it, and then they cry because jeez! They want that toy! Thane’s not there yet, but very close.) As I was taking these pictures I was attempting to coax Thane into sitting unsupported long enough to get some good pictures of it. (He was doing that before I got the camera!) While doing that, he accidentally pushed away his toy and then burst into heartrending wails of despair because his toy! Was gone! WOE!!!!! So chalk that milestone up as accomplished.
Sitting is not quite there yet. If I prop him up, he can sit for a while. He USUALLY is smart enough to fall to the side, into a comfy crawling position, instead of thumping backwards onto the hard floor. He doesn’t seem to really like sitting unsupported much, and will only do so for as long as he has a neat toy in his lap. I think this is 50/50 ability/desire at this point.
Thane has gotten extremely grabby. I thought he was before but now he REALLY is. Anything within the surprisingly large radius is liable to be pulled towards him. Favorites include the cats, his brother’s hair (both brother and cats are very long-suffering), any noses, earrings, and spoons full of peas and/or prunes. The spoon thing is SO FRUSTRATING. The child will be hungry and piteously wailing about how much he’d please like some yummy sweet potatoes, meanwhile his two waving hands are more effective than anti-aircraft artillery about knocking away incoming sweet-potato-projectiles.
We’re still sort of in flux with food. For a while there we cut way back on solids. They went in fantastically. They came out with less ease. Then he got an ear infection, which prompted a nursing strike which threw my production for a loop. Then he got antibiotics which gave him diarrhea (two rs! That’s it!) which meant we could give him solids. Then he recovered from the ear infection and antibiotics and got REALLY HUNGRY and my production isn’t keeping up and I’m not in the habit of giving him that many solids. Also, he would like you to know that he may be hungry, but he isn’t hungry enough to eat peas, thankyouverymuch.
It’s been very interesting to watch my sweet, smily, sunny child develop opinions. Instead of a default of happy, he now sometimes decides he doesn’t like something. Most of the time, what he doesn’t like is sitting still. We still get the 100 watt gummy smiles (no teeth yet!) but he is also showing more frustration.
Happily, one of the things that makes Thane very happy indeed is Big Brother Grey. The love and affection that already passes between the two of them makes my heart gooey. Grey patiently puts up with having his hair pulled. He distracts a fussy Thane with funny faces, goofy voices or silly games, often without my asking. He restores lost toys with cheer. He talks about all the things Thane will do when Thane is a big boy like Grey. He often wants to play family, where there’s a mommy, a daddy, a Grey and a Thane. His animal babies are all named Thane and all treated with tender lovingcare. For his part, Thane rarely looks anywhere else when he can see his brother. (Less than optimal when one is nursing.) Even between tears, Thane will grin at his big brother. You can see the adoration in his deep blue baby eyes for the hero of the nursery. It warms my heart to see it.
I can tell that the next month will bring big changes. There will be sitting and crawling. Perhaps there will be pulling up to standing. There will be throwing and exploring. He may start encountering foods he can serve himself. My baby is turning into a boy. Oh! I will miss the baby! But I will also enjoy the boy.
A few vignettes on my oldest.
Last night was gaming night. Usually, Grey doesn’t get to watch tv on daycare nights, but an exception is made when we’re gaming. (Tangent: Last night a cleric with zero combat ability managed to throw a rock, hit, and get past the soak of an unwise wizard. Booyah! Learn the lesson, kids. Never leave your shield grogs at home.) He wanted to watch “Planet Earth: Caves”. Now you might THINK that there is nothing wrong with a nature show. But that is because you have never witnessed the vast guano heap alive with beetles. So one of our fellow gamers very reasonably requested that this not be on the tv while she ate her dinner. I explained that she thought it was scary and he should watch something else. He went up to her, very seriously, and solicitously explained to her that she should pray to Jesus so she wouldn’t be scared.
She nearly fell off her chair. See, she’s in the middle of her PhD in Religion and culture and is in the throes of finals. She just took a 24 hour test that involved having read, remembered and synthesized about 80 books. She has another next week with about 70 OTHER books. I think Grey’s comment overloaded already taxed circuits. It was pretty funny.
It was also nice to see Grey problem solve that way. Instead of yelling, or pitching fits or any of the other things a thwarted, hungry, tired kid might do, he tried to give someone else the tools to deal with their fear so he could watch something scary. I thought it was a pretty good solution, as three year old tools go.
I had been having one of those meals where you don’t actually get to, you know, sit and eat. Between negotiating television with Grey, supervising the requisite bites of chicken, rice and green beans, making sure everything was on the table, and then putting an exhausted, fussy Thane to bed it felt like I hadn’t sat at all. Then Grey asked for salt and pepper for his pizza (dinner #2 after a polite feint at dinner #1). I put my head on the table in mock/not-so-mock exasperation.
Then Grey put his arms around me, patted me on the back and said, “It’s ok mommy.”
It is a wonderful and amazing thing to watch your child develop empathy and kindness, and then turn those skills upon you. I’ve watched Grey be wonderful (and terrible) to other people, but when he is intentionally kind TO ME it’s a truly amazing feeling.
Grey has largely been in an awesome spot, lately. (Well, except that he doesn’t reliably sleep as well during the lighter summer months.) The other day he sat at the table with his father and brother. He started playing with Thane, softly calling his name: “Dane! Dane!” He made his brother laugh. Then his face got soft, and he said, “I love you, Dane.” Thane smiled back at his beloved older brother. And it was good.
This weekend was, as you may have noticed, Easter. Holy Week is always one of my big weeks of the year. Last week I went to church 5 of 8 days: Palm Sunday, session on Tuesday, Maundy Thursday, Good Friday and then Easter Sunday. A fellow session member turned to me on Good Friday and said, “I think I might live here now.” I think she might be right. In other news, for the first time in my 8 years doing it, the light on the parking lot stayed on throughout Good Friday services.
But Easter is usually a big service for me because I’m usually playing trumpet. For once, I picked a good combination of relatively easy trumpet pieces, practiced them ahead of time and rehearsed them adequately. (See also: Palm Sunday, Maundy Thursday and Good Friday) But between playing the prelude and postlude, singing in the choir for the anthem and the Benediction Response (Hallelujah Chorus), doing the session-leader bit for welcoming new members (YAY new members!) and playing with the hymns, it was not even remotely possible for me to take care of my children for the service. This usually falls to my patient husband.
Then my patient husband got conscripted to be head usher and wander around in a vain attempt to count all the people in the church. (We kept moving. This was not very fair of us.) Errr…. Happily one of my friends took custody of my kids for the whole service. She did a better job of keeping Thane quiet and happy than I do!
I posted some church pictures to Facebook — I’m hoping they’re viewable even if you’re not signed in.
In other news, I’m interviewing preschools for Grey for the fall. I really wish I felt more like I knew what I was doing instead of being a big fat imposterer. “Dear preschools. My son is really smart, but he needs to learn stuff. Please take him. kthxbye.” Happily, a side effect of parenting has been an increased tolerance for realizing I have no clue what I’m doing.
I found one preschool that I think will be ok. I want Grey to go part day to preschool and part day to daycare. That’s concern one — along with transportation. Concern two is which class to put him in — do we make him the oldest of the young kids or the youngest of the old kids? And if we do the youngest of the old kids, do we have him repeat Kindergarten twice? Once in private preschool and once in public? Do I attempt to enroll him in public schools early? (Darn October birthdays!) Basically, is there one or two years before he starts Kindergarten? I think two, which argues for the earlier preschool class.
Bah. Do other people fret as much as I do about this kind of decision? This is the kind of decision I make and remake for years. (I’m still wondering whether we should’ve bought the house, for example.)
All this is really just a preamble to what I KNOW y’all really want — pictures. Herein please find a slightly more balanced representation of my oldest and my youngest. You get to see my mother-in-law and friends, Easter pictures, an unseasonably early trip to the Middlesex Fells reservation, and actual pictures of my husband and I! Shocking! I also fixed the video links (I think — I didn’t, you know, test) for last month.
Enjoy!
I am going to write a book called “The Common Mythology of Parenting”. In it, I will lay out what lies stories we should tell about our holidays so we can all be on the same page.
It’s like this. Saturday night I was lying in bed. I turned to my husband and said, “It doesn’t make sense. It just doesn’t hold together!”
He replied*, “Yeah, the nest of hydras should definitely be after the spike trap. Good thinking.”
“What,” warming to my argument “Does the Easter bunny have to do with the Easter eggs? We dye them, then what part does the bunny play? And how do the eggs equal the candy? Does it blow our cover if we put Easter eggs he dyed into the Easter basket? Or should he have to hunt for them? And Grey wants a DS for Easter — someone needs to explain to him that the Easter Bunny works on a more constrained budget than Santa does. And then there’s the confusing fact that “die” and “dye” are homonyms. And how does this all tie in to, you know, the Jesus parts of Easter?”
He carefully mulled my words. “Do you think a party would think to use a chime of opening if they came to a dead end?”
I had never realized how poorly constructed the common mythology of Easter is. I’m all up on the theology of Easter. I can talk until I’m blue in the face about the meaning of Jesus betrayal, death and resurrection. Ask me about the Road to Emmaus or doubting Thomas and I’m good. But give me one good explanation for the Easter Bunny that doesn’t use the words “Pagan fertility ritual” and is appropriate for a three year old sensibility while encompassing candy, Easter eggs and why you’re not getting a DS.
Christmas is much better thought out. Thanks to “The Night Before Christmas” and the Coca-Cola Corporation, we know a lot about Santa — from what he looks like down to the names of his reindeer. There’s a plausible, if weak, connection between Santa and the birth of Christ. “Um, we give each other presents because the Wise Men gave Jesus presents.” Well, ok everything but the Christmas tree holds together. But there’s no good mythology of Easter.
Wouldn’t it be a great service if there was a chapter in our Parenting Manual of commonly agreed upon lies that we should all tell at Easter (and similar holidays)? That way we’d know what not to tell the three year old friends who come over to visit, “Oh, the Easter bunny dyed your eggs for you?” and we wouldn’t have to get quite so creative.
Think about it, publishers. There’s a market out here.
Next up: explaining why you shouldn’t be afraid of fireworks set of to commemorate a bloody war of independence.
*OK, so this conversation didn’t actually happen this way. I’m making up his parts of it entirely. It’s funnier this way, though.
On Saturday my little, itty, bitty, tiny baby turned five months old. Ok, he was little itty bitty and tiny for a while. You know, two or three weeks after he was born. Now he’s more big, bouncy and bonny!
Last week was not my best week ever for sleep. See, Thane has mastered the art of turning from back to front. “What” you ask “Does that have to do with sleep?” Well, see, it’s like this. Thane can turn over back to front, and front to back. This means he can now put together a chain of rollingoverage and actually roll across the room if you let him. “Still not relevant to sleeping!” you so rightly point out. Ok, Thane CAN roll over. What he cannot do is roll over intentionally to go somewhere he wants to go and do something he wants to do. He also (this is key) cannot roll over in both directions — he only rolls to his right. So what would happen is I would put him down — face up — in his crib. He would promptly roll over in such a way that his arm was sticking through the slats of the crib and he was totally uncomfortable. What do you do in those circumstances? Right. You call on mom to come rescue you.
The degree to which mom is patient about this is directly related to
a) whether it is currently 4 am
b) whether you did the same thing at 3 am
c) also 2 am
It seems to have improved in the last night or two. He’s promptly rolled over onto his belly and started snoozing. I’m not happy with this as it regards SIDS, but have lost the ability to control exactly where my child is when he’s not strapped in.
That, by itself, is a milestone.
In additional to rolling over like a wheel, Thane is attempting to crawl. Happily, he’s not successful yet. But he gets himself up on his hands and moves those feet for all he’s worth. Once he gets his butt up in the air, he’s going to be unstoppable.
He’s also at the very edge of sitting. If you put a toy in front of him, he can sit quite nicely, although he lacks the wisdom not to throw himself back or to the side. He has the strength for it, but I always have to create this cage of my hands so that I can catch him when he makes an errant move. I think he might have only a week or two until he starts sitting unsupported. He can actually sit himself up, too. Not all the way from lying down, but I’ve caught him sitting up straighter than intended in both his swing and his car seat.
I’m trying very hard not to think of how much babyproofing needs to be done when he gets mobile. I’ve blocked that stage out of my memory. It’s not the grownup stuff that’s the problem, it’s Grey’s 1000001 toys — the Matchbox cars and small green frogs and D20s that are strewn through the house. La la la! I’ll deal with that once it comes to pass….
Thane is doing pretty well on solids. When hungry, he’s a terrific eater. Nom nom nom. There is no problem getting the food INTO him. Getting the food OUT of him, well, that is still a work in progress. I’m keen on the solids, because he’s started to get harder to nurse. If there is any distraction at all, whatsoever, he is always interrupting his nursing to turn his head and look. I would object less if he, uh, opened his mouth before turning. Thane is even more distractable than Grey was at that age. He’ll look out a window 20 times instead of settling to nurse. He still dislikes noises that even approach loud, and will shoot me a reproving look if I talk at all while nursing.
He is, as I mentioned, big. His thighs are like ham-hocks, both in how they look and in how delicious they look. He’s quite tall, especially in the waist. I think (no drs. visit this month) that he may have passed the 17 pound mark. He’s into 6 – 9 month clothes, and wearing size 3 Pampers.
Thane has hit the “grab everything” phase. This is the time of life where you start wearing contacts, eschew dangly earrings and cut your hair. He’ll make a grab for your pizza, the spoon you’re attempting to feed him with, his brother’s toy, pretty much anything within arm’s reach. He plays quite nicely with his toys, which he’ll hold for a quite a while before tossing them away. We are entering the “throw the toy away and then cry because you don’t have the toy” phase, although I actually haven’t seen Thane upset because a toy was “removed” from him yet.
The best parts of Thane, however, are not necessarily his kissable head or squirmy little body. The best part of Thane is his brilliant, wonderful, joyous gummy smile. He is the smiliest baby, especially in the mornings. He is just SO HAPPY TO SEE YOU and SO DELIGHTED THAT YOU ARE CHANGING HIS DIAPER! He also loves to talk to you, making all sorts of silly baby sounds. He’ll talk to himself, happily, for quite a while in his crib when he wakes up. He is beautifully good-natured, most of the time, and loves to be in the middle of the action. When his father sings “You are my dear, my darling one” he will often interrupt even epic weeping to smile in appreciation for his dad. Thane has been a bit more fussy lately, but I think much of that has to do with a combination of digestive and sleep issues, which are hopefully resolving themselves. But even a fussy Thane is a really fun kid to have around.
In additional good news, I’m starting to see the benefits of having two. Grey is a very, very helpful big brother. He’s still extremely affectionate, often surprising us with some gentle and loving thing he wants to do for his brother. He gets upset when Thane cries (like in the car) and demands I make him happier. He gladly returns thrown toys to his brother. Yesterday there was this great moment while I was cooking and Grey was dancing for Thane and making him laugh. Grey calls him “Dane”. I hadn’t realized how hard the “th” sound was for the kids to hear and say. He also says ‘nank you’ — I don’t know if he even realizes he’s saying it incorrectly? Anyway, Dane isn’t a bad nickname either, if that’s what the other kids end up calling him. Although if he ends up being as tall and strong as he appears, the appellation “great” will surely be added.
It’s such a happy time with Thane. I’m finding his babyhood passing even faster than Grey’s did. With Grey I was always so eager for him to be hitting milestones early, etc. With Thane, I wouldn’t have minded a more deliberate tempo. I don’t really want him crawling by 6 months, or walking by 9. I wouldn’t mind having a sweet, snuggling baby for just a little longer. But he outpaces me. Babyhood is so fleeting, and he is diving headfirst into boyhood.
Ah well. I love Grey just the age and stage he is, too. And it’s a long time before Thane is Grey’s age. I suppose I should just enjoy life at the pace it happens!
My Truant Pen 