Love is...

letting your 4 year old play with the remote control on your fancy-schmancy camera that US Airways bought you after losing your luggage with your old camera in it...



















...and letting her hold her baby sister all by herself because she's really shown she can be gentle and careful with her.




Happy Love Thursday!

Gotta get it out so I can move on

Sunday, I had someone tell me that I looked great, really well-rested. Nice compliment, I thought. I just said that I felt fairly well rested since it was pretty easy to just go right back to sleep after nursing in bed. She proceeded to tell me how she was always too scared to put the baby in bed with her and how she always made herself stay awake to put him back in the basinet at night. OK, personal choice, I completely respect that. Then she goes on to tell me some story about how there was a case recently of a twin "that died from SIDS from co-sleeping." I simply said "Babies die of SIDS in cribs too" and walked away.

There are many problems with what she said. First and foremost, the diagnosis of SIDS is made when there is no other obvious cause of death. If the baby died of being overlain in bed with an adult, then it is not SIDS. So, don't blame SIDS on co-sleeping. There are studies out there that show that a baby is less likely to die of SIDS when co-sleeping, but with some searching, you can almost always find some study to validate what you believe. Second, it was just a completely inappropriate comment to make to someone with a new baby. If you don't agree with my parenting, fine, it's your prerogative. But, don't feed me a scare tactic as why your choice is better than mine.

Co-sleeping is an individual choice, I believe. Some people and some babies really do sleep better in separate spaces. I don't, nor do my children. I laid there and worried with Dillon because we were in separate spaces initially. I don't have to worry if Corryn is breathing- I can feel that she is. It isn't insurance against SIDS any more than a crib is. But it's the choice that we feel is best for our family and I feel like that should be respected just as I respect her choice- and anyone's choice- to do it differently.

I've been stewing over this ever since then and I really need to stop. This person is well-educated. She has a PhD in accounting. I've known her for a few years now and have never enjoyed her company, yet she almost seems to seek me out to talk to me. She's made inappropriate comments to me before- like telling me far too much about her marriage when I had only known her a few weeks. I feel like I probably handled it the best way possible, but it has still just crawled under my skin.

Maybe I can move on now.

2 months old!

Well, yesterday she was. It was a grumpy day for her, so I didn't get a chance to post this. She was only happy if I was moving, making it hard to type anything on the computer.

Anyway, she's 2 months old! She's getting chubbier by the minute :) She's smiling like crazy (well, except yesterday), cooing and making all sorts of cute baby sounds. She looks like she's starting to try to reach for things, but most of the time ends up hitting herself in the head. She loves to watch Dillon and loves to be talked to- and carried around in the sling or front carrier. She'll only sleep if there's a warm body beside her, so the picture was taken in the 5 minutes between being put down and her realizing that the warm body was missing. It's one of those things that can be hard at the time (like when you want to take a shower longer than 5 minutes!) but that's mostly fine. I know I'll look back on it nostagically one day. Yeah for slings is all I can say to that.

We're all still adjusting and sometimes just surviving. Mastitis over the weekend and residency demands are not making the adjustment easier, but it's a joy to have had her join our lives. Dillon is enjoying being a big sister now, making it a frequent theme in her play with her toys.

I know, it all goes fast. I'm trying to remember that and focus on the better parts of life right now. It's hard sometimes, though, I have to say.

When it rains...

it pours. At least it seems to around here.

Friday evening I had a horrible headache. Saturday morning I woke up with a painful spot in my right breast and still had the headache and as an added bonus, fever. Not bad, 99.5, but just enough to feel miserable. This plagued me the whole weekend with my fever getting as high as 101.1. I so don't want antibiotics, given my ability to grow yeast. Dillon also woke up with a runny nose saturday morning- her third time since Corryn was born.

The fever is gone this morning, but I still hurt. As a second added bonus, I woke up to Dillon throwing up this morning. She laying on the couch now, enjoying the very rare treat of getting to watch TV and seems to be feeling a bit better.

Fortunately, Dave called in today to be able to take care of us. Unfortunately, he'll have to hear from his residency program director about how the residency program should be his top priority, not his family- and he'll have to extend a day at the end. I'll save my opinion about the paternalistic, demeaning nature of medical training for another day. I'll just express how thankful I am for a husband that does not bow to the demand of putting the residency first and is willing to put up with the flak he'll have to endure for being available to his family.

Nicknames

"Momma-On Corryn, I think we should call this cheek "Chubba" and this cheek "Wubba"

Seems fitting :)

Love is...

"Mom?"
"Yes honey."
"I pooped"
"OK"
"I wanted you to know there were poop germs in the toilet so you didn't put your butt in the water the next time you use the toilet."


And for the record, no, this is not a problem I have. But I have been forwarned of the poop germs in the event it does become a problem for me.

Happy Love Thursday!

The Day the Furnace Died

We noticed yesterday that the furnace was making a knocking sound, so decided to have it serviced. Turned out to be a minor thing, something about a water valve. At 4:30 this morning, I was awoken (as if I need one more thing waking me up...) by the sound of the furnace trying over and over in vain to start. I walked to the stairs to be greeted by the strong smell of oil burning. Great. I hit the emergency shut off switch, made sure all the carbon monoxide alarms were in working order, looked at the thermometer to note that it was at that time -19 degrees F out. Decided that we weren't in danger of carbon monoxide poisoning at that point and that probably snuggled under the already warm covers was the best place to be. At 5:30, I got up and called the people that serviced the furnace to tell them of the problem, noting that it had dropped 3 degrees in the house in the hour the heat was off. Someone came out promptly, found what he thought was a minor problem and fixed it in no time.

Once Dave got home from his call shift at the hospital- and why does this stuff always happen when he's on call, by the way?!- we discussed at and decided that our 35 year old furnace was probably giving us warning signs of imminent death. What to do when faced with unexpectedly spending $5-6,000 on a new furnace? Why, go have breakfast, of course! We came back, then I decided to make a trip to the library. When we arrived home an hour later, the house was 62 degrees, despite the fact that the thermostat was set on 70. Not good. Nor was the fact there was no hot water.

So, the new furnace will be installed on Monday. They were kind enough to do a patch-up job to get us through the weekend so we didn't have to pay the emergency installation fee. So now we just have to hope it actually gets us through the weekend. At least it isn't supposed to be quite as cold over the next few days.

Still, it would be a lot more fun to spend that money- not that we really have it- on a fun trip to say Hawaii or something. It reminds me of a song by the Bare Naked Ladies "It's the perfect time of year, somewhere far away from here..."

The new title

"And when they ask how far love goes, when my job's done you'll be the one who knows." - Dar Williams

Since Corryn has now joined our life I thought it would be a good thing to change the title of the blog. I was introduced to the music of Dar Williams while pregnant with Corryn and went in search of more of her music. I found the song "The One Who Knows," and just loved it. It's a very simple, folksy song about the love of a parent for a child, wanting to show them the world and then realizing that it all went by so fast. It's beautiful and sappy without being bubble- gummy. It was one of the 3 songs I managed to play (out of the 4 hours of music I had chosen!) while in labor. But, with a small modification to the title of the song to account for both of them, I thought it fitting for the blog. They are, afterall, the ones who'll know.

Mother's hand

Love is...

begging your dad to teach you how to play a game that's been in his family for decades. I think it's official name is Wahoo, but it's more affectionately known as The Idiot Game, in honor of how it makes adults act when they are soundly losing. It's essentially the game Sorry, but with the wonderful aesthetic quality of being played on a handmade wooden board with real marbles and dice that were the "lucky" ones of family members long gone.

Happy Love Thursday!