Earlier this week, I was thinking about that over-quoted line, “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways,” and I decided that it would be fun to try to enumerate what I love about my crazy little son. So, here ’tis...a list that is far from exhaustive, but that shares some of what I think makes our Theo the greatest little guy on the planet.

 

Ten Things That Make Me Fall in Love with My Son Every Day

 

1. The incredibly cute way he sticks out his lower lip when he’s MAAAAAAADDDDD!! (Especially when Mean Mama takes away the car keys.)
2. The way Luna is obviously his best friend in the entire world. He stares at her in wonder and adoration, laughs at her antics, and happily pats her whenever she is in reach. (This could also be an entry in “Ten Reasons Why I Love the Pug,” since she is just amazingly good with him!)
3. The way he gets so excited to see me in the morning that he kicks his feet like mad and smiles that huge toothless grin when I come in the room.
4. The way he attacks his Exersaucer with such purpose and determination. I set him in it, and it’s as if he says, “Okay, first I grab the rattle and smash Piglet, ’cuz he won’t stop staring at me. Then I have to spin Rabbit wildly for at least 30 seconds. Then I stomp my feet like crazy and chatter excitedly. Then I need to make sure Pooh is down in his honey pot—I don’t like it when he’s popped up and looking at me! Now I need to chew on Tigger, and then I’ll go smash Piglet again....” He seriously has this whole system of activities every time he’s in the Exersaucer. It’s as if he’s a Man with a Plan.
5. The way he fights sleep naps at all costs. Yes, this drives me NUTS a lot of the time, but I also have to admire his spunk and will: “Can’t sleep, Mom! Too much to see, too much to do! Must be awake and playing (or eating) at all times!”
6. The way he thinks blowing raspberries is pretty much the pinnacle of entertainment and comedy. (C’mon, be honest: Who doesn’t think farty noises are highly amusing?!)
7. The way he shrieks happily in a store when he’s riding in the Baby Bjorn. It’s like I have a tiny, adorable Howard Dean strapped to my chest. Or a small pterodactyl....
8. The hilarious way he snorts like a little nerd when he laughs. He sounds like a cross between a tiny donkey and a piglet. It's seriously adorable!
9. His thrill-seeker attitude when trying something new. You’d have thought he was a champion bungee jumper the way he bounced like mad in the Jumperoo when we put him in it! Given that I was scared of everything as a kid, I’m delighted to see that my boy doesn’t seem to have inherited that from me. He has a “go get ’em” spirit that I didn’t get until I was an adult.
10. The way he curls his hand around the back of my neck and immediately calms down when I pick him up, as if to say, “Okay, Mama, I know you’ll protect me. I can relax now.” It makes me feel like I’m doing something right. J

And now that I'm done being mushy, back to our regularly scheduled blog....

 

I managed to whittle my 50 chapters of copy editing down to 29...only to get slammed with 13 more unexpected chapters last night. (Don’t ask me how an author can just “forget” to send me a third of his book! Suddenly my lovely 300-page book has become 400 pages in the blink of an eye. ACK! Oh well, the paycheck will be nice, even if this puts me WAY behind schedule.) So this week will be madness, again. Wah!

 

Anyway, amid editing this past week, we had a nice play date with our friends Janay (grad school friend of Chris and I) and Belen (Janay’s two-year-old daughter). Unfortunately, I forgot the camera! Which is too bad, because it was really cute to see Belen share her toys with Theo. Theo was wide-eyed at all the new toys to play with, and Belen was very generous in sharing anything that wasn’t purple. (Purple being her favorite color!)

 

Friday night we took Theo to visit the newly expanded mall near us. He loves to people-watch at the mall, so it makes a good place to walk around with him. Alas, the poor “I refuse to nap” boy was so sleepy by 7pm that he fell asleep slumped across the tray of his stroller, his arm wrapped around a Snapple bottle that was in the cup holder. He looked like a little drunk...we got many comments from amused fellow mall-goers. “Shopped ’til he dropped, eh?!” Indeed...although window-shopped is more like it. I did buy him a cute winter hat, and we ogled the neat toys at The Learning Express and bought him one small one, but that was the extent of our shopping adventure.

 

Speaking of Mr. Theo "I Don't Nap" Small, my Pack and Play napping strategy is only very rarely successful. Most of the time he falls asleep with the bottle, but wakes up shrieking like a banshee the second it's gone, and then won't go back to sleep. And although I know the obvious comment is, "Why not put enough milk in the bottle that he can't possibly still be hungry after finishing it?" I must respond that I tried that, and all I got was screaming and a bunch of extra spitup. He downed an incredible amount of milk and still shrieked at me when it was gone. Stubborn little boy! The strategy did, however, work on Sunday...for a half an hour. Then he woke up MAAAAADDDD! But hey, half an hour is better than nothing, I guess.

 

Saturday was a day trip to San Jose to see Grandpa Tom, Grandma Kathy, Great-Grandma Norma, “Uncle” Billy, and Uncle Steve, Auntie Tanya, and cousin Nicky. Theo had a grand time with very little “Leon” time. He and Nik were really staring at each other this time, and at one point Theo even took Nik’s hand, which I got a picture of. Very cute!!

 

I think the highlight of Theo’s day was probably the new toy his grandma and grandpa got for him and Nik to share...a Jumperoo! Theo was like some sort of fanatic Tigger on fast-forward in that thing, bouncing like there was no tomorrow! (Remember the old Winnie the Pooh cartoons, where Tigger was always irritating Pooh by bouncing, because “Tiggers love to bounce!”? That was Theo...he just thought bouncing was pretty much the most fun he’s ever had. We have a doorway Jumperoo for him that we need to set up again. He’s been in it a couple times, but he seems to have now reached the age where this is just the absolute height of excitement!

 

Theo’s big developmental accomplishment is learning to sit on his own for extended periods of time. He’s been sitting for a couple weeks, but it was sort of hit or miss...he’d often go crashing off to one side or do a nice face-plant into the carpet. This week he seemed to get a lot better at sitting up for 15 or 20 minutes at a time without crashing. He is also trying desperately to crawl...rocking back and forth on his hands and knees. Perhaps Chris and I should start thinking about baby gates a bit more seriously. J

 

So, a good week was had by all. Hope you are all well!

Okay, you know you're too much of a Starbucks fan when you start foaming your son's bottle of formula....

 

Let me explain, as this isn't quite as yuppie as it sounds. In the interest of "simple answers" (a la this week's blog post), I decided to try to a new tactic to keep formula from getting clogged in the nipple of Theo's bottle, so that my "bottle in the Pack and Play" nap strategy might work. Stirring the formula with a fork wasn't breaking up the chunks, nor was shaking the bottle vigorously. But what if we had one of those little battery-powered hand-stirrers that's like a tiny hand blender? That might do the trick! So, at the outlets this weekend, I bought one at a kitchen gadget store. When I got home and opened it, I realized that it was designed to make delicious gourmet coffee drinks with milk foam on them. And I realized the utter absurdity of, in my quest for a simple answer, deciding to make my son a "gourmet" bottle of formula. Ah well, the boy had a massage therapist at a few weeks old, so why not just diva-fy him one more way?

 

So yesterday, I used said stirring device in his bottle. It worked like a charm, breaking up all the tiny formula "clots." Only problem is, it makes milk foam like a champ, too. The volume of the bottle doubled in size, and it became five ounces of formula with a lovely five-ounce foam cap on it. Ack! I scooped out as much of the foam as I could, put Theo down in the Pack and Play, and gave him the bottle.

 

He seemed happy enough for a few minutes, until he reached the end of the bottle, where all the foam had sunk. He then screamed mightily, so I added a bit more water and made a rather thin second helping of formula. Theo wrinkled his nose in disgust and pushed the bottle away, so I started patting his back to try to get him to sleep. As usual, no luck—we don't need no stinkin' naps!! And then, like something out of a horror movie, he spewed up the most massive spit-up I've ever seen from him. It must've been half the bottle at least. And so, I was left with a wide-awake baby soaked in spit-up and a playpen with a giant puddle of spit-up in it, needing to be stripped and wiped down.

 

So, for future reference, Theo takes his lattes with no foam.

 

I love simple answers. For the first several months of Theo’s life, we were bombarded with problems feeding him, and there were no simple answers. And it drove us nuts—we wanted to help our boy, but we didn’t know how! We couldn’t pinpoint what was wrong or how to help him, which was incredibly disheartening. But now, the answers are getting simpler in a lot of cases, and I love it!

 

Case in point #1: Nighttime wakening. Theo has been a great nighttime sleeper since he was about 2 1/2 months old. That’s one of the reasons we waited so long to transfer him into his own room—we were terrified to mess with a good thing! His good sleeping at night was the only easy thing about our boy, and we were scared to death to blow it. So, he has now been in his room for just a little over a week, and it has gone pretty well. Except suddenly, he’s waking up a couple times a night. And usually, he’s extremely wet...diaper, pajamas, sheets—the works! Changing sheets at 3am is not much fun, and if we have to change his PJs, there’s no getting him back to sleep unless I nurse him again. Why is he suddenly wetting so much at night? We have no idea. But, we have a simple solution, which we stumbled upon through trial and error. First we tried “stripping” our cloth diapers. Apparently hard water and detergent can form a buildup on cloth diapers over time, causing them to repel liquid. And then you have to strip them. So I spent the better part of a Sunday afternoon stripping...which sounds much more exciting than it really was! ;-) That didn’t work. The diapers absorbed much better in general, but Theo was still a Super Soaker at night. So, we decided to try disposables to see whether they’d hold more liquid. Nope—he soaked through that as easily as he does through our beloved Fuzzi Bunz cloth diapers. So, I came up with the ridiculously easy plan of double-stuffing the Fuzzi Bunz at night. FBs are “pocket diapers,” meaning they have a shell, and you stuff a cloth liner inside them to soak up the liquid. So, at night now stuff two liners in there. The end result? Theo is no longer wetting through his PJs and onto his sheets, and he has an adorably “fat” bottom from the super-stuffed diaper. J

 

Case in point #2: Naps. This is still a work in progress. As I mentioned some weeks ago, Theo won’t nap. I have tried nearly everything, and he won’t nap. Not consistently, anyway. Every so often we get a day where he suddenly falls asleep for 90 minutes, but those are few and far between. And I say I’ve tried “almost” everything because I haven’t tried one method: “cry it out.” I have let him fuss for 20 minutes or so when he knows I’m in the near vicinity, operating under the idea that perhaps he would fuss himself to sleep. But when fussing turns into full-fledged crying or screaming, I cannot do it. I’ve made my peace with the fact that I’m just not wired that way. Some people (like our pediatrician, for example) believe strongly in “cry it out” techniques, and if that works for them, great. But for me, I can’t do it. When Theo is two years old and throwing a temper tantrum, I expect I’ll be more able to do it if the need arises. But when my sweet seven-month-old is sobbing because he thinks his Mom has abandoned him, it just rips my heart out. So, for my own emotional health if nothing else, I don’t do it. If he amps up into truly crying and I can’t calm him by patting his back, I give up and get him up. Missing a nap won’t kill him, and it’s a heck of a lot easier on my own emotions to go pick him up and bring him back into the room with me to play.

 

That said, I have tried everything else to get the boy to sleep. Swing? Check...didn’t work. Pack and Play alone? Check...didn’t work. Pack and Play with his soothing-sounds sleep sheep turned on? Check...didn’t work. Pack and Play with Mama patting his back for a few minutes? Check...didn’t work. Crib with his mobile turned on? Check...didn’t work. Napping on the bed with Mama? Check...didn’t work. Napping on my lap after nursing? Used to work like a charm; in the past month or so, not so much. Putting him down in the Pack and Play after he falls asleep with a bottle? He wakes up and squalls every time and won’t go back to sleep. And so, I have nearly given up on getting the boy to nap. But yet, I know he’d really benefit from napping. And so, I have now stumbled onto what I hope will be a simple solution. Although I’m sure somewhere some child-rearing expert would say that I’m somehow warping my son by doing this, because I’ve come to realize that no matter what choices you make as a parent, some expert somewhere will tell you that you’re warping your kid. And another expert will tell you you’re doing great. There’s just no pleasing everyone!!

 

So, the solution: Bottle in the Pack and Play. Supposedly it’s bad form to give babies a bottle in their crib. I forget the exact reason why, but it probably has to do with either choking or tooth decay. Or acid reflux, which thankfully Theo doesn’t have, so we haven’t had to worry about that. Anyway, it finally occurred to me that Theo falls asleep eating, but then just won’t stay asleep when he’s transferred to the Pack and Play. So why not feed him in the Pack and Play? So that’s my latest strategy. The lazy boy won’t hold his bottle on his own yet, so I just lean over the Pack and Play and hold it for him while he eats. He dozes off, and (in theory!) I can ease the bottle away when he falls asleep. I’ve only been at this for two days, but it worked like a charm the first day...he slept for 45 minutes, until our barking dogs woke him up. The second day was a royal disaster because the nipple of the bottle got repeatedly clogged, which sent Theo into such a rage that it took Chris quite a while to calm him down. (I was in the shower, but I could hear the squalling even with the water running and the fan going and the door partway closed!) So, I’m cautiously optimistic that we’re on the road to another simple solution...if we can just get the darn bottle to stop clogging. Cross your fingers!!

 

Speaking of naps, by the way, I have to say that if you’re so tired that you fall asleep with your hand in midair, it should be a clue that you need to nap more. Theo was furiously shaking one of his favorite toys (Jittery Lion) in the car yesterday evening, and suddenly there was dead silence. He had fallen asleep with his arm above his head, Jittery Lion clenched in his fist, ready to slam him down. Probably a good thing for Jittery Lion that Theo fell asleep, as the poor critter was getting rather brutalized.

 

But moving on to simple answer #3. We’ve found a new way to keep Theo occupied for decent periods of time. Give him an old shoe with laces. He is obsessed with playing with shoelaces on shoes. He spent a good 20 minutes one night undoing a double-knot in Chris’s shoelace. You’ll see lots of pix in this week’s album of Theo sharing the wonders of shoelaces with his faithful companion, Luna.

 

Now that I’ve rambled on endlessly about such mundane things as leaky diapers, lack of naps, and shoelaces, how about a recap of the week? It’s madness here work-wise, as it will probably be until the end of the year. I have fifty—yes fifty—chapters lined up to copy edit. And one is almost 100 pages. OUCH! Don’t ask me how I’m going to get through those. And there are more to come. Yikes. I don’t even want to think about it....

 

But, as usual, we did fun stuff too. On Tuesday, of course, we watched the election coverage. I had to work, so Chris watched more of it than I did, but I did get to see some of the highlights, and I was continually checking the poll results online as I worked. I won’t go into much political commentary here, but I have to say that I was thrilled to see Americans take a chance on a candidate who doesn’t fit the usual “mold” of a Presidential candidate. If we are to be honest, it’s a fact that all of our Presidents have been middle-aged white men (with the possible exception of JFK, who was a little younger than most). And while I have nothing against middle-aged white men, I also don’t think they’re the only group qualified to run the country. I just think the election of Barack Obama is a huge step forward in terms of equal rights and tolerance, and I love the idea that Theo will grow up in a world where he doesn’t wonder, “Can anyone other than a white man be president?” Of course they can. In this election, women got close to the office. An African American man was ultimately elected. Boundaries were broken, and I think that is a great thing. Sometimes I cringe at the scary world that I brought my child into. And then other times, like this week, I am pleased to have brought him into a world where there is hope for change and progress.

 

Okay, political commentary aside; back to our regularly scheduled blog. On Friday night, my Mom watched Theo so Chris and I could have a date. We went to Guy Fieri’s new restaurant across the street from our house...yum! (Guy Fieri is one of the Food Network personalities, for anyone unfamiliar with him. Chris and I love his show Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives. We got hooked on it right after Theo was born, and we’ve been devotees ever since.) Luckily, this time Theo was a prince for his grandma, so all was well. (Last time she got to babysit Leon, I’m afraid....)

 

Saturday, we went to the Farmer’s Market in Davis. That happens to be where I realized I was in love with Chris, so it holds a special place in my heart. (I’m not sure I knew it was love at the time. I believe my exact thoughts were, “Oh crap...I feel really weird. Is this being in love?!” Sure enough, ‘twas. J) Theo enjoyed people-watching from his stroller, and we got a lot of good produce to make baby food for him. This week’s menu addition, by the way, was plums! Theo is a fan. And actually, I have to say that warm pureed plums are oddly tasty. They’re a pain to peel, though. We also nearly came home with another pug. They have a dog rescue group that does adoptions at the Farmer’s Market, and they had the sweetest pug there. Poor guy was incredibly undernourished—all his ribs were visible, which is unusual on a stocky dog like a pug, and he only weighed 10 pounds (most pugs are more like 18 to 20 pounds). Apparently he had been dumped out in a field in the middle of nowhere. I don’t know who could do that to a dog!! Anyway, were it not for the fact that we have a young baby who requires most of my attention and a semi-sick older dog, I would’ve adopted that sweet pug in a heartbeat. But, I’m hopeful that he will find a good home with someone else. His “foster mom” was there, and she seemed quite fond of him.

 

We also stopped at the Nut Tree (a little shopping/amusement center) for lunch on Saturday. And, I royally cheated...we had pizza!! Theo has done so well with everything I’ve “experimented” with lately that I finally decided to brave cheese. Time will tell how it goes. In theory he should outgrow his dairy sensitivity, so it’s just a matter of testing it every so often. Saturday was the first big taste. And man, did that pizza ever taste good! So good that I put a picture of it in this week’s album. J

 

I’m not sure how it went, though. Leon was with us for much of Sunday. Theo was cheery and happy while we were out wandering around the Folsom outlets, but he was very crabby all morning and after we got home. It didn’t seem like was crabby because of an upset stomach, but who knows. I will lay off dairy for the next two weeks or so, and then try it again to see what response we get.

 Anyway, enjoy your week, all!!

Oh, I wish I'd had the camera handy last night. I had a ton of work to do, so Chris was playing with Theo downstairs while I worked in the office. It was very quiet down there, so I kind of wondered what was up, but I kept working. After about 20 minutes, Chris called me down to see Theo's handiwork. Apparently, our boy had amused himself for 20 minutes straight by attempting to untie his Papa's double-knotted shoelace. And, he succeeded, much to his delight. So, if anyone is looking for Christmas ideas for young Theo, I'd say shoes with laces.  I just love the serious expression on his face when he tries to figure out something like shoelaces. He has this intense look of concentration that says, "I WILL master this!" Determined little booger, that boy of ours....

 

What I'm glad I did not have the camera handy for was this morning's Festival of Spitup. Theo had a couple shots yesterday, and I think they're taking a bit of a toll today. In the first hour he was awake, he spit up probably 20 times. No joke! He usually manages about 15 times over the course of a day, so 20 times in an hour was a lot even for our little King of Spitup. Luna, however, in her neverending glee at "cleaning up" spitup, was pretty sure she'd hit the jackpot. Our carpet will never be the same. Good thing it wasn't the best carpet to begin with.

Major milestone of this week? Theo can officially sit up on his own now! He can’t get himself into a sitting position yet, but if we put him on the floor in a sitting position, he can stay that way for long periods of time. I think he enjoys the vantage point it gives him of his toes....

 

Second major milestone of the week? Theo is his mama’s son after all. He likes zucchini and has decided peas are for the birds. He makes an “ick” face and just lets the peas ooze out of his mouth and onto his chin. And if I dare try to sneak them in again, he begins to gasp dramatically, as if I’m trying to poison him with the vile veggie. Which is pretty much exactly what I do when I have to eat peas.

 

Third milestone of the week? Theo’s first baking experience—he and I baked a lovely loaf of pumpkin-pecan bread. And yes, “we” really did it, as Theo was being a little grouch who was only happy while being held that day, thus I baked the bread one-handed while balancing Theo on my hip with my other arm. I was rather impressed by that feat, if I do say so myself. So impressed that I had to post a pic in this week’s album....

 

Friday was a looooong day with lots of “Leon” time, but luckily our sweet Theo returned in time for trick-or-treating at the mall. Well, we just walked around and watched older kids trick-or-treat, but the point is that Theo got to wear his monkey costume, and Chris and I had fun seeing all the kids in costume. (My favorite, next to our little monkey, was a tiny Yoda running around!) But what’s up with Godiva running out of candy? Godiva?!? They are candy—it’s what they do! How does a candy store run out of candy when there’s oodles of chocolate on display in their case? I have documented the abomination in this week’s album, because the absurdity of it amused me endlessly. (I’m easily amused, I know!)

 

Saturday Kim came over and took our photos for this year’s Christmas cards. They turned out really cute, but I’m keeping them secret until I send the cards out in mid-December. However, I am posting a few other shots Kim got of Theo (the diaper-only shots). We then went to dinner with Kim and Dave at our local Turkish restaurant, where Theo’s beloved belly-dancing friend, Laura, was performing again. Alas, poor Theo was so tired that he mostly just stared sleepily at the lovely belly dancer, but she did get a couple smiles from him.

 

This tiredness worked to our advantage Saturday night when...drum roll, please...Theo slept in his room for the first time! We finally moved the Pack and Play upstairs into his room, and he did fantastic. He woke up a couple times, but didn’t seem nervous or confused by the change in surroundings at all. I think he just woke up from teething pain, as usual; when he awoke in the morning in his room, he was his normally happy, babbling self when I went in to get him. And Chris and I are happy with this arrangement because Theo is safe and happy in the Pack and Play. He’s in his crib once or twice a day when we’re in the near vicinity, and he continues to get himself stuck between the slats nearly every time. So, the Pack and Play solves that problem nicely...no slats to get stuck in!

 

Sunday was my field trip to the Sikh Festival—you’ll see lots of pictures in this week’s album. I got to “play” with a super-nifty lens (of the $1,000 variety, so something I’ll never own!) that was donated to the college by Canon, and I had a lot of fun getting close-up candid shots of people while standing 50 feet away from them. I felt like I could capture their candid expressions without getting right up in their faces, which was nice. I don’t like to be the pushy type and thrust my camera in people’s faces. Anyway, Kim and I were sharing the super-cool lens, so when Kim was using it, she let me borrow her lens, which has a considerably stronger zoom than my normal lens. So that was fun, too...I was able to get a lot of neat detail on some of the clothing and such.

 

Upon doing some research on Sikh religion and culture, I discovered that it is based on brotherhood, acceptance, tolerance, and equality. And we found the Sikhs to be incredibly warm and welcoming to us. They went out of their way to make us feel welcome, and in fact our “press passes” even got us moved to the front of the food line, which was an unexpected surprise. All the food at the festival is free, as is customary in Sikh culture—they believe that everyone should share food as equals, so all the food at the festival is free, and everyone eats together—rich or poor, regardless of race or religion. It’s strange and sad that sometimes people wearing turbans (as Sikhs do) are thought to be “terrorists,” and in reality, Sikhs practice peace and tolerance to all, regardless of race, religion, gender, ethnicity.... But, there are many ways that our world can be a sad place, so I won’t get started on that here.

 

Anyway, this tolerance and acceptance turned out to work very well for Kim and I when we inadvertently crashed the Sikh parade! We were trying to photograph the float carrying their Holy Book, when we sort of got swept along in a crowd of people. We followed the masses...and then it became apparent to us that we were actually marching in the parade of Sikhs worshipping the Holy Book. Suddenly, we were no longer visitors; we were part of the action. And not at all dressed for the occasion. But, none of the Sikhs batted an eye at our intrusion on their religious procession, so all was well!

 

All in all it was a great experience, and one I’m glad I had. Even were it not for the delicious Indian food!

 

So what did Chris do during my nine-hour absence? Spent much quality time with Theo, playing, eating squash and apples, and strolling the mall. The boys were going to watch the Cowboys game, but evidently it wasn’t on. I’m sure Theo was crushed.

 

Sorry my writeup is rather brief this week, but I am exhausted after a long week and weekend. More next week...enjoy the album!

So I’ve decided I like six months. It’s a good age. I’m a good mama for a six-month-old. I love watching Theo learn and playing with him—we are starting to have so much fun together! (This may be obvious by the ridiculous number of pictures I took this week!) He now really laughs at my silly jokes and antics, and it is an incredible blessing to realize that as long as he is fed and changed and it is before about 5pm, I can take him out of the house and he probably won’t blow. This is in stark contrast to his first several months ex-utero, when any trip out of the house meant wondering whether he would suddenly start shrieking and wailing uncontrollably, causing me to flee whatever place we were in and head home. There’s a school of thought that says babies are actually born too early—that they could benefit from a “fourth trimester” in the womb. And I have to say I think that might sometimes be the case. I think maybe it took Theo a few months to really adjust to life on the outside. Now that he’s more comfortable, he seems to do a lot better. Which means Chris and I do a lot better...a good thing. As a side note, you’ll see that Luna features in many of the Theo pix. The pug is never far from her little brother’s side. He fascinates her, and she is just an angel with him. Thank goodness!!

 

So as usual, it’s lots of work lately. The end of the year is always that way for me. But we work in lots of fun stuff, too. Theo and I met up with Janeane and Emma on Thursday—we went to the mall in search of corduroy pants for the wee ones, among other things. No good corduroys were to be found, but we had a nice time hanging out with Janeane and Emma. And Emma very sweetly invited “Baby Beo,” as she calls him, to go to Disneyland with her and Janeane and Jason next week.

 

Thursday night Chris and I had a grown-up date! We went out to dinner at a not-so-kid-friendly place where we wouldn’t normally get to go with Theo. It was delicious and nice to enjoy a meal without worrying that “Leon” would emerge at any moment. Although Chris and I had to laugh when we realized that we spent the majority of the evening talking about Theo and his alter ego, Leon. Specifically, we rated the Three Best Theo Poops of All Time. Now that is sad...has it really come to this?! (To redeem ourselves, I will say that we also discussed the upcoming election and the worst movies we’ve ever seen, so we’re not totally pathetic. Just half pathetic.) Alas, we got home to find that Theo had not been so kind to Grandma Diane. Leon made an appearance for much of the 2 1/2 hours we were gone, and poor Grandma looked a little exhausted and very much covered in spitup when we got back. (It was a sweet potato day—more on sweet potatoes in a moment.) Funny thing is, I think they wore each other out. Leon disappeared and Theo returned the minute we got home, and he fell asleep pretty much as soon as I sat down to nurse him, and then didn’t wake up for about 11 hours. Grandma Diane went home and slept for something like 10 hours. Ha! Lucky for us, she insists she’ll watch him again despite his crabby demeanor.

 

Friday night I had the first session of my next photography class: Documentary Photography. Next Sunday is our field trip to the Sikh Festival in Yuba City. It’s estimated that 75,000 Sikhs will be in town for the festival and parade, so I’m sure I’ll have lots of good photos to post on the blog. The event sounds really neat—it’s the second largest Sikh gathering in the entire U.S., and they even have a helicopter fly over and shower rose petals over the parade when the Holy Book comes out. Besides, I’m told the Sikhs love to share their culture and will be plying us with all the yummy free Indian food we can handle. Given that their diet is vegetarian (and often vegan), I can probably actually partake. Yum!!! And Chris will be spending nine hours on his own with Theo...his longest stretch without me around to give him a break. Let’s hope Leon doesn’t appear too much!

 

Saturday we went to a pug meetup...well, actually we sort of hosted it. I was hosting our annual Howl-o-Ween bash, but I was lucky enough to get a tip on a woman who owns a pet boutique and who likes hosting dog meetup groups. So, she did all the hard work—provided a spare room in her store, decorated it up, got local vendors to donate prizes, set up a costume contest/parade, etc. All I had to do was coordinate with our members, which was pretty easy. Anyway, when I say “we,” I mean my Mom, Theo, and I (and Luna, of course). Hordes of marauding pugs are not Chris’s idea of a good time, but my Mom loves them. So, she joined Theo and I while Chris took a much-needed several-hour break from work and fatherhood and spent some leisurely time going out to lunch and reading a good book. I’ve added a couple of the cutest pug pix to this week’s album.

 

Sunday, Chris and I took Theo up to Apple Hill, and I cheated! I had pie! And oh, did it ever taste good! I had a piece of blackberry apple, and Chris had raspberry apple. I wasn’t so bold as to get it a la mode, given that I think straight ice cream would send Theo’s poor tummy into a tizzy, but I did have a piece even though I’m quite sure the crust (and probably the crumbly topping) is made with butter. We’ll see how Theo reacts. This is my biggest cheat so far. I figured it warranted a picture or two, so it features in this week’s album. Along with several pictures of produce. I was playing with my camera settings again.

 

Also in this week’s album, I finally managed to get Miss Bits to pose. Really, she was just resting in the family room and I snuck up and took them, but hey...we’ll call that posing. Miss Bits seems relatively happy and oblivious to her illness. In fact, she’s delighting in the fact that she gets peanut butter twice a day (I hide her pills in it). I take her in on Tuesday for Xrays, so hopefully we’ll learn more then. I am just hoping my poor girl doesn’t have something that will make her suffer.

 

But on another more pleasant note, the jury is still out on sweet potatoes. Theo likes them very much, but I’m not so sure his tummy agrees. So far he’s had them twice, and both times he has spit up all over the place afterward. Our little boy is the King of Spitup anyway (it’s a way of life around here!), but it seems twice as bad with the sweet potatoes. We’ll try them one more time and see what happens. He seemed to have the same problem with bananas and doesn’t do well at all on rice cereal, so we’re wondering if his stomach just doesn’t handle starchy foods well yet. My dandy baby-food cookbook recommends zucchini, avocado, yellow squash, or one of a few fruits next. I think I’ll go with zucchini, so we get another veggie in there. Then maybe apricots....  

 

So in case anyone is wondering why I’m going to the trouble of making Theo’s food, here’s my reasoning: It’s cheap. Really, really cheap. The little containers of Gerber’s baby food seem to run about a dollar a piece. Which seemed affordable, until I realized that I could buy a butternut squash for about $3 and get 24 servings out of it. And I can get 30 servings out of $5 worth of organic apples. That’s roughly 10 to 15 cents a serving! I figure we’re saving about $30/week this way, which is nothing to sneeze at. That’ll help pay for my decidedly less healthy Starbucks habit. Besides, I have a thing against preservatives in Theo’s food, so this way I know Theo’s getting just the vegetable or fruit, without anything added to it. So there you go...it’s cheap and it’s healthy. Which makes Theo’s mama very happy. Besides, it only takes me about an hour a week to prepare enough to feed him for a week or more, so it’s really ridiculously easy. I kind of enjoy the hour a week I spend doing it, actually. It’s sort of soothing to me, since I actually do like cooking...I just don’t get much of a chance to do it.

 

Anyway, until next week, then.... Have a good one!

Many of you know my sweet old dog, Miss Bits. She rarely appears on the blog because she doesn't like to pose for pictures anymore...at almost 14 years old, she's much happier just to eat, sleep, and get the occasional cuddle time with us. Anyway, Bits has been having some incontinence issues, which is quite unlike her, so I took her to the vet yesterday. It appears she likely has liver disease. Best-case scenario is a liver infection, so we're starting her on a hefty course of antibiotics today. Worst-case scenarios are cancer or Cushing's disease. I'll be taking her in next week for some Xrays that hopefully will shed a little more light on what's going on.

 So, I ask you to think good thoughts for my girl. She is 14, and if her time to go is sooner rather than later, I can't say she hasn't had a very good life...she has lived with us since she was about 7 months old, and we have always treated her like the princess she is. But I am hoping that she has a couple good years left in her. At this point, she seems happy and comfortable, so I am not taking any drastic actions. But if she begins to suffer, I'll do the humane thing for her, even though it will break my heart.  Let's hope it doesn't come to that just yet....

Couldn’t resist a peas pun for the title of this week’s post—sorry!! Especially given that I’m still confused by the fact that my flesh and blood likes peas. Blech! But Theo seems to think they’re pretty tasty, so more power to him. The next food on his menu is sweet potatoes sometime this week, so we’ll see how he likes those. I like those, so if he doesn’t eat them, they won’t go to waste! So far he seems to be a pretty good eater. He likes some foods better than others, but he’ll eat the ones he doesn’t like...he just sneers at me and sometimes fusses as if I’m trying to poison him.

 

First and foremost, a VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO AUNTIE LISA, who is now old like me!

 

This week has been work, work, and more work for me, and work, head cold, and more work for Chris. His head cold is now gone, which is nice, leaving just work in its place! Seems we’re both crazy-busy with it right now, but no complaints...we can always use the paychecks.

 

I also had the final class of my first photography workshop on Friday. I was really pleased with the course overall, and I’m looking forward to my next one, which starts next Friday. My portrait submissions were well received in class, and I felt like they were pretty average in comparison to everyone else’s, which is better than I had hoped. I was one of only two people in the class with no photography training or previous classes, so I expected to be leagues behind my classmates. But really, I was pretty average, and that made me happy! Though it’s probably because I had adorable subject matter in little Theo. Babies make for cute pictures...if you can catch them when they’re not flailing around!

 

I guess Theo was pretty fussy while I was gone, which was no great surprise as it was evening, which tends to be his fussy time. But he went to bed early, and Chris was happily cleaning the kitchen when I got home, no worse for the wear, so all was well. This next class I’m taking is Documentary Photography, and then there are two I’d like to take in the spring: Cityscape Photography and Landscape Photography (emphasis on the California coastline). These mini-classes are so much fun, and a great chance for me to get away for a couple hours every once in a while, which is very good for recharging the emotional batteries, I must say!

 

Theo is still working on crawling. He can scoot backward, he can pull his knees up under him and push up on his arms, he can roll all over the place, and he can push himself up into the “Downward Dog” yoga pose (basically on hands and feet, with bottom pushed up into the air so the body forms a sort of “triangle”). But no crawling yet!

 

Theo also managed to snag Luna’s coveted “Squeaky Ball,” and I have to brag for a minute. Luna loves that ball more than life itself, so I expected all hell to break loose if Theo ever grabbed it. Not so! Luna hovered nearby, staring at Squeaky Ball, but she stayed back and let Theo play with it, with no prompting from Chris and I. When Theo dropped it and rolled away to go get another toy, she hurried in and reclaimed Squeaky Ball. But she didn’t make a move toward it until he had already left it alone and moved onto something else. That dog never ceases to amaze me in her sweetness! She seems to instinctively know that she needs to be nice to her brother and protect him. (She was chasing my Mom’s dog away from him earlier today, and I think she was trying to “protect” him, even though Peekaboo wasn’t being at all aggressive.)

 

Anyway, our big event for the week (aside from my monitor dying, which necessitated a trip to Fry’s for a new one) was a daytrip down to San Jose on Saturday. Theo, Chris, and I got to spend the day with the extended family: Tom, Kathy, Tanya, Steve, and Nik, but also Aunt Linda and Uncle Bill, Aunt Carol and Uncle Erryl, Grandma Norma, Aunt Helen, and cousin/“Auntie” Sarah. Theo slept all the way down and all the way back in the car, which was wonderful since the monkey doesn’t want to nap anywhere but in the car (or on his mama’s lap after nursing). And, he was a happy boy for most of the day. He got a little crabby toward the end, but he had been all day without a nap, so it wasn’t the least bit unexpected.

 

Theo and Nik seem to be noticing each other a bit now...Nik more so than Theo, which makes sense since he’s a month older. I suspect at the next visit, Theo may have a much keener interest in his cousin.

 

Theo had great fun playing in Nik’s Exersaucer, which had all sorts of fun new buttons to press and songs to play. In the great world of “baby gadgets,” I have to rate Exersaucers highly. Theo loves them, and Nik seems quite enthralled with his as well.

 

Theo spent most of the day spitting up everywhere, which is nothing out of the ordinary. I don’t think Auntie Tanya was too pleased to get nailed within about two seconds of picking Theo up, but we tried to tell her that he spits up on those he loves. I, for one, get spit up on at least five times every day. At this point, I just consider spitup a lovely accessory to everything I wear. It’s inevitable. (By the way, no cause for alarm about this. We’ve talked to Theo’s pediatrician about him spitting up 15 or more times a day, and she says it’s normal...some babies just spit up a lot, and Theo is one of them. This is probably some sort of cosmic payback, given that I was the Queen of Spitup as a baby!)

 

The upcoming week should be...interesting. We delayed Theo’s 6-month shots a week just in case he had caught Chris’s cold, so he’ll be getting the first couple this week, then the rest in about another 10 to 14 days. (We split them up so he’s not overloaded with vaccines all at once; we prefer to have him just get a couple at a time.) Last time shot day was NOT fun—Theo ran a fever for about 24 hours and was very crabby. Ah well, a necessary evil that we will deal with. And this coming Saturday, Theo will be going to my pug group’s annual Howl-o-Ween party with me. I’m going to try to get him to wear the monkey costume, but if nothing else, he should have fun watching all the costumed pugs playing. Luna is going to be a bat.

 Have a wonderful week, all!

Well, the winner of the weight-guessing contest for Theo's six-month checkup is Auntie Lisa! She guessed 18.8 pounds, which is way over, but closer than any of the rest of us got! It seems Gigantor's growth has slowed way down. He is now:

 

This has been a rather quiet week in terms of events. I’m entering the “busy season” work-wise, so I’ve been working like mad. And Chris is sick (with a head cold) right now, so he has been resting a lot and working (and, inexplicably, shampooing the carpet and putting up shelving in the garage—not sure why he chose to do that while sick, but it was a nice surprise to me!). However, Theo and I did venture out a couple times—we got Theo’s six-month pictures done on Tuesday (see some proofs in this week’s album), and Theo and I got together with Janeane and Emma on Friday for a little play date, and hung out at the park with Roxann, Tico (3 months old), and Becky for a bit on Sunday. 

 

However, this week has not been quiet development-wise. Theo is changing like crazy, and it is so neat to watch (in most cases!). Here’s a little summary of recent developments:

 

• The boy is insane for apples. Pureed butternut squash was his first real food, and he seemed to quite like that...until I introduced food #2—pureed apples. He has now decided that squash is pretty much poison, and he fusses and squalls when I try to feed it to him. In contrast, he fusses when I feed him apples because he wants more, more, MORE! I can’t feed them to him quickly enough, and he throws a tantrum when his portion is gone. (As a side note, my nifty new apple peeler/corer/slicer is the best gadget ever! I’m completely impaired at peeling apples, so this thing is a godsend.)
• Sunday we got smart and thawed both some squash and some apples and alternated spoonfuls. That way, he never knew whether he was getting a yummy bite or a yucky bite. He squalled for the squash bites and devoured the apple bites...smart little cookie! The next food to introduce is pureed peas, so we’ll see how he likes those. So far he seems to have a bit of his mama’s sweet tooth, so I’m not overly optimistic about peas (which I happen to loathe), but we’ll see. He may surprise me.
• Theo has also learned how to blow raspberries, so he spends a lot of time making “farty” noises these days, which amuses me to no end. (Yes, I know...I have the sense of humor of a 13-year-old boy!) He spent yesterday morning blowing squash all over me as I tried to feed it to him, in fact. He makes a royal mess when eating because he tries to help feed himself—he grabs the spoon and helps me shove it into his mouth. You’ll see some pictures of him this week covered in squash. When he tries to “help” feed himself, he gets the food all over his hands and thus all over anything he touches. It makes for a fun, messy experience!
• Theo is interacting so much more with toys (and pretty much anything he can grab). Instead of just flailing and grabbing at anything in his path, he now focuses on one item and maneuvers to reach it. Usually this is accomplished by rolling, since he is still really only scooting backward. (He’s managed a couple tiny forward scoots, but nothing really productive yet.) You’ll see a picture this week of a “treasure” he found on the floor—a large-print romance novel, Crimson Mountain. No, I’m not claiming that masterpiece—it was my grandmother’s, and my Mom gave it to us to re-sell on Amazon when she finished it! But evidently Theo thought it looked quite interesting.
• Theo is also focusing much more in his path of destruction. He loves his Exersaucer, and one of his favorite things to do is take his rattle and smash it with all his might on the Exersaucer. Often he will just whack anything in sight on the Exersaucer, but the other day I caught him purposely bashing the Rabbit toy on it, which has been greatly annoying him of late. (He chatters angrily at Rabbit for some reason. I think Rabbit has done something to offend him.) Anyway, I turned around the other day to see him using the rattle to beat up Rabbit. He also has a grudge against Pooh in the honey pot. There’s a little pop-up Winnie-the-Pooh on the Exersaucer—you push a button, and Pooh pops out of the honey pot with a squeak. Well, every time I pop him up, Theo immediately slams him back down into the honey pot, with a look on his face as if to say, “I TOLD you to stay in there!” I have to admit, this penchant for destruction worries me a bit when he is more mobile and able to beat up other things, but at the moment, it’s kind of cute.
  
• We are also learning what an iron will our boy has. I had no idea a six-month-old could be so darn headstrong! When he is irate about something, he lets everyone know. He seems to be quite easily frustrated by his lack of mobility, and when he can’t reach a toy or something that he wants, he shrieks and squalls. Can’t say that’s my favorite part of his personality, and I shudder to think of the temper he may have as a toddler. With luck, though, maybe he’ll mellow out a bit as he gets older and can do more for himself. I think a lot of his temper is frustration. He is desperate to achieve whatever his goal is, and when he can’t do it, it infuriates him.
• I’ve also noticed something else neat over the last week. I knew Luna was very, very good with kids, but I didn’t know just how good until Janeane and Emma came over on Friday. Luna had her favorite Squeaky Ball (the bane of Chris’s existence, as it’s very loud and obnoxious and, for some reason, it just won’t die!), and she was playing with it with Janeane and Emma. When Janeane would reach for the ball, Luna would fiercely hang onto it and tug on it, as most dogs will. But when Emma would reach for it, Luna would immediately relinquish it and wait for Emma to throw it for her. (Well, at her...Emma is two, and hasn’t quite mastered the concept of throwing the ball for the dog, and not so much at the dog! But Luna didn’t mind—she was just delighted to have a playmate.) This gives me great hope that Luna will continue to be as sweet with Theo as she has been up until now. She really is a fantastic dog, despite her disgusting penchant for “helping” me clean up spit up.
• And speaking of spit up (how’s that for a charming segue?!), hurray for baby signs! As some of you know, I’ve been working on baby sign language with Theo for about two months now. I started with just the “milk” sign, because Theo tends to just suddenly shriek out of the blue when he’s hungry, instead of giving a little forewarning. So I decided a well-placed “milk” sign would be a nice alternative to an unearthly scream designed to rouse the dead. Anyway, the “milk” sign is opening and closing a fist, as if squeezing a cow’s udder. So for the last two months, when it’s time for Theo to eat, I say, “Do you want milk?” and I make the “milk” sign with my hand. Yesterday, he made it back! He was laying on my lap, getting ready to nurse, and I said, “Do you want milk?” and made the sign. He had one fist wrapped around my other thumb, and I felt him squeezing it. I looked down to find him making the “milk” sign and smiling! I was so excited!!! We shall keep working on that one, and I’m also starting to introduce the “food” and “more” signs.
• And last but not least...the Great Crib Saga continues. In this week’s album, you’ll see a picture of cute, chubby little feet sticking out of the side of the crib. I took that early in the week, when I had Theo in there for a few minutes during the day. (I put him in there when I need to get something done and I need him in a safe, contained place. He likes to play in there.) Inevitably, he wiggles and gets his feet stuck out through the rails. So we haven’t yet moved him into his crib in part because we figured he’d be doing that all night. Um, yes...we were right. Last night I put Theo in his crib by default. Chris was asleep, Theo wet through his PJs and all over the sheet in his Pack and Play, and I had no way to change the sheet without him squalling and waking up Chris when I put him down to do the changing. So, I decided on the spur of the moment that last night would be the Great Crib Night. Ugh...bad idea! Theo slept fine in the crib, but just as we suspected, he flailed and moved so much that he kept waking me up all night long because he’d get his legs stuck in the rails, and he’d start fussing. After freeing him several times, I decided that the crib is currently for the birds. I’m going back to the Pack and Play...at least I usually get a decent night of sleep when he’s in that. (In theory, anyway....)

Anyway, another week in the life of Theo and his weary but excited parents. His six-month checkup is this coming Thursday, so stay tuned for a midweek blog post about Gigantor’s weight, height, and all that good stuff. We’re accepting bets on the weight. My guess is 19 lbs 3 oz, although a little voice in my head says I should be guessing more like 18 lbs 7 oz. Chris has guessed 19 lbs on the nose. The winner gets...well, nothing but glory and the joy of proclaiming himself or herself the winner.

It seems we have acquired the wrong kid somewhere in the past week or so. Maybe some switched him on us at the park or something. The baby we have now has been happy for four straight days, with minimal fussing, and has taken naps for two days in a row. No way this is our Theo! I've been trying for literally months to get him to nap, to no avail! And suddenly, he took two naps yesterday and is on his first nap of the day today (noon on Tuesday). And he went to bed at 8:15 last night, a full hour early, and slept until 7:45 this morning!

 

Not that I'm complaining, mind you. But I swear, it's like he misunderstood the concept of a birthday and somehow thinks he's supposed to give us a gift. But a lovely gift it is!!!

First and foremost, I want to say HAPPY SIX-MONTH BIRTHDAY, THEO!!! He turns the big six months today (Sunday, 10/5).

 

The early part of this week was spent getting settled after our Portland trip and catching up on work. It has been crazy-busy for both Chris and I. Luckily, Theo has been mostly relatively cheerful. We also paid a short visit to Grandma Ruth one day when Theo was in a particularly mellow mood.

 

We also made another attempt at rice cereal this week, now that Theo is six months old and can theoretically eat solids now. I can’t say it went overly well. After two days of having a cheery little mellow fellow around, Leon returned with a vengeance a couple hours after the rice cereal experiment. We couldn’t tell for sure whether it was the cereal that bugged him, but it didn’t seem promising. Leon finally took leave about six hours after he arrived, and we breathed a sigh of relief and decided that rice cereal would no longer be on the menu, since it’s really not a nutritional powerhouse anyway. (We’ve now tried it twice, and neither time has yielded particularly positive results.)

 

So, we’re onto bigger and better foods now. After giving his system several days to get back to normal, we attempted pureed squash on Sunday. I bought a butternut squash, steamed it, and pureed it, then froze it in ice-cube trays, which make perfect single-serving amounts. I did the same with apples, so if the squash goes well for an entire week, we’ll then try apples and see how those go. I’m hoping the solids go well, as Theo isn’t nursing particularly well these days. We had a good run of it for a while, and now he’s constantly delatching and fussing again. I’m not sure whether it’s teething or what, but he’s just not nursing very well. I was trying to make it at least until the end of the year with him, but he may be self-weaning early, for all I know. We’ll keep at it for a while and see how it goes, but in the meantime, I’d like to at least get him started on solids, in case he is indeed wanting to wean.

 

Anyway, the good news is that my feeding worries today were squashed. (Get it? Squash...squashed?! Ha ha, I kill me!) We fed Theo his squash around lunchtime today, and he suffered no ill effects at all. He ate maybe half of one cube (we thawed it and warmed it to room temperature), so we were happy with that. And he had much fun demonstrating his new talent of blowing raspberries while eating said squash, so that was amusing for Chris (who did the feeding).

 

Our other celebration for Theo’s half-birthday was a trip to a local park. The one near our house has no shade (because it’s brand-new), so we drove over to one in Rocklin that has a nice, shady playground. As always, Theo had a blast on the swings. I swear, he loves nothing more in life than going on the swings. It’s very cute!

 

Sunday wasn’t our only big day, though. Saturday we took Theo to San Francisco for the first time. A few people I work with were in town for an audio engineering convention, so we drove down to meet them for dinner, along with our friend, Kim. But, because it’s a two-hour drive each way, we decided to make a day of it and attempt the drive around when Theo might theoretically nap. (Not that the kid naps very often, but we always like to try, even though it rarely yields results!) So, we left at 11am, had lunch on the way, and spent a couple hours at the San Francisco Zoo. I wish we’d had a little more time at the zoo; it was a gorgeous day, and the zoo is very nice (and quite uncrowded that day). Afterward, we drove back into the city proper via the Great Highway (which runs along the coast), which was gorgeous. We stopped at the Sutro Baths/Cliff House so Kim and I could walk down to the beach and take some pictures. Unfortunately, the sun was shining directly at us, so most of my pictures didn’t turn out, but it was still beautiful to see. Best of all, dinner went well, and Theo was a very good boy all long. Chris and I breathed a huge sigh of relief! I think Theo charmed my coworkers instead of scaring them by being fussy Leon, which was a good thing.

 

In honor of Theo’s six-month birthday, I thought I’d keep the blog relatively short and instead include a letter I wrote to him, since it really sums up his little self for those of you who haven’t yet met him. I have this rather morbid “tradition” that I’m starting of writing Theo letters on certain occasions, so that if I’m ever not around someday, he can look back at those letters and know how much I loved him. I wrote him one about his birth, and I wrote him one on Mother’s Day (and plan to do one every Mother’s Day and every birthday). So, here’s his six-month letter, so you all can get to know our little guy just a little bit better:

 

October 5, 2008

 

Dear Theo,

 

You are now six months old, little man! And you are nothing—nothing—like I imagined you’d be. Before you were born, I envisioned a quiet, calm baby, perhaps rather reserved, like your Dad and I can be sometimes. But no—you are the furthest thing from that possible. In fact, you are just like you were in the womb—a constant whirlwind of energy and motion. In retrospect, I should’ve known you’d have a lot of energy...you kicked me all the time, and your tiny fists pummeled my bladder those last few weeks of pregnancy. Even now, you kick me when I nurse you, and you slam your fists down on the keyboard when I try to work while feeding you.

 

You, my boy, have a passion I didn’t know existed in babies. You are middle-of-the-road in nothing. You have a fiery temper and scream like an angry pterodactyl when you’re mad—in fact, I think we can safely say that your first word was, “MMMMMAAAAAADDDDD!” even if you didn’t know what it meant when you were screaming it at us. You cry with gusto when you’re hungry...there is rarely any “mildly fussy” time with you. If you’re fussy, you’re generally wailing. But, you also laugh in absolute glee when you find something funny, like the dogs barking or when you’re playing on the swings. You have a radiant smile that lights up a room when you’re happy, and you can go from angry squalling to a devilishly handsome grin in a matter of a moment. I’ve taught you that I need a “Theo smile” to let you out of your swing, and you can be hollering up a storm at me in there, and then turn on that absolutely glowing smile if you think it’ll earn you a release from your prison. You’re a charmer, little one.

 

You have learned to blow raspberries, and you delight in going, “Phhhhbbbbllllltttt” at me whenever possible. You’re obsessed with your hands and feet, looking at them every day as if they’re the most fascinating things ever. You have an ardent affection for your caterpillar toy (the giraffe that you once loved has now been relegated to mere friend status) and your seahorse toy. You love your bath, and you splash in it with great merriment. With equal enchantment, you slam your rattle down on your Exersaucer, smashing everything in sight.

 

Somehow, Theo, just when I think I’m going to fall over from the sheer exhaustion of keeping up with you and a full-time job and a husband and two dogs, you flash that beautiful smile at me or giggle when I push you in the swing, and I completely melt.

 

One day, I hope you’ll learn to control that wild temper of yours...but at the same time, I hope you’ll always keep that incredible joy that you have. Hopefully, you can learn from your Dad and I to calm your temper, and we can learn from you how to live life with a passion and joy as intense as yours. Theo, you live life to the fullest like no one I’ve ever known. It sounds silly to say about a baby, but it’s true—you don’t do anything halfway. And I can’t help but admire the heck out of you for that, even when you are screaming at me. J

 

Love very much and always,

Your mama

 

We are back from Oregon, and no worse for the wear! In fact, we had quite a good time, although it wasn’t without its challenges. On the whole, though, much more relaxing/successful than our travels to Texas a few months back, thanks largely to the fact that we can now pretty much keep Theo fed without issue.

 

Our flight up to Portland was uneventful. Theo was such a good little boy that the people behind us commented, “You have such a good baby!” We laughed and thanked them, admitting, “We don’t get to hear that too often!!”

 

We arrived in Portland in the morning on Thursday, so we took a leisurely afternoon drive (in our rented Mazda 6…much more to our liking than the minivan we had in Texas—this car didn’t have warning lights coming on while we drove it!) along the Columbia River Gorge (east of Portland). There are several beautiful waterfalls along the way. We stopped at two for pictures and to walk around a bit: Horsetail Falls and its far more famous counterpart, Multnomah Falls. Theo seemed to enjoy the feeling of the waterfall spray on his face—he was giggling a bit. That night, he surprised us by scooting across the hotel bed, army-crawl style. He has yet to replicate the feat frontwards, but he is now scooting backwards with some regularity. I suspect full-blown scooting in both directions and then crawling can’t be too far behind.

 

Friday we were in a bit of a stupor, as Theo had kept us up quite a bit the night before, so we were glad to have a relaxing day with not much on the agenda. Our only goal was to make it to the Evergreen Aviation Museum to see the Spruce Goose and their SR-71, and we accomplished that. What a neat museum! If anyone is interested in planes or the space program and you happen to be in the Portland area, I highly recommend a trip out to Evergreen. As an added bonus, they had a really great playground where Theo got to ride his first teeter-totter, go on his first slide (both of these accompanied by Mom and Dad, of course!), and ride on the swings. As usual, the swings were a highlight for him. So much so that when we got to the car, we discovered that he had enjoyed the swings so much that he pooped his pants in glee. Ah, the life of a little one!

 

We also had to stop at Target to buy a replacement stroller. Our lovely umbrella stroller had seen better days, and I don’t think the flight up did it any favors. It was rather like piloting a shopping cart with a very messed-up wheel. It would stick in one direction, making us walk in lovely little circles to “unstick” it. So, we replaced it with another small umbrella-type stroller, which Theo actually seems to prefer…probably because it only has a lap belt and no shoulder harness, allowing him much wiggle room! He has also figured out how to open and close the canopy himself, which seems to give him much amusement.

 

We had dinner with my Aunt Sally and Uncle David on Friday. Delicious Mediterranean food, although Theo was not pleased. To be honest, he was rather beastly for most of the meal. Overtired, teething…who knows? Chris and I took turns walking with him when he’d get fussy, and eventually we made it through the meal. Theo even got a bit of lemon sorbet for dessert!

 

We spent pretty much all of Saturday with my aunt and uncle, too. Saturday morning was our Epicurean Excursion…a tour of local Portland restaurants, complete with tastings. My favorite was the bakery tasting because we got to have some lovely chocolate bread (yes, I cheated a tiny bit!). That was Chris’s least favorite, though, because he stepped outside to check Theo’s diaper and got a verbal tongue-lashing from a nasty woman about changing a baby in public near a restaurant. I’m not sure where she thought he ought to change him—Theo was in his stroller, and Chris had stepped over to a discreet side of the building, so he wasn’t standing right in front of the windows or something. Most men’s rooms don’t have baby-changing stations, and Theo can’t stand up on his own, so I’m not sure what she would have him do—lay Theo on the floor of a public restroom? Anyway, I chalk it up to bitter nastiness. Chris was checking Theo discreetly in his stroller outside…what more could he do?! You’d think the woman would’ve thought, “Oh, a man doing diaper duty instead of a woman…what a good guy he is!” At least, that’s what I would’ve thought.

 

Anyway, Chris’s favorite tasting was the pizza. That would normally be mine, too, but cheeseless pizza just isn’t quite as exciting as one would hope. (The tour guide arranged for a vegan slice for me, since I can’t eat dairy.) We also got to taste some local Portland beers, some regional wine, some exotic mustards, some teas, some breads, some locally made soups, and some gelato (sorbet for me and Theo). Yum…it was a foodie’s dream!

 

Saturday afternoon we went to the International Rose Test Garden, which was lovely despite it being September (and generally past the best rose season). I would’ve loved to explore it more, but there were a lot of stairs that were tough to navigate with a stroller, so we moved on. We tried to go to the Japanese Garden, but it, too, was not terribly stroller-friendly, so we gave up on that and went to dinner. After which, we bade my aunt and uncle goodnight and then wandered over to Powell’s, the largest used bookstore in the U.S. (It apparently used to be the largest in the world, but now there’s a bigger one in Beijing.) We found a couple of my books in there (that is, books I’ve edited—always neat to see my name in print, especially in someplace like Powell’s!), and we bought Theo a couple Dr. Seuss books. I read him One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish last night, and that seemed to be a hit.

 

Sunday morning Theo and I walked to Voodoo Donuts, known far and wide as being one of the best donut shops in the U.S. I love a good donut, and thus I had vowed to come to Voodoo the next time I was in Portland. And they even make vegan donuts, so I could stay dairy-free! Well, Theo and I walked the half-mile over there while Chris got ready, with the idea that we’d get a half-dozen donuts and just sample them. Voodoo makes all sorts of crazy flavors, so we wanted to try bites of several. And indeed, the donuts were quite good. The vegan one was just as good as the regular ones, amazingly enough! But wow…I felt a wee bit out of place in Voodoo. First of all, it’s in a rather seedy part of town, nestled among strip clubs and questionable bars, with a fair number of people sleeping on the street. To be perfectly honest, if it had been nighttime, I probably would’ve turned around and gone back to a safer part of town, since it was just Theo and me on our own. But it was a sunny Sunday morning, so I figured it was safe, albeit rather seamy. Second, Voodoo itself is a rather seedy little shop—dark and rather moldering, with blaring thrash-metal music and sullen, angry teens waiting on you. The girl who helped me was pleasant enough…in an angry, “I hate the world” kind of way. And, in fact, to go along with the strip-club atmosphere of the neighborhood, there were even X-rated donuts on display. (Thank goodness Theo isn’t old enough to ask questions yet!!) But, I had come this far, so I wasn’t about to leave without my donuts! So we got a half-dozen and walked quickly back to the hotel. And darn if they weren’t some really tasty donuts! I see why they earned their reputation for awesome donuts, and I realized I was not alone in my quest when I saw the 80-year-old woman in front of me in line buying donuts. She looked a bit bewildered by the thrash-metal music and the X-rated donuts, but she and her family forged on and bought their donuts, just like Theo and I did.

 

After the great donut excursion, Chris and I decided to drive out to the Oregon coast, so we headed for Cannon Beach. What a neat little seaside town! I would’ve liked to poke around more, but Theo was grumpy for most of Sunday (our good friend Leon made QUITE a few appearances!), so most of the time was spent dealing with a crabby baby. But, we did get a quick peek at the coast, and we had a nice picnic in the park and then played on the swings with Theo. As usual, he was all smiles for that! Then I suggested that we drive up the coast a bit to Astoria, thinking that maybe cranky boy would benefit from a nap in the car and Chris and I could enjoy the views of the coastline along the way. Well, he got a nap (and he did indeed benefit from it), but we soon discovered that the coastal highway doesn’t really run along the coast at that point. So, we just had a nice drive through the forest instead. I wish Chris had gotten to see more of the Oregon coast, which is really quite spectacular, but oh well. We’ll just have to make another trip up there sometime.

 

Theo also got to add Washington to his list of states visited, since our route back to Portland took us up into Washington for about 45 minutes before dropping back down into Oregon. He has now been to California (obviously!), Texas, Oregon, and Washington ex utero. If you count in utero, he has also been to Nevada, Florida, and British Columbia. Well-traveled little guy already!

 

Sunday night we ambled around Portland, enjoying the beautiful weather, and then went back to the same restaurant where we ate with my aunt and uncle on Friday night. I had an awesome seafood pasta, Chris had butternut squash ravioli, and Theo enjoyed sucking on a couple small pieces of honeydew melon. On our walk back to the hotel, we came across a Baskin-Robbins ice cream shop, so we stopped for some sherbet. Sherbet does contain dairy, but the content is very, very low, so I decided to use it as an experiment, and I ordered a kiddie scoop of rainbow sherbet. We gave Theo a couple tiny, tiny tastes, which he loved. Only problem is, he loved them SO much that much screaming ensued when the sherbet was all gone! Good heavens, I didn’t think a six-month-old baby was old enough to throw a fit over sherbet being gone, but that seemed to be exactly what he was doing. My gosh, I think we’re going to have a headstrong little boy on our hands when he gets older!!

 

Speaking of which, one of these days I’ll have to do a soapbox post about my love/hate relationship with Dr. Sears. For those of you unfamiliar with the name, Dr. Sears is sort of the Dr. Spock of this generation…the go-to source for issues about pregnancy, baby care, and childrearing. I finally broke down and bought his book The Fussy Baby, after Chris read a synopsis online and said, “This sounds just like Theo!” I had resisted buying this book, which discusses what Sears calls “the high-need child” in part because it seems to me that all babies are “high-need” at some level, but more because I really, really hate the label “high-need.” It sounds so negative to me, and I just refuse to think of Theo in a negative light. He is what he is, and the best thing we can do for him is love him exactly as he is, so I don’t want to stick what I see as a negative label on him. (In fairness to Dr. Sears, he sees “high-need” as a more positive label than “fussy,” which is why he has adopted the term.) Anyway, neither Chris nor I has finished the book, but we have a love/hate relationship with it so far. On the love side, it makes us feel better about the fact that we aren’t messing up here…we’re doing the best we can with a baby who can be quite challenging! On the hate side, we both dislike the term “high-need” because it sounds negative, and we aren’t in agreement with Dr. Sears about some of his suggestions. They might work great for a stay-at-home mom who is 100% devoted to raising her baby, but for a stay-at-home mom who is also juggling a full-time job, they just aren’t feasible in the manner in which Dr. Sears prescribes them. And when Dr. Sears describes his own “high-need” baby (the fourth of his eight children, I believe), neither of us really likes the person she turned into. Dr. Sears seems to see her as a great success story, but we both see her as a rather bossy, domineering tyrant. (She was graduating high school at the time of the writing of the edition of the book we’re reading. She’s probably in her early 20s now, I’d guess.) He speaks proudly of her browbeating the student council (of which she was president) into going along with her way of things, and Chris and I aren’t crazy about the idea of Theo growing up into some little dictator.

 

Anyway, I digress, but the point is that we are continuing to work our way through the book, since it does indeed seem to fit Theo quite well in its descriptions of such babies. But, we have adopted the far more positive-sounding term “spirited” to describe him. Chris found that term somewhere (I forget where), and it’s basically a description for the same type of child Dr. Sears mentions, but to me, it just sounds a lot more positive. Who wouldn’t want a “spirited” child?! Sounds like a fun little person, doesn’t it?! So anyway, if I mention our “spirited” child in some future post, you can translate that to mean fussy or high-need if you so desire.

 

But I’ll get off my soapbox for now (and perhaps return to it when I’ve finished the book) and just say that Portland was a lot of fun. Traveling with Theo was much easier this time around, despite several Leon moments. We’re looking forward to doing more of it in the future! And we both loved Portland. We have no desire to leave Sacramento, but if we ever did, Portland would be on the list of contenders. It’s beautiful and relaxed and just generally a very nice little city. And now, on to planning our next great adventure! We’re debating something around my birthday in January.... Last year we were in Florida for my birthday, so maybe someplace warm again. Or maybe back to the Pacific Northwest. Theo would look so cute in a little snowsuit! Oh, the possibilities are endless....

So Theo has been rather grumpy today (teething again, I think...he's running a slight fever, and I think that's making him feel poopy). I was trying to get some laundry folded, but he was having none of it. So I put him a sling to "wear" him while I folded. That was good for a couple minutes, but then he started fussing again. And then I hit upon a solution: singing! But not just any singing. He really didn't care for "Wimoweh (The Lion Sleeps Tonight)," and it was hit or miss when I tried to croon some George Strait tunes. However, he was a BIG Elvis fan! In particular, he seemed to very much enjoy "Suspicious Minds" and "Hound Dog." Good taste, little man!!

Well, it's official: Theo is a ladies man. I had my suspicions, as he always flirts with the women at the grocery store when we go in, and women pretty much everywhere we go. (He also flirts with a very old man we often see at the grocery store who likes him, so I guess he doesn't discriminate by gender...or age!) But last night, my theory was proven. We went out to our favorite Turkish restaurant Saturday night with Grandma Kathy and Grandpa Tom, who were up visiting for the weekend. I was a little nervous because dinnertime is Theo's fussy time of the day, but we braved it. Sure enough, Theo started fussing shortly after we arrived...not terribly, but just kind of whiny and irritable, which did not bode particularly well for him making it through an entire sit-down meal. That is, until he laid eyes on the belly dancer who was performing in the restaurant. He was absolutely rapt as she danced by our table, clicking her finger cymbals. Then he started smiling and laughing and kicking his feet. At one point, he literally drooled—I kid you not! The belly dancer, Laura, seeing her biggest fan of the evening, then made it a point to keep coming by and dancing for Theo, and he ate it up! Every time he'd see her, he'd stare in awe at her bright, beautiful costume, and then begin laughing and smiling and bouncing. The people at the tables around us were laughing at how enthusiastic he was whenever his friend Laura would dance by!

 

As we finished dinner, Chris and I gave Theo some money to tip Laura (this sounds ridiculous, I know, but one of Theo's new things is that he likes to hold EVERYTHING—he's very proud when I let him hold my credit card at the grocery store, or when he gets to hold a light bag and carry it out to the car; he clings on for dear life!), and he proudly clutched his $5 bill. However, you're supposed to place the money in the dancer's waistband, which Theo obviously couldn't do, so Chris had to take over. And it was then that I realized I have no idea where our son got his prowess with the ladies! Poor Chris turned about five shades of red and fumbled his way nervously through sticking the money in Laura's waistband. Ha ha, I love my shy husband! I'll never have to worry about him frequenting exotic dancer places or anything like that...he's far to shy and embarrassed! Nope, my bigger worry is that I'll lose him to the lovely produce aisle at Nugget Market someday. He's far more comfortable among the peaches and strawberries than scantily clad women! Now Theo is apparently another story.... But, Laura told us Theo made her night with his enthusiasm, so all was well. And Theo fell asleep within two seconds of leaving the restaurant...I guess all that flirting really wears a boy out!

 

It was nice to get a good day on Saturday, because Friday was absolutely awful, for the most part...thus my venting blog post. Apologies for posting a non-happy post...but I needed to get it off my chest. Anyway, Saturday was actually a busy day for us. I had a photography workshop in the morning, and Chris and Theo came along to be my models. They were excellent models, and I think I got a few good shots. You can check 'em out in this week's album. After the photo shoot, Grandpa Tom and Grandma Kathy came for a visit, and we walked Theo over to the park so he could play on the swings, which he loved. I took him on the swings for the first time on Friday (in an effort to get a break from his constant fussing!), and he was in seventh heaven! He giggled and smiled and kicked his legs enthusiastically...it was so neat! We went back later that night so Chris and my Mom could see him, and he was similarly excited. Lots of swinging pictures in this week's album—our boy’s a swinger! I knew he'd like the swings—he's a bit of a daredevil who loves the "airplane game" where I hold him above my head and exclaim, "Wow, look how high up you are!!" so I figured he'd dig the swings. And indeed he does.

 

One of his other favorite interests is his hands. Ever since he was a tiny baby, he has liked to stare in fascination at his hands, particularly while sitting in the car. Lately we notice him doing it more and more. You’ll see several pictures in this week’s album. He just stares at his hands as if to say, “What are these beautiful things? I’ve never seen anything so fascinating in my life!”

 

He also has a new interest in cantaloupe. My Mom and I went to lunch one day early in the week, and Theo was getting fussy, so I picked a piece of cantaloupe out of my fruit salad and let him suck on it while I held it. I quickly became a rather sticky mess, but he loved it! He sucked on the cantaloupe with such glee that the woman next to us was laughing! We’ve given it to him in a little mesh food bag designed for babies a few more times, and he seems to like it well enough. And, best of all, it doesn’t appear to cause him any grief. Though we can’t be sure yet because he’s having a really rough time with eczema this week...but we think that’s unrelated to the cantaloupe, as the timing doesn’t quite add up. (This might explain Super Fussy Friday, though. The eczema is usually just a little bit on his upper arms and legs that is pretty much always present. But on Friday night, it had crept pretty much all over his arms and legs, and he even had a few small patches on his back and tummy. So maybe he was uncomfortable, thus the grumpiness. Or, maybe the grumpiness made it break out more. Who knows....)

 

Saturday afternoon, Kathy, Theo, Luna, and I went to a pug meetup while Chris and Tom stayed home and hung out. I didn't get any pug pix this time, but the meetup was fun. Theo seemed to enjoy seeing all the pugs...he hung out in the Baby Bjorn and stared at all the pug chaos. Afterward we went home, and Luna crashed alongside Bits while we humans went to dinner and Theo met his lady love, Laura the belly dancer.

 

That was actually the second night in a row we went to the Turkish restaurant. My Mom's birthday was on Friday, so we went there with her for a birthday dinner. Theo was pretty good...a little fussy, but much more cheery than he had been all day. I admit that I was rather worried about how he'd be, since he was SO grumpy almost all day on Friday. But, he did okay. He was calm for a little while in the morning while we baked a cake for my Mom. And this time, "we" really did bake it. I normally put Theo in his high chair while I cook, and I talk to him and give him an incredibly boring running dialogue of what I'm doing as I cook. It usually keeps him relatively content, but not on Friday...he wailed and wailed, so I finally put him in a sling carrier and held him on my hip while I baked a cake from scratch one-handed. I'm rather proud of that accomplishment—it wasn't easy! Theo was entranced by my hand mixer, though. I thought the sound might startle him, but it didn't, and he was fascinated by watching it. The cake even turned out pretty good. It was ostensibly a mocha "cream cheese" cake, with the "cream cheese" being made of tofu cream cheese, soft tofu, and a couple other ingredients. It actually tasted more like a spice cake than a mocha cake, but it was pretty good for a dairy-free treat.

 

Other than those events, the week was mostly spent with me working a lot. My two weeks of calm suddenly came to an end, and I'm now entering into the end-of-the-year rush, which always happens. Yikes, I hope I get through this okay. I have 22 book projects currently in the works, which is a good deal more than I've ever handled at once. And this with an often-fussy baby! We'll muddle through, though I may be a bit of a basket case by the end of the year.  Luckily, many of the authors are ones I've worked with before, so that always makes it a bit easier. I have one monster book that may be the death of me, but that one should be happening more in January.

 

I did manage to get out to the mother of all consignment sales, though. As most of you know, I love, love, love a good bargain, and this sale was fantastic! The merchandise was pretty much all in really good condition, the prices were fantastic, and there was a TON to choose from! If I'd had about three more hands, I would've come home with even more. As it was, I got a much-needed backup Boppy (nursing pillow), a really cute walker for Theo, and some musical toys. Theo seems very attracted to two types of toys: those that make crinkly sounds and those that make music. So I picked out a few musical toys for him, and he seems to really enjoy them. This consignment sale comes around twice a year, and I will surely go again in the spring. They had a lot of good stuff for slightly older kids, but I ignored it since I only have so many hands and we have limited storage space....

 

Oh—anyone have an answer for this? Last night, I woke up at 3:30am for a bathroom trip. I checked Theo and went back to sleep; all was well, and nothing was amiss. Chris, Theo, and I are currently still camping out in the living room (long story, but it works for us), and Chris and I generally make a nest on the floor by the fireplace to sleep. So I woke up again at 6am when Theo fussed to get up...and the fireplace was blazing with a lovely fire right by our heads. Now, we have a gas fireplace that you have to turn on with a wall switch that is high on the wall, next to our mantle. To get to it, one would have to step over sleeping Chris’s and my heads, navigate around an end table and the knickknacks on the mantle, and hit the switch, then navigate back past us. There is absolutely no way we could’ve done it from our beds. So the best I can guess is that one of us slept-walked and turned it on, but being that we’re both quite clumsy, I’m wondering how the heck we did it without running into anything, knocking over the end table, or stepping on the other person’s head. Weird, weird, weird. Either that or we have a ghost living with us. It was kind of freaky. Anyone have any other ideas how our fire could’ve magically been turned on in that 2 1/2 hour span when we were supposedly both asleep?? And no, the postpartum depression hasn’t gotten the better of my addled brain. I actually woke Chris up and pointed to the fire and said, “Why is our fireplace on?” I knew he wouldn’t believe me if he didn’t see it with his own eyes.

 

I think the album is a little huge this week—my apologies! I've been practicing my portraiture for my photography class, and I guess I got a little overzealous! Next week's album will be similarly huge because it'll be full of pictures of our trip to Portland!! By the way, I generally update the blog every Sunday night, but next week will be a day or two late, as we're not getting back from Portland until Monday. Wish us luck that Theo enjoys the trip so that WE can enjoy the trip!  

 

Okay, I try to keep this blog very upbeat, but it's been a long day already (and it's already 10:15am!), and I need to vent. We have a fussy baby. There, I've said it. Theo is a fussy baby. He's not an easy child. And that doesn't mean I love him any less, but maybe it explains why I'm so darn exhausted all the time!

 

I think people think we're overreacting...we get a lot of, "Oh, all babies cry!" Which kind of makes me feel like a five-year-old. I know all babies cry! I know some babies cry a lot! And the truth is, ours falls into the latter category. And it doesn't help that he won't nap, so he's overtired much of the time, which only makes him fussier. And the truth is, when he's really fussy, we don't tend to take him around other people. So a lot of people who think we're overreacting haven't seen him in true form.

 

The food problems seem to be sorted out--as long as I stay on my very restricted diet and primarily nurse Theo, he does fine. He gets a little bit of Baby's Only formula from time to time, but not very often. So on the food level, he's going great as long as we don't throw a wrench in it by trying something new that upsets his tummy. And so, I realize that he is just a fussy little guy. Much less fussy now that the food issue is sorted out, but still fussy.

 

And it's not his fault, so it breaks my heart when people seem frustrated by him. He's not crying for no reason...his bonehead mama just doesn't know why he's fussing.

 

My Mom gave me a very valuable piece of advice: You have to raise the baby in the way you're comfortable. So that's why we ignore the "cry it out" advice for the most part. I'm not opposed to letting Theo fuss for a few minutes as long as he knows we're in the near vicinity and that we haven't abandoned him. In fact, we do it frequently, because sometimes it's the only way I can brush my teeth, go to the bathroom, prepare dinner, or do any one of a hundred small tasks that take a few minutes. I put him somewhere near me and talk to him as I do whatever, so he knows his mama is there. I don't want him to feel abandoned or ignored. But at the same time, there are things I need to get done, and at six months old (almost), I think he's okay to fuss for a few minutes.

 

The problem is, fussing often turns into full-blown shrieking, complete with choking, gasping, spitting up, etc. And I'm not okay with that. Not at his age. So I try to calm him down, and once he has calmed down at least a bit, I pick him up to "reward" him for calming himself. This is maybe too much for a six-month-old to process, but I can't help but think that eventually he'll figure out, "Oh, if I try to calm down, I'll get what I want." Which I'd much prefer to "If I scream at the top of my lungs, I'll get what I want."

 

We're reading a book about "spirited" children, which seems to fit Theo fairly well in some respects. And it talks about how they have two volumes: calm and shrieking. That's Theo all right...there is very little "mild fussing" with this kid. We call it "Zero to sixty in two seconds."

 

So today's a grumpy day, and I'm feeling overwhelmed. I have a lot of work to do (that two weeks of calm is rearing its ugly head now!), and a cranky boy to boot. (I think he's probably teething...and overtired.) And so I post, just to clear my mind....

 

So I guess what I'm saying is, I know some people think we spoil Theo, or we cater to him, or we overreact to him being fussy. But the truth is, he is fussy, and we just do the best we can to make it through each day. I'm very, very proud to say that neither of us has ever lost our temper with him...which is good because there's no way that would ever help him. Instead, the frustration eats away at us until we're both exhausted. But that's better than taking it out on Theo, any day.

 

And as for Theo, I hope his fussiness will end because I want nothing more than for him to be a happy child. I'm biased, I know, but in my mind, he is a wonderful, sweet, intelligent, creative, amazing little boy. The fussiness is a layer on top of that...the first thing a lot of people see. If you look past that layer, you see the absolutely wonderful little boy within. And that is what keeps me going. I tell Theo "you're super--you're the best!" every day, and I mean it. I'm exhausted--yes. Fighting postpartum depression (some days more successfully than others)--yes. Crying a lot--yes. But above all, I'm a mom to the most incredible little boy in the world. I will make it through this, and someday Theo will be primarily the happy little boy that I know is in there.

 

Thanks for listening...I needed a good vent.

It has been a pretty quiet week around here, so I've been working extra hard to try to get Theo to nap. No dice. The kid will not nap! Well, that's not entirely true. He'll fall asleep while nursing or while taking a bottle, but then if I try to put him in his swing or his crib or his Pack and Play, he immediately wakes up and fusses. So, I sit trapped in my chair with a snoozing baby on my lap. Which is fine until I have to go to the bathroom or something.... And, he'll sometimes sleep in the car or in the stroller...but again, the minute you take him out, he wakes up. I have tried everything to get him to take a nap at home, and he won't do it. I even finally resorted to the "fuss it out" strategy one day when he looked absolutely exhausted so I knew he needed to sleep...and he won. After 20 minutes of fussing, my nerves couldn't take it anymore.

 

On the plus side, he still sleeps well at night, so no complaints. But the poor kid looks so tired most days because he needs a nap! His little eyes get all red-rimmed, but still he fights it. Stubborn little one! He gets that from Chris, surely not from me.

 

I've been playing with the camera a bit more, trying to work on portraits, so you'll see a fair number of attempts in this week's album. And I had my first photography workshop on Saturday, so you'll see my attempts at taking portraits of my friend, Kim. I think some of them turned out pretty decent, although I had trouble getting the lighting right. There's a lot of "math" stuff involved in photography, I'm finding...and I can't say math was ever my strongest point! So, it's a steep learning curve for me. But I sure am enjoying doing it! So much so that Chris said, "Why don't you take another photography workshop after this one?" And so I'm taking a second one with Kim...this one in October/November. This one will be a documentary photography one, and our field trip is to the Sikh Festival in Yuba City. Free yummy Indian food, I'm told! Not sure I'll be able to eat it, since Indian food is often made with yogurt and/or ghee (clarified butter), but maybe they'll have some nice boring chickpea stuff I can try.  And anyway, the photo ops should be good...I guess they've done this field trip for this workshop before, and it is supposedly a lot of fun.

 

Also featured this week are some pictures of Theo "eating" a peach. We have created a monster. We have a rule that he needs to sit in his chair with us while we eat dinner, so that we're able to eat together. Most nights he's pretty good, but one night he was being really fussy...just didn't want to sit there. Instead of giving in and picking him up, we decided to let him suck on a piece of peach. He was hooked!! Every time we'd pull it away from his mouth, he'd shriek at us. My, that boy has a temper! But he sure did like that peach....

 

Alas, the peach success led us to try a similar experiment the next night with a banana. Supposedly the first foods to try with a baby include bananas, sweet potatoes, and avocados, since most babies can tolerate those well. So, I chose bananas. Yikes. NOT my best idea. Theo liked the banana just fine (after making a horrible grimace at the first couple licks), and he looked adorable all covered in mashed banana as he ate it. (I had put a small piece in this tiny mesh "baby food" bag. You put a piece of soft food in the mesh bag, and then the baby can hold onto the bag's plastic handle and suck on the mesh, which makes little bits of the food squeeze out. This way, they don't get so much that they end up choking. They slowly eat the one piece of food.) However, the banana must not have settled well. We went to take an evening stroll around the mall after dinner, and after we gave him some milk, the carnage began. He spit up on me five times as we walked back to the car. And not small amounts either—large amounts. He was soaked and I was pretty wet and sticky by the time we got to the car. He then spit up two more times on the changing table as I stripped him down for a bath. His bath went fine, but then he spit up on his clean pajamas.

 

We finally got him down to bed, and he was a fussy Leon. He woke up after two hours and wanted to eat (very unusual for him—once he's down for the night, he rarely wakes to eat), so I nursed him and then put him back down. He woke up screaming two hours later, and I discovered that he had spit up all over the Pack and Play and had then rolled in it, so the poor guy was covered in it. Spitup in his hair, spitup in his ears, spitup in his nose...it was a mess.

 

So, I'm led to believe that he's not quite ready for bananas yet. I guess the only way to know for sure would be to try again, but I'm not really wanting to experience another evening like that again right away, so for now...no bananas for my little monkey!

 

But moving on from spitup stories.... We also got our new TV hooked up, and I'm very excited because now we get The Animal Planet. Woohoo—Meerkat Manor! I think Chris is more excited by the extra ESPN channel, but I think Animal Planet is much more fun.

 

We had a baby sitter again this week, too—Briagha came over and watched Theo, so Chris and I went out and had a nice dinner at our favorite Mexican restaurant. And then we bought Theo a Halloween costume, which is too cute for words on him, if I do say so myself. I'm a sucker for Halloween.... I will share that he is going to be a monkey for Halloween, but I'll save the pictures for the actual holiday. (I took a few when I tried the costume on him, but I had a lighting setting wrong on the camera, so they didn't turn out too great anyway.)

 

We also got to go out on Saturday night—after Kim's and my photography workshop, Dave, Chris, and Theo met us at a Japanese restaurant for dinner. Dinnertime with Theo can be a bit challenging, but all in all it went well. The only bummer about Saturday was that I had to miss a visit from Jason, Maria, and Kaitlyn (whose name I hope I haven't misspelled!). They arrived just as I was leaving for my photography workshop, so I didn't get to see them. But Chris had a great time visiting with them and Theo was a very good boy...though I'm told my son tried to pull up Kaitlyn's dress. Where he learned that naughty behavior, I'll never know!

 

Sunday we decided to take Theo to the Folsom Zoo and Animal Sanctuary. I think he's a little too young to really notice the animals yet, but Chris and I enjoyed it, and I think Theo liked being out and walking around. He did notice a few of the chickens running around the zoo and park, and he was smiling at those. (Perhaps he takes after his mama and likes chickens!) We'll definitely go back when he's a bit older, as the zoo is pretty neat. It's small and fairly quiet, so not much chaos. And the park surrounding it is nice and shady. There were a lot of toddlers there having fun chasing the chickens and peacocks that roam the park, so I think it might be a fun place for Theo to visit when he's a little older.

 

And so ends another week with our crazy boy. He is getting to be more fun every day, as he learns new things and explores. Every day is a new adventure for him, and it's neat to watch.

So Theo managed to amuse me twice in short order today...both for rather gross reasons. So if you don't get a chuckle out of baby bathroom humor, then don't read on....

 

First, the only problems we have with Luna with regard to Theo are that she wants to lick him all the time and that she wants to, er, "clean up" for us when he spits up on the carpet. Which he does on a daily basis, since he is the King of Spitup and thus he spits up at least five times a day, sometimes more like ten or fifteen. This attempt at pug cleanup really grosses me out. I realize she's a dog and they do gross things sometimes, but ewww! So today, I was holding Theo on my lap, and Luna was laying at my feet. Theo suddenly leaned over and spit up, managing to do so squarely on Luna's back! Luna heard the telltale sound of spitup and jumped up, looking everywhere for the mess to "clean up." Little did she know it was on her back. Ha!!

 

Second, I almost always get the poopy diapers. Sometimes I think Chris deliberately "forgets" them so I get them. Today, he came home from work and said, "I'll take the baby after I get out of the bathroom." Well, Theo hadn't pooped in about three days...but he just managed to do so right when Chris was about to come out of the bathroom. So for once, I got to pawn off the poopy diaper!! Nice timing, my son!!

 

Ahhh, it takes so little to make me happy these days.

It has come to our attention that Theo is quite the little mini-perfectionist. He spent the better part of this week getting furious that he can't crawl yet! For some odd reason, I haven't had much work to do this week (which does not bode well for next week, when I'll probably get slammed!), so I've been able to spend a lot of time playing with Theo. I put him on the floor and give him a toy, then put a couple other toys just out of reach. He immediately flips over onto his stomach and begins to try to make his way over to the just-out-of-reach toys. He'll try for a good five minutes, and then dissolve into angry, frustrated tears and wailing. He seems to be furious that he can't master crawling yet, even though he's only five months old! (In other news, he turned five months old on the 5th! Yay Theo!) So a lot of the pictures in this week's album are of Theo desperately trying to crawl. I should add that on Saturday night, he did accomplish two feats of strength: First, he managed to scoot on his belly to get a toy. It was only about 10 inches from him, and it was a long, laborious journey filled with much anguished wailing, but he managed it. Second, about half an hour later, I put him down on the floor while I moved the kitchen chairs to be able to vacuum under the table. Next thing I knew, he had rolled two full rolls to make it over to the vacuum cleaner, which he was happily playing with. We really need to think about doing some baby-proofing sooner rather than later, methinks.

 

Other than being crabby about his inability to crawl, Theo has been a pretty cheery little guy this week. Which is a good thing, since Chris had to spend a lot of time at the office, sitting in on interviews for a new editor. We did have one Leon day, though. And it was probably my fault, really. The pediatrician told me to periodically experiment with small amounts of dairy, because eventually Theo should be able to tolerate it, and the only way to find out when is to experiment a bit. So about a month ago, I had a cookie made with butter. And we had a bad Leon night. Blech. This week, I decided to try again, thinking, "Well, the small amount of butter in one cookie can't possibly upset him, can it?" Hmmm, I think maybe it can. Theo had been cheery for 3 1/2 days straight when I tried said cookie. I ate the cookie (which tasted fabulous, by the way!), nursed him a few hours later, and within a couple hours, he did a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde switch into a fussy, screaming little Leon. He was pretty awful for about three hours, and then calmed down and went to sleep. The next morning, he had a big patch of eczema on one shoulder that wasn't there before. I don't want to jump to conclusions, but it seems to me that perhaps the butter was the culprit. (I should point out that this was a decent-sized meal-replacement oats-and-grains-and-fruits cookie...not a small modest cookie like one would make at home.) So, I am led to believe that it's probably best to continue my extremely rigid avoidance of dairy for the time being. We'll experiment again in a few more weeks, when I feel up to another Leon night!

 

We had a lot of fun this week, since I didn't have to work much. We went to see Great-Grandma Ruth one day. I think she was rather surprised and amused by Theo's temper when he finishes a bottle and his mean, mean mama takes it away. He screams like it's the end of the world for about a minute, and then realizes he is indeed full and settles down. Stubborn little poop, that boy of mine....

 

We also went to visit Auntie Lynnie and got to see cousin Stevie, too. Theo had a ball with my sister—she had him laughing up a storm as we ate lunch! He also found her dog, Roxie, quite amusing. Which is good since no one finds Roxie amusing.  Poor Roxie—she's a Chihuahua, and an extremely yappy one. So she drives everyone nuts with her barking. But Theo thought she was just the funniest little thing ever! So she has a friend in Theo. Theo is a lover of all dogs, I'm finding. Yesterday I was holding him while Luna raced around the house in circles, trying to get me to feed her, and I looked at Theo to find a HUGE smile on his face as he watched Luna's antics. He just loves those crazy dogs...he laughs and smiles at them a lot!

 

In non-Theo news, we got our new furniture delivered! The desk looks great and creates a lot more space in the den, which was our intent. And the TV cabinet fits perfectly and looks really nice, too. The TV will be hooked up this week, when we switch from Dish Network to cable, and I'll have to take a picture of the new setup after that.

 

And, the biggest non-Theo news is that I have FINALLY done something I've meant to do for years: I'm taking a photography class! It's just a short four-session seminar, but the first meeting was Friday night. I absolutely loved it! I learned a lot even on the first night. The seminar is on outdoor portraiture, so I'll spend three hours each of the next two Saturdays in field workshops, taking portraits at the college's nature center. Next Saturday we use each other as models, but the following Saturday we have to bring models...so I'll be bringing Chris and Theo to pose for me. Then we have an evaluation class in October where we frame/mat our four best portraits that we've taken during the class duration and present them for critique. Almost everyone in the class has far more experience than I do, so I don't expect to get great critiques, but I'm just having fun learning about photography, which I have long meant to do. And frankly, it was fun to do something that didn't revolve around baby poop or breast feeding!  I'm taking the class with my friend Kim, so that makes it all the more enjoyable. She's my go-to person for camera advice, so it'll be fun to do this together. Now I REALLY wish I could've gotten into the Fall Colors photography workshop that I was originally eyeing, but alas it is full...and the first day is while we're in Portland, so I can't even try to add it. Oh well, I'll just have to find another good workshop next semester and take that.

 

Saturday was an errands day and became a cleaning day when Theo took an unexpected two-hour nap. I seized the opportunity to clean the house. Which sounds utterly pathetic unless you realize that I’m somewhat of a neat freak who actually enjoys getting to clean up the house. Not that I so much enjoy the act of cleaning itself...I just like the end product, so doing it makes me happy.

 

But Sunday was really a fun day. Chris, Theo, and I headed up to Empire Mine State Park in Grass Valley to try out my portraiture skills, and to just escape the heat and enjoy the park. (Grass Valley is in the Sierra foothills, so it was a mere 90 degrees; Sac was slated to be 100 degrees today. Ugh!) I’ve always wanted to go there, as I’ve heard it’s beautiful, but I just hadn’t ever made it up there. It is indeed beautiful and peaceful, and Theo was a little angel, so we had fun. I did discover that I’m horrible at taking direct-sunlight portraits, but I’ll ask the instructor of my class for some pointers next week and see whether I can figure out what I’m doing wrong. I did better with shade portraits this time, I think...Chris and Theo don’t look like Smurfs. So that’s a start. Anyway, day trips like that are something Chris and I used to do a lot, and I’ve really missed them since we had the baby. So it was a lot of fun to take a day and do that. You can see some pictures of the beautiful park in this week’s album.

 

Have a good week, everyone! Less than three weeks until we head to Portland—can’t wait!

 

Oh dear. Theo is the most interesting person I've had opportunity to meet in quite some time, but there are days when he is really the most interesting (or at least the most entertaining!) person on the planet to me. Today was one of those days....

 

Mr. Theo has been cheery for three straight days, which is wonderful!!! And each day he has learned something new. Yesterday was how to kick the back seat of the car while riding in his car seat. The day before was how to peel the fuzzy monkey sticker off his changing table, which gives him great glee. Today was how to grab his feet, which kept him busy for quite some time. But the real entertainment came when I got ready to bathe him tonight. Theo's greatest desire right now is to crawl, so if I put him on his back, he generally will immediately flip over, push himself up, and attempt to crawl. Only most of the time, he looks like he's doing the breast stroke or some kind of frog motion as he flails wildly on his belly. So tonight I laid him on the bathmat, buck naked, while I ran water into his tub. He flipped over and wiggled himself onto the linoleum. I told him that didn't look very comfortable on his...er, privates...but he paid me no mind. He began to kick wildly with a big grin on his face, doing his breast-stroke/frog imitation. I thought this was very cute and called Chris to come look. And then I noticed the giant puddle spreading beneath Theo. The boy was peeing all over the floor and "swimming" in his own pee...very happily, I might add. And thus, he has been swimming in raw sewage, and he loves it! (I believe that line came from one of the Naked Gun movies back in the '80s or early '90s, but don't quote me on that....)