pfbbtt!

We found a cool new game. When Thad buzzes his lips at Nate, the buddy gets really excited, kicking and squirming around. This is especially fun for us because it's really the first interactivity we've had. We can actually see cause and effect. Yay! We caught it on this video, which has a surprise ending (and we swear it's Nate and not us!)



Also, happy birthday Grandpop/Dad!

drooly puss, jr.

According to Thad's baby book, one of his nicknames was "drooly puss." His son seems to have inherited this drooling trait and now often looks rabid because he blows bubbles in his saliva. He's also started to put his fists in his mouth a lot, leading numerous people to wonder if he's teething already (way early, if that's true). He seems to think that he can fit not only one but both fists into his teeny mouth. Hopefully he isn't teething because there's no way either hand will fit with little teeth in the way.

Another recent development is a newfound ability to grab things. Nothing intentional yet, but if something comes in contact with Drooly's hand he will grasp it. This was very cool when he was grasping at toys and rattles, relatively amusing when he pulls on my shirt while feeding and whips off the strategically placed washcloth during diaper changes, and not so fun when he grabs hair and faces. What a grip... and those little nails hurt!















Nate also had a magic pee today that soaked through his onesie and up his back, probably 25-30 square inches, but he was totally dry inside. Nothing on the outside of his diaper, t-shirt, back, etc. Weird.

And, the best news of all, is that The Rash is actually healing! Hip hip hooray! It's not totally gone, but it's SO much better. We can hardly believe it. I'm almost speechless. And that's saying something! We have another dermatologist appointment tomorrow, but I think we've finally got things under control. The stomahesive powder has worked wonders. And we are seriously relieved. Yay!

strangers

As most people are aware, babies attract lots of attention from strangers when they go out. We get lots of questions (What's his name? How old is he?), lots of advice (You should use [insert brand name baby product here]), and random stories (My child did xyz when he was a baby).

Sometimes these comments are helpful. Like if we're shopping for diapers and the dad next to us in the store says, "we like that brand best."

Sometimes they are irritating. A few days ago I was out and someone said, "I'm cold just looking at him." Yes, it's cold and snowing out. That's why the kid is bundled up in layers of clothing, topped off by a wool hat and a blanket. And we had a whopping twenty foot walk from the car into the building. He's fine. In fact, I'm more concerned about him sweating than being chilly. Whatever.

Sometimes the comments are unrelated to Nate and his surroundings. That's nice that your granddaughter lives in Seattle and likes the color purple, but I've got a five minute window to buy all these groceries and get home before my baby starts wailing because he's starving, not having eaten for two whole hours.















But Thad and I just experienced our weirdest story yet. This must be why we call people "strangers." We were out running errands, carrying our peacefully sleeping baby in his carseat carrier. This lady comes up to us and lifts off the blanket (violating rule #1 - never touch someone else's baby without permission) and says, "Oh good! All the parts are there!" Then she proceeds to tell us that when her son was a baby she dreamt that she boiled him. Her mother (in the dream) said that whenever you make broccoli you must also boil a baby. She talked about this dream for about five minutes before letting us get on with our shopping. Umm...?!? How do you react to that? Thad wishes we had been quick enough to say that we prefer ours fried.

a long walk

Have you've seen any of those cooking competitions where the chefs create a cake that is five feet high and shoots of fireworks? Or the candy competitions with psychedelic gravity-defying sculptures? At the very end of the competition, the chefs have to carry their creations from the kitchens to the display table for judging. Last night after Nate ate his (second) dinner and was dozing off in my lap I pondered the walk from the rocking chair to the crib, feeling very much like those chefs. One fasle move and the cake comes crashing down. Or the baby wakes up. Unfortunately for me, I think the chefs have a better record of making it to their goal!

stock tip

Buy desitin.

a rookie mistake

Today I made a new mom mistake. Nate fell asleep and I thought I could take a shower. Silly me. The first part of my plan went off without a hitch and I am, in fact, clean. However things went awry quickly. I exited the bathroom to crying. I was going to just let him cry for a few minutes but he seemed more upset than usual, so I headed into his room in my bathrobe and picked him up, thinking I'd calm him down, get dressed, then calm him again (since by that point he'd be crying again). My plan was foiled when I found my sweet little baby covered in poo. This was the mother of all poos. So much poo that he not only oozed out of his diaper and through his onesie, but also up his back, into his t-shirt, through the crib sheets, and all over the mattress pad. I feel lucky that I was in the shower with the fan on and not close to Nate when the poo happened, because I assume the sound was quite loud and may have be resulted in a mild hearing loss. So, of course, I clean him up. This, however, adds a washcloth and changing pad to the quickly growing laundry pile.

At this point Nate is starving because he hasn't eaten in two whole hours. So I feed him for 15, maybe 20 minutes (I have a marathon eater. It usually takes him 40-45 minutes to eat!) when I hear more rumblings. I am not sure where all this "output" (in pediatrician terms) is coming from, but Nate again blows through his diaper, onesie, t-shirt, etc. So, I get him all cleaned up again. Then came the pee. Twice. I am not sure what I was doing wrong, but I clearly didn't fasten his diapers well enough. The list of casualties so far today is as follows:
1 crib sheet
1 mattress pad
4 onesies
3 t-shirts
3 changing pads
3 washcloths

Aside from the massive explosions of this afternoon, we had a relatively good day. I eventually got dressed and miraculously didn't get poo on my bathrobe. Nate slept very well last night, to the delight of both Thad and myself. And he was cheery and smiley this morning. Our fingers are crossed for another evening of (somewhat) decent sleeping.

the carlson boys

hooray for liz

I just saw my friend Liz, who was the first to suggest the powder that is miraculously fixing Nate's bum at light speed (or what seems like light speed after 10 weeks of no changes). I guess I didn't realize how emotional I still was about the whole situation, but I almost burst into happy tears in the middle of my 200-some chorus when I saw her. As it was, I made a big enough scene hugging her that she had to give a mini lecture to the soprano section on treatments for colostomys. I am just so thankful that Nate's actually getting better, and that he doesn't have some sort of wacky, horrible problem that was causing The Rash. Yay Liz!

Off to bed...

shake it up baby

a sticky situation

I am afraid of this post, because I'm worried I may jinx something. But I had to share our good news, even if it plummets us back into the pits of dispair, because I am just so freaking excited. After close to ten weeks of frustration, The Rash seems to be healing. Slowly. But (fasten your seatbelts!) it appears to be getting better. And we have my pediatrician friend Liz and a slew of children's hospital websites to thank. We have found a miracle product that's used mainly for colostomys (but is also approved for use in babies) that helps make creams stick to oozy, wet skin. I could jump for joy if I weren't so darned tired. Anyway, on Liz's suggestion we tracked down the one place in Rochester that sells this stuff and started using it last week on maybe Wednesday or Thursday, and we've seen a clear improvement since. I think perhaps the dermatologist's theory about irritation was right, but because nothing would stick to The Rash, things just weren't getting any better. But now, low and behold, happy new skin is appearing right before our eyes! And this wonder has been witnessed and confirmed by my sister, so it's not just the sleepiness making us hallucinate. Don't hold your breath, but I'll keep you posted...

We had a nice visit this weekend with Nate's Uncle Matt, Aunt Joanna, and cousin Joshua, with a short visit from Aunt Jean too. I'll post some pics soon.

let sleeping babies lie

Last night went much better than the last two. Nate started off fussing a lot, but ended up settling down and going to sleep quickly after eating at 10. Then he didn't eat again until (get ready for this) 4 - hooray! It took awhile to get him back to sleep again after that early feeding, but he's still sleeping now. And just in time too, because sleepiness seems to make me feel ill, and Thad's brain is starting to go (he told me this morning that he took Nate from me last night because I couldn't get him to sleep, but I'm positive that didn't happen!)

Matt, Joanna, and Nate's 10-month-old cousin Joshua are coming to visit this weekend. Should make for some cute pictures!

the son is a mass of incandescent gas

Well, maybe more methane, but that's not how the song goes. Last night stunk. We were once again Foiled by Gas. Nate was up most of the night crying and fussing trying fruitlessly to pass gas. We tried to let him fuss himself back to sleep, but that too was fruitless. Of course, Thad and I are now up and awake while Nate is sleeping quietly in his swing. I guess it's only nighttime gas that causes trouble.

The saga of the bum continues... we have an appointment schedlued in a week and a half with another dermatologist for a second opinion since our current treatment doesn't seem to be doing any good.

On a more upbeat note, here are a couple of pics from Anna's recent visit:

94!

Great Grandpa Rocco, who little Nathaniel Rocco is named after, is 94 today - happy birthday!

We went back to the dermatologist and have pretty much nothing new to report there. Do we sound like a broken record yet? She did another swab to see if we've cleared up the bacteria. Other than that, it's the same old, same old. Aargh.

reading is fun!

I have always loved collecting books. If I were independently wealthy I would have rooms filled with books. I love reading them too, but I also just love owning them. I have always been particularly fond of children's books. I love the mood set by the illustrations, the choice of wording, the way the type floats around the pages... Like in Where the Wild Things Are I think it's just so cool that the farther Max drifts into his imagination, the more space the illustrations take on the pages. One of the many things that excited me about the prospect of having a baby was expanding our library and sharing these adventures with him.

In addition to children's books, I also find myself salivating over graphic design books. Like with kids' books, I think I'm attracted to the creativity and expressiveness of these books.

So I was excited to see this recent post on one of the popular design blogs:
http://www.underconsideration.com/speakup/archives/002850.html
I thought I'd share this unusual perspective on children's literature, and also solicit other "must read" suggestions. I personally have to add the Eric Carle books "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" and "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?" for their great illustrations and the cool interactive part of Caterpillar where he eats through all the food. And "Piggies" and "The Napping House" by Don and Audrey Wood.

i bought coffee beans

So, I really related to this recent post at Mom's Daily Dose:
http://blogs.clubmom.com/daily_dose/2007/01/so_what_do_you_.html

Similarly, I often feel at a loss when asked what I've been doing. Usually I've been changing diapers and driving to and from doctor's appointments. I do eat, although not on a typical schedule, and rarely at a normal pace. And occasionally I sleep. I have been trying to catch up on email but haven't done very well at that and still have messages I want to reply to that arrived soon after Nate was born. I'm not sure why I have the desire to tell people something I find exciting or interesting. Or why I don't think it's exciting enough to tell someone that I ate breakfast. I mean, I was pretty excited about that, so why shouldn't I share? And most people are repeatedly saying that I don't need to tell them anything, and that it's just nice to say hi (and usually get a report on the latest treatment for The Rash), so it's not like there's pressure from outside that makes me feel the need to share something. I think I might just still be in a daze because I switched from this pretty diverse and comfortable life where I took eating breakfast with two hands for granted to one that revolves almost entirely around someone else's poop.

So in the spirit of embracing my new lifestyle and sharing things of importance to me, today I took a shower. In the morning. And when I got out Nate wasn't even crying. And that makes it very exhilarating. And I bought coffee beans.

still itty bitty

We got it! A picture of the smile!!!

We had our two month check up today, and Nate is doing really well. He's now a whopping 9 lbs 11 oz, placing him in the 10th percentile. His head is also in the 10th percentile now, and his height is in the 25th. He seems to be growing at a perfectly normal pace, which is good to hear. He got a round of immunizations today, and seems to be pulling through those well too (although I'm probably jinxing myself saying that!) The doctor said that most babies are either really cranky or really tired after immunizations, and so far we seem to be the latter option. My fingers are crossed that it stays that way!

A brief update on The Rash... nothing is particularly new. The dermatologist did a couple of swabs and they came back positive for staph bacteria, which we are now treating with antibiotics. She seems to think that will make an impact, although we're not holding our breath. Her theory is that The Rash is now mostly inflamation, exacerbated by Nate's poop. At some point in the next couple months he will stop pooping so frequently, but for now our job is to try to keep him as poop-free as possible. The good news (mostly for me and Thad) is that we don't need to air him out quite as often. That unfortunately means we probably won't get to use these:

blow outs

This is almost too easy, yet I find it necessary to make an analogy between two recent blowouts: the OSU game last night and Nate's diaper incident this morning. Both began innocently enough, and quite happily. OSU opened last night's game with a 93 yard kick return for a touchdown. And Nate was quite bright-eyed and bushy-tailed when he awoke. In fact, he was in the best mood we've seen him in over the past couple of weeks. Hooray for OSU and Nate! But that's when things went awry. As many of you probably know, OSU stunk up the BCS Championship big time, losing 41-14. Ouch. Not such a happy day for the Buckeyes. Nate followed suit this morning by stinking up the living room with a gigantic exploding poo that not only blew out his diaper but exploded all over his legs and through his fleece onsie. The big difference, however, is that Nate's poop was easy to clean up, where OSU's just goes into the annals of history (or, perhaps more appropriately, to quote a collegue, the "anals of history.")

And thanks to Kate, Aaron and Dylan for the new diapers. We clearly need them!

the dark side of the street

Last night was a bit rough, but not mainly because we have a small child. Nate had been "sleeping" in a cradle in our bedroom since we arrived home from the hospital. We decided to move Nate into his own room yesterday. Things started out relatively well - we moved all of his stuff from our bedroom into his and set up the changing and nursing areas so we'd be ready to use them during his nighttime feedings. He went down to sleep after a bit of coaxing, which was not unusual, and he awoke around 3, which was also pretty typical. However, our electricity was out. So I tried to calm down the starving, and therefore crying, baby while Thad ran around looking for a flashlight. He knew exactly where his headlamp was, but the battery had died. Then he found his travel alarm clock, which has a mechanism that illuminates the time if you press it, so he kept pressing the clock and trying to look around for either a flashlight or batteries with the blueish light coming off the clock. Meanwhile, our carbon monoxide detector was beeping to let us know the power was off and it was using it's battery. The beep is SO loud because it's supposed to wake you up. This is great in the case of an emergency but unbelievably annoying when there is no light and a screaming baby. I looked out the window and realized that the lights were only out on our side of the street, which was fabulously inconvenient. Thad finally found a flashlight and he held it up so I could change Nate, and then we positioned it so I had some ambiant light for his feeding. Of course, about 20 minutes into the feeding the power came back on. Sigh!

Now we're getting psyched up for the OSU football game and trying to figure out if we'll even be able to stay awake for it. And we're back to the dermotologist tomorrow for another bum check-up.

mi:s - the saga continues

Last night was half as good as the night before. We started off really well, with the little buddy sleeping in the cradle with minimal finger sucking. However, things weren't quite so peaceful after the early morning feeding. Nate did go to sleep in his cradle again, but seemed to have Thad's hand attached to his mouth for most of his "restful" sleep. This was one of the loudest sleeping incidents to date! Nate grunted and moaned for what was basically his entire time sleeping. According to Thad, the buddy only sucked his finger for an hour ("only" an hour!) but kept psyching out Thad, making him think he was waking up so Thad would get out of bed, only to quiet down as soon as he neared the cradle. I too have experienced this mind game. It is not so much fun, especially at 3 or 4 am. Depsite all the grunting, He did go five hours between feedings, so that seems like a step in the right direction!

Thanks to everyone for their stories of sleepless support and tips. We will keep you posted!

mission impossible: sleep

Our typical nighttime routine is feeding Nate at 9 and attempting to get him to sleep right afterwards. This usually means Thad swaddles him and bounces him for over an hour while Nate stares adorably at him, not at all tired. If Nate does actually doze off, Thad will gently lay him in his cradle and he promptly wakes up within 30 seconds, which means Thad has to start all over with the bouncing. Often, in a fit of mild despiration, we'll put Nate in between us in bed and stick a finger in his mouth to calm him so Thad can at least lie down. Nate actually falls asleep and all will be well for an hour or two, when our sweet boy starts grunting like an 80 year old man (or more accurately, like I did when I was nine months pregnant). We're pretty sure this is caused by gas, and it usually goes on for at least an hour, when he'll finally wake himself up, Meanwhile, I'm lying awake because I find it difficult to sleep when someone is repeatedly grunting in your ear. Then I'll feed Nate around 2, spend time trying to get him to go to sleep. For whatever reason, my attempts are far more fruitless than Thad's and Nate usually ends up more wound up than he was to begin with, at which point Thad either wakes himself up or I wake him because I am baffled as to how to calm this teeny little guy. Anyway, after more bouncing and finger sucking, Nate finally falls to sleep, and we repeat the hour or two of rest followed by grunting until we're all awake, bright eyed and bushy tailed.

Apparently, Nate's still to young to learn anything from "crying it out" but we can play with his eating scheudle; so, last night we decided to mix up our "sleep" routine to see if Thad and I could actually get some rest. The results were bizzare. I went to bed at 9 while Thad stayed up and played with Nate until 11, when they woke me for a feeding. Thad hopped in bed and Nate ate for a few minutes and then fell asleep. I don't think I've ever seen the kid so tired! I kept trying to wake him to eat for about a half hour so he wasn't starving, but didn't have much luck. Then I put him in his cradle and voila! Sleep! He did wake at 3am to eat, which wasn't a big shock since he hadn't eaten much earlier, but he again (with a little prodding from Dad) slept in his cradle. If I hadn't been so tired I might have done a little jig. Anyway, we are happy to have had one promising night, and are going to try to figure out how to keep this cradle stuff going!

I'd like to buy a vowel

Nate has started making vowel sounds. He's still grunting up a storm, but now he's also being more "conversational" with "ahs" and an occasional "eh." It's really interesting to see how he's learning to talk. Now he can express not only displeasure through crying but also some positive emotions by vocalizing vowels, smiling, looking at something, etc. We're certain that he'll be able to do at least 75% of the "O-H-I-O" football chant by the big game on Monday. And who knows, maybe he'll be able to do an "h" by then too!

Here are a few shots our friend Sol took on New Years.

the bum chronicles continue

Arrgh - we went to see the dermotologist again this morning and she wants us to keep doing the same butt routine as the past week, although applying the topical meds three times a day instead of twice. We're frustrated that things aren't healing faster and really didn't see much improvement since last week, so we're not really sure how much better things will be in another week. And poor Nate is pretty cranky, we assume because his bum is uncomfortable. The good news is that they don't think there's anything seriously wrong with him, like a staph infection or something systemic - it's just an inflamed bum.