Smule's Newest Employee

 We went to visit Joel at work and Holly fit right in, made herself at home and didn't want to leave.  If of course work meant hanging out on the bean bag, eating snacks and playing drums all day, then Holly would sign right up as Smule's Newest Employee, Sadly though she doesn't quite yet know how to play star craft and that is a point against her resume :-)  Of course all joking aside Daddy does work hard making fun iPhone Apps, except of course on the day;s we come into San Francisco to visit.

A Little of This, A Little of That

Not too much to report on, this has been a bit of a low key week. I think it is because I am still batteling this allergy thing, it acts like a sucky cough and I am congested and can't breath half the time, but it's not Ashma and its not a cold, it is just compacted sinus from the weather changes, so there isn't much I can do. Today my glads were swollen and hurt, I can't sleep because when I lay down I have a coughing fit which wakes Holly and is well pretty uncomfortable, so transitioning from awake to asleep and vice versa is a killer. Whine whine whine.... blah I know....

My little bubble butt has been a pain when it comes too sleeping too. Isn't she cute sticking her bum in the air like that its her favorite way to sleep, well and then some of the time she has her blanket over her head too. She likes to wedge her self into the corner pressing up against the crib. But she has been fighting her naps and not wanting to go to bed, the other day she had a night terror again, this one was really bad. That day she had only taken two thirty minute naps, but I wasn;t expecting it because it was too naps and she just woke up early from them and wasn;t cranky and fell asleep right away, but minutes after we transfered her into the crib she woke screaming.

This one was so bad she threw up several times. I was standing in her room Joel had just handed her to me in hopes that maybe I could sooth her, but her eyes were still closed so I realized it was a night terror and then up came the vomit and all I could think was the excorsit. It was horrifying and I was covered in it. I had to undress both of us all the while she was screaming and then I changed her and cleaned everything up, and I took her into bed and just held her tight. All the while her eyes were still closed and she was still screaming like a banshee. After a few more minutes she would settle whimper and then scream.. this went on for another several minutes, I don't remember if I gave her another bottle at this point, I may have and then she threw up again, this time wasn't very bad, more like a spit up from a cough, but this time it it seemed to wake her up a little bit. So she started to look around. We took her at this point into the living room and put on baby Einstien. She was still crying quiet a bit and it didn't help much but then we went to lay down again and this time she was gulping and whimpering but eventually settled. the whole ordeal was maybe 30-40 minutes, but Joel said it felt like forever. I think the scary part is that she isn't reachable when she is in that state, Joel tries to wake her and engage her and talk to her, I have read that that makes it worse, and you become part of the nightmare, so i like to be in the dark dark and just hold her tight and be there and she eventually calms, but it is incredibly humbling to be so out of control and unable to do anything to help. Its pretty sad that she has been having these night terrors so young, they say they don;t start until closer to two years old, but she has had a hand full now, and I know thats what it is.

Today she refused to go down for her mornign nap until almost 11:40 and luckily Sally her PT was able to come back at 1:45 instead of 12:30 letting her sleep for an extra hour, but then at 5:00 even though she was yawning I tried to put her down for a nap and she refused and got pretty cranky about it, so we got up to play and then Joel tried to put her to bed around 9:00 because she was tired and had been awake for seven hours, but she was having none of it, so I calmed her down and waited and then we tried again at 10:15, we had Karma and Saneesh over and we planned on watching lost, but she refused to let Joel put her down, as soon as I left the room she would scream, I would sing or hum or hold her and she would be calm, then if I tried to leave she would yell, so finally joel told them to leave and that I had to put her to bed. While I was laying down with her she stayed calm, but it took about 30 minutes for her to fall asleep and it was almost 11:00.


Doesn't she look like such a big girl in these pictures, I am remembering back to when I first made these pillows and she used them to pull up on and now she is big enough to sit on them like a chair, it is amazing. Every time we turn around she is taking something off of the table that we didn;t think she could reach so she is getting taller by the minute. She isn't really using her sippy cup well, but she is getting more practice with it daily, we fill it with juice and she likes to shake it and walk around with it she takes a couple of sips here and there, but she isn;t really drinking a lot. But its a start and I am Happy with the progress.

Sally was thrilled with Holly's walking today. She says she is very controlled and she was impressed with her turning and piviting and even her falling is slow and controlled. She is navigating obsticles like pillows or toys on the floor, and taking mini steps up or down over door stops or on and off the carpet. She is even squating down picking up a toy and then walking while holding onto it. She has the skills to stand on her own rather then pull up but hasn't figured that out yet, so it is one of the things we worked on today with Sally. She showed her a few times how to do it. Our session went pretty well.

On Monday we missed our playdate at Chloe's because Holly refused to sleep in the morning, and went down at 2:30, since the playdate starts at 3:00 and she slept till 5:00 we didn't go. I have een pretty busy all week and since falling alseep hasn't been easy I haven't been napping with Holly when she naps, as a result of that I have been pretty tired myself. I guess the apple doesn;t fall far fromt he tree, with a mommy who has sleeping issues, of course she will too. It is sorta scary the things that you see in your kids that simply can't be learned, and present themselves at such a young age.

Yesterday we went to the Eye Doctor, he was wonderful.. he was a pediatric opthamologist and said that holly's eyes were healthy. There were two conditions that are common for kids with Fragile X that dr. hagerman wanted us to check up on, and she was fine, but he said we should come back in a year for another visit, to do a yearly check-up until about 4. At that age, she should be able to do a regular vision test and if her eyes are still healthy then she gets turned over to the pediatrician for checkups during well visits, until she has issues with the vision tests. Which we of course hope won't happen.

We found ourselves rushing out of the house becasue again she went down for her nap late and I wanted to give her every possible moment of sleep before waking her to transfer into the car, and the ride there was about 30 minutes, afterwards she got very cranky and did not want to be in the car seat so we headed over to Sadie Dey's and I let her play for the rest of the afternoon. She didn't go down for another nap till almost 7:00 and slept till 8:00 so of course she was up till midnight that ngiht too... man I should stop whining about sleep issues, can you see this is a theme.. I should call this the gripe and moan post.

I have just had a lot to do, I had a WASC conference call this week, today in fact, which went swimmingly, but I had to rush to review and analyze three reports over the weekend, and I was the lead reader so I was in charge of the call, which was a little stressful of course until the call started. But also I am dealing with an issue related to the title company, apparently someone things there is a judgement against my house from the previous owener that the title insurance didn;t catch, of course this is from 2004 when I bough the house, and the original Judgement was 2000. So it is a pain in my butt that I have to dig out my title insurance for my storage files of 5 years ago, and then find the office and go down there and deal with this, because of bad debt that the previous owner had, I mean why doesn;t the lawyer go chase him down and find him rather then relying on me a responcible person to clean up his mess. Well tomorrow we are having a playdate over here, so I will try and remember to take a bunch of pictures and have a happy post posted soon!

Life is good, I am just in a whiney mood. We are both feeling worn out, but we are hanging in there.

Busy Week

This has been a very busy week for us. On Monday I attended a Positive Parenting workshop at http://www.bananasinc.org/ Banana’s, which is a great organization, BTW if you are local. It is a 6 week session, no babies. The first night Joel stayed home with Holly, as I originally thought she could come but found out last minute there is onsite childcare but it was “full” when I arrived there was plenty of room for her, but it was too late by then, so next week Joel will be attending with me, and we will see how Holly handles being away from Mom and dad for about 90 minutes, playing in the next room. The class is lead by an MFT and there are about 15-20 parents. We basically talk about parenting in a positive way, like rather than saying No all the time, say hands in lap, or redirecting. It is a very interactive workshop and the group has kids from 7 weeks to 8 years old and each has different issues they bring to the table to talk about. I look forward to future sessions.

One of the reasons I am also looking forward to this, is from what I have heard about the Spirited Child Series. The other mom’s like to call Holly Busy, and Active, but I can tell already her temperament is “spirited” so I am hoping to learn many discipline strategies now before I need them, so I can set them in place and well be proactive, because I’m like that. But I fear it may be too late in some cases already. I guess that’s why they say the first baby is your practice child.

On Tuesday I had a WASC Review which was sorta fun, as usual I enjoy doing the academic and educational stuff, just to keep me on my toes. This week I also got around to doing my taxes which was crazy, as I thought I was prepared, and I thought I scheduled the appointment at a time when Holly would be napping, but things didn’t work out how I planned. First I didn’t realize I needed her SSN, and I didn’t have it memorized, well I had, but wasn’t sure, and I thought my mom had it but she couldn’t find it, so I had to call Joel to go home and get it. Which was lucky because I found out you could deduct the cost of daycare, but I needed the tax ID number, and a few other items. In the end I got it done and filed so I was excited. But Holly was not asleep, so speaking of a “spirited” child. What was supposed to take me about 30-45 minutes actually ended up being 90 and Holly cruised and crawled and explored all over the H&R Block office. My tax Guy joked to a colleague that he was a babysitter tonight, as several times he had to hold Holly as I searched for some paper work or called Joel for information, and even more times than that he had to help pick up the many toys she threw off the desk onto the floor, or the other stuff she decided to drop. The other clients were also very amused and she wandered over to say Hi and explore the office. It certainly was a preview of what is to come, once she can actually walk, I swear I will need a leash.

We have made good progress on the eating front, or at least I have been. Joel has been able to feed Holly Yogurt in the morning, at least a half container usually, but he has not had any luck with other feedings. I on the other hand have gotten her to eat entire jars. Just this week at one feeding Joel gave up after about 5 bites of Pear/Blueberry and 20 minutes later I tried and Holly ate ½ container of Pear/Blueberry, finishing it, and then an entire container of Spinach Potatoes. Joel was in shock. I read an article the other day, which reassured me I was on track. It mentioned a few strategies I have been using, and they seem to be working. One is letting her hold her own spoon. I had started that months ago, but it was nice to see it in print. The next is to distract her with finger foods. While she is busy picking up and trying to eat them, you can slip in bites of food between, and she gets to practice her fine motor skills. Finally it suggested letting her practice with a Sippy cup, and feeding between sips. I have only tried that a few times, but will continue as she begins to understand that she can get liquid and its good.

I thought I was bribing her to eat, but Joel says I am rewarding her. My most successful strategies is using puffs. I give her the first few bites, which she almost always takes without resistance, and then she begins to shake her head no. So I show her a puff, and say, Holly if you want this puff you need to take a bite. She tries to grab it and I don’t give it to her, I repeat, and then she usually opens wide and I give her a spoon. Sometimes I say two bites, or three, depending on if it is food she like more or less, and then give her the puff. When Joel was feeding her the other day he realized that I taught her open without realizing it. He wasn’t really saying it and then said it by accident and she opened for him. So now he tries to say it more, but she doesn’t always want to open. I think Joel is less constant and gives in and gives her puffs anyways, so she knows he doesn’t mean business. So I assumed I was bribing her with Puffs, but Joel says it is rewarding her for doing the behavior I want, taking a bite, and it is a great way to get her to eat.

She is also slowly expanding her repertoire. We had Mac and Cheese Veggie Dinner the other day which she liked, and she is eating some pasta, and really beginning to like cheese. Next week I am going to give her salmon and peanut butter (not together) based on an article I read about how the Salmon can help prevent allergies, and how you should start peanut butter early, rather than later. But I will give it to her on a cracker though, as a glob of peanut butter is a choking hazard.

The other thing we are doing is mild sleep training. It’s a Hybrid we made up between the cry it out and no tears method. Another article I read say the trade off is time or crying. If you have a lot of time to get your child to learn to fall asleep on her own, like weeks then eventually the no-tears method will work, but if you need your child to learn in a week or a few nights even, then you get a lot of crying, but it happens fast. We just spoke with a family who did this and said it took only three nights. Night one was an hour of crying, night two thirty minutes and night three only a few. Now there son is sleeping on his own. Well we certainly can’t stand to have holly cry even 5-10 minutes, so that won’t work for us, but a little whining, and 1-2 minutes of crying is ok. So we have been putting her in the crib and she plays, for about 20 minutes and then wines, if she is whining we let her continue, once it turns into a cry we go in but do not pick her up (at first at least) usually I can calm her by rubbing her back and “hugging” her as she stands on the rail of the crib. But she reaches up wanting me to pick her up, and even that is heart breaking. I mostly make Joel go in, as she whines to him a lot, but isn’t as desperate and having a crying fit usually. She gets pretty sleepy and he had a lot of hope that this would eventually work. We do this for about an hour. Starting at 10:00 usually at that point, I pick her up and we have watched Baby Einstein and she falls asleep within minutes.

But this is the thing, getting her to fall asleep on her own is secondary to getting her to bed the same time every night. So the other thing we have done is try and create a bedtime routine. Bath (some nights) some Baby Einstein or playtime in Mommy’s lap. After 9:00 most nights we try not to let her crawl and cruise around on her own, as it keeps her keyed up. We tried story time, but the books seem to rile her up, as she gets excited about turning the pages, so we have tried “telling” her a story and singing a song. Then by 10:00 I give her a bottle in bed with me, and hope she falls asleep. Some nights she does, some she is settled, and if I rub her back and head a few minutes she falls asleep. If she is in an active mood where she wants to jump up and won’t stay in bed, then we put her in the crib, and do the “hybrid” method from above. So far we haven’t gotten her to bed by 10:00, but most nights now she is asleep by 11:00. So my question is, is that her natural bedtime, and I need to move late afternoon napes up, or cut them out, or do we need to move up our start time to 8:00 if we want her down at 10:00. I suppose if I can get her to bed at 11:00 every night and then slowly move it earlier, it’s a start. What I plan on doing after a few days of this working well is maybe feed her in the rocker instead of the bed and when she is sleepy but not asleep put her in the crib and see how that works. Oh and yes, lastly we are no longer letting her sleep-in in the morning, mostly. We try and wake her every morning at 8:00 AM. That means though, that Joel has to be awake, so it has been 8:00, 8:30, 8:45 some days, but we are working on it. I think a morning routine is also necessary for her to take her morning nap and be productive at Therapy., so I am in process of creating an entire daily schedule for a guideline, I don’t plan on being stringent, but having it written out helps remind us what the routine should be, even if we don’t follow it every day.

On Friday we went to swimming and had a blast as usual. Holly is starting to not like being tossed up in the air. She used to love it, it was her favorite part of swimming. We would jump up and down when the windows on the bus went up and down. I try it but then sometimes she makes a face that tells me she isn’t having fun, so then I don’t jump up any more after that or let go. I still lift her just above my head, and she still likes that. Maybe she is cold. It is hard to tell. After swimming I was on my way to get a new toy for Holly off of Craigslist, it is a Giraffe that you put a ball into the mouth and it twirls around and drops out of one of four exits. It was only 10$ but it didn’t have any of the balls. I thought our Bubble Gum balls would fit, but they are a little too big, so we need to get some smaller ones. The toy is normally like 39.99$ though, so it is still a good deal I think. It ended up being the same person I got the exersaucer from a while back. Well anyways, on my way I was stopped at a light and I had called my mom and a cop pulled up at the other light. I hung up when the light changed green, but a few minutes later he pulled me over anyway. He said it was from talking on the phone, California is pushing a zero tolerance policy and I said, well I wasn’t driving, I was stopped at the light I didn’t realize that wasn’t ok. He said, well you are also not wearing your seat belt. So he gave me a ticket for that. Well I am short, 5 foot, and the seat belt basically cuts across my neck and face and is dangerous to wear, so I show him, and say what do I do? Can I wear it behind my back or under my arm, and he says no that is also against the law. And I have to by one of those seat belt adjustment things, but in the mean time, he can’t tell me not to wear it, but I should do what is safest for me, and he will drive off before I leave. So he basically told me not to wear it. Go figure, so now I have to figure out how much the ticket is for.

We also had Xray's done and went to UC Davis Mind Institute this week, I will update you on this tomorrow.

What We Accomplished

I think today was a success. I am so proud of Joel for staying positive and productive even though it may have seemed like I was trying to sabotage him with my cranky mood at every turn. It was so not my intention, I have figured out why I was grumpy and I will get to that later. But I swear my Husband is a saint, it was like I was undermining him with every decision he made today, I was reminded of Bree Hodge from last weeks episode of Desperate Housewives and I so don’t mean to be condescending, I just come across that way sometimes when I don’t even realize it.

I am pretty sure Joel realizes this, and that is why he is amazing, but it can be a downer especially when little things do go wrong, instead of being encouraging I was like.. see I told you so. However in the end he did such a wonderful job with the baby proofing. We didn’t get as much done as he would have liked, but then again I slept until like 12:30 and it was almost 2:30 before we left the house, and the darling that he is we even stopped at a baby store to just shop and look around.

We went to this great Plastic and Acrylic place where they custom cut the Plexi for the entertainment center doors, I of course was convinced Joel had the wrong measurements and there was no way they would be big enough, I was of course wrong, I mean come on, I should give the guy some credit, he does know how to use a tape measure. The Plexi was much cheaper than I expected which was exciting. Then we went to Subway for lunch. I was starved since I didn’t eat any breakfast.

After that we stopped at a used baby store called Little Raspberries. I learned that they are passing both a federal and already passed a state law that you cannot resell used baby clothes or toys. I was like WTF!! Yes, I suppose there is these fear that they are not up to spec/code and there will be toxic lead in the buttons, so no more thrift shopping for all of you frugal moms out there. That is insane. The store might have to close down. I mean they can still sell things like used swings and such, but no clothes and toys I am sure is ½ of their business and what about all of the stock they already have. I think it is just people going way off the reservation…

So I took advantage and purchased an adorable light blue traditional Chinese pants suit outfit thingy. I had just read this article about teaching our children to be global citizens and it listed all of these neat holidays we could celebrate throughout the year starting with Chinese New years on the 26th. This outfit was so beautiful and at that price I couldn’t leave it behind.

Next we went to the hardware store. Holly enjoyed sitting on my shoulders, but I got tired of her pulling my hair and ended up finding a cart and wheeling her around in it. We found a safety gate for the hallway and all of the various fasteners and hinges and such that Joel needed for his projects. Then we went home.

Holly fell asleep in the car for her second nap, so I decided I would sit and read my Magazine and let Joel get started upstairs with the drilling and such. She ended up only staying asleep for like 30-40 minutes total, and she woke up way cranky, I tried to sit her down and feed her Apple/Strawberry and she was having none of it, so I gave in and fed her a bottle. Normally I would push her to eat but she wasn’t simply resisting she was outright crying, which isn’t typical, so I knew she was still very tired and decided to pick my battles. After the first bottle I tried to feed her again, as she drank it down in about 2 minutes but she was having none of that, and drank another 2 ounces a few minutes later.

Once she had a chance to wake up and play, about an hour later I tried feeding her again. It was about 7:00 now and her regular dinner time. She wasn’t too jazzed about this, and had a few bites so I decided maybe she didn’t like this flavor and tried some Sweet Potatoes instead. She had some but still wasn’t that into it and getting crankier by the minute. She was so fussy and all over the place looking back and forth and trying to escape. She was reaching for the lid to the food container so I picked it up and said Holly if you open wide you can play with this. She stopped fussing looked me right in the eye and opened her mouth. I put a bit in and gave her the lid. I was of course in shock. She totally understood me. I could not believe it.. And then I told her that she was much smarter then I give her credit for. I was able to use the lib bribe for another 8 or so bites and then she was just done.

All this time Joel was happily at work, of course with me nit picking. There were a few obstacles he had to overcome and I was less then supportive when he was explaining them to me. On the surface this was because he never explained how he planned on doing this door thing to begin with so I couldn’t visualize his initial plan, but I was grumpy for other reasons.. I promise I will get to that.

So first he installed the gate across the hallway and of course Holly had to test that out. Then he brought up the child fencing we had downstairs that was given to us by a friend. I think this will be great for Holly’s party, we can use it outside in the backyard around the play mat and it will be wonderful. I wanted to over complicate things and move the swing to the other side of the room and have the fence go from the entertainment center in front of the bookcase and across the heater. We will eventually do this, as Holly keeps hitting her head on the swing and pulling books of the shelf, but Joel wanted to focus on the task at hand and not get off track, so we simply blocked of the heater. This is also Holly tested and approved and at least tonight she wasn’t able to knock it down, so I think it’s a win.

Next we installed some plexi glass in front of Mac’s tank where the wires, times, and extension cords are so Holly can’t reach inside and get at them. This was wonderful, as she can now safely go and look at his tank and pull up on this piece of furniture and I don’t have to worry, currently I had boxes in front of it making it too far for her to reach, but really not very safe. I also decided to move my laptop over here and plug it in there so I don’t have to stretch the wire across the living room when I need to use it or unplug it. So I am also happy about this.

So finally Joel was working on the main project, and this was the glitch. The plexi was actually about ¼ inches too big because he did not account for the space that the hinge on the top and bottom would take. I swear though in the outside world they looked way too small. But anyways, he devised a plan to cut a notch and sand down the area where the hinge went and did this as a proof of concept for the first of 4 doors. The second glitch was that shelf was pushed back for some reason and the others are flush, so he will have to adjust the other 3 shelves, and by this time it was late, so we decided to have him finish the install tomorrow since we have a proof of concept and know it will work.

Tomorrow we will also need to take down the Christmas tree, and do something with all the crap on top of the entertainment center. Ultimately it all belongs in the office, but I simply don’t have enough shelf space in there for all of my crap. I do think however that we will be able to get it all down. Oh and there is one other extension cord we have to do something with, but we have another do it yourself plan for that one too.

So for dinner we ordered pizza and holly was being very fussy. I tried putting her down twice and gave her two nighttime bottles and she finally fell asleep, but then about 2 hours later she woke up screaming with a night terror. This one lasted about 20 minutes and then I gave her another bottle (only her 8th though) and she fell back asleep, or stopped crying.. She did whimper however for a good twenty minutes and just a few minutes ago I heard her whimpering again, it’s been another 3 hours since she was last up. Something is going on with her, a developmental thing, or a growth spurt, or transitions. This morning she only slept about 40 minutes though and we had a very busy day out, so perhaps she just didn’t get enough naps and good sleep. I am not worried about her but she isn’t quite herself, so I am hoping she isn’t getting sick or anything. They say kids get 10 colds per year, and she was certainly sick in daycare, but since then she hasn’t been, so she is far from that 10.

So besides the fact that I am stressing because I have a stack of mail and bills I need to go through and organize I have this proposal that has been looming over me.. So here goes the explanation of why I am grumpy. I of course didn’t realize it until now that I am done with the review and I feel much better. So I am on this Committee for the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), and I am one of the reviewers who gives all of the colleges and universities in this region (the western states) there accreditation. So I am not the official person who gives it out, that is a board who ratifies the committee’s recommendations, typically comprised of university presidents, but I am the person who does all of the legwork and my peers are VP’s and Provosts. So I feel very lucky to be on this committee, and it is pretty prestigious, and a wonderful thing for my career, plus nerd that I am, kind of fun!

Anyways When I was working a large portion of my time when into the work of doing the report needed for my own school to renew this accreditation, this happens once every 7-10 years. It’s a big to do, the whole institution is involved and it is much like strategic planning, but we also have to evaluate ourselves, and show how we are using what we have learned for improvement, so it’s all about assessment.

Well anytime a school wants to start a new program (I am over simplifying here) they need to write a proposal, prove some items and get permission from the accrediting agency. That’s where I come in. Once a month I read a schools proposal, see if they meet the requirements, the program is educational sound, sustainable, cost effective, assessed, planned, resourced, ect. And grant or deny approval. Each proposal has 2-3 reviewers. This month I am the lead reviewer for the first time. I received said proposal way back in December and my review is due 9:00 AM Monday.

Well of course I didn’t read it all over break, and then once break was over I got busy, so here is it 3 days till it is due and I have to read it, and well these proposals are long, and then I have to analyze it, and review and assess it and make educated remarks for my peers to read and get my game plan together for the conference call with the institution this Thursday where I tell them what I think and give them an opportunity to answer any questions before my team makes its final decision. Long story short.. This overwhelming responsibility looming on my shoulders has made me very grumpy. There aren’t enough hours in the day, Joel will ask me if I am coming to bed early tonight, and it’s not like I want to stay up until 4:00 Am, but It’s also not like I have time between 9:00 am and 10:00 pm to do paperwork, write the blog, pay bills, or read this review. So if I want to get any of that stuff done I do have to stay up and do it.

So now here comes the weird philosophical part of this post. Having to do this review, so reminds me why I am so happy I quit my job. I simply do not want the stress of having to write reports and a looming deadline at all when I could be enjoying every waking Moment with my daughter, carefree with no loomingness. However after 5 10 hour days with a Baby, reading Baby magazines, and talking to other Mommies about baby things all of which I love it was kind of nice to get out of that space and into a very different intellectual part of myself and remember how smart I am. I know I sound like an a$$ but it took a lot of hard work and dedication, and education to get to where I am, and the fact that I can evaluate this proposal and talk and write like I know what I am talking about, because I do, reminds me that I like my child, know a lot more then I remember sometimes to give myself credit for.

So in the end it was kind of fun to read about this program, get all uppity about the things they were doing wrong, and be all impressed with the things they are doing write and being able to analyze it all and articulate my thoughts for my peers to read and finish the review. Now I have the call to look forward too, which I am usually never at all nervous or anxious about,. This time I am but only a teeny bit because I am the one in charge and the others will be looking at me to take the lead, so there is a bit more responsibility, but I am so also looking forward to using all kinds of grown-up words like rubric, educational effectiveness, Carnegie Unit Calculations, Needs Assessment, ect.

So all in all, what have I learned, well I don’t want to work, but I do need something on occasion to remind me that I have a life outside of my child. Not that I like being there for too long and can’t wait to get back to her clingy little arms, but to appreciate her, and who I am that made me such a great mom, I have to remind myself of what else is out there on occasion.

Spoiler Alert

Yeah to the free screener gods!!! I am so excited that we got to watch Quantum of Solace the new James Bond movie. Joel was going to see it with friends when I went to Florida, and I was sad that I wasn’t going to get to watch it with him, but then last night we had this FedEx package sitting on the counter that I hadn’t opened, and Joel is like, what’s that, and I was like I don’t know, it’s for you. And he was just telling me how all his co-workers were heading over to Pixar to watch the Academy screening of Quantum of Solace and he was sad that he didn’t get to go, so we open the FedEx and it is a brown envelop that says Quantum of Solace, we think it’s just the schedule of screenings, but then he opens it up and low and behold.. Thank you to the screener gods, it is the DVD. Whippeee…..

We had a fun romantic date night watching the film that fufilled all of its promise, starting off with an awesome car chase, that I particularly liked because the cars got very beat up, and I was scared for the stunt drivers.. This was speeding through the mountains of Italy, followed by a rooftop chase through Sienna. I won’t go into the details except to say that we were shortly followed by a boat chase, a few more street chases, and in the end, you can’t have a chase movie without a… wait for it… airplane chase! The move was a fun action movie, and typical bond. I did wish I had watched the last bond more recently so I would remember more what happened with Vespa, as the motivation for this film was somewhat fueled by revenge. I also thought that M didn’t react nearly as much as she should have, and lets Bond get away with way too much, but I suppose he wouldn’t be Bond otherwise.

Oh and one of my favorite scenes, a homage to Bond fans everywhere is the martini scene, I found it great comic relief, and a very original twist to a classic bond “thing” So yeah.. That was our evening. Dinner, then putting Holly to bed and by 11:00 we had a bowl of Ice Cream and the DVD in the player and had a cozy night.

Busy Thursday

So my mother’s group is getting on my nerves. Last week I went and saw a sign outside that they had moved to a new location, so had to get back into the car, and drive to and find the new location. The facilitator Jennifer did talk about how the set-up might change but I didn’t think anything was set in stone. See was set up as follows, 0-6 months, 6-12 months, and 12 Months Plus.. The 0-6 month group met at 12:30 which was awesome for me because that is when holly has her Therapy, so it is a time of day that is very active for her, and she typically wakes for her naps in time for a 12:30 appointment.

But when we graduated from that group we started going to the 6-12 month group at 10:30. This was harder because it is during her nap time, but I was usually either able to get her to take a short nap from 10-10:30 before hand, or if she woke up late in the day, I could keep her up and then she would be over tired, but immediately fall asleep for a long nap at 12:00 so it was ok. I was able to get there by 10:30, even though it is pretty early for me. The group has about 5 moms in it who come regularly and all the babies are crawling or sitting, and at a similar developmental area, starting foods, starting to be move active, ect. The Toddler group meets at 9:00 and sometimes we would see them running around before our group started, to give us a glimpse of what is to come.

Well, in the new location the groups need to be done by 1:00, so they decided to break them into 2 instead of 3 groups, the first 9 months and up and the second 0-9 months. The 9 and up group meets from 9-11am and the 0-9 meets from 11-1pm. So I had no idea this was officially changing and showed up today at 10:30 as usual, and the toddler group continued until 11:00 which was fine, as Holly played with all of the toys, crawled around and watched the other babies running around.

Then at 11:00 the other moms came, and when the group started and there were about 10 moms with babies all between 4-12 weeks old, and then me and one other mom each with an 8 month old. So they of course all wanted to talk about newborn issues, breast feeding, sleeping, ect. And the issues we wanted to talk about really had nothing to do with it, nor did they have any experience to tell us how they may have dealt with the same thing. So I feel like we were totally displaced.

Holly is 8 months old, so Jennifer said we could go to the older baby group, but hello people, that at 9am I had previously had 4 more months before having to go to the earlier time, and 4 more months of the calm before being thrown in with the sharks called toddlers, but it was so not appropriate for us to be in the infant group, so alas, I guess its 9 am. That said, next week is Thanksgiving, then I go to the mother’s group, and then the next 2 weeks I am out of town, and then the next 2 after that are Christmas and New Years Day, so by the time I go back to the group regularly Holly will be 10 months old, and I think actively crawling across the room and maybe even cruising, so perhaps by then I will feel like I am ready to be in the new group. Wow that was a lot of Bitching, so a not very big deal, I guess I just don’t like having my routine messed with.

This afternoon I missed Holly and Sally’s Session, but Joel came home for it. I was on a conference call for WASC, which is an accrediting body for Colleges and Universities in the Western Region, and I am doing this as professional Development, to keep myself active in my field. So I had to basically write a report and the approve or not approve a school who wants to start a new degree program, and then meet with my co-reviewers for 30 minutes to discuss the proposal, and then meet with the school for 45 minutes to answer questions and provide additional data. The meetings are all conference calls, so it is pretty easy to do these, and I have 1 report a month to do.

Sally normally comes on Wednesday at 12:30, but had to reschedule last minute, and I told her Thursday at 2:00 would be great, and then forgot I had my Call. So She came and tapped up Holly’s back, Holly had just woken up from a 90 minute nap (as I kept her awake all morning for the mother’s group) and had a bottle and a big poopie, so I expected her to be in a good mood, but I heard her crying in the other room the entire first 30 minutes of the call, so between sections while waiting for the institution to get on the line I came out to check on her, she was crying while Sally was taping her which she had never done before, but Sally had just finished so Joel picked her up and she said Hi to me, and then I had to go again, but she continued to cry and whine most of the session.

Joel reported back that while she was playing independently she would be fine but as soon as Sally would hold her or try and get her to do something she started to protest. Sally thought that perhaps Holly is at a developmental stage where she has learned quite a few skills and just needs to work on them, so she observed her at play and gave Joel a bunch of tips of things we need to do with her, like extending her legs was one. She also thought that the foam cushions I got were wonderful, and told us about a foam store that has more random shaped cushions we could get for a few dollars and was worth checking out, this weekend I plan on sewing the covers, so I am excited to let her play on them.

I got off my Call early, but Sally was already gone as she was making no progress with Holly. Holly was of course happy as soon as she saw me and was now ready to play. Joel went back to work and I decided to take her for a walk to the park. It was cool outside so Holly was wrapped up in the Jacket I knit for her and a green bean pod knitted hat from Silvia a friend of Jackie’s. She had on her purple Mary Jane sock/shoes and was nice and warm. She enjoyed walking in the stroller and when we got to the park was ready to play. There was a mom there with twin 2 year olds, and two older girls maybe 4/5 and 7ish they were all very cute with white blond hair and super rambunctious,

Holly liked watching them play. Later a mom and Oma came with a 13 month old and her older brother, I only know it’s the Oma because they were talking German the whole time, and they had fun, at 13 months old her baby was able to toddle around and play in the park a little more than Holly. Holly was the youngest Baby at the park, and basically could only swing, but that she did, and she loved it, she squealed with Joy and the other kids watched her swing because she was having so much fun. We also walked around the park watching the other kids play; there was a train, and a big slide. Then I sat her down and she played in the sand, it was a little pebbly, not too fine, so she liked to try and walk on it and it was a weird feeling on her hands, I watched her like a hawk though, as I was afraid she would try and eat it, but she didn’t. We stayed maybe 45 minutes and then walked home. She stayed awake for the ride back and then I put her into the swing and she fell asleep for her afternoon nap.

When she woke up we ate some more of her Garden Veggie baby food and she finished the rest of the container. She either really liked her green veggies or she is getting better at eating, I was very proud of her. We read some stories, played, and then watched language nursery, it’s my way of getting her to hear the sounds of Russian, Japanese, Spanish, German, and a few other’s too. They say you should expose your baby to the various language sounds between 8-10 months, so she is the perfect age.

Daddy came home and played some more with Holly, her new favorite game it trying to get to Mommy’s laptop Power Supply, I will put her on the far end of the carpet away from it, and she has to crawl several steps to get there but she does, I had to move her back about 6 times today. She has also discovered the Stereo and DVD Player, and tried to pull herself up on the Black entertainment center.

I didn’t want to make a big deal over her getting to it, as I was afraid if I took it away she would want it more, like the laptop cord, so I let her climb watching her closely, and she didn’t get into anything. My hope is she will find it boring, realize it’s not her fun toys and not be bothered to try and play with the electronics, but we will see how that goes.

She had a long busy day and fell asleep in her swing by 8:45. It’s almost 10:00 now though, and we transferred her into the crib which woke her up some so I am hoping she stays asleep, but the odds are not in my favor. She is quite wiggly on the monitor, but I have my fingers crossed, she is at least not crying.

New Week

Yesterday was a quiet laid back day. Holly was little miss energizer Bunny. She had her regular session with Katie, and Katie brought a colleague of hers Kristy to meet Holly. In comparison it seemed like Kristy was man-handling Holly, she was really getting in there trying to stretch and move her around to come up with ways to get her to drop her shoulders, relax and work her back muscles and extend, ideally we want her to do something like a backbend, but forward, keeping her hips planted.

I was shocked that Holly did not protest, she continued to be a very busy bee, and would not sit still for the entire 90 minute session, she would not be deterred, she wanted to crawl and climb and stand and reach for toys and twist and turn and she was on the go go go… and didn’t let Kristy get in her way. They were in awe with not only her energy level, but how cute she was trying to engage them, and how strong she was picking up toys, but more than anything else her determination. She is a girl who works and plays hard, and the moral of the day, is no one will stop her from doing anything, she will find a way…

I wonder where she gets that level of determination from…..

She took a brief nap after Katie and Kristy left, but not for very long, before she was at it again. We had a fun time playing and then ate some pears. She seemed to like them much better this time and ate 2/3 of a small container. Later she took a longer nap and that gave me a chance to read and comment on a WASC Report I am reviewing for a new program in Aviation at a school. It is nice to have a little bit of Professional stuff to do, a few hours a month is just perfect. I had been putting of the report for like a week, and it was due Tuesday at 8am, and I wanted to finish it before Joel got home, as it was our Anniversary.. 10 years married, and 15 years together.

I pre-ordered from Home on the Range 0 we still have a gift card from there that I have been using up, and they delivered chicken parmesan for me and pot roast for Joel. When he got home we decided to all sit at the table and eat, we are supposed to be socializing Holly to eating, so we put her in her little read chair and I gave her a Barley teething biscuit.

She seemed pretty interested in Joel’s food, and he had some potato, so I decided to give her it to try.. It was hilarious, I am a bad mommy for tormenting my little one, it was “spicy” Joel said it had some clove and cinnamony flavor, but was mild… Well, it was too much flavor for Holly. She picked it up, put it in her mouth, then made the most yuckiest face and grabbed it out of her mouth and threw it down, then tried to use her tongue to get the taste out of her mouth. I gave her the Barley biscuit back and she was happy, but I didn’t take the potato away, and she tried it three more times, I guess maybe she thought it would be different, and it probably was a little less each time, but it was really funny watching her trying to suck on it. Joel thinks I am going to traumatize her and make her not like stew like Mommy… I told him he has nothing to worry about she will like stew just fine. I am really looking forward to Thanksgiving and giving her all kinds of new foods to try.

She went to bed at 10ish and then Joel and I had Apple Tart with Coffee ice Cream and caramel Sauce and had a quiet night watching some tv and went to bed early. We talked about maybe doing something exciting for our big 10 year, but really a quiet night with the family was just what Joel wanted, he is so happy with me and Holly, he feels like his life is complete, and it was a very content filled night.

We decided sometime next year when someone comes and visits we will go away for a night and let them watch holly, but for now an evening together with her, is all that we need.

Today Holly had Pears with oatmeal, and I gave her a slice of apple to chew on. I think she liked the apple. Tonight we are going to Baby Brigade to see W. I should be getting ready to head out, so I have to go… It was a quiet day.

Glow in the Dark

Glow in the Dark
Originally uploaded by vczdavis

This morning Holly and I were up and out of the house by 9:15, she was scheduled to act as a standardized patient for a nursing student pediatric class. The teacher was showing the student’s how to do a health assessment of a baby. It was fun, but tiring, if I had know Joel would be out of town, that I would be sick, I would not have agreed to going, but I didn’t want to cancel last minute and leave the class without a baby for the demo. It ended up not being as bad as I thought, as we got home by 10:30, and were napping till 12:00.

So Lucian and Tracey did not come over on Sunday, but they came over today to visit. I had invited Tracey and Lucian to join us to observe during Holly’s OT/IDS Visit, so she could see the types of therapy the OT does with her. Holly worked very hard today, she was doing lots of crawing, and actually goes forward 3-4 steps and backwards 3-4 steps, it takes great effort and time, but she is obtaining motion. She is also really starting to pull herself up.

The running joke is that Katie her OT/IDS is “mean” to her, because she makes her work so hard, today she was still trying to get her to roll onto her stomach, she moved all of the toys out of her reach, and placed her on her back, and tried to motivate her to turn over. She refused; she would think about it, and roll onto her side, but then get stuck over the last hump of getting her bottom arm out of the way and turning her big heavy head. Katie “the meanie” made her try for almost ten minutes, and was really quite surprised by her stubbornness. She is completely capable of this movement and has done it before. But didn’t want to. After a while she was upset and fussy, and we kept her at it. Eventually Katie helped her and gave in. But now she has a new theory.

It seems that when Holly is moving around, it takes a great deal of concentration on her part. So Katie’s theory is that when she is “emotional” fussy or upset, she simply can’t focus enough to do those movements, its almost like she shuts down. Joel and I have never really pushed her that hard and when she is in a position she doesn’t like and makes a squeak, we run and help her. So the goal is to let her do more for herself, we will see how successful I am at that.

After her session she was really worn out, and she started to sneeze and cough, so now I think she is getting sick. She doesn’t have a fever though, but she has a snotty nose. So I unfortunately cancelled my playdate with Sarah and Quinn. I had hoped Holly would take a nap and be refreshed. But we watched 3 episodes of Baby Einstein and she didn’t nap, and just got more and more fussy. Lucian was napping and Tracey and I were sitting around and chatting. She left at 4:00 to get David from the airport, but here it is almost 5:00 and Holly is still awake whining

So sadly I think Holly has caught my cold, speaking of being sick… Prednisone is magic! I was feeling so awful yesterday, and took a dose of it and felt so much better today. Yesterday I was out of breath simply sitting still, and was completely winded in full on asthma attack mode if I had to get up and do anything. Today I was out of breath when active, but when I was sitting still, I was ok, wheezing, but breathing ok.

Then I woke up freaking that I took the prednisone, worrying about it being in the breast milk, but I called the pediatrician, and she said in the dosage I took it was ok! So I was excited that I could take more today, and will hopefully be on the mend.

Holly finally took a nap at 5:45 but only for about 45 minutes, I had time to wash bottles and make some pasta, she is still super tired, she is awake but trying to fall asleep, she is so cranky and sick.. I am going to give her a bottle and see if she goes back to sleep.