John and Doodle, NYC ~ 4/8/2010
Landing on un-updated blog is as about as unappealing as pulling back the drapes to find a sticky grey hair ball glued halfway on the carpet/halfway on the hardwood, wouldn't you say?
I'm catching a few minutes here at 4:30 am while my two-month old son's Zantac kicks in. That's right, the kid's got reflux. We found out today at the pediatrician that this stuff is to be given prior to a feeding so John stops barfing up his dinner. I plopped him little green swing wrapped up like a burrito, his pie hole plugged with a pacifier, and he's making fussy, hungry I'm dissatisified with this fake boob which doesn't produce milk grunting noises.
Doodle's also making weird sounds. She has to take a dump, so she's running around the apartment crying. She knows where the toilet is, it's simply that she'd rather poop like the big cats in a pile of dirt--or Tidy Cat--which we don't have over here at Two Can Anne. So I'm shuuushing the boy, I'm shuuushing the cat...wait, okay, Doodle just flew out of the bathroom with a gutteral howl, she's officially finished with her business.
It's a pretty busy place around here this morning, aren't you glad you checked in?
We also learned at the doctor's that the rash on John's face which began as a few cute pimples and then traveled all over his head and upper torso is completely normal, just upsetting for first-time parents and innocent onlookers. Although there's a prescription for hydrocortisone and heavy moisturizing, allegedly it will just go away. Essentially, babies's systems are sensitive and wackadoo and they "just get stuff." Encouraging.
Having a kid is kind of like having a plant. And the name of the game is Keep It Alive. The difference is that your plant is wicked expensive, and when it gets aphids, and Miracle Grow doesn't work, you can't just throw it out for the trash man and buy a new one. So when your plant cries at 4 in the morning you can't ignore it; you have to change its diaper, grease it up with Desitin, olive oil and hydrocortisone, give it Zantac, walk it around, put it in a bouncer, put it in a swing, put a plug in it, play childish music to it, flash colorful toys in its face, and breastfeed it, supplementing with formula. Repeat every three hours.
And when you feel like hurling it out the window, you remember that you signed a paper in the hospital promising you wouldn't shake your plant. Plus, your plant just got a Social Security card in the mail so people might notice if you suddenly didn't have a plant anymore.
Ok, well it appears as if I've distracted my plant from breakfast long enough, so I must go. I've decided from now on seize the minutes in the wee hours of the morning waiting for John's Zantac to kick in--and Doodle to relieve herself--to blog. But there's so much to write about, and so little time. I need some structure, an assignment, so to speak, in order to make this work, so why don't we make the next few posts interactive? What else do you want to know about what's poppin' (or poopin') at Baby Barftown USA? Ask your questions the comments, and I'll try to find time to answer some of them.
Fisher price forever, yo.
I don't recall delivering another baby on John's birthday, but the likeness is uncanny, no? Here he is pictured wearing a gift from Grama Altman, a camo-inspired swaddler which essentially calms a newborn the farg down as it reminds them of the close and comfy quarters in the womb before their violent eviction. Too much exposed space in their new orbit freaks them out, and they whack themselves in the face and wake themselves up. 'Round these parts, we call the swaddle "fabric jail." Sometimes John fights getting in to (and out of) fabric jail, but he likes it. And since he's discovered his hands and the joy of sucking them over the past week, he's not punching himself in the grill as much, which is good. I guess?He's also smiling a lot, cooing and gurgling lots of important things.
