thumb sucker

i was so distracted by the fussiness of nissa's reaction to her shots yesterday that i forgot to mention that she's officially become a thumb sucker. grandpa g would be so proud. she used to suck her whole fist, or a few fingers, but now she almost exclusively sucks her thumb. it's really cute. she usually has her hand open, but every once in a while she'll close her fingers in the classic thumb-sucking position. she never has been fond of a pacifier, so i'm glad she's found a way to pacify herself effectively. i'm trying not to think about how we'll eventually have to break her of this habit. . .

by the way, the fussiness ended almost instantly when adam came home from work. i'm grateful, but it was like it never happened and adam never experienced the stress of it all. jerk. but today nissa's all fine, so i'm happy. but looking at her leg, i can see why she was irritated. her right leg is fine, but her left leg is a bit swollen and bruised. i'm not sure which shot went into her left leg, but if it gets worse or doesn't improve by monday, i'll be giving the ol' doctor a call.

i'm proud to say that although my time home is coming to an end, i'm feeling good about what i've accomplished. my favorite project is what i was able to do with some PUL (waterproof fabric): some reusable breasfeeding pads and a couple of wet bags.

i'm excited for both because i've made them myself, saved some money and all with one yard of PUL! the bags will let us transport cloth diapers (without going thru way too many ziplocks or something) and later will be great for wet swimsuits! the pads let me save money on the disposable kind, plus they're a lot more comfy.

stupid doctor

well, to be fair, our doctor is awesome. the experience of going to the doctor is stupid. getting shots (though good for nissa) is stupid.

we had our two month check up today. since my insurance hasn't changed from hmo to ppo yet, we went back to the same doctor whose offce we were not too fond of. we saw the doctor an hour and forty minutes AFTER our scheduled appointment time. so, after the appointment business was conducted, it had been over two hours. who has that kind of time to dedicate to a doctor's appointment? anyways, the appointment itself went well and i do appreciate the knoledgeable and kindhearted approach our doctor takes; she has an excellent combination of skill and bedside manners! we impressed the doctor with nissa's talkativeness and weight gain- she's shot up into the 75% range for weight and length. the doctor even liked the cloth diapers. nissa met all the milestones for her age (grasping, following with her eyes, lifting her head while on her stomach, etc) and otherwise passed with flying colors. one thing the doctor does need to work on is her closing; it's hard to tell when she's done or what to expect. . .

the colors all ran when the doctor left and nurse entered (oh, by the way, this nurse will be doing the shots, not the doctor; which i deduced after they did and awkward switch in the doorway). shot one went as well as could be expected, shot two was interrupted by nissa's wriggling and so nissa had to get stuck a third time. i've never heard her cry and scream quite like that. nissa was seriously pissed and all i could do was stand there and watch as she lay on the bed thingy. the nurse was sweet, but not as effective as i would have liked.

now, several hours later, my sweet little cutie patootie has become a wailing mess of a baby. she adjusts in her sleep- cries. she gets laid down for a diaper change- cries. she sits too long (even amidst a dancing session, her favorite)- cries. getting her into position to eat- cries. i've taken her temperature and looked at her legs where she got her shots; her temp is ok and her legs are no more poofy than usual. i'm hoping she's just a little sore and a little traumatized, both of which can improve with time. i really hope so, because more than a day of this new behavior could really wear me out.

she's sleeping contently on my lap now, and i'm grateful for the repreve. too bad i have to get up soon to change loads of laundry. . . :(

she's stan!

so, for those of you familiar with the monkey island series of computer games, you know stan.

my baby is stan reincarnated when she eats. or when she gets excited. or sitting in her bumbo. she's a pretty animated gal.

i meant to write something earlier, but nissa did have her first experience with death the other day. our friend's iguana, guinevere, passed away not too long ago after many years of cherished companionship. we were watching the iguana until our friend had the space to take care of her at home. unfortunately, she did not make her next move. nissa was with me when i made the sad discovery and although i doubt she could understand, we had a quick heart-to-heart about death and dying and she seemed ok.

on a lighter note, it has me really bummed out that i have less than 2 weeks left before i go back to work. where did the time go????

awesome

i love this motherhood stuff. still adjusting somewhat, but loving it!

it's been a few days since i've written, and i've had some thoughts of what i wanted to write, but it'll be a test to see if i remember it all. by the way, i'm pumping as i write; apparently last night was good for milk production.

nissa is sitting next to me in her new bumbo. in general, she likes to sit up (vs laying down in our arms) so this is perfect for her. and we love it because it's like having her in a recliner with us and we can interact with her so easily. plus it's super cute.



i haven't mentioned anything about this to date, but gibson has been an excellent big brother.at first, he was first on the scene any time nissa made the tiniest noise. he got over it after a while, but he's still very interested in everything she does and loves to come by and give her kisses as often as we will let him. nissa doesn't mind the kisses most times, but sometimes she gets annoyed or gibson simply gets a bit carried away, so we have to ask him to stop. he's always very gentle with her and loves to rest his head on her or near her while we sit together on the couch. the cutest thing he does is every once in a while he'll go up to her in her swing and place his kong bone (or whatever) next to her, expecting her to throw it for him (as the rest of us do). he will sit and wait for quite a while, but i always have to grab it for nissa and toss it on her behalf. soon enough, gibson!

she's really starting to be quite the conversationalist- a lot of oohs, aahs, heys and huge smiles. when she gets going, she's a regular chatty cathy. i caught a little bit of her conversation the other day, while she was on the changing table. i'm still trying to get it in a good format for flickr.

speaking of flickr, i can't help but notice my obsession with getting pictures of nissa smiling. she does it often, and i can usually get her to smile with little effort (laughing still takes some work). but i've found i'll keep the grinning shots and hide the blank stare shots when i'm getting pictures together to share. sure she smiles a lot, but she does other things too- i wonder if i should keep things more balanced.

we had our first bad parenting moment the other day while playing video games. nothing serious, but adam made a bad call, i reacted poorly and nissa had nothing but tears for us. there was no permanent damage (no real damage at all, unless you count the hurt feelings), so we'll all know better for next time.

well, miss fussy pants has finally fallen asleep on my lap, so it's time to hit up daddy for some baby alone time (there's plenty of milk for her next feeding), so i can run some errands.

she does sleep pretty well, i must admit. and i love not having to say, "oh, be quiet so you don't wake the baby" because unless it's a sudden noise, she's out for the count. like just now, gibson came scrambling downstairs, sounding the bark alarm. not too sure what he thought he was warning us about, but we're all on alert now. nissa didn't so much as flinch. awesome.

bottle bound

yep, we are bottle bound, as i will need to return to work in a few short weeks. sunday proved unsuccessful, so we needed to try again soon.

thursday night worked swimmingly. i pumped about 2 ounces a little before nissa was due to eat and handed it over to adam. after a couple of tries and some adjustments on both sides, dad was feeding nissa!



of course, i watched with mixed emotions. practically speaking, this means i will eventually be able to leave the house for extended periods of time and someone else can feed her. emotionally, it seems like the first of many steps my little girl wil take in growing up and not relying on her mommy in some way. sure it's silly, and the food still ultimately comes from me (i'm committed to pumping as long as i am able), but still. the prospect of adam feeding her makes up for any sad feelings because now he can have a more involved role with nissa and be able to provide for her in a new way.

another 'first' happened thursday morning, but it was considerably less noteworthy. i made an attempt to bathe nissa without the sling in the infant tub. nissa ended up clean and non-drowned, so i guess it was a success, but it got sketchy at times. when i frist laid her in the tub, she seemed way too interested in curling up (avoiding the nice support down the middle of the tub) and getting way too close for comfort to the water (scant few inches there were). i wanted to give it a try to help her feel the water and to stay a little warmer during the process. i'm not sure we'll do it that way next time, though.

par-tay!

this past saturday we hosted our annual holiday party. it was a lot of fun and nissa got to meet a bunch of new people. plus, with adam's schedule in play, the late night was easy for us. gibson had a good time too, with several folks playing with him and complimenting us on his behavior. we take it as a good sign of our parenting skills- if we can do ok with a dog, we should rock with a kid!!

nissa has been cooing and smiling a lot and it's super cool. sometimes she'll even look your way if you call her name. she and i will dance together during the day and she really seems to enjoy it. she doesn't do much come "tummy time" but those legs are always going!

i got my hooter hider last week and tried it out. it's the most brilliant thing for public nursing! it covers thoroughly and still lets you see what's going on. big, but not bulky. now i'm really ready to go out and about with nissa (not that it's slowed me down much so far).

we tried a bottle of breast milk yesterday- to mixed results. she wasn't really awake (but we wanted to avoid her being too hungry) and she didnt' seem to really like the bottle nipple. adam's back was hurting, though, so he couldn't try for too long. we'll try again this week. . . we'll have to figure it out eventually for going back to work (boo hiss!).

now i'm off to clean the house from after the party and start washing the next bigger diapers that came in the mail today!

settling in

so, i think we're finally settling in to a groove here. only 7 weeks in!

when a baby doesn't have much going on, it's really easy to pick up on the new things she does. like sunday, nissa discovered her thumb for sucking. i tried to sneak a picture, but she moved back to her whole fist before i could manage it. yesterday she giggled for me on the changing table. she giggled before for a friend, but this time it was all me! hopefully she'll do it for adam soon too. she smiles a LOT when we dance together and that's when i got the giggle. it's kind of a cooing noise with her mouth in a huge anime grin. it's awesome.

but we're on adam's winter schedule now, so morning starts around 11am and bedtime is around 3am. as long as i get a few hours sleep, i'm good, but it will be tricky when i have to flip that schedule to start work. but that's weeks away!! we do try to get out during the daylight, though. like yesterday we walked down to get adam some pipe tobacco. right! adam had his last cigarette 2.5 weeks ago on 12/22/08 and i couldn't be more proud of him. to assuage his urges and help make the change more permanent, he smokes the occasional pipe. he averages about 2-3 times a day, incredible given his previous habit had him smoking a pack of cigarettes a day. he misses cigarettes but is very excited to have been so successful. the money savings is an immediate bonus and the health advantages will be appreciated too.


today we'll try to head down to a new organic grocery store down the block. i'm intrigued to check it out! the weather has been more supportive of outings, so i'd like to take advantage of it as much as possible.