too long

it's been too long since i've shared my thoughts, so i'm going to make a mad dash this morning.

i've had some bouts of terrible mothering lately, but nissa seems to be surviving just fine. some are worse than others. like thursday i was cutting nissa's nails and in an effort to address a hang-nail, clipped too much skin and she was bleeding. had little smears of blood on her cheek. very traumatizing for me, nissa didn't seem to mind after the initial injury. yesterday i almost lost one of her favorite toys. it ended up being in the car, but still. she doesn't like many of her toys (most are too heavy for her to hold AND put in her mouth at the same time), so the blue elephant needs to be kept safe. she's 17 weeks (4 months tomorrow) and i'm so terrible i just had to look up the week count. i suppose i could just chalk this last one up to baby-brain-rot, but still.

i've decided two things. first, i really miss my mom (dad too, of course) and i was meant to stay home with my kids. i noticed missing my mom by having her around. she was in town this past weekend for rick's shower (can't wait to meet their baby!!) and it was so cool to have her around to chat with and to watch her with nissa. they had such an excellent rapport: within the hour of mom's arrival, nissa had a half hour long giggling fit, just sitting on the couch with her. it was too cute for words. i got some of it on the new video camera, so i've got to figure out how get it off, crop it down and post it somewhere. whenever mom talked when i was nursing, nissa's eyes would get big and round and often she'd stop feeding to look at her grandma. how can you argue with that? i know i was meant to stay home because my quality of life was so much higher when i was on leave. i had time to sleep a full 8 hours (or more, if needed), shower every day, work out, eat well, shop for groceries and make tasty dinners, keep the house in order, stay up to see adam for a little while before retiring; i could go on and on. going to work keeps me away from nissa, hooks me up to a breast pump for about an hour a day, causes me to skip showers every other day, limits my sleep to 5-6 hours a night and keeps me frantically trying to balance house keeping and baby quality time. what adam misses in this last part is that my sanity is directly linked to the relative cleanliness of the house. the house doesn't have to be perfect by any means, but if it's in disarray, i can't think straight and i pretty much go nuts. it's unfortunate, but how i work right now, so i'm trying to cope.

we closed on our refi yesterday and it's a great relief. with everyone carrying on about how everyone's broke and the economy is in the toilet. . . it's great to be able to do something about it, like take your mortgage rate down by a percentage and a quarter point. not everyone is that fortunate in the current climate and we barely scraped by, given that our house was appraised at over $80G less a year later after we bought it. ugh.

we are also very fortunate to have such an awesome kid. we get complimented by everyone on how happy and sweet and calm and quiet she is. and unless she's really tired or really hungry, she's like that all the time. she never gets upset when someone new holds her, almost always smiles when smiled at and is almost always easy to entertain. man, i hope she keeps it up! she's got us completely spoiled. the other comment that strikes me as interesting is more than one person has called her appearance elfish. given her name's origin, it's ironically appropriate. beyond the terrible rash of cuteness and general like-ability, she's totally strong and impresses everyone by her ability (and distinct preference for) to sit up, her persistent and almost aggressive gnawing on anything she can get into her mouth (including her hands, sometimes both concurrently, your fingers, toys, etc), and rolling over skills. nissa rolled over from her belly to her back for the first time on valentine's day and has done it again quite a few times since. lately, though, she's been curling up to her side from laying on her back and can get quite mobile doing so. yesterday she seemed to get about 3/4ths of the way over, with just her shoulder holding her back. it's quite the sight to see. nissa's even showed a preference for sleeping on her side, but only if she gets there on her own: you can't put her there!

so i made notes for myself on stuff i wanted to write about. that was almost 3 weeks ago now. yikes.

we finally got her social security number right before my birthday and we were able to file our taxes. next, we hope to set up some college savings for her, so she can have the education she deserves.

it didn't last long, but adam found a way to dumbfound nissa. while sitting in her bumbo, adam would put her barrel rattle on her foot. she'd stare and stare, intrigued by the noises when she moved her foot. on one foot it amused her, on the other foot it would annoy her. it was really funny to see the varying reaction, based on what foot the rattle was on. now she just reaches for the rattle, so it's not as much fun.

nissa has become a lot more vocal now. before, she'd occasionally strike up a conversation of hi's and ma's, but now she squeaks, ooh's and squeals. she has also taken up blowing spit bubbles for extended periods of time- minute long sessions! it's messy but cute. beyond the noises, nissa seems to be vocalizing her needs too. when she's uncomfortable, bored or not paid attention to, she lets us know in a hurry. our little laid back baby is starting to have opinions!

one last thing: a while ago nissa was sitting on my lap on the rocker and i was feeding her. she decided to stretch out and in pushing her feet against one armrest, she knocked her head against the other armrest. it was kinda funny, but she was not amused at all. ever since, i've held her at more of an angle to prevent it, but i'm sure she will again before she outgrows the width of the chair!