On sitting and crawling

[Note to readers: This blog entry has been sitting unpublished here for about a week. Oops!] Now that I'm caught up on past entries, I thought I'd fill you in on what's been going on more recently. Roan has been so much fun this past week. She seems to be happy all the time. This week we started our regular schedule with two days with the nanny and a half day at Mother's Day Out. When I picked her up after her first day of MDO, Miss Charlie said "I don't know what you've been doing with her at home, but she is the happiest baby!" I can't take credit for her disposition. As far as I can tell, she was just born that way.

We've been having lots of fun just enjoying the everyday normal stuff together like bathtime, playtime and mealtime. She is so intriegued with the world around her; it's neat to see the wheels turning in her head. If I put her in a seated position she can stay there for a while before she topples over. And when she's on her tummy, she's started drawing her knees in and balancing on her elbows or hands. She's thinking about crawling, but hopefully we have a little while before she gets fully mobile. She loves watching Sasha and Hallie, and I think being able to chase after them is her main motivation for learning to crawl.

She's been an excellent eater lately. She eats several tablespoons of cereal most nights. I've given up making my own babyfood for the moment since the applesauce was such a flop. (Hmm, kind of like the cloth diapers and that whole natural childbirth thing...) This week we tried some storebought winter squash and pears, both of which she ate with enthusiasm.

The sleeping has been hit and miss. For a week or so she went back to sleeping 9 pm to 8 am which was soooo nice, but more recently we're lucky if she sleeps till 6 am. We got a little cold snap in Denver the other day, and that night she kept waking up every hour. Eventually we figured out she was freezing cold. She was only wearing two thin layers and I accidentally left her ceiling fan on high. Her little hands were popcicles. Bad mama! So we zipped her up into a fleece sleep sack and slept her between us that night. That did the trick. The only thing is, every night since Arwen keeps wanting to sleep her with us. The other night I had put her down in her crib and in the middle of the night he went and got her. When I asked him about it in the morning he said, "I missed her." So cute.

She is making a lot of sound now, the most adorable cooing and babbling sounds you can imagine. They seem designed specifically to turn a parent's heart to mush. Occasionally it gives way to pterodactyling, but that is more rare. She is getting going with the consonants, mostly mmm, bbbb, and dddd. When she really gets on a roll it sounds like she's having a conversation with her mouth closed. It's kind of funny.

Not a day goes by that I don't look at her and marvel. She seems like such a miracle, already an amazing person. I wonder sometimes how it can be that she is so full of joy. I feel lucky to have this little creature in my life that fills me with a renewed sense of appreciation just to be alive.

Catching up

So *finally* here are some pics from Josefa's visit here a few weeks back and Arwen's birthday. Here's one of a happy baby with her Grandma Feefa in the same chair Grandma rocked her daddy in.

One thing we did while Josefa was here was go out to Georgetown, a cute historic town nearby, and ride the open car scenic railroad. It winds through the mountains and over a river with gorgeous views. Here they are looking out the window at the view on the train.

And here Roan is with her daddy on the train ride, all bundled up.
We've been feeding Roan some solid food for the last month or so. Mostly organic rice cereal. I made some applesauce for her with organic apples in the blender and so far she has hated it. Here she is with her first teething biscuit, which she absolutely loved.

It gave her a chance to actually hold on to the food herself. She always tries to grab the spoon out of my hand when I'm feeding her, and mean mommy that I am I won't let her have it, at least not when it's loaded with cereal.
She had a good ol' time with this biscuit though. There was dried on cookie mess all over her face, in her hair, crusted to her eye, caked to her feet, etc. We went straight to the bath afterwards.
Here's another one with Grandma Feefa in the chair, this one at mealtime.
While Josefa was here, Arwen's cousin Thomas, his wife Vanessa and their seven adorable kids came over and had dinner at our house one night. They just had baby #7 about 3 months before Roan was born.
Here are Thomas, Vanessa and their whole clan in our backyard. And here's Roan on cousin Nick's shoulders. With six brothers and sisters he's had a lot of practice.

Arwen had a birthday while Josefa was here. One of the things I got him was a book of 100 dayhikes in the Denver area. We've been here a whole year now and we've hardly done any nature stuff. So on his birthday he picked a hike in Evergreen, and even Sasha got to go.
Jen made the cutest bug-shaped cakes for Arwen's birthday. Everyone got to pick a cake (or two) and decorate it with colored icing, chocolate chips and sprinkles. Here he is with his dragonfly birthday cake - undecorated. Before I knew it, he'd decorated it and swallowed practically in one bite.

All in all, it was a good birthday and a great visit.

Man I'm a delinquent blogger

I have *got* to make time to post an update. I just noticed that blogger has a (new?) option to post a video, so I'm gonna try that real quick. Let's see if it works.

Hopefully that'll tide you over till I can take the time to write down some *actual words*...

Finally a moment for a quick update. Here's my new 'do. I gotta say it makes me feel so much more me. It's fun and easy to style and much less likely to get sucked into any nearby vacuum cleaners.

And here's an attempted shot of the back. Notice the reflection of me in the mirror awkwardly taking the shot.

I don't have long to write, so I'll make it quick. It's 10:30 and Roan is up waaay past her bedtime, determined to fight sleep as long as possible. She's wiggling around on the bed next to me like a maniac, playing peek-a-boo with her lady bug blanket and cooing up at the fan. I however, am so beat I could just drop. But even so, I have to say that looking at her sweet smiling face I am relishing this time with her. She is a little charmer, I'll tell you.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll get a chance to catch up on the latest. But right now my little girl is letting me know it's time for this mama to pay her some attention.

I did it!

I chopped off all my hair. Yippie!!!! Photos to come soon, as well as updates from Grandma Fifa's visit.

Attack of the vacuum cleaner

Yesterday was a weird day. It began with an incident with the vacuum cleaner. I had summoned up the energy to vacuum, sweep and mop the whole house and somehow Roan was content to play by herself long enough to let me accomplish it, so I got out the trusty vacuum cleaner. I was suctioning away when Arwen came in and asked "What's that burning smell?" "I was planning to ignore that," I replied. Giving me a look of admonishment, Arwen turned over the vacuum cleaner to find its rotating brush had become completely paralyzed by gobs and gobs of my hair wound round and round it.

Have I mentioned that I am so over my long hair? It is time for this mop to GO. Apparently it's normal for tons and tons of hair starts to fall out of your head about 3 months after you have a baby. Every time I take a shower it looks like there's a gerbil in the drain. The drifts of hair around the house have begun to rival Sasha's ubiquitous tumbleweeds. Not to mention Roan thinks it's real fun to yank on it now. I have a appointment set next week to chop it all off. I am counting down the days.

Anyway, Arwen's discovery with the vacuum led me to have to unscrew the bottom of the machine and spend the next half hour cutting and yanking a ton of dust-encrusted hair off the brush. Disgusting. Once free to spin again, I got back after it with the vacuuming.

I thought to myself It's been a while since I managed to vacuum, and who knows when I'll get the next chance. Better make the most of it. I hooked up the attachments so I could vacuum under the bed. I was down on all fours, halfway under the bed reaching for all the hidden dustbunnies when the unthinkable happened. I didn't even realize what was transpiring at first, and then it hit me. The vacuum had sucked most of my hair up into it. I couldn't actually look at the vacuum cleaner though, because it was attached to the back of my head. That must really have been a sight. Me flailing around from half under the bed, blindly groping for the off switch.

I finally found it, turned it off, and extricated myself from the contraption. That only served to underscore: This hair has got to go!

Tooth Number Two and a Trip to the Zoo

Yesterday I stuck my finger into Roan's mouth to check out how her tooth nub is coming along, and I couldn't believe it: I found another tooth coming in! It's right next to the first one. So when they come in all the way, she'll have two cute little teeth on the bottom. I tried to take a photo but this was the best I could do. You can sort of make out the first tooth just above my finger, but the new one is way too small to see.

We took a trip to the Denver Zoo on Sunday, a first for the whole family. We went with Jen and Micah as well as Micah's step sister Angela, her husband Matt, and their 2 year old daughter Morgan. It was a lot of fun. I love this photo because it looks like Aunt Jen is dangling Roan into the Polar Bear exhibit, but don't worry. She wasn't pulling a Michael Jackson.

Roan really seemed to enjoy herself. She was mostly oblivious to the animals, except for the fish exhibits and the Siberian Tiger, who paced back and forth in front of us for a while. More so than the animals, she loved all the people watching, especially Michah's neice Morgan. She is an adorable little girl, and incredibly well behaved for a two year old. We enjoyed hanging out with Angela and Matt too, who moved here not long ago and are building a house in the Denver metroplex.

The last few days Roan's really been going easy on us, and I've been enjoying it. She's been so happy, as you can see for yourself in this picture. We've had a number of outings - whether just running every day errands or fun stuff like hanging out at the zoo all day - and she's been amazingly easygoing. She just has a good time, whatever we happen to be doing. She was a little champ at the zoo. She nursed on the go, stayed awake for a long time enjoying herself, and then sacked out for a nap in the stroller without a fuss when she got tired.

Napping in particular has been going much better lately, although she only takes 2 or maybe 3 naps a day (as opposed to 6 or so naps when she was 2-3 months old). For almost a month she was having a lot of trouble going down, really fighting it. But she's regained her composure, and once again when I see she's getting sleepy I can swaddle her up, stick a paci in her mouth and lay her down, and she goes right on to sleep.

She's still having trouble sleeping through the night. She had been a great sleeper, but at 4 months she went through a growth spurt and for weeks afterward it seemed she just couldn't get enough food. More recently we've been able to go back to sleep just by giving her a pacifier when she wakes up in the night. But we're finding that with her new ability to roll over and wiggle all around, she tends to wake herself up every night and want to play for a while before going back to sleep. Last night she was awake for an hour and a half, and both Arwen and I got up multiple times to attempt to get her to fall back to sleep.

Anyway, that's the nuts and bolts of what's been going on lately. It somehow does not convey though what a little treasure she is. She is growing and changing so much, I am eating up this baby time, enjoying it before it's gone.

4 1/2 months

Things are getting more and more fun around here. Roan has been in good spirits lately, and she's added a few more tricks to her bag. We started solid food last week. It was a messy endeavor the first time around. I'm pretty sure she spit out every bite we spooned in. All over her tummy, her face, it was on the back of her head, all over her bumbo, the table, covering her fists... Lots of fun. But since last week she's gotten to be much better at it. Now she manages to swallow three whole teaspoons of cereal once a day. I'm planning on adding some more foods soon. Maybe pureed carrots or apple.

Her cute little tooth nub is getting bigger. It's still a ways from looking like a full fledged tooth, but still so cute. This means of course that we can no longer let her use our hands as a teething ring because it feels like she's shredding your hand.

This week we met some other mommies for a potluck picinic lunch. We spread blankets out under the trees and all the babies crawled around (those that could, anyway) and checked each other out. It was neat to see how interested in each other they were, even at this young age. Roan faced off with a cute little boy named Iggy with big blue eyes like hers. He started talking to her, making weird throaty noises. Roan was transfixed. I told his mom we call that "pterodactyling" and she said "We do too!"

The picinic was nice because I got to meet some more moms from the neighborhood, including 3 that live on my street! There are so many couples we'd like to invite over for dinner or meet out for margaritas. The trick is finding the time to do it, planning enough in advance and not being too pooped to socialize. It was certainly a lot easier to make new friends last fall before a certain someone came into our lives.

One of the moms I met had been planning a home birth, but like me, after 30 odd hours of unmedicated labor ended up with an emergency C-section. It was nice to commisserate with someone. It's funny, right after Roan's birth I had no negative feelings about having had a C-section. But over time it's bummed me out a little. Mostly there's the trepidation I have about going into the next one, if there is a next one.

Last friday we took Roan to the pool for the first time. I actually thought she'd be thrilled because she loves bath time so much. But as with most things on the first time, she wasn't so sure about it. She cried a little at first, but gradually warmed up to it. And she looked so darn cute in her red & green bikini with ruffles on the butt!

Roan has been growing ever more interested in the world around her. I can no longer put her in her bumbo on the kitchen counter and not expect her to tump over the olive oil or reach for the knives. She can hold her bottle now, not through an entire feeding yet, but for 5 or 10 minutes at a stretch. The other day I had her on my lap while I was eating my lunch. She grew more animated as I was eating slices of apple, until finally she started crying when she reached out her hand and I wouldn't give her one. I figured what the heck, and handed her a slice of tart granny smith, expecting her to spit it out, but instead she gummed it enthusiastically. It was pretty cute.

We've also been doing some stuff around the house. Guys came this week and blew insulation into the attic (finally! now that the summer's almost over). Arwen spent all day yesterday putting cedar siding up on the outside of the house. In a week or so roofers are coming to put on a new roof and install new vents to further cool the attic. And then painters will come to paint the outside, including new gutters. We've also been starting to look at landscaping books.

We've also had a ton going on at work. As soon as I finished a big software rollout with an important deadline, Arwen got slammed with a different big sofware rollout. It's been a week of long work hours - I worked till 11 pm the other night helping him proofread some user manuals to go along with the software - and we are finally today putting it out there. It's a relief to have that behind us.

Even with all we've had going on, I did much better this week than the week before in terms of having "Mommy Meltdowns." Part of what helped is a long talk Arwen and I had last weekend about not letting Roan's challenging moments get to me. As he pointed out, she's a baby. It's her job to cry and it's our job to not freak out and just calmly figure out how to help her. And sometimes we may not be able to figure out how to help her. You know, there's this point you reach right before you lose it where you can either give in and blow off some steam or you can kind of go limp and let go. I've been opting for the latter this week, and to my surprise it's really helped.

Oh one last thing. I'm moving all our photos over to Flickr, a popular photo web site. I've had problems with storage limits on virtually every site I've used, so hopefully this one will do the trick for us. I'll post a link to our photo albums on Flickr soon.

Wait, one last question: Does this constitute child abuse?>> We're not actually feeding our sweet little baby processed cheese food, but just try keeping the cardboard box it came in away from her!

Lots of news to catch up on...

We have lots to report today. Last week we were blessed with a visit from Gramps and K. We did all kinds of fun things while they were here, including some sightseeing, white water rafting (Arwen, Roan and I sat that one out), visiting the farmer's market and teahouse in Boulder, and lots of eating, drinking and being merry. Roan just loves it when we have company. She digs being the center of attention.

On Tuesday Roan had her 4 month checkup and vaccinations. I'm not sure what it is about the doctor's office, but she is always in a good mood when we're there. She was making eyes at the nurse, rolling all over the exam table, cooing up a storm, and when being examined she kept grabbing the doctor's hand and shoving it in her mouth.

She now weighs 14 pounds and 14 ounces and is 24 inches long, in the 80th percentile for both height and weight. She got a clean bill of health, and Dr. Bacon was pleased to see how great she's doing developmentally. She in particular commented on Roan's upper body strength (she can completely support her head and chest on her hands) and oddly enough on one of her more recent tricks - shoving her toes in her mouth. Apparently that's a six-month skill.

So she impressed the doctor and got her shots. She was pretty grumpy about that last part, but within a few hours she'd shaken it off. Later that evening she was playing and laughing like normal.

In this last week we've also had 3 days of care with the new nanny, Lindsay. Roan really likes her and heck why not. She's very sweet, responsible and relaxed. She also goes out of her way to play, sing, count and read to her. And she manages to do that not with one baby but with two. Pretty impressive.

So as far as what Roan's been up to lately, she's added some new tricks to her bag:

• rolling tummy to back and back to tummy on both the right and left sides
• wiggligng around her crib a lot - I find her in a different weird position every morning
• reaching more for her toys
• putting both hands to her mouth
• shoving anything within arm's reach into her mouth
• passing toys from one hand to the other
• growing ever more curious about the world around her - can't leave her in reach of things she shouldn't grab
• making more cooing noises, just on the verge of starting to babble
• picking her paci off the blanket next to her and putting it in her mouth
• holding her bottle
• laughing
• putting both feet in her mouth
• being intermittently ticklish
• very interested in watching us eat and drink - we may start trying solid foods with her soon
• still the most smiley baby ever
• her first tooth coming in on the bottom front right!

Oh and lastly, all her pretty hair has fallen out on the sides so now she's left with a cute little mohawk right down the middle that curls up on top just like a kewpie doll. Not that you can really tell in this picture. I'll have to post a good mohawk photo soon.

oh hey

We're alive. Better than that even, getting by pretty well. We've got a big software rollout at work this week that has us going a little crazy, so sorry I haven't written. It's times like these - you're going to think I'm nuts - that I thank my lucky stars I work with my husband, who might just be the brightest guy I know. It doesn't always happen, but it's usually the case, that when the chips are down we really come together as a team. It is so nice to be working on this incredibly challenging and sometimes infuriating project and have Arwen for my partner in crime. After a long, hard day at "the office" he knows just what kind of day I've had. And there's this reassuring feeling that like all things in our life, we're in this together.

Ok enough mushy talk. Honestly that should be illegal after 14 1/2 years together.

So Roan's doing a little better this week, starting to return to her normal self. She still has some turbo cranky moments, and she's not terribly predictable but the beginnings of a pattern are starting to emerge. She's transitioning from napping every 3 hours or so to just one nap in the morning and one in the afternoon, followed by a long (10 + hour) sleep at night. I'm not complaining!

We do have a couple of wrinkles to iron out though. Somehow she mysteriously "unlearned" how to fall asleep at naptime. She had been so good, to the point where she would yawn, I'd lay her down still wide eyed, and she'd happily relax, coo to herself and gradually drift off to sleep. Now it's practically a wrestling match getting her down. But we'll get back on track, one step at a time.

The other minor issue I'm working on with her is the fact that she keeps wanting to nurse forever and ever and ever. I talked to the pediatrician's nurse and we both think that what was a growth spurt has degenerated into nursing for comfort. The child is quite clearly not starving. So I've instituted a tough love policy (not that tough actually). I'll only nurse her for 10-15 minutes after she appears to have fallen asleep at the breast, rather than letting her go on for 45 to an hour.

So today was a very exciting day. Our new nanny came for a trial run, along with my friend Molly's daughter Audrey, who is nanny sharing with us. I was a little nervous how it would go. There are times I feel so drained after just watching Roan all day I was wondering how she'd manage with two. But I guess for me I'm watching her and trying to work. If I was just focused on her it would be a smidge easier. But still. I was very impressed with how Lindsay handled herself. There were only a couple of spells where both girls were screaming at the top of their lungs, and she seemed totally upbeat even by the end of the day. And I found that even after a relatively stressful day of working I was so glad to have little Roan back to myself by day's end.

Tomorrow's another big day. We'll be dropping Roan off at Molly's house. It'll be hard going all day without seeing her. It actually seems a little cruel to us both, but I think it's another important milestone.

More pictures soon!

Clean bill of health

The checkup went as expected. Roan's not sick. And when we went to the doctor's office she wasn't even cranky. In fact she was in rare form, cooing and smiling at the nurses and doctor. She had them all charmed, and probably thinking I was making things up.

So we're not sure what's going on, but at least there's nothing medically wrong with her. I've just accepted that I can expect the unexpected for now. She may not eat when she normally eats, she may do things out of order, she may skip naps... but as long as she's not screaming bloody murder there's not much to worry about.

Yesterday overall she did pretty well except for one episode in the morning when she had trouble eating and did this alternating laughing and crying thing, ending up nestled on my chest whimpering before *finally* drifting off to sleep. She skipped all her afternoon naps and was up for 5 hours straight which is unprecedented. But she was in a good mood, at least until Arwen and I tried to slip off for a nice evening walk to the grocery store to pick up a few minor essentials. Jen called us shortly before we were going to make our way to the checkout line, saying Roan was unconsolable and to come home immediately.

I knew it had to be bad for Jen to call. She's handled plenty of crying fits in the past without a problem. I left Arwen to pay at the grocery store and headed home as quickly as I could walk. When I got to our block I could hear Roan screaming from 5 houses away. I broke out into an all-out run. I don't think I've ever heard her like that. Not even after she got her first vaccines - and that was pretty pitiful. She was crying so loud and seemed so distressed it was actually scary. Had we not been to the doctor's office a few hours beforehand I would've been a little freaked out. And she had apparently started screaming like that out of nowhere and nothing Jen tried consoled her.

She calmed down after I got her swaddled and snuggled up in front of the AC vent. Even after she drifted off to sleep, she continued to whimper piteously. But I guess she eventually found some peace. She slept through the night and woke up happy as a clam this morning. And so the adventure continues.

I am hoping things return to some semblance of normal here soon though because Arwen leaves tonight to go out of town on business till Friday night. Hopefully I won't have pulled out all my hair by the time he gets back. :)

Time for a checkup

Well Roan was kind enough to let me get a decent night's sleep after my last post, but unfortunately she had another tough day yesterday. She just isn't herself. She is usually such an easy baby - an enthusiastic eater and a peaceful sleeper on a schedule you could set your watch to - but the last couple days everything seems hard for her. She's struggled at some of her feedings, and every nap time is a fight to get her to go down. And she's thrown the schedule out the window.

Last night I was completely spent by the end of the day. I struggled with her for an hour and a half trying to get her to go down and to take a full feeding. Once she finally nodded off to dreamland, I collapsed on our bed in tears. Arwen came in and consoled me. I didn't know it but he had a little mommy relaxation time planned for me. He'd drawn me a bath with all kinds of aromatic oils and salts and lit a bunch of candles. He even dragged the massive swamp cooler we normally keep in the living room in there to keep in cool enough so I could enjoy a hot bath. It was just what I needed - I realized I couldn't even recall when the last time was I had managed to wash my hair. By the time I got out of the bath I felt like a whole new woman. Jen called in an order for pizza, so dinner was taken care of, and Arwen finished up the evening with a wonderful back massage. It made me stop and marvel how many people it takes to care for a baby, and how many more to care for the caregivers.

This morning I called our pediatrician's nurse just to ask what I can do for teething and to my surprise she said they'd like me to go ahead and bring her in to get looked at. I figured that as easy as I've had it the past few weeks, this latest tough spell is just a dose of cranky baby that inevitably gets meted out to every parent, but the nurse was of a mind that unexplained behavior out of the norm calls for a checkup. She doesn't have a fever, so that's good. And she's up to date on her shots. I'm betting they'll come to the same conclusion that I have, that it's pre-teething, but the nurse said the main thing they need to check is her ears. The good thing is that at least she's past the 3 month marker, so no spinal tap! Anybody tries to come near my baby with a needle, they're going to have to go through me first. But a checkup probably couldn't hurt.

Just one of those days

Things have been going along so smoothly that I've gotten spoiled. When a day like today happens I get all out of sorts. Roan woke up about 4 times last night/ this morning so I was incredibly tired when I finally got out of bed. Even though she'd slept badly (and me as an unfortunate consequence as well), she woke up at 8 am, big sunshiney smiling eyes, ready to tackle the world. I was so exhausted I just parked her in her barnyard (a playmat thingy with lots of fun things to do) and crashed out next to her on the couch. Around 9 I finally gave up and got up for the day. Haven't been this tired in a long time. Until I got some coffee in me it felt like an out of body experience.

Once I did get going my big task for the day was to make the trek across town to hit Bosom Buddies (cute huh), a local merchant specializing in all things breastfeeding. It looks like we have indeed found a nanny, and unfortunately our stocks of milk are totally depleted. The pump I've been using developed a crack so I haven't been able to harvest much milk for the past few weeks. I needed to buy a new pump so I can replenish our stocks before Roan's first day with the nanny. It will probably take me over a week to pump enough for a single day - she is eating so much now.

The trip out to the store was all rush-rush-rush because I was trying to hurry back before Roan woke up and needed to eat again (of course little did I know she woke up the second I stepped out the door). As I was hurrying home I was thinking to myself how interesting it is how much of my day, my brain and my life revolves around her. Even though she kept me up all night and I was so sleep deprived I could hardly see straight, my whole day was about getting that pump, and my spare time for the next weeks will be all about building up her milk bank.

It didn't help that it was really really hot today. Really hot. Not only is that a drag for us big people, but it especially seems to tax Roan. She just gets crankier when it's hot. Thank goodness for the AC in her bedroom. While I was on the hunt for a pump, Arwen went to our storage unit and loaded up some things we need for our office. We spent the hot afternoon unpacking books into our bookcases and moving desks into the new office. We now have *almost* all the clutter out of our living room, and Roan has her room to herself now.

I had intended to catch a nap this afternoon, but somehow before I knew it it was already 5, and that's when my busy time starts. From 5 to 11 I nurse every 2 hours, which means there's not time for much else, certainly not a nap. Oh well.

Then this evening Roan suddenly went into turbo cranky mood out of nowhere. She was acting hungry, but then when she tried to nurse it seemed like she couldn't. She arched her back and screamed. Nothing I did calmed her down - none of the stuff that usually works. It's just not like her to get cranky for no reason. And I mean she was sqawling her head off, all red faced, head thrown back. It's upsetting to see your baby in such discomfort and not have a clue what's going on.

Eventually I figured out (I think) that her gums are bothering her. We pulled out all our baby books and Arwen did an emergency search on teething. It sounds like she may be "pre-teething," starting to feel discomfort as her teeth begin to think about coming in. Once we got her a cold washrag to suck on she cheered up. But nursing her was tricky. I had to ice down her gums and stand in front of an oscillating fan before she would latch on. And the thing is if I have even a shred of hope at a reasonable night's sleep, she *has* to eat.

Then she got tired and was ready for a nap. I've gotten so spoiled lately because normally she goes down so easily. I don't have to rock her to sleep anymore normally; I just swaddle her up, lay her down still awake, give her a paci if she wants it, and she takes care of the rest. But not tonight of course. She just needed a little extra help getting off to dreamland, but by then I was feeling so taxed. We worked through it together. Some nights are just harder than others. Now I have a whole 20 minutes to myself (which actually I've already used up writing this blog entry) before it's time to feed her again.

So here's hoping tonight will be nice and uneventful, and tomorrow will be a better day.

What's new this week

This has been a fruitful week. We're just about ready to move into our newly converted office, thanks to one final push this past weekend by Arwen. I "helped" too, although he may've been better off without me. I swear, every time I pick up a paintbrush or a hammer lately - always with the noblest of intentions - I somehow create disaster in my wake. Case in point, I was doing some final paint touchup while he took the car into the shop saturday morning. I was hopeful that if I was quick about it I might have it all done before he got home, as a pleasant surprise. Instead I had a mishap with the can of spray wall texture and it practically exploded all over our nice new stained concrete floors. I mean all over. As it turns out the stuff is oil based so I spent the next two hours scrubbing a million bright white spots off our dark brown floors. Harumph! But that proved to be a minor setback, and tonight we plan to start moving furniture in. Yippie!

Also I've started a nanny search, hoping to find someone to come in a couple days a week to help out with Roan so I can attempt to rub two brain cells together for more than 15 minutes at a time. It seems like every mom in my neighborhood is looking for a nanny at the moment, and there aren't enough to go around. I don't want to jinx it, but I met a very promising candidate in person today and it may even work out to where we can "nanny share" with our friends Molly & Scott. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

As far as new Roan developments go, I'm still mildly embarrased by my nonstop gushing in the last post, but what can I say. New parents. This past week was funny because after all that fussing over her rollovers, she didn't roll over again for a week. And she's only done it once since then! I think she's making it clear to us that she's no one's circus monkey. Anyway she's been very wiggly this week, raising her legs up and swinging them to one side or the other, or grabbing at hanging toys with her feet. She seems to always do things on the left side first. Maybe she'll be a lefty. Last night was the first time she grabbed both feet at the same time, one in each hand. (See top photo) It was so cute - she looked up at me with this expression that seemed to say "Are you seeing this Mom? Isn't this cool?!" She was so proud of herself.

Holy cow! and Happy July 4th

We had an exciting development today: Roan rolled over from her tummy to her back! We had no inkling she was about to do it. It was just a regular old "tummy time" session like any other. Except that Aunt Jen was supervising instead of me. And also she was playing with a new very special rattle from her Uncle Jim in San Francisco; maybe she likes it so much it literally made her "flip!"

We got some video of (most of) her second, third and fourth rolls. It looks like we're torturing the poor child in them because she's crying and crying and we're going "Come on Roan, do it again!" What mean mean grownups she has.

I did not actually see her first roll, even though I was sitting about 5 feet away, working on my laptop. Jen was so surprised Roan rolled over that she jumped up. Neither of us could believe our eyes, but there she was on her back. I figured it was a freak accident, something she had done unintentionally and would be trying to figure out "Now how did I do that?" for weeks to come. But wouldn't you know, she kept doing it. We'd put her back on her tummy, she would start to cry (she really does hate tummy time, I'm not kidding), then she'd stretch out one arm, cock her head back for leverage and bingo! go right over. It was amazing.

We were all so excited about today's developments we thought we should check in with the "experts" on Roan's progress so far. She just turned 3 months on July 2nd, and to our surprise she can do all of the activities they list. According to What to Expect the First Year, they say "Your baby..."

Should be able to:

• lift her head 45* while on her stomach

Will probably be able to:

• laugh out loud
• lift her head 90* while on her stomach
• squeal in delight
• bring both hands together
• smile spontaneously
• track an object 180* when held 6" from her face

May possibly be able to:

• hold head steady when upright
• raise chest, supported by arms, when on stomach
• roll over (one way)
• grasp a rattle
• pay attention to an object as small as a raisin

May even be able to:

• bear some weight on legs when held upright (she's been doing that practically since she was newborn)
• reach for an object
• keep head level with body when pulled to sitting
• turn in the direction of a voice
• say "ah-goo" or similar vowel-consonant combinations
• razz (make a wet razzing sound)

That last one, the razzing, is pretty cute. We call it making motorboat sounds (with her top end, as opposed to the usual bottom end). She starts out by getting a good supply of spit bubbles perched on her bottom lip and then just sort of blows sound through her lips. It always makes her smile. Anyway, that's the latest on what Roan is up to.

I also thought I'd mention that for 4th of July we went over to our friends Molly & Scott's house, who have an adorable little girl Audrey who is 5 months old. They cooked up some delicious ribs chicken, and brats with all the fixins. Jen made a wonderful pasta salad which was a big hit and she and I made star-shaped cupcakes, iced white with red and blue sprinkles. Roan had a great time making new friends. She is a very sociable little girl. So far she's not met anyone she doesn't like. And she wore her newest little party dress from her Uncle Brian and Aunt Hali.

True to form, she partied till she dropped - literally - and crashed out on a blanket under a tree in the backyard, oblivious to the toddlers and other babies running around her shrieking.

New photos are up

http://www.babysites.com/sites/roanvaughan
Email me if you forgot the username & password. Enjoy!

Regarding the aforementioned "adorable cooing sounds"

Um yeah. We have had some interesting developments over the weekend. And by "interesting" I mean holy crap I hope she doesn't keep this up. Roan has started making the weirdest noises. They fall somewhere between the mating cry of a bobcat (or perhaps hyena?) and nails on a chalkboard. We've begun to wonder if in fact I actually gave birth to baby pterodactyl who was only disguising herself as a baby human up to this point. It would not surprise me if she suddenly unfolded leathery wings and took flight, striking fear into the hearts of all small mammals in her vicinity.

It is the weirdest thing. It's not like she does it all the time; she has to sort of get into the mood. But the mood seems to strike her about twelve times a day. And when she gets going, look out! We are talking glass-shattering, brain-bending, ear-splitting shrieks that go on and on. She pauses every once in a while to break into a huge grin, she's so pleased with herself. If my eardrums weren't bleeding it would really be quite adorable. Arwen is fond of saying, "It doesn't bother me at all" right as I'm mentally to the point of ripping a fistful of hair off my head to use as earplugs.

How are you supposed to help your child "find her voice" when you're really hoping she will just shut the heck up? Ah, good times...

What, you don't like cold beet soup?

Hey folks. Long time no writey. I've just been having too much fun doing the mommy thing. Roan is showing more personality every day, and she is such a joyful creature I just love my time with her. Latest developments:

• she is very interested in her toes, often grabbing at them
• she likes to shove a hand/ finger/ thumb into her mouth whenever possible
• she gets into cooing spells where she makes all kinds of adorable noises
• she's given the thumbs down to several of her major toys, prompting me to go out and buy a new exersaucer to keep her entertained
• she loves standing on her legs (assisted of course)
• she hates spending time on her tummy
• she is sleeping through the night!!! yesssss!!!!!

Since my last post we took a road trip down to Texas to pick up our cat, celebrate Arwen's grandpa's 90th birthday (!) and put some face time in at the home office. I must say, we were rather leery undertaking a 16 hour drive with a 2-month old, but it went amazingly well. She slept a lot (Arwen drove through the night) and wasn't very fussy at all. And while we were in Texas she was so good and so happy it was incredible. I would've thought she might get cranky or out of sorts, but no sir, she was a gem. She even slept through the night 3 nights in a row. I think she really liked being around so many people, having lots of folks fussing over her and keeping her entertained. Our first two days back in Denver she went into a bit of a cranky spell. I think she missed being the center of attention! "What, it's just you and me Mom? Borrrring!"

While we were traveling she had her second growth spurt. You know it's a growth spurt not because she suddenly shoots up overnight, but because she starts nursing around the clock like crazy. I basically didn't sleep for 3 days. But this time just knowing what was going on, I didn't stress out about it. Eventually she returned to normal.

The only other hiccup on our trip was she got another somewhat bad diaper rash. I hadn't packed our super special hospital-issued diaper rash cream. Instead I packed the prescription refill our pediatrician gave us to save space. I figured if we needed the stuff, no problem, just run by Walgreens and pick it up. Wrong! It could only be filled at a compounding pharmacy (one that mixes stuff up) and all the ones in Houston were out of one key ingredient. A day of phone calls and $53 later, Roan had a different cream that works not as well but well enough to get her bottom in good enough shape to sit in a car seat for 20 hours.

Anyhoo, the funny thing is that once we got back to Denver and the rash cleared up I picked up some Desitin, the only diaper cream I hadn't tried and by far the most popular. I don't know, I guess I figured since everyone uses it it must not be any good? Or maybe I just had to be different? As it turns out it has not only cleared things up, it's kept the persistent recurring rash we're always fighting at bay. Go figure. Lesson learned: Save yourself some time and trouble and just do what everyone else does.

The last thing I thought I'd mention is I've been a little short of time lately because I've cranked up the cooking. I got really spoiled having Jen here cooking wonderful healthy meals all the time before she got a new terrific job. Now she has better things to do with her life than be my personal chef. When Arwen started to say things like "Are we ever going to eat at home again?" I figured I better pull it together. Happily I heard about this menu service, http://www.kitchenmuse.net/, which provides a week's worth of nutritionist-prepared menus that are healthy and wholesome along with a shopping list and a food prep To Do list to save time. For me, the recipe hunting/ grocery list making is the most taxing part of cooking so this is treat. And the Muse is into all kinds of ethnic foods, which I love, and she also has recipes for eating various foods that I don't really know what to do with normally.

Like beets for example. I don't think I've ever purchased beets or attempted to cook or eat beets. Beets were always sort of a mystery vegetable to me. They seemed to harken back to some quaint distant time in the past in which people ate things like collard greens and rhubarb pie. A sort of vestigial vegetable in today's modern produce section. Anyway, in last week's menu there was this recipe for summertime beet soup. Of all the recipes in the list it seemed the most iffy to me, but I thought to myself, Do not fear the beet. Embrace the beet. I figured if ever there was a time, it was now.

Flash forward to dinner a couple nights later. Arwen: "Are we having one of your new recipes tonight?" Me: "Yeah and I think it'll be really good. Different. Earthy. Here try some." At which point I served him three ladelfulls of bright fuscia soup with a dollop of plain yogurt, a handful of cucumber and a smattering of dill. I just forgot to mention one thing: this is a cold soup. He took one bite and I wish I had a picture of the look on his face. Horror. Disgust. Confusion. Me: "I like it, what do you think?" Him: "Well it's definitely different."

This is a man who will eat anything. I have sometimes complained that he will wolf down a delicately prepared meal that took hours of care and attention with equal enthusiasm/indifference as a pot of mac'n cheese straight out of the box. In fact, I think if it were up to him mac'n cheese would find its way onto our table much more often. Anyway, I looked over midway through my bowl of purple puree and actually saw him gagging. And then dutifully shoveling in another spoonful.

Oh we had a good laugh over this culinary adventure. Since then I'm happy to report the dinners I've prepared have been resounding successes. But then when you set the bar that low, it's hard to do worse!

PS. To any of our beloved friends and family in Texas who we did not get to see on this trip (and/or who didn't even know we were in town), we love you and miss you and are sorry we were so short on time. We didn't even get to spend a proper weekend in Houston and were working during the weekdays so it made for a hectic trip. Big hugs from the whole Vaughan family.

aw hail no

It hailed yesterday. Marble/grape sized. It looked like it was raining a million white marbles really hard and really fast. Thank goodness for carports.

In other news, wow it's really hard to find time to blog. Or shower. Or brush teeth. Or [insert activity of your choice here]. Babies take up a lot of time.

On the mooshy gooshy cutesie tootsie front, aw I just love my little girl to pieces. My daughter. Still seems strange to say. Like maybe that repo man might show up again and take her back. I'd like to see him try. Did I mention that she's adorable? And also brilliant. She is cooing and gurgling more and more. No doubt she'll be working on her masters thesis soon. Also she is getting huuuge. It's good to know the thousands of hours of nursing time I've clocked since her birth are not for nothing. We estimate her to be 12+ pounds now. She has a checkup coming up on Friday, so we'll report back with exact facts & figures.

Oh so I guess the last time I had much to say about Roan we were about to try putting her on a routine, and also dealing with more and more crankiness. Boy, we've come a long way baby. I learned that 1) if you think your child might have colic then he/she does NOT have colic and 2) if you don't let your baby nap enough they will get so grumpy you might think they have colic. I read this book (yes! another book) called Babywise which I do not agree with in its entirety but I must concede totally saved our bacon here. They suggest putting your child on a 3-hour eat-play-sleep routine, allowing them to sleep as much as 1-2 hours out of every 3.

This was a lot more sleep than we were letting Roan get, especially after 6 pm or so when I thought she better stay up to help her sleep longer at night. It's not like I was using the sleep deprivation techniques employed at Guantanimo or anything; I just wasn't recognizing that her fussy cries in the evening were because the poor thing needed a nap. The beauty of the eat-play-sleep routine is that it pretty much takes the guesswork out of why she's crying. When she wakes up crying I know it's because she's hungry. After feeding we play until she gets fussy again, which I know means she's tired. It's that simple. I couldn't believe that the very first day we started trying this approach she hardly cried all day, and when she was awake she had many more happy moments.

The other thing that's great about the Babywise routine is that now I feel much more confident about leaving the house with her and not having to worry about her having a major fuss attack. Basically, after I feed her we can go for a walk or go to the grocery store or get in the car or whatever. She'll stay awake as long as she wants and then fall off to sleep. I usually get a 1-2 hour window before she then wakes up and needs to be fed again. It's worked great.

PS. We have some new photos posted on Roan's site: http://www.babysites.com/sites/roanvaughan

If you forgot the username/password, just email me.

If these walls could talk

It's been a while since I checked in... I'll post some new pictures soon. In the meanwhile I thought I'd mention some puzzling anecdotes about our house. It seems this place comes with a a history.

You all know of course about the pipe bomb we found under sheetrock in our attic. In addition to the mystery explosive, it seems every time we open a wall we find some new curiosity. In the course of converting the old 1-car attached garage into our new office, we opened two walls and found a small aluminum frying pan (what?) and three truly hideous ties pinned together that must've been in there since the house was built in 1952.

Since we have lived here we've also had some curious visitors. One day Arwen answered a knock at the door and found himself face-to-face with some sort of repo man. The guy was asking for someone we'd never heard of - niether the former tenant nor the previous owner. When Arwen assured him he'd never heard of the individual in question, the repo man looked him up and down suspiciously and then reluctantly left.

But the most perplexing encounter was one day when Jen was home alone and answered the door. She heard a knock and was surprised to find a very short Asian gentleman standing on the stoop, wearing an eye patch over one eye inquiring into the whereabouts of a certain "Miss Ambrosia." When she replied that the lady in question was no longer living here, he was undeterred. "But where did she go? Have you seen her daughter? She used to live here too..." Jen could hardly get the guy to leave. When she told me about it, I couldn't help but wonder what kind of person goes by the moniker 'Miss Ambrosia'?

So we're left to surmise that this house has had a storied past. It seeming has served as a workshop for a would-be joke bomb maker, a home to some mystery man who loved fried eggs and wore ugly ties, a hideout to debtors, and a brothel catering to one-eyed Chinese midgets. Wow we must seem really boring by comparison.

Happy Mother's Day

To all the mamas, grandmamas, great-grandmamas, doggy mamas and so on out there: Happy Mother's Day. Mine sure was.

It was just a quiet day around the house for me looking after Roan. I love the weekends because I can just focus on her without trying to squeeze in work or other distractions. Not so quiet for Arwen who worked like crazy on the house yet again. We've (he's) made great progress, but man! the list of what remains to be done is long.

This was our first weekend on our own without Aunt Jen around. (She went out of town to hang out with a dear friend and attend a book signing with Chuck Palahniuk.) I'll be honest. I was worried this weekend would be a disaster. I rely so much on Jen day in and day out to look after the baby here and there while I work, clean house, run laundry, grocery shop, etc. I am happy to report, however, that not only did we survive the weekend, we did just fine.

The weather in Denver is beautiful right now - daytime highs in the 80's and lows in the 50's at night - so we did a lot of hanging out in the backyard hammock (me) and swing (Roan). We took walks to the park, the library, the yarn store (just browsing). And then tonight Arwen took me out for my first sushi dinner in nearly a year. It was fantastic. We took Roan along and she was not a perfect angel, but she didn't cry too much. Eventually she passed out and we enjoyed dinner out like two civilized adults. Refreshing!

Roan is doing well. She's still struggling with cranky moments here and there, but in between she is smiling more, cooing more, and more aware of the world around her. Arwen and I think she's ready for some added structure in her life. Up to this point we've pretty much gone with the flow as far as her eat/play/sleep schedule is concerned. She and I have also been sharing a bed at night, to help facilitate those middle of the night feedings (and, to be honest, I have just loved sleeping next to her at night).

Now we're going to try getting her on to a more regular routine, so both she and I know better what to expect from our day. She is also going to sleep in her crib for the first time tonight (a big step for both of us). It's hard to explain, but she just seems ready to become integrated into our lives rather than have us revolve around her.

Did I *actually* say this child never cries?

Uh, scratch that folks. We have entered a new phase. Gone are the good old quiet days, so tragically short-lived. Roan has begun to find her voice. The good news is that she has strong lungs. Very strong.

They say it's pretty typical at around 4-6 weeks for babies to start getting fussier, crying more, being harder to soothe, and having a harder time with gas. These are the symptoms of what gets the blanket label of "colic." And it seems our perfect angel is not exempt from this next stage in development.

For the most part it hasn't been too bad. And by "too bad" I mean I haven't jumped off any bridges yet. It's weird. She can go from smiling and cooing one minute to writhing and shrieking the next. She pulls her legs in and makes the most piteous frowny faces, seeming to suffer from terrible gas pains. And she can produce a symphony of bodily function noises to go with it - burping, gurgling, farting, pooping and spitting up.

One of the challenges of dealing with these fussy periods is that they are unpredictable as to when they will strike. If we get a hankering to go out to eat, we don't know whether she'll sleep through the meal or scream through it. And when I wake up in the morning I don't know if we'll be having a fussy start to the day or if all will be well till it's time for bed at night. It's just sort of moment to moment.

I think we're managing pretty well. When it's really bad Arwen, Jen and I take turns passing her around, patting her this way or bouncing her that way until finally something works. It's usually a matter of working our way through the dozen or two possible methods of soothing her until finally something does the trick.

I will say that I had two horrendous nights with her last week. I think the problem wasn't colic but a growth spurt instead. For two days straight she basically wanted to nurse all the time - instead of every 2-3 hours it was more like every hour. And instead of sleeping at night for a 4-5 hour stretch, she was awake and crying every hour or 2, sometimes every 45 minutes. And for those two days, if she wasn't nursing or sleeping she was screaming. I would get up in the morning wrecked but still facing a full day of Mommy Duty. It was not pretty. Jen and Arwen really stepped up though, watching her so I could sneak in a nap or a shower. And then - mercifully - after two days of agony she resumed a more normal routine as far as nursing and sleeping. All I can say is I'm glad that's behind us.

Even though it turns out our child is an actual human baby and not a perfect angel, she is still pretty terrific. Even on the days with the worst crying (except for the 2 days mentioned above which will forever live in infamy) she has her funny cute moments too. She always wakes up with a big, contagious smile on her face. She cracks me up with how engrossed she is by the mobile that hangs above her crib. I can lay her down crying for a diaper change, and one glimpse of that mobile and she's smiling and cooing. I mean what is it about clouds, moons and stars that is just so freaking hilarious? I also love the way her cheeks are taking over her face as she fattens up nicely. I adore the dimples in her elbows and the backs of her hands. Her little feet with their oversized toes are so cute. And when she's not crying with tummy pains, she sure smiles a lot. More rarely, she coos. And once she even seemed to laugh. I love the way she looks right into my eyes as she nurses. And when she falls asleep at my breast with a look of utter contentment on her peaceful face. Those are the moments I just soak up like a sponge.

Happy One Month Roan

Well over the past weeks I've posted quite a bit about the ordeal we went through getting Roan here, as well as how I've felt about being a mom so far. But I haven't shared very much about what our little girl is like, and what she's been up to so far.

I would have to say that Roan has a great disposition. She seems by nature pretty easygoing, not especially prone to cry or fuss for no reason. She doesn't usually cry when I change her diaper; often the only sign I have that she's hungry is the way she sticks her tongue out. She's very tolerant of noise - whether it's the tv or loud voices or doggies barking.

The morning is her best time of the day. She always wakes up with bright eyes and a big smile on her face. When I smile back at her sometimes she even brightens more and gives a little coo.

One of her favorite things to do is to lie in her crib and stare up at her mobile or into her mirror. She's very interested in faces - whether mine, her Daddy's, Aunt Jen's, or her own. She also loves her playyard that rocks (literally!) and has a mirror. She loves to be held, talked to, read to, and sung to. I feel bad for the poor kid on that last account, given the fact that I can't carry a tune in a bucket.

The evenings are the tougher time for her. As bedtime approaches she starts to have a harder time nursing and just being her normal happy self. She seems to have more tummy troubles as she cranks out the dirty diapers one after another. Mom, Dad and Aunt Jen usually take turns swaddling, shushing, patting and jiggling her back to contentment.

Lately she's been working on some new tricks. She has been seen sucking her thumb - although this is a rare occurrence - which I of course am convinced is a sign of intelligence. She surprised us from birth with how strong she is, but as each day goes by she gets stronger and more coordinated. She can support her head pretty well, and she can even lift her body weight onto her legs. She gets a little "tummy time" every day, which gives her a chance to build her arm, neck and leg muscles. I'm convinced she'll be crawling before too long.

She is also starting to become more vocal. It seems to happen more in the morning that she will emit an occasional coo while staring at her mobile or mirror. We all hang on every noise and talk back to her, trying to encourage her to express herself.

FYI, I posted some new photos of Roan at her web site (If you don't have the login info, email me and I'll send it to you) : http://www.babysites.com/sites/roanvaughan

Happy Birthday Jen

I haven't managed to get to the blog since Jen's birthday last Thursday, the 26th. Happy 29th Jen! I thought I'd post a photo. Doug happened to be in town on business, so he graced us with his presence out to dinner at LOLA, a trendy Mexican-nouveau restaurant in our hood. We drank well, ate well and enjoyed good company. And it was Roan's first dinner out. She slept through the whole thing, can you believe that?!