Due to border crossing issues, passport processing times and general broke-ass-edness, we will not be going to New York to visit Pete's mother at the end of the month as planned. Instead, we'll be using Pete's vacation days for this:
Boring white walls? Your days are NUMBERED.
(FYI, anyone who wants to help paint OR watch the spawn whilst we paint, be advised that we're totally taking applications for both positions)
I spent a good chunk of time yesterday cruising Kijiji for Ikea-style (aka low to the ground) kids' bed frames for Eli, after coming to the bowel clenching conclusion that he's going to climb out of his crib early and we're going to be caught with our pants down. And when that happens, we need to have a back up plan for him - a safe one. There's one spare bed but it's HIGH off the ground. We could put the mattress on the floor but I'd rather just get him his own little bed that we can keep until the time comes and continue to have a spare for guests.
I'm getting ahead of myself. I know this. But the truth of the matter is, he already tries to climb out of his crib. He's woefully bad at it but his intention is clear. The frantic pistoning of his legs as they search for purchase on the bars is both a hilarious spectacle and a signal of our doom. To be fair, he prefers to sleep in a bed and always has.
His gross motor skills continue to develop ahead of the curve. He crawls expertly, pulls up with no difficulty, cruises and tries to climb with wobbly persistence. The other day, he pulled up on Pete and then let go, standing under his own power while his father and I exchanged raised eyebrows over his head.
"Did you see that?" we silently asked each other, "That demonstration of strength, that horseman of the Apocalypse?"
At the sight of him standing unassisted, we realized just how very screwed we are.
The house is not yet baby proof which means someone is constantly pulling Eli away from the XBox or the cats' water dish or his beloved vacuum. And if you think he's ahead in motor skills, you should see the tantrums.
The boneless fish-flop? Perfected.
The face-down, full body flail? Easily demonstrated.
The head back, fists balled, crocodile tears over-cry? Pfft, he had that mastered IN UTERO, BITCHES.
I don't want to be one of those moms talking about how her baby is so SMART, he's a GENIUS because he's so far AHEAD, because he's not. At least not overall. Like most babies, I suspect, he has areas where he bounds ahead and areas where he lags. Verbally, he's behind. He rarely babbles and when he does, it's still almost all vowels, all the time. The only time we get a "ma" or "mum" sound is when he's crying, which I suspect is less an intentional vocalization and more a clever evolutionary development that all human babies share.
But he progresses and that's the important thing. He plows head-first into new experiences, both literally and figuratively. He's currently sporting a nickle-sized bruise on his forehead, the result of a tile-floor crawling mishap (he over-reached for a passing cat-tail and toppled onto his face). I cuddled and consoled but in my head I knew it was just one of many. I try to parent him like he's not my first, in that I don't overreact to every bump and bruise. Do I feel bad for him? Yes. Do I worry that it'll damage him in the long run? No. And I know that, over the course of a his life, there will be worse bruises and probably stitches and maybe even a broken bone. Because boys play rough and do silly things. Growing up with my brother, I saw enough idiotic injuries to learn that lesson well.
But it still kills me to see the marks, even if it doesn't seem to bother him one bit.
The other day, I sent my mom and sister a text...
"Mt. Fang is erupting"
... and immediately I got a flurry of replies wanting to know just where this volcano was and exactly what was happening and was anyone HURT? At which point I had to really examine the translation of my sense of humor via text messaging because what I actually meant was this:
Oh yes, that is EXACTLY what it appears to be. I've been thinking about it and I've come to the conclusion that it's not so much a tooth as it is a symbol of everything that is terrible and evil in the world, forcing itself through his innocent flesh like a blight on goodness itself. And since it's making him miserable, he's been a huge pain in the ass kind of high-maintenance. Add that to the fact that I'm not feeling so great myself and have therefore been delegating some of the baby-care stuff to Pete and pitifully dragging myself through the tasks I can't foist off on him, and you've got a recipe for disaster. In short, nobody is getting enough sleep, several of us are in pain and everyone is feeling a lot like this:
And just think... as far as teething goes, this is only the beginning. Fan-freaking-tastic.
Please excuse the poor flow of this entry - there has been a sighting on ToothWatch 2010 and Eli is taking it will all the grace of a hurricane smashing into a coastal town. Which is to say, he's a destructive, loud, wet, force to be reckoned with. As a result, nobody is getting much sleep. Also, my mother-in-law showed up in town with no notice the other day, so I'm a little on edge.
We only got around to taking Bubbie for his six month appointment on Monday, even though he's nearly seven months already. There were issues having to do with our doctor taking vacation time and Eli having a consultation with a specialist for another, unrelated to well-baby-visit thing, but really, it just didn't get scheduled early enough to find a day that worked for everyone. I wish I had a story about the receptionist or nurse lecturing me about being more responsible for my son's medical well-being because that would be a lot more interesting than what actually happened, which is - I called, they fit us in, we offered up our first born for ritualistic puncturing with little bits of metal.
Nothing much happened at the visit. He was weighed (18lbs 11oz), measured (26.5") and stabbed in his meaty little thighs. Of course, I had to hold him because his dad can't handle that sort of thing. My husband, the guy who claims to be so tough he could "fight a bear", once held his young cousin while they took a blood sample and when exiting, so mime's-ass pale was he that the nurses thought it had been Pete who gave blood.
Anyway... the kid did fine, screaming for only a minute or two before being distracted by the shiny wonder that is Daddy's Watch, and even allowing his ears to be examined. The doctor gave me the go-ahead to give him eggs, since I kind of accidentally did that already and he didn't have any sign of an allergic reaction. We'll still wait on peanuts just in case. You know, assuming I don't gap out again and randomly offer the kid a bite of my PB&Banana.
(I promise not to give the baby any of my peanut butter sandwich)
(Although, I did give him some grilled cheese today)
(He mashed it into the carpet)
And now, because my brain is protesting the level of effort it takes to string together words in semi-coherent sentences, I'm going to post a bunch of baby pictures and call it a night.
What's that? I've been lazy about updating this blog? Well, that might be because I'm busy chasing down my HUMONGOUS CHILD. Who is an entire HALF A YEAR old. The mind, it boggles.
He knows his name but will also answer to Bubbie or just plan "baby". He eats solid foods, mostly purees and baby cereal but I've been known to give him the odd sample bite of whatever I'm eating. Today, I gave him a finger of toast for the first time. He lurved it.
He can sit up if you help him get into position, which means that lying immobile on his back has officially been downgraded from a 'Great Way to Spend Your Day' to 'Something That Is Strictly For Suckers'.
What's doin' with that shiny camera? Maybe you give it to me? Maybe it can be MY camera?
And... there was something... hmm. I could have sworn that there was something else. What was it? Um... OH THAT'S RIGHT. HE CRAWLS.
I'll wait while your brain explodes. Mine did.
Eli - 6 months from Lesley on Vimeo.
It's part army crawl, part The Worm, but it gets him where he's going and he's getting more coordinated every day. I spend a lot of time singing the Thundercats theme to him. It's mostly for my own amusement since he's far to busy chasing after one of the cats or honing in on the nearest electronic device to notice me. I guess we're going to have to start babyproofing the joint ASAP. We were already forced to move the coffee table out of the living room because he was drawn to it like a moth to a flame.
He still doesn't sleep very well. He wakes up often and we've yet to keep him in his crib for a whole entire night because he's so hard to settle after his 4am feeding. Recently, he's started throwing fits when a toy is taken away or we're too slow fixing his bottle of milk. He arches his back, he screams, he flails. He is a whirlwind of moods and he wants your attention Every. Single. Solitary. Second. He pinches, he pulls hair, he still has a penchant for clawing bits of skin off his face.
He is, hands down, the best thing I've ever done in my entire life.
