18 months and running

Wow, I just logged in and see I last posted one year ago today, on Jan. 27, 2009. Funny, it didn't seem like a year whenever I thought I should post again. I guess time really does fly when you're having fun, which I have been, as silly as that might sound.

Today we went to the doctor for G's 18-month-old check up. He weighs 26 pounds, 2 ounces, and measures 33 inches tall. Dr. Kash said he's very impressed with his development, and he thinks he's about 6 months advanced for his age. I'm a little surprised to hear that, because he seems pretty normal to us. For comparison, Dr. Kash said a typical 18-month old says six words. G says the following words:

• Mama
• Daddy
• Meow-Meow (that's the cat, who's name has officially been changed)
• dog
• door-door (not sure why he always says it twice, but he does, usually as he opens and shuts the bedroom door)
• mobile
• noodle
• yogurt
• nana (that's what he calls banana and really, food in general)
• be (that's what he calls a ball)
• out
• moon
• cold-cold (that's what he calls ice cream)
• brrr (he says that whenever you mention it's cold out or he's feeling chilly)
• bed

In addition, he makes the following animal sounds, which count as words:

• meow
• woof (following by panting)
• baa
• moo
• quack quack
• bock bock
• cheep cheep
• sssss
• oink (well, it's really a cough, because he can't make a snort noise, but he does it consistently for a pig)
• roar (for a lion)
• grrr (for a bear)
• neigh
• snap snap (for a shark)
• ooo aaa (for a monkey)

We also use a little bit of sign language, and he can use the following signs:

• milk
• water
• more
• all done
• diaper
• thank you
• book

He knows the following body parts:

• eyes
• nose
• mouth
• chin
• cheek
• head
• ear
• mustache (not his, of course)
• beard
• chest
• tummy
• leg
• knees
• feet
• hands
• arms
• shirt

His favorite activity is reading books. He'll read books all day if you're willing. I usually put a few books in bed with him so he can look at them himself before he falls asleep and when he wakes up.

G and his dad have been drawing a lot, and he's getting very good at scribbling on all sorts of papers using pens, pencils and crayons, and he loves it.

He seems to have excellent vision and hearing and loves to point out planes and birds. He's also fascinated with the moon and points it out to us whenever he sees it. He eats with a fork and spoon and does pretty well. I have wiped spinach off the wall behind his high chair recently, but overall it isn't too bad. In fact, he did really well with his cake and ice cream tonight.

Baby G is six months old today!

More to come later, but for now, we had a happy baby in the house this morning!

Not sweet on sweet potatoes

Baby G is now five months, one week old. Recently he's been very interested in what we eat, often grabbing for my fork when I eat while holding him on my lap, which I do fairly often. He's also started opening and closing his mouth with a smacking noise, which seems like he's imitating us eating.

Those activities, coupled with his insatiable desire to nurse throughout the night, convinced me he was ready to start on solid food. Originally I'd planned to stick with straight breast milk until he was six months old, but he was exhibiting all of the signs that he was ready. And I'm ready for him to sleep through the night.

My good friend gave me a great book about how to make homemade baby food - Super Baby Food by Ruth Yaron. I'd read the chapter on baby's first meal and decided on sweet potatoes, one of the four choices for babies younger than six months. My other options included commercial rice cereal, (I wanted his first meal to be homemade); avocado (not my favorite); and banana, which some say is too sweet for the first food and could cause baby to refuse other less sweet foods. So, sweet potato it was. 

The book recommends serving the first meal in the morning, when babies are typically in better moods and more receptive to new things.

This morning I decided would be the morning. Baby G was in a great mood, I had extra time before I had to leave for work and I even had a sweet potato in the pantry. I rushed around microwaving the potato, getting out the video camera and packing up all of my stuff so I wouldn't worry about getting ready while serving the all-important first meal. Unfortunately, by the time I was ready, he wasn't. He'd fallen asleep because he was so exhausted staying up all night nursing.

So, fast forward nine hours. I'm home from work, excited, rewarming the cook sweet potato, mixing it with breast milk to just the right runny consistency. And I'm not the only one excited. Daddy had set up the high chair and Baby G was thought sitting in it was very fun.


Well, it turns out he wasn't nearly as excited about eating the sweet potato as he was about sitting in the chair.


He gamely tried a few more bites, then vomited the entire mess into Daddy's hand. So, I guess he isn't quite ready for solid food yet.

He did, however, enjoy sitting in the high chair and playing with his toys.

We'll try again in a few days ... or maybe a week.

Four Months = Four Sticks

Yesterday we took our son in for his four-month check up. First, the stats:

weight -- 16 lbs 12 oz
height -- 2 ft 2 in

Technically, the doctors call it length and declared him to be 26 inches long. However, Baby G prefers to stand, as evidenced below, so I translated it into height, which we don't usually measure in straight inches, hence the 2' 2".


I was a little disappointed that the doctor did not ooh and aah about him being the most beautiful baby alive, but my husband pointed out that he sees hundreds of babies. That seems reasonable, but still ... my baby has to be the most beautiful baby he's seen even if he's the busiest doctor in the area! The old lady nurse did say he was very cute several times, which helped.

But then she stuck him with four shots, which pretty much wiped away any good mojo she'd created during the visit. To top it off, she had me hold his arms down while she stuck him. My baby boy screamed and screamed. He was upset all day. Thank goodness Daddy could stay home with him while I went to work. We're very lucky that Daddy can juggle working at home and an active baby.

Baby G. ended up having a fever overnight and off and on throughout the day today. Typical, but still heart-wrenching to watch the little guy whimper in his sleep. I couldn't help but wonder if he was having nightmares about the lady sticking him while Mommy held him down instead of protecting him.

Just Start Writing

I'm a procrastinator. I admit it. I have been my entire life. In fact, procrastinator was my first big word. "Heather is a procrastinator" was a common comment on my report cards in elementary school. It wasn't that I didn't get good grades, or that I didn't want to do the work, I just didn't want to do it YET. I could never seem to get started.

Years later I learned that some people define procrastination as a sign that the person wants things to be perfect, and, to avoid it not being perfect (it never really is anyway, is it?) he or she never starts. That was really a revelation to me. It helped me to realize that it doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to get done. At the very least, it has to get started.

That philosophy helped me a lot when I was a reporter. I would tell myself "Just start writing" rather than sitting at the computer thinking about what I might write. Having to meet deadlines everyday helped me tremendously, but I'm still a procrastinator at heart. And, being out of the news business for a couple of years has allowed the waiting to creep back in.

These issues resurfaced when I decided to start a blog. I've been reading a friend's blog and been really inspired, but, that same inspiration and admiration for her blog put me off of starting my own. What would I title it? What would it be about? I found myself fretting endlessly about the title. I thought it should be something witty or profound or, at the very least, defining. I had posts composed in my head, but nowhere to post them because I didn't have a fun title or a definition of who I was and what I was writing about. Then I realized, that is what it's about. I'm not defined, not really. I have a wide variety of interests, none of which likely will dominate this space. I know who I am, but I don't know how to tell anyone else. At least, not in the amount of time most people spend reading something on the Internet.

So, I'm going to Just Start Writing. I don't have a cool graphic to display or a specific profile picture to post, or even a description of myself in the profile, but I'm writing. I'll fill in the other things later. Or, maybe I won't. But I won't waste another minute waiting for perfection before getting started.

Maybe I thought of a cool title after all.

Then again, I can always change it later.