A Holly Jolly Christmas

What a fun Christmas we had! I'm really really glad that we decided to drive down through the night, so that Abby's sleep schedule wouldn't be messed up. She slept pretty much the entire way. Of course, it wreaked havoc with our sleep schedules, but since there were plenty of people to pawn Abby off on, we got to take a nice nap once we got there. And then she slept through the night every night. And took good naps during the day. We have the most amazing baby ever.

I was really bummed when Regis told me that we'd have to take off the day after Christmas, since his mean ol' boss wouldn't give him any more time off. I LOVE going back to my parents' house, especially when all my siblings (sans missionaries, although we did get to have a chat with Court) will be there. It was great to laugh with everyone, to play Mah Jong together, and to eat clam chowder in a bread bowl. Oddly enough, we didn't watch any of our traditional Christmas movies. No Scrooge, no It's a Wonderful Life. We did snicker while the little girls watched the Barbie version of the princess and the pauper. Gag me with a fork.

On the way back we drove during the day, and Abby slept nearly the whole way again. I was worried that this meant she'd be awake all night, but she slept most of the night as well. I'm glad she did, because (surprise surprise) a lot of germs got passed around at our Christmas gathering, and she and I are both a little sick. She is just so amazingly good, though. Still cheerful even though her little schnozz is all stuffed up.

Yesterday I was struck by how intelligent she is. Yeah, I know, she's only 4 and a half months old, but it's amazing to me how much she seems to understand. I put her on her stomach to give her some tummy time on her new playmat that Grandm--er, Santa gave her, and rolled her onto her back when it seemed like she was done. (She loves her new playmat. It's got tons of jungle-y toys on it, and even I think they're cool.) I guess she wasn't actually finished, because she kept trying to roll back over. She's SOOOO close to getting it, and after a few tries she starting fussing because she couldn't quite make it. That might not sound extremely smart, but going from being a lump to understanding that she can roll herself over is pretty impressive to me.

And Abby must have been at the top of Santa's "Nice" list this year, because she cleaned up on Christmas morning. Even though she wasn't awake to see it. :)

Morning Giggles

This morning, I handed Abby a toy to play with and turned away for a minute to sort through some stuff. I heard a little "uh!" and turned back to find:

I burst out laughing. She wasn't upset at all, just confused. Probably wondering why Mommy was laughing so hard.

She's been so fun lately, giggling when we blow on her belly and when I do my famed walrus impression.

Bucket of Blood

So, what do you do when your infant starts spitting up blood?

Always a delightful experience, I'm sure. Bucket decided I needed that particular experience the other night (of course, it would be on Sunday, at 9 pm). At first, I figured she had just scraped the roof of her mouth a little with her thumbnail, since she's started sucking her thumb. However, when she spit up quite a bit a few minutes later, I decided it was time to call the doctor. We headed over to the hospital, where the after-hours pediatrician's office is. I was worried, but very nice and calm up until we actually got into the office, where I promptly started bawling. I wonder if they could tell I was a first time mom?

Happily, Napoleon's sanguinity was justified, as it usually is. Since Bucket appeared fat and happy (11 lbs 9 oz--wabba dooba!), and was in fact having a great time sitting on Daddy's lap, the doctor suggested it was probably a problem with me, not her. I do remember a weird pain when she was eating earlier in the day, so we think she probably just got a little something extra with her milk. I guess we should have dressed her differently for Halloween: she's a vampire!

Algo Nuevo

As you may have noticed, I've changed the names on my blog. I'm not sure exactly why, but in deference to the Society for the Prevention of Abuse of Me (SPAM), I thought I should probably not put our real names out there for everyone to see. I read a few blog posts recently that warned of the dangers of using real names and allowing people to see pictures of your kids, since there are so many sickos out there. I've changed the names, but I'm not taking the pictures off. I don't want anyone using the pictures of my baby for anything disgusting, but I'm not that worried about it for the same reason I'm too ashamed to put up a visit counter: I really don't think there are too many people who come to this blog. I'm pretty sure that everyone who does is someone I know or someone whose blog I visit, and I'm not too concerned about you guys.

So enjoy reading about the adventures of Napoleon and Josephine, and our daughter Bucket. We really do call her Bucket, usually prefaced by things like Fuss and Snuggle. If you don't like the pseudonyms, take comfort in the fact that they may be temporary. I might not like them either.

Slingin' Baby

In honor of Court's birthday yesterday, Bucket and I put on the spiffy authentic Indonesian sling he gave us for Christmas and took a walk. I had tried it a couple of times before and she was definitely not happy being slung, but she took to it pretty well yesterday, I'm sure in consideration of her dear uncle. We did it again today and she fell asleep, so it's apparently pretty comfortable. It's nice because I can carry her around and still have my hands free, although I'm still not entirely convinced that she's not going to fall out, so I am frequently readjusting the fabric and reassuring myself.

We walked over to JoAnn's to grab some cutesy wutesy stickers as promised, so Amber and Glade, here are your choices:

Let me know which one you want. (The one in the middle is glittery too, just not as much as the two side ones.)

My Sweet Baby

No really, she's delicious. I keep seeing advertisements that say "Keep your baby delicious all day long!" Sounds good to me.



I'm wondering how she went from this . . .

. . . to this!

Heartbreak Hotel

I'm down at the edge of Lonely Street . . .

Okay, so after I decided on that title for this post, I realized it doesn't work: my baby didn't leave me, my hubby did. But don't worry, he's coming back. Tonight, in fact. Me and Bucket have been . . . well, frankly, we've been doing what we do most days. I just haven't been able to look forward to Napoleon coming home in the evenings. He's been off in North Carolina at a job interview, being wined and dined (or at least the latter) by a big financial company. I've been reading up on the area, since we might actually be moving there soon.

It didn't occur to me for an embarrassingly long time that North Carolina is in the South, very much so. And by South (with a capital s) I mean the seceding, grit-eatin' part, which to my mind does not include Florida. When it finally came to me, I thought "Holy cow, can I live in the South?" But within a few days I'd convinced myself that the South can't be all THAT different.

Enter the internet.

Yikes. Apparently there's this big North v. South feeling in North Carolina. Have you heard of the War of Northern Aggression? Yeah, apparently they're still not over that. Except now, instead of "You jerks, you're trying to take away our slaves and our states rights," it's "You jerks, you're bringing your rude Northern ways (which apparently include cell phones and yelling at your kids--who knew?) into our sweet Southern hospitable realm and jacking up the price of housing." Um, wow. So now I'm wondering if there's some big East v. West feeling as well. I'm from California originally, and I love the western part of the U.S. I've always described the east as a "nice place to visit, but I wouldn't want to live there." Are they going to hate me?

The thing is, I probably wouldn't know it if they did. I didn't even know there was a big rivalry between southern California and northern California until I came to BYU. Ha! And I think it's ridiculous.

Ouchie

There's nothing like getting your baby immunized to make you feel like a rotten scumbag.

If I knew of something she wanted, I would totally go buy it right now. I'm wallowing in guilt. It's probably a good thing that she's not a material girl--for now, I've got everything she wants.

Honestly, why don't medical places treat people better? I think a sucker would have made me feel better about making my poor innocent baby cry. Or how about a sticker? It could say something like "I'm a Good Mom: my baby's immunized!" or "I Helped Prevent Polio!" Or how about one for the baby that says "Be Nice to Me, I Got Shot"? Please add your most clever sticker phrase in the comments. If it's REALLY clever, I'll send you some stickers. Seriously. Cute ones.

Blessings and Cursings

Don't worry, there are no swearwords in this post. At least not yet, but since this is only the second sentence . . . . Bucket's blessing went well, even though Napoleon's family was grossly underrepresented, due to a yucky attack of the flu in the Logan side of the family. I very much appreciate the fact that they didn't want to pass it along, especially since there were old people and lots of little kiddos, but it was still a bummer that they couldn't be here. Bucket slept through most of the actual blessing, but she did hand out some smiles during the evening. We had yummy pizza, and a good time.

The family reunion was also fun, even though we only made it to the evening activities. It's always nice to see family. We took a couple of cute pictures of Bucket and her cousins. We also got to hang out with my parents the rest of the week, including on a wacky Halloween cruise down the Provo River--VERRRRRY cheesy. I don't recommend it.

Something not so fun happened on Saturday: getting out of my parents' car, I opened the door too wide and dinged the car next to it, which just happened to be so new it didn't even have the plates on yet. Yuck. It was a pretty bad ding, and I felt really rotten about it, so I ended up leaving a note with an apology and my phone number on it. They called today and said they are going to get an estimate. I was hoping, since the car already had a few little scratches on it, that they would just let it go, but I guess if someone else was going to pay for the ding they did on my new car (jerks) I'd get it fixed too. Unfortunately for me, nobody owned up. So I get to pay the price for honesty and just hope these people pay it forward.

Random Snapthoughts

Well, you can all stop worrying about me: the repair guys came, spent about four hours plodding in and out of my house carrying various sizes of drywall, stinking up the place with paint, and blocking my bathroom. It's a darn good thing they didn't come when I was pregnant. Bucket was pretty good through it all, in part because she spent most of it outside. She loves being outdoors, which is tragic because we live in Utah, and even if she could stand the cold, her mama is a California girl and can't. To me, 75 degrees is cold. And oh look, the average high temp for where we live is BELOW 75 for eight months of the year. Yes, that is the average HIGH temperature, as in the highest point it hits sometime during the day, meaning the rest of the day is usually a lot colder.

Napoleon wonders why I don't want to live in Utah.

What was I talking about again? Oh yes, repairs. It looks like it's all done, and ok.

My folks are coming into town this weekend, for a family reunion and Bucket's blessing. It will be neat to have so many of us here for her blessing. Fun, but stressful. Does anyone else get stressed out when family comes to town? I can't really find a good reason for it. We have a little apartment, so we don't have to host everyone, although we've had people stay with us several times. Dad usually takes us out to eat somewhere nice, which is a fun treat. Nobody in my family is a compulsive liar, overtly manipulative, unbelievable obnoxious, or otherwise really difficult (unless it's me, I guess!). I think we're all pretty fun to be around, so I'm not sure why I always get stressed out when we're all together. I'm wondering if it's because I feel like I have to prove myself, that I'm all grown up now and not the silly little girl I used to be. That's hard, because I get stressed and therefore overly sensitive and more apt to cry when I hear something that I perceive as criticism, which makes me feel immature . . .

I still find it hard to believe that they let somebody like me just walk out of the hospital with a brand new baby. Okay, technically they don't, because they made me sit in a wheelchair, but that's not the point.

We're taking Bucket to get some photos taken today, by a friend of mine who wants some baby pictures as examples for her photography business. I sure hope Bucket has been saving up all her good behavior for Heidi, because she sure hasn't been wasting it on me.

I remember asking my mom, when I was in high school or thereabouts, "What if you love your kids, but you just don't like one of them?" Her answer, which I still have to chew on every so often, was "Then you need to repent."

Invasion

Our condo has problems. Last year, when we still liked our upstairs neighbors, :) I noticed there was water dripping down into our water heater closet. Not good. I ran upstairs and told Miriam, who got the property management company to send over a plumber. This guy was obviously not very smart--he insisted that the leak was not coming from the second floor, since there was no damage in their closet, but from the third, and then tried to distract us by cooing at Miriam's baby. Since I am not a plumber, and my landlords (my parents) live far away, nothing happened on it after that. However, the leak continued to get worse, and finally my dad decided something needed to be done. He called the property management company again, who sent the dippy plumber again, who gave the same report. Dad was not fooled--he grew up as a plumber, helping his dad--a plumber. He called in another company to take a look, who reported that not only was it coming from the second floor, but there was also mold growing in our closet. Joy. He estimated that it would take a week and lots and lots of money to fix it all.

The managers of the condo above us balked at his estimate, and wanted a second opinion. They invited a carpet cleaning company to come look. He estimated several hours and much less money; however, it sounded to me like he was a bozo and was planning on doing a lick-it-and-hope-it-sticks job. I am SOOOO not excited about this. I have a new baby, whose schedule is still not fixed, and they want to come over and spend lots of time doing construction in my small apartment, making noise, creating dust, and probably screwing stuff up. If they do a lousy job, Dad will just make them pay for someone else to do it right, which will mean more people tramping through my apartment, more dust and noise and irritation. I wish I would have gotten this taken care of earlier, but it was really out of my hands. I'm also irritated because of my lack of knowledge. I had the same problem when our car was broken--I have this vague idea that I'm being ridiculously overcharged and cheated, but since I know nothing about cars (and not very much about plumbing), I can't really do anything about it. I guess this is one of those cases where you're just supposed to trust the experts.

However, although I don't know much about plumbing, my dad does and my uncle does, and they both think this carpet guy is up in the night. My husband did construction for a year, and he agrees that there's no way he can replace the things he says he will for the price he quoted. So none of this bodes well. Can I go home now?

Nobody is Perfict

My poor baby has broken out in lots of zits. This does not bode well for her teenage years.

She definitely looks like Napoleon's side of the family, although I can't really explain why. I think it's something around her eyes and nose. I love her profile, even with her little pimples.

I really haven't been doing very well with Thank You cards, so Miriam, I hope you don't mind an online one. You're the only one who gets a picture with yours. :) Doesn't she look cute? We really do love the little outfit. And I would LOVE to come visit you, especially since it's starting to get cold up here. (Napoleon doesn't feel it, but he never does. I wear about six more layers than he does in the winter.) I'll have to find some free airline tickets somewhere, or suck it up and drive.

Bucket's belly button glop finally came off, so we can finally bathe her. She really likes being squirted with warm water, but she's not too fond of just being wet. I'm sure it's because it's getting cold (See, Napoleon? Bucket knows it too.). I'm so glad she hasn't lost her hair yet.

Sniff sniff

I smell like baby.

Naturally, I've been reading lots of stuff on kids recently. What do you think of piercing babies' ears?

I think it's sick. I understand that it's "cultural" in some places. So is infant genital mutilation. In fact, that kind of amounts to the same thing: you are inflicting pain and a permanent physical mark on a child because you think they should look a certain way. Makes sense? No.

I'm not opposed to pierced ears. Mine are pierced. I chose to have them pierced, when I was about 10. I'm opposed to hurting kids for stupid reasons.

Wow, a Whole Month

Today is Bucket's official one month birthday. I'm tempted to make cupcakes. Cute little pink ones. I decided last night that it was getting too cold to let her sleep nekkid, so I put her in little footie pajamas. They were huge on her, but man did she look sweet. (I didn't really let her sleep naked--we wrapped her up in blankets. But it is getting too cold for that, I think.) She still doesn't fit into any of her newborn onesies, but she is filling out a bit. It's funny to see her in the 0-3 month clothes. I bet she'll be wearing them until she's about 6 months old. I really like a lot of the clothes she's gotten as presents. She's going to be such a stylin' little girl.

Napoleon has started school again. I think this semester is going to be really stressful for him. Partly because he's working half the time, and partly because his classes are really stinkin' hard, and partly because I can't handle caring for Bucket all by myself. As it is, I don't eat until around noon. I was never a morning person in the first place, and it's even worse when I have to wake up every three hours or so. This is why I HATE 8:30 church. I don't think anything should start before 9 in the morning. It's indecent.

Not Good

Today was a bad day.
It didn't start out bad. Bucket woke up at around 6, which is when Napoleon gets up, so I got to see him off to work. I fed Bucket and had a hard time getting her back to sleep. She slept until 11, which is when I finally woke her up to eat. She was pretty cheerful after she ate, and smiled a lot. I may have even got her smile on camera. We went for a nice walk outside, looking at the sky and the trees and the grass and the funny men trying (and failing) to fit a huge couch through a doorway. Usually, Bucket's good for about an hour of happy awake time before she gets tired and falls asleep again. NOT today. This is where it gets bad. I brought her inside, thinking she'd want to sleep soon. She absolutely refused to sleep. Didn't want to be held, didn't want to be laid down. All she wanted to do was cry and cry. She likes to be bounced. I bounced her until my arms were about to fall off, but she was still unhappy. I tried feeding her off and on, but she really didn't seem hungry. She stayed awake until Napoleon got home for lunch, at about 2:30, at which point I burst into tears and handed him the baby.
She is such a daddy's girl. He said, "Calm down, Bucket." She stopped crying. "Go to sleep." She immediately looked sleepy. "Close your eyes . . . close 'em more . . . more . . . " And she was out.
Sometimes life really isn't fair.

A is for . . .

Here's Bucket on her Alphabet and Animals blankets, made for her by her great-grandma and grandma. It's weird for me to think that she not only has both her grandmas, but four great-grandmas as well. My mom's mom passed away long before I was born, and all my great-grandmas were long gone by the time I showed up. (Careful readers may wonder how Bucket has four great-grandmas if my grandma passed away: Grandpa remarried, and I was pretty far along in life before I realized Grandma Anne wasn't a blood relation. She has always been very loving and attentive.) I will have to take some more cute pictures of my little girl. We've been trying to capture her smile, but it remains elusive. She only smiles while she's eating or sleeping--yet another example of how she resembles her dad, by sharing his favorite activities. :) We're still waiting for her yucky little umbilical cord stump to fall off. I hope it happens soon, because she needs a bath. Trying to sponge-bathe a squirrelly little baby has not gone all that well.

Who Needs Sleep?

Bucket discovered her hair the other day. She found out how fun it is to play with, and grab a fistful, and . . . that was where the fun ended. Silly goose. She's been so much more alert these past few days, and she actually looks us in the eyes sometimes. I've had fun laying her on the quilts her grandma and great-grandma made for her, and watching her look around and try to lift up her little head. She's surprisingly strong--babies aren't as fragile as I used to think they were.

She was quite the little twit last night, which was all the more painful because I'd just been bragging about what a good sleeper she was. Luckily, my earlier predictions were correct: Napoleon sleeps through everything, unless I joggle him awake and beg him to try and calm her down for a while. That's usually not very effective, because generally Bucket wants to nurse again and her dad is just not equipped for that. Oh well. Who needs sleep?

Yawn

I am sooo tired. (I'm sure everyone's shocked.) My mom's been here helping out, which has been WONDERFUL. I am amazed that anyone can have more than one child--I can't imagine trying to take care of a baby AND a toddler and still exist myself. The fact that she did it while going to law school just floors me. Mom asked today if I wanted her to stay another week. Errrrrrrrr. Massive indecision. Yes, I would love for you to stay here another week and take care of making dinner and holding the baby when I'm about to fall down and burst into sobs. However, there's Dad and Coral to consider, and a whole bunch of little twits that are waiting for you to go teach seminary. Not that I really care about the little twits, but I know it's one of your responsibilities. Decisions, decisions.

Not that anyone's asking, but I think breastfeeding is WAY harder than labor. Maybe because you don't get an epidural. :)

Awwww . . .

Wow. It's been five days.

She's so cute. I joked with a lot of people that I was scared I'd have an ugly baby. No way.

Things got underway on Thursday. I was supposed to go in to the hospital so they could administer some gel to get my cervix to ripen. They wanted to do a dose in the afternoon, send me home, then another one in the evening, and then start the Pitocin Friday morning. Ha! Fat chance. After the first dose, I started having contractions, and after watching for an hour or so, they said I wasn't going anywhere. Things progressed pretty quickly, and my contractions were coming so strong and long they actually had to give me something to slow them down, since the baby wasn't taking them very well.

I think I had kind of hoped I wouldn't have to have an epidural, just to be tough. But man oh man, the guy that put it in was one of my favorite people. I was a lot happier after he came to visit.

I started pushing at 1 in the morning on Friday, and she was here 40 minutes later. I didn't get to see much of her, since she'd inhaled a lot of fluid and was whisked away to the NICU. They brought her back a couple of hours later with an IV in her head--poor baby! But she's doing fine, sleeping well and looking cute. I love it when she smiles in her sleep. She has a head full of black hair that's fun to play with.

Reeeeaady, Seeeeehhht . . .

Whine, whine. I'm still pregnant. Friday the 3rd came and went, with very little excitement. I had another appointment today, at which we learned that my cervix is not very good at discerning my wishes. (When I say dilate, I mean DILATE, dang it!) So now I'm scheduled to be inducted into the world of Mommydom, on Friday the 10th. I'm kind of bummed about that, since from what I hear, being induced is no fun and makes things more painful than a "normal" birth. Greater risk for a C-section, and all that. Boo. But on the bright side, at least we know the baby will sure be here by Saturday. This whole episode has a definite ending!

We had lots of fun Saturday night hanging out with Miriam, Ryan, and Ava, and some of their friends. Miriam was right: Shoots is my new favorite restaurant. Yum yum. It's kind of like P.F. Chang's, except maybe not so full of itself. I prefer the atmosphere of PFC, I think, but I definitely like the prices of Shoots better. :) Ava was hilarious. She makes very funny cute little noises, kind of like a mix between baby and lamb. People keep asking us "Are you ready for this?", particularly when someone's child is being especially rambunctious. Well, no, we aren't, but good thing nobody gives birth to a one-year-old, huh?