Let the Madness of March End

I have become one of 'those' moms.

I think it started 2 weeks ago when Tim had to work through the weekend. He had to fly that Saturday, and then work the airshow that Sunday. I was not pleased; not only did it mean that he wouldn't get a weekend and much-needed rest, it meant that I wouldn't get a weekend, either. And we all know I need my rest.

Since then, it seems like we've been playing catch up. But I haven't quite caught up and I'm wondering when I'm going to finally feel like we're on top of things. Add in craziness like a doctor's appointment for me on Monday, a dentist appointment for me on Tuesday (both of which took several hours when you add in time for driving the kids to and from daycare), me getting either food poisoning or a short case of the flu after a trip to the mall food court on Wednesday, a photo shoot of the girls earlier that morning, and Kate having some flu symptoms yesterday and today, and you get very behind.

Three loads of clean laundry on our bed.

Living room disaster.

Tim came home on Thursday night and suggested we hire a maid for some 'help' once or twice a month. Some women would take offense. Not me. Hire away, sweet husband! The dust bunnies that are bigger than Claire need to be tamed. How do other mothers do it? I guess it gets easier as the newborn becomes not so newborn? I hope so, so I can actually get around to updating the baby books, ordering photo prints, and dusting my bedroom. Also, I apologize to those of you who have called in the past, say, month, for not calling you back. You're on my list.

In the meantime:

Come On, Vamanos!

Nap hair and summer teeth.

Everybody, let's go! Aaah, Dora. She makes me crazy. Rather, her songs do, but Kate loves her Dora the Explorer. Her face lights up when Map or Boots shows up on the TV screen. She dances to the silly songs that get stuck in my head for days. Her little head bobs back and forth as she smiles, watching Map tell Dora how to get to the high tower.

Is it just me, or does Map sound like that gay actor with the bad teeth? I for the life of me cannot think of his name, or I would have told you who I was talking about. Anyway. Map totally does. Nasal, with an east-coast accent. Odd for a children's cartoon, no?

And does anyone else have this compulsion to root for Swiper the Fox to steal whatever it is that Dora and Boots are holding? Maybe it's just me.

So I survived the scorpion incident. I was lucky; by 36 hours my foot was almost completely back to normal. Now, of course, I'm more freaky about them than ever. Anyone who knows me, I think, knows how obsessed I was with them before this sting. Maybe it was just Tim who knew. I don't know. But now I'm positively OCD about the whole thing. I've got glue traps in the bathroom, in the hall, and I need to call the Orkin guy to bring more out. I've stuck one of those Sylvania sticky LCD lights on the bathroom door so I can light the hallway at night. And every time I get up in the middle of the night, I diligently shake out each slipper before putting it on my foot. If it were convenient, I would make Kate wear shoes in the house at all times. If I knew of some place that sold full-body armor for children (and socks for adults), I'd buy them and make us all wear them. When I'm not wearing shoes, I'm always watching where I step. Paranoid? Yes. Damn scorpions.

McLaren is now 2 months old. I can't believe it. She's just under 12.5 pounds, and is almost sleeping from 10pm till 4am straight. One or 2 more nights of getting up to give her a binky at about 2am, I hope. She's getting pretty good at falling asleep on her own, and does so for most of her naps. She knows where she is and what to expect in some cases here at home; for instance, she knows the mobile over her crib and knows when we put her in there that it means we'll leave and want her to sleep. She knows the mobile over her changing table and knows it means a new diaper. Hence, more crying in the crib than on the changing table. Smart kid, this one. My favorite thing is when you put her down for a nap in her crib and turn the mobile on: often she'll eye it suspiciously out of the corner of one eye, intently watching one of the arms go round and round. The look on her face is priceless.

Kate is 18 months, and is teething (?) again. She has been grumpy, whiny and generally crabby for the past several days. She spent 2 hours at the CDC (daycare) today and cried almost the whole time. Joy. But she's getting smarter every day. Last week she said, "One, two, three" pretty clearly. She can say many letters of the alphabet when you read her ABCs book to her, and she is trying to say her name. She loves dolls, and always wants to burp them, give them a binky or feed them a bottle. I can't imagine where she got those ideas. I think she loves being a big sister, but is struggling sometimes with the diminished attention she gets due to her baby sister being around. Claire, on the other hand, stares wide-eyed at her big sister, and it's so fun to watch them interact.

Tantrum.

2 months.

2 months.

How to Ruin Your Night

1. Hear baby cry and get up to give her a binky.


2. Shuffle back down the hall in the dark to return to bed.


3. On the way, feel a sharp pain in your foot.


4. Immediately turn the light on the the bathroom next to you, certain you know what caused the pain.


5. Watch as the scorpion that just stung you slinks across the tile floor in search of more things to sting.

It was just after 1:30am when I heard McLaren crying. I'm trying to wean her off of her 1am feeding, so I got up to put a binky in her mouth to help her get back to sleep. I walked out of her room to go back to bed, and nearly immediately felt a sharp sting. I knew what it was even at that hour. Son of a bitch! I turned the bathroom light on and sure enough, there it was on the tile, scurrying away. I grabbed Kate's bath cup and stuck it over the pest, and walked quickly into our bedroom. "Tim. Tim! I just got stung." Huh? He woke up pretty quickly. I limped to the kitchen to get some ice, as what had felt initially like a bee sting was beginning to hurt a hell of a lot worse. Tim got the Raid and I heard him spray the thing to death. It didn't give me much satisfaction, as my foot began to feel like it was on fire.

I grabbed the phone and the list of emergency numbers from my desk, and called poison control. The woman who answered told me that I was probably going to be okay, since I'm 33 and in generally good health. She said that children under 3 (hello, I have 2 of those) are the most likely to have problems. I recalled the toddler on the northwest side who got stung last week and didn't get better after 3 days so they had to take him to another hospital and give him an experimental antivenin (he is now fine). For children, you have to watch for muscle twitching and convulsions. I can see why, as my foot spontaneously twitched for several hours afterwards. Having lived here for 2 years now, I had hoped that none of us would ever get stung.

It is now almost 12 hours later and it hurts to walk. Starbuck stepped on my foot this morning and caused shooting pains. My foot is numb, but a burning type of numb, not the kind where you just don't feel anything. Earlier this morning, I had numbness halfway up my shin. Occasionally I feel a stabbing at the site of the sting that feels like I'm getting stung again, sending me into a fit as I drop everything to look down at my foot and make sure there is no scorpion on me. This is particularly hazardous while driving. I talked to my friend Katie who got stung twice here about a year ago, and she said her whole arm was numb for 4 days (she was stung on each wrist after putting her son in the baby bjorn - it was hiding there and she was thankful it didn't sting him). I like Arizona, but I am about ready for our next assignment please.

All in all, I thank God that it was me who got stung, and not one of the girls. I cannot imagine dealing with that.

The Brilliance of FedEx

Dear FedEx Guy,

It's almost spring here. Having lived in Tucson for 2 years now, I know that 'spring' is synonymous for 'hot'. I assume that you live here, since you delivered this gift box to me sometime on Friday, or maybe on Saturday. Since you, too, live here, you probably knew that it was 93* on Friday, and 95* on Saturday.

I have become (somewhat) accustomed to the weather and now wear long sleeves anytime the temperature falls below 76*. But you and I can both agree that 93* is rather warm. Warm enough to say, melt chocolate. I also assume that you can read, since you delivered this box to me and not my neighbor. What I don't understand is why you put the box in my carport instead of putting it on my doorstep.

It was by chance that I walked out to the mailbox on Saturday morning with my daughter, and she walked over to my car and pointed to the box lying next to it. What probably caught her eye was the bright neon pink sticker that says 'Perishable Items Enclosed'. What caught my eye was, of course, the word 'chocolate'. You, being the professional that you are, ought to have put those 2 pieces of information together and put the box somewhere that I might see it when I walked out my door, not next to the passenger side of my car. I've included 2 photos for your reference, and hope this correspondence will help you please your future customers.

Sincerely,

An Owner of Melted Chocolate Bunnies

It used to be a bunny.

P.S. Thanks for the chocolates, Niki!

The McLaren Connection

"Did you name her after the car?" Tim gets asked this question a lot at the squadron bar, after people hear we named our daughter 'McLaren'. In a word, no. There will probably come a time in her life when she swears she was named after the car, but since she's still in diapers, I think we have a few years. For those of you who are a bit foggy on your sports car trivia:

Developed by McLaren cars LTD, a subsidiary of the McLaren Formula One Team, the McLaren F1 GTR is the fastest, most powerful and most expensive production car in the world.

The McLaren is powered by a BMW 6.1 Liter V12 engine producing 627 hp with a 0-60 mph time of 3.1 seconds and a top speed of 230-240 mph.

The original McLaren F1 was started in 1991 and 64 cars were made. The LM model was introduced in 1993 with 5 cars built. The GT model had 3 cars. Finally, in 1995, the GTR was introduced, and over the next 3 years, 28 cars were built.

Unfortunately, production stopped in May 1998 after only 100 cars were built.

Indeed, I can see why their eyes light up when they ask about the car-name connection. Sounds like a sweet car. Looks like one, too.

McLaren F1.

Clockwise, starting with the baby: my great-aunt Phyllis, her grandmother Mary McLaren, her mother Helen McLaren Gaines, and her great-grandmother MacKenzie.

According to my great-aunt, they left their clan McLaren (in the 1800s?) and came to the United States from Edinburgh, Scotland. I imagine they were into horse/buggy racing, but I can't be certain.

It Was Funny Until...

Kate had a nice long nap today, allowing me time to post photos, get some household chores done, and read some articles on the internet. I swore that wouldn't happen for years. Anyway. She got up and I made some juice for snack, which she drank while she ate her goldfish crackers and dried fruit.

I was cleaning the juicer, allowing her to finish her last dried blueberry, a dried cherry and a goldfish that were left on her tray. The thought occurred to me that perhaps I should take that blueberry away; it was just the right size to fit into her nose... I don't know why that thought popped into my head, but I should have heeded it. Moments later, Kate began whimpering, and sounded rather stuffed up. The blueberry was gone. She pointed to her nose and said, "boom", which I believe is synonymous for "ouch" for her (we say "fall down go boom"). It was a cute "boom", all nasal sounding. I tried not to laugh. I asked her if she had put the blueberry up her nose. She looked at me, confused. She scowled and whimpered again. Then blue goo started to run out of her nostril, and I knew. I called Dr. Mom (Tim's mom) and asked her through my laughter what we should do and had any of her sons ever stuck anything up their nose. She laughed a little and told me that we needed to get it out, either here or at the doctor's. Oh. I was about to call Tim to let him know that perhaps if he were to come home soon that would be great, when he called. He was on his way home.

Blue goo coming out of her nose.

I called the doctor's office. And that's when it ceased to be funny. No, they couldn't do anything for us, we had to go to urgent care. Are you kidding? The ER here took like 4 1/2 hours last time, just to be seen. I started looking around the living room for that damn blueberry. And I found it! Yahoo! I called the doctor's office. They told me that no, they still couldn't do anything for me, except have a nurse call me back. Tim packed Kate, food and toys into the car and headed to the ER to get in line. I waited at home with Claire.





The nurse finally called and told me that she is probably fine and that we should just take her in later if she seemed irritated or stuffy. Tim and Kate are on their way home. The blueberry incident is now funny once again.

The culprit.

2 More Videos

Kate is definitely her mother's daughter: here she gags slightly on a tomato and tries to wipe the taste off her tongue. Icky.



Kate waves buh-bye to everyone.

JC Penny's Photos

I took the girls in last week for their first photo session together, Kate at 17mo and Claire at 1mo. We ended up photographing them seperately for the most part, for reasons you can see. If you would like to order a photo, let me know and I'll email you the order information.

Kate's famous scowl.

Note Kate's glee at her sister's angst.

Revitalized

Kate can now open our door. She's wearing a dress of mine from when I was 3. Yes, she is only 17 months.

Kate plays with matches.

Sleep. It is a magical thing, something that I have lacked for oh, about 5 1/2 weeks now. But last night I think I got some of the best sleep I've gotten in weeks. Claire is still eating about every 3 hours, but I think she's on the verge of dropping a feeding. Yahoo. She woke up around 1:15am and cried until I sat up in bed, mere seconds later. Then all was quiet again. Yeehaw, I'm going back to sleep! She did wake up again about 45 minutes later, but that was a whole extra 45 minutes of blissful sleep for me. She did the same thing around 4:15am, not needing to actually eat until 5am. Then, then, both kids slept until almost 8am. Big sigh of contentment here.

I feel like I can do just about anything. I am so well-rested (comparatively) that I hardly know what to do with myself. So I'm blogging. I ought to be doing laundry, picking up all the toys in the living room so one can actually walk to the sofa, writing thank you notes, or any number of other things. But that can wait. I'm taking a break.

Have you heard about this? Washington state's interscholastic activities association's director (sports authority) wants to ban booing at sports events. Are you kidding?

Photos

Teehee.


Stretch.

Helping with the laundry.

Why I Shouldn't Leave the House With Less Than Five Hours of Sleep

I've learned recently that more than one outing a day can be hazardous to my sanity. Also, fewer than 3 outings a week will cause me to feel cabin feverish, especially since it's so nice out right now.

Yesterday was Claire's 1 month check-up. Kate, Claire and I packed up gear and toys into the car for the 1.7 mile ride to the doctor's office. Once out of the car, Kate immediately ran in the opposite direction that I wanted to go. Carrying a diaper bag, a baby in a car seat and trying to herd a toddler all at once is ... challenging. Forget about taking that cup of coffee inside with you - there's no way to make it happen.

The highlights of Claire's well-baby exam:

• height 21" (20" at birth)


• weight 10lb 10oz (8lb 5oz at birth)

Apparently all that regurgitation of food has not affected her ability to pack on the chub.

We came back home and got ready to head out to playgroup at Erin's. Kate was already showing the signs of sleepiness (at 10:30am) but I ignored them, convinced that her social well-being was at stake because we never go anywhere to play with other kids. We got to Erin's and Kate was excited to see other children, play with Erin's dog, and play in the grass. Claire was sleeping peacefully in her car seat. Way to go, Jen; this was a great idea. I mentally patted myself on the back.

Then, just like it did with Tim last week, all hell broke loose at once. It was lunchtime and Kate couldn't be corralled. She is used to sitting in her highchair for meals, and without it she won't stay still to eat. I couldn't hold her because Claire woke up and needed coddling. Before I could get Kate any food, Claire spit up (read: vomited a gallon of milk) all over me and down my shirt. She has this way of doing that; she turns her head and spits right down my shirt. Mmm. Covered in baby goo, that's how I wanted the afternoon to go.

So Deb gets some food for Kate and tries to feed her and her daughter while sitting on a blanket on the grass. Kate kicks over her plate of food and walks through the fruit salad on the blanket to get to me. Claire is screaming (why, I'm not sure. I was the one covered in goo), and I am verbally questioning my desire to have kids so close in age to one another. Kate wanders out to the porch and tries to sit in a chair but falls down and bumps her head. Melissa picks her up and tries to calm her down.

These were all warning signs of Kate's pending meltdown, but I didn't see them. Why? Because I had too little sleep the night before. Kate wandering around looking like she is drunk and bumping into things is a sure sign that she is exhausted. I guess me not picking up on the cues is a sure sign that I am.

I decided that we were done and asked Erin to hold Claire while I took Kate out to the car. I carried her down the long driveway, put her in her car seat and buckled the seat belt, and drove up to the door to go get Claire. I think by the time I made it back out to the car Kate was already half-asleep. I snapped the baby seat in and we were off. We were halfway down Sabino Canyon road (which is really like a highway) when I noticed that Kate was so tired that she was falling forward as she nodded off to sleep. I called her name, apologizing to her that I had kept her out so late. She sat up and then leaned forward again. Wow, she is so tired. I have never seen her do that; she must be absolutely exhausted, poor kid. She was sleeping on her lap, totally bent over at the waist. Then, after about another minute of this, I realized why she was leaning over so far. I had forgotten to tighten her seat belt. Duh. You can't lean over that far if your harness is tight. Way to go, mom.

And that is why I should not leave the house with less than five hours of sleep.

On the positive side, Kate slept for 4 hours yesterday afternoon, allowing me to get my first daytime nap since Tim's mom left. Hallelujah.

Girls night out - Revenge

Well its time for "Dad" to add a little drama to the Blog. Thursday night was girl's night out, and Jen needed to leave at 6:15 to go to an event. Thoughtful and well-planned out husband that I am I arrived at 6:14 to take charge of the kids as Jen ran out the door. The rest of my instructions were passed by cell-phone as I had no idea who had eaten at what time and who needed medicine for the night.

It was "Bath Night", and what I didn't know was how detailed the plot to "get back at Dad" had become. I imagine if I had arrived at 6:13 I would have heard Jen completing her last minute pep-talk to the girls: "Okay girls, remember, your Dad doesn't get nearly enough vomit or "poo" (I'll keep this in Kate's terms)at work so you two need to help him out with that." I envision a little high-five just as Dad is pulling into the driveway.

We finish Kate's dinner, clean up and head for the tub with Claire pretending to sleep peacefully on her chair. Naked toddler goes into the tub and instantly the infant goes into blood-curdling mode - on the other side of the house. I sprint to the kitchen trying to calculate how fast a toddler can drown herself and remembering fondly Kate's headfirst trip into the 45 degree pool a few months earlier. The bathroom isn't big enough for me and Kate and the bouncy-chair, so the newly quiet and "pacified" Claire is now sleeping right around the corner.

The bath continues, with a little soap and some playing by Kate and Claire shattering the peace occasionally after dropping her "binky". (Every time Claire starts crying, Kate dutifully looks up at me and exclaims "binky!"--knowing that will fix everything) Two or Three trips around the corner to tend Claire have me thinking about all of the news stories I'd seen with shattered parents telling a random news crew "I only left her alone for a minute!". Kate is happy-as-a-clam, but I decide this isn't working out so well and relocate Claire into the bathroom doorway so I can keep track of both kids at once.

Now, understand that Kate LOVES her bath time. Usually bath night never lasts long enough, and often ends with Daddy saying "Okay we're done, stand up" while trying to wash the soap off the toddler who only wants to keep sitting back down in the tub. Tonight, as I "plug" a pacifier in the infant for the 30th time to stop the crying I glance in the tub and Kate is sitting their with a weird look on her face. "What's wrong Kate?" I ask while making attempt 31 with the pacifier, and then I notice a lot more than toys floating around Kate in the tub. Kate notices too... and promptly stands up, hands waving in the air and exclaiming "Done...Done...Done!".

As if on cue, (part of the pre-arranged plan) Claire spits out the pacifier and joins in. Did I mention Claire's lovely way of regurgitating every time she gets upset? Now Dad is dealing with one crying infant and one toddler trying to crawl out of a shit-bath while dodging yellow-ish green floaters. Somehow I manged to get kid #1 rinsed off and swabbed with baby-wipes while holding screaming kid #2 over my left shoulder.

Kate's nightly tooth-brushing went quick, with the rising stench of the bathtub making life in the bathroom unbearable. A fast "Dora the Explorer" story later and Claire and I showed up back in the bathroom armed with rubber gloves and everything in the house labeled "bleach" or "disinfectant". The cleaning was a story of its own and I'll just say I learned more than I cared to about what Kate had for breakfast and lunch that day, and we ran out of Jack Daniels that night.

I called Jen at the Ladies Night out in the middle of all this, and I only remember laughter...

Because I Can

Kate walks in mommy's shoes.



Kate doesn't care that Keith Urban is flat.

Video

I'm trying this video thing....this is Kate's first try at walking in flip-flops.

Random Stuff

I ought to be napping, but I wanted to update my faithful readers before doing so. Be forewarned that I'm working on new-mommy sleep deprivation and therefore this might be not only random but also slightly incoherent. But, you will get photos, so it's all good.



We made it to the park this morning, me, Kate and Claire. Christy is in town from MO, and invited several of us to meet up with her, Taylor and Jack. It's challenging, going to the park with a newborn and a 17-month old. Kate isn't really into taking direction, so it's slow-going. She is into exploration, which is entertaining and messy. Today she decided to try to climb something but fell down and ended up with a mouth- and nose-full of rocks. Seem familiar? This was also accompanied by a scrape on her nose which bled slightly, and a fit of crying. I was attending to Claire at the time, who had started crying. Yee-haw.


This all followed our packing up into the car before heading to the park: I had Kate outside while I unlocked the doors and started the car. Kate wandered down the driveway, like she usually does (except this time she didn't have her push-toy to slow her down). This meant that Kate was at the end of the driveway while I was in the carport watching her. She is very good about not going in the street, but others don't know this (and I'm always, always close by watching just in case) and a car with a woman driving past our house stopped and gawked as she watched this toddler wander aimlessly close to the street without a parent in sight. Somehow this annoyed me. I am sure she was just concerned that I was not aware of Kate's proximity to the street, but I felt the judging eyes: Where is this child's absentee mother?? Why is she letting her child play in traffic? Ah, well. She stopped well-short of the street and after the so-concerned lady left (without doing a thing about Kate), I went and picked Kate up and put her in the car.



Okay, that was a lot of writing and now I need a nap. Y'all enjoy these photos.

I wonder how many things I can get into while Mama changes that baby's diaper.

Woo-hoo! Claire has been evicted and the bouncy seat is now mine!

Yes, she is watching the Today Show.

Mommy's Lil Fighter Pilot. Hey, you never know.

Bath time.

Weekend Update

My dad and step-mom visited over the weekend, and Kate and Claire got to spend time with their grandparents.

After they left, we took the kids to the park. Kate loved the slide, even when she went down all by herself and got a mouth and nose full of dirt and rocks. Woohoo, parents of the year award goes to us!

And now that I've updated you with all sorts of information, I'm going to try to take a nap. My 3 hours of sleep last night are wearing thin.

My Angel

Claire and Tim sleeping on the sofa.

Tim is fabulous. He is The Most Fabulous Person in the world. Not only did he get me See's chocolates for Valentine's Day (which I asked for; you gotta take 'em when you can get 'em and right now my metabolism is as high as it'll ever be =), he got home after flying, ate some leftover pizza (do I know how to treat my husband for Valentine's Day or what?) and told me to go to bed. I gleefully accepted, knowing that he would take care of Claire while I got some rest. He gave her a bottle before coming to bed, which allowed me probably 4-5 hours of mostly-uninterrupted sleep. Blissful. After the night before's antics, sleep was the best thing anyone could give me. Thanks for taking one for the team, Tim. My turn tonight.

As for Kate, she did much better last night. She woke up a few times sort of whimpering, but Katie is right: Motrin is the way to go when it comes to teething. So Motrin it will be, with lunch and with dinner.

Those are some granny pants.

McLaren's first trip to the zoo, 2 weeks old.

Grandma and Kate watch the elephants.

If It Isn't One...

...you can bet your bottom dollar that it will be the other. This applies to issues involving:

• feedings
• wake time
• crying fits
• illness
• teething
• general neediness

Tim's mom left last night. She'd been here since the day before Claire was born, and Kate had gotten used to having her Grandma around to play with her, feed her, get her up in the morning, and take her on walks. I had gotten used to having someone here to cook, do dishes, take care of Kate (and Claire if I needed a nap), and listen to me question my sanity at our decision to have children so close in age to one another.

Over the weekend, Claire had regressed in her nighttime sleep habits. She was back to sleeping for a bit and then waking up pretty much every time you left her in her crib and walked out of the room. I was concerned about how she would do (and how we would do) during our first night without mom here to help if we needed her.

Claire did great. She slept when I wanted her to, waking up every 3 hours to eat. Awesome.

Kate did not do so well. She was up until 2:30am, screaming at the top of her lungs (I'm pretty sure you could hear her at the end of our driveway. Seriously. It was that loud.). I do not know why. I didn't know why then, and I don't know why now. Tim tried to get her to sleep on his chest (he thought maybe she was upset that Claire got to do this and she wanted to do the same). No luck. He took her into the guest room to sleep in the big bed. No luck. He slept on the floor next to her crib. No luck. He fed her some milk and fruit puffs around midnight. Gave her Tylenol. Tried rocking her. No luck. The only blessing that I can think of about last night is that Claire slept through it all. I don't know how, but it was good that at least one of the kids got some sleep and gave us some peace.

I think Kate must be teething something fierce. Why the Tylenol didn't do anything, I don't know. It's after 3pm now, and she is just finally quieting down to nap. She has been in her crib since about 1pm, screaming, talking, crying, and generally being miserable.

Us, we are exhausted. Tim cancelled his first flight this morning, and I'm not even trying to nap right now because Claire is currently refusing to sleep. So I'm here blogging, one-handed, as I cradle her in my left arm. Are you sure you don't want us to build that guesthouse in the backyard, mom?

All it Takes

Apparently, all it takes for Claire to sleep peacefully at night is for her to know that her Daddy is on night duty in addition to her Mama. Oh, it's not just Mom I'm going to keep awake all night? I guess I'll sleep between each feeding. The last 2 nights have been much better than the one I posted about last time. Claire is back in swaddle-loving mode, and I am getting more sleep. I still don't know what I'm going to do when Grandma Cheri leaves, though. She is allowing me the opportunity to nap whenever I need to, and to sleep in.

Tonight is a majors promotion party, and Tim and I are headed out for our first 'date night' since Claire was born. It will be an early night, I'm sure, but it will be great to get out and see people and it will be fabulous to have a beer!

More photos later; both the babes are sleeping right now. I'll try to catch them in action later this afternoon, as Kate tries to hit her sister with the school bus, or Claire tries to launch milk back at Kate.

Growing and Growing

13 days old. I don't want to wake up, Mom.

Claire had her 2 week well-baby check up this morning. She's 13 days old now and weighs 8lbs 9oz, and is 21" long. That's some growing since she was born! She was 8lb 5oz and 20" then, so the doctor says she's doing just fine.

Unfortunately, she is back to sleeping most of the day and crying at night. Swaddling is no longer working for me, and I am once again tired. Last night was a tough one - she was particularly fussy and I think I was up with her more than I was in bed. I remember Kate not wanting to wake up during the day, too, but I don't remember what I did about it. Maybe that's why I was in such a fog for the first 4-6 weeks of her life.

The problem was probably that we had a tasty dinner of roast pork, potatoes and broccoli, followed by pie. Claire knew that her sister got pie, and she didn't get any. Not fair! I'm going to stay awake all night!

Pie after dinner.

Mommy put Cool Whip on my nose.