Jaws V

Just when you thought you were safe from the breastfeeding talk.... Dun DUN Dun DUN Dun DUN.

You know when you're single and everyone says, "Love will happen when you stop looking," or something nauseating that you are not even hearing even if there is the remote possibility that it will turn out to be true? Well, the same "forget about it" principle apparently applies to milk production. With the safety net of formula supplementation, I've sort of let go of my milk obsession and I've been producing, if not copious extra to have on hand at all times, at least enough to feel pretty psyched about my output instead of constantly disappointed. As many of you know who have been through it, this comes with the non-desired side effect of messing up my carefully restored peaceful nursing mojo (we had to re-learn proper latching after a seemingly endless bout of thrush nipples). What's been happening for the past couple of days is that HR seems to be getting so much so fast that he pulls back and whines and treats my nipples like Stretch Armstrong. Ow for me, and I feel bad for any discomfort it causes for him. I guess there's really no way to win in the game of breastfeeding, except for, you know, the babies in the end. But that's the important thing. This blip will pass, and again it's nice to not worry about making enough. I have to think of it this way: I plan to nurse for seven more months give or take, but I get to raise this dude who makes me smile constantly for a lot longer than that so any aggravation has been worth it.

I was sure that I got the awesomest baby available since the minute he was born, maybe even before that, but he just gets more awesome by the day. By the second. When I hold him facing me now he puts his little hands on either side of my face. In his mind I guess he thinks he can hold it still so he can eat my nose off, but in my mind he's doing something unspeakably precious. In a way, we're both right.

All Baby Extravaganza!

The downside of a four-days-in-the-office week: Mondays here are insane. Nothing I can't handle, and it's nice to be busy as it makes the time go a lot faster.

HUGE news:

Early last Friday morning my first niece was born, four months to the day (almost to the minute) from HR. This is noteworthy for other reasons, such as: this is the first girl born to Mike's family in two generations (he's one of four boys, and HR has two older boy cousins) and she's been an impatient little miss, wanting to be born for some time-- as it is she's almost two months early, but thankfully everyone's doing just fine so far. Congratulations to my brother- and sister-in-law, we can't wait to meet the little one and commence with the spoiling.

Our mini-vacation with the in-laws was nice as could be, what with the excitement of the birth of the new bebe-la and then there was the matter of the weather being cooperative and everyone relaxed and had a good time. The remainder of the weekend was stuffed with goodness like a birthday party for a one-year-old and a birthday party for a forty-year-old in the same day. And I got in lots and lots of playing and laughing and snuggling with my little beast. Sundays are usually our special day together.

Today is, well, today. So I'd better get to work and make it the best today it can be.

Before I go, here's a blog o' the week: Lovely Morning. See for yourself, it really is just lovely.

Clearblue Anniversary

Today my brother turns 25. This is big, because my brother was sort of my first baby. We're ten years apart, so when he was born my sister and I (who was only five herself at the time, but a precocious five) got really involved in his raisin' up. This is a good or bad thing, depending on whether you like us. We've sort of left an imprint. It feels like I was just hauling him around in his little feety pajamas, but here he is turning 25 and getting ready to be married a year from October. Tomorrow it'll be HR, right?

Speaking of the bean (when am I not?) it was one year ago today that I found out I was pregnant with him. I had a feeling I was, but I wanted to wait a few days after my period was late before I took the test. I lasted exactly one day. When I woke at five a.m. to pee on the morning of that second day, I just had to find out. So I got Mike out of bed and and decided this was it, I was going to take the test. So I did. I think you can fill in the rest for yourself.

I'm taking off early today and taking a day off tomorrow so we can spend some time with Mike's family on their vacation in Rhode Island. Most of them haven't seen the baby in months and he's certainly gone through a lot of changes. I'm really looking forward to it.

Catch y'all next week!

Antiquated Pastimes

Just so you know, I'm going to write about music on here a lot. Not as someone who claims to be an expert or have good taste even, just as a person who loves and appreciates all kinds of music. It's always been a huge part of my life, even if all the musical talent was hogged by one person in my family and that person is not me. It's my brother. The jerk. ANYway, when we were on vacation we were sitting around the fire one night and somebody came up with the idea that we'd go around and each person would name a category, then everyone would name their most favoritist thing of that category. For example: favorite sandwich. That's easy for me: veggie sub with cheese, no onions, extra pickles, extra hots. Not so easy: favorite band. To keep it interesting, the rule was that the Beatles don't count. After a lot of thought, I decided to go with the Afghan Whigs. But it was no easy decision. Favorite band of all time? That's not even taking into account all the different genres, or emotional associations with times in your life. So difficult! Harder still, we later built upon this by going back to that old chestnut, top ten albums. After a ton of deliberation, I produced, in no particular order:

Kick - INXS
Pinkerton - Weezer
Low End Theory - A Tribe Called Quest
Purple Rain - Prince
Tapestry - Carole King
Grace - Jeff Buckley
Gentlemen - Afghan Whigs
Obligatory Beatles pick - Revolver
I'm Still In Love With You - Al Green
Maybe the first Scissor Sisters record?

Ack, too much pressure! I didn't even get a Ween pick on there because I can't choose. Clearly this list will be ever evolving. But it's a hell of a conversation starter, assuming all the people in the conversation understand the concept of an "album."

I have too much work to do to be playing around on here any longer. But if you'd like to share your list I'd love to see it!

Foodstuffs

When I was a kid, I LOOOVED Pop-Tarts and Ding-Dongs and Little Debbies. It's ridiculous, because my mom is an amazing baker and we had cookies and squares and things she made from scratch around all the time. I was spoiled with the good stuff, and I preferred the bad stuff because it was exotic. My friends whose family members didn't bake thought I was crazy. There was another aspect to it too, and it was that my grandmother, the baked goods nazi, always lived with us and to this day she swears she can always tell whether something's made from a boxed mix. I believe it. Because of this my mother and I shared an illicit love of boxed cake and canned frosting - when Gram went away we'd take the opportunity to get down with the Pillsbury like it was cigarettes or dirty magazines.

I bring this up because lately I've been craving Pop-Tarts or Ding-Dongs or Little Debbies or some chemical-y, preservative laden, mass-produced sweet thing. No, I'm not pregnant again. It's just one of those things. And it's just going to get stronger and stronger until I give in to it so I should probably go buy myself a box and be done with it. I know all I need is one and it'll take care of the jones, and I can put the rest in the freezer for future "emergencies." I'm lucky I don't have issues with food, food and I have a healthy relationship. I know what good food tastes like, and when I eat something crappy and inferior it turns out to hardly ever be worth it. It doesn't taste as good as I was thinking it would, and it reminds me that I could make myself a cake in an hour from fresh ingredients and it would be a hundred times more delicious. When I was younger, though, I'm not sure I had the palate to tell the difference and it seems such a waste in retrospect. But then again I also loved vegetables - I was the only one who liked brussels sprouts and a box of those was a treat.

I guess I'm thinking about all this because I hope that HR will grow up with an appreciation of good food, and we'll give him the best start we can and not encourage any picky tendencies. Some kids just aren't great eaters, though, I accept that. We'll deal with it when the time comes. I'm just happy to be living in a time where there's so much awareness of nutrition and locally produced and organic foods and less emphasis on technology and convenience. My parents did the best they could with us, nutrition-wise, but it was a different time, and we didn't exactly have the money to go all out for the best fresh items (it's still an issue for many families these days). Plus even with all the bounty we kids were still all, "A pox on your humble brownies! Get that sugary plastic-wrapped stuff we saw on TV in our bellies!"

I don't plan to make junk food a regular thing, but I won't hide its existence or deny a bit on occasion to my little guy because I know from experience that naughtiness is the ingredient that makes it more appealing than it actually is. And even though my strawberry-frosted loving self eventually grew up to appreciate the real quality stuff, I still get these cravings. The important thing is to strike the balance. Balance in all things, that's my ultimate goal. Maybe I should have called this blog Moderationberry Pie?

You Know That I'll Be Back

I'm sorry for anyone who is on vacation this week, but I'm digging the rain. The trees and things need it, it washes away the troublesome pollen, and it's given me a chance to do things such as put pants on my baby. Not to rob him of the joy of pantslessness when he's got a lifetime of pants wearing ahead of him, but he's got so many nice things he's in danger of outgrowing before he gets a chance to wear them, it's nice if they make it onto his body at least once before being passed down the line.

Ah, my petit bonhomme, he is full of beans lately. He's been backsliding a bit in his sleep habits (boo) but he makes up for it in other types of development (yay) such as keeping up a constant stream of jabber. We have pretend conversations all day long and it is THE awesomeness. I said my first word at five months and spoke in full sentences by my first birthday, but I'm not sure that's the sort of thing that's hereditary. I think this is just what babies do at this stage and is no indicator that he'll be an early talker. I don't even care about that, I'm just enjoying the expressive nonsense coming out of his mouth. Anyway, you know I think any little thing he does is the bees knees-- I still high five him for producing an especially impressive shart. HR will be four months on Friday, and can you even believe it? This one has definitely gone by the fastest so far.

This past weekend was full of friends, which is so great because I feel like we haven't socialized with other non-related adults for a long time. Two friends were in from Vermont with their beautiful five-month-old daughter, and though we mostly talked about the ups and downs of new parenthood, it was a treat. Yesterday Mike worked the brunch shift and I joined my best friend and her husband at the restaurant where he works to catch up over biscuits and sausage gravy. We live about 100 yards from one another, but lately if we see each other once a week we're doing well so we really have to take advantage of these opportunities to get together, especially since they're about to bring a little dude or dudette into the world in a couple of months.

Ooh yes, Blog of the Week: Lois Lowry (author of The Giver, the Anastasia Krupnik series, and approximately one million other excellent books) is one of my writing heroines and her blog--which offers a glimpse into her thoughts and private life as well the occasional post on her writing process--is fantastic.

I was just telling my brother that I heard Mark Morris's "Return of the Mack" on my drive in this morning and it took care of my Monday blues before I really caught them. This is admittedly an awful piece of pop music, but it holds a nostalgic place in my heart and its airing was perfectly timed. What have you heard recently that rearranged your whole mindset?

Conundrum

Work-from-home day, LOTS to do. Baby and Dada are taking a morning nap on the couch and this is the perfect time to get down to business. But they are so beautiful all snoozy and snuggly I can't stop staring at them. Somebody get me some blinders, STAT. I could write them off as a professional expense, right?

Fudge-ickles, rather

I just want to take a moment to thank you all for your comments! I want to respond to every one but for some reason blogger doesn't let me. I think it's user error more than anything, but until I figure out what I'm doing wrong please know that I enjoy and appreciate all of your words.

Mike and HR are coming by in a little bit to take me out to lunch so I don't have time for a proper post today, instead I'll hit you with a semi-annotated list of five awesome things:

-Song Away by Hockey.  It's apparently wicked old but I myself am wicked old and this is how I learn about music these days: way after everyone else. Anyway, it's one of things that make me glad to be alive, especially since there's another truly adorable version of the video starring Charlene Yi. For some reason the embed code was disabled for that one, so I highly suggest looking it up for yourself.



-Fall. This summer has been ridiculous with the 90 degrees every day since April. Though I can never say enough about the miracle that is air conditioning, I'm sick of it. I'm ready for fall and all the New England-y goodness that goes with it.

-Catching someone rocking out in their car, bonus points for terrible music (good-terrible like Night Ranger, not terrible-terrible like Limp Bizkit. You get no points for that. Minus points). It just makes my day.

-Fudgecicles.

-The morning, between six and seven. This is when HR usually wakes up, and it's his very best time of day. After I get him from his crib, feed and change him, he's full of smiles and laughter and baby magic. We hang out in bed, playing and singing and talking, and though I'm exhausted I don't care. I'll get to sleep in again someday, but I'll never get this time with him back. And there's always coffee, of which I am partaking right now.

Have a great Thursday, everyone.

Or IS it the Mob?

Today is my 13-year job anniversary. I can hardly believe it myself. This is the only real job I've ever had, I started the summer after college graduation, and Mike started his last job that day too. This is the first year we're not sharing the anniversary, and that's A-Ok with both of us. When I started here, it was nowhere near what I wanted to do - I was hoping to go into publishing, but time was running out and I needed a job and nobody else was offering. Maybe someday I'll go into the story of how I got connected here in the first place, but the important thing to know right now is that the prospect of a salary and benefits was mighty appealing to me at the time. All of that is still true, obviously, and publishing is not exactly what I'd call a growth industry. But I had no inkling I'd still be here all these years later. If I did I might have jumped off a bridge - 13 years sounds like such a long time. My job's old enough to be bat mitzvahed, for crying out loud. L'chaim!

I'm not a fate person, or a believer that there's a larger plan or, ew, that things turn out for the best. Things CAN turn out for the best, but I think that's where it's up to us to make the best of what we've got. And with that in mind, even though I've gone through bouts of feeling trapped and sick of being in the same place for so long, I feel like it's where I belong. I know I'm lucky to have a job at all these days, let alone one that's so fulfilling and that values its employees so clearly in word and deed. And that's a big reason why I'm the one kissing the bean on his wee head every morning and leaving him with his dad instead of the other way around. I believe in the mission of the place, and it's a bonus to have such a connection to the ultimate purpose of my work. Plus we're like a family here, my coworkers, bosses, our Board of Directors - we interact with mutual respect. We all have each other's back. It's not all sweetness and double rainbows every day, there are disputes, and things that go on that are part of the job itself can be very discouraging. But the majority of the time it's a wonderful culture in which to conduct a professional life, with the occasional veer into the personal. When I went back to grad school (even though it was just for my own sick thrills and not remotely job related) my bosses were super supportive, and I can't even get into how amazing everyone's been through my pregnancy, maternity leave and return to the job because I might just cry. I'm endlessly grateful to do what I do, where I do it, and for the company I get to keep.

My ultimate goal is to be able to sustain myself through writing and quit this job. I hope it won't take another 13 years before I can make it happen, but it's worth noting that in a staff of five, I'm the fourth most senior by a gap of at least 10 years. And even if/when I no longer need the income (HILARIOUS), I'll be here on a volunteer basis, no doubt. There's no real leaving this place. I won't tell you what I do or where (most of you who read this already know anyway), but even though it sounds like I'm in the mob I promise it's not the mob.

For Posterity

Routines are boring, but they work. Oh, welcome aboard, Captain Obvious. I'm a pretty laid back, go-with-the flow person, and I had always assumed I'd incorporate that part of me into my parenting style. Turns out I'm successful with this some of the time. But I realized pretty early on in the months since my boy's been around that I never feel more on top of things, more in control, than when we're able to stick to a routine. Especially since I've gone back to work. Having a plan is actually calming. For example today, HR woke up for the day at nearly seven a.m. (after only one nighttime feeding - thanks for doing your part, buddy!), and that got us off to a great start. I had time to get in two feedings, get myself ready for work, eat breakfast, help Mike get himself ready for the day and get some good play time in. Nobody was too tired (I'm talking parent-tired, not before-kids tired) nobody was late to anything, we're all happy. So today's on the right track. So far. I just know that if I tried to free-form it, I would feel way too scattered, and be on edge by the time I got to work and the whole day would knit itself into an itchy sweater of anxiety. No good. Sticking to the routine as much as possible: very good. It's true what they say, children crave consistency, but so do parents. The challenge is to make sure we keep a little flexibility, because it's the baby's job to throw a curve just when we think we've got it figured out. So far when we have deviated--and we deviate a lot, frankly--we've been fortunate enough to have decent results. HR is a pretty chill baby, he's slept away from home with very few glitches. He is not enamored of riding in the car unless we can get him to sleep first, but that's getting better as he learns how to entertain himself. Overall I guess we can chalk any success up to equal parts effort and luck. The real thing we're all bad at is naps. He doesn't like to be put down for them, and we don't push him too hard. I know that has to change for all of our own good, especially because that late afternoon nap is key to him not being overtired by bedtime. But it'll come in time, and if it doesn't I guess we'll all survive.

Does anyone watch Huge on the ABC Family channel? I love that show. The writing is just so good for the most part, the characters rich and beautifully imagined, and though I don't love the whole cast (Nikki Blonsky rubs me the wrong way) I think that many of them are amazing, especially the young man who plays Alistair. I don't know if it's just great acting or if it's his real personality that shines through, but something about him is so sweet and magical. His character also keeps me mindful:- I vow that if HR wants a princess unicorn doll for his birthday instead of a catcher's mitt that's what he'll get. 

Bee-Oh-Tee-Dubs

I regularly read a shit-ton of blogs. I guess I'm a bit of a voyeur, people's real lives and the ways they choose to present them, the aspects they show, they are endlessly fascinating to me. So I've decided to start featuring one of my favorites every week. Since you are what you love (and not what loves you back, etc.), I think it gives a peek into the (occasionally questionable and/or bananas) facets of my own personality.

The first one I'm going to feature is my current favorite: Carrots 'n Cake.  I can't remember how I stumbled upon this one, probably linked from someone else I like or maybe recommended by Google. However we came to be united, I'm hooked on this one for numerous reasons. The first is that it's a food blog, and I'm a sucker for a good food blog. The second is that, though it's a health-conscious food blog, the author is not afraid to have a drink or five from time to time. She comes from a health-first standpoint, but what I get from her more than anything is a sense of balance. She works out a lot, but she also indulges a lot. Tina always seems like she's having a blast without sacrificing or obsessing - I think she's a terrific model for living well. I'm currently jealous of her recent nine hours of sleep and foodie-job-related traveling and the marathon she's going to run in Hawaii (well the Hawaii part anyway), but living vicariously through her is almost good enough. Oh, and she's local-ish so I love to see the places she goes in and around Boston.

So there you have it, Joyberry Pie's first Blog of the Week. I highly recommend CnC, but be forewarned that she updates a LOT. I suppose I should be less of a lurking lurker and take the time to leave her a comment someday. Anyway.

Did y'all have a good weekend? I really, really did. The boy is growing so quickly before my eyes, every day brings something new and astounding. Latest feats: belly laughs, and getting really psyched about the baby gym. It's only a matter of time before he figures out that he can make the froggy play music just by pulling his leg, then all hell will really break loose.

Benefits

I'm working from home today, which means I have to be a bit more efficient (i.e. spend less time on the internet) in order to get things done. The extraordinary upside of this, of course, being that I get to take frequent play breaks. Today I dangled a toy over the boy and he grabbed it and shoved it into his mouth. It's not as simple as that at this point really, there's a lot of hesitancy and false starts and misses, but what a privilege to witness this milestone, to see before my eyes the way his little mind works and puts things together. I owe a lot to my job, and I'll write more about that when I get the time. Right now I have to go nurse and maybe when I'm off the clock we'll venture out for a walk on this gorgeous day. Happy Friday the 13th!

Snippets

- First off, thanks for the votes of confidence re: yesterday's entry. We feel pretty good about the way we're raising the boy so far, but it's lovely to have a cheering section.

- As for barf-o-rama '10, HR's pediatrician thinks he just had one of those 24-hour bugs. From whence he picked it up I have no idea, but since Tuesday night there's been no more vomit, and he's eaten and slept wonderfully. How lucky we are to have such a healthy guy, I can never take that for granted. And it's reassuring to have a doctor telling you you're doing fine.

-In my before-life, I exercised a lot. I was a runner and a yoga junkie. One of the proudest moments of my life was when I stuck the crow pose for the first time. Since I got pregnant, I sort of stopped. I kicked running to the curb because I had run a 5K the weekend before my miscarriage, and though I rationally know that it had nothing to do with why that pregnancy didn't work out, every time I tried to run I felt this bad juju so I decided the stress wasn't worth it and I switched to walking. I really miss a good run, and I intend to get back into it. The question now is how and when - looks like M and I will need to take turns instead of running together, probably in the early mornings or evenings when HR is on a longer-between-feedings schedule. As for yoga, I kept that up until the week before he was born, but I switched to gentle prenatal yoga. I'm ready to go back for the pain. I loved being pushed to my limit on the yoga mat, it helped me feel alive and, strangely, balanced. I know that yoga can be a lifestyle, and I can build my own practice at home, but there's nothing to me like a really good communal practice. Coming away from a challenging class always made me feel like a superhero, the benefit for me was definitely physical, but it undoubtedly affected me mentally. I can fit in some DVDs now here and there, but it's not the same. I hope I can get back into class at least once a week. It's not even about losing weight or looking a certain way at this point--yeah, I'd love to be as fit as I was but I'm doing my best to be patient with my body and know that it's not really mine while I'm providing someone's nutrition--I just miss the feeling. Again, all in time.

-What TV commercial do you hate the most? Since I got DVR (clearly mankind's greatest invention) I manage to not catch that many, but I keep seeing that ad for the ladies' razor with the built-in trimmer and it makes me insane. Have you seen this? Women walking around, doing their thing, and as they pass a shrub or whatever it morphs into a triangle or rectangle or--what is that, an oval? (Who has a oval-shaped bush I ask you?)--that we're supposed to infer is the shape of that particular woman's pubic hair. It's one of the stupidest things I've ever seen period, just a ridiculous commercial, not even getting into the way that women are once again reduced to their body parts. Women and advertising is a big thing with me in general and I won't get into it right now. Just saying that that commercial is almost enough to put me off shaving altogether.

- Tonight my husband (let's call him Mike, since it's his name) doesn't have to work and we're going out on a date. Mike's brother, wife and two kids live in the burbs about 20 miles away which is great since we see them a lot. It's so good to have family nearby. Way back at the beginning of the summer my sister-in-law asked when we might like her to babysit, and we made date for tonight, as she and her husband could easily come into the city while their kids were at sleepaway camp. I'm really looking forward to going out to dinner just the two of us - I have not been to a restaurant when I haven't nursed at the table in a long time. Hopefully the little boo will be an angel for his aunt and uncle. At least I'll be leaving plenty of milk for him because everything I pump today won't be needed tomorrow since it's my work-from-home day. Speaking of: gotta go get on the milking machine. Oh friends, there was a time when referring to my breasts so much might have been provocative.

Tradeoffs

Ah, boy. Yesterday's entry was supposed to reflect my gratitude rather than imply hubris, but I got repaid for the celebratory tone nonetheless in the form of lots of baby barf. When I got home from work HR got busy throwing up--about seven times within two hours--emptying his wee belly and transforming from my action baby into a pathetic little snuggler. We still don't know what the cause was, but he didn't have a fever, his wet diapers indicate he didn't dehydrate, and as of this morning he was back to nursing (and keeping it down) like a champ. My husband's taking him to the doctor for a follow-up just to be safe, but I have a feeling this can be chalked up to one of those mysterious things babies do to keep your life from getting too comfortable. The long sleep the night before was probably an indicator of the impending illness, but it was also a good thing to have under our belts because we got the opposite sort of sleep last night. It was like the old days, the two of us taking turns holding him while he snoozed because we're neurotic noobs and we didn't dare put him in his crib on his back for fear of some sort of Bon Scott action. Reading this ought to keep some people on birth control for a good long time, eh? This is my life now. It's totally worth it.

I'm trying very, very hard not to be a guilt-ridden worrywart as I sit in my office and the husband deals with the baby all day today, but I was on baby watch last night so it all works out in the end. That's how we do it - I've got the job with the office hours and benefits, he fills in the cracks with nights and weekends and work-from-home gigs so that one of us can be home with the baby. So far, so good. Nothing against daycare at all, we are just selfishly obsessed with our little dude and decided that if we could at all work out a way to have one of us home with him most of the time, it was worth a shot. Of the two of us, he's the more domestic and I just like my job better than he liked his so he's primary caregiver four days a week. He's playtime Dada, I'm the bedtime lady. We don't see each other a whole lot with this schedule, but you know, right now it's more important to us that HR gets someone to be indulgent to his every whim. And who is going to call one of us to report on an especially impressive fart or make videos of him bouncing around to "All the Single Ladies" with a pair of shorts on his head for Mama to watch when she gets home from work if we send him to someone else? We'll find a way to get him socialized - we're not trying to make an isolated little freak boy out of him. We're just older parents who have the luxury of this arrangement and are on the fence about whether we'll ever have another baby experience so we're jumping into this one with everything. People may have opinions about whether this is bad for him, but I'm not hearing them.

Nine. And. A. Half.

HUGE NEWS: HR slept through the night last night, clocking an unprecedented 9 1/2 hours, not even waking to nurse. I have no idea what prompted it, and I have no realistic expectation that it will happen again anytime soon, but glory glory that was the longest chunk of sleep I've gotten since I was probably 7 months pregnant. And of course I was like, what's wrong with him? Isn't that the first thing you think when things go suspiciously well? He's just fine though, growing up-- probably coming off a growth spurt, actually, as he's 15 weeks today and couldn't seem to get enough chowing down at the boob ranch over the weekend. Oh yeah, and because I was so, er, full by the time he woke up this morning, he had his first "reversal of fortune" due to the unfamiliar abundance of milk. Barf fountain aside, I got a little taste of how other women must feel, women whose babies sleep and who produce milk like goddamn milk-producing-prodigies and it tasted ambrosia-like. So there we have it - a milestone. I expect setbacks, but I'm enjoying it for what it is. Eventually I guess I'll have to sleep train him instead of nursing and rocking him to sleep, but first things first. I'm not into messing with success right now. He sleeps, we sleep, life is good.

About vacation: this is the same summer vacation we take every year, that I've taken every year of my life and my father before me (his mother, at 88, still goes, though she's rented a cabin for the past couple decades instead of tenting). We go to the same campground and go to the beach every day and play games and have campfires and eat lobsters and slap mosquitoes and don't shower much and catch up with the far-flung family and this is our idea of fun. It's amazingly fun, and luckily my husband has come to agree. I remember last year very well, it was probably our best time ever. I was still getting over the miscarriage I'd had a few months earlier (though it turned out that I had my LMP while at the campground and ended up getting pregnant immediately after we returned home), and being in that place with those people was really key to my healing. Suspecting that it would be my last child-free vacation, I really whooped it up the two weeks, eating and drinking and tanning and staying up late and reading book after book. Did I mention drinking? This year was ever so different, but wonderful in its own way. We went to the beach, but I had to stay out of the sun with the baby. I had an occasional cocktail, but I didn't get tipsy on 4 o'clock gin and tonics (that is the best summer drink period). I sat around the campfire, but I had one ear to the camper where the baby was sleeping at all times. But every single member of my father's side of the family got to meet and hold our little one. And we took a couple of days in the middle to go visit my mother and maternal grandmother (my parents have been married for 36 years strong, but, as I tell people, she divorced camping 20 years ago). Unlike other years we took one week instead of two, and I didn't go into psycho packing mode for the trip - I was pretty laissez faire about the whole enterprise but it worked out fine. Next year I'm pretty sure I'll resume my ultra-organized ways and the vacation will be even better, since HR will be old enough to run around and enjoy the beach and the woods. But this year, for all its weird and chaotic vibe, was pretty rad and I'm so glad we got to go. And now I've got to go.

In the Thick of It

WHOO! I am slammed today. I haven't had a workday like this in ages... since I haven't had a real workday in ages. But still. It feels good to be using my brain.

Of course I'm a bit sad about the end of my vacation. It was outstanding, all told. My little one was amazing - sleeping like a champ and really loving the outdoors. We all did better than I had ever dared to hope. It was great to see family and relax, and now I'm ready to settle into my real life: a 40 hour workweek, 32 hours of it spent away from home. Plus the return to good eating and getting exercise in there somewhere. Oh, and writing. And keeping up my share of the housework. And sleeping (HR's new personal best: 7 1/2 hours. He did it once, he can do it again, right?). Bring it on, I say.

More on how it all works, and more on the vacation itself coming up but for now it's back to the never-dwindling pile of tasks. As things that need my attention go, it's definitely not as fun or cute as this one:

But we make do.