Worth at least six new gray hairs

Around 7:45 Monday morning we were, as always, scrambling to pull everything together at the very last minute. Shoes, daycare blankets, diapers, everything that somehow gets scattered to every corner of the house over the course of the weekend, I was trying to round it all up to get us out the door.

As I was standing at the dining room table stuffing the daycare bag, I heard Aerin laughing behind me. I turned around to see her standing on the sofa, bouncing up and down, and grinning at me. She was SO PROUD of herself. I told her to sit down, but because I was busy, I didn't go over and pull her off. I knew full well she'd just climb back on again, and I honestly just didn't have the time to get into a battle of wills.

(Hahahaha, you know what else I didn't have time for?  EVERYTHING THAT HAPPENED AFTER THAT.)

The next thing I heard was her walking backwards off the sofa and hitting the side of her head on the coffee table on the way down.

She immediately started screaming and I ran over and picked her up. There wasn't any blood and she was crying, so I figured she was okay. I got her calmed down, we got everyone loaded in the car, and we went to daycare.

At 11:30, while Todd and I were at lunch, they called to tell me Aerin was sick. They told me she'd fallen asleep during the gym that morning, then thrown up right before lunch. She didn't have a fever, but she was acting strange and they were pretty sure she had some sort of bug.

Sadly, I spent a good 15 minutes lamenting the presence of another goddamned stomach bug in our home before it finally occurred to me that the child probably had a concussion. And of course, by then, her pediatrician's office was closed for lunch until 1:30.

Todd took her home and I went back to work, Googled the crap out of "baby concussion," and decided she was probably okay. But I called the doc at 1:30 anyway and described her symptoms and asked them if they wanted to see her, or if I should just keep an eye on her. And the nurse immediately told me to take her to the ER. Apparently I should have been a hell of a lot more concerned than I was. So, yeah, I guess I failed that parenting test?

Anyway, once at Huntsville Hospital's Pediatric ER, they checked her out and decided she needed a CT scan, since she hit the side of her head and there wasn't any real lump. Aerin had to be restrained for the scan and holy hell, that sucked, but at least they didn't have to sedate her. Based on the scan, they determined she was fine and probably just had a mild concussion. We were given the okay to go home before our paperwork even made it through registration.

She was still a little off the next day, but by Wednesday she was back to normal. So even though I clearly missed the "freak out about head injuries" portion of the parenting class, no harm no foul this time.

I always told Todd Aerin would be the first of our children to ever visit an ER. And even though I fully expected there to be more blood on her first trip, I'm still going to say NAILED IT.

Festival

Every year, on the first Saturday of October, the city of Madison, Alabama hosts the Madison Street Festival.  I had never been, even when I lived in Madison, but this year I heard that Madison Hospital had decided to sponsor all the kid activities, and therefore all the facepainting, pony rides, bounce houses, and crafts would be free.  Also, one of my friends had a booth on Artist's Alley and I felt like we should go and show our support.

It took a little bit of convincing where Todd was concerned, but Saturday morning, despite the chilly, wet weather, we left our house at 8:30 and drove to Madison.  We didn't know what to expect, but at least we were doing something different!

First, we stopped by Jessica's booth to say hi.  Then Todd left with Aerin (and my phone and all my money) to get Jessica some coffee and ended up in the slowest coffee line ever.  So Micah and I had a good thirty-five minutes to hang out with Jessica and examine her jewelry.

While we were waiting, Micah got to see two trains go by up close. I managed to get back over to the tracks in time to see the engine on the second one, so he got to wave at (and be waved at by) the engineer.

When Todd finally showed back up (with some hot chocolate for me, which offset my anger at not being able to get in touch with him to find out when or if he was ever coming back), we decided to wander over to the Kids Pavilion. Micah was a little overwhelmed at first, but he really got into it when we started seeing his a bunch of his daycare friends running around. He got to pet a turtle, get his hair colored, and have his face painted. When he and Kaya (a super sweet little girl from his Preschool class) met up at the bounce house, he really had a blast. After that, he got to pet a pig, two goats, and some chickens.  Aerin was stuck in the stroller the whole time, but she at least was having fun watching everything going on all around.

After all that, it was time for pizza and cookies.  While we were eating, a couple of Ghostbusters walked by. We tried to explain to Micah why they were so cool, and ended up promising that one day he'd get to see the movie and then he'd understand.

When we left, Micah was so tired that he rode in the stroller while Aerin walked.

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I am so glad we went. It turned out to be a really fun event, and it was definitely better than being cooped up in the house getting increasingly irritated with each other.  It also gave us the courage to take both kids out to dinner that evening, something we haven't done since Aerin developed her 100-decibel pterodactyl screech and learned to haul full margarita mugs off the table. I like to think maybe we're finally turning that corner where we can once again go out in public and not come home exhausted and covered in splatters of baby-launched cheese sauce.

But if not, still, Saturday was a banner day.

15 Months

• When she sees a bird or a plane flying overhead, she yells, points, then covers her mouth with both hands.
• When she sees a car coming, she yells, points, and starts doing a crazy stomping dance.  Then she starts waving.  (Pretty much everyone waves back.)
• She can climb the stairs unassisted. When she gets to the landing, she stops, sits down, and claps for herself.  Then she finishes climbing the last four stairs.
• She can come down the stairs, mostly without falling to her doom.
• She refuses to wear shoes in the car.  She has trouble removing socks, though.  This requires a lot of howling until someone helps her get it off her heel.
• We moved her upstairs on Micah's birthday. I haven't finished putting everything back up on the walls, so she has a pinwheel mobile hanging over her crib temporarily. She'll try to blow at it to make the pinwheels spin.
• She can say ball, bubble (buhba), mama, dada, hi, and moon (mooh).
• She says "baba" for book and apple.
• She signs for "more" and "please."
• When she hears music, she starts dancing,  Last night she was groovin in her highchair at the Mexican restaurant.
• She loves books. Every morning as we're trying to get out the door, she follows us around with a book in her hand. When I walk into her room at the daycare, she immediately points to the books and starts signing "more please."
• She still desperately wants to squash a cat.  Any cat.
• She's becoming very attached to the pink Snoopy Jessica's mother bought for her at Easter.
• She spends the whole night wandering around her crib. I've never seen a baby scoot around so much in their sleep.
• She really likes wearing Micah's old shoes, so I haven't bought her a new pair. I like to think of them as her ass-kicking shoes.
• She can go down the slide by herself and stand up at the bottom (most of the time).
• She's a tough cookie. She isn't really bothered by things like falling face-first off the ottoman,  sliding off the picnic table she's climbing, or getting whacked in the chest by her brother's feet as he's coming down the slide.
• She hates having her diaper changed.
• She's finally cut all four eye teeth, but they seem to have stopping coming in again. She has all the rest.
• We had to buy a trash can with a lid after I caught her throwing toys in the trash. MULTIPLE TIMES. I can't help but wonder how many she chucked before I noticed.
• She has a temper.
• Oh my god, does she have a temper.
• And a little bit of a violent streak.
• But she is usually sweet and cheerful, so that kind of makes up for it.
• She's not at all what I expected, but she's actually pretty awesome.

These kids

A lot has happened in the last month:

Abby came to visit:




Aerin started walking. First with a push toy, and now on her own (sometimes):




And she learned to "climb" the slide:








And biggest of all, Micah started Pre-K:



I really do intend to write more at some point, but 1) our computer is dead (it is no more! it has ceased to be!) and I'm having to use my work computer, which makes me uncomfortable, and 2) Blogger keeps shitting the bed and only giving me an inch-high window in which to type.  I don't know what that's all about, but I hate it.  A lot.

7 Months

Seeing as I'm awake anyway, I might as well take the time to post. As always, the weeks have flown by and Aerin actually turned 8 months old on Tuesday. This would probably be a more tender look back at the month if she hadn't woken up at 3:15 this morning. Or if I'd been able to fall asleep after I put her back down.

So yeah. This adorable brat is 8 months old.

The big story of the last month is TEETH and MORE TEETH. She has total of four now, her two top left teeth having made a rather dramatic appearance a few weeks ago. She supposedly has two more lurking on the right side, waiting to pop at the most inconvenient time, I'm sure.

This month marked her very first (and hopefully last) nursing strike. One morning she woke up, nursed, and went to daycare, just like every other day, but when I went to feed her at 3:30 that afternoon, she absolutely refused to eat. She arched her back away from me and cried. At the time, I thought she was just tired and maybe hungry for the blueberries she hadn't eaten yet. So we got home and she still refused. She was clearly hungry, but she wouldn't even lie in my arms, much less latch on. She screamed, she scratched, she pinched, she pushed away, and she wouldn't eat. Todd was out of town, so finally, I just had to put her down in her crib so I could cook dinner for me and Micah. Aerin screamed the whole time; I mean screamed. And so went the rest of the evening. And the weekend. And the first two days of the next week. She wouldn't even take a bottle or a sippy. When Todd would hold her out to me, she would stiffen in midair, already pulling away just from my touch. I spent the entire time worried, upset, hurt, and just kind of pissed. When she finally latched on at 8 PM on the following Tuesday, my arms were covered in little black bruises and I had already promised her to a roving band of Gypsies.

Of course, she's fine now.

Jerk.

Her growth has slowed down a bit. She's still in 9 month outfits, although she fills them out a bit more. Her weight dropped during the nursing strike, so she's still holding at around 19 pounds. Since she's approaching the 22-pound weight limit in her Chicco carrier and Micah's nearly outgrown his car seat, we bought Micah a new car seat a few weeks ago and turned his old Roundabout around for Aerin to ride in. We're still using the baby carrier in my car, but she seems to enjoy the bigger seat in Todd's.

She's started eating more solid foods like Cheerios and puffs and has learned how to chew things pretty effectively. She loves yogurt and can drink water from a sippy (although she can’t quite hold it up yet). She still doesn't roll over (I KNOW), but she's got pretty good balance when it comes to sitting. She can also swipe a remote, water glass, or phone from a far greater range than you'd expect. Nothing within a good 3-foot radius is safe. She's also pushing up on her arms and acting like she's thinking about getting her legs tucked up under her. She's actually happy to play on her stomach these days, at least for a little while.

She's got a whole repertoire of noises now, from a happy little dadadadaDA to an imperious tuh and she straight-up GROWLS at us if we're not moving fast enough when getting her dinner together. Her teachers laugh at that one; she's their little feral baby.

She has started bouncing a lot when seated and loves the jumper at the daycare. When she's excited to see someone, she flaps her arms, squawks, and bounces up and down with pure, unrestrained joy. She has yet to meet a stranger and is still completely free with her smiles. We've been known to cut quite a swath through the grocery store, and no little old lady is safe from her charms.

See what I mean?

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Looking back:

 

Now with pictures

Yesterday I conned Todd into helping me get some belated 6-month portraits of Aerin. Just pretend these were included with the last post.

6 Months

Weight: 17 pounds

Height: 28.5 inches (above the 99th percentile, folks, while Micah holds steady in the 50th)

Head Circumference: 42.5 cm

As of December 21, Aerin is six months old. Today, she's been with us for 206 days. The time is sliding by faster than I can keep up. One minute I was holding a wrinkled, sleepy newborn, the next a happy little roly-poly howler monkey. Some days I feel just completely bewildered by the whole thing.

Round about the middle of December, Aerin sprouted her two bottom teeth. This was followed by several days of misery as they finished cutting through, but now she's back to all smiles. She's also started biting when she nurses. She keeps it up, I guarantee baby's first word will be "SONOFABITCHowowowletgoletgoletgoGETITOFF."

Last Wednesday morning, I decided to try her on some cereal again. Unlike a month ago, this time she practically climbed up out of the seat trying to get to the spoon. Since then, she's been wolfing down two to three solid meals each day. So far we've tried rice, oatmeal, bananas, sweet potatoes, carrots, cinnamon, and prunes. I'm pretty sure she packed on another couple pounds in just the last week. My back says so anyway.

At Christmas and New Year's, Aerin was sitting propped up in corner of the sofa. The next Tuesday, she started sitting up unsupported at daycare. By Saturday, this was happening:

She still doesn't roll over, but she's done with lying down anyway. The play gym is no longer acceptable entertainment. She wants to be UP and DOING. Micah has recently learned several important lessons on putting down treasured items within the baby's reach. And girl can snag an unattended cell phone, remote control, or baby monitor in the blink of an eye.

She's still sleeping through the night. I'm almost afraid to put that out there, but it's true. Since six weeks, she's slept nearly every night from 9:30 until 6 or 7. In the last three days, we've managed to get her down by 8:45 each night; I go in at 7 AM and wake her up. I freely admit this is NOT due to anything we did or didn't do. I'm sure if she was my first baby, I'd be obnoxiously smug about it, but she's not and I know better. She sleeps because she is an awesome baby. Period. I also freely acknowledge it could change at any moment. The baby giveth and she taketh away.

Half a year old. Rock on, little girl.

Christmas Roundup

Aw, crap. It happened again.

I swear I just blinked and POOF there went the entire month of December. I don't even know, man.

So! Christmas!

We made a big deal out of Christmas lights this year. We went out several times just to see decorations around our town. For myself, I am generally opposed to inflatables and other holiday tchotchkes on the lawn, but we sure had fun finding them in other yards. Then one night, we saw a light-up crane. The next weekend, we had to buy one. I'm concerned it may be a gateway to a blow-up reindeer the size of the house, but it was Micah's favorite decoration EVER.

Late one Thursday evening, we made an impromptu trip to see the Galaxy of Lights at the Huntsville Botanical Gardens. Although he seemed underwhelmed at the time, Micah enjoyed it enough to ask about it repeatedly for the several weeks. Of particular interest were all the lighted planes, helicopters, and rockets on the way in.

Then there were the daycare Christmas programs. Aerin tried to eat the jingle bells and succeeded in eating the tissue paper. Micah, despite having loudly practiced every song for weeks on end, refused to sing and instead kept running over to hide next to us.

This year, we hosted Todd's mother's family for their annual get together, and we hosted Christmas for my parents (my granddad was supposed to come too, but got sick at the last minute). Since we had guests, we decorated a lot this year. And I loved it.

And Christmas Eve...oh, I can't even tell you how special it was. After bathtime, we watched one of my favorite Christmas movies, The Snowman. Micah was actually laughing out loud, he loved it so much. When that was over, we scattered reindeer food in the back yard and carefully selected cookies for Santa. Todd read The Polar Express and I read The Christmas Story and Silent Night. Then all of us sang Silent Night together and we took Micah up to bed. I can't describe what exactly made it so perfect, but it was.

I never expected how much I would enjoy being the parent of a small child at Christmas.

Of course, then we spent the next THREE HOURS assembling toys. Another thing I never expected? How much WORK it is being the parent of a small child at Christmas.

All Micah asked for from Santa was a pretty castle (his words) and cars for its parking lot. And Santa delivered.

Santa also included an un-asked-for train set. We tried to tell Micah the engine would go around the track on its own, but he wanted to push it.

Among a whole list of awesome gifts, there was also the play kitchen from Papa and Melissa. I'm expecting many, many years of play out of this one.

Oh, and my Aunt Anne sent Aerin a Santa suit. Behold!

It was strange to be the ones hosting Christmas and putting together toys for Christmas morning, but it was also a lot of fun. Give us a couple of years to recover, and we'll be ready to do it again.