Newborn Holiday Guide

I always loved the holidays as a kid. The hustle, the bustle and of course anticipating Santas arrival down the chimney. Once I reached adulthood, reality came crashing down and what was once an exciting and joyful time of year, became stressful and WAY to expensive. The holidays became more about outdoing last years gifts and blowing a months income doing it, than spending time with family.

There is something magical about having a new baby. The anticipation returned, the joy rekindled and I have to at least pretend I still believe Santa comes down the chimney. We went simple this year. Being on maternity leave, six weeks of which were unpaid, we had to. The days of blowing minds and our wallets are over. Just a little “Charlie Brown” tree, a new stocking for the Munchkin, and a few “family” gifts. I’d tell you what, but then we would know what we bought ourselves and spoil the fake surprise Christmas morning!

Being on a new tighter, penny scrounging budget this year realy brought into perspective what is truly valuable and worth having. Sure it’s nice to buy DVDs every Tuesday, books nearly daily and picking up a warm frothy peppermint mocha in the mornings isn’t half bad.

I’ve found though, there is a certain satisfaction in the “freebies”. Waking up to a smiling baby, warm Hubby snuggles on a cold winter walk, making a game out of penny pinching at the grocery store, cooking new crazy dishes because leftovers are no longer disposable and getting super sleuthy about finding free admision family activities.

Getting our first tree with Kahlan was hilarious and fun, not a chore. Having to dicker down to the $10.99 special didn’t feel like a sacrifice. We just laughed and admired our baby proportional Christmas twig. We didn’t need a big tree, we don’t need a ton of “stuff” under it either. This year we got the greatest gift already, our little Kahlan. So although all that stuff is nice, just being together, with our daughter on her first Christmas, is all I want from Santa…

Tags: first christmas, newborn, stocking

Parenthood : Paranoid

Remember the SAT word association pairs? You were given two words like dog:cat and then had to know that chicken:man was equivalent because the association was the same number of legs or some other nonsense. I’m not sure if parenthood:paranoid ever came up, but I sure hope I answered something meaning they have more in common than just starting with P and ending in D.

Everyday of being a new Mommy is an adventure that likely would end in the cute “lesson learned” minute if it were a sitcom. But not every lesson is cute or humorous. The first close call, no matter how unlikely or easily resolved still shakes you to your core. It is one thing to face your own mortality head on, to then quiver in fear soaked panic at the very thought your child may get so much as thier first cold let alone be hospitalized. Surgery? Someone grab the smelling salts…

What started as a minor rash for our new nephew, a mere three weeks younger than Kahlan, quickly turned our entire familly into paranoid fearfull wrecks. In the week following Dev and his Mommies stay with us, his little baby rash developed first into larger pimple sized pustuals and then took over his little system. 2 weeks after thier visit we get a call… Dev has been hospitalized, he has a high fever, some kind of infection and a silver dollar sized absess on his chest. It might be MRSA.

Pre-parenthood response:
Offer to rush down to help in any way posible. Visit them in the hospital.

Post-parenthood response:
Offer heartfelt condolences and best wishes for a positive outcome. Jump on Internet and research MRSA. Have a panic attack becuase that crap is super contagious and your newborn just spent a week snuggling up for cute pictures with the now hospitalized cousin. Do more research. Inspect every inch of our newborn. Call back to see how cousin is doing, ask if they know what it is and if it’s contagious for the hundreth time. Inspect newborn again. Debate with spouse if what we thought was just regular old baby acne is realy something else. Second guess your eyes, your instincts and every tiny blemish for hours. Break down and call the pediatrition on a Sunday morning in tears convinced your baby is next. Ban anyone from coming near the baby or visiting who could have had contact. Consider cancelling Thanksgiving. Then consider cancelling every familly get together for the foreseable future, moving to a remote hermit location and installing a germ proof baby sized habit trail.

Get the call – NOT MRSA, just some unavoidable bad luck bacterial infection that unfortunatly absessed.

Cancel plane tickets to Alaska wilderness. Call off code-red. Reduce panic attack to

Tags: cradle cap, MRSA, newborn, skin

Boiling Hot!!!

Ok Mommy, I know you say it’s cute, but realy is this necessary??? Your honestly going to make me wear this puffy hot thing just so Daddy can play portrait studio and you can tease me with a pile of candy you won’t share with me? My cousin the Power Ranger says this whole “Halloween” thing is great and just a special day for us littles. I’m not convinced…

Tags: costume, halloween, lobster, newborn

The days that make it all worth it…

After a difficult week in nursing land, reminiscent of some college freshman hazing ritual except initiating new moms into parenthood instead of adulthood, days like today make it all worth it.

It seems I’ve earned a reprieve from the growth spurt week and my baby girl not only reverted back to her sweet snuggly self, but all that hard fought nurturing has given me a new gift today.

When the soft mewlings of my little one called me from slumberland this morning I was greeted from over the crib rails by the most beatifull thing I’ve ever seen. Instead of just calming down and waiting for food time, Kahlan opened her eyes, looked straight into mine and literally burst into the biggest brightest smile I’ve ever seen! She knew me, and not only that but was HAPPY, happy to see me looking down on her! I wish there was a way to bottle up these kinds of firsts so later in life when the world gets us down, mommy could just open up her little jar and feel all that love wash over her all over again

Tags: newborn

Babies SUCK

No, realy. They SUCK. All day, all night. Suck, suck, suck. The first week breastfeeding was tough. There is definitly a learning curve on both sides. Mommy learning when and how to offer the goods, and baby how to take hold without ripping off an apendage. Once we made it through the rough spot everything seemed easy. Of course, I still only slept an hour or two at a time, but we had a system, and it worked.

Welcome week 3. Oh, did the baby book mention a teeny tiny growth spurt this week? Yes? Hello 24/7 boob duty. All that time I was using to blog, read and do chores from my phone… Gone. Sorry blogaudience but this week I’ve barely gotten enough shut eye to feed myself let alone surf the blogosphere. The updates are now few and far between.

The books fail to explain exactly what they mean by “growth spurt”. Allow me to explain. We were nursing steady every 2-3 hours for about 30 min including burp time. Then mommy could put her down, grab a potty break, snack and a good 1-2 hour nap. Then one day this week, like a switch had gone off, we are feeding every hour on the hour, getting upset tummies and needing to be extra burped, gas gas gas, mommy runs to the bathroom only to barely get back in time to start all over again.

It was a lot easier when daddy was home to make food, it took me 3 hours in between all the feeding to put together a lunch consisting of more than snack cups of applesuace (my breakfast since I can grab it and nurse).

Since she’s eating so much her little tummy gets upset too. So now on top of the constant boob duty, poor little girl is so uncomfy she’s barely sleeping for long in between either. And the sucking is the only thing that settles her. The boob, her hand or my finger, if there isnt something in her suck range she’s fussy. Im loath to break my steadfast no pacifier stand, but too much more of this we may have to compromise. Luckily, the pediatrition recomended Mylicon drops. What a life saver! These little baby gas drops let me get a full hour nap today, without which I was on the verge of collapse.

Pediatritions are excellent! They are on call for all of your questions no matter how ridicoulouse and if they can’t give an answer over the phone will squeeze you in with a days notice. If only all doctors operated like this, less people would probably wait too long for treatment when things are realy serious.

Tags: newborn, nursing