Baby Shower

On Saturday we packed up Rachel, met my aunt Judy, went and picked up Josie and then headed to my Grandma Layton's house in Salt Lake. We were only 15 minutes late, which I felt bad about, but as my Aunt Judy pointed out that's just Mormon Standard Time, and more excusably, Mormons with a New Baby Standard Time.

Shortly after our arrival Andrew's Grandma Pat, Aunt Becky, Aunt Nicki and Emma showed up. Since the twins were sleeping, we immediately started to play some games. The funnest game was probably the one where we all put paperbags over our heads and removed something we could "do without." Andrew was the last man standing, but I was pretty close, too. We were removing our rings, glasses, shoes, hair elastics, etc. only to finally realize that no one needs a paper bag over their head. At least we brought Andrew so that he was the last one. Of course, had he not been there, Aunt Nicki would have been the last one...and then me.

Rosie, me, Andrew, Becky, and Grandma Pat
Andrew guessing baby food flavors...mmm...apples

It was fun to visit with everyone and Kelli and Grandma L. went through a lot of work decorating and planning activities. I got some great gifts, but our favorite was probably the swing that Aunt Judy got for us. It's as small as our bouncy chair, it swings, it vibrates, it plays music, and it disassembles to fit into a bag. We tried it out today and Rachel was asleep within 2 minutes (we will therefore only use it when we want her to fall asleep).

Kelli, Aunt Judy, Josie, Rosie, and me feeding Rachel
Rachel with Great Grandma Layton and the twins

(Sabrina is standing, Olivia is eating Grandma's necklace)

Rachel with Great-Grandma Pat, a bit of Becky, and Emma
Rachel with Aunt Judy, Emma, Nicki, and Grandpa L.

My left shoe

When Patrick was little all of his bodily functions sounded like how you would say comic strip sounds. He couldn't read so we're not sure how he knew how to make those sounds. His yawning sounded like "yawn," his gasping sounded like "gasp." I suppose people really can sound like that, but when you pretend to punch invisible people does it really sound like "pow-pow?"

Rachel seems to have taken after him in this manner. She is a sneezy baby and has been from the very beginning. Her first cry went like this, "Waa, waa...a-choo, a-choo, a-choo!" (That may be a slight exaggeration, but she sneezed a lot in the hospital and she sneezes a lot now. Maybe she's allergic to life).

Today Emma, the little girl I babysit, Rachel, and I were going over body parts.

"Where's your nose, Emma? No, those are your ears. Where is your nose? That's right! Where's Rachel's nose? Touch the baby's nose..."

In the midst of this engaging mental exercise, Rachel had a sneezing fit. It sounded just like the sneezes in a comic book.

"A-choo, a-choo, a-choo!" said Rachel.

Looking very proud of herself, Emma showed Rachel her shoes and said, "Ooooh, shoe! Yay!" and then clapped her hands. I'm not sure if she was thrilled about correctly identifying her shoe (I suppose when you're one-and-a-half your shoe counts as a body part) or if she was happy that Rachel has started talking (as we all know, 5 week old babies aren't the most entertaining of playmates) but at least she was happy.

According to Emma, Rachel can say shoe. This is good news for Andrew, who may need some help with his vocabulary. Rachel can coach him.

A few nights ago as we were going to bed the whole house was dark, and I whispered, "I love you."

"My left shoe," Andrew mumbled in response.

"Are you sleeping?" I asked.

"No," he replied, "My left shoe."

"What?"

"My left shoe..." and then he burst out laughing.

"What?" I asked again.

"Oh, it's just, you know that trick where you can say 'My left shoe' and it looks like you're saying 'I love you?'"

"Yes, but in my family we said, 'Elephant poo,'" (which, by the by, often made me cry as a child. I would chase after my siblings nattering, "Did you mouth 'I love you,' or 'elephant poo?' Tell me, tell me, tell me!" It was very damaging to my psyche).

"Well, that doesn't work if you say it out loud because it has different sounds than 'I love you.'"

And to think he thought about majoring in linguistics. It's a real shame. He would have been good. He catches on fast.

Mathumatiks

I will never understand people like my Uncle Bruce or Burt. How can anyone thrive on math? I mean, some people really enjoy it. I am not sure I ever will. When my Uncle Bruce was tutoring me in math, he said that he would teach me to love math.

He failed. I don't love math. But I suppose it isn't too horrible, either. That's an improvement.

I'm now tutoring Josie in math. Who, besides Ms. Horton, would ever have believed that I would tutor anyone in math?

Ms. Horton is famous in my books for saying one of the funniest things about math I've ever heard. I suppose I was kind of her "teacher's pet" simply because I am a perfectionist and so, although I don't feel I am very talented in mathematics, I usually got the best grade in the class because I worked hard. I found it rather humorous that she nominated me to be "student of the week" for the math department two times in one semester. I found it more humorous the day she said to me,

"You love math, I can tell."

"I don't love math," I told her.

"But you always do so well..." Then she tried to convince me that becoming a math teacher was my calling in life.

It's not my calling in life, I assure you. I dropped her class at the end of that semester and picked up an art class. I really am not very good at math and so I have to work really hard at it. This would be more enjoyable if it was something that was actually entertaining, like dancing. I'm not a very talented dancer either, but at least I enjoy practicing it. When's the last time anyone's ever said, "Hey, let's go do some crazy math problems tonight!" I've never heard that, but I have heard, "Let's go dancing tonight!" Thus we see that dancing is more enjoyable for me than math. Learning foreign languages and going through labor are also quite intensive, but I enjoy them both more than doing math.

"You are good at math," Andrew told me when I told him that story.

"Not really," I said, "I have to work really hard at it and it isn't fun. I am much better at writing than I am at math."

"And that's why we don't have a math blog," quipped Andrew.

When I was in grade 9, I took math through the ADLC (Alberta Distance Learning Center). I was struggling at first because I'm not very good at math, but I am a perfectionist so with a little tutoring from David and some long hours put into my math problems my grades started to improve. Toward the end of the school year, I was getting 100% on nearly every assignment, a marked improvement compared with the 60-80% I had been getting at the beginning of the year.

One day I got a letter from my teacher written furiously at the top of one of my assignments:

Your answers are looking more and more like the answers in the back of the book. I hope you are not cheating because exams, and life, will demand it.

I was utterly offended. I was working so hard to solve each problem and when I started to get them right my teacher accused me of cheating. I suppose it was too difficult for him to put A and B together to come to the conclusion that my answers were looking more and more like the ones in the back of the book because I was getting more and more of them right on a more consistent basis.

Luckily we have to take provincial exams every three years in Alberta and grade 9 was one of those years. I scored in the top 10% on the math exam. So I proved "it" on the exam and now I guess I'm proving it in life because, frankly, I used algebra and the order of operations more today as I helped Josie than I have since I took that exam.

She's a handful. She really knows her stuff when she's in a good mood, but once her mood slips (and slip it will since she's thirteen) she starts getting a little mouthy.

"Alright, what's 7 x 3?" I quiz her, as this is the next step in the problem.

"37," she answers snappily.

"Uh, no, it's actually not."

"Fine, 82."

"Come on."

"Uny-un."

"What?"

"I said...uny-un."

"Josieeeeee..."

"Twenty-one! Urghhhh..."

And that is how it took us about five hours to go through twelve pages of math. That's about the average amount of time I spent doing my college algebra homework everyday (with the good graces of the teacher, I pulled through that class). Josie and I both lost our tempers after a while and so took a break. We had lunch, I showered, Josie played with the baby and then we hit the books again. Remarkably enough, Josie made an amazing recovery and remembered how to do math. She got a 94% on her first assignment.

"I hate math," she kept telling me and I had to resist using the phrase Mrs. Weston used every time someone in my geometry class cursed math that way,

"Well, maybe it's not too fond of you, either."

Parent tested, kid approved

Two arms way, way up!

We bought Rachel some blocks that were advertised as "soft and chewable." Shortly after we got home Andrew announced, "Okay, they work."

"What?" I asked.

"The blocks," he explained, "I bit them and they work."

Great, honey, that's great. Thanks for trying those out for her.

Andrew has a grand ol' time playing with Rachel. Sometimes I think he gets a little more rambunctious than most 4 week babies tend to play, but he's really quite gentle with her and she does enjoy his company.

Building a block tower with Rachel, literally
It's okay, baby

I think Andrew is having a hard time waiting for her to be more interactive. We went and visited my friend, Heather, who just had a little girl a week after me. She also has a two year old boy. While Heather and I compared notes on our babies, Andrew threw balls at Heather's son. They found each other equally entertaining.

Heather said, "It's fun for a while but after a few hours he'll get sick of it."

Apparently she's never seen the water bottle battle video.

"I don't think so," I replied, "He has the attention of a two-year-old."

And with that we left Heather to handle her newly hyped-up son.

"What do you mean, 'He has the attention of a two-year-old?'" asked Andrew as we walked home, "He is two."

"Yeah, but you're 22." I responded.

"Oh, you were talking about me?" He asked, honestly surprised.

He's a fun dad. He just may be a little embarrassing when the kids are older.

Trying out the blocks is one thing, but it goes a little deeper. Andrew may, in fact, be reverting back to childhood.

"I like these," he said to me, "They don't spill. You have to, like, suck it out."

Again, "What?"


Oh, yes. He thinks sippy cups are cool. You have to suck like five times to get anything out of them, but at least there will be no spilled juice.

Rachel is currently blissfully unaware that she'll find her parents embarrassing in the not-too-distant future. Right now she just thinks we're both silly (but daddy especially so) which often leaves her in giggles.

One Month

Surprise!

It is interesting how I always wanted to speed the pregnancy along and so would round up. For example, "I'm almost 21 weeks pregnant," means "I'm barely 20 weeks" when you decode it.

With the baby though, I keep trying to keep her small, so "She's 3 weeks old," actually means "She's 4 weeks tomorrow, but who's counting?"

I plan on counting her age in weeks for as long as I can manage. And then I'll move to months... Years is just to strange to even think about right now. Maybe I'll just keep counting in months forever, which means Rachel can't date until she's 192 months old.

So, today, Rachel is 4 weeks and 3 days old (about the equivalent of 1 month). We still don't have a handle on things. Last night Rachel decided that 3:00 am was the new 3:00 pm. I tried to get her to go to sleep until 4:45, at which point I enlisted Andrew. She finally fell asleep around 6:00 but still had the energy to wake up at 7:00. The kicker: she wasn't even grumpy--she just wanted to play.

Even though she still has her night and day mixed up, Rachel has grown up a lot. She almost fits in newborn clothes now, which means that people have seen her in more than just a onesie. She isn't quite as floppy as she used to be--in fact, she's really getting good at holding her head up.

This is not as easy as it looks

She's also starting to express herself in ways other than screaming at the top of her lungs. Trying to catch that on film is very difficult since she feels that if we're paying attention to her she obviously doesn't have to say anything to get attention. Take my word for it, she can be quite talkative.

And, she's started scooting around on the blanket to chew on things. I'm not sure if I'm too happy about that because I'm hoping that I don't have to baby proof the house for at least a few more months.

If only I could figure out how to open my hands
Rachel, 14 barrettes in hair

Time flies when you're having fun!

Corn is not a vegetable

Andrew and I have this ongoing argument about whether corn is a vegetable or not. Oddly enough Wikipedia takes my side of the argument--I insist that corn is a grain. Therefore, I try to choose something green to go with our dinners, like peas. Peas are vegetables (although botanically fruits). Corn is a grain, good for making cereal with. You've heard of corn meal but I doubt you've heard of pea meal.

Well, Andrew got off work last night at 8:00, bringing him home around 8:30. Rachel and I had had a rough day, what with Rachel eating all day and then puking it up and then eating again and then...well, we were exhausted so when Andrew came home, Rachel and I were both just grumpy and there was no dinner for Andrew.

Being the wonderful husband that he is, he decided to make dinner for us. He put corn on the cob on to boil and started making some noodles. Then he thought he'd be a good boy and add some vegetables to our meal. He went into the freezer...pulled out the frozen corn (his favorite "vegetable") and then said...

"Oh, uhhh...I guess we'll be needing a different vegetable..."

Good idea. Corn and corn sounds a little boring to me, too. We ended up just having salad (with tomatoes) for our "vegetable."

By the time we finished dinner and I fed Rachel and she spat it up, it was 10:30. I had been trying to give her a soother (aka pacifier, aka "binky") throughout the day, but she hated it. That made me feel a lot better about her not taking me. Apparently she only likes breast shields and my index finger. I had talked to my mom earlier when I was going crazy and she said that Rachel might be teething already. David and I got teeth pretty early, so it is possible. And it would explain why she feels a constant need to gorge herself and then spit up so she can suck again.

In a desperate attempt to make a happy baby, we made a Wal-Mart run to get a different soother to try.

We grabbed some "Nuks" by Gerber and headed home to make some pacifier soup. We sterilized all the pacifiers and the breast shield in a frying pan because all of our pots were dirty.

No, we probably don't need this many pacifiers but they all come in two packs, so if you want to try a brand you end up with two...so now we have four.

She still doesn't like the soother, but she won't make a disgusted face and scream if you shove it in her mouth and hold it there (like she would for the soothie kind). I've been using it today to supplement her feedings (half an hour on each side every hour is a little excessive, don't you think?). She treats it kind of how children treat vegetables. She doesn't like it, but if I make her suck on it, she will.

Am I a nag or what? Andrew, eat your vegetables. Rachel, take your pacifier.

The Inevitable

When Rachel was about a week old, Andrew said, "Well, I guess we've passed the blow-out stage without a blow-out."

"What do you mean?" I asked.

"Well, she had that one blow-out, but she wasn't wearing a diaper so it doesn't really count...and now she should be finished, right? I mean, she is a week old."

Oh, Andrew, Andrew, Andrew...you're so cute when you're completely naive.

"The blow-outs get worse as the baby gets older because they eat more which means they..."

He wasn't too happy to hear that. She was really pretty good for the first two weeks, which passed incident free.

Now that we've entered week three, we have at least one blow-out everyday, usually first thing in the morning right after daddy leaves for work. Usually I'm holding her or nursing her when she does her thing. I'll then kind of poke around to see if it s leaking anywhere...and of course I never find any evidence of leakage. It's only when I reposition Rachel to stand up that I find the offending area. This is usually done with my bare hand or forearm (which is thankfully easier to clean than, say, my pants or shirt). If I checked up her back, she'll have leaked out one of her legs. If I checked her legs, she'll leak out the back. If I checked both her legs and her back, and then pick her up to hold her tummy-out against my arm...she will inevitably leak out the front of her diaper.

I'm not really sure how she plans it, but she's good!

Oh, and for everyone who volunteered to help, I have a pile of onesies, night gowns and pants that need to be scrubbed before we can wash them, so...now's the time to step up to the plate. Any takers?

Once Upon a Dream

I can tell I am sleeping better in two different ways.

The first is that Rachel has been sleeping almost all night long for the last few nights. For example, last night she went down at 10:30 and I finally woke her up at 6:30, begging her to eat (while simultaneously drenching the bed with milk). And just because she's sleeping through the night doesn't mean that I am yet. She had me on schedule with 2:00 and 4:00 am feedings so I am still getting up with those--I'm working on giving them up, but I'm a die-hard. However, she is sleeping more soundly since we put the vaporizer in our bedroom. That means that I don't wake up to every little snort she makes because she isn't making as many little snorts.

The second way is that I am having dreams again. Dreams so realistic I think I'm awake until I realize how absolutely ridiculous they are. Like this afternoon I dreamt that Andrew and I were in a Rumpelstiltskin type story, only it took place mostly in the upstairs bathroom of my Auntie Colleen's house and Andrew had to spin something into sausage. So here's Andrew sitting at a spinning wheel, turning out sausage links to appease some grumpy old man who is forcing me to fix the toilet. The toilet is one of those cheap-o plastic Russian ones with the tank above the toilet and you press the floating plastic thing to make it flush--not unlike our toilet in Jordan, only there we had a pull string. Odd, I know, but it seemed so real at the time.

It's actually no worse than my pregnancy dreams. Dreams toward the end of pregnancy get really weird, and they are usually about babies. I had two that really bothered me when I had them but I suppose could be kind of funny now.

Dream #1: I wake up in labor. Andrew is already up and getting ready for school (as if that actually ever happens). I come out and I say, "Andrew, I'm having the baby."

"Well, I'm having breakfast, so deal with it," he snaps.

"No, honey," I say, "I'm really having the baby right now."

"I'm really having breakfast right now. Deal with it."

I go back into the bedroom and have the baby all by myself without any help. I then get out of bed without any help (unlike when I actually had the baby) and came out to find Andrew.

"Andrew," I said, with the super long umbilical cord running from the baby on our bed into the living room because I haven't delivered the afterbirth yet, "I had the baby. We should go to the hospital."

"Well," he pauses to kiss me on the forehead, "I'm off to school. Have a nice day."

"I just had the baby. Don't you care?"

"See you when I come home."

I go back into the bedroom to check on the baby. The doorbell rings. I go to answer the door, still with this super long umbilical cord following me all around the house. I look through the peep hole and don't know who it is so answer the door (because I would probably do that if this actually happened...or not). It's some random people wanting to give me a survey.

"Look, I just had a baby."

"Like that's even an excuse not to take this survey."

"No, really...I just had a baby. This is the umbilical cord. I'm kind of tired and need to get to the hospital."

"When you opened the door you agreed to take the survey so you really need to do that."

"I really need to make sure my baby is okay...I seriously just had a baby like five minutes ago and I need to go to the hospital."

Anyway, I'm not sure how this dream turned out because I woke up in tears during my fight with the nasty survey people. And for days I was worried that no one would care that I had my baby.

Dream #2: I have the baby in the hospital like normal, but...she's absolutely hideous. She looks like a monkey-man-goblin-thing. After reading Harry Potter 7, I realized that my baby in the dream was my Peeves.

"Isn't she adorable," coos Andrew.

"Are you blind? She's the ugliest baby I've ever seen!"

We take her home and Andrew leaves for school the next day. At this point he is still thinking she's the best thing in the world while I am feeling guilty for thinking my baby is a monster. After saying his goodbyes and closing the door the baby really starts to act up.

She climbs up in the cupboards and starts throwing things at me. She is using vulgar and profane language and calling me anything but mama.

I tried and tried to console her/control her but she was an absolutely crazy (and ugly) baby. So, I opened up one of the hall closets. She climbed in and started throwing things and I slammed the door shut and shoved a chair against it so that it couldn't open.

When Andrew came home from work he was mad at me for treating an innocent baby in such a way. Innocent? Hah!

Dream #3: This is actually one of Andrew's. As I didn't actually have the dream, I don't know the details but apparently it was pretty bad because he woke up one morning all upset.

"What's wrong?" I asked.

"Is the baby okay?" he whimpered.

"She's fine," I assured him, "Why do you ask?"

"Because I had a dream that she had an extra arm growing out of the side of her head. She doesn't, does she?"

"Andrew, you saw the ultrasound, remember? 10 fingers, 10 toes, pretty face...no arm growing out of the top of her head."

"Are you sure?"

"Do you need me to get the pictures?"

"No...it's fine...it was just so real..."

Yeah, and I felt that him sitting at a spinning wheel making sausage links while I fixed a Russian toilet was real. Dreams are interesting things. At least I'm having them again. For a while there I wasn't because I was so tired and not sleeping.

I wonder what Rachel dreams about though...her life hasn't been very interesting thus far and she enjoys sleeping so much that I think her dreams must be more exciting than real life.

I deny being bored while making a video of my sleeping baby balancing blocks on her tummy. I simply made this video because I thought that balancing blocks on your tummy while sleeping takes a lot of talent.

Keepin' the old

The Slades visited us about a week after Rachel was born, and it was so much fun to see them after almost a year. Our blogs help keep the distance less distant, but it's still fun to see them face to face. Crystal brought a silky blanket for Rachel. We love it!

--Letter from the Editor:

Wow, I guess I never finished writing this post. How sad. I'd write it now and put some pictures up to go along with it but our hard drive died a few days ago so we currently have zero pictures.

Signed,

The Editor

A Realization, or two...or three

Me and Jenna and our babies (two days apart)

This was my first uncontrolled baby passing around event. I was pretty nervous the whole time and kept craning my neck to track the baby. Some kind soul would notice this and would point to whoever had Rachel at the time. I suppose this is what Brother Steed meant when he said to "keep your head on a swivel," although he was talking about how to avoid sticky situations while living in the Middle East. I think it is perfectly applicable for keeping your eye on your baby while she changes arms a thousand times, too. I don't feel too bad about being nervous though because I caught Jenna doing the same thing a few times and she rarely worries about anything.

The new oldest generation

My family is pretty big, and we're pretty close, too. We still hold family reunions for my great-grandparent's generation even though all of the "grandparents" are gone. They've been replaced by our parents who are now the grandparents. And we've replaced the parents as the parents, which is kind of a scary thought. Perhaps I would feel younger if I wasn't one generation down on the totem pole, but alas, I have been replaced by Rachel.


Elizabeth got married this past weekend, and even though we got all four of my mom's siblings together, we were still missing a whole lot of cousins, and other relatives. From Uncle Bruce's family we were missing Heather (2.5), Rachel (4), 2 more boys of Sara's, and Mindy's husband for a total of 9.5 people. From Auntie Colleen we were missing Uncle LeRon, Craig, Eric, and Andy for a total of 4. Auntie Arlene did the best: only Uncle Michael stayed behind. And from our family, my sister Abra and her three kids as well as 3 of Kelli's kids were absent for a total of 7. We were missing 21.5 people from our family gathering, unless I forgot more people. Even more relatives are missing from the picture because some were out changing diapers...and we didn't have all the Breitenstiens in the picture yet.

The 21.5 is possible because my cousin Heather G. is expecting, which is why she didn't come. Another one of my cousins, Heather T., is moving to Chicago. Someone mentioned to Andrew that "Heather is expecting," and he says, "What?! Why is she moving to Chicago then?" He was scandalized that she wasn't married, was pregnant, and was moving to Chicago...until I reminded him that we went to my other cousin Heather' wedding last spring. She's the one expecting.

Breakfast just isn't breakfast at our house unless you have a confusing conversation about relatives. (Sorry Rachel, but I forgot that Mary's daughter is Rachel...and that Sara has a Rachel...so you are Rachel #3 in the family. You have a first cousin once removed and a second cousin named Rachel as well).

My beautiful Rachel

My own siblings haven't managed to get together for like 6 years! There are only 18 of us with all the grandkids. I therefore think it is time to throw the torch--be yours to hold it high...We need to start an Arnold and Pearl Conrad reunion. The Hancock reunion is great, but there are so many people to visit with and I can't think of a time when we've had all the cousins together. It's high time we did something about that.

Family picture

The happy couple

Wearing mommy's dress

David & Vance, Andrew & Rachel

Holding hands