Tears Come Easy

I've never thought of myself as a crier. I could pretty much hold it down whenever I needed to. On the other hand, I was always pretty damn good at faking it if I thought it was in my best interest. I realized tonight though, I'm definitely a crier now. Titanic was on, I didn't catch the whole movie but came in right at the end. It's the part where Rose is holding on to the dying Jack while looking up at the sky and singing some awful song. Crazy woman. Anyways, the search guy is driving his little boat around looking for survivors, while the crazy woman ignores him to kiss the dead guy. That didn't make me cry. But at one point they cut back to the man in the search boat and they show a few scenes where he's looking in the water at all the bodies. In the last scene of this sequence they show the water and there is a man with a baby in his arm, a baby about Mady's age, wearing a white gown. They're frozen together. I was on the edge of hysterical.

What a stupid movie.

That's not the first time I realized I had the potential to be a weepy woman, but for some reason that one was the worst. I turned the T.V. off and haven't turned it back on since. Maybe we should just get rid of it.

Don't even get me started on the news. That form of entertainment is just too awful to even comprehend.

QOD: Where can you buy those giant plastic bubbles to put your kids in?

Crawling at 2.3 months?

Well maybe not crawling, but she's getting somewhere!

I'm afraid I'm going to turn my back to sneeze or something and find her under the couch three hours later.

Baby Blob

I really wish Madelynn could do more stuff. Or at least speak English. For a while there, I was completely content to just stare at her and watch her little arms and legs flail. Don't get me wrong, I still stare for hours at a time, amazed at her grasping ability and coos, but I'm ready for a new trick. There was the roll a couple days ago but I guess she decided she was too good for rolling because she hasn't done it since. She's discovered how to hold onto things and shove them in her mouth, which entertained me for a full 3 days before I realized it could become a problem. I handed her Jeffrey's toothbrush this morning while I was brushing my teeth, she was sitting in her sling waving the toothbrush around and looking in the mirror. Then she poked herself in the eye. Oops. But wait, she managed to shove the end of the toothbrush halfway down her throat and began gagging way too much to cry about her eye. Toothbrushes are not toys. Honestly, I'm not bored with her, I'm just really lonely. I talk baby talk all day long, then correct the baby talk so she knows that baby talk is only acceptable for babies, then I wait for a response. I usually don't get one, or I get some form of "ahh-goo, goo-ahh, ooooh, or GAAAAH!!" I'm so lonely I even talk to the appliances in my apartment. Mady was napping for the 50th time in 3 hours so I carried on a nice long conversation with the refrigerator, basically berating it for not containing the juice I wanted. Again I wait for a response. Nothing. My breast pump talks to me, but it usually either says, "You're a whore, you're a whore" or "Kill bogs, kill bogs" depending on how high I have it turned up. I wish I could teach it more phrases.

Jeffrey's no help. He's hardly home, but when he is, I'm second to Mady and Mady is second to "Call of Duty: Modern Warfare". What a D-bag.

A friend of mine suggested I try to "get out more" with Mady to keep from going insane. Get out more? How? It takes an hour to walk outside to get the mail and I don't even need to shower to do that. Then she suggested we take the baby out for "drinks". What a D-bag.

I've always been a very social person, always hated just sitting at home. I think I need a part-time job. Or maybe we should start going to church on Sundays and Wednesdays. That's a baby-friendly social scene, right? Ha.

Question of the day: Is it ever appropriate to go out with your 3 month old for drinks? I think not.

Balding Beauty

My baby is balding. She had the most beautiful full head of hair when she was born, but now, she's looking like a mini Conan O'Brien or Curly from The Three Stooges. Well, not really, but I couldn't think of anyone with this kind of hair to compare to.

Every time I feed her, there's a little clump of hair left on my arm. So sad.

Up and down

Up.

Down.

And still wearing a smile.

Question of the day: Why are baby boogers so much more sticky than adult boogers?

Like the Beatles said, 8 Days a Week

I spend 24 hours a day with Madelynn. Seven days a week. When something comes up that I get to have a little baby free time, I get really excited. I picture myself as a young girl, looking great in a bikini, laughing and smiling, without a 2 month old dangling from my chest. Today was one of those days. We went to an amusement park, Mady was pushed around in her stroller by her Grammy and Pappy. I was a young girl in a bikini. Was I that young girl I pictured? Hell no. I stood by the slides, aching milk-filled ta-tas too big for my top, tired with bags under my eyes, a huge dark line going down my tummy, a tummy that always looks flat when I see it in my head but definitely isn't when I look down in real life. And am I smiling and laughing? Another hell no. I'm wondering if my baby is hungry, if Mom put a hat on her, if Daddy is tossing her in the air while her head bobs front to back (he wouldn't do this, but I can picture it). And there are babies everywhere. Everywhere! And they're all with their mothers which makes me feel even less stellar. So what do I do? I go down each water-slide once, thinking about all the smiles I'm missing in the too long lines, change out of my too small suit, thinking about the nasty burn Mady will get if she doesn't have a damn hat on, and start to hunt down my baby, thinking about all the random yucky people that are probably trying to get my parents to let them hold her. Whew, I think a lot. But holy hell for every three people there's a stroller. And for every 2 strollers there's one that looks exactly like mine. Where's my baby? How many laps around this stupid park have I made? (Just one, but it felt like a million.) Where's my baby?? Found her. Mady had a hat on and was sleeping in my Daddy's arm, her head still screwed onto her neck. I'm ready to leave. Thankfully so was everyone else. Why was I so worried?

I'm starting to think that there will never come a day when I'm just "baby-free". Sure she may not be physically in my arms but she'll be constantly on my mind. Even for the few moments when I was able to abandon any worry, I was thinking about how much Mady was going to enjoy this exact water slide when she's old enough to go down it, her little arms wrapped around my neck like a vice. And I did smile. I smiled at her future, not as a baby anymore but as my little girl, riding the carousal with her Daddy's arm protectively around her waist. And there's me with my camera, taking pictures while trying to frantically wave back as she yells "Hi, Mommy!" every time her painted horse runs past where I'm standing. It makes me smile and want to cry all at the same time. It makes me appreciate my mother in a way that I never have. It breaks my heart.

Like the Beatles said, "Eight days a week, I love you"*. And I do.

I'm a little sappy today. If the movie Beaches were on right now, I'd be inconsolable. Bette Midler's best.

*Actually it's more like "Eight days a week, I luh-uh-uh-uh-ove you", but I'm not a Beatle.


Question of the day: Is there a baby anywhere in the world that actually enjoys wearing a hat? I would need to see proof.

Sleepy Baby

Madelynn has been sleeping all day, waking up only to eat. Worry started to set in at around 3pm, but at that point it was just a worry that she wouldn't sleep well tonight. By now, real worry has set in and I wouldn't care if she stayed up all night, every night, as long as she's OK. I've been sitting next to her, staring, and I swear I can actually see her growing. I'm serious. She looks longer and I believe her onesie is looking a little stretched since this morning. She smiles in her sleep. A very sick baby wouldn't do that, would they? She's fine. Just growing.

Yesterday she rolled. It wasn't the first time but all the others looked like accidents. This time though, she barely crushed her arm on the turn and looked genuinely pleased with herself when she made it to her stomach. Then she was pissed because she couldn't roll back, the girl hates tummy time.

I really don't have anything to write about. I'm only trying this because I don't know what else to do, with my baby sleeping, maybe sick, maybe just growing really really fast, making me totally crazy and uneasy, not waking up perhaps just to bug me. What a snot.

She's sucking her thumb. I guess that makes me feel better. There's logic in that somewhere I'm sure. What a craptastic day.

Question of the day: How is it that Mady can sleep 20 hours a day, yet I'm always so damn tired and only seem to get 5 hours of sleep? Craptabulous. Ha, that one was too much.

Baby Cocktail

I used to love to drink. More than drinking, I enjoyed having a bottle of something, anything, in the house that I could mix with random juices, crushed ice, capri-suns (gag), and kool-aid to make the perfect "Aimee Cocktail." Sometimes I added too much vodka, or the wrong combination of purple kool-aid and ginger ale, coming up with something that tasted awful but looked pretty good in a glass. I would drink it anyways, waste not. So now it's no surprise to me that I'm looking at parenting kind of like mixing those "cocktails". I add a little of this, a little of that, shake it all up and hope that I have a smiling baby as the end result. Sometimes I add too much nap time, not enough breast milk, or a little too much stimulation and end up with a fussy screamer but she still looks pretty. I'm looking forward to finding that perfect combination but dreading the day that they stop selling that main ingredient and I'll have to start all over. I'm still talking about the baby here.

I find myself thinking these things, sitting outside watching nothing while Mady sleeps and smiles, smiles and sleeps. I think I might be going crazy. I remember the first day Madelynn smiled at a stranger. Her name was Ellen or something or other and it was at Ross. Mady was in her sling facing out and this Elly woman came over to talk baby talk. She made the same faces to Mady that I always do and she was rewarded with an all gums grin and waving arms. That smile, that grin, used to be only for me. My heart broke. I couldn't help wanting to smack the woman upside the head and yell at her for brainwashing my beautiful baby. On the drive home, thinking it over, I felt like an idiot. Of course I want my baby to like other people, but for a moment (felt like a long moment), I felt so betrayed. Now, weeks later, I've gotten used to Mady liking anyone and everyone. She's just happy, how can I argue with that? Like yesterday at Jeffrey's work picnic, Madelynn had a special smile for everyone that looked at her, and it was OK. I wasn't jealous, I actually felt pretty good, proud, my baby was a star. I probably only felt so OK with this because I was noticing a new Mady-ism. She had to see me. Anyone could hold her, as long as she could see me. So now that's what I'm holding on to, my own Mady and Mommy thing (besides marathon breastfeeding sessions). I know that one day this too will end, and it makes me sad already. For now I'm not going to think about it. I'm not. I think I might be crazy.

Maybe I just need more sleep. Or a very large cocktail.

Question of the day: Do babies ALWAYS fart when they sneeze?

Order, Order!

Every night at about 11pm Mady goes off to some baby dreamland and doesn't come back until about 9am. Every night. The nights are so predictable, we could set an alarm to start her hungry time, fussy time, and straight to sleep time. But the days, oh the days. On a Monday, she will not nap all day long, eat hardly at all, and scream at random intervals all day. Tuesday comes and there will be no screaming, constant eating, and sleep from noon to 6. Then Wednesday will arrive and will be a mixture of the two, with no rhyme or reason. How is a girl supposed to leave the house this way? How am I ever going to plan to go anywhere? Ever?

When I was pregnant, I used to secretly laugh at the people who told me the baby would run the household. Yeah right, I was a strong, independent female and no one, I mean no one, was going to tell me how to live. Especially not a seven-pound-little-old-man looking bitty baby. Those same people laugh at ME now because I'm always hours late for any appt. looking disheveled and tired, covered in breastmilk and not at all in control. Mady decides everything for me now. I feel like I have reverted back to childhood and Queen Madelynn is my overly-strict mother. She tells me when I can eat, shower, sleep, and pee. She demands that I keep all doors open, like I'm some convict in a cell and she's making sure I don't poop out any razor blades. Her first lesson for me was to learn to do everything one handed. Or no handed.

Dear God, Thank you for giving me two hands, one to do the laundry with, and the other to hold my precious Mady. Thank you for giving me two knees, one to bounce my Mady on, and the other to hold my dinner plate that I will never get to eat from whilst hot again. Thank you for giving me two ears, one to listen to all the crackpot advice from family and strangers alike, and the other to let all that crap drain out of. And most of all thank you for making me child-like again, able to see things all over for the first time with my baby on my hip. Amen.

People say that kids hit a point when they "get easy." I hope that's not part of the crackpot advice. I demand a little order in this life of mine. I'll ask Mady for it when she's in a good mood.

Question of the day: How do you get baby poop out of new beige carpet?

Shots Hurt

Today Mady had her 2 month check-up and her first round of shots. Wow. Well first off, she's 23 1/2 inches long, 12 lbs and the Dr. says she couldn't be growing more perfectly. Her head circumference is even superb! Now the wow. She was a super little baby, cooing at the Doctor, smiling, and just being all around happy. He commented a couple times on how she was just "such a happy little 2 month old". Then came the needle. Or needles, three of them. Jeffrey had to hold down her little arms so they could put the shots in the front of her pudgy little thighs. She screamed. I cried silently in the corner singing "You are my Sunshine" in my head to block it all out. I've never heard this sound from my beautiful baby. It was the worst. The worst. And there were tears, real tears. It hurt so bad, I could totally tell. And now, at home, you can't put her down or she yelps in the same manner. Jeffrey and I have been taking turns, walking her around, rocking her on the glider, and just sitting with her while she wails. I can't believe I have to do this again in another 2 months. Honestly, I don't think I can handle it. She now has a nasty bruise on her leg. I cry once in a while. Shots hurt.

Question of the day: Why is it that we have touchscreen computers, Apple iPhones, and Guitar Hero but no one can invent a vaccine that doesn't hurt?