Month: August 2009

Quote that I like

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“And know that in our imperfect world, with all my imperfect ways, I have been given you, the most perfect gift one could hope for.” – Kelly Roberson, quoted in the Motherlode blog on nytimes.com, in a letter to her son on his first day of kindergarden.


Something about this struck me, the idea of being an imperfect parent in an imperfect world trying to raise someone I see as perfect.

6 Weeks!

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ClareBear is six weeks old today! She is getting bigger, more alert, more interactive and more complex every day. By complex, I mean she is occasionally fussier and harder to please. Gone are the days when a little bit of cuddling will solve all of her cries (and if that didn’t do it then a meal would). We’ve identified a new cry of hers – the cry of boredom. We don’t hear it very often, but she does let us know when she is not entertained by her surroundings. She also sometimes is happier when we’re not cuddling with her – her first signs of independence. It’s a little bit discouraging when my baby would rather watch her mobile than be with me, but I better get used to that. It helps when I see her smiling at her mobile, mirror, etc. She’s beginning to ‘play’ with her toys.
Her other developments are that she is beginning to open and close her hands (often around my shirt neckline or my hair) and she imitates our faces. She smiles back at us, sticks her tongue out, and purses her lips when J whistles to her. We had a few extremely fussy days, which I think is normal for the age, but they seem to have passed (fingers crossed). We got through them using our sling – she would sleep in it and we would get things done (like eat dinner). She ended up with a few extra crumbs in her hair, but we all were much happier. Like I said, I hope these days have passed and our quiet evenings will return.
On the parenting front, I went out for my first ‘night out’ this evening with some of the other Mommy’s from our birth class. It was only for a couple of hours but it was nice to get away a little bit, sit at a restaurant and not worry about diapers and spit up. We all commented that it felt weird to walk out of the house with just our purses and not a diaper bag and baby. We’re planning on making it a twice monthly event, so it will be something to look forward to. Of course I missed Clare, but it was kind of nice to look forward to seeing her.

What’s in her name

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I’ve always liked names. Since high school (and probably even before that) I’ve been coming up with baby names for future children. Some people thought this was weird, but I know it’s not that unusual. These names have changed over time (and thankfully, as I’ve gone through some really horrible naming phases) but I’ve always had fun with them. When J and I met we found that we liked talking about names. From fairly early in our relationship (even before we knew we wanted to have kids together) we decided that for girls we liked the name Ava. Later on we added the name Olivia to that list. So when I became pregnant our girls names were obvious, Ava Elizabeth (which is my middle name) and Olivia Clare. We couldn’t agree on any boys names, but our girls names were settled.

Well, then I started doing some research and discovered that Ava and Olivia are each on the 2008 top Ten list of baby names. Hmmmm – guess we’re not so creative. Then we started seriously talking about names and realizing that now we didn’t agree on either boys names or girls names. So we started making lists of names that we liked and discovered some criteria.
1. We both liked classic names. OK, that’s something we can agree on. Nothing to trendy.
2. Neither of us wanted a name that is to popular.
However, we got into trouble with the syllables. J doesn’t like names that have more than two syllables. He thinks that a three syllable last name is long enough. I disagree and seem to especially like three syllable names. After much discussion and concessions from each of us, we ended up with a list of about six names for each gender that we both could agree on. For a while there it seemed like the only names on the list were names neither of us especially liked, but neither of us vetoed. We had to fix that – we didn’t want to someday tell our kid “Sorry we named you XX. Neither of us really like the name either, but it’s the name that we both hated the least. You got named by default.”
We decided not to talk to anyone about our name choices. I broke this rule a little bit, but in the end it worked out well. Honestly, when you talk about names people generally have a negative reaction. A person (myself included) is more likely to come up with what they don’t like about a name then what they do like about it. I don’t mean this to personally offend anyone, since I do it myself. In the end, since we had a hard enough time with each others opinions about names we decided that we didn’t really want to hear anyone else’s opinions either. (We’ve since met several couples who felt the same way we did. My favorite story is from our friends Steve and Leah who had a random woman in a restaurant get mad at them because they wouldn’t tell her the name they were thinking of.)
Finally we just decided to wait until we met the baby to decide on the name. This was a bit of a compromise, since J and I had decided on our favorite names of each gender and they weren’t the same name at all. I joked that yes, we each knew what we were naming the baby but unfortunately we were naming the one baby two different names.
When I saw our baby for the first time one of the first things I said was “Well, she’s not a Sylvia.” That was my top name. J took a few minutes longer and decided that no, she wasn’t a Charlotte either. We went down our list of other mutually agreeable names and weren’t quite sure. That night J went home to take a shower and I thought “what about Clare?” During this time he thought the same thing. It just seemed to fit. We both liked the name, but had always thought of it as a middle name. By the time we sent out our original birth announcement email we were pretty sure she was Clare, but we didn’t know the middle name and were hesitant to put it in print. By the next morning we had decided, she was Clare Elizabeth. As I’ve been writing this blog it occurred to me that we actually kept our original names we agreed on but threw out the to popular first names. Sigh – to think of all the disagreements that could have been avoided if we just figured that out sooner. Oh well.
Since she’s been born we’ve gotten all sorts of compliments about her name. Besides that, it fits. Our girl was always a Clare, we just didn’t know it yet.
Oh, and as for the spelling – it’s after County Clare in Ireland.
Family pic from the Bradley Class Reunion last weekend.
Yes, Clare looks like her Daddy.


Growing Up

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We weighed Clare yesterday and found out our girl is a whopping 8 pounds 9 ounces. I said to Jeremy “she’s packing on the poundage!” and he replied “well, at least the ounceage.” She’s still gaining over an ounce a day! I’m not exactly sure what I’m eating to make the kid grow so fast, but apparently it’s working. We haven’t measured her lately, but I suspect she’s added some length as well.

I have mixed feelings about it, because now our Clare has grown out of her newborn clothes. Grandma T mentioned that the blue watermelon onesie a few posts back looked a little snug. I’ve also noticed some of her clothes are getting a little short. So I went through the drawer today and pulled out all of her teensiest clothes and, with a little sigh, moved up her 3 month clothes. Don’t get me wrong, she has some cute stuff in there but it’s a little reminder the my tiny doll baby is no longer doll sized. Her 3 month stuff fits OK in length, but is a little wide. Oh well, I suspect she’ll fill those out soon enough.
Clare has marked the occasion by being especially fussy today. I think we’re fast approaching the 6-week fussiness peak. So most of our day has consisted of a lot of rocking and feeding. Oh well, I can think of worse things than cuddling with my sweet girl if that’s the only thing that makes her happy. Folding laundry and running errands can wait for another day.

Clare at 5 Weeks

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I’ve heard in passing that the first 4 weeks of parenthood are the hardest (or maybe the hardest of the first year). Now that I have the “wisdom” of that extra week, I think I understand what that means. The last week Clare started to become engaged and interested in us and the world around her. While the cuddles and closeness of those first newborn months are precious, the interactions she and I are now having are absolutely wonderful. I feel like we’re in the beginning stages of that 2-way relationship. Pretty much the only 2-way communication we had for the first month was her crying – I would talk to her, play with her, cuddle on her, etc. and she would cry back. My reward was when she was contented. It was great, but now getting smiles and eye contact is better. When I walk up to her bassinet and she smiles at me my heart melts. I think I’d used that term before, but I didn’t really understand what it meant. Now I do. Yesterday at the mall she was fussing in her stroller, but when I looked down and talked to her she focused on me and stopped fussing. Seriously – I can make my baby happy by stopping and talking to her! She likes me! I know it sounds a little silly to write, but in person it’s the best thing. Like I said, it’s the beginning of our parent-child relationship and it’s wonderful. I’m beginning to think this whole “going back to work” thing is going to be rough… I love seeing her everyday and watching her discover new things.

In other news, we had a reunion with our Bradley Birth class this last weekend. It was so fun to see the other couples and their sweet babies. We noticed that every single baby is especially cute – not a funny looking one in the bunch! It was also nice to be in a big group of new parents. If someone was nursing or if a baby was screaming, no one batted an eye. We chatted, shared birth stories, laughed and compared ‘no sleep moments’ over the din of babies. If someone got especially unhappy a Mommy or a Daddy would take him/her away for a few minutes, but for the most part we were able to carry on adult conversations and attend our little ones. It was also really nice to be in a group of people going through the exact same experience we are. I’m already planning a Mommy Martini night for the Mom’s.
Here are a couple of pictures of the babies at the reunion. Several of them (including Clare) were fussing when we put them down on the blanket so we weren’t sure if we would be able to get any pictures. When we put them down every single one stopped crying and we had a good 5 minutes with 7 happy babies. It seemed like a miracle. Of course their view looking up was of 14 parents standing over them cooing and ga-gaing over the cuteness. It may have distracted the cryers.
The back row is all of the boys ( from left: Grayson, Jake, Teo and Peter) while the front row is the girls (Libby, Clare, and Attilie). The four boys were born first and the three girls were born last. Our little Clare is the second youngest and the lightest.
Close up on Clare. She’s ‘straightjacketed’ because she was fussing and J wanted to show off a swaddle technique he uses when it’s to warm for a full swaddle.
Here is a picture of Clare smiling at me from the swing this morning. She loves her swing and just discovered the mirror and mobile on it. It also plays a little song that she likes (she’s just discovered music in the last week). I love the swing because I can put her in it and she’s happy during the time it takes me to grab a shower. She also falls asleep in it sometimes. I try not to ‘overuse’ it, but it’s a handy tool to have.

Smiles

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So I finally have a couple of pictures of Clare’s smile. Neither of these pictures are her full out beam – but they are little half smiles. Either way they make my day whenever I get them. She’s particularly partial to her Daddy, so he gets most of the smiles. Hmmmm – maybe I should give him the camera so he can try to get more pictures of her.

Finally, here’s a picture of her favorite sleeping position – with one arm in the air. At night we swaddle her so she can’t do this, but during the day she usually has at least one arm up.

Happy 1 Month Birthday!

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It’s hard to believe, but this Friday our Clare will be one month old! The first two weeks seemed long, but the last two weeks disappeared in the blink of an eye. On one hand it seems like we were just in the hospital having her, but on the other hand I can’t really remember life without her. J describes it best by saying “I don’t remember a time when I didn’t love her.” Parent love is a crazy thing – it’s the most instant, deepest, natural love in the world. I can only compare it to falling in love with a spouse or partner, except that there’s no heady infatuation phase. It’s just BOOM you see your baby and it’s immediately “I love you more than my own life.” Unlike falling in love with a person, it doesn’t matter who your baby is or what they are like – you instantly love them and think they’re perfect. It’s a good thing too – since these little buggers can certainly test you.
Fortunately for us, Clare is a fairly easy testing baby. Oh she has her moments, but compared to some stories I’ve heard from other parents of newborns, our girl is easy. She likes to sleep and eat and generally doesn’t just cry for no reason (though now that I’ve written that I’m sure she’ll scream tonight just ’cause). Sure she has her fussy moments, but we’re getting better about recognizing them and dealing with them. I’ve noticed that after a meal we get 20-30 minutes of sweet, happy, alert and smily Clare. Then she’ll yawn once or twice and turn into fussy, tired Clare. So we just shush and cuddle her until she falls asleep. Roughly 2 hours later the whole cycle repeats itself. She likes to take longer naps in the morning and early afternoon, and is more awake (and sometimes fussier) in the late afternoon and evenings. She loves to eat and will really lose her cool if she’s hungry (hmmmm, she may take after me in this regard). The really cool thing is that she’s starting to recognize J and I a little bit more. We’re starting to get smiles we think just might be in response to us (not just in response to having a full tummy) and she’s watching us more and making more direct eye contact. This is particularly evident when we’re changing her diaper – she watches us the whole time. It’s as if she’s now realized we’re not just a part of the background like the chair upholstery or wall paint, that we’re a reoccurring cast of characters in her life and she thinks she might like us (some of the time). She’s always been a cuddle bug, but she’s started to snuggle in more and even protest when she’s not cuddling (like a particularly long night when she would only sleep tucked in next to me and not in her bed – aka our first venture into co-sleeping).
She continues to grow and while her newborn clothes still fit her skinny little body, she’s beginning to outgrow them in length. We measured her the other day and she’s now 22 inches long, up from 20 (or 19.5 depending on who did the measuring) when she was born. I’m guessing she’s still gaining about an ounce a day (maybe less) so she’s probably coming up on 8 pounds. Sigh, my little doll baby is growing up.

Clare in her crib

Mama with Clare in the sling

Clare at 3 Weeks

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It’s hard to believe, but our Clare has now been on ‘the outside’ for 3 weeks now. The first two weeks seemed like an eternity (mostly in a good way) but the last week has flown by. I think it’s partly because we’re getting into a little more of the routine of this parenting thing and because it was a very busy week. Jeremy’s mom Teresa (Grandma T) and Aunt Donna (who we’ve named Auntie Donna the Great, since it’s more fitting than Great Aunt Donna), and my brother and sister-in-law, Uncle JP and Auntie Debbie, all came to visit over the week and weekend. Teresa got in first and Clare and I met her at the airport. Clare decided to greet her grandmother for the first time by throwing a royal fit over being hungry. Fortunately, we found a nice chair in a private spot and Clare and I had our first airport nursing experience. Welcome to PDX Grandma T!
We had a wonderful visit with Teresa and Donna, who both just loved our little girl. With them in town, not to mention JP and Debbie, little Clare wasn’t out of someone’s arms until Saturday night. It was pretty sweet.
Clare is growing like a little weed. Yesterday she weighed in at 7 lbs 4 ozs at the pediatricians. This is an average of an ounce a day weight gain from the week before. It makes sense to me, since the kid wants to eat what seems like all the time. The pediatrician was thrilled with her weight gain and J and I are relieved to know that we seem to be doing something right. We were a little bit concerned because she’s started sleeping for really long periods at night (sometimes up to 7 hours!). I felt bad being worried about this (not that I was complaining, but I was a little worried) but the pediatrician assured us that as long as she keeps gaining weight then she can sleep for as long as she wants. For any Mom’s out there who are reading this and giving the blog the stink eye over an newborn who sleeps for 7 hours at a stretch at night, rest assure that Clare acted like a normal newborn the last two nights and woke up every 3 hours to eat. Sigh – it was nice while it lasted. We’ll see what tonight brings.

Oh! I almost forgot the biggest news of the week. Clare has started smiling! I don’t have a picture of it yet, but trust me, it’s a sight to behold. It usually happens after a big meal and the first few smiles seemed to be in relation to having a full tummy, not necessarily in response to what she was looking at (except the first smile, which happened when she was looking at Grandma T – I’m sure that was all about Grandma!). However, the last couple of days she’s started to smile specifically at people and last night I got my first smile directed at me. It was magic. I hope to get a picture soon to share.