Grandpa's Magic Touch

My parents came up this past weekend specifically so they could see Eddie. It had been five whole weeks since they'd last seen him and he had many new skills to show off (eating, sitting, almost crawling, saying "d" sounds, and a new tooth).

On Saturday my dad took Eddie on a walk around the neighborhood to look at all the plants while I got breakfast ready. These little walks are something Eddie and I do together on the mornings that I'm home with him, or any time he's being fussy. He likes to be outside and he LOVES touching all the plants while I explain what they are (or what color, texture, scent they are).

I got a few pictures when they were headed back home:
Apparently the walk was so calming that Eddie fell asleep halfway through the neighborhood:
Isn't that precious?
...And then Eddie heard my voice, woke up, and started fussing when he realized he wasn't in my arms:

Pants?

Eddie's rump has had a minor rash that comes and goes for a while, probably due to friction (since he's so dang squirmy now). I am paranoid that it will get worse so I've been keeping him diaperless as much as possible. When we're inside the house I keep him in the kitchen (where there is linoleum) or on a waterproof mattress cover thing to soak up the inevitable pee. Cassie has also kept his tush uncovered when he plays outside at her house.

Fresh air really seems to work wonders (and probably just not having the diaper on there to rub on his skin helps, too). Lucky for us, the weather has been ah-mazing the last couple of weeks so we've hung out on the patio a lot.
It is clear that Eddie loves being nekid.

Stuck in Reverse

Eddie is this close to crawling. Right now he can only push himself backward, which is frustrating for him but funny for us.

You never know what nook or cranny you'll find him wedged into when you come into the room after a brief absence. Being the wonderful mother that I am, I usually don't rescue him right away and instead I take a picture first. (He'll thank me someday.)

The Big Two-Eight

Happy birthday to me! Friday was my 28th birthday and lucky for me Dave and I got to go out to celebrate. Alone. Sans baby. Got to eat with BOTH hands and have REAL conversations that did not include phrases such as, "Can you eat a little faster so I can give you the baby so I can eat?" It was heavenly.

After school that day we played on the patio until it was time for Eddie's bedtime routine. He was out like a light by 8pm and our friends Brian and Melissa agreed to come hang out at the house while we went out for all-you-can-eat sushi (free on your birthday). Brian, bless his heart, came over at 8pm even though Melissa (who has all the baby-watching experience) couldn't get there until 8:30pm. We made sure to put Eddie in a disposable diaper just in case Brian had to change him. But Eddie's such a good boy and he didn't wake up so they didn't have to do anything (he's been sleeping through the night reliably since January so I wasn't worried).

After sushi we walked to Baskin Robbins to get me an ice cream cake ($3 off coupon and a free scoop when you join the birthday club!). Brian and Melissa stayed to enjoy the delicious mint chip cake with us. It was a great birthday!

Since 28 is a boring number and a boring birthday, all I could think to write on the cake was 7 times 4...next year will be cooler (okay, okay, dorkier) because 29 is a prime number!

My birthday present from Dave was a new kitchen faucet, which I've been wanting forever. There was nothing wrong with our old one...it was just ghetto. And I wanted something a lot taller so washing big pots (like the canner) wouldn't be so difficult.

Eddie was such a good helper for Dave while he was working under the sink. (Am I a terrible mom for letting my 7 month old chew on a grubby metal wrench? Eh...)Before (nasty):After (beautiful):

Relationships

There is an inverse relationship between my blogging frequency and how nice the weather is: less blogging happens when the weather is good. I spend all my time outside gardening or hanging clothes on the line when the weather is nice instead of sitting at the computer during Eddie's naps.

Of course, there is also a relationship between the weather and the number of pictures I take. Over the last week Eddie and I have spent nearly all of his wakeful hours outside on the patio and I've taken roughly a million pictures of him. But I can't post any right now...

My laptop's hard drive fried and during Dave's last attempt to recover some of the data last Friday, it completely died (won't even power up anymore). So I'm still using a temporary laptop, which has no pictures stored on it, and therefore can't even post an old picture for your viewing pleasure.

So stay tuned! I'll try to post some pictures tonight and put into words just how wonderful this past weekend was (I really wish it would never have ended).

On the Mend

Wow--this time last week everything started to go wrong. Eddie was getting fussier by the day from cutting teeth, my infection started getting REALLY bad, my hard drive fried, and eventually my back went out.

But things are looking up!

Eddie's first tooth (bottom right) appeared as a little while blister-looking thing two Saturdays ago and then popped through completely by Monday. He's drooling a lot again, spends a lot of time chewing on plastic spoons, and varies between being super clingy/fussy to being his normal happy self. So I think he's working on another tooth.

My breast infection is basically gone. It doesn't hurt to nurse him anymore and he's not sucking out any gobs of chunky milk anymore (a gross but good thing about nursing/pumping during an infection is that you can SEE the results of getting the milk flowing). Now I have peeling skin from being so swollen (not engorged with milk, but literally swollen from the infection). I'm still on antibiotics but I feel 100% better.

It took three types of antibiotics (one was a good ol' fashioned injection in the butt) to cure me. A breast milk culture showed, luckily, that it was probably just regular staph from my skin instead of something pathogenic (or resistant to drugs). On Tuesday night I had to get the babysitter to come help bathe and bed Eddie since I could hardly hold him. Eddie was NOT PLEASED AT ALL having Jacob do his bedtime routine instead of me. Oy. And I had to ask Dave to come back home, all the way from Gualala because I just couldn't take care of myself or Eddie. He arrived just in the nick of time because in the hours between Tuesday bedtime and Wednesday morning my fever spiked, I was shaking, and all my muscles tensed up. Except for going to the doctor and nursing Eddie or pumping I spent the next two days sleeping. When I walked I avoided bouncing with each step as much as possible and adjusted my posture to accommodate my swollen breast. (Hence my back going out.)

Dave has run something like 8 different data recovery programs on my hard drive but to no avail...yet. He's determined to get at least the report I wrote on Monday (but had not yet submitted) and my R files off of it. Once he's satisfied we'll mail it back to Acer since it is still under the 1 year warranty. In the meantime I'm using a temporary laptop that I don't like much, but at least it has Windows 7 instead of Vista on it.

Yesterday I got a deep tissue (read: painful but wonderful) massage from a sports medicine guy downtown. He made some great suggestions about ways that I can avoid this type of injury again--core strengthening exercises, how to "properly stand up from a seated position, paying more attention to what my body is telling me, etc. He also said I should "not stress out so much" because then I will be happier over all and will probably be able to sense when my body needs to relax. Hahahahahaha. I told him that I have very little time for exercise given that I have to work AND take care of Eddie all the time. But I will try to get a pilates or yoga DVD that I can do at home while Eddie is playing. We'll see how that goes.

My back and thighs are quite bruised and sore from the massage but the lower back muscles that I pulled on Sunday don't hurt anymore. Thank goodness. It was hard to hold Eddie to nurse, let alone carry him around the house for simple things like diaper changes.

So things are looking up! After I mix up some aphid-killer spray for my roses I'm going to go lay on my heating pad for the next hour while Eddie takes his morning nap (let's hope it is a good 2 hours). It is gorgeous outside today...and that means the aphids will soon be here.

=)

Introducing...

We just got back from the hospital after meeting our precious little niece. She's soooooooooooooo tiny and is just as beautiful as her mommy. She's going to break some hearts for sure.She is named after a lot of people in her family. Ida was Dave and Mike's grandmother's name. Rose is Bernie's middle name. And there's a Mary in the family someplace, too. Anyway, I think the name is beautiful and we all know how I feel about names with familial significance. =)

Dave's parents drove down to Davis this morning so we could all go together to visit the new family. They hadn't seen Eddie since the first week of January and he's grown so much physically, developmentally...and vocally. As long as Eddie couldn't see or hear me he was happy as a clam playing with them (he's been super clingy lately and if I'm around he ONLY wants MAMA, no substitutions). It was a great visit and we all had a good time hanging out, even if was for only a few short hours.Right before we left for the hospital, I pulled my back out. Not wanting to miss seeing baby Zennie I popped some ibuprofen and took my heating pad along (with a charger adapter) in the car. I'm beginning to think the universe is trying to tell me something since it keeps throwing all these challenges my way lately (breast infection, fried hard drive and irretrievable files, and now my back). Oy. Dave is going to stay long enough tonight to bathe and bed Eddie and with any luck my back will be better by morning so I can face the long/hectic week ahead.