My Norwegian Lion

We laid down for a nap at 1:15, and woke up just past 3pm. WOW!! So that's what a real nap feels like.

My baby thinks he's a lion. He roars and growls and grrrs. I guess he is a Leo!

He chose his first repetitive noise to be a strange consonant and a vowel. It sounds like "yayayayaya". As Uncle Quinten put it, he's trying to be Norwegian! In which case, I spelt it wrong ("jajajajaja").

His bottom two teeth are coming in at the same time. They seem to be already through, but they are really hurting him. It almost makes me suspicious that there must be a third tooth somewhere. An ice cube in a wash cloth provided temporary relief last night, but he still didn't get to sleep until almost 9 because he was so sad. It's funny how much easier it is to deal with a crying baby when you know why they are crying. Teething is no big deal compared to the nights I spent pacing the floor and wondering why he was in so much pain!

His clothes are starting to look baggy on him! He's getting so long and lean.

He really loves his new stroller. It's fun to walk around the neighborhood with it, I can tell it's going to be nice for daily use in the summertime, when baby wearing gets a bit warm. But for being out and about and running errands, nothing beats the carrier. I can't imagine walking into shops, perusing the museum, or deciding to explore a random garden or trail while lugging a big stroller around!

Babywearing continues...

He loves books!!


While Ash loves the Ergo, and I find it tolerable on my back... but I'd like to have a buckle carrier that I can wear both front and back, and that Ash and I both like. So this week, I borrowed a Boba and an Onya. The Ergo and the Onya have pockets, which is great because I don't have to bring a purse or diaper bag. But the Boba seems to be more comfortable for both of us. Darn!! Maybe I can buy a fanny pack and sew it onto the Boba... they sell an attachment but it's way bigger than I need and way more money than I want to spend. The Onya also converts to a seat harness, so you can sit your baby/toddler in any chair safely. Definitely a plus.

I would still like to try the Beco. I can't tell the difference between their two models...except one adjusts for smaller infants, and one has an insert instead. Also to try... Action Baby Carrier... Kanga... looks like you need to have at least 10 babies before you can figure out what kind of carrier you like best!!

I still love my Didy Tai best. But I almost ruined it (shut it in the car door, drove with it like that, then tried to wash and dry it so it shrank a bit). There are a million ways to wear it, like a woven wrap, but it's easier to get a good seat when the seat is already there! The only downside is that the super long straps (which make for a very comfy wrap) make it awkward to use in the rain, in dirty parking lots, etc. It's also akward to wear/bring when the baby isn't in it. Hence the search for a buckle carrier to use while traveling.

Settling down...

Well, since the last post, we have gotten all moved into our apartment, and Luca has really been improving. His cradle cap is almost GONE!! It's amazing. His mood has improved, he has gotten A MILLION TIMES CUTER every day... I can't even stand it sometimes, I just find myself kissing his cheeks over and over... the only missing piece of this puzzle is SLEEP. He is still a crappy sleeper. I have been successfully increasing his naps from 4, 30 minute sessions to 5-6, 30 minute sessions. But he still has night terrors, usually between 3-6am, where he just screams and screams. I haven't found a food that is associated with it yet. He still only sleeps 2-4 hours at a time, and only once or twice per night... after that he is awake and crying every hour. I can't wait for the day when I get to sleep again, and am very seriously going to delay the next kid for several years so I can recover from this. It's serious business, being sleep deprived!

I also got food poisoning AGAIN (we waited a day too late to cook some thawing beef) and then ONCE AGAIN (some chicken at my moms house smelt funky but I ate it anyways) since we've moved in. This is NOT helping my weight loss issues. I have been taking a probiotic daily now, hoping that helps. I actually just ordered some baby probiotics for Luca, too. Breast milk already has probiotics, but his gut is so irritated from his allergies that it might need the repairing power of extra probiotics. I am so angry that of ALL the reading I did while pregnant, not once did any book mention the western phenomenon of the damaged gut = proteins in breastmilk. If so, I would have gone on the GAPS diet before getting pregnant, to seal my gut wall and prevent any of this nightmare from ever happening. Maybe. Who knows. I just know in places where there are no antibiotics/refined foods, mothers don't have these problems of "colicky" babies.

For those of you wondering what on earth I am EATING since I don't eat gluten, dairy, eggs, tomatoes, coconut, or soy, here's some examples from my food diary (almost none of these foods come in packages, because packaged food is almost always covered in either soy or gluten from sharing machinery):

breakfast: leftovers, rice cereal (made with honey)
snack: almonds and blueberries
lunch: chicken or beef cooked in onion and garlic, rice, collard greens or sweet potatoes
snack: larabar, or some homemade baked goods (made from rice, bean, and tapioca flours)
dinner: beans or turkey, rice, carrots or kale or green beans

Today I added some gluten free oats to my diet, since Ash wanted oatmeal cookies for his birthday tomorrow. I'm also going to add quinoa soon. To eat like this, you have to be cooking CONSTANTLY. I'm lucky Ash works evenings and can do most of that stuff during the day for me, but I have cooked while wearing Luca on my back.

We LOVE living here, and are discovering great things about our neighborhood every day. We picked the place because it was cheap and not in a slum, but it turns out we lucked out. There is a lovely park and playground a few blocks away, an activist bakery down the street (they do make gluten free bread, I will have to see if the other ingredients are safe), and there seem to be a lot of kids around because there are TONS of schools and daycares.

Danielle and Leo came over yesterday, and we hadn't seen them since way before the holidays. It is SO SANITY PRESERVING to hang around another mom and baby. I think it calmed both of us down a great deal. The babies were VERY excited to see each other, so excited that they scared each other with their happy noises and burst into tears. Hee hee. It's funny how nothing seems as bad when I'm around another mom and baby. If Luca cries, I just deal with it rather than dive headfirst into an obsessive, stressful thought process. It's so weird how that happens, I don't understand it at all. Every little thing that goes wrong feels like the end of the world.

Allergen-free baking is a fun challenge!!



I just realized I never put or Christmas picture up here:


And here's Luca looking like a BIG BOY in front of our new place:

Today was so great! Even without sleep. I was out all day with Danielle and Leo; we went to Cary (I HATE CARY I GOT SO LOST) for the Babywearers meeting. We learned Double Hammock, which is a really comfy back carry. I borrowed a wrap/mai tei hybrid.






I'm really glad that every mom I talk to says the first baby is always the hardest. Because I really do want more children...I could just do without the raging depression!! I really should not have stopped taking my placenta.

Vaccines

He got poked on Thursday morning... he screamed pretty loud but only for about ten seconds. He got Pc and DTaP. The day after Thanksgiving he gets Hib, then Dec 13th more dtap and pc, and then on in that pattern until he is 6 months old.

He just slept a lot the day after (Fri) but he held his poop the whole time. Saturday he finally pooped, and I took him to the Ross's house for a couple hours. By 7pm he was fussing so we took him home. He then screamed for an hour, no matter what we did or offered, and fell asleep at about 9:30pm. He woke up to nurse at 12:30. He woke up to scream for another hour at 2am. I dreamed I learned I was pregnant again and then just laid on the floor screaming and crying. Then he woke up every hour until 9am, fussing but refusing to nurse more than ten seconds and rubbing his face repeatedly on the bed. Maybe the vaccines made him itchy??

I really wish they kept data on the prevalence and severity of these diseases in different groups, because I have a feeling that my breastfed and not-in-daycare baby probably doesn't need all this crap!!

In good news:




I got a long, thick woven wrap, used, from an online forum called The Baby Wearer. It's by far the most comfortable babywearing device I have tried.



He has finally cut back on the nursing. He feeds are much shorter and he hasn't fed every hour for a week now. Now if he would just sleep longer...

He has started using his little baby potty :)

I think I have decided that my favorite cloth diapering system is cotton prefolds (with thin hemp doublers at night) snappied under a wool cover. The wool shorties are extremely leakproof, breathable, and adorable (can be worn as pants or under clothes, and come as "longies" as well). The Bum Genius pocket diapers leak. The plastic covers are not as comfy for him. The all-in-ones don't wash and dry well. The g-diapers don't hardly work at all. The fitted and contour diapers just don't fit as well, causing my covers to get dirty more than is necessary.

"Waaa waaaa waaa...."

He weighed in at 11 lbs 4 oz at his final 6 week checkup with the midwives.

I guess the plus side to having a baby that screams when he isn't wrapped is that I get plenty of exercise. Pace pace pace pace... he seems to really like Wu-Tang Clan. I think it's the bass? We always play the album that someone spliced with the Beatles. I think it is one of my favorite albums ever made.

But really.. I'm ready for him to grow out of the crying thing! It's supposed to get better after the fourth trimester, when they don't require to be physically a part of you 24/7. At least we get smiles in exchange for crying sometimes.

He got a little rash on his butt that is just right around his poop place, which suggests a food sensitivity. Oh joy! Elimination diets are ANNOYING. I still think it may have been all those muscadines I was eating. This is day 5 of block nursing to try and get my supply down... his poop looks better and is a few times per day now! But he still passes LARGE amounts of gas and cries all day while scrunching his tummy. Apparently this is normal newborn behavior, because the ped/midwives aren't worried.

Found a great etsy shop with Montessori stuff!

Edit: Two cute things in the last 12 hours he has never done before.. he smiled and cooed in his sleep (he has only ever winced and cried), and just now he stopped nursing, looked at me and smiled!

5 weeks old

There was nothing in the world more stressful than sitting in the dentist's chair yesterday, getting a filling, and wondering if my baby was ok. Daddy is awesome but he ain't got the milk!! I'm glad I haven't tried to use my hour-long massage gift certificate yet, I would just waste the whole massage with my separation anxiety!

(And for those of you wondering, I'd rather not pump and bottle feed him just yet, he has enough of a gassy tummy without bottle feeding on top of it all! Plus he's still too young, he could get nipple confusion.)



I feel like he is hitting some developmental milestones today... a couple times when a new person walked in the room and started talking... he turned his head! And he also looks at your face a lot longer when you're talking to him. He was also awake and happy for almost an hour this afternoon. I have never seen him awake that long when he wasn't nursing. He just EMPTIED both of my breasts just now, which is incredible considering how much milk I have. I can see him growing... I think he gets growing pains, because every couple of days he starts crying for no reason and won't stop until I put him in a babywearing device. I think the position of being upright with his knees up feels good. When he wakes up, he fusses until i put him on the bed and he can stretch out... and I swear you can see his limbs getting longer as he stretches.

I'm wearing him right now in my new cotton gauze wrap…. it's a Wrapsody Bali Breeze. I like it a lot, the batiking is gorgeous (I thought it would be ugly, it doesn't photograph well online). It's much more breathable than the Moby, and since it's not stretchy, it feels a lot more secure. It's amazing how tight you are supposed to wear them…really, the tighter the better. I thought I had it on pretty tight right now, but I just looked in the mirror and he has shifted sideways a bit.



That's his "take me out and feed me please" face.

He is five weeks old today. Feels like he was born yesterday. I keep remembering emails I have to return, from people who want to come visit him, and I think "Oh I have time…. oh wait they've been waiting for a reply for over a month!!"



I remember thinking the sound of a baby crying was really abrasive and annoying... but it's different when it's your own kid. It just breaks my heart, all I want to do is figure out how to fix whatever is hurting him. I'm not saying I don't get annoyed but... it's more of a feeling of impatience with myself, like "why can't you figure this out faster??"

Ash is working on a job site with Bountiful Backyards today. Apparently, there is an intentional community in Rougemont! Who knew? My mom took Quinten out to his homeschooling classes, so it's just me and the baby at home. I wrapped him up on me and went downstairs to do some laundry… why do they make dryers so low to the ground? So old people and people holding babies can't do laundry without getting on all fours?? It took like half an hour to transfer the loads over and start a new load, since I couldn't bend over. That's why I can't wait to learn back carries… I never realized how many things I do that require bending over!

I also spilt an ENTIRE water bottle all over myself and my bed while nursing this morning… and last night as well. Is there a stainless steel water bottle in the world that doesn't leak and/or pop open at inopportune moments?? I have a feeling all of ours have had their lids mixed and matched, which is why none of them seem to stay on properly. Because it's not like they are Wal Mart pieces of junk or something.

1 month

Luca was one month old yesterday! He grows a little every time he naps, it's so weird. I didn't think I could literally WATCH him grow but... I can. I can't wait for him to be a "real baby", as my sister put it! He's one third of the way through the 4th trimester and then the more fun stuff happens!

He has had at least 2 or 3 nights where he has slept 5 hours in a row... and then one night a couple nights ago where he just cried for like 3 hours straight. I got him to stop crying once with the magic baby hold, and then I got him to finally fall asleep by rocking him while he was in the ring sling. I think being worn makes him feel like he is swaddled, because he loves it and it instantly calms him. But I never hold him in cradle hold in the ring sling... it creeps me out. It seems like his chin is right against his chest just like in the stupid car seat. Did I mention I HATE CAR SEATS? They need to design an in-arms car seat so I can nurse him without pulling over.

I'm going to a baby wearing thing tomorrow... I'm hoping to try out different kinds of wraps. I just went ahead and bought a cotton gauze wrap, because the Moby was SO HOT and the stretch was a bit unhelpful (and you can't do back carries with a stretch wrap, and I need back carries for when we start building our house next year). The wrap was on sale and I can return it if I want, but hopefully I will like it enough to keep it...because it was on sale for $45 and most non-stretchy wraps are over $100.

I have been peeing Luca in fun places... the bathroom sink, a parking lot, a mason jar I grab just in time from the nightstand... I wish I had the guts to go totally diaper free, but he just start pooping every day and I'm always really surprised when he goes in the diaper (he grunts, pushes, and farts all day long so none of those signs are reliable... and about 1 out of every 3 times he stares off into space he poops). The dryer is still broken but luckily there was some nice sun yesterday so I got some laundry done. I have to use 4 disposable diapers and NOTHING will ever get rid of the guilt form that!! Which is stupid, because every night when I'm nursing I eat 2 Lara bars and those have disposable wrappers... I just felt like I should have folded up my T-shirts before I started using disposables.

There are a bajillion perverts all up in my flickr ever since I posted some photos of me breastfeeding. Sometimes I forget exactly how public flickr is... so I'm changing those photos to "only friends and family". Someone requested I add some photos to a pool that was full of photos of moms breastfeeding.... and I think that's where the perverts are finding me. GO AWAY ALL HORRIBLE PEOPLE IN THE WORLD. I stinks to feel violated while doing something as sweet and innocent as feeding my baby.

Baby wearing!

I made a sling!! I followed the directions on this website, Mama Roo. I met this mom when she gave an elimination communication demonstration in Raleigh last month. I used my mom's old couch slipcovers to make it, so it cost me nothing but time. The colors are a lot uglier in person so I'm thinking of dying it. That's my stuffed animal RC the raccoon pretending to be a baby.





I also made bread, following my friend Cindy's recipe on her blog. SO DELICIOUS. I made the loaf a little too big which meant it wasn't QUITE done in the middle. Live and learn.