Postcards from Michigan

Chicken Soup for the Cold

2009-01-06T20:32:00.002-05:00

Vivek and I made homemade chicken soup last night -- not because we are sick, but only because it was part of one of those cookbooks that has you make one dish and then use the leftovers in a second dish.

Well, Kiren's been extremely picky lately (seriously, it is suddenly very hard to feed him anything, even things that used to be favorites), so we didn't think he'd want any soup (or "boop" as he calls it). To my surprise, he tried some of the broth (but certainly not ANY of the chunks of stuff, thank you very much) last night, and while he seemed to like it, it wasn't a big hit by any stretch of the imagination.

Fast forward to today. I picked him up early from daycare because they called to tell me that he coughed throughout his nap, his nose was running non-stop, and he was fussy as a result. When we got home, he saw the soup pot from last night, and said "boop?," as in "can I have some please?" That said, even when he uses just that tone, he doesn't actually want to eat it; he is apparently simply identifying it. However, there is no way to tell until you actually warm up the item in question and put it in front of him. Only then do you realize that he actually meant, "don't you dare try to give me that food I just asked for -- how could you, mom??" This time, however, he actually wanted to eat soup!! He had several "bowls" of broth (let's be clear, a lot of it ended up on his bib, the tray, his shirt, his pants, etc -- he's pretty good with a spoon, but boop is a hard one for anyone).

So, this has me thinking -- do you think he's actually a grandmother/nurse/etc in a toddler's body? How does he know about chicken soup's healing properties already?

Oh, and just to be clear, if I'd ASKED him if he wanted soup (and I am not a grandmother or a nurse or anything like that so it didn't even occur to me!), I would have received a resounding NO. It simply has to be his idea these days -- sigh. Oh well, as long as his ideas keep being healthy ones!

Introducing the Potty Chair

2008-12-15T11:48:00.003-05:00

We bought Kiren a potty chair this weekend -- no we are not potty "training" yet because we are not crazy, but he's been following us into the bathroom for a good long while now, and just sitting on a stepstool we use for helping him wash his hands in the sink. So, we thought, why not have him sit on the real thing, right? While he's not showing many signs of readiness (which is completely fine at this very early age), he actually does tell us sometimes after he's pooped (it is fairly apparent to us already, of course, but I appreciate the heads up). In fact, this weekend he told us before he did it for the first time! He said "poo poo," and I checked his diaper and found nothing. But sure enough, just a few seconds later, he did. So he's figured out pooping a little bit (but not every time; let's not get too ahead of ourselves).

Not so much on the peeing front, though. He has NO idea when he's peed; in fact, after a bath the other night, he ran into his room and peed on the carpet. He was pretty sad after that (even though we didn't react that much), but basically, it shows he has no idea that it's coming or anything -- far from it. So for now, we're content to let him just sit on the potty like Mommy and Daddy with all of his clothes, and especially his diaper, completely in place.

Anyway, we got the new chair out of the box and showed it to him, and he seemed pretty pleased with it. I was in there with him the first time he tried to sit on it (yes, doing my business, thank you). He plopped down and, without missing a beat, said "book." Hilarious!! If that isn't a perfect thing for Vivek's child to say, I don't know what is :).

Hmmm, has it been awhile???

2008-07-16T20:49:00.006-04:00

For my five readers or so, I know it's been a LOOOONG time since I've posted anything -- sorry about that! I've thought of numerous posts in my head, but I just haven't taken the time to put them on "paper." That said, I'm sure you managed to find other things to read. And I can't promise that I won't take another long hiatus. But for now, I know I'd regret it if I didn't memorialize a few of the things that Kiren is up to these days.

As an aside, Vivek and I are already trying to remember when Kiren did this or that, and he keeps telling me that it is my job to write this stuff down...never mind that Vivek is the much more conscientious emailer in the family (as you all already are painfully aware, I'm terrible at it), which would translate nicely into maintaining a blog; nope, apparently it is simply my job -- so here goes!

--Kiren can walk! Well, he's getting there, that is. He stood himself up and took a few steps on July 3rd, while we were up north for a vacation. These days, it is still pretty wobbly, but he is adding a few more this week; I think the most I've seen in a row is about 6.

--He can say a handful of words. I'd say his first word was uh-oh, sometime before he turned 1, but this is where the faulty memory kicks in because I he's been saying it for awhile. And it was his only word for a very long time. His second word was "this" anytime he pointed to anything. My theory is that we must have taught him that by pointing at things all along and asking him, "what is this?, "what's this?" I think we may have messed him up, but I'm sure he'll sort it out soon. He's now moved onto "mama" (a full week before he learned "dada" -- yay!) And he knows "nana," which means banana, not grandma, but it doesn't necessarily mean he actually wants to eat one, as he ate them for awhile, but now he just takes a small bite and then pitches it overboard. And he sometimes uses "nana" for other fruits too.

--Most recently, he's starting to say "no," but he doesn't usually mean it so far. He does know what it means, though, when we use it complete with the tone. On Sunday, we went over to a friend's house for a BBQ, and they have a 12-month-old who was about to chew on the table. Both parents said no to him fairly forcefully, and Kiren happened to be directly behind the other kiddo, so he thought the no was directed at him. He did a perfect pout and then disolved into massive tears. He was really upset that they were mad at him. Yup, he knows that word!

--Around 8 months or so, we starting doing baby signs with Kiren, but he's not much for doing them back until recently. The first thing that worked was panting as the sign for dog, and he's been doing that one for ages (before he turned one -- again I'm not sure how long). Then he started panting for cats, trees, other things he saw outside. Basically, it was wildly successful. More recently, he learned the sound for cat -- he says "ooow." Late last week he learned the sign for "more," though grunting and pointing at what he wants is still his preferred way of expressing that sentiment.

--He's quite a mimic when he wants to be. Every time we sneeze or cough, he makes the same noise -- so cute!

--For months I didn't think Kiren liked books, but we're getting there. He plays with them all the time now, especially the ones with flaps to open. He still rarely sits still for them, but very occasionally you can get a whole book in, especially if you're reading his favorite, "I See A Monster." In the past few days, he's started giving (open mouth) kisses, and Vivek has him giving kisses to the bears in "Who Do You Love?" It's adorable.

Okay, I think that's plenty for now. And, yes, if you are wondering, this is mostly just a blog about Kiren and our family stories, as I'm likely to stay out of politics, my job, current events, or anything else that might get me in trouble. Yup, I probably lost about 2.5 of my readers there, as I'm sure the world has no need for another blog that discusses what adorable things jr. can do now. However, I'm really doing this so I can remember this stuff, since I have a pretty faulty memory (did I mention that already; I can't remember). And I figured there were at least a few people (Kiren's grandparents, aunts, uncles...that's about it, probably :)) who would want to hear about what's up with us too.

Thanksgiving 2007: The Good, The Bad, and the Ugly

2007-12-03T23:02:00.000-05:00

We spent our Thanksgiving holiday in NJ with Vivek's side of the family, and we decided to drive because we don't want to fly with Kiren again until we have to (while our trips to AR, CO, and NJ earlier this year via plane went just fine, they were still a bit of an ordeal, especially considering all of the stuff that we have to carry for him. Plus, those trips were back when he would still sleep anywhere and before he was itching to scoot and grab everything in sight; these days, I am not sure we could keep him busy/still on a plane, and he definitely would miss all sorts of naps).

First, the GOOD: We set out from MI early Wednesday morning, and our 10 hour drive between MI and NJ went extremely well. We stopped three times and had a nice, long lunch in the middle. It was actually a pretty pleasant day. Kiren took much shorter naps than normal, but he slept, which wasn't a foregone conclusion given how much trouble he has sleeping when he is not laying flat in a dark, quiet room.

The next day was Thanksgiving, and Kiren had what must have been his happiest day on earth so far! For the few weeks prior to Thanksgiving, Kiren had developed a bit of stranger anxiety; he would cry whenever anyone but me or Vivek held him. The Thursday before Thanksgiving, we took Kiren to the pediatrician, and he cried when the doctor held him, even for a few seconds (oh, he weighed in a 22 lbs., 4 oz., and he is 29 inches long -- yes, that means he is still in the 97 percentile for weight and height; the doctor joked that he looks like a 9 month old without the 9 month tricks). Well, he must have left his stranger fears in MI because he was a perfect angel all day, and he was passed from relative to relative. He giggled and smiled at everyone, and he lasted a really long time in each person's arms. And, not only that, he took several fantastic naps. Basically, he was a delightful, happy guy all day.

Okay, now for the BAD: On Sunday morning, we were planning to get up early to make the trek home. But Kiren woke up at least an hour earlier than we wanted him too; at 4:45am, he was awake and crying. We might have let him cry a bit and put himself back to sleep, but we had a 15 month old and a 2 and a half year old on either side of us...so in the interest of not awaking his cousins, we just dragged ourselves out of bed and got on the road. Things actually went quite well after that. Vivek and I were really tired, and he wasn't feeling well (we were both fighting a cold, Kiren had it first, then me, and then it was Vivek's turn, and it was at its worst for him that Sunday), but we just kept telling ourselves we'd go to bed really early to make up for it. And traffic was surprising light, and there were no construction spots or slow downs. During the drive, Kiren took a few short naps during the morning and early afternoon. But we couldn't get him to sleep after 2:00. He just wouldn't close his eyes. It wasn't too big of a deal, but you could see that he desperately needed to sleep.

Okay, now for the UGLY: The last hour of our trip was NO fun at all. Kiren wasn't crying, but he was extremely fussy. If I could have just held him, it would have been fine. Alas, he was stuck in his car seat, and he was no longer being good-natured about it. Vivek was driving, and I was in the back trying to keep Kiren entertained. I tried everything, and each toy I pulled out occupied him for about 3.5 seconds until he started fussing again. I was singing, putting in his pacifer, making funny faces, everything. He probably would have benefited from a stop, but we really, really wanted to get home. We finally arrived home around 5:00 or 5:30, and we put him to bed pretty shortly after that, as close to his normal bedtime of 7 as we could. And we EXTREMELY pleased with ourselves when we managed to get into bed by 9.

Seemingly just as we both fell asleep, though, at 10 on the dot, Kiren started screaming bloody murder. Since he usually sleeps from 7 to at least 5 without interruption, it was very jarring. It was even more jarring because we'd just gotten good and asleep. We hadn't heard him cry like that in several weeks. Nothing seemed to soothe him, either. Even though I'd fed him tons when I put him down originally, I got up and fed him 10 oz. (I had to bottle feed him because I'd just pumped before going to bed)!! And he still didn't settle back to sleep. In all, he was up from 10 to 11, when he finally fell into a fitful sleep. Then he woke up to cry for a few minutes at 2 something, 4 something, and he woke up for good around 6. Needless to say, I was not refreshed from the break when I returned to work the next day!

All in all, though, he was quite a trooper all weekend. Two 10 to 11 hour drives in 5 days, meeting lots of new people, sleeping in a new place, and sitting still for several hour stretches at a time -- that's quite a lot to ask, and he took almost all of it very well.

Baby Stuff I Love

2007-12-03T21:17:00.001-05:00

So I am taking a page from my sister's book (well, blog, actually) because she took a couple of long comments she'd made on other blogs and turned it into a recent post. I don't comment that often (less often than I post on this blog, if you can believe that), so it was quite a feat when I left this extremely long comment on my sister's friend's blog the other day. As a bit of background, before Kiren arrived, I was pretty intimidated by all the stuff that babies require. Actually, I understood then, and I still believe, that there are very few things one NEEDS for a baby, but many items can simply make your life much, much easier. So I spent the months before Kiren's arrival trying to figure out my needs and wants and separating that from the unnecessary stuff; I was particularly concerned that I would spend money and regret buying things I didn't end up needing at all. Thankfully, I don't have very many regrets amongst my purchases -- yay!

Thus, just in case my thoughts could be helpful to anyone, here is a slightly extended version of the LONG comment I left recently:

The BEST swaddling blanket we've found is the Miracle Blanket. Yes, it is pretty expensive, but it is the ONLY blanket that would hold my houdini-boy from the beginning. He was huge, and he could break out of ANY swaddle. The problem was that if we didn’t swaddle him, he was too wiggly to sleep. SO, I highly recommend the miracle blanket, and if it works for you, you’ll need 2 (in case he poops all over the first one — he’ll need to sleep while you are washing it).

We have the diaper champ, not the genie, and I like it A LOT! I can’t smell the diapers at all, it takes a week to fill up (though my 6 mo. old is starting to eat some solid food, so this could change soon), and there are NO filters to buy, so it is much more cost-effective.

I LOVE the ergo carrier — excellent purchase, worth the money. My husband will even wear it (the same cannot be said of any of the slings, I think).

I also LOVE the bumbo. While I agree it is not a necessity, it is almost a necessity for us. My boy, even early on, loves to sit up as much as possible, and it wasn’t until recently that he could do that without some support (he still needs a pillow around him). Even though he can sit almost by himself now, we still use the Bumbo several times a day.

I really like the cotton nursing bras I got a target. I suggest avoiding the underwire completely, even if that is what you use while not nursing. The non-underwire are much more comfortable. And early on, I LOVED the gel packs that others have mentioned. I wouldn’t still be breastfeeding if I hadn’t gotten the relief offered by those gel packs early on; I definitely would have quit around week 2 due to pain. And I hear that lanolin doesn't work for everyone, but it was a lifesaver for me (the generic stuff was just fine)

I use the Medela pump, and I really like it. I have the backpack one, and so far, 6 months in, it is working beautifully. I use the Avent bottles, and those are working great too; my baby seems to really like the wide-mouth and nipple on those (although there is quite a bit of hubbub about bad plastic to read about on the internet — I have decided to stick my head in the sand for now, but if I were buying bottles now, I might choose a different brand). Oh, and I would skip the microwave sterilizer. I thought I really needed it, but I actually just need a bottle brush because we just end up handwashing bottles daily (and we don’t run the dishwasher often enough to clean them in there).

We have a few different brands of pacifiers in the house that we got as gifts, but the only ones my son will take are the soothies that the hospital gave us. Luckily, they gave us tons of those, and so we haven’t had to worry about getting more.

We don’t really use our pack-n-play much so far, except as a changing table. That might change, but for now, it is simply a bin for toys (which isn’t necessarily a bad thing).

We also don’t have a changing table; we just use his dresser with a changing pad on it upstairs and the pack ‘n play changing table downstairs.

The glider in the nursery has been excellent for our late night feeding sessions. And now that he is mr. distracted while eating, I often take him into the quiet, dark nursery and sit in the glider during the day too.

We borrowed a Graco snugride carseat from my sister-in-law, and it was fantastic before my son grew out of it (which was much sooner than most babies do due to his being extremely long); I understand the Graco SafeRide has a higher height and weight limit, so if I had had to buy this item, I probably would have gone with that one instead. We now have a Britax Marathon, which again, is pretty expensive, but this is the type of seat that he will sit in for 4 or 5 years, so spread out over that amount of time, it averages out. And it has one of the highest weight limits available. While most babies might not need that, I am afraid that my big guy just might. I didn’t want to skip this seat now just to end up buying it later. So far we are really pleased with that purchase.

I love our exersaucer, and we got a used jumperoo too. My son loves to jump, so that was a big hit earlier on, and now he loves to spin around and play with the toys in his exersaucer. Both of these fall into the category of nice to have but not necessary…and I would try to get them from craigslist or a used baby stuff store because the market is flooded with them (parents don’t want to store them, but they are in good shape because babies only use them for 5 months or a bit more).

I am extremely happy with our Peg Perego stroller; we have the P3, Pilko, or something like that. It holds all sorts of infant carriers, including the graco ones, it is really light, and it is really easy to collapse and unfold.

We have a swing we got as a gift, which is the Fisher Price Rainforest one. It is one of the few (the only?) that has batteries AND plugs into the wall. Plugging into the wall is a HUGE plus because I can't imagine how many batteries that thing would eat otherwise.

We have a fantastic noise machine that creates white noise for our little guy. If you are thinking about one of these, I will get the name of the manufacturer for ya (I think it is Dex, but I could be wrong).

We have one of the floor mats (the Baby Einstein one, though I think any of the brands would have worked fine), and that has been a great place for Kiren to play for his entire time on the earth so far. He loved looking at the hanging things early on, then he loved batting at them, and now he loves gripping them and trying to pull them closer, into his mouth, etc. And he loves the musical star that lights up and plays a song every time he creates motion. I am SICK to death of the songs (both Vivek and I can sing along all of the classical tunes over, and over, and over) but I can't argue with the results.

Oh, and finally, I learned much of this from Baby Bargains, which is a book that helps parents sort through the needs, wants, car seats, strollers, etc. I highly recommend that book; I still refer to it when I am contemplating a new purchase.

Okay, that's it, that's all I know.

A Bad Sign?

2007-11-12T20:08:00.000-05:00

A few mornings ago, I got up to feed Kiren around 4 am (Kiren's sleeping pattern for the past few weeks involves going to sleep around 7 pm, waking up to eat once between 4 and 5ish, and then waking up for good around 7am). For once, I managed to get out of the bed without waking up Vivek. But when I got back from putting Kiren back to sleep, Vivek was awake and had a story for me. Apparently after I left, our dog jumped into my recently vacated, warm spot. Vivek woke up and heard Kiren fussing a bit, and he started gently poking the dog, saying "Hey Aims, the baby is fussing -- he might be hungry." Needless to say, Bailey didn't respond as he expected, so he woke up further to see why I was ignoring him. He was pretty startled when he realized it was Bailey instead of me!

I Love My Wolverines!

2007-11-03T13:05:00.000-04:00

This past Thursday evening, we took Kiren to his first basketball game. We had season tickets to basketball last year, and despite being some of the only people in the stadium (MI is not that good at basketball, typically), we really enjoyed ourselves. So we decided to get season tickets again this year. The Wolverines have a new head coach, so there is even a bit of a buzz around the team (this is still mainly a football town, though). The Big 10 has a dumb rule that requires everyone to have a ticket -- yes, that's right, our 5.5 month old has to have his own ticket. Luckily the tickets for basketball aren't all that expensive (did I mention we're not very good?).

The evening games usually start at 7, which is just about the time that Kiren typically goes to bed. So we're a bit worried that this is going to be a challenging season. For any game that we really, really want to watch, we'll get a babysitter, but we're going to try to take Kiren to as many of the other games as possible because we don't care if we have to leave early.

On Thursday evening, for that first first game, our goal was just to make it to halftime. It was an exhibition against Ferris State, so we were pretty sure that we wouldn't be missing a close game. Kiren was an angel, and we made it WAY past halftime. He didn't get fussy until well into the second half. He seemed to be pretty intrigued by the motion on the court (we sit in the upper deck, so it must have looked a bit like television to him, which also catches his eye quite often), and I think he liked the band music too. Michigan was up by almost 40 points or something, so we felt it was safe to leave with about 8 minutes to go.

All in all, it was an excellent outing and it hopefully bodes well for the rest of the season -- go Blue!!

Yum, Rice Cereal

2007-11-03T12:45:00.000-04:00

Just before our four month appointment, Kiren was going through a big growth spurt, and I didn't feel that I had enough milk for him during our breastfeeding sessions (or I had just enough to keep him from fussing, but not enough to be sure that he didn't want just a little more). After a few days, I called our pediatrician's office to see if I could try to some solid food to supplement. The nurse said that the very, very earliest they suggest solid food is four months, so she felt we should wait. Just about the time I needed to decide whether to listen that advice, Kiren stopped eating as much (and my milk supply likely adjusted too). We made it to the four month appointment, and the doc said that it wasn't necessary, but we were welcome to try some solid food if we wanted. So we tried some very liquid-y rice cereal that very evening, and Kiren had no idea what to do with it. He didn't know how to swallow it, so it ended up all over his chin and outfit. We could see that he wasn't ready for solids, so we waited another month.

I tried it again on October 9th, and Kiren still wasn't sure what to do with the food. I probably would have waited a few more weeks before trying again, but during the next week, Kiren started watching us eat very intently and opening his mouth when we were taking a bite.

So we tried rice cereal again just a week later (Oct. 16th) to see if he'd figured out what to do with the food. As we were beginning, my never-can-be-still boy was flailing his arms about. Vivek asked me if I wanted him to hold Kiren's arms down, and I assured him I had it. A few seconds later, rice cereal was all over my shirt, my pants, the floor, the high chair, and, of course, Kiren's face and hair. Kiren had managed to bring his arms down and flip over the entire bowl of food I was holding. Through laughter, I scooped a few spoonfuls off the tray to see if it was going to work this time. Sure enough, Kiren had figured out how to swallow food. That didn't mean that it didn't get all over him after that; to the contrary, half of every bite ended up on his chin or shirt. But since he seemed to like those few bites okay, I made another bowl of cereal, and he gobbled it up the entire bowl. Here's a series of pics taken during that feeding (if you look closely, he has cereal all over him).

The last one makes it seem that he loves the food, and it is definitely the best smile we've ever caught on camera. But in truth, Vivek was behind me making Kiren giggle.

Since then, we've given him some rice cereal every day between regular feedings, and it seems to be going just fine. Last week, Vivek branched out and tried applesauce, and I tried it again the next day. That was not a hit, at all. Kiren made the most sour face I've ever seen. Since then, he's also made a sour face at the banana baby food. Hmm, he doesn't seem to like anything with taste!
As sour as this face is, it doesn't even do justice to the first face he made.

Extreme Garage Makeover

2007-10-27T14:43:00.000-04:00

We have a dog, and we walk her quite frequently. During those walks, my neighbors have their garage doors up, and I am able to see that many of them have very nice, functional garages. By contrast, our garage was completely unfinished and pretty ugly. The original builders hung drywall, added tape and one coat of mud, and then did nothing further. That was 7 years ago, and the original owners didn't do anything in the garage but hang a few hooks (but they didn't put them in the studs, so they were coming out of the drywall).

I guess you could say I had garage envy. Recently, though, that all changed. My dad came to visit us at the beginning of this month, and while he was here, he finished our garage for us.

My dad added several more coats of mud and then painted it. Our garage is now a very pleasant light yellow (I couldn't stand the idea that he'd do all that work for just a white garage, so I chose yellow, instead). We painted the door into the house a dark blue, so we almost have a maize and blue garage in honor of being MI Wolverine fans. With the help of my uncle Hughy, Dad also added a hole in the ceiling and an attic ladder so we can access the space above the garage for storage. We even have baseboards! Yup, that's right, we probably have the only garage on the block (maybe in the whole town) with beautiful white baseboards. If there was any heat out there, you could lay a carpet and add a couch for another living room -- that is how nice our garage is now.

Now Vivek and I just have to hang some hooks -- in the studs, of course -- and add some shelving. But we are light-years ahead of where we were before Dad arrived. Thanks Dad; you are the best!!

p.s. I am too new to blogging to have thought of taking a before picture and an after picture for my "audience." Oops! I will take an after picture and post it when I can, though.

Four Month Doctor's Visit

2007-10-16T22:44:00.000-04:00

This is long overdue, but here goes anyway. On September 12th, we went to the doc for Kiren's 4 month visit. He weighed in at 18 lbs, 13 oz, and 28 and 3/8ths inches long. That means he is still 2 standard deviations above the 95th percentile in weight and more than 2 standard deviations above it in height, so he hasn't slowed down yet. The doctor said that Kiren is going to be one of those kids that wants to walk as soon as possible, so he'll just fall down as often as he has to in order to figure it out; he won't be one of those kids who waits until 15 months when the muscles are all in place so that he doesn't have to fall down. He concluded that Kiren will be a "needs to achieve" kind of baby. I believe the doctor on this. For the last month, Kiren has been doing everything he can to reach whatever item he sets his sights on. When he is on his tummy, he'll push off and launch himself forward if we hold his feet. He can also slowly turn himself in a circle to reach new items; with Vivek the other day, he completed a 360. In the last couple of days, he's even been trying to put his knees under his butt and chest. Vivek calls it his inchworm move. So far, it is ineffectual, but it won't be long before he's propelling himself across the room with it.

So far, we've been really excited to see each new trick, and we are anxious to see what Kiren will do next. But I have a slightly foreboding feeling that we are going to look back at stationary Kiren with some nostalgia as we treat his many bumps, cuts, and bruises.

My Boy Needs Product

2007-10-12T21:18:00.000-04:00

Kiren looks like a big boy now because he had his first haircut last Wednesday (10/3). Vivek offered to cut his hair, but when I asked him what he'd use, he proposed to use regular kitchen scissors. I quickly forbid him to go anywhere near Kiren's hair!

Instead, we took him to my hairdresser, Deanna, Wednesday evening after work. She has a studio in the basement of her house, complete with the swivel chair that pumps up and down and the comb cleaning jar with blue stuff in it. She had me hold Kiren on my lap while she quickly trimmed all the long stuff on top of his head and shaved his little sideburns. Kiren wasn't still, of course, but he didn't fuss or mind, either. Deanna did a great, fast job even though Kiren was turning his head all around; she'd obviously cut the hair of many babies before. Vivek took the pictures, and when we were done, he took Kiren home so I could stay for a haircut of my own.

While I was quite pleased with the end result, I was hoping Deanna would be able to do something with Kiren's cowlick, but no luck. As someone told me the other day, "that boy's going to need some product."

I'll post some haircut pictures as soon as I get a chance.

During:

After:

I was right, by the way...

2007-10-09T21:12:00.001-04:00

I was right about Kiren being in danger of bumping his head on the wood floors. Last Sunday (Sept. 30th), about a week before the carpet was delivered, Kiren strung four rolls in a row together and hit his head. It happened SO fast. I was sitting on the rug with him, I blinked, and he was across the room and crying.

My dad was visiting, and he was on the couch above where Kiren landed, so he picked him up and comforted him. The crying didn't last long, but I sure was happy to see the carpet delivered last Friday (the 5th). It looks great, and it should help (some) to protect my rollin' boy.

Poop and Carpet

2007-10-04T17:14:00.001-04:00

We have lots of wood flooring in our house, in the entryway, living room, dining room, on the stairs, and in the upstairs hallway, but I don't quite understand why. The people who lived here before us put the wood floors in, and they had three small children. So far, I don't see how wood is compatible with kids. I can already tell that Kiren is going to bump his head and fall down quite a bit on his way from rolling to crawling to walking, and the wood floors seem like a spectacular way to cause larger than necessary bruises. Yes, the floors are pretty (well, they were before we let our dog scratch them chasing her toys), but they are fairly impractical.

That said, I am definitely not replacing them. I get that they are really expensive, and desirable, and replacing them is just silly. Instead, I decided to replace the 5x8 rug in our living room with a larger rug or piece of carpet. I wanted something neutral, bound on the edges, and I wanted it to be 12x15 to give Kiren more carpeted space because I anticipate his attempts at being really mobile are just around the corner.

I struck out on the internet, so a couple of Sundays ago, I set out to find a carpet or rug at a local store. Against my better judgment, I decided to take a slightly fussy Kiren with me so Vivek could get some work done.

As an aside, it was Kiren's first ride in his brand new, big boy car seat. We bought a convertible Britax Marathon because he is now too tall for his infant carrier type car seat (it was his second seat, which had a 29 inch limit; his first maxed out at 26 inches. Luckily we borrowed both of them, so the britax is the first one we've had to buy).

When we arrived at the carpet store, I started to get Kiren out of his car seat, and I smelled something fairly nasty. But he was wearing navy, and I didn't see anything amiss, so I decided to chalk it up to farting. And then, I held him against my shirt, and I found the source of the stinky-ness. By then it was too late; I had a huge yellow poop spot on my shirt. And Kiren managed to inaugurate his new car seat too, of course. By now, Kiren was crying very loudly, so I set up for a backseat diaper change. I am not sure how I did it because I was trying to hold him as far away from me as possible, but somehow I managed. Approximately 17 wipes later and after a whole lotta screaming, Kiren had a new outfit on, and I had done all I could to minimize the shirt spot (not much). I contemplated going home, but I decided that I'd come this far. Rather, I walked all over the store and just held Kiren over the poop spot. I don't think the salesman noticed, but my arm was killing me because I couldn't change sides.

All's well that ends well because I did manage to find a great carpet remnant that the store agreed to bind and deliver a couple of weeks later. But I have to say I could live a long time without being pooped on in public again.

14 Things I Love About My Husband

2007-09-18T19:55:00.001-04:00

Our 4th wedding anniversary is this Thursday, and I was thinking recently about the sappy cards and presents Vivek and I used to give each other on our dating anniversary (Feb. 10th or 13th depending on which one of us you ask) and contrasting that with this year's reality, which is that we are probably going to say "happy anniversary" (if we even remember :) and not do much else. I don't think there is any deeper meaning to this fact other than the obvious one -- that we are the new parents of a four-month-old, which is consuming most of our creative energy. But tonight, something Vivek did made me smile, and once I got started, I was able to think of a good many more things I love about him too. So in that spirit, I came up with this non-exhaustive (and pretty sappy) list:

1. He doesn't think it is just my job to get up in the middle of the night to comfort our baby.

2. He is willing to be the only guy in a class full of stay-at-home moms so he can learn silly songs and games to do with Kiren. This despite the fact that the teacher continues to refer to everyone in the group as "moms" and said that one of the topics of discussion could be the ladies complaining about their husbands.

3. He continues to load the dishwasher his way, even though I have patiently explained that 4 times as many dishes will fit if he would do it my way. Of course, most importantly, he is loading the dishwasher.

4. He doesn't recognize that we have at least three different types of spoons, so when I look in our silverware drawer, I can always tell when he has unloaded the dishwasher. Of course, most importantly, he has unloaded the dishwasher.

5. He gets really excited to learn new things, often by reading books, especially ones that present coherent theories on dog training, baby sleep habits, parenting, etc.

6. He knows that I am particular about certain things, like not using metal on non-stick pans, and he tries his best to do it my way, even though such things don't bother him in the least.

7. At the very beginning of our stay in the hospital for Kiren's birth, he held my hand while I got an IV, and in response to my cringing, he promised that he would clean the kitty litter forever. This, even though he'd been doing the kitty litter for 9 months solid at that point, and that after pregnancy, it would no longer be dangerous for me to take my turn. I am pretty sure I won't hold him to that.

8. Even though he doesn't like to, and has tried to talk me out of it, he still saves all of his receipts so that I can do my time-consuming (and arguably useless) bookkeeping.

9. It bothers him more than it bothers me to have dirty dishes in the kitchen, so even though he was wary of all of my breast pump equipment that has to be washed constantly, he is the one doing those dishes more often than not.

10. He is incredibly passionate about his work, and he is always on the lookout for more ways to be involved, learn new things, or advocate for changes that will improve his field and his clients' lives.

11. On the last night of our stay in the hospital, I encouraged Vivek to go home and get a good night's rest because my mom was willing to stay overnight with me instead. At first, he agreed that was a good idea, but he changed his mind saying that he would miss his family too much.

12. The first time they wheeled Kiren into our hospital room in the clear rolling crib thing, he asked the nurses for permission to pick up Kiren. The nurses said that since Kiren is our baby, we didn't need permission. And this question was from a guy who teaches classes on parental rights! Truth be told, though, I am glad he asked because I wasn't sure about "the rules" either. That is just the tip of the iceberg re: what we didn't know about parenting, but we are having fun learning together.

13. He doesn't retain song lyrics at all, but that doesn't stop him from constantly singing silly songs to Kiren with made-up lyrics that make our boy (and me) laugh.

14. He's taking four months of paternity leave, which could be a much deserved break for him. Instead, he is teaching a night class, working on various proposals, advising students, attending faculty meetings, talking to the professors covering his cases AND he still finds time to read the entire newspaper every day, do the dishes, and change the laundry loads, not to mention take care of Kiren, of course. I was only able to accomplish the Kiren part and the occasional load of laundry during my leave!

Happy Anniversary, Vivek. I love you!

Best. Baby. Ever. and weekend #3

2007-09-08T11:20:00.000-04:00

Before I get back to the third weekend for the wedding(s), I just have to say that Kiren slept 10 hours last night -- from 8ish to 6ish -- WOW! Unfortunately, I woke up at 5ish because I was uncomfortable (he usually eats well before then, and my body had a lot of extra milk). Oh well, since I went to bed at about 10, that was still a seven hour sleep for me, easily the best since he arrived four months ago. To top it off, I kept him up for about 30 minutes after he ate, while I pumped away the extra milk, and then he went back to bed at 7 for a 2.5 hour nap, and I slept for most of that too. Yay!! I feel pretty darn good today.

Oh and as a note to my future self if we ever do this baby thing again, I think the long sleep is because we are double swaddling him. In the past couple of weeks, he has been compulsively rolling from his back to his tummy. He doesn't remember that a few weeks before, he learned to roll from his tummy to his back, so he gets stuck on his tummy. He only likes his tummy for about 5 to 10 minutes, and it certainly is not a sleeping position for him. Compound that with the fact that our Miracle Blanket is simply too small for our big boy, so he is fighting out of the blanket, rolling around, etc; he just can't be still to go to sleep. The second blanket helps contain the first blanket, so he's sleeping better. Well, that's one theory anyway. Another theory is that we hit the magic four month mark that everyone said is when it will get better (which seemed really, really far off when he was a week old, so it wasn't much consolation at the time!), and it was nothing that we actually did. Finally, the whole thing could have been a fluke, a one-night-only event. I hope it is not the last one, but who knows. We'll just have to see.

Now, back to the wedding weekend. Vivek's first cousin was the groom, so many relatives descended upon NJ for the event. In fact, many of them stayed with us at Vivek's parents house, which was fun and a bit wild too, especially since it included my two MI nephews, a 2.5-year-old and a one-year-old.

We flew out Thursday afternoon, the 30th, and it was Kiren's worst flight by far (I know that you might be saying, hmm, he's too young to have flown much, but with trips to AR and CO under his belt, he really has had four flights before this one). He was not crying really, but doing his "fun" pterodactyl screams/screeches, which I am sure were quite a hit with the folks around us. We know how to fix it -- get up and bounce him -- but the seatbelt sign was on for most of the flight, so that quiver in our arsenal was not available. Luckily, it is a fairly quick flight to NY, so it wasn't too bad.

The rest of the weekend was a whirlwind of family members meeting Kiren for the first time, which must have been quite a bit of over-stimulation for him. New people were constantly sticking their faces in his -- and, in a bit of irony, even mentioning how overstimulating that must be while doing it themselves! There was a Hindu wedding on Saturday morning, and Kiren did quite well at that one and looked quite dashing in his Indian clothes that his Thathi, a.k.a. Kiren's grandma and Vivek's mom, got for him in India. However, on Sunday evening, there was a interfaith ceremony complete with dinner and dancing. He was fine during the actual wedding (not quiet, exactly, but definitely not crying -- just talking some, so Vivek was standing up with him in the back), but he was pretty unhappy during the reception. He was actually asleep early on, but then the loud clapping and woohoos after the first toast woke him up. That meant he was fussing during subsequent toasts, and wouldn't you know we were in a corner unable to escape without walking in front of the people giving the speeches. Later in the evening, we ended up putting him in our ergo carrier and dancing around the dance floor with him some. And then we left early, but we probably should have left even earlier if we were actually responding to Kiren's cues. Once we made it back to Vivek's parents house, he had a brief meltdown of red faced crying (that we deserved for keeping him up so long), and then he finally slept.

Unfortunately, after all the "trauma" of the night before, we had to wake him up to make our early morning plane back to MI, but he was great on that flight because he slept for almost all of it. And in a first for me, I got some digits on the plane. Yup, that's right, I picked up a family. There was a mom in front of us with a 5-month-old, and her husband and two older children (5 and 7) were sitting across the aisle. They live in Ann Arbor, and since we haven't really met anyone that close to Kiren's age, and they hadn't met anyone with kids their 5-month-old's age, we exchanged numbers.

To top off the weekend, we went to the annual faculty Labor Day picnic for dinner. It is great to see the faculty with their families, and the picnic always has cool stuff for kids to do. This year they had pony rides and a petting zoo, which was lost on our little guy, but will be fun in future years. Although last year, they had a clown, and one of our friends said her son was scared of it. That makes sense to me, so I hope they'll just bring back the animals next year.

Three busy weekends

2007-09-04T18:14:00.001-04:00

I am heading back to work tomorrow, so this is probably a very bad time to write my first blog post because I'm not sure I'll actually have time to continue blogging. Oh well, here goes anyway!

The last few weeks have been a bit of a whirlwind. Three weekends ago, Vivek, Kiren, and I went to Keystone, Colorado for a conference. Vivek was doing a presentation, so Kiren and I tagged along. Kiren did really well on the trip -- he swam for the first time, took lots of naps, saw some fireworks, and was great at two of our four dinners out (he was pretty fussy during the other two, though. We spent his first few months on this planet taking him out to eat several times a week while he slept. We may continue to eat out, but the sleeping days are pretty much over). Also, I had a massage, we went for a family nature walk, we had a great dinner with Vivek's co-presenter and his family (they have an 8 month old), and we spent an afternoon exploring Breckenridge. All in all, a great first family vacation for Kiren.

We almost missed the fireworks, though. Kiren was sleeping, and we decided to wake him up to go (I know, I know, never wake a sleeping baby). The resort said the fireworks started around 9:30. Apparently, "around" was the key word because they actually started at 9:15. We grabbed our shoes, jackets, and Kiren, and made a mad dash for the outside. We made it for the second half of the show. Kiren was pretty mesmerized by the lights, and he didn't startle or cry at the noise, so we think he liked the fireworks...although, it could be that he was just so surprised to be awake.

The weekend after Colorado, Vivek's parents and two family members came to town for our nephew's first birthday party. They arrived on Thursday evening and stayed through Sunday morning, with the party taking up most of Saturday. It was a nice, but quick, visit. On Sunday, we were looking forward to having a quiet day. It was not to be however.

That morning, Vivek was sweet enough to let me sleep-in while he was in charge of Kiren (although, truth be told, Kiren stayed asleep the whole time -- lucky Vivek, but it was still a sweet offer). Eventually, Vivek woke me to tell me our freezer had a big pool of water under it. In my sleepy stupor, I thought he was talking about our chest freezer. I almost had a heart attack because I have lots of bags of frozen breast milk stored for my return to work. Instead, he meant our fridge freezer. We moved into action and moved all the frozen stuff we could salvage into the chest freezer. We couldn't tell right away whether the fridge side was also broken, but it quickly became clear that it was. In an inspired bit of problem-solving, I remembered that our neighbors have a beer fridge in their garage, and they leave the garage door open. So we moved all of our frig contents next door. I then spent awhile calling several places that SAY in the phone book that they are open 24 hours, but don't actually answer the phone, which makes it hard to make an appointment. I finally did manage to get a service call scheduled for the next morning, and the woman on the phone mentioned that if the compressor is the problem, we will simply want to replace the fridge. It is only 7 years old, so I thought that was pretty silly. However, according to Consumer Reports, 8 years is about the life a fridge these days -- that is terrible! My parents still have the fridge I grew up using, and my grandmother apparently bought a used chest freezer in 1958 that she is still using. As my uncle pointed out, she has never been shy about putting it to work, either. Apparently, though, they just don't make 'em like they used to.

Upon her advice, I spent the rest of the afternoon researching new fridges. Vivek and I then went to Home Depot to look over my choice and pick up our own, smaller beer (or coke) fridge; we are now the proud owners of a dorm fridge -- I guess Kiren can take it to college (if it lasts that long, which seems unlikely given the current sad state of fridge making).

On Monday, the service folks came, and for a mere $70 (plus $100 for the service call), we are back in the cooling/freezing business. I will just save my fridge research for another day.

As an aside, on our way to Home Depot, we stopped by a used children's stuff store and found a jumperoo for Kiren -- it's a hit! He really likes it. I will try to post some video of him jumping when I figure out how to do that.

Then for the final busy weekend, for Labor Day, we went to NJ for a family wedding. But since it is my bedtime, I will post about that later.

I think this post is entirely too long, but since I don't have any readers, I am going to post it as is. Good night!