Here’s a picture that will serve as an ode to my parents’ kitchen, which is soon to be no more. It will be rebuilt bigger and better but I’m glad that I have a picture of Liam being bathed in the same sink in which Sarah and I were bathed before it’s gone.
So finally I’ve gotten around to posting about the announcement Matt mentioned in the last post. You’ll have to excuse the tardiness–I’ve got a 4.5 month old who is just learning how to nap!
Drum roll please…
As of August 1st I will become a stay-at-home mom!
There are many factors that played into this decision and I’m extremely grateful to have the ability to make this choice. Without going into too much detail it was simply the right choice for our family and I’m really looking forward to getting to watch Liam grow every step of the way! I’m also really looking forward to having more opportunities to see all the local folks since it’ll be much easier to find the time to do more than eat, sleep, and take care of Liam (hopefully!).
Since I’m well aware that the best part of this blog is the eye-candy we’ll try to get new pictures up in the gallery very soon and I’ll try to do my part to update more often especially after the end of July rolls around!
After many nights of horrible sleep with Liam in our room, we finally got up the gumption to move him into his crib on Monday night. It took him a while to get to sleep, but he finally did around 11pm. He woke up at 2:30am, cried in between bouts of being soothed until 4:30am (during which time Dad was awake and Mom was awakened a couple of times), then woke up again at 5:00am and was inconsolable. At 5:30am, Dad decided that Liam was hungry and prepared a bottle, which Mom (now awake) fed to him, while Dad grabbed an hour of sleep before work.
Yesterday, Mom did yeoman’s work in keeping Liam awake during the day. Last night we made the hard decision to try it again. He wailed from 9pm-9:50pm (he knew exactly what was happening), but then fell asleep… until 5:30am!!! Dad soothed him back to sleep and he was asleep / quiet until 7am!!! This is the most sleep we’ve had and the most exclamation points I’ve used since he was born!!!!!!
I can only assume tonight will be the worst night ever to make up for last night.
Shannon took Liam for a walk through the park yesterday, and stepped on a snake! How ironic (it’s ironic because St. Patrick drove all the snakes out of Ireland). She realized she wasn’t wearing green, so perhaps she deserved it.
Liam’s cousin Walker came by recently and the two of them hung out together. I think they might be a little too cool for school…
Liam is really trying to stick his hand in his mouth these days, although he’s not any better at it. He also likes to grab his bib and shove it in his mouth, even though he already has a pacifier in his mouth. Here he is really going for it.
And finally, Liam: The Happy Burrito.
Liam went in for his 2 month checkup on Friday, and he is super duper. He was about 2 feet tall (75th-90th percentile) and 12.5 lbs (75th percentile). His noggin circumference was also 75th percentile. He got 4 vaccinations (don’t call ‘em “shots”) and was very brave- he only wailed while they were actually stabbing him with needles, he calmed down quickly when they stopped. His doctor says Liam should be sleeping through the night by the next time we see him (in another 2 months), and we both nearly passed out.
In other Liam news, he is offically a grinning fool. Nothing makes him happier than being fed and changed, then mugging for his folks. He smiles with everybody that comes by, too. He has also started “talking”, although most of it is gibberish. The rest is complete hogwash.
In other news, Shannon and I bought each other our Christmas present (a new dishwasher), and the Flickr set has new pictures.
Man, this kid loves being naked. He loves having his clothes changed in his crib and getting his diaper changed on the changing table. When summer comes around you better believe he will be running around in just a diaper.
The past 9 days or so have been a little rough on everybody, because Dad has been sick. So Dad wears a mask. Ugh. Liam got a little cold anyway, but a quick trip to the doctor on Sunday confirmed that he is fine, he just snorts and sounds like he can’t breathe. Things that Liam does not love: saline drops in his nose (or eyes), getting his nose suctioned, taking a cold bath because his parents were too busy taking pictures of him smiling to realize the water was getting cold and then peeing on himself after the bath.
That’s right: baby sunglasses! All the other babies we passed on our walk were jealous of the hot shades.
We are ready for St. Patrick’s day with this lovely outfit. It lasted about 4 hours before being soaked in spit-up.
Liam had a real Sideshow Bob thing going on with his hair, but he wasn’t too keen on getting his picture taken…
We calmed him down by cranking up his new mobile with sheep. It doesn’t put him to sleep, but that’s only because he’s not old enough to count. (Counting sheep, anyone?)
A visit from Matt’s grandparents was a lovely way to celebrate a Saturday, although any day you break out the argyle socks is a day of celebration.
No. No, he doesn’t.
So Shannon and I both wake up last night around 2am to the sound of something slamming onto our roof, followed by a bunch of other things hitting our roof and rolling down the side. My mind immediately jumps to the small to medium branch that has been hanging in the tree above our house, the one that our home inspector told us last March to have removed as soon as we move in. It looked too small to really cause damage, I thought. I was planning to get around to it sooner or later, too.
When it hits your house at 2am it’s pretty scary. I mean, acorns falling on our roof are enough to wake us up sometimes. Oh, did I mention the power was out, too? Fortunately, Liam wasn’t bothered in the slightest. I put on my pants and grabbed a flashlight and went outside to make sure our roof was more whole and less hole. It looks like the branch hit flush with the roof, so there was no damage. The branch looks pretty puny on the ground, though:
So we go back to sleep, waking up at 3:30am when the power comes back on. Then, I’m preparing Liam’s bottle around 8am and I here a scraping noise from outside. I peek through the shades, and some lady is parked outside our house with her car running, lights on, walking around the outside looking under her car. I set the bottle down and step outside: “Is everything all right?” Turns out she ran over a cable that was hanging down in the street and it was lodged in her undercarriage. It looked like a phone line, one that goes from the main line to someones house. I thought it was my neighbors across the street, some renters who recently moved out. I was able to yank the cable out and I tied it off around their mailbox so that it wouldn’t be hanging in the middle of the street (I took a picture but you can’t really tell anything). The lady mentions that Hart’s Mill (a street around the corner) is blocked off and that traffic is being diverted through our neighborhood. As she says this, I turn around and see this:
Yeah, that would be my next door neighbor’s house. And my tree. From the middle of my backyard. Crap!
My neighbor wasn’t home, but I called her cell phone and we are working out the details. It looks like her roof is in decent enough shape, but everyone is fortunate that more damage wasn’t done. Miraculously our house was unscathed, despite multiple things falling on it or around it during the windy night last night. Click here to see the rest of the photos / evidence.
I am already researching certified Arborists.
The “More Liam” set has a few new pictures, too!
Liam had his 1 month doctor’s visit today. The vitals:
Liam has a new prescription for “baby Zantac”- although he had previously been diagnosed a “happy spitter”, lately he seems to have continuing digestive problems. He spits up a significant amount of formula, and at times he seems to have discomfort in his stomach / intestines (he will rip a big fart and then feel better). Shannon has acid reflux, which makes it far likelier that Liam will have issues, too. Something like 10% of babies are diagnosed with acid related issues these days. It should take at least a week to have an effect, and we may try a slightly different acid reducer if nothing changes within 2 weeks.
In the meantime, Liam has been feeling better the last couple of days after a few days of rough times. When he feels uncomfortable, he goes rigid and gets tall, sticking his legs out as far as they go, and as I mentioned before- he is a tall baby.
So it looks like Liam’s hair is going to fall out. His dark black hair is beginning to recede, and he has a different hairline with a lighter brown, course, short hair. He plans to get an earring and a convertible to compensate.
 We also got to experience Liam’s first snow! He was thrilled, as you can tell. We spent about 2 minutes outside.
Although we do have the family bassinet, Liam hasn’t quite taken to sleeping on his own just yet. To make sharing our bed a little safer, we got him a little bed that fits snugly in between us. So instead of just me waking up and putting his pacifier back in, we both wake up! He only got poop on our comforter once, so I think we can say it’s been a smashing success.
Changing time is a blast. It typically happens right after a feeding, so we need a burp cloth to make sure he doesn’t spit up all over his outfit. We also need a burp cloth to protect us from his sneak attack pee (we tried pee-pee tee-pees, but they last about as long as a rookie cowboy on a bucking bronco). It takes about 30 seconds to get to this point:
Here is Liam watching the Giants take down Brett Favre and the Green Bay Packers. He can’t believe Eli Manning is going to be in the Super Bowl, either.
Liam is a good baby. He only cries when he is hungry or his diaper needs changing. The only real “problem” we’ve had is with feeding him, which is an ongoing saga. Shannon and I are both committed to breastfeeding, but Liam is slow to take on that one. We had one good feeding in the hospital, with the help of our favorite lactation consultant (ask us about that one). We were unable to have a good feeding by ourselves, and Liam still got very fussy while attempting to latch.
After coming home, we weren’t seeing much improvement. We would spend 20 minutes trying to get him to breastfeed, then we would give him formula by dropping it onto one of our fingers that was in his mouth. When we had a legendary 2 and half hour feeding, we knew we needed help. At the recommendation of another DeKalb Medical lactation consultant (they don’t do home visits and Shannon was still not ready to move), we called another lactation consultant (Anne Grider) to come to our home.
 Anne was very thorough and good at our job. She worked with us for a while before revealing her initial diagnosis: Liam was tongue-tied! He had a “Simple”, Type 2, case of being tongue-tied, which means that his frenulum (the little piece of membrane that connects the tongue to the base of the mouth) was too short and pulled on his tongue, making it very difficult, if not impossible, for Liam to breastfeed. At Anne’s recommendation, we had a frenectomy performed- a simple procedure where the frenulum is cut after being numbed. Liam was half asleep when Dr. Keith Jackson snipped his frenulum, and he didn’t even flinch! There was hardly any blood and Liam didn’t seem concerned.
Since then, Liam’s breastfeeding abilities have greatly improved as well as his bottle feeding. Shannon’s milk supply is still not enough to keep Liam full, so we are continuing to supplement with formula. Shannon is taking a nasty looking herbal supplement called More Milk Plus. Our feeding sessions are still time consuming, and will continue to be so until Liam is able to breastfeed for all his food or we make the hard decision to stop trying to breastfeed and go with the bottle. We’ve been through a lot and so has Liam, so hopefully Shannon’s milk will come in all the way and feedings will become a thing of ease.