Baby’s first haircut

Today we took Jaden for his first haircut. He handled it like a champ. He cried at first when the hairdresser put the buzzer near his ear, and I thought uh-oh….but just when I was about to say “okay, we’ll try another time”, he stopped crying and started to inquire about everything, and I mean everything, that was going on around him. He is so inquisitive… I’ll post pictures to the pictures tab, and below, asap!

What’s happenin’

Three posts in four days was evidently too much to keep up with. By now I’ve probably gone two weeks in a row without so much as a word about what we’ve been doing. 

It’s been busy, busy, busy. I’m sure I mentioned in an earlier post that I finally decided that my best option for next semester is to take a leave of absence and stay home with Jaden. Each day that passes by in which I get nothing done at home (because I’m just trying to keep up with the massive volume of university-related emails, student emails, and student IM’s), I realize that taking leave is the best decision I’ve made since coming home from Korea. Those of you who are still waiting for a thank you note are unfortunately getting the brunt of my busy life I promise the TY’s (as they have now become on my TODO list since they’ve been there for so long they have their own abbreviation) will be out soon. I’m saving the best for last.  

Jaden is doing terrific, except for – you guessed it – sleeping. I had to bring him to the doctor’s office last week for a rash that he was getting all over. Turns out he has dermatitis, and we think that is part of what was keeping him awake. That’s the theory anyway. He was scratching everything in the middle of the night, and every day the rash would get a little worse, which then created more scratching, and the cycle continues. They gave us an antihistamine, and said it would not only eliminate the itching but it would make him drowsy so he could sleep without scratching. It sounded too good to be true. 

As it turns out, the antihistamine worked like a charm to eliminate the scratching, and to help him sleep. The problem it created, however, is night-terrors every hour or so- -including during naps, which is a new one for us. Anyone who has been through night-terrors would probably agree with me that they’d rather be awakened by a cranky, over-tired, itchy, scratching baby than have the emotional suffering and feeling of helplessness while they listen to the sound of their child’s relentless crying, without any means to calm him/her. It really is heart-wrenching to see and hear. I did figure out that picking Jaden up when he has night terrors can be worse than leaving him in the crib. The last night that he had them, I just let him stay in the crib and patted his arm and back, while talking to him in a soothing voice, and believe it or not it really helped him calm down. He didn’t wake up during that night-terror session. The thing about Jaden’s night terrors is that they start when he’s asleep, and sometimes he’ll open his eyes once they start (especially when he’s picked up), but I really think he’s in a partially-awake, mostly-asleep state and doesn’t know where he is, who has him, etc, and of course that would be terrifying to anyone. I’m not sure if it is a by-product of being removed from his foster family’s home in Korea, or if it is just something that happens to all babies around this time. I do know that the antihistamine they gave us for him made them much, much worse, and very, very frequent. We stopped giving him the meds yesterday and he’s now back to itchy and scratchy, but no night-terrors. He is giving us a really hard time about going to sleep now, which I guess is because he’s afraid he’ll end up with more nightmares. I don’t blame him. Nightmares suck.

Mr. Smarty-pants (what we lovingly call Jaden now when he does something relatively unbelievable) has figured out how to open up his seat-belt on the high chair. Last week I turned around to dampen a washcloth to wipe his face with after he finished eating, and by the time I looked back he had unfastened the belt and was doing his ’superman’ impression which is his sign for “pick me up and get me the heck out of here.”

Yesterday (or was it Saturday? I have it written in my “baby’s first” notes) Mr. S-P put a couple of pieces of bread in his mouth all by himself. YAY! Mommy can’t wait until the motor skills are developed enough so that he can feed himself more often. It can get tiring popping Cheerios into his mouth all afternoon. 

He’s testing gravity, along with his ability to balance now. He’ll hold onto the chair, or the ottoman, or some other thing that he’s managed to pull himself to a standing position with, and he’ll do sort of a ‘look at me – no hands!!” thing. He leans his chest up against the object, and pushes himself away from it momentarily so that he’s standing freely. He lasts a few seconds before he has to sit down or grab the object again. Looks like Grandpa was right and he’ll probably start walking by Christmas.

We still have our family room looking like a disaster area with the miscellaneous, random objects in front of the TV to try to keep Jaden at least a few feet away. Every day he figures out how to get around one of the objects, and thus challenges me to find something else to barricade him with. We got a new TV and we are not going to even turn it on to check the picture out until it is safely bolted to the wall – we’re afraid that once Mr. S-P realizes it is a TV, we’ll have a new, 135 pound, “keep Jaden away from the TV” challenge on our hands.

We had a scary moment tonight after Jaden had scoffed down two and a half jars of baby food – he gagged on something as I put the spoon in his mouth from jar #3, and that was the end of dinner. We had so much green projectile vomit that he turned red in the face, and then blue, from suffocating while wrenching his guts out. Of course what I fed him was primarily green, so I half expected to see his head start spinning around. All kidding aside, it was a scary moment, and I didn’t stop shaking for about an hour afterwards. 

Speaking of shaking!!! We had another interesting even this weekend… our dumb ass neighbor (good thing we’re Luna and Neville, eh?) decided to dump cinders from his wood stove into the small section of woods between our houses. Like, um, yes… these are the woods with all the dead, dried out because it hasn’t rained in a week, leaves on the ground. The woods with trees so high that if they fall, say because they’re engulfed in flames, they could potentially land on our roof and poof there goes everything. Thankfully the wind was blowing parallel to our house, and not directly into it. The neighbor went out and tried to smother the flames by -guess what?– putting more dried leaves on them! Okay, dumb-ass, so now the fire is getting bigger, and bigger, and bigger by the minute. I guess he was never an Eagle Scout.

I called 911 right away, before the fire had even started to spread more than a few feet, and I’m glad I did because it took the volunteer fire department a LONG time to get there. We even called 911 back two more times before we finally heard the sirens. In the meantime Neville and Dad ran out to try to get the hose to work, but it was frozen. So Neville ran down with a rake and tried to make a barrier to prevent the fire from coming any closer to our house (every man for himself!), which thankfully worked because the wind was blowing the other way. The fire took out quite a bit of the brush, and had started to go up the trees, and dangerously close to another neighbor’s house, when finally the fire department showed up and used about a gazillion gallons of water to put the darn thing out. While I watched this fiasco from my deck, close to tears, with Jaden in my arms, I had a fleeting thought that if the fire came any closer to the house, I should probably grab whatever we really, really have to save, and get the heck out. But my brain, under pressure, tends to get hazy, and I couldn’t think of a darn thing except for ourselves and Jaden’s papers. All I could think of was, “OMG, where did I put Jaden’s passport and visa?!!!” 

So after the excitement was over, the fire was out, and the fire trucks had rolled back to the fire house, I found Jaden’s passport and visa and put it in the fireproof safe with our passports and all of his immigration papers…….. and Luna, Neville, and Jaden lived happily ever after, next to the dumb-ass neighbor. 

The end.

You know you’ve had a rough night when…

… you wake up (for the hundredth time) at 4:30 a.m. and think “Wow, we slept an entire HOUR that time!”

…which is exactly what happened last night. I was up every 20-30 minutes, all night long. It was a nightmare. Maybe those two hour naps during the day are killing Jaden’s ability to sleep at night. There’s something about day vs. night that makes Jaden want to be up more at night- or maybe it is just because he knows after 2 hours of sleep he can get up during the day, but we’ll put him back to bed at night. Dunno. I just know I gotta get some more sleep!!!

My friend and her son came to visit yesterday. Her son has a name that also starts with J. He is about 5 months younger than Jaden. What a cutie he is. He was so good – and he let Jaden explore all of his clothes without making a fuss. Of course, Jaden wanted to go full at him, but Jaden can be a bit rough (we assume this is a by-product of playing with a 9 year old foster brother), so I was worried he might get too excited and the little J would get hurt. It was great to have some adult company for a while. The weather has been so crummy that we haven’t even been out on our afternoon walks, so I have been getting a little ‘house crazy.’ Having someone here with me to share the afternoon made all the difference in the world. We’ll have to plan for more of these ‘play dates.’

It was fun to see what Jaden might have been like at 5.5 months old. He was that age just before we received the referral, and it was about at that age when the pictures on the ‘referral’ tab, above, were taken in South Korea. My friend commented on how smart Jaden is. It’s nice to hear, because during the times when I think to myself “he’s so smart”, I then question my ability to see clearly. Is he really that bright, or am I just seeing him through my parental bias? Probably a bit of both.

My, my. Two days in a row.

Of course I’m proctoring another exam. This is exams week for my classes. After this they are free and clear until finals week in December. They’ll all take a short break before cramming for finals and coasting into the end of the semester. For the professors, it is a different story. This is when our work gets increasingly difficult. It seems the end of the semester brings more meetings than any other time of the year, and more requests from Dean’s, department chairs, committee leaders, you name it. This is our version of cramming. If we didn’t get it done yet, it has to be done by December or we have to carry it into the next semester, and THAT would be awful. 

Then there are all those exams we gave this week that need to be graded, a final that we need to make, class projects to collect and presentations to grade, and then the fun part… rolling all of those grades up into one semester-end grade for each student. It sounds easier than it is. I usually spend an entire day or two trying to get my grades in. Maybe I”m just not efficient enough – or maybe there’s a better way to do it. 

Not much new to report on Jaden. I just can’t believe how he seems to change with each day. I looked at him this weekend and thought he looks like he got taller already. Grandma and I measured him and sure enough (if we were able to measure properly given the wiggly nature of a 10-month old) he is another half-inch to an inch taller. I’m looking forward to our next doctor’s appointment so we can have her check his height again. It is amazing to see him fill up on food, fill out, then grow taller and thin out – and now he’s back on his eating binges again. All of this in just a few short weeks. It is hard to believe.

We finally received the furniture that the grandparents bought us from USA Baby – so now we have to put together the new furniture and take apart the loaner crib to return it. I really can’t wait until Jaden’s room is finished. I even have some more decorating to do, but I’ve been putting it off since our furniture wasn’t in anyway. It will be nice to have a real changing table set up – right now we have all our changing supplies on the family room floor. We put Jaden on the changing pad on the floor to change him, which has been more difficult than I thought it would be. I’d like to be able to change him while standing up, for a change (pun intended). 

This weekend is a big weekend – we’re going to put Jaden’s furniture together, finish decorating, and make an attempt at cleaning the entire house. If we can manage it, then it’ll be the first time since we returned from Korea that every room is clean, all at the same time. Don’t get me wrong, most of you know that I’m a bit OCD about cleaning – so my house doesn’t really need much – it is just the fact that I can only clean one room on any given day that drives me crazy…. and that is only accomplished by either putting Jaden in a sling, or trying to run around while he’s napping. Of course, that makes vacuuming especially difficult, since I don’t want to do it while he’s sleeping, but vacuuming with a 23 pound wiggly worm in a sling isn’t exactly easy. It is going to take a monumental effort to get this done. Let’s see if it works.

Speaking of the wiggly worm. I believe I have sprained my thumb and index finger on my left hand, and I’m sure that my lower back is going to stop working soon. I guess I should have practiced lifting 23 pounds before we picked Jaden up (another pun!). 

I could probably bore you for another page or two, since I’m just sitting here waiting for everyone to finish, not to mention that I have the extraordinary ability to write pages and pages about absolutely nothing (just ask my PhD advisors), but I’ll let you go now so you can refill your coffee. Have a great day!!!!!!

Guess where I am?

It is after 7:00 p.m. on a Monday evening – and I have a moment to write in the blog. Can you guess where I am? You got it – I’m proctoring an exam. I’m also putting together a slide show of some pictures from Halloween, and the pictures of the favors and a few other things that I’ve been promising to post since “pJ” (pre-Jaden). I’ll put the link on the “pictures: forever family” tab when it is ready. 

I can’t believe how long it has been since I’ve been able to write. Things are getting better in many ways, and more challenging in others. Jaden is sleeping 3 to 4 hours at a time at night. He wakes up once for a bottle on good nights, twice on so-so nights, and every other hour on the worst nights.  I think he’s become comfortable with his new home, it is just those darn teeth creating the problem now. On the flip side, my body has adapted to no longer receiving 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep each night, and I’m not feeling as exhausted as I was the first few weeks after coming home. 

I have been promoted and now have the official title of “Associate companion to Jaden at all times and always within a 3 foot radius.” I know every word to the songs for Elmo, the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and the Little Einstein’s (these are the shows he watches on and off – but nothing really keeps his attention as long as Elmo). I can even tell you the order in which every Elmo ’skit’ proceeds. 

Speaking of Elmo, this past weekend we went to Grandma and Grandpa’s for a couple of days. It was a great weekend. We celebrated some birthdays, a couple of anniversaries (including my Aunt and Uncle’s 50th!!!), and Jaden got loads of attention all weekend long. Grandma and Grandpa gave Jaden an early Christmas gift: “Tickle me Elmo.” He did well with it even though the warnings online say some kids are frightened at first.  Jaden tends to be on the brave (more like ‘fearless’) side.  The weekend was a good reprieve for me from my new job of “associate companion.” Jaden was so overwhelmed by the attention he received from everyone that he took two 2-hour naps on both days, and slept nearly through the whole night. Grandma swears it is because he likes to sleep at her house.  

I am convinced Jaden will be walking by Thanksgiving. If not, then definitely by Christmas. He constantly wants to hold onto my index fingers and have me walk him around the house (or as Grandpa says, it’s more like running around the house). Every day he has been testing the waters a little more by taking his hands off of whatever he holds onto for support to see how long it takes him before he loses his balance. I think he’s given up on figuring out how to go directly from a crawl position to a sit position, and has instead decided to go from crawl, to climb, to stand, to sit. 

We had a fun Halloween – we took Jaden out to a few houses around the neighborhood. He was great. He enjoyed the stroll in the stroller and we got to meet some more of our neighbors. Everyone says the same thing: “We didn’t know anyone lives in that house.” I guess we are very good about turning lights off in rooms we’re not using, and we must be very stealth in coming and going. You would think we would be noticed more often, since one of us is home at all times with Jaden, and we are in and out of the house for one thing or another all the time. It probably doesn’t help that we keep most of the cars in the garage, so I can fathom a guess as to why it would look like no one lives there. 

Speaking of cars; we got a new ’safer’ car for Jaden to ride in. Check it out – I am turning into a soccer mom already. We did our research and tried to find a car that was great on fuel efficiency but also very safe, and it just seems the best of both worlds does not exist. We went with a very safe car that gets acceptable gas mileage, and called it a day. I love it, although it is definitely like driving a tank compared to most of the cars that I’ve had in the past. I’m still getting used to backing up – it is wider and longer than any car I’ve driven before.

Jaden went with us on both visits to the dealership: to pick out the car and then to pick up the car — and he was an angel both times, even though we had him there much longer than we should have. On another tangent: If you ever need to buy a car, you should take my mom with you. She got us a terrific deal with extras that I probably wouldn’t have tried for if she hadn’t been there. After she started to deal, the sales manager said “Oh great, you brought the closer.” 

So that’s all I can think of for now. OH – I forgot the most important – - Neville and I decided it would be best for me to take a semester leave of absence in order to further ease Jaden’s transition and give us more time to get him accustomed to other people (and therefore ready for day care or a baby-sitter). I wasn’t going to take off – but I ended up with a schedule that would have been too difficult to manage if we wanted to continue having one of us with Jaden most of the time each day. I am thinking that he may be ready for a baby-sitter by the time next semester starts (the end of January), but there’s a chance he won’t, and if that happens, and I working a tough schedule, then I’ll be in a bind with no easy solution. Taking time off ended up being the logical choice. It is going to be difficult financially for a few months, but it will be worth it since I’ll have until the end of the summer with Jaden. By then he’ll be 20 months, and will have spent almost an entire year with us. So it sounds like a plan, right? So why do I always worry that plans will go awry? 

And now, speaking of finances, does anyone want to buy an investment property in Newport, RI? The price is reduced!

LOL