I'm exhausted

So, Gerard's been out of town for a long weekend, giving me newfound respect for single moms. I'm exhausted. It was the grocery store that did me in. Yesterday was fine, actually. And Solomon was a perfect gentlemen for my doctor appointment this morning, where me OB got to meet him. I also got the clearance to be a normal person again and can run and work out and do whatever I want!

I was a little apprehensive about the appointment, since I knew I'd have to leave Solomon in the car seat instead of the carrier due to the nature of the appointment. It was right smack during his most consistently awake period of the day, so I was nervous he'd want to be held and played with instead of trapped to the car seat. He was a little fussy, but much better than I had feared. With this success, I figured all would be well to go to the grocery store, which was a dire need. I figured I'd feed him in the car before starting shopping, but he was asleep by the time we got there and I didn't want to wake him. So I strapped him in the carrier and hoped I could keep him asleep the entire trip.

It's appropriate to say here I'm not a quick grocery shopper. Not only am I indecisive and am known to give serious thought in the middle of the aisle to which cereal I want, but we really did need a lot of food. We had made it through about half of my shopping when he woke up. He was fussy, but mostly just grunting and wiggling. We keep shopping. By the time he starts crying I'm completely committed to the grocery trip. I have too many groceries packed to just bail and leave. I have too many refrigerated foods to stop and feed him. And I have too little coordination and too few hands to attempt to feed him while finalizing my shopping. With no other choice, I pick up only a few more necessities and head to the checkout.

Here is where I realized the grocery store was busy. Busy with stay at home moms feeding families of 27 judging by the size of their carts. So I park myself in a disturbingly long line, which is precisely when Solomon starts to wail. Like, really, really loudly. It was awesome. I was so that girl. It was so bad, in fact, that not one- but 2- employees came over to assist me. One opened up a checking lane just for me, the other unloaded my cart as I did my best to console Solomon. I was exceedingly grateful for the help, but also embarrassed I was causing such a scene to necessitate the fuss.

Solomon screamed the whole way home, instead of sleeping like normal. I wanted to feed him right away, but didn't want to risk my food spoiling either. Of course I couldn't take everything in one trip, which faced me with an unexpected dilemma. After the first load, I wanted nothing more to lay the screaming boo down so I could run back down to the car faster, and carry the bags up, unlock all the apartment doors, etc. easier. But I really didn't know if that was an okay thing to do. Common sense says to me don't leave a baby by himself. But he'd be in the crib, perfectly safe, for 2 minutes. And honestly I wouldn't be any further away from him then someone in a big house (ok, maybe a mansion...) could potentially be away from their baby. So does anyone have any thoughts? In a small apartment building, is it okay to leave a baby in a safe place for a short period of time to run down to the garage, put the garbage out, get the mail, etc?

Big Boy!

Solomon is becoming a big boy right before our eyes! Well, that might be a leap, but he is learning new tricks- beyond the ever impressive 'lay down' and 'stay.'

He's starting to vocalize a lot more- both happy and frustrated yelps, coos and exclamations. They're fun. And he can smile! It's still infrequent, but he can give actual real-life smiles, not just gas-induced faced contortions. Even better, Gerard swore up and down Solomon laughed last night. I didn't believe him, until boo giggled for me this morning! :)

And, amidst complaints I don't post enough pictures I'll one-up you. Here's Solomon getting annoyed with his usually enjoyable tummy-time, and trying to crawl or kick me or something.

In other (sorta) news, I've joined a play group to try to meet some other mamas. We met yesterday in one girl's townhome- that's already babyproofed! For real. Her baby is 8 weeks old. My apartment is still a death trap. And probably will be until the day he crawls and spins us into a panic. So how do people deal with stairs anyway? It seems that most people put the baby gate at the top of the stairs, but I think it's more likely that the baby could crawl up some stairs, and then fall down- so the baby gate should be at the bottom. Plus we spend most of our time on the bottom floor anyway. Am I missing something?

I had other stuff I wanted to talk about, but I don't remember now... That and my left-hand typing skills aren't up to par yet.

Questions

Why does the boo only spit up when you decide a burp cloth isn't needed or when one is no where around?

When is a baby no longer a newborn- but just a baby?

How does he always manage to squirt pee out of a diaper?

Happy Conversations

I remember what I was going to brag about now. Solomon has become more sophisticated and rational in his communication. Before he pretty much only had two settings: content and tortured. He'd barely open his eyes from a nap before he'd be wailing "Why have you been starving me you horrible lady?!" Now, he has the ability to say "Hey Mama, I'm getting a little hungry. Wanna work on some yum yums? Oh, you need a couple minutes first? Ok, I'll just munch on my fist in the meantime." This dialogue is much appreciated.

And did I mention he's way too cool for thumb sucking? He prefers to try to shove his entire fist in his mouth. He hasn't entirely succeeded yet, but he's working on it.

But back to eating. In conjunction with fist-sucking, he's also taken to pulling down the collar of my shirt. I've taken to wearing really low cut shirts, because they're easier to breastfeed with (well, that and they look good now with my new milk-filled boobies), so after he continually pulls down and stretches out my collar, I'm pretty much always walking around with my boobs and bra hanging out. Which is cool.

Oh, one last thing. When I went to my new playgroup meeting, the other moms were (impressed? surprised? I'm not sure what they were exactly) that I was breastfeeding in public. I haven't figured out how you could go a month without breastfeeding in public. But judging by the fact some girls didn't even bring their babies with them, I'm assuming many are at least supplementing with formula. But regardless one girl complemented my discreetness, and ability to "not make a mess." Thanks...?

Happy 1 Months!

So boo is 1 month old today!

I haven't been posting as much as I'd like, but my internet has been rather intermittent lately. And I've been taking care of a boo.

We've been venturing out more with Solomon. He walked along the Embarcadero and saw the Pacific Ocean for the first time. He went to the ultra yummy Serpentine and watched me eat some red meat all pink and juicy and delicious (I've been craving it since my pregnancy ended and my meat no longer had to be cooked so much). He also went to his and my first playgroup with the local Mother's Group to try to meet some other new mamas to be friends with. He's done really well in our outings so far. He usually sleeps for a while cozied up in the carrier, then starts to get fussy and eats. I do notice he tends to munch on the boob a lot longer when we're outside of the apartment. I assume it's a comfort to him, in effort to avoid getting scared or overstimulated with the surrounding environment. But maybe it's just in my imagination.

We haven't weighed him since his last Dr. appt, but he is noticeably heavier to me holding him with one arm to eat. Fascinating, I know. I'm not sure what other updates to make...

The Boo

So, my apologies for the absence of updates. I've had my hands full (literally). Little Solomon is great. So, in an effort to an effort to be both as inclusive and concise as possible, I'll break this post into three parts:

EAT: He eats. He likes boobies. If I'm holding or burping him, and he decides eating would be a better use for his time, he'll make a nose-dive down towards a boob with no regard to his personal safety or how he'll stop at the boob and not just keep falling (don't worry, I always catch him- but I wish he'd give me a little warning). He has tried very hard to make Gerard's boobies work, but continues to be unsuccessful with this venture. Some days he has a normal baby appetite, but sometimes he really just wants to stay on my boob and snack all day and night. This is way more fun during the day than at night- but either way it's exhausting. Solomon also has special skills that trigger his appetite. He can be sound asleep in Gerard's hands, and I'll just reach out my hands to hold him and he starts smacking. He can like just smell the boobs. Solomon is also very aware of when I want to eat myself, and doesn't want to miss out on a meal, too. Without fail, precisely the moment my food is ready- whether it's milk poured in cereal or dinner taken out of the oven- he starts crying to eat. Without fail! All this eating is paying off, as he's gaining weight, and faster than the recommended 1oz/day ratio, so that's good. He also already grew 2 more inches! And he's in the 91st percentile. I see a basketball scholarship in our future... One last thought- I've discovered the value in shopping around for a good nursing bra. It's really worth it. And I won't even say worth the money, as my new favorite bra from Motherhood is half the price as the Medela nursing bra which is a piece of crap as far as I'm concerned. So it's not worth the money, but rather the effort, of finding good bras.

SLEEP: I think as far as babies go we've got it pretty good. He likes to sleep, unless he's having one of his 'all I want to do is eat' days. We can usually get several 3 hour stretches of sleeping, which generally leads to a pretty good cumulative sleep. The past few nights are the first times he hasn't consistently been content sleeping in his bassinet. One night I had to put him to sleep while in the rocking chair before moving him, and Gerard and I have both put in shifts where he really will only sleep on one of our chests. Overall pretty typical baby behavior. But he is atypically cute with his crazy dramatic sleeping arm movements.

POOP: He likes to poop. His favorite times to poop are when he's eating, and within seconds of getting a new diaper on- like, before we even walk out of the bathroom. He loves it! Not sure what else to say about the poop.