Words

I'm not doing super spectacularly today, so I figured I should do something to make me feel better. And spilling it all out seems to help me, so here goes.

I am having a second miscarriage... in a row. I got a faint positive on a pregnancy test on Monday. I was super excited about the discovery of Baby Gamma, and it was even more exciting after losing Baby Beta last month. And because we've trying for a second pregnancy for nine months now. I've found it frustrating, and what a relief for that to be over with.

Only then I started bleeding heavily the very next day. And you can guess a lot of what went on after that. Bye bye, Baby Gamma.

The biggest trial here for me is emotional. Now, both of the miscarriages were so early that they definitely qualify as chemical pregnancies, because they both ended just after four weeks gestation. Very, very early miscarriages indeed. So I sometimes berate myself for reacting so strongly to them, telling myself I have no right to cry compared to someone who miscarried at six weeks or eight weeks or ten weeks.

But the truth is, it still is really hard. In my mind, I can't not think of either of them as potential babies that just didn't make it. I know, in the sciencey section of my noggin, that most miscarriages happen because something was wrong the fetal genetic material. And I certainly would prefer my baby to have a fully functional body.

BUT... It. Still. Stings.

Especially when you add female hormones to the mix. Sounds like a recipe for an emotional earthquake to me. And really, the Atonement of Christ is the only thing pulling me through right now.

I am desperately hoping that this time I don't bleed for an entire two weeks like I did after Baby Beta. Every day of bleeding is a reminder of what I'd been so excited about.

So... here's to hoping Baby Delta comes soon and makes it to dinosaur name status (i.e. past the first trimester).

On that note, I should end happily. Amelia has been so sweet lately, and talking up a storm with increasingly recognizable speech. My Facebook is littered with words she's been spouting out this week. Yay!

Love and babies,
Jenna

Thanksgiving Eve

Note: I started this on the road but I finished long after arriving at Danny & Steffanie's house. Don't get confused.

At this moment, we are roadtripping to Nevada to spend Thanksgiving weekend with Danny & Steffanie. Woohoo! Amelia (15 months old) is decidedly anti-carseat today, of course. She keeps wailing something that sounds eerily like “LET ME OUT!” and it's freakin' me out a little. She's too young to talk! Well, not really. I know lots of kids her age are saying way more words than she does, but this kid uses words very inconsistently. At times I wonder if it's because James and I are usually pretty good at figuring out what she wants without the words, especially now that she can point at something she wants (usually something I'm eating) if a whine is insufficient to communicate her needs.

Amelia has also invented a sign which we think means “hug”. She folds her arms emphatically at times, and we've been interpreting it as a demand for a hug or cuddles or something. For a while we weren't sure what it meant. Heck, we're still not sure, but hugs seem to satify.

So it seems talking is merely a tool for entertainment for now. She has mastered “OH NO!” and “WHOOOAAA” and “MAMAMAMAMAMAAAA!” and “HAHAHA!”. I would find “mama” much more endearing if she'd use it without making it sound like a complaint. She says “daddy” sometimes, but she says it a lot when James is at work. Perhaps she's just wondering aloud where he is...

A few nights ago she said “amen” with us at the end of our family prayer. Woohoo! (Update: During family prayer at Danny's house, she even knelt and folded her arms with us. Impressively cute.)

Amelia has pretty much plateaued growth-wise. She's still big and all, but it my delight she has yet to grow out of 18-month size clothing. She's gotten longer without adding much weight to her bones, but I'm not sure if she's gotten skinnier or not. Still, now the clothes issue is keeping them clean. I've discovered how pervasive dirt stains can be... and yet I have discovered how strangely satisfying it can be to take once-white socks which have been brutally transformed into nearly-black (and sometimes multicolored) creatures of filth... and them make them brilliant white again. Ahhh. So good.

It's possible she no longer needs size 5 diapers and can switch back down to size 4... We had to move up to that size back when she was 8 months old because her thighs were so fat that the size 4s were too small to reliably hold in pee. I got leaked on too many times in a row to deny that we needed to move to size 5. It's just a little weird though, because her cousin Oak (about a year her senior) is only in size 4 diapers. It feels backwards for her to be wearing bigger diapers than he does.

Speaking of diapers... for some reason, ever since we came to California, she has all but shunned her potty. How odd! She used to love the thing. We've been giving her some extra diaper-free time lately (during which I tend to call her Naked Butt Lady) because, importantly, it helps her diaper rash go away and stay away.

So far, our carpet has been completely spared. (Miracles!) When she pees during diaper-free time (we can't always avoid it, sadly), she trots over to the adult toilet and pees next to it. Most of the time. If the bathroom door is closed, she squats and pees on the tile next to her little potty. (Sigh. Really? The potty is right there.) She also climbed onto the kitchen table once to pee there. As far as I can tell that was her only purpose in climbing onto the table at all. This morning she peed on the bed though. That was less fortunate, so I was grateful that we'd planned to wash the bedding this morning anyway.

I've decided to take her pee location choices as encouraging, though. I mean, peeing next to the toilet is almost peeing in the toilet, right?

Amelia still nurses a lot. There was about a month or so where she cut her nursing in half—inexplicably—and then—also inexplicably—she went right back to nursing like a maniac. There are still some days when she shuns solid food and prefers to nurse. (Those days are just a tad frustrating because it seems she is never quite satisfied. And some of those days I don't want to nurse that much, so she just has to deal with it. I figure no nursing when Mommy would rather listen to hours of fingernails on chalkboards instead is a completely okay as a rule, particularly when Amelia is old enough to get calories elsewhere.) Mostly the lots of nursing is fine with me. The increase was just surprising. And she still shuns all liquids besides water and the rare orange juice or high-quality apple cider. Seriously. Picky, picky, picky.

Ug. So just now we took a 45-minute walk around some fancy schmancy shopping center because Amelia needed to stretch her legs. It took that long before she seemed even remotely ready to be strapped into the carseat again. Of course she screamed bloody murder when we strapped her back in.

We still have another two hours before we reach Danny and Steffanie's. I'm really hoping she'll decide to fall asleep and stay asleep now... or soon. [She didn't fall asleep until we were half an hour from Danny's house. She was quite angry until then.] She slept for about forty-five minutes earlier, but honestly, it didn't count for much because I got emergency starving and so we stopped at Popeye's and ate some finger-lickin' good fried chicken. Om nom nom. And then she woke up. Oh noes! Darn it. We wasted our nap on fried chicken. Oh well. Thankfully, she is currently quite entertained by some My Little Pony board books we found at Barnes & Noble the other day for fifty cents a piece. Awww yeah.

Anyway. Speaking of naps, the little one continues to be wildly erratic in her napping habits. Sigh. Well, she usually takes one nap everyday, which lasts something between twenty minutes and three hours. And we've established a bedtime routine... short and simple. Pajamas, brush teeth, sit on the potty and maybe read a book with Daddy, baby prayer, then nurse and/or cuddle with Mommy in bed until asleep. Even with the routine, there is no guarantee she'll actually go to sleep anywhere near the same time each night. She goes to bed sometime around 7pm and 11pm. Doom. Especially because James and I ideally like to climb into bed by 9:30pm.

Oh oh oh! The other night was super special and she slept for four hours on her own mattress all by herself. After the four hours though, she apparently desperately needed to nurse and so I was forced to abandon my book and join her in bed. Oh well. It was a record-breaking mommy-less stretch of sleep, so I was excited. I think she is nursing less and less at night. It really is kind of exciting.

At the end of next month (December 22^nd), I will be flying down to Arizona with Amelia to spend a couple weeks with my parents. I'll be honest. I partly decided to do this because I wouldn't have to ride in a stuffed-to-the-brim car with a whining toddler for an entire 8+-hour drive. Also, if I fly away, I will also take the baby, the carseat, the gianto stroller, and an entire suitcase worth of clothing. Which means there will be lots more room in the car to take extra things back to Oregon. Namely, books.

I am so going to miss Pleasant Hill. I love, love, love it here. It has been my most favorite place to live in my entire life so far. So I am sad to leave. One of the awesome things I will be leaving is a library which is highly superior to the pathetic library back in Springfield, Oregon. One of the things that makes this library so awesome is the HUGE used book sales every three months. We will be leaving California with over one hundred more books than we entered with. I am so saddened that we will be missing on this book sale for the rest of our lives. Le doom.

Though I'm not certain that I could point to any one thing about the Pleasant Hill that I like better than anywhere else I've lived, but I do love it. Most places I have to continually convince myself that I like it. I have not had to do that here. My best guess is the proximity of other Diltsen. We like Jesse and Jenny. And Urban and Ayla and Oak. And I'm sure we'd like Pikachu when he or she is born. (I wonder what they'll name him or her.) And also there is significantly less rain. And our apartment is significantly nicer than any we've lived in before. And library. And everything I could ever want within walking distance...

And even a ward I really like. And the ward really likes us. (Honestly this shocked me. My first impression of the ward was that everyone even close to my age were couples of “it” girls and former jocks. Possibly still true, but my mistake was thinking that meant I'd never be able to connect to anybody in the ward. Boy, was I wrong. And I was never happier to be wrong in my life. I guess I needed to learn something. To my credit, my hopelessness at finding any friends here lasted all of forty minutes.)

People keep trying to convince us to stay. Unfortunately, as I keep trying to explain to the Pleasant Hill branch of our fan club, this would require James dropping out of school and losing all our income and perhaps find a job as a cashier at Safeway or something. And then we wouldn't even be able to afford living here. Doom! And then there isn't much hope of us ending up here in the future because that would require James landing a professorship at UC Berkeley. In his words, he's good but not that good. Awww maaan!

I've spent a lot of time reading lately. Although I've been reading like a madwoman trying to get through the Wheel of Time, I've finally admitted I'm not going to get through book 11 by the time I leave California if I continue at the current rate. I slowed down significantly this week while trying to read Lord of Chaos. I suppose it's possible it's something about that particular book, but I think more likely it's just because I've been busy and super tired. I've spent more of my free time napping this week. Oh well. I guess that just means I'll be forced to purchase book 11 so I can continue reading the series since the Springfield library is lame and doesn't have it.

I've been really enjoying this series, but I feel a little silly when I realize that it has most affected me in the following way: I am heavily considering not cutting my hair for a decade or two because I think it'd be sweet to have a waist-length braid to tug when I'm angry. I'm not sure how this'll work, since as you may recall, I don't like having hair. I have a better chance now than I ever did before though, since ever since James bzzzzed all my hair off, it has grown back immensely more cooperative than I ever remember it being in my entire life. Strange, but I'll take it.

I've also convinced myself not to ever write fiction... at least not for a public audience, anyway. No one would enjoy fiction I'd write because I have the most remarkable difficulty imagining any point of view besides my own in enough detail to write with. All my characters I imagine all act like me, think like me, and speak like me. My brain hurts when I even try to invent a character even remotely energetic or flippant or evil. Which presents another problem. How the heck am I supposed to create conflict when I can't imagine any motives for anyone ever doing anything bad? Ugh. I try sometimes. I'm like, oh, well maybe he's going to do this awful thing because he's super jealous and... wait. That makes no sense. Why would anyone ever do something that dumb? Yet somehow, other authors can pull it off.

Since this realization, my in-head fiction has even started boring me. And since I've used my in-head fiction to help myself get to sleep at night for almost my entire life, now I don't know what to think about to wind down at night anymore. Doom.

Oh, joy. Amelia just handed me a loaded mouse trap—which I mistakenly assumed to be sprung—and it snapped onto my thumb. (Danny's house apparently had a mouse problem before they even moved here, and now that the neighbor cat is no longer sleeping in Danny's garage... Lo, and behold, Speedy Despereaux Gonzales has moved in and is masterfully evading all traps.) And earlier she set it off and scared her. I think moving it out of reach was probably a good idea...

What else, what else...

Ah yes. It took a while, but my body eventually got over the miscarriage of Baby Beta. I was shocked that despite only knowing of Baby Beta's existence for two days, my brain had a really rough time coming to terms with this. I feel better now that I know that this is actually pretty common to feel that way... well, at least it is for women. It didn't seem to even phase James, so for a bit I wondered if I was going nuts. But apparently, I was acting and feeling pretty normal. Once the two weeks of bleeding was over, I started feeling pretty normal again. Woohoo. Thanks for your prayers and well wishes. I'm feeling optimistic for Baby Gamma to arrive soon. (Don't laugh. Sometimes when I'm feeling particularly baby-hungry, I look down at my belly and say things like, “Go, Baby Gamma, go! Divide into sixteen cells! Commence morula stage!” and “Psst. You should be burrowing into my endometrium now. I've made it super cushy for you over the last few weeks! You can do it!” I really hope there is a Baby Gamma and I'm not just talking to nothing...)

Well, love and turkey,

Jenna and Amelia (and hopefully, any time now, Baby Gamma)

Diva

I wish I could tell you that James and I have been super exciting for Halloween and such, but the fact is, we have not. We did not celebrate Halloween at all. We didn't dress up or go trick-or-treating, and no one knocked on our door. Oh well. We figured it was all right to ignore Halloween this year as we may never get to do so ever again.

I am worried to report, however, that Amelia may be a diva in potentia. I couldn't tell you where she inherited her diva-ty, as I was sure I'd distilled every ounce of diva out of my genetic code and, well, James didn't teach her how to diva.

Nevertheless, the signs are there. Take, for instance, her innate sense of dramatic timing. Need a maniacal laugh? Sounds of evil plotting? Incredulous laughter? Indignant exclamation? Amelia will provide it and you won't even need to ask. She's that good.

Next, I have detected a certain love of clothing and fashion. Every dish towel is a chic scarf. She digs through our laundry in search of flamboyant zebra-print panties to wear on her head, and is often found raving in loud tones about some clothing item or whatever. She was too pleased about her new penguin pajamas that we got at Costco last night.

(What does she do with all of mom's flamboyant underclothing? Why, dance, of course! I swear it looks like she's warming up for a dance performance.)

And, of course, she's a charmer. Oh, how she loves the boys. There is no doubt about it--she flirts shamelessly. And no one can resist her wiles.

Now, here's where it gets interesting.

The fact that it is her destiny to be an epic nerd woman is written all over her future. She never bangs me on the head with toys demanding for me to entertain her rather than rest; it is invariably a book that she stubbornly carried across the house to demand me to read to her. This happens something like twenty to forty times a day.

And then, if it wasn't obvious, she is my child... and James' child. She already has a nearly scientific approach to life.

Thus, we have reached the conclusion that she is doomed to be trailed by a swarm of nerd men until she is married (early in life). There will be so much doom.

Other than this revelation about my daughter's perilous future, I have been... stressed. And hormonal. Unfortunately, shortly after learning of the existence of a Baby Beta, I learned that Baby Beta had already met his or her demise. My poor body has been overreacting to this event, and I have felt... well, frankly... bloody (and) evil. Downright grumpy and mean. Quite unbalanced in every way. So I could use some prayers and good vibes and things. I am eagerly anticipating a return to my normal hormonal state.

Love and feather boas,
Jenna

Oh Yeah, I Have a Blog

Hello folks, I'm still not missing the Internet all that much, but boy, do I miss you. Do you miss me? (I think maybe Facebook misses me. It keeps deciding I simply do not get enough updates anymore despite my hard work to minimize what I see.)

Amelia is walking, for real. At a schmooze-with-other-mathematicians-and-physicists party James, Amelia, and I just attended, she totally walked all over the place. Toddle, toddle, toddle. She also tried really hard to uproot the ADT sign in the yard. She guzzled apple cider (the opaque kind). And she climbed a cat tower.

My life is not all that interesting, but I suppose I'll have to come up with SOMETHING I can tell you. Hmm.

Oh, yeah. I've been reading so many books! Since I last blogged, I have devoured the following:

• Mistborn, by Brandon Sanderson
• The Eye of the World, by Robert Jordan
• The Great Hunt, by Robert Jordan
• The Dragon Reborn, by Robert Jordan
• Men at Arms, by Terry Pratchett
• Soul Music, by Terry Pratchett
• Interesting Times, by Terry Pratchett
• Maskerade, by Terry Pratchett
• The Source of Magic, by Piers Anthony

And I am 8.8% of the way through Feet of Clay by Terry Pratchett. And I have Well of Ascension and Hero of Ages by Brandon Sanderson on the shelf ready to be read by osmosis under my pillow tonight.

Huh. Only nine done since last time? For shame! Actually, that's not bad, considering how many pages some of those books have, and how much time Amelia eats like a supermassive black hole. (Oooh, good song. Sing it, yo.) Oh, and did I mention the child has an evil tendency to run up, slam my book shut, and scream like a mini female Tarzan baby? She does. She can't keep her hands off my books. First word in both Serbian and English was book, too.

I've noticed though, that when she points to things on the covers of the books, it is most often blurbs of text, like the title, or the author, or Tor Fantasy, or "New York Times Bestseller", or "sequel to such and such", or even "OMG, so awesome--The New York Times". I sometimes wonder if she is trying to figure out how to read, and then I decide, naw, that couldn't possibly be it. And then I remember my mother telling me I started reading when I was two.

I don't think I realized that was impressive until I imagined Amelia that old. And now I am twitching thinking that it might actually be remotely possible that she will begin reading books aloud to me sometime between 24 and 36 months. It makes my jaw drop through the floor, the basement, and halfway through Earth's crust. I actually find myself hoping my mother was exaggerating, because I think that'd scare me a little bit. Almost as much as it would make puff to twice my size with motherly pride. (And we don't want that to happen, now do we?)

Oh, oh, oh! Good news for Mommy the Me!

Amelia kind of suddenly started nursing less AND falling asleep without nursing, almost all the time. Yaaay! It just kind of happened without us doing much differently. She is also suddenly accepting more solid foods at the same time, but I think that is because she decided to, and not because I've been offering her an elephant to eat everyday. I realize most babies have already passed through the less nursing and more solids transition by now, but apparently Amelia's biological clock had it scheduled for fourteen months. Well, not complaining now.

Amelia hearts grapes. And raspberries. And blackberries. And popcorn. And fruit snacks. And honey nut Cheerios. And almond butter and jelly sandwiches. And chili. And zucchini soup. And Swiss chard lentil soup. And pizza. And chicken nuggets.

She does not heart cow's milk. Or soymilk. Or almondmilk. Or coconutmilk. She tried each one once, and now won't even touch them. Apparently it's breastmilk or bust. (Oh hey, pun! That wasn't even on purpose.) She does drink water though... for which I am thankful. I don't like being Amelia's only source of fluids. Though I suppose today she guzzled apple cider, but I think that will be a special occasion thing. It made her so excited that her eyes went wonky.

I believe that's all I can think to prattle on about.

Love and wonkytizing apple cider,

Jenna

California

Apologies for the long wait in between updates, my loyal fans. It was unavoidable, though. We've had quite an adventure. We are currently living in Pleasant Hill, California in a cute little two-bedroom apartment that is much bigger and much nicer (and more expensive) than we needed, but it is in the perfect location and, more to the point, we were allowed to live here despite the brevity of our stay.


James takes the car to work everyday. He drives for 25 to 50 minutes depending on the traffic... I think it's usually closer to 30 to 40, but you'd have to ask him. I have yet to drive since we've been here. I'm scared of the drivers around here. They are so aggressive! I am not an aggressive driver, however, and so I feel a lot less safe. I haven't exactly practiced driving assertiveness.


I walk everywhere that I need to go. Jesse (James' brother) and his family live about a half-hour walk away... the church building is about that close. There are three grocery stores that I'm aware of within that half-hour radius (two Safeways and a Lucky)--four if you count a restaurant supply store, and if I'm willing to walk a tad farther, I can get to a Sprouts. There's a post office close by, and our bank has a branch inside one of the Safeways. And, most importantly, the library is about a twenty minute walk away.


This is super important because, well, we do not have Internet at the moment. Our apartment costs us, roughly, a whopping $1500 each month, and then suddenly we have to pay gas and car maintenance for James' commute (he used to take the bus when we lived in Springfield). Oh, and it seems like our grocery bill has gone up too. I don't know how permanent that is, but part of it was inflated because at first we didn't know which store has the cheapest Swiss chard and which store has the cheapest almond butter, for instance.


So, yeah, Internet. If we just live without our home Internet and canceled Netflix, we have a fair amount of extra money every month. This has had its disadvantages, but all in all, I'm actually pleased with the change. What this means is, if I want to use the Internet, I absolutely HAVE to get off my lazy butt and walk for half an hour. There's the library, there's Jesse and Jenny's house, and there's even the church building. We have enough Internet for our needs.


What our Internet-less home ALSO means is that both James and I are spending A LOT less time squandering our life away reading everything to be read on the Web. I thought I was pretty good about not idling away my time too much, but apparently there was a lot MORE time I could have shaved off. I've had to suck it up and pretty much hide all but Griffins and Diltsen from my Facebook news feed.


This was, I'll admit, a little heartwrenching. I thought, Oh man, I absolutely CAN'T hide so-and-so from my news feed. I heart her face and I want to know everything that's happening in her life. And then I realized that I heart too many people's faces, so if I'm not checking the Internet every two hours every day, then I will have about two hours worth of stuff on Facebook to sort through every two or three days. Um, doom. I do not have that sort of time.


So I ruthlessly hid all-a-y'all who ain't related to me. I figure if I'm all that curious and I actually do have extra time, I can stalk you as much as I want by actually going to your personal wall. Brilliant. Now I only devote about ten minutes to Facebook when I do check it, and I hardly click on any of the links anyone shares.


I've done a similar thing with my email account. I ruthlessly unsubscribed from all sorts of stuff I had previously thought worth my precious time to look at, but since I now only have a few minutes a week to check my email, I just got rid of it all.


So, what have I done instead of browse the Interwebs endlessly when Amelia does not require my attention?


The same thing I used to do before I had Internet—or for that matter, obscene amounts of homework. (Oh my gosh, that was over a decade ago.) I am reading gazillions of books. Since I've been in California, I've read: Small Gods by Terry Pratchett, Introvert Power by Laurie Helgoe, Lords and Ladies by Terry Pratchett, Alcatraz versus the Evil Librarians by Brandon Sanderson, Alcatraz versus the Scrivener's Bones by Brandon Sanderson, Alcatraz versus the Knights of Crystallia by Brandon Sanderson, Alcatraz versus the Shattered Lens by Brandon Sanderson, and A Spell for Chameleon by Piers Anthony. I am about one hundred pages into Mistborn by Brandon Sanderson and am waiting extremely impatiently for whoever has Men at Arms by Terry Pratchett checked out to turn it in so I can get on reading all the Discworld books in order. I also have The Eye of the World by Robert Jordan on hold. (I've been waiting to start the Wheel of Time series until it was finished entirely, and well, it's finished and now I have no excuse.)


Huh. So I guess I've really only read eight books in the last three weeks, but I say that's totally impressive given the amount of time I spend tending the Amelia-bot. I haven't spent much time socializing with the people here, but I'm beginning to suspect that I'll be happy without them. After all, I have enough Diltsen to hang out with and enough books to read, plus I'll only be here for a little over three more months. Often, it hardly seems worth the immense effort it takes me to make friends considering that it took me a year and a half in Springfield before I felt like I had friends.


The Amelia-bot 2000 had some difficulty adjusting to the new environment at first, but this was to be expected. I think after about three days, she finally started to recognize our new apartment as home base.


We celebrated her first birthday a few days late by eating “birthday cake” (i.e. rice krispies Dilts-style) with Jesse and Jenny's family. It wasn't much of a party, and it wasn't even our idea. She didn't get any presents besides the big box of board books Katie and Peter sent her. (Thank you!) Oh, and I suppose I got her a xylophone, but this was unveiled during the big car ride down to California rather than on her birthday.


Amelia is not walking yet. That's all right. She is demanding as ever, and I fear she'd be much quicker if she could walk, so I'll just say I'm lucky.


She loves bathtime with a passionate fire of firey passion. If I am showering without her... wo is me! For I shall receive a cacophonous earful in an echoey bathchamber while she tries her best to climb into the tub with me, fully clothed. Sigh. And she's close to succeeding in her bath entry attempts.


All in all, this is BY FAR the nicest apartment we've ever lived in. I'd probably want to stay here longer if we didn't have to pay for it. We have a lot of empty space in this apartment, which I've always enjoyed. Space is luxurious. Furniture-wise, we have only a queen-sized bed and a kitchen table and chairs. That's it.


Amelia sleeps with us, so the second bedroom is essentially the play room. And the living room is completely bare, so that is practically the running-around-in-circles room. We have our first backyard (miniature though it may be) and the countertops in the kitchen and bathroom are granite (or more accurately they look granite—I doubt it's real). We have our very first kitchen table and chairs, which is nice, though I've been shocked to discover that Amelia can reach well over the edge and can pull nearly everything off of it.


So perhaps you won't be shocked to discover that, within a week, she got hold of BOTH my pairs of glasses (despite them having been placed in what I thought were secure locations), and broke them, fairly irreparably. One she broke at the nose bridge. The other, she twisted off one of the arms; it's twisted enough that no screw can hold it together anymore. Doom!


I was a little panicked about this at first since I needed an eye exam for a new prescription... and we couldn't really afford that, let alone a whole new pair of glasses. But! The Lord always provides, and we received an anonymous donation from someone in our new ward who recognized a need and decided they didn't need $100 for themselves. (I think it would be so cool to be able to do that. This seems to be one of the many benefits of self-reliance.)


Anyway, so I got my eye exam on Thursday and then ordered a new set of glasses. (Incidentally, did you know you can get great deals on the Internet for glasses?) I knew what shape of lens looks good on me, so I found one that shape, and this time, I got memory titanium frames. You know, the basically unbreakable kind that you can also twist around your finger if you want to. And I even got a hydrophobic and oleophobic coating on the lenses so they'll stay cleaner longer and be easier to clean. Awesome!


So yeah. Amelia the Destructo-bot, should she get hold of my new glasses (and I shall redouble my efforts to prevent this), will have to work extra hard to destroy them.


Money is coming from everywhere. Pay your tithing, folks. That's all I can say. Pay your tithing and when the Spirit leads you to do something crazy, do it.


Seriously, I can't really fathom how we are paying for our little California adventure. The price of moving and living here is so great that it totally requires divine intervention for us not to go broke. I'm not sure why it is so important that James needed to come to this general relativity (though there are some obvious vague guesses, like meet other researchers in his field, etc.), but from the very beginning, I knew he needed to go. I felt like that even though at the time I thought that meant I'd be in Oregon for four months without him.


But miracle after miracle has facilitated this experience for us. First, James' advisor's grant got funded by the NSF—in full, even after the government supposedly cut back on science spending. So that meant Amelia and I could come too, because James will be receiving $1000 each month from that grant to help pay rent. Then, another miracle, we found the perfect location in which I personally would not go crazy. In fact, this is quite possibly the most ideal location I've ever lived in for anti-craziness. I could never have picked a better location if I had been looking for it.


Money is practically falling out of the sky for us. I already mentioned how money for my glasses materialized from a kind soul in the ward. I got a survey in the mail today which I will get $40 for completing, which will cover the extra glasses expense. We got our oil change and our tire rotation both for free, coincidentally. James' advisor let us store all our possessions in his garage for free so we don't have to pay for storage. Some days, James is getting paid $70/day to take notes on stuff he was planning to take notes on anyway. And it even looks like we'll get money for babysitting too, perhaps as much as $45/week. Um, seriously, the Man Upstairs is just making stuff up now. He's not even trying to make up good excuses to give us money anymore or pretend like it isn't Him meddling in our lives. I mean, getting paid to take notes? Pssh. It's gotten to the point that it's almost impossible to worry about finances because somehow, everything is getting paid for with relative ease.


And—there were even miracles to help me get comfortable here. Not surprisingly, I felt a bit uprooted once we got here, and I actually even felt some culture shock. California culture is apparently just barely different enough from what I'm used to that I feel out of place here. After about twenty minutes at church the first Sunday, I was extremely discouraged and lonely. And right when I was feeling my worst, I looked down at the Relief Society newsletter being passed around—and I recognized the baby picture on it. I knew that baby's mother! I already knew someone in this ward. I felt so relieved.


And then we went to a barbeque after church to meet other ward members... and BAM. We immediately met a Serbian woman who was absolutely thrilled to have someone to speak Serbian with. She even brought out her visiting mother (who doesn't speak English) so she could join in too. I was shocked to realize how much of the Serbian conversation I understood. I understood noticeably less of what the mother was saying because she was Bosnian, but I was still shocked that understood as much as I did.


AND. (Yes, there's another and.) This ward is filled with one-year-olds. If nothing else, there are tons of other families we have something in common with—babies. Whabam. Miracles, miracles, miracles.


Money and love,
Jenna and Amelia-bot



P.S. Amelia now has four teeth—she sprouted two on top, though they aren't visible in pictures yet.
P.P.S. I really appreciate comments.

Eleven Months

Gosh, I haven't been writing on here as frequently as I used to. And double gosh, I may be taking a months-long hiatus when we move to Berkeley and live largely Internet-less. I guess that could be okay. One of the biggest purposes of my blog is to soothe myself through write-it-out therapy. I haven't needed it as much since Amelia's sudden improvement after visiting the chiropractor at six months.

But today... Today I need it. I am more harried than usual. I suppose then, that the following will all sound rather pessimistic and melodramatic. Please keep in mind that this is a skewed version of reality and that Amelia is mostly sunshine and giggles.

Amelia, I believe, is kind of in between the baby and toddler stages. I think they call it the "older baby" stage. Yes, she's mobile. Horizontally, vertically, diagonally, diurnally, nocturnally, you name it and chances are... she is indeed mobile in the manner of that adverb. The stairs are kind of a scary place for me. If I set her down, she makes a beeline for them. I sometimes feel as if she's trying to become stairmaster within the week or something. Stair fetishes are scary things.

I'm grateful that she isn't walking yet... I have a nasty feeling that she'll get speedier once she can actually run anywhere she wants to. Oh, and not to mention that she'll be able to get into more things. Doom.

The little lady is insatiably curious. She loves water, which is also a tad scary. Another thing she makes a beeline for... the toilet. I am glad we have a toilet lock, as annoying as it is. I am dreading the day she figures it out, for then I'd have to worry about her possibly playing in it, drowning in it, splashing its unsanitary water all over the bathroom, flushing valuables down it, etc.

Ay caramba.

Oh, and yes, we are still doing that elimination communication thing. With mobility, though, came a newfound desire to NOT sit on the potty for longer than is absolutely necessary, because that is BOR-ING! So... yeah. She's in a "I'm way too busy to sit on a potty. I'd rather pee while exploring the house!" phase. It's mildly frustrating when I know the little vixen needs to release a turd, but she won't sit on the pot. And then it gets even more scream-inducing when she does poo in her diaper... and by the time we notice that she's soiled herself and change the offending diaper, her bum is already bleeding from poo exposure. And, gosh, is it difficult to get all the fecal matter out of all the nooks and crannies of a wriggly, writhing female baby... bleeding bum or no bleeding bum. Diapering a mobile baby is quite the adventure.

Amelia eats everything. She can handle pretty much anything we're willing to give her. Recent favorites include air-popped popcorn, strawberries, pineapple, bread, pizza, chicken nuggets, and... well, ANYTHING that we happen to be eating. Sometimes I just don't see the point of giving her "her own" portion, because she won't eat what we give her. She much prefers to steal our portions.

The baby lady is absolutely convinced that if she sleeps, she will miss out on all the wonders of the world. So, of course, she resists falling asleep no matter how tired she is. It is a rare occasion when she falls asleep without lots of help. And help usually means that I nurse her for five to sixty minutes. (Ugh. The sixty minutes gets a little laborious. And then it gets frustrating when it takes sixty minutes to get her to sleep... and then she only sleeps for a grand total of twenty minutes. Gross.) Sure, I admit it could be possible that we are encouraging a bad habit here, but SHE WILL NOT GO TO SLEEP ANY OTHER WAY, so it's not like we presently have much of a choice if we want any semblance of rest and sanity in our house.

We had made some progress getting Amelia to fall asleep without the breast... but she got sick a few weeks ago, and all that progress went out the window. She was miserable. And then she got so plugged up in her nasal passages that it was impossible to breathe while nursing... which lead to her first ever nursing strike! Doom!

And remember now that she doesn't go to sleep without nursing. But now she couldn't/ wouldn't nurse, and so... the miserable, sick, starving baby would not sleep and was SUPER DUPER GRUMPY.

I suppose if I had been better rested (i.e. not dealing with a miserable, sick, starving baby who would not sleep and was super duper grumpy), I would have been wise and thought, "Oh, I should take special care not to get engorged. It would be bad if I got a plugged duct. Or mastitis."

Buuuut. I was NOT well rested, and I was actually also sick with the same illness that had Amelia under the weather, so I did not think this thought. Thus, disaster struck.

I went to bed feeling like the symptoms of my respiratory viral illness were finally fading (hallelujah!), and I remember thinking these words: Gosh, tomorrow I'm going to feel fabulous, I can tell.

...

Well, no. I did not feel fabulous. Definitely not. I woke up about two hours after drifting off to sleep imagining how fabulous I'd feel upon waking... FREEZING. I was convinced that it must have been like fifty degrees in that room. And cuddling with mini-space-heater (a.k.a. Amelia) was not warming me up sufficiently. I was so cold, in fact, that my teeth were chattering uncontrollably... and also, my whole body was seizing and shivering... and I was just flat-out miserably cold. Doom.

So, I cuddle up with James. Also, I chatter my teeth loudly in his ear.

This grumpifies him. Also, he icily informs me that it is NOT cold in the room and I should take my temperature. It was difficult to do so, as I was shivering and chattering so badly, but I did manage to find that my temperature was nearly 103°F.

Anyway, I somehow made it through the night. Mostly with the help of my martyr of a husband who sacrificed being not-too-hot and let me cuddle him until my hypothalamus finally determined I was hot enough to kill demons and I stopped shivering uncontrollably.

It was mastitis. I was pretty sure it was, because when I woke up with that fever, I also had a plugged duct that magically appeared out of nowhere. So, besides all the usual advice you get to treat mastitis (which I followed), I also had to see the midwife to get antibiotics... Apparently one of the indications that antibiotics might be appropriate is if the symptoms come on severely and suddenly, and that certainly seemed to be the case for me.

Anyway, Amelia STILL refused to nurse, so I had to fish out my breast pump. And we had to syringe the pumped milk into her face in order to quell her starving and exhausted screams. I kept trying to offer her the breast, but all she would do is bite me. Hard. (Ouch!) And then scream even more when I wouldn't put her back on the breast for a replay of said piranha action. So yeah. We didn't nurse for a couple days until her nose deplugged.

It sucked. (Oh ha, pun! I didn't even do that on purpose.)

And I was exhausted and under the weather for another few weeks, and Amelia hasn't gotten into a happy sleep routine since then, and seriously... the child is probably sleep-deprived, but I CAN'T get the kid to sleep for very long. The world is too darned interesting.

We've also found it difficult to get her to sleep at night. Instead of falling asleep once the lights are out, instead she will crawl all over and inspect stuff and giggle and scream loudly, and pound on the wall that separates our bedroom from the jumpy neighbor's bedroom. (Doom.)

Despite the lack of sleep... Amelia seems as happy as ever. She's grinning from ear to ear most of the time. She giggles a lot. She laughs heartily: "HAR HAR HAR! HOO HOO HAA!" She giggles some more. And she says, "Giggle-giggle-gogle-giggle-gogle-gogle-gogle!" Just like that. She squeals in delight when people (familiar or stranger) talk to her and smile at her. Happy baby.

Ay caramba... so tired.

Love and giggle-giggle-gogle-giggle-gogle-gogle-gogle,
Jenna and Amelia

Mobile, Vocal, and Fanged (Er... I Mean Tooth'ed)

Amelia is a different baby woman... compared to my last report anyway. On Thursday she will be ten months old!

Earlier this week, she progressed from that nebulous state where she can move, but not purposefully in the right direction, to where she can move in whichever direction she decides to go. Let the (more) chaos begin!

Well, of course, her first target was me. Once she succeeding in achieving this goal, she realized that she could go wherever she pleased... and thus, she immediately turned around and headed for our tall, rickety, overburdened bookshelf, babbling a triumphant "booh, booh, booh!" as she went. And proceeded to pull expensive (and fairly new) Brandon Sanderson novels off the bottom bookshelves. Before she destroyed all the dust covers and ate all the About the Author pages, I distracted her with board books (and grandma) and immediately set to packing all our books safely into boxes.

I suppose that if you were unfamiliar with the extreme ricketiness of our bookshelves and our plans to move in two months or so, this course of action might seem a little extreme.

Well, here was my course of logic.

The bookshelf in question was basically five planks with thick plastic sticks in between. Once the plastic sticks kind of screwed into the planks, but most of them were broken. Now though, if you were unbelievably unwise, you could pull out one of these plastic sticks and most of the bookshelf would collapse like a Jenga tower, only with books. Put a baby at the bottom, and we've got a major problem.

Well, of course, if I wanted to save the books, I'd have to relocate the ones on the bottom shelf or two. You can imagine though, how this would throw off the balance of the rickety bookshelf so that if you were to sneak up behind it and tap it on the shoulder, it would let out a pathetic "eep!" and then collapse. Again, pancake baby.

In general, I don't approve of pancake babies.

So, there was only one thing left to do... pack away all our books (except for the ones we planned to read during the next six months) and destroy the bookshelf. The poor creature was at the end of its life and would not survive another disassembly and reassembly.

Now, we have two bookshelves. Unfortunately, the second bookshelf--though sturdier than the rickety one aforementioned--is by no means a baby-safe furniture item. The designer did not have securing it to the wall in mind when he or she designed it. It is built in such a way that if we were to  attempt securing it to the wall, and Amelia were to attempt scaling it, the backboard of the bookshelf would likely remain attached to the wall... and then the rest of the shelf and all its books would fall down on top of her. Boom, pancake baby.

So basically, I packed nearly the entirety of our book collection into boxes. I was surprised and disappointed to find it only filled six large boxes. The ones we left out would probably fill a small box. Clearly, we need more books. Donations are welcome. (Particularly if these donations come pre-packed away in boxes.)

As for the fate of the bookshelves... We will be giving away the less rickety bookshelf (anyone interested?), and the majority of the very rickety bookshelf went straight to the dumpster. It has lived a long and useful life. I think it belonged to Katie in one of its previous lives. But a piece of it lives on!

The rickety bookshelf has been repurposed into a baby bookshelf. It is now two planks with the four sturdiest plastic rods in between... and these all still have threading on them and can screw into the endpieces! Woohoo! It turns out that the rickety bookshelf's most recent incarnation is actually rather sturdy. Amelia has her very own shelf! She hasn't discovered it yet. Partly because we haven't put anything on it yet. I'll get around to it later in the week.

Besides using her newly-found mobility powers to attack the heebie-jeebies out of all our books, Amelia uses them to chase James. And sometimes me. But if James is home, mostly James.

Amelia is saying pseudo-words... semi-words? Half-words? Whatever. Not quite words. I am "muh", James is "duh", Becca is "buh", and books are "booh". I don't know when these sounds will morph into actual words, but I fear "book" may get the privilege of being her first word. Humph. I thought "mama" was supposed to the requisite first word. Oh well.

In any case, if her first word is "book", it would reflect the reality that Amelia is extremely fond of books. If presented with a large basket full of toys and a single book, she will dig out the book more often than not. I personally believe she is so good at fine motor skills because she decided she needed them in order to properly play with books--hold them, pick them up, open them, turn pages, etc. Amelia may have nearly forty books, possibly more. I haven't counted them, but she has lots. All of them are getting quite used... Her current favorites seem to be "Pat the Bunny", "Peek-a-Boo Bambi", "Goodnight Moon", and "Baby Day".

There are some indications that Amelia is beginning to understand English (and Serbian!) to some extent. She definitely knows what mom, dad, Becca, Grandma, potty, bonk, milk, and book mean. And she knows zvezde (stars) for sure, and possibly patka (duck). Oh, and possibly miš (mouse) and pas (dog) as well. Yikes, she is growing up!

Amelia finally sprouted a couple teeth (both lower central incisors) right around 9.5 months old. They are starting to be visible instead of just invisible sharp things in her gums. They haven't made much difference, except that I have to be careful if she smiles while still at the breast or I will get pinched. Ouch!

James and I decided yesterday to begin teaching Amelia in earnest how to fall asleep on her own. She has come to believe that she is incapable of falling asleep without a boob in her face. So I began the whole stealing-the-boob-just-before-she-falls-asleep, give-it-back-if-she-asks-for-it, steal-it-again-just-before-sleep-etc.-until-she-finally-surrenders-to-sleep-boobless routine. It took over TWO HUNDRED boob-steals and two hours before she finally gave up and fell asleep without the boob. (She began screaming bloody murder after every steal... then she'd anticipate a thievery and begin screaming bloody murder BEFORE I even stole it... and then she decided to give up on a nap despite being tired as heck... and played for a few minutes... and then decided she really did need to sleep... then about fifteen more boob-steals and she finally slept. Woo! What a process.) The next time only took about a hundred times. Once she let go and fell asleep before I even stole it. The last time today probably only took thirty tries. What improvement! I am pleased. After phase one is complete, I will crack down on sleeping alone during the daytime. Le gasp!

Love and thievery,
Jenna and Amelia

In Nine Days, I Will Have a Nine-Month-Old on My Hands

Wish me luck.

In fourteen days, I will have an accurate height and head circumference to give you, but in the meantime, I have only a weight to give you an idea of how giant my baby is. As of this Tuesday, Amelia weighed a jaw-dropping 23 lbs 10.6 oz. My dad tried to measure her length with a tape measure and he got approximately 29 inches, but this might not be entirely accurate. She is wearing 12-month pants, but 18- to 24-month everything else. And 2T dresses fit surprisingly well.

All this means that whenever I'm stupid enough to take Amelia on a walk without a stroller or baby carrier, I get insanely jealous of my friends who have babies just as small as Amelia is big. On the other hand, my biceps are insanely grateful that Amelia has given them a reason to live. They used to be shriveled up pieces of limp bacon in my arms, but now someone might even venture to risk calling these babies muscles. Huzzah!

Just before Amelia and I left for our Utah-Arizona adventure, our home visitor from Healthy Start¹ gave her an eight-month developmental assessment. She had extraordinary fine motor skills... but on the other hand, there were some things to worry about. Namely, Amelia had roughly zero interest in food (or even putting anything in her mouth as it seems most babies her age do incessantly) and roughly zero interest in mobility. They gave me tips on how to encourage her to move² and to mouth things, but I feel like these were fruitless attempts at getting a horse to drink the water I just led it to.

WELL. Fast forward to now. Apparently there was absolutely no need to worry, because now does exhibit interest in these things. It happened suddenly, too... like somebody flipped a switch in her brain.


Amelia is a voracious food-lover, despite having a zero tooth-count³. If I'm eating it, she's gotta have it too. Her first actually swallowed food item was a few soggy green beans from a beef soup at Sizzler while we were in Provo. I wasn't sure whether to believe the disappearance of these green beans meant Amelia had actually consumed them--until, that is, I rediscovered them in her diaper, smelling like decaying flesh.

Zoinks, solid-fed baby poop is exponentially worse than exclusively-breastfed baby poop. I am thus now more enthusiastic than ever about elimination communication. As satisfying as it is to flush breastmilk poop down the toilet without having to wipe more than a dab of it off baby's bum, it is that much more satisfying to NOT have to wipe caked solids poop out of Amelia's many rolls and crevices. Plus, when baby poops directly into the toilet, the blessed water covers the fetid waste so you don't have to smell it so much. Viva toilet seat reducers!

Forgive the TMI tangent there.

Anyway, Amelia has enjoyed everything we've given her tastes of. We've decided that, given her personality, Amelia will do well with baby-led weaning⁴, so we'll be skipping the pureés entirely. I didn't know there was yet ANOTHER⁵ nonconformist parenting method we could practice, but there you go. I found yet another. I really need to start hugging trees or something.

Amelia's diet is still mostly breastmilk and I'm hoping to keep it that way at least until she's one year old. And then I will continue to breastfeed on demand until she finally weans herself entirely. There are so many benefits for doing so that I just couldn't imagine weaning early (prior to two years old).

That said, the one disadvantage of breastfeeding (besides Amelia's constant sour cream breath) is that the high prolactin levels my body is producing while breastfeeding are preventing me ovulating still. So no more babies yet. Problem is, I am so pumped and ready for baby number two, it's not even funny.⁶

I suppose some (or even most) might see lactational amenorrhea as a huge boon, but after heavy consideration I have decided to listen to my instinct: I think my body won't do as well with pregnancy as I get older due to my scoliosis and Harrington rods. A few of my health providers suspect this as well. So in that regard, it will be wiser to have all⁷ my babies ASAP. James is okay with this plan, so hopefully the next kid'll come soon.

Gosh, I'm just going on all sorts of tangents today. Back to Amelia consuming stuff.

While Amelia and I were in Arizona, she fussed a bit more than usual. At first I was confused, but thankfully it didn't take me long to figure out what she was trying to communicate: I'M RIDICULOUSLY THIRSTY, MOM! PARCHED! I'M SHRIVELLING UP INTO A BABY RAISIN OVER HERE! SAVE ME!

So, she picked up water-drinking skills fairly quickly. She's now fairly proficient at using water bottles and regular cups. She doesn't really get straws, and we haven't even tried a sippy cup yet. But cups and water bottles? Oh man. "Drink the Water" is the best game ever. She'll actually pull the cup or bottle back if you try to take it away, even if her thrist seems to be momentarily quenched. If she's already gorged on water, she'll take more sips anyway, and spit it out all over herself.⁸

Amelia is... quasi-mobile. By that I mean that she can't purposely move from Point A to Point B. But she definitely moves. She can thus far only scoot backwards while on her hands and knees, so she usually gets further away from her intended destination. This seems to frustrate her to no end.

However, there are signs that she will be fully mobile soon. The desire is clearly there. I've seen her rocking back and forth on her hands and knees several times. Once, after a several-minute concentrated effort of intensely deliberate coordination, I saw her bring one of her knees forward--and then she collapsed. So close, and yet so far.

Amelia also has been experimenting with what I call the Spiderman pose. Both hands on the ground, one leg bent up with foot on the ground, and the other leg fully extended out to the side. Spiderman pose. Part of me hopes she somehow adapts this into a Spiderman crawl, because we'd get so many nerd points that I'd cry many tears of intense parental nerd joy.

On the other hand, there is a slight possibility she may start walking and skip the crawling altogether. She'll take a few steps if she holds onto my hands, though she isn't cruising along the edges of furniture yet. The girl IS pulling herself up to stand... and sometimes, just pushing up off her feet from the sitting-on-the-potty position directly to the standing position, with nothing to hold onto. Thankfully, she can't maintain that for more than a few seconds yet. We may yet have time.

Amelia is quite talkative and makes all sorts of speech-like sounds. She does say, "MAMAMAMAMAMAMAAAA!" when distressed, but I don't feel she equates "mama" with me yet. Oh well. My mother is convinced Amelia is starting to imitate our speech because she'd say "gooh" over and over again after reading Goodnight Moon; I, however, remain unconvinced. Though... I will admit that by the end of my visit to Arizona, I did find myself wondering if I was just imagining her saying "geeyuk" everytime she saw a cat and "guhg-guhg" everytime the dog came to visit her. And this morning, I said, "Good morning, Amelia!" and smiled smiled real big and responded, "Gooh!"

So far we have been spared stranger anxiety. For this I am immensely grateful, as travelling alone with a stranger-anxious baby could have been overwhelming. Instead, she is totally confident in herself and flashes grins at all the old ladies everywhere we go. And also any novel-looking people who have such unique qualities like beards, tattoos, sunglasses, or lots of jewelry. Thus, going out and about is always a treat.⁹

I guess besides Amelia getting wiser and stronger everyday, the only other news is that our family has decided to start eating nutritarian again. Permanently. Yay! I might do another post a bit later explaining what this means and why we're doing it, as well as how we plan to teach Amelia to eat well too. However, I'm beginning to tire of typing, so I'll save that subject matter for yet another day.

Love and nutrients,
Jenna and Amelia


1 Someone comes over every week to see how Amelia and I are doing. They also inform me about stuff going on in the community that might be helpful. To be honest, I decided to do the Healthy Start program because they give out free kids' books. What can I say? I'm a sucker for free books.^↩

2 One of the most common pieces of advice I've been given to help Amelia develop gross motor skills is to put a much-desired toy just out of her reach. This has been largely ineffectual. I've discovered though that she is most enthusiastic to get to ME if I am just out of reach.^↩

3 I don't know when her teeth will suddenly appear. It's supposed to be largely genetically determined. My mom tells me my teeth started coming in around six months, Becca's a bit after that, and Jessi's were latest around nine months. I don't know when Dilts babies usually get teeth.^↩

4 Not to be confused with child-led weaning. Which we are also doing.^↩

5 Besides cloth diapering, that is. Thus far, we haven't been doing it solely because it would cost us $3 per load in our apartment complex's communal laundry facilities. Otherwise we'd have done it from the start. We're excited, though, to start cloth diapers in December once we live in a place with washer and dryer hookups. Woot! We are moving up in life! Washer and dryer!^↩

6 How this feeling came about, and more specifically, how it lived through Amelia's six months of colic, I couldn't begin to tell you.^↩

7 My current fantasy is ten babies. Yes, you read that right. And yes, while I was pregnant, I was the one saying I don't know if I could do it more than one more time. It'll be interesting to see how I feel during my second pregnancy.^↩

8 This apparently deliberate spitting makes me wonder how futile a sippy cup would be.^↩

9 For Amelia anyway. Sometimes I miss being able to go out in public without people being friendly and talkative at me. Amelia seems to be a people-magnet.^↩

Still Alive

I've been posting less frequently. I'm not sure why that is, but I think it is paradoxically because things are getting easier. You see, blogging is sometimes a release. And right now I don't really feel a whole bunch that I'd like to release. Okay, that's not true... anything I'd like to release to the general Internet populace. (And you thought I shared everything. Try not to feel too betrayed.) So yeah. We are all, indeed, still alive.

Good news! I am becoming more and more convinced that taking Amelia to the chiropractor has changed her disposition so that she's a super happy baby. It's absolutely wonderful. She smiles so much more. Now, when she smiles at strangers and they say she's a good baby¹, I actually agree that yes, Amelia is quite the joy to have around.

She's so good-mannered that I think James has even succumbed to her baby powers. At least once a day I hear him say something along the lines of "She's SO cuuute!" in a high-pitched voice. Before he decided not to check Facebook so often, I had to be careful not to post too many cute baby pictures on Facebook, or else James would no longer be able to concentrate. Once he got Amelia cravings, so we had to visit him at lunchtime.

She's starting to get better at playing alone. And by alone, I mean someone is sitting next to her and she is ignoring them while playing. If you try to go into the next room to, say, cook up a masterpiece of a meal that will make your husband worship your shadow for 3.1415 years, SQUAWK.

Amelia likes books. She's sometimes quite adept at page turning. She's quite studious.

She's still fond of her potty, though yesterday she nearly stood up off of it. Her whole butt was in the air and everything. Eep! I also discovered that she can stand up by holding onto the couch. I guess it's only a matter of time before she's cruising and walking along the edges of furniture. Eep! She's not crawling yet, though. Maybe she'll figure out how to do that while we're at my parents house. There's a dog and some cats she might get motivated to chase.

Amelia can pick up Cheerios with her thumb and forefinger in a pincer grip. Our home visitor and a couple motor development researchers were super impressed. They tell me this takes some pretty complicated brain processing to do, so at her age, it's impressive. Maybe I should brag about her pincer grip more often if it's so impressive... Nah. My face (particularly my nose) does not appreciate that pincer grip very much. Oooh, and neither do my inner upper arms. She like to pinch me there while nursing. I've taken to wearing baby pants on my arms occasionally.

Still not really eating. Whatever. We offer her food to play with. Sometimes she will taste it. So far she seems more fond of vegetables than fruit. Weird. She has even less interest in baby food. Speaking of which, we'd decided not to bother with purées. So. If you live in the Springfield area and have an avid purée-eater, we have tons and tons of jars of baby food and a couple of packages of baby cereal that were all given to us. These need a home. Let me know.

She's making some very speech-like sounds. She sounds like many teenagers I know. ("Blah blah blah blah...") Hmm. What else... Ooh. Amelia reminds me of a little scientist carefully performing trials over and over and over again.

I'm doing all right too. I've been reading a lot. My goal is to read and return all my library books before I leave on my trip to Utah and Arizona.

Love and science,
Jenna and Amelia


1 I know they all mean "easy" baby, but I think it's awful to imply that any baby that isn't easy is a "bad" baby. All babies are good babies.^↩

Upcoming Adventures

Eeee! Because James will be going to several math conferences in the next few months, I decided the coming months would be an ideal time to visit far-away friends and family before Amelia gets too big to share a plane seat with me. I'm super excited!

So the plan is this.

Firstly, I'll fly down to Utah to visit friends at BYU before they all graduate and scatter across the country. Maybe say hello to some family members and such... I'll stay for a week, staying at least part of the time with Clifton, Amanda, and baby Kate. Theoretically I will also say hello to the Copes and get tasty blueberry waffles.

Then Amelia and I will fly down to Arizona where my parents (and several other relatives) are. I'll be there for two weeks or so. I've heard that my home ward was split since I visited last, so I'll visit both wards with heavy fan club populations. I assume I'll go to my parents' ward first, then go to the other ward the subsequent Sunday. I am secretly hoping I'll get tons of invitations for dinner. (Just thought I'd plant that suggestion in your mind.)

Woo! Excited! After those three weeks are up I will return home and be (mildly) gross with James at the baggage claim.

But this isn't all! Most of James' family (with the notable exception of his dad) will be going on a cross-country road trip. They will eventually make it all the way from Pennsylvania to Oregon. Amelia and I may accompany them on the drive back to Pennsylvania and then we can fly back. I'm not sure who we'll see on the way back, but I assume there will be a number of far-flung relatives involved.

And then after all that I will come home... And then pack up all our stuff and put it in a storage unit. Then James, Amelia, and I will likely live in Berkeley, California for three months so that James can hang out with tons of researchers who also research general relativity.

I am pretty excited about this prospect, because when James originally told me about this three-month thingy, we assumed that he would have to go alone, and that I would be living all alone with a baby for the entire fall. I was sad about it, but I had a strong feeling that I should encourage him to go because it was important. I hadn't imagined that we could get funding to go with him! How exciting!

Then, when we get back to the Eugene-Springfield area, we will move into a new apartment. We don't know if it will still be in the same ward, but we figured since we'd be moving anyway, we should move in to a place with a washer and dryer hookup. And carpet. And without stairs. There's a place in our ward jokingly called Little Provo that meets these specifications, but we're far from certain about where we'll end up.

Amelia is pseudo-mobile. She's been scooting along the floor...backwards. She's just gone halfway across the room. And now she's frustrated.

Love and travels,
Jenna and Amelia

P.S. I randomly decided what to call our next child while he our she is in utero... Microraptor. Number three will be Triceratops.
P.P.S. No, I am not pregnant. As far as I know anyway.

Six Months Old Already

Today was Amelia's six month checkup. For the hardcore Amelia fans, here are the stats.

Height: 26.75 inches (90th percentile)
Weight: 21 lbs 9.5 oz (above the 95th percentile)
Head circumference: 17.25 inches (90th percentile)
Shots: one in her right thigh and one in her left thigh (she whine-cried for about five seconds, then promptly shut up once I picked her up)
Development: mostly pretty average, very good at interacting with people, very interested in surroundings... not at all interested in rolling over (she is, however, capable of doing so; I saw her do it once on Monday)
Comments from the pediatrician: "She is always so bright-eyed and intent!"

Diaper size: 4
Shirt size: 12 month (snug) to 2T (somewhat loose)
Pants size: 9 month
Sock size: 18-36 month
Cuteness factor: ludicrously cute

She will also be starting fluoride drops every day since there isn't any fluoride in the water here. And we like pearly white teeth around here.

Oh, and since the doctor's noticed Amelia wheezing on more than one occasion (as have we), we are trying an albuterol inhaler until Monday to see if it helps. The idea is to deal with the wheezing now before she'd need a steroid inhaler, because those have some not so pleasant side effects for kids. The wheezing is probably completely unrelated to Amelia's fussiness. I also asked it she was wheezing because she's so fat. The answer is no. Bum.

Speaking of which, I have to confess I like Amelia's naked baby bum. I always thought it was weird when my dad would tell my bum used to fit in his hand. But now I understand. Baby bums are cute.

Amelia has continued to be regularly fussy. For all of you who were telling me a month and a half ago that she's teething... there are no teeth in that little mouth of hers yet. And things that are supposed to numb the gums don't seem to help. Nor do any traditional teething pain remedies. Oh well.

I assume most, if not all, of you have been following Amelia's progress on Facebook. But in case you haven't been, she underwent a slew a tests, all of which were normal. Lots and lots of blood tests... some stool tests... and a head ultrasound.

So, the only thing left to try, I've decided, is chiropractic adjustment. (The idea is, a baby might get a pinched nerve during a traumatic birth or something. And I don't know if birth was traumatic for Amelia per se, but at the very least her entire head was a giant bruise when she came out. It's possible.) I'd been putting it off, because our insurance doesn't cover a lot of the chiropractors in town, including many of the ones that are good with babies.

But! One of our friends (who also has a baby about six months old) has a dad who is a chiropractor... and he'll adjust her weekly for free for anywhere from six weeks to three months. Also exciting for me? He just happens to be a preferred provider for our insurance, so I can get adjusted too. Woo!

The bad news... Dr. Clifton is fifty minutes away. I should remind you that Amelia has made her feelings about car rides abundantly clear: car rides are akin to torture.

Well, we made the journey on Monday. By the time we got there, I was a wreck. You try driving that long with a screaming baby. Now don't get lost or killed. I did take a wrong turn somewhere too. And, as if that wasn't stressful enough, somehow I ended up with a horn-happy truck behind me who'd honk angrily anytime I braked at all. Not exactly sure how I ticked the driver off so much, but clearly, I did.

We made it, and the chiropractor adjusted a few places for Amelia. Her legs now appear to be the same length, whereas it at first seemed her left leg was shorter.

My adjustment was much more of a process. They took an x-ray of my neck. It is bending the wrong way. "Wow. You DO need to be adjusted," was the doctor's comment. And so I was adjusted in about a gerjillion places. I am suddenly sleeping better, and I don't have any headaches or other aches. Magic. Yes, I  do indeed think there should be more chiropractic adjustments in my life.

I'm not sure what to tell you about how Amelia's been since her adjustment. Here are my observations, though. For one, she hasn't cried during any car rides. This is highly unusual. She has had some major crying spells, but besides one exception, those seemed to have obvious causes... like being really, really tired... or really, really bored. There has also been a slight increase in good naps. I was also surprised at how her shots today seemed to be no big deal. (A little deal, yes, but only worth crying about for a few seconds, apparently.)

So, at least for a little while, Amelia and I will be travelling to Lebanon every Monday to see the chiropractor. I'm pretty sure I'll at least benefit from it, even if Amelia doesn't. And she does seem to like the staff. While I was being adjusted, she perfectly happy "helping" the receptionists.

Anyway, I've also been wanting to do another "a day in the life" post, but I'm not sure I have enough time tonight. Instead, I guess, I'll write a letter to Amelia about what she is like now.

Dear Amelia,

I do believe you are developing a sense of humor... and the capacity to giggle. You think it's funny when I make exaggerated chewing sounds, and when I pretend to eat your belly. I don't think you're ticklish. You enjoy sticking your tongue out. Your favorite sounds to make are spit gurgles and raspberries.

One of my favorite things is your face first thing in the morning. Although I admit I dread when you open your eyes because I'd usually like to sleep another four or five hours, I find that my heart melts when I see you twist your head up to see if I'm awake yet. I usually pretend I'm still asleep. You wiggle and wiggle and wiggle impatiently. And when I finally open my eyes, you immediately flash your biggest grin.

I do my best to entertain you all day while dad is at school and while Auntie Beek is at work, but I think you get bored with me pretty quickly. I often find that when I am unable to console, your dad will waltz on in from a long day at work, and you will be just tickled pink to see him. You really like to play with dad. I sometimes think I must be boring.

But perhaps I'm not all that boring. I think you might be the most fun for me after you've gotten bored with dad in the evenings. I'll take you back, and you are all full of grins. This is the time of day when I am most likely to get some giggles out of you. Your giggles are the best, particularly after a long day of mostly just screams.

Sometimes at night you make it way too hot for a blanket. It's okay, though. You're a pretty good cuddle buddy. You somehow push both of us across the bed at least a foot during the night. I think this happens because I move over a few inches when you're done nursing in the night. And then I wake up to find you snug up against me, bobbing for nipples.

We are getting kind of good at communicating. You've gotten into the habit of leaving your mouth wide, wide open if you're hungry. Sometimes you will try to suck on my cheeks or my chin when you're hungry. Or sometimes, you try to latch on through my shirt. You are never successful.

Yesterday you sat up unsupported for nearly three minutes. You only sit up when you are in the mood to do so, though. It's fairly often that we will try to sit you up, but you lock your legs and refuse to do anything but stand. You also seem to enjoy being held upside down. Strange child.

You are terrified of the blender. Also the popcorn popper. You cling to me when those make noise. And, if you're asleep, you scream yourself awake like you just had a nightmare of mechanical horrors.

You do not like diapers. I caught you yesterday morning with your diaper half-off, and this morning I found you scratching at it. You much prefer to use the potty. I don't blame you. You also seem to dislike clothing. I have discovered that it is far easier and far less traumatic to wrap you in a blanket when going outside than to try and strap you into a sweater or coat.

You like going to storytime at the library. Not only do you enjoy the songs, I think you particularly like to watch all the toddlers be exciting. It also seems that, among strangers, kids are your biggest fans. Today while we were at the pharmacy, some little girls came up and told me how cute you were. They danced for you while I was preoccupied with the pharmacist. Just before that when I was strapping you in the shopping cart seat, a boy told me how cute you were. Then he told me all about what he was going to buy in the store.  At the doctors office, some other kids stared at you, then tugged on their parents' sleeves and pointed you out. Things like this happen all the time.

It seems you would really like to crawl, but so far you fail miserably at it. Instead, you do a kind of Army scoot... you dig your face into the ground, essentially smothering yourself, and then you push yourself forward a few inches with your feet. You don't roll over very much. I've only seen you do it once. I think you only did it because you were avoiding getting your eyes clawed out by another baby. (Your eyes are shiny, you know.) You particularly enjoy playing your feet.

You haven't started eating solid foods yet, although I suppose you are technically old enough now. Your only interest in food seems to be in watching us intently when we eat it... and I think you were determined to squish yourself some sweet, messy raspberries tonight. You are always very confused if we ever offer you any food to eat. You are definitely a mama's milk girl.

I love you lots, Amelia. I think you must be pretty smart, because you're always so intently studying everything. You are so studious. Sometimes I suspect you'll have everything figured out by the end of the week.

Love you forever and like you for always,
Mom

Gorg

I'll bet that word wasn't in your vocabulary. Gorg is something one says when quite tired, but happy, but also impatient for a break, and even a hint of ice cream craving. Hrm.

Little Miss Amelia has not really given us (or me?) much of a break. About half of the time, she's either crying or we're desperately trying to distract her because she's on the verge of crying. It's great fun! I'm reasonably certain she is, indeed, teething. I think I might feel her two bottom front teeth just below the top of her gums... but then that could be wishful thinking, right? Possibly. But the fact remains: no teeth yet. And she's been fussy since about six weeks old and this last month has been pretty bad too.

The last week or so has been doubly awful. Tylenol is no longer magical. For some unexplained reason, she's been even fussier! Eep!

Well, I took her to the doctor Wednesday morning to verify that she doesn't have something else obvious going on in addition to teething... something like an ear infection, or appendicitis, or, or, or... cancer! Brain cancer. Yeah. Or an aneurysm.

Lest you think I'm seriously stressing about the possibility of some lethal disease, I should point out that I'm about 99.5% certain that she is just teething. I do appreciate having proof though. I like to be able to say, Yeah, I'm right. And then when someone says, Oh yeah? Prove it, I like to be able to prove it.

So yeah. Doctor visit. No ear infection. Completely normal physical exam. Of course Amelia was screaming inconsolably the entire time. It was exciting.

Dr. Pelinka said she wasn't sure enough (that Amelia is only teething or that she just has a difficult temperament) to just dismiss her fussiness. Why? Because she's been fussy so consistently for so long... and most fussy babies turn into sunny creatures by three and a half months. Amelia is five and a half months old. So the pediatrician sent me home saying she'll call later after talking to her colleagues about Amelia.

Well, I did get a call back and the consensus among the pediatricians is that Amelia is most likely perfectly healthy. But then, she might not be. So the plan? First, some stool studies. If Amelia's still fussy after a few more days, some blood studies. If those are normal and Amelia is still a banshee, brain ultrasound. Oh, and lucky mom should try going dairy-free for a few weeks.

Oh, gorg. I really, really like dairy. And worse, I've been eating quite a bit simply for convenience's sake. Now I had gone dairy-free for four or five days a few months ago. If anything, Amelia got fussier during those days. And then when I ate dairy again she had a great couple of days. That was good enough for me at the time, figuring that I could go all out a little later if needed.

So yeah. I'm going all-out dairy-free until just before Amelia's six-month checkup on the 20th. That way, before Amelia sees the doctor again, I'll also get to see what happens when I reintroduce cow milk.

We ended up needing the blood studies. Unfortunately, they needed lots of blood, so they decided to try getting it venously.

Oh, it was so awful. Apparently these phlebotomists usually get it on the first try, even with fat babies. Amelia was not so fortunate. The three nice phlebotomists tried to get baby's blood venously FOUR times, all to no avail. Poor Amelia was absolutely hysterical.

The worst thing was that I couldn't nurse the poor baby per lab policy... they're afraid of her choking. Seriously? So sad. The phlebotomists apologized every time they failed, promising that they wouldn't have stuck her again if they hadn't been fairly sure they'd get a vein.

I wasn't sure which would have been less traumatizing for Amelia: staying there and continuing to attempt to get her blood, or coming back another day and starting this whole ordeal over again. It's hard to make decisions like that when your baby has been screaming at the top of her lungs for half-an-hour straight.

I decided to stay. I didn't think they'd be more successful on a different day... Amelia'd be just as chubby (if not chubbier) in a few days, and her veins would be just as thin.

Instead of trying venously for the fifth time, they finally just poked her left ring finger and milked for blood until they had filled eight of those baby-sized vials.

It was really hard on me, though I couldn't claim it was as hard on me as it was on Amelia.

Anyway, the stool and blood studies are already back. Mostly normal... and the abnormal things are the sort of things that aren't necessarily abnormal, if you know what I mean. For instance, an inflammation marker was high. And one of the stool tests maybe could possibly indicate the teensiest bit of malabsorption. So we'll probably repeat that test in a couple weeks.

So tomorrow I get to schedule a brain ultrasound which will probably turn out normal. We figured we might as well do that before her fontanels close, because after that happens we'll only be able to image her brain via a more expensive and radiationy method, like an MRI or a CT scan.

I confess that I've secretly wanted to see images of Amelia's brain. These are the urges that afflict mothers with neuroscience degrees. It seems this wish will be fulfilled. I should be less excited.

I've also been trying desperately to get Amelia to sleep for more hours each day, hoping she'll be happier if she's less tired. It's not turning out to be easy, partly because she's obviously having a hard time. And I'm not sure sleeping more is improving her mood, but we'll keep trying.

We're trying to get her to bed earlier each night too. We hadn't been doing that hard-core at all, because James often gets home at the time Amelia should be in bed. And well, I don't want her to miss out on too much daddy time. Oh, I'd like some me time too. Secondly, all the exciting stuff (like hanging with Paul, Cassie, Matt and Shanna) happens at night. I need to get out of the house to stay sane, but Amelia is absolutely not ready to be babysat... particularly because she doesn't sleep unless I'm next to her. Darn. Still not sure where the appropriate balance for this is.

Well, hopefully she'll go through a happy phase soon, and we can work on teaching her fall asleep and stay asleep on her own. At the very least, I am happy to report that she is able to stay asleep about half the time without staying attached to my chest. This is progress, I'd say.

Sigh. I don't know if I'll ever get around to that "a day in the life" post for five months. Oh well. Stay tuned for the six-month edition. Hopefully, I will find time to write it.

Love and brains,
Jenna and Amelia

The Next Challenge

It's quite possible that Amelia is teething, but there's a big part of me that remains skeptical because long ago everyone and their dog posited that possibility as an explanation for her fussy behavior. I suppose I won't be completely convinced until she cuts her first tooth.

Nevertheless, the past few days have been even more challenging than normal. She's even more irritable than usual and definitely less playful. She's usually in a great mood first thing in the morning, but lately she's having a hard time having fun.

The child is constantly attempting to cram her entire fist in her face and is furious that this doesn't seem to be working too well. She's also nursing even more than usual. Teething rings and toys aren't too popular, though. Neither are cold rags. Perhaps I should be alarmed by the lifetime preference for human flesh.

Drool always adorns her face and she keeps trying to bite my fingers and knees. I give her gum massages and they help... though not for long. (My secret to smooth, soft, beautiful skin is baby drool. Call me if you want some for your own beauty regime.)

I eventually just didn't know what else to do, so I brought out the Tylenol. I kid you not, this has made all the difference in the world. The post-Tylenol Amelia is sunny and playful... or dead asleep. I'm a little confused about the sleeping, though. Fatigue to this degree isn't really a common side effect. My best guess is that the teething pain has made it difficult (or perhaps impossible) for Amelia to sleep deeply, so once she's not screaming or writhing in what looks like excruciating pain, she immediately packs her bags and takes a train to dreamland.

In other news, I had a little episode of mommy burnout. I'd recently determined not to complain to just anybody about such things, but in moments of weakness I break down and ask for advice. This often ends up only discouraging me further, since people offer advice that worked for them... and, well, I don't think very many of my friends have children with temperaments like Amelia's. Perhaps they think I exaggerate and they think that, in reality, Amelia is more like their own babies than I'd care to admit.

No, I don't think Amelia is like all those other babies. But can I blame people for thinking that she probably is? No. No, I cannot.

I made the same mistake at first: that is, I assumed everyone else's baby was just like Amelia. I have slowly come to realize that this is simply not so.

It took dozens of times hearing the exclamation "I can't believe you want to nurse again, baby! It's only been three hours!" tumble from the lips of other mothers for me to realize that seriously, their babies are usually perfectly satisfied nursing only every few hours. What a novel idea.

And I started hearing other moms pining after the sacred nap time, a time when baby sleeps (and stays asleep) alone and mom can have some time to herself. And maybe cook or clean something. How perplexing. Maybe I'm just not putting baby down as gently as they put their babies down or something. Nope.

And then I hear mothers praising the almighty swing. I joined in too, saying that every once in a while, it tricked Amelia into thinking she was still in my arms long enough for me to eat breakfast. And then I realized that many babies stay asleep for HOURS in a swing. And I ran across several warnings not to leave your baby in a swing for more than x number of hours... when they're awake. James and I were surprised and wondered aloud, "What?! There are babies that let you leave them--awake--in a swing--for hours?" I'm not sure I'd believe it even if I saw it.

It took me months to realize, deep down, that everyone else's baby is not like mine. And then, during mommy burnout, I forgot. When I got a ton of recommendations to hire a babysitter and go do something without Amelia... I began to doubt myself. Perhaps everyone and their dog is right. Perhaps I do need to do what everyone else does and leave Amelia with someone else for a while. But it didn't feel right.

So I did what I always do when I feel like something isn't right: I prayed for clarification. I prayed a lot. I even got a priesthood blessing for strength and comfort. Well, of course that helped tremendously. I have no idea what happens to other people's babies when they're left behind, but I know Amelia, and I need to stay with her. And you know what else? Yes, I needed to recharge, but I found out that there are ways to recharge while keeping the baby with me.

I feel a lot better now. I recharged... by going out. With the baby, but I went out. I went shopping. I hung out with other moms and their babies, and we had some nice adult conversations without a hint of sing-song voices or nonsense. I spent time with friends. And I feel 100%... and I never had to leave Amelia during one of the more difficult parts of her life so far. Whaddaya know? The Man Upstairs knows what He's talking about. Even better: I'd been feeling so alone, like I'm the only mom with a high-need baby among all my acquaintances... I discovered that one of my friends also has a high-need baby. Yay (for me)!

And besides... I honestly believe there isn't a babysitter on the planet who could handle Amelia. And honestly, time without the baby isn't all that relaxing.for me. Most importantly, it's awful for Amelia. Someday she'll be ready to let me leave her alone for a while. Not yet, though.

The other big thing I needed to do to feel better? Stop comparing myself to others.

Anyway, Amelia is sad that I'm not nursing.

Love and lactose,
Jenna and Amelia