so lax of me

I am not blogging much these days. I barely email my tried and true email pen pals. This too shall pass. What I wish wouldn't pass, are the days of Nate's babyhood. They fly by too quickly. I just want to hold him tight and absorb him, and slow things down. I want all the little moments to last and last. I think if I could change anything it would have been having him so late in my life. That was unavoidable. I was never in a place in my life to have a baby when I was younger. I think people who space their babies 4 years apart have a good plan. They get to enjoy the littlest one after the previous child is old enough to enjoy their sibling as well. Each child gets much more specialized individual attention. It seems the second child and onward sometimes get lost in the shuffle a bit more than the first baby when they are close in age. But I can't wait 3 more years to try again. I don't even know if I can try again at all. Each stage of his life is wonderful, and I love it all so much, but unlike others who just roll with the changes, ever looking forward to the next, I feel this deep sadness underneath the smile he brings to my face, because I instantly think of how fleeting these "firsts" are. He's amazing.

Thoughts of Spring

Tomorrow is the first Saturday in April. It happens to also be April Fools day. An appropriate day for the traditional "Hash Bash" that happens in Ann Arbor every year. A great day to drag out the camera and capture the people that crawl out from under the porches or wherever they normally hang out and hide while smoking weed. Usually this date is a cold one so it's kind of miserable for the participants. The cops are usually running around looking for law breakers and it's just great fun for all. I say that sarcastically but it is a bit amusing.

Today was Nate's 6 month baby check up and he's doing great. He weighs 23.5 lbs. He's therefore still 99th percentile on the chub factor. He's also kind of long so he's in the 92nd percentile there. In other words, he looks like he's about 9 months old. I hope when he crawls he burns a little of it off. As it is, it's hard to keep him in clothing that fits.

another Sunday

This is Spring Break week in Ann Arbor so things are quiet. The barbershop closes early all week due to the low volume of kids around. I wonder what Katrina will do to the Mardis Gras crowd this year? Most of the buys I talked to are heading to Mexico or some tropical place for fun. I hope everyone has a fun FAT Tuesday. Nathaniel is getting bigger all the time. I can't believe it. He's about 22 lbs at 5 months old. I'll be posting some great photos in a few weeks. We went to a friend of mine's photo studio and she's a wiz with babies and children. We should have some cute stuff.

The last two weeks

It's been quite a life changing couple of weeks. Nate is just a little darling, and I know every new parent says it, but you can't describe the depth of love you feel when you hold your baby in your arms. I spent the first week in tears half the time because I just felt like I wasn't able to really take care of him properly since I couldn't feed him enough and he was getting jaundiced, etc. But it's gotten better in the second week. I get to hold him for a LOT of time, because he's apparently got a bottomless tummy and I can't keep him fed enough. It's wearing me out but I figure it'll all even out eventually. I love how tiny he is. I look forward to the fun months as he grows but a part of me wants him to stay just like he is for a while. Well, he's crying now as we speak, so I have to get off here.

He's here at last

I finally have my little guy....it was a long, complicated labor, but we pulled through thanks to some epidural help. I just have a minute to do a photo update. I sent these to a few of you already but just wanted a little posting publicly.

So busy

I keep putting things off that I can't put off any longer. I have to find a pediatrician for the baby, and get my own act together with various projects that I will not have time for later-like, a ton of thank you notes that I haven't had a chunk of time to take care of , and I just HAVE to get it going. We did our hospital tour a week ago and that was an interesting step to take. I had a small local baby shower at my sisters last Sunday. It was really nice to have my friend Robin from Tennessee visiting at the same time. Having such a huge change in my life coming up is starting to really finally hit me in a big way. There are a few aspects of the change that I am afraid of. I have always liked having control of myself. I've never really just surrendered my entire life to something else or someone else in every single way since adulthood. And that's just the way I've felt especially in the last few years. George and I have had this almost idyllic existence together, and this "honeymoon baby" is a big factor of change that is wonderful, and yet I always fear that it will be such a big change in our marriage and it's scary. We've rarely had issues needing to be resolved in day to day life, and a baby brings new issues to be resolved and I am hoping our lack of need for that previously doesn't leave us ill equipped. I don't want to be a statistic. Again. Not this time. Not ever again.

I'm getting nervous

There are so many conflicting stories and opinions on having babies. The chances of me being one of those easy stories seems awfully small. Knowing that, I just get a little freaked out. You'd think that with all the amazing miracles of medicine available today they'd figure out a way to make childbirth as easy as other formerly nightmare procedures used to be. I don't want to hear "but it's all worth it". Sorry, I am a serious WIMP. I barely survived getting my fingers stitched up. I hate to know that I am probably going to be doing the epidural option because I just am not up for hours of ridiculous pain. And just imagining that NEEDLE makes me ill !!! I KNOW my baby will be worth giving my life, but it shouldn't HAVE to be that way. So, all I can do is hope for the best. My pregnancy has been a healthy one. I wanted to go to a hypno birthing expert, but that costs serious money. I am doing some reading on the subject and who knows if that will help. I can't wait to see my little Nate. I wish I could just fast forward to that moment.