Not quite a happy first but...

I did spot a first tear today... as I was holding her to try and comfort her, a lone one slowly rolled down the corner of her left eye :(

Oh well... it was bound to happen.

She's fine now... we're sitting at the computer listening to Beethoven Piano Concerto No 5 in E Flat Major.... after this will be Ode to Joy....

People have asked me numerous times over the past couple of months if I'm scared, ready, or excited about having a child.... I think I'm coming around.... I think I'm starting to realize that I'm not going to have the time or the resources to put in that I really want. As I think back, I'm wondering if there is really anything that could have done, or that someone would have said that would have really made me realize this up front.

Oh well.. she didn't quite make it through Ode to Joy... I guess she didn't like the quieter beginning that the song has.... after a bit of me trying to convince her to listen and that the song would get better... I handed her off to her mom for a try.

I think she is starting to gain a bit of consciousness though... consciousness of things around her, maybe partial control/consciousness of her hands and fingers. On a scale of 1-10, I'd still put her down around 2 or 3, but progress nonetheless.... exciting to see and notice all the little things... I wonder how much more Bethy sees from the 24-hour constant view, or if I get a slightly better/fresh view in that I'm away for at least a couple hours a day.

I never doubted that this was going to be a learning experience for Bethy and I as well, and I know there was no way to really gauge the impact of having a child on one's life is, but I guess I'm still a bit surprised. :)

Almost bedtime....

Time flies...

when you are trying to sleep.....

So I've adjusted my sleep schedule a little to compensate for bumps, coo's, changings, and feedings in the middle of the night.

Last night I went to sleep around 10:30 or so... yes... guilty as charged.. I was trying to unpack/move in a little bit...

So going to sleep is of course the easy part... but there is a thing in the back of your mind... the fear of being jolted out of sleep and thrust into action for one of the above required actions.... I've trained myself at least a little bit to try and break out of sleep as quickly as possible so that I can be helpful to Bethy(yes.. the same "skill that I enact in work meetings). So it comes again... jolted out of sleep...

MAN!!! so early this time? sure I'll take her and walk around with her a little bit... give Bethy a break.......

oh my goodness... IT'S 5AM ALREADY?!?!!? where did all my sleep go? man.. tomorrow at work is gonna suck.. maybe I can work from home the 2nd half or something.... oh well...

Oh hey... little girl settled down once I took her from mom, that's a reversal in roles, but hey, I'll take it. So I walk around with her a little bit... and end up settling down in the room I've started to move into as an office... my computer, the day bed opposite. She's wide awake and looking around... arms flailing a little bit.... but most importantly, she being pretty quiet.... and it's 5-friggin AM, so it's quiet outside too.

While sitting in my rolling chair, legs propped up on the day-bed, and her nestled in my lap against my legs, I figure maybe now is a good time to expose her to some music.....hmmm classical.... So we start going through Bach's Brandenburg Concerto's.....

It was actually really nice.. I have a couple MP3's here and there(who doesn't) and worked my way through what I have of 1 through 4, and part of 5(it's an 18 min MP3) before she started to fuss.... that only being about 40 minutes, I figured I needed to buy a little more time... so I went downstairs to check out the fridge to see if there was some relief in a bottle.... it's not ROLAIDS we're looking for here.. it's some good ol fashioned..... ok... yes it's in a bottle.

So it needs to be warmed and so I turn on the water and try to get some hot water going... I put her in the swing and she continues to fuss a little bit..... wakes up her grandpa who's been trying to offset his unconsciousness by waking the dead ;) . After a couple rounds of swirling the bottle in hot water, the milk seems up to temp to start the feeding...

WRONG.... the bottled cooled in my hands... apparently this is a different thicker bottle than the other ones, so it takes a little more time to warm it up, and subsequently to feel the bottle cool down along with the milk. oh well.. another couple times and we're good to go....

She drinks it up pretty good and has that contented look on her face(instead of the concerned one). I go back upstairs and fire up some more classical and walk her around a bit and she's doing pretty good.

at about 6:30 or so she starts to fuss again... I guess I grabbed a small bottle instead of a big one and she's still hungry... yes, I'm still working on that. So after another 10 minutes off fussing(I'm trying to buy time here!!!!) I go back in and wake up Mom for a feeding.... and I try to get some sleep.

You get another affirmation that you enjoy fatherhood when, short of sleep, you wake up, take care of your little girl... spend some time while she continues to gain consciousness and listen to some quiet music. While I don't prefer that those times all be at 5AM, I certainly don't mind.

:)

More pics

Obviously a post-feeding pic... I'd be the same way if I spent time in a nice warm nap..... or in a meeting...






















Don't remember when in the last week these were taken... but some shots of mom too!!!

Just a picture

Here's a picture from the other day(thursday I think) of her after her bath... content and you can see her fuzzy hair!

Maybe there is no such thing as a schedule. One of the little books that we have says that at around 3 weeks, kids get fussy because they yearn to be back in the womb or so... or maybe her feeding schedule is a moving target.

I spent a little bit of time with her alone today while bethy went out and ran some errands. She napped while Bobby Flay took on a Chef Lang in a battle chicken... There were some interesting things they made... what a shocker.. Bobby Flay did pulled chicken instead of pulled pork. So Lauren chilled for just shy of 2 hours with me before she woke up, got a little fussy, and mom came home and fed her. That's what this picture is from.... kinda a cute picture of her with her slightly concerned look. She's had that from day one.

She did a really big poop diaper... so big that it overflowed up her back a little bit... not such a big mess... Maybe a good way to judge the severity is by how many baby wipes it took to clean up, something like the Fujita Scale ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fujita_scale ) . I'll call this one the Lako-scale... This one actually used 3.. but the 3rd came up with very little if any poop, and was really just used for reassurance that everything was clean... so I'll call it a 2.5 .

Then she slept for like 4 hours or so before her next feeding. Barry Bonds didn't his his home run, and I did a little bit of stuff around the family room trying to move in and organize a little bit. Finally got the DVD player hooked up.

So mom and Lauren were upstairs sleeping.. and it was all the sudden 11:00.... I went up... picked up the car-seat(she likes to sleep in that) and ...

*CLICK*

I moved the handle.... and yup.... woke Lauren up..

I woke her... I had to try to put her back to sleep. I walked her around a little bit... a couple different positions... upstairs... downstairs... check the daiper.... other room upstairs, downstairs in the swing... wrap her tightly, too hot? unwrap her... all the time ... still fussing..

So I go to the relief... I've never done it before... but there are 2 small (2oz) bottles in the fridge..... it's never been done before... but if she's not dirty.. and she's not grunting like she needs to be changed... then maybe... just maybe.

So like I said, it's never been done before... I pull the bottle out... look for the top and the nipple. turn on the hot water, get a mug.... after warming the milk to the point where I can't really feel or discern a difference in temp, I pick her back up and give it a shot. Yes... it's a bit foreign to her... doesn't take it on the first try... yes.. I know it's not mom... but it tastes like her right?

Finally she starts to take it.... she's been doing this funny thing lately with her latch where she kinda clicks or smacks whenever she feeds, and it's back here. I'm trying to get the angle right so she always gets a full gulp of milk instead of sucking half-air... we know that only leads to trouble... so about 5 minutes later... she's done.. not bad. Bottle down, Lauren up... instant burp.

So she's content now... not sleepy.. but not fussing. I walk around with her a little bit, a little bit longer... it's 12:30, so I go upstairs and ask if the 2oz that I gave her might not be enough... Mom says she'll give it a try, and off she goes... and a little bit of nap for me... ready to recharge for another day.

Greg and June are supposed to be back... hopefully we'll get to see them today. I never got to see June's hurricane photos... maybe she'll have some good ones!!!

4:!5AM.....

Little girl was a bit fussy.. so 2 changes later... I'm up..

I got a call from Bethy just I was about to leave work, asking for me to make a stop off at the store on the way home.. I guess we're going to try the binky. We had some discussions about it before, some of the pros and cons of binky vs thumb vs nipple... we'll see how it goes.

After getting home and sterilizing them in the steam bag thing, we tried them out a bit, but she doesn't seem to take them right off the bat. We're not going to press the issue, maybe try it once or twice in the future.


When I came home today... I was shocked... she looked like she grew a couple inches!!! I'm not sure if she ACTUALLY grew noticeably in the span when I was at work, or maybe she just stretched out from having her legs held so closely to her tummy to outstretched a bit. Maybe my thoughts were skewed along with it because when I put her in a couple of the seats that we have for her, her torso seemed to look really long. I'm eager to see what her weight is going to be at the next dr visit.

I'm trying a new way to figure out if she is hungry.... when she's crying or what I believe is rooting, then I'll put my nose in her mouth and see if she tries to latch. I'm already holding her, all I have to do is bend over a little bit... tries so far have been amusing. Either she'll try to latch, or she'll shake her head back and forth with my nose still slightly in her mouth.... if she's not hungry, she won't necessarily react.

Last night we also gave her the first tub bath. She fussed through most of it but seemed to calm down once again when we washed her head/hair. The question I have is... what am I supposed to do with the tub when I'm done with it? Maybe I'll drill a hole in it and hang it in the garage to dry. Seems like less than friendly design.

Welp.. back to bed... maybe

I don't have any new pictures off the camera right now ... so here are a couple from the hospital...thanks Dad!

July 25, 2007

Today's new thing was to try out the swing. She was awake and content while in the swing. After about 20 minutes she started to cry, but I think it was because she gets cold. So I have to remember to put a blanket on her and try it again tomorrow.

I find myself watching Lauren as she sleeps and laugh at all the funny faces that she makes. Even if it is just gas as many people say, I think babies do dream about something. What do babies dream about?

Since I still haven't set up my computer properly, I will ask Eric to post a few more pictures of her that we have taken. I think Eric is doing pretty well even with all the late night feedings of Lauren. He doesn't complain when I ask him to change her diaper and he is becoming an expert at burping her. :)

Ok, time for my 2 hour nap...

2 weeks!!!

Today we had a double trip to the doctors... one for mom and one for the little girl.

Mom is doing well... due back in 4 weeks.

Lauren is doing well... up 9oz from last week!!!(figures)

Mom said that once they got back from the appointments they both took a healthy nap of almost 4 hours!

Not a whole lot else going on today... Last night I bought new phones for the place... a cordless phone set with 3 handsets... we got to try them out today(charging overnight) and it looks like not only can we use them as tw0-way radios in case one of us wanders over to the Sakai's, but there is also a Room Monitor function that we might be able to use as a baby monitor!

We tried to get some pictures this morning of some funny faces that Lauren was making, but I'll try to pull those off tomorrow morning and post them up....

Gnite!!!

Monday July 23, 2007

Apparently today I(dad) missed out on a triple poop episode. I guess whatever mom is eating has a very direct impact on Lauren as she was also a bit constipated and thus resulting in a mid-day triple poop. There was some icky stuff when I came home, but I've yet to experience anything overflowing.

This evening she was fairly content. Maybe a bit of her fussiness last night had to do with the stoppage she was experiencing, so today, all was good.

I think today she also found her thumb. Something which will hopefully pay sleep dividends or at least a bit more leeway or grace in the feeding timings.

Tonight was bath at home #2. She fussed through most of it, but was actually quite content while we washed her hair. Attached is a picture of a her not only trying to suck on her thumb, but also trying to take mine in as well. In just under two weeks, it's amazing to see the amount of strength that has increased, along with how alert she is.

The two pictures(if I can get them posted up here) are right after the bath, one going for the thumb, and the other ready for a feeding and then to bed!

Last night...

Last night was a relatively rough one.... it seems that our activities from yesterday might have thrown mom and Lauren off schedule a little bit so there was quite a bit of fussing last night, some partial feedings and a whole lot of partial sleep.

She was wide awake at about 3AM... and was fussy for what felt like a good portion of the rest of time time. It's just shy of 8:00 right now, and she's sleeping... but it seems to be a light sleep.

Hopefully they can get back on schedule today.

My first blog entry

Sorry it's taken so long for me to get this up and running. I've never been that big a fan of blogs... but it's no longer about me... :)

So today we learned yet another lesson in helping take care of the little girl.... mainly in the reprioritization of our comfort level in the car vs. what Lauren might like/be able to tolerate. During a little car trip today, we forgot to take into account that she might be a little hot in the car and she got a little fussy... no major damage... just a little fussing and everything was better.

I'm not sure we'll go so far as putting a diaper count on here.. but at least this can be a place for some pictures... and we'll try to post up here on a regular basis... I guess this can be the modern version of a baby book.

Today we spent a decent chunk of time moving stuff out of Mountain View.... Lauren spent some time between her mom, Grandmother(wow... that's weird... sorry mom), and then even A Harr came to visit and spend a couple minutes.

We'll be looking forward to a couple things... first being free and clear of things dealing with Mountain View from the standpoint of getting our stuff out and clean, and being able to get back into a groove of stuff after we've had a chance to really move in. Hopefully we'll be able to move in a decent chunk by the time that Uncle Greg and Aunt Juney are back in town.

We did take some pictures yesterday, but I don't have the thing to get them off the camera unpacked yet, so as soon as I do, hopefully we can have pictures up regularly.

Till tomorrow... seeya!!!