Breaking a Promise

     Well, I know I promised to keep news of James's productions to myself for a week, but this was just too weird not to share.  Read on; you'll see what I mean.

     Last night Grandma and I were preparing to give James a bath.  He doesn't need but two or so a week, but last night's was especially important as James is going to have his picture professionally taken while he is in the buff today, so he needed to be extra clean.  He did not like his bath as much this time and kept wiggling himself all around so that he was virtually submerged in the water.  Perhaps he was cold.  But I digress.  The interesting part came before the bath.

    As we got him all undressed for the bath, we could not help but notice that James had produced a large pile of bright green poo.  And I do mean bright green.  Oh dear, I thought.  James has radioactive intestines.  This means an immediate call to the doctor.  Of course, we had his bath and things all ready then, so we had to do the bath before I could call the doctor.  Then, after the bath was over, I did a quick internet search to see if there was some sort of likely culprit for such an event.  Turns out, according to multiple internet sites and my What to Expect the First Year book, that bright green is a normal color of poo for a baby.  So, for future reference, it is normal for it to look as though Slimer has visited your child's diaper.  This assertion does fly in the face of conventional wisdom, but I'm learning that I know less and less every day.  I suppose parenthood will do that to you.  That, and sleep deprivation.  Nap time.  

All is Well

     James had his weight checked at the doctors' office today, and he's up to seven pounds, two ounces!  I normally abhor the use of exclamation points but feel that several might be warranted after James's wild success in weight gaining.  Breast feeding can work!  Yay!   

     I was particularly relieved as this was the first weight check when we hadn't been keeping careful track of exactly how many ounces James was eating.  Those of you who know me will be shocked by this, but I was worried.  ;)  He is a thin baby, and after what happened during his first few days, I was so scared that he might be losing weight again.  But perhaps he just has his father's metabolism.  Either way, this is cause for celebration in our house.  Patrick is out getting KitKats so that we can celebrate properly.  I hope all of you guys have a good day too.  :)  

Admission

     Well, as much as I hate to admit it, I was apparently wrong, and James's grandpa was right.  No, Obama has not been proclaimed the antichrist.  It was the other major issue the two of us have been, um, discussing, for the past several weeks: thumb sucking.  

     At pretty much every opportunity, my father has been trying to teach James how to suck his thumb.  I kept telling him to stop as he was going to cost me a fortune in orthodontia ten years down the road.  He insisted that I would get more sleep if James learned how to suck his thumb and could comfort himself in that fashion during the night rather than crying for me or Patrick to come hold him.   

     As I sat up holding him last night at about one in the morning, I perused my trusty parenting books and websites scouring articles on pacifiers.  Were they detrimental to breast feeding?  Is it okay for kids to go to sleep with pacifiers in their mouths?  I have to admit that I was surprised to see that most articles advocated thumb sucking over pacifiers.  The babies control the thumbs themselves, these articles told me.  That way, the babies can suck them when they really need comforting, and parents can't use them as a crutch.  They are less likely to interfere with breast feeding because the thumb is in no way similar to something from which the kid might eat.  On top of that, they said that pacifiers could be even more harmful to teeth than thumbs.  The only plus to a pacifier was that, since parents control it, parents can ween kids off that easier than they could thumb sucking.  

     So, Dad was right and I was wrong.  Darn it.  I hate when that happens.

     On a completely unrelated note, I loved this picture and couldn't help but share it.  Don't Patrick and James both look so good?  

Up to Something

     Well, James sure did have some adventures this past weekend.  James did wear his UGA outfit on Saturday to cheer on the team, and actually stayed awake for most of the game, so that was exciting.  The same cannot be said of me, as I fell asleep at about half time and did not wake up again until it was over.  But I'm told UGA played brilliantly.  

     Our first excitement of the weekend, however, I was awake for.  James, Grandma and I began our Saturday by taking what was by far James's biggest stroll yet.  Up to this point, Patrick and I have pretty well kept James within the confines of Grandma and Grandpa's neighborhood in our strolls; we wanted to be close in case James got upset.  However, Grandma is brave.  We went over a mile from the house and back.  This will shock you: James slept through the whole thing.  

     Our other excitement is rated ***PG-13*** for some mature (or possibly immature, depending on how you look at it) content.  So proceed with caution.

     After everyone but James and I had gone to bed Saturday night, I needed to change James's diaper.  His official changing station is upstairs where James, Patrick and I are staying, so, to avoid waking Patrick up, we just set up a portable station in Grandma's family room.  We have a portable changing pad in our diaper bag (thanks to Auntie Erin), so I got that and the necessary diapers and wipes out and ready.

     Things seemed to be going well at first.  James wasn't crying, and I felt that success was eminent.  However, I soon realized that I had forgotten that tissues we use to keep him from shooting the walls as we change him.  No matter, I thought.  I'll just use the soiled diaper as a shield.  I am wildly clever, I thought.  It did seem like that plan would work at first.  But, when I lifted his little legs to clean off his bottom, he transformed himself into ThunderPants and proceeded to shoot poo straight out of himself and all over everything in the general vicinity.  Thanks to my lifting of his legs, the trajectory was really quite impressive.  Having held him prior to this incident while he, um, produced, I had felt that, even through his diaper and outfit, he had some impressive force behind his output.  I had no idea.

     So, shocked as I was by that, I was laughing as I tried to clean him up, because what else can you do?  Sadly, the laughter and focus on one mess caused me to let up on my vigilance on the other offending orifice.  Sure enough, James then let loose with some pee.  Fortunately, genius that I am, I still had his old diaper balanced atop him.  Unfortunately, the diaper had slipped a bit as I cleaned and laughed, and, instead of being in a position to absorb anything, merely pointed his member downwards.  The end result was the most repulsive, soupy mess of excrement that I have ever seen.  The poor kid was swimming in it.  It was disgusting.  I used up all the wipes, and his UGA outfit might need to be burned.  

     Sorry about grossing you out there.  I just had to share that particular bit of adventure in parenting.  They didn't cover that in any of the books or magazines I've read on the subject.  Grandma says that all I write about on the blog is James's output, so I promise to avoid that topic entirely for at least the remainder of the week and focus only on James's more positive and non-biohazardy attributes.  Of course, even covered in bacteria, he's the cutest baby in the world.

Tired Today

     Well, James and I got a much needed nap this morning, as I think we both only slept for about two hours last night.  After we woke up, James ate, spit up, and went back to sleep.  I, on the other hand, am trying to get some work done.  Well, to be fair, I'm procrastinating on my work by posting to the blog.  

     Last night, Grandma and I gave James a bath, and he really enjoyed it for the first time.  Previously he's been rather upset by the whole bath ordeal, but last night he calmed down enough to realize that it's really quite pleasant sitting in a pool of warm water (he even added some of his own water to the tub).  Of course, I forgot to bring his rubber ducky into the tub again.  I'm sure he'll enjoy the whole experience even more if I can ever remember that.  Nonetheless, James was not at all eager to get out.  Of course, once he did get out, he REALLY wanted to get back in as he got all cold and was generally unhappy.  He and I snuggled by the fire for a while, and he calmed back down.  Of course, as it was nighttime, that particular condition (calm) didn't last long, but it was nice while it did.  

     James has also built up his wiggling skills.  We have this special sleep positioner thing that's supposed to help keep James on his back while he sleeps.  It is basically a piece of slightly inclined foam cushion that has two removable wedges on the side to keep him centered and his head slightly elevated.  James now has the ability to wiggle himself all the way down his positioner to the bottom of his bassinet.  In the process, he also wiggles himself out of his swaddle.  Since he's inevitably already kicked off his socks, his feet tend to get cold, which makes him wake up, which makes me wake up, which makes us all very tired.  Perhaps tonight we'll try to put him to sleep in his special sleeping bag outfit.  That might help.  

     Well, I should get back to work (or, more likely, find a different way to procrastinate).  More updates later.  

Healthy Little Boy

Well, we went to the doctor yesterday for James's two week visit, and the official verdict is that he's a healthy boy.  He weighed six pounds, twelve ounces, and despite the measurement that indicates he shrunk a half an inch (Auntie Erin assures me it's very difficult to measure babies accurately), everything seems to be in perfect working order.  After our visit with the pediatrician, we visited with the lactation nurse to work on feeding better.  Finally, I had a nurse visit to check my blood pressure, which seems to be holding steady.  The only thing that was a bit off about the visit (other than the whole thing taking upwards of three hours) was that the doctor prescribed Zantac for James for his reflux.  Patrick and I are going to try to get a second opinion as to whether or not that's really necessary as the information online indicates gross over-prescription of the drug for infants.  Also, it's been approved for infants as young as one month, and James is only nineteen days old.  Plus, Patrick found on its website that it has a side effect of headaches, and we don't want to just replace one pain with another.  The doctor did say that there were no side effects, which also makes us question his expertise.  So we'll see how that goes.  Well, the little guy is back to sleep, so I'm going to go try to be the same.  

Flying Solo

After a blissful two weeks with Patrick at home with us, James and I went it alone today.  Poor Patrick had to return to work on about two hours sleep, and he didn't even get to spend his tired day with someone adorable.  Well, to be fair, I haven't seen his coworkers, but I can't imagine any of them could be anywhere near as cute as James.

Today was about as hard as I expected it would be.  The biggest excitement of the day was James nearly choking to death on his bottle this morning.  He tends to get so excited about his meal that he forgets to breathe, and then remembers that oxygen is essential to continued life mid gulp.  But we got that taken care of, and we'll be visiting a feeding specialist tomorrow after we see the doctor.  I am optimistic that things will get better and better on that front.  

Tomorrow Patrick has the day off so he can go to the doctor with us, so that will be good.  Then Thursday will be hard again, I imagine, but probably just a little easier than today.  We'll get the hang of this flying solo thing yet.  

Heavy Weight

Well, James continues to keep us guessing on his weight.  Today at the doctor, he weighed in at six pounds, ten ounces.  We weighed him twice, just to be sure we were doing it right.  I think there's either something wrong with the scale or with the kid.  We'll go for a full doctor's appointment on Wednesday, so we'll see then how his weight is going.  We're cautiously optimistic.

Meanwhile, I'm not sure what it means about what kind of kid James is growing into, but it turns out that James definitely likes to run the show.  Today he decided that lunch was not something Mommy should have.  After I warmed up part one of lunch (Black Bean Stoup, a la Rachel Ray), James immediately made the largest and loudest mess in his pants yet.  So, we left the nice hot soup on the table, dealt with the matter at hand, and, of course, returned to room-temperature soup.  Hungry as I was, I wolfed it down and hurried to heat up part two (a yummy veggie quesadilla made by my work friends, Angie and Chris) while James took a power nap.  Just as I cut into the steaming pocket of goodness, James woke up, hungry and roaring.  So, again I abandoned lunch to take care of the kiddo.  It is now cold.  Alas.  I fear a pattern is developing here.  I may not eat a hot meal again for the next three years or so.  

Sleeping Patterns

Well, James maintains his sleeping pattern of approximately two hours of sleep during the traditional sleeping times and approximately sixteen hours of sleep during traditional waking hours.  While this pattern is wreaking havoc with his parents' sleep schedule, he seems quite content.  To be fair, some of the nighttime awake thing is my fault.  When James wakes up to eat, we feed him, the burp him, and then hold him in some sort of upright position for twenty to thirty minutes to minimize reflux.  Almost inevitably, somewhere during that process, James both falls asleep, and he switches to his somewhat secret identity (ThunderPants) and requires changing.  So, the question becomes change him and wake him up, or let him sleep and slowly marinate in his own excrement.  I can't help myself; I have to change him.  So, it's partly my fault he doesn't do enough sleeping.  Alas.  On the up side, at least he's still adorable, no matter the time of day.  

Going Down

Sadly, both our energy levels and James's weight are going down.  James's weight is the more important thing, of course.  We went back to check his weight again today, and he's down to five pounds, eleven ounces.  We had really hoped he'd be over six pounds today as the doctor said on Monday that he should gain between half an ounce and an ounce a day starting then.  He seems to be eating really well, so I'm not sure what else we should be doing.  The doctor today said that she wasn't that concerned since it was only a small loss, and that we can start feeding him more at a time.  We'll go back to see how he's doing on Monday.  Keep James in your thoughts this weekend.  Perhaps he'll start gaining the way he should.

On the energy level front, Patrick and I are nodding off with nearly the frequency that James is.  The poor kid has had some trouble at night with crying for multiple hours at a time (likely what has been sapping his energy, if you ask me.  It's certainly sapping ours), so none of us are sleeping really well then.  Therefore, we all nap intermittently during the day.  Of course, James is adorable even when he's screaming, but it does break your heart to hear him cry like that and not be able to help him feel better.  So, it's emotionally draining too.  

Patrick is up taking a shower right now, and it occurs to me that I don't remember the last time I brushed my teeth.  I might have done it this morning, but I honestly can't recall.  Apparently personal hygiene is one of the first things to go when you have a kid.  I think I'd better go brush them now, just in case.  More later.  

People have diaper preferences?

So, several months ago when Patrick's mom called and asked if we had made a decision about what kind of diaper we preferred, I thought she was insane.  What kind of snobby, diaper elitist, I wondered, has some sort of diaper preference?  I imagine I prefer whatever is on sale, I thought.  Ha.  Little did I know.  Apparently my son is not the proper shape for Huggies.  It would seem as though he is more of a Pampers shape.  I know this because when we put him in a Huggies diaper, we laid him down to put on his outfit and discovered that, despite the diaper covering the relevant areas, he had nonetheless managed to soak himself and my sister's bedspread (sorry Kristin) in the ten seconds between putting the diaper on him and getting his outfit out.  You learn something new every day, I suppose.  Who knew?

Talitha's day

Our attention is almost constantly focused on James right now, but today we also remember James's big sister.  On this day last year we learned that our first child had died at 16 weeks in the womb.  We named her Talitha, which is what Jesus called a little girl who had died that He brought back to life.  Our daughter had 69 chromosomes instead of the necessary 46, so her body wasn't a suitable vessel for her spirit.  So today we admit feeling sadness that she is not here with us, but we are also happy that she is with God in a place where no physical frailty can cause her pain.  And we look forward to the day when James, Melinda and I can meet her face to face.   

Goooooooo Dawgs!

So, James helped send UGA to victory on Saturday.  To be fair, he does appear to have slept through the whole thing.  However, one day, when he's able to stay awake for the duration of a game, I'm sure his grandpa will teach him to call the Dawgs with enthusiasm.  

James sleeps on Daddy's shirt.
James wears Auntie Erin's old CareBears outfit.
James is moderately displeased with his bath.
Daddy helps James get warm after the bath.
James is now a cleaner beautiful baby.

Weighing In and Wetting Down

Well, James has had an eventful past twenty-four hours.  The most important thing was his trip to the doctor today, where he weighed in at a nice five pounds, fourteen ounces.  Way (or weigh) to go, James!  He'll go back to be weighed again on Friday, where we hope he will reach six pounds.

The other exciting event of this past day was James's first bath.  Rest assured that we have not just left the poor kid festering in his own filth for the first week of his life.  He's been getting sponge baths because his umbilical cord and circumcision wound couldn't be submerged in water.  However, last night, both hindrances had healed properly, and we could put him in a bath.  James seemed prepared to enjoy the whole experience at first, but, as the water cooled, so did his attitude towards the task at hand.  At a new personal best, James managed to poo on Daddy, and wet squarely down the front of Mommy's shirt, skimming Grandma in the process.  A three-fer!  On the up side, Daddy managed to capture the pee on the high definition video camera.  It should look great on the huge tv Grandma and Grandpa have.  James will appreciate that video on future milestones in his life, I'm sure.  

Packing on the Pounds (ounces, actually)

James, after a somewhat slow start, has really caught on to the idea of eating.  Today the nurse weighed him, and he is 5 pounds, 10 ounces.  That is just where he should be - after a week outside Mommy, he is supposed to be back to his original birth weight.  We're still going to weigh him regularly for another week or so, but it appears that his weight is no longer a problem.  

The James Fountain

What can he do? Well, James counts among his many talents a strong grip, lifting his head, bending himself into strange positions, and expelling various bodily fluids with tremendous force, often with a particular aim. He excels in pee, though he is improving in spit up. So far, he's hit his father and his grandmother with the spit up. The pee, however, has reached a wider audience. He has hit Kristin's wall (twice), Patrick, me, Grandma, the ottoman in Grandma and Grandpa's family room, and the somewhat arrogant doctor. I commended him for that last one.

He cannot yet smile, though it sometimes looks like he can if he has gas. Oh. Gas. That's something else he's good at. Of course, it's adorable gas, so nobody minds.

He does make eye contact with people, but doesn't seem to focus on things that are farther away from him. I'm not sure how long it takes before he can watch things that are happening around him. Patrick took him for a stroll today, and we'll take him on another tomorrow. Perhaps he will soon enjoy looking at all sorts of things around him.

We go back to the doctor tomorrow. After his incredible feat of gaining almost a pound in a twenty-four hour period, we'll see what he was able to accomplish in forty-eight. I did get on the scale with him today, and then get on without him. The difference was 6.2 pounds. I can't imagine that's right, though he is looking a bit more round (in a cute way). We'll see what they say tomorrow.

A note from Melinda: update & antics

Mostly James just eats and sleeps. He's absolutely the cutest thing no matter what he's doing, but he doesn't spend too much awake time doing anything but eating. Of course, we have to feed him every two to two and a half hours (measured from the start of the feeding), and the feedings themselves take about an hour, so he's actually up a good percentage of time, just not socializing. Once he gets bigger and can eat more at once, he'll probably have more energy for just hanging out.

A nurse came out to the house today to check on James. He's lost nine percent of his initial body weight--an admirable achievement on The Biggest Loser; not such a great thing for a little baby. So, we're working really hard on the feeding thing, giving him a little extra formula at each feeding in addition to his normal food. We go see the pediatrician tomorrow for the first time, so I'll ask a zillion questions and find out everything I need to about how to get him back up to fighting weight in no time.

He doesn't really fit in any of his clothes, being so small and all (five to eight pounds my rear end), so everything pretty much hangs off him. In the absolute cutest way, of course. I wish you and Erin could meet him. You will love him when you finally do. He's the greatest.

I do have one good story about his antics on this world so far. Earlier today, Patrick and I had just finished feeding him--definitely a two-person job--and Patrick had progressed to changing him. Patrick was excited at first, and called out to tell me that James had done a poo. Now, this is more exciting than it sounds as, um, production on James's part means that all this effort and energy the three of us are putting into the feeding is paying off. I, too, was thrilled, but I was not able to observe the product at that time (something else we have to do regularly so that we can describe it to the doctor) due to the fact that immediately after James feeds, I'm supposed to use the breast pump to further my milk production. Therefore, I was tethered to theother side of the room. Unfortunately, just at that moment, James decided it was time to pee. Of course, Patrick had already disposed of the soiled diaper and had not yet extracted a new one. Therefore, the veritable James Fountain sprayed most heartily right over top of the little kiddo and all down the wall of your room. Sorry about that. Don't worry. Patrick cleaned it up. It was pretty hilarious though.

It's official: James is the cutest baby in the world

James sleeps peacefully...

James leaves the hospital

James left the hospital today to head over to his Grandparent's house. Melinda and Patrick are tired but so very happy.

James has arrived!!

James Patrick Franklin Wallace, Jr. was born on October 4, 2008 at 10:30 a.m.

He is 5lb 10.5 oz and 19 inches long.