Over 40 mama — Adventures in poop, patience, and first-time parenthood

So, as I mentioned, the bug has learned to scooch. Which means she’s getting into everything that’s between 0 and 12 inches off the floor.   The magazine rack, C’s immense pen box, and the cat box are all potential targets.  Fortunately the cat box is a little off her beaten path as of now.  As soon as she’s crawling instead of scooching, we’ll be worrying about the cat box.

We spent Xmas at C’s brother’s house.  We were all in the living room, with an enormous fireplace where they burnt all the wrapping paper.  The bug was just rapt watching it all: Her cousins, who bounced between the tree and the rest of us, playing “Santa” — the ribbons and paper and crinkly sounds and the TOYS and OMG OMG OMG the PACKAGING for said toys which came in all manner of plastics and paper and cardboard and all kinds of fun textures.  And of course the fireballs that erupted when someone threw in some paper.  Those were cool. 

Thankfully, it wasn’t as orgiastic as it’s been in years’ past.  I made most of my presents this year, since I wanted to save some $$.  So early on I bought some cool yarn and knitted a bunch of hats and scarves for folks.  Nobody totally vomited or said “what’s this supposed to be?” so I guess they were relatively successful. Maybe next year I’ll have a little more skill besides the knit stitch and basic hats, and can venture into more interesting patterns. 

We went to the pediatrician on Dec 23rd, something I really don’t recommend.  The bug was the last patient that day – we waited in the waiting room for 50 min before Dr P saw her.  And by the time Dr P came in to see us, she was clearly exhausted from a long day, and ready to run screaming out of there.

I asked about food and sleep: Turns out, the bug is now to the point where we no longer have to worry about allergies, so she can eat pretty much whatever she wants I want her to eat.  So she’s now eating tofu, carrots from our garden, and lentils.  C’s sis-in-law gave her a graham cracker which I wasn’t totally stoked about, but I’ve learned to pick my battles. 

Dr P also suggested we do a little “cry it out” to help the bug to sleep through the night.  We’ve actually already implemented this during the 3 and 5 AM wake ups and it seems to be working. She doesn’t cry for very long –she may not even be awake.  She seems to know on some level she’s supposed to be sleeping, and can soothe herself.  Daytimes are a little harder.  We’ll get there.  One thing I realized is that I prefer to implement change in interations, where Dr P tends to prescribe things in more black and white terms.  Definitely something to keep an eye out on.  Esp as the bean gets into crawling, I want a ped who can view an issue from multiple sides, and explain the various facets of each.  OMM!