Battle Cat

I don't know why it's so important to me to keep the cat out of the nursery.  Do other people worry about this?  I don't think Renny would want to hurt Oliver.  On the contrary; Renny loves a warm body to snuggle up against.  And at about eleven and a half pounds, Renny is still bigger than Oliver.

[Side note: Oliver had his one-month check-up earlier this week.  He was 10 pounds 14 ounces (75th percentile) and 23.5 inches long (90th percentile).  And very healthy.]

I mean, if I shouldn't have a stuffed animal in the crib, I shouldn't have a real one in there for the same reason.  Right?

Although, to be fair, Renny has managed to gain entry to the nursery dozens of times, and I've never once found him in the crib.  When that room was Steve's and my bedroom, Renny's favorite place in the world was to sit in that window.  It was the perfect vantage point to monitor the sidewalk below (with accompanying dash down the stairs whenever he noticed us coming home) and the birds in the tree, right at window-level.  In all the times I've found him in the nursery, he's either been in that window or curled up on the bed (which Steve and I are sleeping in).

Still.  I don't want cats in the nursery.  So this has been an ongoing battle.

First, I bought an "extra-tall" baby gate that, in online reviews, mentioned keeping cats out successfully.  (Actually, it does keep Monet out, because she can't be bothered to jump.)  Extra-tall baby gates are a joke to a determined cat.  I knew Renny could successfully jump onto pieces of furniture much taller than the gate, but I was hopeful that the accompanying drop straight down on the other side would deter him.  HA.

I mean, somehow he got up there.

Next, I taped cardboard to the gate, up an additional foot or so.

I think the cardboard might have worked--at least for a while--if it wasn't for the unfortunate location of our washer/dryer (immediately adjacent the nursery door).  Which I somehow never even considered.  So Renny could just jump onto the washing machine, even if the lid was open, and get right over the cardboard.  The way back out proved trickier, and Renny ended up plowing right through the cardboard a time or two, destroying it.

I re-assembled the cardboard and put a regular baby gate up across the top of the washer.  The top of the gate is shoulder-height to me and about an inch wide, but Renny can still get on top of that.  And right over and into the nursery.

[The sign says "Oliver's Room, No Cats Allowed" and has a drawing of an orange cat with a NO sign through it.]

So my next Big Idea was a curtain over the washer/dryer.  It hasn't had time to truly be tested, so we'll see.

Fingers crossed.

If that doesn't work, the only other solution I can think of is a screen door.  Or am I being silly to worry?

One Month

Oliver is one month old today.

This tiny, wrinkly newborn with squeezed-shut eyes and a watery little cry is suddenly a baby instead of a newborn.  He's alert and intense with wide, dark blue-grey eyes.  He knows when he's content, when he's angry, and when he's tired or hungry.  (He gets angry at having a dirty diaper, and angrier at having it changed.)

His superhero pose

He's met his Grandma S and Grandpa W, Grandma M, Aunt Jessica, first-cousin-once-removed (right?) Phil, and six of Mom and Dad's friends in person.

He peed on two of them.

He's met Great-Grandma Peggy, Great-Grandpa Jim, and several of Mom's aunts, uncles, and cousins over video chat.  He'll meet most of them in person next month.

Aunt Jessica

His umbilical cord stump fell off, but not without a couple days of bleeding first, which had me on the phone with the nurse line more than once.  (More than three times.)  I was reassured repeatedly that a little bleeding is normal, and given a list of things to look for that would be concerning.  None of them happened.

He had his first "real" bath.

It's tiring being one month old!

He lost ALL the hair off the top of his head, but none of it from around the sides or back.  He looks like a little old man.

Baldie!

According to non-official measurements, Oliver is 10 pounds 8.5 ounces.  He gained 44.5 ounces in 27 days, counting from his leaving-the-hospital weight.  That's a little more than the one-ounce-per-day average.  Oliver is a good eater.

Every time we do something for the first time with him, Steve and I tell him about it.  "Oliver, this is your first time in Santa Barbara!"  "Oliver, this is the steepest hill you've ever gone up!"  "Oliver, this the farthest from home you've ever been!"  "Oliver, this is your first time at a bank!"

The longest he's slept in a row is six hours.  He did it three times, and then went back to his usual four-hour stretches at night.  But that's okay, we'll get there!

My life has changed so much in these last weeks.  Just leaving the house seems to take hours.  I spend a huge portion of my day sitting on the couch or in bed nursing the baby.  But at the same time, it feels like Oliver was always here.  I wouldn't have it any other way.

Love you, kiddo!

PEP

I've been going to this parenting group, PEP (Postpartum Education for Parents) for the last two Wednesday mornings. 

I'm really enjoying it.  There are about 30 babies and their moms (and the occasional dad) each week, although not always the same ones.  There's a lot of discussion about the highs and lows of parenting, with lots of advice from experienced moms or moms currently going through the same things. The group is very unbiased, un-judge-y.  There are breastfeeding moms and formula feeding moms, co-sleeping parents and babies who have been in their own rooms since day one.  There are working moms and stay-at-home moms, families with full-time nannies and families whose children attend daycare.  And everything in between.  Each meeting starts with a reminder that we all parent differently, and we're there to offer support, not judgement. 

I love getting different perspectives on things we might be going through, or learning about things we haven't experienced yet. 

The youngest baby, I think, was thirteen days old during our first meeting, the oldest, twelve weeks.  I'd say the majority of babies were between three and six weeks.  (Oliver was three weeks.)  But it means we're all in about the same boat.  Probably half the moms have older children at home, too. 

It's in Santa Barbara, which is both nice and not-nice.  Nice, because it gives us an excuse to visit Steve at work, or to visit with some of our Santa Barbara friends after the meeting.  Not-nice because part of the point of the group is to meet other mommies in the area, and Santa Barbara is not that close.  It's far enough that when they get together for walks along the beach on Thursday mornings, so far I haven't been able to haul us up there a second day to participate. 

I really wish there was a PEP group more local, but there isn't.  So I'll take what I can get, and I'll happily spend two hours once a week talking with and listening to other moms navigating this same crazy world of parenthood.

First Mom's Day

Mother's Day may be another of those Hallmark holidays, but I don't care.  My first one was awesome.

"Bananas Over Mommy"

First, it started with Oliver sleeping six whole hours in a row.  Six!  That was a first, but hopefully not a last.  (Well, it wasn't, because he did it again last night.  Let's hope it continues from there.)  Then Steve brought me his amazing banana chocolate chip pancakes with a sprinkling of powdered sugar on top and a mug of hot lemon water with honey and a basket of strawberries to eat in bed.

There was an unpleasant interlude wherein Oliver spit up probably everything he'd eaten in a projectile fashion I was lucky enough not to witness...

But I digress!  Once we recovered from the epic spitting up, we got ready and headed out to a botanical garden we happened to spot the sign for on the way home from Whole Foods earlier in the week.

The gardens were spread out over a hill, and the paths were covered in wood chips, making it sort of an uphill off-roading adventure for our little city stroller.  But we made it to the top!  Where there was a breeze!  (It was 92 degrees, according to my car thermometer.  The weather widget on my cell phone estimated it had gotten up to 100 at some point during the day.)  The hilltop garden boasted panoramic views of the Conejo Valley, and right in the middle of the plateau was a lovely cactus garden with picnic tables.  We sat and let the breeze cool us while I nursed Oliver.

This was the "easy" path

View from the top

A neat little table and chairs carved out of tree trunks

And I earned my Mommy Card by remembering a water bottle and granola bar for the grown-ups.  And diapers and wipes and a changing pad for the baby.  And hand sanitizer.

We stopped for frozen yogurt on the way home, and walked over to pick up carry-out from the local Mexican restaurant later for dinner.  I'm glad we opted not to eat there, because not long after we took our first bite, Oliver started crying.  He'd had a long and hot day.

I had an amazing day!

Stuff I Dig

We've been at this parenting thing for three weeks and two days, and in that time, I've come to discover some baby items I'm not sure I could live without.  Or, at least, I couldn't live without them as happily.  

Feed Baby Pro

I honestly don't know what I'd do without this app.  You track feedings, obviously.  There's a button for Left or Right that turns on a timer.  It keeps track of what time and for how long you fed, along with the length of time from one feeding to the next.  It also tracks pumped amounts, and bottle feedings with both length of time and amount.  (There's a button for solid foods, but we haven't gotten there yet.) 

But that's not all!  It tracks diapers!  Poo, pee, or both.  And growth, and medications, and... probably other things I haven't even discovered.  There are charts and graphs, and you can sync accounts so both Mom and Dad have the same info.

This app was worth every penny of the $3.50 I paid for it.  I'd never remember which boob he had last (probably the most valuable bit of information) or how many diapers we changed in a day (which his pediatrician always asks).  Darn good app.


Gummy Bear Nightlight

Daytime picture...

This was a Christmas gift from Grandma S.  It's perfect for mid-night diaper changes and nursing because the light is red, and it's not jarring.  It has a 60-minute timer (which is sometimes depressing when we're awake for more than an hour in the middle of the night...).  Our bedtime sort-of routine consists of turning off the overhead light and doing our bedtime nursing with just the gummy bear nightlight while Steve reads us a story.  I suppose any red light bulb would accomplish the same thing, but it's red and it's cute.  But don't try to eat it.


Snoogle Pillow

Snoogle-as-nursing-pillow, bonus cat

This thing was a sleep essential while I was pregnant.   It supported my belly or my back (depending on which side I was sleeping on) and kept my hips aligned.  It took up a ton of space on the bed, which was its one drawback.  But I've discovered that I can curl up one end of it to sit against and use the other end as a nursing pillow!  So while I don't keep it in the bed we sleep in, it's handy to use when we're hanging out in the other room.


My Brest Friend Pillow

Photo borrowed from Amazon (but linked, too!)

Speaking of nursing pillows... I use the heck out of this thing.  I love that it clips around you and stays snug against your body.  This feature alone beats the Snoogle-as-nursing-pillow any day in my book.  I don't really know what else to say about it, except that it's awesome.  I tried nursing without a pillow once, and it was a disaster.  I don't know if it's because Oliver is so small, or what, but two thumbs up for the nursing pillow.


Chicco Stroller Caddy

Walking the dog and the baby

This was a shower gift from a friend I went shopping for my car seat with.  The car seat just snaps right into it.  It's light and sturdy and and folds up easily and turns on a dime, seriously.  The basket is big enough to stow a few bags of groceries, too, so we can still walk to the grocery store.  I know we'll have to get a "real" stroller at some point, but for now this thing is perfect.


Aden & Anais Swaddle Blankets

I registered for these on Noelle's recommendation, and then she gifted them to me!  They're big and stretchy-but-not-too-stretchy.  Steve is the professional swaddler.  Oliver always manages to wiggle his arms out of my swaddles (I'm pretty sure I did the swaddle pictured...), but Steve can wrap him up nice and tight and he'll sleep for hours.  Last night, for the first time, we slept for five hours in a row!  And then I fed Oliver and changed his diaper and we got three more hours!  Bliss.


I'm sure this list will grow, but for now, these are the things I think are pretty awesome.

The Many Faces of Nap Time

I don't know how I get anything done in a day.  Actually, I don't get anything done in a day. Not really.  I spend most of it just watching Oliver.  Yesterday, I sat for over an hour while he slept, and took pictures.  (I apologize for the focus issues... the camera loved his striped shirt.)