Mr. Gummy Is Gone

Okay, there has been no sign of Mr. Gummy Bear. I think we're safe. I felt a little weird talking to the babysitter about this. She's wonderful, but she doesn't speak English very well. Our conversation yesterday kind of bogged down for a while after I asked, "Was there any candy in Simon's diaper this morning?" It took a while to get things straightened out.

Lesson of the day: Gummy bears dissolve quite nicely in the tummies of small babies.

Super Mom

I accidently let Simon have a gummy bear this afternoon. I believe it was cherry flavored. I thought I had taken them all out of the bag, but I guess one was sneaky and stuck to the bottom. And then Simon found it and put it in his mouth. It's much harder lately to take stuff out of his mouth, as he now has two bottom teeth and the beginnings of two top teeth and he's not afraid to use them. I tried to get the candy out of his mouth. I really did. But he locked his jaw tight and I couldn't get a finger inside. So I watched him closely, ever alert for the slightest sign of choking.

Also, these gummy bears weren't the freshest or softest. I was worried that he wouldn't be able to "gum" it down enough to swallow. I guess he didn't have much problem, because about 30 minutes after he popped it in his mouth, I managed to get a clear look and saw that it was gone. Did he swallow it whole? Will I change his diaper tomorrow and find a nearly intact gummy bear? Good going, mom. I hope he doesn't expect more corn syrup and red dye treats in the future.

On the plus side, though: my calculations show that that single gummy bear provided my son with 8 calories!

Oh, Baby

This is a look at what bedtimes can look like at our house. There's no winding down here.

First Word, I Think

I'm pretty sure this counts:



I just happened to be filming him at the right time yesterday.

Monstro, the Baby Monster

My sister coined that phrase, and it really applies to my son.



He loves to be a monster. My back has gone out again from trying to comply with his wishes. Wishes such as holding his hands while he walks up and down the stairs to Michael's office (the garage, really)--over and over and over. Wishes such as wanting to climb over Michael's drums to get to the ones he wants to bang on (Mommy eventually said no to this one and had to endure much screaming). Wishes such as wanting to climb up onto exercise equipment and then jump off onto the living room couch (this was made baby-safe by Mommy). What else does he want to do? Oh, yeah: walk up and down our driveway, which is a pretty steep hill.



He doesn't get tired of this. He also loves to walk up and down the steps in our front yard. Here is a picture of just the last section of steps:



He climbs them fast, too.

Anyway, my back is really bad. It's my lower back, the sacrum area. I can barely walk, let alone lift Simon. My parents are coming over at 5:30 to help after the babysitter goes home. Yes, I use a babysitter to help with Simon, even though I'm at home at the time. If I didn't have help, I wouldn't be able to do my work (I cyber-commute). If my back doesn't get better soon, my life is going to be a disaster. I can't lift Simon out of his crib to nurse at night. I can't move fast enough to keep up with him during the day. This makes for potentially unsafe situations.

Help!

Nursing Fun

Lately Simon has decided that my breasts are hilarious. He nurses for a while, then crawls or squirms away, then looks back at my breast and laughs out loud. He can't resist coming back for more. Usually he crawls back to me, pulls himself up, and bends over for boob access. He nurses like that for awhile, standing, a little bent over, with his butt in the air. Sometimes he does a little bouncy dance, too. It's really cute. When he's done, he moves away, then looks back and laughs again. He'll come back a few more times before he's fully done nursing.

Guardian Angel?

If my guardian angel is anything like me, she's probably still working on trying to get me a date with that guy Ruben I liked in 9th grade. Sure, she's probably got my back on the "big things," like making sure Simon doesn't fall out of my arms while we sleep/snuggle on the couch in his bedroom in the early hours of the morning, but I imagine she's bogged down with the little things. I imagine there's a lot of disorganization in her "in" pile.

'Cause there sure is in mine. Combine that with the time deficit I'm experiencing (aka "baby time") and you get a woman who has had her Dell laptop for 11 months and has yet to call tech support to fix a problem with the DVD region setting. For some impossible reason, my DVD region came set to Europe, so I can't play any of my American DVDs. I've been meaning to call Dell about this, but it's just not my top priority, and that means that it doesn't get done. In fact, I don't don't even know where my warranty info is. It's in some pre-Simon area of my office. I think the warranty is only for one year, so I had better get moving on this.

With Simon becoming more and more mobile, I barely have time to get dressed in the morning. In fact, I haven't bothered to do so for two days now. I just wake up and go. I look scary in these black sweats that have stains from multiple meals on them. Looking down, I can see several islands of gunky rice remains, a smear of yogurt, and many splotches of avocado and banana. I actually found time to do laundry yesterday, but I haven't found the time to replace my dirty clothes with the clean ones. I don't really have time to write this, but I'm forcing myself. Otherwise, I'll be stuck with an insurmountable backlog of thoughts to sort through, and I'll be just as bogged down as my angel.