4th of July

Memorial wreath for David Sparks (veteran)

New Blog Title

So... you may have noticed the new blog title - punny, eh? :-) For those who don't know me in real life, "Phantzi" is a melding of my last name and my husband's. And "yarns," of course, can refer to the knitting kind or the narrative kind.

On this light note, I list here three new games Valerie has initiated:

• Bonk. Not for the thin-skulled, the primary object of this game is to provoke hilarity by bumping your forehead against someone else's (if you are V., that would be mine). Laugh, repeat. And again. Game ends with a nose rub.
• Feet. Alternately known as "Happy Feet." Sit in Lazy Boy. Hand mom your pink bunny or the toy known as "green guy" (kind of a dragon-ish thing, with little mirrors on its feet) and brush your hands together to signal "do it again." Mom flips bunny or Green Guy over twice, then holds out his feet saying "feetfeetfeetfeetfeet!" You hold up either one foot or both feet, then laugh and giggle while she tickles your soles with the toy's feet!
• Where is Valerie? Edition 2.0. Unlike the prototypical cloth-over-face version, this more sophisticated version of the game involves standing behind mom's back, sometimes gripping her shirt for support but sometimes unsupported! Stay very still while mom swivels her head back and forth looking for you. Then slowly leeeeaaaaaan over to one side where she can see you. Mom cries, "There she is!" and grabs you for a hug.

Happy Canada Day!

Christmas 2006, Cuzco, Peru

Happy Canada Day to all you Canucks out there, but especially to Valerie's one and only Uncle David!

Thanksgiving 2008, Savannah, GA

In Memoriam

I had thought about what I wanted to say at the memorial service, but they closed the open mic sooner than I expected, and I was left with words unsaid. So I thought I would post them here. I know I will repeat things other people have said, but I guess that's not really actually a problem - anyway, this is how I remember Dave Sparks.

My earliest memories of uncle Dave are a child's memories; awareness of a strong and gentle presence in the background there among the adults; a deep and resonant voice, and a feeling of safety. When I came to the US for college, the whole family kind of moved into a surrogate parental role while my parents were still in Peru. I remember Dave including me on a trip to Darien Lake for Max's 6th birthday, simply as part of the family. When I was in the Black Hills taking science classes, Dave sent me not only the biggest care package I've ever received, but certainly the biggest care package anyone at the science center received that summer! The enormous box held clothes, snacks, and camping gear enough for three people. I shared the snacks with my roommates all summer long, and to this day I still have some of the clothes. Dave was one of the most generous people I've ever met. The last time I saw him, he was still loading our car with drinks and snacks, as much as we could carry.

He loved to look after Grandma. Another memory I have of Dave is the hours and hours and hours he would spend fixing things for her, replacing fixtures in the house, and so on. I actually still have some of the clothes that he bought for her, too.

The last thing Dave told me before I went to Bolivia as a volunteer with the Mennonite Central Committee was "now don't you come back with a Mennonite boyfriend!" (this was due to, shall we say, "issues" he had with his neighbor who happened to be Mennonite). Ironically, I came back with the one Mennonite guy I met who most resembled Dave in temperament and personality! At first Terry and Dave locked horns over US foreign policy, but later on they bonded while yelling at the airline people when the Sparks were bumped from their Cuzco-Lima flight after visiting my parents one Christmas (classic Dave line: "Call the embassy! They're bumping Americans!"). They also share a disdain for bad/inconsiderate/annoying drivers on the highway, and an enjoyment of big meals and honking at golfers.

As much as Dave has meant to all of us, I know he has meant the world to Wendy. As long as I can remember, it's always been Wendy&Dave, like peanut butter and chocolate, like stars and stripes. He leaves a big absence. It is you we'll be thinking of in the weeks and months to come, holding you in our hearts, trying to match the measure of love that Dave put into his family, into the world.

Love You, Uncle Dave

In Honor Of

Happy Father's Day, Big T!

Check out Millenium Hand and Shrimp for a photo retrospective of Terry's first year of fatherhood. The pictures say it all - naps, walkies, babywearing, diaper changing, webinars, and the great outdoors. Great job, honey!

Love you, EEP

Terry has taken over the night parenting again, and last night she slept 8 hours straight! This is a formula that works for us.

I like Rosanne's line of blog title suggestions - my top two possibilities are:
- Baby Yarns (except she's moving into toddlerhood)
- Yarns of LOO (LOO is Tia Ros's acronym for our nickname for her, "Little One-One")

Terry is resisting the change however!

Hubris

About the sleep, I may have spoken too soon - or even jinxed it. Last night Valerie and I were up and down and up and down and up and down again from 11:45 to 2:30 a.m. I made myself a bed on the living room floor (we moved our bedroom upstairs and I got tired of going up and down creaky stairs) and got some shut-eye until 6-ish. At that point she was throwing teddy bear and blankies out of the crib and stating "up!" in a very determined voice. But as soon as I picked her up to nurse, she fell asleep again, for another 40 minutes! I dozed off too, which was nice.

So we'll see what this evening brings. I think her 8th tooth (incoming) might have been bothering her. I put some orajel on it... but who knows, really???

Also, I'm thinking I might need to change the title of this blog (not the url, just the title). Any suggestions?

Thirteen Months Old Today

I have decided that I am, more or less, on vacation. That means not trying to do any academic work at the moment. Since we got back from Dallas, it's been all about settling into our home and routine and spending lots and lots of time focused on Valerie. I mean really focused, not just meeting her daily needs from moment to moment, but sinking attention and energy into her like water on soil. Thankfully it's not just me - but Terry and Grandma Dot and Grandpa Vern and her babysitter Rhoda as well, and our circle of friends to varying degrees.

Sometime between Saturday and Sunday I felt her settling into our home and routine herself. It really took a full week. From the beginning of May, it's been a revolving door of change and readjustments, and she took it well overall. But it was beginning to wear on her, and by the tiem we got back from Dallas (after the week of immunization-fevers and allergy rash as well) she was pretty worn out, I think. Mostly this manifested through sleep issues (of course) - waking around 3 times every night, uneven napping, and restless sleep - at least once every night it would take around an hour to settle her back to sleep. As of last night, this is abating.

I have been nursing her down since our move to Ithaca, both for the initial going to sleep and for the night waking. During our first few weeks in Ithaca she was still mostly sleeping through the night, but little by little that eroded. And even then, she would never go to sleep without crying at least for a few minutes (although never more than a half an hour). Now, thankfully, we seem to have found our bedtime rhythm and she's been going down really smoothly. As of last night, she still woke up 3-4 times, but she didn't have that restlessness so I think we are on a good trajectory.

So what is she up to at 13 months?

• Working on walking! Tara and Aaron generously gave us the little riding toy in the previous post's picture, and she LOOOOOOOOOVES it!! She pushes it around all over the place, and it really seems to be supporting her walking practice.
• She is going to be an athlete, because she loves to play with balls! She has 8 now (I counted) of varying sizes and textures. She still loves the game my mom invented, where we put her in the Pack'n'Play and toss a ball into it and she throws it out again. She's getting better at throwing them too.
• She is going to be a scholar, because she loves her books! The last time I counted a few days ago, she had 56. And that's not counting the mini Tonka books or the books at Grandma Dot's! Since then she was given a set of Little Golden Books but I'm not sure how many are in it.
• She is babbling ever more distinctly and coherently. Her two all-purpose words right now are "Up" and "Ba," although she modifies the vowel sound following the B, depending on the word she means: ball, bird, balloon, banana, blueberry, bear, etc. "Up" means: up, down, take me over there. She also growls "rrrraaaa!" to indicate a bear or lion (toy or picture), and says "babababa" in a high-pitched voice to imitate a chicken squawk (copying the way I do it: "bok-bok-bok-bok-bok-AWK!")*
• She is signing a lot: ball, hat, dog, duck, bye-bye, and the one she invented (derived from the "zoom zoom zoom" rhyme) where she brushes her hands together as though brushing off dirt, which means "sing me a song," "tell me a story," or "keep singing," or sometimes just "again." She also waves her hand like a conductor when I'm supposed to sing a song to go with one of her books. And she points expertly :-)
• Today we invented a new game where I tossed all her stuffed toys into the crib, and then she would throw out the one I asked for: dog, cat, Superman, etc. It was so cool to learn which ones she was able to identify!
• She is eating really well! This was another area of development that suffered with our latest trip; she went back to nursing 7-8 times a day (instead of 3-4 as previously) and ate very little solid food. Now she's really putting it away. She especially likes black beans, avocado, blueberries, salmon, applesauce, and hummus, but chicken made her throw up the other day. So no meat (other than salmon). She's also eating cottage cheese now, in small portions. She does NOT like her food warm, she definitely prefers it room temperature or cold. She also eats bananas, pears, apples, green beans, potatoes, and more I can't even list it all. She's a good eater.
• She continues, overall, to be an active, curious, delight and joy to our hearts.

* Historical note: my first word was evidently "coco," which is what chickens say in Spanish (co-co-co-co-co)

Beep Beep!

Last night in Singer's Glen:
And for comparison purposes, 11 months ago in Pennsylvania:

Thinking of you, Uncle Dave, in hospital.

what a week Valerie had

1. 5/31/09: moved back to the Burg from Ithaca
2. 6/1/09: 12-month checkup with shots
3. Subsequently: fever from vaccinations
4. 6/3/09: developed rash after eating acai berries in baby food
5. 6/4/09: flew to Dallas (after Dr. inspection and approval, with Benadryl)
6. 6/5/09: still rashy and itchy
7. 6/6/09: my college room-mate's wedding! (Rash all gone)
8. 6/7/09: few back to VA

1 Year Check-up

Valerie is a little under the weather, having caught the cold Terry brought back from Uganda. At least she had a milder version of it than either he or I had. She's been mostly herself, except for a runny nose and a little bit of a cough.

But she did NOT enjoy our little jaunt to the doctor's office today. Sometimes I wonder why we go through this every few months. She was tiiiiiiiiired, from the trip yesterday and not having slept quite enough last night or during her morning nap. It's just that everything here is so interesting! Toys! Books! Furniture! Stuff! It was tough today to get her to focus/slow down enough to eat. So anyway, our appointment was at 1:30, creeping into naptime. We had her tested for lead, which meant a finger prick, and she had two shots. That on top of the usual poking and prodding was just too much. My poor little one-one.

The lead test was fine; they also tested her iron, which was also fine. She's on track with her milestones. Terry's a little concerned because she's only gained 1 lb 10 oz. in 3 months, for a total of 19 and 10 - which puts her in the 25th percentile, where she was in the 40th before. She's still in the 75th for length, at 30 inches even. But she eats well and generally has a great appetite, so I'm not too worried.

She had a haaaaaard time falling asleep tonight, even though she was really tired. She had a good nap in the afternoon, at least. But I think she was just uncomfortable from the shots, and it looked like she might have had too much sun too (it wasn't even that much, just about 15 minutes while we waited for Terry to return the moving truck at around 1 p.m.). She drank a lot of water and just wanted to nurse and nurse. I really don't think she was feeling very well. But she's sleeping soundly now... hope it lasts all night!

Home

To a yard full of blooming daisies, a kitchen and bathroom so clean they seem to glow preternaturally, house plants putting out new growth, and... a living room fully of stuff... AGAIN!!!

New Knitting

If you're wondering about the sweater Valerie is wearing in the the sulky picture at the bottom of the previous post, here is the story.

I started this sweater last summer. It's scrumptious sock yarn that Tara gave me, but I decided it was enough for a baby sweater and I was kind of tired of knitting socks (!!!!). So I cast on, aiming to finish a 6-month size sweater by December. Well, it languished.

At last I finished the main body (knit in one piece, no side seams) and measured it against her... only to realize that it was going to be too short. She outgrew it while it was still on the needles.

So I decided that instead of ripping back to where I started the armpits, I'd just (brilliant!) unravel the bottom edge (6 rows of moss stitch), pick up and knit another two inches, and then add the border again. I have done this before with hats.

What I didn't realize was how incredibly sticky this yarn is. Sorry, I've long ago lost the ball band so I can't tell you anything about it (except that it drapes beautifully and the colors are thrilling), but it took... welll... a couple months to do the unravelling. The knitting itself was short work, and I also added about 6 rows at the shoulders. (She grew so fast!)

Finally I was able to measure for sleeves, guesstimate a pattern shaping for them, block the whole thing (the day before we left VA). After I finished my exams and finally sewed on the sleeves and wove in the ends. Still needs a button.

But it really is gorgeous, and I'm so happy she got to wear it at least once while the weather is still cool enough! I love spring!

Two Words

BEFORE

AFTER

Check it out!

My sister-in-law, Rosanne, has a new blog! I can't wait to get updates from Romania!

Graduation Sunday

I'm sitting in the dark, listening to the sound of Terry snoring over the noise of the dehumidifier in the next room. The teenagers upstairs had friends over for a BBQ, but have been generally pretty quiet. Valerie is sleeping soundly, and I expect that soon I will be too.

Strangely enough, I was mentally all prepared to slip into the sleeping bag on sofa cushions on the floor that has been my bed for the past two weeks while Terry was in Uganda and my parents were here. It was a mighty comfy little nest!

I feel a sense of accomplishment today. Our department had a little reception for this year's graduates, and I and two of my friends were awarded MAs in Anthropology. I had somehow forgotten that this happens when you finish your orals here. After all the work of the past 3 years, it's really nice to get a little recognition - something to show for it. It was so nice to have my parents here for the event. Sadly I forgot my camera, but will try to get some photos from a couple profs who were there documenting the ethnographic ritual!

It was a good day.

baby talk

Tonight while I was reading to Valerie I said, apropos of nothing, "Daddy is coming home tomorrow!" She looked up at me and said, very seriously and intently, "Da! Da!" pointing with one finger vaguely towards the room beyond the curtain that partitions off her little corner cubby where she sleeps. "Tomorrow," I said. "Not right now."

Her new way of asking for water is to smack her lips and put a finger to her mouth.

She has started signing as well as saying "Ball."

We visited my Aunt Wendy and Uncle Dave today, and saw real live sheep and chickens and a llama! She was kind of scared of the chickens, but fascinated by the ovine and cameloid species.

She learns and does new things literally every day.

Valerieisms

• New game: Cheerios tiddleywinks! Really and truly, I am not making this up!
• Says "jish" for "more" or "again"
• Says "up"
• Tonight said "droosh" for "nurse" (I think)
• Says "buh" for "bus"
• When I said, the other night, "do you know what time it is?" (cue for bedtime) she pointed at her bathtub!
• Makes "vroom" noise when playing with toy car (that used to belong to Willem)
• Likes to hug trees
• Recognizes Grandpa Conrad, and it sounds like she calls him "Baba"
• Likes watching Granpa C and Mommy kick a half-deflated basketball around the backyard and also likes to try picking the ball up with her little hands!
• Is outgrowing her shoes
• Finds her toes
• Will point to the nose of any stuffed animal or person on cue ("Where's Grandma's nose?" e.g.)
• Waves her hand when she wants me to sing the song that goes with whatever book we're looking at
• Likes watching the numbers count down on the microwave
• When we get to the Humpty Dumpty page in her new Mother Goose book, she turns it around so he's right side up instead of upside down!
• Points to the puck on every page of her "Z is for Zamboni" hockey alphabet book
• Does the hand motions for "zoom zoom zoom" (game from library)
• Will lean into the tissue to have her nose wiped

My big little girl!

Now She Is One!

I've been too tired to post anything, we had the party on Saturday and this afternoon I started to catch up on sleep! Valerie is teething again - her 7th and 8th teeth (lower incisors) are about to erupt. But generally she's the same happy, curious, active baby as usual. She loves taking walks down to Beebe Lake or the bus stop on Jessup road, and watching me and my dad kick a slightly deflated basketball around the yard. She likes to pick up the ball and throw it down again! She's eating much larger quantities of food than she was a month ago.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY VALERIE!

Photo retrospective: Months 8-11

Eight Months Old

(wearing a sweater I knit, in outfit from cousin Heidi)

Nine Months Old

Ten Months Old

Eleven Months Old

(I never get tired of looking at this series!)

Photo Retrospective: Months 4-7

Four Months Old

Five Months Old

Six Months Old

Seven Months Old

Photo retrospective 1: First Three Months (aka the "Fourth Trimester"!)

Brand New

One Month Old

Two Months Old

Three Months Old

This Time Last Year...

Get ready for a photo-post extravaganza, counting down the days until Valerie is ONE YEAR OLD!!!

Mother's Day 2009

I never knew I could love someone so much.

Jittery

I'm getting nervous about the oral exam next week. Caffeine is making me jumpy. Chocolate is the best antidote to brain freeze. I'm feeling a little ADD right now. When did ADD become an adjective? Hoping that spilling these thoughts into the blogosphere will make them dissipate so I can concentrate. Ooh, that rhymes! Ok back to work.

Dialectic

"Both child and adult are engaged, shaped, and reshaped in an ongoing interplay – a continuous process, a continuum of existence within the everyday world. Both are shaped by mutual actions and reactions, utterances and replies, verbal and nonverbal cues, modifying and being modified at each interactional, affect-laden node."

~ Norma Gonzalez, I Am My Language: Discourses Of Women and Children In the Borderlands. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, p. 62.

pictures

My how my life has changed - 7 a.m. at the grocery store!

We like to go to the infant story time at the library on Tuesdays - after books, play time!

Val was getting a wee bit tired on the trip to Ithaca...

These awesomely cute clothes were all inherited from 5-year-old Ada!

In Ithaca

We're back in Ithaca! Tired, sleepy, ready to go to bed. Not even 9 p.m. Happy that we got Valerie to sleep within spitting distance of her actual bedtime. She did really well on the drive, although she did NOT SLEEP like I thought/hoped she would... I deliberately planned the trip so we'd cover both her nap times and she could sleep in the car. Well, those days seem to be over. She didn't take her first nap until noon (normal time is 9 a.m.) and she only slept 40 minutes or so (normal is at least 1 hour). She was obviously tired, kept wanting to nurse, but wouldn't quite drift off... In the afternoon, she and I were both so tired that Terry stopped the car at a nice rest area and napped her in an armchair while I rested in the car. That lasted about an hour. Normal would be around 2 hours. But she was only really cranky for the last leg after the second nap, about an hour and a half. Even then she was pretty easy to entertain with an inflated globe (the new favorite toy) and peek-a-boo. Too bad Mom got bored long before she did...!

Terry and I were reminiscing about all the traveling our parents did with us when we were little. We have a new-found admiration for how they managed it all!

Time Capsule

I'm planning to make a time capsule of Valerie's first year, for her to open when she turns 11. At that point she can add things to it, and we can close it up until she turns 21. It sounds fun to me anyway!

Here are some things I am thinking about including - please send me your suggestions!
- the little pink hat and socks I knit for her while I was in the hospital
- her cord stump (yes, we still have it!)
- a lock of her hair
- the Pat the Bunny book she has chewed up and otherwise loved to death
- the little shirt she wore home from the hospital
- a little bell she used to play with until the enamel started chipping off
- the Ithaca Journal from her birthday
- an Obama button I have
- a letter from me
- letters from anybody else who wants to (Grandmas?) :-)
- birth announcement from Ithaca Journal, also in church bulletin
- congratulations cards

What else? What else?

Remembering Last Year

This weekend last year, I had just moved back into my apartment after 3 weeks of bathroom renovation. Terry was about to get back from a teaching trip to Belize. I was 33 weeks along and getting really excited, thinking about how soon we might meet our baby - turned out it was sooner than I even expected! But not a moment too soon.

I never blogged about the actual series of events that led to my 3-week hospital bedrest, mostly because I had been giving family and friends e-mail and phone updates along the way. But then I started putting updates on the blog because there were just too many concerned people out there to keep them all updated individually.

Here is what I wrote on Monday, April 21, to the women who were planning my baby shower for the following weekend in Harrisonburg (I also went back and inserted it as a post in last year's archive):

~~~~~
So we're having a little (too much) excitement here - Friday night my feet were so swollen, that I decided to check my blood pressure. We bought a little home monitor back in December but I haven't really been using it since bp seemed to be back to normal during the whole second trimester. Well, it read really high again - around 160/110. They had told me that over 90 was cause for concern. So I took the day off on Saturday and just kept my feet up and drank a lot of water. Sunday Terry got back from Belize, and we went to a childbirth class. But still the blood pressure stayed high and the low-grade headache I'd had all weekend got really bad Sunday night. So this morning I called the ob/gyn, and they had me come in for b/p check and urine test. Even though the urine test was negative for protein, the b/p was still really high - 150/100. They recommended keeping me at the hospital overnight for 24 hours monitoring, and Terry thought that was a good idea so here I am! Thankfully they have wireless.

The good news is that the baby is doing great - they monitored the heartbeat for a couple hours, and also did an ultrasound so we could see all the parts again - it was cool because Terry hadn't seen any of the previous ones. It's growing right on track, moving vigorously, and seems not at all stressed out. Also, by 2 p.m. my blood pressure had dropped to something like 120/84, which is much much better. But I'm to stay here until tomorrow morning while they collect all my urine to check for enzymes.

I guess there has been a lot going on recently; the end of the semester always stresses me out, plus the remodeling of our bathroom has disrupted our routine and made kind of a mess in the apartment. Add to that all the baby things that are piling up, unassembled and chaotic - it's like a constant reminder of how much our lives are going to change, but without the feeling of preparedness, because it's all just a jumble. And I was worrying about Terry and all the travel and work he has going on. So maybe I just needed a "Time Out." Hopefully all is well and I can resume a regular schedule by Wednesday. They'll decide by tomorrow noon-ish. I really really hope I can come but will keep you posted either way. Take care, and big hugs from me - EEP

~~~~~
Brace yourself for lots more reminiscing in the four weeks to come until Valerie's first birthday...!

Tick Talk

Last night I was putting a little bow in Valerie's hair, when I noticed a dark spot on her scalp, that looked kind of rough and shiny and bumpy at the same time. At first I thought it was a scab, because she'd bumped her head on the underside of the table earlier in the day. I looked closer and realized it was a TICK. A huge, horrible, nasty, disgusting, gross, revolting, ugly, TICK. I, um, sort of freaked out and called Terry; Valerie started crying because I was upset, but I calmed down and calmed her down as I checked on the internet for how to remove ticks.

It's not like I've never dealt with ticks before, but there's just something upsetting about seeing a blood-sucking parasite attached your baby's HEAD!!!!!

When Terry got home, he held her still while I applied tweezers and lifted off the offending creature. It took several tries because I didn't want to squeeze it too hard, but hard enough to get good traction. Finally got it out. We threw it in the trash, but then went to fish it out later to preserve for possible testing. When we went to look for it, we found it CRAWLING UP THE WALL. OH MY GOSH IT WAS SO GROSS. This time we flicked it into an empty plastic container, which we duct-taped shut and put in the freezer.

Then I gave Valerie a bath, and washed her hair really really well. With a real, not proverbial, fine-toothed comb. No more ticks were found.

I called the pediatrician this morning and she said that the big ticks are dog ticks and don't carry Lyme disease, but if we notice a sudden-onset fever and crying to call them. It can be 2-12 days before symptoms show up. A friend then told me this morning that ticks can live for SIX MONTHS without feeding. We actually probably picked it up last week at her house, because she lives on a farm near the woods and has two outdoor dogs.

I checked Valerie's scalp very carefully this morning in good light, and the spot where the tick was attached just had a tiny, light-colored scab; no redness or swelling whatsoever. But I'll keep an eye on it anyway.

MY POOR BABY!!!!!!

Eleven Months Old!

Valerie! You are eleven months old today! I measured you a few days ago and you are 29 inches long. You have grown more than 10 inches since you were born, and you probably weigh around 20 lbs. - almost 15 lbs more than when you were born (holy cow!).

These days, you are really into books. You pull them off the bookshelf a handful at a time until you see the one you want, then sit down to read it. You not only turn the pages in the correct direction, but you have recently figured out which way is right side up - and you consistently rotate the book you are reading so it is the right way up. Your favorites right now are all the Dr. Seuss books, the Priddy books (which I usually "read" to you in Spanish), anything that has pictures of babies, and just recently Hug, which was a gift from Tia Rosanne. A few months ago you suddenly developed an intense interest in Pat the Bunny (a gift from your great-aunt Cathie), which has now been loved to death:

You have figured out how to crawl up and (gulp!) down steps, and cruise regularly around the furniture. Occasionally you'll stand unsupported for a few seconds, but only if you're not thinking about it. You continue to eat a variety of foods with enthusiasm (although yoghurt was an epic FAIL), nurse well, and sleep.... a bit better.

Here you are, then and now:

A Bit Hazy

Yesterday afternoon around 5 I put my head down on my keyboard and cried, because the entire essay I'd been working on all week was crap. Kind of like when you hold up the sweater you've been knitting away at for, like, ever, and you realize that you've failed to get gauge and it's way to small/big/ugly to ever wear. I texted Terry and he called right back and within a few hours he'd helped me figure out a different approach to kind of reframe what I'd been writing about. I tried it and it actually worked... so I'm 2 days past when the essay was due, but I will turn it in tonight. The prof said I could go over.

These exams are like some kind of crazy hazing ritual. Like when Anita and Phoebe had made up this game called "Bloompes," and I so wanted to be a Bloompe too, but in order to become one I had to run up and down the Banana Patch trail (between the main road and the print shop). No big deal, except that to provide traction for motorcycles during rainy season they'd spread crushed bricks all over the trail. And we went everywhere barefoot. Have you ever walked across crushed bricks barefoot? OUCH is all I have to say about that. Only rubber nut shells were sharper. It was worth it though, to subsequently be permitted to make (imaginary) stomach bag beezle nut pickle nut brew, collect golden cups (a certain kind of yellow flower), and do arm piggy-wiggy (if you have to ask you obviously were not a Bloompe).

Now I want to be a PhD candidate so I have to write these punishing essays. No big deal, except that about a month from now I'll be sitting in front of a panel of my advisor, two committee memebers, and a field representative for the oral defense. SCARY, is all I have to say about that. It will hopefully be worth it, though, to subsequently be permitted to conduct original field research, write and defend a dissertation, and earn the title of Doctor Phelps. Mmmmm... yeah, that sounds pretty cool to me.

Happy Easter!

I think Easter is my favorite holy-day of the year; better than Christmas.

CIO days 2 and 3

It's getting better. Last night she fell asleep in TWO MINUTES, on her own in the crib. Although she woke intermittently through the night, she'd just complain a little bit and fall asleep again, never long enough for us to even get up at all. I did a wake-to-sleep nursing at 4 a.m., and Terry settled her down at around 6, and then she slept more or less until 7:30!

The only downside was that after 4 a.m. neither Terry nor I could fall asleep again. I thought of the irony that we're trying to get Valerie to learn to fall asleep on her own when we can't even do it ourselves! Some stretching, massage, and counting sheep eventually worked. I was pretty tense all night though.

I have to say that the second night we had a rough start. I put her down before she was ready and she screamed so hard she threw up - all over her pajamas, the crib, the floor... As soon as I ran in and picked her up and took off her dirty clothes she was fine. Happy and ready to play. Terry cleaned up the room while I changed and cleaned her up, then we started bedtime routine all over again and that time she was fine. I waited a little longer before putting her down. She cried for 20 minutes before falling asleep; during that time we spoke to her I think 3x. She woke intermittently through the night, but didn't have any really long waking periods. I nursed her at 3:30 or so. I also made the mistake of going in to her at 6:30; I thought she was awake for the day, but she fell asleep in my arms until 7:15.

So all in all this method seems to extend her sleep longer as well. But it may not be as deep of sleep, because yesterday she napped for a total of 4 hours when usually she does about 3.

Well, I guess I should get back to work...

Sleep? Me? HAHAHHHAHAHAHHAHA!

I'm so tired that it's hard to think. I'm writing here in hopes that writing something - even a blog post - will get the juices flowing for my essay exam.

I had to give co-sleeping one more shot. Terry was exhausted, so I spent two nights in the mattress in Valerie's room with her. It... really didn't go well. After talking with my sister, I was wondering if the memory foam mattress was the problem, the reason why it was hard for me to sleep while side-lying nursing at night. Well, that question has been answered conclusively - it's not the mattress. In fact, my previous hunch was confirmed - she and I just keep waking each other up. I had a single 4-hour stretch of uninterrupted sleep each night; the rest was waking just about every half hour.

So last night we turned to the "big guns" - the Dreaded CIO, or "cry-it-out." We had agreed on a protocol - go to the door and reassure her with our voices and ever-increasing intervals, starting at one minute. (Last night we did 1-3-5-5-5-10- and then she fell asleep.) It went better than I expected - she fell asleep in half an hour, and didn't wake up again until midnight (4.5 hours later). That time she went to sleep in 15 minutes. At 2:30 she stirred and said "waa" for less than a minute, then was asleep again - we didn't have to do anything. But from 4:30-5:30 she was awake and not happy about it. She did these little intermittent complaint-cries, while kneeling in her crib with her head leaning against the slats, almost asleep. After an hour I went in and nursed her for 30 minutes - she was out again, for another hour, then Terry held her for the last hour of sleep that she needed. She woke up happy and was her normal self all day today.

We had been planning for me to go in and wake-to-sleep nurse her (see earlier post) at 8 hours but she woke up before I had a chance to do that. Tonight we'll do it at 7.5 hours. I really do think she gets hungry at that point in time because she always wakes up then.

We're also going to do a gentle wake-to-sleep without nursing just before the 4-hour mark because she nearly always wakes up at that point too.

It's just that the timing is terrible. I'm supposed to be writing this essay exam, as mentioned previously. But we had to try everything else before doing CIO.

And I've fallen off the wagon. The coffee wagon, that is. After more than four years, I've re-caffienated my life (well, I did drink green and black tea in the meantime, and decaf).

Somehow, it will all get done. We'll survive. I'm fairly sure of it.

gone fishin' again

My current status: Second exam currently in progress. Valerie into heavy-duty night waking mode. Groggy.

Hope you are having a good Holy Week.

Wake to sleep

Part [n] in the sleep documentation series:

For more than a week, Valerie entertained us by not just waking multiple times throughout the night, but also by staying awake for an hour and a half. It didn't matter who went in to her, whether she nursed or not, she just would not go back to sleep. After a couple nights I noticed that, pretty consistently, this was happening 8 hours after she first fell asleep.

So we pulled another trick from the Baby Whisperer book (although Pantley writes about this too): evidently if you anticipate this kind of consistent waking, you can nip it in the bud. What you do is set your alarm for 30-60 minutes before the baby's waking time, go in and wake her up gently (it doesn't even have to be all the way awake), then let her go back to sleep. Do this three nights in a row, and bob's your uncle.

IT WORKED. Freaky.

She still isn't sleeping through the night consistently again yet, and I sometimes have a hard time falling asleep again after I wake her to sleep, but I still prefer gently picking her up, nursing her for 20-30 minutes and returning her to her bed over pulling my hair out as she sits up going "bababababa" in the darkened room.

Thus she has earned a name for her night-waking alter ego: SOULCRUSHER. Babycakes by day, Soulcrusher by night. They look eerily alike, and you never see them in the same place at the same time! It's a mystery to me!

Shout-out, updated

I just posted photos from when Terry cleaned the kitchen.

Growing Girl

All of a sudden, she can reach shelves she couldn't reach before. Her 9-month pants are short, and scarcely cover her bottom (no, sweetie, you can't worry about fashion yet!). She wants to climb on the furniture. And she's becoming more strong-willed. If I don't let her play with my phone, she cries! If I don't take her next door to visit the doggie Kai, she fusses! If the babysitter tries to take away power cords, she tries to bite her!!! Yes! She has tried to bite me too when I don't let her have her way!

It used to be just food, milk, and sleep that she would make demands about. Now it's all sorts of things. I used to be able to distract her easily from something I didn't want her to have, now she will insist. Oh boy. The teen years are going to be FUN.

We scored some awesomely cute outfits from Holly last week - this is one of my favorites:

Captions:

Left to Right,

top to bottom:

1) Karaoke night with Ter-Bear!

2) Yes we can!

3) 'Splorin'...

4) Reach for it!

Sock it to me

File this under "life lessons I learned from knitting."

Any knitting pattern begins with a very important row: the set-up row. This is where you establish the pattern that you carry through for the rest of the knitted object. Some knitted objects, particularly those that have three-dimensional shape, require multiple steps where a new pattern is introduced and established midway through your project. Like socks. For the most part, a sock is just a tube closed at one end, but the heel shaping is what makes it anatomically correct and infinitely more comfortable to wear. Except for the afterthought heel, every kind of sock heel requires a change in pattern midway through the knitting.

So. This pair of socks was supposed to be done by Christmas. Unfortunately, all Vern got was a ball of yarn. My next goal was to finish them by his birthday (March 13). I was way ahead of schedule, all set to finish the pair by the end of January... when Babycakes got into the yarn and created a snarl unlike any I have seen before. It took me six weeks to unravel what she accomplished in 5 minutes... there's another life lesson there, but that's another story.

Ok. Thanks to my mom and sister, the yarn was duly untangled and rewound into a ball by March 3, and I happily finished the second sock, with only this much yarn left over:

All was well with the world. Just before kitchener stitching the toe shut, I tried on the socks just to admire them, and to my horror, I noticed this:

So... um, can you see the problem? The cable pattern on the side is on the same side for both socks. I knit two right socks...

After some weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth, I decided there was nothing to do but unravel the second sock up to the beginning of the heel and re-knit it on the opposite side. Folks, this was heartbreaking. Despite having overcome the setback of the tangled yarn, I was poised to meet my deadline... to no avail. One moment of inattention while establishing the heel pattern led to this.

So the "life lesson" here is: pay attention to your set-up row. Establishing your pattern right at the start will save you much pain and anguish* later on down the road.

*I am exaggerating slightly for dramatic effect

Not much to say

I've been kind of taking it easy this week, recovering from last week. It wasn't so much the exam itself as combining exam time with Terry doing a midnight webinar all week. We both were recovering this week. Fine time for Val to start with the night waking again. Teething? Too much mommy coming in to soothe her at night? Hunger? Who knows. Last night she did manage a 5-hour stretch at least. But the night before it was every hour. And the night before that, it included a 1.5-hour stretch of wakefulness. Neither feeding her nor putting orajel on her gums prevented continued waking. Not sure what our next steps will be.

I think she's been saying "baw" for ball! Most of the time she just whispers it, when she sees me kick or throw a ball, she'll go "baw - baw - baw."

10 Months Old!

Little Val-val! You are ten months old today! I was struck dumb this afternoon while swooping you up into the air, when I looked into your laughing mouth I saw the nubs of two new teeth coming in on top, and that was only on one side! I didn't get a good look at the other side, but I can only imagine there's at least one coming in there too. And I know there are several on the bottom pressing in as well. No wonder you are having trouble sleeping at night! I gave you some Orajel last night, but only on the bottom - I never dreamed you were already getting new top teeth too!

Wow.

And I'm calling it: YOUR FIRST WORD. Yes, agua! You say it all the time, and mostly for "water." You have also learned, from your babysitter, to say "Uh-oh!" Although you don't always quite know when to quit - you see something fall, and you'll go "Uh-oh-oh-oh-oh-oh!" It's very cute.

You love to stand, and are just beginning to learn to balance on two feet without holding on to anything - but only for a second or two. You continue to have a healthy appetite and are willing to try all kinds of different foods. I swear you've gained a pound this past week. But there's nothing I love more than your delicious little toes, to whit:

36!

Happy Birthday to me!

Just popping in to chronicle baby cuteness: yesterday I was folding laundry on the living room floor, and Valerie picked up one of Terry's shirts and pulled it up, covering her face. Then she threw her arms down with a big grin - peekaboo! (She didn't say it, but the intention was clear!) I was so tickled! She did it over and over again, and every time I'd say "wheeeere's Baby? There she is!" It was awesome.

In the bath last night, I was squirting a steady stream of water from one of her bath toys, and she kept trying to grab the stream with her little pincher grasp, with both hands. Soooo cute.

I almost thought we had a first word - she's been saying "awa" (agua = water in Spanish) at appropriate times - when grabbing her water bottle, when getting in the bath, when watching water pour in the washing machine. But then she started saying it apparently at random, so I'm not sure. I'm also trying to figure out whether her little pinchy-finger movement sometimes means she wants cheerios? It's very similar to the sign for "duck" in our baby animal signs book, but she doesn't seem to associate it with her rubber ducks.

Anyway, that was it for my break - back to the exam! TTFN...

blogging will resume on or around May 14

This is my "gone fishing" sign. (You know, I've only ever been fishing twice? Once we tried to catch piranhas in Lake Yarinacocha using raw liver for bait, and the other time we caught a bucket full of sunnies (?) at "Sheila's" lake using cigarette butts for bait. Oh, wait! Then there was that time in the Chumbakiwi creek with Ariela, using a net! We caught a little catfish, I think. But I digress.) I'm not really going fishing, though. I'm starting my first A-exam on Monday. Wish me luck!