Stormy Weather...
Seems as though California is taking a beating with all of the rain it's gotten this year. It's been literally years since they've seen this much, and I live 2000 miles away from it for a change. We also get some crappy weather here in Atlanta, and had a triple thunder storm here today.
What started out as a bit of rain this morning turned into some afternoon thunderstorms, some evening thunderstorms with hail the size of golf balls (I shit you not!) and finally the night time thunderstorms. Lightening accompanied them all, and it was some pretty serious weather here for most of the day, but fortunately the system has passed through and we can expect it to be far better tomorrow than it will be in California.
I actually dig the rain storms. Growing up in LA we never saw any super-serious weather like we get here, but I like the daily rain shower we get during the summers. Drought conditions aren't the reality for us here in Georgia the way they are in California. I guess Angelinos won't have to worry about that for a while now!
Jack wasn't bothered by the weather; it actually made him sleepy. I kept him close to me in case he did wind up getting scared, but he snoozed through all of it. Even the cat kept her cool. It did however affect my wanting to barbeque for dinner. Thank God for the George Foreman Grill!
A New Do...
As you all know for about ten years I have had really long hair. I've gone through some color changes, but all in all I've had extremely long, all one length, healthy and enviable hair. When I was pregnant with Deanna I cut my hair super-short from waist-length. I spent FOREVER growing it out, especially with all of the layers that were part of the style. It took about four years to make it even and then another two or so until it was down my back and back to my waist again. I've worn it that way ever since, and people really like my hair when they see it down.
When you have an infant you don't have time to style your hair. It's sort of the last thing on my list of to-do's. I shower, wash my hair daily, dry it and stick it up in a pony tail and I'm good to go. I work in the restaurant industry, so of course my hair stays up when I'm at work as well. The only time I wear my hair down is when I go to sleep. When I wake up it goes right back up into another pony tail. It's so nice to have long hair, you know? I've stuck it out day after day, having all kinds of things go on with my hair. There's the baby food that gets in it, the baby spew, the fact that there are these yard-long hairs all over the house since I'm now losing bunches of my hair from the lack of hormones in the prenatal vitamins I was taking, (not to worry, I have TONS of hair and I'm told this is normal after child birth.) there's hair all over the baby's clothes, there's just a lot of long hairs everywhere and it's kind of gross, no matter how much cleaning I do!
Ken asked me why women with children have shorter hair than single women. Now he knows why. Long hair is not the most condusive thing to have when you have kids. Your hair is the last thing you have time to think about, so keeping it shorter just makes sense. The fact that I've gone these six months with hair this length is a miracle in itself.
After much discussion on this subject, I headed out the door yesterday and sat down in a stylist's chair for the first time in years, not counting trims every few months. I left the hair dresser with a chin-length bob with layers and Locks of Love got a yard of chestnut brown hair, and I have once again joined the millions of mothers who have kid-friendly hair. I was traumatized a good portion of the day, and I felt guilty because my husband really loved my long hair. A few martini's, a good home-made scampi dinner, some time with Jack playing with my new hair, (it IS kid-friendly and I actually had no problems when he was playing with it!) and a few hours of lovemaking with my husband, who DOES still love me despite the fact that my hair is now short, made all the difference, and when I woke up this morning I felt better about my new do.
Okay, so I have some adjustments to make. I can actually towl dry my hair now, and the blowdryer and curling iron and rollers will be put away for a while, leaving more space on the bathroom counter now, but the upside to this is that I now can wear my hair down for work, styling is a snap, it's a cute haircut, and it makes me look more my age finally. It's hair, and it will grow back. At least I hope it will!
Mr. Sippy Cup
King of the Sippy Cup....
Jack had his six-month appointment this past Friday and I'm pleased and proud to announce that he's doing wonderfully. He weighs in at 19.12 pounds and is now 28 inches long. He's fit, happy, and damn good-looking if I do say so myself!
Our pediatrician asked us about his diet. He told us it was cool to give him meat products, which we've been doing for about two months now. Jack even eats his biter biscuits and drinks juice from time to time. When we let the doctor in on all of this information the only thing he could say was, "well, I guess you could get him a sippy cup now." He had no other information for us. It seems we know what we're doing with our son, and our doctor was suitably impressed.
Yes, he had more shots this trip, and because he was woken up from a nap for this little outting, Jack was in rare form with Doctor Stetler. He pitched a major fit while the doctor was examining him, which is a little different for Jack. Normally he's really good, but this time he was just tired so when it came time to have his shots he was already fired up. He took a three-hour nap when he got home from his little ordeal. A minor fever ensued, but all in all he's survived another round with his shots. His next appointment is in May.
So I bought Jack a sippy cup. They have made major advancements in the world of sippy cups since my oldest was this age. You can now hurl the darn thing across a room without a drop of bright red juice spilt! I know this because Jack already hurled it. He likes to hold it and bite on it. and he'll drink from it with help or if he's laying on the floor or his back. I think he'll do fine with it.
Last but not least; Jack now sleeps entirely through the night. It only took about six months, but I tried a little experiment. Jack sleep with a pillow in his crib, and I finally took it out because he rolls. The last thing I want is to walk in and find him suffocated by this pillow that he couldn't get his face out of when he rolled over onto his stomach in his sleep. It worked. Jack rolls onto his tummy when he's asleep, and there he stays for a majority of the night since he starts on his back. He sleeps really well on his tummy, but then again so do I.
In short the King of the Sippy cup now sleep through the night on his tummy...not bad for six months. Hey, he even had a date for Valentine's Day, which is mighty impressive, considering that two of his uncles didn't. It's good to be the King, you know?
Fathers and Sons...
My two men...could I have gotten any luckier? Ken is such a great dad, and now that Jackson is growing, they seem to have this bond that defies all things. I've never seen a baby love someone so much, and when Ken comes home from work he becomes the center of this little boy's world. I've never seen anything like it, and no, I am anything but jealous. I'm the one Jack will wave to when he's pitching in the World Series, but I'll be sitting next to his proud father of course.
I don't remember my father being as hands-on with his sons as Ken is with Jackson, but then again we live in different times. The fact that Ken works during the day and I work at night may have something to do with their relationship as well. I have a daytime routine with Jack. It's early to rise, breakfast and playtime and Sesame Street and The Backyardigans and then a nipper nap. While he's down I shower, do my chores, you know the mommy-thing. Once he's up, I get him dressed for the day, he has a bottle, we play and watch Blue's Clues, he swings in his swing, hang's out in his excersaucer, watches me start dinner, random little things and then around three or so he goes back down for nap. He wakes up in time for Mommy and Daddy to switch off as I head out the door for work. Now it's Daddy's turn. They play and hang out until about six when he goes down for his final nap. Up at eight he has dinner and they play. Daddy plays the guitar for him, they hang out on the computer together, Daddy rough-houses with him and then around nine thirty or ten it's time for Jack's bath and then it's bedtime for the little man. We've agreed to start weaning him into an earlier bed time, so we're both going to cut out a nap from his schedule in the hopes that he'll become tired earlier. You don't know Jack the way we do...he used to be nocturnal! If he gets to bed earlier, Mommy and Daddy will have a little more time together in the evening when I get home from work, and Daddy won't feel so wiped out from a long day of work and then parenting.
I enjoy watching the relationship between this father/son duo. They're both crazy as can be, and they both keep me laughing. I'm glad Ken took to fatherhood the way he did; it makes for a happy home and Jack absolutely adores him...lucky me.
You've come a long way Baby!
Jackson Dillon 08/25/2004
This is the infant Jack...below is a picture of Jack taken today. He was about 15 days old in this snap shot, and I put it here on the blog so you all could see the drastic changes that this baby has made in the past six months. He's a completely different baby now!
Jackson Dillon 02/03/2005
The Six-Month Mark...
So we've made it to the first six months of Jackson's existance. It seems like just yesterday that we brought this little bundle of baby boy home from the hospital, and now he's rolling over, slapping his toys around, actually trying to pet the cat, and yelling at the top of his lungs because he thinks the sound of his own voice is amusing. What a change.
I remember the tiny infant that didn't want to sleep at night but slept all day long. I remember before he had a belly button. I remember when we thought Jack was smiling, but it was really just gas. I remember the colic and the endless search for the right formula to get him through it. I remember falling asleep on the couch with him on my chest, listening to endless streams of waves coming from the computer because it helped him fall asleep. I remember size 0-3 months clothes and size 1 diapers. I remember life before baby food.
Jack knows his name, he knows his mommy and his daddy and his kitty, he knows his favorite toy, he knows Elmo and The Count from Sesame Street and The Backyardigans. He naps about every three hours or so and becomes predictably fussy if he goes past his nap time. He knows his daily routine, he knows the nurse at the pediatrician's office, he knows that he likes to eat his breakfast while watching Big Bird and Ernie and Bert, he knows that he likes Daddy to hang him upside down by his ankles until he laughs, and he knows that when Daddy does the drill sargeant voice he's only kidding around so it doesn't make him cry anymore, he knows that dinner time is right after he wakes up from his final nap of the day, and he knows that after his bath he's going to bed for the night.
Jack has a life now, he has a routine. I remember life before Jackson, but barely. Deanna is self-sufficient being a teenager who's almost 15, so her needs were easily met. Ken and I used to go to movies, go to dinner, sleep late, shop at Farmer's Markets, have two or three drinks after work while cooking a quiet dinner for two. Somehow as I look back I realize that the only thing we haven't done since having Jack is sleep late TOGETHER, and have those two or three drinks, now it's just one or two, and very rarely so that we have our wits about us for Jack's sake.
I don't miss any of it. Jack has enriched our lives and I've seen a more loving and tender side to my husband as he plays with our son. I've mellowed out a lot more since Jack's birth, and I've become much more protective of my immediate family. I wouldn't trade the last six months for anything...it's been a blast! Now on to the One-year Mark!
