8/25/2007 - Chunky baby joy

Jonah is a bright, fat butterball of sunshine in our lives. He really is, what with his chipmunk cheeks and sparkly eyes, and his ear to ear grin that is perpetually contagious. How could we have been blessed with such a wonderfully happy baby? Don't get me wrong, Joshua is a treasure and wonderful in his own right, but Jonah? He wiggles his whole body with giddyness when you so much as glance in his general direction. And to make eye contact and . . . gasp . . . pick him up? He might explode with pleasure.

Which actually makes me feel a little guilty sometimes. I wonder, how abandoned must he feel to get so excited over a smidgen of attention? I'm sure he's not really feeling abandoned (or so I tell myself), but I have to have something to stress about, right? It's like how we were at Gymboree the other day and he was, as is the trend these days, drooling like mad. I checked the two teeth that he already has on the bottom, and around them - nothing new. Hmmm, I think. He never has any sign of teeth or swelling on his top gums . . . maybe I'll just check and see . . . FOUR NEW TEETH?? I mean honestly. With Joshua I checked and rechecked his teething progress twice a day, he was under such a microscope. You'd think that the huge bubbles of drool coating Jonah's entire chin and neck would have tipped me off to the arrival of the four teeth. And the thing is, if I'd known, I'd at least given him some teething tablets or something. But he's a survivor and smiles through it all.

Now I guess neither of the kids will be under the microscopic glare of my surveillance. Which I think is good mostly. Or maybe they'll both be under it, but it won't seem so intense spread over the both of them.

But then something happens. Like Joshua . . . we have to take him to the doctor for a little lump I found . . . well, more like a nodule, really, on his jawbone. When I first felt it I thought instantly that he had a little lipoma. Then, being the compulsive person that I am, I googled "lump on neck" (and it isn't really even on his neck) which, of course, took me off in all directions. Hodgkins lymphoma . . . leukemia . . . I was a wreck by the end of the night. I think that a normal person just thinks "I'll have to make an appointment with the doctor to see about that," and goes on with their lives. That would be way too easy. Microscope on.

Jonah is the worst napper in the history of babies, and the longest nap he's taken since birth I think, has been 45 minutes. He sleeps upwards of 12 to 13 hours at night, but is he getting enough sleep? Are we putting him down early enough for his nap? Too early? Microscope on.

Joshua doesn't like his new Sunday school class, and today when I came to pick him up he was lying under a table. "Why were you under the table?" I ask, trying not to let my voice betray any worry I was feeling. Like asking "What color shirt do you want to wear today?" "Because," he replies, "I had my hand in my mouth, but the kids said, 'Don't put your hand in your mouth.' " I try to sort it out in my head. "So you were hiding under the table so that you could put your hand in your mouth?" Nod. Microscope on.

Jonah is six and a half months old, and is not yet eating food. Microscope on.

It's not for lack of trying, he just doesn't want to have anything to do with it. It's funny the looks you get from people who find out how old he is and that he hasn't, say, had rice cereal in a bottle since he was four months old. We have a fat, thriving baby, though, and while I worry that he will still be nursing in fifth grade and we won't be able to pack him a lunch (instead I'll have to show up in the cafeteria and hoist up my shirt . . . do they have nursing rooms for fifth graders?) I have to tell myself that he will eat food someday, and try not to push it.

So I have my own issues and I foster them and care for them like they're furry little pets that need to be combed and washed, watered and fed. And all the while I keep trying to realize that it's the kids I need to invest my time in, not my worries about who they are or what they did, or what they're turning into, or not turning into. I don't want to squash them with my microscope. I want Jonah to always be a little spark of joy who lights up the room he's in. I want that for Joshua, too . . . for all of us. We need that little spark of joy in our lives.

8/7/07 - My poor lost Cheetos

Oh, the Cheetos. I miss the Cheetos. I really wanted them, and I was going to save them for later when Tim and I settle in to watch our next disc of Lost episodes. They were the baked kind, which is not that much healthier, but it always makes me feel better to eat baked snacks. Now they're gone. Where, you ask? Okay, I'll share. But beware, because it's a gruesome story.

The Cheetos are lying forlorn in a little pile in a gravel parking lot somewhere between Aunt Gwen's house and our own. We'd been at Aunt Gwen's to go swimming, and we had a great time. Since she and Uncle Doug are out of town, we'd taken our hamburger patties over to grill, and our corn to boil, and we had a great afternoon of swimming and dinner. Joshua even ate one of the little Jello pudding snacks from the refrigerator (thanks Aunt Gwen!), and was relishing every moment of the afternoon in the way only 3 year-olds can. We packed up, and didn't even have to remind Joshua to go potty before we left - he remembered himself. We thought we were good to go. And we were. Until.

Driving in the car, and then: "Mama, I have to go poop!"

Why do so many of these stories revolve around bodily functions?

"Joshua, we're almost home," Tim replied without missing a beat. But I knew better. I looked back and saw the panicky face, and he said it again, hoping to impart the desperateness of the situation to us. "But I have to poop!" I entered panic mode.

"Tim, he has to go now," I said.

"I'm looking for somewhere to stop," he replied. But Tim was looking for somewhere to stop that had, you know, and actual toilet. Plumbing, utilities, the works. Unfortunately we were beyond that.

"Tim, you have to find somewhere to pull over right now," I said, as Joshua was beginning to wail about not wanting to poop in his pants. And the poor little guy kept interjecting helpful comments like, "Mama, can I poop in there?" about each abandoned-looking warehouse building we passed. After what seemed like ages we finally pulled over into a rocky parking lot, overrun with weeds, and thankfully, empty. I honestly thought that he could just poop over behind the trees, out of the way, and we'd find a way to cover it up. The problem is that Tim has much more delicate sensibilities than that, and was already looking around for a plastic bag or other poop-appropriate receptacle.

"We can't just leave feces on the ground," he said with such disgust that I almost laughed. And now, writing about it, I am laughing. So my poor, poor Cheetos had to go. I dumped them into a little pile underneath the car, and Joshua promptly decided that he no longer needed to poop, but instead needed to eat the Cheetos. Tim corralled him while I rolled the bag several times to, of course, make a toilet. Out of a Cheetos bag. Very unsure of how to proceed, Joshua stuck his little bottom backward a little bit, and Tim propped him up. I'm still wondering how I got stuck with bag duty. (Get it . . . duty? Doody? I'm so lame.) I don't think that there are many things grosser in the world than the heavy thud of the poop landing in the bag, and the smell wafting into my face. So I'm holding the bag, gagging and laughing at the same time, only laughing silently so that my poor little boy wouldn't feel somehow embarrassed, or like he'd done something wrong.

He finished pooping and, if you can believe it, things still got worse. We noticed that he'd actually dripped poop onto his underwear, and urine onto his shorts. Ugh. What can I say? We're not practised side-of-the-road poopers. If I'd been prepared in any way it wouldn't have been so bad. As it was, since I had no extra clothes with us, he ended up wearing one of Jonah's swim diapers home. And I hung the Cheetos bag out the car window until Tim found a dumpster. All I can say is how thankful I was that Jonah was peaceful and happy throughout the ordeal. I can't imagine it all happening with a screaming infant in the picture, too.

And so maybe now I have all of the poop blogging out of my system. I'm not promising anything, because you never know what will happen with the little guys. I'm just saying, I'm ready to move on to the next topic. Next time, I promise, no poop talk.

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