He just smiled and gave me a vegemite sandwich. Also, crawling! December 16, 2009

Not only does Baby Sally have a passport, but … she has a United frequent flier number, as well. (I’m not sure why, but that one completely weirds me out.) Ticket is booked — Australia, here we come! Salma and I are going in February, right at the height of their summer and our winter, to see Liz, Andy, Simon, my Mom, and … most importantly, meet Baby Girl Steggall-Lewis! (She doesn’t have a name, because she isn’t born yet.) I’m also planning on getting in some serious naps on the beach, if only Grandmarge will be kind enough to watch Salma. Somehow, I don’t think that will be much of a problem.

I’m a little worried about the trip over there — hopefully the baby will be fine. But honestly, she is the WIGGLIEST little piggy there ever was, and that’s a mighty long flight to be holding a wiggler on your lap. A wiggler who can crawl! As of the last few days, our girlie can get herself from Point A to Point B all on her own. Her form is still a bit sloppy, but she’s ambulatory. And after looking at her dirty little knees tonight, I realized just how much mopping is all of a sudden in my future. But whatever! We’re going to Australia!

St. Lucia, St. Nick December 13, 2009

It’s been a pretty fun day. We had rolls for breakfast.

And then for lunch, we had 12 adults and 3 other kids over. So much fun! It was a bit of a squeeze, but everyone fit. Luckily, not everyone arrived at the same time, because we did have to wash a couple of plates in between eating shifts. I love big dinner (or brunch) parties, where there are little kids toddling around and 6 different conversations going on at once. Bonus: clean house, and leftovers.

Being good hosts and awesome managers of time, we had to hustle folks out of the clean house so that we could head up to Andersonville, the historically Swedish neighborhood in Chicago, to celebrate Santa Lucia with Charlotta (who is actually Swedish), Matt, Breck, Lisa and Eliza (who are not). It was really lovely — there was a procession down the street, which we missed because we were late and also because there were some really nice shops to peruse. If only I had $900 for a lamp. Here’s a blurry photo of me and Salma out on the street. I realize we have very few pictures of her doing anything but laying on the floor looking cute, so here’s proof that she actually does leave the house from time to time. Also, please send chapstick.

Eventually we ended up in the Swedish American Museum for some traditional Swedish songs sung by little girls in white dresses, and one brave young lady who walked around with a wreath of lit candles on her head. Darren was a good boy and only made one or two IKEA jokes. When we were kids in Yemen, there were several Swedish nurses who celebrated Santa Lucia by coming into our houses in the middle of the night, singing carols, wearing candle wreaths and bringing breads. It was nice to get a little context for a somewhat surreal childhood memory.

And we got the requisite baby-and-Santa photo. She didn’t seem to care much either way about jolly old St. Nick. Maybe she knew his beard was fake.

Overall, it was the perfect way to celebrate one of the darkest, shortest days of the year — good friends, good food, Swedish carols, and Santa. As I said to Darren and Charlotta tonight, it’s really strange to suspend my typical cynicism at an activity that really is more for the kiddos than for me. I’m not the sing out loud in public type, but for my baby, I will sing about Rudolph, and enjoy it. Because she needs a mama that is not too cool to sing out loud in public. I’m hoping this is the first of many Santa Lucias that we celebrate this way — it’s really fun to start making holiday traditions for our girl.

Sweet potatoes for the sweet potato December 10, 2009

Before:

During:

After:

She seemed to like it, and ate quite a bit! This was her first real food, with the exception of the rice cereal she’s been working on for the last few weeks. We had a couple of scary moments where she choked a bit – I think perhaps there was a little clump of not-entirely pureed yam in there. I made the stuff myself, using a “recipe” (basically, cook and puree) from a website my friend Anne recommended: http://www.wholesomebabyfood.com, which seems like a really great resource. If any of you reading have any tips or suggestions for homemade baby food prep, storage, etc, I’d love to hear them.

In lieu of a baby book December 9, 2009

Recent whiny posts aside, Salma has been doing a bang-up job of sleeping lately, at least during the night. Last night she went down at 7:30 p.m., or so, and slept straight through till 6:15 this morning. (Results not typical. Your outcomes may vary.) Generally, however, she is still waking up hungry at least once during the night, and while I know she’s capable of going through the night without eating, I’m not really ready to wean her from the night feeding. As masochistic as it may sound, I really enjoy that particular feeding. For starters, it’s the only time she’ll really snuggle. It’s also the only time where I feel like I have a lot of milk to give her. And the best part is that when I pick her up and walk down the hallway with her, she wiggles in the craziest way –like one of those wooden Mexican wiggly toys, where the body stays still, but the legs, arms and head are all moving in different directions. It makes me laugh every single time, even though it’s 4:30 a.m., and I’d rather be in dreamland.

We went in for Salma’s 6-month checkup yesterday. She weighed in at 17 lbs, 12 oz, which is just 2 oz away from doubling her birth weight! She’s somewhere in the region of 26. 75 inches long — though she was squirming too much for the nurse to get a good read. According to the doctor, she’s between the 75th and 90th percentile for weight, and somewhere around the 90th for height. According to the babycenter.com growth chart, she’s 75th for both. So, on the high side of normal, but nothing outrageous. (My dreams of having  a WNBA superstar are fading fast… But as Darren said, “Rachel, 100th percentile is Andre the Giant. Do you really want that for her?” I dunno. Maybe. He was in a really great movie.)

Poor kid got several shots yesterday, and it wasn’t fun for anyone involved. The nurse was near tears, in fact. Baby girl now has two tiny little prick marks in each chubby thigh, like she got pulled behind the schoolhouse and attacked by a mini-vampire. Side note — what is WITH the vampires?? Really — why are they everywhere?

Since it is looking less and less likely that I will ever get around to making a baby book, this kid is just going to have to be content with having a baby blog. So in the interest of posterity, here’s what she’s up to at six months:

Primary interests: Eating, smiling, “petting” the cats, and rolling over.

Favorite songs: “Good Morning to You,” which my Grandma used to sing to us every  morning when we visited her at her house; “Head and Shoulders, Knees and Toes;” and “Your Love,” by The Outfield.

Dislikes: Mittens, getting strapped into her carseat, being alone, poop in her diaper.

She does everything with gusto, which is one of my favorite things about her little personality. When she smiles, it’s a real smile that almost breaks her face and my heart, every single time. When she latches on to me during nursing, she lunges, whole mouth open. The second her clothes come off, her toes are in her mouth, and she’s rolling on her back like a little potato bug. Otherwise, she seems to prefer being on her stomach. When she’s on a mat, blanket, or rug, she tries to get to the edge of it as quickly as possible, so that she can SMACK the floor. She also smacks her bottle or my chest whenever she eats, which is hilarious and annoying at the same time. So far, not much stranger-danger, though she has gotten a bit more clingy to me than usual. Being out with her is always fun, because she WILL smile at any person who looks at her. Sometimes to the point where I feel like I awkwardly need to start a conversation with that person, because my kid is relentlessly smiling at them. Even after they’ve turned away.

She has begun to army crawl, and is still working on sitting up. Everything goes in the mouth, especially if it is something connected to Mama or Dad. (Though I can’t blame her — I find myself absent-mindedly nibbling on any part of her that comes within range of my mouth. Especially her ears and the chub on the back of her head.) She is laughing a lot now, and makes bbbbzzzzpppt sounds constantly. She’s in the jumperoo right now, looking at herself in the mirror, going bbbbbbbbbbbzzzzzzzzzzzzzpppppppppppppttt!!! Her tongue is generally sticking out, and her nose is perpetually covered in crust. Salma is quite a little rough-houser, which I really enjoy. She loooooooooves to be thrown in the air, held upside down, and bounced around on the bed. I think Darren is always a bit nervous that I’m going to disjoint her little shoulders, but she really seems to like doing backwards somersaults.

I know that I’ve said that every stage she’s in is “my favorite stage so far,” there really is something magical about this particular age. And something very magical about this particular kid!

I’m sick. But pickles are being made. December 6, 2009

I have a pretty good cold at the moment. Sore throat, ear ache (not normal for me, so it makes me really annoyed). And the baby WILL. NOT. SLEEP. (Actually she is asleep, finally, but on my chest, which makes it hard to do any of the 4000 things I feel like I need to do.) We did a small amount of xmas shopping this morning — mostly unsuccessful, unfortunately, but we did get a few things knocked off the list. I just want to make a sock monkey for Salma for xmas, and for whatever reason, a DIY sock-monkey kit is impossible to find at a bricks and mortar store. Darren thought he’d seen one at Blick, but they only had a knit-your-own-monkey kit and that is not the same thing AT ALL, so we also tried the Pearl art supply store. Where I was told by a very snotty clerk to just get a sock and some buttons. (And it made me feel bad, because he’s probably right.) And I’m currently missing my company xmas party because I feel like crap and also have a sleeping baby remora attached to me. I just felt a string of drool roll down my chest.

But the upside of today is that Darren is on his 2nd annual Christmas Pickle making spree. My man makes pickles, and they are good. And we currently have some hot sauce in the house, made by the good people at El Yucateco, that will knock your socks off in the best possible way. It’s some secret variety that they don’t usually have, but Darren noticed it at the fruteria the other day and picked up a bottle. Maybe it’s the special Holiday Habanero blend?

Bjorn upgraded…and not a moment too soon December 5, 2009

Living in a third floor walk-up, the thought of dealing with stroller is less than appealing. Obviously wheels do offer a certain mechanical advantage once you’re out on the street, but until we can afford to have Dean Kamen build a stair-climbing stroller for us, we”ll probably keep using one of the many, many child carriers that our friends and family have loaned us.

Our current inventory includes  a BabyBjörn, a Snugli, an Ergo, a Malawian Kitenge (kih-TEN-jay) , a Moby Wrap, a Guatamalan sling and probably one or two more I’m forgetting about. Perhaps in deference to her Native American heritage (she’s 1/32nd Munsee), Salma seems to prefer the papoose-like geometry of the Bjorn and Snugli carriers.

Although both the Björn and Snugli put most of the child’s mass on the caregiver’s shoulders, Rachel and I each appreciate how consistently these more mechanical carriers operate as opposed to their crunchier cousins. The sling-style carriers can be configured in a variety of positions, but my inability to get any of them tied in a way that made me feel Salma was secure was nothing short of infuriating. My struggles to properly tie the sling carriers also served to remind me that a certain scout leader was being VERY generous when he awarded me my Pioneering Merit Badge.

And now our love for the Björn has become even greater since Rachel picked up the water- and wind-resistant Björn cöver. She bought it Thursday evening, and let me tell you, few purchases have ever been better timed, because Friday morning the harsh Chicago winter kicked-off in earnest with temps in the mid twenties and wind chills in the low teens.

Here’s a pic I snapped with the help of a mirror at the Gap Outlet after picking Salma up from daycare.

With the cover in place we could barrel across the Alaskan tundra on a snow machine and she'd stay snug as a bug, you betcha!

And here's a plum tuckered-out little bear after our evening constitutional on Saturday...

Half a year December 3, 2009

Yowza! Salma turned 6 months old yesterday. I have no idea where the time has gone — it honestly feels like it was just yesterday that I was vastly pregnant and unable to tie my shoes. And now … I have a little person on my hands. She’s a whole different kid than she was a couple of months ago, and right now, it feels like the developments are coming fast and furiously. We drove up to Wisco yesterday to spend the day with Tiera and Oliver, who also turned 6 months old. Oliver is a real cutie, and quite proficient at jumping in his bouncer thing. Also, he is a champion sleeper — one of those kids that can go down AWAKE for a nap. Salma is still a little unsure about the whole jumperoo aspect of being a baby, but she’s getting there.

Salma is wearing a shirt here that says “Organically Grown” on it, and I feel like I need to make a bit of a disclaimer every time she wears it. Because technically, she’s not really organically-grown. I want to get a sharpie out and make it say “organically grown most of the time” or “was organically grown, but then my mama went back to work and had to pump and now I have to eat formula because my mama can’t make enough milk.” (Truth in advertising is very important to me.) But while I’m on the topic, I just want to rant a little bit about the frustration of pumping at work. This morning, I was reading a blog of a new mother, who just went back to work after a 4-month maternity leave, and I became pretty annoyed because this woman was complaining a bit about having to book the “Mommy Room” on Outlook. And how the “Mommy Room” was right off of a main hallway, so she could hear her co-workers walking to and from the water cooler. And how there wasn’t a sink in the Mommy Room to rinse her pumping gear, so she had to do it in the communal lunchroom. I know that pumping is rough, no matter where you do it, but you’re one of the lucky ones, ma’am. I have to ask my boss twice a day to leave her office, so that I can use it to do my business. And then I can hear people in the communal office adjoining her office saying things like “What’s that noise in there?” “Oh, that’s just Rachel pumping.” And I have it better than others — I have a really supportive boss who lets me use her office. I’ve heard stories of women pumping in the bathrooms or in their cars because there is no other place at work for them to do it. And by pumping at work, you set yourself up for ALL KINDS of questions — “What does it feel like?” being the most common of them. Some people are fascinated by it, others act like it’s dirty and look the other way when you carry your “Pump In Style” (with a fancy gold buckle) into the office.

Point is, pumping is not fun. It is not easy. It is not pleasant. It’s the opposite of relaxing, humiliating, and often very, very frustrating. (Like earlier this week, when I dumped 10 oz of milk all over the floor by accident. For those of you not familiar with feeding a child, that’s a meal and a half or so. And about an hour of my time.) And it’s not just the pumping that’s hard — it’s also remembering to clean your pump gear, making sure that you have all of your pump gear with you every day when you leave the house. But for me, the worst thing, is that my milk is drying up. And that really pisses me off — I made a choice to do what I think is best for my child, but the system is absolutely not set up to support nursing mothers. The pediatricians tell you to breastfeed exclusively for 6 months — but I don’t know that many working mothers who were able to do it. The two that I do know both have their own offices and could pump in them multiple times a day. Now that Salma is 6 months old, I feel like the pressure is off a bit, but still …

There’s no real point to this rant. I don’t have any solutions. It would be great if we could all have 6 month maternity leaves. Or afford donor milk (which is what a midwife suggested I do rather than supplement with formula). Or be lucky enough to work in a place that supported nursing mothers by giving them a Mommy Room. (Pepsi, for instance, is apparently amazing to its pumping employees.) But most of us are not. So if you work with a pumping mother, please be nice. Don’t treat her like a side-show freak. If you’re married to a pumping mother, take a cue from my husband and pack the pumping supplies up for her every day. And if you’re the child of a mother who pumped, give your mama a big hug and tell her thank you. Because (pun intended), pumping really sucks.

Tis the season December 1, 2009

The tree is up, the Christmas cactus is going bananas, and I made an orange pomander for the first time since maybe third grade art class. The house smells like pine needles and cloves. I suddenly feel like baking, which is completely out of character. Good thing I bought Christmas cookie cutters.

The last time we decorated for Christmas, it was in preparation for Lewis Family Christmas 2007, here in Chicago. And the last time I saw my Dad, that tree was still up and the lights were still twinkling. He died a few weeks later. Last year, I didn’t really feel like decorating. But this year … I’m ready to celebrate again. Christmas will never be the same without my Dad, but thank goodness for the little girl elf who, without even knowing it, has brought joy back to this season for me.

Thankful November 27, 2009

We have so much to be thankful for. Beautiful baby, our health, wonderful family both near and far, great friends, more than enough to eat, and a roof over our heads. But this Thanksgiving, the thing I am most thankful for is the arrival of this little turkey, Theodore Luke Diener. (No relation, though I quite enjoy it that he and Salma have the same middle name.) Our dear friends Kari and Obie have been through a really difficult pregnancy, and after many months on hospital bedrest, their boy arrived on Thanksgiving. We’re so happy that you’re here, little Theodore! And we’re so proud of you, Kari and Obie. Congratulations!

And here are a couple of pics from our quick trip to Wisconsin for the holiday… (And Charlotta, if you’re reading this, the pants are wonderful! Thank you.)

17 pound turkey baby. November 25, 2009

According to the Butterball calculator, Salma is big enough to feed 7 adults and 3 kids. If those 7 adults and 3 kids are big eaters and like leftovers. Dibs on the thighs.