Imperfect Memory

The Sickness has passed. Senpai still takes Mucinex for his chest congestion and the rest of us are finishing our bottles of antibiotics, but we all feel so much better.

A quick discussion about our need to create wills (can I just write "cremate me" and call it a day?) led Senpai to say he is thankful that I blog. Whenever death decides to come for me, this blog will remain for my children to see me for who I was. Imperfect. Human. Trying too hard for perfection and yet feeling like I haven't done enough. That's me. I should make more of a point to consider what my daughters will think when they read this record in the time to come... For now, though, I write for me. My short term memory leaves much to be desired. You could ask me what I ate for lunch yesterday and I'd have to stop and think really hard to remember. I blame it on all of the Equal packets I downed as a kid, even though the FDA is loathe to draw a solid connection between aspartame and short term memory loss. Being that my own memory serves me so poorly, this blog and flickr help me fill in the blanks.




I Wish to Remember

Poppy is almost 9 months old. She learned how to sit up at 7 months. She still doesn't crawl, still doesn't have any teeth, and hates to be placed on the floor lying down.


Girl loves her some food.

Rosemary has been practicing the word "delicious," and the phrase, "The best [I've] ever seen!" She constantly asks, "MOMMY! What are you doing?" Multiple times per day, per minute, even. When I give an answer, she tells me what she's doing, usually prefaced with, "I'm TRYING to..."

We got her an iPad after the Nook died for the third time. We should have gotten one sooner. The apps on the Nook just cannot compare to the iPad apps. Rosemary is learning her letters. How to draw them, what they look like, the sounds they make. It's amazing. LetterSchool, look it up. She's also learning how to spell with FirstWords Animals. She loves these games. She actually plays the educational games more than the arbitrary games because she's enjoying learning new things. What educational apps do your children enjoy?

I Wish to Remember...

Poppy is on the cusp of some huge developments. She can now stand while supporting herself against a play-table for about half a minute. On her own. No help. She isn't sitting on her own yet, but she's getting there. She tried to push herself forward when she was on her stomach yesterday. She can occasionally bring a morsel of food to her mouth, but she's still figuring out what happens next.


The following vignettes are all about Rosemary:

She called our long-haired cat "kitty-fur-walking." Pretty accurate description.

She found a small stone. "It's a rock! Baby rock!" She then proceeded to sing, "Rock a bye baby..."

She saw cracks in the bricks of our garage wall. "Uh-oh! It's broken!" She patted a broken brick and consoled it, "It's awwight. All better! Give a hug!" She hugged the wall.
I said, "Aww, that's sweet, honey. C'mon, let's get to the car."
Except she found another cracked brick. "Uh-oh! It's broken! It's awwight. All better!"
I started to say,"Okay, Rosemary, that's enough..."
But she kept going, "Give a kiss!" And she kissed the wall. TWICE.
"Rosemary, get your lips off the wall!"

Today was monumental. Remember when I said I was working on getting Rosemary to say hi to Ms. Sue?The reason we were going to the car this morning when she kissed the bricks was to go to Barnes & Noble. Storytime is on hold until after the holidays, but we still drove up there to get out of the house. In spite of some huge meltdowns at the house earlier, Rosemary behaved beautifully while we were out. She was social, talking to other kids and adults. She listened to me when I said it was time to go potty or time to leave. She didn't give me much response when I asked her if she'd say hi to Ms. Sue, but when we did see Ms. Sue later, Rosemary babbled to her at length and then asked for a hug. Ms. Sue looked at me in surprise and I exclaimed, "Hallelujah!" It was a short hug, but it happened. And that is amazing. When it was time for us to eventually go, Sue said, "You have my heart!" as we walked away. :-)

Singing and Eating

Rosemary sings. For awhile she would sing, "Na, na, niiii! Na, na, niii!" It's supposed to be the name game from Pooh's Heffalump Movie, shown below.

The song starts at 0:39.

Now, she also sings, "Dow-ie dow... A dowie dow!" Which is her version of The Farmer in the Dell. I'll try to catch video of her doing it sometime. I sang that to her once because she asked me to sing a song about cheese. Having no other ideas, I remembered the cheese standing alone at the end.

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How did I end up in this position again?

Poppy came home on Monday of last week. I prepared a bottle for her after every nursing session. She would nurse strongly and still drink a half to a whole ounce from the bottle. On Wednesday I asked my lactation consultant how to wean myself off the breast pump. I spent a lot of time last week drenched in breast milk; it was super plentiful. I was making far too much milk for Poppy, and it was actually a problem. The engorged breasts were hard for her to latch onto, and the excess foremilk gave her digestive issues. I was given the advice to pump for only about 5 minutes - certainly not until I was empty. I followed those directions, and felt a lot more comfortable by Saturday. Sunday, Poppy didn't nurse well. On Monday I found myself struggling to rouse her enough to finish a bottle. She's getting better now, but we're doing more bottle-feeding. She either falls right to sleep at the breast, or she'll aimlessly (and endlessly) root without latching on. I'm back to pumping for full 15 minute sessions, usually because Poppy didn't drink out of the breasts at all.

I need to remember that she is still a preemie. Yes, she is a month old now. No, I can't just run out of the house for a day trip without bottles and expect her to eat well. I hate that I still have to pump these full feedings out, but I need to remember that it won't last forever.

I wish to remember worrying over numbers: Is she being fed every two and a half to three hours? How many ounces is she drinking? Can we get her to finish at least two ounces? Is she gaining weight, ounce by bitty ounce? Has she had six wet and three dirty diapers today? Numbers, numbers, numbers.