Word Toast

Ready, aim

2012-07-19T11:14:00.002-07:00

I am told my daughter has now figured out how to load and fire a Nerf gun...
Not bad for an almost-two-year-old

Hopefully that'll help take care of any issues that arise if she manages to use the stud finder to find some studs

Daylight

2012-07-18T08:23:00.000-07:00

On Monday we had a solatube installed in our (windowless) bathroom. I'd intellectually known that solatubes bring in a lot of light, but the difference it makes to the space is pretty phenomenal. After it went in Kate sent me a message saying that she'd cleaned a layer of dust off of spots that we had no idea had needed cleaning.

Z seems completely unfazed by the change. She seems to take most things in stride (provided that she's not overtired and being told that she can't watch Elmo or My Little Pony).

Business as usual

2012-03-15T00:51:00.001-07:00

I had my first business trip since having Z. Apparently she kept asking for me and Kate kept telling her that I was "at work".

I like traveling, but until Z's a little older I'm pretty happy that my travel is a rare event.

Random memories

2012-02-24T21:18:00.000-08:00

Zoë has been building her vocabulary. The other day at Starbucks the barista was surprised when I was adding cream to Kate's coffee and Zoë said "Milk!"

She's also just started conjugating words. She can not only say "Rain", she can tell us it's "Raining"

Watching the cat herder

2012-02-24T00:12:00.000-08:00

I remember watching Sesame Street as a kid and Prairie Dawn was always this character that I didn't connect with at all. Now she's one of my favorite characters.

She has this wonderful air of trying to maintain propriety in spite of the world around her. I love how she embodies the necessary futility of being well mannered when surrounded by lunatics. And particularly when she's paired with Cookie Monster she forms this hilarious object lesson of Superego being overpowered by Id with chaos as the consequence.

Well, there's your problem

2012-02-22T23:56:00.000-08:00

There's this guy I sit next to at work. He frequently complains about how he's having money troubles. He also does that annoying brag/complain thing about his recently acquired gadgets, especially the ones from Apple.

Not that I have anything against Apple products. They're quite nice. But they're a luxury/status good.

And, quite frankly, living within your means is something I respect way more than a phone.

Confession time

2012-02-21T08:49:00.000-08:00

I think I've now listened to more Caspar Babypants than Presidents of the United States (and that includes having the radio station incessantly play Lump during my college years).

Random memories

2012-02-18T02:07:00.000-08:00

This morning Z picked up a pair of foam rubber rectangles and said 'fly'. This was definitely an improvement over her blowing raspberries as a way to ask for an airplane ride.

Kate's loom is partially packed away but Z likes to look at the yarn running through it. Invariably she knocks the beater bar loose and says "fall" when it tumbles down onto the partially woven fabric.

This evening Z opened up Kate's laptop for the first time. I think we'll have to get Kate's laptop set up to lock itself after it's been closed.

Random memories

2012-02-07T00:02:00.000-08:00

This morning Zoë was playing a game she learned from a TV show. She shouts "run run run" and gets people to run and then points and shouts "freeze" (or the toddlerish equivalent of it). Everyone freezes. Then she shouts "run run run" and the game starts over again.

Yesterday she was getting grandma and grandpa to blow raspberries when she pointed at them.

She has started noticing when the nesting cups she's stacking aren't in the right order.

When it was snowing a few weeks ago she was running around with her tongue pointed at the sky so that she could catch snowflakes.

Nobody tells you this stuff

2011-04-18T22:27:00.000-07:00

#213 on the list of things nobody told you about having kids:

Babies snore. Like a drunken frat boy.

It's been a while since I've updated

2011-04-15T08:41:00.000-07:00

So, Zoë co-sleeps with us and has taken to kicking me out of bed in the morning. Or at least kicking me repeatedly until I decide that it's easier to substitute coffee for additional sleep.

In other news, Z is finally getting old enough where she requires a lot less attention, so it looks like I'll get to make beer again sometime soon.

Can't Win

2010-11-27T10:57:00.000-08:00

So, now that Zoë is finally asleep it's hard to concentrate because I keep wondering if she's still breathing.

Sometimes things come back to haunt you

2010-11-24T11:18:00.000-08:00

I have this rather clear memory of being in a store that specialized in inexpensive Swedish modern furniture and being less than happy with the asking price for the furniture (especially since it was all fiberboard).

Which eventually resulted in a fairly nice pair of solid wood bookshelves (and the purchase of about $350 in tools).

Of course, now that we're going to be needing more furniture.

I guess I'll be looking for a surface planer on craigslist.

The changing priorities of parents

2010-11-22T15:03:00.000-08:00

Conversations with my baby

2010-11-18T09:15:00.000-08:00

"Far!"

Walk close enough to touch noses.

"Near!"

Take 4 steps back.

"Far!"

Repeat until baby stops giggling.

Also Important

2010-11-17T01:00:00.000-08:00

When posting pictures of your baby, make sure embarrassing objects are cropped out. Nobody's going to believe that the pump bottle is full of clear "hand lotion".

Through the woods

2010-11-17T00:47:00.000-08:00

I don't know what other people's experience has been, but there was a really rough patch between 1 and 3 months where sleep deprivation just made everything blur together and it was a miracle that the bills were paid.

But we've made it through and we're rolling with the punches. Speaking of punches, Zoë's latest trick is to brighten up when I'm singing to her and then turn sour faced when I stop. It's like an anti-encore. She's booing me until I start singing again.

Baby Yoga

2010-09-21T17:47:00.000-07:00

Today was Zoë's first day of baby yoga. It's also about a week since Kate's gone off of dairy in an effort to help Zoë be less gassy. Also, Zoë seems to be feeding like crazy in preparation for another growth spurt.

These things happen to be related.

After Kate went off dairy Zoë became generally less gassy (we'd like to think those two things could be related), and stopped producing poopy diapers. It isn't unheard of for babies to go a few days without pooping, so we weren't too concerned as she was both happy and extremely well hydrated.

In any case, apparently there's something the yoga class teaches that's called "digestion massage". It helps with the end part of digestion. This is generally a good thing, except that Zoë had a bit of a backlog which was rather accelerated to where it overflowed her diaper, her onesie, mom's pants, mom's shirt, a changing pad, and a packet of wipes.

I'm told there was a nice shower once everyone got home.

Running tally for the evening

2010-09-08T22:21:00.000-07:00

As of 10:00pm

1 fuzzy blue bathrobe (baby poop)
1 hair towel (baby poop)
Carpet near bathroom (dog blood)
1 button down shirt (baby poop)
1 baby bathtub (baby poop and spit up)
1 Penny Arcade "Div" t-shirt (spit up)
Carpet near bed (dog blood)
1 pair of pants (spit up)
1 pair of jeans (shower nozzle overspray)
Purple wrap (spit up)
Carpet near dresser (dog blood)
Top blanket for the bed (baby poop)
Brand new nursing tank (spit up)
Liver (bourbon)

(the dog is fine, he had a minor altercation involving the cat's claws and his ear)

Silly doggy

2010-09-06T22:55:00.000-07:00

New Rule: baby wipes go into a container that Porter (our black Labrador) can't get into.

Porter tends to walk when he poops, and my wife's taken to describing his current predicament as "diarrhea odysseys".

IC Tots

2010-08-30T13:22:00.000-07:00

It's official.
My kid's swing is now lame.

Pandora Fail!

2010-08-28T19:18:00.000-07:00

I generally like Pandora. It was a godsend in the hospital as my phone effectively contained several thousand hours of music and good music made the hospital room seem a bit more like home.

But every once in a while it falls down.

I'd created a station that typically plays music that's good for falling asleep to (started with Dead Can Dance and Loreena McKennitt). This worked pretty well until we added the Twin Peaks theme and one or two tracks off the Edward Scissorhands soundtrack. Suddenly, Pandora decided that any movie soundtrack was fair game.

King Kong? Exciting! Thumbs down.
Avatar film score? Not relaxing. Thumbs down.
Lord of the Rings soundtrack? Bombastic! Thumbs down.
(Also, why isn't there a "This song belongs on my other station" button. It's not bad music, just completely wrong for the station)

Regardless of how many we gave a thumbs down to it kept digging up new movie soundtracks.

After Kate was woken up early this morning by the theme to Star Wars I have removed all the soundtrack entries from the station.

Update:
I've been informed that Pandora does now have a Move-To-Another-Station button! Did they add that when I wasn't paying attention or did they always have that?

Perhaps I should seek psychiatric help

2010-08-25T22:28:00.000-07:00

Am I the only one who finds it kind of satisfying when you see your baby spit up a whole lot. Not one of those dainty spit-ups that you dab at with a burp cloth, but one of those outfit soaking fountains. No? Maybe it was because great-grandma was the one holding her at the time.

Lies, Damn lies, and Babies

2010-08-23T21:15:00.000-07:00

A few baby related things I've found to be less than true:

"Cats will suffocate/eat your baby."

I'm not sure where this anti-cat sentiment came from. Given some of the bizarre cat myths I've heard over the years I'm inclined to believe that the same traits that lead to cat hatred also lead to making up stories about your opponents. Feel free to extrapolate this to which ever political groups you hate.

So far our cat has sniffed our baby (with disdain) and has occasionally had to be removed from various pieces of baby furniture. Given the high price and low quality of most cat furniture I'm seriously considering getting an extra foam changing pad for a cat bed.

"Your car seat is easy and intuitive to install."

Apparently this is only true for certain models of SUV in the 2015 model year. It was most certainly not true for our 2001 model year car (sorry, we're bad consumers who buy long lasting cars and then perform maintenance on them. I know it's really terrible that we're doing that to the economy and it would be better for everyone if we bought a car that would need replacing in 5 years. If it makes you feel better you can come over and have some of my homebrew beer that I've made with money I wasn't spending on car payments).

"You can soothe a child and type at the same time."

Ok, this is one I keep telling myself. It totally does not work. My wife's holding the baby as I type this.

"Once your infant is fully asleep with floppy limbs it will be nearly impossible to wake her"

Lies! Any attempt to fool around with mommy instantly wakes up the baby.

And now:
Gratuitous adorable baby picture

How to change a diaper

2010-08-21T13:08:00.000-07:00

Wake up.
No, really. Wake up.
Sit up.
Have the wife explain that the house is not, in fact on fire.
Resolve to not sleep on my arm again. Flex hands and arm until I'm pretty sure I won't drop the baby.
Don't ask what time it is. There is no answer that will improve the situation.
Take baby, put baby on changing pad.
Search for the wipes.
Look for the diapers.
Search for the wipes, become confused when they're already in my left hand.
Attempt to open wipes.
Swear at whoever invented the EZ-Open latch on the wipes.
Contemplate getting a pair of pliers to assist with opening the wipes. Gleefully think about tearing the lid off of the wipes. Frown as the lid springs open.
Put diaper on changing pad, put clean wipe over diaper, put baby on clean wipe.
Undo dirty diaper.
Marvel at the similarity between an infant's poo and curry. Wonder if this will put me off Indian food.
Move dirty diaper far enough down the changing pad so that baby won't put her foot in it.
Pull out fresh wipes. Try not to feel too weird about cleaning my daughter's genitals.
Make up for weird feelings by mentally rehearsing scary and pithy things to say to the first boy who seems overly interested in touching my daughter's genitals.
Put dirty wipes in dirty diaper.
Discover baby has gotten better at kicking. Wipe off baby's foot and move dirty diaper farther down the changing pad.
Lift baby's legs and get that last bit of poo that's smeared on her backside.
Hear baby make a cooing sound as she pees and soaks through to the clean diaper.
Count to 10, watch baby poo out a fresh supply of poo (Ha! I win this round, baby).
Swap newly dirty diaper for next clean diaper.
Re-clean baby.
Try to remember how tightly the diaper is supposed to close.
Realize that it doesn't really matter, the baby's started kicking and any tightness is fine provided that it doesn't fall off.
Admire handywork. Decide that diapers that are twisted at crazy angles will probably leak. Re-adjust the diaper until it looks more like a garment and less like some fashion designer's "creation".
Pick up baby (baby will now be crying).
Swing baby back and fort until arms feel like they're going to fall off. Marvel at her pretty smile up at top of the swing.
Try to imagine that swinging a baby will somehow build massive back and arm muscles that will have women ogling me.
Stop swinging baby, experience total lack of surprise in how she goes from happy to fussy in less than 3 seconds.
Spend 30 minutes doing a bouncy-walk up and down the hallway.
Listen to one perfect contented sigh as she truly falls asleep.
Give baby back to wife.
Collapse into bed, sleep.
Wake up.
No, really. Wake up.