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This has been a good weekend – despite feeling like a truck ran me over from here to the ends of the earth. Josh’s sister is in town, so we strongarmed her into babysitting our fussy toddler on Friday night while we ran away (oh yes, literally – I ran down the stairs and urged Josh to hurry behind me so M wouldn’t fuss as badly, although as we shut the door I heard a little wail coming from upstairs) to a delightful Cameroonian restaurant in south Berkeley. Delicious, and perhaps because of the food, or perhaps because we were starved rats, we ate really fast, and then headed over to Barnes & Noble in Emeryville to kill some time before the movie started – we saw Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Good movie, although to be honest I think I have seen entirely too much of Jason Segal’s penis.

Yesterday was a deliciously napful day. After Josh put Matthew down for a nap, we settled in to watch an episode of News Radio on DVD. Halfway through, I started conking out, and by the time I woke up a couple of hours later, Josh had done the grocery shopping and put them away.

Today, I woke up a little earlier than I would have liked (and it’s my morning to sleep in, which seems like the greater injustice!). We met Jera for brunch at the Thai Buddhist temple and ate oh so much food, and then hit the farmer’s market. It’s been a lazy Sunday afternoon – the best kind – and really, I couldn’t ask for anything more. Maybe a pony. Ponies are good.

The verdict thus far: undecided. Matthew’s pediatrician thinks his recurrent cysts/boils in his diaper area are MRSA. She thinks all of us have it (and definitely me too since I’ve had 2 bad abscesses and cellulitis), Josh has colonized it too. So we have to wash all of our clothes in hot water:

which will come in handy when we get our washer and dryer this weekend!

We also have to do bleach baths once a week (all of us), and swab the insides of our noses with an antibiotic ointment.

Of course, my doctor doesn’t think I have MRSA. I’m on another antibiotic, and if my current abscess doesn’t decrease after this course is done, then I have to go in and get cultured.

Man almighty am I sick of being sick.

Matthew, though, is none the worse for wear. He spent a bit of time yesterday in and out of Ava’s crate.

Sorry for dropping off into the ether like that. I’d say I’ve been busy, but haven’t we all?

Some fun things: today the landlord’s handymen have been by to install washer and dryer hookups! I am beyond excited, because this means I will break out Matthew’s cloth diapers. And because he was so chunky as an infant, he fit into size larges – which he will still fit into now. Woot! Cloth! Hiney! Yay!

I am the dorkiest person I know getting all psyched about diapers. Sheesh.

Another fun thing: the weather this weekend was gorgeous. One of my favorite pictures of my most favorite subjects:

• washed diaper laundry
• made baby food – baked and/or steamed: green beans, carrots, acorn squash, applesauce and sweet potatoes
• took a nap
• made black bean soup
• pumped milk
• washed about 4,000 bottles and their assorted accoutrements
• made egg salad for lunch (I added dijon mustard and worcestershire sauce – very yummy)
• nursed Matthew
• organized all babyfood stuff in the freezer

Things I still have to do but probably won’t:

• sort and “fold” diaper laundry
• purge stuff on desk for preparation to move
• work out
• work on work stuff that I brought home

Win some, lose some.

So, we went to Florida, and came back again. Nothing too terribly remarkable about the trip, to be honest – I went to a conference, Josh and Matthew spent time with his parents. Matthew slept for shit on the trip.

I am tired, but I am going to spare anyone the effort of typing into a comment box – you win. You are more tired than I am, okay?

It’s easter Sunday, and as heathens who are not celebrating, we have very little planned. It’s a regular weekend – Josh is working, I am babywrangling. In a little bit I am thinking of taking Matthew out to get some pastries for lunch.

We asked Josh’s parents this weekend to be Matthew’s guardians if something fatal should fall upon the two of us. We also asked a friend of mine here to take charge of Matthew (of course, if we’re still in Chicago) until Josh’s parents could come and get him. I cried both times. I have become such a sap. I can’t imagine not being here for Matthew’s future.

Matthew is such fun right now. He’s figured out how to crawl – just enough – to get to the books and pull them down from the shelves. He’s fascinated with Philip K. Dick right now and aims just for those books. He clicks his tongue a lot now, and the latest fun thing he’s done, from the annals of “The Joy of Breastfeeding,” is that when he’s nursing, sometimes he’ll unlatch, I’ll be distracted, and I’ll feel a sharp pinch. It’s not his teeth – it’s his fingers. He’ll be concentrating and poking at my nipple, and then grab it. His fingernails are like razors.

My milk supply is decreasing daily. I think I’ve come to terms with it. I have only 14 ounces in the freezer saved up. Since Friday I didn’t pump any (I forgot my pump parts, and Josh and Matthew came up for lunch so he could nurse), I have to make up 8 ounces for Monday. And for some reason, Mondays and Tuesdays are my lower pumping days – it’s like my body readjusts and realizes it has to produce later in the week. I’m just afraid he’s going to really hate the smell and taste of Alimentum, even if we mix it with breastmilk. I will worry about that later.

Also, what you’re probably really here for, pictures from our trip to Orlando.

Pros – Ava is thrilled to bits that Matthew has started solids. She’s eaten more Cheerios (or rather, Safeway Toasted Oats!) in these last few days we’ve had them than she’s ever eaten before in her life.

Cons – Matthew’s diapers. Yech.

Over the last few months, my milk supply has drastically tanked. I know this is in part due to Matthew starting solids (somewhat), and the pump being just not as efficient as Matthew, but the reality is that we’re staring down 14 ounces in the freezer to hold us over. At this rate, next week or the week after we’ll have to start supplementing, in some shape or form. I am upping my pumping sessions and started taking fenugreek (carefully, though, because it’s been known to cause low blood sugars in diabetics) to help up my supply, but I don’t want to go to extreme measures, for my health or Matthew’s.

I’m still going to pump, because I want to keep breastfeeding and providing as much breastmilk as I can, but I would be lying if I didn’t say it was killing me a little inside. I never thought I would enjoy our nursing relationship as much as I do, and at some point, after nursing got easy, I decided that I would let Matthew wean himself. I never considered that I’d stop before at least a year because my supply would tank spectacularly.

I am being completely irrational, I know – I provided over 8 months of breastmilk and that is better than 7 or 6 or no months of breastmilk. I know that formulas today are a fine substitute, and whatever Matthew does he will be just fine, he will continue to thrive and I will continue to nurse him as much as he wants to or can until my milk dries up.

I feel, irrational or not, like my body is failing me. As stupid as it sounds, I feel like I’m in mourning, a little.

Dear Mama’s friends:

I was so cranky at my parents all day today! First, my baba was barely awake when Mama had to go walk the dog so she set me on the bed, right next to Baba so she could take the dog out. Well, dontcha know I saw SOMETHING underneath Mama and Baba’s bed and so I had to go look at it and maybe chew it, so I went to go get it, and fell off the bed. Baba felt bad; I cried tons of tears, but felt much better after Mama and Baba lavished me with hugs, and I got to pull Mama’s hair.

Later on, when Mama was changing my diaper, I decided that I’d had ENOUGH of diapers and changes and flung myself around and smacked my head into the wall. OW! I was okay – I think I just scared myself, but Mama gave me a pear cube in a mesh feeder and that was yummy!

But that was also messy! Mama was changing my clothes afterward because I had pear juice all over me, and I got impatient with her trying to put my onesie on and yanked my arm back – and hit the back of my head against the wall!

To spite them, I only took a twenty-minute nap this afternoon. HAHA Mama and Baba, I’LL GET YOU.

The last injury of the day – We went out grocery shopping and Baba zipped up my hoodie… with a little bit of Math-flesh in the zipper! Baba was wondering why I was shouting incoherently. Mama quickly figured out what happened and unzipped me.

Here’s hoping tomorrow they don’t let the bus run me over. It’s hard work being a baby.

In Babies I Trust,
Matthew

Dear CTA:

Did you by chance know that there was a time change last Sunday? Because still flashing the incorrect time on one of the moving ad blinkie things feels like you’re rubbing salt into the “it’s not really 7:44AM, it’s 8:44AM, you bastards” wound.

Regards,
Casey

First, gong xi fa cai! This is the year of the pig (and if you don’t enunciate, it sounds like, “you’re a pig!”), and we celebrated by inviting a ton of people over to eat a hell of a lot of food. Josh’s parents were in town for the festive events and Matthew celebrated by looking particularly yummy. See all of the pictures I took in the Chinese New Year set.

My favorite:

Today was a fabulous day. I got off to a late start, so at the train station, I decided to take a cab to where I needed to go. The cab driver was a fool and had no idea where he was going and I didn’t realize he didn’t have any idea where he was going until we were going in the wrong direction. Blah. I love wasting money.

Then, I left the breast pump horns at home so I didn’t pump until 3:30, when one of my colleagues was kind enough to bring me to Target to pick up some new horns in a jiffy. My supply is totally going to tank because of this – it did the last time I forgot my horns at home. After I went back to work from maternity leave, it was really easy for me to get 9-10 ounces during my first pump, and another 6-7 during my second. Now, I’m pushing my luck at 11 or 12 and that’s not counting the pumping I do early in the morning or in the middle of the night. Alas.

But the day ended pleasantly; I got Matthew a bathtub today while I was at Target and I think he really likes it – he kicked up a lot of water and splashed quite awhile – and fussed when I pulled him out.

I wish I had a bathtub for me that was inflatable and looked like a rubber duck.