Training Videos

So before I had my own kid, parents would tell me about things they were working on with their child and I would be SO tempted to talk about how I was using the very same techniques to train my pup. But (usually) I would bite my tongue because it's inappropriate to compare someone's little snowflake to a Labrador Retriever.

But seriously dog training required a lot of patience, consistency, and clear (verbal and non-verbal) communication, so you can see how that might translate well.

Now that I have my own snowflake, I find myself using some of the same phrases on him that I used on Kona in training. Must curb that before he gets old enough to notice...

However, as the following videos demonstrate, it's working.

Oh, I kid. What these videos really demonstrate is that I need to stop saying "good boy."



Someone should fire the camera woman on that one. She cuts off the subject half of the time. It also sounds like she came to work with a cold. Sheesh.

Having Taken to My Bed

I'm camped out in my room today surrounded by various phones, my laptop, and the TV remote.

Sunday evening I started to feel a cold coming on. I don't get colds very often, and when I do, I usually cancel all of my plans, down a bunch of soup and orange juice, take one of those nighttime cold medicines and sleep for 10 hours. And I usually wake up feeling fine.

Obviously having a baby complicates this routine. First of all, I'm not going to take any cold medicine, much less the blessed sleepy sleepy kind.

I'd love to sleep for 10 hours, but there's this alarm that goes off every 1.5-4 hours, and I haven't been able to find a snooze button on him.

I did cancel most plans. And I did inhale a bunch of soup and OJ.

Yeah, the OJ may or may not have affected Agustin. Either way, he's been really fussy the last couple of mornings. Stupid move, noob mom. Lay off the citrus.

Anyway, I felt even more wretched this morning, so I decided to just stay in bed.

Also, last week, breastfeeding was going so well. It was so natural! Such a bonding experience!So much easier than all the pumping and bottling!

And then this week... my nipples are burning, BURNING constantly and every couple of hours the baby cries and I must heap more coals on the fire. I know. They shouldn't hurt at all. Obviously we are not getting a proper latch.

I think I got too relaxed about the latch. Especially at night. I'd just leave the lights off and stay half asleep and fill the baby bird's mouth. So now we're working on things. I think Agustin never had a GREAT latch, and he's getting bigger and more powerful by the day. I'm having a hard time getting him to open his mouth wide. But I have a lot of incentive to convince him--BURNING, STINGING INCENTIVE--so it's getting a little better. I need to get to the lactation consultant, but that would require getting out of bed.

Incidentally, the weather is cooperating with my mood because a storm came through. The morning newscaster just threw it out there like it was no big deal. "High chance of storms..." on to the next topic. And it amused me to think that this kind of storm would make headlines in California. Especially coming in the Spring/Summer as this one is.

There was thunder and lightning--and this is like the fifth such storm I've experienced since I moved here. Crazy!

Adam is not as impressed. I'm such a California kid. OMG! Weather! Reminds me of this storm that came through when SuBu and I were in the dorms at State. We lived on the 11th floor, and the lounge had a great view of the downtown area. One night there's this lightning storm and there's a perfect view of it through the big windows in the lounge; a bunch of us collected in the lounge watching it with MUCH excitement. I should say, a bunch of the California natives. Then Suzanne walks in like "what's going on" and we're all "SQUEE! LIGHTNING!" And then she yawned and went somewhere to study. She's from the Midwest.

Although I hear y'all are having some cold weather back in California right now. I know because my Facebook page is covered with comments about COLD! IN WINTER! OMG!

Oh California. Gotta love ya.

The Crying Game

Not surprisingly, many theories I had about babies and parenting have been altered since we had Agustin.

However, one theory I have that has only become stronger in my mind is my Crying Baby Theory.

It goes a little something like this...

When a baby cries, that noise is most stressful to the baby's mother. This is for hormonal reasons, but also mothers tend to feel most responsible for the baby. If our baby is hurting, we want to take care of it and we will do everything in our power to fix whatever the problem is. When there are other people around, the situation becomes a lot more stressful because we're worried that the baby is bothering other people. And we worry about people thinking we're bad mothers, to be honest.

So, my theory goes, when a baby is crying, the job of the adults within hearing distance is to not stress about it and to act like everything is fine.

Seriously. Babies cry. Yes, usually for a reason, though it's not always something that can be fixed.

I know when a baby cries people want to comfort the baby; that's how we're wired. But ask yourself, am I the one "on duty" with this crying baby?

If the answer is no, GO ABOUT YOUR BUSINESS.

Obviously there are exceptions. If the baby is being hurt, for example. Or if you are asked for help. If mom (or the current caregiver) is struggling, you can offer to help.* But for the most part, the most helpful thing you can do is not act like the crying is a big deal.

Now that was the extent of my theory before; I've added to it.

One really valuable thing I learned recently is that the baby picks up on stress, and when you find that your baby is smiling at other people and calming down with them and not you, it's often because you're carrying so much stress as The Baby's Mother, and baby is stressed in response.

As soon as I realized that, I consciously started calming myself down when I went to comfort Agustin. I clear my head of all the worries I have before I look at him, and just tell myself that it's okay if he cries a little bit while I'm figuring out what's wrong. Better for me to calm down and methodically look for the answer than try a bunch of things over and over and get more and more upset when they don't work.

That's been difficult for me because when he was so little, I didn't want him to expend any energy at all with crying. He needed to gain weight, and he didn't have the fat stores that would give him energy to burn. Then, once he got bigger, I had concerns about what the implications of his prematurity might be, and I think I was watching too closely to make sure he was "okay," and getting stressed if I had an inkling that anything might be wrong. (Because being stressed would TOTALLY help matters, right?)

But since I've adopted this new approach, I've really seen a difference in him. I certainly get more smiles. And I feel a lot more confident about my ability to care for him. I recognize some of his cries now and can respond accordingly.

Now there are two things that inhibit my ability to be the best mother I can be when my baby is crying, and I'll write about the other one later, but back to my original point--one of those things is when other people freak out about my baby crying.**

Look, I'm the mom. If I'm not stressed, don't you be stressed.*** Mkay?

If we all work together to remain unstressed, the baby will be much better off.

I'm admittedly learning as I go. But I'm learning my baby, and we're learning together, and if he cries an extra couple of minutes while I'm figuring out what he needs, it's really not going to kill anyone.


*Some more experienced parents have helped me when Agustin was crying and taught me a few tricks that have been really useful. The difference is that they weren't at all stressed--they were just offering to help when they saw me with my hands full.

**You can cluck sympathetically; just don't get all tense and start firing potential reasons for the fussing at me.

***If I take my baby to a fancy restaurant or something, then I think you're entitled to a little bit of stress. But if I'm out in the world and my baby happens to fuss--and I'm not pushing the limits of what should be expected of a baby--realize that I'm trying to raise the next generation here and spare me The Look.

Turtle

So now I'm taking the videos...I'm just not getting them posted.

Baby steps, right?

Still, I'm trying to get better because he's starting to ramp up on the fun developmental milestones.

This is from a couple weeks ago--the turtle was next to him when I turned around, and when I turned back he'd pulled it on to himself (accidently, I'm sure) and was spending a fair amount of time squeezing the crinkly foot.

Three Months

We spent Agustin's three-month birthday taking family pictures with Ellie of Pitter Patter Portraits.

Here's a teaser--I can't wait to see the rest!

Aussie Born, Cali Bred

Today we took Agustin to the U.S. Consulate to file a Consular Report of Birth Abroad and get him a passport and social security number.

The paperwork I downloaded online was quite intimidating (it asked you to list PRECISE dates you were on U.S. soil and PRECISE dates you were off of U.S. soil and what reason you had for being there), but when we got there they were like, "Eh, you're citizens. You lived there. No biggie. But how'd you have a baby so soon after getting here anyway?"

...

As part of the process, I took Agustin to get his passport photos done yesterday. Cracks me up that it'll be good for five years. He was really good--they weren't set up to lay him down, so I had to prop up his head but keep my hand out of view. His hands are sort of flailing into the picture, but good enough. We should receive his passport in 2-3 weeks.

It's kind of funny that my baby is going to have a passport. On the one hand, I'm all, "OMG, a baby passport! Cuteness overload!"

On the other hand, I already have the urge to wag my finger in his face and tell him how his father and I didn't get passports until we were in college because we weren't able to go gallivanting ABROAD because we were too busy walking uphill in the snow to more local destinations.

Thirty

I have this theory that many of us at one point arbitrarily picked an age when we thought we'd have ourselves "together." Then when you hit that age and turn out to be still human and stuff, you have a little depressive episode because OMG, you DON'T have everything figured out. For many people that age is 30.

However, for me it was 24.

I KNOW. Someone needed to smack that girl.

Point is, turning 30 ain't so bad. I kinda like it. It seems more...authoritative. I feel like putting on a blazer and telling someone to do something.

Happy birthday to me.

Pics from my birthday dinner with the hubs.
We also saw Chicago.
I also got sapphires in honor of my son. :-)
And there were chocolates too.

An Aussie Thanksgiving

We had not one but two Thanksgivings this year. Appropriate since we have a lot to be thankful for!

On actual Thanksgiving day, which was technically the day before Thanksgiving US time, we had some of Adam's coworkers over as well as a few people from church. Our original idea was to have over the other Americans Adam has met on his project, but none of them came. HA! Luckily the Australians came through so it was nice and festive for us. Which lends credence to my theory that Australians are generally more sociable then Americans...

It was my first time hosting Thanksgiving and Agustin's first Thanksgiving. A momentous occasion.

I made my dad's famous bourbon sweet potatoes, green beans with pancetta, and stuffed turkey (I cheated; it came stuffed).

Meanwhile, some people from our church had already planned to hold a Thanksgiving celebration on Saturday (it's not an Australian holiday, so nobody has Thursday or Friday off). So we attended that one as well.

It was a fantastic event, made even more special by the effort our Aussie friends put into replicating the traditional American dishes. I LOVE our church. It really did feel like a family Thanksgiving with all the kids running around, the huge makeshift table set up, and the heaps of food. Such a good time. And at one point, looking around, I remembered how when I first found out I was pregnant, I was looking forward to having a baby with us for the holiday season. That was before I even had an inkling that we'd be in Australia. So funny how different reality was from what I pictured. But so wonderful.

I also got a birthday cake. Chocolate. Doesn't get much better than that.

Then and Now

*Shout out to the Bradleys who sent the handsome outfit Agustin is modeling in the "After" picture. I heart the polo shirt collar. :-)

Orange

The Ballouns sent us some adorable outfits for Agustin.

Adam hadn't seen this orange stripey one. I dressed Agustin in it the other day when the air conditioning was blasting again.

And when Adam got home from work, he was enthralled by the cuteness.

The Fabric of Our Lives

For various reasons, we recently purchased cloth diapers for Agustin.

I'm not going to lie. One of those reasons is that I think the cloth diaper covers they have these days are just so gosh darn cute. And I got to pick a bunch of different bright colors. SQUEEEE!

And, yes, I'm willing to do poopy laundry for the cuteness factor. I do a lot of things in the name of cuteness, including enduring the pain of four inch heels.

Anyway, out here in the Land Down Under, I found that my cloth choices were somewhat limited. There were really expensive prefitted nappies, prefold nappies in eco-luxe fabrics, or flat nappies. I started considering the flat nappies since I read somewhere that they are more common here than in America (explains why the prefolds here are so expensive) and then one website mentioned the "charm of the flat nappy" and I was sold. Well, that and the fact that they were a quarter of the price of any of my other options and I really don't want to have to do laundry four times a day, so I wanted a nice stock supply.

Oh, and the flats are all in terry. So basically I received a load of square towels in the mail.

Awesome.

I had to wait for the covers, which I'd ordered from a different site. When they finally arrived, it was with great anticipation that I plopped Agustin on the changing table, pulled out one of the nappies I'd carefully folded as per the internet instructions I found, and laid it on him.So, I know he's still a small baby. But the BULK! Y'all would not believe it. He looked like a bulbous cartoon insect with legs dangling out the sides.

Really. Dangling. In the air. Helplessly elevated by the copious amounts of fabric.
The pictures don't adequately capture how ridiculous he looked. I couldn't stop laughing.

Way charming.

I ended up cutting a few flats from the cheaper set of nappies in half and using them with the boosters I'd ordered. Of course, now there's an unfinished edge, which is less than ideal.

I'm weighing my options now. There are some booster/newborn nappies I could get; I'm just wondering how much use I'd get out of them. Or maybe I should bite the bullet and get some of the prefitted kind. Decisions, decisions.

Overly Diapered Babeh

...haz concernz.

What Child is This?

So...

At the risk of having to eat crow while sleep deprived, I am tempted to report that Agustin seems to have figured out night time. He's still eating every three hours throughout the day, but after his early evening feed, he does a longer sleep than the rest of the day.

For you non-parents (and parents of bizarrely good sleepers), that doesn't mean eight hours. That means, like, five hours...maaaaaybe six. Once seven.

At first this totally freaked me out--so conditioned was I by the hospital that he MUST! EAT! REGULARLY!

EAT! GROW! POOP! REPEAT!

But now that he has some fat stores, he's acting like...well...a healthy baby.

In other healthy baby news, I'm down to pumping once or twice a day--the rest of the time we are breastfeeding!

Like so much of Agustin's progress thus far, this latest step seemed very Agustin-led, even though I kept threatening... at six pounds, we're breastfeeding! ... well, at seven pounds, we're breastfeeding!...and then somewhere between seven and eight pounds Agustin started going on these crying jags and the only thing that would comfort him was breastfeeding--he'd refuse the bottle. That was my cue, and one day I realized that I hadn't pumped all day because I had been feeding him.

I do still pump during his longer sleep in the evening because the girls are like, "hey! doesn't that baby need to eat?!" and it allows Adam to help with one or two of the night feeds. But it's been so convenient to not have to worry about storing milk, cleaning bottles, and bringing enough food if we head out somewhere.

I've now breastfed him on trains and trams, in the sling while walking down the street, and in various cafes and restaurants. For some reason, this makes me feel very badass.

On the Hunt

We spent the weekend attending "inspections" (that's what they call it here when you go look at a place--it makes me feel like I'm Inspector Gadget) all over the greater Melbourne metropolitan area.

I had devised a plan that had us to six inspections between 9am and 1pm on Saturday. Keep in mind that we don't have a car, so we're walking and tramming from one suburb to the next with baby in tow. In the end, we made it to four of the six.

The first two places... H to the OVEL. I walked into the first apartment, and my first thought was "I'm too old for this." Which is odd because it's likely that I'm just too snobby. But I'm probably both. Seriously, though. It was a dump. My 23-year-old self would have been all "This is why God made Febreeze! We'll get some area rugs! It'll be fine!"

But I have a child now, and I don't even want to think about the stuff that's got to be living in that carpet.

The second place almost seemed like an option for a minute...until we realized that was just because we were comparing it to the first place.

The third place was finally nice. It had just been redone, and it was small, but it had everything we NEED if not everything we might want. Okay, scratch that, we really don't need even that much, but let's just say it was workable for the life we enjoy.

All three were in locations that I LOVED. The first one was near the beach and fantastic family-friendly cafes and boutiques, the second was slightly less ideal but in a tree-lined street. And the third! I loved the area (cute maternity and baby shops, cafes, restaurants, etc.) and it was a great commute for Adam.

So the catch? We're trying to bring Kona over, so we need a place that will be okay with a dog. I've only selected apartments/houses that have at least a courtyard and didn't specify "no pets," but obviously most landlords would prefer to not have to deal with that. And the third place seemed a bit reluctant.

Old picture of Kona in a bowling shirt (don't ask) with rapid tail movement.

Finally the fourth place actually said that they would take a dog...and it was...fine. Honestly, we've been living in this deeeeeluxe apartment in the skyyyyyy, and it's a little hard to adjust to a place that doesn't really cost less but isn't as nice. Also, the neighborhood the fourth place was convenient to a good train line for Adam, but it was very bohemian. Now it's not like I need a fancy pants neighborhood. I LOVED Oakland. But this was like, kids in their twenties (do you like how I turn 30 next week and I'm already referring to "kids" in their twenties) who are apparently able to spend a lot of time and money on being bohemian. That annoys me.

So we're soldiering on. Am I naive to think that we'll find a place that we just "click" with? Only time will tell...

The boys enjoying the night lights in our current apartment.

P.S. Agustin was so beautifully behaved throughout the day. That was a huge blessing!

Clean Bill of Health

We had our followup visit with the pediatrician yesterday, and Agustin is doing great. The big news is that we can fly!

I'd read that preemies shouldn't fly until at least 9 months, which was a huge bummer for us. Australia is a big country without much in the middle. Not to mention that it's off by itself in the middle of the ocean. Air travel really makes living out here a lot better.

Turns out, air pressure in plane cabins has improved a lot over the years, and since Agustin never had serious lung issues (he had oxygen the first couple of days just to help him out), the doc says there's no reason he can't fly.

Wheeee!

I'd been considering an 11-hour train ride to see Sydney (vs. 45 minute flight). Now I'm free to move about the country! We can use the tickets we have to back to California in January! We could vacation in Fiji after all!

I'm giddy with the possibilities...

Sad

My mom finished her second two-week visit today, and I'm kind of a mess.

She's been such a huge help. I've been able to sleep a ton, and she provided relief from baby duty when Agustin was being particularly grizzly. She also made it possible for me and Adam to have a few outings on our own. Plus, having her here makes me feel like I'm not so far away.

I'm sad that I didn't get to show her more of Australia. I had such big plans about what I'd do when my parents came out, but I've just been a useless lump and they've spent their vacation just taking care of me. (My dad came out last time.)

I'm so spoiled that she was able to come out here twice and that she was willing to do that long flight. She's such an example of selflessness, and I love her so much.

Baby It's Cold Inside

Agustin was getting a bit chilled with the air conditioner on the other day, so I started bundling him up (our AC seems to be arctic breeze or nothing at all).

Eight Pounds

Someone weighed in at 3.69 kg today. And there's only one person in the CoHo that could be.

He's continuing to gain around 35g a day, or half a pound a week. I'm told that's VERY good.

He's been having much more awake time lately and is interacting a lot more. That's mostly a good thing...although, the other day his little lip started trembling and then he turned and LOOKED ME IN THE EYE and then his little face melted into tears like he was saying "help me." Heartbreaking.

But it's fun that he's starting to recognize things like his toys, and he gets excited when people talk to him.

We Have the Technology

Adam bought me a Flip before we left the States (they're not available down here yet) with the thought that I'd be able to easily video our baby. And it is the easiest thing in the world to use...I just never think to take a video until it's too late. But I'm working on that so that I don't flunk Motherhood 101.

So, here's me trying to coax a smile out of Agustin--he'd been smiling up a storm for several minutes before I thought to pull out the Flip, and at this point he's mostly tired but he sticks his tongue out a little. There may be a faint grimace.



And here's Agustin doing pushups/plank pose. I was a little quicker on the uptake for this one.

Hot Summer in the City

While most of y'all are heading into fall, things are heating up here in Melbourne. It's been in the high 80s this week (Fahrenheit, obviously, in the 30s Celsius).

Midday is kind of brutal for this NorCal gal, but the warm evenings are lovely. Adam took this shot from our balcony one such night.

It's going to be interesting celebrating Christmas in a sun dress.

Mission Cute Sun Hat

Accomplished.


Mission Get Picture in Said Hat without Yawn or Grimace...still in the works.

We went out to Port Melbourne on Saturday and stopped into a baby boutique where we picked up a couple cute brimmed hats. He looks so adorable in them I could just eat him up.

We've also been taking him out in his BabyBjorn from his other grandma, Carmen. He looks so "grown up" in it!