Stuff About Josh

Things are getting better. Joshua is gradually stretching out his happy times and doesn't appear to have the same level of discomfort. He still has his moments, but between me feeling that he isn't hurting quite so badly and having developed some coping skills, overall things are better.

I started putting those little scratch mitties on him when we drive and now it doesn't bother me nearly so much when Joshua cries in the car. He may end up purple and dripping with sweat, but I know that his face will still be intact when we get to our destination.

I am still giving him the homeopathic drops. I also ordered a Baltic Amber necklace for him. Apparently when worn, the heat of the skin causes some substance(s) to be released from the amber and they help to ease pain and reduce acid in the body. Lots of them targeted to the teething baby available on Etsy. Figured it might help, and it couldn't hurt.

Joshua gave us his first social smile yesterday morning!! Andrew was holding him, Eva and Micah were gathered around and they were all talking to him. And voila! Big grin. It was amazing.

He feels so much bigger and more solid now that he's got muscle tone in his torso. He feels and looks long. His legs are chunking up a bit but his arms are still kind of skinny. His eyes are still blue, but darker. More along the grey/hazel lines. I wouldn't be surprised if his eyes end up the same colour as Eva's (hazel). He has just about got the hang of holding his head up.

Things I have learned about Joshua lately:

- just holding him usually is not good enough to get him on track once he's started to cry. Things that may work to calm him include:
* bouncing. This is almost always a winner. Exercise ball is best, but bouncing on tip toes may constitute a reasonable facsimile. Hippy, dancy walking can also do the trick.
* swaddling. This helps to get him organized. Fortunately the weather should be cooling down any time now and allow us to employ this technique more frequently.
* shushing. Loud shushing beside his ear sometimes calms him, but only if used in tandem with one of the above methods.
* noises such as blow dryer, blender, vacuum, and shower distract and quiet him. They don't put him to sleep, but pull him back from crylandia and get us back to square one.
* soother. Neither Eva nor Micah had any interest in a soother. I am not one to automatically introduce one. But I have found that the soother helps to bring him back, and reorganize him. If he's really upset, sometimes tummy-to-tummy dance walking, together with soother can do the trick where he would have still been crying if there were no soother. Or, it can help take him from reasonably settled all the way to sleep. It was VERY helpful in the car during the 8 hours of driving we did this weekend. I am very happy to nurse him whenever he wants (except when I'm driving, of course) but he doesn't always want it. I'm pretty sure the soother as we're currently using it is not taking away from his time at the breast.
* wrap. Bouncing or possibly walking, maybe shushing and offering soother, while he is in the wrap can often put him to sleep. The sling is not nearly so effective. He hates laying down in it until he's already asleep or almost asleep. He does not like to nurse in it.

- He has sensitive feet. Ticklish, and becomes VERY annoyed if you try to cut his nails or otherwise mess with his feet.
- His bedtime is around 8 or 9pm. As long as he's not hurting too much, he's ready to go down for the night around then. Very recently he's been going down solidly enough to spend the first part of the night in the Amby. He is pretty consistent about waking up to eat around 3 or 4am. He tends to wake up for the day around 6 or 7. He's often stuffy nosed, which may indicate reflux in the night from nursing laying down? This past weekend, a couple of times he refused to nurse laying down. I was not happy about having to wake all the way up after being used to dozy wee hours nursing sessions.
- He always has a white tongue. My initial research indicated that it was milk tongue and not thrush, but further research has cast doubt on that. It sounds like it's a bit hard to know for sure unless it's really obvious. So at Lucia's suggestion I am swabbing his tongue with a baking soda solution a few times a day. I am also taking acidophiles. We'll see if there's any change.

I really thought this baby #3 thing would be a snap. I have a sling, a wrap, and two kids worth of knowledge. I figured he'd be sleepy for the first month or two, easily soothed by being in arms (and especially by driving in the car!), and that I'd spend a lot of time nursing in the night. Well Joshua has been the exact opposite. He has never been placid during the day; we've never been able to put him down and just leave him to doze off or coo happily. But the nights have been better than I ever could have hoped for. So I'll count my blessings and continue trying to find ways to meet everyone's daytime needs adequately.

Novel Ways to Nap

Micah has been a little under the weather since Friday. I guess the activity of the weekend really caught up with him today. When we got home from picking Eva up from school, he didn't make it past the back entrance. This is how I found him:


He briefly woke and thought about getting up... then thought better of it (he is asleep in this photo).



He slept there on the floor for 60-90 minutes.

At 6pm he told me he wanted to go to bed. Poor kid. Praying the extra sleep will do the trick and he'll wake up feeling better tomorrow!

Thanksgiving in Monterrey

We spent the weekend in Monterrey. I attended a conference- The Humanization of Birth- with Joshua. Andrew and the big kids swam their buns off and did some exploring in downtown Monterrey.

The weekend did have a couple of tough moments- crazy big kids refusing to fall asleep, Joshua crying for four hours, beginning the moment after we started eating an expensive meal. But while the weekend had some tough moments, overall it was quite amazing. Joshua was very good about letting me focus on the speakers and even take lots of notes. Eva and Micah were very well behaved for Andrew and they had some really fun times together. And the cherry on top of the sundae? A beautifully smooth bedtime tonight! It was really nice to shake up our routine and do something different. I feel good.

Good, and ready to jump into my own wonderful bed.

But first a short Thanksgiving list. I am thankful for:

- my husband who is incredibly supportive and loving. I am married to an AWESOME man.
- my smart, loving, beautiful, healthy children
- my body that brought forth those children- a miracle each time, and I got to be part of it!
- awesome parents and in-laws
- friends and extended family whom we love and love us so well in return
- our comfortable home and reliable, comfortable, perfect-for-our-needs vehicles
- the means to keep our fridge and pantry stocked with healthy and yummy food
- the opportunity to live and work abroad, to grow and stretch and learn through the experience
- the opportunity to attend a conference on a topic about which I am passionate
- much, much more. I am truly blessed.

Eva-isms

Two Eva-isms I don't want to forget to document:

Tummy Egg: "Owww, I have a tummy egg". More rarely, comes in the form of a head egg.

Examples: "When we're at the grocery store, can we get some examples to eat? I like it when I get cake examples."

Josh Snaps

Finally, some photos of Joshua! Nothing fancy, but some snaps nonetheless.

Three weeks old.

Also three weeks old, taken the day after the previous photo. Who doesn't love to have a baby sleep on their chest?

Tell me this isn't a smile! I think he looks like baby me in this photo. I took these and the rest today. Joshua is exactly 5 weeks old. Eva was so excited to hold her brother! I was excited that he was calm and relaxed enough for a photo opp...

Addendum to Quite the Week

Got a call today that I need to take Joshua back to the clinic because they didn't get enough blood the first time.

Had a good evening yesterday, but Joshua was up for the usual 90 minutes from about 3:30am. The last few days he is waking increasingly early with a stuffy nose. Apparently congestion is a sign of food sensitivity. He also has a couple of pimples. He has been fussy all morning and finally fell asleep in the wrap after crying for a long time. He's still arching his neck back which is a sign of reflux as apparently it soothes the burning esophagus. So I'm still working with the food sensitivity + silent acid reflux theories. The really encouraging thing is that kids generally grow out of both within a year.

I am so hot!! It is a hot day and I have a big hot water bottle (AKA Joshua) strapped to my chest. But the poor kid needs to sleep so I'll take one for the team.

Quite the Week

This was a challenging week. Even since before he was born, I had been dreading pulling together everything for Joshua's proof of Canadian citizenship and Canadian passport applications. With good reason; it was as horrible as I expected. On Tuesday morning, knowing it was overly optimistic but hopeful since all our destinations were close to one another, I hoped to accomplish the following: Get Joshua's blood test done, get his passport and citizenship photos done, and get the photos and passport application signed by our guarantor.

Here's what really happened. We got to the clinic at the time they told us to be there, waited 20 minutes, then were told that the special test thingie wasn't in yet and to come back in half an hour. So we went to the photography studio, showed them the diagrams with the size requirements, had Joshua's photo taken, and were told to come back in an hour and a half. By the way, try getting a photo of a fussy four week old which does not show hands holding him, and where his eyes are open and mouth is closed. About as easy as finding and killing that mosquito that lurks under Andrew's desk making mincemeat of his legs.

Went back to the clinic, and of course by this time there was no parking nearby. There poor Joshua was subjected to multiple heel pricks in order to fill the little circles with blood stains, and Micah played in the hazardous waste bucket.

Called the studio and the photos weren't ready yet.

In the afternoon, took all three kids back downtown to get the photos. Micah, did you bring shoes? No, why would I have done that? Carried Micah and Joshua into the studio (luckily there was parking right in front). The passport photos were clearly not the specified size. Guy said he would take care of it. Eva is now hungry and thirsty. Micah now has to go pooh. Willy bad. I did not want to take him back, shoeless, to a restroom we had once used and didn't care to use again. Never mind with two other kids in tow. You're gonna have to hold it, kid. Finally we got the photos we needed and couldn't get out of there fast enough.

Later that evening I actually had a look at the photos. Not only were they still not the right size, but my hands were showing. Big no-no.

So the next day we went back. After fiddling with the photos for 15 minutes, it became apparent that another shot would have to be taken. It took about 20 minutes to get the shot. And then we spent an hour waiting for the prints. In the muggy waiting room. With an inconsolable baby. Aughhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

When we finally emerged victoriously with the necessary photos, we headed over to drop one off with our guarantor for signing. Micah didn't want to leave the building but I managed to convince him and finally we were done for the day.

Getting close to having everything together now. The rest should be a piece of cake. There is a bank and courier office in walking distance, and walking with Joshua and Micah is cool. Fun, even. This morning we did that walk, only to be told at the bank that we need to have an account to get a cashier's cheque. I'm pretty sure that's not true. I also know that the service fees for the cashier's cheque are going to be almost as much as the value of the cheque itself, but I'm purposely not letting that get to me. Anyway also the courier office by my house has shut down. Perfect.

Thursday we had our monthly Circle of Friends meeting. I barely got to be part of it because Joshua was super uncomfortable and just cried and cried. The only thing I've eaten different lately is the trial of two pieces of toast on Monday. I would have expected to see repercussions the same day or day after, but he was really hurting on Wednesday and Thursday!

The other thing that has been tough this week is the acting out by both of the bigger kids. On the one hand I understand, but on the other hand I can't just let it go. Eva spent a good thirty minutes in time out rather than clean up a few things she took out. I put Micah back on his time out chair over and over and over and over and over again (not to mention chasing him down as he dashed for another part of the house- all of this with a baby in the sling) before he finally acquiesced. I was sooo close to just giving up on both of them, but the persistence did pay off. That was encouraging.

So those are the challenges of my week. But there were plenty of blessings and good stuff to offset it as well. People at Andrew's work took care of picking up the stuff from the guarantor and will take care of the cashier's cheque and courier stuff for me. Whoohoo! The last couple of days have been a little better with the big kids. Joshua had a much better day today. Still having discomfort but doing way better than Wed and Thu. Andrew takes good care of me, picking up the slack in the dinner department, being totally in charge of bedtime for Eva and Micah (even if Joshua is asleep, sweet!), doing the grocery shopping, and encouraging me. Micah was really quite well behaved during all the many runs to downtown. We had a fun time doing our walking errands this morning. We bought some birthday supplies and Micah was so excited to come home with Spiderman plates and cups and whatnot. In the afternoon Eva and I had our little birthday supply date and she loves her Princess paraphernalia. We have a social weekend planned and I think that will be good for the kids. On Wednesday I did something very out of character and I not only took the kids to a fast food restaurant, I also bought them something to eat. They played for a really long time on the play structure and finally got up the courage to explore the whole thing. They were so excited! AND, Eva made some friends. So happy for her.

Also, next weekend is my birth conference! Everyone is coming along and Andrew is going to enjoy three days in Monterrey with Eva and Micah while Josh and I conference it up. I'm so excited!!

So life with three is just a little more extreme. The challenges are tough but the blessings and rewards are great!