better her father's territoriality than her mother's brains.
Lanthanum Quits Periodic Table Of Elements
One year ago: Darin and I run out to see Notting Hill, back when we still saw movies.
Two years ago: I watch caper movies. On video, where I can still watch them.
Three years ago: I wallow in bummage and do not watch any movies.
Four years ago: I was not yet posting regularly.
Strangely, all those entries were on June 6, not June 7. Hmmm.
Today's news question:So, has Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson made any rulings recently? (Bonus question for online journalers: what was the ruling Jackson made in regards to privacy in a case involving the diaries of Senator Bob Packwood?)
(Don't send me your answers. This is just a little way to expand your horizons. Honest.)
She's tiny, still. I mean, she's a lot bigger than she was -- why babies are not continually screaming at the top of their lungs given how fast their bodies are changing is beyond me -- but in the relative scheme of things she's still small.
Except in one way.
We sleep with Sophia. We weren't going to. We had the bassinet set up at the foot of our bed. We had the whole mindset that the parents sleep here and the baby sleeps there (or even there, in the case of the crib).
The first night we brought her home we swaddled her like a burrito the way we'd been taught and put her in the bassinet. Then we got into bed and turned off the lights. When she started whimpering, I started crying. If I heard the same sound now, knowing the sounds she makes, I wouldn't start crying, even if I had the same hormonal state. I was new at this game. So I immediately got her out of the bassinet and put her in bed with us, putting my arm around her and cuddling her next to me.
Over the next couple of weeks, sometimes she slept in the bassinet, sometimes she slept with us. The biggest determining factor was how she was doing after I fed her in the middle of the night. We often had trouble getting her to go to sleep in the first place and we needed to swaddle her, or dance around with her, or do whatever it took to make her drop off.
I wasn't totally comfortable with breastfeeding for the first several weeks, so I needed a full setup in the middle of the night: the light on over the sink needed to be on so I could see what I was doing, I needed to sit up in bed with the nursing pillow, and we often had to spend a half hour or more until we got the position right and she had enough to eat. By the time we were done, Sophia was wide awake and we'd have to go through the whole swaddling/dancing nonsense again to get her back to sleep, so often we'd just put her in bed with us, where she'd fall asleep a lot faster.
Then I learned to nurse on my side.
Pretty much this involves me lying on my side and Sophia lying on her side and she can just go for it without any help or support from me. It's actually my favorite position now: it's comfortable for both of us and I can do something else, like read a book, while she nurses.
At night, of course, it's even better: roll over, offer breast, go back to sleep. She can suck as much or as little as she wants.
She's been sleeping with us ever since I figured out the side-lying thing. We even moved the bassinet by Darin's desk, so he can put her in there while she naps. Although she's not going to fit in there soon, by gum. When she grew 4 inches, she wasn't just growing upwards, she was growing in all directions.
She goes to sleep faster when she's with us, and in the morning she's in a joyous mood, the best of the day, and it's great to be woken up by a smile with a baby attached. I don't know how long she'll be with us; we'll re-evaluate when she starts sleeping through the night. Given that she's back to waking up twice -- at 2 and at 5 -- I don't know how soon it'll be.
Anyhow, how is she large? (See, I haven't forgotten, I'm getting back to it.) Well, she's got quite a wingspan on her...which she insists on proving each and every night. I cuddle her into a little ball, take her downstairs, put her in the bed, go to brush my teeth, come back, and discover that the arms are flung out to the sides as if to say, "My space!" I fold the arms in and within minutes they're out again: "Mine!"
Even funnier is how she pushes me over to the side of the bed during the night. For a kid who can't move yet, she sure is mobile.
(Her recent discovery is the lift-and-turn. She lifts her legs into the air, which lifts her butt into the air, which makes her back round, which allows her to roll to the side of her choosing. This is hilarious to watch. No, really, it is. But the best thing is when I lie down next to her to nurse. She will be lying on her back. I lie down. Her head turns to look at me, and she notices my breast. Up go the legs, up goes the butt, and over goes the little girl, who is happily nursing away within seconds. All without my doing anything.)
I understand after a while she discovers the horizontal placement, with her head grinding into one of us and her feet pushing into the other. Maybe that will be the signal it's time for her to move. She does nap in her crib quite happily now, which at one point we thought she'd never do. Yay team.
DIANE
I did something so stupid--
AUDIENCE
HOW STUPID WAS IT?
DIANE
It was SO stupid...
I got a phone call today. A nice man named Peter. Turns out he's a reader for one of the screenplay contests I entered. He's reading my script and enjoying it very much, there's just one problem.
He's missing pages 30 through 57.
Um. Oops.
I never have a problem with my printer. I stopped doing page checks on my scripts because they always came out right.
Didn't you have a printing problem mid-way through on this copy?
Aw hell, yes I did, didn't I? And then I didn't read through it before sending it out.
Okay, let's look at the up side: Peter was apparently so interested he got to page 29 and said, "Hey, what happens next?" So he called. (Amazing that they gave him the cover page with my name and phone number on it, but whatever.) But boy, I feel like Dorkus Maximus. I hope this doesn't go down in the Mouse's files under "Stupid Applicants -- Never Hire."
And while we're at it...
Got any favorite historical novels? And what do YOU think of Terry Pratchett's Discworld?
Diana Wynne Jones: fun novelist or evangelist of Satan? (Okay, I made that part up.) Also, which novel of hers should I read next?
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Copyright 2000 Diane Patterson
Send comments and questions to diane@nobody-knows-anything.com