Counting Down

So only a few more days until my sister leaves - boo. Only a few more days until my father-in-law leaves - yay! I am really happy because I have gotten to see a lot of my sister this visit. Usually she tries to see everyone, family and friends when she is down and I only see her a couple of times. I have seen her four or five this time and now I am sad that she will soon be on her way again.

And while I am glad that my father-in-law finally made it out to see the boy, I will be even gladder when he is on his merry way. I have noticed a strange phenomenon about old men - old man smell. My father-in-law has it and my grandfather has it. I don't know what it is specifically - the hair products they use, the toothpaste, liniment - what? But it smells exactly the same and poor Kes has had to suffer the old people smells in her room after both of their departures. We are SO building a guest room - OR - they are SO staying in a hotel next time they come - OR - we are SO just going to go to Montreal and visit them from now on. Pick one.

Hayden has been miserable for days on end now and I cannot for the life of me figure out what it is. I have just started treating everything from teeth to feet and hoped for the best, but I have more than a little guilt about shoving things down his throat constantly. I start to feel queasy when I think that it may be his feet bothering him - but there is no telltale odor there yet. I want to blame teeth because that is my old kneejerk reaction to all things fussy, because generally speaking my kids are pretty happy babies. Or it could just be that he is "the miserable one" - who knows? My brain hurts from trying to figure it out and I guess "this too shall pass" - NOT DAMN FAST ENOUGH!

On the bright side, Hayden has started babbling a lot of consonents and it is the cutest thing! He will also grunt at me to get my attention! We sing the Crocodile song to him and he grins at the same part every time. He mimics chewing when Doug does it and the cutest thing ever is that he shakes his head "no", particularly when you do it to him first. Naturally he doesn't know that it means "no" and my guess is he likes the feeling (I don't - my eyes go all funny and my brain hurts when I do it), but it is the stinkin' cutest thing! His two little teeth are becoming more apparent and I have felt them nip me a few times when I've put my finger in to examine him - so I guess I'll have to be on guard now for the biting of the nipple event.

As for self care, I have been doing some card making, which has taken forever because I am interrupted a jillion times, I've been trying to finish a baby sling I am sewing for a friend and I want to write, create, sew more - but alas the time just floats by and before I know it I have gotten no farther ahead than the day before. Ah well. The ideas never leave, so that is comforting.

I am starting to get nervous about Hayden's procedure on Tuesday and am trying not to think about it. All I have is memories of the Botox incidents and that is enough to curdle my blood. My online support group have been very supportive and encouraging and thank goodness I have them to turn to in these situations because more than a few of them have "been there" and in many cases their children have had surgery before they knew about the Ponseti Method. One mom has two boys with clubfoot (and a third on the way I think) and the first had lots of surgery and still has problems, the second was treated with the Ponseti Method and has perfect feet. How would that feel to a parent? I count myself lucky that we (so far) have not headed down that road.

One more thing, I am going to write down the first line of my diary for each month over this last year - I saw somebody else do it and it was most revealing! So here goes:

January: Worst New Year's ever.

February: Yesterday I was feeling very full in the belly area, even when I hadn't eaten.

March: I had to firmly ask this guy at work the other day to stop calling our area "the incubator".

April: Got into work around 12:30 yesterday and it was pretty slow, but oh well.

May: My nights consist of tossing and turning and really not sleeping all that well.

June: More false labor again last night, except that it's getting more intense/painful.

July: N/A

August: Last night was not too bad in terms of sleep.

September: So the one thing that I forgot to mention is that Doug finally caved and got an exterminator into the house to deal with the mouse problem.

October: So Thursday right around dinner time, Hayden broke out in what appeared to be hives all over his head, face and trunk.

November: The appointment yesterday went very well.

December: Yep - just as I predicted.

So there it is - revealing? Or just plain boring?