Babies

Mylostone – Crawling

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My son Mylo started crawling today! It’s exciting but at the same time also somewhat surprising because he’s been scooting or doing the army crawl since he was 5 months old. So much so that I assumed he might skip moving on all four’s all together and go right into walking.

There’s something so utterly adorable about a baby crawling, though. The slapping of his hands on the ground, the widening of his eyes as he gets closer to what he’s set his eyes on (usually me). His pensiveness as the smallest distraction causes him to change course. His laughter as he passes life from a new angle and with new perspective.

It’s all so very humbling.

Slappity, slap, slap… here I come!!

Failed gDiapers Users

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I wanted so much to love gDiapers. I really, really did.

When I was pregnant, my husband Jason did some research on cloth diapering. The fact that newborn babies soil diapers up to 10 times a day coupled with the fact that Jason does the laundry (I know, aren’t I lucky?!) made him not love the whole tree-hugging cloth diapering thing.

But then he told me about gDiapers. Hybrids. The insides are biodegradable and  disposable. You could either flush them down the toilet or throw them in the trash or garden compost where they would break down in 50 – 150 days. The gDiaper shell gets washed only if and when they get dirty.

We were sold.

We began to stockpile the inserts the way new expectant parents collect Pampers. When I was in my third trimester I even vied for gDiapers’ limited “New Baby Bundle” along with thousands of other pregnant and hormonal, internet-savvy women.

Eventually, I accumulated everything needed to catch our newborn baby’s pee and poop while being kind to the earth at the same time.

Everything that is, but a plunger.

There is a whole procedure to flushing the insert of a gDiaper down a toilet. The decomposable fluff on the inside needs to be peeled away from its lining, dropped in the toilet, swished with the swish stick, flushed and THEN the lining can be disposed in the toilet.

I’ll give you the play-by play as I remember it when our use of gDiapers came to a head. (Erm, no pun intended.)

Mylo was just a couple of weeks old. He woke up for what was probably the third time in the middle of the night. He ate. He pooped. He peed on me while I was changing him. Jason ran to the bathroom with the dirty g in tow. I put a clean one on.

Jason returns and informs me that we have a problem. The toilet is clogged. Very clogged. Beyond plunger clogged. Of course I blame him for not following the flushing procedures. He swears up and down that he did. But it’s 1 in the morning. I’m a zombie. A zombie who now has no place to go potty.

Relief didn’t come until 9:00 Saturday morning. I don’t know what was funnier. The fact that we had to relieve ourselves in the bathtub during this sleep-deprived toilet debacle or Jason explaining to our Hungarian Super that he flushed a diaper down the toilet.

After that experience we had written off gDiaper’s until Mylo was out of the newborn phase. When he began pooping less (about 3 months) we reevaluated and decided we’d wait to give gDiapers a second chance when he was pooping solid (about 7 months).

Things were going pretty well until I flushed a dirty insert down the toilet and sure enough… it clogged! I submitted a repair request through my building’s website and when our Super came up with his snake-a-ma-jiggy-thing I was sure NOT to tell him that the culprit was a diaper. I wish I could have contained the news from my husband but alas, I couldn’t, and so guess who had the last laugh?

While I don’t think gDiapers are practical for newborn babies, now that our son is older, we do use them occasionally. But for all the love gDiapers bring mother earth, it bestows little love on this here mother.

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Have you used gDiapers, or any other hybrid or cloth diapering? Did you fail like us or are you an earthly success?

Mylostone – First Swing

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I took my son Mylo down to the Brooklyn Bridge Park at the foot of Atlantic Avenue this morning and pushed him in the swings. We were at the same park this past Friday with five of his best neighborhood buds and their moms but he was napping in the stroller during the majority of the outing. When he woke up I was excited to put him in the swing for the very first time, but he sat there slumped over, on the verge of falling back asleep. I pushed him once and then yanked him out. It didn’t count.

We made up for it this morning though. Turns out he’s still a bit too small for the swings so I took off my sweater and used it to prop him into place. He smiled a bunch but I wouldn’t say he was exactly screaming with delight. He’ll eventually get into it, I’m sure.

Mylo's first non-baby swing.

A Song With My Son

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My husband Jason and my son Mylo have a song. When I saw them dancing around the room to it for the first time I was touched. Moved. And jealous. Mylo’s daddy’s best dance move resembles that of “a hold” on a football field. Mommy on the other hand, well let’s just say that I’ve been known to cut a rug. A damn pretty good one, too!

Because Mylo adores dancing and because I don’t want him to look like Lawrence Taylor on the dance floor, it was imperative that I find a song to dance to with my son.

There is the song that I heard over and over again when I was in labor for 30 hours: “Heartbreak Warfare” by John Mayer. The word “war” in the same sentence as my son? I don’t think so. And let’s face it, John Mayer’s a douche.

There’s “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star,” but that’s what I sing to him while I’m nursing him before bed at night.  I wasn’t feeling that one either.

I was at my friend’s store the other night in the city and there, over the Pandora radio waves, I heard it: “Starlight” by Muse. It’s upbeat, it’s fun and the words are poignant.

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I hold my son in my arms and twirl around the room while his lips are pursed in a perma-smile. Then there’s our other move where I hold his hands and he shakes his hips while stomping his feet on the ground screaming with delight.

“You electrify my life…” That is for sure.

Dancing to Starlight with my boy.

Sleep Deprived Yet Again

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I want to write and blog so bad but I’m finding it difficult to grasp even the slightest coherent thought today. All I’m capable of is jibberish because my son Mylo decided to not let me sleep one iota last night.

It all started with putting him to bed, which is usually quite painless. My husband Jason was at work and I began his usual bedtime routine at 7:00. I bathed him, changed him, read to him, sang to him and then nursed him. I then put him in the crib awake, and he flipped out.

Before I could even collect his damp towel and leave the room he hoisted himself up the bars of his bed. (Jason recently lowered his crib to the lowest level since Mylo’s learned to pull himself up to standing.)

As I closed the door behind me he was holding on to the side of the crib, peering through the bars like a caged animal, protesting at the top of his lungs. I left the room and waited 10 minutes. Waiting, hoping, praying that he would settle down. He didn’t. I returned to the bedroom after 15 minutes and nursed him some more. I put him back down and he repeated his climb up the side of the crib followed by his freak out routine, yet again.

Defeated, I sat down at my desk in the living room questioning if I should have left and wondering if and when I should go back. Unable to write and unable to think after almost 45 minutes of what sounded like sheer distress, I picked up the phone and called my mom. An advocate for crying it out, she suggested I go in and hold him like Jason does on the rare night I am not home to put our son to bed.

Looking for any excuse to have my motherly instincts validated, I hung up the phone and ran right in to my baby.

It took a while but he eventually settled down with his head on my chest and the remnants of his hard-earned cries dissipating with each breath.

Getting him to sleep last night, which is usually the easiest part, was tough. Don’t even get me started about the middle of the night. I’m not so sure that will ever be a walk in the park.

I’m minutes away from his bedtime routine. If tonight is anything like last night, then rest assured that there will two of us screaming and crying at the top of their lungs.

The Evolution of Standing

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My son Mylo recently learned how to do something new. Pull himself up. Last week he did it with a great deal of shakiness and this week he pulls himself up more swiftly and with greater assurance and posture. My in-laws snapped these great photos of him. Check out the rise of the little guy…

On another note, I wish I could tell you that my husband Jason got him dressed on this day but only I am responsible for the above fashion disaster. I don’t know what I was thinking other than that it was really early in the morning and I was half way between taking his pajamas off and putting his day outfit on when I all about gave up.

It’s become increasingly difficult to get Mylo dressed because the boy refuses to sit still for even five seconds! I thought, ‘no big deal it’s just my in-laws who are going to see him today,’ and now, well, now he’s out there for the whole world to see.

Beers and Babies, My Guest Post on CafeMom’s The Stir

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The wonderful Michele Zipp of The Stir was kind enough to let me guest post about my beer drinking, breastfeeding forays around my Brooklyn neighborhood. She was a bit perturbed. Not because I enjoy the occasional beer while breastfeeding my son, but because she’s a breastfeeding mom of twins who happens to live just a few blocks from me. Small world, right?? Well you can bet who’s getting an invite at the next bar meet-up!

You can check out the post, here.

Springtime in Brooklyn, if Only for One Day

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It was an absolute gorgeous spring day in New York City today. There’s something in a New Yorker’s’ step when the first signs of spring begin to unfurl themselves. The sidewalks are jam packed with strollers, parks fill up with screaming children, restaurants with sidewalk seating become standing room only.

I spent the day in the new park at the foot of Atlantic Avenue with my son Mylo, four of my mommy friends and their sons.

Matias, Odin, Mylo, Eli and Lucas 

The wind coming off the river had our hair running amok.

My friend Katie and I peeled off and took a stroll down Court Street so our little guys could nap. We landed outside Abilene’s where we sucked back a couple of pints and a plate of nachos, too.

The park, the boys, the sun, the Hoegaardens, the nachos. It was all very wonderful. And very telling of a delightful season that’s just around the corner!

Guest Post on A Lot of Loves

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Happy St. Patty’s Day everyone!

 

 

 

 

 

 

The wonderful Marilyn of ALotofLoves.com welcomed a guest post from me today. It’s the story of when I became a new mom — just six days into this incredible journey and I had made my first mommy-fail. I drove 55 miles with my son in the wrong car seat. I know I’m not going to do everything right, but at the time, I felt like the WORST mom in the world. Go on over to her blog to check it out.

Naming Our First Born

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I can’t remember the exact moment my husband Jason and I decided we wanted the sex of our first child to be a surprise. With friends and family weighing in heavily about our decision, I do remember feeling great relief that we were on the same page.

In their defense, they were simply just surprised that I wanted to be surprised. After all, I still shake the presents under the Christmas tree that have my name on them!

While I was pregnant I got used to the same four questions: “How are you feeling? Do you know what you’re having? Have you picked out names? Are you sharing the names?”

I generally felt wonderful throughout my pregnancy and we were firm in that we didn’t want to know what we were having. But the name questions, that was a personal matter.

For starters, we hadn’t yet agreed on names, especially for a boy. We also didn’t want to hear people’s opinions on the names we had chosen. Say we were considering the name Lonnie, someone might have said “Ugh, I had an Uncle Lonnie who had an unfortunate LSD habit.” Get my point?

I did exactly  this to a friend of mine who was due around the same time. She and her husband also wanted to be surprised but shared the names they had picked. Matthew for a boy and Reese for a girl. I remarked how Matthew was an interesting choice since the couple had a close friend with this name. She fell silent after I said that, and well, could I really blame her? I had just did to her what I was trying to avoid having done to me!

The spiritual side of us believed our child would bring its own name into the world. Or we at least wanted to meet the baby before saying ‘yes, he is a Harry,’ or ‘yes, she is a Sally.’

That’s not to say that we didn’t have some front runners, we did. We didn’t want our baby’s name to be as common as my husband’s name, Jason or as different as my name, Reedu, but some place in between.

My brother-in-law suggested we name the baby ‘Pomegranate.’ And my dad liked the name “Jazz.” I rest my case.

I was more than half way through my pregnancy when we were thousands of feet up in the air on our way to my brother’s wedding in San Fransisco. I was listening to something on NPR and the reporter’s name was Milo Miles. I leaned across the isle to where Jason was sitting (a great compromise by the way for two people who hate the middle seat), and asked what he thought of the name Milo. He flashed a big grin at me and his blue eyes beamed the answer back. It was the first male name we had agreed on.

Just a couple of days before I gave birth,  Jason presented me with another boy name that I liked a lot. We went into the delivery room with two strong contenders for a boy, and three options for a girl.

In the moments after our son was born there was a ton of commotion and excitement in the room. My mom was bouncing around like a kid in a candy shop and my husband was holding on to the wall, fighting off happy tears.

It seemed like a half hour had passed before our midwife quipped, “So what’s this kid’s name?!”

Jason looked at me then, quite like the way he looked at me on our flight out to San Fran, and we agreed it would be Milo. Accept we would spell it M-Y-L-O in honor of our moniker for one another, “my love.

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How did you arrive at the name(s) of your baby? Did you share it with friends and family, why or why not? Please share with me, I’d love to hear!