Tag: Family

Kayla is getting ahead…ache.

We had read that Kayla will soon be climbing on things (which she’s mastered) and attempting to scale her crib walls. This normally happens at about this time, but she is 4 inches shy of the “36 inches required for a successful crib escape.” We had her mattress in the lowest setting, and assumed we needn’t worry yet. After all, it’s only her head that is significantly larger than normal.706

We are not exactly certain how she managed it but after hearing the cry, mommy returned to find her standing beside the crib, a bit distraught. Did she scale the crib walls? Did she use her head as a counterweight? There were no bumps or bruises. That was Wednesday. Figuring that she almost certainly has climbing in her blood, the only sensible thing to do was move her mattress to the floor. Today we picked up her new toddler bed which she thinks is quite dandy.

Kayla is 18 months!

Adorable. Cute. Sassy. Fun.

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I’m sure she does not see the irony of her, with a head that measures off the charts (greater than 100th percentile), wearing my cap that says, “fatbrain.com.”

and then they were four.

Before committing any impressions of dear little Lucas to print, I wanted some time to elapse. Words committed to print can take on a life of their own so I wanted the birthing dust to settle, external pressures to abate, and just feel a tad more normal before making proclamations.

We are now three and half weeks into Lucas’ life and much about this little man is clear. I find it easiest to explain via contrast. If you might recall, we commented profusely on how wonderful and easy to raise Kayla was. We received a number of baby books, and we bought a few more. We read them and created a synthesis of how we wanted to parent. Most everything we tried “just worked.”

It would have been easy to succumb to The Great Parenting Lie, that it was easy because we are such great parents. However, many a conversation with other parents had prepared us for what the future could hold. Now that that future is the present, the words of wisdom bestowed upon us are embodied in a mass of flesh that can best be described with a single word, needy.

Mind you, I am not complaining. We really do love this little destructor of our tranquility. By comparison to Kayla, there is little comparison. A typical feeding for Kayla was quite easy by most any standard; wake her, insert nipple (natural or synthetic), let her eat until satiated, burp her, keep her awake for an hour, swaddle her and put her back to sleep. Feedings could often be done in 30-45 minutes. Then we had that 1 1/2 hours of blissful peace and calm afterwards. Sweet blessed calm.

With Lucas, everything takes much longer. Waking him enough to eat is a 15 minute ordeal. So far the most successful technique is to uncover him and wait until he gets cold enough to stay awake. Feeding is sporadic, sometimes he eats well and at other times he fusses all the way through. He clings to his burps as if they are part of his dinner that we are trying to take away. Burping often takes 10 minutes.

He has caused us to use words in new ways. For example, we have seldom before farted something, but Lucas needs regular farting. When he wakes up crying at 3AM, we grab his legs and push them up to his chest and he breaks wind. We repeat the cycle and so does he. Sometimes a dozen times. Genetics predisposes him to having a highly active gastrointestinal system and his reticence to belch compounds the issue.

Warming him is best achieved with direct skin contact. Pick him up and hold him and he melts onto us. If it is the least bit chilly, he burrows in burying his head against our neck. We noticed his burrowing nature in the hospital. Even swaddled, he’d find a way to burrow down into his blankets. We could sell Lucas Technology[TM] to the military for use in heat seeking devices. During his warm up, he will invariably drift off to sleep. The problem is that he won’t stay asleep.

It is bitter irony. At 18 months, Kayla is in a stage where snuggling with her is vigorously protested. She is quite independent and has her very own conceptions of order in the universe. Lucas is simply carnal. It warms the heart. We enjoy our snuggle time. But all is not well in the land of snuggles. After he falls asleep, we put him down and within 5 minutes he is awake again. Pick him up, snuggle, and he goes back to sleep. It is all so sweet that he responds to us, but not at midnight, 2 AM, 3 AM, 4 AM, 5 AM, and 6AM.

Because this little man is so carnal, we have tried co-sleeping a few times. The bad news is that he absolutely loves it and sleeps extremely well in our bed. His favorite is either on my chest or between us with my hand atop his head. However, when co-sleeping, neither parent gets any deep sleep. Between the fear of suffocating him and all the little noises he makes, it simply is not possible to drift completely away. This accords with my deep seated feelings that our bed is hallowed ground, not to be encroached upon. Yet, we need a solution. Tomorrow we might be searching online for a bassinet sized electric blanket.

So, if you wonder why there are so few pictures and posts, it is because one of us is preoccupied with a needy little baby. The other is caring for Kayla, making meals, buying groceries, and otherwise tending to the care of our home.

It’s a boy!

Due: Today.
Arrived: Today, 2:49PM.

7 pounds, 14 oz.
20.5 inchesl

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We are still hunting for a first name, something that suits a boy and begins with the letter L.

Unlike Kayla, who gave one cry upon arrival, Junior has been a fairly steady stream of small cries, squeaks, and chatter. It’s quite interesting, and one thing is certain; Junior is much more vigorous.

Kayla Update

Sorry folks, but we just have too much fun playing with Kayla to spend time writing about it. She is too much fun!

At just over 16 months, her personality is really starting to develop. She displays a surprising number of emotions and jabbers incessantly, unless someone else is around, or we are videoconferencing with grandpa and grandma, in which case we can’t get a peep out her. She has 5 pair of shoes now, well on her way to becoming an American woman. Except that she really has a thing for daddy’s tools, and is quite curious to see how things work. When she has decided it’s time for our daily walk, she brings her socks and shoes to us. Once shod, she stands by the door and makes pitiful little sounds until one of us complies.

She has learned most of her face parts by name and is just starting to learn the names of colors. At the top of her reading list is 101 Dalmatians, Goodnight Moon, and her touch and feel bedtime book. Her two favorite objects are the moon and birds. Both are quite thrilling to see in real life and in pictures. Two evenings ago we were walking around our cul-de-sac and had to pause to see the moon. And we paused, and paused, and paused, and paused….

She very much enjoys baths but disdains a wet face. That makes rinsing her hair challenging. Mommy tries the delicate approach. Daddy just dumps handfuls of water over her head. Neither way prevents her from recoiling but one method only lasts for 5 seconds, which is not quite long enough to work up to a cry. Despite the aversions to a wet face, the wading pool Grandpa & Grandma Ruby sent home with us continues to be a big hit. We would toss that pool onto our back porch on 100° days (Aug-Sep). The very instant she could see it, anxious cries of excitement ring out.

We are also learning a lot from her. For instance, we did not know the primary reason why bathrooms have doors. Jen and I have lived in a fairly “open” environment. We never bother closing any doors except the ones that keep the hot Texas air out (or the Michigan mosquitoes). This has changed. It might have had something to do with the toilet paper Kayla loves to unroll, but I doubt it. It was the sinister news I received one night while I was in Atlanta.

While talking on the phone with Jen, she told me that she had forgotten to close the guest bathroom door. With the two of us in the house, one of us always catches that detail. It slipped by unnoticed until Jen heard the sound of the toilet lid closing. Not content to simply play in the conveniently placed pool and drench herself from head to toe, Kayla decided that her stuffed animals would like to play in the mini-pool as well. That door remains closed now at all times.

We have also given Kayla a new nickname, “harm.” We spend a part of each day making sure anything that she could hurt, or might hurt her, is out of “harm’s” way. She is at the point where she knows no limits, but she is very smart. It only takes whacking her head once to dissuade her from doing “that” again.

She has taught us to be fastidious housekeepers. Anything within 12 inches of the edge of a desk is subject to relocation under the Kayla World Organization Plan. We haven’t entirely deduced the logic behind the KWOP but the results are quite predictable. One, or often two, adults walking around the house, checking the trash cans, toy bins, and anywhere else about knee-height for something that was too close to the edge of a desk or counter. Being quite wise, mommy has taken to planting decoys to help distract her.

Bedtime has become somewhat ritualistic. Late in the evening she starts getting tired and silly. Then we play and be silly until she crashes. Tonight I recorded a couple minutes of us being silly.

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If you’ve got the bandwidth, click here to see the Kayla-Go-Round movie.

Development milestones

It is fairly well established that a direct correlation between brain size and intelligence exists. It is commonly held as fact that brain size is directly proportional to skull size. This is apparently why skull measurements are one of three that Kayla gets at each of her checkups (weight, height, and skull size).

Weight: Over the course of her life, Kayla started out on the small side at 6 lbs, putting her in the 10th percentile. Since then she made it over the 50th percentile once, but has since slipped back down to the 25th. In simple terms, she does not weigh much (22lbs). This is not the least bit concerning when we consider that for his entire childhood, her daddy was a wee little runt.

Height: She started in the 25th percentile for height. At four months she was in the 50th percentile and by the eight month, in the 75th. She is holding steady, just above the 75th percentile, a trait that is likely attributable Jen’s side of the family. Height is a rare gene in my family.

Head Circumference: This is where things get interesting. As her mother will attest, the cute little thing had one mighty big head upon arrival. That, in and of itself, is not unusual. Since then, her head size has steadily been outpacing her peers. At four months she was in the 80th percentile and at 6 months she was in the 90s. At nine months her doc read her chart and said, “Well, she’s definitely college material.” This last week he read her charts again and this time he upgraded her, “She is scholarship material!”

After looking carefully at the chart, I saw the basis for his comment. Her head size is literally off the chart, and not just a little bit either. The NCHS charts cover from the 3rd to 97th percentiles and she is far enough past 97 that if there were a 100% line, she’d be dancing on top of it. That means that her head is as big as you are going to find on any child her age.

This has very practical implications on a day to day basis. For example, just try getting a t-shirt for an 18-month over her 15 month old head. It takes a good bit of stretching. When we go up a size, we can get the shirt on but it is far too big for her little body. There will be other concerns that we are already starting to see. She is surprisingly smart. Unfortunately, Amazon does not have a How to Raise a Child That Is Smarter Than You Are book. We can already see that it will become quite the challenge to stay a step ahead of this pint sized dynamo.