The hair! The hair!

Maya's hair is out of control. I realized the extent of its ridiculousness when had water problems up here over last weekend. From Saturday through Tuesday we had a boil water order because of a broken pipe that supplies water to Boston and its suburbs. Maya and I walked around the reservoir near us both weekend days, then I went home and assumably showered in it as they pumped from it for emergency water. Usually its not used for drinking--we know because we let Bailey swim in it and wanted to make sure we weren't going home and drinking from it!

When I couldn't give Maya a bath for three days (she sticks her tongue out for her entire bath and I wasn't about to boil and cool that much water), her hair got all emo style--greasy, dark, and combed toward her face and over her ears. We listened to a lot of Conor Oberst on those days. 

Fortunately the emo hair didn't make her mood all sensitive and introspective.

Also, I think she's actually getting a mullet. 

Say what?

Here are a couple of pictures I've taken on my iPhone over the past few weeks. Maya's expressions just crack me up.

Face out!

Maya is a few weeks past three months old now, with excellent head and neck control if I do say so myself, so we've started facing her out in the Baby Bjorn. I've literally been looking forward to this since I got pregnant. It feels like a milestone because it means she's more able to interact with the outside world, and maybe I feel a little less overwhelmingly responsible for her because she's not just a little baby pod attached to me--she can support her own adorable head, even with the weight of all that hair. Also, the world is so exciting and it's equally exciting to have Maya facing out towards it. 

The other day we met friends for ice cream then did errands around Coolidge Corner, the busy part of our neighborhood, so Maya saw lots of people, traffic, and the T. It's just funny to walk around all of these things in the city with Maya riding on me, awake and aware, and think about how she's seeing it all for the first time. She's been out and about with us since she was 3-4 weeks old, but until now we've strived to have her asleep while we're out because the Bjorn was like baby valium. 

This is us last week on Maya's first face out. She started out pretty psyched. We went on a walk with Anil and Bailey.

Then this is how she ended the walk. Old habits die hard :). 

Then this was us that weekend, going for a walk on the Esplanade, my number one favorite spot in Boston in the spring/summer. Note the crazy Boston spring weather--one day it's in the 50s and the next it's in the 70s. Maya's favorite position in the Bjorn is tongue out, as you can see here. I wonder if they make a drool guard for this thing.

Judgement Day

One of the worst things about being a new mom is realizing how you're slowly but surely doing seemingly everything you swore you'd never do as you observed other moms in your holier than thou pregnancy.

Exhibit A.

These are my favorite pants: Lululemon "still pants". I met a new mom in Patagonia who was wearing them, shortly after I bought mine, and she said an intervention had to be staged because she wore them so often after having her baby. The pants aren't the problem though. The problem is that we have an area rug near the baby area that collects dog hair, and Lululemon pants are like dog hair magnets. Dry leaves too. Literally you can walk down the sidewalk in the fall and in five minutes look like a preschooler's autumn art project from the waist down. So twice lately--okay the past two days because I've been wearing these pants two days straight (and yes, I'm still wearing them now!)--I've walked out of the house like this:

Exhibit B.

I ran out of shampoo at least a week ago, and have been squeezing every last drop of it out of a travel bottle. Now I'm doing the same with conditioner. At this point, I stick my pinky inside the travel bottle to get just enough shampoo to justify calling it "washing" my hair. I just haven't made the effort to go get more with baby in tow. My hair is at what I like to call the "Carrie Bradshaw two-tone look" anyway, so I really need to get it cut and touch up some highlights. Remember when Carrie Bradshaw had half brown hair and half blond, and it was kind of bird's nesty? That's how it gets, but not so much intentionally. And now it's also unwashed.

Exhibit C.

I swore I wouldn't pepper Maya's world with black and white dangly objects. I saw them on car seats, strollers, mobiles, you name it. I thought, isn't the outside world enough entertainment? I mean, she's been in a dark womb the last nine months--a blade of grass should be stimulating enough. But Maya is not a fan of the car seat. She takes after Bailey; they both whine when the car's stopping and going but fall asleep on the interstate. So I caved and bought these admittedly cute little black and white and primary colored bugs that hang on her car seat handle and ring like wind chimes. I don't know if Maya enjoys them or not, but I kind of do. Don't tell anyone.

Girls Night

This week marks the first string of nights that Anil has been working through the evenings (3-11 p.m. shifts), so Maya and I have had girls nights since Monday.

This is the result of tonight's festivities.

Here's what I learned:

a) Baby massage oil makes great baby hair gel.

b) Baby gets mad when playing with hair interferes with her bedtime.

Bedtime, we've learned, isn't so much a parentally imposed time at which we put Maya in her crib to go to sleep, but a time after which she turns from fuzzy and cooing Gizmo into a screamy and scary gremlin. Right now it's at about 8 p.m. So we try to preempt that.

Maya's bedtime routine goes like this: bath, book, bottle, bed. When we follow it and time it right, it's easy, she's happy, and no one cries. And this week I've tried to be on time because no one's here cooking me dinner while I'm putting her to bed, so my Whole Foods oven-ready meals go in at 8 when Maya goes to sleep. I try to start it at 7, and I gauge my timing based on the Seinfeld/Simpsons lineup. Bath and book take place with "Seinfeld" in the background, and she drinks her bottle on the couch with me trying to face her away from the glow of "The Simpsons."

Bailey's decided that he loves bathtime, so while Maya's in her tub, we're both leaning over the edge of the big tub into hers--me and Bailey that is. He wants to lick all the water off of her cheeks and hands, so I'm continually and alternately swatting him away and laughing it off. After bath, we do a little infant massage on the changing table as a way to wind down after all the splashing (she doesn't splash yet but I do). Then we read books, alternating ones from her board book library with the mainstay Goodnight Moon. Then we dim all the lights and head to the couch for the bedtime bottle.

We instituted the bedtime bottle because I was so exhausted by the time Maya used to go to sleep, around 11 p.m., and it was a relief to have Anil be the one to feed her that last time and put her to bed. Even as her bedtime moved earlier though, and I took over the job as Anil cooked, we stuck with the bottle strategy because we know how much milk we can stuff her full of (assuming more full leads to longer sleep) and it's just more straightforward than nursing. Maya literally passes out while drinking the bottle, so it's this wonderfully reliable way of putting her to bed each night with zero fussing when we put her in the crib. [Sidenote: Funny that as I'm typing this I'm watching "The Office" and they're talking about Pam's breastpump.]

Tonight, I pushed the limits with the hair party, so we sped through Goodnight Moon, the final pages being recited by me en route to the couch. She was predictably grumpy as "The Simpsons" were half over by then, so we struggled through some fussing, but inevitably the milk coma ensued, and she's been sleeping peacefully since about 8:30.

Now, I know this is a pretty random segue, but bear with me... I realized tonight that I was watching the series finale of "Ugly Betty"! Literally half way through watching last night's episode on DVR, it dawned on me. I had no idea! No one told me it was ending! And no one's here for me to tell, so I'm telling you, Internet. I'm so sad. It being girls night, I had to watch my favorite show that Anil loves to hate, and as if there hasn't been enough upheaval in my life already, it's over. Probably if I was on full brain capacity I'd have noticed that things were wrapping up awfully nicely lately--Hilda got married, Justin came out, Betty resolved things with Henry, Mark committed, Amanda found her father with the Tweety Bird tattoo. I'm having a kind of self-made montage moment here. What, so I'm a bit emotionally invested; I've been watching since the first episode and TV has long since replaced my pre-pregnant social life--we've talked about this.

I've been relieved that "Lost" is ending this spring, because I've long felt like "Lost" and having a baby are such big commitments in themselves that I don't know how I'd continue to balance them both. Both involve a whole lot of unanswerable questions and really confusing circumstances.

Anyway... our girls nights have been fun, but we're looking forward to having Anil back. Because Maya can only take so much of this:

Marathon Monday

All throughout my pregnancy, my friend Katie and I would muse about this year's Boston Marathon, and stare off into space thinking about how I'd actually have a baby by then. So bizarre to imagine at the time. I had a hopeful vision of myself rocking the sideline with a baby that would be about three months old, so theoretically she'd be able to hold her head up, and she'd be fitting into some of the gratuitous Patagonia items I'd already bought for her.

And I was amazed on Monday--seriously, shocked and awed--that we actually pulled it all off! Maya was an absolute rockstar for Marathon Monday, and I couldn't have been more proud of both of us. After those first two months of near insanity, I feel like we really pulled things together and were this in sync (do you spell it that way as a phrase and not the band?) little team. Anil and I started the day with Maya's first T ride. She took it all in like a champ. Then we had breakfast at Katie's apartment before heading out to Beacon Street to watch the runners. This was the third annual marathon party that Katie threw; she makes a mouth watering brunch and pours mimosas so that we all simultaneously waddle and wobble our way from her Coolidge Corner apartment to the sidelines. She writes a great food blog too--check it out if you want to see what I stuffed my face with. Let me entice you with the words homemade pop tart--YUM.

Check out my Patagonia-adorned family here. I got Maya this baby down sweater jacket because resisting wasn't an option, but lately I've been convinced that I was a tool to buy it because, really, what baby wears a down jacket? Well, mine does! It was perfect. Unnecessary yes, but perfect. She wore her Patagonia fleece booties too. If you ever forget what this jacket looks like on her, you can just look at winter photos for the next three to four years, because she has this exact version in sizes 24M and 3T as well. The 24M one was a gift from her future ski instructor (my friend Betsy, also the manager of the store) and the 3T was a return to the store with a small defect, so I was able to snag it. Good thing it looks so cute on her!

Anil had to go to work shortly after the first runners came by, so I put Maya in the Bjorn, and she slept that way for over three hours! Which also meant that I was standing on those sidelines with her strapped on my chest for three hours--that's equally impressive. Finally I went back to Katie's apartment to regroup, to feed and change Maya, then we all walked back to my part of Beacon Street and had dinner and beers. We walked past all the drunk college kids still hanging out on Beacon Street and I secretly resented all the girls holding beers and wearing skinny jeans, but Maya was being so good and cute that I got over it pretty quickly.

We were all pretty beat by the end of the day. Admittedly, we didn't run a marathon, but we were out and about the whole time that other people were running it. Below is how the day ended, complete with a burger and fries and a Goose Island IPA for one of us. I don't even know how to express how I felt having pulled all of this off, just like I'd fantasized about it being all those months of pregnancy. I think relief might be the most accurate word. I'm not sure I even believed it would go this well during all of those hopeful visions, and in all honesty, even the morning of I was sure I'd last a few hours then retreat home with my crying baby, happy that we did breakfast and at least made an appearance to cheer for the runners. Maya went so far above and beyond--she's my super baby. I'm starting to realize that we're actually leaving Boston, and I'm starting to let myself be sad to leave the friends and traditions we've made here, so it was special to have a day like this. Katie and I are already looking forward to telling Maya about her first Marathon Monday. And I've already recruited my parents to make the trip with us next year. Maya already has the jacket.

The moment that will live in infamy is me seeing a student that I taught at BC running the marathon, and yelling "I had a baby!" while pointing to my chest, as she ran by and waved. She was the one running the marathon; she was almost finished running 24.6 miles, and I was yelling about my baby? For some reason, the thought went through my head that she wouldn't recognize me with this baby strapped to my chest, so I felt the need to point it out; that's my best excuse. I did push during labor for as long as it took some of the faster runners to finish, but I at least kept from yelling out that part.

Turning corners (for now!)

Maya’s imposed a moratorium on napping at home for the past few weeks, so I’ve literally had NO time to make good on my promise to post more to the blog. Above is what she looks like without enough sleep. Or with crazy hair after a bath. Actually she looks a lot more mad with no sleep but I don't take pictures during those times.

But today… today! She’s been asleep in the swing for two and a half hours. I’m in heaven. First things first—I had to do laundry or risk wearing the same clothes for way too long. It’s already been too long, but today is going on waaay too long. Then I had to catch up on Ugly Betty on DVR while uploading a gratuitous amount of photos online so that my parents don’t get the shakes from not seeing recent pics of their granddaughter. Then I actually just sat on the couch for like fifteen minutes watching the end of a show and did nothing else. Amazing.

I’m rushing to try to get something up here now though, and hopefully if this nap thing keeps up, I can make it a routine part of my day again. Maya is 10 weeks old (!!) today, and supposedly her daytime naps are supposed to start “organizing.” I think I got that word from one book or another, and I’m hoping it just means “appearing” or “happening.” In the apartment, anyway. Before these past few days, the only way I could get Maya to nap was by leaving the house and putting her in the Bjorn while I walked around or went to lunch. I know, it’s not such a bad deal for me, because I get to go out and meet up with my new mom friends during the day (and eat too many fries and sandwiches for lunch since I turn to the side while wearing the Bjorn and eat with one hand). But it’s also exhausting, and frustrating to be going from station to station around the house for hours trying to get Maya to sleep so that I can do something, anything, around here, only to have her cry, and cry, when I just want to get something done here. I desperately hope this nap phenomenon sticks around.

I’ve been on solo mommy duty 24/7 for the past three days and nights, so the nap break this morning is extra refreshing and necessary. Anil’s working overnights this week, so as of Tuesday night until, well, today when he wakes up, it’s been just Maya and me. I can’t decide which shift is worse—3-11pm or the overnight shifts of 11pm-7am. I think 3-11 is the ultimate worst, because Anil isn’t here for the evening Bailey walk or for dinner or for Maya’s bedtime, then still has to sleep in the morning and go back to work in the afternoon. I haven’t yet had to juggle all of that on my own, but stay tuned because I will in another week. Overnights are good in that he’s here for dinner, and by that I mean he takes care of dinner and clean up, which is great, of course. But he’s away all night, obviously, then sleeping for most of the day, and in order for us to eat, I’m still taking care of Maya while he’s cooking and doing whatever else in the evening, so there’s no baby break in sight.

I have to admit though, I think it’s getting easier. Crap, did I just jinx everything by saying that? We’ve gotten in the habit of not commenting on anything that’s going well, ever, because it always ruins the streak. We quickly learned to never say, “Wow, she’s sleeping so well!” early on, or “She went to bed really easily tonight!” It was immediately followed by a wail or a squawk. But it’s supposed to be getting easier, right? So it’s not just a fluke, I hope. I know more about my crazy little daughter and am more comfortable, and more rested, 10 weeks in. And Maya is evolving too. She’s been struggling with reflux, and whether it’s the baby Zantac or just that her digestive system is growing with her and evening out, she hasn’t had as tough a time eating as she was for a while there. It’s crazy how sudden a change can seem though. I mean, last Friday I called the pediatrician crying because she was screaming so hard (seemingly from reflux), and I couldn’t get her to sleep or eat (maybe the lessening reflux is a result of them upping her dose of Zantac after that phone call!). But she’s also sleeping noticeably more, or at least more reliably, and definitely more during the day, this week. I’ve heard again and again that you have to learn not to stress about things too much, because they change so quickly. It’s crazy to see it in action though. Yesterday she napped in my friend's swing for two hours, so I tried my luck at home again today, and hallelujah!

You know what though... I'm hearing noises emanating from the swing now though that would make a third grader giggle (okay, it makes me laugh too), so I imagine Maya's either waking herself up, or will soon realize that she has a load in her diaper and that she's really unhappy about it. See? I knew I'd jinx it by recognizing my good fortune. But that doesn't take back the sweet sweet time I had this morning.

This is from the last time Maya napped in the swing at home, literally two weeks ago! I put the teddy bear there for her to feel and she fell asleep holding it. Ridiculously cute; I fell on the floor and melted.