apology.

sorry for this unfinished and hard to read template. i was working on it and now i am le tired so i am going to bed. i'll be functional again soon, promise!

procrastination.

let me begin by saying that i should instead be working on a poetry analysis for my online class that is due by midnight. but since it's been a long and busy kind of day i choose procrastination. i will justify by saying that i have over two hours to complete the work, i cleaned most of this gigantic house today while balancing jude on my hip, and haven't gotten a nap. in other words, i earned it. additionally, it is a bit necessary since we've had a lot of "firsts" going on this week. kind of. and since my parents have been in ecuador with my laptop since last friday i haven't found a convenient time to sneak away into the computer room to blog. so since i'm already here and jude is successfully (and quite easily) gone to sleep, here goes...

i'll work backward and see what all i can remember...

today jude tried yogurt for the first time. supposedly this is an "8-10 month" food, but seeing as he will be 8 months in just over a week, i decided to go ahead and try it out. plus we are out of fruits, veggies, and grains to try from the "6-8 month" category. the only things we missed out on were pumpkins and plums, if memory serves me. and that was only because the whole foods market didn't have them. to date jude has eaten (and enjoyed) rice cereal, barley cereal, oat groat cereal, avocado, apricot, apples, bananas, mangoes, nectarines, peaches, pears, prunes, sweet potatoes, acorn & butternut squash, yellow squash & zucchini, carrots, green beans, sugar snap peas, and beets. he has not enjoyed parsnips (got quite the parsnippity face on that one) or the plain whole milk yogurt. to be fair, i tasted the yogurt and it tasted more like sour cream than the delicious flavored dannon i'm used to. i added some apples to it and that helped (he did eat an entire oz of it after an initial complaint) but i think next time the ratio needs to be more fruit to less yogurt. he is generally indiscriminate when it comes to what food he eats though he makes a bit of a sour face to the tartness of apricots and nectarines and could definitely tell a difference in the texture of the mango when i left it a little chunky. for this next round of foods i am going to try to steer away from the puree and try more texture so that he will get used to it. he always pauses when eating green beans, peas, or zucchini as they have a grainer texture than most everything else. the beets he liked, though they made his poop pink for two days, and like i said, the strong flavor of the parsnips worried him a little. all in all, though, it's been a very successful first couple of months with solids. i can tell he understands now that the smells coming from the kitchen generate tasty treats, even if it's only for mommy and daddy. he is getting more curious about the things i eat, always watching me bring bites to my mouth and even crying out to indicate that he would like some. but not yet baby jude... as we get closer to 10 months, i definitely want to experiment with finger foods and also with letting him make a mess of his meals. right now i try to keep mealtimes as tidy as possible and discourage fingers in the mouth during feedings as well as fingers in the bowl. not because i don't want him exploring and learning about food but really just because i can tell he isn't intellectually ready and doesn't understand anything other than picking up things and throwing and them down or turning them over and around is fun. once he gets a better grasp on hand to mouth equals feeding himself, then i will encourage the mess. i can't wait for that actually! :)

other than new food, today has been relatively quiet. we cleaned, we played, we had a busy day. i let him explore the carpet while i vaccuumed and gathered laundry, which he found to be quite entertaining. he inspected the fuzzies that were the worn parts of the carpet, tasted them, and deemed them alright. he pulled every drawer handle within reach. he moved the door to the armoire back and forth on the hinges (a new thing he has learned to do with books, his toy laptop, ect... basically anything with hinge-like movement capabilities) and hit his head on it once or twice. attempted an unsuccessful climb into the dog's bed and i eventually gave in and let him roll around in there until he fell asleep. very cute. and when he woke up he followed me around while i vaccuumed the wood floors and all the carpeted rooms upstairs. he is getting very mobile, although he is still doing the lunge-and-pull as opposed to actually crawling. now he is sleeping soundly next to daddy.

a big happening this week was teething. ugh. not that we actually have any teeth to show for all the effort, but i am now sure they can't be far off. and i think he is getting his fangs first. no, seriously. he is cutting little vampire teeth, or "eye teeth" as us hillbillies from KY call them. it's the strangest thing. his gums have also been swollen on the bottom right side so i'm thinking he might get three or four teeth coming in pretty close together. who knows. i just know that it's been absolute hell on all of us. he has been glued to my person all week and i haven't had my mom here to act as a substitute for me so that i can get any studying done. it's been a true test but i think we have all passed and i think the pain for jude might be lessening. or he is getting used to it. he's had the crying, unsoothable fits, restless nights, biting, chewing, gnawing, and even a little diarrhea and fever (although these last two i will discuss next paragraph). orajel seems to do nothing for him so i've been giving him tylenol once or twice a day for the past week or so. i know, i know... i hate that i have to dope him up, too... but honestly, anything to ease his pain at this point and my doc okayed it. the homeopathic teething tablets seem to help as well, but for nighttime, tylenol has been the only real help. he has been having an absolute time getting to sleep at night. he was up until 11pm the other night just restless and crying and whining. he doesn't want to be laid down and he doesn't want anyone but me. in order for zach to get to spend more time with him (and it give me a break) i've asked him to do the nighttime routine for the past week. he plays with jude, bathes him, gives him a bottle, and then bam! all i can hear from upstairs is "WAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH WAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!" so i trudge upwards, get him from zach, calm him down, and spend at least 45mins trying to trick him into falling asleep. we've done frozen teething rings, ice cubes in mesh feeders, cold washcloths, the works. finally he wears himself out enough to fall asleep curled up into me. it's sweet, sure, but oh-so-tiresome. tonight though he actually just nursed right to sleep, which gives me hope that the times they are a changin'...

now, as for the fever and diarrhea... not totally sure if they were teething symptoms or something else. he had a rectal temp of 101.7 a couple days ago, vommitted, had some loose stools, and then broke out in a rash. the fever broke within an hour of my giving him some tylenol, but i was still really worried. he wasn't himself, he was excessively tired, cranky, and generally unhappy. the nurse i spoke to said that if he got any worse that day i would have to take him to the ER or an UTC. so yesterday morning when we woke up (it's been 10ish all week, YAY!) i made an appointment, tossed him in the car, and away we went. dr.rettie examined him (and by this time of course jude is back to his happy, talkative self so i feel a bit silly) and found that he is a whopping 23.7lbs, has two very perfect (albeit waxy) ears, and a rash as a result of the fever. a sigh of relief. he told me to stick it out and learn to deal with the teething because it was just a natural part of life. but of course he said it in his nice, cute young doctor way so that i wasn't mad at him for it, haha. he did say that the fever, nausea, and diarrhea could be the result of a tiny viral infection, so i guess jude has had his first minor illness.

what else? well, this past week jude has decided to experiment with his vocals. he now does this scream/squeal thing in the highest key he can muster for as long as he can hold it and then when he runs out of breath stops, takes a deep breath, and does it again... and again... and again. you get the picture. he's actually given himself a cough due to voice strain. he's also learning to whine. he whines, bordering on crying, when i take something away from him, or when he wants something out of reach, or when he is hungry, tired, you get the picture. he is for sure learning the art of manipulation. i try not to give in but honestly most of the time it's just so funny that i can't help but give in. if i ignore him he will usually give up relatively quickly and turn his interest elsewhere, thank goodness. he has been crying tears pretty frequently though. i can never tell if it's a real or imagined hurt since he does it at the drop of a hat. the personality this kid has got is amazing!

i can definitely say that i am at a point in our relationship where losing him is unimaginable. not that i ever thought it was alright, but i guess i can say that i am now so connected to him as a personality and not just as a soon-to-be-personality. before, my love for him was based more as a caregiver's love... he was helpless and i fell in love with him while taking care of him; he needed me and i loved him for that as well as what i knew he was becoming. now my love for him has surpassed that and grown into a mutual need... he vies for my attention, does things purposefully to make me laugh or react, cries for ME to hold him, etc. it's simply amazing what a bond can develop in such a short time. it definitely makes up for all the time i spend exhausting my own supply of energy to make sure that his endless supply continues to go unharmed. it's worth the lack of sleep, the 24/7 job responsibilites, the overwhelming extra amount of laundry, the early mornings, everything. i am smitten.

some of my favorites.

some poetry i wrote in 2008. oh, where have the time [and my mind] gone?



crucifictitious cruxes. 

feet shuffling
and here we come!
marching like good soldiers,
to the beat
of your nails on tabletops 
with our uniformed
heads and toes
brandished by
our iron-on crucifixes
and morbid curiosities,
intermingling with 
rosewood karmic beads
dangling mindfully down
our breastplates. 
we have come!
so that they may find rest
in death and breath, alike
clouded lens call for
weepy handkerchiefs
and ants' armies,
one by one,
stepping on
stones brought down
from babylon's skyscrapers,
to reach higher mind
constructed of readied ashes
free-falling from pillared incense 
smelling sweet like india
and attracting us all. 



oh sweet kind love, patience but with fits of passion. 

sweet, kind love
harboring my heart
rocking gently in the eaves
with patience hundredfold
painting a portrait
in crimsons and golds
lacing ribbons
through ribcages
tightening our souls
with tugs of strings
strung through my skeleton 
overlaid with sugar netting
nesting in our mind
so docile 
in your way
filling empty spaces
with violent hints of violet
royal sashing
eyelids shut tight
involuntary trusting
as was meant 
for lovers of such caliber
our sweet, sweet circled love
orbiting in atmospheres
drenched in familiarity
of uncharted territory
dealt in hands honest
from a hard day's night
tuning strings
with imaginary fingers
hearing reverberations
with blinking curiosity
those notes you know
by heart
and breathe
by lungs
to speak of how
it was you and i
at the dawn of time
blowing smoke rings
into black holes
created by crashing
into all that glitters is gold
and all that will be
will soon be in me
and all that is come
will soon come to three. 



anti-mercurial matters. 

words finally failed me
having depleted descriptive resources
when it comes overflowing 
from my lips
how much i love you
or what i absolutely feel
it is far from diminishing
instead ever-increasing momentarily
surpassing the english language
inspiring me to learn a new tongue
and speak sweet exotic murmurs. 



eons of adventure. 

thoughts drift to climbing
cliffs' faces with bared hands clenching tight, knuckles white
as though we've grabbed at ghosts 
and maybe we have in the spirited outdoors
stretching climatic history over miles and millenia
christening old traditions with ropes of technicolor
and clips with no rust
i commence my ascent, reaching for chains that bind
my body to this rock 
aged, yet with built strength from decades of withstanding
forces both natural and not
never forgetting the ones who pierced and bolted
those that came before but here i am today 
clinging and clutching building a strength of my own
in enduring endearing pain carrying pleasure 
like buckets of water over my shoulders weighing me down 
just enough for the challenge, stopping to disect route
analytically picking holds best for gripping
no chance of slipping though i know i won't fall
still determined to stretch legs and stand on my own 
reminders of life and inherent needs for control
independing on others, i do this alone with my mind
reasonably reassured that you're watching my every reach
and pull, climbing stairs to the astral sky
blinding enlightenment awaiting and peace in the making 
inhaled breath of filled smoky lungs
calming exhale is meditation 
i go for the next at increased pace instinctively running rough hands
across smooth stone, eyes closed and i've found the fit
fingers rigidly respectful keeping close to the wall
empathizing with blinded men reading faces, seeing in mind's eyes
is how i climb finding footholds, rubber soles of shoes on toes squeezed
now i swing and play
descending deciding only to rise again
feeling fearlessly for new paths less worn
the abstract like painting a perfect portrait of nothing
musing of ease far too soon as the ache seeps up arm's length
radiating around radius and ulna alike
you take it in strides to allow rest for fretting forearms
two seconds and i am off again on a tangent toward the tops of trees
feet protesting at heights undefined and i find myself at the end of my rope
reflectively dazed and lungs crashing
systematic systolic pumps blood to nervous branches shaking
rock hard overexertion and in that moment i see self-worthy science
when the heat in your voice ringing upward approval
melts me into black pupils' reflection 
and it appears i am the man in the moon. 



fancied philosophical farmers. 

beads dangle from backward mirrors 
smoke swiring in one ear and out the other
curling up and nesting with nephrons
weary from over-working witnesses
the single strand of tiger's eye
protects us from ourselves and killers
eager to aim shotguns at our dreams
fearing they have overpopulated fields
thus becoming every man's for himself
uprooting father's children too soon
or not soon enough for prodigal persistence
pushing plows with blistered palms
secretly studying philosophy by candlelight
to discover truths in lifetime lies
outright warnings of books burning
bearing burdens meant for tarnished souls
saying deliverance is upon us: shed a single tear. 

my toothless wonder.

tonight, for the first time, i am going to attempt to let my little co-sleeper try out his crib. not that he hasn't slept in it before, but it's mainly been used for naps and perhaps a couple of nights long ago he spent an hour or so in it before waking and being moved back into my bed. it's honestly not been that important to me where he sleeps as long as night nursing is convenient and easy and doesn't disturb our sleep too much. it's daddy that has finally put his foot down.

we have been staying with my parents for a few months now. most of the time. 99% of the time. of course we unfortunately still pay rent and bills for our own apartment, but since i have been taking classes this arrangement is easier. needless to say, jude spends many a night sleeping with his nana. my step-dad works nights, and they have a king-sized bed, so this works. if i had a king-sized bed, jude would probably never know what a crib is. but i don't. and jude has a rather nice and expensive crib that was collecting dust at our apartment.

on the way home from dinner, i convinced zach to stop at our house to get the crib. he was reluctant but also knew that he wanted sleep tonight. so while he broke the crib down jude and i visited my grandmother across the street. (i would have helped, but those sorts of things usually start fights between us haha, go figure.) once we got home (mom's home) it was bath time for the baby jude and by the time i had him lathered with lotion and in his pjs, the crib was ready.

round one: 9pm. i gave him a bottle (as i do most nights during school semesters) and laid him down on his tummy in the crib. bad idea. he woke up, burped, and puked on his nice, clean sheets. round two 9:10pm. i gave him his paci, held him close and endured about ten minutes of pinching and scratching then laid him down on his back. well, of course he woke up. instead of picking him up, i decided to really try out this big boy thing. i turned on his mobile and walked downstairs. finally after about 15 minutes he fell asleep ON HIS OWN! two hours go by and just as i'm getting some videos uploaded, he wakes screaming. round three 11:30pm. in my mind i curse his teeth as i get up to get him. there are real tears so i pick him up and try rocking him. after a combination of orajel, hyland's teething tablets, tylenol, and an ice cube wrapped in a washcloth, he lets me nurse him to sleep. poor, poor teething boy. i hate teeth, too.

not that he's got any. not that i can even feel a hint of any. he did this with the fussiness and night waking a couple of months ago. we will see if this round bears any results. i sure hope so. i hate the crying. i especially hate not being able to help him comprehend that everything will be alright. it's a hard job being someone's everything and complete source of comfort. i hope the crib will cultivate some independence in my sweet, needy boy. and in my sweet, needy self also. i still haven't even left him away for the night.

well, goodnight. here's to hoping baby jude will pull an all-nighter (in his crib, of course) ;)

lucky number seven.

i wish i had more time to blog, i really do. then my posts would be shorter and easier to swallow. but i guess i am doing this a lot more for myself and my own records rather than for everyone else. sometimes i read
really great blogs with tons of followers and admittedly get a little jealous. but most of the time i barely have time to write my own updates much less worry about attracting readers. maybe this will change. maybe i can actually start using this blog as practice for the freelance writing career i one day hope to have. maybe.

on a brighter note, i just got to read all of story's updates and must say mama kayla is a blogger i envy. her posts are always well-written and timely. and after spending an afternoon with a very busy little story, i have no idea how mama has the time to write such wonderful blogs. story is one on-the-go girl! (i have no idea how i will manage when jude can crawl and is starting to walk.) it seemed as though jude really dug ms.story's vivaciousness though. as always, he played the quiet observer, but he managed to procure his first kiss, and subsequent slap for said kiss. it was probably the cutest thing i've ever seen... :)

now about my seven month old. yes, i said SEVEN. i am in disbelief. with all this mothering i have been doing, it appears as
though the half way mark has come and gone (half way to one year, at least). my sweet baby boy is now an almost talker, almost crawler, bathtub swimmer, everything investigator. he has been making da-da-da sounds as well as other vowel-consenant combinations with increasing enthusiam. he is starting to understand "daddy" and almost always looks to zach and smiles. he knows when i am feeding him and i say "bite bite?" to sit up and open his mouth. he will show you his tongue if you stick yours out at him, and this has actually gone from his tongue barely peeping out of his mouth to a full-fledged gene simmons impression. very funny. he still does the ever-endearing fake cough as a means of communication also. on the whole, he is really becoming quite the little verbal thing. except around strangers or when people are paying too much attention to him. ignore him, however, and he jabbers away.

also, he is getting closer to crawling everday. tonight, for instance, I coerced him forward about six feet on the hardwood floor. of course i had to tempt him with his two favorite things: mommy's textbook and a water bottle. but either way he scooted, pulled, and flopped himself forward until i stopped moving them away from him and let him have them. i was very impressed. he is also sitting up very well on his own. he can catch himself when tipping over and sometimes lunges forward or to the side into crawling position.

aside from these milestones, his eating skills are getting both better and worse. he opens his mouth and swallows perfectly but gets increasingly distracted at mealtimes. i also decided to cut back his portion sizes this past week. he had been showing such interest in solids that i decided to indulge his appetite and took some advice i had read that said to basically feed him as much as he will eat. now i understood this to mean that if he finishes his breakfast/ dinner and still acts hungry to feed him another ounce of fruit or veggies. well, he would eat about 2-3oz of cereal and fruit at breakfast, then about a quarter of a banana in his mesh feeder for lunch, and finally another couple of ounces of cereal mixed with veggies/fruit at dinner. so like 6-8oz a day. it would have been fine but he had stopped nursing as much. i always tried to nurse before a feeding, but it was getting to the point where he wouldn't nurse but would readily eat his solids. so i called the doctor and they advised me to cut him back down on the solids and see
how that helped. now he eats about 2oz of cereal/fruit at breakfast and 2oz of fruits/veggies at dinner. and he nurses like a champ once again.

and now that it is past midnight i am going to cuddle with my
little co-sleeper and get some rest. goodnight.


all you need is love. <3