Alexis in Amsterdam

Thoughts on Work Travel as Parent

2012-01-31T13:04:00.001+01:00

I've thought quite a lot about my trip last week for work. It feels like the natural progression in a theme I've long noticed: the disenchantment with travel for work. Other workin' mamas of young children have shared similar feelings with me. In the beginning one has a shiny new job and travel is exciting and new. You are a singleton - no partner, no family, footloose and fancy free!Traveling with your business gear, staying in hotels, adding days on to visit the location, eating with colleagues and/or clients. These are at first positive things.

Then as you get used to it, the annoyances of travel start to wear on you - delays, bad weather, bad meetings, not so interesting colleagues and/or clients. Missing things at home with friends/family because you are traveling for work. It starts to get a bit old. You meet someone, and this compounds the negatives rather than expounding the positives. You miss your someone. But perhaps you can still meet them somewhere exciting since you are traveling anyways. It's not great but you make the best of it.

Next thing you know, you've gone and reproduced. Now there is a tiny little one who in the beginning requires constant attention. You miss your new family dearly. You don't like foisting all the work on your partner, especially overnight travel. It's getting more expensive to meet up somewhere and then of course you have to bring the little one with you as well (travel with little ones, wee hoo!)

I wonder what will happen next? With more children? Older children? I see in the future that it probably gets better again, you find the balance.

Weekend Roundup

2012-01-30T13:28:00.002+01:00

First off I would like to apologize to family and friends I was supposed to skype with on Sunday. It was a hectic weekend, mostly in a good way. Friday had no plans but ended up meeting up with our friends M and A and their two boys for a walk in the park, followed by accompanying M to on the first hair cut of her youngest boy. Her son fell asleep in the stroller on the way there and the hairdresser, a special one who only does children, was able to cut the hair while the boy slumbered on his mother's sholder. He didn't wake up for the entire hair cut! Being close to so many friends for this impromptu meet ups is something we really enjoy about living where we do in Amsterdam.

Friday night we had a babysitter who showed up as normal, and OH & I went out to see comedy! English-language stand up can be quite hit or miss in this town but most of the acts were good and the Munchkin obliged by not waking up until we'd gotten home and I'd had time to process all the alcohol out of my bloodstream*.

Saturday we had a lovely Normal Day. We were supposed to meet up with a friend for lunch but this ended up falling through as she is busy with school and a new job to exhaust her. OH and I know all about exhaustion, so it doesn't bother us at all. Instead we went to the market to stock up on veg and protein for the week. I did some veggie prep and OH did a bit of cleaning, we tag teamed watching the little one, and generally did very little at all.

Sunday morning I had the very special treat of sleeping in. Normally we try to alternate so that one of us gets a turn each at sleeping in each weekend morning. Baby schedules and illness don't always allow that so I hadn't had the luxury in a long time. Usually sleeping in means around 8:30, 9am. This Sunday however the munchkin was very fussy so we tried laying her in bed for a bit of sleepy-nursing. This is where the little one is in bed with mama, sleeping right next to the boob. Anytime you hear a bit of stirring - slap that baby on the boob. Generally they nurse a bit and fall right back to sleep. Mama doesn't get really any sleep this way but these days I'll take the facsimile. This usually doesn't work with our Munchkin who apparently hates sleep, but for whatever reason we laid in bed until 10:20! I can't even remember the last time I lay in bed until 10am, folks.

Unfortunately the reason she was so sleep was less positive as we later found out. Because of our amazing late morning start, we were a bit late to our birth group luncheon meet up. We have managed to see our birth group friends quite reguarly and it is such a pleasure to discuss how things are going with our same-aged babies and to watch them all grow in different ways. The munchkin remained very sleepy, fussy, and wanting to nurse the whole lunch. Eventually we noticed the pattern and also that she was feeling a bit warm. We had planned to check out a market on the way back but went straight home to confirm the little one had a fever. Thanks to taking the temperature incorrectly** I almost had a panic attack thinking she was gravely sick. She still had a fever but OH had a calm head - we have been lucky, one of us always manages to prevail in these cases. She was super fussy all afternoon, a pill to get to bed, and woke up many times during the night. I had a chance to repay the cool head Sunday night (well Monday morning technically) when I was up for an hour and a half trying to get the Sleepless Wonder to sleep. We have a rule in our house that when you start swearing at your infant child it's time for the other one to tag in. Usually when the other one does, for some reason she will immediately settle.

Needless to say I am extra sleep-deprived retarded this morning, and unfortunately so was the little one. An eventful weekend to say the least!

*you cannot breastfeed a child after drinking alcohol, you need to wait about 2 hours per unit of booze - similar to if you are driving a car.

** helpful hint - don't do it straight out of the wrap as they are warmed like a burrito in there.

Travelin', Workin' Mama

2012-01-27T17:10:00.001+01:00

I want to write this all down before I forget. Wednesday was the first travel for work since I got back from maternity leave. I feel I've done a good job putting it off until the Munchkin was a little older. Not that she is sleeping any more during the night because of it, but more that I'd be able to be separated for any period of time. This was a day long training in London. Normally in the past I would have flown in the night before. It's only a 4 minute flight from Amsterdam but there is always the chance that you will have a delay and end up missing half the training anyways.

One nice thing about not getting any sleep - you really don't notice much of a difference getting up at 5am to catch a flight than 5 am to feed a baby. The major challenge was mainly to do with the fact that we are still breastfeeding. For those who are unfamiliar, you can't just "stop for a bit" - your breasts will explode*. So for an 8 hour journey I had to check a bag. Not for the pump itself but for the milk afterwards. Evidently here you can only bring expressed breast milk if you have the child with you. Which seems a bit strange since why would you have it expressed if you're with the kid but fine, no problems.

I'd written ahead to confirm with the London office that they had a room where I could nip off (hah! pun totally intended) to pump. In fact it was much nicer than the room I usually have at my disposal in Amsterdam and I no trouble vanishing at the breaks to do the deed. One issue came up: fridge but no freezer. Lemme explain: the milk gets transported in a cooler bag, and in there goes a fancy shaped freezer pack that keeps all the milk cold. So of course it is not going to be frozen if it is sitting in a fridge all day. I figured keeping it in the fridge in the bag would keep it cool enough - plus I had no choice.

Nearly missed the flight home after taking ill-advised taxi to the airport at rush hour. When I got home I found the milk still cold but the pressure had caused the now melted cold liquid-gel stuff that keeps the freezer pack cool had exploded. It was the only casualty at least. Now I can look forward to doing this all next month again.

*okay not literally but it will feel that way**
** surely this idea has made it into at least one B movie.

Catching Up

2012-01-26T13:16:00.000+01:00

I had a long post for today but as a result of a very long day of travel yesterday I have a bit of work catch up to do. Lemme see how far I get with it and I shall try to fill this out with EXCITING DETAILS.

In the meantime I will leave this with a Question: London. Would you live there or not?

On the Road

2012-01-25T13:22:00.000+01:00

First work trip since coming back from maternity leave! It's a one day trip to the UK for training at the company office in London. Flying in god awful early, getting back the same day god awful late. Such is the life when you have a small one. I am going to try to express at the office as they have a room for it. Let's see if it makes it through security on the way back!

Baby Milestones Captured In Photos

2012-01-24T13:18:00.000+01:00

Munchkin triumphant over OH's Patented Baby Rollover Prevention Device. Also drooling a bit.I don't know why but for some reason the leopard print + her look + the lighting makes me think of Pat Benatar.

The Munchkin is ready to travel on her new UK passport.

Shortly after birth the Munchkin lost all her hair... and then the exact same color began to grow in. The little bald spot began in the front and now seems stubbornly stuck her at the back of her head. Hope that works itself out before high school!

5 months - peepers still looking like they will be blue

Mom and dad are ready for the Munchkin to start solids but it looks like we have a bit more time to wait...

Elephants! These have been enrapturing her since we put them up.

Testing out "lovies". This is a snuggly something-or-other you give the child so they can comfort themselves.

OH still suffering from the effects of sleep deprivation, attempts to put on two onsies on one child.

Weekend Roundup!

2012-01-23T15:34:00.001+01:00

Weekends continue to be really good. I think as long as there is no disaster, weekends are generally quite awesome these days. This is because both OH and I are pretty nuts about this Munchkin we've produced and we've made our peace with the fact that she is not going to be a Sleeper. This is when your infant performs the wonderous act of sleeping for 6 hours straight or more.

Friday continues to be mama day. Most of these days I contribute my schedule to spend as much time as possible holding the munchkin. If I am complaining about back problems in a few years, I will have no one to blame but myself. We managed to get out of the house early to experience my first ever PLAY DATE. Actually it's an organized play date where you pay a small fee and can then use the nice toys and facilities, meet other expat parents, and everyone even contributes fruit for a snack. Obviously our five month old child is a little young for all this and in fact found the best use for the room was to fall asleep in the wrap, but it was fun to preview the future. I went with our friend M and her two boys, and we all got soaked on the way home. In the afternoon it continued to pour rain so we hung out at home until OH was able to get home to relieve me. That evening I went to surprise a good friend S at her house out in Ijburg with a small gathering of just a few of us girl friends. We had a lovely time but I admit I wish I could be two places at once as I really enjoy my weekends with the hubs, even if we don't get up to much in the evenings.

Saturday we did shopping, more watching of rain falling, and lots of prepping for the first inaugural Husband Planned Date Night! Not that he has to plan them all mind, but it was the first he'd organized that was officially recognized. We had a babysitter and a reservation planned. We realized the night before that the babysitter, who was new, would not meet our munchkin at all if she came at the scheduled time so we wrote to ask if she would be available to stop by earlier in the day to at least see the child in a waking state before being committed to caring for her for several hours. We use a service which is actually a one woman show. She said she was not able to get a hold of the babysitter but would keep trying. This was early on Saturday. I assumed it was not going to happen and pretty much forgot about it until 7:00 that evening when OH and I were sitting in our fancy gear, baby stuff out and at the ready for a new person, and no babysitter in sight. I checked my email and saw the service had gotten back to us later that afternoon if the babysitter could come by at 5pm to meet the Munchkin. Oh crap, and she had sent a text message. We had the number of the babysitter and turns out she'd been informed by the service that we wouldn't need her that night. After a WTF moment we thanked her and apologized for any inconvenience the "cancellation" had caused. I guess the service interpreted our silence as a cancellation. It's a long story but in the end it was a simple miscommunication, and we know this service is very good but on busy nights you can feel the strain of it effectively being one person trying to coordinate everything. We obviously canceled the restaurant, got burritos and enjoyed being together. Luckily it was not some special occasion we might have missed.

Sunday I woke with a bizarre need for American pancakes. The Munchkin obliged by napping during the cooking of said pancakes, good old classic Joy of Cooking with wheat flour and bananas thrown in. They were delicious and excellent fortification for a session of yoga with Friend Learning to Instruct Yoga (she is very good!). I also had time to put to pots of delicious things (soup and beans) which filled the house with nice smells all day. A quick stroll out to meet with friends for coffee in the afternoon rounded out the weekend.

Pick Your Battles

2012-01-20T10:17:00.000+01:00

Napping is one of our favorite topics around here. Namely, how certain people in our household refuse to take them. Actually this was the case but it is getting steadily better. The Munchkin isn't keen on long naps. We accept this fact. Even the creche can't get her to nap, and we had been told by other parents that the creche could work amazing miracles with baby behavior, since they tend to be less sentimental than parents.

Often you don't realize something has changed right away, it happens so gradually. Right around 4 months, whilst in New Mexico, we noticed that less and less fighting to get the Munchkin down for daytime naps. She would also demonstrate much more clearly when she was tired, rather than the muddled messages you feel you get when they are just born and don't know themselves why they are unhappy. Our Munchkin rubs her eyes, yawns, and starts to rub her face against you when she is getting tired. Wait too long and she will start to cry. In short, it's not rocket science, but it has been only the last couple weeks that we realized she was really doing this consistently. Granted her naps are still ridiculously short but she seems to have accepted the fact that she does need them from time to time.

When Attack Babies ATTACK!

2012-01-19T10:01:00.001+01:00

AIA Presents: Strategies for Increasing Your Blog Content: #1 - Press the Publish button.Yes, this was supposed to go out yesterday but apparently willing it to be so does not yet make the post actually get posted.

I have been making a concerted effort to take more photos. The results are not good - but they are prolific. Like many of the digital age, I like to mask lack of quality with abundance. And witty captions. However, I did manage to capture our ferocious, expert trained Attack Baby making mince meat of this innocent, slow moving (read: pre-coffee) citizen. Keep your eyes open National Geographic subscribers! I'm waiting for the call any day now....

Sizing up the victim

Notice gigantic TOTALLY ADORABLE WANT TO EAT THEM UP cheeks. These are actually, uh, aerodynamic. Balance her out when she is flying through the air to spring on her opponent.

Innocent bystanding citizen notices Attack Baby - but it's too late!

Attack Baby attacks - straight for the jugular! Oh the humanity, I have to turn away for a moment.

Attack Baby emits special Cute Baby hormones to lull her victim into a smiling complacency by drooling sort of all over them. This makes the final blow much easier to administer. Takes years of training - her baby kung foo is very strong.

Attack Baby, gloating over her victim, savoring another glorious triumph in battle.

Oh sh*t, she's spotted us

Argggg, she's coming for us next!

Teeth pushing out sleep and thought

2012-01-17T09:31:00.002+01:00

Oh man, we love our little Munchkin to bits, but it feels like getting hit by a perpetual stream of trucks some days. Last night we had a particularly rough evening. First time I simply gave up counting how many times she woke up. OH and I do a particularly irritating thing where one of us will posit a thesis to explain the Munchkin's latest sleep problem, the other will not agree, only to then posit the same thesis a bit later, having totally forgotten that the other one already suggested it. I guess we are just too tired to remember whether we thought the idea or it was told to us originally but I notice we both do it.I mention this now after a more challenging night than usual. Munchkin has had a stuffy nose for what feels like FOREVER, meaning she wakes up because she can't breath well and then of course cries. On top of this, we are wondering if she is starting to teeth. Teething is a mysterious event which can last for days, weeks, or if you are particularly lucky, months according to the books. Some kids aren't effected at all, others go crazy. In most cases, it is the first teeth that are the worst and then the babies get used to the sensation. Sometimes, however, it is very painful for the child and they aren't able to get used to the pain. I still have my fingers crossed that our Munchkin will give us a break just this one time and have an easy go of teething, if that is what kept her up for over 2 hours last night. In the meantime, my brain is mush so it's picture time!

Mostly you hear of kids not liking tummy time, but our Munchkin can't get enough of it - to the point where she gets herself all pissed off because she can't crawl yet. Enter OH's patented "Tummy-Time Blocker". It's more of a deterrent than a block since she just rolls onto the pillow nowadays.

Ahh, this smile melts my heart - less so at 3am last night though.

Munchkin has been upgraded to economy plus bedding

Flight attendant, I ordered the special meal.

Many thanks to H and A, whom we visited last year. H already gave me loads of great maternity wear and then on top of it they sent us these totally adorable trousers. As if I didn't have excuse enough already to pat the baby booty.

Apparently we do not need to worry about the Munchkin getting less sleep if we carry her facing forward in the wrap

Super Awesome Weekend Roundup!

2012-01-16T12:26:00.000+01:00

We are having a strange winter in Amsterdam. It is unusually dry and up until this week also very mild. Looks like this week the spell ends and we have successively very cold followed by very wet weather. But in the meantime we have been enjoying the weather as much as we can. Friday I had my mama day. We started the day off very early. It is amazing how much one get get done in a day when your day starts at 6am. The munchkin and I went and hit some stores in the morning, shopping in preparation for dinner with friends (more on this later this week). Later a friend from my birth class came over with her little man who is just three weeks younger than the Munchkin. It's been so much fun to have these new friends have little ones around the same age. They are all developing in their own ways and we are all parenting in different ways. Anywho, N came over with her little man to chat, try out some baby gear we have, and have lunch and coffee. Afterwards, I took Munchkin for a stroll with our good friend A who very handily works near the park by our house. Friday evening we did absolutely nothin'. Prepped for Saturday dinner and passed out.

Saturday was a day of food prep and unprecedented productivity. OH and I used a gift certificate that was a pre-wedding gift up finally, picked up some chains from the jewlery store that needed to be shortened, got ring polished (been meaning to do that forever!) and got the last of the food necessary for dinner. The rest of the day I spent cooking for our First Ever Hosting Dinner Post-Baby. We invited our friends C and D that we are stalking of late, since we figured C is pregnant and hopefully they would understand if we started to pass out at 10pm. Dinner was a great success! Deets for the foodies: I decided to make roast chicken for the first time. I know, it's a bit sad to have lived this long and never attempted it before. To commemorate the event I figured it was only fitting to get a really excellent bird. Hence why on Friday I schlepped all the way out to a recommended organic butcher to get what I hoped would be a very natural and tasty specimen. I got the bird the day before as I was going to try a recipe I got from my father, which required rubbing the whole thing in salt and pepper and leaving it uncovered in the fridge overnight. This dries out the skin, keeps the moisture in (hopefully) and then you roast it at a very high temp in the oven.

Well that's what you're supposed to do in theory. I practice I mixed up another recipe in my head and put the bird in at the temp of the original recipe but at the time for the wrong one. The cooking time difference was about 1 hour! Fortunately the second recipe was very similar to the original and I was able to jack up the temperature after I realized what I'd done and get it done in another 40 min, so about 1hr 15 min cooking time in the end. I think I probably could have stuck it in there at the high heat and cooking temp of the second recipe in retrospect. With the chicken I made comfort food: green beans, roasted potatoes, gravy from the pan drippings. I am happy to say the chicken was a huge success! For dessert I sadly blew everyone into a comatose with Dutch appletart and homemade cinnamon ice cream. This effectively ended our evening as everyone needed to pass out. Munchkin did fantastically, she woke up once during the whole affair.

Sunday - I am not super keen on meat myself but I love chicken stock. Nothing more exciting then making stock from a bunch of bones, which is what I did all day. Went for a walk with friend M, ate soup and then had an awesome session of yoga, in my own home, with an instructor! Well, instructor-in-training. I highly recommend you befriend people who are training to be certified yoga instructors, as they need to practice actually giving classes and will often come to your home to do it. A is really talented and I hope I'll be able to afford her when she becomes a real professional as I think she will do fantastically! The only sad part was how out of shape I am! It doesn't really hit you that a proper exercise class has not been undertaken in over a year (since getting knocked up effectively) until you try to flex those flabby muscles. Time to get back in shape.

Long day ate my post

2012-01-13T17:59:00.000+01:00

The day got away - if I were a day hunter I would have come back empty handed. OH loaded a bunch of pretty pictures but you'll have to wait with baited breath over the weekend for them. TGIF!

The only two things sure this week: Death and Taxes

2012-01-12T16:26:00.001+01:00

Last night I finally submitted all our forms for various and sundry child subsidies we are entitled to now that we have procreated. I don't know how it works, but here we get one subsidy, a pittance (or maybe more accurately a royalty?) for having produced a future tax payer. Also because both OH and I pay income taxes - aka we work - and we have to send the munchkin to daycare, we get a childcare subsidy. Not really sure why it works this way rather than just subsidizing the childcare facilities themselves, but anyways, it is all based on a complex combination of factors including our pay and how much we work.

To give you an idea: baby daycare is regulated by the government (pretty much everything is here!) price as well as qualifications of the employees. Probably a bunch of other stuff too I don't know about. We send munchkin three times a week for a full day. For the month we pay about 900 EUR. If you have two children, you would pay 1800... and so on. So it's a big expense on top of all our glorious income tax. We are lucky, we are foreigners who both have a tax break- not eternally but for now it makes it that I pay roughly what I paid in the US for taxes.

I know, probably too much detail but I'm recording it as much for your general benefit as for my records should I want to know all this crap in the future. You are probably thinking, why have there been no baby pictures all week? Well my friends, there is a photo drought until our local photographer beats his current addiction, a video game (sadly not the one I gifted him for Xmas). I enjoy watching video games to a degree but this game is a bit repetitive. Also it is very difficult and involves a lot of dying. And then repeating the level unless you die again. Then doing the level again until you die, then repeating it again... You get the idea. On top of this, as one would naturally naturally expect, after about the 7th time of getting killed the player gets a bit annoyed. This at least varies things up a bit in terms of user-provided sound track, which increases with swearing as the number of times dead increases.

Let's all keep our fingers crossed he beats the game tonight.*

*to be fair, he is totally enjoying the game! In that sense this is probably one of the best value-for-plays we have ever bought so I should stop my complaining

Proof that having a baby is like an addiction or, you're not crazy, your friends really are totally different after having a kid

2012-01-11T15:16:00.001+01:00

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/07/080707081852.htm

That's right, I get a little high every time I see my munchkin smile. So now I am just waiting for the study that proves women really do forget completely the PITA that is being pregnant and giving birth, since we all seem to come back for more.

I'm struggling this week for whatever reason*, so let's keep with the links. Those who knew me as a child will know you could substitute unicorns for horses, and know this review to be pretty spot on.

*Probably 4+ months not getting a solid night of sleep has something to do with it but I hate to point fingers.

Sleeping Milestones - alas not for the parents

2012-01-10T13:58:00.001+01:00

Well the kid keeps doing it - getting older and bigger. Over the last weekend, OH and I finally bit the bullet and accepted that the poor Munchkin really could not stay sleeping in the bassinet any longer. Her head was practically butting the top of the thing and her arms had long been folded up from the elbow and were now balancing along the sides when she slept.

So OH performed one of his man-tasks (I hate assembling furniture and I'm pretty sure the furniture isn't so keen on it either) and assembled the big baby bedding: the crib. Nothing says baby in my mind more than a crib. When we stood back and observed the final product, it felt like the room had really transformed into a parental room. Even though we've had the Munchkin for over four months now! I admit, I had been resisting the crib for a while. Nothing to do with not wanting to admit being a parent! But more not wanting to aknowledge that the Munchkin was getting bigger.

In fact the crib reminds me of how little she is! She is once again dwarfed by her giant-seeming bed. I thought as well that it would feel less personal or something. But actually I am loving the improved stalkability the crib allows. Bassinets are baskets - so of course you can't see your kiddo from the side. We have the crib next to our bed for now, and like most cribs, the sides are the classic bars allowing the obsessed parent to see their kiddo at any hour of the night while they are sleeping*. One can also stuff the binky/pacifier back into their mouth straight through those bars without even lifting their head from the pillow. I am sure I'll regret writing this now, but so long as your kiddo is not sleeping through the night I don't really see why you would want them in a separate room. Seems like precious minutes spent getting up, walking to the other room, and soothing the child could be saved for much more important sleeping. Perhaps if both bedrooms are located near to each other (on the same floor would be nice, in our case), but I am loving our new sleep arrangement for now.

Further good news - the Munchkin has no problems at all with her new bed. There is sometimes a problem if the baby does not like being so dwarfed by the bed. However our kiddo, she likes her space. I think this is why co-sleeping (this is where you share the bed with your child.) hasn't been an issue. The Munchkin's preferred sleeping position is arms spread eagle like a tiny little Jesus, head turned to one side. Parents in the same bed would only cramp her style.

*this validates my earlier decision not to get a baby monitor with video as I would probably do absolutely nothing else except obsessively check it at night.

Weekend Roundup

2012-01-09T14:28:00.000+01:00

Thanks to a relatively rain-free weekend, we had good fun all three days. The doomsday winter of snow and freezing cold temperatures has yet to realize itself. In fact it has been relatively dry and mild for a Dutch winter as of yet. There is still time and in fact I wouldn't regret a cold spell, if only to kill off all the mosquito eggs.*

Friday I had lunch with mamas at a place new to me Mazzo, which also has a changing room. This now brings the total to two restaurants I know of that have changing facilities for babies. It was very nice if slow in service, but when you're with a baby that is the general speed of things so no one was complaining. A very nice lunch and fun to meet other working mums. That afternoon I rolled over to a friend's for coffee. C and D are expecting their first kiddo in a few months, so we are very excited for them naturally. In the evening the Munchkin more or less slept in her normal pattern, allowing OH and I to watch Super 8. Really good, and I am a wimp at watching violence in films.

Saturday was Get Stuff Done. We restocked on food for the week. In the afternoon I met up with some other gals to plan C's babyshower, the same C I saw on Friday. I am looking forward to this especially as C helped plan my shower so now I get to return the favor. We did almost nothing of interest at all in the evening. I think I made a pasta casserole (was craving lasagne but had only half of the ingredients for it). Living the wild life abroad, woo!

Sunday we had breakfast with C & D. No normally we are not stocking them like this every day, so don't call the cops to get a restraining order on us. We tried breakfast at the Pulitzer Hotel, which was really nice! The food was typical hotel buffet, and it was bloody expensive, but it was nice to be somewhere very clean with good service. We purchased a paper calendar, I took some jewelery to be resized, and in the afternoon we got to talk to our friends O & W who will be coming to visit in March after abandoning us last fall to return back to South Africa.

There were some Munchkin milestones as well but I'll save those for a future post - I imagine most readers fall asleep after Friday afternoon recountings of our uber exciting lives. Well, too the hell bad for you reader**, I have no memory anymore and I have to write this stuff down somewhere.

*it's the curse of living in a wet country. When the winters aren't very cold, we have bumper crops of mosquitos in the summer. You need the freeze to destroy the eggs.

** admit it, you secretly LOVE reading my boring weekend roundups. Masochists.

The Sleep Man, evidently persona non grata.

2012-01-06T09:29:00.000+01:00

Things that are rough about being a new parent

It's been a rough week for we adults here. The munchkin's new years resolution was evidently to wake up more often at night. It's hard to tell if it's the jet lag lingering on - she is sleeping more or less in per usual pattern with one small adaptation. This is to wake up crying her brains out every 40 min or so for the first 3-4 hours of sleep. The books will tell you this is the first time at which most babies emerge from their deep sleep cycle, so it's quite common for them to wake up then if something disturbs their rest during the following light sleep cycle. Our kiddo, she likes to follow it by the book.

And then something totally awesome happens that makes you so glad you are a new parent

Last night the same deal as the rest of the week began. We put the munchkin down to sleep and just managed to eat dinner before 40 minutes later we heard the crying. OH went up first to try to wrestle her back to sleep land. We gave her a bottle even though she'd just nursed. No good. She would not take the binky/pacifier. She was getting steadily more wound up and angry. It was clear she was very tired but for some reason would not/could not get to sleep. After about 30-40 minutes I tagged in. Often the first parent will be getting extremely frustrated when something like this happens and the other of you needs to tag in whether you are asked to or not. OH and I, I think, do this pretty well. Otherwise the stress that builds up while trying to get this damn kiddo to sleep starts thwarting your own efforts inadvertently. Certainly there is nothing new or different that the other parent is going to do - it's just fresh (wo)man in.

I go up and the munchkin is writhing around and crying in her bassinet. I pick her up and cradle her in my arms. Not a limp grip - our child, she has a will you see. So it's firm but gentle. I hold the binky in her mouth. She fusses and writhes furiously for about three minutes. Then with a shrug she goes limp. She accepts the binky quietly, and looks straight up at me. At first I try to cover her eyes because I want her to go to sleep. The room is dark, we have only the dim, blue light from the bathroom nightlight to illuminate us. But I can see every time I peak under my hand that she's still looking up at me. I lift my hand, and I see she's got a little smile on her face. Very calmly, she is looking up at me with this small smile. I smile back. I rock her a bit more, because I am falling in love with the moment. But this kid's gotta sleep. So I tell her as much very quietly, and place her in her bassinet again. She looks up at me from the bassinet, still smiling, then with a sigh closes her eyes and drops off to sleep.

Holiday Milestones

2012-01-04T09:00:00.000+01:00

Not sure how auspicious it is to begin the new year looking backwards, so going to try to finish the holiday wrap up today. But what better way than to commemorate a couple milestones achieved by both mama AND baby over holiday in New Mexico?

MILESTONES - the good, the bad, the ugly:

GOOD (Baby)

The most important of all the milestones is of course the graduation from one nickname to another. By general family concensus, it was decided that our little girl was no longer acurately represented by her nickname, the Piranha. In fact the breastfeeding is going very well now. We breastfeed exclusively in New Mexico and it was wonderful - she had one top up bottle I think the whole time. I have made my peace with the fact that I simply don't get enough for her via a pump. So as long as I am working, I have to accept that at creche she'll need formula in addition to what the pump can extract. Hopefully she'll be ready for solids very soon and that will help with eliminating night feeds (aka sucky having to get up 2-3 times a night moments). And it must be admitted we have been using the new nickname at home for a while now, the Munchkin. It does derive from Piranha, because it also can be Munchy or the new favorite, Munchy Moo. I have no idea where the moo comes from - OH used to work as a brand naming consultant and so we are getting fun nick names all the time as a result.

Developmental milestones:
Munchkin is getting better and better at using her hands, holding herself up straight in a sitting position, goo-ing and ga-ing, etc. I think she is reading the same baby books as us because if you go down the checklist of things kids can do at 4 months she is doing them all. This kid is if nothing else punctual.

BAD (Baby)

Thumb is discovered! Only we are not sure if she has really FOUND her thumb. She's discovered her mouth and hands in general and it's not entirely clear that she is favoring the thumb above all digits. She's certainly not using it to self-sooth at night in place of a dummy/pacifier. I had earlier harbored hopes she would become a thumb sucker if it would eliminate the dummy but now that it is happening I am not sure I feel so positive about it. You can throw away a dummy - obviously not the same case for thumbs.

THE UGLY (Mama)

I am proud to announce that I finally have a valid driver's license again! Sure, it took me five years to get it sorted again, but what matters is that it is done, right? Why did it take FIVE YEARS? Longtime readers will recall that I moved to the Netherlands and evidently completely forgot about the need for driving cars because my then valid driver's license expired and I didn't notice for about 6 months. By then it was too late to switch it over for a Dutch license. Turns out in certain states if your license expires you will need to go into a DMV office in person to get a new one. As that wasn't really going to happen and I didn't really need to drive I let the matter sit. And sit. Eventually I got married and realized it sucked having only one person who had to do all the driving. The driver's test in the Netherlands, however, is a Proper Test. It costs between 800 and 1200 Euro to take (you need to clock some practice driving time via lessons + the exam costs) and is notoriously difficult because you actually have to know stuff about driving & roads. By contrast, the New Mexico driver's license costs 54 bucks.

Learnin' to drive on the mean streets of Albuquerque

I actually did try to get a NM license a couple years back but was foiled by paperwork after a delightful 2.5 hour wait at the DMV. This year I came PREPARED to get a license or die trying. Because it had been ridiculously long since my last license exipired I had to do the written and practical exam. I can tell you that the rigorous written exam in New Mexico is 30 multiple choice questions covering minutea such as "what does a yellow line in the middle of the road mean? ". I was a more bit nervous for the practical exam, but 5 right turns & a U-turn later I passed that too. To be fair, I did have to "parallel park", if by parallel parking you mean pulling to the side of an empty residental street.

In short, 20 minutes of testing and 90 dollars later, I had a valid driver's license. And the picture isn't all that bad either.

Holiday Recap - Fun Stuff We did

2012-01-03T13:32:00.002+01:00

Continuing on the themes from our wonderful winter holiday trip back to the US, today a run down on all fun stuff we actually did. The word "fun" is in there deliberately as there were some less fun things that also had to be done.

The family fortress, with giant stone daisy visible from outer space.

Hang With Family - I get to see my full family in one place maybe every two or three years. We are all married with kids now, and we live all over the freakin' place. So when we get together, it is AWESOME. We are the rare family that gets along. We spend most of the time just talking, running after kids, and catching up so I can't report that we did any particular activities except what we always do when together...

Eat A Crap Ton of Food - Granted we do this apart as well but when you get us all together it is like condensing matter into a black hole of foodie cooking. The patriarch and matriarch were our hosts and were so wonderful in getting the whole house prepared for such an onslaught of people. In addition, my father cooked nearly all our meals beforehand to save time AND they gave mother earth the middle finger by using disposable dishes for the entire trip to save on dish washing. Food highlights include: two kinds of lasagna, the traditional homemade pizza on Xmas itself, and my mother's amazing candy, which I am blaming for the 2 kilos I put on in 10 days. More deets on the whole affair on the patriarch's blog and the sister's blog.

One of the really fun things was seeing the kids interact with our baby. They are old enough now that they see her not as a threat (usually) but as the best toy doll ever imagined.

In addition to talking about, eating, and making food, we also like to watch shows about people making food.

See, the family gets along fantastically.

Catch Up with Awesome Friends - We saw NMMichelle and I finally got to meet her then 5 week old son, who is totally adorable and soooo little! It is already hard to remember our 4 month old + being so tiny. We had the amazing luxury of spending an entire day together, something we rarely get to do as we live on different continents. And it was really neat to connect on a mama level. NMM has been a mama for a while now, so there was lots of probing for ideas and opinions. We hung out at the house then played at tourist by going down to Old Town to eat New Mexican, wander around, and support the local economy by buying lots of stuff. Sadly I missed seeing most other friends but I guess that is the way of things.

Friends burping babies together

NMM is an amazingly talented lady. She did the flowers for my wedding, she makes amazing jewelery, and she knitted this SO ADORABLE I WANT TO DIE hat for our little one.

Take Family Pictures - All I can say is we survived photographing four families with six children, oldest being 13. It seems there is a gender split between women loving family photos and men dreading it.Have a Date Night - OH and I managed to foist our kiddo off on grandma and grandpa (after she'd adjusted to the time difference) and sneak out for a romantic evening of sitting in a slightly tatty movie theatre to see a classy movie. Okay, we saw Mission Impossible 4, but I'm sure some other people were seeing a classy film that evening. We ate cold pizza which I smuggled through in my purse and were exhausted when we got home at 10:30. Woo, living the high life!

Back from the Dead... I mean, Holiday

2012-01-02T13:43:00.000+01:00

After a long hiatus, the family is back in Amsterdam. We had an absolutely magical time with my entire immediate family, something that happens very rarely. The character of the celebrations was also somewhat changed thanks to OH and I finally joining the reproduction party and bringing our first efforts along. I'll cover the time in themes, that's probably the best way not to forget anything given my porous memory these days. Starting today with our favorite...:

TWB - Travel With Baby

Surprisingly not so terrible! I think I was so anxious about it that it would have been hard to meet my low expectations. The Piranha was no more fussy than usual, and planes are surprisingly loud. This means only the immediate neighbors had to put up with us and I think they could mostly tell we were doing our best to quiet her when she did fuss. If the cabin pressure effected her, she didn't complain about it.

Advice for folks traveling long haul with babies:

factor in the length of the flight leg. Our trip to ABQ had a layover in Houston, an 11 hour journey from Amsterdam, almost entirely during the daytime when our napless wonder is wide awake. That is a long f-ing time to entertain a baby. Then on top of this we still had a 3 hour layover (good because everything takes a long time with a baby) and another 2.5 hour flight to our final destination. Our return trip went via DC making the trip 3.5 hours to DC and then 7 to Amsterdam. Plus a nearly 5 hour layover that we definitely didn't plan for but via a flight change ended up having anyways. Luckily we dodged a big weather bullet with snow storms occurring the day before and after our travel in Albuquerque.

fight for the bassinet seats! We flew on United/Continental. If our experience is anything to judge by, this must be one of the most excruciatingly painful mergers in corporate history. Things are a bit of a mess chez United/Continental The airline(s) changed our departure time and aircraft for one of our legs and as a result our seat reservations were changed for all our legs. It took 8 calls to their separate help centers and several hours standing at check in to fight for the seats where a bassinet can be used. The problem? These are bulkhead seats and now premium. The systems noticed we hadn't paid for them (per the airlines policies) and automatically kicked us out. Then every single person we spoke to was uncertain about the policy and had to check for us if we could still have the seats. This was all done with mostly good humor on their part but still a major PITA. BUT, it is totally worth it for your very young kiddo! Having someplace to set your child on an 11 hour flight, and ressembling the environment in which they are accustomed to sleeping, is a huge relief for the parent. In particular on our night flight back the Piranha slept over half the flight. Unfortunately those bassinets are quite small (the one we had only supported 12 kilo/ 25 lbs) so I don't think we'll be able to use it again.

bring an ass ton of toys, formula for backup, nappies, changes of clothes, and wipes. We forgot extra wipes and were nervous the whole way there. On the way home our little cherub had two back-to-back explosive poos that nearly blew her onsie off if the stain is anything to go by. Especially if your travel is primarily daytime, you will need toys to divert your kiddo. Another benefit of the bassinet seats: the space under the bassinet can be used for tummy time and dangling toys above for grasping little hands.

everything really does take twice as long. We had a ridiculous near 5 hour layover on our way back and were completely surprised at how quickly the time went! So err for long layovers and remember all those toys you brought. Especially for your piece of mind. Traveling in winter and having to go through the notoriously long-lined US border made me very happy to know I had plenty of time to deal with delays from either.

jet lagged baby = SUCKS. There's no way around it, just prepare yourself for several nights of sleeplessness (I know, what's new right?). The Piranha took about 3 days to adjust on the way there, and we're on night #2 for the way back. By last night's scream-a-thon, US --> Europe direction might be a bit more painful. One nice benefit to having an infant however, is that you as a parent hardly notice jet lag from your usual sleep deprived state.

NM - safe, mainly sound arrival

2011-12-23T17:05:00.000+01:00

Just a brief missive to report that we are in the NM homeland after a long but uneventful journey. The Piranha was very good, only crying when she was tired or hungry. Even when everything goes fine, the journey from Amsterdam to Albuquerque is just very long. I have only respect for those who have to travel even further. The only thing we are struggling with now is the Piranha, whose body clock is completely messed up. This morning we were all up at 3am, alas.

Probably will be off computers for a bit after this so I wish you all a wonderful rest of the holiday season!

Travel with Baby part 2

2011-12-20T14:43:00.002+01:00

As the first offering of TWB was so successful, we decided to follow up immediately with a sequel. Only this time the journey will be many multiples longer than our hop to the UK. After about 7 calls with Continental/United (oh mergers are such fun for us all) we think we have seats with a bassinet for the baby. Or we may not. We will find out tomorrow, when we climb into a giant metal tube and hurtle through the air for about 11 hours, get off, climb into a slightly smaller metal tube and hurtle through the air a couple more hours. Total travel time door to door, assuming everything goes smoothly and we are not delayed by: snow, fog, rain, or the TSA*, will be about 18 hours. We're not actually traveling that far, but we are traveling to a non-hub city in the US, which means you add on at least 3 hours for the international transfer plus however much longer it takes to get to your po-dunk city of choice.

I suppose 18 hours is a long time, but in the grand scheme of things, it's not so bad. Only a few generations ago my great grandparents were traveling for months by boat and train/carriage to get from Europe to the US. And a bit further back than that, it took folks hundreds of thousands of years to traverse the land bridge from Russia to get to the Southwestern United States. If you look at it from that perspective, a day doesn't sound so bad.

In any case, anticipate a bit of radio silence for some days while we get there and enjoy massive jet lag + baby with jet lag.

Weekend Roundup

2011-12-19T16:53:00.002+01:00

We had a lovely weekend. The weather continues to be good, though more and more these days this is the Amsterdam definition of good. AKA - if it is not raining (much) it is nice weather out.

Friday was a get s*** done day. Woke up craving a fancy-doo coffee. I decided despite it raining and having a baby around, I would not be deterred. I've mentioned before my philosophy about kiddos is that you should not let them stop you from having as normal a life as possible. So I strapped the kiddo on and we strolled out to the nearest cafe for a take-away latte, and bought a few groceries for the weekend while we were at it. I think we went out two more times that day (thank goodness the Piranha loves going out!).

Friday night was my work holiday function, a sort of weird cabaret-style dinner/show combination. Everyone agreed it was just a bit odd to have something like that billed as the ideal entertainment for your corporate holiday event (folks in velcro easy-off trousers for example?), but at least the food was decent and we all had a good time. The young people went out afterwards until the wee hours of the morning, whilst we old boring folk declined. While I am often up at the same hours as them, I can assure you I am doing something very different at the time.

Saturday we got one of our massively old to do tasks off the list. We have had two gargantuan bags of television series and films sitting in our closet since before the Piranha was born. We finally took a bag each, walked two city blocks over, and sold the lot of them. I think the guy could tell we were desperate to get rid of them, so we didn't really try to bargain for a better price. In fact, we actually left the one film he didn't want to buy and snuck away, we were so keen to be rid of them.

That evening we braved our first ever Evening with Piranha. We went to our friends' house S and V, which is just around the corner from where we live, for dinner and a documentary. We took along the Piranha, the wrap, the baby monitor and the Piranha's bassinet. We arrived at prime fussy hour - poor kiddo seemed a bit thrown that we were somewhere totally different for her evening ritual. S provided a dark room upstairs - we took the kid gear upstairs and in more or less the same amount of time as normal we managed to get her down for her evening sleep. This allowed us to have a long dinner with S & V and not worry about a babysitter. We watched a really good documentary on S's epic home film screening set up, complete with popcorn. If you haven't seen Inside the New York Times - go see it. It's very insightful for the information age. The Piranha managed to sleep through the whole film! We actually had to wake the poor kiddo up to take her home.

Sunday we took the Piranha to Hard Rock Cafe with friends M, D, their daughter Z, and our other friend D to meet Santa Clause at a kiddie brunch thrown there. We figured she'd met Sinterklaas, it was only correct that she get both sides of the story. Unfortunately we totally missed Santa's viewing hours and so she didn't get the obligatory photo with Dude In Scary Fake Beard. But we did enjoy catching up with our friends and eating a vast array of fried foods. The rest of the day was spent doing laundry and trying to pack.

Lessons from the 3 Mo + Experienced Parent

2011-12-16T08:46:00.000+01:00

Sleep - Holy crap! I never realized how little sleep one could get and still manage to perform basic functions. It's not so much the lack of sleep on one particular night. Rather it is the cumulative effect of not getting very much sleep over weeks and months. When you are excited about 6 hours of sleep in an evening, something is wrong*.
Mental functions - I've written about this before but it is related to sleep and persists in being an issue. Coffee, extra caloric intake, and probably also uppers - none of these is a substitute for sleep for more than a few hours. As you lose sleep, a cloud of retardedness descends around your thought processes. You realize you've been reading the same email for 15 minutes. You can't hear as well because every pause in a conversation gets automatically converted into an opportunity for a mini-nap. When people talk about baby brain, this is what they are referring to I think.
Love Life - When you look lovingly at your partner and you say, "I want to sleep with you" and you both understand you mean sleep for hopefully 8 full hours in the same bed, the romance is temporarily on hold. I have a good crop of single friends who share their exploits on the dating scene. It is fun to listen to their stories but I can't help but translate all their evenings spent partying as precious hours of sleep lost. I don't envy them going out - I envy their time to sleep in the next day.
Unexpected Windfalls of Breastfeeding- Let's face it: if you're breastfeeding in the western world these days, it's because you wanted to. I know for some it comes very easily but for us it's been a constant struggle. We persist because we feel it is important and while it has always been work, it has not been overwhelmingly so. If you are breastfeeding when you return to work, you can look forward to a sudden increase in personal time. Every couple hours, you retreat to what is probably a utility closet or the office shower or some other lovely "facilities" provided to you for the purpose of pumping. If you are using the same pump as me, you then spend most of the time trying to find a way to muffle the roaring noises of your ridiculously loud breast pump. While you are doing this, you read. I don't have the mental capacity to read any new material so I've been rereading non-fiction I recall as being particularly educational. A lot of these are good reads only because I realize they aren't very good after all and I should get rid of them. Just recently however, I picked up my ancient copy of "Getting to Yes", a book on negotiating. I was thinking it was for the disposal pile when I had a discussion with OH the other night** and realized I could apply stuff I'd learned from the book to get to a mutually satisfactory compromise. Go learning!
Physically versus Mentally Draining - young babies at this stage are physically draining. You are feeding them, comforting them, trying to get them to sleep. It's a constant wear on your body. As they get older, they become more physically independent and then the real work begins. They start developing mentally. I am interested to see if I look back on these days of sleeplessness with nostalgia when the Piranha was only spirited in physical ways...

*We're getting around 5-6 hours a night. I know, it can be far worse, isn't that scary?
**when I win, it's a discussion, if he wins, it's an argument :)

More baby photos because YOU LOVE THEM. Admit it!

2011-12-15T09:00:00.000+01:00

Actually I did go out Tuesday night with friends. Unfortunately I am running such a sleep deficit right now I was a bit useless.On the subject of uselessness, I am going to do another cop out entry. Thank goodness we spent 9 months making something photogenic for just these occassions.

Smiling happy people

The Piranha perfecting her Aloof Distant Look for the next cover of Baby Vogue

I fully expect to see this look again when I visit her at her first office job.

Yeah, pretty much sums up life for a 3 mo old I suspect

Can you have enough witty onsies? I think not.

Now if I can just figure out a way to do this at work

2011-12-14T07:30:00.000+01:00

Some of you may know already that I feel there is a decided lack of interpretive dance usage in the modern world. I am always trying to find ways to promote it's further use. What could be better than something that encourages communication AND exercise at the same time? I even tried to get OH and I to exchange vows via interpretive dance*.

Of course I could not NOT then pass on this new amazing discovery. Those who check the Ted.com site will have perhaps already seen this, but for those of you who do not consider this my mitzvah of the day. I can even think of a reader or two who would be qualified to do this next year.

*Sadly this got vetoed.

Weekends and weekends of photos

2011-12-13T07:30:00.000+01:00

Get ready for your eyeballs to run and hide in the back of your head, I have so many photos today. It is a giant spit up photos from the last couple weeks :)

You would look this happy too if you were playing on your new lambskin mat with new rattles

This is my new brilliant, get rich idea: Working Out With A Baby. Just try to follow a baby when they are wriggling their arms and legs like maniacs. Guaranteed to burn off all those holiday calories.

This is the Piranha's first cousin, once removed. Seems a penchant for beer runs in the family.

When the onsie is cute but ever so slightly too small...

The following series of photos is brought to you by Baby Trainers, Inc. "Training babies to do silly human tricks for over 3 months"

"The High Five"

Weekend Roundup

2011-12-12T13:16:00.001+01:00

Despite both of us feeling still very low from disease and sleep deprivation, didn't manage to really slow down this weekend very much.

Friday had what I think can best be classified as breakfast/play date with some ladies from the birthing class. It's great to let the little ones roll around. They won't actually play or engage with each other for a while but it gives us a chance to drink lots of coffee and catch up. The playdate was in suburb/city Amstelveen which required getting on a bus, something I've now done a couple times and luckily does not phase the Piranha anymore. I think I already mentioned first ever work call with baby strapped on, fortunately there was a lot of sleep caught up on Friday from our otherwise sleep-averse child.

Friday evening I flew solo with the kiddo while OH attended his work Xmas party. Things are getting difficult in Europe but apparently there is still money in the budgets for Xmas festivities. It wasn't a late night for him but then 10:30 now counts as a late night in my book.

Saturday saw a great day of triumph. Our good friends O and W moved back to South Africa this fall and left us with "a few movies". Apparently in their dictionary, this means "two gigantic shopping bags of films and television series". Most of them OH had already seen and I am rubbish at watching tv series, so it was decided we needed to get rid of them. Fast forward months later, the bags were still sitting in our closet until this Saturday when we finally got off our buns and took them to the ridiculously close by second-hand shop. We didn't negotiate, we just dumped them all on the desk and hoped they'd take them all off our hands. Which they did - much rejoicing!

Saturday evening we had a babysitter who, for the very first time, didn't have to do very much. The Piranha is sleeping with some consistency from 8 to 12pm, waking up sometimes for her dummy. We parents went out for Tibetan again with friends. Now that we have kids the discussion tends to center around this (or debating how Europe is going to crash next year, fun!). It helps when the friends also have small children as then no one is embarrassed when we are all passing out in our coffee at 10:30.

Sunday was finally a quiet day. We are not getting a ton of sleep yet as the Piranha is still not feeling 100% and oh goody, seems to be having another growth spurt. Seriously I think it'd be easier to mark the times she is not having one, they happen so frequently. She was not sleeping well so I strapped her on and walked around the park until she passed out. This is classic textbook no no according to all the baby manuals but then were probably written by bright-eyed experts getting 8 hours of sleep each night.

Modern Working Mama

2011-12-09T15:13:00.001+01:00

Have been so tired from being ill and normal sleep deprivation that comes with a baby that I was actually feeling light headed last night! Luckily the fates were smiling on us and the Piranha obligingly slept over 5 hours for her first stretch! Feeling much better today on my mama day but still trying to take it easy.

Unfortunately that still meant taking a work conference call this afternoon. First call as a mommy from home! The Piranha slept through the whole thing, thank goodness, though I still had to mute the line a couple times because of a fun, hacking cough that has been lingering from this cold (anyone know a remedy for itchy throat coughs, feel free to share!). I did get a big kick out of having a baby strapped to me while we talked about internet protocol and decimals.

Sinterklaas with Kiddos

2011-12-08T13:11:00.000+01:00

Well we can't let this week close without talking a little about Sinterklaas. This is celebrated the 5th of December here. Kids put shoes out and Sitnerklaas (NOT fatty Santaclause) comes on a white horse and leaves presents, aided by his highly racist-imagery helpers, the Zwarte Pieten. I've written about this before in the past but this year we have a kiddo and turns out the Sint came to the creche to give all the munchkins gifts. A friend (thank you M!) was there to capture the event and kindly sent us some photos. I don't think words have really effectively conveyed how Totally Wrong On All Levels the Zwarte Piete tradition is, so here is a photo to show you exactly what it's about. I heard recently of what seems to me to be a really good compromise, which would be to have Pieten of many different colors, like a rainbow. This respects the tradition I think while removing the odd need to have Minstrel black-face stereotype promoted.

The Piranha with a Zwarte Piet. Although I am really not in favor of this, I admit I cannot WAIT to show this photo to her when she is old enough to be embarrassed.

Well, the Piranha is at least curious about Zwarte Piet but I don't think this means she approves of it!

As always, a link to my favorite way to describe the holiday, a reading of a short story by David Sedaris:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NYdpte1W0vk&feature=related

Flying With Baby Post Mortem (warning - ridiculously long & detailed entry)

2011-12-07T12:18:00.001+01:00

Whew! We are having our first bout of family disease. Both the Piranha and I got sniffles and then full blown colds over the weekend, leading to some very fun evenings. In my life experience there is no effective remedy for the symptom of a stuffy nose, except a very hard-core nose spray which you can only use a few days and certainly isn't meant for babies. So we had a tough time soothing the Piranha when she woke up unable to breath at night. I suppose this is a rite of passage all parent go through (probably many times, unfortunately for us).

Anyways, I am grateful (sooo grateful) that the Piranha and I were not feeling this terrible over our weekend of travel! As of course this entry is to record is painful details our very first time Traveling With Baby. TWB is almost up there with sleep loss in the spectrum of Things Parents Dread. Like sleep deprivation, we found it's something you do you best to prepare for and then simply learn to cope with it when it happens.

First step was to a) Not Fly Easy Jet. OH sort of on habit was looking there initially for flights since they are indeed less expensive but I more or less vetoed this (to be fair, we discussed and agreed it would be tempting the fates to fly a discount airliner for our first flight with an infant. We then tried to find flights that did not coincide with known fussing times, but were only successful here with the departure. We were exceptionally fortunate in that OH's sister picked us up directly from Gatwick London airport, meaning we didn't need to plan for trains, rental cars, or public transit.

Second step is to b) pack every imaginable provision necessary. Since my mama day is Fridays I was able to do this ahead of time. What do you pack for a 40 minute flight?

- half a package nappies (okay a bit overkill maybe)
- two extra outfits for you, baby, and partner in case of multiple spit-ups
- toys galore
- bottle and formula for what you hope is enough for three days in case of sudden unexpected breast failure (water you have to buy on the other side of security of course)
- Extra sleep sack in case of evening spit-ups
- Extra hats in case you lose one en transit

OH only had time to pack that morning and this was a bit stressful, given we also needed to feed the Piranha one last time before we left. Lesson learned: pack ahead of time for peace of mind. Pack so that all your important items (extra clothes, the liquids in separate bag for carry on, passports & documents, etc) are quick to hand. We took a taxi to Schiphol airport in the morning, arriving about 1,5 hours before our flight. We got boarding passes and thought we had time to grab some coffee and food before our flight, but neglected to factor in the fact that we have to take turns. Lesson learned: bring food if you can, don't count on coffee. Another lesson learned? The Piranha needs her UK passport stat. Turns out when she travels on her US passport she needs a residency card! So she is officially visiting the Netherlands for the next couple months... need to get on that ASAP.

Because of breakfast snaffoo, we were the last on the plane! This is a major change for me because I am one of those folks who is crazed about getting on as soon as possible to ensure room in the overhead compartment. Now that we have kiddos however, I am resigning myself to a new order of thing, wherein actually it is best to board as late as possible. If needs be I think we could send one of the adults ahead with all the luggage if we think it's an issue while the other hangs out with the kiddo. This is also where we found out that the car seat needed to be checked as luggage. Everywhere online had said we should check it at the gate but evidently this is not always the case. We were lucky in that the flight was not full so they had room to store it on the plane. Lesson learned: be prepared to have to wait for car seat with checked luggage even if we don't have any checked luggage ourselves. We had the Piranha in the wrap, so of course she fell asleep just before boarding the plane. This is when we learned babies have to be facing forward during take off and landing, which was a shame because we had her facing inwards to sleep. Luckily she didn't fuss too much when we took her out.

ON THE PLANE. This is the moment we all dread, especially because your munchkin always sounds much louder to you than anyone else. And both OH and I have traveled enough that we've been on the other side of the Screaming Baby in the Plane. I was desperate to prevent it from happening but the funny thing is, you don't really get to decide that. The worst part of the trip for babies is the ascent and descent as this causes their sensitive ears to plug up painfully. This means you need to be ensuring baby is sucking during these times because it is soothing, helps prevent plugged ears, and gives the baby something to do during a strange experience. Fortunately the timing worked out and the Piranha didn't even peep during take off! Hurrah for boobies indeed. Another lesson learned: max out baby cuteness points for increased sympathy. I had planned to change the Piranha before we left, as she went to sleep still wearing her prize-winning holiday outfit. Unfortunately we ran out of time so she was looking a bit over-enthusiastically festive given we were flying on the 2nd of December. Apparently it's okay for babies to break out the festive wear as early as they like and people will still find it ridiculously cute, as we got tons of attention and praise for her attire.

The flight itself was very short, she was happy most of the time though we were unable to persuade her to hold off on booby #2 (trying to save it for the descent). However she was still happy to munch on the descent and only peeped a tiny bit. If you can manage to get a window seat, this is good for mama nursing without flashing the rest of the plane. Huge success!

On the return flight, nothing special to report on check-in, other than it proceeded smoothly. The Piranha was not to be dissuaded from having a meal before we boarded the plane, so we knew to prepare a bottle as soon as we boarded (again we were lucky and there was room to store the car seat on the plane rather than check it as luggage). We were not the last to board but not the first. She fell asleep (again!) just as we were boarding so we knew we'd have to take her out of the wrap. We were also flying during prime fussing hour, around her bedtime, so we were expecting more complaints from the 3 mo and under set. Already on the tarmac she started to fuss and we had to start nursing her then, though I was anxious to try to really wait until we started to take off. Fortunately it turns out she was happy to be on the booby even if she wasn't really eating. She did cry a bit during the flight, probably a combination of sleepiness, hunger, and discomfort but between OH and I we quieted her down. The bottle came in very good stead since we weren't able to time nursing-hunger-flight ascent/descent. We could feed her the bottle and still "save" the booby for the descent.

In sum I would say being over-prepared with formula, nappies, and clothes was a good thing. I would also take an extra dummy/pacifier for peace of mind. We didn't take a buggy and we did not miss it but ONLY because OH's sister very luckily had a travel cot for her to sleep in. We had planned on her co-sleeping with us but she started rolling two days before we left, and it had not occurred to either of us that of course she'd be in bed hours before we would and oh yes, what about naps? So bedding for baby is something we need to think about in the future. Also I would absolutely recommend from this experience for all mamas to try to stay with breastfeeding, even a little, because in this case it was sort of the nuclear option for calming her down. We shall see if it is the same for when we fly to the US in a couple weeks.

Everyone Sick

2011-12-06T14:00:00.001+01:00

Well this is fun! I am sick, OH is sick, baby is sick. More (maybe) later

Weekend Roundup

2011-12-05T13:04:00.001+01:00

We had a great weekend, full of challenges and learning.

As always I begin with Friday since that is my mama day. The Piranha and I took advantage of another unbelievably nice day (not raining AND some sun!) to frantically get errands done. We needed to buy food for the week ahead, meet a friend for coffee, and get presents for a party game at a party that evening. Oh, and pack for our FIRST FLIGHT WITH BABY.

Friday night we had a lovely evening at a friend's party for all the folks in our birthing class. It was really nice because of course everyone had small babies so there was no problem with bringing the babas or tending to them as necessary. In particular we were quite proud of the fact that the Piranha won most festively dressed baby, mainly by the fact that she was the only one festively dressed. We would have liked to have stayed longer but we were leaving the next morning for a flying visit to the UK to show the baby to OH's family.

More on the trip tomorrow in horrific detail, for now I will simply say that it went well. We were picked up from the airport by OH's sister J, who is a wonderfully gracious hostess. She and her hubby have a beautiful house in the countryside. We always have a wonderfully relaxing time eating very well (pudding - dessert - with every meal!) going for long walks with Wellies (the country around here is almost always very wet and muddy), visiting with family, and generally not doing terribly much more than this. OH was able to show off our scion to his mum and another sister for the first time to great effect. The Piranha is living up to the developmental expectations for the 3-4 month old child, getting more and more cute, interactive, and delightful for other people. She was spoiled rotten with many gifts and returned the favor by waving her arms and legs vigorously and even rolling over a couple times.

Sunday was more of the same on Saturday with the flight at the end of the day instead of the beginning. We learned a LOT from what is something like a dry run for out big flight in a couple weeks to the US. As earlier mentioned, that gets a post all its own. In this one I just want to celebrate good friends and family, and what a joy it is to be able to see them. OH and I are especially appreciative of the time we get with both, living in a foreign country where sometimes the visits are not so obvious.

Ghosts and Milestones

2011-12-02T10:33:00.001+01:00

OH warned me that we'd be living with a ghost cat for a while. It's true - I keep looking up when I hear a scratch or klink on the floor, thinking it is the cat's toenails tapping in the hallway. I still look before I sit on our couch to ensure the black throw pillow is not a cat. I put down glasses on tables, feeling strangely sad that I don't have to worry about a cat sticking her paw into it to drink during the night. I am still putting the toilet seat down (the cat was obsessed with standing water of any kind) and closing the shower door religiously after every use. I can leave the front door open and no one will get out except those who intended to. And yet I don't feel freed from no longer having to adapt my lifestyle, I feel strangely empty and saddened that everything returns to a norm again.

But life goes on! The Piranha is 15 weeks today (that's just over 3 months). This week she decided she would roll over. This is one of those Big Baby Development Milestones you are supposed to fret about continuously check parent forums to make sure your kiddo is normal*. What surprises me is how little is said about what else you can tell about your child when they pass this physical developmental phase. When our daughter decided to roll over, it was not a peaceable event. The Piranha is a "spirited child" as I've started calling her, nothing is done half-ass. If you had seen the drama! Babies tend to get stuck by either their big ole noggins or their arms - these body parts have to be conquered before you can achieve that ultimate of 3 mo old status symbols: rolling over. There were tears and streams as she lay on her side, left arm standing in the way of what the rest of her clearly wanted. She seemed so distressed I thought something must be wrong with her but OH told me to wait a moment. Lo and behold, she got herself over the arm and from back to tummy. The look on her face was part self-satisfaction, part "well it's about time, damn it". This kid does not give up. She may make the biggest stink about it along the way but she is going to get what she wants. Makes me slightly nervous for when she gets older.

*OH is continuously worrying about the fact that she hasn't said any consonants yet, for example.

A Puss by any other name

2011-12-01T08:24:00.000+01:00

The cat came with the name Haley but seeing as I only ever had one cat, it seemed a bit extraneous to then name her on top of that. She was first and foremost known as The Cat, but in the way you would say the Bishop or the President, with honor. As a result when we asked people to cat-sit, we'd forget to tell them she had a name and so they would give her names themselves: Porkchop, Palla di Lardo, Kitso, Cleo. She was a fat kitty, with activity being a rare enough event that when people reported back that she had been very playful we were skeptical to say the least.

Sadly, Haley cat's days came to an end yesterday, after 13 years of life, 9 of them with me. We'd noticed in February she had a strange limp, which went away and was pronounced arthritis by the vet. Later in July we realized she'd been losing weight and her back legs went out on her briefly again. Then got a bit distracted with the birth of our daughter. The cat continued to lose weight to the point where we were concerned and OH took her to the vet to find that her kidneys felt strange. Last week we took her in for a scan of her heart and kidneys. The left kidney had two big fat tumors. The heart had a build up of muscle which can be bad or benign, and is common in older kitties. When they took a sample of the tumors to see if they were malignant or not, it sent the cat into catatonic shot. She stayed on a drip at the vet and then the pet hospital for two days before her heart rate and body temperature were stable. We brought her home, found out the tumors were not malignant, and debated what to do. We could do a surgery to remove the bad kidney but the tests indicated the other kidney wasn't working at 100%. She was also very weak and it wasn't sure her heart could take the surgery.

Well, Tuesday was OH's daddy day and when I came home he remarked that he hadn't seen the cat at all that day. We assumed she was hiding under the bed. Later that evening just before bedtime she came out from hiding and we saw the poor thing was paralyzed from the middle of her back down. I don't know how much pain she was feeling but it was clear she was very unhappy. We made her as comfortable as possible on a warm blanket next to food and the next day called the vet.

I have to say we have had a very positive experience with our vet. They have been very kind throughout the whole ordeal, trying to give unbiased advice and information at each step while doing their best to not color our decisions as we tried to decide to battle or throw in the towel. But this time we knew the decision had been made for us. I suppose most of you already picked up on the past tense I've been using in this post.

Yesterday the vet came to our house to administer a bit of morphine and then the final shot that put Haley cat to sleep for good. The paralysis was caused by thrombosis which was certainly related to her heart abnormality. I really appreciated that she spent her last week at home, in as much familiarity and comfort as possible. She was an excellent cat in all respects, put up with an enormous amount of crap from me while I moved her all over the western hemisphere. She was one of these pets with whom it was very easy to get along: soft, fluffy, fat, and self-sufficient but still affectionate. She had a good run and I'm proud that she decided to go out with a bang. If you're going to succumb to illness in old age, go for broke, let your whole body give out at once.

Give your pet a snuggle today for Haley.

T-day

2011-11-30T09:21:00.000+01:00

First some sappy: A week late I know, but we can still give thanks right? This year's celebrations opened my eye to just how different our lives are now that we have reproduced. As mentioned already, we celebrated T day with friends and LOTS of kids. My reaction was completely different from any other adult encounter I've had with kiddos. Now that I have one of my own, I look at older kids and see the Piranha perhaps in a few years. I have a lot to discuss with parents and it feels a lot less superficial. Not that I didn't try to engage and emphasize with parents and kids before! But I see how far I was from really understanding now. In particular I am now looking even more forward to seeing my sisters and their families in December when we'll go back to the Land of Enchantment. I hope to connect, admire, and appreciate what they've been going through for years now in a way maybe I didn't before.

Anywho, now for what y'all really came for - pictures of the life exotic that is T-day in Nederland!

Baby squeezes, 1 EUR a pop

The other hit of the evening, big-ass honking appeltaart

Yeah, let's get a closer shot of that monster. Don't get caught in a dark alley with this dessert!

The other monster. Yes, I will force my children to wear silly holiday outfits until they are old enough to run away

Babies are a big hit. Next time you want to be the life of the party I suggest you bring one.

The Piranha also partook of that other American tradition of Thanksgiving: lounging in front of the TV.

Eftaling Revisited, at least a post revisiting it, or whatever.

2011-11-29T15:06:00.001+01:00

First by popular demand the appeltart recipe. It's in Dutch, um, maybe not a total surprise given the nature of the beast.

Now, photos from the Eftaling - finally!

This basically captures our shared feelings about using a buggy. Parents and child felt a bit odd after only using a wrap for so long. Seems like the child is so far away!

This is an example of the animatronics that bring to life the Grimm fairy tales. There is a placard that tells the story and noises and sounds effects that happen when you do certain things

Mom: delighted! Baby: waiting to be impressed

View of the Eftaling logo from the high spinning ride thing

This passes as a family shot these days (spinning pagoda thing in background) I do wonder if we will ever get any shots of the three of us with the Piranha's face.

These are hilarious. They are all over the park, stylized garbage cans and they all say "Papier hier!" repeatedly.

Weekend Roundup!

2011-11-28T12:41:00.001+01:00

I celebrate Thanksgiving even though I haven't lived in the US in a few years now, just a little later. I have been very lucky that every year we've managed to organize something or have friends organize something.

Friday was my mama day. I have to say it is still such a pleasure I look forward to all week, the day I get to spend with my daughter. Even though she is a "difficult child". Thanks to all those lovely hormones for reprogramming my! I met with a couple of the ladies from my birthing class for lunch. It is really lovely to keep in touch with them. We compare parenting notes, trade tips, and generally gripe or marvel about various baby-related thing. Especially since we all have munchkins of the same age it is really nice to feel comfortable talking about things you are experiencing that are sure to bore the tears out of anyone else. The rest of the day was spent prepping food for Thanksgiving in Amsterdam, which always takes place a few days after since obviously we don't get Thursday off here. We were going to a big shin dig in the outskirts of town with lots of other families so we only needed to make a dish with enough for 10 even though many more folks were coming. I made macaroni and cheese and most exciting of all, a proper Dutch Apple Tart. More on the latter in a bit. Mac n Cheese is a nice one because it's basically bechamel sauce with cheese and noodles. You don't really need a recipe and you can double it for those many evenings when you can't remember the last time you slept more than 3 hours straight and can't think consequently straight enough to prepare a meal.

Saturday was assemble apple tart. Dutch apple tart is awesome. It is basically a really tall, cake-height sweet pie crust with sliced apples baked inside. It's much less sweet than an American pie, does not always have a top crust, and is best with ice cream or whip cream. I'd never dared to make one but this one was not only easy but as good as anything I've had out at a cafe. It's nice to feel empowered that I can make something at home that is so good and best of all, doesn't really require a lot of ingredients (except a butt ton of apples, 1.5 kg!) that you won't usually have lying around the kitchen anyways. We managed to transport Piranha, selves, two mac'n'cheeses, and the pie an hour across town via public transit without any casualties. I think there were something like 60 folks at the open house, a third of which were kids of all ages. It was a bash! We did Thanksgiving proud, stuffed ourselves silly, and waddled home at a respectable hour for parents of a wee one I would say.

Now that we have procreated, I find I see anything family-related with totally different eyes. It is humbling to know just how little I really understood about the experience of raising a family before, but also exciting to look forward to experiencing it at all its different stages in the future. That made Thanksgiving that much more enjoyable. In particular it has made me look with even more anticipation forward to Xmas this year. This year the US is up, and we'll have the pleasure of seeing both my sisters and their families. I am really looking forward to appreciating their lives and experiences that much more. Perhaps I will finally remember all my nieces and nephews' ages (sad I know).

Sunday started very early when the Piranha threw up all over OH at the 3am feeding. Snuggly hand-made grandma sleep sack, I'm afraid, was a victim of the events. Two hours and a fresh sleep sack later, she threw up again, this time in a perfect arc that made it over her bassinet and splattering onto me. Fortunately that was the end of it, and in the dichotomy that is Sick Infants, she was in a great mood all day after that. Well most of the day! We met up with friends for coffee and walking to round off a pretty nice weekend. Photos to come! I still need to post pictures from the Eftaling...

Naps: the Final Frontier

2011-11-25T14:41:00.000+01:00

Since you are all probably comatose or shopping from yesterday, I thought I'd keep the subject light. Our child is not sold on naps. I know as adults this is difficult to imagine (who doesn't love a nap?) but the Piranha has inherited her mama's total inability to sleep effectively during the day. However, she is three months old, so we are going to have to insist on it. Sleep at all times of the day, therefore, is our priority.

The Piranha is old enough now to not need to be swaddled to sleep at night. This means we've been using Grandma's handmade, super snuggly sleep sack to great success. It's not quite as snuggly as cuddles from Grandma but it's a good second place.

Our strange child is a morning person, generally she is very happy at 6am when most sensible people are not

OH is not suffocating our child, this is a technique whereby you cover their eyes so they can stop being overstimulated. It works at least for getting her down initially.

Rocking and looking like she is trying to suffocate herself (it's a theme) are also a hit

Ah, I am probably writing a blog entry here. Oh and this is technically "day", at around 5pm in the Netherlands.

When the child falls asleep during the day in the wrap, our recommendation: just leave it on, hat and all, and get on with your day

Happy Thanksgiving Y'all

2011-11-24T21:13:00.001+01:00

I have been here so long I just tried to call two businesses in the US and was wondering why no one was picking up!

I am thankful for:

- having met my wonderful husband, who has turned out to be a wonderful parent, who is also my best friend
- our little Piranha, who has enriched our lives so much
- my family who is so far away yet so close
- my friends all over the place, whom I wish I could all have with me all the time
- living in the times we do. Sure they are complicated but I am ever so grateful, every single day, for the hot water that magically jets out of my shower without fail (sometimes with a bit of difficulty but it always comes out eventually) every morning. Add to that list: indoor heating, refrigerators, modern medicine, emancipation and opportunities in all roles for all genders, living in Europe, being born in the US, etc etc etc.

Weekend Roundup - finally!

2011-11-23T13:00:00.000+01:00

Weekends are still sort of three days for me since my mama day is on Friday. It was a little sad because of course this was the first Friday with baby but without OH. I think if we could afford anything, it would be an extra day together on top of the mama and daddy day that we both individually take. Any benevolent, rich folk out there who'd like to subsidize an extra day of lost income for us, don't be shy!Friday was really nice, especially because I looked forward being with the Piranha all week basically (sad, I know). Even when she had a melt down and was arching & screaming in my arms, all I could think was how much I'd missed it! We did a bit of shopping in the morning, then met up with friends for a walk and coffee in the afternoon. That night the Piranha obliged by actually falling asleep quite quickly and as a result I was able to prepare a kick ass meal with tofu. Marinading is the mama of infants' best friend.Saturday was a big day. BIG day. We have been planning for ages to go to one of the Netherland's biggest amusement parks, the Efteling, for years. We finally managed this year. It was our second Driving Trip With Child and I think we did quite well. We borrowed a buggy from a friend for the day since we imagined it might be tough to carry her in the wrap that whole time and also to try out buggy ownership (more on this later).

If you live in the Netherlands, I absolutely recommend going to Eftaling, in particular the new "Winter Eftaling", since the park was until recently only open for the summer. Try to go on one of those rare sunny days because the park is set on a nature preserve. There is something for everyone: adults & young folks for the rides, scenery for those of us with tiny kiddos, and of course lots of tot-sized attractions for families with older kids. The park is themed around old fairy tales, specifically the Grimm fairy tales. The original park was all the stories recreated with animatronics. Those who lived in Columbia, MD back in the day will recall the Enchanted Forest - think of that on steroids. We had a ton of fun and the Piranha was very well behaved. We ended up carrying her in the wrap most of the day anyways! The buggy was nice for carrying our bags and eventually allowed us to go on one of the roller coasters while a friend minded her. One roller coaster is about all I can handle these days so it was plenty for me.

Sunday started off normally. OH woke up complaining of a bit of a stomach ache, which seemed to be expected given that we had eaten a 100% diet of fried fair food the day before. I did some provisions shopping and by the time I came back he was looking much worse. I took the Piranha out for a walk and by the afternoon when we came back the lights were all out in the flat. OH was curled up in bed with a fever. Fortunately we already religiously wash our hands these days thanks to poopy nappies, but I upped the vigilance and immediately set a ban on OH/Piranha contact. Usually OH has a bit of spirit in him when he gets ill (he hates being sick) but he was so out of it that he slept the whole afternoon and evening, poor thing! As I am writing this well after the event, I am happy to report that it was an intense but temporary 24 bug and he is feeling much better, although a lot of the symptoms seems to be lingering annoyingly on in a much weaker form.

Anyways, an eventful weekend to say the least! Here are photos from actually last weekend, better late then never right? I'll post more photos from this weekend... uh, eventually.

This picture makes me thing our friend M and the Piranha are doing some kind of story-telling dance from a musical like Grease. I have no idea why.

Thanks much to Auntie H for the super cozy, super warm baby snow suit. The Piranha is still way too small for it but we're using it anyways, just making sure to hold her up so she doesn't drown in it!

This drives me nuts. How is it possible our child looks SO MUCH LIKE HER FATHER? Where are you, lazy mommy-given genes? Why don't you express yourselves??

Latest favorite toy is this psychedelic cat toy. All baby toys look like they were designed after the Electric Kool Aide Acid Test.

The Piranha and her friend J, 4 weeks younger, from our birthing class. As you can see, J was a big fella when he arrived and he's not slowed down since!

Size however, is no match for the power of the Electric Baby Swing. Seriously, if you get one frivolous piece of baby equipment, get one of these things. Try to test the baby out first, but most of them are completely enraptured by it. J was laughing and smiling after the initial shock and awe wore off.

The Tides of Stupidity

2011-11-22T17:27:00.001+01:00

This is a lighthearted, late entry, though in fact there is a bit of turmoil going on in our lives at home. More on that later when I know definitively what is happening. I swear I will post a weekend round up sometime this week. We did actually have a nice weekend, for at least half of it.

Instead I bring you another gem of insight into life as it is for new baby parents. The last couple evenings, despite best efforts, have been long and sleepless. The Piranha seems to be going through a phase of wanting to eat more at night, while her parents are going through a phase of desperately trying to convince her she isn't. The books all say she is physically capable of sleeping 5-6 hour stretches without needing food. Evidently she is not reading the same books as us. This combined with OH being down and out a couple days has meant double night duty for me. The result is that I am borderline loopy some moments of the day from cumulative. Granted there are parents who put up with a lot worse interruptions - to them I tip my hat, I don't know how they do it!

This results in periods when I am, well, not as bright as I usually might be on a full night's sleep. I can feel myself getting stupider, like the tide coming and going on a beach of mental capacity. Coffee can't stop the tide indefinitely, but it mitigates the effects. I feel it especially at work when I've gone at least three times to the office kitchen and each time forgotten why it was I went until I get back to my desk.

Weekend Good Until Everyone Got Sick

2011-11-21T09:43:00.000+01:00

Well I had about half the weekend round up written before OH came down with a sudden and unpleasant flu. Baby is still fine, thank goodness. We are hoping it's one of these diseases the child brings from the creche without succumbing to it herself. Sadly this has meant a hold on a lot of other activities including expansive blog writing. On top of this our poor old cat is in a very bad way. It happened just when our little Piranha arrived so we were distracted for a few critical months during which she lost quite a bit of weight.

It's a bag of fun negative emotions: feeling guilt that we didn't notice it earlier, worrying of course for the cat's health, but also a bit of frustration as we had noticed she'd lost some weight earlier this year and had a bit of testing done. Nothing came up then, which was just before the new family addition arrived, so I think this was in our minds some license not to worry to much about it. So now tomorrow after just a week back on the job we're already dealing with the fun of family sickness. I thought it'd at least take a month! The cat gets some scans of kidneys and heart, OH fortunately just needs to stay home, drink lots of fluids, and not touch the baby.

3 months never felt so long

2011-11-18T10:37:00.001+01:00

Well officially the Piranha is not quite three months. Or she is, depending on if you're counting weeks or months. Anyways I feel I have to record how far we've come. In the very first weeks it was so intense as to be painful. You feel so much for this very helpless little person, and let's face it, it's your fault they are feeling miserable (transition from womb to world is not the gentlest one). Up until about week 6-7 it was very hard. I was grateful to have my patient, experienced, caring mother in town for a long time to help us muscle through some of that time.

During that period it is really difficult to hear people tell you that it is all going to be easier. It really, really doesn't feel that way in the beginning. And then suddenly one morning you wake up and realize three months have gone by. Your evenings are not dominated by a three hour long session of fussing. Your evenings are (sloooowly) going back to more sleep and less baby maintenance. Your little one is doing incredible things, is finally accepting that this world isn't so bad and there is lots to go and experience. It's a good feeling. It's an incredible learning curve for all of you - parents and munchkin.

Anyways, blah blah blah. These days I try to focus on baby stuff. If I look anywhere else in Europe things look continually grim. The dominoes are slowly falling (Italy, Spain, France... who's next?), the pain is starting to be felt in the Netherlands as well, albeit very slowly. Unemployment is slowly creeping up, the government is cutting spending, and our real estate market may finally burst.

Hrm wait, did I just say the baby sees this is not such a bad world after all...?

First week survived!

2011-11-17T13:02:00.001+01:00

Granted I'm celebrating a bit prematurely as it is only Thursday afternoon and I feel like collapsing already, but so far so good! What can I report? A roller coaster of emotions for sure (no doubt the extra high hormones that sit around a year in your body after giving birth are not helping here). First day was great, it was nice to see everyone again, discover I hadn't forgotten all of my Dutch (thank you Dutch news radio), and dust the cobwebs off the "work stuff" part of my brain that's been on old for the last four months. I will be honest: I couldn't stop thinking about the Piranha all day and left embarrassingly early to make sure I was not late to pick her up from her first full day at the creche. She was fine, I was fine, at least in body.

Second day was a bit less so. Luckily Tuesday are OH's daddy day so I was heartened to know that the Piranha was with him at home at least. I still rushed home and held the Piranha basically until she started protesting, something I think may become a pattern if I'm not careful.

Third day was the toughest. I was tired, my brain was tired. I felt as rusty as I am at work, making lots of beginner's mistakes and feeling very down about how nothing had changed. Of course - it feels the most poignant when you have changed a great deal. The Piranha must have felt my mood and taken pity on her parents, because she only woke once that night. Seven whole glorious hours of sleep (with one small interruption). Is there anything more sweet than sleep in the first few years of your child's life? Sure it was a one-off but still greatly appreciated!

Today is my new Friday and I think I'm coming down with a cold. I feel tired but that's to be expected. I feel better about things in general and in fact even the fat mist is not bringing me down. Part of this is a bit of schadenfreude, as work is hosting a big event with lots of folks who had to fly in. Isn't it a lovely feeling, on a wretched day, to know you don't have to travel? But also people are cheerful as there are snacks for us all leftover from the event and I have made my peace with the way things are. I am lucky to live in a country where it's normal for me tomorrow to be home with my munchkin, where I don't have to worry about getting fired to take this privilege.

Aquatic Evolution

2011-11-15T21:27:00.001+01:00

Yesterday after OH had his first daddy day flying solo with the Piranha, he looked up at me after dinner and asked if I had ever thought of way back when, when the Piranha was still Squidette? I can't believe I never made the aquatic connection. I blame it on sleep deprivation.

Sorry it's short today - despite predictions, work is in fact just as nuts as it was when I left. Plus ca change, plus c'est la meme chose. This combined with our new rocking bedtime of 9:30 means there is not a lot of time for the ole recreational internetting.

Weekend Roundup

2011-11-15T07:30:00.000+01:00

Right, weekend roundup! Now that it's been a day or so already, you will be lucky if I remember anything we actually did to enjoy my last weekend on maternity leave. Le sigh, I miss having the Piranha with me already.

I need to properly start with Thursday, my last day proper on maternity leave since I will have Fridays as my "mama dag", mom day free with the little one. I had a perfect day with lots of sun, friends, walking, and above all, basically not letting go of the Piranha for a minute longer than necessary.

Friday we had one mission: first pro photo shoot for Family Photos. Can't say enough good things about our experience. We had to go out to a suburb/town, but the photographer picked us up from the train station. He works out of his home, but he knows how to shoot babies, and has a set routine of shots which he moves effortlessly through. This sounds possibly dull, but with a tiny baby your time is quite limited and in this way you maximize the potential for photos actually turning out before there is a meltdown. He was kind enough to give us few small versions to enjoy and share (read: publicity) so I'll throw a shout out here as required to Rudi Wells Photography. I understand I am a terrible person if I don't send Xmas cards now that we have procreated, so look for some of these shots on a card near you soon, if I can be asked.

Couldn't have this on my work desktop because I'd cry every time I looked at it

This is one of our favorites - our specially trained elite Attack Baby!

I like how she is already starting to look aloof, and she's not even a preteen yet!

Saturday we went for a big food shop, something we have not had to do while I was on maternity leave and able to go out every day to pick up things. Ah, new routines to get used to! Sunday we had a really nice time visiting with many friends and we had some new friends from our birth class come round to say hello and test out our Magical Baby Soothing Swing. Motorized swings: get one, love it, save your arms. Their little boy is a few weeks younger than the Piranha but he positively swooned in the swing. I have never heard laughter from such a tiny infant - only 8 weeks! At the same time, I felt some vindication in seeing that their child too resisted with all his strength the lulling effects of the swing. They just don't want to sleep at this age (or ever?) when every day brings new mental and physical capabilities.

Back to the Grind

2011-11-14T10:20:00.001+01:00

I'll post a weekend round up here eventually but today is my first day back at the job! So far so good. OH and I had a fun evening of listening to acoustic snorting by our congested child most of the evening. This combined with one of these big growth spurts (they do seem to happen every couple weeks!) meant I got a generous 4 hours of sleep. Luckily I had a feeling something like this would happen, since I had seen that the week I went back to work coincided with one of these massive development leaps, and hadn't really counted on very much sleep this week anyways. I had not foreseen she'd be a little congested. Babies are loud sleepers on the best of days but now she is like a train wreck in her basket to the bed.But what a surprise when I came back to find not one, not two, but THREE ladies in our office are now pregnant! The office fully staffed stands at 22 folks, and several of those are sales who only come in the office every so many weeks. I actually found out about the third gal when I jokingly asked her this morning, "so are you pregnant yet?" as she'd just gotten married and had not made a secret of her plans. I did not expect her to respond with "three months!".I feel like a true trend setter.And now to go back to the thousand + emails left...

Is it still Veterans Day?

2011-11-11T11:22:00.001+01:00

Crap! I think I can be forgiven for being a little late given I live where it's celebrated at a dif time of the year. Hat's off to all the rank and file who did/do the dirty work, the small but necessary work, the tedious and the deadly work deemed required to keep our nation-states secure. You may not agree with why or what was done, but Nation-states have done well in protecting our comfort and standard of living. I still think they're worth keeping around, and that takes brave folks, sometimes willing to do what they are told whether it's right or wrong. My thanks to you all, it means a bit more this year now that we have a little one who needs to inherit it too.

Starting off in the hole

2011-11-10T09:14:00.000+01:00

Yesterday we received the hospital bill for the Piranha's birth. I say we but actually it was addressed to her. In fact, I think it's the first piece of mail she has personally received. Looks like my daughter owes St Lucas Andreas Ziekenhuis about 2 grand! Not even three months old and she's already in debt - that must be the American in her.

How Beautiful to Be Sad (warning - sappy entry)

2011-11-09T11:16:00.003+01:00

Tomorrow is the last day of my maternity leave. I was feeling okay with everything up until this morning, when I was surprised to hear that her first full day of creche is actually supposed to start tomorrow. That set the waterworks off I'm afraid. I had somehow in my mind that it would be next Monday. I am going to be a bad person and keep that last day to myself however. I don't imagine I'm the first parent to do this.

But it's also caused me to reflect. How amazing has this first dawn of parenthood been? It feels to have gone by both slowly and quickly at the same time. Like marriage, it's turned me into one of those annoying people trying to tell everyone else to be like me and try it themselves. I understand it's not that easy, like starting salsa classes or trying a new restaurant, but I can't help myself, I have found them to be so rewarding. There are a lot of life experiences about which people will tell you that you have to live it to truly understand it. Logically you can read a book, talk to someone who's been through it, and study all you like, but for whatever reason, you really, really can't understand it until you've done it yourself. Parenthood has been one of these experiences for me.

So today I am ruining my mascara thinking about my little Piranha and how already we have come so quickly to the first stage of many of separation. It's not fun to feel so sad but on the other hand I would be even more sad to have never known I could feel this way. I console myself in knowing that lots of wonderful things await us in the future, along with many other heartbreaking moments as they grow. Isn't life fun the way it saves these surprises for us as we get older?

I think the Piranha is going to be very social when she gets older. Already it often looks like she's conversing with her baby toys.

Another good example. Can't help but think she is trying to network or sell something here. My little capitalist!

Sneak Preview - Baby Fashion Week Winter Collection

2011-11-08T09:12:00.000+01:00

The question on everyone's mind, what are babies going to be wearing on the ~~catwalk~~ changing table this winter 2011 season? AinA has an exclusive sneak peak at the trends you can see in-the-know 3-6 month set old sporting.

The sponsored look (thanks work!)

Patriot Proud Look - this is also the only onsie we have purchased to date (thank you to all our friends for having baby girls last year!)

The Literary Look

The Pink Gangsta Look. Wish we had a baby over-sized bling gold chain.

The Sponsored Look 2 (thanks OH's work)

You'll notice they're all short sleeved. It is getting cold here, but it has been unseasonably warm up 'til now. Which is good, as we have a lot of really cute short-sleeve onsies to get through.

Weekend Roundup

2011-11-07T12:59:00.001+01:00

We not only survived but flourished on Friday night! Readers might recall that we were due to go out for the first time in the evening with baby. I was very nervous, OH was non-plussed. We have had the good fortune of at least one of us generally feeling brave about trying new things, often when the other one is not. That means we've been good about pushing ourselves to go out and try to do normal-life things even though we have a demanding baby. The challenge was to go out during prime Baby Fussing Hours and eat dinner in a restaurant. To be fair, we were meeting at the most uber-child friendly establishment I know in Amsterdam, with a private room booked, and we were meeting the other couples from our birthing class who of course all had small babies of their own. But still - the Piranha did not have a complete meltdown, she finally slept in the wrap pretty much around her normal time, and we were able to enjoy the meal very much. We were further encouraged by some of our friends from the class to dare to invite people over to dinner. This means exposing people to prime fussing hours, but we think if we start with folks with kids or going to have kids soon, they may be more understanding. Actually I think all our friends would be pretty understanding but it would be more for us rather than them a bit less stressful if we know for sure the guests understand it's not personal when the Human Siren goes off at 7pm.

Class of Fall 2011, successfully all made babies. Yes our child looks massive in comparison, she was first in the class to graduate.

OH proving the child does actually sleep in the evenings sometimes.

Can you see why everyone says she looks like dad?

Saturday we did not do very much. The weather has been unseasonably warm, and we were able to go for a walk and coffee with good friends V and S. The Piranha was quite fussy (hence the not doing very much) but fortunately the magic of the wrap mostly worked and she was even obliging enough to sit on laps and be cute for a while. We watched a really good documentary in the evening, The Kids Grow Up, about a dude reflecting on children growing up (no obscure references in that title). As with all things these days, I got all teary and had to be restrained from going to wake up the Piranha to give her a cuddle.

V modeling the baby. It's always good to do a test run before you decide to get one yourself

Hopefully there won't be any buyer's remorse

Sunday we tried to try a new place for breakfast with friends C & D but turns out even though they serve a "full English Breakfast" evidently this is something you eat for lunch since they only open at 12pm. We went instead to a pancake place we had been to a while back. These are Dutch pancakes, which are very flat, extra-large crepe like things. You eat them with a kind of molassesy syrup or powdered sugar, and they can be cooked with all sorts of things from cheese and ham to apple and banana. They are super good. This place does nothing but pancakes... and stampot. Longtime readers will recall stampot is Mashed Potato With Stuff In It. Usually with a meatball or sausage on the side. It's a weird dish, and even weirder to be the only non-pancake item served at the joint. Weirder still, the only two other diners who came in while we were there ordered it! Clearly it's a breakfast staple we've been overlooking. Sunday evening our sweet angel child went ballistic extra early. My apologies to friends and family who attempted to call Sunday afternoon/evening - it was a bit of a lost cause I am afraid!

D is evidently something of a baby prodigy. We are thinking of having him come round nightly at about 6pm to work his magic around bedtime.

C and D, getting practice to do this often enough with one of their own soon :)

Um, maybe not so easy

2011-11-04T09:53:00.002+01:00

For a while now I've been describing the Piranha as "normal" in response to the perpetually asked question of "how easy is your child?". Indeed, before I felt like she was not really easy, but not really difficult. However, I have to say now that we've handed her over to other people to care for a couple times, I have to admit, perhaps we are a bit more on the difficult side than easy. The Piranha is what I like to call a "spirited" child, what others might describe as "very fussy". Fussy is the nice way of saying "crying lungs out", by the way. Nor is the difficult time limited to one time of the day, but rather dots the day randomly, culminating in her grand fuss at the end of the day.

Fortunately the good (or bad depending how you see it) thing about kids at this age is that they change all the time. You think you have them all figured out and they will completely change their disposition and schedule on you. There is hope for the future! In the meantime, we are due to take the Piranha out for her first public evening appearance ever, an early dinner with some of the folks from our birthing class. It is in a private room at an uber-kid friendly restaurant on a Friday night when there should be lots of ambient noise to drown out crying baby sounds. But it is right smack in the prime time of the fussing hours for the Piranha. Wish us luck!

Letting go to hold tighter

2011-11-03T09:19:00.000+01:00

Well I survived the first day of creche. Of course the Piranha was totally fine, she slept most of the time. Granted she was only there an hour without us. We are exceptionally lucky it seems in our timing. The creche will have a maximum of 9 babies enrolled. This however, does not mean that all 9 babies are there at the same time. Just as we are only putting the Piranha in for 3 days a week (can I reiterate how happy I am about that decision? So happy, and happy to live in a country where it is an option), many other parents also choose not to have the kiddo there for five days a week at this age. As it turns out, at this exact time there are only a handful of babies enrolled right now. It was a little unclear but the Piranha is the youngest by a year or more (the group goes up to 18 mo, then they switch to an older group). This means she gets effectively one on one time with the care giver on most days. Throughout the rest of this year they will get more babies and be full by January, but it is really nice to know to begin she will have extra attention. In the meantime we will try to train her to charm the pants off everyone so she can get unfair amount of attention after that. Hahah, kidding of course... sort of.

I would be very interested to hear how day care works in other countries. I have no experience with it. Here there is a maximum ratio caregivers:kiddos depending on age, and I think it's something like 1 to 5. This creche offers three groups plus a horizontal and vertical program. First group is babies, 0 to 18 months though they don't take children younger than 8 weeks. Next are toddlers from 18mo to 2.5, and then older kids. I need to double check that, mind, since we've only been focusing on the baby group of course. The horizontal group means the children stay in their age group, a sort of traditional class. The vertical group mixes them, so younger kids play and interact sometimes with older kids. I take it this is more advantageous when the kids are a bit older than our tiny sprout, when they can start watching older children and perhaps learn from them (good things, one hopes!).

In general I imagine I am feeling the absolute universal feeling of all parents in our day and age in the western world at this stage. Sad because I have to share the Piranha and let her grow. Happy to have a bit of time back. Mainly wishing I could somehow do both at once.

On a totally unrelated not, the new layout can go bleepity bleep bleep, seems it had quite a few bugs to sort out. I really try not to complain about stuff that is basically awesome and totally free, but professionally it bothers me when pretty obvious bugs are left in something before a launch. Who knows what the story there was.

:(

2011-11-02T09:15:00.000+01:00

Today is the Piranha's first "wendag" (habituation/adjustment dag) for starting at creche. It's not even two hours and we parents will be there the first 45 minutes or so, but I still find myself a little teary-eyed this morning. I know as well she has to go and my logical brain knows that it has to happen. OH is taking it much better, of course he has had to be back at work for a while now. I do wish they would grant fathers the same rights as mothers when it comes to new baby arrivals. Anyways, as if the Piranha could sense my unhappiness, she did not have the greatest night's sleep last night, so here's hoping the creche doesn't get an extra-fussy baby today.

Now a question for you-all out there. Is anyone having trouble with the new layout for the page? I quite liked the look of it but now that it's been a couple days I've heard from one or two that they are having trouble leaving comments. Is this the case for a lot of you? Also I find the fact that I have to click through a few more times to get to the comments a bit annoying. If it seems like it is a lot of trouble, I will revert back to the older templates that have less bells and whistles but have the nice advantage that they work.

Ah yes, and the latest on the thrush, for those who can't get enough of TMI: doc says the baby is all clear and if I still have it it's not clear. So perhaps it's just general soreness now. If I do have it still though, he said, she would get is straight away. Um, hurrah?

Why aren't more baby toys anatomically correct?

2011-11-01T09:01:00.000+01:00

Sorry, random thought, after noticing that the cow on the Piranha's mobile has a very accurate looking udder. Today we are going back to the doctor because I still have thrush. Seriously!!! Ignore all the books, if you get thrush it lasts FOREVER AND EVER. The baby is usually not annoyed but mom can have serious pain or like me just really annoying pain. Enough whining, here are some pictures to distract:

The Piranha welcomes you to her realm

Head action. I like how it looks like she is being interviewed by a giant flower

Baby survives tummy time

Impossible to imitate that serious expression babies always have

So true

Weekend Round Up

2011-10-31T10:10:00.000+01:00

We had a lovely weekend! Good mix of not doing anything and periods of business. Friday we got a babysitter (we are getting good at this!) and went out to dinner with our friends E and D to thank them for lots of amazing advise and baby stuff they've given us since the Piranha joined us. Saturday was spent doing very little. We went out to the negen straatjes, a little shopping area. I used to go here quite a lot pre-baby but this was the first time with kiddo in tow. Man, I had completely forgotten how busy and crowded it is on a weekend! I had a bit of a panic moment realizing I'd not thought about exit strategies should we have a melt down or need to feed the child. We managed to find a place to feed ourselves without having to wait hours for service, and at the first signs of baby disquietude, hightailed it out of there. Well, a good try anyways. We watched a film in the evening and listened to the Piranha howl (issues with sleeping, more on that later)

Sunday was our chance to celebrate Halloween. In the past, I didn't generally bother with Halloween, unless someone had taken the time to have a nice dress up party to attend. This year, as a sign of how we no longer exist to the single, hip crowd, we did not get a single party invitation AND we did a parent-kid thing! An expat group was organizing a parade through the Vondelpark which is very nice and close to where we live. I found I could not resist the temptation to dress up our child, especially at a young age where she doesn't get any say in it. Another advantage to owning a wrap in this respect is that you only need think of a costume for the neck and up, since the rest of the child is going to be hidden in the wrap. Naturally we knew exactly what the child should go as.

Getting into the spirit. Thank you auntie W and uncle O for the adorable bib!

There, that's a better one.

Mommy is not a crafting genius, but she does know how to tape eyeballs and teeth to a sheet of fabric. One bit of creativity I am quite proud of: the piranha has actually a quite distinct head shape, very tall and flat. Not sure I want to mention how we achieved that on the blog, but let's say we made use of some leftover items from our kraamzorg packet.

Ferocious baby Piranha!

Even piranhas need to nap. Sadly I did not think to take the novelty shot of the baby "eating" someone in her costume so this will have to make do.

Babies and buggies on parade

The Piranha starts to rouse.

Watch out! She's awake and probably going to fuss the hell out of you.

One handed blogging

2011-10-28T14:59:00.000+02:00

Turns out the Piranha also hates the purple medicine. We've had some rough nights as a result, and a lot of blue stained mom and baby clothes. I have her now in one arm, so it's Cop Out Picture Entry today!

We have had lovely fall colors for Amsterdam

Tummy time, although this kid seems ready to crawl already.

One of the charming things about Amsterdam are its highly specialized shops. Who knew a city of 775.000 inhabitants required its own saxophone shop?

The Piranha is not impressed.

Good friend E and N - can't believe this is the Piranha in a year's time!

Answering Life's Big Questions: What Do I Do With 18 Kilos of Apples?

2011-10-27T11:28:00.000+02:00

As you may recall, we recently acquired about 18 kilos of apples. I thought I demonstrated huge restraint, given we had something like 30 kilos last year. Nevertheless, 18 kilos is still an ass-ton of fruit to get through. In case you find yourself in a similar situation (random fruit attacks can happen to anyone!), here are my recommendations based on a couple years' experience with self-inflicting the problem.

Applesauce is a great way to use up a ton of apples and tastes way way better than the stuff you've had from the store. It's easy to make, and if you happen to have just popped out a kid, applesauce is a great food for them when they start weaning. It freezes well, it's an ingredient for many delicious baked goods. In short, make a ton of applesauce. I think I used about half the apples this way.
Baked breads/cakes. We had a few recipes last year we liked, including an apple-cheese bread that is fantastic and an applesauce cake. Again, these freeze well but also eat very well straight out of the oven. They are also easy recipes to double so you can bust out a bunch of loaves in the same time it would take to make one
Dried apple slices - this is a new one this year as of course I never had a food dehydrator before. Where oh where have you been all my life, food dehydrator? I have to say the apples have been absolutely the best thing we've put in there so far. Talk about reducing bulk! A couple kilos of apple turns into a quart bag of dried apples. Best snack on earth, but dangerously so in the same way a bag of chips is dangerously good.
Apple butter - another new contender. I decided it was time to live on the edge and do something crazy. Something dangerous and out there... like canning. I have opened many cans but never tried closing them back up. This year I decided, what the hell! Life's short, give it a try! How hard can it be. Well, without the proper equipment, canning in a modern kitchen is a bit of a bitch. I sterilized the bottles something like three times before I got it right. And I'm still not sure I did it right. This can be problematic because if you do it wrong the cans can develop botulism which has nasty side effects like killing you. But I'm pretty sure I did it right. And just in case, I am going to keep them all in the fridge and eat them straight away. This year was more for the practice and sadly to convince myself I need to get some fancy canning gear.

The Purple Solution

2011-10-26T08:48:00.000+02:00

Oh, it wouldn't be a week if I didn't manage to talk about boobies at least once on the blog! There are many good things about breastfeeding (good lord, being able to eat anything I want and not gain weight? Surely more women would soldier through if they realized this!) but there are also challenges. One of the ones we are dealing with now is thrush. While the English name is itself quite unpleasant sounding, the Dutch is so much more fun, pronounced "sprew". Well, we've had sprew for weeks now and I am getting a bit sick of it. I've tried two rounds of the traditional remedy and so yesterday we made the long journey out to the eat of town to get The Purple Solution. This is a violet medicine that for some reason has fallen out of favor with pharmacies but is universally recognized as being the most effective treatment, supposed to drop both mom and baby's thrush like it was a bad date. The one downside is that it turns baby's mouth and mom's, um, critical booby parts bright, Batman's Joker purple. It's a bit scary looking and it gets all over your clothes. Just wish I had thought of saving it for Halloween so we'd have a costume sorted.*

*by the way if anyone has any excellent baby in a wrapper costume ideas, feel free to share here!

Thank You Immunization Shots

2011-10-25T15:04:00.001+02:00

Yesterday the Piranha had her first shots. She did well, if by well you mean she screamed nearly the entire visit even before the poor consultatiebureau lady got near her with a needle. We had one of those classic baby moments getting there. We were running short on time as the appointment was early in the morning. I'd changed the little one, gathered our parent warrior equipment for going outside, had the wrap on and was shoveling breakfast in when I heard what sounded like a high-pressure coffee percolator bubbling. I hadn't made any coffee - I looked over at our sweet daughter, sitting in her bouncy chair, and heard the sound again. Result: massive, peanut butter blow out that shattered all sense of clothing boundaries. There was no time to change her, and I didn't want to dirty the wrap so we made a baby burrito with as many swaddling cloths as I could get my hands on and off we went. I sense this happens often enough as the consultatiebureau didn't bat an eye at out unorthodox transport.

Shots have one upshot, which is your kiddo screams themselves up quite a workout and you might get a full 2 hour nap out of them afterwards.

Weekend Roundup! - the Good, the Bad, the Ugly

2011-10-24T14:18:00.000+02:00

Friday - the Good

We had a lovely day on Friday, getting up late and then heading out to Amsterdam Zuid-Oost to once again be overwhelmed by buggy choices. Our goal was to hit up some megastores that are located out that way, one being a giant baby store so we could check out buggies. Unfortunately there are so many damn buggies out there that we basically end up staring sort of stupidly at them for a half hour before giving up. I think we are going to see if we can test out some friends' buggies to get a feel for what we like. The big problem is Amsterdam is a very buggy unfriendly city - it is so narrow that the things don't really fit through anywhere: public transit, sidewalks, restaurants, etc.

The other thing we did while out there was show off the Piranha at my office. Turns out there are two other women now pregnant in the office! I feel like such a trendsetter. The Piranha very obligingly demonstrated all the things babies typically do: she was asleep when we arrived, woke up and demanded food, had a nappy change, was smiling and cute for about a microsecond, then topped it off with spectacular crying. I'm pleased to report the pregnant ladies were not disturbed by any of this - so they're ready for it!

We had Indian takeout and watched Chicago get destroyed in Transformers 3.

Saturday - the Bad

Saturday morning I woke up around 3pm, fed the baby, then went to the loo and threw up 80% of our take out curry that we'd had for dinner. Hurrah, food poisoning! A few hours later I woke up still not feeling well, complained to OH that I wished I would just throw up already if I was going to feel better. Ten seconds later, dashed to the loo and threw up the remaining 20% of dinner. Ask and you shall receive. OH was also feeling not spectacular but for whatever reason only my body decided not to digest dinner at all. Saturday was spent on the couch in that general blah-haze that you have while getting over food poisioning - boo. Indian Express indeed.

Sunday - the Ugly

Sunday was Ugly but tasty. Woke up feeling much better (today Monday feeling pretty much fully mended thanks) and processed a butt-ton of apples. There is one particular recipe for an apple cheese bread. The bread looks like... well, never mind, and the batter comes out like silly putty it is so thick, but it tastes very nice indeed. We have loads of apple sauce for future baby consumption (and adult!), cakes, breads, and tonight if all goes well, I will make apple butter. We met up with lovely friends E and M and their little girl N for a coffee in the afternoon then called it a day

Happy 2 Months Piranha!

2011-10-21T18:36:00.002+02:00

Our little one celebrated two months strong among the human race here on Earth. So far she seems to be doing incredibly well. Her parents are absolutely delighted that she has decided to be a very average baby. Sure she still has her fussing hours in the evening but she gets a little better every day. Truly in our case the books were all spot on - they mention a peak in the inexplicable crying in the first weeks of your baby's life around week 5-6, and then it gets slowly better.

Best of all, she is showing a clear affinity to sleeping at night, like her mama. Unfortunately also like her mama, she doesn't really see the point of daytime naps when there is so much to see and do. But if you've got to pick a poison, praise all the deities that she's chosen her difficult time to be days and not nights.

Yesterday I got to meet up with ladies from our birthing class and their little men. It was fun to compare notes and of course babies! The Piranha is a couple weeks to a month older but boys also develop more quickly physically. Then there is the case of our friend T, who effectively birthed a toddler at a birth weight of FOUR AND A HALF KILOS (basically 10 lbs). He nearly fills his pram and at 4 weeks is already rolling over and holding his head up, things you generally expect to see several months down the road. Despite taking a birthing course we all three had complications along the way and ended up needing the care of a hospital in the end. If I could give any advise to folks awaiting their first birth it would be to have an open mind about all eventualities and remember that your experience will be amazing in its own way. A "normal" birth is a very generic term indeed.

The Piranha using her grandma's hand sewn bib. She's far from solids but apparently no one told her she's supposed to wait until then to spit up all the time.

This is called "Tummy Time" - learn it, love it, it's evidently the focus of parental obsession for the beginning months

I love this photo, as it happens the Piranha is absolutely fussing up a storm as I look at it

I loves television

2011-10-20T10:31:00.003+02:00

Well it took about three weeks for me to give into the allure that is breastfeeding while watching television. Watching TV is a great activity when your hands are occupied and you have a little person laying across you like the safety bar on a roller coaster.

The other place tv has recently introduced itself is eating in front of the it during dinner. This is because the Piranha's fussing time seems to be around the evening meal hour and it is still very rare that we can get her settled enough that both of us can eat together at the table. Usually one of us is soothing her and the television is on because we find background noise actually works better than silence right now. Then it feels silly for the other one to sit at the table alone. So we eat in shifts and now that we've become slightly obsessed with the 7pm showing of the Dog Whisperer (naturally we're hoping a Baby Whisperer will be soon forthcoming), we stare at the boob tube. Hopefully this is a phase and we will get back to eating together - and shortly as a family with little Piranha in a few months too.

Pictures!

2011-10-19T13:09:00.001+02:00

Baby's first apple picking

Husband's third apple picking

The Piranha loves face planting when she is in the wrap

Trying to get exercise/stretching in can be difficult if you don't combine it with something

Practicing baby tricks - raising the roof

You are never to young to start plotting world domination

Oh yes, this IS our favorite hat these days

Good friend W approves of hat choice

Go home foreigners

2011-10-18T10:12:00.000+02:00

There's an interesting and potentially very important debate going on here in the Netherlands. Many of the foreigners (myself included) who come here for work are granted something called the 30% ruling, where 30% of our income is exempt from tax. To take a very simple example, if you earned 100k, you would only be taxed on 70k of it. This was introduced in recognition that most foreigners do not stay forever and therefore don't benefit from all the programs and benefits that the full taxes are being used for. Also and more importantly, acknowledging the much higher tax rates here compared to other countries. In my on case, I would have taken a pretty significant pay cut when I transferred here, and I don't earn anything near 100k :) (alas). So to attract talent from overseas this tax ruling is very beneficial.

Now it seems the current government is going to change the ruling. They are hiking the minimum salary up to high-middle management pay rates, effectively shutting the ruling out to lower paying job levels - aka most of us. The argument is that the ruling was only ever intended to attract very skilled, highly valuable people, and if companies want those younger people they can just pay them more.

I understand the logic but I don't understand what they think is going to happen. Any company whose brought over someone from overseas knows it is not a load of fun and those people cost a lot of money and present a lot of risk in the sense they often don't stay long and go home. I can't say I know the whole market but my anecdotal experience has been most of the people, starting or experienced in their careers, who are brought over for work come over because they have some combination of skills/experience that are scarce in the Netherlands. Not to say there aren't locals with the skills/experience but the demand far outstrips supply. It strikes me as a protectionist, populist move. Why you would kick out talented people who help your local businesses grow doesn't make sense to me. It reminds me of the anger you see in the US against illegal immigrants coming in and (oh no!) taking all the crappy jobs no one wants. You don't see a lot of people, even in this economy, lining up to pick fruit for hours on end.*

* or has that changed?? I know things have gotten tough...

Weekend Roundup - Goodbyes & Appley Pickin'

2011-10-17T13:56:00.001+02:00

This weekend was a bit sad, as it was truly the last weekend of our good friends O and W before they moved back home to South Africa. We will miss them as we would family, but know that we will continue the friendship from abroad. Such is the way of things when living overseas - lots of coming and going.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. We had amazing weather this weekend. Friday OH tried to get some things sorted for the Piranha's British passport. Seems we need to brave taking another photo of her, as none of the ones we already have are suitable. We had lunch with good friend A, then had a look at a flat which was a bit sad, dark and had a funny smell. But otherwise it was really nice. Friday evening I believe we did very little and lo, it was good.

Saturday was a busy day! We met several friends including O and W for our last breakfast club meeting with the original members. It was very sad. The Piranha was stellar - she stayed awake just long enough to be cute for everyone then passed out for the full duration of the meal. We then went for what is now a tradition - appley pickin'. Apples are pretty much the only thing near Amsterdam you can go pick yourself. This place gets nicer every year we go, with more things for kids to do and better organization for getting in and out to pick the actual apples. They also have pears but we have only ever managed to get them once off the trees themselves. This year we did get some but they were the last bits, already picked in a big bin. Another good friend A was kind enough to take us in her car, braving even taking a small child without batting an eye. The Piranha pretty much enjoys any activity where she can stay strapped in the wrap next to a warm mama. Whatever gods look over the social lives of parents with young children must have been pleased with us because both outings on Saturday the Piranha obligingly stayed asleep the full duration, only waking up when we got home to feed her.

That evening we got our second babysitter ever so we could go out to dinner one last time with O and W. We had planned to go out in town but there was a double whammy of protests against the bank bailouts and preparation for the Amsterdam Marathon the next day. We ended up just going around the corner to our local pub and had very nice food indeed. The only way I cope with goodbyes is by not thinking about them at all. With the amount of hormones still swimming around me, I tear up at the Dog Whisperer nowadays if I think about anything at all.

Sunday I got to sleep in a whole extra hour and we dashed into town to buy a birthday present for another great friend, M's daughter who is one year old this year. This time we almost had perfect timing but the Piranha did not feel that taking a tram was as soothing as walking. We had planned to take the tram home but after a few warning grizzles we had to make a hasty exit and walk the rest of the way. The birthday party was lovely. Very young children parties are more for the adults, a sort of nice break when everyone can feel comfortable about their little ones doing the things that little ones do. The Piranha wasn't quite as obliging but she did concede to stay sleeping and placid so long as I wore the wrap. This means I have a very sore back and shoulders today since I am not used to wearing the kiddo in the wrap quite so long.

Pictures tomorrow!

Done and Done!

2011-10-14T10:24:00.002+02:00

Sometimes it takes a while to wrestle with a problem. When this happens to me and the issue is one of those big ones, I have a hard time thinking of anything else until I get it resolved. What was the issue? Well the Piranha is doing this annoying thing of getting older. As she gets older, we move steadily towards the end of my marvelous paid maternity leave. You can argue it is generous (if you come from the US) or stingy (coming from quite a lot of other European countries) depending on your frame of reference. In any case, you get 12 weeks. It's too bad you can take your so-called pregnancy leave, which is an additional 4 weeks before the birth, and use it for when the baby is here but the rules are not flexible in this way.

A lot of friends had told me to think about taking additional unpaid time off work, because the 12 weeks would fly by and I would not feel ready to leave the Piranha with strangers at creche. Some of these friends used holiday to extend their leave, some of them took advantage of the parental leave you get here (a lot) which allows you to take unpaid time off any time you need until the child is aged 4. Of course this latter option has the disadvantage of, obviously, you not getting any money.

Unfortunately, my friends were right. It's difficult to know how you will feel in advance of such a life-changing experience though. I am sad and a little regretful but I don't blame myself for having not foreseen that I'd want to be with her more. Honestly before a week ago, I don't think I knew what I wanted either! It took that long just to get used to and comfortable with the whole cute baby/no sleep lifestyle. Of course there would be the obvious issue of informing work and probably pissing them off a bit but I think they'd be understanding. They were the ones who kept asking me if I was coming straight back, but it was such a foreign concept to me at the time I didn't pick up on their multiple times asking as a subtle hint of how I might feel.

The bigger issue is of course our having struck gold and gotten into the top creche on our list. You cannot delay your enrollment, there is simply too much demand for them to hold a spot for you while others wait on the list. The other option is then to just pay for the unused time. You have to therefore add that cost onto the lost salary. So the last couple of days have been fretting, examining and pondering the possibilities of last-minute changing my decision and adding some time off before she goes back.

In the end, I waffled confidently before finally deciding to leave my original decision alone. No matter when I go back, it is going to suck majorly. I am the type of person if I delay it now, I will spend every minute up until that fateful day fretting about it. There will be many more points in her life I am not going to want to miss, that I will feel just as strongly about then as I feel now, that I can use those unpaid leave days towards as well. Sadly, that's one of the downsides of our modern lifestyle.

Well, crap

2011-10-12T09:43:00.002+02:00

The title sums up effectively our feelings here about a recent topic that's dominating our thoughts. It's a bit too early to discuss on the blog, but I need to at least hint at it since it literally is consuming all my remaining brain power and making thinking of blog material a lot trickier. Hence the sudden increase in pictures! I can tell you that the weather is miserable, aka, normal Netherlands weather.

Sometimes wish I could show her this picture some days to remind her it is possible and desirable to take daytime naps.

OH is not attacking our child.

This is the best attempt so far at our trying to teach the Piranha to "raise the roof". Baby tricks are fun for everyone!

Bad Piranha Day

2011-10-11T21:55:00.000+02:00

I did have lovely bits today but they were rather overshadowed by a very fussy Piranha today, so we're focusing on not going crazy. If you need to be shushed to sleep, our flat is the place to be.

Weekend Roundup

2011-10-10T15:12:00.000+02:00

It rained more or less continuously all weekend so our plans were modest. Most of our days are centered around getting out of the house with the munchkin. Friday we braved the rain and did a bit of window shopping and lunch. We went back to an old favorite which we have not been to since we were not even man and wife! It was still lovely and the Piranha obliged by staying asleep the whole time.

Saturday the major event was trying out letting one parent sleep in (well, an extra hour) while the other got up with our sweet Piranha who's wake up time is regularly around 7am. It worked out quite well - the other person did not go crazy, desperate for sleep. Walks feature prominently in our weekends (well, actually every day) since the Piranha is too little to go on a bike for quite a while yet AND she hearts her some wrap time. Stuff her in the wrap, head out the door, and you have a very happy camper. And since it generally involves a sleeping camper, very happy parents as well. We took a long walk and stopped for lunch at the only kiddo-friendly place I know within walking distance. They also have delicious (if a bit expensive), pretty unique stuff on the menu for Amsterdam. I had the champignon croque messieur, which was incredible. Again the Piranha obliged us again by remaining asleep for the whole meal, only waking up afterwards to demand hers. We were quite tired and plans to cook got scrapped so we were naughty and ate out for the second time. Milestone! We did not get burritos but tried a Thai take out that is very nearby and came recommended by a friend. Generally we don't get take out other than burritos or pizza because for whatever reason it is ridiculously expensive here in Amsterdam. This place however, had very large portions so we were able to share a main and a starter (probably didn't need the starter either) for the same price as two burritos. And it didn't suck, another big problem with take out here.

Sunday is easy - we did absolutely nothing. The weather was gray and cold, and our couches were very appealing.

Now time for a dose of baby pictures. Remember every time you look at a cute baby picture a fluffy puppy gets its wings.

The Piranha loves her hand knit Alaskan beanie. Alas her noggin is getting too big for it. This is the dark side of cute baby clothes, having to let go of them when the kiddos are too big. :( ...

...But the upside is that you can look forward to bigger cute clothes that they will grow into. I don't even remember where this outfit came from but damn is it pink.

All y'all on Facebook should have seen this already but I find it such an excellent photo. If there is one non-essential product you get for your infant, make it one of these giant, self-propelling swings. It is a godsend to parental arms and sleep. As I write, the Piranha is asleep in hers.

Hurrah for boobies!

2011-10-07T10:00:00.000+02:00

The great thing about breasts is that they have this wonderful function of feeding a small human being. All this time they were just sitting there and, kabloowie, overnight (literally) they are suddenly doing this incredible, almost Jesus-like thing where they turn blood into milk (big apologies to the religious out there for any offense caused). It still amazes me, even though it consumes nearly my entire day doing its thing. Yes, they do this wonderful thing, but they take their sweet time doing it. In the beginning if you opt for breastfeeding, it can take half the day, as small ones have small stomachs and feed slowly & frequently. Also, while it is almost by definition one of the most natural things on earth, it's not the easiest in our modern culture. I think I've discussed here a number of times already the issues we have had* and I do not begrudge any woman in decided to go bottle. It can be a long struggle.

But the real reward in the end for the adult, complete license to talk about your breasts. I have to admit, for most of my life I have paid no more attention to this part of my anatomy than any other part. If it's not broken, it's not getting any additional think time. It's also somewhat frowned upon in polite company to talk about them - except if you are a breastfeeding parent. You can call them whatever fun juvenile term you prefer, but I think we all know in our hearts that boobies is certainly the most fun to say, if only for the alliteration it has with "baby". This holds not just for mom but dad as well, although you do need to exercise a bit of caution. For example, one gets into the habit of referring to feedings as "booby time". This hasn't happened to us (yet) but a friend recalled sitting in a restaurant with her husband and their first child, who started to fuss. Without really thinking about it, her husband picked up their little girl to sooth her, booming louding, "Aww, sweetie, do you want some booby?".

*Thrush. Twice. Wee! Need I say more?

House hunting and how it sucks

2011-10-06T11:22:00.000+02:00

We saw a couple places this weekend. We are very keen on the idea of buying a place since we are likely going to be in Amsterdam a few more years at least. Saturday was a glorious day - we had crazy, summer-like weather the last week. Of course everything we saw looked wonderful. In particular we saw a newer building. It had funky windows, a view out onto a playground, and lots of sunlight. The kitchen and bathroom were lovely. It had lots of rooms. We liked it - a lot. The price was less outrageous than most of overpriced Amsterdam. The neighborhood seemed like it was mixed economically speaking but definitely on the up and up.

So we went back for a second viewing this week. Now we are back to normal weather. AKA - gray, overcast, chilly (hasn't started raining yet). I was early and noticed the neighborhood was a lot more "mixed" than I had originally thought over the weekend. On the playground there was a crowd of annoying adolescent boys hanging in the corner. Just on the cusp of teenage years, they looked still too young to get into serious trouble yet. Without the assistance of brilliant sunlight, the flat looked dingier and we were able to take in some of the construction - the "double glazed windows" were actually two windows, which you had to open separately. The bathroom, while new, was a very odd color green in the normal muted light of Amsterdam. The noise of the playground seeped through the while we looked around. To top it off, the Piranha had a fit and the poor real estate agent had to sit an additional 20 minutes while we had an unscheduled feed and change. I tell you I am getting good at this breastfeeding on the go business, but still...

I think more than anything OH and I were disappointed at the change a little weather can make. We really felt like we had liked this flat and that it fit most of what were looking for. To be fair the faults with the flat itself were minor - it was more the fact that in the light of day I still felt a little uneasy in the neighborhood. Imagine then at night how one might feel. And we are not anticipating boom years to come. Things that are "up and coming" can stagnate. I am still leery of this from our trip to Chicago this summer, where I used to live. There are neighborhoods there that were hot when I left in 2006, with people buying left and right with the anticipation that prosperity would continue to rise everyone's boat. When I came back in 2011, these neighborhoods were completely unchanged. Nothing had gone up. Some had gone down. It's shame when you miss the boat but you shouldn't try to swim after it if you have.

Waiting for the Domino Effect

2011-10-05T11:04:00.000+02:00

I still manage to sometimes read about non-baby things, unfortunately most of them are bad news. We are all sitting around here waiting basically for the Euro to tank. In particular I'd like it to wait until after Christmas when I'll be going back to the US, so I can get one last good shopping trip in. A big bank in Belgium is in the news as being on wobbly ground. The more pressing question is if it's the first of a bunch of other European banks that will take a second hit as Greece moves ever slowly towards the default precept.

For us here in Europe, it does effect us directly. Already we've seen the job market, while thankfully not contracting, completely seize up. This at the time when folks of my age are in are hitting our peak earning years. So that sucks. Second, liquidity is still jammed up so getting loans is a bit tricky. For most individuals that is not a big deal, but we are thinking of buying a place. We can get a loan now but will a future buying also be able to when we want to move? Of course the big change would be if/when the Euro takes a sharp dive in valuation. We've enjoyed traveling on a strong currency for a while now, but it will just make traveling to see our family that much more difficult. Lastly, when things get tough, countries get protectionist. Already we've seen some signs of this.

Anyways, you live in the times you are given. I remember one of the most interesting studies I read during my MBA program was that one of the single most overlooked factor in your lifetime earning potential was what year you were born in. If you live in boom times, lucky you. If you don't, not so much. Looks like much of my lifetime is going to be in the not so much camp. Don't take this as complaining, but more being realistic about what you need to do to do the best you can in the circumstances. No use killing yourself over why your investments are not performing if nothing is performing.

Growth Spurts, or, Pretty Much Every Other Week of Your Child's Life

2011-10-04T09:58:00.002+02:00

The Piranha is 6 weeks old as of this week. The literature will tell you that most babies experience one of their many growth spurts during this week. Generally this means the same can be expected:

- food department: demand will outstrip supply, boobs need to work overtime to catch up and baby is not very understanding client.

- physical abilities increase. This round we had what seemed like some additional vision-brain processing functions come online, in what felt like literally overnight. We had a fun (aka sarcastic fun) Saturday with a baby staring around like she was rolling on E at everything around her. The sensory overload made it impossible for her to sleep which meant loads of crying, overtired baby time for mom and dad.

- mental abilities increase. Cries seem to differentiate themselves better these days, although a lot of times everything is upsetting her all at once ;). The other day she was able to try to imitate mom waving both hands in the air.

If this works, some video evidence of the Piranha's progress (and another battle waged in the war on triangles). Remember in life you are either the triangle or the Piranha. Ignore that annoying voice off camera, some lame person trying to follow on the coattails of the Piranha's obvious natural talent.

Weekend Round Up

2011-10-03T11:08:00.000+02:00

Three Day weekends continue! Sunday nights are always sad though after you've had the whole family together. It really is amazing what a difference a single day makes - and we have an infant child, so it's not like we are getting up to a whole lot these days.

Friday was spent mostly trying to sooth the Piranha (she is going through a growth spurt - more on that tomorrow) and then I bailed on my family for the second time in a week and went out! A group of ladies went to see improv (surprisingly not awful) and then have nightcap or in my case, a nightcake since I had a piece of apple pie - hey I'm breastfeeding damn it. Need to expose the child to all sorts of flavors...

Saturday we looked at flats! We are thinking of buying (no investment is good right now, so why not park your money in something where at least you can lower your monthly costs going out (renting is EXPENSIVE here). In the evening we had an incredible, never before witnessed event happen. The Piranha was not having a happy clap clap night, and in the middle of preparing dinner she decided she needed to eat again. Both parents were exhausted and hungry by then, so we were disheartened at the new delay before we would get to eat. Thereupon a miracle happened and OH stepped in, without a word from normal chef in the house, and finished making dinner. Until now, OH's culinary endeavors have stopped with frying eggs, and this not very frequently. He is a champion toaster and sandwich maker. He claims he can't cook but let me tell you he did a lovely job and it tasted even better for him having made it. Have I mentioned what a great husband I have? I have a great husband. I suppose this means at some point I am going to have to surprise him and assemble some furniture/appliance one of these days....

Sunday was quiet - we OD'd our child on a mega bottle of expressed milk early in the evening and she shocked us by sleeping 5-6 hours! We went for a walk (one of the few ways to get her to sleep in the day), got back, got a call from some friends who were in the park, joined them for a bit, then came home and collapsed.

Pictures, or, Distract You From Lack of Content

2011-09-30T17:00:00.000+02:00

Well I hope pictures will speak a thousand words since I am not writing nearly so many today. Yesterday I discovered a rare beast in Amsterdam - the child friendly cafe. I met a friend there for lunch and found only moms with kids as our other diners. The food was also very good if on the pricey side for Amsterdam. E has been a wonderful support in both advise and generosity, having had two little girls and pleased to give away a lot of her stuff. We are waiting a bit longer before we get a babysitter so we can then take them out and properly thank them for all their help.

We are so lucky to have talented, wonderful friends. K, who also incidentally is a very good baker and cook and made our wedding cake, made this beautiful baby blanket. Actually we have no less than three hand made baby blankets, all of different sizes and material so we can use them in different seasons and ages. This one is nice and small, perfect for laying the Piranha out for short play times.

Luckily neither the Piranha nor her parents get tired of sticking the black and white shapes in her face. I think this almost is a proper smile...

And maybe a even more proper smile. I sweat there is some favoritism for that triangle...

Sleep deprivation - a tale of loss and gain

2011-09-29T17:48:00.000+02:00

This weekend was the official going away party for our dear friends O and W, although they will be around a couple more weeks sorting out last details. I had arranged a bunch of us to have our well wishes for their move printed on some shirts with the Amsterdam city emblem of the three crosses.

Alas, "baby brain" (caused by sleep deprivation) meant that I left off the message of one person, good friend A. I only noticed at the party when A saw her's missing from the presented shirts. I was devastated. A said it was alright, she would send her message via email or write it on the tag inside. It would be her secret message to them, so it would be even more special that way, she explained. I wasn't buying it at all.

That night/morning at our usual 4 am Piranha wake up call for midnight snacks, a brilliant idea came to me to make amends. It would honor the secret part AND make amends for missing the original tee shirt:

Well, I thought it was brilliant and luckily I am too tired during the day to have the sense to second guess "brilliant" ideas based on 5 hours of sleep for the last 5 weeks.*

*beware family - I have discovered the pleasures of custom printing on clothing and we are in New Mexico for Xmas this year!

Continuing changes unfold

2011-09-28T09:59:00.000+02:00

A fun day yesterday as we continue to gently push back out into the real world, avec child. Last night OH gave me the evening off and I went out to dinner with good friends I know through mah jongg. I would have never thought I'd get into a game like mah jongg to begin with (the US version, which we play, is similar to bridge I think), let alone have made so many lovely friendships through it. I think I knew these were people after my own heart the first time we drank and ate so much we forgot to play the game entirely. We are trying to get better at that, mind. In the meantime, this was the first time I had seen a lot of the gals and it was really lovely. We went to a Moroccan restaurant I'd been curious to try forever, and it was fantastic! The presentation in particular was beautiful, I had a couscous that came shaped in a circle with the veggies arranged artistically on the top. I even managed not to look at my phone for text messages until the first course arrived.

While the Piranha is now over a month old, I am still discovering new, strange changes since I asked my body to make another human being. For one, I apparently smell certain things a lot more acutely. Our starter was a scallop served in thin, raw slices. It tasted lovely but I could not get over the smell. Fish it seems, is a tricky subject for me nowadays. I also had my final check up with the midwife where I was informed my stomach muscles were still miles off from each other. This is another of these fun facts they generally skim over before you get pregnant, but your stomach muscles distend and I believe nearly always end up actually splitting a little in the middle to accommodate your gigantic belly. Normally they nip back together pretty quickly, so I was a little disheartened to hear exercise, at least stomach exercises (those I need the most) need to wait another month while my glacial stomach muscles slowly migrate back towards one another.

Proof I am not making up my weekends

2011-09-27T13:25:00.000+02:00

I will post more pictures tomorrow but our time is always a bit short with the fun, unpredictable "schedule" of a tiny child.

The Piranha trying to knock the sh*t out of some black and white shapes. Show that triangle who's boss kiddo!

O and W with their going away presents. Boo. :(

Our walk on Saturday. To begin we had these lovely parents and their 1 year old sitting behind us. Their daughter tried to share a cracker with the Piranha. Then we had a couple behind us when the Piranha decided she'd had enough and started to howl. They were less understanding.

OH sporting the hot new style for men this fall: baby strapped to chest. Hip and slimming on the figure!

Rare instance of the Piranha falling asleep after a feed in a restaurant. Apparently the greater the ambient noise, the happier our daughter. Clearly born a city slicker from the start!

Weekend Round Up

2011-09-26T09:46:00.000+02:00

We had an amazing weekend. Seems we are getting our Summer #2, a week of lovely weather (well low 20's C/ 70 F is hot for us) and sunshine. Fully intend to take advantage of it!

Friday - we have three day weekends still to enjoy for another month and a half or so, when I go back to work. It was a nice day, we went for a walk in the Vondelpark, had lunch there (Vondeltuin - not very interesting food) and to be totally honest I don't remember anything else we did during the day. I think we both went out seperately to do various things and the Piranha was very well behaved for us. The big event was going out in the evening and leaving the kiddo with a Proper Babysitter for the first time. Mom had watched her for us, and a good friend we'd trust our lives with, but this was the first time we were leaving her with a stranger. We had a lot of angst finding a reliable service. Luckily we are tapped into a great network of fellow parents and we got very good referrals to a number of people. We opted to go with a service that has a network of babysitters, whom she all meets via people rather than placing ads. She vets them out, has strict rules for conduct, and helps pair you with one that has the best experience for your family needs. In the future when the Piranha is older we will be more relaxed but because she is so little still we were very anxious to get someone as experienced as possible. The service found us a lovely, serious young lady who'd worked in creches before and had lots of experience with very young babies.

The reason we both wanted to go out was to say goodbye to our very good friends O and W. You might recall we went to South Africa earlier this year with them. They are some of our dearest friends and we are going to miss them terribly, but they have an amazing opportunity back in SA that is going to catapult them to fame and fortune (okay, well it's a great job anyways...) so we are also happy for them. For the party we had a special goodbye gift with everyone sending their well wishes which we had printed on tee shirts with the three X's that are the emblem of Amsterdam. As novices we had only budgeted ourselves a few hours before running home to make sure baby was still okay so we didn't stay as long as we'd liked, but it was great to be able to say goodbye properly and get a trial run on getting out of the house.

Saturday was very relaxed and beautiful weather again. We went for a long walk, stopped for lunch, and the Piranha had her first meal al fresco as we sat outside and had to breastfeed. The Piranha also did us the great pleasure of falling asleep in the evening and allowing us to both eat dinner together AND watch a film (Bridesmaids - funny but the main character was completely unlovable).

Sunday we decided to go for broke and attempt BREAKFAST OUT. I know, we are eating out like there is no tomorrow this weekend. We went to our favorite place, Greenwoods, and the owner (I think his name is Daniel?) congratulated us on the new family addition! It was really nice that he remembered we'd last been in there pregnant. I was very nervous going out to someplace a lot further from home and it is quite cozy in there so if the Piranha started to fuss it seemed it would be quite challenging to get out of there to avoid ruining other diner's meals. As it turns out we had excellent luck with the single corner table freeing up just after we arrived, complete with bench on the wall side. Benches are critical when dining out with a baby because there are probably only a dozen eateries in the whole city that have heard of changing tables. The bathrooms here are the size of a closet, as most of the restaurants are very tiny in and of themselves so of course you're not going to waste space on a giant restroom. So for a baby, benches are key when you need to do a nappy change. I don't want to brag but I am getting pretty damn good nappy changing in public.

AS it happens, the Piranha was very obliging again! She fell completely asleep while feeding, stayed asleep the whole time, and only woke up as we were leaving. As it turns out, she loves loud restaurants, I think the constant noise probably counts as white noise which little ones generally like. And in a busy, small restaurant, actually your screaming child is much less noticeable, a very, very valuable lesson to learn, as her cries are muffled by the cacophony of chit chat from other tables. We took a long walk home and then our sweet cherub extracted her revenge for all this good behavior by being gassy and impossibly fussy from afternoon straight through 4am feed. Ah well, nothing in life is free. Pictures tomorrow, the Piranha is awakening...

Confirm child is still normal, at least in medical sense

2011-09-23T10:27:00.001+02:00

We had our first visit to the consultatiebureau Wednesday. This is where you get regular check ups, shots, and can stop in weekly for a free weight check of your little one. You only go to the doctor when something is wrong. An interesting breakdown of work responsibilities. We had been to the hospital last week for our check up that everything after the "difficult beginning" was fine and gotten a clean bill of health so I wasn't expecting too many surprises. Indeed the Piranha is doing great, everything from weight gain to growth to body functions is completely normal. Last week she weighed just under 4 kilo, and already this week she is 4.24! She also grew a centimeter from 53 to 54cm. Doesn't sound like much but if I grew that much in a week I would start getting nervous.

Enough chat though, I know anyone still reading this just wants to see pictures:

the Piranha loves her real Dutch Girl Outfit, complete with tight white leggings (thanks auntie Ale!). If only we had tiny baby knee high boots the look would be complete.

A box full of toys and the big hit are black and white shapes drawn with sharpee marker

I know this means I am a bad mama, but I love this picture

Bye Mom (warning, a bit emo!)

2011-09-22T09:46:00.002+02:00

Sadly today we say goodbye to mom, though I know it's time for her to return to her normal life. For one I think her husband misses her... The past three weeks have been incredible. Neither OH nor I really had any expectations and yet she blew them all away. We got time to talk like normal people. I even enjoyed bickering and getting on each others nerves from time to time (it's going to happen with anyone if you are with each other all day long + an infant!). Usually when you live far away your visits are short and intense - there is no time to adjust to each other and interact as you would if you had contact on a daily basis. I really enjoyed that. I also enjoyed listening to OH and mom speak in totally incomprehensible terms as they chatted cameras with each other. Mom is also legend in our family for being really good with little ones - it was great to finally really see and understand these teachings from the master. Both of us learned so much from her, but I the two big tips that I hope I remember are these:

1. Be patient. Keep trying things, and when the don't work, try them again, and again. Eventually you will get the right thing at the right time and answer whatever it is your baby needs - or they will exhaust themselves and settle down.

2. Sometimes babies cry for no reason, or mixed reasons, or for mysterious reasons. You will not figure it out every time. It's okay, it's not personal. No matter how bad it is, the baby will survive and so will you.

These are lessons even the fabulous kraamzorg cannot teach you. Anyways - bye mom! It's such a joy to have a good relationship with one's family :) Can't believe the Piranha has been asleep long enough to let me write this - ah she just woke up.

Happy 1 Month to You Piranha!

2011-09-21T08:38:00.001+02:00

Today marks a month of existence on Earth of the Piranha. What a difference a few weeks make! She is starting to awaken to the world - every week you see some new little step. And as parents we become less freaked out every week. A good progress from both sides I'd say.

The Piranha will tolerate her chair more and more as she gets older. When babies are first born they have no concept of world/self/others as separate entities. This why it is so hilarious (I know, I am a mean mama) to see them bat themselves with their own hands and not know where it comes from

Piranha's first day trip to Hoorn with her beautiful grandma

OH and the frites at the cafe in Hoorn that took 30 minutes to arrive. Ah, Dutch Service.

No mayonnaise was spilt on our daughter

Weekend Round Up

2011-09-20T08:27:00.000+02:00

Okay! Luckily Monday was terribly dull so I can finally catch up. This is also an increasingly rare moment of being able to type with both hands as most times I have the Piranha in one arm and type with the free hand of the other. Ah, luxury.

Saturday we had a quieter day thanks to the terrible weather and general exhaustion from our busy couple days beforehand. The big accomplishment happened in the evening when we all went out to eat again to Zus en Zus (thanks to baby brain, I totally spaced and managed to call the wrong resto, make a reservation, and not even have it dawn on me until I checked my phone a week later and saw the wrong number dialed that day) and LEFT BABY WITH BABYSITTER. This is a Big Deal when your kiddo is still very small - the Piranha is four weeks old this week. Especially if it's your first one. I admit we totally cheated and the "babysitter" was actually a really good friend with two little ones of her own. We are really happy to have such amazing friends and I hope we'll be able to swap babysitting nights over time. I assume we newbie parents will have to be trained for the older kids. We had a wonderful evening, only the second night mom has been here that the three of us were able to eat together without baby interruption. And the food and service were still really good! They even managed to have changed a few things on their menu in the week since OH and I had been there last week. Amazing - this is a new favorite for sure.

Sunday I took the Piranha off everyone's hands for a few hours and met some ladies from my birthing class for lunch. One was actually giving birth as we were lunching (only found out later). For the rest there were two of us who had already "popped" and one who was due in two weeks. It was great to meet the other lady's little girl and catch up with them all. It was really nice and the wrap did its magic again, allowing the Piranha to snooze the whole time we chatted though I nearly dropped tomato on her head.

End of Last Week Round Up

2011-09-19T10:53:00.000+02:00

We had a great weekend, tinted by a bit of sadness as its our last weekend with mom. We are still enjoying our three day weekend, but I'm way behind so in the interest of being thorough we will leap back in time to Thurs & Fri.

Thursday was a great day, mom and I went out to the Albert Cuyp, finally being able to start our big project which is Teach Me to Sew (Again). Mom brought some easy patterns and I had a few from the year before that I had not braved starting. The Piranha was in the wrap again (she loves her some wrap) and we headed out to the Albert Cuyp to pick up fabric and sample every fatty, fried street food treat you can get. We had a loempia to star (like a long egg roll), frites with fritesaus (french fries with a sweetish mayo), a toastie at a cafe so I could nurse, and a giant waffle with chocolate and nuts. It was great having mom there as there were a bunch of details I didn't know about for preparing sewing projects.

Friday we dared our first day trip! The day started inauspiciously as the Piranha had a bad night and we parents awoke cranky and tired but it all went well from there. We hired a car and went to the picturesque town of Hoorn. Actually all the picturesque towns of Holland more or less resemble each other, so we figured if we didn't see much it wouldn't be a total loss. In fact roughly half the time was spent nursing the child. The other half was mostly dominated by a Dutch Service Experience at lunch. First it took nearly 40 min to bring our sandwiches. Then mom's order had been entered incorrectly and instead they brought her one of the foods she abhors, smoked salmon. It took another 20-30 min to bring out the correct order, which by the way they didn't comp and the only reason they even apologized about the order mess up or fessed up to it is because we asked after 15 minutes where the correct sandwich was. Well, at least she knows she's having the authentic experience.

In fact the little trip was still a success as we did manage to walk around the village and having a car is very useful with a small child for nappy changes and feeding.We are excited to try it again!

Busy days!

2011-09-16T18:57:00.001+02:00

whew! last couple days have been pretty activity packed - more soon promise.

Sign off on Baby

2011-09-14T08:27:00.001+02:00

Yesterday we had to take the Piranha to the hospital for a last check in to make sure everything was okay. From here out all the regular check ups will take place at a Consultatiebureau. If she is ill, she goes to the doctor. It's a bit of an odd breakdown of the tasks but I guess this allows you more time with the Consultatiebureau to ask questions and they are meant to be also a general reference for any questions you may have about anything. The first meeting the consultatiebureau nurse came to my house and was an absolute gem.

The other good thing is that the consultatiebureau is super close to my house whereas the hospital, if you are not going by ambulance as I did the last time, is slightly more of a POA to get to with a baby, requiring a walk and tram ride. We took our giant wrap thing again (excellent for cold weather) as the Piranha loves it and generally falls asleep straight away when you put her in. Unfortunately the hospital's first task was to take her out & strip her naked in order to weigh and measure her (just shy of 4 kilo/8.5 lb and 53 cm/ 20 '' ) which pissed her off quite a bit and oh, reminded her she was ravenous. This resulted in our second breastfeeding in public practice which went just fine, thanks.

The good news is she received a full bill of clean health. There are no adverse affects from what the doctor kept referring to as her "difficult start". Her growth is just above average and they were very pleased with that as well. As a reward, we got to use the hospital's very nice nursing room to finish feeding Lia, which is good since I think the poor adolescent boy accompanying his mother in the waiting room was getting a bit freaked out at the possibility of seeing boobies.

Weekend Round Up

2011-09-13T10:36:00.001+02:00

We had a very full weekend, not intentionally but things sort of happen now as they happen. Saturday we had a very fun but very demanding day out with our friends O and W. We are trying to see as much of them as possible before they move back to their home country in the fall. One of the downsides of living in the expat bubble - people you like very much leaving!

The challenge was of course taking the Piranha out with us on a stroll. We wanted mom to get out and actually see some of the city and on top of it there was a minor miracle of sunny, warm weather. O and W were in the neighborhood and we all caught a tram to the Jordaan area of town to wander and grab a bite to eat. Everything was going well until the Piranha had her first fuss and we had to hightail it to a cafe, where we successfully managed the first breastfeeding in public (to my oldest sister, thank you very much for the nursing cover thing, it's brilliant!), and managed to change a nappy on top of a public loo. Note to self in future: scope out restaurants with changing facilities in future. We continued on for a bit longer before the Piranha let us know she'd had enough of the wrap we were carrying in and oh by the way, she was hungry again. While the others ate ice cream I performed street bottle preparation and we fed her a top up before bowing to baby pressure and getting home asap to feed her properly and change her nappy.

It was not the intention to attempt back to back outings with the little one on Friday and Saturday, so Sunday we stayed in the whole day recuperating and focusing on getting feeding schedules back on schedule. It is exhilarating to try new things and push the limits of your comfort zone, but there's a time when you need to rest as well. Plus we had the pleasure of our friends S and M along with their little man Q come by for a visit. So nice to see friends around the house!

OH packing baby on the mean streets of Amsterdam

Grandma: amused, Piranha: not amused

Proof we have left our house with our baby! We heart our giganto wrap thing, if you couldn't tell - excellent for little ones.

Date Night!

2011-09-12T09:24:00.000+02:00

Sorry, normally there'd be weekend round up but I realized I totally missed a very, very important event from last week. 4 September is OH and I's anniversary. We didn't really do anything or exchange gifts (budget and sleep deprivation I think) on the day of but with mom here we were able to go out to dinner later in the week and we had our first evening out together since the Piranha arrived.

Boy, you certainly appreciate it a lot more! We went to a restaurant up the street from us we'd been dying to try, Zus en Zus, reported to be very good and it did not disappoint. It was not terribly busy which was a surprise as we'd tried to get in a couple times and it was always full. The service as a result was excellent. I suspect on a full house evening you'd have a more typical Dutch Service Experience only because they had just one server on staff for the whole resto (a small place but not that small). We had a fantastic meal and I had my first drink in weeks. Because breastfeeding has been a slow (but ever progressing!) haul, I've not been drinking booze. Sure you can drink while breastfeeding but you have to time it correctly and then also not drink more than a glass or two. Once we have this whole feeding business nailed, I'll feel more free to have wine (oh, sweet, missed wine...) on occasion but in the mean time let me tell you that glass of pinot grigio was prettying f*ing divine. And oh, yes, also had a cocktail to start, a Bourbon Street - very nice!

Everything we had was excellent, from carpaccio and raw tuna starters to our main, a really interesting salmon served with guacamole, and an incredible dessert (brownie for me, passion fruit creme caramel for OH). All this for a fixed menu price of under 30 EUR each. Highly recommend the place. AND I have huge thanks for mom for making it all possible.

Citizen Piranha

2011-09-09T16:56:00.003+02:00

Adventures in new parenting! The first times out with your child are always a drama. Today OH and I took the Piranha to the US Consulate in Amsterdam to request a number of documents - passport, social security card, and most importantly, citizenship. We decided to the US first because, surprise, surprise, the US requirements were a lot more stringent. For one, we all had to go to the consulate. We took a taxi thinking this would be faster and easier with a little one. Turns out Amsterdam has decided to have major construction on every single inroad heading into the center of town. What should have been a quick 6 minute jaunt ended up taking nearly 25 minutes. Luckily I had budgeted a half hour so we were still in time.

It was very sweet because I actually know quite a lot of people at the US Consulate in Amsterdam thanks to the women's group I used to chair, which had meetings there. It was great to see the guards again and of course show off our little cherub, who was still lulled by the car ride over into placidity. Once we got in the waiting room she immediately needed to be fed (aka, she cried). Pretty much everyone else in there but one person was there with babies! Requesting passports or visas evidently. To request all these documents, you need to fill out a TON of paper work yourself. The gentleman who processed ours was very kind, ticking everything off and then asked, where was the birth certificate? Ho hee, guess who forgot the one, critical document to bring when registered the birth of a citizen abroad? I was devastated but the fates smiled down on us and took pity in the form of the officer saying we could come back later that afternoon with it rather than make a new appointment next week. Hurray! Oh, and our stupid passport photos were the wrong size after all that! Luckily they had a flyer with three different shops within walking distance of the Consulate that would do the proper US size. Can I say I have never had a bad experience at our Amsterdam Consulate? They are always friendly and helpful.

Thus our quick venture into town with baby turned into a near-full day task. We didn't have a ton of time before the reschedule so we divided and conquered - OH walked back to the flat to get the document, I took Piranha to get the photos done. The guy clearly had photographed babies of all ages as he knew many clever tricks for getting a passport-appropriate picture out of a wriggly, not able to support head yet baby. We then had our first meal out together as a family since we didn't have time to go back to the flat. Well, the Piranha didn't really eat with us but I did have her wrapped on me the whole time. The officer had gone for a run when we came back, so we had to wait a bit longer, just enough time for a massive fuss, a feed, and a giant poo to occur. The officer was exceptionally kind when he did arrive (and from the same small town I was born in - small world!) and we got everything approved and now just have to wait for everything to be mailed to us, hurrah. Oh and it costs 150 EUR, so bring your wallet folks.

While I'm pleased we were pushed to do a lot more with the baby and gained a lot of confidence in doing so, I am also glad that the UK process only requires one adult to go in sans kiddo and file some paperwork.

Finding the sweet spot

2011-09-08T12:17:00.000+02:00

We've now achieved several ventures outside with the Piranha successfully. The only problem is the carrier of choice, a Baby Bjorn, is a bit tricky to get baby in and out of by one's self. Hopefully by the time mum leaves we will have that sorted out. We are holding out on getting a buggy and I can't say I feel it lacking since we live on the 3rd floor and the walk up with just baby and shopping is pain enough.

A mixed blessing turns out to be that the bjorn puts the Piranha straight to sleep. Normally this is very good but we have a situation as a result. Currently our precious child has no nationality. She is not Dutch because neither of her parents are Dutch (only a few countries automatically grant nationality because a child is born on their soil), and we need to apply for US and UK citizenship. No problem, we have an appointment to get the US citizenship sorted tomorrow. Only issue is that we also need a passport photo. We found a place just down the street that can make the US-specific sized photo (of course it is different from the Dutch passport photo size) while out doing shopping and thought, let's pop in and try it! We extracted the Piranha only to find she was dead asleep. Parents can confirm that one thing you don't expect to have trouble with is waking up your child, but when newborns sleep, they are as the dead. Nothing can rouse them. Still we were prodding and gently rocking, trying to get her awake, when the shop owner helpfully pointed out that if we awoke her from deep sleep, we would probably have a crying baby on our hands. Turns out babies can be neither crying nor asleep for passport photos.

Today we have crafted an elaborate plan wherein we will withhold food for a short while, stuff unhappy baby into bjorn, hightail it down to shop, feed unhappy baby just enough to satiate crying but not to cause her to pass out, and in that sweet spot of about 5 minutes, hopefully produce a non-sleeping, non-crying baby to photograph.

Will let you know how it goes.

the fourth pillar of baby activity

2011-09-07T11:33:00.000+02:00

I see now that while kraamzorg is one of the best things on this planet, they have a bit of a racket staying just the first week. At least in our case this is because dear sweet baby only came into the Fourth Pillar of Baby Activity during the second week of her life on earth. The first three start immediately: Eat, Sleep, Poo. The fourth activity, crying, can be somewhat delayed as the first week the kids are still sleeping off a lot of the labor (it's hard work for them too) and I think are a bit shell shocked from the whole experience, sort of like mom and dad.

The Piranha used to be consolable last week. She'd cry for a reason. This week it seems like none of the tricks we'd thought we'd learned last week work. She cries randomly for hours, pausing when she runs out of steam. I hope it is not the dreaded "C".... colic...

The Parent Side

2011-09-06T12:57:00.010+02:00

Yesterday we had a visit from good friend M and her little one who is about 9 months old. It is amazing how noticeable the change is after Crossing Over To the Other Side. We have a number of friends with kids already I've mentioned and it is a great boon in that they provide us with experience, knowledge and also handily, hand me downs. It also amazes me how much more detailed your questioning gets once your child is actually here and you realize application is very different from taking notes. I don't know if it's just my impression but I almost feel like I've been welcomed into a secret society, the Society of Parents. Is it because misery loves company? I recall reading somewhere that many people are not happier after they have kids, because of course of the stress involved and the sudden change from only having to care about yourself (we live in very self-centered culture these days) to caring for others. This is another thing for which I am grateful I was not the first of my circle of friends to Cross Over, as we had many models of what sort of life we could expect.

Perhaps it is the pleasure of having someone else to share the pain (misery loves company) that inspires this feeling in me. Perhaps more positively, it is the pleasure of other parents being reminded of/reliving a bit of the time when their own children were the age of your child. Hard to say as this is all conjecture of a newly minted.

And... pictures!

Get swaddling - the Piranha at week 1

the Piranha practicing perhaps for some future Hamlet?

New babies, not the only ones who sleep a lot to begin

Weekend Round Up

2011-09-05T10:18:00.000+02:00

The Piranha is sleeping a little later this morning so we are trying to get in a quick morning post and shovel some breakfast in before she rouses. We had a great weekend. Great in particular because weekends are for the duration of my maternity leave three-day affairs, with OH taking his daddy day on Fridays now. It's brilliant. On top of that my mum arrived in town and has done an amazing job coping with the jet lag and of course being a wonderful grandmother! The big highlight for me was a long walk around the neighborhood with my mum. We bought some things for the house, we had lunch, we enjoyed some rare warm, sunny weather that has now been replaced with more expected wet, gray stuff today. Throughout the weekend we ensured everyone got out of the house at least once. Today or tomorrow we will again attempt to get out, but with the baby. The timing is tricky because little tiny babies have no schedule. My good friend Ale described it most aptly as boot camp, with something to do every three hours (if you are lucky).

In Piranha news, she seems to be growing like a sprout, she may nearly have outgrown her first onsie/babygro.

Ah, she's awake!

Reserves Called In!

2011-09-02T17:17:00.000+02:00

Today after three days flying solo, the reserves arrived in the form of my awesome mother. I have always been grateful to have a wonderful relationship with my parents as an adult and mom has come to help every one of her daughters at the birth of their children. It's a godsend, I can tell you now. Just having another pair of trusted hands, someone of course you know completely, is a great help in the wilderness that is first child rearing.

Another milestone was achieved in the form of OH and I successfully leaving the house together with the Piranha! Granted it was literally 10 minute walk down the street to our doctor (have I mentioned I love living in the city for these sorts of reasons? I do). but as usual the first time you do anything it's a monumental task of discovery. In particular we have received a number of carrying devices for the baby, none of which we knew how to use. The Baby Bjorn won in terms of easiest to figure out and master. Naturally we looked like complete freaks, hovering anxiously over the harnessed baby strapped to OH's chest clucking nervously over every small detail. I assume it gets easier with time or you have a nervous breakdown, one of the two

Adventure Time - Try to Leave House with Baby

2011-09-01T12:29:00.002+02:00

Today's big task is getting out of the house. I have left the house a total of once since getting back from the hospital. Interesting that that never seemed like it would be such a big deal up until now! I've managed to have several visitors now and nearly made it out yesterday if not for suddenly running out of steam. I can't tell you how exciting the grocery store is sounding right now.

On the other hand, doesn't sound like I've missed too much out there!

Update: hrm, looks like leaving the house is not on the menu today.

The Piranha

2011-08-31T08:38:00.001+02:00

How Does a New Mom Have Time to Blog

I should mention that I have kept journals or blogs for many years now. I suspect that many of us that like this pastime do so because it helps us digest the events around us and also in my case, helps serve as an outsourced memory since even before procreating I had a rubbish memory. Warning to those thinking of/embarking on procreation yourself: no matter how garbage you think your memory is now, it is actually possible for it to get worse, even worse than Pregnancy brain. The Piranha also handily sleeps many hours a day now so there is time to write and reflect. Especially since I am crap at taking naps. The age old advice is to nap when the baby naps for new parents. I have never been very good at day sleeping, and it seems I need to be utterly exhausted before I will be able in this case as well. Give it a few weeks, I suspect cumulative lack of sleep will start to kick in.

How the Piranha Got its Name

Warning, for the squeamish of body functions this section may contain graphic description of parts and functions of sh*t your body actually does. We got off to a bad start with breastfeeding, wherein I seemingly learned a bad technique and performed it for several days. This resulted in my ladies (aka boobies) getting basically wrecked. The kraamzorg, who was very supportive and helpful, decided the problem was beyond her expertise and called in a lactation consultant who actually came round the very next day. She saw the issue immediately. There are a number of things that can go wrong with breastfeeding and while UNICEF informs us that 98% of women are physically capable of doing it, a much, much larger percentage eventually give up. In my case the issue was latching on. The baby has to attach to your milkjugs just so. Otherwise you can cause a lot of pain and even permanent damage to them. She proclaimed both baby and mommy parts involved in the task to be fully up to the job, no inherent flaws. The issue was that our sweet little bundle of joy is a ravenous, disgusting beast when it comes to eating. Put anything near her mouth and she begins voraciously smacking and gnawing with that surprising strength of suction power newborns possess. The metaphor she used was like a little piranha coming at you, chomping away. Even with the bottle or dummy, she chomps away like the meal is going to be whisked away from her at any second if she doesn't try to eat as much of it as possible before that happens.

First Day of Work

2011-08-30T13:29:00.000+02:00

Today is my first day flying solo with the Piranha, but even then I can't really say I've been alone. For one we had a visit already from a really good friend and fellow mum whose kids are just a little older now. The danger for visiting mums is of course, seeing a newborn automatically triggers dangerous hormones causing the mum to forget all the sleepless nights and stress and immediately want another one. As a mum and of course being a wonderful person all around, she also knew to bring food, offer to make the tea (I was feeding the Piranha) and leave when it was time to nap. I will remember these things when it is my turn to go round to the next new mommy.

There was also a visit from the Consultatiebureau. This is an interesting office of in my case what seems to be very nice people who are responsible for the shots and general resource for little babies. It was an intake/get to know you session, and she was immediately helpful confirming some questions about breastfeeding and even got the door (we are on the 3rd floor so this is a very big gesture for a stranger indeed) when my friend came around afterwards. Nanny state success, in my book.

So far so good, both Piranha and I are still alive and Amsterdam even graced us with a few moments of sunlight.