Sometimes you just have to giggle

Sunday evening, I found myself leading worship and reading a prayer asking God to "make us children of quietness" at the same time that Quinn was fussing in the back of the church. I managed to hold in the giggle and avoid ruining the contemplative tone we were going for in the worship service.

One other time, I was not so lucky. At another church, on a Sunday morning when I was pretty tired from a lot of extra stuff that week, they had the Christmas pageant in the morning worship mid-December. One little girl was the angel Gabriel, and she was sitting up in the chancel in one of these big wooden chairs built in to the wall, covered in huge, removable cushions. I guess she was wiggling a bit, because both she and the cushion slid onto the floor!

I'm glad another grown-up was sitting next to her and made sure she was okay. I was unable to keep myself from laughing -- I'm pretty sure there was a hymn being sung to cover it, and I was doing my best to suppress it -- but I was overcome with the giggles. I think I was moved to tears.

The Big 5 (Months)

Quinn is five months old today!

She is getting to be such a big girl. She sits in her highchair and eats rice cereal,


can hold her bottle by herself,


and is getting closer every day to being able to sit up on her own.



She also got just her thumb in her mouth for the first time today.

We actually had a bit of an adventure today. Amy, Quinn, and I went to the cafe down the street this morning, Amy and I each assuming that the other one had keys with them. We got back to our building, and while our kind neighbor did let us into the building, we found that we had left the door to our apartment locked as well! Fortunately, Amy had her purse, which contained her cell phone and SmartTrip card for the Metro, as well as her wallet. So, we called Tim, who sent emails to the people who were expecting to see me at noon (this was around 11:30). We then took the Metro down to Tim's office, where we got his keys. We ended up taking the bus home, which gave us an interesting tour of some different parts of the city, including taking us through the Chinatown gate.

Quinn, who was in the BabyBjorn (front carrier) this whole time, fell asleep as we were walking to the bus stop and woke up shortly before we got off the bus -- an interlude much shorter and later than her usual morning nap, so I'm anticipating an early bedtime tonight.

Quinea Pig

Quinn participated in her first experiment yesterday. (As a subject; all babies are mini-scientists who are running experiments all the time as they figure out how the world works.)

She was in a study at the linguistics lab, one of three labs at the University of Maryland that do infant studies. I held her on my lap and had a visor over my eyes so I couldn't see the large screen TV she was looking at. Apparently, the screen was split in two, with different versions of a woman's face on either side. One was saying "ooo," the other was saying "eee." For the first half of the time, the woman's voice saying "ee. ee. ee." was played. For the second half, it said "oo. oo. oo."

A video camera recorded where Quinn was looking when this was going on. Apparently, she (like other babies who are 4 months old) looks more at the face whose mouth matches the sound. Anyway, it was pretty fun, and I always like doing my part to advance the cause of science.

Firsts for Quinn

Quinn has had some exciting firsts in the past week or so. She had her first time in the pool last Sunday.

The previous day, she got her foot in her mouth all by herself for the first time! Tim caught this new skill on camera on Wednesday:



And just yesterday, we fed her her first "solid food." Solid food, for babies, means a lot of mush before they graduate to anything more substantial. But, she found rice cereal pretty agreeable. We felt that she was ready because she's been watching us intently while we eat, and is now grabbing for adult food at the table.



We've been feeling like she' has gotten really big: at the doctor for her 4-month checkup, she was 16 1/2 lbs and 24 1/4 inches long. But sitting her in the highchair sure made her look little again!

Do I Look Like My Mama?

Well, here are some shots of her vaguely posed like my baby picture.

Here's Quinn:


Here's Baby me:


And here's a little better smile from Quinn:


I have trouble catching the full magic of her smiles on camera. Perhaps that's because the squealing isn't picked up along with it... well, seriously, it's probably because she gives her biggest smiles to people face-to-face. And I haven't yet figured out how to implant a camera in my face. :)

What do you think?

Do I Look Like My Daddy?

So, I had a silly idea that we should pose Quinn like baby pictures of her parents to help decide who she looks more like. The challenge is that I really don't know how old we each were when we got our first portraits taken. I suspect we were older (around 6 months) than she is now (3 1/2 months). But, we got the one to compare with Tim.

Here's Quinn:



And here's baby Tim:



Or does this one look more like him?



What do you think?

Stay tuned for "Do I Look Like My Mama?"...

This Week

Quinn has had a pretty good week. She's sleeping in 2 4-hour chunks at night with some regularity (although, the night before last, she did think that bedtime was 2 am).

We went for a walk in the neighborhood yesterday.


She has no end of adorable clothing to wear, thanks to her many fans.


And, she's getting better and better at playing with things.


Not to mention other babies!


Make no mistake -- her hands are still the most interesting things around!

Rocking and Rolling

Ever since I started my Lenten blog, I haven't found time to post on this one. Since I get Sundays off from my Lenten discipline, here are some glimpses of Quinn's life lately.

Amy (her aunt) came back home from her a vacation in Mexico, which included celebrating Carnaval in Cozumel. Amy's taking her massage therapy licensing exam tomorrow. Go Amy!

Quinn also got to spend some quality time with her cousin Grace, who insisted, "I want to hold Baby Quinn!" Those of you who are lucky enough to have met Grace will notice that she has had her first haircut. She donated the hair to Locks of Love.

She also got to hang out with one of her baby friends, Harper (the 6-month old daughter of one of my favorite people). Quinn was actually kind of interested in looking at Harper for the first time this week.

In other baby news, Quinn finally seems to have mastered rolling from her back to her side -- she repeated it enough times that I actually caught it on camera...

...and, Quinn has inherited a "big girl swing" -- she sits up in it, unlike the other one, where she is in more of a lying-down position. She played happily in this thing (with her polyhedron toy) for about an hour today!



She's been more interested in sitting up in general -- she still needs to be propped up, but she does these cute little baby curls if you try to hold her in a reclining position.

So, to sum up: she's still cute!

Sadness

Lest you think that Quinn's life is all happiness and smiles, I wanted to share some photographic evidence to the contrary:



Actually, I think this face she makes is adorable (although sad). Believe it or not, I only managed to capture the less extreme version; she somehow manages to get the corners of her mouth all the way down to her chin.

Here are some things that have made Quinn sad recently: getting medicine on her neck (what neck, you say? well, that's the problem), which is supposed to happen twice a day, and Mama cutting the tip of her finger with the nail clippers. That was VERY sad.

Buy Nothing New Year

So, Tim and I thought that, between the two of us, we could probably keep one New Year's resolution this year, and so we decided to buy nothing new.

Inspired by a column in Sojourners by someone who had committed to a Buy Nothing New year in the same year they had their first child, I figured we could do it, too. The way I see it, there is already WAY too much stuff around, and we can easily get by with re-used things.

Climate change seems more real and scary every day, and this is one small way to reduce our impact, as well as a way (for me) to begin to wrestle with the massive disconnect between the haves and the have-nots, both in the U.S. and globally.

At the very least, it should make us consider carefully what we really need.

I think that all the "transgressions" (or "exceptions," depending on your point of view) so far have been mine. So far, it's been all baby things: a few (bisphenol-A free) bottles, which were probably necessary, and some cute organic cotton baby clothing, which definitely was not.

We're currently in a competition to see who can post our reflections first. I think I won. But Tim's is probably way smarter-sounding.

Money Shot

With a nice camera, great sunlight, and an adorable subject, taking photos is really fun! And sometimes they turn out incredibly well, like this one.

Quinn had a doctor's appointment today, and she weighs 13 lbs, 14 oz (90th-95th percentile), is 23 1/2 inches long (75th-90th percentile), and has a head diameter of 43 cm (off the charts!). She was very sad about her shots -- she cried loudly, but didn't make a special new, "ouch that hurts" noise, like I thought she might. It was just loud crying with extra flailing of limbs. Fortunately, the crying was over pretty quickly, and she fell asleep pretty much as soon as we got her into the car seat.

...And the sleeping continues!

This is what a happy, well-rested baby looks like. Quinn continues to sleep like a champion. She has slept 5 1/2 hours or more 6 nights in the past week -- and 4 of those were 6 1/2 hours or more. We are feeling much better rested and loving it! Time will tell if this will last, but I'm just appreciating it.

In other news, Quinn (yeah, right, you didn't think it would be about anyone else, did you?) is discovering her hands. Several times in the past couple days, I have caught Quinn looking at her right hand -- sometimes moving it around a bit, but a lot of times just staring very calmly and intently. She will grab things that are placed in her hand, and try to reach for things. She still doesn't have total control of her arms -- she gave her self a good whack in the face with a rattle two days ago. It was very sad, and shocking to her -- she had her mad, crying face with the mouth wide open, but no sound came out for the first 20 seconds or so. We've decided to stick to softer toys for now.

I should also note that in this photo, she is smiling AT the camera -- I was holding it out, and she smiled when the little red light came on, looking at it rather than my face.

She just keeps getting more interesting!

A Champion Sleeper

Quinn slept almost 6 1/2 hours last night!

And, she went 7 1/2 hours between feedings. She's been a bit irregular with her sleeping schedule, but this gives us great hope (not to mention an unusually well-rested feeling).

She thoroughly enjoyed our trip to California, and showed further sleeping prowess by sleeping pretty much the whole way on the plane trip there and back -- and by adjusting to East Coast time instantly. We had feared she might literally be up all night when we got back, but she fell asleep more easily than we did.

Christmas Outfit

I had Quinn try on her Christmas outfit the other day. At first, she was suspicious.

Then, she got MAD!

She settled down and felt calmer once she got into normal clothes. I think maybe she is like her Daddy (okay, her Mama, too, a little bit) and does not like dressing up.

I'm not sure you can tell from these photos, but our girl is balding. Sadly, I think she will follow in my footsteps (and not her Daddy's), and have that respectable head of hair she was born with fall out and new hair (eventually) grow in. Tim's hair stayed, apparently. Tim reminds me, however, that in the long run, she should have plenty of hair, since mine grows fast, and his is voluminous.

Life as a Baby...

The highlights of life with baby are simple.

Quinn had her first bottle recently -- once breastfeeding was "well-established," I started expressing milk so that other people could feed her occasionally (someday, perhaps I'll even be able to sleep through a middle of the night feeding!). Here she is getting her first bottle:



Yum, Yum!



Yesterday, she had her second doctor's appointment (the 4-week checkup, a few days early because we're traveling for Christmas). Our big little girl weighed in at 10 lbs 2 oz and is now 21 1/2 inches long! She's gained 2 pounds and grown 2 inches since she was born.



And, she's practicing for her life of fame by averting her face from the paparazzi already!



She's also been getting in some quality father-daughter bonding time. She looks a little startled -- Tim is probably making a funny face at her.

A Yellow Walk

Last week, we took Quinn out for her first walk around the neighborhood.

She stayed warm with her yellow blanket...



... and we encountered many other yellow things as well.

Whoa, Baby!!

We are now living in a Quinn-centric universe.

Quinn Irene was born at 5:54 am on November 17, 2007. She weighed 8 lbs 2 oz and was 19 inches long. She is a beautiful, healthy baby girl and we are so delighted by her -- even in the middle of the night!




See lots of photos at the blog of her doting daddy.

It feels like ever since I gave birth, I've been living in an alternate reality. This could have something to do with the pathetically small number of hours of sleep I've logged in the past 3 weeks, but it's also the mental and emotional adjustment of taking care of this entirely new other person, and getting to know her, and Being a Mother.

It's amazing to me how tiny she is, and how every part of her little body works. I get stuck sometimes staring at her pinky nail, usually when I'm trying to file down her nails, which are long and sharp and grow fast. I'm fascinated by the weird little noises she makes, often in her sleep: grunts and squeaks and snorts, and every once in a while (okay, every time she eats!), a contented little hum.

It's also amazing to me that such a tiny person can dictate so much of our lives, and demand so much of our attention. Especially since the focus of our time and energy seems mainly to be around Digestive Events: Eating, Burping, Peeing, Pooping, and the dread Spitting Up.

So, she has taken over our life, and we love her! Isn't she cute?

Baby!

So, Tim and I are having a baby -- the due date is November 10th. See his post here.

Opting Out

One of the best dialogues in cinematic history is from the movie Say Anything. Lloyd Dobbler (played by John Cusack) is over for dinner at the home of his valedictorian girlfriend and her ambitious, overprotective single dad asks what he intends to do as a career.

The father of course asks the young man what he intends to do with his life, what career he wants to pursue. His response is, “I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that.”

“Well then,” asks the father sternly, “just what do you intend to do?”

His earnest response is “Kickboxing, sir. It’s the sport of the future.”

I used this in my sermon on Sunday as an example of someone attempting to opt out of the economy -- his list is fairly exhaustive, and includes most possible careers (although, unless you think we're selling something ;) , doesn't include pastors). But even if young Lloyd did manage to avoid buying, selling, and processing as a career, he would still be using all kinds of things that were bought, sold, and/or processed...

My point here being that opting out seems like it's almost always not an option. We are inextricably entangled in too many systems and institutions (economic, political, social) that despite their deep flaws, we can't escape. And most attempts at "opting out," whether in personal interaction or on a larger scale (e.g. not voting b/c you don't like the government) turn out to be acceptance and implicit affirmation of the status quo.

I have a blog now too.

Caving into peer pressure (and desiring to comment on certain other blogs), I now have a blog, too. We'll see what gems come forth... stay tuned.