I like to be with my family

Un-posed moment of sibling sweetness.

A few weeks ago, back when September was new and Sally was just starting to come more fully into her two-ness, we took a week of family vacation. We spent the first part of the week at Barb's House in Osh Kosh, the second part in Baraboo/Wisconsin Dells, and visited with my parents before, in between, and at the end. We did some more celebrating of Sally's birthday with dear friends, we did some poor sleeping and questionable eating.  There were fits of great sadness and defiance and moments of unbearable sweetness.

I took notes. 

• "Salad noodle cricket." Those were Walter's first words to me as we woke up at Barb's house Tuesday morning. I made him repeat it. "Salad. Noodle. Cricket." he said. "What is it?" I asked. "Something very yummy."  Silence for a bit.  "Would you mind saying that to me one more time?"  It never changed, and he continued to insist on it the rest of the morning. 
• "That was a good choice." That's all I wrote in my notes, and I don't remember what exactly it referred to, but it's something Walter's been saying quite a bit lately when he's pleased with a family activity and how it goes.  He likes to affirm my good choices. "Mama, that was a good choice."  I think in this case he might have been talking about going to the Appleton Children's Museum, or to the coffee shop for a snack after we played at the museum, or maybe it was the day before when we rode the train at the Oshkosh zoo with his dearest ones (Sally, Henry, Bennett, and Anna and the moms of same.)  When he enjoys something, he really enjoys it. Which leads me to ...
• "I think they did that for me." Another fairly common recent Walter-ism, which he says when something really delightful happens, like a violin piece coming on the radio while he's listening, or an especially beautiful sunset. 
• "All my toes are asleep.  Let's wake them up!" This is Sally, now. She is HILARIOUS.  And she seems be fairly intentional about it and aware of it. Other funny Sally sayings from vacation week: 
• "Look at that doggy, he can drive!" (On seeing a dog in a parked car.)
• "I'm gonna eat your pizza, Mama! Om nom nom nom nom nom!" (With great menacing flair, a gleam in her eye, and seriously wicked, pizza-stealing intent.) 
• "I'm standing. I'm a lamb." (I have no memory of what the set up was for this one, but it was one of the best and most brilliantly-delivered punchlines in the history of comedy.)
• Wandered Off: The Musical. Both kids sing almost constantly.  Two musical moments stand out in my memory of this vacation week.  One was the song Sally wrote while we were swimming one morning: "Swimming swimming where's my shoe? Swimming swimming where's my shoe?"  The other was on our last day in Baraboo, as we finished up lunch at the Mid-Continent Railway Museum and started to think about heading out to Umma and Baba's.  Walter found a giant tree stump and declared it a stage.  He got up and started to sing, and told Sally to dance; she complied. Then he started to sing her story: the story of a little girl who wandered off into the woods one day. "Wandered off!! Into the woods!!" Eventually, our hero makes it back home. Whew. 

  

  I like capturing the moment right before they zonk out.

• "That's what I'd been planning on." Walter's plan, every day we were at the hotel, was simply to maximize our time in the hotel pool.  Eating the deli meat we'd brought with us in the hotel room was great, because if we ate in the hotel room, we were closer to the pool. I think we swam a minimum of three times each day.  Our skin and hair will never be the same.  
• "Where's the duckies?" Excursions that took us out of our hotel room and into the gorgeous September days were met with some resistance: Walter only wanted to swim, Sally only wanted to watch movies. But we did manage to get them out and about.  My favorite outing was a ride on the Original Wisconsin Ducks.  The ducks are amphibious vehicles from WWII re-purposed as tourist carriers. I loved holding little Sally on my lap as we zoomed through the woods, the wind blowing in our hair.  I loved watching Walter walk very confidently up to the front of the duck when the driver asked for a young volunteer: we were out on Lake Delton, and Walter got to drive, and he did so like he'd been born doing it.  As we were walking through the parking lot to the van to head back to the hotel, Sally sleepily said, "Where's the duckies?"  All this talk about ducks ... well ... where were they?

Vacationing together is pretty exhausting.  Separated from their usual routine, the kids had some sustained moments of genuine misery.  They missed their friends, their teachers, their regularly scheduled programming. We started the week with a house full of friends, and when they went home and we four stayed, Walter was very lonesome for them and asked, repeatedly, as young ones do, "Can we just go home, now?" But we persisted in our vacationing, and the kids had fun, and so did we.  We watched a new Daniel Tiger episode while we were getting dressed and going one morning, and the theme seemed to fit just right with what we were doing, so we sang it often, usually led by Sally: "I like to be with my family!" Sometimes we'd sing it as though we were trying to convince ourselves. Other times we'd sing it and I'd know that there's nothing more true in the whole world.  

I like to be with my family!

Way too much for one blog post

Ohmygoodness.  Life is so full of life these days.  And it has been way too hot to spend any time in front of a laptop.  And I am really, really tired.  I know I've said that at other points in this pregnancy, but now I really mean it.  I am so tired it feels like my brain is melting. (I have no idea where Walter gets his flair for drama.  And whining.)

Writing with a melting brain is not easy.  But I'm going to try! (Note: this post was written over the course of two weeks or so.  Short spurts of writing seem to be do-able in spite of the melting brain.)

Our first radio silence fell when we went on vacation.  We spent June 18-25 in Sea Isle City, New Jersey, with the Albrights. It was glorious. Some highlights:

• We were worried about flying post-weaning and trying to convince Walt that he's still a lap baby (ha!) The flight out went quite well and Walt slept through most of it.  The flight home was a bit of a nightmare, including about a one hour delay on the runway with no air conditioning in blistering heat.  But even that flight had some pretty bright moments, including Walter's excited exclamations of "Airplane! Airplane!" and Walt playing with the 14 month old in the row behind us (peek-a-boo, and many many kisses.)
• From the moment we arrived, we relaxed.  All of us.  One giant "ahhhhhhhhh."
• Walter had his first ride on Pop Pop's boat, and it was a great success.

  

  Go Go Go!

  After some initial nervousness, Walter got into the spirit by loudly encouraging Pop Pop to "Go Go Go!" When the wake rules allowed, Pop Pop would then make the boat go fast. Walter continues to try to get us to repeat this experience on land, usually in the car when we can't go any faster than we're already going.  
• After some excellent gogogo-ing, we settled in on the boat to enjoy some delicious pulled pork sandwiches ala Grandma.  Walter was the picture of contentment.  Then, he took a bite of sandwhich and fell asleep mid-chew.  Completely awake one moment, completely asleep the next.  We got the bite of sandwich out of his mouth and Walt slept soundly all the way back to the dock. You know your toddler is having a good time when he spontaneously falls asleep. 
• We went out for dinner at a nice restaurant and I ordered a calamari appetizer.  Walter is usually initially intrigued by new foods,, then when they're close enough to his mouth to smell he has second thoughts.  This new food aversion applies to all new foods, including things like apple pie (you should have seen us trying to get him to eat that pie.  Proud moments in parenting.) On this particular night, Walt must have been really hungry from all the salty air and sun, or the stars were aligned with the tides or something, because he didn't hesitate at all and took a nice big bite of the calamari ring I offered him.

  

  What toddler doesn't enjoy a nice fried squid?

   He ended up eating most of the calamari himself, including the tentacle-y pieces.  I cried a little bit with pride. 
• Speaking of crying, I found myself doing just that behind my sunglasses, sitting on the beach, and it had nothing to do with the sunblock in my eyes.  I was watching Walter play frisbee with his dad, his Uncle Matthew and his Aunt Kate. Walter tried a couple of times to throw the frisbee--no success.  So, Aunt Kate would very gently throw it to Walter (not sure how she did it, but the frisbee landed softly right at his feet every time); Walter would pick up the frisbee and run it over to Uncle Matt (have you ever seen a toddler run? It is the greatest thing in the world); Matt would throw it Sean who'd throw it to Kate and then repeat. He had so much fun. Between this game on the beach and a game he and his cousin Ada invented together (she'd make a funny scary face at him, he'd make a funny "I'm scared" face and then laugh) I was awash with good memories of times with my extended family on both sides.  There is nothing quite so wonderful as being given time and attention by cousins and aunts and uncles.
  It is such a gift.  Seeing Walter with all his older cousins (9 of them!) made me especially miss my cousin Jason.  I love watching the videos my dad took of Lisa and Jason playing with me and including me so lovingly when I was about Walter's age. If you're familiar with Edison-Swift family videos, you know I'm talking about The Saga of the Three Bass.
• Having said all that, you'd think I would be a good parent and take a picture or video or somehow document this beautiful game of frisbee.  

  

  Cousin Rowan was especially good with Walter.

  I did not.  But Walter-Reading-This-Someday, you should know: you are so loved.  You have all these amazing people who truly care for you and who found ways to make you feel included and special when you were little and couldn't throw a frisbee to save your life.
• In addition to frisbee, Walter enjoyed digging in the sand with his cousins, sitting in the sand at the edge of the ocean and letting the water rush over his legs with each wave, looking for shells and tasting a few of them, and, most of all, going into the water with Daddy.  He was always a little shy of the water in the beginning, especially the first time.  He planted his feet and wouldn't move for a long time, until we suggested taking a few steps forward and couting the steps out loud.  Walter loves to count these days.  Usually the steps came in groups of 3, 6, or 11 which are his favorite numbers to count to.  Walter also enjoyed it when Sean picked him up and carried him out into the waves, playing a game called "Walter jump!" Sean would hold Walt up and then dip his feet into the wave as it passed.  This game was not particularly easy on Daddy's back, which meant we were pretty good about taking breaks to come back to the beach to visit Mama, get some water, maybe eat some pizza or peanut butter sandwich.  The weather was perfect and Walter didn't want to leave, but he was a trooper and walked home with us each afternoon for a quick shower and a long, lovely nap. 

  

  Joy on the beach

• A funny thing happened on the beach.  We were playing in the sand, having a good time, when Walter suddenly got up and, with great purpose, toddler-strode over to a 10 year old boy who was digging a hole and shouted "NO!"  The boy looked at him quizzically, then at us.  We were a little puzzled, too.  We talked to Walter about the beach belonging to everyone, and that kind of talk usually slows him down and makes him think a little bit, but he insisted: No.  This boy could not dig in the sand.  He even found ways to return a few more times to let the boy know he still meant what he'd said earlier. Sharing isn't easy for toddlers (in fact, most of the experts I've read recently say it's impossible for them,) so we weren't surprised by that, just by this particular display of anti-digging fervor. It was one of those moments when you realize that your kid is a person, a person with definite opinions and the means to express them. 
• One of Walter's strongly held opinions turns out to be that theme park rides should never, ever end. We discovered this at Wonderland Pier, where Walter rode some rides with us (flying elephants, train, carousel) and, for the first time, road some rides all by himself (little boats and fire trucks that go around in a circle.)  We couldn't believe he was ready to ride by himself and were very proud of him and excited to watch him discover this new joy.  He gave some of his characteristic Walter exclamations of happiness, but for most of the rides he appeared introspective ... not scared, not excited, just very content and pleased.  When the ride ended, he was distraught and even did a little kicking mini-tantrum when removed from the vehicle.  When we visited the Cape May Zoo later in the week, Walter was pretty meh about the animals (except the llamas, because of Llama Llama Nighty Night) and really set on riding a rather expensive train around the park grounds.  We rode the train twice, which wasn't nearly enough, but was better than no train. Again, he was very quiet during the rides, maybe trying to soak in the whole train experience as much as possible, maybe steeling himself for the inevitable disappointment of the ride ending ... hard to say.  
• We ate very well on vacation.  Very well indeed.  I won't go into the details of our gluttony, but will say that the highlight were the two flounder that Pop Pop caught and the 16 crabs that Sean caught and turned into crab cakes.  That, and watching my nieces and nephews (with a little help from Walter) devour a full four pounds of bacon on Sunday morning. Those kids really really like bacon. 
• Sean and I had a wonderful date night, just the two of us, with dinner at a very nice restaurant followed by ice cream at our favorite ice cream place and mini golf at our favorite mini golf chain (Pirate Island, of course.)

  

  Before Walt was born, all of our pictures looked exactly like this.

   Sean and I have always particularly enjoyed mini golf at the shore, so getting to do that again was pretty special and romantic in a very Edison-Albrighty kind of way. Also, I won, which was nice.  And there was a big, full orange super moon over the ocean. And maybe some kissing by the light of said moon.  =).
• One of the benefits of vacationing with extended family, or at least with our wonderful extended families, is that there are lots of great times together as well as opportunities to be alone.  Walter was very well watched and cared for and so I got to spend some time with just me and Sally, paying attention to her and her movements in ways I don't always get to when I'm working or hanging out with Walter on weekends. Getting some good Sally time in every day was wonderful, I and wondered at her increasing strength, size and gymnastic ability.

  

  Mama and Sally on the beach (more family in background.)

   After seeming much smaller and much less active than Walter for a long time, Sally has caught up in a big way and does all sorts of great rolls, shimmies and bumps. She especially likes to press down on my left hip, in a way that's both disconcerting and delightful to me. 

It was a glorious week. I wish I'd done a better job of documenting it, but I'm hoping all the un-photographed, un-blogged moments will stay with us, at least as general impressions of happiness and fragments of memories that will come back next time we visit. One thought that stuck with me during and after the trip is that spending so much more time with Walter than we do during a normal work week is a very good and very important thing to do.  I think our regular work week routine is good, too.  Walter and Sally will grow up with two well-educated, hard-working parents who care about what they do.  My job, in particular, is very meaningful and fulfilling and I think that's a good model for them to grow up with.  But I'm also very grateful for vacation time, because we get to know each other in a different way when the routine is gone and we get to be with each other for long stretches of non eating, non sleeping hours. 

For example, I realized that I've always made a big deal of Walter's bigness on this blog. Not just his physical size, but his larger-than-life personality, the bigness of his presence. But I don't write much about his quietness, his understated and introspective nature, his sweetness, his patience, his sustained, focused interest in working on a puzzle or gazing thoughtfully out the window. All of that is pretty remarkable, too. And I got to see more of it, and appreciate more of it, during our time together on vacation. 

When we got home from vacation Sean started two weeks of paternity leave (don't ask. Long story. Or do ask, and we'll tell you offline.)  We moved Walter from his crib into his big boy single bed.  The first night went really well.  Too well.  Eerily well. Since then we've had wildly varying levels of sleeping success, including some especially rough nights where Mama or Dada had to climb into bed with Walter in order for any of us to get any sleep at all.  

Adding to the sleep complications has been Walter's reluctance to miss a single second of time spent with the wonderful guests we've hosted the past two weekends.  Precious, beautiful time spent with Ben (Uncle Cuppa,) Arden and Greta and Josh (Uncle Gosh,) Vanessa and Beckett is more than worth a little sleep disruption, and I can't say I blame Walter for wanting to stay awake and make the time together last longer. I did that, too.  We have had so much fun, and again I can't help but overflow a bit with gratitude for the remarkable people in Walter's life. We are so, so blessed. 

With all this excitement, though, one of the greatest blessings came yesterday when Walter took a 3 hour afternoon nap, went to bed nicely at 7:30 pm and had to be woken up to go to day care at 7:45 am.  He went down easy tonight, too, and shows every sign of sleeping long and well.  When I say "tonight," of course, I mean the night I wrote these sentences.  Adding photos and editing and publishing this post will happen on another night.  My melting brain needs sleep! 

Looking back on month 7

When I sit down to write these monthly Walter roundups, I ask Sean to help me make a list of topics, which I then rearrange and expand on to write the post. So much happens every month that it can be hard to remember it all.  This time I transcribed the list using Sean's exact words and emphasis, and I rather like it just as it.

SWIMMING!
zoo!!
swings!
croup!
Z-Pack!
Cruisin'
Crawlin'
Feedin' myself!
Fruits and veggies and meats
Bonk
New car seat
Mama!
Romantic week with grandparents
Signing
Starting to baby proof
Playing ball
gentle, gentle
sitting down and sitting up
... let's get you a new diaper.

That last one wasn't actually part of the list.

Caught napping.

The months have been going by very fast, and this month was no exception, but it also felt exceptionally full. Lots of people asked me this month, "Can you imagine what you did with your time before Walter?" And the honest answer I gave was, "I slept!" Certainly there was more spontaneous napping, and certainly our lives were meaningful and full.  But since Walter arrived life is full-to-overflowing; life is not just life, it is life abundantly.  This month was overflowing, abundantly full of love, firsts, tears, coughing, exploring, laughing, growing and joy. And also the occasional nap.

And now (over the course of two weeks) I'll take a crack at writing the narrative version of Sean's list ...


It felt like we'd all been better for about a week from the pink eye/ear infection/sinus infection/bronchitis saga when Walter started getting sick again. He was OK during the day but very sick and very sad at night, and one night he made a kind of whooping sound in between body-racking sobs, so back to the doctor we went. We were very relieved to hear that his coughing sounded like a classic case of croup, which sounds awful but isn't so bad in the grand scheme of baby sickness. We gave him a short course of steroids to help open his airways and imperil his major league baseball career.  The medicine made him 'roid-rage-cranky on top of sick-cranky, so when that was done and he started getting better he seemed extra sweet to us.  Of course, it was difficult to appreciate the sweetness through all that mucus.  Sean and I got terribly sick. The high point of this low point time was taking the day off from work together and gazing at each other miserably across delicious, steaming hot bowls of pho.

Somewhere in that haze of illness, Walter learned how to crawl. It happened gradually and also all at once ... he went from scooting and backwards crawling to learning how to maneuver into a sitting position by himself to a series of yoga/pilates moves that turned into real, genuine, one knee in front of another crawling.  At first he crawled pretty slowly, but soon he began motoring at an alarming pace, inevitably and determinedly toward the most dangerous places and objects he can find. When he's crawling and there's no one in-between him and a danger zone (the stairs, the dog's food and water bowls, the kitchen, etc.) Walter lets out a cackle of joy and crawls extra super fast toward his goal. He also likes to play "go find Mommy/Daddy."  For example, if I'm in the kitchen and the boys are in the living room I'll hear little hands and knees hitting the floor and Sean say, "Are you going to find Mommy? You are, aren't you?"  Shortly after that, Walter comes around the corner, closely followed by Sean, sees me, smiles, and doubles his speed.

I think this means he is very, very smart.

Walter in his "freedom enclosure"

Soon after the crawling came the pulling himself up to standing, and soon after the standing came the cruising using furniture for support and practicing getting up and down from the standing position, bending down to pick up a toy, etc. without falling.  These days, Walter is experimenting more and more with standing without any support at all--staying close to objects he can use to steady himself again. (Yesterday he evidently steadied himself using a nearby baby at day care, which reportedly was pretty funny and turned out OK for both of them.)  He did have his first "incident report" at day care during month 7, when he fell and got a little bruise above his eye.  The word "Bonk!" has entered our daily vocabulary as Walter and gravity get acquainted.  He also hears a lot of "gentle, gentle" ... you should have seen Hank's face when he realized that Walter can now chase after him. The perfect doggy expression of "Oh no.  It moves." That said, Walter and Hank the Dog are still good friends and interacting well with each other.  They check in with each other, look for each other, and look out for each other, too. When Walter heads for the open stair case, Hank goes ahead of him and gently blocks his path.

On Sunday, June 10, Sean and Walt went to urgent care (Sean had a badly infected throat, Walt had two badly infected ears,) Walt started a new course of antibiotics (the much easier-to-administer Z-Pack), Sean headed to Florida for a week of training for work and Walter and I headed to Johnson Creek for a wonderful week of vacation with Umma Sue and Grandpa Paul.

Mmmmmwah!

Sean called this a "romantic" week in his list, which I should probably explain.  Walter is a very affectionate boy; we're very affectionate people.  This week though, he was especially affectionate ... approaching us with half-closed eyes and open mouth and planting big wet kisses right on our lips with endearing frequency. Even with the ear infections and terrible sleep schedule and raging case of eczema (complicated, we found out later, by a yeast infection on his skin. yick.) even with all that he had such a good week.  He nursed and nursed and nursed, he cuddled and snuggled and cuddled, he explored and crawled and played and played. We didn't try to pack too much into each day, but we did do some pretty wonderful things: ate out at restaurants and sat in restaurant high chairs for the first time, swinging on the baby swings at the neighborhood park for the first time, first trip to the zoo (Henry Villas, in Madison,) first carousel, first petting zoo, first back yard baby pool.  He got to meet Maureen, a dear friend since way back in the days when we lived in Middleton circa 1984 or so, and he got to visit with Heidi and Bennett, my soul sister and his soul brother, again.  He went 6 days straight (GAH!) without pooping, which was exciting for all of us.  He had a growth spurt and moved up to 24 month sized clothes. He moved up into a big boy car seat.  Sean joined us on Friday night and we went down to my old hometown on Saturday, worshiping at our old home congregation on Sunday and celebrating Father's Day with great worship, a lovely family photo shoot and delicious Indian buffet.

I'm pretty happy, on the whole, with our weekly family routine and the time we get to spend together.  But it was a remarkable experience for me to get to be with Walter all day and all night, in a way we just haven't done since I started back at work.  I believe it is in all our best interests that I continue to work in this job, this calling, that I love so much, and that Walter spend significant time every day with other adults that he trusts and other kids that he's growing to know and love and learn from and with.  But it was good for us to have that week of intense, "romantic" time together.  He got some amazing bonding time with Umma Sue and Grandpa Paul, too, which makes all of us very happy indeed.

We took lots of pictures.  Lots and lots of pictures.  You should go look at the pictures, now. I'll wait. They are really, really good.

The happy glow from vacation stayed with us for awhile.  When we got Walt home to his crib (and away from the temptation of constantly nursing with Mama) he started sleeping better, even sleeping all the way through the night for almost a whole week. He started weekly swimming lessons at the YMCA, where we realized that "95th percentile" really does mean Walter is much much much bigger than other babies his age (and most babies several months older than him, too.)  He loves swimming and we love being in the water with him.  It was neat for me to back in the water at the Y with Walt for the first time since my last water aerobics class when I was pregnant.  Other than his skin problems, the transition from 7-8 months found Walter quite healthy.

Of course, now he has another ear infection and I'm sick, too, but that's what happens when I take two weeks to write a blog post.  Life continues and brings bugs our way!

Walter's diet expanded dramatically in his 7th month, but variety hasn't really led to greater enjoyment on his part.  He makes fantastic "YUCK!" faces when we give him applesauce or any other kind of fruit to eat.  He purses his little mouth and looks accusingly at each person at the table, one by one, saying "How could you do this to me?" He loves oatmeal, corn, and Cheerios.  He's extra interested in nursing, even as my milk supply is noticeably slowing down. Walter's first and most often and consistently used sign language is the sign for "milk," which he uses when he wants to nurse.  Lots of mixed feelings for Mama, knowing that this chapter of our life together is changing significantly--even if I'm able to nurse him beyond age one, very soon I won't be his main source of nourishment anymore.  It's a good thing, it's progress, but it's an adjustment for both of us.

Things are changing.  They're changing much faster than I can document them, clearly.  I don't want to slow time down, I don't want to stop the changes, but I do want to notice them and note them as they come and before they go.

At 7 months, Walter's favorite babbling syllable shifted from "dada" to "mama." That's a pretty standard progression--he's doing a lot of experimenting with "baba" these days. Babbling is how babies practice talking--working on their talking muscles, working on different tones of voice, listening to the way their voices sound and engaging in "conversations" with anyone who will repeat their sounds back to them.  The baby books point out that babies don't associate meaning with the babbling syllables the way we do ... "dada" doesn't mean Daddy, for example, or "mama," Mommy.

Right from the start, though, Sean insisted that Walter was using "mama" differently from other syllables--he was using it to refer to me. I was skeptical, but then I started noticing it, too.  Sometimes he looks right at me and lets out an emphatic "MOM!" He says it when he's sad or scared or has had a recent run-in with gravity and then reaches for me, crawling into my lap and burrowing into my arms.  This morning, when I said, "Are you ready to go to Daddy?" he smiled, turned his head to look at Sean, and put out his arms for Sean to take him from me.

I think Walter knows who we are in a different way, these days, and in a way that's changing and deepening every day.  And I think he knows we love him, too.