Jamie Chew's Web Log: Vol. 0 No. 27

2004-05-11 09:45 (John) If I seem curiously absent in yesterday's entry, it's because I was off getting my dental implant inserted, and spent most of the day convalescing. I did get to take Jamie out for a walk in the evening to go out to get dinner, and he let me lean on his stroller, making it do double duty as my walker. :) Kristen's friend Paula also dropped by, and spent the evening chatting with us and watching Jamie bounce happily in his saucer.

2004-05-11 24:10 (John) Jamie celebrated his six-month birthday in glorious summer weather, eating vast quantities of real food, and generally being in a fine mood. Well, I'm not sure that sweet potatoes count as real food; I won't touch them. And the experiment with grating fresh apple on top of his okayu* (rice gruel) won't soon be repeated, following a most flatulent afternoon. But he did certainly have a food-centred day. We are officially Not Allowed To Eat Without Jamie: anytime he sees us eating, Jamie is Entitled To Eat. I suppose that's Rule #1. Rule #2 is we are Not Allowed To Eat Anything More Interesting Than Jamie is Eating, Unless We Share. I guess Rule #3 is When Jamie Starts Eating, Jamie Will Decide When The Meal is Over. Such a gastronomic tyrant we've spawned, I'm so proud.

For most of us at Michelle's regular Tuesday night dinner, it was time to celebrate the beginning of fiddlehead season with our traditional scallops and fiddleheads recipe. Jamie had to refrain from directly participating, but did seem more interested in licking my fingers than usual afterward.

(Kristen) Jamie slept in while his parents ran around getting as much done as they could before he woke up. His sleeping patterns are shifting again, and the day of the three-hour afternoon nap is a thing of the past. I feel lucky if he sleeps for 40 minutes at a time now. Well, sometimes not: he often falls asleep on my lap as he nurses, and wakes up if I move him. I try to have a book nearby whenever I nurse him now in case I'm stuck in place for a while. He'll do this about three times in a day, and then it's off to bed. He's still sleeping well at night, so I can be thankful for that, but there is some disturbing indication that he may start waking up around 7:00 AM. Ugh ugh ugh.

Ken Sagara noticed that Jamie was fussing in the stroller when they were on their afternoon walks. Jamie faces back towards the person pushing the stroller rather than outwards, and noting that Jamie was smarter than the average bear, Ken declared that he was tired of watching Jamie strain to look around Ken at what was going on. Jamie's stroller flips around so that Jamie can face forwards rather than backwards, so John and Ken flipped it today. Jamie was very pleased with the new arrangement, and chortled mightily.

2004-05-12 23:52 (Kristen) Jamie's capacity for solid food grows exponentially. Today he ate two tablespoonfulls of barley cereal and two separate servings of okayu, miso, and buckwheat. Anytime he sees other people eating, he wants some too. Tonight, John let Jamie lick a finger that has some spicy mapo tofu sauce on it. I thought that John was out of his mind, but instead Jamie's eyes went wide, and he wouldn't give John his finger back.

He's nursing for food, of course, but I have noticed that he will more clearly nurse for comfort, and he is going through a phase where he wants to be nursed to sleep for some of his naps in a supine position, as if it were nighttime. He is also nursing less in general, which is a huge relief for me. I love the bonding time between us, and I will miss it when he stops nursing, but the every two hours thing is pretty exhausting. I will be interested to see if he stops nursing early because of his very obvious interest in food.

He has started rolling over and twisting himself around on the ground for objects other than Mr. Rubber Duck. He will often get himself 90 degrees from his starting point, and will roll over both ways to get at a desired toy or object. John thinks that his experience with the exersaucer is reminding him that he can move himself around and that it's fun. He loves paper, and will cheerfully stuff magazines and other paper objects into his mouth if I'm not paying complete attention.

Tonight, at the Scrabble club, he was having some difficulty with the heat, and so John and I took him into a nearby games room. I can play ping-pong better with a baby on one hip than I can without a baby at all, and the baby likes it better that way too.

2004-05-13 23:55 The weather continues to be hot, but Jamie's adapting fine. In addition to his copious food intake (new taste sensations today: a bit of natto off my finger, and beans-and-rice baby food), he insisted on gulps of whatever was on tap: water or dilute apple juice.

He's a sharp kid. He's learned that if a bowl is on a placemat, then pulling the placemat brings the bowl closer. Much of his spare time right now seems to be devoted to figuring out how to move things, generally toward his mouth.

2004-05-14 22:36 (Kristen) It was an eventful day, although Jamie seemed to sleep through much of it. We went for a walk this morning after a somewhat stressful morning: Jamie had been congested during the night, and had woken up at 5:45, 7:10, 9:10, and possibly more than once earlier in the night. He had started a few times, with a cry that sounded like he was in pain. Michelle has noted that he has three tooth buds right now, and we wouldn't be surprised if he is working on three teeth simultaneously: the front two that he's been working on for months, and a new one.

The walk distracted him, however, and he slept for an hour on his usual afternoon walk with Ken. Then it was over to Tai Tai's for miso shiru and okayu, and over to Tom and Michelle's to pick up Daniel and me for a Second Cup run. We all, minus Daniel, went then to pick up Michelle at Bakka on our way to Maclem's to look at high chairs for our budding gourmand. The trip there, however, was Not Fun, as it was hot and the entire length of College Street was under construction. Jamie was becoming more and more hysterical as we drove through Little Italy, and it became clear very quickly that we had to stop. Sure enough, he had a diaper that needed changing, but we had no diapers as I had not restocked the diaper bag. John ran off to get diapers, and I consoled a diaperless, screaming baby. He eventually forgave us and got back into the car, but we were all pretty shell-shocked by that point.

We finally ended up at Toys R Us with a tired, fragile, but game baby and Michelle bought us a lovely Peg Perego high chair. Now I can keep my promise to Jamie that he can try to feed himself if he is in a highchair. We also bought him a new, larger bib.

While we were in the Toys R Us, we noticed that Jamie was very warm. He had a long nurse (those glider rockers in the display area are very nice), but wasn't cooling down. He wasn't himself, and when we got home, he had a temperature of 38 C and a runny nose. It is unclear if he has a cold or if these are teething symptoms , and only tomorrow can say. He is sleeping beside me now, beautiful and peaceful, and I hope that he has a good night.

2004-05-14 26:30 (John) I'm quietly freaking out, because Jamie has a temperature of 38.1C (100.6F) and is intermittently running clear mucus out of his nose. I even let Kristen give him a millilitre of children's Tylenol. I think I will stay up all night fretting. Maybe I'll go count my Orkut friends again.

2004-05-15 18:34 (Kristen) Jamie's temperature is back down around 36.9 C, which is much better. He's sleeping a lot and his nose is still running now and then, he's crabby and doesn't want to be put down At All. John was up until almost 5:00 AM worrying, and Jamie and I were up at 8:20, charming the garage sale patrons next door. We might all find the same schedule some day.

Today's "d'oh, where's the camera?" moment was when Jamie and I were at the Second Cup. He was nose to nose with a two-month-old black pug puppy, and it was about as cute as it sounds. Today's 'hooray, found the camera!' moment was when I finished putting his highchair# together (thanks, Gary) and he was perched inside, ready to eat. He still slouches somewhat to the side, but he's getting the idea. I let him play with his cereal bowl (avec* cereal), but didn't let him fling it to the floor. Mom still is the Death of Fun.

2004-05-15 24:50 (John) When I got up this morning, Jamie's nose was dribbling, so Kristen and I both tried snorting and snuffling at him, hoping he would try to imitate us. Instead, he laughed and laughed so hard mucus came gushing out his nose, which I suppose served the same end.

2004-05-16 24:15 (John) Jamie's nose continued to dribble, but he was a little less clingy and more his usual cheery self. He slept in until a record 1:00 P.M., had a light breakfast, watched me garden for a while from his exersaucer, then went for a stroller ride with Kristen to the Second Cup, where Kristen did not spill a vanilla bean latte on his head. (She did yesterday, which gave me quite the start when I sniffed his head for a customary whiff of now sadly diminishing fresh baby smell.)

The aforementioned gardening was the planting of two big boxwoods, a task made more of a pita (think rude acronym) by our discovery that the previous owner of the house had had the paving tiles we were taking up laid on top of a thick layer of cement, defeating the purpose of using paving tiles (drainage) and wasting a couple of hours of my day. For much of it, Kristen and Jamie played with Ben and Sam, and Paul and Betsy ended up inviting us in for dinner, perhaps noting how beat we were (Kristen from her cold, me from landscaping). As usual, Jamie ignores adults when excited children are around, and Ben and Sam did a fine job of keeping him amused.

2004-05-17 24:16 (Kristen) Well, after more than three months of watching, waiting, no-shows and patience, Jamie's first tooth is finally here. I checked his gums this morning, and there was a lesion on his gum like a canker sore, and the sharp feel of a new tooth against my finger. This was the lower front left, and the lower front right (which I thought would be the first to show) is on its way.

This would explain in part why Jamie was off his food for a few days (deeply disturbing), and why he so happily devoured so much miso shiru and rice this afternoon. Dinner was more miso shiru and rice, but he was given a string bean of his own to work on. He enjoyed it much more than the pureed string beans and brown rice from a jar that I've been trying to feed to him, possibly because he could do it himself. [John: we were surprised at how quickly he was able to gnaw through the string bean, and how little trouble swallowing it gave him.] He's also enjoying drinking diluted apple juice from a small bottle because he can hold the bottle without adult help.

This evening, I went to play Trivia while John and Jamie wandered around the Eaton Centre having Guys Night for two hours. Jamie had a good time with his dad until the end, when the two of them were waiting for me just outside the pub we were playing at. After getting off the phone with me, John said to Jamie that Mom was coming. When I didn't appear instantly, Jamie got more and more freaked out until John called me again to hurry out and I actually arrived. Jamie is not a clingy child, and is generally quite happy with other adults (and with John in particular), so I was quite surprised by his reaction, although John says that I shouldn't be.

* For the benefit of Scrabble players, words that are not in the Scrabble dictionary are marked with an asterisk.

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