We're pooped!

Heh, heh, that title takes on a whole new meaning when you have an 8 week old. Especially when he wakes you up at 2am with a "special prize" for you in his diapee...

Here's Dean on his changing table with is best stuffed pal, Cow. Cow showed up in my Christmas stocking this year. If you pull her tail, she shakes. When I pulled her out of my stocking on Christmas morning, I never dreamed she'd become a staple in our household, keeping our baby company at every diaper change. She likes to sit on top of the wipes. He stares at her intently while we change him. We also sing little songs about Cow. Yay, Cow.

For the record, I saw Dr. Shepard today, who does NOT look like McDreamy, by the way, and I don't have chronic hypertension. :):):) My blood pressure's been weird since I gave birth, but now seems to be leveling out. This could be due to the fact that :
a. I finally feel like a real human being again and I actually started going back out in public this week
AND
b. Marcus and I have stopped adding salt to our food. Do you know how hard that is for a southerner? Yeah, you do.

Dean went to work with Daddy today while I went to the doctor. He was babysat by the lovely and talented Julia, one of Marcus's students. He is becoming quite the social butterfly. Speaking of which, he nad I will leave Tuesday morning to visit my mom and dad for 2 weeks! (I'll be at the Southeastern Theatre Conference in Chattanooga the first weekend, where Marcus and I will be helping with the hiring for TWV...did I tell you this already?) Please pray for us on the airplane. I tried to pick the worst seat on the plane so that no one would sit next to me. We'll see how that goes. I'm bringing him a pacifier and a bottle for takeoff and landing. If anyone has any other suggestions about how to make travelling with a tiny one more comfortable, please share. Every time I get nervous or freaked about it, I think about my poor, dear mother-in-law traveling from Japan to America with a 4 year old Marcus and a 1 year old Michael BY HERSELF. I think I can handle 3 hours.

Maybe, baby?

Jen doesn't want to jinx it (so she will, therefore, refer to herself in third person), but could it be possible that her baby boy's colic has passed??? Oh, please, oh, please! He actually slept through a feeding the other night! We woke up at 5am to his little hungry whimper, looked at each other and asked "Did you feed him at 3?" Neither of us had. He went 5 hours without eating. And I felt like a new woman. A woman who had experienced REM sleep. YES!

Now if we could just get him to stop peeing on his changing table! He did this about 15 minutes before we were due to have company on Sunday. It ran all over the vinyl pad and onto his back and head. There was no time to drag out the baby tub. Fortunately, Marcus was in the shower, so I just handed the baby to him to hose off. Dean actually seemed to enjoy himself and looked quite cute wrapped up in his froggy hooded towel.

Next week, Deano and I head to Oxford for his first visit with Grammy and Papa! (My parents) Everyone's just a little excited. My mom and I have been making list after list of baby essentials. Her friends from church are giving them a grandparents' shower on Sunday! Dean will be in heaven for our 2 week visit.

Oh, by the way, I've changed the settings on here so that anyone can leave comments...you don't have to have a google account. So comment away!

Prepare to melt

Look who started smiling!

Have we told you lately that we love him?

Whaaaaaaaa?

Dean Nelson Lane slept through a feeding last night. It's true. We fed him (after a HUGE screaming fit) at 12:30 and finally got him settled into the vibra-chair (he has rejected his bassinet this week...who knows why) about 1:15, knowing we'd be up for another feeding by 3. The whimper cry woke us up at 5. I picked him up and started changing his diaper when it hit me--we should have done this already! I went back to the bedroom and asked Marcus "Did you feed him at 3? Because I didn't." Marcus, still half-asleep, thought about it for a while and replied "No, I don't believe I did." We are hoping this means he's going to start sleeping for longer stretches. That would rock. Needless to say, the poor little guy was ravenous when we did feed him at 5. Poor baby.

I had my six-week checkup at the baby doctor yesterday, even though it's been 7 weeks since I had the baby. I'm good.

This week will mark me kind of "going back to work" as I am knee-deep in resumes for Theatre West Virginia. We're looking for a scenic designer for our musical and I'm starting to interview possible candidates for assistant stage manager positions. It's nice to get that ball rolling. I feel like I haven't really been a part of the real world for the past couple of months, so it's nice to re-connect with some adults again! And it makes us look even more forward to the summer. Marcus and I will go to the Southeastern Theatre Conference in a couple of weeks to help hire TWV's summer staff and cast. Dean will be living it up in Oxford with my mom and dad. (translation: Getting spoiled beyond belief by Grammy and Papa!)

On another note, Marcus and I are absolutely addicted to HGTV. We watch it ALL THE TIME! When we finally have a home of our own, it's going to have awesome curb appeal, a sassy kitchen and a very "zen" bathroom.

Happiness is...

This little guy smiling at you at 6am. You don't even care that he won't let you go back to sleep and you just have to read him a story. :)

Cutie McSweet Face

Yep. That would be Dean in his visor. Eileen gave him this outfit right after he was born and he wore it today to visit Daddy at work. Could you melt?

Oh, by the way, we're getting REAL smiles now. :)

aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!

That is what I felt like when I woke up this morning after 10HOURS of sleep! Marcus's mom and dad came into town yesterday and took baby Dean to their hotel to spend the night. Now I must admit to having some mixed feelings. I felt a little guilty about feeling so ok about handing my child off to someone else. This is when my dear, wise husband reminded me that a. they are his grandparents and they really, really want to be with him and b. I seriously needed some sleep. We had about 3 sleepless nights this week and they were starting to really take their toll. I was getting dizzy and feeling really out of it. And let's not even talk about my blood pressure readings when I don't sleep. Marcus went back to work full time this week, so he really needs to rest before going to KBCC every day. So the full night's sleep did wonders for Marcus and me. Today we were also able to get some stuff done around the house AND I got a pedicure!!! We met up with Grandmama, Pappy and Dean-o for lunch and dinner. He really is a fun little guy. He's started giving some very sweet smiles! He was charming the ladies and making friends at the hotel when we were eating dinner. Notice his "Chick Magnet" onesie in the picture above. Truer words were never spoken. Old ladies come up to us on the street. A gaggle of teenaged girls were talking to him at the hotel. He makes friends everywhere. This excites us--we want him to be social. Being a theatre baby, it's essential.

As much as I would love to stay here and chat with all of you, I'm going to sign off and go to bed, where I intend to enjoy at least 8 full hours of glorious sleep. But by tomorrow, I'm gonna be really happy to get my hands on that baby...

Hello from the colic monster and his sleepless minions!

Oh, y'all. Somebody cure the colic. When it's 4am and all three of us are crying, life ain't too grand. It breaks my heart when he cries and nothing we do can console him. I sang showtunes to him for 2 hours yesterday, which mildly amused him. I'm going to have to expand my repertoire--I made it all the way to Tell Me On A Sunday, so you know I was reaching.

Here's a picture of Dean enjoying tummy time. As you can see, it relaxes him. Or he's just really over-stimulated by all the stuff on the mat. The world may never know.

Marcus's mom and dad (Grandmama and Pappy) are coming tomorrow! We are uber excited because a. no one really ever gets to come visit us and b. we can hand off Baby Dean. I feel a tad guilty that I am so excited to hand my baby off to someone else, but all the books and the pediatrician have said "Make sure you get a break from your colicky baby from time to time." I think it will do wonders for all of us. We may even get to go grocery shopping. I know one thing, I am going to renew my love affair with my container of Clorox wipes and give my bathroom and kitchen a good scrub-down!

I turned 31 on Wednesday. It feels good. I feel older, probably because it's my first birthday as someone's mommy. Fortunately, I didn't have the middle of the night freak-out this year. Last year, on the eve of turning 30, I frantically emailed my friend Eileen and said "I feel like I should wake up tomorrow and be wise." I did not wake up wise, but I did have a spiffy birthday party at Daniel's house where we served several tasty recipes with cheese as the main ingredient. I have no idea where I was going with this paragraph, so I'll just tell you that Kitty kept Dean for us on my birthday (THANK YOU, KITTY!!) so Marcus and I could eat at Red Lobster. It was so good. SOOO good. And it was nice for both of us to make it through a meal without having to pick up a fussy baby. But by the time the check came, we were both ready to see that sweet face and get a little baby cuddle. No matter how cranky he is, he's still our boy and we kind of adore him. :)

Dealing with it

Baby Dean is one month old! I don't know where the time has gone. It's so much fun to watch him grow and learn new things. He rolled over all by himself this week, much to our surprise! I think he's minutes away from his first real smile. He's getting fat rolls on his legs and arms. We kind of love him. :)

We took our first road trip as a family of three last weekend to visit the Lanes in Virginia. Dean was an angel in the car, not making a peep until we turned onto Grandma's street. He met his Aunt Mirka, Uncle Mike and cousin Adam for the first time. Adam was not too sure about that baby at first! He didn't understand why Dean got a bottle and he didn't, and he SURE didn't like it when his mommy was holding another baby! As you can see in the picture, he eventually warmed up to him enough to plant a sweet kiss on his head as they donned their matching jogging suits for Super Bowl Sunday. They are going to have such fun together in a couple of years.

This weekend also marked the first time in a month that Marcus and I had gotten a full night's sleep. Our first night in town, Grandma Claudia took the night shift and we got a glorious 9 hours of sleep! We felt like new people. Of course, you forget that when you take care of the physical part of you so that it feels good and stable, that opens the door to your having to deal with all the emotions you've been pushing to the back burner. Needless to say, we've had a very, very eventful 8 weeks. My mom had a kidney transplant, I was diagnosed with the same disease that necessitated said transplant, we've had a baby, I've had major surgery, an no one has slept. It wears on you. And it decided to hit me halfway through my second taco at dinner Sunday night. I had to go upstairs and lay down because I could not for the life of me stop crying. Marcus, of course, was there as the voice of reason, encouraging me to get it all out and take a nap. And crying it out did make me feel somewhat better. Every once in a while you've just got to give yourself a break. (Dean knows this and is exercising his right to cry it out right now.)

This week will be a big one for us--Marcus returns to work full time and I turn 31 on Wednesday. What am I getting for my birthday? Aunt Kitty is babysitting Dean so Marcus and I can go eat at Red Lobster (Thanks for the gift card, Mom and Dad!) and then come home and get another night of much-needed uninterrupted sleep. As exciting as this is, I know that, come Thursday morning, I won't be able to get my hands on my little baby fast enough. Did I mention that we kind of love him? :)