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? :)

Mom update

http://www.djournal.com/pages/story.asp?ID=264891&pub=1&div=News
This is the link to an article in the Tupelo, MS paper about my mom and Bradley. Get a tissue.

Colic, party of 3

Here's Mr. Dean after his midnight bath last night. He did a huge poop (after scaring his mommy by not pooping for almost 24 hours), then managed to pee not once but twice on the changing table. His hair was soaked. The table was soaked. His clothes were soaked. We decided it was best to just throw him in the tub and hose him off. Now, Mr. Dean has not been enjoying his bath. I think it freaks him out a little. Marcus and I have gotten it down to a science--we can bathe him in under 3 minutes. Well, apparently we've just been doing it at the wrong time of day. The midnight bath actually went well! He even hung his little foot over the side of the sling and dipped it into the water. Yee haw. This was a nice change for us, considering we've had our first couple of nights of serious colic this week. On Monday night, I slept an hour and a half, 40 minutes of that with Dean passed out on my chest. He wouldn't nap on Tuesday unless he was in my arms, so napping didn't happen for me. By 8:30pm on Tuesday, my brain had turned to complete mush and I just had to lay down. Then it was back up for the midnight bath. :) We didn't get much sleep last night either. I read somewhere that babies hit a growth spurt around 3 1/2 weeks old, so maybe that explains his erratic behavior this week. Who knows. Hopefully he'll settle into sleep tonight. We do ok until about 5am, when we seem to hit the wall. Marcus and I can't help but worry a little that the neighbors are going to eventually fire-bomb us if we don't keep him from crying. We can let him cry it out on his own a little until the shrieking starts. I just can't take the shrieking. Marcus had the quote of the week on Monday at 4am. Dean had been screaming for close to 3 hours. We'd fed, changed rocked, sung to and held him. We put him in his swing. The screaming continued. Marcus looked at him in all seriousness and said "This is why some species eat their young." :)

We have a big weekend ahead of us. We'll take our first road trip as a family of three (well, with the baby on the outside) to DC to visit the other Lanes. Dean will meet his Uncle Mike, Aunt Mirka and cousin Adam for the first time and will get to hang out at Grandmama and Grandpappy's house. We are excited that said grandparents will take care of baby so we can sleep!

On another note, I feel like I should go ahead and share this. I went back to the doctor today to follow up and get my results from my renal ultrasound and bloodwork they did last week. I have been diagnosed with polycystic kidney disease, the same disease my mom has. At this point, I'm in very good health. My kidney function is perfect and there is medically no emergency. My doctor was fantastic today--he spent 45 minutes talking to me and referred me to a nephrologist (kidney doctor) he knows and likes. He even called me at home tonight to see how my mom had reacted to the news and to tell me he'd talked to the nephrologist about me and that he'd be calling after my appointment to see how it went. I really, really appreciated that. My blood pressure was pretty close to normal, so hypertension is not a concern, which is good. Obviously, Marcus and I have a lot of questions, but we'll deal with things as they come. Some people live with the disease and never have any problems. We'll keep you posted.