Holy Crap!

Today Alexander had an exceptional crap. Yes, my excitement is reduced to this.

It was a funny moment while being fed. He started with his usual old man grunts (oummff, hummfff...) and then pushed so hard his little face went red.

Then came the gurgles and the unmistakable squishy gush.

Then the happy baby.

Then the warm feeling on my leg.

Then the smell.

Then my somewhat disgusted and delayed reaction to the event.

I started to change his diaper when I realized the poop went outside the top, back edge of his entire diaper. What the hell!?! I was so careful not to squish it!! Then I noticed the warm spot on my leg became cold. Yuck. It was wet.

I lined the change table with a disposable plastic sheet as I knew this would be messy. How messy: Very. Fortunately, E was nearby and took the first casualty for washing: My pants. Next A's shorts. Next, his the onesie ~ which didn't come off easily... a residue ensued. I used a pile of wipes for excess stuff... then I took the final casualty, Alexander, straight into the freshly poured bath.

Poor boy. I think he was relieved we just went all out with a bath. Really, wiping was futile.

I hope you all enjoyed that description. I'll spare you the consistency and colour details as I'm sure you can conjure the best of images. Suffice to day, we did some more laundry yesterday...

Ta ta!

Easter

We had a great Easter weekend!

Our plans were to go to Prague to visit L, her newborn and the rest of the family ~ then we remembered... Alexander doesn't have his passport yet! Bummer! We're so used to getting up and going!

So then we thought, why don't we go to Switzerland? And maybe make plans for Russia?!! Well, as you can see we have short term memory. So we "decided" to stay local.

This turned out to be great! Frankfurt has had a bout of fantastic summer weather and the weekend was perfect. On Friday we had Y&S over for dinner, on Saturday we spent the day with J&S and had delicious BBQ at theirs. MMmmmmmm! On Sunday we vegetated at home and on Monday we had brunch with friends to celebrate Y's birthday. We were busy to say the least.

We are still learning how to be social and how to manage our expectations of outings with baby in tow. For instance: My brain is split about 70/30. I am constantly trying to keep one step ahead of what Alex might need (food, diaper change, general comforting and all the accessories that come each). It's certainly a good thing when he sleeps through a social event and if he wakes, when he's in a good mood. The other options are certainly less desirable until I learn to deal with them confidently. So, I look for that perfect shady and cool place where the noise level is constant. I wiggle the carriage when sudden noise stirs him, I'm making sure he's not too hot or cold.... I am that mother!! Yikes! Well, we don't always get the ideal scenario and are learning to manage with loud and sudden laughter, bar tenders whacking coffee out of the machine, a dog barking and the summer heat... This is the 70% of my consumed energy. The remaining 30% is used-up trying to keep in time with the conversation ~ not get too far behind. I'm not sure how I'm doing as I am rather divided and lean towards the needs of my son first (as I should). I guess it's a matter of time.

So in this sense, Saturday was perfect. We went to J&S's place and they too have a young baby. We took the babies out for a stroll, came back, ate yummy homemade ice cream, lounged around all afternoon playing with the babies and talking then had BBQ yumminess. I must say, I stressed in the evening as we'd never done the bed time routine away from home. Under these circumstances, everything worked out quite well as our gracious hosts were perfectly equipped for all things baby.

Over the weekend we also managed to get some mundane stuff done (chores etc.) but even more excellently mundane, watch some movies! What bliss!! 2/3 movies were completely uninterrupted and we enjoyed our great luck.

Lastly, it must be told... we ate a lot of chocolate. MMMmmmmm!

Overall, a very, very nice Easter!

Lullaby Mama!

Oh how awesome! This evening, Alexander fell asleep to my singing him lullaby's for the first time!

Things started out grim. The batteries in our mobile thingy died slowly over the past couple of days ~ with the last horrah last night being a German lady's voice repeating "have you heard the sweet songs" or something like that in German. She always says that when you start the mobile but this time, over the baby-monitor we heard her stuttering and rapping the same sentence over and over again. Then it came. Baby laughter! He was supposed to be falling asleep!! Then the babbling began. It was very funny to hear him start chatting-up the German mobile lady. But eventually, she bored him and crying ensued.

So tonight I decided to sing to him while he was in his crib. (Usually I sing while he's still in my lap in the living room after his last feeding).

He started smiling and laughing and talking to me. That was not what I expected. I persisted. Then after only a mere 5 minutes of singing his little lids started getting heavy. I thought, "no way!!". With 2 extra minutes of humming to a faded nothing and 3 minutes of insurance, he was asleep!!!

AWESOME! I really feel great about it! It seems to have stuck as it's been 20 minutes of sleep so far!

I'm feeling proud and happy. I wonder if it will ever happen again!?

Alexander's 100 Day Birthday!

Well, it's official!

Alexander is 100 (+1) days old now!

Celebrating this milestone is a tradition in some households. I've heard of it and think it's nice. I don't really know much about it, but it's still a milestone and it was a nice day.

Celebrations were small, mostly spent enjoying the day with Alexander's cooing and babbling. And also by walking about the Frankfurt downtown. The other notable milestone for the day was changing from size 1 diapers to size 2. The smaller ones still seem to fit, but they're not so trustworthy in the "capacity" department anymore.

Next birthday: 1 year.

Patinhas (little paws)

When I was a little girl I used to love riding my bike. As soon as the snow was off the ground in the spring time, you would find me in my spring jacket riding my little 3-wheeler back and forth along the sidewalk in front of our house. I did this every day and then my mom started calling my little hands "patinhas" because they were so tanned!

I was in the Galleria Shopping Centre when a friend recently pointed out my dark hands. I didn't think so at the time, but when I got home I looked more closely and saw that my hands ARE darker! It's from all the stroller pushing! I guess I have "patonas" (big paws) now!

A Crow Crow

Here's my crow about crows:

Crows. I respect them. I believe they are intelligent. I don't know much about them but I know they're smart and can learn. I'm a bit superstitious perhaps even leery about their possible connection with higher powers based on rumors I've heard... that kind of thing.

But none the less, crows can be such... nasty, crotchety creatures.

I've been walking in the park daily with Alexander and always watch these birds respectfully and with the benefit of the doubt. Well, just 2 days ago as I left the park, I guess I pissed one of these birds off by walking too close to him??? He dropped a rock about a foot away from my head. About the size of a circle you make with your thumb and index finger. Seriously. It landed with a startling "clack" on the hood of the car next to me. What a cranky bastard!

This then reminded me of a rather remarkable crow fight I witnessed on the way to preggo-yoga a few months back.

I was waddling along when I noticed a woman pushing a carriage on the other side of the street pretty much in stride with me when I heard a crazy-nasty angry racket coming from a driveway near the lady. We both followed the sound into the driveway where we saw 2 crows tumbling about the ground screaming crow-profanities at each other whilst stabbing each other with their beaks!

The lady and I stood and watched in shock while they battled it out. We did make a point of keeping a safe distance, then exchanged similarly shocked expressions and murmurs of disbelief!

Crows can be such nasty, crotchety creatures!

Introducing Alexander!

Our Alexander was born on January 6 after a relatively fast, "au naturel" labour. He weighed 2.65kgs and was 47cm long. He is just over 3 months old now and weighs approximately 4.8kgs and is 59cm long.

If "Au Naturel" makes me sound like a heroine... I accept! And YES, I AM! Although I was ready and willing to take pain killers, it was all too fast for the hospital staff (i.e. not for me)! I was too busy to be upset for very long.

The three of us have been enjoying the time getting to know each other over the past 3 months.

There are so many wonderful experiences we've already had! First smile, hiccups on the outside, cooing, babbling, wicked poops, surprise puke, pee target practice... over stimulated and wide-eyed deer in headlight stare, what else... bath time, tummy time, singing time, can't-figure-you-out-crying-screaming-going-purple-desperate-mamma-and-papa-time... oh and another funny one: the first, and to date only time he joy-screamed so loud he startled himself!

It's been very busy and very meaningful on so many levels. I do believe the 3 of us are smitten with each other!

Sabbatical

You've probably noticed that there has been no commotion on my blog for a while. Since wee-one was born, I've been a bit... busy! :) I'm starting to manage my time better each day and will resume postings as soon as possible!

I can't wait! :)

Cya!