Zora Travels

Round and Round: Day 6

It is Day Six.  The sixth day of Nora feeling sick and tired.  Yesterday, the doctor confirmed my suspicion.  Her cold had manifested during the week into double ear infections.  She has now sipped three doses of electric pink bubblegum-flavored antibiotics...to no avail.  The moaning, clinginess, exhaustion, and nursing continue.  She still refuses all other food, any other comfort.

***Remind me with the next baby to PLEASE teach the little one to take comfort at night with Daddy, too. Being the sole provider of night-owl pats, hugs, and rocking...night after night...for hours and hours...while the other parents snoozes...leads to a tinge of resentment during the day.  Granted, I am JUST as responsible for creating this inbalance...but it's not the best set-up.

 

Even my mom's butternut squash soup, corn bread from scratch smeared with butter, and warm apple-oatmeal crisp couldn't entice Noodle to eat.  It's only All-Boob-All-the-Time. 

But maybe I'm losing weight!  Hey, now that's a positive.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, what does a family do on a marvelous three day weekend with a sick baby (after we've canceled all our fun plans)?  We pull out the sofa bed, pile up the pillows, and play a game of "Round and Round" with the little snot-faced cutie.

You have to REALLY love Budda-Bee-Bee to watch this video.  But I think it's great.  She also said TWO more German words today..."Tschuess" and "Nase."  You can hear her little "Bye" and "Tschuess" (German for "bye"), if you listen closely.  Note her clasping her hands casually behind her back as she wanders around the corner.  Love that.  Again, this video will bore 99.99999% of you.

(Keep in mind this is also my 6th day in the house, I've finished a novel, burned my eyes on facebook, Words with Friends, the newspaper, and knitted half a hat for Lulu Bell.  Videotaping the mundane is a wecome relief.)

The "Nuglett Nooks Tour"

Those of you who know me outside of this blogosphere know that I tend to be fairly (or ridiculously, depending on your barometer) organized.  But this has been in the realm of work and my classroom...it has never translated into my home domain.

Now, due to the phenomenon of "nesting."  It has.  Daniel and I have worked over the months to slowly create honey-sweet nooks and crannies for Nuglett.  I thought I'd post them today...more than anything so I can look back in a few months and say, "Wow, the house was once really clean."

Here, Little Mouse, is your corner in our bedroom.  Lola Loi found the dangling yellow mobile recently in the Philippines and your changing table is right below.  The coolest wet/dry bags for your cloth diapers await the care packages...and I'm hoping I can figure out a good system of washing/drying and using these contraptions...otherwise the 7th Generation version is underneath for emergencies.

You can also see your co-sleeper.  Your father swears that you'll only by in our bed - right in between us- for months (or if he had his druthers - years)...but I think we'll just have to see.  I refuse to succumb to the prevailing sentiment in baby books and some relatives that I'm a bad mom if I don't snuggle and sleep with my baby until they're a toddler...or in school.

Here are "the goods" that are all going to the hospital.  The two gifts bags are for the nurses and the doula.  Having a mom that's been a nurse for 25 years has always helped me realize what an incredible job they perform.  In case you're curious what a nurse recommends for an appropriate "gift bag" gesture, I was told: 

good quality coffee (already ground)
box of chocolates or donuts 
healthy granola bars/snack bars/cookies

The doula gift back for Lauren contains various fun items...but since she peruses this blog...the contents will remain a mystery.

I also have a nursing pillow/contraption and the little suitcase with just a few items.  I know the mere fact that I packed this bag three weeks before my due date makes me the "typical first-time mom" but that's what I am and I like knowing that the clothes I want are comfy and clean inside.

 

This, Nuggles, is your dad's favorite corner.  While his mom was picking out a yellow mobile in the Filipino market, he was fingering this multi-colored version.  He also found these vibrant butterflies and wanted all of it to hang above your crib (your eventual crib that's in the garage for now).

This is the "Grandparents Nook" for all of our parents who will stay with us at various times in the next few weeks.  We have a comfy sleeper-sofa and on the walls are many pictures from the Philippines and also a painting by my Uncle Paul of my great-grandparents, Matt and Zora.  We can't wait for our Lola's and Lolo's to be with us! 

Aunties, uncles, and little cousins are coming, too!

And lastly, Noodle, here is the area that you and I may end up occupying the most.  A plush glider and ottoman, near a sun-drenched window, and all of your baskets of toys and books.

Sometimes your dad and I sit looking at this space...just sipping in the silence that still pervades throughout the house...then one of us will smile a big goofy grin.  We're so excited to meet you!

And this is Sophie about to lick her chops.  She's normally camera-shy but I caught her off-guard.  She may not like you getting real close...but she is my ultimate snuggle-girl and curls up with her paws up around my face each day.  Watching you kick underneath her belly has made me laugh many times.  She gets very perplexed by the movement and just has no idea how things will shift around here once you enter the scene.  But Daniel and I have vowed to keep paying as much attention (as possible) to our furries.

That concludes the "Nuglett Nooks Tour".  I'm sure that all of these locals will blend and transform after your arrival (and by "transform" I mean turn into total chaos and disaster that I won't mind).

The secret in my bra

I tuck an antacid inside my bra every time I go to pre-natal yoga.  Yup, right inside the underwire rests a little pastel tablet.  Due to Nuglett's long legs and vigorous poking, I have constant heartburn.  I've tried the "honey-nonspicy-sittingup-goingonawalk-sleepingwithmanypillows" approach but nothing cures the zesty fire like my beloved tropical antacid tablets.  Sometimes I imagine their salvation glowing within the cupboard.  I insist, for some bizarre reason, on tucking them stealthily away in the bathroom cabinet after every dose.  I suppose under the auspices that perhaps the NEXT meal won't cause any burn.

I wondered today - what do I look like with my enormous belly stretching the olive-green tank top, reaching into my bra with two deft fingers while in downward dog?  Furtively seeking my chalky friend, slipping it into my mouth, and crunching ever-so-quietly as I fold into child's pose.

Within moments, the swells of fire churn less...and by the time I'm in pigeon pose...my heart feels again only the tranquil gold of yoga - not the burn.

Today is the first day of school for many of my dearest friends.  I thought of each of them as I checked my email and watched the minutes tick closer to 8:00am.  My own maternity-leave substitute teacher (armed with my syllabus, my summer-reading packet, and my lesson plans...and probably not using ANY of it) also endeavored to guide my freshman today on a literary adventure.  An adventure, that although the backbone is sculpted by my literary choices and curricular maps, is still in the hands of a man who has never taught a day of English.  Never coaxed 180 fourteen year olds through a dry text with various figurative language devices under inspection.  I find myself; however, letting go more and more each day.  I am a serious teacher.  By "serious," I mean that I consider my lessons, my selections of literature, my projects, my essay prompts for hours (and hours and hours)  It can be a little too much sometimes.  I've been known to need sleeping pills on those first few nights of school...just to keep my mind from spinning through each minute of my PowerPoint and my activities.  Changing clipart in the dawn hours of morning...running copies all over again because I forgot the Name/Period/Date lines at the top of the handout.

But this year there are so many other priorities:

• the tiny feet that protrude regularly below my ribs
• the hiccups that quip below my bellybutton
• the labor, the swells, the slide into life that now floats on my horizon
• the calming poses and affirmations of my doula that soothe and satiate
• the husband that massages my swollen sausage feet at night 
• the mother that helps me sew curtains for the baby/guest room (seen on right)
• the vision of a life around the corner that is shrouded in cloudy, golden light
• the friends below who speak of motherhood with such velvet tongues that my spirit soars with anticipation

How many more weekends of sleeping in until 10:00am, savoring the newspaper, walking to Coffee Cup, dressing up for luxurious dinners and wine-tasting with friends, dancing with Daniel across the wood floor at Haydar's, and finishing the night in the wee hours of the morning by chasing reluctant cats for a goodnight snuggle?

I suppose four weekends would be the max...at some point the doctor will induce.  So somewhere between no weekends and four weekends left before I become a mama.

And what will become of this blog?  Will I turn to it more as I'm tethered (albeit affectionately) to my caramel babe and their smacking lips?  Will I find even less time to tippety-tap on these keys?

I am going to try---from today on---to blog each day until "go time."  The brilliance will be lacking, brevity assured; yet, to have an online record of how I soaked in the final days before Nuglett's arrival might be fun one day.  It may serve as some subtle reminder of the luminous waves that I was so anxiously awaiting.

So, here's to a daily post.

Tenth summer of bliss!

This week there have been countless moments that I want to hold in my mind forever.  Sitting in a warm beach chair with my toes wedged under damp sand...eyes affixed on the horizon with the sounds of splashing surf upon the shore in Carlsbad.  Rebecca's squeals as she holds tightly to both of my index fingers, leaping into the air as the wave whispers its last breath around our ankles.  Sam pulling at his surfboard shorts, hiking them ever-higher, struggling sincerely with what to do with the three sand crabs inside his blue pail (he finally, with sulking lips,let them go).

Conversations with my father about his impending retirement, potential hobbies, love of the ocean and need to wear sunblock.  Hearing my voice nag him to keep his hat on, put on more suncream, put back on his shirt, for God's sake!  Loving the smile and joy in his face as he spends time with his two children and two of his grandkids. 

Sliding my pregnant belly into a kiddie-pool in my mom's back yard.  Hours spent frolicking with Sam and Rebecca...turning delicate pink bougainvillea flowers into translucent alien skin, tiny leaves into boats, and the fact that everything, truly every thing can potentially become a sword.  What's up with boys and swords, anyway? 

And breakfasts with grandparents.  Seeing the exact image of my father's face thirty years from now reflected in my grandfather.  Cherishing moments of Sam trying to eat french toast without cutting it, Rebecca playing "wink, wink" across the table, Mema talking to me about Southern pork chop recipes, and my father and grandfather laughing - with identical tones - just one throat a bit more seasoned.

I pinch myself sometimes.  Although this is my 10th summer vacation as a teacher...it never fails to impress me that I don't have to work during this glorious, warm, breezy, relaxing season.  I don't know how others do it.  The incredible fortune of every July - and I mean every July of my entire post-college life (with the exception of one summer at 826LA with Claire) - having to prioritize which novel, which craft project, which letter to write, which exercise class to attend, and which restaurant to patronize for lunch.  Summer decisions of the teacher.  I suppose this summer the reading list has changed: Healthy Sleep Habits, Happiest Baby on the Block, Baby Hearts, Baby Minds, Birthing from Within, Gentle Birth Choices  but overall it is still a golden pool of time, choice, and ease.  I suppose it is probably the last summer that I describe that way for a while...since next summer, with a 9 month old may not feel as fancy-free.  But we shall see.  I'll have to come back to this post in July of next year and reflect upon how this month has changed.

Until then, just four more days of my brother and Kathy's family visiting.  Four more days to have more hugs, wet kisses, tiny sticky hands, and belly laughs with my beloved niece and nephew.