Melissa had a school assignment to make a game consisting entirely out of recyclable materials. It was her idea to make a bowling game, so we raided our recycling bin for cans to use and cut an old poster cylinder down to size to use as a "ball."
Tuesday, May 01, 2012
Melissa's game
To the ER!
This happened a few weeks ago and Jonathan insisted it deserved a post.
The day after Easter I kept finding bits of wrappers, scotch tape, assorted flotsam on the floor- just perfect for Corinna to practice her finger grasp and eat. Even though I swept the floor several times she still found things to shove into her mouth and so I fished bits of this 'n that out from between her clenched teeth (and was bitten for my efforts too!).
That afternoon, I was on the couch when I heard Corinna making a gagging sound by the toy basket. Here it goes again! I scooped her up, tilted her head down and forward and swept her mouth with my finger expecting to make contact with a forgotten wrapper. Nothing. Thinking perhaps Corinna was just making noise I set her loose. Perhaps a minute past and she started gagging and coughing again. My investigations still yielded nothing. I turned her loose again and then she gagged and threw up. Hmm. She didn't expel anything obvious. I got a flashlight and peered into her mouth and still couldn't see anything.
After throwing up she wanted to nurse and so I obliged her thinking perhaps that if there was anything in her throat that perhaps it would be dislodged down to her stomach by swallowing. She suckled briefly and then vomited some more. At this point I started to get alarmed. While she didn't seem to have any difficulty breathing, she did start drooling and it seemed likely that she had something caught in her throat. She continued to gag off and on.
I called Andrea and asked her to come by to watch the big kids while I took Corinna to the emergency department. Andrea arrived and Corinna and I left. When we got there, they hooked her up to check her oxygen levels. Fortunately her oxygen saturation was perfectly normal. The doctor still wanted to do an x-ray since it was still very possible to have something lodged in her throat with normal oxygen levels. He did caution that if it was plastic it might not show up on x-ray, but that there might be swelling in one of her lungs and that would be apparent on film. So we waited for a tech to free up and do an x-ray.
Throughout our wait in the little room Corinna was much more subdued than average. She just wanted to snuggle on my lap. She didn't want to crawl around and cause mayhem which is highly unusual for her. However the oxygen monitor wrapped on her big toe really annoyed her and whenever she could, she ripped it off and tossed.
The techs stripped Corinna down to her diaper and did a chest x-ray. To do this they set her in a clever contraption. She was placed in a bicycle like seat and two long clear plastic shields tied together held her in place with her arms above her head. Corinna howled in protest to the indignity, but the whole process took less than a minute.
Then we waited some more.
The x-ray results didn't show anything, so the doctor wanted her to do a swallow test. If she drank and kept things down then we could go home. If not than the next step was exploratory surgery with a surgeon. Eek!
They brought 6 oz of baby gatorade. I coaxed an ounce down her before she refused any more. She was hungry and wanted milk! She hadn't eaten since her abortive attempt 4 hours ago and hadn't really had a meal since much earlier than that. When we arrived she was to have nothing by mouth, so she was very eager to nurse. So she did.
It stayed down! Hooray! We were discharged with instructions to call if anything changed and admonished to keep small things picked up.
It seems whatever was stuck in her throat resolved itself, and so we left for home. Poorer and wiser. When we got home, the big kids were still awake in their beds and very concerned about Corinna. In fact they got very vigilant about picking up small things. For a few days anyway.
The day after Easter I kept finding bits of wrappers, scotch tape, assorted flotsam on the floor- just perfect for Corinna to practice her finger grasp and eat. Even though I swept the floor several times she still found things to shove into her mouth and so I fished bits of this 'n that out from between her clenched teeth (and was bitten for my efforts too!).
That afternoon, I was on the couch when I heard Corinna making a gagging sound by the toy basket. Here it goes again! I scooped her up, tilted her head down and forward and swept her mouth with my finger expecting to make contact with a forgotten wrapper. Nothing. Thinking perhaps Corinna was just making noise I set her loose. Perhaps a minute past and she started gagging and coughing again. My investigations still yielded nothing. I turned her loose again and then she gagged and threw up. Hmm. She didn't expel anything obvious. I got a flashlight and peered into her mouth and still couldn't see anything.
After throwing up she wanted to nurse and so I obliged her thinking perhaps that if there was anything in her throat that perhaps it would be dislodged down to her stomach by swallowing. She suckled briefly and then vomited some more. At this point I started to get alarmed. While she didn't seem to have any difficulty breathing, she did start drooling and it seemed likely that she had something caught in her throat. She continued to gag off and on.
I called Andrea and asked her to come by to watch the big kids while I took Corinna to the emergency department. Andrea arrived and Corinna and I left. When we got there, they hooked her up to check her oxygen levels. Fortunately her oxygen saturation was perfectly normal. The doctor still wanted to do an x-ray since it was still very possible to have something lodged in her throat with normal oxygen levels. He did caution that if it was plastic it might not show up on x-ray, but that there might be swelling in one of her lungs and that would be apparent on film. So we waited for a tech to free up and do an x-ray.
Throughout our wait in the little room Corinna was much more subdued than average. She just wanted to snuggle on my lap. She didn't want to crawl around and cause mayhem which is highly unusual for her. However the oxygen monitor wrapped on her big toe really annoyed her and whenever she could, she ripped it off and tossed.
The techs stripped Corinna down to her diaper and did a chest x-ray. To do this they set her in a clever contraption. She was placed in a bicycle like seat and two long clear plastic shields tied together held her in place with her arms above her head. Corinna howled in protest to the indignity, but the whole process took less than a minute.
Then we waited some more.
The x-ray results didn't show anything, so the doctor wanted her to do a swallow test. If she drank and kept things down then we could go home. If not than the next step was exploratory surgery with a surgeon. Eek!
They brought 6 oz of baby gatorade. I coaxed an ounce down her before she refused any more. She was hungry and wanted milk! She hadn't eaten since her abortive attempt 4 hours ago and hadn't really had a meal since much earlier than that. When we arrived she was to have nothing by mouth, so she was very eager to nurse. So she did.
It stayed down! Hooray! We were discharged with instructions to call if anything changed and admonished to keep small things picked up.
It seems whatever was stuck in her throat resolved itself, and so we left for home. Poorer and wiser. When we got home, the big kids were still awake in their beds and very concerned about Corinna. In fact they got very vigilant about picking up small things. For a few days anyway.
A conversation with Isaac
"Isaac, did you have a good time at school?"
"Yes!"
"What did you have for lunch?"
"Cookies!"
"I like cookies, too."
"Chocolate! Happy!"
"Mmm, chocolate cookies."
"Dada chocolate! Om nom nom nom nom!" [He pretends to eat my arm]
The funny thing is he did not actually have cookies in his lunch today. Perhaps he was thinking back to yesterday's lunch. Or maybe he thought I was asking what he liked in his lunch. It's hard to say...
"Yes!"
"What did you have for lunch?"
"Cookies!"
"I like cookies, too."
"Chocolate! Happy!"
"Mmm, chocolate cookies."
"Dada chocolate! Om nom nom nom nom!" [He pretends to eat my arm]
The funny thing is he did not actually have cookies in his lunch today. Perhaps he was thinking back to yesterday's lunch. Or maybe he thought I was asking what he liked in his lunch. It's hard to say...
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Easter 2012
Matthew, Melissa, and Isaac made paper mache eggs this year.
Here they are dying eggs. Isaac thought this was the Best Idea Ever!
Later that evening we had our traditional Easter story egg hunt with Uncle Brian's fiancee (Aunt) Kirsti. Mom gave that to us years ago and we love tell the story of Jesus Christ's atonement as we open each egg with the children. Each egg has a small item representing a part of the story. The last egg is empty, because He is not here, He is risen! It helps to bring the focus of Easter back to Christ.
Easter afternoon.
Church starts at 8:30 am, so the Easter bunny visited while we were at church. Corinna was fascinated by the eggs and quickly figured out that there was goody inside. She helped herself to her first taste of chocolate by pilfering foil wrapped eggs carelessly left out. Corinna whole-heartedly approved. She went through three chocolate-covered outfits and I had to fish foil out of her mouth. The big kids were threatened with losing their loot if they didn't keep it up out of the hands of babyzilla!
I think Isaac had chocolate in his mouth for all of the pictures taken that afternoon.
Melissa searching for eggs.
We did not get any pictures of Matthew hunting eggs. He was too fast.
Later that evening we celebrated Easter together as family with Aunt Andrea, Uncle Jeremy, and Gwendolyn. The Thomases and their two children joined us for dinner as well. This year I tried a Texas Easter dinner with beef brisket and potatoes. We did have the traditional hollow Easter rolls, however.
The kids cracked confetti eggs after dinner. Aunt Andrea was a very good sport.
Happy Easter!
Oatmeal
Isaac breakfast of choice is oatmeal. Typically we don't dress him before breakfast and this is why:
Bluebonnets + Springtime in Texas
The bluebonnet is the state flower and is near and dear to the heart of Texans.
Every spring families traditionally gather in the bluebonnet patches in the parks and fields. They plop their kids down in a patch and take pictures of them.
Conference Weekend
I built a tent a la the people of King Benjamin (Mosiah 2:5) for the kids to watch General Conference.
It was an uplifting conference, and I especially appreciated Elder Uchtdorf's talk on forgiveness and mercy. You can listen here: lds.org
It was an uplifting conference, and I especially appreciated Elder Uchtdorf's talk on forgiveness and mercy. You can listen here: lds.org
Tuesday, April 17, 2012
The sink from hell
Moving sucks. But some things suck more than moving. Like living with the sink in this house.
Every month or so it falls apart, literally: the pipes were put together in such a poorly thought-out way that they won't stay together for longer than that. So then we have water (if we're lucky, that's all it is) spewed all over the floor and anything we had in the cabinet underneath.
This weekend was especially awesome, since it broke on Saturday, and then again on Monday, when we were still digging our way out from the mountain of dishes caused by the first explosion. (Of COURSE we can't use the dishwasher while the sink is broken. I think this is standard design but it shouldn't be.)
So here is a picture of where Rachel did a load of dishes in the bathtub.
We will not miss this house.
Saturday, April 14, 2012
Miss No
Monday Melissa was in one of her moods before school. "Melissa, it's time to get dressed." "No!"
Rachel and I decided that if she pulls this stunt again, we won't cajole or coerce her; we'll just deliver her to her school in whatever state she is pleased to present herself.
(We did this with Matthew once, in preschool. Once. That was all it took.)
Corinna's first Easter egg
At not quite 10 months, Corinna was too small to participate in the Easter egg hunt. But today she was going through the bookshelves, and got quiet. I investigated and found her eating the jellybeans from an egg Rachel had hidden on top of a binder. The older kids missed it, but Corinna did not!
Saturday, April 07, 2012
Daddy's cake
Rachel took Corinna with her, leaving strict instructions to turn the angel food cake upside down on top of a glass when it was done. So I did. This is what happened.
I told Rachel what happened on the phone. "You weren't supposed to take it out of the pan," she sighed. So I am making another cake. She can be in charge of this one when it is done cooking.
Tuesday, April 03, 2012
An interesting lunch
Rachel and I took the youngest two to Midori Sushi for lunch today. The food was good, but the service was challenging since they had the table in the middle of this large platform to sit on. Kind of a westernized tatami area, so us white guys don't have to sit in seiza for the whole meal.
Cool idea, but it made it *very* easy for Corinna, aka Babyzilla, to climb on the table and make a grab for whatever she lusted after. I was quick enough to keep her out of the soy sauce all meal ... except for once.
Isaac mostly sat as he was told, but he kept up a running, high-volume commentary on his sister: "No, Baby! No! Nooooooo!" He was especially indignant if she tried to get his keychain or his dora lunchbox (which we brought in the vain hope that he'd finish).
All in all Midori Sushi was probably just as glad to see us go.
(Side note: this makes three Japanese restaurance I've been to in Austin owned by Koreans, and none owned by Japanese.)
Friday, March 23, 2012
Sunday, March 18, 2012
Yum! Yum!
Yum yum gum gum!
Gum yum!
Yum gum yum!
Says Isaac after pilfering his big brother's stash of gum.
Gum yum!
Yum gum yum!
Says Isaac after pilfering his big brother's stash of gum.
Saturday, March 17, 2012
Use Your Words
Overheard from the back of the car:
Yuck! Yum!
Issa Yuck! Isaac Yum!
Yuck! Yum!
"Moooom! Isaac keeps calling me yuck! Make him stooop!"
Sure enough, Isaac was pointing to his sister and calling her yuck. He grinned back at me, pleased with himself for getting a rise out of Melissa. This is the first time Isaac has teased Melissa verbally. And so it begins!
Everyday Isaac finds another new word to test out. A few days ago his word of the day was gross. Throughout that day he looked for things he could appropriately label gross, and did so with great relish.
Friday, March 16, 2012
9 months old ...
..and some change.
At nine months Corinna weighed 18 lbs 14 oz. 99% of that weight is breast milk with a few cheerios, mushed bananas, and bits of foraged paper tossed in for good measure. She's getting long at 29 inches, which puts her in about the 90th percentile.
Corinna is still our happy baby bubbles. She's pulling herself up to standing, cruising the furniture, and crawling lickety-split all over the house. A few days ago I caught her attempting to climb up the brown relining chair and making good progress! Currently she has six teeth, four on top and two on the bottom. She squeals with delight when tickled, loves to scatter books and toys, and chase the big kids. Corinna coos, makes "ma ma" "ba ba" "ga ga" sounds (but I don't think they are actual words yet), chatters with you, gurgles, and sticks out her tongue, spits and laughs. Her laughs are infectious belly laughs. When she smiles, her eyes turn to crescents and smile too. She absolutely loves bath time and splashing in the water. I'm usually thoroughly drenched at the end of her baths.
Her strong personality is becoming more apparent now. When you take something she really wants away such as colorful paper, itty-bitty lego pieces, or car keys, she throws a fit, yells at the top of her lungs, and tries to reclaim it. While crawling does increase her opportunity for mischief, it is still a godsend. She is very pleased with her new motor skills and finds plenty of ways to entertain herself. This gives my back a much needed break!
Matthew, Melissa, and Isaac dote on her and sometimes smoother her in their affections. She's pretty good-natured about it, but she will squawk if she is being held when she really wants to crawl around and play. Isaac has discovered that Corinna's new skills means that she can now get his stuff. He'll tell her "No baby! No baby!" Paybacks, young man, paybacks.
9 months postpartum update:
To my relief, I've stopped losing gobs and gobs of hair. I think that ceased at 5 months? My hairstylist assured me that I still have a lot of hair and not to worry. Most of my clothes fit again, yay! However, I still have 10 pounds hugging my hips, belly, and thighs. The whole 9 months on, 9 months off thing didn't work for number four, so I'm going to have to put in some real sweat equity, I think. Up until Corinna's teething started, I got a full nights rest. Going back to fractured sleep is rough. Boo teething! Corinna will also take a bottle occasionally so it is time to take a night a week to do something I enjoy. Perhaps I can join one of local orchestras and start playing again. Or maybe take a night class, just for the fun of it. Hmm...the possibilities.
Some days having four kids is totally doable. No problem! Everyone plays well, is pleasant, smells clean, and is cheerful. I love those days; they are awesome! I start to think that I've got it all together. Haha...hahaha! Then I get whacked with the humility stick. There are days when there are four emergencies happening simultaneously, two bottoms needing attention at the same time, so-and-so is doing something, tears, no more clean socks, the dirty laundry is piling up, it is dinnertime and I haven't had a chance to cook, Corinna is tired and wants to be held, and there are dishes in the sink still from breakfast; on those days I wonder if I should change my occupation to air traffic controller. They at least get guaranteed bathroom and lunch breaks. And I'm pretty sure they don't clean up any bodily fluids or wipe anyone's bottom but their own.
Most days however, I wouldn't trade for anything. The pay isn't great, but the benefits sure are nice. Now if I could just lose that last 10 pounds...
At nine months Corinna weighed 18 lbs 14 oz. 99% of that weight is breast milk with a few cheerios, mushed bananas, and bits of foraged paper tossed in for good measure. She's getting long at 29 inches, which puts her in about the 90th percentile.
Corinna is still our happy baby bubbles. She's pulling herself up to standing, cruising the furniture, and crawling lickety-split all over the house. A few days ago I caught her attempting to climb up the brown relining chair and making good progress! Currently she has six teeth, four on top and two on the bottom. She squeals with delight when tickled, loves to scatter books and toys, and chase the big kids. Corinna coos, makes "ma ma" "ba ba" "ga ga" sounds (but I don't think they are actual words yet), chatters with you, gurgles, and sticks out her tongue, spits and laughs. Her laughs are infectious belly laughs. When she smiles, her eyes turn to crescents and smile too. She absolutely loves bath time and splashing in the water. I'm usually thoroughly drenched at the end of her baths.
Her strong personality is becoming more apparent now. When you take something she really wants away such as colorful paper, itty-bitty lego pieces, or car keys, she throws a fit, yells at the top of her lungs, and tries to reclaim it. While crawling does increase her opportunity for mischief, it is still a godsend. She is very pleased with her new motor skills and finds plenty of ways to entertain herself. This gives my back a much needed break!
Matthew, Melissa, and Isaac dote on her and sometimes smoother her in their affections. She's pretty good-natured about it, but she will squawk if she is being held when she really wants to crawl around and play. Isaac has discovered that Corinna's new skills means that she can now get his stuff. He'll tell her "No baby! No baby!" Paybacks, young man, paybacks.
9 months postpartum update:
To my relief, I've stopped losing gobs and gobs of hair. I think that ceased at 5 months? My hairstylist assured me that I still have a lot of hair and not to worry. Most of my clothes fit again, yay! However, I still have 10 pounds hugging my hips, belly, and thighs. The whole 9 months on, 9 months off thing didn't work for number four, so I'm going to have to put in some real sweat equity, I think. Up until Corinna's teething started, I got a full nights rest. Going back to fractured sleep is rough. Boo teething! Corinna will also take a bottle occasionally so it is time to take a night a week to do something I enjoy. Perhaps I can join one of local orchestras and start playing again. Or maybe take a night class, just for the fun of it. Hmm...the possibilities.
Some days having four kids is totally doable. No problem! Everyone plays well, is pleasant, smells clean, and is cheerful. I love those days; they are awesome! I start to think that I've got it all together. Haha...hahaha! Then I get whacked with the humility stick. There are days when there are four emergencies happening simultaneously, two bottoms needing attention at the same time, so-and-so is doing something, tears, no more clean socks, the dirty laundry is piling up, it is dinnertime and I haven't had a chance to cook, Corinna is tired and wants to be held, and there are dishes in the sink still from breakfast; on those days I wonder if I should change my occupation to air traffic controller. They at least get guaranteed bathroom and lunch breaks. And I'm pretty sure they don't clean up any bodily fluids or wipe anyone's bottom but their own.
Most days however, I wouldn't trade for anything. The pay isn't great, but the benefits sure are nice. Now if I could just lose that last 10 pounds...
Thursday, March 15, 2012
PyCon
I made it back to PyCon this year. 2011 was the first year I didn't attend PyCon since my first in 2005, so it was good to go back. PyCon is still my favorite conference, although it's lost a bit of its small-town feel with about 2400 attendees this year, double what it was last time I attended.
I gave a talk on What Python can learn from Java. I set out to be controversial but the only boos I got were when I told the audience to use a modern IDE instead of emacs and vim. Either I made a good case or I wasn't controversial enough.
I also had a poster session accepted about the Cassandra database that I work on. This was the third year of posters at PyCon but my first time to bring one. I built the poster from 10 Keynote slides, and Andrew at work stitched them together in Illustrator. It turned out pretty well. Note for next time: add QR codes that people can scan to learn more.
DataStax sponsored the conference. $3000 got us two passes and an exhibition booth. We had a pretty good stream of attendees by the booth, enough that (even with Paul and Tyler doing yeoman's work at the booth) after three days of speaking and explaining Cassandra I was as hoarse as I've ever been in my life -- more than when I used to do our all-day training classes. I think we got some good sales leads out of it.
I gave a talk on What Python can learn from Java. I set out to be controversial but the only boos I got were when I told the audience to use a modern IDE instead of emacs and vim. Either I made a good case or I wasn't controversial enough.
I also had a poster session accepted about the Cassandra database that I work on. This was the third year of posters at PyCon but my first time to bring one. I built the poster from 10 Keynote slides, and Andrew at work stitched them together in Illustrator. It turned out pretty well. Note for next time: add QR codes that people can scan to learn more.
DataStax sponsored the conference. $3000 got us two passes and an exhibition booth. We had a pretty good stream of attendees by the booth, enough that (even with Paul and Tyler doing yeoman's work at the booth) after three days of speaking and explaining Cassandra I was as hoarse as I've ever been in my life -- more than when I used to do our all-day training classes. I think we got some good sales leads out of it.
Yours truly manning the poster
The keynote hall Friday morning
Lunch!
Isaac did Not poop his pants
(Dad, this one's for you.)
Today when I put Isaac down for his nap, I locked his door since he didn't seem inclined to stay in his room. Then the plumber arrived to fix a broken toilet in the master bathroom. While showing the plumber the problem, I *thought* I heard Isaac calling out from the opposite side of the house. Since I was busy, I paid no attention. After a few minutes, I left to check on Isaac. I opened the door and was smacked in the nose by a pungent sent. "Mama! Poooop!" and he held out both hands completely covered in poop. His underwear and pants laid neatly on the floor beside him, clean and unstained. Apparently the lesson "thou shalt not poop thy pants" has been impressed on his mind. Now we just needs to work on the whole timing/not touching poop thing. Really can't fault him though, since he didn't have access to the bathroom.
Today Isaac got a bath instead of a nap. He didn't seem to mind.
Also, I am a big fan of clorox cleanup wipes. They rock.
Today when I put Isaac down for his nap, I locked his door since he didn't seem inclined to stay in his room. Then the plumber arrived to fix a broken toilet in the master bathroom. While showing the plumber the problem, I *thought* I heard Isaac calling out from the opposite side of the house. Since I was busy, I paid no attention. After a few minutes, I left to check on Isaac. I opened the door and was smacked in the nose by a pungent sent. "Mama! Poooop!" and he held out both hands completely covered in poop. His underwear and pants laid neatly on the floor beside him, clean and unstained. Apparently the lesson "thou shalt not poop thy pants" has been impressed on his mind. Now we just needs to work on the whole timing/not touching poop thing. Really can't fault him though, since he didn't have access to the bathroom.
Today Isaac got a bath instead of a nap. He didn't seem to mind.
Also, I am a big fan of clorox cleanup wipes. They rock.
Saturday, March 03, 2012
Kids Workshop
I usually help Isaac follow the instructions for putting the kits together, but he has sole responsibility for the decals. I think it has more personality that way.
(Isaac is at that age where he scrunches up his face horribly when a camera is facing his direction. I tickled him to get a natural smile... but he also turned away. Best I could do.)
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