January 2007

Besides the house falling apart things are going generally ok. Mike’s parents came down for a visit last weekend and it was an absolutely enjoyable time, not just seeing them but also handing over diaper duty to someone else for a little while.

I recently had an interview with a library in New Jersey. I haven’t heard anything back and don’t know how long these things take but I’m inclined to think that they found me a little fresh and slightly too small town. It was, however, a very pleasent conversation, good practice and made me think a lot more about the things that I would like out of my next job. They were a brand new facility and through the course of the interview it seemed that we all had very similar philosophies when it came to youth services and inter-work relations. It would have been a dream job. And New Jersey, well, it’s just cool.

Liam has reached a few milestones recently. He now plays with his feet all the time, pulling off his socks constantly much to his mothers frusteration (in case you don’t live here, it’s just a tad freezing right now). He’s also learned how to play peek-a-boo, lifts the blanket over his own face and pulls it down, flashing a cheeky grin the whole time. And the growling. My child has started to growl. Interesting. We also went to storytime at the library yesterday for the first time since he was newborn. I think he really enjoyed it. I think he was more interested in all the other babies than he was in the stories. Hopefully we’ll be able to keep going.

With all these changes in him, it’s getting harder and harder to leave him everyday. I feel like I miss so much. My parents are taking care of him in the afternoons all through the week except Thursdays so Mike can actually sleep more than four hours. We’re just so thankful that we have them here. The schedule Mike and I are keeping is getting really tough. We’re constantly tired and find it hard to synchronize our own “awake and alert” moments so we can actually spend some quality time together. This is why we’re pretty desperate now to find a job, any job at this point, that will pay us more so we don’t have to do this night shift thing anymore. Right now, we’re both scanning the Syracuse classifieds pretty regularly to see if there’s anything that fits us. I’ve even considered working as a hotel receptionist if it means full time pay and benifits and a chance for one of us to stay at home with Liam. Moving is scary, but there just doens’t seem to be any opportunities for either of us down here.

Here’s a recent pic of Liam from xmas. See flickr for more:

Just spent the last hour chipping ice off the roof of our sun-room after I noticed several rather large leaks coming through the ceiling. Have I mentioned in the past, oh, 24 hours how much I hate this house? I can’t wait to be rid of it. Owning a house is not easy, that I have learned, but neither should it be this hard. I still have to fix our shower which is leaking, once again, and it’ll cost me in the neighborhood of $50-$75 to fix it, not to mention an afternoon of cursing and busted fingers. This because our fixtures are so old (”How old are they?!”), they’re so old they don’t even stock the parts anymore, plus they’re Kohler, which apparently is the Cadillac of plumbing, so they’re extra expensive. We’ve already pretty much decided that we’re going to pay a little extra in order to ensure we get a well built, solid house - if that means we have a mortgage, then so be it.

Poor guy, we went in for the 4 month check-up, which included 4 (count ‘em, 4) immunizations. He cried, of course, but I soon got him to settle down (by the way, that’s twice I’ve had to handle “the shots” by myself - I think I need Karma Points or something for that, though the Pediatrician didn’t think so). Carleen had him for the rest of the day and about an hour after I fell asleep, she rushes into the bedroom asking what the doctor told me. Seems the little man had been screaming his head off for the past 15 minutes. I got up and we gave him some Children’s Tylenol and he I rocked him - had him settled pretty soon. Boy he’s got lungs - when he wants to use them (which luckily isn’t too often). He’s off again today, groggy and feverish, but otherwise in good spirits. He weighs 13 lbs, 5oz, and is 24 3/4 inches long.

I told our friend Cindy that parenting means wanting five minutes alone to yourself and upon getting those five minutes, wishing you were with your child. It’s been frustrating the past week or so. He gets tired and you try to put him to sleep and that just pisses him off more - I’ve taken to letting him be - if he wants to sleep, he’ll go to sleep, I’m just shooting my nerves all to Hell trying to get him to sleep. He’s still feeding fussily, but he’s gaining weight really well, so I’m not too worried about that.