Nico News #3

Dear Friends and Family,

A day comes in everyone’s life when you have to take off the training wheels, fly without a net, jump into the great unknown.

No, that day has not come for Nico, but for his parents, as the last of our amazing live-in helpers has headed home.

Gulp.

You might think this wouldn’t be such a big deal. After all, Meghan and I are in our mid-thirties, are reasonably well educated and capable. What’s the big deal of taking care of a baby? Any Tom, Dick and Harriett can have a baby if they want, and must figure out how to play caregiver. Teenage mothers do it. Single parents do it. It shouldn’t be so impossible for us to do it too.

But here’s the difference: Those other people aren’t also the parents of two needy cats. At least our two needy cats.

Don’t get me wrong. Our visiting family members—my mom, then Meghan’s mom, then Meghan’s sister Caitlin—did much more than give attention to Bucky and Bitsy. They cooked. They shopped. They laundered. They held baby.

But perhaps their greatest contributions came as peacemakers. They gave our cats attention, and in doing so helped ease the transition for the newest member of the family.

First there was Meghan’s mom Judy, grooming Bucky and Bitsy as she waited for us to come home (late) from the hospital. Then there was my mom, who called the cats “Cat” and made them a deal: They don’t jump on her and she would sing and talk to them. Neither party ever reneged on the agreement. And then Caitlin, who went above and beyond and took the kitties to get their annual shots. A Herculean task, and one that we as new parents surely would have put off for a year, probably to tragic result. (And how fitting that the vet would comment on how well groomed the cats were…thanks to Judy. And it all comes full circle…)

So, to be clear, Meghan misses the help from our family. I miss the help from our family. Nico misses the help from our family. But the cats miss the help from our family the most.

Not that we haven’t tried to be accommodating to their concerns and feelings. Case in point: We quickly decided to abandon our plans for Nico to sleep in the Arms-Reach Co-Sleeper (a bassinette that attaches to your bed—a “sidecar” as my friend Chris calls it). This idea sounded great in theory before the baby arrived. We would all get the benefits of Nico sleeping near us, just an “arms-reach” away, but, by not actually having him in the bed with us, we would never have to worry about rolling over on the little guy. But let’s face it: sleeping babies make a lot of noises (at least our sleeping baby). And those little noises can keep parents up all night long. So we quickly ditched the bassinette and opted for the crib in the adjacent nursery (just a few feet away) instead.

Which meant that we were in possession of a vacant Arms-Reach Co-Sleeper Bassinette. Nature abhors a vacuum as does Bucky, who quickly decided that it would make a perfect bed for HER. And so it was, for several blissful cat-weeks, until THE MISTAKE.

It was last weekend. Meghan had nursed Nico and filled him up to the gills. My job was to rock him to sleep. And she explicitly said…foreshadowing here…DON’T PUT HIM DOWN ON HIS BACK FOR AT LEAST THIRTY MINUTES LEST HE’LL THROW IT ALL UP.

Now, I’ve become a bit of a sooth-the-baby-to-sleep expert, and had a routine of my own down, and yes, it included quickly putting the baby on his back so I could quickly change his diaper, and then swaddle him. So I said to myself, “A minute or two of back-lying won’t hurt…it hasn’t before…I’ll have him upright again in no time.”

Well, you know how this story ends. What’s remarkable is how much breast milk a little baby’s stomach can hold—and eject.

So how does this impact Bucky and her Bassinette? Well, Meghan’s idea that the baby would up-chuck came, in part, from mother’s Intuition and in part from “What To Expect Your Baby’s First Year”—among my least favorite baby books, but what do I know—which EXPLICITLY warns us NOT to put the baby on its back within the 30 minute window. What it ALSO warns is to beware of cats and babies…that we should put a screen on our crib to avoid a “terrible tragedy.” (Who writes these things?) So here’s Meghan’s late-night brain at work: “The book warned us NOT to put the baby on its back…and it was right. AND the book warned us NOT to let the cats have access to the baby and his crib or else we might face a terrible tragedy…therefore,,, the cats are OUT OF HERE.

And that’s why Bucky got kicked out—not just from the Bassinette, but from our bedroom and adjoining nursery.

And that’s why Bucky (and Bitsy) miss our visiting family members even more than we do.

More soon…

Love,

Mike, Meghan, Nico, Bucky and Bitsy

PS Here are the latest photos including, of course, a picture of Bucky and her Bassinette: http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/WeGiveThanksForNico.

Nico News #2

Dear Friends and Family,

Nico is settling in to his new home here in Takoma Park. His favorite place to be, besides in Mom, Dad or a Grandmothers’ arms, is on his changing table naked and staring at the light coming from the stained glass lamp shade.

He’s had several baths with Dad and diaper changing is much less traumatic now that Dad has fast fingers. His diaper rash from the antibiotics is clearing up. Basically, things are getting normal again around here and the cats are once again getting some attention.

Nico makes adorable grunting sounds when he eats and his sighs are heavenly. We are welcoming visitors into our home. So, if you’d like to come visit us, don’t be shy. Below are two links to his most recent photos.

Love,

Meghan and Mike

http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/NicoSFirstHalloween
http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/FamilyFun

Nico News #5

Dear Friends and Family,
Having a baby makes you a better person. You begin flossing regularly. We've also started eating more vegetarian food. It's good for us and let's face it killing animals is not nice no matter how you think about it.

I've also started paying more attention to our two cats, Buckey and Bitsy, whom Nico adores. So....let me preface this by saying there was A LOT of cat hair. It was EVERYWHERE--on Nico's pacifiers, on our socks and plastered onto my black yoga pants. The cats have long white hair and our black things were beginning to look gray! And when I found cat hair on my contact lenses, I started fantasizing about getting rid of them.

But Nico loves the cats. He watches them with rapt attention and tries to grab them and Mike also has a deep affection for them. They are the first cats Mike has ever owned. Mike had a cockapoo named Salty growing up but Salty never let Mike hold him and he spent a lot of time ruining the front lawn of Mike's childhood home. Salty also humped guests. So when we adopted Buckey and Bitsy and they purred and cleaned themselves and let him hold them, Mike fell in love.

So with such a tight bond between Nico and Mike and the cats I came up with a compromise--the lion's cut. I know some of you will think I am cruel but the hair was driving me CRAZY. And desperate times call for desperate measures. The day the cats were to be shaved, the vet called me at home to make sure I knew what I was doing. "I can't glue the hair back on once it's gone," she said.

I admit the affect is startling. [Note photos in attached link.] Mike said they look like characters from a Dr. Suess book. Since the cutting, they've been especially needy. They keep looking at me like, "Do you still love us now that you can see who we really are?" Between trying to train Nico to sleep in the crib and the cats trying to get our approval, I haven't gotten a lot of sleep.

But, I've decided to keep exercising anyway in an attempt to burn off what we affectionately call the "Mommy pudge." Nico and I have joined Stroller Strides. This is an exercise class where about 20 mommies and babies in strollers gather. We stand in a circle and talk, talk, talk. Then we snag our strollers and take off jogging in a circle, our mommy pudge giggling. The instructor shouts out intervals: "speed it up, ladies," or "piggly wigglies"--where we touch the floor jump up and then tickle our baby's feet. As we go whipping around the room together, Nico looks up at me like, "Mommy, you've GOT to be kidding me." But it works. I'm shedding pounds!

We are about to have Nico try his first few bites of food. I'm nostalgic about this, soon he'll be driving and then moving away! I do look forward to his first words, however. What will he say? Perhaps, "Thank you, Mommy, for all you do for me." But, more likely he'll say, "Let's do the piggly wigglies."

Hope you enjoy the latest photos of Nico and his cats.
Love, Meghan

http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/NicoSFirstBite
http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/Haircut
http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/CarolinaDreamin

All photos:http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan

Nico News #4

Dear Friends and Family,

Nico is closing in on four months of age and he is teaching us that love is not born in an instant but blossoms over time. In the evening, after a hard day of playing, crying and sucking, I watch Nico totally in love. He sleeps soundly, his little barrel chest rising and falling, a scrumptious baby sigh slipping out between his lips.

Other evenings, when Mike returns from the office, we have a NAKED BABY ALERT--Mike strips Nico to his birthday suit and cradles him in his palms as he carries him through the air to the bath. Nico is stoic and maybe even enjoys the bath.

Then there was the wonderful moment last week when I took Nico to Mike's work for a book party and to be doted on by Mike's colleagues. I breast-fed Nico in a back office and after gulping down his milk, Nico smiled at me and took the BIGGEST POOP OF HIS LIFE, right there in the office! He pooped up, he pooped down. When I got his clothes off it appeared that Nico had even gotten poop up on his shoulder. I found this move irreverent and wonderful.

Our attachment grows... One thing we've discovered is that Nico is the BEST AUDIENCE EVER. We sing to him, loudly with rattles and a whole lot of dancing. Mike uses Nico's lotion bottle as a microphone and I shake his baby rattle and my hips like I'm a Temptation. He loves it! He thinks we're great. Hey, maybe we really are talented.

Then to prove that love isn't logical, rational or ever prudent, there was the... FIRE ALARM INCIDENT. In late December, we took Nico on his first airplane ride to Connecticut to visit Auntie KK (my sister Caitlin) for her baby shower (Caitlin is expecting a baby boy in April). To save money, we stayed at the Comfort Inn in Guilford, now known to us as the UnComfortable Inn. At 8 am on Saturday morning some poor customer of the UnComfortable Inn had an unlucky run-in with the toaster in the mini kitchen in the lobby. Apparently, this customer blackened his toast and simultaneously set the fire alarm off in the entire hotel. Mike and I were in a deep slumber until the untimely toasting mistake. In Mike's defense, the fire alarm did sound like the arrival of a space ship--high pitched screeching. So poor Mike is ejected out of what was probably one of the soundest sleeps he'd had in a few weeks of child-raising. Testosterone pumping, Mike, the father of an infant, flies upright swinging like he's Daniel Day-Lewis in the final scene of Last of the Mohicans. And for some reason decides he needs clock his wife in the back of the head! Apparently, he was reaching for the radio alarm on my side of the bed because he thought it was going off. (I still don't quite understand the logic, if any, behind this move.)

Anyway, the next thing that happens is that Mike--who is probably still asleep and acting from the depths of his subconscious--picks up the baby who is sleeping in the king-sized bed with us and tucks him under his arm like a football. Still swinging like a prize fighter Mike jumps off the bed. At this point, I am fully awake and I start yelling, "It's a fire alarm, it's a fire alarm." Mike looks at me and then heads for the window, tearing aside the curtains where he sees that we are on the second floor and he calculates that he can probably make the jump to the ground with the baby safely in his arms.

Fortunately, before jumping Mike seems to wakes up and think better of the move as there is no sign fire or smoke or anything dangerous at all!

Love...is a liquid that flows through our veins. Love...makes us tender and strong beyond our imagination. Now we joke that Mike saved Nico from the toaster but in reality Nico is very, very loved by two people and as he grows and becomes more himself I hope he will be loved by you, too. To help you fall in love with him, go to the Picasa links to see more pictures!!

http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/SantaBaby
http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/NicoSGrowing
http://picasaweb.google.com/meghanmullan/FebruaryPhotos