milo

eight months old!

2008-08-16T18:44:00.000-07:00

milo gives being eight months old a thumbs way up!

these are crazy times in our household. for anyone who doesn't already know, we are planning to move to texas at the beginning of october to live for seven months in the apartment on my parents' property. we are really excited about it but have to do lists of what needs to be accomplished before we go that go out the door.

meanwhile, milo just keeps changing daily before our eyes. his third and four teeth are coming in right up top, which has made him unusually grumpy these past few weeks. everything he can get his chubby little handrs on goes right in the mouth to be rubbed against the top gums. no one ever buy any toys for this kid, please! he goes right past his toys to play with the empty plastic water bottles and empty cardboard boxes. mama's sunglasses are another favorite; he loves to pull them right off of my face and into his mouth.

speaking of things going into his mouth, we are extremely lucky because milo has liked every food that he's tried so far. here he is patiently waiting for his dad to feed him some mashed up pinto beans at a mexican restaurant:

a short list of just some of the foods he's tried (and liked!) so far: avocado, plums, peaches, bananas, applesauce, apricot sauce, corn tortilla, brown rice cakes, nopalitos, black beans, pinto beans, mild guacamole, pineapple, tamale, sweet potatoes, hash browns, tomato, corn, and a half dozen other fruits and vegetables. we did learn the hard way a few weeks ago that while he loves to eat edamame beans with his mama, his body doesn't actually break them down, just digests them whole. so we won't be making that mistake again!

milo has been getting a lot of rides from his dad, as usual:

and our friend shantelle took this wonderful picture of milo on my shoulders on the day of matt's and my combined birthday party:

he's growing up so quickly! we can't wait to find out what the next month will bring.

crawling!

2008-07-26T14:03:00.000-07:00

i haven't taken many pictures of milo in the last few weeks, but we have taken a few videos, because milo is finally learning to crawl!

here is a sample of his new skill. the password is "milo":

milo is crawling from joannalovesyou on Vimeo.

seven months old!

2008-07-08T21:32:00.000-07:00

milo turned seven months old yesterday!

he has hit so many developmental milestones in the last months that i'm not sure i'll be able to remember them. let's see: he can sit up on his own, which is the most exciting for us, and when he could finally do it for more than 10 seconds at a time, we took a lot of photos.

he's added a lot of new foods to his repertoire. stone fruit like peaches continue to be his favorite. here he is covered in plum:

most days i don't even bother putting a bib on him, because he gets it all over his clothes, anyway, so the bib is just one more thing we have to wash.

his most recent favorite food is sweet potatoes. he can't get enough! i mix mashed sweet potato with a little rice cereal and breast milk and he gobbles it up.

milo still doesn't like being on his belly as much as he likes to stand and "walk" between our outstretched legs. his dad and i keep joking that he'll be the first baby in the history of time to walk before he crawls.

milo's favorite thing in the whole world is being outside. if he starts fussing, we can get him to stop almost immediately by taking him outside. here we are at the farmers market, where milo loved sitting on the carpet in the sunshine, people-watching.

last week, i found out that my very closest friend in the world, melissa, was diagnosed with cancer. it's treatable, and once she has finished treatment, she will have beaten it forever, which is a huge relief for those of us who are on the opposite side of the world from where she is currently living, in japan. she has started to undergo treatment, and i shaved my head in support of her. here is a photo of milo and i from saturday night, two baldies:

although milo is having some teething pain these days, he's still such a happy baby and a total joy to be around. his personality is so positive and cheerful, and when he sets his mind to something, he pursues it relentlessly until he reaches his goal. we love these qualities about him, but of course it's a little frustrating when his goals run counter to ours, like when he wants to reach the silverware on the table and we have to move it further and further away from him.

we can't wait to see how his personality evolves from these early traits. he's so much fun.

six months old!

2008-06-09T18:58:00.000-07:00

milo is six months old!

we took this photo of him on saturday at cannon beach, or.

i will probably say this dozens of more times in his life, but this is my favorite age yet. he's happy all the time! he's even teething and he only complains about it for about ten minutes a day.

happy half-birthday, milo!

happy birthday, granddad!

2008-06-02T12:32:00.000-07:00

this is a big week: milo's granddad is having a birthday tomorrow, and this saturday, milo will be six months old! six months, we can hardly believe it.

it's also a big day for me: as of this morning, i have lost all of my pregnancy weight plus ten pounds. i am fitting into pants that i haven't worn since we moved to portland! hooray!

milo is so close to being able to sit up and to stand unsupported. he can do both for a few seconds at a time and then needs to hold onto our fingers or lean back against us.

he's also eating solids a few times a week now. milo's new favorite post-nap activity is to sit in my lap while i eat a peach or nectarine, and then he sucks on the pit while i hold it. he also likes very ripe (almost over-ripe) banana and avocado, and this morning, he tried iron-fortified brown rice cereal for the first time (mixed with breastmilk) and he loved it. he's becoming such a big boy.

here are a couple of photos from the last few weeks:

milo helping matt play scrabble:

milo snuggling up to me on the couch:

5 months!

2008-05-14T11:05:00.000-07:00

milo is five months old! we're starting to notice that his new skills and abilities are harder to tick off when people ask, because they're much more subtle and you wouldn't notice unless you spent every hour of every day with him like we do.

for instance, milo has started to cuddle. it used to be that when we had him against our chests, he'd have his chest and neck erect, always trying to take in his surroundings. he still does this, but now he will also snuggle against our shoulders and nuzzle our necks with the top of his head. i can't express how wonderful it feels to receive voluntary affection from him.

the other new development is that milo has shown a lot of interest in our food lately. here is a picture of milo trying to get his dad's dinner into his own mouth:

we suspected that he wasn't developmentally ready to add solids yet, but we decided to give it a spin just to see, so here is milo having his first taste of avocado:

i put it on his lips and the tip of his tongue, and he smacked it a little, but wasn't able to swallow it, so it's still too early! we'll keep trying, since the interest is definitely there.

two weeks ago, our whole family went with a group of friends to volunteer at lighthouse farm sanctuary, which is a farm for animals that have been rescued from abusive situations. mostly this involved matt carrying milo around in the carrier while i cleaned out chicken coops and petted the animals. it was a wonderful way to spend a saturday and we'll definitely make this a regular trip. here is milo at the farm getting hugs from one of his favorite pals, katie:

milo is taking two naps a day now. the first is in the morning when his dad "dances him down," which means that they listen to music and dance until milo falls asleep, and then they both move to the couch and milo sleeps on matt's chest. (let's be honest: matt usually takes a nap then, too, as well he should!)

here they are just as milo is waking up:

then in the afternoon, milo and i take a nursing nap, which means that we both get into bed and he nurses until he falls asleep. i look forward to this all day, because it means that my work day is over and i get to just enjoy snuggling against him for a couple of hours.

now that it's springtime, milo is wearing sunhats when we leave the house to keep the sun off his head and out of his eyes. here's a photo of him in a freakishly coordinated outfit. none of these items was purchased together! they were all gifts or hand-me-downs.

that adorable dinosaur onesie is a new gift from his grandmom and granddad and he's already worn it many times! thanks, grandmom and granddad!

finally, here's a photo of milo from this past friday when we met some friends for after-work snacks and drinks. milo is being held by our friend michelle and he's totally enthralled with michelle's daughter ruby, who is three:

ruby is going to be teaching milo all sorts of things soon, both good and bad, i'm sure. milo is lucky.

twenty weeks old

2008-04-27T19:56:00.000-07:00

no time to write an entry these days (or to do much of anything online, as the 147 emails in my inbox can attest to), but here are some recent photos of milo enjoying the springtime.

milo is getting better at his rolling over skills, and sometimes bellytime turns into back time:

we had dinner with our friend erin and she showed us her pictures from her visit to japan:

milo loves hanging around naked before his bath time:

jason was in town for a few days and we had a wonderful visit and milo loved getting to spend time with his uncle:

matt took this very sweet photo of milo last week:

and then our friend katie took many photos of us today after we had brunch. (yes, my hair is bright pink, get over it.)

(just one more reminder that these are only a small portion of the photos that we take of him and the rest are available on flickr, but you need to have a user account and to have us add you as "friend" or "family" for you to see them. we get many emails requesting more photos of milo, and that is the best way
to see them as i upload photos almost daily but don't have the time to write blog entries very often these days. there is a detailed explanation in the last entry of how to get a flickr account.)

milo's favorite thing to do right now is to hang upside down. when we turn him upside down, he cackles and coos. there is a good chance that his first word will be "again," because every time i turn him upside, i say: "again?" and then do it again, so he probably thinks that "again" means: "this is the greatest thing in the world!"

we are trying to cherish these few months before he learns to crawl because he is just so easy. he's happy doing almost anything and it's easy to take him anywhere. we know that won't last for too much longer!

sixteen weeks

2008-03-28T15:35:00.000-07:00

i am stunned to say that milo is sixteen weeks old today! i know that everyone says that once you have kids, the days just fly by, but i feel like entire weeks and months happen in a blink. it seems like yesterday that he was three weeks old and i was pacing the apartment in a loop at four a.m, rocking and shushing him while he wailed in my ear.

now he goes down to bed like a champ and i nurse him in my sleep while we lie next to each other, and instead of fussing when he wakes up, he lies there happily until one of us wakes up, and then he gives us the biggest smile, like: "oh hi! i like you a lot!" it's the greatest part of my day.

it snowed this morning, so milo and i weren't able to go on our usual hike because the snow had turned the trails into a muddy, slushy mess, so instead we walked the cement paths around the vietnam memorial. it was beautiful.

milo's favorite thing in the whole world continues to be music. he's very picky, and when his "favorites" start to play, he becomes silent immediately, and hugs us close, and usually falls asleep within a minute or two. his current favorites are the scottish band belle and sebastien, and the song "holland 1945" by neutral milk hotel, which is about anne frank, so clearly he has excellent taste.

anyway, onto the pictures!

matt clipping milo's fingernails:

and i think this is one of my favorites of all time, milo in the carrot hat that his friend julie bought for him:

and here is a video that we took documenting one of milo's new favorite activities, practicing to stand (the password is "milo"):

milo likes standing from joannalovesyou on Vimeo.

just a reminder to our family members that the photos i put on the blog represent only about a half or a third of the photos that we take of milo, and if you want to see the rest, you'll need a flickr account. signing up for an account is free and easy to do, and once you have an account, go to my profile and click "Add ll cool joanna as a contact" in the upper right corner. then i will add you as a contact and you'll be able to see the rest of the photos. i know this seems complicated, but it will take you five minutes, tops!

fourteen weeks

2008-03-18T22:45:00.000-07:00

there is really nothing that i can say other than that this is such a fun age and we are trying to enjoy every minute of it. milo is so happy and sweet. i read that most babies his age cry for a total of an hour a day; milo cries for maybe ten minutes total. all he seems to want to do is to look at us, to be held by us, to listen to music, and to nurse, and we are happy to fulfill his wishes.

i made a promise to milo that we would go on a walk together every day, and so far, i've done pretty well at keeping the promise. on the days where it's been too rainy to go on a walk outdoors, we just go to ikea or target and walk around and around, and he loves it. a few times a week, we go for hikes at the hoyt arboretum, and he loves these the best. he makes cooing sounds, and he seems to prefer the same parts of the trails that i prefer—where the trees are so thick that there's only room for one person to walk on the trail and the branches touch your shoulders as you hike.

onto the pictures!

mama kisses:

beautiful blue eyes:

about to go on a walk:

napping with his dad (look how long he is!):

daddy kisses:

matt took this one:

gripping the drawstring of dad's pants:

three months old!

2008-03-05T12:18:00.000-08:00

milo is three months old! he's officially finished with the dreaded "fourth trimester!" hooray!

milo has had two doctor's appointments since the last time i posted: wellness checks and vaccinations. he's still in the upper percentile for height (or length) but has fallen into the bottom half for weight. we know that he's eating enough because i feed him on demand, he's very active and alert, and he's peeing and pooping constantly. i was also reassured by a website that pointed out that since the vast majority of babies are overfed, being in the bottom percentile doesn't mean that your baby is underfed. he may fill out a bit when we add some solids to his diet, or he may just be a skinny kid! we'll see.

milo's new thing seems to be flirting. i now have him so he's facing out when we go on our daily walks, and he loves interacting with all of his friends. and i think that they like finally being able to see his face, since for the first two months, he was facing my chest and would fall asleep only a minute or two into our walk, lulled to sleep by the rhythm of my steps. he sure is growing up fast. when i look at pictures from his birth, i can hardly believe it was only a few months ago. it seems years away.

milo loves music. when he is fussy, his dad and i put on some music, and dance with him in front of the stereo, singing the songs into his ear, and he immediately quiets down and sometimes falls asleep. his favorites are the beatles, arcade fire, cat power, tilly and the wall, and the white stripes. he has good taste, of course.

now onto the pictures!

here are father and son crashed out on the couch:

this is our cat, meatwad, deciding that milo looked so happy in matt's arms that she wanted to get in on the action:

and finally, here is a photo of milo having a thoughtful moment. not really, he's just sucking his fingers. he might be pondering their delicious flavor:

eleven weeks

2008-02-24T18:56:00.000-08:00

i know! i missed last week. every day i thought: "i really need to write milo's entry today!" and then we'd get wrapped up in our daily routine and the next thing i knew, it was the weekend again.

milo is actually the easiest part of our lives right now. in addition to parenting a newborn, matt and i are both working; i'm writing a second cookbook; and on top of all that, we're searching for our first house. our whole family is go go go every minute of the day—which is great! i vastly prefer busy to bored.

it helps, of course, that milo is such a carefree baby. if he were a high needs child, there is no way that his dad and i could accomplish half of what we do. he is just so happy and laidback, and we can take him (almost) anywhere that we would want to go. we're smart enough to know that our parenting has nothing to do with it: this is his personality, and it's radiant, and we're just the lucky jerks that get to spend time with him.

onto the pictures, since i know that's why you're really here. don't pretend otherwise.

here is our blue-eyed babe repping for the home team:

milo has a mobile that hangs above his changing table, and he absolutely adores it. it's just six suessian fish, dangling. his aunt sara bought it for him from ikea. they don't spin or play music; they just hang there, but that's enough for milo. he is totally enthralled by them. here is a video that i took a few weeks ago of milo and his fish (the password, as always, is "milo."):

fish friends from joannalovesyou on Vimeo.

milo loves his fish friends so much that i had to take a picture from his perspective to see what was so great about them:

they are pretty special! i like the orange one the best.

but if i had to pin down one thing that was milo's true love, i'd have to say it was his fist.

like most newborns, milo is orally fixated. he sucked so much on his forearm that he started to give himself hickies:

then, sometime last week, milo discovered his fist. forearm, forget about it! you are no match for milo's passion for his fist. he goes at this thing like it is the greatest possible thing that he could have in his mouth. he is templeton the rat and his fist is the fair smorgasbord.

finally, here is a photo of milo sitting in his baby chair for the first time:

he wasn't supposed to be ready for it until 3 months, but he has such great head and neck control that we thought he might try it a bit earlier, and sure enough, he loves it.

milo is also "talking" more than ever. every day, he cracks us up with his little monologues. his only word is "unga," but he's giving javiar bardem a run for his money with how many different ways he can say that word.

more heartbreaking photos and videos next week.

nine weeks

2008-02-10T13:48:00.000-08:00

this was a very low-key week for us.

here is milo chattering away on the bed right before we went on one of our daily walks (the password is "milo.")

about to go for a walk from joannalovesyou on Vimeo.

milo also attended his first potluck yesterday and was the star of the show. lots of people commented on how mellow and happy he is, and we love being able to take him anywhere with us at this age and knowing that he'll be happy.

after the potluck, he and i came home and took a nap on the couch together and then matt snapped this photo of us.

eight weeks old

2008-02-04T19:45:00.000-08:00

this weekend, milo's gram came to visit! i wish that i had some pictures, but the only pictures i took were when louise was bouncing milo on the exercise ball, and they were very blurry and unflattering, and louise would kill me if i posted them. but we took pictures of her and milo with her camera, so maybe she'll share some of them with us when she gets a chance.

we had a lot of excursions and adventures while she was here because milo is such a breeze to run around town with right now.

during the days, we went to the vegan mini-mall (twice!), four different restaurants, target, and a couple of other spots.

here are matt and milo at vita getting some lunch. we'd forgotten to bring a pacifier, but that didn't stop milo from sucking—he just chomped on his dad's thumb.

here are matt and milo at herbivore, patiently (or not so patiently) waiting while their mothers ogle a new shipment of merchandise with michelle and heather.

i know that louise was really sad when she couldn't come in january because she was too sick, but i think that the timing of her visit worked out just perfectly: she got to have milo all to herself! and he's at a really cute stage where he chatters happily when he's in a good mood, and when he's in a bad mood, he's easily calmed down with walking, rocking, or bouncing, all of which his gram was happy to provide.

this week, i tried out pumping for the first time. we really wanted to wait until he was a breastfeeding champion before we introduced the bottle so there would be no nipple confusion. pumping will allow matt to feed milo every once in a while, which will come in handy if i need to do something without milo for a few hours—although at this point, i really don't want to. when i run quick errands and leave him home with his dad, i enjoy about five minutes of my "freedom" before i miss him and wish that i were home with him instead of out.

this morning, matt fed milo for the first time!

and then this afternoon, matt shaved his beard off, so expect to see a cleanly-shaven matt in the pictures next week.

seven weeks old

2008-01-26T17:02:00.000-08:00

there is at least a 75% chance that milo is the happiest baby that has ever lived. we are having so much fun with him that we sometimes have to fight over who gets to hold him.

this week, i read the no cry sleep solution and used it to finally get milo's sleep schedule worked out so that his daytime naps are completely separate from his nighttime sleep, and i'm happy to say that he's slept through the night (that's 5-6 hours for a baby, but hey! huge improvement!) for the last four nights.

if you know parents who're having a hard time getting their child to sleep, i highly recommend the book. we were loathe to become those parents who end up locked into an hour-long, elaborate "going to sleep" routine every night that they have to follow or else their children never go to bed. so hopefully we'll be able to use this book to establish good patterns for him throughout his childhood. i also really loved that the book is very supportive of co-sleeping, since a lot of the older sleep books still advocate the "cry it out" approach.

here are some photos that i took of milo yesterday, since i had resolved to take more awake shots:

everyone always tells me that milo looks just like me, and i've never seen it, until i saw this photo, where he's making a total "joanna" face:

finally, here is a video that matt and i made yesterday when we were playing with milo. (the password is "milo.")

fun with baby from joannalovesyou on Vimeo.

one last thing: this week, fit pregnancy magazine named portland as the "best city to have a baby in" and i'm extremely proud, as if i have anything to do with it. here are some of the statistics from the report card:

"88 percent of Portland mothers attempt breastfeeding. That's the 3rd highest percentage of any city in our report. The average for cities in our survey is 75 percent."

"19.9 percent of Portland mothers breastfeed their babies exclusively (meaning no solids, formula or other liquids) for 6 months or longer as recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics, making it the 2nd highest scoring city in this category. The average for cities in our survey is 12 percent."

"Portland has one doula for every 146 live births, the 4th highest ratio in our survey. The national average is one doula per 649 live births."

this statistic is especially amazing:

"Portland has 116 midwives for every 1,000 births, the highest in our survey. The national average is 37 midwives for every 1,000 births."

triple the average!!

hooray!

six weeks old

2008-01-22T15:43:00.000-08:00

isn't it classic that the mother of a six week old wouldn't have time to write the entry until he was almost seven weeks old?

milo is suddenly so vocal. he "talks" to us all the time: when we're holding him, changing him, carrying him around—he even will break off from nursing to babble to me for a couple of minutes. i'm hoping that this is a good sign that he will be verbal early.

i have been taking the occasional video of milo with my digital camera. the other day, i managed to capture one of my favorite things that milo does. after a nap, when i unwrap him from his swaddle, he throws up his hands and screws up his face and stretches for a full minute or more.

here's the video. (the password is "milo.")

milo has been having a little bit of reflux lately. we're not worried about it because he's still gaining weight, so we know he's getting enough to eat.

on sunday, we were all set to go to brunch before going to milagro's for a baby clothing swap. i strapped milo into his carseat and he promptly spit up all over his outfit. so i peeled off his clothing and matt ran in to get him a change of clothes:

matt came back with the clothing and i changed him and strapped him back into the carseat, and he immediately spit up all over the new set of clothes!

but most of the time, the three of us are just having a lot of fun together. the days are flying by. i apologize right now if we don't respond to phone calls or emails right away, but it seems like every day is only a few hours long. i can hardly remember having any free time, even though i know that the last few weeks before milo was born, i was so bored, and desperate for activities to take up my time and distract me from being extremely pregnant. that seems like it was a million years ago. i vastly prefer the busy!

five weeks old

2008-01-13T09:20:00.000-08:00

milo has changed more in the last week than he changed in the entire first month of his life, and that's not an exaggeration.

the first (and best!) piece of news is that his fussiness period is over! blissfully over! he had a little bit of gas and indigestion this week but it didn't lead to the kind of colicky crying that it had in the weeks before. now he only cries for two reasons: he needs to be fed or he needs to be changed. it's always one or the other. i can't even express what a huge relief that is for us, to know exactly how to interpret his communication and meet his needs.

his eyesight has also vastly improved and he can finally see us, which means that not only does he sustain eye contact with us, but he can see enough of his surroundings that he can start putting things together and making connections. for instance, until this week, i couldn't put him down in the bed unless he was in a deep sleep. if he wasn't in a deep sleep, he'd wake up a minute or so after i put him down and start crying. now, if i put him down and he's not completely asleep, he might wake up a little and look around, but when he sees that he's in bed and he's between his parents, he closes his eyes and decides it's safe to go back to sleep.

here he and i are, taking a little nap on the couch:

and here he is with his dad, sleeping in on saturday:

then, last night while i was holding him, milo laughed for the first time! he's been grinning since he was born, but this time he grinned, looked off in the distance, grinned again, and then laughed! i really wish i knew what he was thinking about. it wasn't related to anything i was doing, for sure, so i can only imagine how great it will be when i can make him laugh.

milo is also sleeping in long stretches now -- last night he sleep for five hours. i think that was his longest yet. this week, i've usually only had to wake twice a night to nurse him, instead of three or four times. i think a lot of credit goes to the fact that we are trying to make sure that he gets out of the house for some sunlight at least once a day to establish those circadian rhythms.

here he and i are at junior's yesterday for brunch:

milo stays in and sleeps in the carrier the whole time when we are out, and just this week, he went: on walks to the vegan mini-mall (three times!), to dinner at nutshell, and to brunch at junior's.

i'll try to take some pictures this week of milo while he's awake, but i usually forget because i'm too busy just enjoying him. matt and i are having so much getting to know our son.

one month old!

2008-01-07T10:20:00.000-08:00

milo is one month old today!

i don't know if i can write this without getting a little weepy. his personality is emerging more strongly with every successive day and i fall a little more in love with him. he is sweet and tender, happy and mellow. he grins and makes big eyes at us. in the mornings, when he starts to stir a little and wake up, i snuggle him closer and press our faces together and breathe slow, deep, steady breaths and he makes a happy whimper and falls right back to sleep.

he is my favorite person in the whole world. i can't wait until we can have conversations!

last sunday, matt's father left after a week-long visit. here are the okin men:

and the very next day, new year's eve, milo's aunt melissa arrived for a visit:

poor melissa came during the peak of milo's fussiness. (i say "fussiness" rather than "colic" because it doesn't follow the rule of threes, but it's essentially an hour or two a day of inconsolable crying and screaming.) every trick in our book and weapon in our arsenal that had worked before was suddenly useless, or it would work for a minute or two and then he'd let loose again with more wailing. i think that over the entire course of last week, i got a total of 18 hours of sleep. it's kind of amazing how little sleep you can function on when you have to.

and i'd very happily endure a couple of hours of fussiness a day when the rest of the hours are so wonderful. i can't wait to see what month 2 will be like.

three weeks old

2007-12-29T16:49:00.000-08:00

milo had another big week. we celebrated his first christmas, his grandpa was in town, he went on several outings, and his parents got engaged! (follow that link to read matt's account of how he proposed. i might be biased, but it's the most tender engagement story i've ever heard. eat your heart out, ladies.)

not much has changed in our daily routine. milo still sleeps a lot, of course, and we try and sleep with him when we can.

personally, i think that the real difference in milo is his face. it's gotten much longer and less chubby since his birth, when it was basically just a round ball perched atop his neck. he looks more like an infant every day and less like a newborn. see for yourself:

milo on the day he was born:

milo yesterday:

matt says i'm crazy whenever i say that his face has changed so much, but no one spends more hours than i do gazing into that gorgeous mug, so i should know!

the newest development in milo's life is that we used an amazon gift card that louise's gym friends sent milo to buy milo a moby wrap, and it arrived today and already, we are so very pleased with our purchase. i had sewn some ring slings for carrying milo around in, and they are great for putting him in when he's already asleep, but he wouldn't tolerate being put in the sling when awake.

with the wrap, he's equally happy to be snuggled against us while asleep or awake, and if i need him to fall asleep, i just slip him in the wrap and bounce up and down on my exercise ball for a few minutes and bam, he is out in minutes, and in a deep sleep. we knew that we wanted to try a moby soon, but probably would have put off buying it had it not been for the gift card, so thanks very much to weezie's gym pals! i'm sure there will be plenty of pictures of milo in his wrap in the weeks to come.

we were really sad that milo's gam was too sick to come visit with his grandpa this week, but we know that she will visit soon, and she will get plenty of milo hugs and will be glad that she was in peak physical condition to enjoy her visit and her grandson!

milo's aunt melissa arrives on monday and i'm so excited that i might fall over! expect lots of pictures!

two weeks old

2007-12-21T13:03:00.000-08:00

frankly, i can't believe that milo is two weeks old today. the days are passing by so quickly. i feel as if i just blinked and all of the sudden, here we are.

last saturday, we had a big family outing and all went down to the herbivore store so that i could sign cookbooks.

we were sad to say goodbye to my mom and dad on monday. they were such a huge help while i was recovering from surgery. and i know that milo misses getting hugs and kisses from his grandmom and granddad.

we are getting a lot better with the sleeping thing. it's not so much that milo is sleeping more hours, but that matt and i are figuring out how to nap most effectively, how to keep him awake more hours of the day so he sleeps more at night, how to use nursing to knock him out, and how to trade off baby duty so that we're both getting more rest and still getting work and chores and errands done.

one week

2007-12-14T09:35:00.000-08:00

milo is one week old today!

the first week of milo's life has been all about the learning curve—his and ours. there are things (like breastfeeding and calming techniques) that matt and i didn't know how to do a week ago, but are now old pros at, and there were things that scared or upset milo a week ago (like being naked) that he now takes in stride and sometimes even happily babbles during. we have some routines down pat and are developing more every day. it's incredible.

milo is so expressive and alert—while we were in the hospital, our midwife and multiple nurses commented on how much he had his eyes open for a newborn. i heard: "he's really taking it all in!" at least a dozen times. he has a very sweet temperament and is hardly ever fussy, and when he is, his dad is a total pro at taking him from a bloodcurdling scream to utter silence in seconds.

here are some top fives!

milo's top five favorite things:

1 and 2. breastmilk and the acquisition of said milk
3. snuggles
4. being swaddled
5. poop, the making of

milo's top five most hated things:

1. poop, the cleaning of
2. changing clothes
3. the act of swaddling
4. the 10 seconds when mama is getting me adjusted to breastfeed. hurry up, woman.
5. mike huckabee's proposed solution to the AIDS epidemic

i might have just thrown in the last one. there isn't much he doesn't like. he's only a week old, people.

today, my mom and i are going to make a carrot-ginger cake to celebrate milo's first week and we're going to go over to the herbivore store to sign cookbooks for a little while and so milo can meet josh and michelle!

my parents are leaving on monday and we're really going to miss having them here. they've been a huge help and it's been wonderful to see them bond with the boy.

some photos from this week:

milo is here

2007-12-09T10:36:00.000-08:00

milo bear okin was born via c-section at 4:36 PM on december 7, 2007, weighing 8 lbs 7 oz and measuring 22 inches.