A Swingin' Saturday

Zach loves to go for a ride on the swing at our local playground. He loves a good push.

Zach's First Meal

Zach turned 6 months old and we celebrated with some real food (something other than breast milk). Nothing like some rice milk for dinner.

Video #4 - Zach at 5 months.

A quick shot of Zach at 5 months old.

Don't Bring These...

Going to the hospital to have a baby? Here's what not to bring.

Zach Video #2

Zach's ride home from the hospital.

Videos of Zach #1

Since some of you readers live in far away places like Nepal or New Jersey, I've provided some quick videos to check out. Enjoy.



An early glimpse of Zach taking his first nap.

Top 5 Things Learned about Being a Dad

Top 5 Things I learned about Being a Dad.

5) Forget "sleep when the baby sleeps." It's more like, "clean up the kitty litter, empty the trash, do the dishes, wash the clothes and clean the bathroom when the baby sleeps."

4) Avoid buttons on the baby's clothes at all costs.

3) Never wake a sleeping baby.

2) Sleep is sacred.

1) Keeping up with a blog or just about anything else is virtually impossible. (Hence the 5 months between posts.)

Catch Up On Your Sleep

Since we announced our baby plans to friends and family, we've received a universal comment. It's typically said this way:

"You better catch up on your sleep."

"Sleep while you can."

or, my personal favorite...

"Don't expect to ever sleep again."

The first two types of responses are somewhat true, but not matter how much sleep we could accumulate, nothing could really prepare us for a combined 8 hours of shut-eye over 4 days and nights.

This ain't easy. But he's so darn cute!

Labor & Delivery

As many of you probably know, you don't need this much luggage to have a baby at the hospital. I didn't know this. As my wife and I prepared for the big day, we didn't want to leave anything out of our bags of goodies. Extra undies? Check. Two peanut and butter sandwiches? Check. Playing cards? Check. Question cards from Urban Myth board game? Check. Let it be said that I now know you do not need playing cards in the hospital. We were there for 4 days and didn't begin a game of Texas Hold 'Em (although those waiting for us could have played and completed the World Series of Poker in that time).

Let me take a step back. We arrived at the scheduled labor induction at 6am Saturday morning. Bright eyed and bushy tailed--wait. what are we...rabbits?-- we were excited and ready as we were ever going to be. We were taken right away and brought to a spectacular room. Let's say it was more spacious than most hotel rooms and the hardwood floors were a nice touch. So was the private bathroom and shower. We had our first visitors at 10am, my aunt and uncle who so graciously brought tasty brownies and godiva chocolates. They probably had no idea that they'd not return home until 2am and I didn't either. To put it mildly, the labor period went slowly and in the interest of keeping this story short, she gave birth to our beautiful baby boy at 12:02 Sunday morning. He was 7lbs 7oz and 21 inches long. Since my nephew's birthday was Saturday and his dad is my twin brother, we've been talking about how wacky it would be for both children of twins to have the same birthday. Seems our little guy was hell-bent on NOT sharing a birthday with his cousin. The young man likes his independence!

After watching the birth process and uncontrollably bawling like a little girl at the moment he entered the world, we had a son. This blog, this laptop and these keys don't allow you to really describe the feeling, but for those who have kids of your own, you probably know what I mean

Car Seat Conundrum

When you take a baby home from the hospital, you can't put it on your roof rack. This is according to our local Fire Department. Since they're experts on safely strapping in little ones in vehicles, I consulted them on installing our car seat. We've got a Graco, the kind you see above. It's got 22" chrome wheels, a V-8 engine and the power of 300 horses. Wait, that was the Nova that Xzibit turned into a hot rod on Pimp My Ride. This Graco has shoulder pads--not a joke--a foot warmer and a foldable canopy.

After I drove into the Car Seat Check program building (which is conveniently located directly behind a 7-11 so you can get juiced on a purple Slurpee prior to installation) I heard these encouraging words from a supervisor as I exited my 2-door 2001 Chrysler Sebring. "You can always tell the first time parents," she explained to me. "They're the ones with the sports cars." She was right, my sporty days are coming to a close, but we still had to get this seat in properly and I was determined to have it in there as correctly as humanly possible. This is why I enlisted another human to make sure I was correct. The installer was Dan, a very pleasant fire fighter and 6 year veteran of car seat installations. I figured this guy has done probably a zillion seats like mine and this will be a cake walk.

That wasn't the case as my vehicles crude excuse for a back seat was at an angle that just wasn't friendly to a rear facing seat. After we both sat on the base a few times (I bet that's not a phrase you hear too often!) and after a more than a few moans and groans, it was as good as it was gonna get and we got the approval from one of the higher ups that signed off on the seat. Don't worry relatives--it's safe!

Next came the putting the baby in the seat demo. Dan brought out a doll that looked like the one we had in a baby class at the hospital a few weeks earlier--they must shop at the same baby prop store--and handed it to me. We went over the 5 point harness and Dan informed me that my baby was going to be strapped in just like NASCAR drivers are. It's basically the same harness, except I'm about to begin an endless circle of spending boatloads of cash on the baby and NASCAR drivers earn boatloads of cash for endlessly going around in a circle. I guess that shows what I know about NASCAR. Anyway, I figured out how to easily put in and take out our baby without waking them up if they happened to be asleep. As I exited and thanked him for being so helpful, he imparted some dad to dad advice I'm sure I'll learn on my own quite soon. "Never," said Dan. "Wake a sleeping baby."

Don't Dilly Dally

A funny thing happened at my wife's weekly doctor's appointment a few days ago. Doc checked her out, did an unprintable act that can't be described here in a family blog (don't worry, it was standard operating procedure i'm told...) and checked the baby's heart rate. After noting it wasn't up to speed, she sent her to what looked like a Lay-Z-Boy and strapped a fetal monitor to her tummy. After twenty minutes of me trying to figure out a chart that looked like a polygraph test I once caught on CSI--and i'm no William Peterson--our doctor tilted his head and said something that made me a bit concerned. All I heard was "Blah, blah, blah, go to the hospital, yada, yada, yada." Go to the hospital already? He was concerned and then added something to the effect of, "Blah, blah, blah, don't dilly dally, yada, yada, yada, I might decided to induce today, blah, blah."

Induce? My job at work wasn't done. We are weeks away from having the baby. I hadn't even put in the car seat yet! Heck, I hadn't even showered yet and my wife fan attest to that I'm sure. I was a bit nervous and the photo above isn't too far from what was going on inside my noggin, thinking today was the day. I think--no--I know I was more nervous than she was. So much for being the rock. Well, long story short, we spent several hours at the hospital, determined everything was fine and the little guy was not ready to head out just yet. What a wake up call. Now if I could just get that car seat in right...

This baby brought to you by Similac

Now that we're less than 2 months away--did someobody say YIKES??!!--it's time to select a pediatrician. Though medical doctors can be stuffy, boring and generally unable to hold a conversation with living humans (with apologies to my buddy Dan and of course Dr. Phil), this is a time they have to sell themselves to you. They want you to like them and even allow you to--gasp!--interview them when considering if you'd like to sign on to send your baby to their practice. I guess they are thinking about getting a customer for the next 20 years or so. What a beautiful thing when a highly educated person with deep pockets has to bend over backwards to get you to want them!

My wife had already visited two other practices prior to our visit to the Doc we ended up picking the other day, and after that fantastic visit, I really regret that. Not because I should be in on this important decision (I know I really should), but because I love to be wined and dined by someone who just might be a card carrying member of the wine and cheese crowd. How's that for brutal honesty.

The first 2 choices weren't looking so hot. The first was a large practice (good) that was just outside the Arctic Circle (bad). The second was a solo practice led by an older gentleman who seemed to bring the phrase "kick the bucket" to mind a little too quickly. Number 3, as they say, was the charm. I was completely unaware that these folks are selling themselves to you and absolutely loved the experience. The Doc we chose--I'll call him Dr. A--had all the right answers. Here are some bits from what he said to us:

"You'll never be put through to a machine and always a live person."
"We encourage breast feeding."
"We believe patients shouldn't have to wait long."
"If you come early, we'll take you early."
"I shop at Strosniders all the time." (for the uninitiated, that's my place of work)
"We separate sick and healthy babies."
"My dad had a flower shop for 30 years."

OK, that last one might have been irrelevant, but at least the guy knows a thing or two about customer service. After a great Q&A, came the icing on the cake. He offered us a GIFT. After thanking us for coming, he handed my wife a beautiful, educational book on babies. The how-to paperback was practically glowing and even came with a laminated bookmark. What a nice guy, I thought. He went out of his way to talk to us sincerely and even gave us a thank you gift for coming. I can't say I've every pulled out a thank you gift after having a conversation with someone in my office. We'll, I don't really have an office, but that's for another blog. We both thought Dr. A was ideal and his partner seemed fine, so we said we were signing on.

On the ride home, I was overjoyed. A pleasant conversation and a wonderful gift to boot! Then my wife dropped this bomb on me. "Everybody gets a gift. The other 2 offices gave me something too. He probably didn't even pay for it. Look, the book says, 'A gift for you from the makers of Similac Infant Formula.'" I felt like I'd blown the world's biggest bubble and my wife popped it, slapping a sticky, gooey mess all over my face.

Welcome to baby retail and commercialization, I thought. Being in the retail industry myself, I couldn't believe I was so gullible and my federal government employed wife had to set me straight. Then came the pièce de résistance as even the bookmark was tagged "Compliments of Similac."

I'll know better next time...

Furniture Frenzy

This is just some of the baby furniture that was recently shipped to our condo.

Just kidding.

Our little one should arrive in about two months and we're actually beginning to get the goods before the arrival. We just selected some baby furniture. Oh, did I say we? I mean she. My idea of baby shelving was the plastic assemble-it-yourself-with-no-tools garage shelving we've got loads of at my place of work. Hey, it does come in white. You can even put a changing table on top. But instead of pushing the cheap stuff, we ventured to a mind boggling 80,000 sq. ft. baby warehouse store and got some very nice stuff from a company in Canada I can't recall the name of at this time.

After being smooth talked by a baby salesman--he helped us nab the top rated mattress according to a leading consumer magazine (yes, i'm afraid of lawsuits)--we were told that the furniture would arrive in 14 weeks or less. That's almost 3 months folks and because I was overloaded with joy by having bought these items at our first stop of the day and therefore avoiding up to 14 weeks or less of more furniture shopping trips, I didn't object. Hopefully it will come before the little bugger's a teenager.