Ross, Rachel, Helen, and Arthur

Helen introduced me to her "special" friend, named Katie (or possibly Cadee) Rasmussen. I've been told she is 4 years old, a little taller than Helen and has brown hair and black eyes. She apparently likes doing everything Helen likes to do. Seems like a nice girl.

Arthur is now a little over 8 weeks old. He has proven his skill at all things newborn: eating, sleeping, and pooping. In fact, lately he has taken to sleeping just about all day and all night (broken by feedings every 2-3 hours, of course). He even slept in his crib for two hours last night. I can't complain about the excessive sleeping, although I fear he will go out of it.

He is also quite the conversationalist. He likes to chat on the changing table in a vocabulary that was once grunts but now includes coos and sighs. I really appreciate the change from not-smiling to smiling. It makes the whole parenting thing a whole lot easier.

We all took an outing to the nearby Las Palmas Park. When we arrived, we were sorry we hadn't brought our bathing suits, as the fountains were going. We had a good time, anyway, and Helen intently went back and forth on the posts. Afterwards we went out for dinner, and as a treat, we let Helen pick out a slice of pie. Firstly, we were pretty sure that we had ordered a child-sized slice for Helen, but the slice she got was like a quarter of a pie. Rachel remarked that her chocolate cream pie selection was further evidence of her being our child, as the chocolate impetus come from Rachel, and perhaps the desire for creaminess comes from me, since I do have a known fondness for dairy treats. Naturally, this is over-analyzing a 3-year-old decisions process that simply homed in on the two important keywords: pie and chocolate.

Arthur continues to expand in all directions. Did I mention that he is wearing 6 month old clothes? Our extremely inexact scale claims that he is 15 pounds. Sigh. It is a good thing that he is so cute and smiley because my arms are killing me from lugging His Chubbiness around. He is getting better at carrying on a conversation and even seems to laugh in response to my laughter, although it sounds a bit like he is clearing his throat.

He also enjoyed his first bottle today. I define "enjoyed" as "did not throw a fit."

We've had a bit of a hot spell, and we thought that we'd beat the heat by going to the Mall. Of course, so did everyone else, and it was a mob scene. Of course, maybe it's always a mob scene on the weekends, we don't know, we try and avoid the mall at all costs on any day. What led both Rachel and I to think that going was a good idea is now lost on us, and we've sworn not to do that again. However, we loaded the children up and headed out.

My mother went home yesterday is having a well-deserved, restful Mother's Day. I can not tell you how nice it has been to not have to worry about feeding my family for an entire month. I've had a less than positive relationship with food for the last year, and the simple act of organizing the grocery list every week was seriously stressing me out. For one whole month, I got to revert to childhood and just eat things that were put in front of me. It was lovely. I wish every new mom could have this experience. She also left me with a freezer full of food including pasties. Yum!

Arthur is four weeks old today and he is a very big boy. We have started weeding out the newborn clothes and putting him in 6 month plus sizes. Crazy. As can be expected his sleep patterns are still pretty erratic. The last couple nights he has pretty much refused to sleep in his crib. This irritates me since he is usually happy to take a couple hours nap in his bouncy chair in the middle of the day. I've ordered a white noise machine and am praying that will help. He has also started cooing and every once in a while says "guh!" He has been able to hold his head up for a while. The pictures linked below have a lot of his reflex smiles in them. He also might be doing some actual social smiles, but it is hard to tell.

First Month Album

Mom and I went to an ice workshop in Oxnard this week and we took Arthur with us. He was very good: he slept the whole way there and back and also the two hours during the session that I gave my talk. It is a 5 hour drive, but we took 8 hours each way with all of the diaper/feeding stops. It was fun to do a road trip with my mom. It was also very nice of the workshop organizers to be so helpful since I could not confirm my attendance until the last minute.

Arthur has just achieved two weeks of breathing air. We took him to the pediatrician yesterday and he is doing well. He has gained weight again: 10 pounds 15 ounces and grown half an inch: 22.5 inches. He's doing very well.

Helen	Arthur

*** Some of the following is not for the weak of stomach. I'll mark the offending paragraphs with a ***.

You can guess from the title how the hospital/birth center comparison is going to work out. I guess I just did not know how good I had it at the birth center.

To be fair, we may have ended up in the same situation if I had been pre-pre-eclamptic the first time, too. I am also very grateful for modern medicine. I definately would have preferred a C-section to dying, if it had come to that. I just wish that the stay at the hospital was a bit more pleasant.