margaretyagan

 After 6 and a half hours of sleep, my Sunday started out at midnight — I was starving!  I hadn’t eaten since around 5:00 pm yesterday evening.  Dad woke up and gave me a bottle…and then another bottle…and then another bottle.  That’s right, I went through parts of three bottles in the course of drinking over 8 ounces of milk.  (Mom was shocked that this was even possible, saying “but her stomach is the size of a ping-pong ball!”  Um, Mom, I’m glad you didn’t go into biology.)  The whole process took almost an hour and half, my longest bottle feeding ever.

I woke up again at 3:40 and then had an extended double-feeding at 5:40 and 6:30.  I slept much more soundly last night than the previous few, so I think Mom slept better, too.  Mom asked Dad to get rock me to sleep around 7:00 and at around 8:00, I was ready to get up and I started getting pretty loud in my bassinet.  Dad sprung out of bed like a man on a mission.  We went into the living room where Aunt Claire was already awake.  Dad decided that we were going to sneak out of the apartment without Mom knowing in the hopes that she would get some extra sleep.  Claire thought this plan sounded fun, so the three of us went to, where else, Starbucks.  It was cold, windy, and misty outside but I was bundled up in a couple blankets, so I was fine.  Dad worked on his laptop, Claire read, and I slept for about an hour.

Finally I made it clear that I was getting hungry, so we all headed back to the apartment (stopping by Europan to get Mom a bagel).  But Dad’s plan wasn’t over just yet.  He pulled the same trick he did last weekend: he gave me a bath to distract me from my hunger.  And sure enough, it did.  I cooperated pretty well and the whole thing went off without a hitch.  Finally, at 10:15, it was time to eat and Mom was ready for me.  I ate again at 12:30 and 2:45, pretty uneventfully.

Then we headed out on our big adventure for the day motivated by the fact that Mom had two coupons that expired today.  We ended up walking over 40 blocks to go to Ben & Jerry’s (Thanks for the coupon, Grandma Sherry!), Blockbuster, Best Buy, and Duane Reade.  I kind of missed it all, though, since Mom refused to let Dad open the cover of my stroller.  When we were outdoors, she said, “I like to keep her stroller covered when I’m around tall buildings.”  And when we were indoors, she said, “the air seems stagnant and germy.”  I enjoyed the walk but missed ths sights.

We got back and I ate, of course.  Then Mom and Claire did some work while Dad took me into the kitchen so we could make dinner together.  I helped him make spaghetti pie and he taught me how to add fractions when we were putting the spices in.  I ate again at 7:30 and then turned in for the night.

I got up and hung out with Mom and Dad while they got ready for work.  I threw a huge fit when Mom left for work and that pretty much set the tone for the rest of the day.  Dad gave me my bottle kind of late (7:00 am).  I was super-crabby with Dad and even crabbier when he left and handed me off to Aunt Claire.  I whined and cried about everything, even about nothing at all.

I was in a somewhat better mood after breakfast.  A/C was hopeful that my nap would get me all the way back to normal, but no.  When it was time for lunch, I kept pretending to gag on my barley & mushrooms.  When I didn’t gag, I just spit it out or blew the food at A/C’s face.  I have to admit that I loved the avocado & cream cheese, though.

The afternoon was a bit better, but it still dragged on.  I made A/C read me “Busy Kitties” eight times!  I think she almost went crazy.  In fact, Mom felt so bad for Aunt Claire, she came home with a skinny vanilla latte for Aunt Claire to try to make her day a little better! 

I welcomed in the day waking up from a 6 1/2 hour nap, my longest stretch of sleep ever.  I got up at 1:30 am to see Dad desperately trying to keep his eyes open.  He woke up Mom and I ate with her but I had no interest in going back to sleep until about 3:15.  I woke up at 5:00 for a little snack with Dad.  I wasn’t too hungry, so I drank half a bottle and Dad had me back in bed within 25 minutes.  I think we were both kind of out of it — me because I slept so much; Dad because he hadn’t slept so much.

I couldn’t really fall back asleep and Mom woke up about 45 minutes later and fed me the rest of the bottle at 6:30.  I was so fussy that I woke Aunt Claire up and she ended up rocking me to sleep while Mom pumped tonights bottle.  Mom took me into bed with her and Dad (still sleeping through all this, of course).  I ate again around 9:00, after Aunt Claire got back from her morning run and while Dad was in the shower.  The four of us dilly-dallied for a while before motivating to get out of the apartment.

Our initial goal was to find breakfast for Mom, Dad, and Claire, so we stopped by Le Pain Quotidien.  They seemed not-to-impressed, so we stopped by Starbucks (Aunt Claire LOVES Starbucks, probably more than Dad!) on our way to the old stand-by, 72nd Street Bagels.  Armed with food and drink and the New York Times, we headed to Central Park.  We had a little picnic and I got to sprawl around on the ground.  We had a family photo shoot and hung out for a while before packing up and heading back home.  Of course, I ate as soon as we got in the door.

Mom and Aunt Claire decided to have some sister-bonding time and went for a walk to Grom.  (Ok, so, I have no idea if they were bonding or not, but they sure shared a passion for gelato!)  While they were gone, Dad and I tried to take a nap in his bed, but I only slept for a few minutes before wanting to play.  So, we played on the bed together, but of course, Dad’s definition of “play” just involves tricking me into improving my motor skills.  So, he got me to do tummy-time, grasp a rattle, life my head, etc.  Finally, he sat me in my chair and did some work around the house that Mom wanted done.

Mom got back and fed me (twice, actually) while Claire went to hang out with a couple friends and Dad went to Duane Reade.  Aunt Claire came back with her friend Jo, an anarchist.  Then Mom and Dad went to Whole Foods and left me with Claire.  And so my day ended, at 5:30 pm.

I woke up at 1:00 am, expecting Dad to get up and give me a bottle, as has become usual.  But Dad wasn’t around last night so I got up and ate with Mom.  (And much to my surprise, I found that Aunt Claire was here visiting for the weekend!)  I then got a couple hours of restless sleep before eating again at 3:00 and then getting a few more hours of restless sleep.  I had breakfast at 6:00 and got a couple hours of deep sleep before eating again at 8:30.  Mom got pretty much no sleep all night.  Not quite an all-nighter, but close.  I’m sure Dad’s night on Uncle Max’s & Aunt Sarah’s futon was way better.

My lack of a good night’s sleep made me fussy all day.  I whined for a couple hours before Mom mixed things up by giving me a mid-morning bottle.  I fussed and ate and fussed and ate until about 2:30, when Mom and I went for a walk in the park.  It was such a beautiful day that I wore my first-ever dress and my first-ever sunglasses (both gifts from Aunt Claire — thanks!).

I got another surprise when we met one of Jess’s very close friends, Aunt Bridget, at Columbus Circle.  Aunt Bridget and Mom sat in the grass, but I was stuck in my stroller, mostly because I took advantage of the beautiful weather to take a nap.  Bridget threatened to kidnap me and take me to Florida with her, but luckily Mom protected me.  Aunt Claire met all of us in the park on the way back from a meeting she had near the United Nations.  After Bridget took off (without me), Mom, Aunt Claire, and I walked around Central Park and helped Aunt Claire get her bearings.  We stopped by Magnolia Bakery and Aunt Claire bought dessert.  We stopped by Bed, Bath, and Beyond (for the third time in three weeks, sheesh!) and then went to LuLuLemon on our way home. 

We got back from our exploration and I was starving!  I ate around 4:30 and then I played with Mom and then got some really good nap time in.  Dad finally got home at 6:00, just as I was getting ready to eat with Mom.  Dad and I hung out for a bit and then Dad got dinner ready while Mom fed me.  Dad got me to fall asleep and then put me in his and Mom’s bed.  After about 20 minutes I started sreaming like crazy.  Dad calmed me down and then I fell asleep in my swing.  Then the weirdest thing happened.  I fell asleep for the night!  Mom was smart enough to get into bed at around 8:30, but Dad kept thinking I would wake up, so he was up until well after midnight!  Who knew that my day would end at 6:30? 

 For the third time in the last four nights, Dad got up to feed me my bottle without Mom’s prompting.  Not sure if he’s just becoming a lighter sleeper or if our top-secret telepathy project.  I barely woke up and we made it back to sleep in less than an hour.  I slept soundly for about an hour before falling into what Mom calls “noisy sleep” — a moaning, restless sleep that keeps her awake.  I ate at 5:00 and then had a noisy nap.  I at at 6:30, napped and took a bath all before having breakfast at 9:00.  

My string of uneventful baths came to an end, unfortunately — but this time on Mom’s watch.  In the middle of the bath I spit up on myself, the big chunks of which got caught in my mesh bath contraption I was sitting in.  Then just as Mom pulled me out of hte bath — before she could even think about grabbing a diaper — I pooped  right smack-dab into the towel.  Can’t wait to see how that comes out of the laundry…

 I napped and ate and napped and ate.   My rogue excretory system continued its challenge of Mom’s authority as I peed all over my changing pad and then within an hour, peed all over the replacement blanked that substitued for the peed-on changing pad. 

We went for another walk in Central Park.  Mom is all about exploring new areas of the park, so today we walked by Shakespeare Garden and then to the Great Lawn.  Then the craziest thing happened: Mom took me out of my stroller and laid me on a blanket in the grass.  WHOA.  I’ve never been allowed out of my car sear outdoors before.  It was really cool.  There were about infinity other Moms with strollers celebrating the beautiful day. 

Then Dad came home a bit early from work because he was going to a funeral tomorrow and wanted to see me and Mom before taking off for the night.  We hung out in the park and then walked back home.  I ate at 5:00 and then was pretty fussy until about 8:00 when I finally fell asleep for a three-hour stretch, my longest of the day.  Luckily for Mom, since she wasn’t going to have Dad’s help tonight, she got a little nap in, too.  I got up at 11:00, ate, and turned in for the night.

I amazed even myself with my sleeping skills.  After having supper at 10:00 pm, I slept until 2:00 when Dad, for the second time in three nights, woke up without assistance from Mom and gave me my bottle.  I then went back to sleep until Dad’s alarm went off just before 6:00 am (even though I was making a lot of weird noises for the hour before that).  So, that’s 6 hours of sleep with only one interruption, which Mom got to sleep through.  Go me.

I stayed up after breakfast and hung out until I ate again at 7:45.  Then Mom and I took a nap (I love sleeping in Mom’s bed) for an hour and I ate again at 10.  Mom showered, we got dressed, and then Mom and I went for a walk in Central Park.  We walked through Strawberry Fields and headed toward the Sheep Meadow and met up with Aunt Ali…and 65 of her students!  Mom kept me away from the germy kids, though. 

I was still asleep when we got home and my gobbled down a quick lunch and then I ate lunch.  I swung, we sang, we walked around…all the usual stuff.  Finally I fell asleep and Mom got some work done.  I woke up for dinner just as Dad was walking in the door, around 6:20.

After I finished eating I was really wide awake and playful.  Dad carried my facing out (Mom has been doing this for a few days now) and we walked around the apartment and I even helped Dad make a purchase from Amazon.  For a while Dad refused to support my head, telling Mom that it was the only way for my neck to get stronger.  I was doing really well until my neck gave out and my whole head flopped over and fell about six inches.  Dad decided he’d support my head the rest of the night.

Then I fell asleep in my new swing while Mom and Dad ate dinner.  I ate at 8:45, which is quite unusual and inconvenient for my parents.  Dad always roots for me to get a meal in around 10, so it fits in with their sleep schedule.  Mom suggested perhaps turning in for the night, but I settled everything by getting hungry again at 9:45.  I ate, Mom pumped, and we all called it a night.

Well, I certainly felt like I didn’t get anything accomplished yesterday, what with all my naps and my snacks.  So, I decided that today would be much more active and awake.  In order to be awake all day, I made sure to get a good night’s sleep, waking up just briefly for a snack at 2:00 (thanks, Dad) and then again 5:15 (thanks, Mom).  I didn’t fall back asleep for a while, hanging out in my bassinet, and watching the break of dawn.  I napped a bit and then woke up for an adventurous day — after eating breakfast, of course.

I was up for two hours after eating.  Mom has a new strategy where she carries me kind of in a sitting  position, facing outward.  It’s cool because I get to see more of what’s going on and that helps keep me awake, too.  I really love looking out the window.  This guy in the building across from us has the biggest television EVER.  I can actually read what’s on his screen.  I bet Dad’s jealous.

Then we did some tummy-time (Mom doesn’t like to use the activity mat for tummy-time because she can’t fit in it with me.  Doesn’t she understand it’s for me?  Then I was getting fussy, so Mom pulled out a new weapon: singing!  She taught me a new song, Seasons of Love.  At first I thought it was a great song and I definitely stopped crying and Mom’s a great singer and all…but…”How do you measure a year?”

Um, I don’t know much about anything, really, but measuring a unit of measurement?  Come on, guys, even I know this is a trick question!  Like, what weighs more, a ton of bricks or a ton of feathers?  Chew on that one.  Back to the question at hand: How do you measure a year?  The first three suggestions are “daylights, sunsets, & midnights.”  Am I missing something?  There are are the same number of each of them!?  Man, I can’t wait to start school.

After lunch and a nap, we went for a walk (my first time out of the apartment since Saturday’s three outings).  Central Park was beautiful, as usual.  Luckily Mom forgot the camera, so I could enjoy the park in peace.  For the first time, we went to The Lake in Central Park, which was really pretty awesome.

The rest of the evening was pretty uneventful until Uncle Marty came over for dinner.  He has gotten so much more comfortable holding me, although I overhead him saying that everytime he takes a step, he thinks about how he would protect me if he were to trip and fall.  I can’t wait until Uncle Marty comes up with a fun nickname for me!

I got up around 1:30 am and – shock of shocks – Dad got up on his own, without Mom waking him up.  That’s never happened before.  This was by far the smoothest bottle-feeding ever.  Since Dad got up so quickly I never got that fussy.  He finally moved me back up to the faster-flow nipple, so I drank the milk that much faster.  After we were done, Dad walked around the apartment, burping me, and I let out the loudest burp ever.  I think it actually scared him.  I kind of fell asleep on his shoulder and Dad was silly enough to think that meant he could just lay me in my bassinet without properly swaddling and swinging me to sleep.

Once I got to sleep, I slept until 5:30 — meaning that Mom got her longest stretch of sleep as a mom.  My 5:30 and 7:30 feedings were uneventful, except that between the two Mom thought she saw me smile for the first time.  Not a smile because I was farting, either…a real smile.  Dad was on his way out the door to work, so he ran back over to see it.  It’s not really clear whether I smiled or not, but Mom and Dad sure made exaggerated smiley-faces at me all day!

I slept until my 10:20 feeding, which was nothing special.  Yeah, I pretty much just slept all morning…and all afternoon.  Finally, around 6:00 pm, I felt pretty playful, so I hung out with Mom on the activity mat and got some good tummy-time in.  Then Dad came home around 6:30 and I played with him for a bit before screaming out of sheer exhaustion.  He got me to sleep pretty quickly.  I ate at 7:10, took a little nap, and ate again at 9:15.  I ate all I could with Mom, but when Dad tried to get to me to sleep, I made it very clear that I was still hungry.  So, at 10:00 I got a bottle for dessert and then finally turned in around 10:30.

I got a good stretch of about 3.5 hours of sleep before getting hungry and waking up around 1:00 am for my bottle with Dad.  It was uneventful and I was back in my bassinet by 2:00.  I woke up again at 4:00 but had a hard time falling back asleep.  Mom walked around the apartment with me until about 5:15 when I finally dozed off.  I got up for breakfast at 7:00 and Mom fed me again.  Dad woke up around 8:00 and encouraged Mom to get some more sleep.

Dad and I got a lot done.  First we went to the laundry room and put in a couple loads of laundry.  Then we came back to the apartment and did some tummy-time and I eventually fell asleep on my stomach, which was ok since he was watching me.  After I got up, around 9:30, I hung out in the bathroom while he took a shower; I love the sound of the shower!  Then it was my turn to get a bath.  I didn’t let out a single cry and I didn’t pee or poo at any point during the process.  By the time I got done, though, I was really hungry.  Mom heard me screaming and after Dad dried me off and got me dressed, I got to have brunch.

I pretty much feel right back to sleep until about 1:00, when I had a ginormous poop in my diaper.  I had lunch right afterward.  I then napped for over three hours — definitely out of the ordinary during daytime hours.  Mom & Dad let me sleep on my tummy and I woke up on my own around 5:00.  I was really hungry and drained ’em both.  I drank so much so fast that I ended up spitting up a lot more than usual.  I was still hungry but Mom was out of milk, so for the first time ever I had a bottle during the day (it was just an ounce, but hey, it counts).

I hung out with Dad for a while and then I fell asleep until 8:45, when I finally got to have dinner and then turned in for the night.

 I slept for about 3.5 hours, until I got hungry around 1:00 am.  Dad got up to give me my bottle.  It was pretty uneventful and I fell back asleep pretty quickly.  I ate again at 4:00 am and then again at 6:00. 

Dad got up around 7:00 and decided to go pick up some breakfast for Mom.  Uncle Chris, who lives in our neighborhood, had suggested that we try 72nd Street Bagels.  Rather than leave me with Mom, Dad decided to take me with him so that Mom could have some alone-time.  The entire trip took about an hour and Dad came home with breakfast and a couple extra bagels.

I ate breakfast as soon as Mom finished her toasted sesame seed bagel with cream cheese.  Then, much to my surprise, Mom & Dad packed me up for my second trip of the day.  This time, we went back to Whole Foods where we bought our groceries from last week, so this was old hat for me.

We got back to the apartment and I ate lunch with Mom while Dad got lunch ready for the two of them.  I fell asleep while they ate and then Dad stole me from Mom’s arms for a quick catnap with him in their bed.  Mom followed quickly and the three of us slept until I had to get up to eat before Aunt Ali and Aunt Sarah Hall came over.  Aunt Sarah was so comfortable with me — it was almost like she was already a mom herself.  She was especially full of encouragement for me to poop!  I ate again around 4:30, when they took off.

Then, as if my first two outings of the day weren’t enough, we went out again — making this the first day I went out three times.  I was shocked that we went back to 72nd street.  The goal was to buy a box to return my defective swings, but The UPS Store was closed.  We then stopped by FedExKinkos (also on 72nd street) but they didn’t have a big enough box.  Mom and Dad decided to give up and head back home.  Just as we were abou to turn into our building, Dad pointed and ran across the street.  Mom started to protest but just let out an exasperated sigh.  I looked over to see Dad dumpster diving to rescue a huge box out of a neighbor’s trash. 

I had dinner with Mom while Dad stuffed two partially-assembled swings into a huge television box.  Mom had gotten me to fall half-asleep and asked Dad to finish me off.  Dad turned to his favorite trick: the elevator.  We made three trips up and down (and up and down and up and down) the elevator until I fell asleep.  I got to sleep in the middle of Mom’s and Dad’s bed instead of my bassinet.

Mom & Dad brought me in to the living room and unswaddled me to try to wake me up.  I got up and ate and then turned in for the night.