Lady Bug

Halloween came on a Tuesday this year. Since the time change back to Eastern Standard Time, it was getting darker sooner. We were debating whether to take Sydney out on her first Halloween trick-or-treating adventure. There were only a few groups of trick-or-treaters walking around our neighborhood. It didn't seem like everyone was in the spirit this year, especially after our neighbor from across the street had moved out. He was always the one who went all out with the Halloween decoration. This year, hardly anyone decorated their yards. We had two groups of kids banging on our door demanding treats. Otherwise, all was quiet as a church on a Tuesday.

So we opted for staying in the warmth of our house. She was catching a cold anyway. It was a shame since Tracie had already bought a costume for Sydney. Well, if nothing else, we got a good photo opportunity out of it.



Sydney looked very cute in her lady bug outfit with black antennas. It didn't take long for the antennas to get mangled from her rolling all over the floor. But they were fixable. She allowed us to take about 6 pictures before she ripped the antennas off and dumped them ceremoniously on the floor, which meant they were not to go back on her head again. Even if they did, they would not last more than 3 seconds like an amateur cowboy on one of those mechanical bulls on HIGH speed.

Scene from "A Few Good Teeth (Men)"

DAD: "You want answers?"

SYDNEY: "I think I'm entitled to them."

DAD: "You want answers?"

SYDNEY: "I DON'T WANT THE TOOTH!!"

DAD: "You CAN handle the TOOTH! Baby, we live in a world that has solid foods. And those solid foods have to be eaten by babies with teeth. Who's gonna do it? You? Mommy and I have a greater responsibility than you can possibly fathom. You weep for baby bottles and you curse the sweet potatoes. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know: that baby food, while tasting quite gross, probably is good for you. And the existence of baby food, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, is good for you...You want the TOOTH. Because deep down, in places you don't talk about at the daycare center, you WANT me to give you solid food. You NEED me to give you solid food. We use words like puree, mashed, ground...we use these words as the backbone to a life spent raising someone. You use 'em as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a baby who eats and burps under the staple of the very food I provide, then questions the manner in which I provide it! I'd rather you just said thank you and went on your way to the changing table. Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a spoon and eat a jar. Either way, I don't give a darn what you think you're entitled to!"

SYDNEY: "Dad, did you order the Code Red??"

DAD: "You're dang right I ordered the Code Red!! It's about time you have teeth!!"


And, as if on cue, Sydney had teeth just as the pediatrician predicted at around 7 months of age. Actually, one tooth and one on the way. Nature was on my side. No wonder she's been gnawing on everything. Sydney doesn't seem to mind Code Red, although I'm sure her red gum could use a little soothing.

It is an odd feeling to be sitting in a hotel and blogging about Sydney. This is the farthest I've been away from my family since Sydney was born almost 7 months ago. Because of a business trip, I'm in Lyon, FRANCE, which is about 4500 miles from Atlanta. I miss my family already. Sydney is teething and becoming increasingly restless. Her first tooth showed up around 2 weeks ago. It's just a cute little white bump on her lower gum. I can feel the sharp edges when she grabs my thumb and bites it. The second tooth is coming along. It is starting to push through. Tracie bought some liquid-filled teething rings for Sydney and placed them in the freezer. We figured the coldness would ease the pain. But it doesn't seem like she's in much pain. She's just irritable. She wants to be held a lot and doesn't want anyone else to hold her other than Mommy and Daddy. I hope she isn't morphing into this annoyingly shy little girl who spends most of her time in public hiding behind mommy's legs or hiding her face against our chests. That would just not be the rambunctious Sydney I'm used to seeing.

Anyway, Sydney terrorizes anything around her with a tag. We gave her a toy donkey with a rattle on leg, a shatter-proof mirror on another leg, a rubber ring on the third leg and a noise-maker on the fourth leg. She explored it, touched this and that, and then spun the thing around to shove the manufacturer's tag into her mouth. She sucked on it and gnawed on it and pulled on it as if it was the most delicious lollipop on earth. Seeing how much she enjoyed the "toy" in her crib, we left her alone and draped a blanket on her. She started to kick the blanket off until she noticed the manufacturer's tag near the corner of the blanket. The toy donkey was abandoned for the tag on the blanket. Eventually, we discovered every tag of every item within Sydney's reach was slopping wet. It reminded me of our cat. No matter what toy I had bought for Buffy, her favorite toy remained the plastic ring from the milk jugs.

The only other thing that Sydney enjoys putting in her mouth is the pacifier. The daycare center gave her a couple of the Gerber NUK pacifiers. When we put her down to sleep, she would pitch a fit unless the pacifier is in place. With her teething, though, it was more than just a sucking device. She would grab the ring and pull the pacifier out of her mouth hard while her gums were firmly clamped on the rubber tip. It was a brutal exercise to watch. It makes a very loud noise, especially at night when everything was quiet. She then would fumble with the pacifier to put it back in her mouth to do it all over again and again until she was tired or bored. This has been going on for about a month. I'm surprised at how durable the pacifier is.

When she was sick a couple of weeks ago, she was frustrated that she couldn't breathe well enough to torture the pacifier and her chew tags. She is all better now. Her nose is still runny a bit but no more fever or coughing. At the check-up last week, her upper respiratory tract infection was gone. She weighed in at 15 lbs and 5 ozs. She was healthy enough to scream at the top of her lungs at the sight of the pediatrician, as Tracie reported. She pitched such a fit that she was hoarse and was totally exhausted when I came home that evening. It didn't help that it was decided that she should get her flu shot early. That was definitely NOT the answer to calming down a screaming baby. At least it is over now. She is immunized for the season.

Well, this blog is long enough. This is Daddy Eyeduck signing off from Lyon. A few quick words about the hotel. It is annoyingly cute, like many things in France. HAW, HAW, HAW ... OUI, OUI!!! The rooms are in a separate building from the main lobby. The rooms are small, as usual, and are contemporarily decorated. The lampshades have a shiny aluminum finish, which makes them look like upside down buckets. A small plasma TV is mounted in the corner of my room. Everything is compact. I basically have to maneuver my way around the bed and furniture to get around. The most annoying part of the room design is the toilet is in a small room next to the door but there's no way to get to the sink to wash my hands afterward without walking all the way around the bed to get to the bathroom. What's up with that? The driveway is made of gravel. Dragging the big ol' suitcase across the driveway to the room was not much fun. Neither was going up the stairs as there was not an elevator in sight. Other than that, I like this place. I'll be here for 3 days and will head back to Paris to spend one night before flying home. I can't wait to get home to the wife and kid to rehearse the next scene.

Nasty cold

It looks like the crisis is over. We had to take Sydney to the emergency room two weekends ago because her temperature was climbing rapidly. It turned out that she had an ear infection and an upper respiratory infection. The hospital gave her a dose of children's Tylenol, put her on Amoxycillin for 10 days and gave us a prescription for eardrops. As usual, Tracie was right in insisting that we took Sydney to the hospital. Being Sunday night and babies get colds, I didn't think it was necessary. After all, Sydney's temperature was only 102. By the time we got to the hospital, her temperature was already at 103.5. Mommies do know best.

As of today, she is coughing but not running a fever. She developed the cough about 4 days ago. The poor thing can't get a break. We have been having to suction the snot out of her nose, literally, to keep the post-nasal drip to a minimum. She HATES getting the bulb up her nose as always. She didn't like it at the hospital when they decided to flush her nostrils byt sticking a syringe of saline up one nostril and pushed the saline through while suctioning it out of the other nostril. She let the entire hospital know about her unhappiness. She cried a few buckets of tears during those few minutes that felt like an eternity. At least her battle with the diaper rash is over. We took the advice of one of the staff members at the daycare to try different brands of diaper. We had stocked the drawer at the daycare with Pampers Swaddlers. At home, we were using Huggies Gentle Care. We just couldn't figure out why she kept coming home with a rash even after careful instructions for the staff to change her every hour and make sure her skin is completely dry before putting the new diaper on. Finally, someone explained to me the difference between the two types of diapers. The Swaddlers are designed to stay snug (thus the name based on the word Swaddle...duh, why didn't I think of that??) while the Gentle Care was designed to be much looser to keep moisture from the baby's skin. After a few days of using nothing but the Huggies and heavy applications of Balmex and Desitin, the bumps and blisters are gone. Her little bottom is smooth as a baby's bottom. Oh wait, it IS a baby's bottom. It's baaaaack!!! The problem was so bad that the bumps had spread up her torso. Her entire body felt like sandpaper. She's on the path to recovery. Most of her skin is soft again. What a relief!

This week, as her reward, we allowed Sydney to sleep in her own crib. It's in our bedroom, so it's not like we have exiled her to Siberia. We have far exceeded our plan to let her sleep in her own bed after 3 months instead of sleeping between us in our bed. Better late than never, I guess. Surprisingly, we have not had much trouble out of her. The first couple of nights, we kept having to get up to put the pacifier back in her mouth to stop her from waking up and crying too long. Since last night, she's been stirring every couple of hours and whimpering a little but falling back to sleep on her own after a few seconds. She's doing great. We don't even have to feed her around 2:30 anymore. Yes, yes, yes!!! My baby is doing fantastic. I'm so proud.

Sydney is actually doing great overall. She weighed 14 lbs 11 ozs at the last check-up. We thought for sure she would be over 15 lbs from the way she felt when we held her. Tracie had started to feed her solid food for about 2 weeks now. Tracie even prepared some baby food made from pureed meat, green beans and potatoes. Sydney was not too crazy about it. From the look of it, I don't think I can blame her. Sydney might grow up to be a vegetarian from this experience. :-) I am just really glad she is pretty healthy, despite the colds and other mishaps along the way.

One of those "mishaps" occurred about two weeks ago. Sydney didn't exactly get the kind of birthday that we wanted for her when she turned 6 months old. The day started off well enough. We spent an hour outside to let Sydney get some fresh air and morning sun to help heal her poor little red bottom plagued with the bad yeast infection. We then fed her some sweet potatoes, which she loved. Pushing our luck, we decided to go to see a movie with Sydney for the first time. As we packed up the diaper bag, we found some pre-made jars of Good Start formula that the hospital gave us when Sydney was born. Since these will expire soon, we contemplated trying some. These were not the soy formula that Sydney had been on. They were milk-based. After a few seconds of debate, I egged Tracie on to take some jars with us to try at the theater. "What the heck," I said. "She's only on the soy formula because we're being cautious of her having milk allergy. She probably doesn't have it."

At the theater, Sydney was great. She spent a lot of time watching the screen intently for the commercials and previews. We decided to feed her when the movie started. I emptied two of the milk-based pre-made into a feeding bottle. She drank about 3 ounces and fell asleep. All was well. After the movie, we went to Babies-R-Us to pick up some supplies. I let Sydney play in one of the "saucers" which is a seat in the middle of a plastic tray surrounded with little toys for babies. Sydney was having a great time, so Tracie left us in the aisle and went off with the shopping cart. I sat against one of the shelves, admiring my beautiful daughter playing with all the toys. But then she started spitting up. Formula was coming out of her mouth and dribbling down on the plastic tray in front of her. I jumped up and searched my pockets frantically for a Kleenex or something else to wipe her up. I had nothing. Tracie was nowhere to be found. What's worse, the spit up kept coming. We had a puddle. I picked up the baby and held her well in front of me while racing to the back of the store looking for Tracie. I found her three aisles down.

"The baby is spitting up!!" I yelled.

Tracie grabbed a washcloth from the diaper bag and cleaned the baby up. I grabbed the washcloth as soon as she was done and raced back to clean up the saucer. I felt so bad that we soiled the display at the store. Luckily, the entire puddle was on the plastic tray so it was easy to clean up. I quickly put the saucer back where it was and went back to find Tracie. The baby was spitting up again. This time, it looked and felt more like she was vomitting. The formula was coming up hard, and the baby was almost gagging. We headed quickly to the restroom with the baby to clean her up some more. We decided to wrap up our shopping and head home. The baby was apparently allergic to the pre-made formula. As Tracie was paying for the items, Sydney started gagging some more. That was it. We decided to never give her milk-based formula again.

As we were heading home, Sydney fell asleep. But every 10-15 minutes, she would stir and then started gagging like she was about to vomit. We kept having to pull over and hold her to let her recover. It was like she was experiencing car sickness. It took forever and a day to get home. At one point, she vomitted a little bit of bile so at least I knew she finally got all of the bad formula out of her system. She was exhausted. I held her for 3 hours while she slept, which gave Tracie time to recover from the shock. We gave her a bottle of the soy formula when she woke up. She happily drank it and didn't have a problem afterward. Man, oh, man. We were jumping for joy. We didn't think we would suck this badly as parents. Someday, Sydney will repay us for our mistakes. I wouldn't blame her one bit. Let's just hope she'll be gentle with the retribution.