7 1/2 Months!

I bet you thought I was over the Blog Thing, that, like one of my many high school boyfriends, I had carelessly discarded it and moved on. Well you were wrong, my friend! I am back, finally armed with 6 hours of nightly sleep-look out world!

So Ben is now seven months. He continues to laugh at everything we say and do (great for Nuni, who thanks to two decades of Joey and me beating her down, and destroying her self- esteem, was starting to doubt her endless supply of puns). He is also close to walking. And by "close," I obviously mean we have three more months, 12 more weeks and whatever 12 times seven is days of holding his hands while we circle the apartment-luckily I am so mentally stable, four hours a day of this activity does not wreak havoc on my state of mind at all.

Oh, we are also moving! Goodbye smokers on the street, goodbye Strange Crazy Lady on the corner and hasta la vista disturbing puddle by the curb that does not go away regardless of how many rainless days we experience. Hello Hastings on Hudson! Hello Gymboree! Hello supermarkets that sell yogurt for less than $1.99 a container. It has been 16 months since we were free, rested, thin and moderately attractive yet Eric and I can't quite figure out how we got to a place where supermarkets with good deals and local Gymboree classes were our nirvana, but alas, we have arrived. We can't wait for Ben to be able to run naked through the fields (okay, in a diaper on the patio, but still...) to pick apples from the trees (at the cheap market) and to milk the cows in our backyard (or the Mommy in the kitchen...ew, I know, but true). Regardless, he is going to love it and we are so excited to share all of these firsts with him. He continues to be the sweetest, most adorable boy in the world. I know I am biased but am sure this is true because my mother confirmed all of these facts just yesterday when she visited.

Ben-Three Months and Counting!

This morning I woke up with a deep, purple hickey right above my collarbone. At first I panicked. Had I cheated on my husband and in my post-baby delirium not remembered it? But alas, I soon recalled passing out at 4:00 a.m. with Ben on my chest, desperately searching for my breast but settling on my neck when he realized I was going to play hard to get (I had just fed him thirty minutes before). So that is my life now. Hickeys from my child, not a cute guy I met at a frat party. Oh well-all good things must come to an end.

On a brighter note, Ben is now three months old! The saying really is true: Time flies when you are doing laundry and changing diapers. Oh. That’s not a saying? I wonder why. But seriously, although I have begun to hit a wall (and by “hit a wall” I actually mean “lose my sanity in a way that I fear may be irretrievable"), Ben is even more lovable than ever before. He smiles now almost constantly and “talks” to us when we ask him questions by grunting and making incomprehensible coos-In fact, I believe he and Eric may be conversation soul mates.

We’ve also been getting out a lot more. We spent the holidays in Vermont with my family and, in spite of himself, even my brother fell in love with Ben. Nonetheless, Joey still refuses to read this blog, claiming “[I’ve] lost my edge and stopped being funny the minute Ben was born.” Tough crowd. Naturally Mom cried the night before we were set to leave and was so inconsolable we finally all broke down and told her where we’d hidden my homemade brownies. Due to a huge snowstorm in Burlington, coupled with Eric getting a nasty stomach virus, we ended up staying thru the weekend and had to repeat the whole crying/brownie hiding and disclosing dance 48 hours later.

We also started playing in our football league this weekend (cleverly renamed “All About the Benjamins”) and went to a friend’s 30^th birthday. I had my first shot of tequila in over a year (fine it was two shots) and Eric ended up wandering the streets until 2:00 a.m. (okay that's not true, he just can't remember where he was). If you are beginning to question whether we are fit parents all I can say is...Why did it take you this long?

Another Crazy Weekend

It's been a few days since I've written and SO much has happened (note sarcasm).  We started our weekend with a bang on Friday night when Ben pooped in his bouncy seat. I know what you're thinking: First your kid pees in his mouth and now this?  Are you sure you two are fit to be parents? And I must admit, I am beginning to wonder.

It all started innocently enough: Eric came home tipsy from his office party and offered me a deal I couldn't refuse:  If I let him sleep it off from 7:00-11:00, he would take the entire night shift.  I couldn't believe my good fortune.  Ben and I settled in for a lovely evening of reading, bouncing, and breast feeding. Sadly at around 8:05 I made the aforementioned discovery and had to rouse my very disgruntled husband, who begrudgingly threw the soiled pajamas in a plastic baggy-Is there some special cleaning method that involves Fairway bags I am unaware of?- ran Ben a bath, and promptly returned to bed. If it weren't for threats that tales of a drunken, deadbeat dad were going to surface on my blog, I predict I wouldn't have heard from him for another three hours. However, The World According to Ben apparently is the gift that keeps on giving because Eric was soon awake, using his foot to soothe Ben in the rocking seat, as the bouncer was temporarily out of commission.  

The weekend truly began to gain momentum when we went to an Islanders game and sat in the skybox.  Our friends even put a picture of Ben up on the big screen to welcome him to his first game. Naturally, he was thrilled and promptly pooped in his Islander colored onesie. Are you sensing a theme here?

The real fun happened Sunday when Eric watched Ben, and I ventured out into the Real World.  It quickly became clear that despite having given birth a mere eight and a half weeks ago, I still had It when a homeless man hit on me on the subway. Now let me tell you, Eric mocked me for being flattered by this but it was a REALLY crowded subway.  This gentleman could have chosen anyone.  

I would have been satisfied to call it quits right then and there since I didn't think I could feel any better about myself than I did at that moment but I decided to see what else the day had in store for me, so I pushed on and went to Babies R Us (after all, I had just pumped my breasts so I knew I had a good two and half hours before I had to get back to Ben. The world was my oyster).  And boy was I glad I made that decision because it turns out I had seven (count 'em!) coupons and two gift cards and I managed to spend -$.10.  I could actually feel my father beaming all the way from Vermont.    

I know all of you out there are reading this and feeling jealous...maybe you went to a club this weekend or a really long, fancy dinner and you are just now realizing all you've been missing.  And while I know you are hanging on my ever word, just waiting for the next titillating anecdote, I have to go.  Ben is getting antsy in his swing and I think I smell something...

My First Ever Blog

This entry will mark my official debut as a Blogger. I really should have started this sooner but until recently I haven't been coherent enough to write a grocery list, much less post for all the world to read-and of course by "all the world" I mean my mother and best friend.

Ben was born on October 13th, after 27 hours of labor-28 if you count the 50 minutes I spent wondering if this truly was "It" or just a result of the eggplant parm, stuffed artichoke, and four slices of pizza I'd consumed eight hours earlier.

Since his birth, it has been a whirlwind of diapers, breast milk and sleepless nights. And with the exception of a handful of silverware that I hurled at my husband's head (contact was avoided, as a few forks and spoons grazed his left ear and landed safely on the living room rug) these weeks have been filled with lots of love, exciting firsts, and most important, precious hours of getting to know Ben.

Ben. He is amazing. I am sure all mothers say that about their sons-and they should-but he truly is special. Sweet, funny, adorable. He was born full term and big-nearly nine pounds, a lot to carry on my (once very petite) frame, and the product of what I can only imagine was the approximate 4000 calories a day I consumed during my pregnancy. Nevertheless he has always been alert and aware. He is handsome like his father and by six weeks old, we began to see that mischevious twinkle in his eye-a look I predict will mean countless things in the near and distant future-I have a HUGE poop in my pants... I found the chocolate Daddy hides from you and I've eaten it all...I met a girl and we got married in Vegas...

And while I have stopped using antiperspirant in order to keep my breast milk pure, and I have removed every piece of jewelry so as to protect his delicate skin, I don't claim to be a perfect mother. Today for instance, Ben peed in his very own mouth. Now, a good mother probably would have known how to avoid this. There are Pee Pee Teepees after all, designed exclusively to prevent this exact event. It all just happened too fast-He was on the changing table, one thing led to another. My own mother relishes these stories as I am sure I will too one day when Ben, all grown up with children of his own, will recount his own mistakes. But what I lack in experience and general knowledge, I make up for with an abundance of love.

I have been home now for eight weeks. I worked until the day before I went into labor. That means I have had 1344 hours dedicated just to loving Ben, something for which I am truly grateful. While there is something so incredibly special about maternity leave--the opportunity to leave work and focus solely on your, well, maternity-there is also something very lonely and isolating about it. As a person who loves to communicate, socialize, and interact, I find myself at a loss for ways to remain stimulated amidst the burping, changing, and feeding. What to Expect in the First Year encourages new parents to speak to their babies-something that sounds easy but talking to a person who never responds eventually becomes tiresome-even my husband occasionally looks up from an Islanders game and grunts during our conversations. I find myself longing to think. Last week a monologue about the laundry- "This is Daddy's shirt..." "Oops Mommy got chocolate on her pants again..." morphed into a lesson on the history of integration and racism when I discovered two single socks-one black and one white at the bottom of the basket. A high school English teacher, I divide my time between longing to return to the classroom and crying about how much I will miss him in February, when I do.