On Sunday night we returned from a fun and relaxing 4-day trip to Maine.  I think the break was good for all of us on many levels.  I needed adults to interact with, Rob needed to get away from work for a bit, and H needed a change of scenery.  Rob, H, Uncle Steve, and I set out on Wednesday afternoon.  We made the entire 5-hour trip without stopping and somehow managed to be lucky enough to miss the traffic.  Wednesday night we enjoyed a wonderful dinner at Saltwater Grille.  Holden was fascinated with their aquarium as he lounged in a lobster Adirondack chair:

Thanksgiving Day was relaxing and quiet (or as quiet as could be expected with a 4-year-old, a 3-year-old and a 5-month old).  Rob had a 23-lb. ham shipped up from Caw Caw Creek in South Carolina.  We became acquainted with the farm when we took the “Farm to Table” cooking class at Charleston Cooks during our trip to South Carolina last spring.  The class was organized by the pig farmer from Caw Caw Creek, who shared with us his impressive knowledge of organic farming practices, business, local economy, and nutrition:

 The ham was from an heirloom pig that had lived its life roaming a 90-acre farm, interacting with other pigs, and enjoying a diet of grasses, acorns, and other goodies.  The ham tasted unlike anything we had ever had before—the meat was dense and was more like a pork chop than ham in terms of consistency and flavor.  It was excellent!

I made homemade pumpkin pie for dessert.  I actually roast the pumpkin…I’ll never use the canned stuff again!  Did you know that the first pumpkin pie was actually a pumpkin filled with milk, honey, and spices, roasted over a fire?

Holden got to enjoy lots of new things.  He LOVED the little activity mat.  I think it’s the only time I’ve ever seen him actually relish being on his back:

He also got to try the fancy jumper.  This jumper has music, toys, and lots of colors—a lot of bells and whistles for our little guy:

And of course, Holden got to spend quality time with his cousins.  Colby LOVES his cousin Holden and of course jumped at the chance to get his picture snapped with his new favorite cousin.  Seconds after the picture was taken, Colby jumped up to preview the picture.  The suddenness of Colby jumping caused Holden to topple over.  But I caught him just in time!

Cousin Dylan worked off some energy outside while dinner was being prepared:

We enjoyed a few childless trips out around town thanks to Oma’s willingness to spend some special time with Holden.  We visited L.L. Bean in Freeport, Coffee by Design, d. cole (where we purchased our wedding bands 8 years ago), and ended our visit with a dinner date at Katahdin in Portland.  Plus, Oma treated me to a body scrub at Inn by the Sea.  It was so relaxing!  Here is a big cyber hug for Oma:)

While in Maine, Holden effortlessly rolled from tummy to back for the first time.  Of course, when Rob started the camera to capture it on film, Holden acted like he had no clue how to do it.  After we got home, he started rolling over from tummy to back constantly.  He just dosen’t seem to want to do it for his Papa!  Holden was also intently observing everyone while they ate.  With each bite of food I took, Holden would open his mouth.  While at Flatbread, Holden watched Dylan devour some Cheerios:

And grabbed at slices of pizza:

And when the food was all gone, he stared longingly at the empty plates while smacking his lips together.  All of these things coupled with the fact that he has been nursing like crazy led us to conclude that he is finally ready for solids.  A few weeks ago he started nursing more often and had even picked up a few feedings at night.  He was up to 3 or 4 feedings per night.  Exhausting.  Again.  I decided to see whether it was a growth spurt or a true readiness for solid food by simply giving it some time.  The extra feedings went on for over 2 weeks, which is way in excess of his normal growth spurts.  When we got home on Sunday night, we gave him his first taste of organic brown rice cereal mixed with breastmilk.  At first he wasn’t too sure about it:

But he knew exactly what to do.  He would open for each bite, close his mouth around the spoon, and gradually work the food to the back of his mouth.  And whatever excess food got on his face, he managed to push into his mouth with his fingers.  He was even grabbing for the spoon to try to feed himself:

He seems to be tolerating the food just fine and is back down to a more reasonable two-feeding-per-night schedule.  He is learning some new motor skills and experiencing novel tastes and textures.  And I too, have to learn a whole new set of signals regarding his level of hunger and satiety.  I don’t want to overfeed him so I definitely don’t make him eat everything.  I just wait until his attention wanders or till he starts squirming to get out of his seat.  Then I consider him done with his meal.  On Friday we are going to try carrots.  I am really excited to see what he will and won’t like, although the feeding process is a level of messy that I am decidedly not excited about.

I decided that while I am busy being unemployed, I should do something useful with my time.  With the job application process at least temporarily behind me and my eye feeling better over the past couple of weeks, I figured I would take the plunge and start donating some of my breast milk.  Holden will be starting solids in just a few short weeks and will likely be dropping feedings as a result.  So, I figured I could pump once each day or every other day and start freezing some milk for preterm, low birth weight, and critically ill infants.  I wanted to donate milk through our local hospital, but a cursory search didn’t turn up any organizations accepting human milk donations.  There are many national human milk banks, and I finally chose to donate to Milkin’ Mamas.  My application to donate milk was approved today and I got to speak to the super nice coordinator over the phone.  I have to get H’s pediatrician and my midwife to sign off on H’s weight/height gain and on my health status, and then I have to have bloodwork done to confirm the absence of infectious disease that could be passed to the babies receiving the milk.  The milk is processed after it has been donated and then it is sold to hospitals to be given to the babies in need.  I am really excited about being able to help—for many of these babies, having human milk means that they recover faster and leave the NICU sooner.

There are some interesting (and thought-provoking) news articles out there about cross-feeding, or breastfeeding another woman’s baby.  On the surface, it seems like a horrifying proposition that is unsanitary and just….well, difficult for us to accept.  But when you read stories about the breastfeeding mother who traveled to Sudan and breastfed infants who were on the verge of death, the impropriety that our culture has placed on these acts seems trivial.  Certainly, the CDC is not wrong to warn against nursing other women’s babies as there are many communicative diseases that can be passed through breastmilk.  And maybe milk banks are our compromise.  We can donate milk safely and anonymously without violating any of the unspoken rules about how a baby should receive his or her nutrition.  Honestly, I would not breastfeed another woman’s baby for the heck of it, but if someone paid for my flight to Africa, I would nurse a baby in need without question.  But I am not hopping on a plane to Africa.  I live here in Vermont, in this frozen tundra I call home, with my husband, my son, our pets, my electric breast pump, and a freezer filled with bags of frozen milk, destined for tiny, empty stomachs….

That is how much material I just stuck into an envelope as part of my most recent job application.  Fifty-six pages.  Granted, that includes five of my published articles, but that is still a lot of writing to do in just a couple of weeks.  Once Holden wakes up from his nap, I am going to bundle him up and we will be off to the post office to drop this bad boy in the mail.  And hopefully that will mark the last of my job applications…for a while.  With any luck, I will get a call to come out and give a talk.  My fingers are super crossed for this one.  And I have to say, the most kick ass part of this job is that it starts in August!  So I have a few months to spend with H if I happen to get this job.  Of course, a good chunk of the next few months would have to be devoted to hammering out a more solid research plan, but I have to say that constructing a research statement as part of the application process got me thinking more about what kind of experiments I would like to run.  Now I can enjoy Thanksgiving without suffering from job application hangover….

Have a great Turkey day everyone!

It’s hard to believe that our little guy is now 5 months old.  This week seemed to usher in many new abilities for our ample boy.  He now sits up regularly to play with his toys (but still requires a circle of pillows to protect his head from the hardwood floors in the event of a fall):

A new and surprising talent of Holden’s is that he can hold his bottle to feed himself. He rarely gets a bottle, and in fact, the last time he had a bottle was over a month ago. I had pumped a bottle for Holden this morning so he would have food while I went out with my friend S for two hours in the afternoon for some girl shopping time. Imagine our surprise when Holden not only grabbed onto the bottle, but brought it to his mouth and started drinking from it completely on his own!

Look at how proud his Momma is! This new skill was so amazing to us because his experience with bottles has been so limited—not only did he know exactly what to do with the bottle, but he was able to flexibly apply his existing set of motor skills to a novel situation. We are so impressed!

Things have been quiet on this blog recently because I’ve been knee-deep in job application hell.  I’ve already reneged on my vow to steer clear of academic jobs.  I am indeed applying for an academic job.  It’s tenure-track and it’s in Maine.  And as I’ve poured hours into crafting a research statement, I’ve felt increasingly that I don’t have what it takes to get this job.  And I’ve found myself wondering why in the hell I’m in this field anyway.  Science was always my worst subject.  Seriously.  It’s been over a year since I’ve been fully involved in the lab; during my pregnancy I was very limited in what I could do and spent most of my time in front of the microscope, an activity that ended up going nowhere.  Because of all of that down time, I don’t have any new data to publish and I feel more and more like I’m on a raft without an oar, watching the only piece of land in sight shrink to a mere speck on the horizon.  There’s no funding to attend academic conferences, no babysitter to give me a hour to attend a seminar or two, and if my VPN access goes away, then I will be truly screwed.  In all honesty, I am very excited for this job and I am anxious about how I will come across on paper and during a talk.  And if I get the job, I will continue to be anxious because I do not like to disappoint.  I’ve asked virtually everyone I know to review my statement of teaching philosophy, my cover letter, and my research proposal.  I’ve gotten some stellar advice.  I still can’t shake that feeling that I won’t be good enough, especially as I pour through the literature and realize that I truly have gotten behind ALREADY.  I’ve only been out of work a few months.  

I’m going to change the subject now because, in spite of the immense stress of job-hunting while taking care of H, I had a happy end to the day today.  Generally speaking, this past week has been a whiny one for H.  I believe his gums are bothering him, and he is unhappy laying on his back.  But he hasn’t been able to sit up on his own either.  And it’s unreasonable for me to keep him propped up with my hands for hours on end.  On Monday, we had the pleasure of meeting our friend’s new little baby, 5-week old Maddie:

Isn’t she sweet?!  While there, H got to try out Maddie’s Bumbo seat:

I wanted to see how he would like it, as it had the potential of solving all of our sitting problems.  Well, guess what?  It’s hard to tell from the photo, but HIS THIGHS ARE TOO FAT FOR THE BUMBO!!!  When I went to pick him up out of it, the Bumbo seat was stuck to his butt because he was wedged in there so tightly.  Although the Bumbo seat is awesome, it’s not going to work for our full-figured man.  He is getting too big for so many of his gadgets, yet developmentally he could still really benefit from them.  So I told him that he needed to learn to sit on his own because he is miserable laying on his back and he is too fat for the little baby seats.  What other choice does he have?  

Up to this point, H would sit unassisted for mere seconds before toppling over unapologetically.  But I suppose suffering the indignity of having your large infant ass get stuck in a Bumbo seat served as motivation for him to get with the sitting.  Today when we practiced sitting, he demonstrated much better control for longer periods of time than ever before.  Moreover, he would perform self-corrective movements to maintain his posture, which is something I’d never seen him do.  He would also put a hand on the floor to brace himself and prevent himself from falling over.  As the day wore on, he would sit for longer and longer, while trying to flip through the pages of one of his books (it’s no Being and Time, but still):

Here he is surrounded by pillows to cushion the occasional fall¹:

But he still detests tummy time:

And still does not roll from tummy-to-back. 

 

1.  Falls are typically preceded by the following series of events:  (1) the cat struts casually past H; (2) H follows the cat with his gaze; (3) H turns his head as the cat casually leaves H’s field of view; (4) H attempts to look over his shoulder at the cat who is now behind him; (5) H falls over backwards; (6) cat runs away anxiously as if he didn’t know that was going to happen (although he totally did).