Never Interrupt a Voodoo Doctor

I think Jones might have acid reflux.  This is, of course, a conclusion I have come to based on my exactly zero years of medical experience and roughly six months of being a parent, but I think I might be right.  He started throwing up/projectile spitting up on Saturday evening (projectile green beans - not pretty!), so I have been giving him Zantac twice a day every day since then (we had some from his first stomach bug - Dr. H prescribed it to give his stomach a rest when he had been throwing up for several days in a row).  It really seems to help.  The kicker for me, though, is that tonight, when I had not given him any in over 12 hours, he projectiled some bananas and then cried and cried when I laid him flat on his back - I think that reflux causes you to have pain if you lay flat? - but as soon as I gave him some Zantac, he had a good amount of formula and went right to sleep.  So, I will be continuing the Zantac for awhile, I think.

Fall weather arrived last night!  It was downright cold today, and I have to say I enjoyed it.  Fall is my favorite season, and I'm looking forward to the chill in the air and the changing leaves and the general smokiness of the season.

I had a good time at Zumba tonight - we did a segment to the Cupid Shuffle, which I enjoyed, and Susie (the instructor) had put several of my favorite routines in the lineup.  I skipped out on toning though, because I was up late last night and I just didn't have the energy for it (I feel kind of guilty about it, though ... I will do the toning exercises with extra gusto on Thursday to make up for it).

Bet you thought I had forgotton about my Harry Potter quote project ... I didn't!  So, here we go:  Book Six, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince:

"'No, I thought not.  You have not asked me, for instance, what is my favorite flavor of jam, to check that I am indeed Professor Dumbledore and not an imposter.'
'I didn't ...' Harry began, not entirely sure whether he was being reprimanded or not.
'For future reference, Harry, it is raspberry ... although, of course, if I were a Death Eater, I would have been sure to research my own jam preferences before impersonating myself.'"

"'Yes, Harry?' said Dumbledore, for Harry had come to a halt.
'The ring's gone,' said Harry, looking around.  'But I thought you might have the mouth organ or something.'
Dumbledore beamed at him, peering over the top of his half moon spectacles.
'Very astute, Harry, but the mouth organ was only ever a mouth organ.'
And on that enigmatic note he waved to Harry, who understood himself to be dismissed."

"'What is Dumbledore up to? said Scrimgeour brusquely.  'Where does he go when he is absent from Hogwarts?'
'No idea,' said Harry.
'And you wouldn't tell me if you knew,' said Scrimgeour, 'would you?'
'No, I wouldn't,' said Harry.
'Well, then, I shall have to see whether I can't find out by other means.'
'You can try,' said Harry indifferently.  'But you seem cleverer than Fudge, so I'd have thought you'd have learned from his mistakes.  He tried interfering at Hogwarts.  You might have noticed he's not Minister anymore, but Dumbledore's still headmaster.  I'd leave Dumbledore alone, if I were you.'
There was a long pause.
'Well, it is clear ot me that he has done a very good job on you,' said Scrimgeour, his eyes cold and hard behind his wire-rimmed glasses.  'Dumbledore's man through and through, aren't you Potter?'
'Yeah, I am,' said Harry.  'Glad we straightened that out.'
And turning his back on the Minister of Magic, he strode back toward the house."

"'The Prophet is bound to report the truth occasionally,' said Dumbledore, 'if only accidentally.  Yes, that was why we argued.  Well, it appears that Rufus found a way to corner you at last.'
'He accused me of being 'Dumbledore's man through and through''.
'How very rude of him.'
'I told him I was.'
Dumbledore opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again.  Behind Harry, Fawkes the phoenix let out a low, soft, musical cry.  To Harry's intense embarassment, he suddenly realized that Dumbledore's bright blue eyes looked rather watery, and stared hastily at his own knees.  When Dumbledore spoke, however, his voice was quite steady.
'I am very touched, Harry.'"

"'You are protected, in short, by your ability to love!' said Dumbledore loudly.  'The only protection that can possibly work against the lure of power like Voldemort's!  In spite of all the temptation you have endured, all the suffering, you remain pure of heart, just as pure as you were at the age of eleven, when you started into a mirror that reflected your heart's desire, and it showed you only the way to thwart Lord Voldemort, and not immortality or riches.  Harry, have you any idea how few wizards could have seen what you saw in the mirror?  Voldemort should have known then what he was dealing with, but he did not!'
'But he knows it now.  You have flitted into Lord Voldemort's mind without damage to yourself, but he cannot possess you without enduring mortal agony, as he discovered in teh Ministry.  I do not think he understands why, Harry, but then, he was in such a hurry to mutilate his own soul, he never paused to understand the incomparable power of a soul that is untarnished and whole.'"

"'Harry looked around; there was Ginny running toward him; she had a hard, blazing look in her face as she threw her arms around him.  And without thinking, without planning it, without worrying about the fact that fifty people were watching, Harry kissed her."

"And Harry saw very clearly as he sat there under the hot sun how people who cared about him had stood in front of him one by one, his mother, his father, his godfather, and finally Dumbledore, all determined to protect him; but now that was over.  He could not let anybody else stand between him and Voldemort; he must abandone forever the illusion he ought to have lost at the age of one, that the shelter of a parent's arms meant that nothing could hurt him.  There was no waking from his nightmare, no comforting whisper in the dark that he was safe really, that it was all his imagination; the last and greatest of his protectors had died, and he was more alone that he had ever been before."

Wow, the sixth book is intense, right?!  The seventh is even more so ... we'll get to that one, eventually, though, and here's something to lighten up the intensity (this is mine and Alan's new favorite thing, and we wander around quoting/singing it all of the time now):

When the FBI Shows Up, Make Sure They are Toting Proper Identification. Don't Put it Past Shady Characters to Impersonate G-Men.

As a new parent, the first time your child sleeps through the night will elicit a range of emotions in you:  first, you will feel delightfully rested, your awakening for the day reminiscent of your pre-parenthood days where you would lay quietly and think about the day ahead, maybe stretch a little bit, think about what you plan on wearing ... this is quickly, quickly followed by:  panic.  Sheer, utter panic where terrible thoughts like, "Oh my God, it's 7:00 and I didn't get up with Jones at all in the night - is he still alive?!".  The panic leads to an adrenaline rush that will cause you to leap from your bed and take off to your child's room at a speed you would previously have thought yourself incapable of, where you will then peer down at your child closely to discern that he is, indeed, breathing deeply and sleeping peacefully.  Upon confirmation that your child is perfectly fine and is, in fact, better off than you are, seeing as how he is sleeping quite peacefully and has been for some time, relief will flow through you and then you will experience a feeling of pride, as if you yourself are responsible for this feat (although perhaps you are owed some credit for the perfect combination of play, solid food, bath, and cereal bottle the night before), and then you are back to feeling delightfully rested, and just delighted in general, because a milestone has been reached. 

This has been our experience the last three nights.  I do give myself credit for coming up with a good pre-bed routine.  We play from about 7:00 to 8:00, eat our last serving of solid food at 8:00, play for another 10 - 15 minutes, take a bath, followed by a massage with the Johnson's Bedtime Bath Lotion, and then it's time for the cereal bottle.  Jones usually falls asleep while taking the bottle, and is as limp as a dishrag when I deposit him in his crib which, in general, is right around 9:15.  And then we don't hear from him again 'til about 6:30 or 7:00 which, as any new parent will tell you, is glorious, and is akin to sleeping in until 10:00 back in your pre-parenthood days.

In my previous post I mentioned that I'm trying not to get into a cooking rut, and I have a recipe to share!  I can't decide if I made this up on my own, or if I heard about it somewhere and stored it away in my brain and remembered it later, but can't figure out where I heard it from (honestly, this is probably what happened, and I probably heard it on the Food Network).  Anyway, it's Mexican Lasagna, and I would have pictures of it, but we were so hungry by the time it was ready, we devoured it like wolves, so it was not pretty enough, in my opinion, to take a picture and post ... when I make it again, I'll definitely take a picture so you guys can judge for yourself.  Anyway, my recipe:

Mexican Lasagna

• In a large skillet, saute one bell pepper (any color) and one onion (or 1/2 of an onion, depending on the size) in a small amount of olive oil.  Add in a pound of ground meat (we used deer meat and loved it, but we love deer meat, so ...) and brown/cook through.  Add in about 1/2 a packet of taco seasoning (I used the low sodium version, which I think is a must).
• Line the bottom of a 9 x 13 baking dish with tortillas (I used the "large burrito" size).  Spread a generous layer of refried beans (I used fat-free refried beans, to make myself feel better about it).  Spread a layer of the meat/bell pepper/onion mixture.  Spread a layer of shredded "Mexican" cheese (I believe Kroger labels this as "fiesta blend").  Spread a layer of red enchilada sauce.  Repeat the layering process.
• Bake for 20 - 30 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

Another great thing about this recipe is that you could split it into two 9 x 9 casseroles and freeze one - we did that the second time I made this recipe, and it worked out really well.  When you want to eat the second one, just let it thaw during the day and pop it into the oven when you're ready (it works better to cook it after thawing than to try to do it from the frozen state, we discovered).

Alan and I recently subscribed to the daily state paper, and Alan makes a very determined effort to read it every day and be aware of current events.  Right now, the current event that interests him most is the "Occupy Wall Street" situation.  It infuriates him.  And, although this is not a politically oriented blog and I certainly don't want to rant about things like that, I did tell him I would quote him on my blog, giving his opinion on the whole thing:  "What would happen if the wealthy people in America decided to stop making money?  Fewer companies, fewer jobs, fewer products, less tax revenue ... doesn't sound like that would help the middle class at all.  Yet these morons, most of whom, when you get down to it, are just unemployed hippies, are demonizing the "richest 1% of Americans" claiming that they just want things to be "fair", when really all they are is just a bunch of frustrated, unemployed (or unemployable) people begging for socialism."  It may come as no surprise to you that Alan and I also love Stephen Colbert, and that he is, in fact, our main source of world news (after the newspaper, of course).  We used to really love Jon Stewart, but he's gotten pretty liberal as his popularity has increased, and we get frustrated with him more frequently nowadays, although I do think that he does a pretty good job all-around on interviewing people and asking tough questions, for the most part (I think he kind of cuts Democrats a break/seems like he's sucking up to them while interviewing them).  I still do like it when he interviews people, though, because I feel like he is honest in his questioning.  I prefer Colbert's interviews, though, because even though he stays in character/persona throughout, there just seems to be some sort of sincerity, and I feel like that gets people to give more sincere answers; also, Colbert is so supportive of our military men and women, and whatever you may think about the war, you have to admire our military men and women and their families.  Anyway, I like them both, and they are my preferred news source (although I do like Diane Sawyer, and usually watch her  on World News Tonight if I'm home in time ... and this may or may not be due to the fact that her show is on the same channel as Wheel of Fortune, which I love ...).

Name-Dropping Your Famous Parent Will Spring You from the Hoosegow Pretty Much All The Time

We won't even talk about my negligent blogger status.  Nope.  Not gonna discuss it.  So:

Jones is 6 months old!  I can hardly believe it, time is flying by so fast!  I'm looking forward to Halloween, I know we're going to have a lot of fun dressing the little guy up.  Some of our friends throw an annual Halloween party we'll be attending, and I think we're going to have a lot of fun.  I'm going to force Alan to decide this week what we are going to do as a costume.  I say "we" because we're doing a family-type thing where we all have coordinating costumes.  Right now it's between Star Wars and Star Trek ... I was kind of torn, since the little animal costumes are so cute, but I think it'll be more fun doing something like Star Wars (ha - just typed "Star Wards", which is actually pretty appropriate) or Star Trek, and the pictures should be hilarious.



So, the Jones update ... at 6 months, Jones:

• Wears size 6 months clothes (although I still squish him into some of his roomier 3 months clothes)
• Wears a size 3 diaper (and they look ginormous to me!  We just put him in them this week.  Alan said, "There is no way these are the right size for him."  Me:  "Check the weights listed on the box!  This is his weight class!")
• Eats solid food 3 times a day, and, I would say, probably around 30 ounces of formula a day.  We are having some difficulty with the formula right now - he'll eat about 4 ounces at a time and then he. is. done.  And no amount of coaxing can convince him to eat more.  He's doing really well with the solid food, though, so I guess that's probably affecting his desire to eat formula.  His favorite solid foods are green beans and pears.  He likes squash and mangoes as his second favorites, and he will eat sweet potatoes, carrots, apples, bananas, and peaches, but not with gusto.  He WILL NOT eat peas.  We have had two bad Exorcist-type incidents with peas, so they are off of our menu list.  He also gets a 6 - 8 ounce bottle of cereal/formula right before bed, so as to try to get him to sleep through the night, because he ...
• Is having some trouble sleeping through the night.  I think it's just because we've had some upheaval lately - he's had 2 ear infections inside of a 3 week span, so he hasn't been sleeping well because he didn't feel well, and then I think he's still adjusting to sleeping in his own room (although he does really well), and I also think the dietary change has some bearing on the issue.  It's not like it's terrible - our average right now is 9:00 - 4:30, so I'm thankful for that.  If he could just make it another hour, we'd be all good.
• Loves his jumperoo - he would jump, jump, jump in that thing all day long if you let him.
• Can sit up on his own for short periods of time, and especially loves for you to sit in the floor with him and work on this skill.

• Has a favorite phrase:  "mmmm-bah" ... also, "mah, mah, mah" (I like to pretend he's saying, "Mama!", but I know that he's not).
• Has discovered his feet!

• Loves to smile and laugh, and it's pretty easy (and fun) to make him do both!  However, I don't have a lot of pictures of him doing either - he seems to have inherited his daddy's predilection for not smiling in any pictures - maybe it's a guy thing?


• Is cutting some teeth!  I can see the bottom front two teeth - they're trying to push their way up!
• Has really gotten to love his pacifiers when he's tired - if he's getting kind of fussy, or you can tell he's tired but fighting taking a nap or going to sleep, if you rock him and put his pacifier in, this kid is OUT.  He has also recently really started liking his Razorback pacifier, which should come as no surprise to anyone, and makes for some cute pictures.
• Loves the spoiled labradors... I think he and Augie are going to have a special bond.  Augie sits on the floor with us when we play with him, checks on him in the night (I know because I can hear Augie going into his room over the monitor ... although he may just be checking for dirty diapers that someone forgot to put in the diaper pail), runs over to sniff and lick him at the first opportunity (usually when Jones is in the jumperoo, as that puts his face right at Augie level), sits beside us while we feed him (both solid food feedings and bottle feedings), and helps with bathtime and bedtime.

• Likes to go on walks with Mom and Dad - we are loving the wonderful weather, great for strolling!  Funny walking story:  yesterday, Jones had been up for, like, 5 or 6 solid hours and was obviously tired but was fighting taking a nap, so we went to rock in his room, put the pacifier in like I mentioned above, and he was out like a light.  Alan, not knowing what we were doing, came into the room and said (loudly, because he didn't notice that Jones was asleep), "Hey, you wanna go for a walk?"  Jones' head immediately sprang up from my shoulder and looked around wildly as if to say, "Walk?!  Walk?!  Awesome!!!!"  We had a good laugh about it.

Other than that, we really haven't been up to much.  Just, you know, life as usual.  I'm trying to think of any interesting stories ... hmmmm ... I don't know if this qualifies as interesting, but my child has rolled off of a bed (please don't call Child Services on me).  He was laying in the middle of it, playing with his feet, I turned to go brush my teeth in the bathroom (which had a clear view of the bed the whole time), and, seriously, in about 45 seconds:  "thunk".  And then, "wwwwwwwwwwaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh!".  He's fine, obviously, but the whole incident probably took about 5 years off of my life expectancy.

Interesting news, interesting news ... ah ha!  My mom and I started going to Zumba two nights a week.  We really like it, and it's definitely a workout.  I enjoy getting the blood pumping and the heart racing, and it's fun to spend time with my mom.  I really like the class we're going to, the instructor is very sweet (and English - love her accent), and the other participants are nice, so it's not intimidating or anything (like, there aren't tons of young, tiny people showing off their tiny-ness or anything like that).

Book reports ... none as of right now, but I'm about to start Cutting for Stone, which was highly recommended to me by a prolific-reader friend of mine who said it was one of the best books she had ever read, which is pretty high praise, and I'm pretty sure if she liked it, I'll like, since we have similar literary tastes.  I am also planning on going to the library and getting off of the black list.  Wwwwwaaaayyyyy back in March, when I went into the hospital for preeclampsia and everything, the spoiled labradors had some difficulty adjusting to my absence and, you know, just the general upheaval of the whole situation, and Spoiled Labrador # 2 (Layla ... BTW, they are labeled # 1 and # 2 in order of their acquisition by the Ward family, Augie was our first spoiled labrador, Layla is our second ... didn't want anybody to get any idea that it was some sort of favoritism ranking or anything) reacted by eating one of my library books.  I mean, she gnawed the corner pretty well, but it was still in one piece and readable.  So, we tried to sneak it back into the library by putting in the book mailbox, but they noticed it and called me up and (very politely) told me we would have to buy the book.  So I owe the library $32 dollars and have since March, so I need to go take care of my fine so I can not feel guilty about it anymore (in my defense, I tried to pay it once but they no longer take checks and I never have cash on me ... or, at least, I never have $32 in cash on my person).

I'm also trying to branch out on cooking, but it's slow going.  I like making tried and true recipes, especially since Alan is so picky (picky as in:  he knows what he likes and he doesn't like to deviate from that).  I don't want to get in a food rut, though.  I'm going to delve into Crazy Sista Cooking, which is a cookbook by Jimmy Buffett's sister, and looks to have some good recipes that I could manage.  I'll post the successes!

So, that's what's going on in the Ward family:  raising a baby, being a family, Zumba, reading, cooking ... life in general, and a good life all the way around :o).