40

Forty. Tomorrow I turn forty. I don’t feel forty. Nice people say I don’t LOOK forty. So what’s the big deal? Is it that it’s a nice big, round number? Or is it because you’re not quite fifty, but no longer in your thirties? At any rate, it’s supposed to be a big deal.

So what’s my point? My point is that tomorrow I break the mid-life barrier and as daunting as society makes it seem, it is still a reason to celebrate. And like any other birthday, there are gifts! In fact, I’ve been lucky enough to receive several gifts early.

I got one of my gifts on Friday night when my lovely wife whisked me away on a weekend trip to Las Vegas! We caught some shows, lost some money and had a fantastic time(Heather took me to see Jimmy Buffet on Saturday night and we caught the Cirque De Soleil’s Beatles show, “Love”). And, as an extra-special gift, Heather’s mom was nice enough to come down for the weekend and watch Finley while we snuck off on our little trip.

It was our first extended time away from the munchkin, so we did something we hadn’t done since before she was born… We slept in. That’s right. There we were in Sin City. The land of a thousand lights. Slot machines and card tables. Liquor and ladies. Randy and Heather fast asleep in their hotel room. It was glorious.

And even though we had a great time… even when we were awake… we both caught ourselves missing the one thing that I consider the greatest gift I have ever received. We missed our little girl.

I know that we’ll have to eventually let her get bigger and move out and all of that other growing up stuff. But for right now, she’s the central part of our lives and being without her is almost like being without air. It’s hard to imagine a morning without her waking up in her crib and keeping herself entertained so that when we come in to get her, she’s all smiles. Then there’s the way she sits up as I carry her around, with one hand on my shoulder and her little head whipping around to check out any and all noises that happen to catch her attention. My favorite part is when I pick her up at daycare and she’s busy playing with whatever toy is in her world. Then I call to her and she looks up and sees that it’s that guy again… That guy who kisses her cheeks and tickles her… and she smiles her toothless smile that makes me forget I’m about to turn forty.

That baby girl… the sunshine of my life… the little finger I am gladly wrapped around… That is the best present I could have ever asked for. But wait. It gets better.

Just when I thought I could never be more smitten with that kid, she goes and says her first words, “Da Da.” Now, you could argue that just making the sound doesn’t mean she knows who or what “Da Da” is. But, I’ve decided not to listen to that argument. She said “Da Da.” I’m Da Da. Case closed.

What a week it has been. My daughter says her first words, my wife takes me on a surprise trip to see Jimmy Buffet and The Beatles “LOVE” in Las Vegas. And, I’m about to turn forty in just a few hours. It’s funny how in forty years, it’s this last one that makes me realize how lucky and loved I am. I sure hope it doesn’t take me another forty to realize that again. As long as I keep hearing “Da Da” and have Heather by my side, I don’t think I’ll need to worry.

It's A Wonderful Life!

Wow! Daddy released the reigns to the infamous baby blog and Mommy gets to take a shot at it now. I don’t know though, Randy is a pretty amazing writer so I am not sure I will not do this thing justice but I’ll try!

Now where to begin…it seems like just yesterday when it all actually DID begin. Our little Finley Ella turned 8 months old on Sunday and it’s just so hard for me to believe. Other parents kept telling me that “it goes so fast” and now I believe it. I guess the most amazing part of this all is just that. Everything is sooooo AMAZING! Finley is such an AMAZING baby and Randy is such an AMAZING husband. We have this little family now and I never imagined I could be this happy. We have a really, really good life and sometimes I wonder what little ol’ me ever did to deserve all this joy! Just watching Finley grow and learn and just be a baby is so wonderful. What’s even more fabulous is watching her interact with her Daddy. They are so adorable together. As you all know Randy dotes on his little princess and she is the light of his life. I think Finley is the luckiest little girl in the world to have a Daddy like Randy. She will learn so much from him and have an insane amount of fun a long the way. I have a feeling though that Daddy will find it very hard to say no to his cute little girl. I imagine that it’s Mommy who’s gonna have to be the “bad guy” most of the time! But that’s okay. And I hope she gets some qualities from both of us. I hope she’s laid back like her Dad and has a love for life just like her Daddy does. However she will have to get her fashion sense from her mother. No tie-dye or Birkenstocks, please. And let’s not even get started on Daddy doing hair…I know Randy is a sensitive male of the 2000’s but there are just some things that need to remain a Momma’s job! But I guess when it’s all said and done the most important thing I hope Randy and I can pass along to Finley is just how very much she is loved. That she knows how much joy she brings us and how our world wouldn’t have been complete without her in it. I hope by being her parents we can help to give her a happy life, just like she is giving us. My little angel may only be 8 months old but what an 8 months it has been! And ah…..what a wonderful life, indeed!

~Mommy

Crime and Punishment

When you go into parenthood, you really have no idea how it will all play out. You can read an entire aisle’s worth of parenting books and get loads of advice from friends and family, but until you are in it, you have no clue.

It’s not like there’s any real parenting going on the first few months, anyway. In the beginning, it’s more of a care and feed operation. The baby can’t really do anything that requires the full-on parental overseeing-type guidance. In fact, I thought I had it pretty easy until about a week ago.

So far, I had been able to pick up this dad thing fairly easily. I became a master swaddler and can change a diaper with my eyes closed (when I remember to put the diaper on). The proper bottle-feeding position was no problem and my spoonwork with the baby food is going well. And the play stuff… I had that down way before Finley was a zygote. But last week, I did something that not only made me a real parent, but made me think about what’s to come. Last week, I said “no” to Finley.

I think it will still take her a while before she realizes what “no” means, but the ball has started rolling. From here on out, we have to make sure that until she can make her own decisions, it’s up to us to let her know right from wrong. And grabbing Daddy’s face with her hands and clawing with her little fingernails is wrong. Pulling on Mamma’s hoop earrings is no good, either. And until she figures that out, we have to keep saying, “no.”

This is the part of parenthood I was trying to avoid. I don’t want to be the bad guy. I want to be the buddy daddy and the fun dad. Heather is much better at laying down the law, trust me. But, it’s not fair for me to try and hog all the good stuff. As much as I’d like to have Heather take care of all of the judgment and punishment, I know I have to step up and bring the hammer down every once in a while. Besides she would whoop on me if I didn’t.

And that’s the great dilemma. Deciding how to punish... Deciding when to punish. It’s a whole new world in the land of raising kids. When we were growing up and you got in trouble, you got spanked. It wasn’t corporal punishment… it was a swat on the tail and you most likely did not become a repeat offender. But these days, you can’t look at your kids wrong without it being considered abuse. These days, a term like “time out” is part of the parental vernacular. These days, revocation of cell phone privileges seems to be the punishment of choice… when they get old enough, I guess.

We’ll have to learn to sit her in a corner, send her to bed and just plain sit through tantrums and tears. We’ll have to learn to read her body language and eyes to see if she’s hiding something or stretching the truth. But the most important thing we’ll have to learn is how to talk to her as we punish.

Because it’s not really just about punishment. It’s about respect. Respect for us as parents, respect for others and respect for rules. And if all she knows is frustration and sorrow from her actions, she’ll never learn how to properly respect all of those things. And she has to also learn that sometimes some rules and some people are difficult to respect and that there are proper ways to disagree and even help change things that are wrong.

But that all comes from us. We have to not only show our disappointment in her actions, but confirm for her several things. The most important thing we have to tell her is how much we love her. That no matter what rule she’s broken or trouble she’s gotten into, we love her no matter what. Then we have to explain - especially when she is little - what she did wrong and why it was wrong. And we have to help her realize the consequences of her actions and how she can either fix the problem or make sure she avoids making the same mistake again. And as we all know, mistakes are an important and necessary part of life. They are what help us learn how to be better.

I know this all sounds pretty straightforward and looks great on paper. I also know there is no way it is going to be as easy as it sounds. So, I will rely on my partner in parenthood to help me along the way. As long as Heather and I do our best to stay consistent and talk to each other, we should be okay. Well, as long as I stay consistent with Heather’s rules, we’ll be okay.

I know I can’t be the happy, go-lucky, fun dad all the time. I know I have to be strong and stand firm with my parental decisions. But I have to say, it certainly isn’t fair when I know those little blue eyes will be staring up at me with guilt and maybe even a little fear. And that’s the LAST thing I want… for her to fear me. But I know, with Heather’s help, those little eyes will look at me and learn that what I’m saying and doing is only to help her become a better person and, eventually, the great parent I can only hope to be.

Still Crazy After All These Years

My daughter is crazy. And I’m convinced she gets it from her Momma. When we last left Finley and her quest for becoming mobile, she had just about learned to roll in both directions. Well, she’s not only accomplished that ability, she’s working her way toward the dreaded crawl.

The way she does this is by flopping over onto her belly and hoisting herself up onto all fours. This part she has down. It’s the next part that is crucial to her development. She has not quite learned how to move her knees in the vital locomotion way. In fact, she pretty much does everything else EXCEPT move her knees.

She’ll flop back down onto her belly. She’ll roll one way or the other. But her favorite by far is to get up onto her tip toes and point her diaper butt straight up into the air in a sort of jackknife position. In the yoga world, this is known as the “downward dog.” In our house, it’s just hilarious.

Of course, she can only hold this position for a short time and usually flops back down. On the bright side, she moves forward about an inch… So she’s making headway. Most of the time she needs to rest after this exercise and rolls over to her back with whatever toy she’s managed to grab. At this point, she attempts to put most of said toy into her mouth and let out her shrill little scream of joy/frustration (It varies by the hour).

This continues for quite sometime. She lurches another direction. Rolls the other way. Runs into a toy or a chair, decides whether or not she can put it in her mouth then rolls another way until she sees the next toy to target. Then she launches into her crawl attempt which turns into the yoga move which ends in the high-pitched squeal.

Now she’s added a couple of new twists to her repertoire. First, there’s the new move she’s added to the end of the downward dog. Instead of flopping all the way down to her belly, she know rolls halfway onto her side with one arm holding her up and the other arm placed on her behind. She’s got one knee on the floor and the other is straightened out. It’s a very model-like pose. It’s almost like she’s asking for a photograph to be taken.

The other new move happens while she lies on her back. She thumps her legs on the ground a minimum of three times before bringing both feet to her mouth. Of course, her whole body convulses during this feat, which helps me to decide that my daughter, indeed, is crazy. And isn’t it great?

You see, in the first nine months of her being, she was folded up inside her Momma. She was yanked and pulled through a 10cm doorway then wrapped up in swaddling blankets for another 2-3 months after. Then she was confined to a small bed and not allowed to roll over at night, for safety reasons. But it’s not like she would have gotten anywhere, anyway. Her little muscles hadn’t quite developed and her best muscle was used for eating.

As each month progressed and she realized that her arms were more than a couple of things to flap around, her neck got stronger and those little legs began to squirm a bit. Suddenly, tummy time was more than a face-down endeavor. She could hold her head up and look at this world that was now beginning to come into focus as her eyes began to clear. That meant there was something to see and something to try and get to. Something these new little fingers could grab. So, she kept trying to get there.

Every day there were new colors and sounds and tastes to try. And every day she got stronger and stronger to the point that she could pull her little body toward something or roll toward something, just by changing the position of her legs. Now she knows that by getting up as high as she can, she can reach that new, interesting and possibly tasty item that has caught her attention. And that is pretty darn amazing, but not the best part. Well, not to me, anyway.

The best part is that in those moments when she decides she can’t quite get what she wants, she takes a little rest and tries again. And if it still doesn’t work, she stops, takes a look around and has fun. In fact, she gets silly. She screams and giggles and wiggles her whole body and flops around like a seal and bumps into things. She blows raspberries and slobbers and tastes EVERYTHING. Then she squeals again and looks around for Momma and Poppa for approval.

And what do we do? We plop down on the floor next to her and make silly noises and tickle and kiss her and blow on her belly. We shake the toys and make them talk in funny voices. And it is absolutely fantastic.

It’s funny how we start out on the floor and work and work to get up on our feet so we can become adults and go to work and make money because that’s what we’re told makes us happy. But my little girl has taught me that the secret to happiness is to spend as much time as you can on the floor, being crazy with the people you love being. It’s a lot more fun and a lot less stressful.

Sugar and Spice

A funny thing happened on the way to this blog. For the first time since she was born, it really hit me that Finley is a girl. Yes, I know that anatomically speaking, I have been aware of her wiring since day one. And, she has more pink clothes and dresses than should be allowed. But, she really doesn’t wear dresses too much and after a while, you get used to pink.

The thing is, she’s got such a cherubic, chubby little face and crazy hair that UNLESS she’s wearing pink, most people would not be able to tell that she’s a girl. It’s not a bad thing. It’s just the way many babies are. They all wear generic onesies and pajamas and without the sex-mandated blue or pink of the clothes, the babies can come across as generic, too. Heck, we even gave her a name that would be good for a boy OR a girl.

But this past week, Heather did something to drive home the fact that OUR little Finley is in fact, a girl. She gave her pigtails. Well, not pigtails in the sense that she had little Pippi Longstocking braids, but with Finley’s thin, wispy hair it was enough to make her awfully cute… and awfully girly.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t mean to make it seem like a bad thing. I guess it’s just something that had not really hit me, yet. Finley hasn’t done any particularly girl-type things. Sure, she has a doll or two, but they’re really just stuffed things to put in her mouth. Momma has put little skirts and dresses on her, but those are just things to drool on. She hasn’t been a girl. She’s just been a baby. But now, after seeing her with her little antennae, I can tell that this is just the beginning of a long, girly road.

I’m sure those dolls that are chew toys, will soon become her friends and daughters. There will be tea parties for these friends and the pushing of daughters around in little strollers. If I’m lucky, I may get to attend a tea party or two and even get to change one of her babies.

I’m sure there will be dollhouses and maybe even a Barbie or two. There might even be kitties and puppies and ponies or even a rabbit on somebody’s birthday wish list. And slowly, but not slowly enough that wish list will expand to include nail polish and lip gloss. Of course, that’s when I will defer to the Momma for expertise.

I have no problem with building a dollhouse or a cage or habitrail. I’d probably be the one cleaning up after whatever pet we get, anyway. But, when it comes to female war paint, I’m done. Because in my mind that all leads to one thing: Boys. And I’m not EVEN ready to think about that. And I sure am glad she’s not ready, either.

It turns out I have a little bit of time before that all kicks in, anyway… Before the female chromosome begins to overpower the male. I’m not sure when, exactly, that happens… When the kid decides to head in the direction of all things girl. It might be in kindergarten, when they segregate the bathrooms (Maybe that’s why women always go to the can together). At any rate, I figure I have at least two years before I get the “Daddy just doesn’t get it” look.

So, in the meantime I can still take advantage of “neutral” fun, like tickling and kissing cheeks and singing. We can watch baseball and cartoons together and Momma and I can read non gender-specific books to her. Because, at this point, Finley doesn’t care. Well, really she doesn’t know. And that’s a good thing. As long as she smiles and giggles and squeals with delight, that’s good enough for me. And as long as when she cries out in the middle of the night, she knows we’re there to comfort her, that’s fine, too. Girl things can wait. She’s got a plenty of time before she needs to worry about being a little girl. But I’ve got the rest of my life to worry about it!