Saturday, September 10, 2011

nope

Remember that freckle Ziah had on top of his head at birth? The one I so loved, figuring it would eventually be covered by hair but then uncovered by old age for someone else to enjoy as much as I, his mother, had? Well, when we first got to North Dakota, I kissed that freckle right off his head. One day I was just kissing it and loving it when suddenly I noticed it was a different shape. I rubby rub rubbed it, and off it came. A couple people had suggested at the beginning that it might be a tiny blood splotch or something, but after it survived several baths and two weeks' worth of kisses, it was looking like I was right.
    Nope.
Ziah's most common look: baffled

Remember how I thought for sure he was teething early, what with the drool and period of restless nights and seeming discomfort?
    Nope.

*
Based on Zoralee, we, Jason and I, thought we produced skinny-legged little things. My favorite cloth diaper combination for her had been Kissaluvs' Size Zero fitteds with small Thirsties covers. Since the Kissaluvs go up to 15 pounds, they worked for Zora from birth until she was totally diaper free. So while I was pregnant with Ziah, I bought 10 of those jokers. I even got them as "seconds" for a discounted price, meaning they were new, just had aesthetic flaws that wouldn't affect performance. How happy was I! Even better, the Kissaluvs website said the "seconds" tended to be skinnier legged. Hoorah hoorah! Because I pop out skinny-legged babies!!!!
    Nope.


Also based on our experience with Zoralee, we feared we produced children who would rather stay bitterly and groggily and whinily awake, NO MATTER WHAT, rather than succumb to slumber.


    Nope.
When he's tired enough, we can actually lay Ziah down on his tummy and he'll go right to sleep. I am aware of the Back To Sleep thing, but I tend toward the theory that SIDS is caused by mattress toxins, so we've taken precautions that direction. Hope I'm right and it's not another "nope," cuz he sleeps way better on his belly. :o? He also sleeps for several hours at a whack in the night, several times 6 or 8. Once 10.


We kinda thought babies must need soothing intervention for every possible life hiccup.



    Nope!
This guy is a champion thumb-sucker when he's ready for sleep. Not only is it undeniably one of the most darling sights I've ever beheld, but so far that's all he uses it for.






You might think a mama would tire of kissing her baby boy's face all the day long, that there would be days she'd think of him as ordinary, rather than super handsome and super charming. You might assume she'd stop taking such delight in fat rolls, wide eyes, and gurgled utterances.

    Nope, nope, and nope.



7 comments:

melissa v. said...

LIKE

Christi said...

Baby boys rule.

Christi said...

That was actually from Max's mom.

Rena said...

I kinda thought you weren't going to post any more blogs, after me being disappointed every day (sometimes several times a day) for 2 weeks....NOPE! Ziah gets a blogpost, and I love it! And great picture of Jason and Ziah :)

Shana said...

I LOVE this post, Lori...isn't it so very true? Just when we think we have something figured out~we are WAYYYY off! And, I suppose this is why they also say kids will always keep us on our toes!

I love the freckle story-great!

That photo of Ziah and his Papa-fantastic! He looks VERY much like Ms. Zoralee when she was an infant.


Finally.....tell me what you are doing about the mattress thing? Did you just get a cover or what? We have looked at some organic crib mattresses-PRICEY! But, to avoid the off-gassing we are thinking it is worth it....that we need to do something. We actually were going to get a new mattress ourselves but have decided to wait because we are thinking (hoping) that it (being 7 years old) is probably done off-gasing and therefore is safe for us now at least. Otherwise the newer ones without the foams, glue, etc that are dangerous are about 4G!

*Reading Between the Lines* said...

Hey...I have learn that babies are not cut from the mold from the previous...some of my loved everything...some hated everthing the other loved. LOL
Good posts.
Keep ip the pictures...please.
Take care,
Nancy

lori said...

Shana - - well, these mattresses are older too, so possibly done off-gassing (???). They actually are part of the house's furnishings. I put Zoralee's little twin mattress into the sun on all sides for some disinfectant action. Then we put it in an allergen protective covering that zips all the way around it. Then I put a thick towel over top, where Z's head would be, then the sheet.

For ours, I have it in an allergen cover plus another thick mattress cover. I wash all the bedding frequently. I've got Ziah on a Thermarest mattress, which I found to not contain fire retardants. (?) Just to be safe though, I have covered it with two thick blankets.

What I'm actually concerned with is toxic gases that build up when the fungus that normally grows in bedding interacts with the fire retardants put into our mattresses. Check out this article:

http://www.healthychild.com/toxic-sleep/has-the-cause-of-crib-death-sids-been-found/

They've been wrapping infant mattresses in New Zealand, where the doctor lives who discovered this. He researched it and found the toxin because at that point, NZ's SIDS rates were like 2.something per 1000 (twice the world rate). Anyway, their success rate with properly wrapped mattresses has been 100%. Seriously. Over a 10 year time span, among indigenous and non-indigenous people - if people wrap their babies' mattresses, they simply do not die of SIDS. It's crazy.

What I really want to do is order the polyethylene covers that BabeSafe sells, but I haven't determined if they make them big enough for twin beds. Haven't looked into it enough yet...