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I'm considerate like that

So Friday morning saw me at the OBGYN's office, bright and early.  So bright and early, in fact, I didn't even get to kiss my Shorty good morning, because he was still in snooze city when I left.

So I'm chatting it up with Amy, catching up on the last year and talking about timeframes for trying for a second baby.  And then we have to get down to the business for which I, completely naked under my leave-it-open-in-the-front sheet gown, was there. Starting with the breast exam.

And Amy jokes that we probably don't even need to do the breast exam, since I'm still breastfeeding at night and therefore probably touching my boobs more than 90 percent of women anyway.  At which point, I open up the gown to expose the gals for Amy.  And then I peer down, catching something slightly amiss.

So I blush briefly, excuse myself and explain that my boy is battling a bit of a headcold.  Because how else would I appropriately preface the act of peeling a 12.5-hour-old, big, crusty, green booger off my right nipple?

Hey, I'm considerate like that.

At which point Amy and the nurse standing by completely lost it, howling with laughter.

Comic relief in extended breastfeeding.  Good stuff.

Some of my best drinking friends

Holy shit, we've been acting like stupid 21-year-olds together for ten years now.  TEN YEARS.

And while we see each other far less frequently than we did ten years ago, and while our visits ten years later involve far less cheap beer and Bankers Club than they used to (well, most visits), we sure do jam as much celebrating and reminiscing into each window of catching up as possible.

Now with our babies.  And toddlers.  And "for the kids" now has a completely different meaning for us, one we're all learning the joys and limitations of along the way.

And how funny it is to watch our littles -- little versions of ourselves -- interact with each other. 

I like to think they'll grow up to be friends. 

Although Erin has already made clear that Cayden will not be allowed into Abby and Nora's East Halls dorm room their freshman year. 

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Christmas Cookies

Much messier this year than ever before (Cayden got into the flour, then threw spoonfulls around the kitchen, as evidenced by the chair), but a whole lotta fun to have a little helper to make and eat chocolate chip cookies.

More

So there are a lot of things new parents become “more” of, when a child turns a comfortable couple into a floundering family. Or at least things Daddy and I have become “more” of over the last 16 months:

More tired
More careful
More vulnerable
More fulfilled
More scared
More busy
More conscientious
More imaginative
More empathetic
More doubtful
More spiritual
More hopeful
More frugal
More charitable
More patient

But you want to know the biggest more we’ve discovered? More productive. And that realization hit me over the head like a frying pan last Saturday around 11 a.m.

The Saturday after Thanksgiving. Let’s rewind three or four years and see what was happening around 11 a.m. Not much, considering we were still sleeping off Friday night’s celebration and staring down a great big day of zero commitment, zero plans and zero initiative. Save maybe getting some Christmas decorations out, but only if inspiration really hit.

The Saturday after Thanksgiving 2010? We were up by 6:45 a.m., and before lunch I had done a load of laundry, put the diapers through three cycles, unloaded the dishwasher, cleaned the hardwood and kitchen floors, cleaned both the upstairs and downstairs bathrooms, pruned the roses and raked the leaves from the front and back yards to the curb.

So the question becomes, will this state of super-fly productivity persist, even when Cayden grows old enough to understand the value of sleeping in and lazy afternoons? I hope not; I enjoyed the luxury of downtime.

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