The entries here are arranged from most recent to least recent. That way you can find out the latest news easily!
Now that Max is home, there has been a substantial slow down in interesting news and time for putting it into the web pages. But I'll keep going as long as people are interested. And probably even beyond that for my own purposes.
Hanukah is going well except last night we had no menorah. You see, during the second night of Hanukah, the second candle bent over while it was burning and lit the third candle holder on fire. I wouldn't have thought they'd make menorahs inflammable. Even though the menorah was in a different room, I caught it quickly and extinguished the 5 or 6 inch flames. The smell of burnt lucite filled the living room for hours. Euch. We've since bought fire escape rope ladders for our bedroom and the livingroom. Although we can jump to safety, we'd probably need such a thing to carry Max if we needed to get out in a hurry.
I realized today that Max is the first (biological) great grandkid for all of my grandparents (now deceased). He's doing very well. I wasted lots of time yesterday updating his web pages with new pictures and other stuff (in case you want to check them out again).
While we were waiting for the lab results, we plopped him on the scale. He was 6 lb, 12 oz (!) which is a 1.5 oz/day increase over his last weight. I'm told the norm is close to 1 oz/day. I'm wondering when he'll catch up, weight-wise, to his age. I got a growth chart from the pediatrician so I can start making plots soon.
Yesterday was Thanksgiving and that was pretty good, I think. Max slept soundly the entire day while his extended family stared at him and burst into excited laughter every time any of his facial muscles twitched. When it was time for everyone to go, he woke up and acted charming. I think people were impressed and agreed that he is the cutest baby ever.
Some new developments:
and...
Thanksgiving was fun. We spent countless hours (close to 7, I think) watching Max sleep. I think everyone enjoyed it except my brother who couldn't understand what all the excitement was about. I can appreciate his attitude. I never enjoyed little babies until now that I have one of my own.
Two quick Max-related stories. You know how parents have this particular bounce they do when they need to comfort their babies? I find myself bouncing up and down even if I hear Max crying in another room! Although he is very good at focusing and looking around, when Max is not actually looking at something, his eyes will sometimes anti-cross. The opthomologist called this a ``divergent squint'' and it's something we'll have to watch.
and...
Here's a quick list of Max's most and least favorite things (everything else he's pretty indifferent to):
Max's favorite things:
Max's least favorite things:
So here is the current medical situation, as I see it.
However, when I sit back and think a little, there's lots of neat stuff going on. Here are some things I thought of while feeding him last week.
One thing is that we have a little nickname for him. We call him ``tiger'' for a few reasons. For one thing, it's sort of a standard little boy name. But that's actually the weakest reason. Another is that, when I hold him, I am reminded of the opening and closing scenes from the ``Lion King'' when the daddy lion holds up the baby lion for everyone to see. That brings in the ``great cat'' motif. But the biggest reason is that, when he gets hungry, he snaps at the bottle (or our fingers) like a little baby carnivore. It's so cute.
Lisa and I have been splitting the nighttime feedings. Usually I'll go to bed in the livingroom around 10pm. Lisa and Max stay in the bedroom and Lisa wakes up whenever Max needs something. At 3am, she brings Max's basinet out to the livingroom and retires until around 9am. When things are going well, Max takes about 2 oz of formula every 3 hours. Lately, however, he's having trouble sucking because of his stuffy nose. The result is that he's taking about 1 oz of formula every 2 hours. That's less food for him and less sleep for us.
Right now, he's very congested and it sounds pretty bad when he coughs. Before that, though, it was really funny. He sort of yells when he coughs, ``kweh!'' Once or twice, he did the yell but forgot to cough. It sounded like, ``heh!'' Lisa and I couldn't stop laughing.
He's still not officially smiling yet but he hints at it more and more often. I think he's going to be an amazing smiler: big, warm smiles all time time. Similarly with his hair. He doesn't have much yet but he's starting to hint at it. There is every reason to believe that he'll be quite the hairy little boy. (In a good way, of course.)
Max has gotten some really cool gifts in the last few weeks. Of course there is his number line with positive and negative whole numbers and his environmentally-correct mammoth (made from reused bottle caps). But he has gotten some other neat stuff too. Some people have given him copies of their favorite children's books. We have some real winners. One of Lisa's co-workers made Max a baby quilt that is stunning. He got an adult-proof portable playpen (adult-proof in the same way that some medicine containers have adult-proof caps that no adult can open). Some of the big ticket gifts include his crib, stroller, furniture, and layette. They are all working out really well. The most personal gift was a hand-made lambchop outfit so Max can dress up like his little friend. It'll be awhile before it fits him.
Right now, I'm really tired and almost burnt out from this. Most of the time, however, I think it's pretty wonderful having him around. He makes the special things that Lisa and I do together much more special. We shared our first family shabbot a few weeks ago and it was very moving. We even enjoy our standard ``bring in chinese food and rent a video'' nights much more with him around. It's spectacular.
Yesterday Lisa got worried about the rattling sound in Max's breathing. We went to the pediatrician who got an X-ray to rule out pneumonia (seems ok) and told her to come back again today to be sure it wasn't turning into anything worse. The thing to worry about, as we were told quite often in the hospital, is RSV (a respiratory virus). Even a mild case can put little guys like Max back in the hospital. Hopefully it's nothing and we're just being safe.
Lisa is off to the doctor with Max. I did most of the work to get him ready on time, and let me say that as hard as it is to take care of Max, doing it in a time efficient manner is well-neigh impossible. (At least for me.)
Max really seems to be growing like a weed. It is likely that he's over 5 1/2 pounds now. Just this morning, I put a newborn diaper on him instead of the preemie diapers he's had since the beginning. I think he really enjoys being here. (We certainly enjoy having him here!) Almost every night I dream that he starts to be able to talk. I dreamt last night that we played ``what's that?'' and he identified his foot for me. That should be fun, I think.
A close childhood friend of Lisa's is flying in tonight with her new spouse. It should be another interesting weekend.
Not much else. He's still not really smiling consistently. He can sort of crawl with help. Well, actually it is more of a ``pull yourself along the ground on your belly by pushing off Mommy or Daddy's hand.'' In fact, his knees do not quite descend below his diaper yet so it isn't possible for him to crawl in the standard sense. His cry is getting very strong. That's mixed news if you ask me.
Both sets of grandparents are coming up this weekend. I hope we can all handle it. Lisa put up a set of rules and regulations to make sure that Max is handled with care. I'm more worried about how Lisa and I will deal with the invasion. I think no one is actually staying over so it won't be too bad.
I believe all the news would be too much. The news in Max's web page is already nearly 87k. The short version is this. Lisa went into the hospital at the end of July because a diagnostic ultrasound indicated that the baby wasn't growing well. A week later, Max Isaac L. was delivered by Caesarian section 3 months premature at 1 lb, 1/2 oz. We spent 88 days visiting Max in the Special Care Nursery in the hospital and he steady gained weight and strength. We took him home last Monday at 4 lb, 1/2 oz, a day before his original due date, and he's doing phenomenally.
I kept a diary during this whole period and collected digital pictures
and movie clips and (poor quality) sound bites of Max. They are
available in http://www.cs.brown.edu/people/mll/max. Now
that he's home, I've slowed down on putting things in there. But
we're starting to get the swing of parenting (it's really wonderful)
and I'll continue to add things as interesting stuff happens.
Later...
Max isn't feeling well. He just had a little epsiode in which his
nose got stuffy and he couldn't cry and breathe at the same time. It
was very scary for him and for us. Once we figured out what was
happening (at first it looked like some sort of seizure), we sat him
up and suctioned out his nose and he calmed down.