First - the new photo album.
Then - the past two months in review:
Greg and I had this theory that Oliver would start eating more solid food, and get over some teething pain, and start sleeping more or less through the night. Once that happened, we would have the whole night to ourselves - we could cook dinner, and watch TV, and have no one else in our bed.
But that's not how it happened. Instead, Oliver got a really severe stomach virus. After a week of regular puking, his fever spiked at 104.6. We couldn't get it down because he kept throwing up the Tylenol. As I was en route to David Kraut's Sunday afternoon wedding in New Jersey, Greg called terrified to say Oliver was listless. He brought the baby to the emergency room, and I met him there as soon as I could get a cab home. Oliver was fine once he got some Tylenol into him (suppositories - who knew?), and after another day or two the stomach flu symptoms passed. But a cold and a hacking cough lingered for weeks longer. He's fine now during the day, but still waking up coughing and congested at night, despite the massive amount of steam we've got swirling around his room. (Here's a more detailed ER visit account, written for parents.)
You can't sleep train a sick baby, with crying or without, so instead we've got a new bedfellow. He's up every hour or so. Sometimes he eats a little and goes right back to sleep, and sometimes he cries and coughs for a while instead. I sleep better with him in the bed, since it's easier than making nocturnal trips to the crib, but Greg sleeps worse, so some nights he spends on the couch.
We've been waiting for this all to resolve and our sleep deprivation to recede and our lives to go back to normal. But lately I've been thinking that I need to let go of that particular fantasy. I don't think that Normal is on its way back any time soon. I guess I better start returning phone calls and making plans, rather than waiting until I get a little more rest...
In the Good News/Baby Development area, Oliver is learning to get around. He can't crawl forwards just yet, but he can go backwards and sideways. Which is kinda funny. The learning process involves a lot of pelvic thusts, or as Melissa calls it "humping the floor." He also does baby push-ups (Greg likes to encourage him as though he's a contestant in the NFL draft) and he's working on baby sit-ups, but right now they're just baby crunches. He can sometimes pull himself up to standing, and sometimes just makes it to kneeling. At any rate, we lowered his crib. He walks when we hold his hands, and he's using his new skill to chase down cats and dogs who don't want to play with him.
I made my first-ever trip to a playground as a parent two weeks ago. It was odd to actually use the equipment as intended, during the daylight, with neither cigarette nor joint in hand. Oliver likes the swings.
In personal news - Greg is considering an offer to teach at the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), and we hope to move down there at the end of the summer. Here's a typical house in our price range in Savannah. We show you this not to torture you (well, OK, a little), but to encourage you to join us on our Southern adventure. It's a small, beautiful, liveable city, 15 minutes from the beach, with a new, young, arts-centered population, and there are jobs to be had. Also, we figure we'll be rich there. Which will be such a nice change from being, well, I can't really say "poor", but it's a awfully small apartment for a three-person family.
My job is much less exciting, but if anyone wants to talk about sustainable carpet, I'm your girl. I'm leaning towards having our office re-carpeted with this cool cradle-to-cradle stuff developed by Shaw in consultation with Bill McDonough. And I'm still working on my nefarious project to make all the Community Board's actions totally accessible to the public via a new website. Hopefully I can get it done before I go.
So, that's pretty much it for the past two months - fever, puking, ER visit, newfound physical mobility, SCAD job offer, carpet. That sums it up.
We miss everyone we haven't seen, and invite you all out to Brooklyn to see the baby and the massive amount of baby gear, and maybe talk to us for the two hours between when Oliver goes to sleep and we collapse from exhaustion.
All our love,
Michelle, Greg, and Oliver
