Our Baby's First and Hopefully Last Surgery

Caleb's basically been a walking crawling ear infection since he started daycare the first week of November. Daycares are notably breeding grounds for germs regardless of how clean they look (and his looks super clean) because, well, they specialize in small people who generally have no sense of hygiene! The children let snot rivers flow freely down their faces, put everything in their mouths, and have no qualms about what they've touched - ever. It wasn't really surprising when Caleb caught his first cold during his first week there. We half-joked that he was building his immune system. Twelve weeks later, here we are. Several colds led to other things... congestion, ear infections, sleepless nights, a chronically medicated child. After 6 antibiotics over not quite 3 months, that became just as serious as the infections themselves. After meeting with an ear/nose/throat specialist, we decided to have tubes put in his ears. We decided this on Friday and the surgery was today.

Our little champ handled it like a pro (dare I say me, the medical pro??). We got to the surgical center at 6:30 a.m. and were home by 9 a.m. It was a 15 minute procedure (or less - he was actually only out of our arms for 15 minutes to include the trip from pre-op to the OR, then to recovery where we got to hold him again) and the only residual symptom he had was being a bit tired for a couple hours after. Hello unplanned early morning nap!

The tubes will likely fall out on their own in about a year, when hopefully his ears have developed a bit more and the fluid that was getting stuck behind his eardrum will be able to escape at the back of his sinuses/throat at that time. Until then, we have to be a little careful not to let water pour into his ears... no special treatment at bath time and if we dunk him underwater when swimming, he'll have to wear earplugs. The biggest benefits: the likelihood of future infections is really low, he won't be taking antibiotics because he won't have infections, and his hearing won't be compromised like it could have been with fluid stuck in there and/or scar tissue that results from chronic infections.

A few pics of our brave boy this morning:

Do you see how cute their pediatric gowns are? Of course, he makes everything look WAY cuter, too... ;)

The anesthesiologist gave him his mask to play with beforehand so he wouldn't fear it when he was on the table getting gassed. Caleb quite liked it. (Not sure what he'd think about it NOW, after how they used it on him to make him sleep and all!)

And this is the little champ, in recovery. Binky and his froggy blanket. Complete nirvana.

This Makes any Crappy Day Better!

To lighten my mood I just went and looked at Caleb pics. That's a pretty sure-fire way of making me smile in any situation.

Since I didn't share any Christmas morning pics on here, here is one of him doing what ALL KIDS INHERENTLY DO... climbing UP the slide! And here I thought slides were for sliding DOWN. Silly me :)

And one more. Paul made a castle for him out of a computer box. Front door, back double doors, windows... one big box and some duct and electrical tape. He (Caleb, not Paul - just to be clear) loves it and still plays in it/around it/on it every day!

One

One last post for the year. One more look back at everything that has happened this year. One more miletsone hit today: the 10 month mark. Lots of "ones."

I can't believe the end of 2011 is here. Although such a whirlwind, I clearly remember January and the baby shower at which so many awesome friends and family members celebrated the upcoming arrival of Caleb with me. As if it were yesterday, I remember the caravan of Mom & Bill with their trailer and me in my car, first to Santa Nella and then to Red Bluff - with Paul following 10 days later - to wait until Caleb was born. At the time, that seemed like the longest wait of my life. I remember seeing Caleb for the very first time and remember the overwhelming rush of emotion those first moments. It's still so very vivid to me.

March, April and May were all about bonding, adjustment, bottles, diapers and sleep! It was so good to find our groove... to find what worked for us. There were no arguments over who HAD to feed the baby or change his diaper. Can an adrenaline rush last for many months?? I went back to work in April and we got into a new groove with a new schedule, but it was an easy transition.

The summer months were so much fun. Every week from the time our nieces and nephews got out of school for summer break until the week they had to go back to school, one of them was here to babysit. It was great to have full-time in-home daycare, the cousins got to bond, and I got some good time with all of them :)

After the kids went back to school, I took another leave of absence from work. Those weeks were the most fun! At the beginning, Caleb turned 6 months and was turning into a fun interactive little person (from an adorably baby-ish baby). We played, went to the park, shopped, went to lunch with Daddy and with friends. The transition from my 6 weeks off went right into another 6 weeks that Paul took off from his work. That was a bonding extravaganza. Paul was in heaven as was Caleb. In that time, we took a week long vacation to Palm Springs and enjoyed the time we got to spend with him. Caleb hit so many milestones during this time - crawling and teeth to name two biggies.

Paul returned to work at the beginning of November and Caleb has been in full-time daycare since then. I am so, so happy we found a great daycare provider! After visiting a few places, my heart was heavy as I began to think I would have to settle in some way - whether it was a schedule I didn't agree with (3 hour naptimes?) or a distance I didn't want to travel (neighboring city that would add at least an hour of driving to each day). But on that fourth visit, I was so relieved to know we didn't have to settle on any one of the wants on our wish list. I am truly at ease when he's there... our provider is super!!!

So here we are in December. December 21st. Caleb is 10 months old today. He's on the verge of walking, has five adorably placed and spaced teeth, is eating mostly "real" food instead of baby food, squirms like a fish when getting his diaper changed (he has better things to do than slow down for that, you know), loudly expresses his opinions at times, climbs *over* Starr instead of around her, thinks Coco's growling "leave me alone" sounds are absolutely hysterical (uh ohhhh), and crawls through the doggy door faster than you can say "the doggy door is only for doggies!"

We have over 3,000 pictures that encompass everything from pre-birth ultrasounds to this week's trip to the beach. To skim through them beginning to end is just mind boggling, but what a great trip down memory lane. The best words on which to end 2011: happy, eager, proud, relieved, but most of all, grateful. Looking forward to a great 2012 for us, and for you!

Merry Christmas!!

Everyone takes their kid to the pet store to get the Santa pic, right??

Baby's First Christmas.

Our Little Chameleon

How fast things change. It seems Caleb is displaying/practicing/developing a new skill or attribute every day. Let's see... he's an official turbo crawler, has three teeth on the bottom (and none on top yet), pulls up on anything in front of him and walks around holding on to furniture transitioning from table to couch and so on, and is starting to clap! My absolute favorite, though, is when he waves bye-bye. It's soooooo cute and clumsy at this point... his whole arm waves. MELTS MY HEART! I even pretend I have to leave so we can do the whole bye-bye routine, I go into the garage, and then I come back into the house and do the whole "you're home!!!!" routine. Pure awesomeness. He also started the whole repeating-consonants thing with "babababababababa" and then moved to "mamamamamama." Of course I love the "mama" noise, but he knows no connection between "mamamama" and me..... but I still answer him as if he's talking to me ;)

He started daycare full-time when Paul went back to work (after a 6 week leave of absence) on November 2nd and since that time he has caught two colds, had two ear infections, and conquered all of it like a champ with the help of antibiotics. He's finally getting back to his non-sick sleep routine which lasts from about 7 p.m. to about 6:30 a.m. waking once or so for a bottle or snuggles. All that fun at daycare wears him out. He comes home so tired that sometimes it's hard just to get him to eat before the bedtime routine starts. It's hard seeing him so little throughout the work week so when I get the chance, I pick him up early.

Caleb was 9 months last Monday, November 21st, and we went for his checkup. Basically, he's the size of a 14 or 15 month old weight- and length-wise. I'll update with the real stats and a recent picture soon.

Happy Halloween!

No time for words other than life is great, Caleb is even better! Happy First Halloween, little man!

All dressed up for daycare

We nailed "happy, cute, sweet skeleton" this year. We'll try for scary another year...

A fun trip to Boccali's Pumpkin Patch in Ojai. Wasn't too fond of the hay poking him until we put a couple of pumpkins next to him :)

A "First" I Didn't Want Just Yet

Just when everything is going great, bam! His first cold. I am so sad! He wheezes and sneezes and coughs and it sucks. I wasn't looking forward to *this* milestone :( I would love to make it all better so he could actually get some good rest, alas this too shall pass.