Ears Pierced- Mommy Daughter Day

Well, young lady, you've been talking about it for weeks and months and years. But recently you got serious about it. We told you it would hurt, and you said "but only for a little bit." You love sparkly stuff, and thought there was one area in particular on your body where sparkly stuff just won't hang by itself. So, on the eve of your fifth birthday, you, and your Mommy, Aunt Sham, and Yaya went to the mall.... went to Claire's...and....well...see for yourself.

Before

After

Notice anything different? That's right! You - with the support of these lovely, wonderful, important, strong ladies in your life- got your EARS PIERCED!

There were some tears. There were lots of smiles and hugs. There was LOTS of shopping!

You were SO enchanted with the store...

you were so BRAVE....

and you are SO SO happy with your decision.

The only problem, for you, is that you can't CHANGE your earrings for ONE month! You want to try on a different pair everyday! 

You are also so responsible! You have taken charge of the cleaning and turning of your earrings. You do it twice a day by yourself, remind us to remind you when you haven't, and are such a wise young lady beyond your years!

This day was also amazing because it was a "Mommy and Me Day" (with some company from your Aunt and Grandma too).

You had especially told us that you were missing Mama a lot ever since the school year started, and that you faked a headache with the hopes that Mama would stay home with you and take care of you. We figured this out all together that you were just missing your Mama! So you had a special ladies day all to yourself. 

And now you and Mama get to share earrings too!

An Earful

Let me paint the scene for you. Sunday. A few hours before Julia's 3rd birthday party. Aidan, you and Mommy were playing around, giggling, and basically tomfoolin' when mommy- who had you in her arms- saw something shiny in your ear. She asked me to get a flashlight. We peered into your ear and both agreed: we saw something in there. And it was too deep and small and wedged in there for us to even try to get out.

We asked you if you had something in your ear.

You were honest, a bit sheepish, but honest.

You said "yes. It's a bead. I saw it outside karate and I put it in my ear and it fell out. Then I put it in again."

You were a little embarrassed by it, but mostly nonchalant. As if you'd forgotten it was in there.

WHAT??????????

Okay. So. We. What? huh?

Thoughts flew left and right. Right and left. What do we do?

This was a Sunday mind you. Karate was on the previous Thursday...and Tuesday...and the Thursday before that. How long had this been in your ear? You didn't have many details.

Okay. So. No time to panic. You and I went to the Urgent Care.

In the waiting room you drew some pictures. I was particularly interested in this one:

"I love it! Tell me about your drawing!" I said.

"It's a chalk monster. With ears. With a bead in his ear." you replied.

See the bead?

NOW you tell us! But, no matter. It was a really cute drawing.

And then you decided to do more monsters.

Finally we were admitted to see the doctor.

They read your vitals.

You chewed their ears off about what was in your ear (now you're talkative!)

...And the doctor tried three times. Unsuccessfully. You cried and we decided to not try to push it any further.

He was embarrassed and said he wouldn't charge us. "I've never been unable to get something out of a kid's ear before!"

But...the good news was that that bead wasn't going anywhere. It was locked in there tight.

So....we went to your sister's birthday party!

Fun. fun. fun. with a bead stuffed in your ear.

On Monday, Mommy took you to see a Pediatric ENT.

Is this it?

He tried to get the bead out. Unsuccessfully.

He said it was too jammed in there.

So, they gave you prescription ear drops to help reduce the swelling and schedule an in-office appointment for Thursday (actually they had originally scheduled your appointment for after Halloween, but Mommy and I didn't want you to be in pain and have a bad Halloween...you'd been looking forward to it for so long! So Mommy asked super nice and saved Halloween by getting the appointment scheduled for before Halloween!). They'd have to put you under anesthesia to make sure you'd hold still.

It was around this time that your ear really started to hurt. You were grumpy and on edge...and we were worried. Your ear hurt. And there was nothing we could do.

We talked a lot during this period about various things we were not allowed to wedge in our various orifices. Lesson was being learned.

Finally, Thursday arrived.   

You went in.

 

And out came this.

Sweet relief! For you...and for your worried parents. 

Look at that thing! Remind me to ask you if you remember this so I can get a straight answer out of you as to why that would look like an appealing thing to put in an ear!

Later that night, you told us tales of how the doctors put a circle over your face and you passed out.

And we told you, "yes...that's right. and while you were asleep they took they bead out of your ear."

You looked very surprised. And ecstatic. You didn't believe us, and started feeling your ear. You didn't realize that that's why you went to the doctor that morning, and didn't realize that it was gone, you silly boy!

We told you again that the bead was out of your ear. "Yes! Yes!" you yelled and gave us big hugs.

"...and I will never put anything in my ear ever ever again."

Sweet relief and a good earful to hear that...









Some Strong Words For You

Last night when I was doing some research on the internet, I came across a parenting study that I'd never heard of.

Check it out: "Twin studies show that language development is as much as 50 percent genetic, yet researchers say that the single biggest determinant in a child's language acquisition is exposure to language. Infants who have more early language exposure score higher in IQ tests, perform better academically and are more socially competent. Apparently, every word counts. According to a study done by Dr. Betty Hart and Dr. Todd Ridley, babies who heard an average of 2,100 words per hour scored higher on standardized tests at age 3 than did children whose parents hadn't been as verbal."

So we don't really care about test scores or anything like that, nor are we even looking forward 3 years or even to your first spoken words. We just want you to be a healthy kiddo. And basically the study says that the more a baby is spoken to directly, the better his or her neural development will be. That can include vocabulary later on, but it's just good for the wiring up front. And, really, I just want an excuse to tell you EVERYTHING!

The study recommends that a baby have 30,000 words spoken to them every day!


That sounds like an awful lot, but when you come out, we're gonna have no problem talking to you! And anyway, that's only 20 words per minute. But, of course we can't talk to you 24 hours a day.

I tried doing this once to your mother and she did not approve.


At any rate though, even though we talk to you some while you're in the belly, and sing to you as well, expect to have your ears chewed off (not literally, of course; we don't own a dingo).

If there's one thing your Dad is good at, it's talking. I can talk so well that I even talk in my sleep!

Your Mom and I are going to read to you, narrate what's going on to you and just tell you everything about the world.

It'll be a one sided conversation at first, well, at least on the verbal front. But it will be so much fun just to chat with you face to face.

In no more that 18 days (and more likely somewhere around 11 days), we'll be able to have our first tete a tete, and I can hardly wait.

I hope you like hearing me and your Mom talk, because you're about to get an earful of about 30,000 words a day! (and don't worry, because I can do 30,000 in my sleep!)

Beat it

It finally happened last night!

After months of trying, and waiting patiently, and continuous effort, it finally happened.

No, your Mom's belly button didn't turn into an outie. It's still an inny. Although, it is a weird one...sometimes it protrudes more than others. But, overall, it's an inny.

No, you weren't born. It's too early for that!

Yes, "LOST" came back on, but that's not what I'm talking about.

What I'm all excited about went down like this:

After LOST was over, I tucked your Mom into her new bed (the couch) and sung you a lullabye. Then I put my ear to your Mom's belly to try to hear your heartbeat again.

After several ear placements (and several iterations of you pushing against my face), I finally heard a heart beat.

Convinced it was not your beat, but your Mom's, I started tap the rhythm out on your Mom's arm.

Not knowing what I was doing at all, she said "What are you doing?"

"Is that your heartbeat?" I asked.

She put her fingers to her neck to check her pulse.

"Nope!" she replied.

And with that "nope," I knew that the loud, strong heartbeat I was hearing was actually yours!

I've been putting my ear to your Mom's belly for at least 10 weeks- because the books all said I should have been able to hear your heartbeat. And for 10 weeks, I never heard it.

And finally, last night, I heard your heart pumping blood through your body. I've heard your heart many times on the Doppler, but to hear it with my naked ears- now that was something special. Even more special than the premiere of "LOST," if you can imagine that!

So, be warned, I'm putting my ear to the belly again tonight, for a chance of hearing your ticker tick once more.

Book Learnin' : Ear to Belly

We used to think "What to Expect When You're Expecting" was THE only pregnancy book you needed. In fact, it was really the only viable pregnancy book we had, aside from The Caveman's Guide to Pregnancy, the creepy, hilariously out-of-date, cartoon fetus book Mimi gave us from the 60s ("Freddy the Fetus") and the equally creepy, out-of-date, incredibly graphic photo book from the 70s Bibi gave us.

Not quite the same as Uncle Jeremy's poster.

But, when visiting our friends Iris and David the other day, they opened our eyes to a bunch of really cool books, including one by Jenny McCarthy (who used to be on a poster in your Uncle Jeremy's room...but not for her skills as a pregnancy humorist.) But one of the coolest and most useful books they showed us "Your Pregnancy Week by Week."

Hopefully she's asleep and not passed out due to a severe allergic reaction to daffodils and ragweed.

I bring up these books because, you know kids these days, they'll try anything they see in a book.

In the 13th week chapter of that "Week by Week" book, I saw a picture of a Father placing his ear against his wife's pregnant belly, as if he were on the belly phone. I thought, "well, if that guy can hear his baby's heartbeat with his naked ear, then I should too!"

So I gave it a try, and put my ear directly on your Mom's belly. This was very weird. I heard all sorts of gurgles and squeaks and crunches and sizzles...but no heartbeat yet. I think the book lied to me.

But I'm definitely going to keep trying!

I bet you can hear your Mom's heartbeat...and maybe soon you'll be able to hear us out here in the non-wombed world! So, maybe we should start reading these books aloud so you can hear!

Music to your Ears

Yesterday I told you that your Mom's sense of hearing is heightened.

Well, last night, while reading "What to Expect when you're Expecting," I learned something else pretty interesting about ears:

In this, the 11th week of your development, your ears are supposedly fully formed and look just like regular human ears. The book said something about your ears not necessarily being on the right place of your head quite yet, but at least you have ears!

The timing is perfect because tonight, we're going to your first real concert. Sadly, it's your mother's and my first real concert too. Sure, we've been to symphonies, outdoor concerts, washed-up rock star concerts at food festivals and smaller who-are-they? concerts. But tonight is the real deal, and you get to be there in utero!

So, for your first entree into live music, we present: Paul McCartney!

Now, Paul McCartney was 1/4 of a really famous rock group called the Beatles, who were broken up long before your mother or I were born. In fact, John Lennon (another Beatle) was murdered the year we were born. But, the Beatles' music transcends time and eras, and your mother and I are both HUGE Beatles fans.

The Beatles! Paul isn't wearing any shoes...just like you!

We're such huge Beatles fans that we have several names we're considering for you that actually come from Beatles music! So it's pretty fitting that this will be your first concert!

Don't worry-- I did some checking online and you will be perfectly safe inside your Mom's tummy. There's enough cushioning in there that the loud noises and vibrations won't even budge you! But, hopefully you'll be able to hear some beautiful music! And maybe he'll play one of the songs that inspired your potential name!

Afterall, you just got those new ears in (even if they're not in the right location yet). You might as well put them to good use!

Now's as good of a time as any to start playing you some music. There are lots of songs that come on our iTunes that make me think of you and, surprise surprise, a lot of these songs are by the Beatles or their members (post break-up).

Here's one that makes me think of how much fun we're going to have together once you come out!




Here's another one that always makes me think of your beautiful mother, even if she can't stand to be near me for too long because of my scent(yeah, we're still dealing with that).




Hopefully Paul McCartney will play both of these songs tonight-- if he does, it was my plan all along to have him serenade the both of you!