Nicknames

So far Atticus has inspired many silly affectionate names in his almost five months of life:

1. Baby loaf (inspired by a block of Tillamook cheese)
2. Fuss bucket
3. Pukesaurus
4. Hiccopotamus
5. Inch worm (Atticus likes to slide away on his back)
6. Pee Pee Herman
7. Puke butt (hey, this is from Daddy, not me!)
8. Mr. Drama King
9. Atticus Eruptus
10. Baby giraffe (due to his favorite stuffed animal and tall body)

Look at my hunk-o-burnin'-love

I know it is slightly rediculous that I haven't put hardly any pictures of Atticus on here. These are favorite as of late.

What's in, what's out

Now that Atticus is a whole 3 1/2 months old, different things impress him in different ways.
WHAT IS IN:
1. stuffed animals - nowadays Atticus spends hours holding them and sucking on them with fierce concentration

2. discovering feet - now he grips his feet as if they are gonna fall off. I'm surprised he hasn't done this with his penis yet.

3. playing with mobile toys in his bouncer- now he has the eye and hand coordination to reach out and touch them. It is really thrilling that just some dangly, rattle things can capture his attention for twenty minutes at a time. I can actually take a shower without Atticus screaming until he turns red.

4. bath time- he loves water already so much that he actually giggles with the widest smile ever.

5. sitting in a shitty diaper- lately it seems if I catch a loaded diaper I wouldn't have known beside the distinct whipped cream canister sound. Atticus will just be sitting there with a big smile. Luckily since I've been home all the time he'll always be changed pronto. Can't always guarantee that with a babysitter.

WHAT IS OUT:
1. pacifiers- Atticus spits these out with such disgust now as if offended I dare try put something in his mouth when its not milk.

2. shoes and socks- it is just plain talented at kicking one or more socks or shoes when I had just saw them on. So defiant and lovable, the little kick stand!

3. being swaddled- nothing will hold Atticus back. He refuses to let his arms be bound. Automatically the arms come out when I bundle him up for the night. Sometimes when I swaddle him the response is a pitiful cry.

4. stop lights in the car- the moment the vehicle stops Atticus tells me the ride is not fun anymore. Until we start moving again.

Stay tuned... things will change again in a week.

Morning ritual

Each morning runs into the next. Around 2am or 4:30am, somewhere in between he wakes up. By now I've become an expert with which grunts mean he's about to cry. I pick up his tiny, long gangly body, reminding me once again half awake how precious and infant he is. Moments like this I cherish, and being half awake the realization of being a mother crashes down on me hard. The heaviness of it.

His legs kick in anticipation in the bassinett. More and more each day his body grows out of the tiny newborn stage to a very long, increasingly heavier infant body. Now Atticus takes up my whole lap and sits up while I feed him. Afterwards he satisfies his constant need to suck by sticking his favorite toy giraffe in his mouth. Atticus actually holds his giraffe tight against him, gripping him and moving him along with his reflexive jerks. He's already interested in toy animals, a stage I never grew out of. My bunny Hazel resembling the worn velveteen rabbit is testament to that. Everyday most hours are spent feeding Atticus. Unfortunately this has made my journaling and blogging suffer. So many initial details have been lost and he's growing too fast. I love these days with him, where I prop him up on his boppy while I do housework and he sits there watching me. I know he can only slide down, but that is the extent of his attempts at getting away. I don't want this to change yet- our days together I can carry him along like an extension of me. I will cry when I'm not able to lug him around and he runs away, discovering his surroundings himself. I know this is selfish, but time is going too fast. When I am offered a job eventually we'll never have this daily bonding again. Atticus' eyes only follow where I am. He's so attached and spends every waking hour with me. But today I can still hold Atticus and experience that rush of love when he peers up at my face in wonder and appreciation. Fin.

Atticus is here, and so is Mama's new laptop!

Atticus Stone Langdon was cut out of my abdomen and came screaming into this world at 5;40 pm, November 27th, 2009. He came curiously on his due date, although I went through one complication after another. First off, when I checked into the hospital right before Thanksgiving dinner, I was under the impression that they would send me away at first since my contractions became irregular. But then my blood pressure kept reading high, and would not go down.
"I cannot let you leave the hospital without your baby. We don't like sending someone away with such high blood pressure and protein leaking into the urine. And this is the day. You're gonna have this baby," the surgeon told us matter of factly. This news stunned both Tom and I, and just as I felt that burning flush of my cheeks and butterflies in the stomach, Tom choked up with tears. I will tattoo this onto my memory forever. Tom was so surprised, taken aback by the realization that this was finally happening. I found it cute also how much of a nervous wreck he was the whole day and a half that I was in labor. After being hooked up to monitors, preventing me from walking around, the doctors waited for several hours to see if my body would naturally dialate more than 3 centimeters. By this time the contractions officially became excruciating. I broke down and asked for the epidural. And... what relief. All through the night I never advanced in dialating. Even after administrating Pitocen for nine hours. This baby was not going to come out. My cervix became so swollen from Atticus' head pushing up against it. Anyways, the c-section started finally late Friday afternoon. The bright lights, the multiple surgeons, all of it made me nervous. I had already went through so much. I started to cry. Tom held my hand and told me everything was alright. A minute later he was out.
"Oh, he's definetely a boy," one surgeon said. Tom filled me in on why. The moment Atticus came out he pissed on four different surgeons. The first words out of Tom's mouth was, "oh, he's cute!" When I finally could hold him, I agreed and rejoiced in his healthy, chubby face.