4.07.2008

Adventures in Parenting

A post over at Antique Mommy got me thinking about some of the now funny adventures we've had in learning to become parents (if you have time, read Antique Mommy's too, it's hilarious).

When we were about the leave the hospital with Ella, the nurses made us give her a bath first. It seemed like the hardest possible way to do it (we had to stick her in a small tub, not one of the handy baby bath tubs). In any case, the poor girl looked like she was freezing by the time we were done, so Brennan picks her up and holds her close to warm her up as he moves her over to the towel. At which point, Ella poops right down the front of his shirt. Of course he didn't have a change of clothes, but I had stolen one of his shirts to wear to the hospital, so he was able to wear that. We knew our place after that.

Then when Ella was a few months old, she started crying over her bedtime bottle. Just screaming. Howling. This went on for about an hour. She would chow down on her bottle for 2 seconds, and then spit it out. We could not figure it out for the life of us. Then we noticed the bottle was just as full as when we started. Turned out the hole in the nipple wasn't totally cut, so she wasn't getting anything. Brennan says, and he's probably right, that had a representative from Playtex been in the room, I would have killed him or her with my bare hands.

She must have been quite a bit older one day at the Pizza Ranch for lunch, when I noticed something clear and goopy had fallen out of her diaper. The silica gel (or whatever it is) in diapers that does all the absorbing was falling out. That's when I discovered the entire package of Huggies I had purchased had slits in the back of them. The package hadn't been damaged, so it happened before they made it in the plastic. That pretty much rendered the entire package useless. Although I was able to return it to Target, and then Huggies sent me some coupons.

I will now admit my most humiliating. When Ella started eating, I was hyper sensitive to choking hazards. It really freaked me out. So, yes, I did break her first cheerios in half. THERE. I said it.

I'm not going to say I've made no mistakes with Natalie, or had nothing humorous, but none are as notable as those first time parent things. Anybody else have something good?

~~~~~~~~~

So this weekend I beat Brennan in Scrabble. He actually went off to sulk a bit. Ella goes to comfort him. "Dad, sometimes I don't win games either. So I go in my room, and sit on my bed...and I think of a tricky game to play that I can win!"



2 comments:

jersey said...

Forgive me, but don't Cheerios have holes in them, which would allow breathing? Wouldn't breaking them in half turn them in to choking hazards? ;-)

And, yes, you can totally decline this message.

Libby Design said...

Ha! That post on Antique Mommy made me laugh...I had the same thing happen with Carson. Nothing like a good pee-bath for the 'ole ear. :)

Another story about being a new parent that involves Chad (because I was the perfect mom from day 1 – right?)...he was home for the summer with Peyton and I had just returned to work. I got this frantic phone call saying that she had projectile pooped across the room and he didn't know how the clean it up. Well he had called about 2pm and I was off work at 3pm. He has a tendency to exaggerate things sometimes, so I told him I'd leave work early to come home and help (pathetic, I know). I rush home and go up into the nursery. Oh my...he wasn't kidding. The kid had completely soiled my cute little barnyard nursery. It was everywhere...on the walls, on the diaper stacker, on the carpet, all down the changing table, even on my cute little coordinating lightswitch cover.

After I cleaned up the mess I went downstairs and asked Chad to give me a little more info. on what exactly had happened. He proceeded to tell me that he took off Peyton's dirty diaper and cleaned her up, but then realized he hadn't gotten out a clean diaper. As he turned to get one out of the diaper stacker he said this stream of poop came shooting into his chest. His exact words of what he did next were, "I yelled 'IN COMING' and ducked until she was done". Thus the poop on the wall, lightswitch cover, etc. See, that's the difference between guys and girls...moms would stand there and be a human shield until they were able to cover it up. Guys just duck and cover, then call the moms to come clean up the mess. Typical.