Nobody told me that babies can squirt their poop. Maybe I read about explosive bowl movements on somebody’s blog or another but in my mind it was a totally different thing. I thought it was like one of those little accordian bottles of puff paint squirting, not full-on paint ball wars! Oh my goodness! Baby Bug got me twice today! I think I should wear goggles when I change her.

This was not what I needed when I don’t have that many clothes to wear in my sort-of-six-months-along-but-not pregnant body shape. She got the changing table pad, her about-to-be-put-on clean diaper, my last clean spit up rag and me! And I was standing a good foot away from her at the time. I screamed it scared me so bad. Toby rushed in from the other room thinking a knife had fallen into her eyeball or something. “No, it’s just your daughter and her amazing power rifle butt.” I had to tell him.

Today was one of those not-so-under-control days. I seem to have two types of days in my new mother-hood roll: a kick ass, I can do anything, I’m a super-mom day and a four-things-have-gone-wrong-at-the-same time, I’m going to just lose it day. On the good days I get the dishes done and I brush my teeth. I cook dinner at dinner time (something besides warmed up lasagna) and I have lots of time to coo and cuddle with Baby Bug. I manage to get in all 8 feedings of the day and she eats for more than two minutes at a time before nodding off into a nap. And sometimes I even remember to water the plants.

On a bad day, like today, I cry and scream at Toby that he’s not helping me enough. I lose it when I realize Baby Bug has just soiled her last clean diaper and the only diapers I have left are the too big scratchy ones that rub up against her infected umbilical cord. The hospital told us not to use alcohol on it and to fold her diaper down so that it can dry out and fall off. Well, Baby Bug is taking after me and she is short waisted so that means her diapers come up to her chest, old man style.

I can only use the Pampers “N” size and not the “1″ size because the “1″ size are way way way too big. When I ran out of the “N” size, I thought I could just cut the top off the “1″ size but that was a BIG MISTAKE. Now, not only did I have runny yellow poop all over everything, I also had the fluffy insulation stuff from inside the diaper all over the place too. It was like I was trying to tar and feather my little girl with mustard and little fluffy cotton curds.

And then she started SCREAMING at me because I was running an hour an a half late on her feeding schedule and her highness does not like to be kept waiting when it comes to meal times. So that’s what, three things wrong so far? Lets add the fact that I haven’t eaten all day, I forgot to take my morning advil (necessary for stitches and sore nipples) and my milk is running down my chest into my jeans. I’m a mess. What I really want to do is run for the hills and take a nice long shower at the nearest Motel 6.

I’ve realized that eating is very important to my success as a mother. If I don’t eat, I can’t handle stressful situations. Baby Bug and I are on the same page on that one. After I fed Baby Bug, I nuked myself a piece of lasagna (all I eat these days, thanks to some very nice friends who brought us much needed sustenance in the form of a restaurant size pan of lasagna) and I came up with a brilliant plan to conquer the day. It’s amazing how the brain actually works when you’re not starving it to death.

I like to call my plan “Bliss Up Baby Bug” or “Operation Boob Bliss”. It works like this: I feed Baby Bug as much as her little walnut-sized stomach can hold, which was today a record 40 minutes of non-stop sucking (ouch-city). Then I watch her go into a food coma. Her eyes roll back in her head, a smile spreads across her face from cheek to cheek. She looks like a fat rolley polley little buddha baby gone to Nirvana. If I time it just right and feed her just enough, she’ll sleep for FOUR HOURS STRAIGHT!!! I don’t usually want her to sleep that long but today it was a godsend.

I rolled her into Toby’s office in the buggaboo (of course) and gave Toby strict instructions on what to do if she woke up and started crying. Then I hopped in my car and drove like a bat out of hell to the nearest Rite Aid to buy some diapers. It felt so good to drive again. Everything is so much lighter and faster now that I’m not carrying around a bowling ball wherever I go. Even though I’m far chubbier than I’ve ever been, I feel as light as a feather. It was heavenly to be out and about in the real world again.

But my plan was foiled. Did you know that they don’t carry every size diaper at the drug store or the grocery store? I did not know this. I just assumed that whole aisle of baby stuff had everything. I mean, it is long enough. Every time I ever accidentally wandered through it pre-baby I was always in awe that there could be so much baby stuff to buy. Well, it doesn’t look so long to me anymore. In fact, I was downright disgusted that they would discriminate against size-challenged babies. There were toddler diapers and training diapers, cruisers and swimmers, size 1 through 52 but NOTHING in Baby Bug’s size. How can this be? Especially in a town where in-vitro fertilization is the new pink and everybody’s having twins and triplets. Where do they shop? Apparently not at Rite Aid or Gelson’s.

With my tail between my legs, I drove back home empty handed. Poor little Baby Bug would just have to put up with the scratchiness on her sore belly button or I was going to be doing a lot of hand washing in the sink.

When I got back home, Baby Bug was still under my magic spell of sleepiness and she hadn’t even made a peep. Toby was so proud of himself for not mucking it up. He actually managed to get some work done too, which is really important these days since I’m the professional-stay-at-home-mom and he’s supporting us 100%.

I called the hospital and asked them where to buy size 0 diapers and they told me of two stores two towns away. Two towns away!!! Thankfully Toby was my knight in shining armor and he drove all over town until he found some at Target.

He bought every package they had.

Oh How I Love the Buggaboo

It’s just the thinger-roo
for wheeling around the house with ease
when you’ve got things to do.
Don’t mind the corners and too small doors
this stroller goes with you on all your chores!
Take a shower, visit the loo
don’t worry about the baby, she’s with you!
From spongy shocks to knobby wheels.
it hugs the curves like a race car deals.
It has a handle that switches from side to side.
No doubt about it, it’s is a stylish ride!
And when you want to take it apart,
you just click on the white circle and it comes in two parts!
The top is now a bassinet
that you can take to a dinnerette!
We go to the kitchen and the bedroom too
we even go outside for a patio view
I’m telling you this because it’s true,
there’s nothing the buggaboo can’t do!
The only thing that really sucks
Is that it costs 800 bucks.

Baby Bug and I had a big day today. Of course my day started at 3am but her’s really got into gear around 9am when she had her first bath at the kitchen sink. She didn’t like it too much. I only sponge bathed her and didn’t even use soap but she still thought it was way too much. (The soap in the picture is just for aesthetics, I didn’t end up using it.) Sensitive skin runs on both sides of the family so I’m not taking any chances. Then she ate and slept and ate and slept and ate and slept some more. It’s hard work eating and sleeping all the time.

The big news of the day is that we went out today. Scary! Scary! It was only yesterday that I was thinking that going to the mail box was too far. Today we went to the hospital for a breast feeding clinic so I could take up the matter of my um… raw and bleeding hamburger like nipples with a lactation consultant. My friend Kate picked me up because I’m still way too scared to drive. Baby Bug looked like a midget next to her eight month old son in the car seat next to her. Wow, eight month olds are HUMUNGOUS!!! He didn’t like her too much and cried the whole ride. I think he was teething. Baby Bug didn’t seem to mind the crying a bit. She slept the whole way.

Baby Bug loved the clinic. She ate two whole ounces and didn’t chew me up a bit. The nurses had to show her around the whole office exclaiming how cute her cheeks were. The nurse who was helping me also informed me that Baby Bug has a strong will. I didn’t think you could tell at this young age but apparently when you see babies every day all day long, you can. And apparently, Baby Bug knows what she wants and she wants it now. Phew! What am I in for? But the same nurse also told me that a strong will can be a sign of intelligence so I’m going to try and focus on that and not on her stubbornness.

How could the nurse tell this from a quick 1 hour meeting? Well, Baby Bug likes to flail her arms about when she’s attempting to latch on and she ends up beating me up like a boxer so hard that she can’t get her mouth where it is supposed to go. I actually have to bind her arms back with a burp rag to make any progress. By then she’s so mad and red in the face, she’s broken capillaries in her cheeks. But thankfully the redness clears up pretty quick and she manages to keep her perfect skin that everyone is always raving about. She was supposed to have jaundice by now (since they had to suction cup her head pretty hard and that can cause pretty bad jaundice) but she looks like she’s going to beat it. Yay for good skin!

I had to call Toby to tell him he has a strong willed child. He was proud. She takes after him, I guess. Though my mom tells me I was a difficult nurser as well.

So that was our big day with scary baths and being out in the big outside world where there are germs and car wrecks to get into.

And we lived to tell about it!