Slideshows

As you hopefully know, dear reader, we store lots of photos du bebe in our pages at flickr.com. (Click link to visit.) I just realized that they've improved the "slide shows" over there -- much bigger! Much prettier! Worth looking at (finally). (Personally, I'm just not a fan of postage-stamp sized photographs.)

In the upper right of the flickr web pages, see "View as slideshow". Too fast too slow? "Options" in lower area of slide show.

love,
b

Field Notes

I have strictly minor observations -- but I have a handful of them.

Elliot's chatter. What a fascinating creature he is -- signs that he knows how to make, he stops making (see, "toilet", "please", "up", "more"). Words he knows how to form, he gives up on (see "key", "tooth"). Syllables he knows how to apply (see "d"), he doesn't apply: it pleases him to call me "ba", instead of "da". And habits that he has, he loses, and then he refinds.

Last week, for example, he forgot how to have dinner. There was just no dinner-having. But this week, he is eating like a champ again. (Well, he's a "champ" if we're grading on a curve, I suppose. Elliot is not nearly as interested in food as most babies. Possibly relatedly, most babies are larger.)

But his talk. Such splendid nonsense, I could listen to it all day. Fluent, elaborate, enigmatic babble grows around him and his activities, like a vine or a cloak or a moat. He vocalizes, soliloquizes, whoops and doo-wops about all sorts of things, from the undignified way we are stuffing him into a winter bundler to the sight of a bird.

The uncanny thing is when it verges on -- or *seems* to verge on -- perfect English. Did he quietly say the word "raisin", just as I offered him a raisin today? Or did was it more like "g'bleisnihhh" that he mumbled under his breath, simply as the fancy struck him? He may have been mulling over something entirely separate from the raisin, something that needed urgent remarking upon. Maybe he was talking through his plans for a new assault on Ada's left nostril with his right index finger. Absolutely no one knows. And yet when our two parallel worlds even seem to swing into alignment, even for a flash, it's eerie. It's arresting.

Elliot's teeth. He spent the week after Christmas teething fiercely, the most obvious episode of stereotypical "teething" that we've seen. (And it seems to have passed now. No new teeth ever showed up, though in our experience, the real pain is in the tectonics, while the teeth do their burrowing underground. Cutting teeth, per se, seems milder.)

Not a drooler, typically, right after Christmas my son began leaking -- pretty much constantly -- from his poor, slack, wistful, but still-half-smiling mouth. He would apply the back of his hand, sadly, to his cheek, and moan "uhhhhh" piteously. He would weep, sadly, many times a day. He was so sensitive about everything. It was pretty sad.

One day I wore a gray cotton shirt that (as it turned out) turns very dark when it's wet, so it shows any spots of moisture very clearly. Then I spent a few hours with Elliot. I found myself decorated with damp half-moons, from one shoulder to other, across my collarbones: the garland of many little consolations, mutterings, minor wrestles, and restful hugs.

While he was lying passively upon me at the bookstore in Evanston, I talked to a woman trailing a thoughtful, experimental little five-year-old girl. They both had eyes for Elliot. The mom asked me if he was teething (this was while I was wearing the drool-shirt, so it was a relatively easy call). I said that indeed he was: baby teeth 17 through 20, if I'm not mistaken. He has everything else. How interesting, said the woman. Those are the same teeth that she (pointing to the daughter) is working on right now.

Kids vary a lot.

Elliot's fever. While the teething was at its peak, he came on all warm. At least, he felt weirdly warm to me, first thing one morning last weekend. I could tell, the same way (I think) that my Mom could always tell: lips pressed to head. (How many times a day do we do that? So many.)

And found him different, strangely radiant. So we called a nurse at the doc's office, and they asked us to take his temperature. New parental task -- who holds him down? And who sticks it up his ass? Answer: B holds him. S sticks him. Elliot: didn't really cry, but didn't exactly break into applause either.

His temperature was a little north of 100, and they said we should bring him in. He had some tiny red dots on his skin, here and there. They called it a virus, and said it would blow over with a little tylenol, which it did. At around the same time as the teething pain stopped, actually, the fever disappeared.

Now, did you know that, officially, our medical establishment doesn't believe that teething can bring fevers? I think they're kidding themselves, but I'm too busy trolling the internet for news about the primaries (pollster.com, for example) to troll the internet for studies about teething immunology.

Elliot's crying. Now we've over the teething episode, and we're over the fever, and we're eating decent dinners again. And yet he wakes up so sad, these mornings. Just crying and crying. It takes something to snap him out of it -- a surprise bath, or an unusual object, or a change of air.

Elliot's head-butting. He head-butts me. He did it on the airplane trip home from Utah, all of a sudden, as we were getting situated in our seats. He just put down the crown of his skull, pointed it at my chest, and started whacking away. I laughed like it was the best thing that's ever happened, and it basically was. This egged him on, and he did it some more. The only thing to watch out for is that he doesn't know what's OK to head-butt, and what's not. He head-butted the armchair I was sitting in today, and that was OK, but when he head-butts the coffee table, it goes poorly for him.

Here's a little video which shows 2 things:

1. Elliot head-butting my knee


2. Ada getting a bath today. Total chaos ensues after Ada escapes from the tub -- still muddy, still grimy, but also with a coating of fresh, gooey shampoo -- and proceeds to SHAKE, which rockets shampoo and muddy water all over the walls. Due to my limitiations as a journalist, most of the real action was not captured on video. But you get to see how it all starts, anyway.

Especially for parents, but also for everyone who likes to cultivate the festive

I just thought I'd point everyone towards this great list of midwinter holidays, generated by the very excellent Beck.

A mentor of mine growing up--an awesome artist math teacher lady--often advised me that in life it is important to "cultivate events." Events don't happen on their own; they only have the spirit and importance that you instill in them. This is something that I try to remember as I go through life, particularly as I parent, and Beck (who I don't know, really, except through her writing) strikes me as someone who is extremely good at this.

When you're only half-way up

Last night in the tub I was singing that song to Elliot about "The Grand Old Duke of York," which ends with the observation that "when you're up you're up, and when you're down you're down, but when you're only half-way up you're neither up nor down."* As you can imagine, this is a fun bathtime song as it involves standing and sitting and thus SPLASHING.

But anyway, today it occurs to me that the song is also an apt description of Elliot's mornings lately. This week, in the mornings, Elliot has been such a crab. He's never been one of those babies who will contentely play in their cribs upon waking (like Anni) or go back to sleep if given some milk and a hug (Gilly). Normally, when Elliot's up, he's up. But this week! No! He's been waking up early, and pissy, and clingy, and groggy. He doesn't want to be left alone or kept company or read to or played with or fed. He just wants to sort of go "mwah mwah mwah mmWAAAAAAAA" for a while. And I am willing to get up early with my child, I really am. But it is a little painful to get up with him WHEN HE DOES NOT WANT TO BE UP HIMSELF.

Earlier on the week there were some teething issues, and that is different, and I was very sympathetic to that. But we seem to be over that now (unless these are just special teething issues that only occur between the hours of 5:30 and 7:00 am) and I am loosing some patience here, my friends.

* I have never typed the lyrics to this song before, and thus only when I was typing it did I realize that I never ever say "neither up nor down," though surely those must be the words. But how awkward and formal! I always sing "neither up or down." But I couldn't quite bring myself to type it that way.

Now back to our previously scheduled Elliot

Enough about politics -- let's talk about little boys and their reindeer games.

First you'll see this weird seal toy, something picked up by family from a street merchant in China. Elliot is utterly, magnetically bewitched by it -- we contrive (as cleverly as we are able) to hide it from him most of the time, just to give ourselves a rest. (And we don't want to give it to him to play with however he wants, because, well, it came from a street merchant in China.)

You'll see he's quite careful not to actually *touch* the thing while it's in operation. But he wants to relate to it somehow. He chatters at it. He invents little signs with his hands.



And this is a video of bye-byes. (Some of the bye byes are actually hellos.) Turn up the volume and enjoy Elliot's most perfectly formed word. (Phonetically speaking, it's even got a diphthong in it. Pretty sophisticated stuff, folks.)

One voice! Your Voice! Every Voice!

Friends. We love Barack Obama.

I am not totally sure what tomorrow, or the next year, will bring. I know that my parents and family, Iowans all, are doing their best.

But I do know that in a long Iowan childhood of listening to many many political speeches, shaking many hands, being inspired by many people, few things have moved me as much as this person and this campaign. Maybe none. I don't remember anyone, even Jesse Jackson, and he was always a great stump speaker, doing such a great job of inspiring an audience not to follow, but to LEAD THEMSELVES. Ourselves.

This morning Elliot was having (yet another) melt down related to the acquisition of his last few painful molars. He was sobbing and drooling onto my shoulder when I started watching this video, but became completely riveted almost immediately. So we watched it three times. By the end, he had stopped crying, and I had almost started.

What I would like in this world is to teach my son this lesson: that it is better to unite than to divide, and that it is bolder to hope than to fear.

Xmas!

We owe the blog some love, and we DO have things to say. But for today, just a few pictures.

Let's talk about a word

The word is "sustainable."

The Times magazine had a great little piece this weekend about the idea of "sustainability," and particularly about how as an idea it's almost become neutralized. No one is opposed to sustainability. Everyone thinks its great! And because of that, you get big agricultural and pharmaceutical companies saying, Sure, we care about sustainability! I'm sure they do. But the problem is that everyone is in favor of sustaining what they do--and no one really wants to learn about how what they do might not be sustainable. That would be, as Gore says, an inconvenient sort of truth.

The times article is about two things that have been shown in the last year to not be sustainable. One of them is the widespread use of antibiotics in farming. This article grabbed my interest, because one side-effect of growing up with a close relative dying of AIDS, as I did, is that you acquire a real sensitivity early on to the importance and fragility of antibiotic care.

Consider this:

For years now, drug-resistant staph infections have been a problem in hospitals, where the heavy use of antibiotics can create resistant strains of bacteria. It’s Evolution 101: the drugs kill off all but the tiny handful of microbes that, by dint of a chance mutation, possess genes allowing them to withstand the onslaught; these hardy survivors then get to work building a drug-resistant superrace. The methicillin-resistant staph that first emerged in hospitals as early as the 1960s posed a threat mostly to elderly patients. [AND MY UNCLE JEFF!] But a new and even more virulent strain — called “community-acquired MRSA” — is now killing young and otherwise healthy people who have not set foot in a hospital. No one is yet sure how or where this strain evolved, but [experts suspect]... another environment where the heavy use of antibiotics is selecting for the evolution of a lethal new microbe: the concentrated animal feeding operation, or CAFO.

This paragraph is basically like a big neon arrow pointing directly at me. It says to me: remember how your Uncle Jeff died partly because of hospital based MRSA's? Ah! Okay, well now your son, your son Elliot Jeffrey, is vulnerable to community-acquired MRSAs.

He is vulnerable because you want cheap pork-chops (and oh, how I love my pork chops!), and in order for cheap pork-chops to be produced, farmers must misuse and overuse antibiotics in a way we all know is not sustainable.

As for independent public-health researchers, they say they can’t study the problem without the cooperation of the livestock industry, which, not surprisingly, has not been forthcoming. For what if these researchers should find proof that one of the hidden costs of cheap meat is an epidemic of drug-resistant infection among young people? There would be calls to revolutionize the way we produce meat in this country. This is not something that the meat and the pharmaceutical industries or their respective regulatory “watchdogs” — the Department of Agriculture and F.D.A. — are in any rush to see happen.

Anyway, I don't expect all of you--you, who do not have my particular history with antibiotics--to find this little article to be the sort of emotional call to arms that it is to me. Probably you all will never have the sort of gut fear of misused antibiotics that I do.

Instead it is just to say that this article is one of several happenings in my life over the last week--conversations, readings, etc--that have managed to bring my vague feelings about environmental sustainability to a head. Friends, I am worried. I am worried about sustaining this world I am making for my son.

Since I am not an apocalyptic person by nature, it feels awkward to me to be writing a post like this. Mostly, I think life turns out okay, regardless. And I am not sure how to make my own feelings about sustainability into something meaningful and active, rather than just vague and self-congratulatory.

So don't consider this a battle-cry, folks. It's just to say: I am thinking. I am becoming more willing to acknowledge some of the inconvenient truths of my life. And lord, I am willing to buy more expensive pork chops, and fewer of them, if that is the small small price of leaving a better world for my boy.

About Juanna

Juanna Buchanan Migliore died peacefully on a beautiful and sunny late fall morning in her hometown of Price. Juanna was born to June and John Miller in Helper in 1914 and, with the exception of seven years back East, lived her life in Price.

Juanna eloped in 1933 to marry her beau Francesco Antonio Migliore (Doc to his friends and patients) in Washington, DC. They lived there and in Chicago until 1940 before returning to their roots in Price where Doc used his Chiropractic skills to support his family including Michael and Launa (Harvey). Doc died in 1983 and Michael in 1994 as a later-life consequence of service to his country in Vietnam. Juanna also mourned the loss of her sister Bertha (Spratling) and brothers Harry and Robert (Buck).

Juanna was an exceptional seamstress who made beautiful clothes for Launa, many friends in Price, and costumes for her grandchildren Brandon and Megan. This interest led her to work for many years selling materials and sewing notions in Price Trading where her skills and outgoing personality gained her many friends. Juanna and family spent happy times at the cabin Doc built in Scofield, a magical place now used by her children, grandchildren, and great grandson Elliot.

Juanna was a beautiful, independent, friendly, and honest lady who dealt cheerfully with life’s many challenges. Her family would particularly like to thank her neighbor Norma Petrie who helped Juanna achieve her wish to live independently at home in her later years, and the amazing and caring ladies at Hospice especially Jessie who helped make that independence possible. A special thanks also to Drs. Etzel and Boyle. Juanna will be dearly missed by her family and friends.

Funeral services will be held on Saturday Dec 1st at Mitchells Funeral Chapel in Price at 11 am, with a viewing at 10 am. In lieu of flowers please donate to Rocky Mountain Hospice at 60E 100N in Price, or the charity of your choice.

Have I told you?

I'm not sure I've mentioned that Elliot is now very fond of reading. He makes the sign for book and then goes and gets a book and then crawls into my lap to read the book, and then I die from the sublimity, every time.

Friends: we have given unto the world: a new reader. Once I teach him how to swim, I feel that my work as a parent will mostly be done (since, as I've said, I already taught him how to lick batter off a spoon).

So, that's the most important thing to say, except that he's recently been making a word that sounds a lot like "book," too, which is awesome. And then today, two more reading breakthroughs. One is that he knows the part of this one bathtime book he like which is about a shark, and at the appropriate part of the story he actually points to his teeth, in recognition of the discussion of the shark's teeth. And then also, today he was readingOlivia Count with Brandon, and the first thing that Olivia counts, right before "two bows" is "one ball." And when reading, Brandon said "One...????" and Elliot totally said "ball."

The signs of his personhood are coming fast and furious, these days. It is so much fun.

This morning's update

Elliot has recently learned some important skills, namely: unsnapping snaps, and unzipping zippers.

To wit: this morning, I got Elliot dressed in one of my favorite one-piece outfits: it snaps down the front and up both legs. He looked very cute. I went in the kitchen to eat my breakfast. A second later, Elliot came running in not wearing his outfit, but rather waving it triumphantly above his head. I'm not kidding. It was like a flag. I stood staring at him, slack-jawed, while he ran past me to the cupboard with the pots and pans, opened the cupboard, wadded his outfit/victory banner into our soup turreen, turned around, and ran out.

I'm not sure that "clothes removal and rejection" is a normal developmental milestone, but I guess that's where we're at.

Dance Dance Revolution

I like to call this medley "Crank Dat One Year Old."



note: Hold Steady in honor of Kate and Catherine; I recorded that part the morning after the concert ya'll went to.

I am such a good mom.

You know what I did today? I taught Elliot how to lick batter off a spoon. Yep! These are essential skills, people, and you have to start teaching them while their brains are still really highly receptive.

In other news, have we mentioned that Elliot now has, like, 15 teeth? Maybe 16. At his twelve month appointment, he had a mere six. That is 9 or 10 teeth in a mere two and a half months, and when I look at it that way I understand why I've felt so busy.

Have a good weekend, everybody!

Pictures

Sorry we've been wrapped up this fall, and quieter blogwise. But there are some new pictures.

P.S. I am so proud of what he is willing to eat now. I guess "relieved" is the word I'm really looking for, and maybe "proud" is really a common parental euphemism for "relief". "I'm so proud I could burst" is maybe just another way of saying "I was so worried I thought I was going to pop. But now I'm OK."

Being the one who is mainly in charge of breakfast and dinner for most of 2007 -- and there have been many trying dinner hours -- I am still relieved/proud when he eats a good meal at all. Relieveder/prouder still that he is growing: due to having eaten! He is getting a little taller, a little lankier.

He ate a bunch of dried blueberries tonight. (Used to spit em out.) Ate much of a (Trader Joe nitrate-free nitrite-free protein-packed) hot dog. Protein! And breakfast? A bunch of peanut butter (straight off the spoon, chip off the old block), some loose Cheerios, and lots of milk. More protein!

Protein.

(Whew.)

He says four words.

Which is a lot. Relatively speaking. It's way, way more than zero.

I suppose we were expecting a big moment when Elliot said his "first word", but that didn't really happen. He's been using some extremely reasonable-sounding syllables (e.g. mamamamama) for months and months. But he's been using them in pretty unreasonable ways. You couldn't let yourself get too excited about how he used amamamamama when Sarah arrived, because he would also talk in very similar terms about a blanket, a paper bag, or some applesauce.

But he's been improving his aim. amamaomamama usually means Sarah, though sometimes it means me. K'hhh and kiiii and k'uh indicate key. (Or toy, or object.) Da might mean me, though it's vague. It sometimes means Ada. The crown jewel, though is tuuf, which he says while pointing to his teeth (which hurt him right now, a lot).

Right now Elliot is standing in my shoes, trying to wear them.