return of the one-handed typist

Here I am again. I have lots to say, but little time to say any of it. Once again, I feel the need to apologize for the sparsity of my comments and comment responses. I can manage to read on my laptop pretty well, and am actually quite well caught up reading the posts in my feed. But seeing as I have a newborn attached to me what feels to be about 75% of my waking hours (plus some of my sleeping hours), most of the typing I’ve been doing lately has been one-handed. And often in the dark, as Theo is bothered by bright lights. My remaining awake time, when I have the use of two hands, I tend to spend eating, fixing food for or otherwise tending to Phoebe, and doing occasional other tasks. I’ve even had more than one shower in the past 3 weeks.

Things are largely good, though our household has been beset by a cold. Phoebe had a minor cold a few days ago, and as of yesterday, the rest of us seem to have caught it. Theo included, poor munchkin.

We went down to see John’s parents this weekend. They were thrilled to get to meet Theo. When Phoebe was born, they drove up from New York they day after we got home from the hospital. But now with John’s dad’s continuing health problems (he is largely unable to leave his bedroom, let alone the state), and with John’s mom being the primary caregiver, they had been unable to meet their newest grandchild. Seeing as Theo got a glowing bill of health at his 2 week appointment on Monday, and seeing as our schedule is looking tight for the next few weeks, we took the opportunity to drive down on Saturday.

Phoebe was very excited to go visit Grammy and Grampa. She’s been asking to visit for a while. She did, however, suggest that we should leave Theo at home for this visit.

The visit was good, but seeing as we did not heed Phoebe’s advice, passed by for me in a bit of a blur of feedings and diaper changes. (Note: I just had to rephrase this, as I had typed “…passed by in a bit of feedings and diaper changes for me.” There are times when one just doesn’t want to leave attachment ambiguity hanging like that.)

We had a phenomenally smooth drive down. Both kiddos slept. We ran into no traffic. As we approached rest areas, we decided to push on, knowing that stopping would mean that Phoebe would be awake from that point forward. In the end, we didn’t stop at all, and arrived in just about 3 hours.

We came back late last night. The ride back was not too bad either, though there was some traffic, and a few stops. Well, I guess the trip was closer to 5 hours. Phoebe was awake for about half of this, demanding that we “talk about” stuff. (One of her most frequent phrases these days is “talk about X.” Current favorite Xs include air conditioners, alarm clocks, and car accidents, a topic that didn’t thrill John as he was driving…) So perhaps it was a bit of a long trip. But there was no screaming, at least.