Squidbits

Nine months old...yesterday. Wow.

This was a long month. In some ways, it was the best month yet - as each successive month has been, because he just gets more fun and more interesting and more himself as he gets older. In some ways, it was the worst since the early colicky days, as the family unit as a whole struggled with travel, with illness, and with exhaustion. I wish I'd written this post off and on throughout, as I usually do with the Squidbits, but there hasn't been time; Himself and I saw one another for a total of six days in the entire month of November, and both of us are tired, recovering from sickness, and a little off our usual game.

The Squid, I am glad to report, bounced back from his disgusting snotty cold in style, and has been practicing his crawling (!!!) and endeavoring to maul everything within reach with his usual glee for at least two weeks now. He still can't crawl properly - it's more like a flail-with-paws, flail-with-knees, and a flop forward, and on our slippery hardwood floors he goes backward, even - but he's getting there shockingly fast, and on carpet he's quite mobile indeed. Our completely un-childproofed deathtrap home is on the cusp of something the likes of which it has never seen. He moves from lying to sitting to crawling to rolling and back on his own, and is just beginning to pull himself up on people and things, which is a precursor to independent "cruising," which is a precursor to walking, which is a precursor to disaster, as all toddler parents can attest.



I let the Squid watch baby telly for the first time when we were both sick - I always thought I'd reserve it for illness, and it truly did help when I was too ill to be properly engaged without breaking down. I have to say, though, that these Baby Einstein DVDs are the biggest scam I have seen in ages. I thought they'd be research-based, carefully calibrated to developmental stages, and strongly edutaining. Instead, they are stock video clips of cute animals, some sequences of smiling children, and simple puppet dumbshows set to public domain music. It's got to cost them less than a hundred bucks to produce each DVD, and they retail for around $16 per. They also include at least three minutes of "Baby Einstein," "Disney," and "Little Einstein" branding at the beginning. A scam, I tell you. I'd love to see some RCT evaluations of the actual learning effects of those things; I hypothesize no significant gains. I "read" them to him, as I discussed a few posts ago, like I would a book, but still. As soon as I felt better, off went the baby telly.

Things he can do now that he couldn't last month: Eat toast and other breadstuffs that soften in his mouth, hold two different things with two different hands, move across a room (flail-roll-crawl-flop-wiggle), play peek-a-boo, search out specific toys and get upset when they are taken away, brush his own teeth (hee), and differential calculus. Except for that last one. I lied about that.



On the parental front, between us we logged nineteen days of solo parenting this month (not counting the three days that I was in meetings and Grandpa took the Squid), two states, at least ten all-day meetings, four cities, two separate cold viruses, one professional conference, and two countries. Upside of all this was that each of us got at least one "day off" and the Squid got to spend some real quality time with Grandpa, Uncle F, and Grammy while we were in LA. Downside of all of this should be apparent without further whinging on my part.

On the grandparental front, his Lola sent us boxes and boxes of Squidstuff, ensuring that he is warm and fed and entertained from now until the end of time February at least, and his Grandpa did some excellent babysitting. The Squid naps so well for Grandpa that I live in envy. This could be because we found out after the fact that Grandpa hadn't been reading the dilution instructions on the formula cans and had been stuffing the baby with extra-rich milkshakes! Or it could be because they play together so hard; there are few things more wonderful than watching my father with my son, tickling the baby with his beard and lifting him giggling overhead. They are great together, though there are certainly moments of weird:

"Come here, Snakebreath," I heard Grandpa coo to the baby, scooping him up and carrying him off toward the kitchen.

"Snakebreath?" I said.

"Oh, yes," said my mother, unruffled. "You and your brother were both 'Snakebreath.' I don't know where he got that."

Snakebreath. Huh.



December will bring a father/son adventure in Chicago, while I try desperately to recover some lost equilibrium at home, and our first Christmas as a family - our first tree, the traditional cinnamon rolls, holiday music on the stereo, sparkling lights, and cards from friends all over the world. Also, no doubt, a highly mobile Squid and the next stage of parenting challenges. Wish us luck!