Schedule With The Baby

Being a stay-at-home dad for awhile is a little weird. It normally doesn't happen. Everyone wants to know what the life of a stay-at-home dad looks like. It depends on the day and what kind of mood I'm in. Here's a few of the days I've done.

When I first got off work (probably Monday the 22nd or the Friday before) and wanted to get some work stuff done, then my day looked like:

• 6:00 AM -- Baby wakes up and want to eat.
• 6:30 AM -- Put baby back down for a nap. Get some work done.
• 8:00 AM -- Baby wakes up.
• 8:00 AM -- Make formula for baby.
• 8:05 AM -- Feed baby.
• 8:30 AM -- Lay baby down on bed. Turn on Baby Einstein station on Pandora. Dance baby around to music.
• 9:00 AM -- Put baby in play gym in my room. Try to get some work done.
• 9:30 AM -- Baby starts fussing. But I still want to get some work done. Put baby in sling to hopefully keep her placated but still have both hands and attention available.
• 9:45 AM -- Baby starts fussing in sling. Rock baby to take a nap.
• 10:00 AM -- Try to rock baby to sleep.
• 10:10 AM -- Baby has closed her eyes for a few minutes. Try to put her down in her crib.
• 10:13 AM -- Realize that i preemptively put the baby down in her crib and that she wasn't really ready. Decide to read her some stories to try to calm her down.
• 10:30 AM -- Phone into work for daily standup meeting.
• 10:45 AM -- Baby has fallen asleep during meeting. Go upstairs and try to get some more work done.
• 11:45 AM -- Baby wakes up and wants to eat. Feed baby.
• 12:15 PM -- Take baby on a walk after eating in her stroller.
• 12:45 PM -- Try to put baby back in her sling and get some more work done.
• 1:15 PM -- Try to get some lunch because I'm getting really hungry.
• 1:20 PM -- Baby spits up all over me and herself in her sling. Change the baby, but leave my clothes on.
• 1:35 PM -- Put baby in swing while I finish making lunch for myself.
• 1:50 PM -- Give baby some more food because she spit it all up.
• 2:15 PM -- Message Erin and try to get her to come home.
• 2:20 PM -- Erin tells me she won't be coming home for another hour.
• 2:25 PM -- Realize baby is napping. Get some work done.
• 3:00 PM -- Ask Erin what she wants for dinner.
• 3:05 PM -- She replies canned soup. Thank goodness.
• 3:30 PM -- ERIN GETS HOME! Hand baby to Erin.

Tessa decided somewhere one of these days that she just loves to snack. So, every half hour or so, she would decide she wanted an ounce or so to snack on. As you may expect, this got a little draining.

About the same time, they said at work that we're not going to be releasing code for the next few months after all. So, I kind of lost a little bit of drive to finish this project super quick. So, I haven't been working on it since Wednesday.

Thursday, my schedule was similar to the first one given. But, since I was drained, I wanted to play X-COM some. X-COM is a tactical game where you play a tactics team with the goal to destroy an enemy alien invasion. I figured out a particular position that I could use while playing X-COM on my laptop while holding and feeding Tessa at the same time! I would prop up this (soon-to-be) gross t-shirt on her to suck up any milk she spills, and also to prop up the bottle. I would then hold her in one hand, and then have another hand free to use the mouse or fix the bottle's position if it got out of position. Baby slept so much that day (she likes being held and snacking all day long). It was a pretty great day. I think that Tessa had a pretty great day too since she fussed very little that day and slept a whole lot while I was holding her.

Trying to smile

First Selfie

Nice path in our backyard

Is Gentle Formula Really Gentle?

I should be washing bottles right now. Tessa (and Erin) will be fussy if I feed the baby a dirty bottle. But I'm blogging. Because that's what the Texas Wilcoxes told me I should do.

Erin started getting formula from the pediatrician when she went in for visits early on. She would get the gerber "gentle" stuff. Apparently, that stuff is supposed to be "easier" for the baby to digest and makes the baby less fussy. Erin liked the idea of a less fussy baby.

When all of the formula that we received for free in the mail ran out, it came time to buy our own. We could by the regular formula, or we could buy the "gentle" formula. I ran the numbers in my head and it turned out that the gentle formula was about 15% more expensive per ounce! That adds up! If we keep buying this stuff, I will be driven to the poorhouse! Here is a picture of the two different tubs we have side by side. The yellow is the normal stuff and the purple is the super expensive stuff.

Nonetheless, Erin wanted the gentle formula. She said she could tell a difference. I think it could be all in her head. Erin told me that as long as she's home, she wants to use the gentle formula, but while I'm home, I could use the normal stuff.

That got my mind running. I could set this up as an experiment. I found two equal things of tupperware in our pantry. I put an equal amount of formula of the two kinds into the two containers. I marked one of them on the bottom to signify it was the "normal" formula instead of the super expensive one. I then mixed them up so I can't tell the difference. I then labeled the two containers "A" and "B".

I will randomly before each feeding flip a coin to determine which formula she will get. I will then gauge fussiness on a scale of 0-10 after the feeding. Where possible, I will also determine the amount of time spent trying to make a bowel movement. I understand that this may not be as easy, though.

Here are some obligatory pictures of the baby! I liked this one below because even though I'm not an army guy, I am definitely her hero. I probably always will be too.

Here's another one a bit closer up.

6 week old baby Tessa

Tessa has been changing and growing so much lately that I thought I better post an update on how she is doing.

Appearance:
Already my little girl is feeling like my big little girl. She has grown SO much in these past few weeks. She has moved up from newborn clothes to 0-3 month clothes and from newborn diapers to size 1. She weighs about 9 pounds and seems to have gained a few inches atleast. Here are some recent pictures so you can see how much she has grown.

Personality:
She is also growing more independent. There are times now that she prefers to look out at the world instead being cuddled up with me. I feel like I understand the phrase "they grow up so fast" so much better now.

Then also sometimes she doesn't want to be held at all and is happier kicking her legs in her play gym.

Likes:
She still likes to be held and rocked to sleep though we have been working on having her fall asleep on her own with some limited success. Though she hates the baby bjorn, we have found that she loves her sling, which makes carting her around easy and I enjoy the cuddle time.

Dislikes:
She does not enjoy getting the hiccups which is unfortunate since she gets them at least 3 times a day. The baby books that say babies don't mind or even notice the hiccups obviously have not met Tessa. Her absolute least favorite thing though is probably getting meal-time interrupted for burping. It's very necessary though to avoid fountains of spit up.

New developments:
She's started smiling more and I think they are intentional smiles now. She has also started experimenting with making sounds. She can make the sounds "gah" and "kah" and seems to enjoy "talking" with mom and dad. Also, her neck muscles have been strengthening a lot lately. Here she is showing them off.