We represent the Lullabye League

I've been meaning to make a note of all of Dominic's favorite songs, and I'd like to invite anyone who is reading this to either post comments or send me email with suggestions of other songs to sing for him, perhaps songs from your own childhood or songs you sang to your children that they enjoyed.

Old MacDonald

Old Mac Donald had a farm

E-I-E-I-O

And on that farm he had a _____ (animal)

E-I-E-I-O

With a ___ ___ (animal's sound) here

and a ___ ___ (sound) there

Here a ___ there a ___, everywhere a ___ ___.

Old MacDonald had a farm

E-I-E-I-O

(Animals we use are duck-quack, dog-arf, cat-meow, cow-moo, sheep-baa, donkey-heehaw, owl-hoo, and we've even thrown in lions-rrrrowr, and monkeys-oo-oo-ah-ah, and the occasional bee-bzzbzz. What animals do you use?)

Old MacDonald is a great song for stopping a booboo face, like if something scares him or if you take something away that he wanted to put in his mouth like a pen.

A great song for preventing a tantrum when wet-wiping Dominic's face and hands is "Happy and You Know It". We sing "If you're happy and you know it, wash your face (wash wash), If you're happy and you know it, wipe your hands (wipe wipe), If you're happy and you know it, then you're face will surely show it! If you're happy and you know it wash your face (wash wash)." It's remarkably the perfect length of song to get both hands and his face clean before it's over.

Night-time lullabyes...

My mom used to sing this to me:

I see the moon and the moon sees me

The moon sees the somebody I want to see

So God bless the moon and God bless me

And God bless the somebody I want to see

I really think

That God above

Created you for me to love!

He picked you out

From all the rest

Because He knew I would love you the best!

If I get to Heaven and you're not there,

I'll write your name on the golden stair.

I'll put it there

For all to see

That I love you and you love me!

And this one she would sing to my little brother, John. It's so incredible to be singing it to my own little boy! I looked all over the internet to find a version of Bing Crosby singing it that I could link you to, but couldn't find one that you don't have to pay for. You can click here and then scroll down to number 21 and click the little arrow in that row to get it to play. If you have iTunes you can search the iTunes store for "little man bing crosby" and they will let you listen to a snippet. The lyrics shown on his version are not 100% the same as the way I learned it.

Little man, you're crying

I know why you're blue

Someone took your kiddie car away

Better go to sleep now

Little Man, you've had a busy day

Johnny won your marbles?

Tell you what we'll do

Dad'll get you new ones right away

Better go to sleep now

Little Man, you've had a busy day

You've been playing soldier

The battle has been won

The enemy is out of sight

Come along now, soldier

Put away your gun

The war is over for tonight

Time to stop your scheming

Time your day was through

Can't you hear the Sandman softly say

Better go to sleep now

Little Man, you've had a busy day.

We also love "You Are My Sunshine" (we sang this to Dominic when he was first born, hoping he would recognize it from all the times we sang it to him before he was born), and when we open the blinds to let in the sunshine in the mornings, we always sing "Sunshine on my shoulders"

Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy

Sunshine in my eyes can make me cry

Sunshine on the water looks so lovely

Sunshine almost always makes me high

If I had a day that I could give you

I'd give to you a day just like today

If I had a song that I could sing for you

I'd sing a song to make you feel this way:

Sunshine on my shoulders makes me happy

Sunshine in my eyes can make me cry

Sunshine on the water looks so lovely

Sunshine almost always makes me high

Sometimes we play the Beatles "Here Comes the Sun" and dance around the bonus room. Have you ever noticed that most songs with "sun" in the title are pretty fun, positive songs?

Here's a video of Dominic singing...

Growing and Remembering...

Last night we lowered the crib in Dominic's room one notch. He has been starting to get up on his hands and knees in the crib and just yesterday started reaching up and taking a hold of the crib railing, so I figured it's just a matter of time before he launches himself.


Lowering the mattress made me feel about the same as when I bagged up the first tiny clothes that stopped fitting him. "Wow, this is going fast."


It's weird because part of me is so excited about him crawling and eager to hear his thoughts on everything when he can talk, but part is melancholy for the tiniest time. It's remarkable, really, because while I have always loved children, I've never been much for infants. My favorite age of child has always been between the ages of first talking and I've-got-to-have-THAT-label-of-tennis-shoes-mom. But with Dominic, I have really really enjoyed his infancy, memorizing the shape of his belly-button, watching his eyes change color, looking deeply into those changing eyes and imagining all of what's going on behind there!


I say I'll never forget the feeling of pressing my cheek against his for the first time, but I also thought I'd never forget the feeling of him moving inside me for the first time, and while I do remember the emotion of it, I can't honestly say I could fully describe the feeling. If we ever give Dominic a little brother or sister, I'm going to write it all down. So here I'm writing the feeling of that cheek just in case it all goes blurry.


It was probably a whole week or two after he was born. I had cuddled him innumerable times and was absolutely in lala land (possibly partly from lack of sleep, but mostly from joy), and I don't know why I pressed his little face against mine that particular day. I had expected his cheek to feel ... I don't know ... less substantial, more like it was filled with air. But it was so firm and squishy (wow these aren't very good words for it... putting things into words is harder than I thought, especially for someone who talks as much as me), and this rush of feeling came over me. It was sort of like a realization that this little person would some day be a man.. almost a fast-forward feeling. I felt so connected to him at that moment, and my body felt filled with the joy of it, as if joy was something physical and there was so much of it inside me that it was pressing against the inside of my skin.


This picture is from January 12 (Dominic was almost 4 months old), so it was long after the cheek incident. But you can see those lucious cheeks pretty well here... doesn't it just make you want to squish them against yours?

Now where was I?

I keep getting intimidated about how I'm going to get back to this blog when there is so much to recap.  So the intimidation makes me put it off until tomorrow, when I think I will somehow wake up with a brilliant idea for getting 4 months of amazing events into a quick blog entry.  

Today I decided that I just have to jump back in or else.  So someday I might post the missing months, but right now I'm starting with recent events and going forward.

First, an event of today.

Today marks a small breakthrough in Dominic's cognitive development, I think.  Whenever I am changing him on his little changing pad on top of the dresser in his room, I always point to the nautical flags hanging on the wall above his head and recite "D-O-M-I-N-I C".  He always smiles and studies how my lips make the letters, and looks at the flags as i tap each one.  But later if we are in the room and I spell his name, he just studies my mouth.  Today, however, when i started spelling D-O-M-I..., he turned his head up to look at the flags, which were behind him.  I think this is honestly the first time I've ever really noticed him linking a random sound to an actual thing.  My dad always wears a baseball cap, and when we see him, Granddaddy always says "hat", at which point Dominic looks up at his hat, and he has done that for some time now.  But this flag thing is the first time I've seen him link something that's not right there in front of him with a sound.

Here are a couple of recent pix and a video of Dominic's first crawling steps (5-31-08) and first carousel ride (6-3-08).

Dominic with our guests, the Carlton family, from England taking the Long Beach Passport bus to the Aquarium 

5-29-08

Dominic touching the rays on his first visit to the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach 

5-29-08

Dominc can almost balance on the rocking horse he got from Uncle Greg and Auntie Jenn 

5-31-08

Cooling off in the parking lot of the Boomers activity center 

6-1-08

Dominic in his stroller on a beautiful walk we took with our guests on Balboa Island 6-4-08

As a gift for my mom for Mother's Day, I took her and Dominic back east to New Jersey to visit her side of the family.  Dominic's namesake, my Grandpa Donald Carpentier, has 2 sisters and 1 brother still living there, as well as my cousins (Grandpa Don's nieces and nephews) and now their kids.  After our trip to Cabo on March 31 thru April 5, this was Dominic's second plane trip.

I think it is thanks to our friend Jack Snow's mom, Julie, a veteran flight attendant for American Airlines, that the only empty seat on our red-eye flight to JFK Airport in New York was the one between Mom and me, so even though we hadn't bought a seat for Dominic, we could still stretch out a bit.  Dominic was an absolutely perfect traveller.  This is saying a lot when you hear our trip back included 

   * a 5-hour traffic jam drive thru Manhattan followed by 

   * a hasty exit from the rental car, 

   * schlepping with volumes of bags (one of which was completely full of yummy New Jersey crumb cakes to bring home!) through the airport, followed by 

   * a 5-hour flight 

at the end of which one passenger told me that he flies 100 days per year and this was the best baby he had ever flown with!!

Our visit with the family was amazing.  I couldn't believe how big all the "kids" are getting.  We stayed with Aunt Louise and Uncle Mike, and Robbie and Donna hosted us for dinner one afternoon, too.  Seeing Aunt Netting and Aunt Connie were highlights... I'm so glad Dominic got to meet them and they him!  Here are some photos:

Rewind to: Cabo or Bust!

Dominic's Daddy, Eddie, is a studly ocean yacht racer.  He goes on these long races from Newport Beach to Ensenada and has even raced twice from LA to Hawaii in the Transpac.  This year, he wanted to try something different, so he formed a crew of 9 to sail from Corona del Mar to Cabo San Lucas, a total of about 800 miles as the crow flies.

Well, it's just about always nice in Huntington Beach; nevertheless, a trip closer to the equator sounded like a plan to this lover of warm weather, so I (and the cupcake of course), Eddie's parents, sister and brother-in-law, and my parents all decided to make a vacation of it.  So here's the beginning of the pictoral history of our trip to Cabo.

Daddy left March 28. Here he is getting some goodbye cuddles that are going to have to last maybe a whole week!  

The morning of the race, a bunch of us met the crew at our yacht club to see them off.  From Eddie's family, present were his mom and stepdad, Cleo and Jim, his sister, Maryke, and his niece and nephew, Danielle and Christian. My mom, Martie, really wanted to be there with my dad, Johnny (aka Granddaddy) and Dominic and me, but she had to work... (thank God someone is!) Thanks Mom!

Here is the crew getting ready to set sail.  Left to right is Ross Nemeroff, Bill Boyd, Scott Atwood, Bill Cuppy, Eddie (aka Daddy), Rob Rice, John Rossbach, Robert Rice, and Linus Ralls.

Granddaddy was very generous to take us out to the starting line to watch from his powerboat, Rapid Fire.  Joining us were Mareen and Elisabeth Rossbach (wife and daughter of crewmember John Rossbach) as well as Karen and Christine Rice (wife/mother and daughter/sister of crewmembers Rob and Robert Rice).  Jim Masingill, Eddie's stepdad, served as Firstmate.

*****

Blogger is giving me fits.  Uploading pictures is a bit of a tug of war.  So I think I will sign off for this entry and pick up again later with more pictures of the departure to Cabo.  Better to give you a taste for now rather than add more and end up crashing it and losing everything.  It's midnight anyway, so I'd better cash it in.  With Dominic's teething, I may be up with him shortly.  

Thank you to those of you who come by this blog to check us out.  I'd love to hear from you (so I know I'm not writing into a black hole) so leave a comment or send me an email: maggie@powerofE.com. 

Teeth = 2!!

Today, Dominic's second tooth broke through!  It is right next to the first one on the bottom, this new one being just right of center from D's perspective (left of center as we look at him).  I sort of got the feeling all day that he was... well... not even really "fussy" but I guess the phrase I would use is "needier than usual".  And sure enough, this afternoon I noticed a second little sharp edge popping through where there wasn't one yesterday.  Here are a couple of pictures.

Rewinding to: My First Foods

On March 22, I had left the plum pudding with Gram & Granddaddy (my parents) at their house while I went to pick up one of Eddie's sailing buddies in Corona del Mar (where they had moved the boat they were taking on the race to Cabo) and bring him back to his car in Long Beach. Due to what should have been a totally expected traffic jam on Belmont Shore's 2nd Street, I got stuck, and the babysitters called on the cell to report that the chubba wubba was ready for another meal. Uh oh, I was at least a half hour out... so here we were only 2 days before the magical 6-month milestone after which solid foods can be introduced... so what the heck? Give him a banana.

Needless to say, I missed the look on his face when he realized that there's more to these tastebuds than breastmilk and nasty cherry-flavored baby Tylenol. I got there about 1/2 hour after he devoured a tablespoon of banana (carefully scraped off the edge of the banana by his loving grandparents so as to avoid any of the tiny seeds in the center). As he sat in my lap for the ensuing nursing session, he looked up at me with a look I will never forget. Then he placed his hand on my shoulder in a way he never had before. It was as if to say, "Oh my gosh, Mom. You'll never believe the amazing thing that just happened!" as if he was in awe of the taste of banana and wondered if I, too, had ever known the thrill and joy of this Flavor of Heaven?

I think this must yet another benefit of parenting: the taste of banana in my mouth since that day is as if it is my first taste, too. I think I'm going to enjoy seeing the whole world as new again, to re-experience all the beauty and majesty and sweetness of God's creation through Dominic's innocent eyes.

Here are some pictures and video of Dominic checking out some different foods. So far he has had avocado, papaya, apple sauce, plain yoghurt, water (just enough to fill the lid of a water bottle), Cheerios, baby oatmeal, and banana, as well as prepared baby food of peaches and apple sauce. At his 6-month checkup on April 7, Dr. Pellman taught us that while Dominic is still nursing, we should concentrate on supplementing with iron-rich foods, which are the cereals and meats. Welcome welcome daily Cheerios! And Tia Nini (Eddie's sister Maryke) and Nana (Eddie's mom, Cleo) gave Dominic his first taste of meat in the form of baby food chicken on April 10.

March 26 - First food since the emergency banana: oatmeal (with added b-milk)

March 28 - Trying Avocado at the Market Broiler restaurant
Hmm. Not sure if that's a happy face or not...?

March 30 - First Cheerios along with banana and baby oatmeal

April 10 - First taste of meat: babyfood chicken at Nana's house

By Jove! It's a TOOTH!

OHMYGOODNESS! Where do I even start?

Sooo much has been going on since I last made an entry in this blog! I can’t even keep up with it all! Dominic has had his first real food, been on his first plane flight (and out of the country no less!), rolled over, made his first belly laugh, become ticklish, and now he has his first tooth! And there’s so much more than that.

I really don’t know where to start so I’m going to start at today and work backwards for a few days. Maybe tomorrow I’ll pick up with some more rewinding. But I promised myself I would make an entry tonight no matter what!

Ok, so the pictures I took today were of 7am this morning, Dominic gurgling his little lugie song on the video monitor. He woke up extra early today (5am, which he usually awakens between 6 and 6:30 and then entertains himself until about 6:45). I’m thinking it’s the new tooth that woke him so early, but he really wasn’t fussy; just up early. I fed him and because it is such a warm day today, when I put him back in his crib I left him in just a diaper. He started his little concert around 6:30 and by 7am I just had to get up and go get the camera. He turns on the mobile music himself and then sings to it and plays with the little pillow hanging on the outside of the crib bars. (Side note: today he has also figured out how to work the velcro fasteners on his diaper, so he was stark raving naked when I came to get him out of bed! You can kind of see at the beginning of the video Dominic playing with the dislodged diaper.)

After getting up for the day, we walked over to meet Daddy who was showing a house in our neighborhood to some prospective clients. They have a little boy named Dominic, too! Then we left with Daddy to go meet some friends who are considering a move to Belmont Shore, which is such a nice place to walk around, even on a super warm day like today. These friends (who I shan’t name in case they don’t want anyone to know they might move) have family in from out of town so we all went to lunch at Lucille’s on 2nd Street. Dominic ate Cheerios and enjoyed having his teething ring cooled in a big cup of ice water. I did manage to spill a small Tupperware full of Cheerios on the floor… good thing the hostess had strategically placed us by the kitchen entrance! (Although I did notice that there must have been at least 5 other strollers parked adjacent to tables as we passed to our booth, so I wasn’t the only one taking a little one for a little stroll on 2nd Street!)

While he was a perfect angel (like almost always, frankly), I must admit that by bedtime tonight Dominic had his first teething fussy episode. That is, I’m guessing it was from teething because normally he has no trouble going to sleep, and because I’ve never heard him make a “real” crying sound other than when he gets his shots. His tooth broke the skin 3 days ago (on the 9th) with exactly zero fanfare. I couldn’t believe it because I had heard I should expect fever, sleepless nights, lots of fussing and crying and drooling. Yet, there it was last Wednesday: a little sliver of rough edge poking out of his soft, pink gums. It’s the lower one just left of center (from his perspective). Here’s a picture of it, taken on the 9th. Boy, you can barely see it in this picture but I could definitely feel a little sharp edge with my finger. And no, it hasn't seemed to impact the breastfeeding, not yet at least. I don't feel anything different at all, so I'm guessing so far Dominic is not choosing to use my boob as a teething device.

Oh and here are another couple of pictures from the 9th. Super smilie despite the tooth showing up! What a love bug he is!!

So tonight about 6pm he started with a little whimpering. Now this, we have heard before and it usually means “I’m tired of ___ (doing whatever I’ve been doing for a half hour, such as lying down, playing in my activity dish, being on my tummy, etc.)” So I tried picking him up… then feeding him… then giving him to Daddy… then carrying him around. After each change of venue, he would quiet down and even smile, coo, or laugh, but just for a couple of minutes. Then the whimpering resumed. By 7pm, it was a bit more than a whimper.. more like a complaint. I handed him off to Daddy because his mattress cover was in the dryer so I knew I’d have to get his bed put back together before the 8:30 witching hour (bedtime, that is). As I was upstairs making the bed, Daddy brought the cupcake up, and he had on a full-fledged boo-boo face! Daddy’s and my hearts were both breaking to see that!

I figured he had got himself over tired, so I went through the bedtime routine a bit early. The routine is basically to change his diaper, cover his little dry/heat-rashed spots with hydrocortisone, then give him a rubdown with lavender lotion and put on some lightweight footie pajamas, feed him and put him to bed asleep. I figure the scent of lavender is some cue to his little mind that it’s time for that 10-hour stretch of sleep that he has made into a (wonderful) habit since December 21. He always smiles when the lavender smell hits him, like he is really happy the day has turned out so well and now he’s ready for a lovely rest. And tonight was no exception – Mr. D was smiling even though we later realized the teething was really bothering him! So I fed him and put him to bed. But he wasn’t down 5 minutes before he began with the whimper. A minute later it was a complaint. Then it was another boo-boo face which Daddy had to go rescue because I was in the ladies room.

Once out, I took him back to the feeding chair while Daddy broke open the as yet unopened box of baby remedies we got at Dominic’s shower. Hmm… little tummies, little fevers, little .. ah here it is! Baby Orajel (as well as some teething tablets and some other teething gel stuff). The Orajel box had both a daytime tube and a nighttime tube. And WOW that nighttime stuff must be some pretty strong stuff because Dominic was nursing and sort of squirming in a gripey uncomfortable way, and I put a dab of the pink, cherry-scented gel on my pinky finger and touch his gum with it (I think most of it got on his tongue, actually, but maybe a little came in contact with the actual tooth site), and PRESTO! Instant sleep. It was actually a little bit disconcerting.. like wow I must have just totally drugged my precious angel. I think I’m going to have to do some research on that stuff (great mom, check it out AFTER you give it to me!) But in the meanwhile, the suffering is over and the peanut blossom gets to rest. That was about 7:45 and I haven’t heard so much as a peep from him and it’s now 11:30.

Trust me, though, I can see him breathing in the monitor. ;-)