• Yet another sleep regression. Screams and tantrums at bedtime and a few wakeups a night.
• Full of two-year old angst. He’s “difficult” according to grandmom, a “pain-in-the-ass” according to dad, and a “shithead” according to me, the loving mother.
• Can’t stop biting his toenails. Aside from my worry about his toes getting infected, I cannot wait for him to outgrow this habit because it’s disgusting.
• He is skinny. He’ll go for days eating very little then days where he shocks the hell out me by eating a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for breakfast followed up by a turkey sandwich 20 minutes later.
• Brilliant. Stole one of his brother’s teddy bears and refers to it as a polar bear. When asked why it’s a polar bear responded, “Because it’s not a panda bear.”
• Able to hold conversations with adults and kids alike. He can communicate his wants and needs.
• Super cuddly in the morning. “I want to lie down on you, mama.”
• Still obsessed with trains.
• Likes to play baseball and basketball, ride his bike and run. The kid loves to run.
• Finger paints- he used to be turned off by the messy hands
• He is observant. I walk upstairs to get him in the morning, still wearing just a t-shirt and he says, “you are not wearing pants, mama.” I got home from a wedding wearing flip flops given to the female guests as favors and he said, “you are wearing new purple flip flops mommy.”
• He wants to know things. “Mama, this is your bathing suit or your underwear?”
• Aside from the shithead moments, this kid is awesome. He is so much fun on the beach and on walks. He loves the library and the playground and the sprinkler park. He jumps up and down with excitement when he’s going to see our friends Doodlebug and Baby Doodle. It still makes me melt when he calls me mama or mommy.

At three months the baby

• Brings hands together and can insert them in his mouth.
• May be teething, as indicated by copious amounts of drool.
• Sleeps like a baby. Long naps, 8-10 hour nights.
• Is finally enjoying toys- playmat, bouncy chair, mobile all provide minutes of entertainment.
• Is delicious. I can’t stop eating his sweet pudgy cheeks and belly and thighs.
• Is extraordinarily good- natured. Doesn’t mind being passed around.
• Takes a bottle without argument.
• Is starting to giggle in addition to his huge, gummy grins.
• Looks enormous to me. Other people keep saying things like, “I forget how small babies are when they’re born.” I can’t stop thinking about how big he’s getting.
• Is sort of terrified of his brother. Probably related to the unrelenting screams in his face occasional squeezes, squishes, tackles and nibbles.
• Still has blue eyes. They are still dark, but getting lighter. I wonder if they’ll stay blue.

So we get to the Hershey Inn, put our names in for a table and got a buzzer thing so we can walk around while we wait. The Fiendling is hungry, tired and cranky so I take him into the gift shop to play with toys. In the meantime, Boyfiend takes the baby with him and run out to get some wine for later. (There’s a story in here about my outrage that the personalized keychains in the gift shop had neither of my children’s fairly common and correctly spelled names, but offered Kaylee, Mackenzie, hottie, I (heart) Zachary and #1 Flirt, but it’s not really of importance so I’ll just leave it at that.)

After about 15-20 minutes the buzzer goes off. I have to pry a toy train out of the Fiendling’s hands which makes him very angry. We get to our table and I hold the struggling child on my lap while I wait for the waitress. Boyfiend and the baby show up soon after and the Fiendling promptly loses his shit. We order French fries for him in the hopes that they’ll chill him out some and Boyfiend takes him outside to calm him down so the rest of the restaurant isn’t subjected to his tantrum, while I hold the pacifier firmly in the baby’s mouth, trying desperately to keep him from crying.

A woman at the table adjacent to ours comments about how I should cherish these times since they grow up so fast. I smile and in my head I tell her to fuck off. I order my meal and tell the waitress Boyfiend has a coupon for the Smorgasboard and she brings the fries right as Boyfiend brings the Fiendling back in. I offer him a fry, which of course he does not want. I meant to offer Boyfiend one since a lot of the time the best way to get him to eat something is to offer it to someone else, but somehow I mess up and take a bite of it myself. This leads him to start wailing all over again and once again Boyfiend has to bring him outside.

A boy at the table behind me asks, “Why is he crying mommy?” The woman at the table adjacent to ours again says something about how I should cherish these moments and I smile through my gritted teeth as I pick up the pacifier that the baby just spit onto the dirty floor. I blow the dirt off the pacifier, look around to make sure no one’s watching, and stick it back in his mouth just as he starts to whimper.

My food arrives and I start to eat one handed. The woman at the other table tries to make conversation. She’s eating with her husband and two teenage boys. They look out of place because they are Jewish and based on the “bible-opoly” board game in the gift shop, we’re clearly not in Jew country. She tells me all about how quickly kids grow up and how beautiful my boys are. She offers to hold the baby for me so I can eat. I politely decline. She starts tells her waiter a joke about a panda. He does not laugh.

Boyfiend comes back in with the Fiendling who notices that the younger boy has a shitload of toys in front of him including a number of Thomas trains. The woman, who I’m now convinced is crazy, makes her kid share them. Boyfiend is relieved that the Fiendling will be occupied and goes to get his food up at the Smorgasboard. The woman tells the waiter a joke about teenagers. He is a teenager and does not get it. She starts to explain it to him as he tries to tell her he has to go. The older son basically tells her to shut up so the waiter can get back to work. The waiter is relieved.

Boyfiend gets back and the woman tells us how they eat at this restaurant all the time. While the Fiendling plays with the teenager’s toys Boyfiend feeds him bits of French Fries. The woman talks about how she’s going back to work as a teacher part time. A lunch room teacher. She asks if we read bible stories to our children. I’m confused because I could have sworn that they were Jewish, but I have no interest in interacting with her so I keep my mouth shut. She keeps talking and talking and asking us questions that I don’t really respond to. She asks if we’re teaching our boys to follow the right path and if we’re teaching them how to be like Jesus. Boyfiend’s fielding the questions pretty well until she straight up asks if we believe that Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior. Boyfiend says, “No actually, we’re Jewish.”

I’m so pleased that he’s taken one for the team and said “we’re” Jewish, instead of just saying that his wife is Jewish that it takes me a split second to register when the crazy woman blurts out, “You are? So are we! I never would have pegged you as Jewish, you don’t look Jewish.” I’m staring at her as she continues, “We’re Messianic Jews!”

She goes back to asking questions about if the Fiendling’s a good eater and offers to go up to the Smorgasboard to get him some cucumber because her kids loved cucumber. We learn that they lived in Overbrook Park before moving to Drexel Hill. At some point her husband and kids disappeared and she’s alone at her table still talking while the Fiendling plays with her teenage son’s toys.

We pay our bill, thank her for letting the Fiendling play, and head to the hotel. Boyfiend and the Fiendling go straight to the pool while I nurse the baby and leave Mix a message cursing him for being on vacation without a phone on the very night I need to tell him all about our meeting with the Messianic Jews.

Then I got this thing on my back. I assumed it was a zit or a bug bite. I’ve never had a zit on my back, but it was reddish and hurt. I asked Boyfiend for his expert opinion and he told me that it was a zit. The following day the zit was bigger, redder and owier. Boyfiend tried to pop it and came to the conclusion that it was not, in fact, a zit and I needed to see a doctor about it. Sweet. And sexy on the beach.

Speaking of sexy, I ended up buying two new pairs of Reef flip flops this year because I was so grossed out by the old ones. They were blue to begin with and three summers of wearing them 90% fo the time turned them dingy and brown.  I figured with two new pairs of flip flops I could alternate and they wouldn’t get so nasty. But then (since I’m neurotic) I went ahead and gave cleaning the old ones a shot. I went to work with Dawn and a toothbrush and the results were incredible.

I could have saved myself the money and cleaned them to begin with. Oh well. You can never have too many pairs of comfortable flip flops.

He’s very strong, and can push up on his arms now when he’s on his belly. He also holds his head up straight when we hold him upright. The other day we were at the pool at my dad’s condo and I was holding the baby so that he was looking intently at something over my shoulder. My dad wanted to show him off to a friend and asked me to turn around so she could see his dark blue eyes. As soon as I turned he turned his head back to what he was looking at. I turned again and again he turned his head. My dad’s friend moved to see him better.

We had his two month appointment the other day. Our pediatrician is in the process of moving into a new office/new health care system so we had to see the guy who bought out her previous practice. The office was a mess and the doctor was a douche, but we did learn his height and weight and get him one of five vaccinations. The doctor, who may have been insane, lifted the baby in his arms, holding him up superman style. He sort of flew him back and forth over the exam table. The baby looked confused and a little bit stricken and he was as stiff as a board up there, wide-eyed and flailing his arms. I don’t know what the fuck that was about, but the doctor said, “Good, he passed,” and put him down.

Sleeping is good. I don’t expect it to last forever, but I’m still enjoying it while it does. He naps in a crib by himself when the day allows it and he sleeps by himself in a crib at night. His long stretch of sleep is usually between 10 or 11 and 6 am. He wakes then to nurse and goes back to sleep for another hour or so. If I remember to put him back in his crib instead of leaving him in bed beside me he’ll sleep for even longer. I am surprisingly well rested.

He’s not so great in the car. He was fine for weeks, but for the last several he mostly cries if he can’t fall asleep. It’s one of the only times he screams. Today he didn’t fall asleep in the car and he didn’t scream either. I’m hoping that’s a sign that he’s becoming more tolerant and a ride to the shore won’t be torture on the ears.

He spends more and more time awake each day and though he still spends most of his awake time nursing, the rest of the time he’s alert and aware, examining the world around him. He’s discovered his arms and likes to wave them about. He gurgles and coos and likes when I repeat the sounds. He plays, which means he makes funny faces and flails his arms, and he smiles. The smiles are brilliant- charming and goofy all at the same time. He sometimes winks when he smiles, like we’re sharing an inside joke.

He’s perfect. Really. I am completely smitten.

He uses pronouns properly now and corrects himself if he accidentally says, ‘carry you’ instead of ‘carry me.” His sentences have grown more complex and he’s often unintentionally hilarious saying things like, “No I won’t say cheese, I’m playing with trains,” when we try to take his picture. Now he’s getting too smart for us and we have to be careful about what we say around him. It’s not just that he repeats what he hears, it’s that he’s able to draw conclusions. He knows who we’re speaking with on the phone and can figure out what plans we’re making. He also knows when we find something funny and tries to repeat it.

One night he was running around naked after his bath and Boyfiend was taking pictures and videos. Of course he peed on the floor. It didn’t occur to either of us to put a diaper on him as I cleaned up the mess and Boyfiend continued to record him running in circles around the train table and playing with his trains. In mid-recording I looked up and realized he was peeing on the floor again. We laughed and laughed. The next night after his bath Boyfiend tried to get him in a diaper. The Fiendling yelled, “No! I’m going to run and pee on the rug.”

The Fiendling is much better with the baby, even helping me burp him and change diapers. He’s been gentle and understands that he’s not supposed to hit, kick or bite the baby, though he does climb on him and squish him a bit now and again. He’s also been much better with me and tells me he loves me and gives me kisses unprompted.

He sings to himself often, sometimes even in tune. His repertoire consists mainly of songs from Thomas the Tank Engine though Baby Beluga has been a recent favorite. He plays imaginatively for real now, and his trains talk to each other and even argue- “No, I’m not a green engine, I’m a blue engine.” or “Don’t pull this tender, it’s my tender, not your tender.”

His favorite activity is still playing with trains but he loves the playground and the sprinklers and the library. He loves to run, and will run around the block rather than walk or ride in the stroller.

He’s still bossy, telling me to stop singing or stop talking when he’s tired, cranky or just wants my undivided attention. He’s also still a toddler which means he’s unpredictable and insists on doing things all by himself which leads to screams and tantrums.

He’s so big. He’s lost his baby roundness- he’s now this sticky, dirty, skinny little boy running around with skinned knees demanding cookies and popsicles.

But he’s back. He’s sweet and smart and funny and lovable, and spending time with him is fun again.

Don’t worry though. I haven’t lost my mind entirely. I know that any more than two consecutive nights is asking for trouble. My mother is still crazy and I still cringe at most of what she says. Sadly I missed hearing this gem first hand. My mom told Boyfiend some story about her friend’s cooking. Her friend G, who I’ve known since I was born, loves to entertain but isn’t much of a cook. There’s always something strange about her recipes and things always taste better when others are helping out in the kitchen. My mom described eating some meatballs at G’s house to Boyfiend and said that they were really cocked up.

As he recounted this to me I needed some clarification. What exactly was the context of the phrase “cocked up?” Does cocked up mean that the meatballs were good or bad? What was cocked up about them? The answer is that the meatballs had cheese in the middle and that cocked up means that they were good. Boyfiend thoroughly grossed me out by explaining that perhaps the cheese oozed out of the middle, hence the word “cocked.” We giggled about it for a while. A long while.

A little later Boyfiend went into the kitchen and I asked him to get me some ice cream. With berries. And pretzels. I wasn’t sure if he heard the additional request so I followed him in. He turned around holding a large bowl of ice cream with strawberries, raspberries and pretzels and said, “Here, I really cocked it up for you. I cocked it up good.”

Weight gained during pregnancy: 38 lbs
Weight lost since: 28 lbs
Pounds to go to pre-pregnancy weight: 10
Pounds to go to pre-pre-pregnancy weight: 18
Pounds to go to weight I’d be happy to settle for: 15

Not bad. Considering that I had 25 lbs to lose for months and months after the Fiendling was born and I actually wore a pair of pre-pregnancy size 2 pants with a waistband yesterday, I’m in pretty good shape. Now I just have to get back to the gym.

He still spends the majority of the day sleeping, but when he’s awake he spends his time looking around with those dark blue eyes. He’s mostly calm and content and very rarely cries for reasons I can’t figure out immediately. He’s a good sleeper and naps on his own for hours at a time in his crib, the pack n play in my bedroom, or on a mat on the floor. At night he wakes to eat twice between 11 and 6 but generally goes back to sleep immediately after nursing for a few minutes. Last night he pleased me by sleeping for a good six-hour stretch. I am grateful.

He nurses quickly and efficiently and doesn’t spend a lot of time just hanging out on the breast, which I really appreciate. The quick and efficient nursing makes him pretty gassy which leads to spectacular spit ups once or twice a day. It’s astounding how much liquid can spew from a newborn’s mouth without them really noticing or caring. The pooping seems to have slowed down, and while there’s still plenty of poop (one of the downsides of parenting) I no longer have to change three diapers in a 30-minute period because of it.

The poor little guy hasn’t had the best health so far. He’s already had a staph infection, a nasty yeast rash (which the other pediatrician in the office told me was not yeast when I brought him in the first time. Two days later she wrote me the prescription for the yeast cream and it promptly went away), and now he’s got a cough. The same cough his brother and I both have. It’s awful to hear his little body coughing, especially since I know how much it hurts. But it hasn’t seemed to affect his mood and it hasn’t affected his sleep.

He’s really pretty strong. He surprised everyone by lifting his head and looking around immediately after his birth and he’s continued to show off his impressive head control since. When he’s on his belly he pushes up on his arms and looks around. He’s also got strong legs. Sometimes when he sleeps he’ll push himself several inches forward. One day he turned a full 90 degrees. I’ve also seen him turn from his back to his side. He’s so advanced. (doesn’t every parent say that about their kid?)

My little baby is growing up. It’s amazing how easily and how immediately we loved him. I’ll miss the newborn stage when it’s over. I love how soft and cuddly he is and how perfectly he fits under my chin. But I can’t wait to see what he’ll be like as he grows.