A collection of 3 random thoughts

So I thought I'd be supermom. Much to my dismay, I am not. I thought even with a baby, I'd have a spic-and-span house, a pie in the oven, and still have time for all my hobbies. I do not have any of these things, but I do have a healthy, beautiful daughter who is growing like a weed!

After "Vicky Christina Barcelona," I've finally made up my mind that I do not like Woody Allen films and I think I've figured out why. All of his female characters are these sexy bimbos who are easy to bed and otherwise weak in constitution of any sort. Obviously, the Academy Awards disagree with me, but I don't think we need to recognize Allen for his misogynistic movies.

I love eating lunch at Whole Foods (or similar gourmet grocery stores) because I love picnic-y type foods where I have the opportunity to sample a little of this and a little of that.

Our daily bread

Until recently, Tom and I have rarely agreed on bread. He prefers generic butter top wheat bread and my tastes are, well, fickle. One week I'd prefer rye, next week sourdough. But for now, it seems that we can finally come to an agreement thanks to Dave's Killer bread, a local bakery whose bread is yummy and nutritious. Even though I pay more for a loaf of Dave's Killer bread than I have ever paid for any other loaf, Dave's bread is worth every penny. Tom enjoys the freshness of the bread, made without any additives or preservatives, and I enjoy its nuttiness and seediness. Not only is his bread delicious, I can also feel good about supporting my local business. An added bonus is Dave's amazing and inspirational story about how he turned his life around after battles with meth addiction and spending 15 years in jail. Check out his bread and his website at: www.daveskillerbread.com. If you have not tried his bread, I strongly urge you to go out and buy a loaf - you'll love it!

Take Out

This has been a take-out sort of week. Between the intensity of my summer school class and taking care of Nicole in the mornings, there has been little time for me to cook dinner, much less anything else! Given the current heat wave, who would want to turn on the stove or oven anyway? (Tom does not eat salads either.) So we have been doing a lot of take-out lately, which, although they taste good is unfortunately not that good for you. Tom has been supportive in this regard by going out to pick up the food and picking up the tab. Here is what we had this week:

Wednesday - Panda Express

Thursday - Sweet Tomatoes (dine-in with coupon)

Friday - Red Robin

Saturday - McDonald's for breakfast and Old Market Pub for dinner

My mom will be here tomorrow and eating out for 3 will definitely be a lot more pricey than eating out for 2, so I finally dragged my butt to the grocery store and now our fridge is fully stocked with meals planned for every day this week. =)

The Cupertino Inn

We recently had an occasion to stay at the Cupertino Inn in Cupertino, CA, right across the street from Apple headquarters (just a coincidence). Here's the thing about me: I have a fetish for hotels. The fancier the better. To me, hotels represent a true vacation. With swimming pools, an exercise room, room service, wi-fi internet, cable TV, a big bed, VCR with a movie library, a refreshment center, and AC, it's hard not to feel pampered and care-free. Staying at hotels also means that I'm not staying at home, which means I'm not surrounded by my usual environs of house chores and endless to-do lists.

Some hotels go above and beyond its usual call of duty and I would list the Cupertino Inn as one of them. Although it's rough on the exterior, caters mainly to business travelers, and one could see that the hotel was at its prime in the late 70's or early 80's at best, the Cupertino Inn had other amenities that make up for its shortcomings. Free food always wins me over. For example, its hot breakfast buffet is quite excellent. With its daily offering of waffles, cereals, juices, eggs, meats, pastries, toasts, fruits, coffee and tea, the breakfast bar is sure a crowd pleaser.

The best part, though, has to be its complimentary cocktail and hors d'oeuvres hour from 5-7pm daily. Do I need to say more than FREE cocktails? Unfortunately, my breastfeeding regime sort of put a curb to my alcohol consumption, but I did partake in some hot potato skins, taquitos, mini-pizza, cheese and crackers, veggie dips, and fruit. I also liked that the Cupertino Inn had a hot coffee and tea bar available 24/hrs a day. Oh and did I mention that they also have a complimentary limo service that takes guests to the airport?

I am also looking forward to our next vacation in mid-August and hotel stay at the fancy-pants Fairmont Hotel in Vancouver, BC, which is offering us a free crib, mini-fridge, and much much more! See: http://www.fairmont.com/hotelvancouver

The Woes of Breastfeeding

By now, I could probably write a whole book on all of our breastfeeding woes. From the get-go, Nicole did not have a good latch. For example, she would only suck on the nipple, rather than the areola. A nurse introduced the nipple shield to help her better identify the nipple, which we are still using. Also, no one at the hospital emphasized the importance of breastfeeding right after birth which delayed my milk production. By Day 3, my milk still hadn't come in yet and Nicole was hungry so we started giving her some formula in a bottle. It is one of the worst feelings in the world when you know you can't feed your child.

By the time we checked out of the hospital, Nicole was 11% down from her birth weight (normal is 7-10%). We were told to supplement with formula and after a week, she had regained some weight she lost and was now only 5% down from her birth weight. We saw our first lactation consultant at this time and she basically scared us with childhood obesity and diabetes and told us to stop supplementing Nicole, which we did. The week following that was hard, because Nicole cried a lot and nothing we did calmed her. She would only stop crying after she had worn herself out. We saw another lactation consultant, who told us that Nicole was crying because she was hungry. Even though I was breastfeeding her 8-12 times a day, she wasn't getting enough from me. So, we went back to formula. To this day, we still feel incredibly guilty for not recognizing her hungry cries and under-feeding our poor girl!

Our next problem was that because Nicole was going back and forth between the bottle and the breast, Nicole struggled at the breast because she wasn't getting the "flow" that she liked. So, we went back to see another lactation consultant who taught me how to pump properly in order to increase my milk production. Things were going pretty well for a while and we checked in with another lactation consultant who prescribed Fenugreek - this herb that is suppose to increase mother's milk.

Our next challenge was getting Nicole to stop being a snacker (i.e. eating every 2 hours which was exhausting for me and my breasts) and being a more efficient eater. So we saw Kathleen, my favorite lactation consultant who is from Texas and who watches out for my best interest as well as Nicole's. She suggested a "Sane Plan" where we feed her 3 oz. every 3 hours. I still pump almost after every feeding and we are still supplementing with formula with the hopes that my milk production will eventually catch up.

So, 4 lactation consultants and 5 appointments later, our most urgent breastfeeding concerns are behind us but things still aren't smooth sailing. So stay tuned!

The Birth Plan

Mama makes a birth plan and Baby laughs.

My birth of Nicole did not go as planned, to say the least. I had envisioned a natural birth, with the least amount of medical intervention as possible, even though I planned to give birth in the hospital with a doctor. I had also imagined that it would be a lot of hard work, but beautiful in the end and very worth it. The latter part was true enough, but the process was very different than the one I planned on.

My water broke at 4:30am on Saturday, May 2nd when I was in the kitchen, fetching a snack. After I woke Tom up, I called the hospital right away. The nurse said to make my way to the hospital in a few hours. After cleaning the house, grabbing breakfast at McDonald's, a decaf mocha from Dutch Bros, grabbing some last minute items such as snacks and tennis balls at Target, and taking a short nap, we checked in to OHSU around 9:30am.

After hooking me up to the baby monitor to make sure that baby's heartbeat was regular, the doctors checked to see if my bag o' water was indeed broken. Apparently a lot of women leak urine and mistake it for amniotic fluid. Unfortunately they weren't certain the first time they checked, so after a few hours they checked again to confirmed that yes, it was indeed broken. One unnamed doctor also checked my cervix (in a not-so-gently-way) and I was only 50% effaced and 1 cm dilated.

Now that my water was broken, the conversation turned to whether or not I wanted to start Pitocin, which I absolutely did not want to do because it interferes with your body's natural ability to cope with labor pains. I was more or less badgered into starting Pitocin, however, because my body did not start contractions on its own after my water had broken and there is an increased chance of infection for mom and baby if baby is not delivered within 24-hours after the water is broken.

I started Pitocin at 4:30pm and ended at 5am the next day (my highest dosage was about 60 ml) and was very frustrated upon finding out that after all that, I had only dilated to 2cm and 80% effaced. The doctors decided to let me rest and eat some breakfast while they pow-wowed on what to do with me next. The options weren't too good, in my opinion, complicated by the fact that I was Group B Strep (GBS) positive. The options were: 1) continue labor with Pitocin, except this time, the doctors were prepared to give me the full dosage. In addition, they would insert an intrauterine pressure catheter (IUPC) which would measure the adequacy of my contractions for at least 2 hours. If my contractions weren't "adequate," I would have a C-section (due to the amount of time that will have passed since my water broke). The risks associated with this option is fetal distress and a risk of infection to baby and me. My second option was an elective C-section and the downside of that is of course the longer recovery process.

I chose the latter option, because I felt like I had already gone through an entire night of labor and I didn't want to go through that again. Also, there was no guarantee that the first option would work, which would result in a C-section anyway with now an increased risk to baby. At the time of the C-section, I was only 3 cm dilated. Aside from the injection of the spinal block, which kind of stung, the C-section itself was not too bad and it was such a joy to hear my baby's first cry after what seemed like 10 minutes of doctors poking around. The worst part of the whole hospital experience, in my opinion, was the administration of IV penicillin through the hand. That hurt like a b****.

I can't say I wasn't disappointed or bitter about the whole experience. Tom asked me, knowing what I know now, what I would change. I wish I had the courage to let my body do its own thing, but I could not have known that everything would turn out ok and that the baby would be fine. In the end, we got a healthy and beautiful baby girl, which is all that any parent can ask for really, but I do hope that my next birth goes more smoothly.

Why I Love Powell's Books

The short answer is: because they buy back my books and cash in my hot little hands always make me super happy.

When Tom and I first met, we use to buy our books from Barnes & Noble because we had a B&N card which saved us 10% on each purchase. And when that ran out after a year, we bought our books from Costco. Then when we got married, we registered for a few books on Amazon.com and had been recycling the store credit from the registry ever since. In the summer of 2007, we did a massive overhaul of our stuff and sold about $400 worth of books to Powell's. Most of the big ticket items were Tom's fantasy and sci-fi books in paperback and we donated the rest to Oregon Women Lawyers (OWLS).

In an effort to make *more* room for the baby, I recently cleared out all of my German literature books. These are the ones I kept from college with the intention of going back to the language or picking up a German poetry book to read one day when I had free time (ha!). Ten years passed and I did not once open up these books. I really didn't think Powell's was going to buy them back, but to my surprise, they bought all but two. I was able to exchange this one box of books for $47 cash or $57 in store credit. I opted for store credit this time and exchanged it for "Healthy Sleeping Habits," "Baby Bargain Books," and "Lonely Planet's Alaska" (2009). A box of books that had been sitting on my shelf for 3 books on my wish list, plus $10 store credit? Not a bad trade-off I say!