When do sweet little feet cross the line from totally edible to not so much?

As if we didn’t love the Discovery Channel enough already, this is our new favorite commercial.

Last May, when we were out in Scottsbluff, Jason and I were driving back to the hotel at night, and we saw a lightning storm on the horizon. As we watched the show, we promised each other that when we had kids, we would always take the time to try to instill a sense of wonder in them. The commercial reminds me of that, and it makes me a little teary every time I watch it.

Dear Simon,

On Saturday you turned two months old. I wouldn’t believe it except today you have your two-month check-up with the pediatrician, so that must be right.

You have grown so much this month. You grew out of your preemie clothes—two pounds ago, in fact. I cried as I folded them up and tucked them away even though I knew I was being rather silly. I am so conflicted. Of course, I cheer when you grow. I call your dad every week after your weight checks to make him guess what a big baby you’re becoming. But then I remember you’ll never be this little again, and that makes me ache a little.

You are starting to make more noises and make them more often. Your range of grunts is definitely expanding. Most interestingly and perplexingly, you seem to have learned to throw your voice. Yesterday we were in the grocery store and you let out this gravelly, sorrowful groan, but in the time that it took me to shift my eyes from the peas to your sweet face, you had become your usual placid self, and I thought to myself that there was just no way that sad sound had come from that peaceful baby except possibly by way of ventriloquism.

You’ve learned a few other tricks this month as well. When we feed you from a bottle, you either place your hand on top of ours as if to guide us, or you ball both your hands into tight little fists up by your chest as if to psych yourself up to chug the whole thing. Impossibly cute. Once in a while you find your thumb, though usually by accident after several minutes of flailing your arm back and forth in front of your face and sticking out your tongue as if trying to catch it like a raindrop. And occasionally you spit up so much that we realize you must be trying to treat us to your impression of a soft-serve ice cream dispenser—this is one trick we wish you would unlearn, kiddo.

You are regularly undecided about whether or not you are upset. Usually, you decide you’re not. Sometimes when you are sleeping, just about to wake, you will screw up your face and trick us into thinking you’re about to let out a blood-curdling scream, but the next moment you will relax again completely. You can go from Mr. Fussy Fusses A Lot to Mr. Limpy McSleeper in such a short span that if you were older I’d think you were faking it. This morning during tummy time, you tried your best to roll onto your back, but after only a few minutes of disgruntled and noisy baby push-ups (wherein you lift your head from side to side), you decided it was in vain and abandoned the project. Poor little peanut without any motor control.

This month you’ve ventured out of the house quite a bit more. You made your debut at Zion, you visited both sets of grandparents for Easter, and you even made the rounds with Daddy’s co-workers. You love your car seat, which is a blessing. Perhaps you have inherited your mama’s love of traveling. You are a big hit wherever you go, of course, and it makes me feel a little bit more sane to be not quite so housebound. Predictably, the downside is that we are now late for absolutely everything. Who knew you would need so much stuff for the smallest outings—and who knew it would take forever to round it all up?

You are also starting to interact more, and that is even more fun than we had imagined. You have given us a couple of smiles, though they are not yet predictable, and your dad and I regularly make fools of ourselves trying to get you to give us a gummy little grin. Now you are happily kicking and smiling beside me. Every once in a while, I stick my face into your line of vision, just so I can pretend you’re smiling at me. Soon, soon. Whenever you hear your daddy’s voice, you crane your neck to see where he is. This, of course, pushes my heart to its absolute bursting point every time.

You are the best baby in the world. My only suggestion for improvement is this: this next month I’d like to see you work on being awake more in the day and asleep more in the night. That’s all.

Mama loves you, little man.

Simon and Ezra

I used to try a lot harder. Yesterday I scrolled through a bunch of old e-mails between Jason and me from when we first met and through much of our time dating (yes, I saved them ALL. Call me a packrat. Call me a dork). Maybe he didn’t catch on, but even from scanning the subject lines I remember that I was flirting with him, often trying to be clever or to reference something he might think was cool—from song titles or lyrics (especially Cure songs)

The old man is snoring
When hip hop drove the big cars
Friday, I’m in love
For dancing like you don’t hear the beat
Watch the walls instead
Life goes easy on me
Wish it were a Sunday

to Buffy or Freaks and Geeks references

Smooches and Mooches
Just another Tuesday night in Sunnydale

to movie quotes

Maaannnniiiiii!
A football is round, a game lasts ninety minutes
Those racecar yia-yias.

I was always trying to think of something that might make him intrigued (not that he wouldn’t have opened the e-mail anyway, but, you know, it added a little something, I thought). And, yeah, the conversations we started in those e-mails were pretty interesting as well. These days, if I e-mail Jason at all, it’s usually with a yawner of a subject line with the potential to get caught in a spam filter:

an e-mail
your message
trees 1
trees2
dress?
font

I feel like I’ve let myself go—gotten old, gotten boring. That said, one of the nice things about being married is that we no longer conduct most of our conversations over e-mail. Then again, it’s a slippery slope—get boring with e-mail subject lines, slack on the content of said e-mails, and the next thing you know all our communication is equally mundane: what did Simon eat today? How much did he poop? Oh wait. 

One of the first decisions Jason and I made about “when we have kids” is that we would have a Totoro-themed nursery (his idea). Finishing the nursey was truly a collaborative effort by Simon’s grandparents, and we couldn’t be more happy with how it turned out. Grandpa Carlson painted the walls. Grandma Carlson made the curtains. Grandma Morehead made the bedding. And the wall hangings were a team effort--Grandma Carlson made the pattern, Grandpa Morehead cut the wood (and spearheaded the installation), and Grandma Morehead painted them. They each did such an amazing job, and I am so thankful to have such a special room for our little guy.

Simon got his first real dose of fresh air today. The brief outing with Rebecca and Livia was refreshing to body and soul, and I’m thankful that we chose it over a (also desperately needed) nap.

Dear Simon,

You are already a month old, which is still kind of unbelievable to us since we really weren’t expecting you to make your debut for another two weeks yet. Of course, we can’t imagine it any other way.

It is truly a blessing that you were born six weeks early (still, right on time, as your dad pointed out). I have needed those “extra” weeks since I’ve already had several near-meltdowns of the “he won’t be a baby forever” variety. Indeed, you are growing so fast—you weighed a hefty five pounds at your last appointment. To others you look so little, but to your dad and me, you are simply baby size. In fact, we have met a number of brand new baby friends since your arrival (there has been an absolute baby explosion at Zion), and we just can’t get over how big they look compared to you—most of them are twice your size.

One of my overwhelming impressions of you on your birthday was that you were impossibly soft. I seem to remember asking everyone who saw you that day if they had touched you and if they noticed how soft you were (okay, I was a little loopy from the Demerol).  Your dad and I got hooked on Mythbusters while I was in the hospital (and have continued our habit now that we have cable TV at home). I keep wondering if Adam and Jamie can come up with some experiment to prove that your wee little head is indeed the softest surface known to man. Totally plausible.

You spent your first three weeks in the neonatal intensive care unit. While we are thankful for the excellent care you received and for the extra sleep (which we are completely deprived of now), I can’t even begin to tell you how hard it was to leave you each night. After your first two or three days, you no longer needed oxygen or other help breathing, so they called you a “feeder and grower,” which sounds like some kind of farmer but just meant that you needed to grow and to learn how to eat before they sent you home with us. And we are so happy to have you home (sleepless nights and all); home just didn’t feel right without the littlest Morehead.

True, your days and nights are pretty predictable: eat, sleep, poop, repeat. But even when you’re sleeping, you have a multitude of expressions, and any one of them has the capacity to bring me to my knees with its sheer cuteness. We knew from your very first day that you had a dark look—one that rivaled even Jones’s pout (not shown in this picture)—but you also have a smile that absolutely lights up my world. Your most common expression is what we think might be bored—you hold your lips completely still and shift your eyes as if you are so over whatever we might be doing as we try desperately to entertain you. Sometimes, though, you do the opposite—you wrinkle your lips into a teeny O (as if to coo) and say with your eyes that you have just heard the most wonderful news. My favorite, though, is when you pucker up: I just can’t stop myself from planting a big kiss on your lips—the kind that would make you roll your eyes and say, “Oh, Mom!” if only you could talk, which you can’t.

On that note, I love your myriad baby noises as well. Your squeaks and grunts are priceless. You’ve already nearly outgrown your goat cry, which makes me kind of sad because it was almost as cute as it was pathetic. When you sneeze, you let out three or four “Achoos” almost always followed by an exclamatory “Huuuuunh!” Oh, how I wish you would not outgrow that one. It’s ridiculously sweet.

Although it’s still a ways off, we have been talking about what you might like to be when you grow up. We think that you may have a future in the military’s special forces. We base this on your guerilla pooping skills. You patiently wait until after your diaper is changed and then promptly fill it. You do this several times a day, and you’d think by now that we’d be on to you, but we continue to fall for it.

You’ll also be well equipped for your special ops career with your rock-hard abs. You lie flat on your back and raise both feet in the air. Sometimes you work on your obliques by lying on your side and lifting your legs. I know from my work-out DVDs that these are difficult moves.

And yet another of your qualifications would be your special ability to Houdini out of your blankets. You always manage get your arms loose, no matter how tight we swaddle you. You are one strong kiddo, that’s for sure.

You are the very definition of “good baby,” as you are about as chilled out as human babies come (you must get that from your dad). You are nothing if not delightful, and your dad and I couldn’t be happier that you’ve come and turned our lives upside down.

Mama loves you, little man.

My heart is full, more than I ever thought was possible, and I’m pretty sure it’s about to burst. Any minute.

My littlest Valentine is fifteen days old, weighs in at 4 pounds 7 ounces, and has been eating like a champ. We hope to have him home in a week or so.

My wonderful husband made me a mix CD. How he had time with everything going on is beyond me, but it’s just perfect--romance old school style. (And just like Christmas and his recent birthday, I dropped the ball. I will have to make it up to him soon.) We’ll spend a cozy evening in the NICU--nowhere else we’d rather be right now.

And! I got my wedding ring on my (still slightly swollen) finger for the first time in months. All is right with the world.

(Photo by Rachel [Grandma] Morehead)

...when you look at your IV stand and think, “Gee, that would make a cute coat rack.”

The Morehead family has been doing fine, all three of us. Simon will likely stay in the NICU for awhile, but he’s getting stronger every day. They’ve had him on some breathing help, including a ventilator, due to some minor respiratory issues—but he’s slowly getting weaned off of that and has been responding really well. He’s also got a slight case of jaundice, so he’ll be under the lights for a little while to clear that up.

My blood pressure and heartrate have still been a little spotty over the past day or two, but I’m on a new, more aggressive drug that has been having some good effects. Jason and I are still planning to come home on Sunday sans Simon. Which will be hard, but we know that the NICU is the best possible place for him. And of course, we’ll be seeing him every day that he’s there.

Thanks again for all of your prayers and thoughts. It’s been a bumpy three weeks or so, but so worth it. We can’t wait to bring Simon home and share him with all of you.