You're a Vegan, What Do You Eat? (Thanksgiving Edition)

 

We stayed at home for Thanksgiving this year, and for the first time in my life, I made a complete Vegan Thanksgiving dinner on my own.

The whole thing started when I got off work a little bit early on Wednesday afternoon.  I began cooking after I picked up William and he was (supposed to be) taking a nap.  First order of business was to make cornbread.  William eats exactly 5 foods, and "Mr. Mike's Cornbread" (Mr. Mike being the cook at daycare) is one of them.  I don't know how Mr. Mike makes his cornbread, but it surely involves eggs and probably butter and milk.  The cornbread I made did not, but it was both amazing and easy.  It involved ground up flax seed as egg replacer (my favorite form of egg substitute), flour, cornmeal, baking powder, salt, agave, soy milk, and canola oil.  Put it in a square baking dish and bake for 20 minutes.  Beauty.

Next, I made pumpkin pie.  Many, many years ago, I used to have this vegan pumpkin pie recipe that I got off a tofu box or something, and I have since lost.  I tried to recreate it from memory, using canned pureed pumpkin, half a tub of Tofutti cream cheese, half a block of silken tofu, some amount of soy milk, maybe 1/2 cup of brown sugar, a drizzle of molasses, and a good tablespoon of pumpkin pie spice.  Whirl that in the blender until it is well mixed.  Then pour it in to a graham cracker crust (surprisingly, the Keebler brand appears to be vegan).

The quantity of pumpkin filling I had mixed up way exceeded the capacity of the graham cracker crust.  I had also bought some little bitty, individual serving graham crusts, thinking that William might be intrigued by the smallness and cuteness of them, and so I filled 3 of these with the pie filling as well.  

Then it occurred to me that I had just made an entire pumpkin pie and 3 additional tiny pumpkin pies, and Rob probably wasn't going to eat it because he doesn't' like pie, and William probably wasn't going to eat it because pie is not on his list of 5 Approved Foods.  So I had a lot of pie going on, and in all probability, I was the only person who was going to eat it.  To make matters worse, there was still more filling.  I thought about putting it in a tupperware and freezing it, or maybe even throwing it out, but instead I took the I Love Lucy route and simply ate it.  Divine.

I baked the tiny pies for about 20 minutes and the big pie for about an hour, then I let them cool and put them in the fridge overnight.

My last order of business for Thanksgiving Eve was to make a cranberry relish.  Also a food that probably no one in my house cared about or would want to eat.  But I felt compelled to make it anyway.  I saw a couple of recipes here and there and decided to combine them into one of my own.  What I did was take 1/2 package of fresh cranberries, 3 stalks of celery, 1 apple, 1 orange, some orange zest, about 1/4 cup sugar, and a smack of cinnamon.  Then I put that in the food processor and 10 seconds later: cranberry relish.  

Thanksgiving morning involved going to the parade downtown via the MetroLink, or as Will likes to call it, The Train.  Will was more interested in climbing up and down the many staircases at Kiener Park, but I was in my element  watching the parade.

First, we waited for the parade to start.

 

 

When it finally did, we saw senior citizens playing accordions.

 

We saw Frosty the Snowman.

We saw Jackie Joyner-Kersee

We got empowered by the YWCA.

I became nostalgic for the days when I was 16 and marched in parades and had to hold my line.


Finally, the real Santa Claus arrived.

 

After the parade, we went back home and while Will was taking a nap, I got the rest of the meal ready.  This involved a Trader Joe's Turkey-Less Stuffed Roast.  I have never before eaten something like this, and I hadn't even been planning on buying it last weekend when I was shopping at Trader Joe's.  But as I saw it in the store and stood there examining the package, another shopper saw my confusion and assured me, "I've had that before.  It's really good."  And so I thought, why not.  I'd been planning on making some kind of marinated tofu concoction and making my own stuffing and gravy.  But this Turkey-Less Stuffed Roast contained it all.  A texturized soy protein thing that was stuffed with stuffing and included a packet of gravy.  All vegan.  It seemed like a win-win situation.

To cook the Turkey-Less Stuffed Roast, I took some celery stalks, quartered small potatoes, turnips, carrots, and garlic and layered that in the bottom of the roasting pan.  I put the Turkey-Less Stuffed Roast on top of that and basted it with a sauce made of Earth Balance (they claim to responsibly source their palm oil, which I hope is true), garlic powder, and fresh sage (that I had bought for some other purpose but since forgotten why) and a smack of liquid smoke.  I covered the the whole thing with foil and cooked it for about an hour and a half.

I also made peas, which involved taking a bag of frozen peas out of the freezer and microwaving them.  And I made gravy, which involved opening the container of gravy that came with the Roast and microwaving it.  At the last minute, I juiced some apples and cranberries to make fresh cran-apple juice.  Festive.

 

When Will woke up from his nap, he was in rare form-- in a good way.  He had been thrilled to ride on the train earlier in the day and run around at the park while (sort of) watching the parade.  We had also been talking up Thanksgiving, and I could tell that the didn't know exactly what that meant, but it intrigued him.  He was on his best behavior.  When I told him that we were having cornbread with dinner, he squealed and jumped for joy (literally) and then went to his chair to sit and wait for the meal.

So here it is, our Vegan Thanksgiving Spread:

 

And here's a close-up of the Trader Joe's Turkey-less Stuffed Roast, or as I now like to call it, The Roast Beast

Okay, so it looks really weird, but honestly, it was pretty good.  The vegetables were the most amazing part of the whole meal, though.  Roasting them in the Earth Balance/Garlic powder baste and then drizzling them with gravy made them out-of-this-world sublime.

 

Scrumptious.

Will ate some peas and cornbread of his own volition.  He declined the cranberry relish (so did Rob) and he told me he didn't want any of the vegetables or "Roast Beast."  With an extreme amount of coaxing, but less frustration than a normal meal (it generally takes about 10 years off of my life just to get him to eat 100 calories worth of food), I did manage to get him to eat one roasted carrot and a slice of Roast Beast.  Victory.

True to my prediction, I was the only person who ate any pumpkin pie.  And wine.

 

Above all, I was really thankful to get to stay at home and have a very nice, very relaxing Vegan Thanksgiving with Rob and Will.  Rob and I are both under immense pressure from up-coming deadlines, and the stress around this household has been all but palpable for the past several weeks.  Adding in a multi-state traveling odyssey to this mix felt like it would have pushed us over the edge.  We did not get to see our families, but at least this way, we got to have real, actual, vegan food and do everything on our own schedules.  Which is to say, Will's schedule.  We needed this.  We had such a great time together, the three of us, and there were very few moments when anyone threw himself on the ground screaming and crying.  It was an all-out stellar day.

Cooking the meal wasn't really that hard, and I think it turned out pretty darn good.  I'd do it again, and again.  I'll do it for Christmas, and next year too.  You're all invited.

 

Thanks for reading.

 

Dear William (39 months)

Dear William,

Today you are 39 months old!

We enjoyed some wonderful fall hiking this month.

 

We took a trip to Illinois where you visited with some of your cousins.

 

Back at home in St. Louis, you finished up your gymnastics class.  You got to wear a costume for the last day.

 

You also got to wear your costume when we went to Boo at the Zoo, a special night-time party at the St. Louis Zoo.

 

You really liked the Fragile Forest exhibit because there were lights and bubbles.

You spent some time checking out a steam engine.

Then we had Halloween, and you got to wear your costume again.

 

You got tired while we were out Trick-or-Treating.

 

You really enjoyed having candy in your "punkin."  When you eat a good dinner, you get to choose a piece of candy to have for dessert.  You get so excited about this.  You say, "I want to go have punkin on the couch."  And you sit there on the couch with your pumpkin, selecting your candy.  You are very sweet.

 

This month, you frequently pushed the limits of your bedtime by taking forever to choose a story.

 

You also demonstrated how well you can dance.

We went to a Dance Marathon on campus, where you didn't actually dance, but you did go through a Bounce House with your dad about 500 times.

You got tired on the way home.

William, I think you have slept in bed with us every night this month. Aside from the week that your dad was on a work trip and I didn't even try to get you to sleep in your own room, you have always started out in your bed. But you wake up somewhere between 2 and 5am and come in to join us. You pad across the floor and stand at our open doorway, breathing heavily, and wait to be admitted. I fear that one day I might not wake up to the sound of your breathing, and I wonder if you would stand there for hours. It worries me. I have told you repeatedly that you can just come on into our room, or at the very least you can say, "Mommy, can I come in?" because my answer will always be yes. But so far you have not done these things. You just breathe until I wake up.

After I hear you and tell you to come in, you run into the room and vault onto the bed. Then you situate yourself between your daddy and me. You even have a little pillow that you use just for sleeping with us. Sometimes you want me to spoon you, sometimes you want me to hold you tummy to tummy. If your feet are cold, you wedge them between my knees. Within seconds, you are fast asleep. You snore, you drool, and you take up more than your fair share of space in the bed. I never sleep very well after you have joined us, William, but I don't mind.

I love these moments when I get to hold you. The other day I was running early in the morning (as I often do), and I saw 16 or 17-year old boy come out the front door of his house, bound down the porch steps, then get into his car and drive away to school. You're going to be that big someday. I need to hold you while I still can.

 

This morning was the best. I woke up before you and watched as your eyelids fluttered open in the dim light of the room. When you saw me, your whole face burst into joy. You threw your arms around me and whispered "Mommy!" Then with your lips pressed against my ear, you sang me your morning song: "Morning, Mommy, how are you? How are you today?" And I told you, "I'm good, William!"

Love you,

Your mom

Howl

Well, I ran my first ultra this past weekend (August 11th).

After my last marathon, I felt pretty jaded about running and the world in general, and I decided that the way to make it better was to run an ultra.

On a whim that may have been fueled by a couple of beers, I signed up for Howl at the Moon-- an 8-hour ultra at the Kennekuk Cove County Park, conveniently located near where Rob's parents live.  We'd have a place to stay the night before the race, childcare on race day, and the event itself would be like a family reunion with all our friends from Second Wind Running Club.

Training went pretty well for me, despite the record heat and drought in July this year (I think St. Louis has had 20 days over 100 degrees so far in 2012).  I did at least 4 long runs (21-22 miles) in 105 degree heat, and aside from a few blisters, I felt pretty good. 

We left St. Louis on Friday and made a brief stop in Urbana, at Will's birthplace (so to speak)-- Davenport Hall.  It was where I spent 10 billion hours of my graduate career.  Most of the people I knew in the department have gone (including SL, who recently took a job elsewhere), but I did get to catch up with some of the office staff and become overwhelmed by the weirdness of merely visiting a place where I'd lived so much of my life.

 

We headed on to Kennekuk to pick up our race packets, and upon arrival we ran into at least 50 people we knew  (slight exaggeration), including Cousin Don.  

The protocol appeared to be that everybody had a canopy tent pitched along the start/finish area (where we would be looping around every 3.29 miles).  There, you were to store the various items you would need for the day, such as a cooler of drinks and snacks, extra shoes/socks, chairs for lounging in (or collapsing in).  I was glad Rob knew this is what you were supposed to do (and had brought a canopy tent), other wise I would have been out of luck.

With our race numbers in hand and our tent pitched, we headed to Rob's parents, where Will opened a few more birthday presents:

"Oh boy, a dinosaur!"

 

And scared his grandfather:

 

We ate some pasta and tried to go to bed.  Unsuccessfully.  Will had skipped his usual nap for the day (refusing to sleep in the car) and was beside himself with exhaustion.  By the fifth time I had gotten up to soothe him, he begged, "Sleep with me, Mommy," so I brought him back to the bed where Rob and I were trying to sleep.  He proceeded to unfurl himself so that he took up the space of 3 adult humans, and neither Rob nor I had any room left.  He thrashed about for the rest of the night and snored and kicked me in the face.  I saw the clock go from midnight to 2am to 3am.  In fact, at 4:59am, I turned off my alarm and just got up because I was already awake.

Not a great way to spend the night before an 8-hour ultra.

It was freezing in the morning.  After several months of scorching drought, an unseasonable cool settled over the region.  Temperatures were in the 50s--almost 50 degrees cooler than what I was used to training in.  I shivered so hard my teeth shook as I waited in our canopy tent.

I was nervous about running my first ultra, especially on so little sleep, but the atmosphere around the whole thing was completely different than any marathon I've ever run.  Everybody seemed pretty laid back, and for me at least, this event was more about catching up with old friends than sticking to a certain pace per mile.  I had no idea what was ahead of me because I had never run for 8 hours before ("That's an entire workday," Rob's brother astutely pointed out when we told him what we were doing), so all I could do was go along for the ride.

I was just standing there chatting with a friend ES when all of a sudden I realized, oh we're starting, and off we went.  

The miles slid by.  It was fantastic to have ES running with me.  He is a very accomplished ultra runner and he probably could have been going a lot faster than I was, but we stuck together--talking about everything from writing to photography to beer-making to Western States.  He became like my own personal ultra marathon doula.  I am eternally grateful.  I couldn't even feel my feet hitting the ground.

The course was a 3.29 mile loop on grass and gravel, with an aid station about halfway through.  Every time you circled around and got back to the start/finish area, you had to make sure that your "scorer" saw you and marked down that you'd gone another lap.  Each age/sex division (ex: open males, masters males, open females, masters females, etc.) had their own scorer.  I'm not sure how many people each scorer was responsible for, but every time I went through, my scorer looked at my bib number and called out something encouraging like, "Melissa!  Heading out on lap number 4!"

I tried to do the best I could with eating and drinking.  I managed to eat a whole package of Clif Shot blocks in the first 4 laps or so (200 calories), and then I grabbed handfuls of pretzels from our snack stash in the tent every time I ran past.  I carried my own water bottle and topped it off at the start/finish area each time we went through.  Probably by about the second lap, I started taking one S!Cap every time we reached The Big Hill, which 1) wasn't really that big -and- 2) was actually pretty easy, because you just stop and walk up it to conserve your energy.

By around mile 16, ES was having some knee pain and needed to walk for a while.  I was faced with a Major Dilemma.  I wasn't at this race to be a hero or to break a new world record, I was just here to have fun.  So…should I keep going on my own, or stay with ES and walk?  In the end I decided that I felt way too good--freakishly good-- and I wanted to keep running.  I was afraid that I might fall over and collapse a few miles later, but I just wanted to see how long I could keep it up.

I did, however, pause long enough to take a picture of myself and attempt to Tweet it (which failed, because my phone had no signal) and to do some math to figure out how many laps I would need to run in order to make my goal of 35 miles.  (Why it hadn't occurred to me to figure this out before the race, I don't know).  It worked out to something like 10.6 laps.  I decided to try to shoot for 11 laps and make it an even 36.19.

Un-Tweetable:  Melissa at Mile 16.3

I felt stronger and stronger as the miles piled up.  My laps were pretty even around 33-35 minutes, which was a decent pace to keep.  8 laps in was marathon distance, and from then on out every step I took was uncharted territory.  I fully expected to fall apart, but I didn't.  I ran a great lap and everybody at the start/finish area called out "Buffalo!" (the battle cry of the Second Wind trail runners) when I got back to start my 9th lap.  I was officially an Ultra Runner now.  I felt like a million bucks.

Except that I hadn't eaten in a while--not really since the Clif Blocks and pretzels early on in the race.  I figured that by this point I had run over 29 miles, so I might as well bust into the stash of junk food we'd brought.  BBQ Fritos are vegan and sounded amazingly good right about then.  I dug into our rubbermaid tub and found, much to my disappointment, that I had mistakenly bought and packed Original Fritos instead of the BBQ ones.  I had a moment of extreme disappointment, because BBQ Fritos are much saltier and sounded a lot better to me.  I tried to make the best of it-- I shoved some boring, original flavor Fritos into my pockets and worked on eating them until made it back to the start/finish area again.

Surprisingly, I didn't slow down, at least not too much.  And I felt peculiarly great.  I kept sucking on Fritos (wishing they were BBQ) and I even ate some slices of cold, boiled potatoes dipped in salt.  The volunteers were fantastic, offering huge amounts of support and encouragement as I ran through aid stations and refilled my water bottle.  They even started handing out ice at the top of the hill, and that was like heaven.

At some point I realized that I had 35 miles in the bag.  I could walk it and make it.  I could lie down on the side of the trail and take a nap and still make it.  I was completely and utterly bewildered by this.  I had thought it would be so much more of a struggle.  I began to have illusions of grandeur and wonder if I could make 40.  I spent several laps doing the math and realizing that it was within my reach.

A brief bout of feeling bad hit right about mile 35, when I was at the aid station at the bottom of the hill.  They'd been handing out soda there all day long, and all of a sudden a couple sips of Coke sounded good to me.  After all, it had brought me back to life after a 2-week stint of Vortex in Nicaragua.  I raced into the aid station feeling much anticipation and when I got there, they were all out of soda!  Such the luck.  Like the BBQ Fritos.  I popped an S!Cap and told myself to keep the crazies at bay.

When I got back to the start/finish after my 11th lap, I had surpassed my goal and it was only 6 hours and 30 minutes into the race.  I stopped to talk to my scorer and asked, "What do I have to do to get to 40 miles?"  I had lost all ability to compute.  She told me to run one more lap of 3.29 miles, and that would put me at 39.48.  Then all I'd have to do is a one-mile out and back, and I'd be there.  Perfect.  I still felt good, and I had an hour and half left to do it.

So I took off for my last big loop.  Right about the time I hit the aid station, Rob passed me for the second time since the race began.  "You're an animal!" he called out.  He looked strong, and I calculated that he was on pace for 50.  Now who's the animal?

I knew I had this wrapped up.  There was no need for speed at this point, I could afford to take it easy.  My quads hurt and my feet hurt from crunching down on gravel in 4mm drop shoes with no rock plate, so I walked a lot that last loop after Rob passed me.

I reached the start/finish area at around 7 hours 15 minutes and had put in 12 laps, totaling 39.48 miles.  I told the scorer that I didn't want to try to run another 3.29, I just wanted to do an out-and-back so I got up to 40.  She said that the out-and-backs didn't start until 7 and half hours, so I just had to wait 15 minutes until that began.

I drank some weak orange gatorade and bided my time.

At 7h30m, the announcer called all of us waiting to do out-and-backs and we lined up to go.  It was a free-for-all on very bumpy, rough terrain, and I had wanted to walk the whole way, but I was afraid I would get trampled because everybody seemed to want to go fast.  I tried to jog as best I could.  I really did not like this section of the race and just wanted the whole thing to be over.

At last it was, and I went to report my one-mile out and back to my scorer, while other people kept running to add another mile or two before the 8 hour time limit.

"Great job!" my scorer said.  "You made 37.19 miles."

"Wait a minute!  I was supposed to have 40!"

"No, honey, you never ran that 12th lap."

"Yes, I did!  I ran right over here and you told me I'd gone 39 miles and all I had to do was a 1 mile out and back to get 40!"

The one thing on the instruction sheet for Howl at the Moon was that you must never argue with your scorer, the scorer is always right.

But goddammit!  I was so confused by this point.  Either she had been wrong about how many laps I'd run and she'd misled me, or she had forgotten to write down my last lap.

I stood there feeling a horrendous cloud of doom wash over me.  Here I was, having thought I was so damn tough for running 40 miles at my very first ultra, and this lady was telling me I had only gone 37.19.  There was nothing I could do about it now-- with only about 15 minutes left in the race, I wasn't going to be able to put in another 3 miles.  I was shit out of luck.

Maybe the scorer just wanted to get rid of me, or maybe she wanted to avoid a nasty outburst of tears, so she reconsidered and said.  "Well, okay.  I'll mark you at 40."  She kind of whispered it, and I got the feeling that she still thought she was right but she didn't want me disappointed or make a scene.

I walked away from the scoring table, feeling shitty, and made it back to tent, where I collapsed in a chair and sat there motionless.  Feeling shitty.

I looked at my watch and reaffirmed that I had recorded splits for 12 full laps prior to doing my 1-mile out and back.  Next year I'm taking a freaking GPS.

I just ran 40.48 miles, dammit. 

 

Rob showed up a while later, looking like death warmed over.  He'd made just over 50 miles, which is 20 miles farther than he's ever run in his life.

Within a few minutes, he turned white and his lips got blue and he started shaking.  ES and I ran over to find some EMTs, who came over and put some ice packs on him (not what I had been expecting) and took his temperature and blood pressure.  I guess he got so overheated that he became cold.  He felt a bit nauseous, and they gave him some oxygen.  You want to see something scary?  Your significant other lying in the grass with an oxygen mask on his face.

He made a full recovery and the EMTs went away right about the time that my Post Race Nausea knocked me down and everybody left to go to the awards ceremony.  It reminded me of the time that I lay dying in Nicaragua, all alone, and when I heard a German doctor outside my door, I drug myself out of the room and asked her to give me an injection of some mystery liquid that a pregnant Chilean girl had told me would help me stop vomiting.  Ah, the memories.  

When Rob came back from the award ceremony, he said that I won a Major Award (though I think just about everybody who did this race won a Major Award), and he got me to drink a few sips of V8.  It revived me enough that I was able to make it to the car and get back to Rob's parents' house.

I was really happy to see Will again; we'd been gone for so long that I was afraid he would think I'd abandoned him.  He seemed no worse for the wear and was happily playing with his grandpa.

I felt weird and sick but in a different way than after running a marathon.  Not as intense, maybe.  And more tired than anything else.  Maybe that was because we'd gotten so little sleep the night before.  Rob hobbled to a grocery store and bought some veggie burgers, and I was finally able to eat one of those with no bun but lots of ketchup.  Then I fell into an exhausted sleep and woke up the next morning, realizing it had been a really long time since I'd peed.

Thanks for reading such a long race report.  I definitely want to run another ultra again soon.  Tomorrow, if possible.  Recovery has gone surprisingly well, and I was able to run again on Wednesday morning (after Saturday's 40 miles!) without even feeling so much as a little stiff.

Also, many thanks to Rob's parents for hosting us and watching Will, to the Second Wind volunteers who cheered and shouted Buffalo and made my day, to ES for being an extraordinary pacer and friend, to Cousin Don for, well, being Cousin Don and giving me the sage words of wisdom: Nothing to fear, it's just runnin.'

Buffalo!

Dear William (31 months)

Dear William

Today you are 31 months old!  This past month you took your first ever international trip.The entire family unit went to Nicaragua, to visit the village where your mama studied howler monkeys for a year.  Your dad ran an ultra marathon called Fuego y Agua.  It was intense.  You can read all about it here, here, here, here and here!

The thing I loved most about this whole trip was seeing the way you interacted with others.  You don't have a shy bone in your body, William.  You don't know a stranger.  Everyone is your friend.  My first indication was when we were on the ferry going to Ometepe and you saw a little girl about your age.  You announced to me, "I GO PLAY WITH BABY," and that is exactly what you did.  You are adorable.  For the rest of the trip you played with everyone you met.  You learned a few spanish words.  Caballo, agua, and vamos were (and still are) some of your favorite things to say.

 

 

You loved Nicaragua, William.  I can't wait until we go back.  I am already planning to take you backpacking through Central America during your summer vacations from school.

 

A few other things have happened this month:

You figured out how to ride a tricycle.  You've been riding a trike for a while now, but by running your feet along the ground, Fred Flinstone style.  It was only recently that you decided to use the pedals.

 

You are a bit dramatic (though that is nothing new).  Instead of saying that you don't want to do something right now, you frequently add the qualifier anymore.  For example, "I NO POOP ON POTTY ANYMORE!" Or, "I NO PUT ON SHOES ANYMORE!"  Or, "I NO EAT APPLE ANYMORE!"  Speaking of eating, you are still a difficult eater.  But sometimes you eat cinnamon toast:

 

You still love dinosaurs.

 

You have a fear of rabbits. About 75% of the time you cry in the night and end up joining us in Mommy and Daddy's bed. I ask you why you don't want to sleep in your own bed and you say, "I SCAREDA RABBIT. HE UP ON DA HILL." Not sure where you got that from. The other day you had a rough nap time and didn't end up sleeping. I asked you why, and you cited your fear of rabbits again, except this time you added, "I GOTTA ALLIGATOR IN MY BELLY." Hm.

Whether you sleep in your own bed or in "Mommy Daddy Bed" (as you call it), you require quite an entourage:

(Your dad bought you Sully and Wazowski after we got back from Nicaragua! Aren't you lucky!)

 

Oh, and your dad got a new car this month.  I am calling it the "Family Roadster."  You have ridden in it once, I think, but I never have yet!  Maybe next month.

 

We love you, William!

 

xoxo

Your mom :)

Slumber parties

So we got the windows replaced in William's room, which is kind of a long story, but let it suffice to say that during the replacement process, we had to move everything out.  This meant that his crib had to be taken apart because it will not fit through the door of Will's room while it is assembled.  One of us (was it Rob?) had the bright idea that Will would just sleep on his mattress on the floor of our room during this process.  We sort of just wanted to see what would happen, I guess.  Will is often very fussy when we put him to bed, but being in the crib really limits what he can do about that, and generally in a few minutes he falls asleep.  If he was going to sleep on just his mattress, I envisioned that there would be a lot of crying and wandering about the room and eventually he would just join us in our bed, and actually, that is pretty much what has been happening.

When we first got his mattress set up and he noticed it in our room, he was so excited.  He ran to the mattress and lay down on it and smiled and said, "Sleep."  So far so good.  The he stood up and jumped and giggled.  Then he used the mattress as a spring board to climb onto our bed.  The he lept off the mattress and ran around the room in circles.

We tried to get him excited about the whole idea of sleeping in his very own bed in mommy and daddy's room, and he eventually warmed to the idea again.  We read stories and turned off the lights.  We rubbed his back and whispered to him.  He smiled at us, snuggled up with his blankie and said, "Happy."

Good, good.

Well, he fell out of the bed at least 4 times the first night.  Granted, it wasn't far (only like 6 inches off the ground), so he wasn't hurt.  More stunned I guess.  Each time he found himself on the floor instead of the mattress, he looked around like, "How did I get here?" and climbed back onto his bed.

And he did wander a bit during the night.  Every once and a while I would wake up and hear the padding of little feet and then barely see his little shadowed form at our door or elsewhere in the room.  It was kind of creepy but okay.

But then at some point during the night, he got tired of the fun new game of sleeping on his mattress and he started bawling and ran around to my side of the bed and crawled in beside me.  Still, I was proud of him for doing reasonably well on his first night out of the crib.

Last night we tried it again.  He wasn't as surprised, since we'd been through this drill the previous night.  He jumped and jumped and ran and ran and got all hot and sweaty again after his bath.  It was more of a struggle to get him to stay in his bed.  Rob tried to coax him to lie down by lying down himself, and although Will stayed awake, Rob fell asleep.  I had meanwhile gone downstairs because I had some real actual work do to.  As I was sitting there compiling my lecture on Callitrichine reproductive ecology, all of a sudden Will was standing in front of me, saying, "MULK."  He had gotten up, let himself out of the room, and walked downstairs all on his own, all while Rob was sleeping.

I got him his mulk and he was very happy.  I made him brush his teeth again and he was even happy about that too.  Then I brought him back to our room and he willingly crawled into his bed.  He lay down, smiling at me, as I rubbed his back and his head.  Then he reached up, touched my face and said, "Happy."  I kissed him and told him how sweet he was, and we kept giggling and whispering "Happy" to each other until finally he pointed to my bed and said, "MAMA, BED."  So I guess he thought I should go to sleep.  By that time it was almost 9:30, and although that Callitrichine reproductive ecology lecture wasn't going to write itself, I decided to call it a night.

I crawled into bed and tried to go to sleep, but William kept getting up and running around the room.  Probably about 2am, he just got into bed with us, which was fine, except he insisted on lying the wrong way-- so that his feet were in my ribs.

He was exhausted from all this running around, and he slept in until 8:30 this morning (and even then we had to wake him up).

The weird thing is that when Rob got up this morning, he found pee-pee in William's potty.  The most parsimonious explanation is that Will peed either before or after his bath, and we just did not notice it.  I actually find that kind of hard to believe though.  Will makes quite a big deal of it when he pees-- demanding to be given his sticker and insisting that he does the flush himself.  What I kind of think may have happened is that at some point during his nocturnal wanderings, he went into the bathroom, took his diaper off, and peed.  This would mean that he put his diaper back on by himself (which is the most implausible part of this whole scenario) because he was wearing a diaper when he woke up, and although it was full there were no leaks.

I don't know.  It's a mystery.

I'm not sure what tonight will bring.  The windows are replaced, but we just kind of want to go with this thing-- hoping that if we stick it out a few more nights, he will become accustomed to sleeping not in his crib and we can just move him to his toddler bed when we reassemble his room.

We'll see.

Thanks for reading!

Stressed

My blogging has definitely taken a hit as a result of The Novel.  In fact, pretty much everything in my life has taken a hit because of The Novel.  To make matters worse, a "colleague" recently invited me to contribute a book chapter to an edited volume he is publishing.  This is an academic publication, totally unrelated to The Novel or my full-time job.  It is a great opportunity for me to sort of keep my foot in the door, but I honestly have no idea when I am supposed to get it done.  Oh, and also I am supposed to somehow collaborate with another researcher, who lives in a different country, who I have never met, and whose data are largely un-similar to mine.

Does this person look stressed?

I am so desperate for a good night's sleep that I walk around half-sobbing sometimes.

I recently used up all of my remaining "comp time" at work to lock myself in my office and have a (an?) hysterical phone conversation with my BFF of the last 22 (!) years.  Words cannot even describe how thankful I am for her.

At this point, I am not sure if The Novel is making my life better or worse.  It does provide a nice distraction from the almost daily messages sent by the universe to remind me that moving to Saint Louis was the worst idea I ever had.  But the thought has recently occurred to me that maybe... just maybe... if I was not working on The Novel and instead forced myself to go out and explore this god-forsaken city, I would hate it less.  I don't know, though.  Every time I consider going somewhere, then I look at the news and see that there have been 60 jillion auto fatalities that day, and I decide I'm just going to stay at home instead.  And write.

I'm in the midst of Chapter 13, going on 78,000 words.  Getting sort of close to the end.  And then what?

This is probably stress induced craziness, but here, I'm going to for the first time ever provide an excerpt of The Novel for you to read:

 

 

“It’ll be okay,” she said, and she peeled out onto the hard road.

 

 

Dear William (19 months)

Dear William,

Today you are 19 months old!  The last couple of weeks have been full of a lot of changes.

First off, I think you are done nursing.  You nursed about a week ago... last Sunday morning when you were crying and fussy (cause I think your teeth hurt).  I was trying to put away laundry, so I stopped and nursed you a little bit, and then you felt better.  You haven't seemed to concern yourself with nursing since then, so I was thinking that was it, until today when you just wouldn't stop crying (more teeth coming in), and I let you nurse again for a few minutes.  So we are probably done with it, but maybe not completely done.  We'll see.  In some ways it would be nice to be done with nursing, but in other ways it makes me kind of sad.  The sadness mainly comes from the realization that you are growing up and I am so baffled about how you went from this tiny crying thing to a great big giant boy like you are now(often still crying).

 

The second biggest change is that you go to bed on your own now.  One night, your dad decided to see what happened if he just lay you down in your crib with seahorse and tip toed out of the room.  You screamed and cried.  For maybe 2 minutes.  And then you were completely silent!  We've been doing that ever since.  Last night you didn't even cry when we put you in your crib; you just cuddled seahorse and went nigh nigh.

 

You seem to be off rice and beans, which has been your staple food for something like 6 months now.  All of a sudden you just don't want it anymore.  Your latest thing is cold rotini noodles dipped in hummus.  Yuck.

 

Well William, your little friend Anton is visiting this weekend.  Do you remember him?  His mama was in my yoga group and you first met them when you were only a week or two old.  Anyway, my point is, we've got company, so I have to cut this letter short!

xoxo

Mama

 

Dear William (Things that are great about you)

I started writing this List of Things About William That Are Great back in October, but I never got around to finishing it, so I never posted it on the blog.  I came across it just now and it made me nostalgic in both a happy and sad sort of way... He's outgrown some of these things already.  I guess it is time to post this one and then start a new list.

 

Dear William,

While I am thinking about it, I just wanted to write down some Things That Are Great About You so that I remember them always.

-- The funny face you make when I am trying (largely unsuccessfully) to brush your teeth.

-- How you stand up at the baby gate and watch me make dinner.

-- How you put your arms around me when I am rocking you to sleep.

-- How you smile at me and say "mama" sometimes.  I think you might actually realize that mama is my name.  Though you are equally likely to smile at me and say "dada" or "tata."

-- The way your voice sounds when you say "Uh oh"

-- The way you try to feed us your food.

-- The sound of your laughter.

-- How cute you look in a hat.

-- The way you open your mouth really big to take a bite out of a banana.

--You were even great that time you were sick and sleeping in bed with us and woke me up in the middle of the night by puking on my face.

Christmas sinus infection

As it turns out, I've been walking around with a sinus infection for the past week.  I've felt like complete and utter hell, but I couldn't really do anything about it because I had 895,000 final essay exams to grade, and then it was Christmas.  Actually, I tried to go to a "Take Care" clinic on the 22nd, and that was a total fail.  First of all, I had to drive through Mall Traffic 3 days before Christmas, and second of all, when I arrived, I was informed there was a 4 hour wait.  The scare of driving through Mall Traffic and also having found myself in an exit only lane for the interstate by mistake (think: The movie Clueless when the character D accidentally merges onto the freeway in LA) was enough to scare the sinus infection away from me, at least for a moment.  Since I was supposed to be at work and was trying to do this on my "lunch hour," I did not have 4 hours to wait, so I turned around and drove back through Mall Traffic so that I could continue grading the 895,000 essay exams sitting on my desk.

I was determined to power through this.  I mean, come on.  I'm Melissa.  When I was in Nicaragua doing my field research, I put bandaids on things that should have had stitches.  Instead of going to the hospital to get an IV for 2 weeks of Vortex, I drank some coke and just kept going.

Well by today, I am no better, and I am so completely frayed from being unable to sleep for the past 8 nights due to the congestion.  I haven't taken a breath through my nose since December 19.  I'm taking the day off anyway... even though I'm not technically allowed to take sick or vacation days until the end of February, I've worked 20 hours of unpaid overtime in the last couple of weeks, so I just get to use that as "comp time."  What better to do with my comp time than go to a doctor.

There are like 7,000 doctors that my insurance covers, and I have no idea who to go to, so I just picked the closest one.  When I called her office this morning, I found out that in order to be seen by her, I had to have a "new patient evaluation," and the first available opening for said evaluation was January 19.  I think I gave an involuntary sob and said, "But I am sick nowwww," and they told me that they would let me know if there are any cancellations.

I suppose I could have kept calling doctors and seeing if there was another one who would see me, but I decided to try going to an Urgent Care Clinic a few miles from here on easily navigable roads that would not necessitate going through Mall Traffic or the freeway.  The good people at the urgent care place were nice and the whole process did take quite a while, but all things considered, I cannot complain.  They did x-rays and found that I did in fact have a sinus infection, and prescribed an antibiotic (that I hope does not send me into anaphylactic shock) and pseudoephedrine.  I told the doctor that I was nursing and I was concerned about pseudoephedrine drying up my milk supply (I'm glad I knew that because it did not seem like that information would have been volunteered to me).  He said that yes, decongestants can have a drying-up effect for some nursing mothers, but that I could drink lots of water and pump to counter balance that effect.  And I was all GEE.  You have no idea what I have been through to nurse this child.  I am already drinking a lot of water and pumping and making like, I don't know, a half an ounce of milk a day.  After I finished off the domperidone, my temporary burst in supply has precipitously declined.  If I add pseudoephedrine to the mix, I have a feeling that is the end.

So I am completely miserable and even more miserable at the thought that the thing that might bring me relief from these symptoms might also put an end to my fragile milk supply.  There is so much sinus pressure in my face that it feels like I am giving birth through my eyeball.  I know we might be at the end of nursing anyway, but still, I don't to put the nail in the coffin myself.  I keep thinking, if I can just tough this out maybe a few more days, the antibiotics will kill off the infection and then I will feel better.  The pseudoephedrine only treats the symptoms, right?  It would just make me more comfortable in the meantime.  But god, I would really like to be more comfortable.

Thanks for reading.

 

Indianapolis marathon

First.  It has been a long time since I had the chance to write a blog post.  To update in a nutshell:  1) I do not know if I had mastitis or not, but it went away with a lot of nursing, hot showers, and tylenol to keep my fever down.  2) Thank you to the people who provided midwife suggestions in the comments on my last blog post.  I've done a lot of investigating since I last wrote, and aside from the one midwife that someone suggested, there are apparently no other midwives in St. Louis.  Not even Certified Nurse Midwives.  The tough anti-midwifery laws (that were only repealed in 2008) have left their mark on this state.  If you are a midwife, please come to Missouri.  We need you.

Now, cutting to the chase.  The whole family went to Indianapolis over weekend, and I ran the Indianapolis Monumental Marathon.  It was my 10th marathon overall, and my second one since giving birth to William.  I ran Indianapolis in 2008 and had a major PR that day-- 3:37:49.  Things are a bit different now!  Not only do I have a little child to take care of, but throughout the course of this training, we moved to Missouri and I started working full time.  I've managed to do all of the long runs on the weekends, but since we moved to St. Louis, I have barely been able to run during the week.  In fact, I have never, ever trained so poorly or done so little preparation for a marathon.  I'm not even sure if I hit 40 miles/week during peak training.  I messed up the timing and did my one and only 20-miler 4 weeks out instead of 3-weeks out.  For two of my long runs (a 15 miler in July and a recent 18 miler), I ran through fever and mastitis.

On Friday night before the marathon, we stayed with the MeyPfans.  It was great to catch up with the MeyPfan clan, and William loved hanging out with Bryn, Shay, and Liam (and playing with all their toys).  Will stayed up way past his bedtime.  It was kind of difficult to get him settled down for the night, and once we finally did, he did this sleep-cry thing, wherein he fitfully tossed and turned and would utter a small wail in his sleep about every 20 minutes or so.  He tends to do this when he is either sleeping in a different place or teething (or in this case, both).  I finally brought him to bed with me, where he romped around and cried for a while, and then eventually passed out with his head on my neck (one of his favorite sleeping positions) where he snored loudly.  I do not think I slept at all the whole night long.

On Saturday, we got up at an ungodly early hour to head downtown, where I still needed to pick up my packet.  It was ridiculously cold out. I vowed I would never run a marathon in November again.

During the first mile, I forced myself to keep it in check and run very nice and easy.  I got to the Mile 1 marker in exactly 10:00, I thought, geez, maybe I have taken it too slow.  So I picked it up to about 9:00 minute pace and stayed there for a while.  Around mile 5 I caught up with the 4-hour pace group and thought I would stay with them.  I've never run with a pace group before, so I thought it might be fun.  Four hours hadn't been my goal.  I actually didn't even have a goal, other than finishing.

It turns out that I did not like running with a pace group.  There were a lot of runners in that group and I actually found it really hard to maneuver, especially at water stops.  We were all running so close together that people were clipping my heels or bumping my elbows from time to time.  I don't know, everybody else seemed to be having fun, so that's great.  I just found myself getting claustrophobic.  Plus, a lot of people in that group were all teched out-- meaning, lots of GPS units, heart rate monitors, etc., and there seemed to be a constant stream of buzzing/beeping from dozens of peoples units.  I've got nothing against units-- I've run with various units in the past (though nothing that beeped).  This time, either because I didn't care or was unprepared, I was old-schooling it with just my ancient Ironman watch (the same one I had with me for a year out in the forest in Nicaragua).

Even though I had told myself not to get cocky and pass the 4 hour pace group, I passed them within a few miles and felt a lot better to have more space.  I stayed right off the front of the pace group, running right around 9:06 pace for many miles.  My cheering squad was at Mile 11-- Rob, Will, and Rob's parents.  I veered off the course just slightly so that I could kiss Will (all bundled up in his snowsuit).  He had a little bit of snot on his face, but I didn't care.  He smiled, and that was great.

My ugliest marathon to date: red shirt, orange gloves, maroon headband, pink on my shoes. And what is up with my face in this picture? It looks like I just got my wisdom teeth removed or something.

I was still feeling pretty good at this time, but my stomach was kind of weird and I couldn't really eat or drink gatorade at the water stops.  I knew that this was a bad sign.  The only thing I could sort of choke down was Sharkies, so as I ran past the family, I asked Rob if he had brought any more of those with him.  He had.  I kept running and Rob caught up with me in a little bit to hand off the Sharkies.

Mile 14 kind of looped back around where Mile 11 had been, so I got to see the family again.  William was still smiling in his snowsuit.  Rob jumped in and ran with me for maybe a quarter mile.  I gave him my gloves when he broke away this time.  My fingers were freezing and I didn't really want to run bare-handed, but gloves seemed to be making it worse.  Whenever I'd grab water from one of the aid stations, water would slosh out of the cup and get all over my gloves.  No gloves seemed better than cold, wet gloves, though neither was ideal.

The crazies started to creep in around Mile 18.  I couldn't even eat Sharkies at this point, and gatorade was out of the question.  Nothing sweet.  I ate some pretzels, but I didn't enjoy them.  I could hear the 4-hour pace group behind me and I thought, just keep them from passing you until mile 20.  I was feeling worse and worse but still managing to maintain pace.  If my fingers would not have been so frozen, I think I would have fished out my cell phone to call my mom and have her read me the paper or something, just to give me something to focus on.

I saw Rob again at mile 22.  He was on his bike, alone this time.  The family had taken William indoors.  Rob rode alongside me, saying encouraging things.  I couldn't say much back because I didn't feel good.  I kept reminding myself that this is not as hard as giving birth.  Instead of giving in to that terrifying abyss of craziness, I tried to think things like "This isn't so bad."

My pace dropped.  I ran a 9:40.  Rob was still riding alongside me.  "The 4-hour pace group is going to catch me," I said.  He kept telling me that I was doing great.  He said that just up ahead there was a woman from our running club in Urbana.  I really do not know her very well, but I have talked to her a couple of times.  She is some kind of phenomenal ultra-runner; in fact, I couldn't even believe that she was doing a road marathon and that she was doing it at roughly my pace.  Rob told me that I could catch her.  I really doubted that I could, but I figured, why not give it a try.  What's the worst that could happen?  I kept my eye on her, and my next mile was a 9:30.  I could tell I was getting closer.  My next mile was 9:06.  And the 4-hour pace group still hadn't caught me!  I was getting closer and closer.  I didn't care whether or not I finished in 4 hours, I just focused on catching up to Tracy.

It was hard, oh my god, it was hard.  I dug deeper than I thought possible.  Rob stayed nearby on his bike, saying something encouraging to me every little bit.  Finally, I think about mile 25, I caught up to Tracy.  When I got there, I realized she was running with another woman from the club too, Kelly.  I hadn't recognized her in a stocking cap.  It was great to catch up to the two of them, but I couldn't mince words.  It was taking every ounce of my being to keep going at this pace.

And there was mile 26.  I rounded the corner and gave it everything I got, into the finishing straight.  3:59:49.  Under 4 hours by a nose.  Over 20 minutes slower than the last time I ran it, but who cares.  It wasn't the fastest marathon I've ever run, but this was by far, the gutsiest.  I had no idea I had it in me, to dig that deep for really, no apparent reason.  But I really gave it my everything, left with absolutely nothing in the tank.

I shuffled through the finishing zone, completely repulsed by all the food.  Somebody handed me a water bottle, so I took that, but really, all I wanted was to get to Rob and get the heck out of there.

By the time we got back to our car, I was freezing, and I couldn't stop shaking.  My teeth were chattering so loudly that I couldn't talk.  We went back to Rob's aunt and uncle's house, and I really was not in the mood to make small talk or pleasantries; my lips were blue, and I was feeling awful.  I took a shower and tried to convince myself that it made me feel better.  I sat on the couch and watched Will romp around.  The world was spinning though, and I felt all kinds of nauseous.  Like, oh my god I'm having a flashback to hyperemesis kind of nauseous.  I realized that I hadn't even drank anything since I crossed the finish line, so I tried to take little sips of water.

I kept feeling worse and worse and was finally like, okay people, I need to go.  The strangest thing was, even though all other food seemed repugnant, the one thing I wanted was a vegan chili cheese dog-- a weird thing I had eaten at some vegan restauarant with Rob and one of his cousins in Chicago years ago.  When I told Rob that a vegan chili cheese dog was what I wanted to eat, he looked a little pale, like, how on earth am I going to find this?  We piled into the car and drove to a Whole Foods, which I swear was about a half hour away.  I couldn't even get out of the car when we got there, so I stayed with Will while Rob went in and foraged for my survival.  He came back out with a gigantic container of vegan chili.  And I thought, of course! I always eat vegetarian chili after a marathon.

By this point I felt even more terrible, and eating was the last, absolute last thing I could fathom doing.  Which is strange, you know, because I can pretty much always eat.  I gingerly took a spoonful of the chili broth and it stayed down.  Waited a couple minutes and took another spoonful.  I couldn't eat any of the beans or tomatoes or peppers.  Just the broth.  And just one spoonful at a time.  It was slow going, and a time or two I really thought it was going to come back up.  But eventually, I started to come back to life.  I could speak again.  I could eat a couple spoonfuls at a time, with some of the beans.  At last I was feeling much better.

We visited Aimee and Brett and the kids for a while, and I had perked up enough to have a good time.  The car ride back to St. Louis was long and somewhat miserable, but we made it.  My next marathon-- Marathon #11-- will probably be the St. Louis Marathon this April.  Logistically, it will be much easier (right in my own town!), and this time, I think I will not wait for 3 hours after I finish to eat or drink anything.

Thanks for reading!

Dear William (14 months)

Dear William,

Today you are 14 months old. You have learned a lot of new things this month. For example, you can now pick your nose. You find that hilarious. But your biggest new thing is waving. For many months you have been doing a 2-handed wave, which was really more like clapping than waving per se, but this past month you have started waving for real. You wave all the time, like crazy. You wave at me first thing in the morning when you wake up. You wave as I lay you down in your bed at night. You giggle and wave at the baby in the mirror.

Your dad claims that you have begun stacking blocks, but I have yet to see it. Just tonight, we were playing blocks, and you enjoyed banging them together and taking them in and out of a box, but there was no stacking. I think maybe your dad may have "helped" a little in this picture he took:

You have become an expert hugger. You always underfoot, standing and hugging me about the knees. When I pick you up, you wrap your arms around me in a big ole hug. It is so sweet. You also make your preference known as to who you want to hold you. For example, if your dad is holding you and you decide you want me, you hurl your body in my direction, while reaching your arms out.

For most of the month, the entire family unit has been sick, and that hasn't been fun. First, you got sick (presumably from daycare), and then I got sick (presumably from you), and then your dad got sick. It just keeps lingering. You haven't been sleeping very well, probably because your nose has been stuffed up. You haven't slept through the night in a very long time. Usually you wake up at some point in the night and I cannot get you to stop crying and go back to sleep unless I bring you to bed with me. You like to stretch out in the big bed with mom and dad. I don't like being woken up in the night, but I do like curling up with you in bed. One night the only way you would sleep was with your head on my throat. It was kind of uncomfortable for me, but to tell you the truth, I didn't mind. Now that I am gone at work all day, I don't get to see you as much, and I miss you a lot. Maybe you miss me too, and that is why you are waking up in the night and insisting on sleeping with your head on my throat.

We Broke Vegan this month, William. It just got too hard to keep you vegan at daycare. So finally I just gave up and said, fine, give him Nilla Wafers (they contain milk). And then I said, alright, he can have a cheese sandwich. And yogurt, of the non-vegan variety. It has been very hard for me to deal with. I've tried to give you the best, most healthiest foods your whole life. But the past several months, it has been so hard to get you to eat anything, that I've just run out of options. The irony is, you don't really go for the non-vegan things either. Well, you'll eat Nilla Wafers or crackers that contain milk protein, but you won't touch cheese or anything blatantly non-vegan. I don't blame you. Dairy is disgusting.

Speaking of vanilla wafers, though, I found some organic vegan ones at the store and got them the other day. Last night after dinner, we were all eating some, and you got this crazy idea to "feed" some to your dad and me. It was so cute. We would open our mouths and you would giggle and feed us each a cookie. You're great.

Love always,

Mom

Standing

We're back in St. Louis for week 2 of this thing, after a brief hiatus to Peoria/Lacon for my grandma's funeral. My mother and aunt had asked me to read the piece I wrote about Grandma at the funeral, so I did. People said so many nice things to me about it and about my grandma, and I really appreciate it. But still. If I'd been making a list of Things I Thought I Would Never Do, giving the eulogy at my Grandma's funeral would have been right up there at the top. The good thing about reading a eulogy (especially one you've written yourself) is that because it is at a funeral, no one thinks twice about it if you pass out or burst into tears during the reading. Luckily, I managed to do only one of those things.

Last night after we got back to St. Louis, it was quite a struggle to put Will to bed. He was very tired and fussy, but he would not stop crying. Our previous method (the one that had been working for the last several days) of putting him into his pack and play with Blue Seahorse until he fell asleep on his own was just not cutting it. About the umpteenth time I set him in the pack and play, he grabbed onto the sides of it and stood up. Now, I know your kid has been standing since he/she was 7 months old, but this was the very first time Will has ever stood up on his own. Unfortunately, he wasn't very happy about it. Oh with the screaming. My frustration with his screaming/crying was momentarily overshadowed by the fact that because he was standing, there was hope that he might someday walk.

Last night Will was a wild man

He never did sleep in his pack and play last night. He slept in the big bed between Rob and me, which meant that I didn't get much sleep at all (I can never really sleep when Will is in bed with us). Tonight it went a little bit better. There was a fair amount of crying and standing as I put him down, but he eventually started to play with Seahorse, and after a while of that, he did fall asleep. Keeping my fingers crossed that he stays asleep.

He went over 12 hours without nursing today. For the first time ever. I can't believe it. He nursed this morning when he woke up and not again until tonight right before bed. We've come a long way. It was only a month ago that he was still nursing pretty much all day every day. I guess I am supposed to be happy about this weaning thing, but it makes me uneasy. Like, it won't be long before he is grown up and living on his own and married to some girl I probably won't like and doesn't call me often enough. I just want to hold him and love him forever.

He's been eating a little bit better this past week or so, for the most part. He ate rice and beans for dinner at least 2 nights last week, which thrilled me to no end. He ate some organic blueberry waffles at my mom and dad's house over the weekend. I also gave him his first ever non-vegan food: a sugar cookie. I decided to just go for it. After Grandma's funeral, the ladies of the church served cookies and lemonade, and I knew that Grandma would want Will to have a sugar cookie. So I gave it to him, and he loved it. I had a bite of it too, so I guess I'm not 100% vegan either. Once we get into our new house, I'll make vegan sugar cookies for us, and I will add lemon to them.

Thanks for reading.

First week (almost)

First of all, I want to say thank you for everybody's kind words about my Grandma Florence. It is sad to have lost her, but it is so nice to know how much she meant to people near and far. Thanks again, it means so much.

Well, by now I've got almost a week of the new job under my belt. The job itself is good, the campus is beautiful, and my co-workers are unbelievably fantastic. When I showed up on my first day, everybody hugged me and they apologized that they didn't have the "Welcome Melissa" banner hung up in time. They're great people. It's just that everything else about this whole situation is incredibly stressful. St. Louis is stressful. I have never ever in my whole life lived in a big city (don't count Paris... I never drove there), nor have I ever wanted to. There are so many cars, and so many lanes of traffic, all the time. I miss Urbana.

We can't move into our new house until Labor Day weekend, and for the time being, we're staying in an extended stay hotel that is about a 30-40 minute trip to campus. Did you know that an extended stay hotel room is pretty much the same size as any regular hotel room, they just jam a kitchenette in there? Said kitchenette was supposed to be fully stocked with kitchen items; there are a few bowls and plates, but as far as cooking items, our only assets are a skillet and colander.

Will's sleep has been difficult to say the least, but it is getting better. The first night we were here, I think he cried all night long. The second night, only part of the night. And so on. What is difficult is that we are all in the same room, and Will is a very light sleeper. So after he goes to bed by around 7:30 or 8, Rob and I just kind of sit here in total silence and darkness. The first two nights, we had a lot of trouble getting him to sleep. Rob finally abandoned the attempts to get Will to sleep and just put him in the pack and play sitting up. We gave him Blue Seahorse and his favorite monkey book and he just sat and played quietly (in the dark) for maybe a half an hour. At some point, Rob looked at him and he was still sitting up, but had his eyes closed and was completely motionless. So Rob gently laid him down on his back, and Will stayed asleep. He was clutching his monkey book in his hands though, and he brought the book up over his face. It was kind of hilarious. Eventually, I carefully removed the book from his grasp and put it over to the side. Miraculously, he stayed asleep... well, until about 1 in the morning when he woke up screaming. But that is beside the point. I still consider the falling asleep on his own thing to be a major breakthrough. The past two nights, we've done sort of the same thing. He nurses but does not fall asleep, I put him in the pack and play (sitting up) and he plays with Blue Seahorse and monkey book until he gets tired enough to lay himself down and go to sleep. It's kind of amazing. I wish he would do that for naps too, but not a chance.

Will's daycare doesn't open until the Tuesday after Labor Day, which is stressful. Rob and I are both trying to work and take care of Will, and did I mention that it was stressful? But in a way, it might actually be less stressful than if he were in daycare. It sort of lets me ease into this not-being-with-Will all day long thing. I am terrified to take him to daycare. What if they forget and feed him something not vegan?! And how on earth will he take a nap there? In the "toddler" room, they have the kids sleep on cots. Cots?! Are you kidding me? When we visited the place, we put Will down on one of the cots to show him what it was like, and he promptly heisted himself off of it and crawled away to go find a toy. I know these people are professionals (it is one of these fancy day cares that costs a million dollars per month), but still, I don't think they have any idea what they are going to be dealing with. I asked them if they ever expel a child for crying too much, and they laughed and told me no. But seriously, they are in for a wake up call. I am terrified to send him to daycare, but in the same sense, I feel that we are all just hanging on by a thread, trying to work while juggling child care.

Will outside my office

Playing on the floor of the hotel room. Gross.

Well, his highness is fussing, so I guess I better turn off the computer and try to breathe very quietly for a while so that he doesn't wake up. We could be in for a long night.

Thanks for reading