Month: October 2009

Irish Eyes are Smiling Again

Posted on by heather.e.d.mcpherson@gmail.com

It’s a much healthier week so far for Clarebaby. Jeremy and I are very relieved that the oral antibiotics have cleared up Clare’s eye infection and she’s smiling at us with two eyes again instead of just one.
She’s growing up so quickly and is so much fun to play with. She’s also getting more independent and will amuse herself with toys while we do other things. Of course she likes it best when we talk to her, but it does make it easier for me to get things done while she’s playing.
This last weekend we went down to Corvallis to visit with Glenn, Beth and Linda. I didn’t get any pictures of Glenn, Beth and Linda with Clare – but they had lots of fun with her. Beth especially can get Clare laughing. It was a beautiful fall day and Mom sat outside with Clare enjoying the sunshine (which has since disappeared and it poured rain today).
Our sweet little swaddled baby. Mom said she looks like a little pea pod in her swaddle.
Look at our big girl in her Bumbo seat! She love to sit up and look around.
Here she is this morning while we were getting ready for the day. She’s such a happy little cuddle bug in the morning – it makes it hard to concentrate on getting ready for the day.
The excitement for this week is that while I was in Corvallis visiting Glenn and Beth, J and my dad stayed home to fix a leak under the sink. Instead of fixing the leak, they decided to remodel our kitchen. Just kidding. J and I have been talking about remodeling our crappy little kitchen since we moved into the condo. If you haven’t seen our kitchen (which most people haven’t) you’ll have to take my word for it that it could win awards for poor design. For starters it has our washer and dryer in it, making it a laundry/kitchen. The cabinets are small and oddly laid out – and there’s not very many of them. Our widest drawer is 4 inches wide, and there is about 2 feet of useable counter space. Yeah, we didn’t buy the place for the kitchen. Anyway, J found a good deal on modular cabinets and countertops, we bought a new dryer so we can stack it on the washer, and away we go. We’re in demolition mode right now (J is pulling nails out of the cabinets as I type) but hopefully when we’re done I should have more cabinets and twice as much counter space. Yes, pictures are coming soon.
And, finally, here are some more cute pics of Clare baby. I know that nobody looks at this blog for the articles 😛

You Should See the Other Guy

Posted on by heather.e.d.mcpherson@gmail.com

It’s been a little bit of a stressful week at our house. After a very healthy three months our baby girl had her first illness. She’s always had a blocked tear duct but this last week her eye became infected. I guess this is common with blocked tear ducts. Before it got better her little eye was almost swollen shut and she looked like the world’s tiniest prizefighter. It came an issue because she didn’t respond to the eye drops and Jeremy had a rushed last minute trip to the pediatrician and pharmacy to get oral antibiotics. Then we discovered that Clare doesn’t particularly like the taste of her antibiotics so we’ve been experimenting with different ways of getting her to eat it.

Clare-Bear continues to be a happy little girl. Even with her obviously uncomfortable eye she was smiley and surprisingly not fussy. She didn’t sleep as well as she has been sleeping, so this was our clue that her eye was bothering her.
Besides dealing with Clare’s illness we had a nice weekend with a friends’ first birthday. There were several little one-year-olds running around, giving J and I an indication of what’s to come in a few short months. Those little one-year-olds are busy! It’s a reminder to us to enjoy this time when she’s small and just loves to be held and talked to.
As an example, here is a video that I took (it’s not just Mary who takes the videos!) of Clare. Her little face lights up when I talk to her – it’s the best feeling in the world.

Tress Meses

Posted on by heather.e.d.mcpherson@gmail.com

Happy Three Month Birthday Clare! Our girl is now a quarter of a year old. Three more of these and we’ll be celebrating with a party and cake – I can’t even imagine that far ahead.
The past week has been quite eventful in the world of Clare. She’s made major developmental steps forward, getting a lot more vocal, grabbing things, seeing objects further away, watching things for longer, etc. Generally she’s just more engaged with the world and capable of interacting with it. It hasn’t come easily though. Clare decided last Friday that sleep was for newborns and big girl three-month-olds didn’t need it. Seriously, J and I had nights of sleep like we haven’t had since she was a week old. We had several nights of struggling for hours to put her down and then she woke up every two or three hours. I’m not sure how effective I was at work this last week, but hopefully I didn’t make any major mathematical errors. Fortunately last night, when we were approaching the breaking point at Chez McPherson, she only woke up twice and we got that blessed four-hour block of sleep. There’s nothing quite like a full REM sleep cycle to make someone feel human.
It’s an amazing thing though, even after a rough night of sleep (or lack thereof) where I’m about at the end of my rope all it takes is one smile and I forget the exhaustion and frustration of the last ten hours. Look at this pretty smile though – can you blame me?
Here is a picture of my Dad with Clare. You can see how happy she is. I say that when she’s not mad about something she’s a very happy baby. When she’s mad about something though… watch out world!
Finally here’s another video courtesy of Clare’s nanny. It’s a pretty good example of her current verbal and motor skills.

12 Weeks? Seriously?

Posted on by heather.e.d.mcpherson@gmail.com

My baby girl is now officially 12 weeks old – out of her “fourth trimester.” The last few weeks I’ve noticed that she’s turning into more of your typical infant with round eyes and cheeks and losing her newborn wobbliness. Those newborn times are so precious, but phew they go by quickly.

Her new stages are lots of fun. She’s so social and loves nothing more than to look at people and talk to them. Her vocabulary mostly consists of vowels, but sometimes she strings three or four sounds together into little ‘sentences.’ Her engagement with the world means she’s started to fight sleep because she’d rather play than take a nap. Hmmmm – I think we’ll have this battle many, many more times. It’s pretty typical now for her to make eye contact with me and coo when I’m trying to rock her to sleep – it kills me to ignore her when she’s being so cute but I know that what she really needs is a nap and that we can play later. Besides, I’ve learned that a tired Clare is a cranky Clare so nap times are very important around here.
Besides being social, Clare is using her hands more. She runs her hands over my shirt when I’m holding her, grabs onto toys, pushes things away and sort of bats toys to her. She’s starting to connect that these hands are attached to her and that she has some control over them. She also finds them fascinating and will stare at them.
I’ve been back to work now for a week – I started last Wednesday full time. It feels good to be back and reconnect with a pre-Clare part of me (it reminds me that I was an adult before I was a mother) but my favorite part of the day is still coming back home to her. We love our nanny and so far our nannyshare arrangement is working out great. It is such a huge help knowing that our baby is being loved and cared for while we’re at work.
Playing with toys – though she was getting sleepy and went down for a nap shortly after this picture was taken.
A picture from last week when Great-Gramma visited. Four generations of McCloy women. I just love how Gramma is holding onto Clare’s hand. You can’t tell by our nice smiles here, but this picture is Exhibit A of where Clare gets her feistiness from (Exhibit B is a picture of the Dion women).

Here’s one more from last week – Grandma T holding a swaddled Clare. Our girl still likes to be swaddled to sleep. I joke that we’ll keep doing it until she’s three if it keeps working!

Back to Normal Life

Posted on by heather.e.d.mcpherson@gmail.com


Whew! It’s been a wonderful whirlwind the last week. Grandma T returned to the lower Pacific Northwest last Wednesday to visit Clare – I mean, us. It was great to see her, Clare enjoyed some good Grandma time and I enjoyed having a happy baby-sitter while I ran errands. Oh yeah, the grown ups had some nice visiting time together.

We celebrated two birthdays over the week – Grandma Carol and mine. To celebrate we all went to Bend and enjoyed the last weekend of summer. Happy Birthday Mom!
Grandma T talking to Clare. Clare is getting quite vocal these days and makes the cutest little coo sounds.
Great-Grandma offered to rock Clare to sleep one night – and when we looked over both of them were asleep!
Clare got lots of Grandma T loves!
Helping Daddy plan a hiking trip.

We went for a hike along Falls Creek towards Green Lake. We didn’t go all the way to the lake, but it was a lovely hike and Clare really enjoyed it.

We took Clare out at one point – she loved the waterfall. She couldn’t stop staring at it.

Peeking out of the Beco Carrier – not napping since there was so much to look at!
We said good-bye to Great-Gramma and Grandma T on Tuesday – I think we all cried a little bit to see everyone off. Today was a big day though, since it was my first day back at work after maternity leave. I was a little apprehensive about it but it went much better than I expected. We have a wonderful nanny who we share with another family (1 nanny + 2 babies = happy families), so I felt much better knowing that Clare was in loving and capable hands. Still I’ve never been in such a hurry to get home before in my life – I needed my Clare cuddle fix.