Two things I didn't realize would be an issue when having a newborn:

1) Bumpy terrain is everywhere. It's really bad in stores when you have kid asleep in the cart.

2) Lots of back pain from lifting the little package repeatedly.

Alien vs. Predator - Does that mean Alien had home field advantage and Predator was the visiting team?

Midnight Diaries Of A Newborn's Parent

Midnight Diaries Of A Newborn's Parent

Last night was better. Baby Lock only wanted fed at 11:30p and 5:30a. She slept downstairs with me on the couch since Mrs. Lock is still sick. I was on my side the whole night to give her room to stretch out next to me. My body will tell me in the next couple of days if it were wise to sleep in only one position all night.

Diaper was quite full when I changed it this morning. It had the works in it, worst I've seen so far and the phantom smell is still with me. I managed to recreate the exact smell after eating a bowl of sugar Smacks, then brushing my teeth and using Listerine mouth wash. Maybe it was just my imagination? The diaper was so full, I had to cram it into the diaper pale and shove it down.

I'm a parent - nothing is gross now.

So Mrs. Lock is sick. She had a 102 fever last night which makes me the sole care taker now. I've got two people to take care of and I have to keep the two separate from each other until the sick one recovers.

My schedule last night went like this:

11:30 Feed the baby.
12:30 Feed the baby. Get some sleep on the couch.
3:30 Feed the baby.
4:30 Heard Mrs. Lock coughing on the baby monitor which is now the mommy monitor. Went upstairs to climb into bed, put baby into crib. Baby woke up, wanted fed again. Mrs. Lock was out.
5:30 All were asleep until 8:30.
Got ready for work.

How do you throw away trash cans? How would you get the trash collectors to pick them up?

Baby Doctor

Baby Doctor - Baby Lock's First Appointment

Today, Baby Lock had her first appointment with her pediatrician. We got her in there and the nurse asked me to strip her down to her diaper (the baby, not the nurse) which I complied. She asked me to bring her down the hall and onto the scale. So I was carrying this near-naked newborn down the hallway, and passersby would catch a glimpse of her and say things like, "Awwwww" and "She's so cute," "Look at that!" It made me a proud papa to put my child on display to adoring fans.

She weighed in at a heavyweight 8 lbs 14+ oz. She's back up over her birth weight. (She had lost almost a pound a few days after her birth). Growing girl!

I got her back to the checkup room and onto the patient bed that had white protective paper strewn across it. As soon I set her down, her diaper started leaking up the back and all over the paper, soaking it. So I did a quick diaper change, the nurse changed the paper then we were in business. The pediatrician, a very nice man, came in and asked us a few questions, gave us some pointers, some things we can expect to see in the next couple of months and did an exam on the baby which included listening to the heart, checking the spine, ear and eye checks. Everything looked great. She has her one month appointment on March 2.

Sex and Dirty Diapers

Sex and Dirty Diapers

I will not be talking about a fetish here. This is two separate topics in the same post.

Mrs. Lock made a sex life check with me and I said I actually feel pretty good; that I wasn't missing it. She told me that it is believed a father's testosterone levels drop when around his daughter, especially a newborn, which might explain the decrease in my libido. It's very strange to be without something I've lived most of my life with. I'm not sure if that's good or bad. I'm sure it'll come raging back in no time.

So the other night I was cleaning out the diaper pale. I sacked it all up, pulled the pull strings out to tie it off into a knot and a gust of diaper air shot out of the opening of the bag and blew into my face. It was with so much force, I instinctively slammed my eyes shut and could feel my hair flipping around. So a gale force of dirty diaper wind hit me in the face. I'll be handling that bag differently from now on.

I was thinking of alternatives to having to smell dirty diapers and I figured if we could get our hands on that coroner nose cream, we could put a dab of it under our nose, a little white smear on our upper lip. If it's good enough to protect you from a rotted corpse, what chance does a dirty diaper have?

First night at home with Baby Lock and what a surprise. Baby Lock didn't go to sleep until 6 a.m. and it happened in front of the television on the couch with her on my chest. Wow, we can't keep that up. We'll have to figure something out.

Day 4 - Going Home

Day 4 - Going Home

Didn't do much logging yesterday. Was busy with my kid and didn't really have anything to report. Today though we're going home.

I went into work for a couple of hours to take care of some things then rushed back to the hospital to take my family home. Got served some papers, id bracelet was removed from Baby Lock.

We got the baby ready. We got us ready. Mrs. Lock was seated in a wheelchair, we put our kid in the car seat carrier and we walked (Mom strolled) out of the hospital and into the world. That was at 1330.

It was a long five minute drive home. We took baby out and brought into her permanent home. She was fast asleep.

Day 2

Day 2

Slept till 0300. Mom was already awake. Baby wasn't in the room. We talked for a bit. I laid down at 0330, fell asleep for good. Woke up at 0700.

0900 Needed to get home ot feed the pets. It's freezing outside. frost on the car. CD jewel cases make great ice scrapers. Got home. The cat was yelling at me again but less today than last night. She looks confused about our schedule. The rabbit was sound asleep but when I showed up with a carrot, he snapped out of his slumber and was wide awake. Carrot was demolished.

Back to the hospital, grabbed breakfast in the cafe. Scrambled eggs, hash brown, bacon, sausage and strawberry milk. Hit the spot. Back up to the room where we mingled with baby.

1030 Friends are beginning to stop by. Everyone gets to hold baby, I take their picture. Nurse comes in, removes some cables from Mrs. Lock, Mrs Lock is fianlly able to get up and move around. First action, brushes teeth. Then back in the bed.

1115 Lactation specialist arrives. Baby has yet to eat since being born. Nurse shows us how its done. Baby latches to mom instantly, has her first meal at 1130.

1150 Mrs. Lock's sister pays a visit. Their mom soon after.