40 Days of Tavi

So much happens in a month! I have forgotten how slowly each day passes when with a newborn (nurse, nap, poop, repeat), yet how quickly the days pass when I look up from the newborn routine.

We are slowly adjusting to life as a family of four. Kevin is taking Sylvia to day care and picking her up, since I have not yet figured out how to get a floppy newborn and a defiant toddler out to the car safely. Sylvia now arrives at day care around 8:30 a.m. and has her breakfast there. We have noticed some signs of her feeling deprived of her parents with the new schedule (occasional clinginess when Kevin drops her off; frantic cries of "Mama! Mama!" random times during fussiness at home), but we are doing our best to make up for it when she is with us.

I had also forgotten how tied to mama a newborn is. Tavio is on me one way or another the whole day. If he isn't nursing, he's generally sleeping, something he does best when next to—or, more often, on—a warm body. In the beginning, he evinced a strong preference for mama, to the point where we could count 3 minutes after transferring his sleeping form to Kevin's chest and, lo, the crying would start! Since then, he has become more tolerant of variation and will nap on other people. Sometimes I succeed in putting him down, or nursing him on the bed and creeping away without waking him up, but it's a work in progress.

During his waking periods, which are slowly lengthening, Tavi engages in various newborn exercise regimens. The first choice is Tummy Time, a requirement generally despised by babies. Tavi has a pretty good tolerance of it, particularly in the morning. His patience for it wanes as the day goes on. At 2 weeks, he was already pushing up on his forearms to look around, and a week later he was rolling over from his tummy to his side, and even his back! So much for that period when you can put a baby down and have him stay put. Not this kid. I have also put him in the bouncy seat (good for just over 5 minutes) and on his back in the bed or the bassinet (better—I even managed a shower while he was in the bassinet in the bathroom). So now I remember how hard it is to get anything done (like this blog, for example).

On September 12, Tavio gave the first of his social smiles. The lucky recipient of his very first smile was none other than his big sister, Sylvia! He didn't repeat this feat for nearly a week, but during the past week he has been smiling on the regular, particularly with Mama, and usually while on the changing table. We haven't managed to capture this phenomenon on film yet, but stay tuned!

Tavio has also been cooing, and he and I engage in lengthy and profound conversations this way.

Sylvia seems to regard Tavi's arrival overall as a gain. Although she has been putting her parents through the wringer, she has been very affectionate with her baby brother, and becomes more so every day. When she greets him, she says, "Hellooooo, Tavio!" She loves to caress his hair and his body, and lately she has been showering him with kissies and huggies. She even whispers "I love you" to him. "He's my baby brother!" she proclaims proudly to visitors.

The depth of her affection—and feelings of possessiveness—culminated one day as I was nursing him. Sylvia started to push at me, crying, "No! NOOO! Don't nurse him! He's MY baby!" Thank goodness we had bought her a doll that in size and even in coloring resembles our second-born! We convinced her to take up the other nursing pillow and nurse Doll, which she did very capably. She lifted her shirt on the right side, nursed Doll, then burped him/her (the gender changes) while singing our special "Burp burp burp, burp burp burp, burp the baaaaby, burp the baaaaby!" song (to the tune of Shake Your Booty by K.C. and The Sunshine Band). She then nursed Doll on the other side.

We welcome another sign of Sylvia taking her big sister role seriously—self-potty training! Influenced, I believe, by books as well as her peers at day care, Sylvia has been insisting on wearing panties or "underwears" much of the time. While she has been wearing panties exclusively at home for a while (except at bedtime), she would tend to forget that she wasn't wearing a diaper if she had them on under her pants. Now she can go all the way to the park and back and keep her panties dry! She still has misses, but we have high hopes of having a fully potty-trained toddler before she is 2 1/2.

I'm typing this during Tavi's Long Midday Nap, but I think he's going to wake soon, so let's get to the photos!

Here we're going back in time to the day we got back from the hospital and Sylvia met Tavi on her own turf for the first time. I think this is the only photo we have so far of our family of four!


Are we sensing some ambivalence?


Sylvia took this photo of Tavi and Daddy:


Tavi and Mezhaidig:


Tavi meets Grandma Sue, big fan of little babies:


... and Grandma Pat:


Sylvia revels in the attention (and gifts) of two of her grandmas:


Not camera-shy, this one:


Our little fashion plate! Yes, she chose this ensemble herself:


Fun with Grandpa/Heart attack for Daddy:


Sylvia LOVES this little shopping cart, which doubles as a stroller. Kevin took her and it to the grocery store one day. When he returned, he said, "I think I asked myself about 100 times, Why did I think this was a good idea?" Headlines: Toddler Runs Amok at Local Whole Foods.


Tavio meets Great-Grandma Estelle:


Sylvia amuses Great-Grandpa Saul:


Jeanie came for a visit accompanied by her sister, Jessica, who now lives in L.A. Jeanie and Kevin go way back. Jeanie is great with kids—Sylvia adores her, and Tavi felt comfortable enough to conk out on her shoulder:


Sylvia loves music and dance (natch), and Kevin took this great photo of our little Maniac in her fabulous 80s outfit (those are pajama pants, by the way) doing her thing in her room:


Sylvia using the nursing pillow:


Tavio with a gift from Kevin's colleagues, which was swiftly appropriated by his big sister. The giraffe's shirt says "Pepperdine":


Kevin took this photo of our 4 hands:


These photos were taken on September 4; Tavi is 3 weeks old here:



Sylvia, whenever she sees Tavi, says, "He's looking at me!" Here, you can see he really is:


I took these last Sunday; Tavi is about 5 weeks old here. I couldn't resist posting all these of my 3 favorite people!




I love how my two children are gazing into each others' eyes in this last photo. When I see this, it makes me feel that they will really appreciate each other as they get older. I had to remind myself when I was pregnant that I wasn't taking Sylvia's parents from her, I was instead giving her a sibling. I can see here that we made the right decision by having another!