Vent

Here's your warning - this is a vent on my part, so don't continue reading if you don't want to! My mother and Jerry got an earful about this yesterday, but it's still in my system...

So Carrie's one year check up was yesterday. Jerry and I were all excited to find out how much she weighed and how long she is now that's she's the big 0-1. We arrive at the new pediatrician's office and fill out all the fun paperwork, and are immediately whisked back into a room. 1 point to the office for not making us wait for a long time! We go back and the nurses arrive and get Carrie's shot record from me, and ask routine questions. Any concerns? Nope, Carrie's a dream; I just want to talk to the doc about vaccine scheduling. This gets a raised eyebrow, but no comment. Is she on formula or regular milk? Neither - she's still nursing once a day and drinking some that I've frozen, but we are trying regular milk slowly and she's not too sure about it yet. Another raised eyebrow. I guess this should have been my red flag, but whatever. They leave and we're getting Carrie ready for her check-up with the doc. (by the way, she weighed 18 lbs 13 oz and was 29 inches long - definitely petite!)

So our doc comes in and is super nice. She's good with Carrie and talks to her very sweetly and the whole nine yards. She lets me hold Carrie while she's examining her, to the extent that it's possible, and Carrie plays with her monkey on her stethoscope. Everything's great, blah, blah, blah. Then she starts talking about all of the vaccines Carrie should get at this visit. She starts listing them off...I'm slowly counting up the number of needles involved, and I ask "Am I counting right - she'll get five shots today?" "Yep, that's right. Five shots." WHAT??? I don't think so. Who the heck wants to get FIVE shots in one day? So I launch into my carefully rehearsed speech about how I don't have a problem with her actually getting the vaccines, I'm not convinced the vaccines cause autism, but what I do have a problem with is my child getting all those medicines in one dose and expecting her tiny little body to be able to efficiently and safely process all of that in one fell swoop. The doc proceeds to tell me that she's of the opinion that it's best to get them done and over with so Carrie doesn't have to keep coming back and getting shots. Okay, maybe I'd buy that argument if it were me getting the shots, but not with my child. It was obvious that I was getting upset - I was crying. I probably overreacted, no doubt, but here's my problem - the research is inconclusive about the autism thing (or at least what I've seen - there's just too many 'coincidences' out there it seems...), not to mention having all that stuff floating around in her body at one time would be bound to make her sick or feel like crap. I feel like it's my job to protect her - what if something did happen, God forbid, as a result of me allowing her to get five vaccines in one day? I know I couldn't live with myself. I'd constantly be saying to myself "what if I had stuck to my guns and stood up for what I believed was best for my child?" I basically told the ped that we would not be doing all those shots in one day...she said "Well, she's your child." I just said "Yes, she is, now let's figure out which 2 shots she's getting today, which 2 she'll get in 6 weeks, and then which 2 she'll get at the 15 month check-up." Which, by the way, at that check-up she'll be caught up and on track again. All of this over one extra visit. Give me a break.

Then I got the third degree again. From the check-out clerk. Seriously? I told her we needed to make a shot appointment and her check-up. I told her which shots she'd be receiving in 6 weeks, and the clerk said "What happened? Isn't she supposed to get those today?" At this point I snapped.
"Yes, techically she was 'supposed' to get them today, but we're coming back in 6 weeks for those." This should have been enough for her, but it wasn't.
"Why didn't she get them today."
"Because I don't want her getting all those shots at once." (funny look from clerk)
"Okay...when do you want to bring her back in for those shots?"
(funny look from me - haven't I just told you this?)
"In six weeks."
"SIX weeks??? Why are you waiting so long? Is there a reason?"
"Yes, there is a reason. I want her shots spread out. Her 15 month check-up is, by definition, in 3 months from now. That means 12 weeks, and six weeks is half of that, so that's when I want to bring her in for her shots."

Whatever happened to letting the parents parent and, as long as we aren't abusing our child or putting her in harm's way, letting us make the decisions?

Okay, I'm done venting now. :)

Weird.

This is so weird...I'm sitting here on GT-Atlanta's campus...not as a student, but as an employee. Campus has changed dramatically since Jerry and I were here as undergrads. Some things are still the same - the student center is still in the same place, but has undergone some major renovations and looks WAY better now than when I was here. Some things are new, though - the old student athletic complex has been demolished to make way for the new Campus Recreation Center (it apparently had to have a new name to go along with new multi-million dollar building). It's obvious that we got cheated while we were here :)

I can only imagine what it will look like in 17 years when Carrie is a freshman here ;) Seriously, I am going to try to be really good and not pressure her into going to GT, although I think it would be one of the best decisions she could make. I'm happy just as long as she doesn't go to a certain school north of here in Athens or one south of here in Gainesville FL. I don't want her to go to UGA just on principle, and I've seen what goes on in Gainesville.

I'll post about her first birthday festivities shortly, once I'm back in Savannah from my trip to ATL. I also have to get all the pics from Ken - he took over 300 pictures on Saturday, so I finally just quit taking them and let him run with it.

Random musings

Nothing huge to report lately, so I thought I'd just highlight a few of the random things rattling around in my brain these days...bear with me...

• My child will be ONE YEAR OLD a week from tomorrow. This is blowing my mind right now. I have no clue where the last year has gone. Nevermind, I do know where it's gone - straight into the most beautiful child ever to walk the face of the planet (I'm not biased or anything!) Honestly, this year has been wonderful. I doubt I would have said that while I was nursing her around the clock. In fact, I think during that time I was wondering just what the hell I had gotten myself into and what made me think I was fit to be a parent. I now know that apparently most, if not all, new parents have this same feeling. It too shall pass my parent-friends said, and they were right. Now I can hardly remember what it was like to not have Carrie in my life (although I do vaguely catch a glimpse of what it used to be like when Jerry and I leave the house without her...that means if we say we are heading out at 5pm, we are actually walking out the door at 5pm, not frantically searching the house for socks/jacket/bottle/food/diaper bag/whatever else we need, and actually leaving at about 5:30)
• When planning your child's birthday party, make sure the decorations are still available that match the invitations you fell in love with and "just had to have." I ordered Classic Winnie the Pooh invites and sent them all out, and only then did I realize that Classic Winnie the Pooh decorations had been DISCONTINUED. Huh? Who the heck discontinues such items? Thankfully eBay exists and I've paid more than I ever thought I would to have matching plates, balloons, and banners.
• Carrie's trying her hardest to walk these days. She likes for you to stand behind her and hold her hands so she can motor around. It's pretty cute, and I'm all for her walking, but terrified of how in the heck I'm supposed to keep up with her at that point. I mean, she can already just about out-crawl me, so what's gonna happen when she's running???
• We really love living in SC! And to answer everyone's question - yes, it's going fine living with Jerry's parents, and I really mean that and am not just saying that since I know they'll be reading this :) Apparently they get the same question as well..."So...how IS it living with your grown son, daughter-in-law, and one year old granddaughter?" As if it's some sort of death sentence that we are bunking up with them for the time being. Alston apparently had quite the experience when some woman overheard her talking to Jerry's mom about this. If you know Alston, please ask her about this story - to see/hear her tell it is priceless.
• While we loving living here, we miss our friends :( Jenn/Rad, Amy/Aaron, Amy/Nate and all of the other folks we hung out with there. It's no secret that Gainesville wasn't my dream town to live in, but we really did have some wonderful friends there, so we miss seeing them on a regular basis.
• I love my job. Love it. And I'm a big dork because I love working for GT.

Okay, I think that's about it for now. Happy weekend everyone!

What a ham...

Word Update

Just a quick update on Carrie's word count...we're now up to four. The first three were, in order, "dada," "uh-oh" (she gets a lot of use out of this one), and "doggie." And now, ladies & gentlemen, last night we finally had a good long string of "mama" thrown in there for good measure. She was sitting in my lap at the table eating my strawberries and all of a sudden just launched into saying a string of "mamamamamamamama" for about 10 seconds. We all just got really quiet, listened to her babble, then clapped for her afterwards. I swear I thought I was going to cry at the dinner table...but I held it together :)

We Made It!!

Well, we've officially made the transition from Gainesville to Savannah. We've been in Savannah for two weeks now, and have barely had time to catch our breath, which is why I wasn't able to stick to me "write a post at least once a week" plan. Hopefully I'll get back on that bandwagon this week!

March 9th was the big move. Actually I guess it wasn't technically too big since we weren't moving everything we owned, just the "necessary stuff." Hah. The "necessary" stuff filled up a 6' by 12' U Haul, a Subaru, an Envoy, and an Expedition. Of course, I think my scrapbook stuff probably filled up one of those vehicles, but that's another post. Don't ask Jerry about it - it's a pet peeve of his that we keep dragging mementos of our past from house to house. I just keep telling him he'll be glad I did it once it's all in a nice scrapbook and he can look back and remember what he did with his life. Rhett was a total lifesaver during the move. She kept Carrie entertained the entire morning while Jerry, Izzie, and myself were scurrying around packing and cleaning up. We finally got out of Gainesville around 2pm, a mere 4 hours past Jerry's target time of leaving. We stopped at Wendy's for a little lunch, where Carrie reached over and grabbed a hot fry off Jerry's tray and screamed bloody murder because she didn't know what to do with it, but knew it hurt like the devil. Not fun. At any rate, we made it to Okatie all in one piece around 7 that evening and unpacked boxes into the front hallway. I'm happy to report that all of the boxes are out of the front hallway...unfortunately they have just been moved up to the upstairs hallway, but we hope to have them put away soon!

Carrie loves being around all the pups. This past weekend with Easter she had 8 dogs to entertain her since Alston & Nick had their two pups, Porter & Sam, to add to the mix. It makes for a lot of chaos with that many dogs, but I think it's great. We are definitely going to have to teach Carrie at some point not to just assume all dogs are as nice as these 8 dogs. They put up with so much from her (except Carolina, who has quickly learned that if she sees Carrie coming that she should just get out of the way).

Easter was great, although church lasted about two hours. Carrie was a real trooper. She got cranky only once, and Jerry took her outside til communion started. Other than that she just looked around and entertained our neighbors in the pews. Izzie wasn't kidding when she said she always felt like she'd been through WWII after a church service with kids. I only had one to keep up with, but Carrie's such a monkey that she was constantly trying to climb all over me the entire time. I can't complain though, she was such a good girl throughout the service.

My job is going really well. I'm such a dork that I think it's great to be back at GT. I got my Buzz Card this morning; talk about surreal. Since I was a student way back when, they still had my BuzzCard picture from freshman year. That was entertaining. Suffice it to say I look a bit older in this most recent picture than the one I had taken 13 years ago (yikes).

seriously???

Is it possible to pinpoint the exact point in time when you lost your mind?

Cause I realized yesterday at about 5:15pm that I had, in fact, lost my mind. I'm just not sure of when it happened.

I realized this as I whipped out my Amex yesterday afternoon to pay for $37 worth of party decorations.

For my dog.

Yes folks, that's right. I spent almost $40 on party decorations for Bailey's "Going Away" party at his doggie daycare for this Friday. And I haven't even bought the cake yet. I can't wait to see how much that's going to cost me.

Jerry and I decided before Carrie came along to make a conscious, concerted effort to not push Bailey to the wayside when she arrived on the scene. I think we've done a fairly good job of that. No, he isn't the only child in the house anymore, and he's had to sacrifice some Mommy/Daddy time to Carrie, but all in all he's adjusted well and seems to be a happier pup for it (except for the occasional pooping in the house for no good reason lately, but I think that's because he realizes something's up with all the packing and boxes). We've continued to take him to daycare at least once a week so he can see all his buds and get some much needed running around time. The folks that run Camp Marlin Doggie Daycare were so sad when I told them we were moving. He's been going there for 4 years. I remember the exact first day I took him to daycare. The only reason I got Jerry to agree to let me take him was because he was traveling all the time and I felt so guilty about leaving him at home all day by himself. The first day I dropped him off he looked at me like "Are you seriously leaving me here with these strangers ALL DAY LONG?" and he wimpered a little as I left. I called twice to check on him. No, I'm not kidding. Then the second day I took him it was all I could do to keep him from dragging me across the parking lot to get into the building fast enough. And ever since then, whenever I tell him to get his jewelry on Wednesday mornings he goes bonkers. We can't even say the word "daycare" at our house; it's referred to as "DC."

So I guess it's the end of an era. He won't need to go to daycare when we move to Savannah, at least not at first since we'll be staying with Jerry's parents and they have five dogs. It'll be like daycare every day. And so I find myself making a list of things I need to do for my dog's going away party....stuff goodie bags...order a cake...pick up doggie ice cream...fill up the pinata I bought with dog treats...

If it's like this with Bailey, someone stop me before I go overboard for Carrie's first birthday party!!