Remiss

It has been too long since I unloaded my camera's memory card, a practice I get mad at others for. I'd say I'm not a hypocrite, but doing so would be hypocritical. Here comes a selection of mostly unprocessed photo dump..

Big Shoes to fill. I swear I didn't stage this.

Papa and Declan

I guess I like this one better.

Owen and I on the train. Someone else took a photo!

He likes being naked more than any child alive. Is he my child?

Owen and Grandma love to play ball on the brick path. Here they are taking a rest. I never found a framing or lighting I liked for this pic, but it was a nice moment.

The same activity. Action Shot!

I am convinced that smiling and laughing show up right around the time Dads are ready to run for the hills. Its evolution at its finest. Note that Declan is hard to catch smiling on camera for some reason, but he does it all the time in person. Come visit him and see!

He seems like such a little boy these days. Not much of a talker, but a good communicator all the same.

Some wondrousness.

The faux hawk is real.

I want the camera.

Hard to get them together.

relax.

Got it.

Trying out the exersaucer.

well, he's awake so our recap is over.

hope you all are well.

welcome back

With some trepidation, I set out again... Work servers are down, so I can write, and feel okay about it.

We are back from Sweden, and can I say it was about a thousand times better than I feared. Travelling back wasn't easy, but we righted the ship and the upswing in Owen's skin that started in Sweden has continued. Which makes me think we learned a lesson or two while there, or maybe we just got a jump on things and don't want to look back, let it fall behind. The three theories about the improvement that happened: Low humidity and ideal temperatures, the bubblepoolen or swedish jacuzi which is kept at about warm bathwater temperature, and finally, hypervigilance.


The weather was remarkable, and its believeable, but I'm losing faith in this explanation.
The bubblepoolen were nice, and Owen really got good soaks in on a number of nights. Bathwater still pissed him off and frayed our nerves, but lots of hotels didn't have baths at all, so the jacuzzi were nice. Claire likes this explanation, maybe because she wants to get a hot tub for the backyard. I dunno. We didn't use them all that often. Really just three hotels, a total of 7 trips to the water, and the skin seemed to be on a general incline independent of the timing fo these soaks. It definitely did help remove scabs, which is a great thing, since Owen picking at scabs is one of the cyclical issues we have: blister, scab, picked at,  picking causes new blister, repeat. Breaking the cycle at any stage helps. But, and this may be in combo with item 1, he did get pretty itchy in Sweden, and we started using both steroids (OTC, not the stuff we use at home) and lotion, something we had mostly avoided. These seemed to help with teh itching, and combined with the scab cycle break, may be a key ingredient.


hypervigilance. Two parents, constantly with him, needles in my pocket all the time, keeps the size of each blister low, because I can pop as soon as I notice. Also, we spent a fair amount of time in hotel rooms and were generally less clothed than we have here, this helped allow hypervigilance. I have, in the past, tried hypervigilance, as opposed to the isolated pop at the end of the day. They were 4 months ago, I was home with Owen full time, and I set out on a quest to "pop throughout the day." To see if this worked. They were horrible days, awful sensation of torturing my child with no gain. And there was no gain, things were as bad or worse after teh short experiment, and I wanted no part in fatherhood, barely a part in existence.


So who knows, hypervigilance at some level has continued, with claire on maternity leave, so has use of lotion, and a few long baths have been successfully executed (a few short scream filled ones as well). The weather here has been mostly hot. Not traditionally good news for Owen's skin, but we continue to improve. Maybe its just that we're finally ahead of the curve, instead of pounded in the cyclical surf. The exception is his eye, which has been hard lately, and started around Sweden, but so many other areas are wonderful its hard to complain. I find myself knocking on every piece of wood for a thousand mile radius, but maybe this is the new norm. The daily blister rate has drifted many times up and down, 40 seemed bad, until it was routinely a 100.
In any case a few photos of our trip...

In answer to James long held questions: Children from my earlier european travels are doing well and appearing in Swedish advertisements

Owen loved the CHIPS style sunglasses I picked up for our drive.

I am speechless, more often than I should be.

In the Slott.

A Dutch Elm, and its not diseased! I loved this tree.

Owen loved sliding around on this floor, and we had this amazing room in the castle to ourselves for play.

Exploreringer-mabob.

Dramatic fields of mustard would pop up whenever we weren't in forestland. I'm sure that better photos exist everywhere, but its for my memory if nothing else.

Also the castle, out of order...

Happily lost in a old fishing village before our hike.

A fun pair of photos at teh start of the hike. Owen got tired eventually, but for most of this hike he was absolutely ecstatic about following the path forward through the trees.

It was at this point that Claire and I agreed that none of my family would be happy with us. It was an adventure.

At Nevis the driftwood sculpture, Owen was getting fussy and tired and would fall asleep on my shoulder in the hike back up.

It is basically impossible to capture this place as half as fanciful as it actually is.

The Car. We'll be seeing you again in 6 weeks.

Stockholm is a great city for walking. Everyone we met in Sweden speaks English reasonably well. At first glance we didn't appear as tourists, since sane people wouldn't travel to europe with a toddler and a very pregnant lady, but on closer inspection, we were the only people with a stroller that wasn't suited to cobblestone, a dead giveaway.

In front of the Royal palace, or beside it, I guess. I love the tiny soldier standing guard at the top of the ramp, but its hard to see at this resolution.

Taking a break on our walk around part of the archipelago (after a ferry ride that Owen loved).

The archipelago is magical.

Hanging out on the beach. Not sure if Owen actually ate any rocks, but he liked it here.

The Volvo factory, dropping off the car, almost 1500 miles after getting it with 7 miles on the odometer. We missed the tour on both ends, Owen was jetlagged on the way in and cried for almost two hours straight. At that point, I was ready to call the trip a disaster, but by the time we dropped off the car, it was a different world, and owen mopped their floor with his blankets happily while we waited. It would almost surprise me if we didn't do this trip again when its time to retire the honda (in ten years I hope).

Over all, the best part was just being a tight group without distraction, we hadn't done much of that since the first maternity leave and at that time we were so overwhelmed that I couldn't tell you which way was up. Obviously we're about to get overwhelmed again, hopefully with a little less drama, so it was good to get this time in. Owen's going to have to get used to being part of a binary system, instead of the center of his parental universe. Wish us luck, and knock on some wood for me.






.

Man of the house.

Already Pulling on Granite

Owen got out a lot of books today

aha, there it is.

Owen got out a lot of books today

? Why can't I add a photo? THe option was here yesterday! curse you!

wipes and mask, unrelated

On order for tomorrow. These are the best for Owen, not our first choice, but I don't think we'll move away for anything ever. Not available on subscribe and save, but not a bad price either.  and for cleaning up the smelly things in life, aka paint, and not diapers (although from now on I'm ordering minimal voc paints, I found a good website listing various options, I'll add that later)

two points does not a trend make

And so, after two good nights of sleep (only up twice, and only one of those for more than twenty minutes to give a bottle, my standards are lower than most). I had one of the worst nights in a long time. Claire took up much of the bed, the cat added to that, Owen was up intermittently from 1 to 3, again at 5, claire made a second bottle at 5:30 or so, but couldn't give it, so I did. The second round of pregnancy is worse for me. The first time through, claire would snore, but I could always wear ear plugs, this time, no such luck.

also, the toilet is still leaking. double down.

Owen after a little lunch. 3/10/10

Toilet San Carlos

Leaks from below the tank at the rental house called at 10am or so. Went down to inspect adn decided that it swas something I could fix. Always a scary decision when water is involved. Leaks can be hard to fix, and sometimes more problems are easily created. But I figured it was from one of the bolts connecting the upper tank to the pedestal. so I drained the tank, shut off water and flushed adn tried to wrnech the bots free. They were so rusted that I couldn't easily do so, and didn't even need a screwdriver to hold the top of the bolt in place . Eventually I used the socket set to get one of them off, the second I was trying to wrench off and the hwhole bolt broke flush, mission accomplished, the third I ground a solid edge into the bolt with a dremel and then used the smaller size socket to take that one off. Even with a big socket it took a lot of effort. that let me remove the tank, but then there is a second level of bolt beyond that. These ones were hopeless, now the inside of the tank would spin if I tried the socket, so I couldn't even wrench them free with a ton of offort. so then I started hacksawing them off. Its brass, and I'm not sure if brass is easily hacksawed, or not, but eventually thel all came off. Where possible I sped up the process with the dremel and the diamond cutting wheel. Then I went to Ace, got the new bolt set and since I was there, a new spud plug gasket. I had read that I needed to bring the old spud plug gasket to teh store to make sure the new one matched, but Ace only had one option, and it looked pretty close. So, back to the house, realized that this toilet had three bolts attaching it and all the bolt sets came as pairs. Curse you 10 hot dogs and 8 buns! back to the hardware store, and now, paranoid, I also get a new flapper, in case that is part of the problem, or if the new spud plug gasket doesn't fit. I'm bad at returning such things, but I figure, I will not make a third hardware store run. back to the hosue, lots of cleaning behind, around, and the underide of the tank, then cranking down on all the bolts, and no leaks. Well, I actually got a leak when reconnecting the supply line to the fill, but that was easily fixed. The new spud plug gasket definitely makes= the tank ride a little higher off teh pedestal, but not noticeably so. It also made thing s a little wobbly until I got all three bolts cranked down. They say don't overtightne here, but I went pretty darn tight to compress the spud plug washer a ltitle and hold the tank on solidly.

Again, fixing things feels good, not having to call a plumber on a sunday, also good. Oh my, Owen is waking up just now after only 1:20 down, that's a bad sign for the afternoon. Two good nights in a row though sleeping, so I'm not going to complain (yet...). Also an update on things, another infection on the left foot. Not sure what just yet, but seems to be responding tot he antibiotic ointment. The blisters on teh right eyelid are gradually spreading away from the nose, the same as blisters seem to everywhere. Once a blister starts in almost any location, there's a ripples in apond effect that spreads future blisters outward. I'm sure these will run their course teh same as all the rest, but they are disconcerting to look at it adnpopping them is extra scary.

Eggplant Parm

Claire sent me this link:
http://simplyrecipes.com/recipes/eggplant_parmesan/
And these modifications:
1. add on top of the eggplant/ tomato mixture blobs of ricotta/leftover beaten egg mixture...just add dolops of this cheese before you put slices of mozerella on it.

2. instead of basil leaves---put the basil in the cuisinart with 5 tablespoons olive oil, a handful of walnuts and 1/2 cup of parmesan cheese to make a pesto. Instead of laying leaves of basil on the eggplant--just put a small teaspoon (dolop) on each of the eggplant rounds.

3. Use all of the shredded mozerella in addition to the 2 packages of fresh (slice thinly) mozerella to spread on the eggplant.

4. taste the tomato sauce--if you don't like it as is..then mix it with one of the jars of tomato marinara sauce we have in the bottom of the pantry for a thicker/better flavor...
 
 
I'd say it was pretty good. The tomato sauce is thinner than when Claire has made this in the past and that is sort of dissapointing, I'd recomend draining the tomato cans, adding more garlic to the tomato sauce. Claire wanted large dollops of the ricotta on the eggplant slices, and that might be alright, but its already a pretty cheesy recipe.
 
Cooking while managing Owen is a whole different ballgame, I have always disliked the hecticness of cooking, and although the recipe ends up being comlicated, there are plenty of points where you can stop and play with the kid, take care of some other pressing matter, stuff like that. i.e. take a break after any of the frying rounds, or after starting the draining process on the eggplant. Owen also has come to like playing with the dials on the stove, scary for sure, so supervision in the kitchen is important, but it is surprising when your frying pan suddenly isn't as hot as it used to be and you didn't see him do it. The eggplant can also splatter oil when you first toss them into the frying pan, which made me very wary for Owen being nearby.
 

progress

well, a quiet few days. Claire was off for three in a row after a brutal night on call Monday. But Owen's sleep got a little better, and even though that change was marginal, I felt better about basically everything. I ordered $230 in parts from Honda. I could have saved about 40, and gotten my recylcing cred had I gone to a junkyard, but I was confused about some of the labeling of parts, so I managed to replace two of the four tail light lens assemblies. Claire said its an amazing transition, "it doesn't look like a junker" I had no idea she had such a low opinion of the car before that. Anyway, now I've got the bug, I'm ordering a set of touch up paint and clearcoat to take out the rusty scratch. Fixing the tail lights took a half hour and saved a ton of money, and even though there is "so little time" it made my day. now back to work.

The changing table

Had a brief email exchange with family that included this:
While the white lie may be an essential parenting technique, I for one think Luke deserves a time out. There may have been more than one lie in James' email, but one of them was not that I agreed with him. As far as teh changing table controversy goes... well, I agree with James. its good to have a place to store stuff, have the "don't roll away from me" pad buttoned on and most importantly, spare your back.



This may be more important for Owen than anyone but any amount of work done on the large children this family tends to have is probably best done at an appropriate height. I also think the changing table only places are ridiculous. that said, Amazon lists several hundred of them, this is for two reasons. 1) It is good to have a changing table, and 2) new parents are suckers. For instance, don't buy thirty outfits in the 3 month size, they will only be in that size for four days, and with a little bit of laundry, fifteen outfits should last 4 days (with proper diapering).



Claire and I got a tallish dresser, it stores outfits, diapers, and a few medical supplies, then we put the changing pad on top. the changing only tables have little bars on the side that are supposed to help with the rolling protection, but Owen, who is an expert roller, and has plenty of desire to escape the changing pad (as he associates it with torture), hasn't really been too hard to keep on the pad we have even without the roll bars. Get something that is adaptable for future use, or get something sturdy that you already have and then firmly attach the pad to the top of it. (carpet tape, or buttons work well).



Speaking of amazon, they are where I buy diapers, often cheaper than costco with free express shipping. If you "subscribe and save" they take an additional fifteen percent off. As a bonus, they often don't charge sales tax, although you are supposed to report these on your state tax return. Also if you follow THIS LINK, every time you go to Amazon, I will get somewhere between 4 and 9% back on your purchase as part of a referral fee. I assure you this is totally legitimate and I will use the proceeds to some good end, like a nice bottle of scotch, or Owen's college fund. Basically, every time you go to Amazon, some website somewhere is claiming credit for you geting there. be it google, yahoo, www.naked_coeds_on_the_beach.com or whatever other site you've recently visited. (they put a cookie on your computer). Amazon is currently paying THEM, when you could keep it in the family.

Seriously, any time you think, oh, I'll go to Amazon, do so by finding this email and clicking on this link (or follow the link, THEN save it as a favorite, bookmark, etc.) :

http://www.amazon.com/?ie=UTF8&tag=jglens-20&link_code=ure

Your christmas presents will benefit, although I cannot offer you a quid pro quo kickback as that is against the terms of service. Still, its better than the money going to www.I_love_rush_limbaugh.com or whatever sites murray visits on your home computer kate. (it is also possible to find equivalent links from worthy charities on the web, but, really, what's a more worthy charity than this?)

But I digress, changing table, not a bad idea with certain specifications.
-John

And thus to silence. Quite a rip roaring start and then a crash. Partly work, partly Owen. We have done minimal pops for two days in a row, so tonight was bad, not as bad as the first night Jo and the kids were here, but rough all the same. This of course means rough for Claire and I. Yesterday and today were the two ahrdest days I've spent with Owen in a  long time, he wasn't distractable, he absolutely hated being picked up, especially to go upstairs, even just to get something out of the bedroom, but a tantrum to go to the changing table. Tomorrow I will try to pop less throughout the day, its so tempting when I see blisters to whip out the needle, and sometimes its possible to get away with it, but as often as not, he gets upset, I've yet to figure out what exactly is a pop that I can get away with and what I can't. Two needlings will be identical in my mind and one will pass unnoticed, while the other means a long time soothing.

Last night we stayed up watching ice dancing. A mistake no doubt, and like bobsled and ski jumping, I can not really tell all that much difference between competitors, except for ridiculous costumes, but somehow we got  suckered in, Owen needed soothing around midnight when we finally crashed. Claire took it and did a good job, very quick, but he was back up at 3:15 and I couldn't get him back down until after 4. At least Claire's breathing was as if she were sleeping. He squacked at 7, but stayed down, clairegot up to keep the dogs quiet and cleaned the kitchen, made a big pot of coffee for me and left. Owen got up at 8.

This is boring, but I'm hoping that even writing this will make patterns easier to recognize. I'm desparate in a way, and tired, and trying to figure out the strangeness of slow days and fast months. It rained a lot today, and not just outside.

Dinner:
can of Red beans with garlic, onion
can of tomatoes not drained
1/2 white onion chopped
4 cloves garlic
1 thin sliced small sausage (cajun aidell) lightly browned after cutting
1/2 cup white wine
ground cumin 2 tblsp
thyme teaspoon
basil teaspoon
red pepper flakes (too much, try less next time, maybe 1/2 teaspoon)
combine in most obvious way, then reduce, served with multigrain rotini, steamed broccoli


not bad, definitely was too strong on the red pepper, definitely started making the past too late as the sauce was done and drying out before the pasta was ready, added a splash of stock to keep moist while waiting. probably served 4.

And BTW

Oh how I wish I would have bought stock in Amazon, even just over a year ago when I started using it for lots of my basic shopping and signed up for Prime shipping. Check it out!
Amazon

Oh me oh my I've got a blog

Hello World. First Light. First Byte. No great opus, but more to come. I hope to keep up family and friends, post links, answer questions that I've had of myself and pose questions I can't answer. Besides, I don't like the facebook format, the twitter format, and the mass emails are hard to keep track of, everyone and their mother had a blog a few years ago already I know, this is so 2005 (what was the worst year of my life, up until the day I met my wife, October was it? ah yes 10/13/05, but the email that really started things wasn't until 10/22). Still, 5 years behind in the tech world, what does that matter? Its only like 3 moore's law's later.