The Trixie Update

I don’t know whether it was the socialization and daily exposure to other talking children in daycare or if it just happened to coincide with her natural pace of development, but Trixie vocalizes all the time now.

We’re relieved. When Trixie turned one year old without talking we were a little worried. But over the past 7 months, our concerns about her language skills diminished because she’s doing most of the other stuff she’s supposed to, and, well, life goes on. Even though it’s not ‘normal’ for her to talk so late, there are plenty of anecdotal accounts about how so-and-so’s child didn’t talk until he was 11, and he turned out fine. He’s down at the docks, go ask him yourself.

In the meantime, we’re enjoying a daily barrage of words like “dog”, “woof”, “bat” (courtesy Sesame Street’s the Count) and her all time favorite, “baby.” Trixie loves babies to no end, and there’s no end to the number of times she’ll chant “Bay BEE!” over and over again while wildly rocking her arms back and forth.

However, the most interesting development happened yesterday when I realized Trixie was identifying herself for the first time. She doesn’t grab hold of her name the way she does the word baby, and drive it into the ground. It’s a more cautious, quiet embrace of the word, as if she’s pretty sure she’s Trixie — but not totally 100% sure.

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Trixie isn’t a kid anymore. I always figured I wouldn’t realize it until she started kindergarten or maybe college. Instead, it happened Tuesday.

I was dropping her off at daycare, unpacking her stuff for the day and her teacher told me that I didn’t need to leave her Silky. Really? Maybe she doesn’t needs pants either. Or her kidneys. But then I realized that she was right. Trixie doesn’t need Silky anymore.

It’s quite a shock. She used to drag that thing everywhere. Now we have to coerce her to take it. And she’ll only accept when she’s tired. Sometimes.

From a managing point of view, it’s a loss. Silky was a means of control and comfort. What am I supposed to throw at her when the server is down and she’s cranky? Raisins?

Not only has Trixie given up Silky, she’s not sucking her thumb anymore either. She had to cut back on that after the raging skin infection she had last month. The infection, of course, was caused by her sucking her thumb so much that the callous split open. That definitely threw cold water on the whole comfort factor. She’s better now, but appears to given up the habit for good.

So in the course of a short month, Silky and thumb-sucking are history. It’s funny, because I always figured we were going to face some kind of security object/activity showdown as Trixie got older. Poor kid, she never even had the chance to figure out that we were spelling S-I-L-K-Y when a certain pink blanket was sopping wet in the washing machine.

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It was worth it. Even the rolling around on the floor with Ebola leaking out out of my face, clutching my stomach in agony part. Trixie loves daycare now, and the whole household is as well as we have been in several months.

I haven’t been sick the entire time. At the end of last week, things were looking much better. By Friday, I felt like eating again. By Saturday, I declared myself well. But apparently the virus was only incubating, growing stronger. On Sunday I caught it all over again, and it put me out of commission for a good 3 days. I can honestly say I’ve never been so sick in my whole life as I have the last month and a half.

Trixie, on the other hand, spent one day vomiting and basically recovered. She was cranky for a couple of days afterwards, but it’s impossible to tell whether that was because she was a recovering sicko or just stressed from the new daycare environment (or some combination of the two.) Matter of fact, there were so many adverse events during the weeks following Trixie’s entry to daycare — from vomiting to separation anxiety to a morning nap relapse — that it’s hard to get a handle on how out of whack life has been around here. Here’s a short summary to help explain the daycare* transition:

*Trixie is in part-time daycare (mornings) Monday-Friday. She started at 18 months.

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So, as reported below, no more Diaper Telemetry. I’m sure the disposable diaper companies are glad it’s gone. They don’t want you thinking about how many diapers a baby goes through — it’s not good for their business. I’ve gotten a handful of emails/comments from site visitors who decided to go cloth or ecological or banana leaves after seeing how many diapers a single baby can consume.

For the benefit of new readers, yes, we used disposables. But before anyone yells at me for so far sending 3,500 diapers to the landfill, just hold on. Nothing went to the landfill. They’re all in a storage unit out on Highway-54 for safekeeping.

Anyway, that’s all yesterday’s news. The big news today is that I am no longer a 100% stay-at-home dad. Trixie is now in part-time daycare. She started last week on what was supposed to be a Mon/Wed/Fri full day. She went for a half-day Monday, a full day Wednesday, and started throwing up Thursday.

Much in the way Native Americans were decimated by the European-born smallpox, Trixie was no match for the daycare super-germs. Everyone told us it would happen, but I didn’t realize I would be able to set my watch by it. After a weekend of recovery, we started her back this morning. We’re now doing M-F mornings, so that she’ll have a regular day-to-day schedule. This way she’ll also get to take her nap at home where she feels more comfortable.

As for me, I’m still at home the whole day, but now I finally get to do some serious work on Trixie Tracker in the mornings. That was one reason that we needed to send Trixie to daycare. That and I was slowly losing my sense of humor. We’re also doing it to help with her socialization. She’s still not really talking yet, and we feel it would be a good thing for her to play in a group setting.

Lastly, I feel compelled to address all the insane wackos who have visited this site once and then gone back to their blogs and ranted about how I should spend more time with my daughter. Just to set the record straight, they finally have a leg to stand on. It’s finally physically possible for me to spend more time with daughter. But I’m not going to, just to spite them.

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I was in the kitchen this morning, with Trixie in her crib, when I heard a huge thump-a-thunk. I promptly ignored it because how much trouble can she get into when she’s in the crib?

Not expecting anyone or anything else to be moving around the house, I almost screamed bloody murder when 10 seconds later Trixie came shuffling around the corner. This is a bad milestone, Trixie can get out of her crib.

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Jennifer, you’ll be happy to know that I did get around to mixing cow’s milk into Trixie’s milk today at a 1:5 ratio. She drank it just fine and there are no signs of any negative reaction*. Who knows, maybe this time next week, no more pumping.

*Ok, well, there is a huge, blistering rash that developed all around her mouth and on her legs where the milk dripped a little, but I don’t want to jump to conclusions.

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Trixie took

   eight

steps

   this morning

traveling
a

      total of
 two feet.

The feat has not been repeated, but it’s pretty legitimate - Trixie has walked. In the two previous days she has taken a step or two, but without actually moving herself anywhere. Today she made some progress.

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Trixie totally just peed in her little plastic potty.

We’ve only had the potty about a week. The idea was that we would get Trixie used to going into the bathroom and sitting down with us. (She always follows us in there anyway.) And so she just sits on it with her clothes on and hangs out.

Today, however, we were getting ready to get in the shower. (Side note: She takes a shower with me now because 1) she has a good time in there and 2) it means I don’t have to waste precious personal time showering during her naps.) Anyway, I sat her down on the potty naked and - BAM - there she goes. I was so shocked and surprised I didn’t know what to do next. I have no idea how you’re supposed to properly dispose of a plastic container full of pee so I just stuck the whole thing in the fridge so I can ask Jenn about it later.

I’m sure today’s potty party was a fluke, but I’m still excited. A guy can dream right? Trixie says, “No”. While I was busy making plans to burn our remaining diapers on a bonfire tonight, she waited until we were out of the shower and she had a new diaper on — and then she let loose a horrible mess. Maybe it’s not quite time to get rid of the diapers.

[UPDATE] Just wanted to make sure everyone knows that the fridge part was a joke. We’re getting a lot of new traffic today from The Daily Bikini, and I didn’t want first-time visitors to get the wrong idea about the site. BTW, if you are a new visitor, I recommend the charts and graphs in the Metrics section. It’s one of the more interesting parts of the Trixie Update.

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That’s a lot of diapers. I’m still shocked when I step back and think about the total number she has gone through. It’s depressing.

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Sometime yesterday, or maybe the night before, Trixie finally cut her first teeth. The good news is that there’s been an improvement in her crankiness level and her sleep patterns are (mostly) back to normal. The bad news is that these new slivers of enamel are sharper than X-ACTO blades. More accurately described, it’s like there’s a piece of broken ceramic embedded in her gums with a razor’s edge just barely breaking the surface. I’m keeping my fingers far away lest I lose one. Notwithstanding the danger, these teeth were hard fought for, and deserve recognition. The first I christen Chopper, the second Excelsior.

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