Christmas, Contraptions, and Concussions

The season of family gatherings is upon us again.  And I know, I already posted about family gatherings back at Thanksgiving, but we all know Christmas family gatherings are a whole other ball game.  Christmas is the big one.  And when you have a kid, it's an even bigger deal.  You want him to look cute, and to be good and you've got a stack of pictures of him to give to all of your aunts and uncles and cousins and so on...(remember that my extended family is so big we need to rent churches and community halls to get together).

Our Friesen family gathering was up first this year.  We met in a church in Winnipeg, which is really nice for us because we usually have to drive at least an hour and a half outside of Winnipeg to see our family.  Otto wasn't super happy but he did pretty good.  Our cousin, Mel Weins, had brought this slingy-wrappy baby holder thing that wraps around you and your child in such a way that they have no choice but to be still.  Once it's on, the parent looks like a python that swallowed a baby whole.  Otto loved it.

It's pretty amazing the simple yet ingenious things people have come up with for babies.  For instance, it's been cold and flu season around our house (Kindergarten Teacher + Emergency Doctor = Lots of cold and flu experience).  Babies have to breathe through their nose, but they aren't smart enough to use kleenex, so when they get stuffed up it's pretty frustrating.  So somebody invented something called an aspirator that is essentially a straw that you stick up their nose.  You then use it to suck all the mucous out.  There's got a built in filter so that your child's snot doesn't get in your own mouth.  Genius.  Also, a Bumbo.  I know it's old news already, but why hasn't this thing been around since the 1800's.  It's moulded foam that lets your baby sit up without falling over.  How hard was it to come up with that?

Then there was our Klassen gathering.  It was pretty nice, so I'm told.  I can't remember a lot of it.  Let me explain.

It was in a town called Sommerset.  The idea was to have a mini curling bonspiel.  I didn't want to play.  Lets say that sports and me are like oil and firecrackers.  But I did.  It's curling, after all, what could happen?  Well, I threw a rock and on getting up from throwing said rock I promptly slipped backwards and fell square on my head.  I then continued to curl, but seemed to forget what town I was in.  I went inside to take out my contacts, but kept trying to take out the left one.  I still have no idea where the right one is.  I found my wife and apparently asked her the same question three or four times.  My wife has experience with me and sports and immediately identified I had another concussion.  (Yeah...I said another concussion).  My wife tells me I was saying over and over again, "but I have to study."

The potential of not being able to study was a very real concern.  Concussions are not very conducive to learning.  I'm fortunate to have a very faithful and prayerful family who took very good care of me, including my wife who drove all the way home and let me rest in the passenger seat.  By the time we reached the perimeter I was able to recite all the reasons I did not need a CT scan.  I read a chapter the next day and remembered about as much as I would have expected to pre-concussion.  It looks like I will be ok (although I've got a decent goose egg and a sore back, but that's a small price to pay.)

For future sport consideration, though, I intend on wearing safety goggles when I play darts and a helmet when I go swimming.

As for Otto, he's doing OK.  Like I said, it's flu season and with all these new people holding and hugging and kissing him it was inevitable that he would catch something.  I'm comfortable with him getting sick and I understand that it is an important part of his development.  What I don't understand is how you can poop that much and still gain weight.  He's making more and more sounds every day and has now figured out how to rock himself in one of his chairs by kicking his legs.  He loves it.

So I guess this might be it until after Christmas (realistically).  I hope everyone has a really nice holiday.  Merry Christmas to you from Jeff, Trisha, Otto and of course, Ralph.  I promise all kinds of new Otto pictures after the holiday.

Otto and his new bud, Ben.

Noggins

December 3, 2011
Ottos acquired skills: Smiling, cooing, eating
Working on: Sleeping

Dad's achievements: 41 chapters read.  161 to go.


Studying for me has become a bit like Otto falling asleep.  At first, I will do everything in my power to avoid it.  I whine and fuss, I eat to comfort myself, I may even cry a little.  As hard as I try to avoid it, though, I know it's inevitable.  Eventually my will breaks, and I study.

And just like Otto's sleeping it's been a progressive learning process.  At first I could only read an hour or two at a time.  Then miraculously I read for four hours straight.  Then a few days later, five hours.  And pretty soon, it's not that unusual to read 8 or 10 hours at a time (That analogy doesn't quite work, because Otto can't sleep for 8 hours at a time yet).

Otto needs props to sleep.  He has his swing and his white noise.  For my studying, it's coffee and music.  I'm really happy I haven't lost the ability to listen to music while reading.  I'm discovering and re-discovering all kinds of great music and it's made me kind of happy about spending most of my day tethered to my computer.  Right now I've found that metal and hardcore punk provide the right amount of angst and motivation to get through page-turners like "Peripheral Vascular Disease" and "Fever."  As much as I hoped metal would put Otto right to sleep, though, that's not the case (nothing ever works quite as well as it does in sit-coms).

Christmas has seeped into our house, despite all the pre-occupation with studying and parenting.  Our tree is up.  Otto was awake for a little family decorating time.  We've got some new Christmas music circulating this year, which is nice because as much as I love Christmas music I have a pretty low tolerance for only one album over and over again for an entire month.

Unfortunately, Otto's first Nog's Eve came and went pretty uneventfully.  What's Nog's Eve, you ask? It's a holiday celebrating the "specialness" of Egg Nog.  In order to protect Egg Nog's "specialness" you should only drink it for one month a year (i.e. December).  Therefore, a proper Nog's Eve celebration involves getting together with friends on November 30th, counting down to midnight and enjoying your first glass of cool Nog for the year.

If you're really interested, read this: http://chrisramblingon.blogspot.com/2007/12/nogs-eve-brief-history.html.

We didn't celebrate this year.  Too busy.  I hope we're not so lazy with Otto's first Christmas.

Speaking of Otto, he's turned into a little ball of sunshine.  He smiles, and laughs, and coos.  He makes eye contact.  "Big deal!" you say?  You can do all those things, right?  Well, let me get sappy for a second.  There's something in a baby's smile that just can't be described.  If you could put it in a bottle you'd be a millionaire.  If you don't believe me, I dare you to watch this video and not feel that something inside.