Long time no post

I temporarily lost the digital camera (horrors! but it is back now) and we went out of town. Going out of town for 5 days is a task of larger proportions than average when you have 8 chickens, 1 dog, and a 3 1/2 month old baby. Thus, I have been busy.

The chickens needed water, which a parade of friends (THANK YOU FRIENDS) made sure was in ample supply. Their feeder holds over a week of food at a time, so that part was simple.

The dog needs love, attention, walks and kibbles. And pee breaks. He was cared for by two friends (thank you weekday friend, and weekend friend) and got to go on a backpacking trip, too. I think the dog had the best weekend of all of us. We packed him up like for summer camp... backpack, sleeping bag, extra leash, food, water bottle. You think I'm kidding on the sleeping bag part, but I'm not. He loves it.

That leaves us with the baby. We set out at 4:15am for the "8 hour" (pre-baby duration) drive, on the premise that the little guy would sleep pretty well for at least the first 3 or 4 hours, thus saving up his crying only for the latter half of the drive. This was an EXCELLENT plan and I highly recommend it to anyone that has a baby and is doing a long car ride. Someone asked, "Why not leave at 10pm and drive all night?" The answer to that is- truly driving all night sucks, and is dangerous. Sleeping from 10pm to 4am is 6 hours of rest before you hit the road, so less sucky, and less dangerous.

Matt and I laughed at all the things we brought to keep the little guy happy, but it was pretty minimal considering we are new at this. The portable crib worked out great, the stroller base was awesome, and the billion spit rags and cloth diapers proved crucial. I even brought the pump (to "pump and dump" for comfort) and that was very, very helpful.

Cooper was kinda frustrated with the ride to Seattle, but then again he was brewing 6 days worth of pent-up digestive matter. He had a few screaming incidents, although none were unbearable and quick walks through various parking areas of Central Washington state calmed him down. Within 30 minutes of arriving at our destination, he pooped (quite loudly and dramatically) and lost an estimated two pounds of body weight. It was horrendous. And stinky. And he was MUCH happier after he was done. Needless to say, it was nice that he did that two days before the wedding, and not during it. Timing is everything.

The wedding was a pleasure and Cooper was on his very best behavior. He didn't spit up onto anyone's suits or dresses, he gave fair warning before getting upset and therefore was whisked out of the church just in time without anyone noticing, he ate fairly quickly and thus allowed me to be in all the formal photos I was supposed to be in, and he clearly enjoyed smiling and giggling at all his admirers. Perhaps best of all, he remained in good spirits for the whole day- no meltdowns, no terrible fussiness, no getting overwhelmed. I am so thankful that he was as good as he was!

The drive home was totally awesome. Exhausted after a long weekend of being held by friendly strangers, Cooper spent the drive alternatively sleeping, chewing on his hands, and making cute baby noises. We only had to stop once (not counting the gas stops that are also feed and change stops) to walk and calm him down, and therefore the drive took less than nine hours. Outstanding! It helped that he had a pretty empty colon, of course. Much nicer for him.

Now we are home, working and renovating, and getting ready for Summer '08 wedding #2. We have about 7 or 8 weddings this summer, which is nuts, and I think we are going to almost all of them. There is one that I might just let Matt go to by himself so that I don't lose my mind. Wedding #2 is in Kansas, and I'm looking forward to being there, but I'm not looking forward to baby's first plane ride. We'll see how that goes, but my guess is that it will be stressful pretty much no matter how well Cooper behaves.

My latest plan is to send most of our formal stuff to Kansas ahead of time in the mail. I think this is brilliant- no checked luggage! Yeah! So Matt and I are going to pack our formal clothes and a few other things that are not easily stuck in carry-on bags and ship them so that they get there the day before we do. How smart is THAT! YEAH! Its not that I don't think we'll be able to fit everything; it is that I don't want to have to try.