The Infant's Body

First Snow

2011-11-23T07:18:00.000-08:00

The first thing Emmett said when he saw the first snow of the year: "Does this mean it is time to go to Pachi's house." The second thing: "I want to drive my dump truck in the snow!"

Builder

2011-11-23T07:13:00.001-08:00

Emmett hearts Zaius

2011-11-23T07:10:00.000-08:00

Halloween

2011-11-23T06:48:00.000-08:00

Emmett & his friend Oliver were both purple fishes for Halloween.

Silliness in Spring

2011-05-14T17:52:00.001-07:00

Spring in Montreal

2011-05-14T17:44:00.001-07:00

December Day

2010-12-17T06:17:00.000-08:00

Looking lovely in red.

Cousin Matilda

2010-12-17T06:12:00.001-08:00

Emmie got to meet his new baby cousin Mattie. He liked her, but was not so sure he liked how much his parents liked her. She's pretty gorgeous and definitely bears a family resemblance to mister Em.

Second Haircut

2010-12-17T06:09:00.001-08:00

Before and after the second haircut. These are always emotional for some reason. I suppose we need to get used to the idea of our baby changing.

Contemplative Moments

2010-10-10T19:53:00.001-07:00

Fall

2010-10-10T19:48:00.000-07:00

New Bike!

2010-09-05T10:29:00.001-07:00

Two Years!

2010-08-26T17:42:00.000-07:00

It's Emmett's 2nd birthday and we are so thrilled. He is tons of fun. We love him something fierce. A couple snap shots from his little birthday party at the park.

Spring for a Day

2010-05-10T12:45:00.000-07:00

Even if it snowed on May 9, we still get some nice days...

With Zaius

2010-04-26T12:44:00.001-07:00

A tender moment with Zaius. Emmett is trying to give him a kiss and fixing his collar. This morning, he wore his bicycle helmet for a long time, eagerly anticipating his outing with daddy.

Why bathe alone?

2010-04-07T12:21:00.000-07:00

Sun!

2010-04-07T12:19:00.000-07:00

Unusual Eating Rituals

2010-04-07T12:16:00.000-07:00

Retrieving his pancakes ("nya nyas") from the counter-top and being surveilled by the cats.

18 Months

2010-03-16T17:13:00.000-07:00

We're overdue with photos and promise some soon. I wanted to record his stats to see how he's grown. He is no longer huge, just on the big side. The doc thinks he might be too skinny though, so they have to go back. Apparently, she didn't notice the buddha belly.

Height: 86 cm/ almost 34 in (80th%)
Weight: 11.7 kg/ 25.7 lb (50th%)
Head: 48.5/ 19 in (70th%)

Emmett's Words

2010-02-12T17:35:00.000-08:00

Mama
Dada
Ball
Block
Book
Up
Cat
Dog
Yes
No
More
Banana
Moon
Cheese
Bye bye
Eye
Drawer
Oh Wow

Beautiful

2010-02-12T07:33:00.000-08:00

Emmett Activities

2010-02-12T07:28:00.001-08:00

Window Portraits

2010-01-09T05:19:00.000-08:00

Emmett and the cats have a lot in common. They like climbing, window sills, standing on the dining room table, sleeping in cribs, cuddling, and blocks.

Stereotypical

2010-01-09T05:16:00.000-08:00

.
infant behavior has begun. He relishes trying out our clothes, slippers, and, well, these special mittens.

Tunnel

2010-01-09T05:14:00.001-08:00

Keeping it interesting at home during the winter can be a challenge. Emmett already has an appreciation of forts, fortunately.

First Snow

2009-12-09T09:27:00.000-08:00

New Nightly Ritual: Naked Spinning

2009-12-04T04:25:00.000-08:00

Nothing like a little altered consciousness before bed. Hopefully it doesn't presage a fondness for bungie-jumping and sky-diving.

T-R-O-U-B-L-E

2009-12-03T05:04:00.000-08:00

What can I say...

Inner life

2009-11-23T11:34:00.000-08:00

I don't know quite how to describe Emmett's expression in this picture:

He's goofing a bit (the crooked smile), but aso looks a bit triumphant or even cocky. One thing I've been noticing over the last few months is how self-relational he has become. He does things (posing, playing on his own, goofing) that seem to me evidence that he sees himself as doing something. That is, he's playing for an audience, and the audience is himself. I know we're a bit shy of the classic mirror stage, but I swear he's developing a self-image.

Halloween

2009-11-01T04:33:00.000-08:00

It was very hard to get Emmett to pose, but we loved dressing him up. The costume was inspired by his current favorite story, The Grouchy Ladybug, and brilliantly executed by Will.

Autumn

2009-10-17T06:20:00.001-07:00

Enjoying the foliage and the beautiful sweater made by cousin Kirsten.

I guess summer really is over

2009-09-30T06:05:00.000-07:00

Thank goodness his Grandma Nancy bought Emmett this great coat for his birthday, because he shows no signs of souring on his favorite activity, even though the temperature is dropping precipitously.

Digging in the dirt

2009-09-25T05:38:00.000-07:00

Ok, so it's more like pebbles, or rocks even, but...he's hard at work, regardless.

Model

2009-09-20T14:00:00.001-07:00

Here is Emmett modeling his beautiful birthday onesie from Jason. It is a lovely piece from Milo in Maine. What do you think? Can he work it?

The whole fam-damily

2009-09-19T16:22:00.000-07:00

Here we are in our finest duds, having just enjoyed our friends' Sara and Ryan's wedding ceremony.

I want to ride my tricycle...

2009-09-19T16:15:00.000-07:00

Emmett loves going down the block to borrow toys from the yard of Lucie and Delia. We caught these pictures on one of his multiple excursions today. The fall weather has been lovely, and Emmett has been taking full advantage of it. He'd spend every minute outdoors if he could. I hope he likes snow, cuz otherwise I don't know what we'll do this winter.

Oh, and did I mention he walks?

2009-09-08T18:10:00.000-07:00

Catching up a bit

2009-09-08T17:41:00.000-07:00

So much has happened, so much has changed, in the three months since we last posted. Here are several pictures from the intervening time.

Emmett is ONE YEAR old!!!

2009-09-08T17:29:00.001-07:00

I know it has been a loooong time. Will is about to add more pics and even a film of Emmett walking (yes, walking!). We are so smitten with him -- a most exquisite piece of fate. Yes, he is the best little bear in the world. I have to go back to work tomorrow and I am devastated. The birthday has prompted me to look back on the year a lot. It was really, really hard. It has become glorious, however. Emmett is so much fun, so sweet, and even seems funny. I am sure more trials await, but the birthday was definitely, unequivocally a celebration. We made it! ...okay, must work now.

Moving & Grooving

2009-06-03T14:07:00.000-07:00

Nine Months

2009-06-01T17:59:00.001-07:00

I am very happy to report that we have made it to nine months. Early on this seemed unimaginable, but life has been getting progressively easier and happier ever since about six months. Nine months, I can confidently say, is mostly a great joy. We are increasingly getting to know Emmett's personality and every day seems to bring changes and new delights. Emmett really began crawling with his tummy off of the floor yesterday. He saw an open cabinet and that was all of the motivation he needed. Once he got in there, he could not be distracted for what seemed like half an hour. He was proudly pulling out everything he could find.

So, what is he like now? Who is our little guy? Sometimes an outside perspective is helpful. We just visited friends and Sara and Ryan said that he is the happiest baby they have ever seen. Now I don't know if they have seen other babies, but he does seem to be really full of joy. He smiles all of the time, loves meeting new people, and Will is singularly good at making him laugh. Sara and Ryan both provoked many giggles through peek-a-boo and various intersubjective games involving facial expressions. It was really fun to see him play this way.

Our very social schedule the last week was such that Emmett also got to meet Ben and Lara, who are expecting a little bear themselves, and he got to see Mufridah again. He seemed energized by the trip and was cruising more and more with the furniture. Then we came home and our friend Jason visited us in Montreal. Jason remarked on how very "active and interactive" Emmie is. He predicted that Emmett will grow up to have some "physical aptitude," since he was so obviously striving to move and groove. Jason also named "the butt dance," Emmett's celebratory bouncing and knee bending, often accompanied by shrieks of glee. Jason and he did some dancing together, which we hope will become tradition.

I think these observations capture his main modes of being right now. He wants to move all of the time and he wants to enjoy these new powers with others. He also wants to communicate with facial expressions, noises, and co-movement, like dancing. He spent today "bouldering" around the whole apartment. It is amazing to watch him figure out how he can use grooves in the wall, a chest of drawers, a window sill, or a cabinet to move laterally about. He looks around, feels for a handhold, stretches out, teeters and restores his balance as he walks around. He is also not averse to risk. He now enjoys pulling up to a standing position in the bath and falling down back onto his butt to make a big splash. He does this over and over, such that it is clear that he lets go and purpose. So, that's our little bear at nine months: playful, adventurous, happy, social, cuddly when he wants to be, and generally raring to go.

Basic Training

2009-05-13T15:13:00.001-07:00

Cutest. Baby. Ever.

2009-05-13T15:06:00.000-07:00

Mama's Day

2009-05-10T11:31:00.000-07:00

Emmett was so excited about Mother's day that he woke up at 5 am! Montreal is damp and shrouded in cloud cover, which makes for a contemplative day, tinged with a bit of melancholy. Motherhood certainly merits some meditation, though perhaps in these first 8 1/2 months it has received all too much. It might also be a good time to get in touch with other aspects of life, a time to connect motherhood to other joys of existence. I don't know. I think I probably should be taking a nap with Emmie right now instead of publicizing these non-thoughts.

I read the Wikipedia entry on Mother's day and apparently the founder regrets ever having instituted the holiday. Apparently, she found its commercialization (which is a multi-billion dollar industry in the US) to be contrary to everything she wanted to recognize in mothers. She was arrested and spent all of her inheritance protesting the very day she inaugurated. She died penniless and childless. It is a pretty sad story actually. In memory of Anna Jarvis, and her aspiration to celebrate maternal love in a sincere way, I think I will just cuddle with my little bear. He is so cute these days that it hurts (and i am referring not only to his teeth!).

Hair, and other developments

2009-04-21T09:22:00.000-07:00

Our little bear is growing up. He has more hair, more determinate desires and projects (like walking, crawling, and stealing spectacles). He is also, happily, sleeping much better. We get 5-7 hours stretches at night now. So, nice. Still, he is pretty much against eating. He will snack on some toast (teething toast or snackbread), which he can hold himself, but rejects purees, or anything that is (a) slimy (fruit, avocado, steamed veggies) or (b) comes on a spoon. He will put anything other than food in his mouth, of course. So, 95-99% of his calories are just breastmilk and he is closing in on 8 months. He remains a willful child, but he is also a happy one. He is so very social. Smiling at strangers and even grabbing at them. People on the street are taken with him. Just yesterday someone insisted on buying our jalpenos for us.

Trying to Crawl

2009-04-21T09:19:00.001-07:00

Emmett is working really hard on crawling. This is very frustrating for him. Still, there are rewards. He can now scoot his way to the cat food. I suppose this is a universal baby desire. It goes along with the at least two words he definitely understands: "Emmett" and "kitty."

Emmett and Jamie

2009-04-18T14:34:00.000-07:00

It's been a few weeks now--time's flying--but I thought I'd put up this picture of Emmett and Jamie from our visit to WashPA. I wouldn't say they're fast friends yet--whatever that would mean at this age anyway--but I like to imagine these boys growing up and going on roadtrips together.

Nuala

2009-03-05T11:24:00.001-08:00

Stacey, one of my very best friends from high school, had her first baby two months before I did. Her birth story was an inspiration for me, since she was her characteristically bad-ass self. It is exciting to think of sharing parenthood with her and other friends I have known since we were kids. I think Emmett and Nuala, Stacey's little one, already get along. Hopefully, they will be hanging out for a long time.

Sitting Up

2009-03-05T11:22:00.001-08:00

In Cali, Emmie started sitting up without falling (very often). He plays by himself for much longer intervals now.

Swinging California

2009-03-05T07:58:00.000-08:00

We just returned from Emmett's first trip to California. We spent 8 days without wearing any down, playing on the swings, spending time with grandparents, meeting cousins and aunties and the kids of dear high school friends. Here is a series of swing photos. Look, no coats!

Mufridah's Visit

2009-02-17T09:40:00.000-08:00

We just had a fantastic visit from Mufridah. Those who attended our wedding may recall her beautiful reading of Walt Whitman during the ceremony. Needless to say, Emmett has good taste and he adored her. She especially got a kick out of how much Emmett LOVES Hegel. See photos and video.

Emmett reads Dickinson

2009-02-16T06:46:00.000-08:00

Modified Ferber

2009-02-13T08:19:00.000-08:00

Here is part of a note I wrote to a friend describing the beginnings of dreaded sleep training:

things got much better with emmett for a while and i was really enjoying him and even fantasizing about a second child until we hit this big struggle with sleep. now i feel like i am risking self-annihilation by continuing to sleep with him and comfort him through the whole night. [i think that a danger of attachment parenting is that, as an ideal, it can involve maternal self-annihilation.]

i like what jessica benjamin--a psychoanalytic feminist--says about how children need to feel the tension between self and other in order not to feel alone in the world. if the child determines everything and the mother erases herself and her needs, he is alone. if the mother is domineering and determines everything, he feels invisible and alone. there needs to be a tension and negotiation between multiple wills and desires in order to have relationship.

still, i never wanted to do sleep training and never wanted to assert my needs while he was this young. i thought it was okay for him to be the whole world for a while. we have done two nights of modified ferber. i nurse him twice in the night and am only a few feet away from him. but i do let him cry at graduated intervals before stroking him without picking him up. also, when i feed him, it is on the clock, every four hours. i have been sick with anxiety and have slept even less, but he naps now without objection. i hope that this will eventually give me back a little bit of myself and allow him to be less frantic and filled with tears during the day. the days were breaking my heart the most. before, no matter how hard the night, i would wake up to a happy baby. for the last 3 weeks, the nights were hard and the days were worse. we'll see how it goes. he still wakes every 1-2 hours, but judging only on one and a half days, the days are much better, probably due to the napping. before he was only napping on my chest and so i never had any time without him, unless will was watching him... which was causing some strain b/w us, since will has always been either working or caring for emmett. neither of us have had any breathing room. it is all part of having an infant, and, if he were sleeping more, we would have both persevered indefinitely. i still feel sick--literally--with guilt, but i have hope that, if not the "right" thing, we are doing an okay thing.

Stats: "6 Months"

2009-02-12T13:18:00.000-08:00

Emmett just had his "six month" appointment, although he is only about 5 1/2 months. He is not quite as tall on his curves now, and his head has moved up, but otherwise he seems to be on the same course. The doctor thinks he is healthy and just needs less attention at night. Of course that is what doctors would say. Sadly, the total absence of sleep for his parents means that we will have to take the brutal course of western normalization. Here are some recent pics, including one from papa De's lovely visit. In one he is sort of sitting.

Height: 70.2 cm/ 27.6 inches; just over 90th%
Weight: 8.7 k/ 19.2 lbs; just under 90th% (though weight for length is about 60th%)
Head: 45.7 cm; 17.9 in; 95th% (BIG head)

Chronicles of Somnia

2009-02-11T07:55:00.000-08:00

Last night made us long for the night before. He did not sleep more than 15 minutes after 2:30, or so. Who knew how nice an hour could be? Emmett may be dead man walking now. That is, sleep training may be imminent.

Upate on Sleep

2009-02-10T10:14:00.000-08:00

Emmett woke up EVERY hour last night between 8:40 p.m. and 8:00 a.m., except he slept two hours from 1:30-3:30. Today he is crying all of the time. No fever. Could he be sick? What is going on? I don't think I can survive another 10 days of this after only a 3 night reprieve. I can't think. I just cry with him now.

Sleeplessness, Or Freud vs. Spinoza

2009-02-09T13:47:00.000-08:00

Before Emmett was born Will and I were both very attracted to elements of "attachment parenting." Although we both found Dr. Sears moralizing and annoying (I could write a several posts on his orientalist and essentialist tendencies), we rejected the common wisdom that babies need to be "self-soothing" and increasingly independent. We liked the idea of carrying the baby (in part for the convenience on public transportation and to avoid the purchasing of a sleek $1,000 stroller), sleeping with him (maximum cuddle time), and breastfeeding (cheap and good for 'ya). Slowly, Emmett has militated against many of the things we were eager to do as parents. He has intermittently rejected breastfeeding since day 1. Sometimes it is the only thing that makes him happy, but generally it is his least preferred way to eat, and sometimes is experienced as torture. He still loves to be carried sometimes (esp. in the controversial facing-out position), but the stroller is unalloyed bliss and now an indispensable feeding and napping tool. The biggest challenge we face as parents now is frequent night wakings on top of sometimes relentless fussiness in the day time. A good night means that Emmers wakes up 2-3 times. For almost two weeks recently, however, he woke 6-10 times per night. During this period, he also refused to be put down during the day, cried and fussed most of the time, and had the attention span of a coked-up puppy. When he saw strangers, he melted down in tears. So, we got to the point where we had to think hard about sleep. Nights were intolerable and the fussy days were a tremendous problem on almost no sleep. The whole family trinity was crying more.

Sleep philosophies, however, remain a kind of battleground of ideology. Those who promote "self-soothing" and training your infant to put her- or himself to sleep on his or her own cite psychoanalysts as authorities. I know Freudianism enough to know that the moral paradigm remains the independent, rational individual. Thus, "self-soothing" becomes a kind of moral imperative if you believe that parenting is about creating (bourgeois) individuals, beings who see themselves as fundamentally separate from others. I acknowledge that it is important to develop a sense of self-in-relation, which requires a grasp of one's individuation (always in process, of course). I find it is important to see relationships as relationships in order to avoid either a fully narcissistic or self-annihilating subjectivity (okay, I am not totally anti-psychoanlytic). In other words, I don't want Emmett to be blind to his own needs/desires or to those of others. Still, I don't think morality--and therefore parenting--requires becoming a self-policing individual. Still, Emmett won't sleep. What do we do? Do we implement practices advocated by the promoters of "self-soothing"?

We are reading one of the ostensible extremists, Dr. Weissbluth. I say "ostensible" b/c his book is horribly written and sometimes just confused. He is extreme in that he advocates the "extinction" method of sleep training--just ignore the baby's screams until he falls asleep. At times, he argues that parents "deprive their children of the skill of putting themselves to sleep" by comforting them and soothing them to sleep. Yet, when read more closely, his thesis is rather simple: babies (and children and parents) need sleep in order to be happy and healthy. the amount of sleep is also measurable. It is not a mysterious quantity. I am receptive to this. Emmett is clearly much crankier in the day after a night of collective torment. If sleeping with your baby, nursing her or him to sleep, and comforting him when he wakes works--as he claims it does for at least 80% of babies--then great. It is not necessary to train them to sleep through the "extinction" of parental comforting and attention. But some babies, especially "extremely fussy or colicky" ones, develop serious sleeping problems that can only be "cured" through a withdrawal of parent on-call comforting throughout night. Thus, for babies that have a very hard time with sleep, *sometimes* more (forced) self-regulation and less other-regulation is the answer, according to Dr. W.

Well, we read this and cried when reading the description of those rare, "extremely fussy" babies. We are among the unlucky few. We cried b/c our struggle was acknowledged, it seemed like the co-sleeping we (sometimes) love might be contributing to our struggle, and we were really, really tired. At the same time, Emmett got sick and suddenly started sleeping more for the past few days. We are going to start enforcing more sleep. We are encouraging him to take 2-3 naps and trying to institute an earlier bedtime. We would like to do this through soothing him to sleep rather than extinguishing parental attention and leaving him to cry. We will see how it goes... so far has been good. The open question: Can we get sleep and have a parenting style that encourages relational subjectivity?

In the meantime, he is growing and loves to roll over, esp. when naked.

He warms to objects and their feel

2009-01-07T15:28:00.000-08:00

Early on, I was fond of saying that Emmett was demonstrating Aristotle's De Anima--first, barely more than a nutritive soul, then the clear addition of a sensitive soul. Now Heidegger has, if not displaced, at least supplemented Aristotle as the philosopher I think of. Emmett has discovered things ready-to-hand. Admittedly, in Heidegger's account, the tool in use disappears into its functionality. Maybe this is true for Emmett, too--maybe he's just trying to do things. But, if so, the functions guiding his manipulations are, let's say, obscure. But he has a very clear affinity for certain things, and the affinity expresses itself in assertive, even manic manhandling. If he likes something, he needs desperately to get his hands on it, and he will lunge and flail well beyond his ability to actually move in the direction of his favorite things.

His favorite things (aside from toys, that is) include:
His bouncy chair (I have no idea what he's trying to do with it when he grabs it, but...)
Our Brita pitcher (yeah, this one's a bit odd)
Books and sheets of paper (such a good little nerdling)
Keyboards

In fact, Emmett's attraction to this last item has inspired me to let him try his hand at blogging for the first time. So , without further ado, here's Emmett, in his own, not words, but letters:

;./,on.o.p ,v uo mc mmklop s jm bkmn vdsmfmzdf,

Red Diaper Baby

2009-01-07T08:51:00.001-08:00

Thanks Jason!

Size Matters

2008-12-19T10:02:00.001-08:00

Emmett had his 4 month appointment yesterday. The night before the visit, I dreamed that we had a very fat girl baby with wild hair. I was embarrassed by how she looked. Obviously this dream reflected anxiety about how I appear by virtue of the baby (who has wild hair?). Despite the fact that babies cannot be too fat, I have internalized cultural anxieties about size. The first thing EVERYONE says when they see him is that he is so big and looks to be much older than he is. Indeed, in mum n' baby yoga, he is bigger than older babies. I spent the end of the pregnancy constantly worrying about how big I was, but, of course, rationally I know that his size is a good sign, an indication of thriving. Also, I think he is the most beautiful creature I have ever seen. So the anxiety is largely a subconscious one, erupting in dreams, and reflected in my fear that we overfeed him. He eats much more than the baby books say to expect. It is not uncommon for him to consume 40 oz. of breast milk in 24 hours (though he also spits up about 20 times per day). Luckily, I am making more than he eats every day (thanks to Fenugreek)! Anyway, here are the stats for our big, beautiful bear.
Length: just shy of 69 cm/ 17 inches (97th%)
Weight: 7.8 k/ 17 pounds (90th%) (but 50th% for his height... though I can't imagine his thighs being any bigger!)
Head: 44.4 cm/ 17 in (90th%)

Growing Baby

2008-12-14T10:05:00.001-08:00

The baby keeps getting bigger and bigger. I know that statement is incredibly banal. It reminds me of that excellent line from Juno that went something like, I learned in health class that pregnancy can often lead to a baby. We have had some very difficult nights sleep-wise these days. But it is totally unpredictable: last night he slept for 6 hours; a few nights ago he slept about 2 1/2 and then proceeded to wake every 60-90 minutes. Maybe it is a "poussée de croissance," or a famous growth spurt. Though I fear that, whenever things suck, the default explanation is growth spurt. Then again, maybe it is default for a reason, since, as I noted, he is growing. I have to relieve Will right now. He wants to write an article and I tend to blog and watch "True Blood" these days in my free time. I have started to return to the intellectual labor, too, these days, merci de le bébé sitter!

Still Trying

2008-12-14T06:32:00.000-08:00

to get non-blurry smile pics. These are mostly out of focus.

Three Months

2008-12-02T05:28:00.001-08:00

Emmett is becoming more fun to spend time with every day. He may not breastfeed, sleep through the night, or keep his food down, but all can be forgotten when he wakes up smiling. He loves being an airplane, playing in the jumperoo and (sometimes) his floor gym. He is very keen on exercising his new powers. He wants to lift his head during tummy time, try to stand, and grab onto things and put them in his mouth. He also seems to get cuter every day.

Inner Kitteh

2008-11-24T06:24:00.001-08:00

The arrival of the baby human has brought out the inner kitten in our 11 year old cat Lyle, for better and for worse. He chases his tail on a daily basis now and seems to enjoy toys with all the more vigor. He also attacks the 12 year old cat, Zaius, whenever Emmett cries for more than a few seconds. Both cats have more scars, emotionally and physically, as a result of the new animal in the house. They both have taken to trying to usurp any baby furniture or toys. They sleep on Emmie's floor gym or in his mini-crib, if they are not in the car seat or bouncy chair. Zaius has also taken to hanging out on the "changing table," also known as our dryer. He even hangs around for the diaper changes, ignoring the flailing arms that periodically whack him.

Roberts Men

2008-11-23T06:34:00.000-08:00

Three generations of Roberts men.

Note Emmett's latest preoccupation: his hands, the tool of tools, the toy of toys.

Recent entries are primarily photo entries. The blog doesn't showcase the photos that well, but you can click on individual photos to see a larger version. I am pretty sure you can copy them, too.

Rattle

2008-11-23T06:11:00.001-08:00

Now that Emm 'n Emm is three months, he is supposed to show some interest in a rattle and grasping rings. So far he stares at it and touches it without grabbing. We will do our best not to compare him to an abstract norm of what babies ought to be doing developmentally. He has already rejected the common wisdom that "all babies love breastfeeding." He is a finger man and I have been trying to accept it, which has been harder emotionally than I imagined. This means I spend hours a day pumping and Will does middle of the night feedings (while I pump, pump, pump some more). Emmett has forced our parenting into a less traditional mold, which is more work for both of us. We are committed to doing it, however, in part for the intrinsic virtues of breast milk (it is much easier to digest and he gets my antibodies), and because formula would cost about 60$ CAD a week (!!!@?*!), and formula companies are evil (e.g. introducing formula to traditional and impoverished communities, where mothers lost their superior and free milk supply and needed to dilute it to spare the outrageous cost, resulting in many dead babies... I would like apply a word to them used frequently on the show Deadwood, but I don't since our families read this blog).

Hood

2008-11-23T06:06:00.000-08:00

Emmett will surely wear lots of hoodies as long as we are dressing him. This one is a gift from grandma Rosie. There is also a pic of Emmie on his dad's shoulders in front of his favorite painting. Emm has been captivated by this painting from the day we brought him home. I often see him staring at it with a smile.

Learning to Fly

2008-11-23T01:29:00.000-08:00

Credit for these impressionistic photos goes to worker's opposition.

Sleeping Angel

2008-11-23T01:24:00.000-08:00

Our friends, known in some circles as "Worker's Opposition and "Beavers Abroad" had to snap pics of Emmett sleeping. Babies are beautiful asleep, and not only for the peace sleep brings.

Experiments with the Camera

2008-11-23T01:18:00.000-08:00

I call these the "whirlwind" series. They are taken by the famous photog "worker's opposition" who appears in one photo (not taken by him). The photo with our friend Rohan nicely reveals the difficulty of photographing a moving baby. He decided to embrace the tendency toward blurriness and to work with it.

Puff Baby

2008-11-07T10:48:00.001-08:00

So gangsta.

Capturing Smiles

2008-11-07T10:26:00.000-08:00

Emmett smiles now. A lot. Still, it is very hard to capture them on film, b/c they coincide with very excited kicks and flailing arms. He has had a super hard week and a half... it seems that one extreme brings with it the other. Lots of smiling means lots of crying, too. Maybe with maturity comes greater sensitivity to pleasure and pain. It is hard being a parent and knowing that bringing a being into the world means that he will experience pain and suffering. I know we cannot only be sources of joy and comfort, but I never realized how hard it would be to see him cry. The smiles are a thrill though... we are elated by them. They provide a wonderful lift, even after negligible sleep. Here are some of our efforts to snap a smile. Notice the invisible arms.

Super Baby!

2008-10-24T07:36:00.000-07:00

Emmett just had his two month appointment (actually 8 weeks/ 2 days) at which he suffered two vaccines and we got to confirm how much he has grown. He is 63 cm in length (about 25 inches), 5.7 kilos (12.5 pounds), and 41.5 cm (16.3 in) head circumference. This puts him in the 97th percentile for height (97 is as high as the chart goes, which attenuated our disappointment at not achieving 99!), 75th for weight, and 80th for head. The doctor kept approaching other docs and saying, "look at this cute baby; he is four months old today", to see if they would fall for it. I ruined his first experiment by correcting him. He was especially keen to see if this one doctor--a woman with three kids of her own--would blink. Needless to say, the doc was very impressed with his size. After the appointment he asked to borrow him to show him off to various administrative and medical staff. I kept hearing loud sounds of "awwwww," as he would go from room to room. It was a proud moment for all of us.

I got home and wanted to check the stats for myself, so I entered his numbers on various websites with charts. According to one website ("babycenter," or something) sponsored by Similac, his height is 90th percentile, but his weight is only 25-50th. Guess what they are trying to sell? Well, Emmers is a breast milk fueled giant. According to the international standards of the WHO, Emmett is entirely off the charts, nowhere near their top percentile. (Yet I bet he is in the middle of a Dutch or German chart.) We did find one that used metric (so probably not US based, like the Similac sponsored one) and gave us the precise stats of the doctor's office.

We are very proud of his height and his relatively lean figure, even if we are not sure how we made such a tall bearito. Everyone says that he is destined to play basketball (as his mom did in high school), but, for some reason, no one says that he is bound to look like Bill from Freaks & Geeks (and thereby play D&D instead). Bill is my absolute favorite character from the show. Needless to say, if he turns out to be a giant nerdling, he would not disappoint the hopes of his parents. If he has to be a jock, however, at least basketball is a really fun game. If he stays in Kanukistan, we hope that his hockey injuries will be minimal.

Joe's photos

2008-10-22T13:15:00.000-07:00

Emmett's grandpa Joe (one of them) was in Montreal for a few days last week, and took a whole mess of pictures. Now he's put some of those up on Flickr, and you can see them by clicking on ... this.

Winter is Coming

2008-10-22T12:50:00.000-07:00

The upside: cute outfits. Clearly, however, Emmett doesn't think we need to take 20 pics of each different outfit. Just the beginning of being bored by parents.

Equipment

2008-10-12T14:27:00.000-07:00

I have been thinking about those things that are most essential to managing the early weeks of life with baby. The two most essential accoutrements are categories of things rather than individual items. First, I have been extremely grateful for various feedings aids. We have relied heavily from birth (he was not keen on breast feeding for the first week) upon the breast pump. We have also been able to share the (significant) burden of feeding as a result of what we call "the finger." It is a tiny tube connected to a soft bottle that Will tapes to his finger. Emmett loves sucking on fingers and is able to get food at the same time. We have photos of this, but they look a bit bizarre (there is one where he is sucking on W's middle finger and holding the two neighbor fingers as though they were handle bars). Will has been able to do late- and middle-of-the-night feedings now and then and he was able to take care of little M when I saw Lucinda Willilams last week. This is so wonderful, since, as it is, I spend most of my waking hours feeding the bearito.

Second category of can't-live-without items are the baby carriers. We have three that are great under different circumstances. But, if the baby is a major fuss bucket, putting him in a carrier is a solution 75% of the time. He will almost always chill out and go to sleep (though he may not remain asleep when removed). He feels very safe in them. It is great for doing stuff around the house when he won't sit quietly on his own; i.e., most of the time. Also, they are very handy for the use of public transportation and navigating the narrow isles of urban grocery markets--much less cumbersome than a stroller. (Also, we don't yet own a stroller, or "poussette.")

Third, we love our bouncy chair. I think most parents know how necessary such an item is for survival. He is also coming to enjoy the swing. He will often nap or sit quietly for a little while in these fantastic seats.

Fourthly, we adore the camera. We takes pics almost every day. Without it, we would not capture the outrageous cuteness.

Baby Power

2008-10-06T13:19:00.000-07:00

Emmett can sort of hold up his head now--we couldn't get a good photo since it bobbles so much, but he is sitting by himself in the chair. As you can see, he likes to champion the cause of babies. You can also enjoy another DIY outfit, decorated by our dear, dear neighbor Sarah. Merci Sarah!

Grandmas

2008-10-05T19:33:00.000-07:00

Here are Emmett's two grandmas, Nancy and Rosie. Nancy, his paternal g'ma, was with him for his first day outside the womb, his birthday. Rosie, his maternal g'ma, was with him for his one month b'day. In this pic, she had just gotten him to sleep on a very fussy night. He is covered by a quilt made by his great grandma, Alice Ake. He is the recipient of much grandma love.

Two of his grandpas are coming to visit in the next several weeks (though he is lucky enough to have three of them... we can't wait to document him with each one). It is very cool to have our folks come visit. It would be nice to be much closer to "our people," as they say on The Wire. [We have some good peeps here, too, though, and Emmett has prompted much kindness from them.]

Relief

2008-10-05T13:22:00.000-07:00

After a very hard night, Emm n' Emm slept SIX hours, woke up and ate for one, then went to sleep for THREE more. I got up once during his six hours to pump in anticipation of his nightly fuss fest (and to maintain what seems to be a fragile supply), but probably slept more than I have since he was born. It was so wonderful. He was still a little too fussy to pose in his adorable outfit this morning, but here he is resting while Will preps class. We both function primarily with one hand right now.

Colic

2008-10-04T20:30:00.000-07:00

I fear we may be learning what colic is, besides being effective birth control. Maybe it is evolutionarily advantageous? The baby is ensuring the exclusive care of his parents. It is also apparently the title of a thai horror movie. Colic is defined simply as "excessive crying." Excessive in character? Duration? Emmett apparently finds being awake in the evening w/o food to be intolerable. Sleep is also not an option before the horrors of the world have been identified with siren-like alarm. I guess maturity involves sublimating such horror into blogging, volunteering at animal shelters, and/or sarcasm.

One day soon I hope to remark on the joys of parenthood (and infancy). We are seeing more and more smiles. One day we will capture one by photo. Our hearts are in this thing 100%, but it can be pretty rough.

McCain?

2008-09-30T13:37:00.000-07:00

Will thinks Emmett looks like John McCain in this outfit. Hopefully he will never know who McCain is.

In the Wild

2008-09-29T04:04:00.000-07:00

Although Spinoza doesn't acknowledge any distinction between nature and culture (humans and everything we do and make are different ways nature exists, no different from waterfalls and rainbows), I keep thinking/ lamenting that Emmett and I would not have survived "in the wild." We had this insanely long labor even WITH artificial hormones to accelerate the contractions. Feeding him "naturally" has required a whole arsenal of technology and state sponsored intervention. I keep feeling like we would have been left behind by the herd or exposed to the elements for our unfitness (though, in reality, living in a herd would probably have major advantages compared with our nuclear family thousands of miles from the nearest relative). In other words, I keep feeling horribly guilty and incompetent, which is resulting in these ridiculous hypothetical scenarios worthy of the imagination of Ayn Rand or some pop sociobiologist. This is also just a way of saying that labor and tending to a new infant are hard work (duh, labor = work) and don't flow seamlessly and unconsciously from my being. It so often feels too hard, out of reach, and I am straining so often. Part of me must have imagined mothering as a salutary animal complement to my intellectual labor, which is totally contrary to all that I intellectually hold to be true (my feminism, among other things, totally rejects such stupid ideas). Maybe after enough work, some of this will become second nature. Or maybe a nice day at the spa will make me feel less physically unfit. Some day... In the meantime, I try to appreciate the beautiful vitality that is Emmett. He is a stunning force of nature. These pics are just cute. He is a month old now, enjoying the lap of his maternal grandma and framed by one of daddy's many sleater-kinney tee's.

New Photos

2008-09-18T10:51:00.000-07:00

Mind's not working today. Say it in pictures instead of words.

DIY Punk

2008-09-09T11:16:00.000-07:00

Emmett is already way punk. Here are some outfits decorated by Charlotte (age 6) and Jasper (age 4). We love them both and think the blue has an awesome 80's punk feel. Thanks Charlotte and Jasper!

The Parent Thing

2008-09-05T13:23:00.000-07:00

I feel like we are figuring out how to survive this parent thing--basically, all is good if the baby is eating, sleeping, or being held. He doesn't mind diapers, baths, or much of anything IF you are holding him. If I am alone, however, and need to go to the bathroom, or do anything without holding him, and he is awake, cries of tragic proportions may be heard. But, if there are two of us, we can go through a whole day and night with almost no crying. It is enough to make one feel supremely competent, even when slurring speech from lack of sleep. It also helps that we are both increasingly smitten with the creature. It was so cool watching Will last night when he came home from teaching. He was so enchanted. He kept saying that Emmett is perfect, amazing, and wonderful. It is really fun to watch their love affair. Basically, if we never had to do anything but parent, we would be awesome. But, alas, Will has to work, I have a paper to finish, letters of rec to write, and we have our own corporeal and spiritual needs to meet. It is incredible that so many people do this, and so often without the time off or institutional support. Parents rock... and special hats off to women since they have to birth and may take on the massive bodily effort of nursing... which really, really sucks, btw. They say it gets better, but it seems so wrong that the start is so ridiculously rough (not universally, but very frequently and definitely in my case). I am very impressed that humans are not extinct. Something so "natural" and necessary for survival should not be so agonizing. But, then again, as Nietzsche observes, life is agon rather than harmony. Emmett's t-shirt, a gift from aunt Carrie, acknowledges a mother's Dionysian suffering. Thanks, C.

Absence, fonder, yadda yadda. You know the drill.

2008-09-04T17:33:00.000-07:00

I've been quite enamored of the little guy this afternoon and evening. Being away from him for my first day back at work made my return to him intensely pleasant. Here are some pictures I took during our time together. I think they convey how much his face can change. This is the pensive baby we saw the first day.

Hubris

2008-09-01T04:55:00.000-07:00

24 beautiful hours. 4 wretched ones. Inconsolable baby paid a visit last night. Must take it day by day, or bird by bird, as Anne Lammott suggests in her lovely little book.

Aftershock

2008-08-31T16:00:00.000-07:00

52 hours of labor, two days in the hospital, and the first two days at home were the hardest days of my life. Will and I thought that this baby thing was pretty much the worst idea any two people could have. Still, everything in me wanted nothing more than for this baby to live and ultimately to thrive. Just as in labor, all I could do was try my absolute hardest, even as it so often seemed to fall far short of meeting our most basic needs. It was just bare survival. Luckily I could give everything to my biologically given task--feeding--and Will did everything else. He is amazing. I owe him my life, our lives. But, then again, I already knew that.

The past 24 hours have been wonderful and even afforded much pleasure. We have figured out a kind of triage system of care and there has been no hysteria on Emmett's part... for 24 whole hours. We had our first substantial outing today. We walked Emmie to the park in the carrier, sat at a picnic table and dog-watched, and had a lovely visitor this afternoon (thanks, C-dog). (I walked 40 minutes!!! My second time outside the house since going to the hospital on Monday at 5 a.m.)

Will's sister Carrie arrived at the beginning of said 24 hours, which is auspicious. She may have some magical baby soothing pheromones that we will be forced to extract from her and bottle.

Thanks are owed to the government of Quebec. Seriously. They sent a nurse to our house two days in a row to help me feed. Another will come Tuesday and spend the morning with me. I never thought I would want The State involved with my boobs, but it has been sanity preserving. Merci mille fois!

Random Thoughts

2008-08-29T10:28:00.000-07:00

I am currently raising my fist at nature. So inefficient. The first days with a human infant--at least in our case--are extremely difficult. We find him very beautiful though... which is surely a help. Somehow this little Smiegel-like creature is perfection to us, even as he is so often inconsolable. I guess he is pissed off about how much more work non-womb existence can be. Or maybe he was equally distressed by the harsh exit involving 52 hours of labor. I know I won't be over it any time soon.

In other news, our cat Lyle is shocked that we brought another animal into the house and cries in harmony with Emmett. We can't tell whether the cries convey sympathy ("imitation of the affects," in Spinoza's terms), competitiveness ("I cry, too"), or a reaction to the unpleasantness of this other animal's cry ("make it stop").

See also some documentation of the copper hair and massive feet.

Emmett Emmanuel

2008-08-28T12:37:00.000-07:00

Born at 7:07 on August 26, 2008. Weight: 4310 grams (9 lbs. 8 oz). Length: 59 cm (23.25 inches). Red hair and blue eyes. Gentle.

Past Due

2008-08-11T07:44:00.001-07:00

Dear Burrito,

We regret to inform you that you are 4 days past due. You will be charged $2 a day for the first seven days, after which the fine will increase. Please emerge as soon as possible. Your parents have already gone out for their "last supper" at a nice tapas place and taken the 40 week belly photo. An even larger belly would be a great inconvenience at this point, since your mother struggles to walk any meaningful distance. Also, people are looking at her funny. Perfect strangers are laughing and saying "bon accouchement"! Finally, let me note that all debt will be absolved should you arrive for your birthday cake on Thursday.

Sincerely,
Baby Collection Services Canada

Descartes & Babies

2008-08-07T09:04:00.000-07:00

Today is my due date. I cannot manage to be distracted by novels, moving pictures, or my own academic pursuits, so I have been reading about infant psychology. It turns out that babies are geniuses. Seriously. Some well-known evidence: newborns recognize their parents' voices from having heard them in the womb; they are comforted by the music they were exposed to in utero (Burrito enjoyed live performances by Neko Case somewhat early on and TV on the Radio quite recently--s/he grooved really hard to the latter); and can discriminate between their mother's and other mother's milk. What truly amazed me to learn, however, was that newborn babies have more than the power of recognition or memory; they can do more than preserve sense impressions... In fact, if Descartes is right, they already exhibit reason.

Descartes offers the famous wax example to demonstrate that reason organizes sense impressions. (Hopefully, I remember how this goes.) Consider how wax changes texture and appearance based on temperature, applied pressure, etc., such that it can exhibit various shapes and be hard, soft, or liquid, hot, cold, or warm. The wax can appear to the senses in radically different modalities, but nevertheless the human mind attributes an underlying unity to the substance. We recognize the various appearances of the malleable ball as permutations of the same thing. Descartes thinks that imagination/ sensory experience alone is insufficient to recognize the continuity belonging to the substance. Thus reason is required to endow a series of sense impressions with unity, allowing us to affirm that this mutable thing is a single object.

Well, René, newborn babies likewise attribute unity to objects. An experiment was performed where newborns were blindfolded and given one of two binkies to suck on. One was a typical nuk and the other had some protrusions. Once the blindfold was removed, the infants immediately identified visually which pacifier they were sucking on. Having only touched an object, they were able to identify it with an entirely different sense afterward, never having seen it before. On the Cartesian model, they must have retained some kind of mental schema, abstracted from the particular sensual qualities of the object that they were then able to map onto their visual experience. Of course, Gassendi may have been right, too, when he protested that reason seems entirely unnecessary for attributing unity to objects. Dogs have no trouble seeing that their human companion who sits, stands, sleeps, wears hats, and changes overcoats is one and the same "object." Perhaps corporeal imagination is far more self-organizing and active than Descartes could imagine? Perhaps the body doesn't need some universal translator overseeing its experiences? Of course, I tend toward Gassendi and think there is far from a vast chasm between human and canine mental life. Basically, dogs, like babies, are geniuses. Still, that binky thing is pretty cool. The psychologist Daniel Stern concludes that newborns have a far more active sense of self, even beginning in utero, than we have hitherto thought.

The Mother's Body

2008-07-26T08:57:00.000-07:00

The changes in my body have been accompanied by almost every kind of feeling: joy, anxiety, many varieties of pain and discomfort, wonder, alarm, confusion, and excitement, to name a few. I have been hyper-attentive to it, for the most part, which makes it seethe with meaning. It always seems to be telling me something, but, of course, it has its own language, it moves and changes on its own terms, and I am a clumsy interpreter. I have been very happy to have Will by my side most every day of this adventure to watch, listen, and care for me. The pregnancy part is coming to a close. Burrito is expected to emerge in less than two weeks... of course, when s/he arrives may be only the beginning of her or his defiance. (Pictures taken at 22, 27, and 38 weeks.)

Imagining Burrito's Body

2008-07-26T08:45:00.000-07:00

These are the first (technologically produced) images of the body that has come to be known as "Burrito." It had been changing and growing for 19-21 weeks at this point in early April. The sonogram was an absolute thrill--Will and I laughed almost the whole time. We had an oddly maniacal response.

Ethics Vp39s

2008-07-26T08:26:00.000-07:00

...we live in continuous change, and...as we change for the better or worse, we are called happy or unhappy... In this life, then, we strive especially that the infant's body may change (as much as its nature allows and assists) into another, capable of a great many things and related to a mind very much conscious of itself, of God, and of things.
- B. de Spinoza