Doctor Visit | Kiesa's Mutterings

Downs

Calvin was really cranky Saturday morning. I was frantically trying to get ready for church (I was pianist this week) but Calvin was insisting on being picked up and put down constantly. Jaeger was gone for the day on his expedition and I was worried I wouldn’t have enough sanity to deal with Calvin all day by myself.

Ups

In spite of the awful start on Saturday, the rest of the day went very well. Calvin took a nap on the way to church which helped both him and me Since I was playing for church, I had arranged for a couple of people to take care of him while I was busy. Unlike some previous times, he seemed fairly content with them taking care of him. After church, we went to the Carbon Valley Library and hung out for a couple of hours. The Carbon Valley library is great for a couple of reasons. 1) I know the people there so it allows me some modest adult conversation opportunities and 2) they have a fantastic play section for children.

This was the first Sunday we had a babysitter so I could start working on Sundays again. I was really happy with how the day went. Jaeger got up with Calvin so I got to sleep in late. Then the babysitter arrived to take care of Calvin and I grabbed the rest of my breakfast and headed downstairs to work for three hours. I finished working just in time to rock Calvin to sleep for his afternoon nap. I had a couple of minutes to relax before heading out for grocery shopping part 1. My grocery shopping routine starts at Vitamin Cottage (think Whole Foods except better prices) and ends at King Soopers. However, I had an extra long list because I needed to get supplies for camping next weekend also so I decided to nip out and do the Vitamin Cottage part of the expedition while Calvin slept. This took longer than I expected because they moved into a larger store and rearranged everything. However, it’s very nice. I got back home, fed Calvin snack, and then took him to King Soopers.

Calvin does appear capable of sleeping in a tent. We’re planning to go camping next weekend for the first time with Calvin. Most of the sites I saw on the internet suggest co-sleeping when camping/backpacking with children. However, Calvin thinks co-sleeping means an extra special treat where he gets to stay up late and pat mommy and daddy’s faces when they try to go to sleep. That didn’t seem like a great idea to me. Previously, I had asked my favorite parenting Q &A site how others went camping with babies. The top voted answer suggested we should just go ahead and buy a big family tent. A couple of weeks ago we bought an REI Kingdom 6 tent. It’s huge and easily fits Calvin’s Pack ‘n Play. Last night we took it for a test run and other than getting Calvin to go to sleep, it worked well. I’m still a little worried about how to keep him warm enough but that’s probably just due to me being an overly paranoid mother.

Because I worked on Sunday, I got a couple of extra hours of free-time today. About half of it was spent at Calvin’s 15-month doctor visit. However, I did manage to squeeze in a massage which was really nice. I specifically waited to schedule another massage until after I was scheduled to play at church. I don’t practice consistently enough so my muscles always protest after I play for church.

I met our backyard neighbors. They were outside at the same time as I was taking down the tent from our practice last night. I mentioned that I was worried about Calvin staying warm and they promptly offered me a kid-sized sleeping bag they had. It looks like it might work well for our purposes.

Calvin Moment

As mentioned above, Calvin had his 15-month checkup today. Other than him crying the whole time, it went well. The doctor pronounced Calvin healthy and he got three more vaccinations. He weighs 24lbs 3 oz and has a length of 30 3/4″. This is 50th percentile for everything, including head circumference which they didn’t write down on my little sheet so I don’t remember the exact numbers. As usual, I had quite a few questions for the doctor. This time I made sure to ask all of them first thing so I didn’t throw the doctor off his routine.

Simplification

Food Diary

Breakfast – Waffles with peanut butter and maple syrup and Hot Chocolate (we were “camping”, I had to have hot chocolate)