Some facts:
- Austin will be 6 months old next Friday
- My breastfeeding goal was 6 months
- The fall semester of school has started
- Theseus' school schedule requires Austin to be in day care twice a week (9 hours total)
    

I have a long post in my head, waiting patiently for my hands to type it out. The last few days Theseus' laptop cord was broken and I hate my own laptop, so I couldn't post anything. Tonight I finally turned on my laptop (we have a new cord for him, also) but my throat is KILLING me and I just want to go to sleep.

This 4-day weekend went by entirely too quickly and I am dreading going back to work tomorrow. Also tomorrow is the beginning of my school-week, so I'll leave at 8 a.m. for work and won't return home from school until 10:30 p.m. Then right to sleep, to go back to work fro 8 a.m. the next morning. I have school three days a week, and only Tuesday is that bad (home by 7:15 the other two days), but still - a long day for me, and a long day away from Austin.

Rushing through these classes while he's still young and won't remember - this is the right thing to do, isn't it?

:(
:(
:(

We had an exciting weekend! And it all involved food. Hmm, I'm sensing a trend...

Friday night Theseus returned from the grocery store with supplies to make our own ice cream. He bought me an ice cream maker for my birthday two years ago that we had never used, which we placed in the kitchen sink and put to work. Thirty minutes later: homemade vanilla ice cream! It was incredibly good. I say was, because it didn't last long enough to be photographed. He added it to peach flambé and whipped cream (also homemade). It was divine. Next time he wants to try a mocha chocolate chip, but I think the citrus orange recipe from our ice cream maker's website looks really yummy. And now you know we made 2 quarts of ice cream and ate it all in less than 3 days. Don't judge us!
    

Yesterday, my friend M lost her baby. She was due July 25.

I don't even really know what to say about it. There are no words that will offer her comfort, I know, so I just apologize and apologize and cry to myself. This is her loss, not mine, but I know what it is like to carry a 39-week baby - how do you recover from the loss? I can't stop turning it over in my mind, how it must have felt to hear that there was no heartbeat. To be so far, to have a name picked out and a house full of baby gear, to have everyone asking when you were going to deliver, to have the nursery ready and the hospital bag packed and be right there in the home-stretch, to be just days from delivery, and then --

I look at Austin and alternate between wanting to squeeze him for eternity and feeling deep guilt in the pit of my stomach. What would my life be like without this little guy? M is still in the hospital recuperating, while N and I both have heathy babies. The three of us were all pregnant together - first me, then N, then M. Our three little ones were supposed to play together. What do I even say to M? The baby was full term. M was supposed to have a baby. 

I am absolutely crushed. It is nothing compared to how M feels.

So - Theseus is out right now, taking the civil service exam for fire fighters. I'm very anxious/excited! He's been looking forward to this for over a year, but because of the deployment, he is just now taking it. I hope he places well!
     

Austin slept for 7 consecutive hours!!!
     

I don't know how long this will continue (hopefully not long!), but Theseus and I have identified a pattern: every late afternoon/early evening, after eating but before bedtime, Austin freaks the heck out. For a few minutes, nothing in the world can make that baby happy. We talk to him, rock him, smooch him, and after 10 minutes or so he settles down and falls asleep. It's actually a lot less stressful for us now that we expect it and can see him spinning himself into The Evening Wail.

Now that we've got him figured out, though, he'll probably abandon this routine and take up another one. He's full of surprises that way. Did I tell you he let out a single, creepy laugh last week? He creeped himself out, too.

Ok, I was going to write some more but now I have a grumpy husband. So. I'll write some more tomorrow.

...even when the baby is screaming.

Austin is having a tough evening - it makes me so sad, because I feel so helpless. Earlier he was wailing his head off and nothing Theseus or I did would comfort him. He had a clean diaper, a dry outfit, a full tummy, his choice of a lap to sit in - still angry. We checked his fingers and toes to see if a hair had become wrapped around them, but they were clear. I adjusted his diaper in case it was pinching him - he continued screaming. He screamed so hard, there was a short pause between wails when his face was beet-red and his mouth was wide open but no sound came out. Finally we took off his (dry) diaper and gave him a new one and that settled him down some.

A little while later, after a walk outside in the garden and a refilled tummy, he sat with me while I worked on some school work. I still have to take an exam before the end of the night. Now he's is sleeping and Theseus and I are watching the Bruins game. I hope he isn't up screaming all night. It's rough on all of us. :/

Yesterday Theseus and I worked on the yard in shifts. Tonight we worked on school stuff in shifts. The yard is much easier.

I was going to write a big thing about how we have to do damn near everything in shifts, but Theseus is tired and he just dropped the baby's pacifier on the floor, and I have to get my stuff ready for work tomorrow and the baby needs to be changed and I have to pee and the cats are demanding attention...

This has nothing to do with anything, but I want to eat these parsnip pancakes RIGHT NOW!

Gahhhh. Good night.