Plugged Into the Matrix

Whew! I survived the first week back into the Matrix!


Maternity leave ended a week ago and I have since been back to work. It is pretty hard leaving my baby and knowing that I am missing out on seeing everything she does in the day and having someone else other than me hold her. There are pros and cons going back to work, but I definitely have a greater respect of working moms that manage to balance both aspects of life, especially single moms! It definitely is hard and at times I just have to breathe and remind myself of the pros. It helps that Ryan is home with Em though, as that provides a sense of security to know that daddy is close by to her.


At the end of this week, it is easier to evaluate my return. The first day back to work started off okay since there was a curiosity to see if there were changes at work (since Sun was acquired by Oracle and the re-structuring has started). The changes mainly were HR related - training classes, IT stuff. Almost feels like going to a new job but with co-workers the same and the office the same. Of course, all I still talk about is Baby Em. I'm sure the conversations about the financial markets and politics will re-circulate around me at work soon, once I am more settled in.


Oh, and, just like most working moms and dads out there, my screensaver is now scrolling various photos of my baby girl. I always thought that was cheesy, but now I see why. I miss her at work and seeing those photos of her just puts a smile on my face as I work with a focus on what I do... is all for my baby girl. Same job, same routine, but different goals and perspectives now.

Mesa Rim Climbing Gym

We went to the grand opening of the new climbing gym in Mira Mesa last Saturday. It's called Mesa Rim, and is quite an improvement over our current gym, Vertical Hold. But the niceties come at a cost as the annual fees are like 75% higher. That extra dough gets you: much taller lead and TR (toprope) walls, simulated cracks of assorted sizes (and they appear to be good quality), a decent bouldering area with topout options, a fitness area with lots of new Precor equipment, a very nice yoga room (although yoga costs extra), and a sweet hangout/family area with playstuff for kids. This may be the biggest lure for us to make a change at some point (hmmm...I guess our priorities are a little different these days).

The gym looks massive inside, but like most climbing gyms, it's difficult to get a good overall picture since the walls go in so many different directions. Anyway, here's an overview shot of a portion of the lead/TR area:


This is the hangout/family area (complete with lots of moons - whassup with my camera?!):


And here's Emilia enjoying the new gym - yup, that's what she did a lot of the time - sleep.


But when she was awake, her head looked like it was on a swivel as she tried to take in everything that was going on around her. She's at a very visual stage right now, and wants to see as much as she can. I like to think that it was the climbing she was interested in, but she'd probably do the same thing at the Miramar landfill ;^p

Resemblances...

My Mom dug up this old baby picture of me (no comments on the hat, please)...


Not sure if I see any resemblance, but I'll leave it open to interpretation...

Mobile Heaven

Emilia loves her mobiles. Here's a couple videos I took a week or so ago. Not sure what's up with the quality of the first one - both were done on the same camera.

Newborn Camping 101

Last weekend (actually on Friday), we set off on our first camping trip with Baby Em. We decided to head to Joshua Tree since it's relatively close, has warm weather, and we could get a little climbing in.

Car Ride Into JTree

Well, the baby camping experience had us learning something as soon as we left the house. Make sure you feed the baby before you leave! She started crying shortly after leaving the driveway, and probably for the next 1/2 hour. We finally pulled into Micky D's in Temecula so we could all fuel up. Baby Em was much happier after that (and us as well), and she slept most of the way to Joshua Tree.

Black Rock Campground with Em

We arrived at our campsite in the Black Rock Campground with plenty of sunlight to get camp set up. So I pulled out the tent, and started putting it together. Uh oh...minor detail. I forgot to pack the tent poles! The tent doesn't work very well without poles so we figured Plan B would be to sleep in the car. Unfortunately the Mazda is a little on the small side so that wouldn't have been too pleasant. Besides, Connie really wanted Emilia to sleep in her new tent (see photo below). Deb, Allan, and Arielle were just arriving, and suggested we hit the nearest Walmart to find a cheap tent.

After confirming that there was a Walmart closer than the 18 miles the GPS was telling us, we set off in search of the cheapest tent we could find. Walmart did not disappoint, and we came away with a $35, 4-person, 1-season (for use in only extremely good weather) tent. It was surprisingly decent, and offered plenty of space for the three of us and the baby tent. Sort of weird to have a tent inside a tent, but it did have its advantages. There was no way you were going to roll over the baby, and the baby tent has a nice air mattress and pad to provide a comfortable sleeping surface. Unlike my side of the tent which had the one protruding rock which was either in my back or ribs depending upon how I was "sleeping".

Em's tent setup inside of our Wal-Mart 4-Person tent

With the tent setup, it was time to get Baby Em fed. Connie found that it's much more difficult to feed her without having good back support. We were planning on hanging out at the fire with Deb, Allan, and Arielle, but we knew we better start working on getting Emilia to bed. We also thought it would be impossible to get back into the tent without waking her (zippers, zippers everywhere) so we decided to hit the sack at the same time. We stuck her in her tent (which she'd never been in before), and hoped she wouldn't cry for too long. We've been doing some sleep training with her lately which is suppose to help her learn to go to sleep herself without a lot of human intervention. She's a little young to start this, but we figured we'd give it a try anyway. And wonders of wonders, it actually seems to be working as she cried for only a few minutes, and was asleep!

At about 12:30 am, we were greeted by the sounds of Yahoo's. That's idiots who arrive in the campground late in the night, and have no courtesy for anyone camping (i.e. sleeping) around them. They made all kinds of noise as it took them eons to get their camp set up. That included using some sort of battery powered blower to inflate a huge mattress that one guy was going to sleep on. Unbelievable. We really expected (and were actually hoping) that Baby Em would wake up, and cry for the next few hours. But somehow she slept through the ruckus, and never knew about the chaos around her.

Em just chillin' with her new sunshade hat

Hanging Out

Some other friends were driving up early Saturday morning so we hung out at the campground until they arrived. Bill, Diane, Jeff, Tamberly, and Kelly showed up around 10 am, and that gave us cause to linger around the campsites a little longer as we developed a plan for climbing in the park. Actually we waited until Jeff came up with a plan since he seemed the most motivated and knowledgeable. As the Park Ranger came around to tell us that checkout was at noon, we finally had a plan. We'd be climbing in a place called Playhouse Rock which was east-facing, and should be in shade for a good part of the day.

The only shady spot until the later afternoon

We drove over to the Park Entrance which is about 15 miles from Black Rock. My old Park Pass had expired so we had to buy a new one. Things have changed since the good ol' days of the Golden Eagle Pass, and the new National Parks Annual Pass is $80! So we opted for the Joshua Tree Annual Pass which is "only" $30. We caravaned into the Park, and found the turnout with the trailhead to Playhouse Rock. While getting the gear unpacked, Allan noticed that the rear tire on their camper was low on air. Fortunately it was a slow leak, and seemed to be holding pressure.

Em and Lily and Bill just chillin' and watching something

We hiked to the climbing area, and found some good spots to hang out. Jeff was already setting up the first TR (toprope), and then Bill and I set up a couple more. We spent the rest of the day lounging at the base of the wall, and climbing whenever we felt the urge. The climbs were all relatively moderate, but with some typical Joshua Tree sandbagging. The weather was suppose to be in the 80's, but some cloud cover and a cool breeze made for some really pleasant conditions. The season is ending at Josh (starting to get too hot) so we were lucky to get some nice weather. Baby Em had her fussy periods, but they were fairly short and she had one long stretch where she was amazingly content. All in all, a great day.

Ryan on a portion of Breaking a Leg, 5.9

Ryan taking a break

Bill and Kelly working neighboring routes

On our way home, we stopped for dinner at the Crossroads Cafe. We were joined by Jeff, Tam, and Kelly. The rest of the crew were spending another day in the Park so they weren't able to join us. It's really nice to have friends around to help take care of the baby. When Tam finished eating, she carried Em around so Connie and I could eat. Em was so comfortable with Tam that she molded into her body, and fell into a deep sleep. We thought that Tam might have to take her home as she was clinging to her so tightly. But with Baby Em, things never last for too long and she started to stir as she got closer to her feeding time. From the lesson learned at the start of the trip, we fueled her up just before loading her into the car. She slept most of the way home, and through the night after her big weekend.

Camping with baby is definitely different than how we use to camp. There's more stuff to take, more things to think about, more time needed to do things, and well, just more. But being back out with friends and seeing how much Baby Em enjoys being outdoors and all the attention she gets, makes it all worthwhile. We'll have to start planning our next trip. And this time, I'll remember the tent poles and a bunch of other stuff we noted that we should have brought.

Mission Accomplished

At the beginning of April, I started running again for the first time since my neck operation.  I made a goal at that time to run the Project Athena 15K trail run on May 8.  Well, I completed the race (maybe survived is a better description), and finally feel recovered after about a week of rest. 

I finished 13th overall out of 66 runners, and 2nd in my age group.  My time was 1:42:39 which is really slow, but the winning time was only a 9 minute/mile pace so that's a testament to how grueling the course was.  One of the runners measured the actual distance on his GPS, and it was 9.7 miles - slightly longer than the advertised 15K.  We don't know exactly how much elevation gain there was, but a friend mentioned that a similar hike she does out there has about 2000 ft of gain.  In any event, there was a lot of climbing, some very steep descents, a couple of river crossings, some singletrack, and even running along a streambed.  Overall, a very sweet course.  What probably made it particularly tough was the temperature - it was hot.  There weren't very many aid stations so I was glad I was carrying my own water.  Even so, I was wilting in the last mile, and was so glad to see the finish line.

Ok, now to start thinking about the next goal...probably something like a Half Marathon trail run.  Long term goal is the Catalina Marathon which is a very hilly, very tough, all trail marathon.

ps.  I got beat at the Project Athena race by a 65 yr old dude.  That's incentive to keep going no matter how old you are!

Vaccination Day

Yesterday was not Emilia's favorite day. She got her first round of vaccination shots for Rotavirus, DPT (Diphtheria, Tetanus, and Pertussis), HIB (Haemophilus Influenza B), Pneumococcal (Prevnar), and Polio. She had her Hepatitis B shot about a week ago.

Before heading to the doctor's office, we prepped her by giving her some infant Tylenol as recommended by our pediatrician. That was an ordeal in itself as there was a recent recall of infant Tylenol due to QC problems. All of the store shelves were empty. Finally found CVS brand at, uh, CVS. Infant Tylenol is in liquid form, and you adminster it using an eyedropper. I squirted the recommended dose in her mouth, and she reluctantly swished it around in her mouth for a while before finally swallowing it.

The shots are all administered to the thighs. Since there were four shots, two went into each thigh. The needles are big and long :^( When they did the first one, Baby Em did not react. So I thought, Oh, she doesn't even feel it. But then a few seconds later, there was a loud scream. Yeah, she definitely felt it. The nurse acted very quickly, and got the remaining three shots finished literally in seconds. Emilia cried for a few more seconds, and it was over. She slept all the way home, and hasn't had any apparent complications from the shots.

Other notes from the pediatrician visit:

• Baby Em is at ~50 percentile for both weight and length. So she's neither a runt nor ginormous.
• Her skin is dry and sensitive (especially the face) so we need to treat it more. They recommended some stuff called Cetaphil.
• We asked about some popping in her joints that we feel. The doc felt that it was just normal infant joint looseness.
• Emilia's been sleeping up to 10 hrs at night. The doc sees no problem in this as she does not have any weight or growth issues. In fact, she called her "chubby".
  
• We discussed her daytime sleep issues, and the doc said that some babies just don't need long daytime naps. So maybe her 30 minute sessions are all she wants (and needs).
• We were told that we need to give her a lot more tummy time. Not only does the tummy time help her head shape, but it also works a lot more of the baby's muscles. Only problem is that Baby Em hates her tummy time, but looks like she'll have to get used to it.
  

Part 2: CSP Photo-Shoot of Em

Part 1: CSP Photo-Shoot of Em

While the cousins were here visiting, we had the special privilege of having my cousin-in-law, Christine, take newborn photos of Em. Christine is a photographer that specializes in baby and family photography. With a limited amount of time and light and with an impromptu McGyver setup, Christine managed to get a variety of photos of Em and the family. It was fun and a learning experience to watch how she worked with Em in creating poses and capturing the photos. Definitely not an easy task with the uncertainties of a baby.

More to come in Part 2...

Happiest Baby on the Block

Sometimes in the morning, we find her well slept and fully wide awake, laying quietly in her bed, waiting for us to greet her. It's one of my favorite moments, when she sees us and acknowledges us with smiles and coos and saliva bubbles.