Available on Ebay: 700 Hous of Sleep

"People who say they sleep like a baby usually don't have one." ~Leo J. Burke

Here’s the deal: We’re tired.

A fellow teacher at my school told me last week that, on average, a new mom loses around 700 hours of sleep the first year after giving birth. 700 hours. How do you get that back?

I suppose we could nap during the day when Audrey is sleeping. But after feeding her and changing her and burping her and such, you have about two hours before the process begins again. It’ s during this brief window that we try to cram in all our activities for the day: laundry, vacuuming, grocery shopping, reading a book, balancing the budget, hanging some shelves in the nursery, grading papers, sorting the mail. . . you get the point. We haven’t been doing much napping. None actually.

Cutting further into our precious sleep time is the fact that Audrey continues to be afflicted with “lower gas,” or what her mom calls, “the bubbles.” All babies suffer from this to some degree, but Audrey’s doctor-prescribed high calorie diet makes it worse. So much that Janell even called the doctor’s office earlier this week to see if we could switch to Similac Advance, the regular formula for newborns, to try to relieve some of her discomfort. No go. Doctor Hans wants our little premiee to be on the high-cal Similac NeoSure for 6 to 9 months.

So we’ll continue to try help our little girl. And we’ll deal with her occasionally crying throughout the night. And we’ll probably have more sleepy exchanges like this one from the other night after I returned to bed after a 3:00 am feeding.

Matt, getting into bed, zombie-like: “Peanut’s sleeping. She ate well.”

Janell, rousing slightly: “Did you put her in the basket?”

Matt: “. . .Um. . . What was that?”

Janell, eyes still closed: “Is she in something that won’t roll away?”

Matt: “? .. .Yeah, I guess she is.”

Janell: “Ok love you goodnight.”

Matt: “Love you too goodnight.”

Like I said - we’re tired. But we did enjoy a brief respite yesterday as Grammy Roz took Audrey for the night. Relieved of parental duties for a few hours, we darted to Target to pick out my new eye glasses. Then is was off to Red Lobster for some fine dining. And then we stopped at Lowe’s, the blue Home Depot, to pick out shelves for Audrey’s room. We returned home and watched the movie Paper Clips. Then we fell asleep and slept through the night. It was a near perfect night, marred only by nagging guilt brought by the absence of our little girl. Janell called her mother three times to check on her. I tried to play it cool, but I was shamelessly giddy the next day when we picked her up. I guess those lost hours of sleep are a small, small price to pay.

A Letter to Baby Audrey. . .

Dear Audrey,

Here’s a letter from your dad on the eve of your very first Easter. I can’t wait until tomorrow to see you in your new outfit and to watch you tear into your overstuffed Easter basket - ok, you’ll probably just stare at it, but that’s ok, I’ll be there to help.

And happy birthday, Peanut. Two months old today, and just one day past your original due date. So now the official clock can begin for all your milestones - smiling, cooing, crawling, talking, etc. That’s gives us about 15 months to get you reading so we can be invited to appear on the Today show and we get a free trip to New York. No pressure, though, Sweetie.

Oh oh. You just started crying in your crib. But you just ate two hours ago. You can’t be hungry already, can you? Seriously? I’ll be right back. . .

Ok, Daddy just spent 30 minutes stubbornly trying to comfort you before finally giving in and giving you a bottle. By the way, your adorable, squeaky preemie cry is now gone and has been replaced by an loud, angry scream. There’s really no guess work when trying to read your moods, Sweetie. There’s happy, mildly agitated, and HOLY CRAP I AM ANGRY GET ME MY FREAKING BOTTLE RIGHT NOW WHAT ARE YOU WAITNG FOR YOU HORRIBLE EXCUSE FOR A PARENT AAHHGGG!!!!!

And you also have the uncanny ability to cry just as Daddy is beginning a task - reading a book, eating lunch, or writing this letter. You no doubt inherited this innate trait from your mommy.

Daddy worked at the Target Center tonight at a Timberwolves game, and the weirdest thing happened - 14,000 people showed up wearing costumes that looked just like empty blue seats. Strange. Anyway, while there I saw someone smaller than you for the first time. A family, complete with two year-old and tiny baby girl sat in my section. I asked the dad how old the infant was and learned that she was born just three weeks ago. She had the shrunken head, shriveled skin look that you had for several weeks before your cheeks puffed out. I couldn’t get over how small she was. I assumed she was full term, however, because why else would her parents cart her off to the Target Center? According to your mom, Children’s Hospital reported 14 gazillion new cases of infant RSV last week, or something like that. Ok, that’s a slight exaggeration. You’ll need to get used to that. Regardless, we’re not venturing out into public with you for a couple more weeks.

Three feelings struck me as I chatted up the dad about birth weights and such. One was pride - I was proud of you and all the growing you’ve done the last two months. Then, while we were talking, the actual occupants of the seats the family had camped in walked up. So then I was embarrassed. Squatters! In my section! Lastly - bewilderment - why would you squat in someone else’s seats with a two year-old and an infant? It must have taking three solid minutes for them to collect their belonging and finally move. The dad sheepishly asked me if they could stay rather than hump it all the way up to the upper deck. I ushered him up to the top of my section. He seemed like a nice guy, if a little dim. And he was wearing a Knicks jersey, so I felt sorry for him.

Someday I will take you to a Timberwolves game. But I want you to be a little older, maybe three or four. I’m looking forward to taking you down on the floor and seeing your eyes all but pop out of your head when you see the players come out for warn-ups. And I’m sure your head will spin when you see the dancers and the Jumbotron and Crunch the mascot and the cotton candy vendor and all the other stimulation in the arena. Hopefully you make it until halftime before total sensory overload.

As for the game tonight, the T-Puppies scored 42 points in the first quarter - the most I had ever seen. It was the most entertaining quarter we’ve had all year. This feat was, of course, aided by the fact that the Wolves were playing the terminally inept New Your Knickerbockers. Casual observers tend to roll their eyes at the term NBA “defense,” but the Knicks take it to a new level. It was seriously the worst defensive effort I’ve ever witnessed. I’ve seen better defense at all-star pregame warm-ups. Let me put this in a way that you can understand. Imagine that daddy had one of your dirty diapers and wanted to put it into the diaper genie trash can and it was your job to get in the way and prevent me from doing so. That’s pretty much how effective the Knicks were tonight. See, in addition to Daddy’s little lectures about Minneapolis history, you also have my NBA defensive analyses to look forward to when we venture downtown.

Once again, happy birthday, happy Easter, happy passing-the-due-date day. Now it’s time for me to go to bed. I’ve got to get up to feed you in about 40 minutes.

Love,

Daddy

Audrey in the 'Hood

To begin, I have to give credit to my wife for coming up with the name for our little blog. Big Love, Little Peanut: Living with Audrey Grace. Simple. Heartfelt. And a constant reminder that this blog is about Audrey, not her dad‘s incoherent musings. And it far outshines any of the suggestions I contributed. I’m just not very adept at naming. I suggested The Baby Ledger. Boring. Baby Blog? Bland. I thought that The Poo Diaries was clever. Hey, did I not just say that I’m not very good at this? So kudos to Janell.

I must say that prior to Audrey’s arrival I gave zero consideration when overhearing friends and colleagues talk about their children’s schools. Now I think about Audrey’s potential schools daily. It’s no wonder that listing for homes always give school information. Well, we happen to live three blocks from Lake Harriet school, which from what I gather is one of the best in the state. I spent some time inside the school a couple of years ago when I took an adult education Spanish class. My favorite part about the class was the that I could walk to it. I imagine Audrey making that same walk someday. Apparently, she’ll be fortunate to be able to attend. A friend of mine told me that kids can only attend the school if they are enrolled in kindergarten - families can't "move in" or transfer when their kids are older. Now that I write that, it seems dubious. I'll have to look it up. Regardless, I never planned it, but we may have stumbled onto the perfect place for Audrey to go to school.

Another reason I like our neighborhood is the kids. These days you read about parents scheduling every minute of their kids’ day with organized activities, so it’s comforting to see the small clusters of kids riding their bikes and scooters up and down the street after school and on the weekend, happily making their way to Pershing Park just down the street. They remind me of being young and spending countless summer hours exploring every nook and cranny of my tiny hometown of Rose Creek. Some day I want Audrey to be one of those kids. Seeing them gallivanting up and down the block reassures me that kids still know how to play. I’ve yet to see a bunch of them organize a pick-up baseball game, something we did every day all summer long, but I guess I can live with that for now.

Remarkably, it appears that by settling in this cozy corner of Minnesota’s largest city, I discovered a neighborhood reminiscent of my hometown. We have old homes, colorful characters, alleys for visiting with neighbors, unsupervised kids, a locally owned hardware store, and huge sleepy trees. And one more thing - we have virtually no crime.

“No crime?! But you live in Minneapolis!” you say. But think of the city as dozens, perhaps even a hundred individual neighborhoods, each with it’s own distinct history and character. Ok, no community is 100% crime free, but when I moved in, one of my new neighbors, a retired Minneapolis cop named Bob, told me that there hasn’t been a major crime on our street since 1973. I guess he would know. He also “patrols” our alley daily, strolling up and down, carefully keeping mental tabs on the comings and goings of cars, both strange and familiar. Some might find this grating or invasive, but I see it as somewhat enduring.

We have had some excitement, however. Two summers ago before I was married and while I was still rooming with my brother, the Minneapolis SWAT team swarmed our block. Apparently Dale, the large, ever flannel-shirted, ZZ Top-bearded guy down the street kicked his wife and kids out of the house and held himself hostage with a gun for several hours. I arrived home from work to find my alley blocked off with police tape. My brother told me that he witnessed the SWAT team guys cutting through our yard establishing a perimeter with a black cable. The standoff eventually ended quietly and was probably much ado about nothing. Maybe he forgot to take his meds or something. One week later there he was at our neighborhood block party and all was OK. I’m embarrassed to admit that I’ve never has a real conversations with him. I guess I don’t know quite what to say. There’s my goal for the summer - I need to chat up Dale. This is a guy I need to know. Another note about Dale - his was the only house on the street to display a “Bush/Chaney” sign four years ago. And by “sign“ I mean four-by-six foot billboard. You could see it from 6 blocks away. I think he’s wound a little tight. Don’t get me wrong. As far as neighbors I’ve never spoken to go, I love Dale. I see his kids playing up and down the street every day in the summer. They seem nice, if not slightly mischievous. I’d like Audrey to meet him someday, assuming I ever talk to him.

Sadly, crime has even reached our household. One chilly night this past January, we absent-mindedly left our garage door open overnight. When I awoke the next morning, I immediately remembered, and an ominous feeling gripped me. Sure enough, we had been vandalized. Debris littered the floor of the garage and interiors of our cars. Upon closer inspection, I discovered that the contents of our glove compartments had been strewn about as if someone was frantically looking for something. Money? Drugs? Tic Tacs? But we both had money in our car that was left untouched. And my wife’s crystal meth was stashed securely in the nursery. What, if anything, were they looking for? I took a quick inventory - nothing seemed to be gone or out of place except the few receipts, insurance information, flashlight, calculator and sunglasses scattered about my front seat.

I was bewildered. Was there a message here? Was I missing something? I repeatedly combed through the now-collected contents trying to fathom some devious intent, but it just wasn’t there. Then I saw it. Near the rear of the garage lay an oddly lumped cloth, as if covering something. I hadn’t noticed it before. With some apprehension I slowly approached it, noticing when I leaned closer that it was actually the non-stick mat that my wife uses to keep her “emergency” crate from sliding around in the back of her Jeep (she tends to drive like Tony Stewart on an IV drip of Red Bull). Baffled, I picked it up and discovered. . . a big pile of frozen poo. Yes, someone and dropped his pants and in the frigid January air, placed a poo in our garage. He no-doubt was sending us a message: “Don’t leave your garage door open all night, Stupid, or I will poop near your snow blower.” Part of me hopes it was Dale. How's that for an icebreaker?

Maybe “Poo Diaries” would have worked after all.

$6 for a box of popcorn?!

If you can survive the first 10 minutes of a Disney on Ice show, you can do pretty much anything. As an usher, that is. I’ve been working in that capacity at the Target Center arena in downtown Minneapolis for about four years, and those first 10 minutes when Mickey and Minnie skate out and welcome all the wide-eyed tots are pure, honest toil. I mean actually hard work. I’ll give Disney credit - they put on quite a show chock-full of blaring music, bright lights, and ingenious costumes. This past Thursday Mickey and Minnie and friends brought us the story of Finding Nemo. In this particular adaptation, Nemo again leaves his home, embarking on a journey of self-discovery, only to find himself in northern Minnesota in the dead of winter. Confounded by his lack of personal identity, and lethargic from the sub-freezing temperatures, Nemo is soon snagged and pulled through the ice by a grizzled and wily Bainerd fisherman. Disappointed with our little orange protagonist’s diminutive size, he quickly decides to use little Nemo as live bait for muskies. Now that’s Disney on Ice!

Ok, not really.

Anyway, for this particular show time (there are eight of them over four days), the lower level of the Target Center was filled to capacity, mostly with busloads of small children in groups ranging from about a dozen up to about 40. Across the arena I even saw am a group that had to approach 200 kids, identifiable by their matching bright red t-shirts. Seating a large group like that can be challenging, especially when the group leaders decide to shuffle their tickets. Then they hand me a three-quarter inch stack of tickets with a desperate look. Every group I seated that day did this, and after much reflection, I cannot fathom why. The tickets are printed in order, and if they could have somehow managed to hand them to me in that condition, I could have breezed through them and surmised their seating situation in about 6 seconds. Instead, it looked as if a bitter gale blew their tickets from their hands out on First Avenue and they were left scrambling to collect them from the street. I’m left looking down at a disheveled pile of tickets that reads something like this: Row Q, seat 17. Row R, seat 9. Row Q, seat 2. Row R, seat 29. Row P, seat 22. Row P, seat 11. And so on and so on. Meanwhile some dopey parent volunteers have started to seat their antsy kids nowhere near where they belong. Seeing this, I have to resist the intense urge to question these chaperones’ intelligences and wonder aloud why the four-year old at my knees has no problem reading the numbers on the seats, but the fully grown adults look bewildered, as though the arena isles are labeled with hieroglyphics.

This same baffling scenario played out for every group I encountered this day, save one - the Main Street Lodge, which according to their uniform yellow t-shirts, is a Catholic eldercare community. These twelve octogenarians, complete with four chaperones, three walkers, and two wheelchairs, came prepared to see Nemo. They occupied three different rows, but their tickets were separated and in order. Better yet, each wore a nametag clearly displaying his or her section, row, and seat number. Genius. I guess when you’re 85, you finally figure it out.

Adding to this mess of confusion is the fact that so many people find it impossible to make it to the show on time. Now, I realize that 10:30 am is the crack of dawn for some people, but still. Keep in mind you are in almost complete darkness when the house lights go down. Once the performance begins, it is nearly impossible to find your seat without usher assistance, and when I’m trying to seat two different groups of thirty kids whose seats seem to interlock like a jigsaw puzzle, it might take awhile before I finally hump it back up the steps to tend to your tardiness. Again, some parents tire of waiting and take the first available seats they see. And then when I bring the rightful occupants to those seats, I have to politely ask the squatters to show me their tickets so that I can get them to where they belong. Typically they will stare at me for several seconds with quizzical looks, as if I was speaking Swahili or some other foreign tongue. Gradually, they comprehend, but the look in their eyes changes to “Can’t we just stay here? What’s the big deal?” It rarely dawns on them to swivel their thick, mullet-adorned heads around to see that the arena is all but full, and that there are people patiently waiting directly behind me for their rightful seats. Meanwhile in the near complete darkness Mickey and Minnie and Goofy and whoever have entered accompanied by shockingly loud music which has many of the younger kids immediately crying. By now I’m sweating profusely and my “Welcome to the Magic Kingdom” smile has long since evaporated. Like I said, I earn my money those first 10 minutes.

Now, being a new father, I’m obviously witnessing all this unfold through a new lens of perspective. A couple of years ago I may have watched a witless father vainly trying to get his screaming daughter to vacate her seat so that they can shuffle off to where they belong, and I would have thought to myself, thank God I’m not in that situation. Now, when this exact scene played out before my eyes and I waited patiently as this completely ineffectual dad pleaded with his tantrum-throwing tot to move while she clung to her seat, or rather, the seat of the family waiting behind me, I thought two things - 1) I’m a better dad than you and 2) I will now dedicate myself to never getting into this situation. In about two quick years, I’ll be at Disney on Ice with Audrey, and so I spend much of the day watching all the kids and wondering where Audrey will fit in. Maybe she’ll be the one scared by the loud music and pyrotechnics. Or she might me the girl who knows all the characters and yells their name as they glide out onto the ice. Perhaps she’ll be like the little girl in my section who found herself out of her seat and in the isle tirelessly dancing along to every song like Kevin Bacon in Footloose. That would be cool.
Regardless, I resolve to come prepared. So take note all you parents out there. Here’s how to make the most out of your Disney Day --

Number One: Come early. Needs no further explanation, right?

Number Two: Buy snackes ahead of time and smuggle them in. Do you really want to pay $6 for a box of popcorn? How about $8 for a souvenir Nemo Icee? I didn’t think so. But do not put the treats in your purse, for the security guards at the gate will confiscate them and enjoy eating them on their break. I’m not making this up. You will need to put some effort into your smuggling. I’m also contemplating going to Walgreen’s a day prior and buying a toy or two, which wouldn’t even be considered contraband. Then I could take little Audrey to the bathroom, distract her at the drinking fountain, and then convince her that I just paid $24 for her new stuffed Nemo doll. Don’t think for a moment that I wouldn’t be bragging if I could pull that one off. Stay tuned.

Number Three: Explain to your little girl or boy that the music is really loud and that’s just the way Mickey likes it at Disney World or something like that. Let them know about the near absolute darkness also. Also, when the show begins, try to have an excited look on your face, as opposed to the uneasy, oh-my-gosh-why-is-the-music-so-loud-and-it’s-so-dark-in-here look. Kids tend to pick up on those things.

Number Four: Even if you do manage to surreptitiously convey some food into the place, it’s likely, inevitable even, that you will break down and spend some dough. Treat it like Vegas. Have a preset spending limit. If your kid is old enough, share this number with him or her. “Sweetie, if we spend $9 on this plastic piece of crap, and $12 on this lighted plastic piece of crap, that will leave us with only $4 to eat and you’ll be hungry cause Daddy’s getting a hotdog.” Something like that. Make it educational.

Number Five: Speaking of education, that brings me to my final tip for your trip. As long as you are indulging your daughter and bringing her into the heart of the Minnesota’s largest city, take a few minutes to give her a basic geography lesson. That way she won’t end up like “Jill,” one of my former ninth grade students. You see, for the past couple of years we’ve read Finding Laura Buggs in class, a novel centered around several St. Paul Central High school students in 1954. Fun book. Some good Minnesota history. Hitchcock-like suspense mixed in. Check it out. Anyway, on our final test, I included what I thought was a freebie true/false question: “Sandy Meyer (the protagonist) attends a Minneapolis high school." Jill marked “True” and quickly toted her test up to my desk to protest when she got it wrong. She had that look on her face that said, “I can’t figure out why I got this wrong.” She said nothing, but the pointing and her expression told everything. I looked at the test. I looked at her. “Yes, Jill?” She pointed again, unsure of what to say. I let the silence linger for a moment longer and then finally: “Sandy went to St. Paul High Central, Jill.” I noticed what I thought was the slightest glimmer of hope in her eyes. She finally speaks: “But. . . isn’t St. Paul in Minneapolis?”

I’ve spent a lot of time since that moment wondering how any parent could keep their child in the dark for 15 years as what constitutes the Twin Cities. In ten years of teaching, I think that was the stupidest question ever posed to me. Is this anything other than gross parental negligence? I’m getting angry thinking about it again. So, Audrey Grace, when you’re rolling your eyes as your dad drones on in the car about Minneapolis history or St. Paul city planning, you will have Jill partly to thank.

Just know that when the Leisen family trots down to Disney on Ice, we’re showing up early, we’re smuggling in treats and possibly some toys, we’re not going to cry when the lights go down (wishful thinking perhaps), and we’re going to look at a map of the Twin Cities before we leave.

Get ready, Mickey and Minnie. Here comes Audrey Grace.

I'm agog; it's a blog!

Fatherhood changes you. For one, I never thought I’d never create a blog. And yet here I am. Blog. I hate the word. Blaaaaaoooog. It rhymes with smog, bog, fog, cog. How did we end up with such an unattractive word for writing? People who write blogs are the type of people who think that the Clintons removed all the Ws from the White House keyboards before vacating. Or they believe that the 911 attacks were a government conspiracy. They’ll believe pretty much anything as long as the information is delivered to them via an anonymous email forward or some ranting lunatic talk show host. These are not smart people, these bloggers. At least that’s what I’ve always believed. And now look at me – blogging away like a crazy person.

Journaling on the Caring Bridge website the last three months has kindled a love of writing – for both me and Janell. We enjoy the feedback we get from our friends. I personally enjoy not having to repeat the same anecdote 14 times, and I’m also the type of person who will bore you with the same story on three different occasions. Some of you are nodding your head right now. And let’s face it – neither Janell or I are particularly gifted orators. When conveying a story, I tend to omit important details while mindlessly digressing at a rate which leaves the listeners wondering what in the heck we were talking about. Janell, on the other hand, likes to embellish her stories. Finding the actually story a bit too ordinary, she will not hesitate to stretch a statistic, or enhance a quote, or adorn her retelling with more exciting details, all the while stretching the simplest incident into a tearfully long narrative. Again, many of you are nodding your head right now thinking, you know, Janell does tell long stories. Speaking of which, is this story long enough for you? Hmmmm? The point is that when we want to share something about our daughter, don’t you think my wife and I are better served just writing about it?

That being said, there will probably come a day when we no longer use Caring Bridge. It served its purpose flawlessly. Friends and family were “kept in the loop” while Janell was on bed rest and while she and Audrey were in the hospital. But the mission statement for Caring Bridge tells us that it connects “loved ones during critical illness, treatment, and recovery. I guess you could say we are in recovery, so Janell will still post updates, but I’m no longer comfortable using the site as a sounding board for a first time father. So this page, errrr blog, will serve as our outlet in the future .Now have I justified the existence of this blog yet? Huh? Can we move on? Alright, I thought so. Here we go.

Today marks the Audrey’s six-week birthday. Six weeks!? Oh, where has the time gone? It seems like just yesterday we were waking up every two hours to appease your insatiable hunger and stumbling around like zombies with warm bottles of formula, wondering if we could possible squeeze in an extra hour before the next feeding. Actually, that was yesterday.

Ands here’s something I was tossing about inside my mind last night at 3 am: Our daughter is perfect. I’m serious. Think about it. She just turned six weeks old and she’s never spoken a cross word about anyone. She’s never been jealous, covetous, prideful, or hateful. She’s never gossiped. Never told a lie. She’s never attempted to realign congressional districts in an effort to suppress minority voter turnout. Daddy is SO proud. When’s the last time you went six weeks without doing something you regretted or for which you needed to apologize? My record is like 11 minutes. In fact, I have a feeling I’ll be apologizing to my wife for parts of this posting very soon.

Oh well. I’m a blogger now. I get to speak my mind, stupid as I may be.