Grandparent visit (or, How my mom tried to kill my dog)

So, after a pretty calm and uneventful June in which one day was pretty much running into the next, July has been an absolute whirlwind.  My parents arrived for a two week visit in the early part of the month, and although my mom had been here shortly after Q's birth it marked the first time my dad was meeting his only grandson.  In addition to lots of baby play time (and mommy rest time!) we were out and about quite a bit.  If anyone is interested, I can now give quite a fulsome review of nursing rooms in a number of malls throughout the greater Toronto area.  We even took Q to the Pan Am Games to see some beach volleyball!

Why don't you look like that in a bikini, Mommy?

Despite being dragged from one end of the city to the other, Q was a good sport and only really got upset when we were dumb and pushed his limits a bit by staying out or keeping him in his stroller too long.  Otherwise, he rewarded his east coast grandparents with tons of smiles and seemed to love having someone besides me around to dote on him all day.

Probably the most eventful part of the trip came a day before my folks were scheduled to leave, when M's parents came to town and we all went out for dinner together.  My mother had bought some chocolates as a gift for my sister, and had been warned by me to keep them out of reach of Buddy the beagle's inquiring nose.  She kept them zipped up in her suitcase for the better part of a week, but the night we went out for dinner just happened to be the one night she forgot to zip it up.  We came home to a completely destroyed cardboard box on the living room floor, with one lone chocolate undevoured.  I'm not quite sure what made him leave that single chocolate, but if you've ever eaten a Purdy's Chocolate Hedgehog you will understand how hard it was for me to pick it up and toss it in the garbage and not eat it myself anyway!  They're milk chocolate filled with a delectable chocolate hazelnut filling; basically, it's like Nutella inside a chocolate shell.  Fucking amazing, is what they are.  And I had to take my dog to the vet and watch him be forced to puke it all up in a melty chocolate puddle that (very grotesquely) still smelled really good coming out.  Buddy seemed to think so too, since he made a go at the puke basin on the floor even after being forced to choke down a charcoal solution to stop the chocolate toxin from absorbing into his stomach.  Yes, Purdy's, I think we've got a new advertising campaign for you right here.  "So good you'll want to eat it again the second time around!!"  All joking aside, my mom felt like absolute crap about the whole thing.  I tried to reassure her it was just an accident, and didn't have the heart to tell her that between the emergency Saturday visit, the shot to make Buddy vomit and the charcoal treatment, the entire ordeal ended up costing us almost $400 at the vet.

This story gives me the sads.

In addition to my folks, we've also had a couple of other friends in town that we've managed to get together with for dinner, and there's been some happy news.  I met up with my friend Dee, who since last year has been going through some fertility struggles of her own.  After TTC for about 6 months with no success, she and her husband went to an RE and found out that she had a blocked tube.  She had a procedure to open it, and got pregnant right away the month after.  Sadly, at her 6 week ultrasound she found out the pregnancy wasn't viable, and she miscarried not one but two babies at 9 weeks.  A few more months of no success and more testing revealed her ovarian reserve was on the low end (although nothing as dramatic as full-blown Diminished Ovarian Reserve).  Her RE recommended considering IUI or IVF, but didn't really tell her which he preferred (just that IUI was cheaper but that IVF had better success rates).  She texted me in confusion, and I was able to offer my 2 cents that as long as her ovarian reserve was OK it probably wouldn't nosedive in the few months it would take to try a round or two of IUI before leaping to IVF.  That's what she ended up doing, and last week she took a test which came out positive!  I'm so incredibly happy for her and I love that there is some small benefit to what I went through in that I could give her some advice that helped.  I am hoping so hard that this one sticks for her.  On top of Dee's great news, last night M and I hosted another couple of friends for dinner.  They were so supportive of us when we were going through our DE cycle, so we were shattered when they told us last year that they had gotten pregnant but ended up with no heartbeat at their 12 week ultrasound.  But things have worked out for them too and they are expecting their first little girl in just a few weeks.  All in all, this past week has been the most excited I've been to NOT drink wine with friends outside of my own pregnancy!

Enough about you, I can hear you guys saying.  What about baby Q??  Well, he's hit a few milestones like rolling from tummy to back (mostly accidental) and back to tummy (definitely accidental).  He's also started giggling, which is just too fucking cute I cannot even.  Unfortunately that's mostly something that Daddy gets, because although Mommy is smile-funny she's apparently not ha-ha-funny.  According to his pediatrician he's ahead of the game with his neck and head strength, and she expects us to be chasing him around in no time because this kid WANTS.  TO.  MOVE.  During tummy time he grabs the blanket he's lying on and tries to pull himself forward while doing this little dolphin kick for propulsion, and the rest of the time he just wants to be standing up.  His arms and legs are constantly in motion, which should theoretically be tiring him out but sleep is still a bit of a moving target.  He's still up at least twice during the night to feed, and naps are hit and miss.  Trying to soothe him to sleep when he doesn't want to is like hugging a bag of writhing snakes.  I fully expect it to get worse before it gets better, since the four month sleep regression is looming and we have a family beach vacation coming up where I'm sure his schedule will get screwed despite my best intentions.

Oh well.  Kid's lucky he's cute.

How YOU doin'?