New West Baby

Rock Around the Clock

Symbols have immeasurable power. They can dwarf the message of words in a single blow. Yet they can be small and so efficient that even a high-resolution photograph can’t compete.

The Olympics’ five rings, for example, would take pages to describe (and most recently 40 billion dollars, too!) Superman’s giant S emblazoned on his chest: a symbol that stands alone. The cross: another symbol with magnificent and historic meaning. Symbols infiltrate our lives, just look as you drive (or bike or walk) to work today: a green light, a red hexagon sign at the corner, and if you’re driving again, the yellow flashing indicator next to your gas gage on the dash!

We are surrounded by symbols.

If I were to pick one symbol to represent me, one symbol with the temerity to sum up my life as a new mom, it would be an easy choice: an alarm clock...

The New West Baby

Inheriting the Fishing Gene: Oregon to Montana

In our family, we like to believe that fishing is a genetically inherited trait: the fish gene, or the f-gene, as we call it.

While my four-month-old baby, Charlie, grips my finger, his knuckles white in a deadlock hold that could now probably fight even the biggest Oregon trout, I ponder the biological (or not so biological) phenomenon.

Does the pair of 23 chromosomes, stacked up like the Olympic rowing team, our very own Team DNA, determine everything that our children will become?

I know I have to wait a good 14 years to find out if the fishing gene is apparent in Charlie, but it won’t hurt to look at his chances by tracking the history of this gene in our family.....

The New West Baby

Reaching for Gold: Beijing or Bend?

What does Bend, Oregon have in common with Beijing during the 2008 Summer Olympics?

Well, it’s certainly not the air quality or population, as 225 times more people live in the Chinese city and its accompanying smoggy horizon, a polar opposite to that of Oregon’s pristine high desert air. But, in a stretch this author is willing to make, both Bend and Beijing currently offer the grand challenge of a life-changing experience.

Both places offer, at this very moment, the chance to reach a gold medal. How, you ask?

The New West Baby

Rock-A-Bye, Bend Baby?

Sleep is a precious commodity in our new-baby household. With drooping eyelids, bags under my eyes and scrambled new-mommy brains, I am reminded daily that being a parent, while so wonderfully life changing, is utterly exhausting.

Sleep time for babies is a strange new world for me. According to the American Academy of Pediatrics, babies need lots of sleep. But the method we use to get them to sleep is a widely contested, and highly individualized, topic.

The adventures of traveling with an infant

Following The Baby Trail To Montana

Balance.

It’s a noun, a verb and an adjective. We use it to talk about our time, our meals and our checkbook. It’s everywhere. But most recently in our new-baby household, it’s a concept that is completely missing.

I was reminded of this word as we passed through Terrebonne, Oregon, home of the infamous Smith Rock State Park on another family-inspired Montana vacation. The vertical rocky spires, illustrating centuries’-old wear of water and wind, towered into the early morning blue-chalk horizon. Balancing in the air. A climber’s paradise. Yet any climber attempting to summit these precipices would also need balance- the delicate equilibrium of flexibility, strength, fitness and desire to get to the top.

Breaking Free On The River

Exploring Bend’s Baby Boom Through The Eyes Of A New Mother

Charlie loves being held. He’s no dummy. Who wouldn’t like the unyielding affection and unquestionable adoration from everyone who crosses his path? Really, for the regular non-Hollywood star, when else in our life are we 100-percent certain that most every person we encounter will fall in love with us?

Charlie has no doubts about this. His favorite place is tightly wrapped in someone’s arms, anyone’s arms. As a new mom, I like to believe mine are second-to-none, as my arms are the ones to calm the storm on most every occasion. However, much to my chagrin, Charlie seems to have no preferences. “Any arms’ll do,” he seems to say. “Bring ’em on!”

Here in Bend, there is no shortage.

Part I: Patience

Bend Baby Hurricane: Notes From The Outside

“Ah-boo,” I whisper through a sweet exhale over my four-month-old son, Charlie. He stretches relaxed across my belly for his mid-morning nap. It’s a respite from the chaotic storm of his wakeful hours. His soft breathing, the barely visible rise and fall, reassures me that “Yes, I am still alive, mommy. Don’t hover over me and don’t worry, I can breathe.”

The past four months with a newborn at home has been a whirlwind - no a complete hurricane - of breastfeeding, napping, diaper changing, sleep-walking days and sleep-forgotten nights simply keeping my little boy alive with the basic necessities of living. If these past months were a movie, the soundtrack to this hurricane-inflicted story would be a complete cacophony. It would be ZZ Top and ACDC fighting it out with interludes of Mozart, Jack Johnson and John Denver in between.

I’ve never in my life done more rocking, feeding, changing, cleaning, cooing, soothing, dancing and “Ah-boo”-ing to this tiny creature that seems to need me with no end. It’s sleep-walking. It’s sleep-talking. It’s sleep tick-tocking.