Chez le pédiatre (at the pediatrician’s)

Before I launch into the theme of this post, I'd like to thank fellow bloggers and family for their kind words of encouragement. I know I complain a lot. Thanks for putting up with it again.

They say when a baby is born, so is a mom. I’d add to that that as a baby grows, her mom does too. I saw how much we’ve both changed again when I took Juliette to the pediatrician this week for her check-up. This time I noticed that she looked around more and interacted a little with the other children. As my own mom says, she seemed to recognize those small faces and big eyes around her as the same “species” and babbled a bit. A fifteen-month-old babbled back at her as he scooted by on a little plastic car. It’s hard for me to believe that in five months (or less), Juliette could be walking unsteadily and that I’ll be holding her hand and making sure she doesn’t bump into things.

At every visit the pediatrician takes her weight and length, of course, but that’s certainly not the only way to measure her/our progress. At three weeks she was a tiny red-faced creature and I was worried about her getting hungry during our visit and me having to nurse in the doctor’s office. I was also peeved that this outing might prevent meant from napping as, of course, she fell asleep on the stroller-ride there but I had to stay awake to talk with the doctor. My questions then were about how to get her to nurse “properly”, how often to do it, and was she eating enough. Nine months later, she and I are old pros at this doctor thing.

This time she didn’t cry right away upon seeing her bearded doctor. My own heart nearly skipped a beat when he seemed to be spending more time than usual listening to her with the stethoscope. But all seemed ok. He asked me if she recognized her own name, and I had to say I wasn’t sure as I seem to still call her “baby” quite a lot. No, not all the time! Does she point to things? Well, she gives us her toys. That seemed to be a satisfactory answer for him. Then I went through my list of questions, about the next car seat to buy, which milk she can use when we’re in America. If it’s normal that she still has no teeth at ten months. I held her in my lap and tried to jot down his answers while preventing her from playing with the pen. Now I’m at ease holding this squirming little body, whereas before I worried about the right way to carry her.

As he’d forgotten to note something on the prescription we stayed in the waiting room after the visit. I gave her her morning bottle, something she wouldn’t take from me until about the age of six months. A curly-headed girl who must have been about three looked longingly at the bottle and her mom reminded her she had one at home, but not as “modern” as mine. I see another mom with reddish hair and a ruddy complexion giving her pink-clad toddler kisses on her head. I don’t have to tell her that my baby is like a (soft) drug to me. Having her warmth next to me can calm me more than modern medication. I can’t help but stroke her silky little head and give her exaggerated noisy kisses in the folds of her neck. And I don’t have to tell that other mom that the mere idea of something happening to my little one brings tears to my eyes. She no doubt feels the same way.

The doctor completed the prescription and we headed back home. Our next appointment’s in July, and I can only imagine how we’ll have changed by then.

She's gonna start asking us for a dog

I have a theory that she thinks the dog is real. This is about the same reaction she has with Chat-chat.

Your new favorite song

Ok, so no matter what key you hit it plays the notes in order, but, hey, she couldn't do that a few months ago. You can thank me later for getting "It's a Small World" stuck in your head.

Misery loves company

We had a three-day weekend last week (the second of many this month), but two of those days were spent at the in-laws’. Not working but being present as otherwise Juliette and I wouldn’t see Remi at all this month of May. Spring is the “saison noire”, or black season, for us as Remi’s business is all-consuming. But I stood my ground to stay home Saturday for a bit of housecleaning (what fun!) and to go and visit my Latvian friend.

There are a series of coincidences that connect this girl and me together. We were born just a few days apart (albeit on different continents). We met in 2002 while both doing our training programs in France. I stayed on because of Remi. She went back to Latvia. But then she met a Frenchman who was in her country on business and voilà, she’s back in France living about an hour away from me.

So armed with her basic directions and my GPS, I strapped baby into her car seat and off we went under a hazy blue sky. At first I tried to follow my friend’s directions but the GPS kept telling me otherwise. Finally doubt overcame me and I caved into the GPS’s commands. And as baby nodded off to sleep I drove through little villages with white-stone houses, places that would be perfectly lovely if not so far from jobs and shops. I maneuvered winding roads lined by those brilliant yellow-green oilseed rape plants and cows grazing on steep farmland. That new Franz Ferdinand song was cackling on the radio (Murphy’s Law: when a good song finally comes on, the station is too faint). I was enjoying my little adventure and realizing a solo ride in the French countryside would have been unthinkable three years ago (sans French driving license).

After about 50 minutes of non-stop driving, I arrived at my friend’s house. She made us lunch and we caught up with each other while half-watching a make-over show on TV. Anyway, she’s about in the same situation as me, unstable job-wise and far from her family and old friends. It all started making me wonder (again) if I’ll ever consider France as a home in the cozy, warm sense of the word. Dealing with limited job prospects and homesickness is really getting to me. If I don’t stop frowning my face is gonna stick this way (your parents weren’t making that up).

I think I’m at a turning point where I could become the unhappy foreigner or I could try and make the best of things. But how? I’ve vowed so many times to turn things around that I should be dizzy by now.

But back to the title of this post. Reaching out to others in the same situation could help a bit. Maybe some kind of virtual or real Expat Wives’ and Girlfriends’ Club. I came across this website once, perhaps it’s a start. They even talk about expat writing. The truth of the matter is, living in a foreign country is not always the daydream it might have seemed during high school French class (or in my case, German). But maybe with a little help from my friends, I can carve out my own little world.

Babble girl

We've noticed she's really been putting sounds together lately. More like baby sentences. If anyone knows what she's saying, please let us know. And of course she's discovered how to shake her head. But does she know what it means yet? Funnily, when I showed her this video she started smiling and making soft sounds and she shook her head again!

Ode to spring- part deux

Before I forget and it's already summer or something, here are some more pictures to get you in the spring spirit. I agree with Crystal that the sun and warmer temperatures do make me feel a lot better (though they don't work miracles!). I think I'll sign up for that light therapy come November. Anyway, here's a glimpse of a field of oilseed rape plants (what's used to make canola oil) coming into bloom.



Then the same place where all the jonquils were blooming before was covered with wild hyacinths a few weeks ago.



Have a blue sky day!

Bébé et son jardin secret

The other day I made it my mission to make my baby laugh. Apparently I’m just not as funny as the sitter and the kids there. I’ve caught her belly laughing with them as I come to pick her up. With my husband and me her laughs seem caught in her throat, difficult to release. Or is she just giving us the equivalent of a baby chuckle to say, yeah, guys, that’s funny, but what I really like is when the other kids play with my feet. Even those famous raspberries you do on babies’ tummies just leave a puzzled look on her cherubic face. What am I doing wrong? Remi says it’s because I’m not a big smiler/laugher myself.

When I see her interact with the other kids, I realize she’s already got her own “jardin secret” or secret garden. That place she knows and enjoys and that mom and dad don’t invade. At nine months?! She even seems to have a boyfriend. Ugo, the nearly two-year-old, who has virtually no hair, is apparently wild about her and talks all about “JuJu” (her nickname at the sitter’s) when he’s at home. Tata Marie gets all the kids to say hello to each other when they arrive. Sometimes they touch each other’s cheeks. And it’s true that Ugo sometimes goes into a slurred repetition of “ZJuZJu” when she arrives.

I realized pretty early on that this little creature we’ve been given is programmed to grow. She won’t stay tiny that long. Already I see her little body lengthening, becoming more child than baby. We don’t own our children. That’s what they said in the pre-baptism meeting. We never do. We’re just meant to take care of them the best we can. And hopefully they’ll like us enough to hang around with us when we’re even older and more boring than now.