Holy busy, Batman!

As you can tell from the frequency of our posts, and especially by the frequency of Mark's posts, we're both back at work now. Life has gotten even more crazy very quickly; we didn't think that was possible after the last couple months! Mark has been in his first couple weeks of his intern year orientation, which have actually been treating him pretty well, hours-wise. They've been going through the basic stuff like tours and benefit information, etc. Sort of boring, but necessary for starting his next three years of work. He officially starts next week, July 1st, and will be starting on his first of 6 hard months of the year, inpatient family medicine. His average hours per week will be between 60 and 70, with around 3-7 overnight calls at the hospital per month. Yuck. His commute has turned out to be not as bad as we thought it would be; it's been between 25 and 40 minutes on the average (not including a really bad hour and a half during a foray onto a construction area). Commutes in general still stink, but I'm so thankful he's allowing me to be closer to work, as that transition has been pretty tough on me as well. Because I'm so close, I've been able to run home for around 30 minutes during lunch to pump and hold the babe for a few minutes before I have to head back. I'm really glad I can do this, as it's hard to go from being with Dane every hour of every day for the last three months to being away from him for 8ish hours a day all week. Dane is in the very capable care of my mom, who has been enjoying being able to bond with our little dude. We're so lucky to have our moms here to watch him, since one of the hardest things about going back to work would have been not knowing if he was in loving, knowledgeable care during the day.

While he's still not doing a super-consistent job of sleeping, he is getting better, and most nights, we can get a block of five hours of sleep. Still not enough to be functioning on our highest level, but better than the 2 or 3 we'd been getting for the last couple months. He's still really struggling with gas, sobbing uncontrollably for about two hours between each feeding. It's definitely stretching our sanity. It's still incredibly difficult to know that there's sometimes just nothing to do for him. Tonight, in desperation, we made a heating pad out of a sock and some barley, with only moderately beneficial results. One more solution down...huh...what now?

We also went to Mark's residency department picnic Wednesday afternoon. It was great to meet the folks who he'll be spending so much time with for the next three years. We had hoped to bring the Daner-bear, but because it was near 100 degrees and humid, we decided it was better to leave him at home until the weather turned more newborn friendly. Work for me has started with a vengeance, as I'm working on a book tour for NASCAR celebrity Joe Gibbs. His marketing manager with Tyndale is on vacation for a couple weeks, so I'll be coordinating the details of his signings. It's a fun project, but one that's forcing me to get up to speed very quickly. I'm also working on the marketing for a book called Letters to Darcy. It's about a high-risk pregnancy that ultimately ends in the birth and then death of a Trisomy 18 baby girl. The theme of sanctity of life is really brought out, so we'll be working with a number of pro-life organizations to spread the word. It was a hard book to read, as it consisted of a mom's letters to her unborn baby, knowing that she would likely never make it past a few days old. Darcy ended up living to be 11 days old, and the book is a powerful story about respect for life, no matter how short. Check out www.darcyanne.weebly.com to see pictures and learn more about the story. While it was hard to read now, I'm super glad I wasn't reading it while pregnant, as it opens a whole new door of worry about what could go wrong...it was very inspiring though.

Anyway, I've just added a bunch of the latest pictures below. We had one of Mark's swimmer buddies visiting from Boston, Dustin, and he was able to lull Dane during his nightly crabby time, so we suggested he visit more often :) We also painted the living room, which Dane was very unhappy to help me with, and then headed down to the Wheaton Band Shell to listen to a Kids' Night concert. Dane made it through about 20 minutes, and then let us know it was time to head home. I found that Dane likes laundry day because he got to snuggle into the warm laundry until I needed to fold it. It was good for an hour of quiet! Dane will suck on just about anything put near his mouth when hungry, as evidenced by his enjoyment of Mark's nose. The other photos are just random ones from the last week or so. Enjoy!


Grandma Moyer holding Dane after a feeding. Also, we painted a couple of walls in the living room. Like the pattern?






The three of us at Wheaton's Concerts in the Park.








Notice that Dane's arms are still not quite long enough to have his hands touch above his head... I guess that's what having a head in the 50th percentile and a height in the 15th percentile gets you...