Baby Nicknames

Nicknames are funny things - unless you purposely plan them, they can show up at random and really surprise you.

Take our cats, for example. We didn't plan this, but all three of my cats ended up with animal nicknames. They may have had given names, but what they were actually called were "Cow," "Pig," and "Weasel." As a conglomerative group, they were referred to as "The Weasels." Weird.

Imagine my surprise, though, when the same thing happened to our first-born. We spent months deciding on his name, but within a week or two of his birth he had been re-christened "Bug" - as in "he's cute as a bug." And he stayed "Bug" for the first 2-3 years of his life!

So when this baby rolled around, I fully expected another animal nickname to show up - I really did. But what nickname has evolved?

"Chubs."

Yes, seriously! Chubs, alternately "Chubby Wubby." Alternate forms: Porkchop, Morsel, Cutlet. Now obviously, these are names which will not and cannot stay around longterm! For obvious reasons. But I think the reason they've cropped up is simply because it is so wonderful to have a properly chubby baby! I never knew how delightful baby plumpness could be!

The difference, I think, is that while both of our babies had nursing problems, baby #2's problems were discovered within a week or so of birth, and corrected - while baby #1's problems were not diagnosed until over two months post-birth - at which time our plain-spoken pediatrician bounced into the exam room and said "What on earth have you been doing to this child; he looks awful!"

Of course, we were rather shocked - being around baby all the time, we hadn't noticed that he really had grown skeletal - looking back at pictures at the time, he was quite emaciated. But we just didn't notice on a day-to-day basis. Anyhow, we got our nursing problems corrected and went from there, but he never really developed into a properly plump baby.

Our current baby, however, has! He's not really plump by baby standards, but in comparison with our first, he's quite chubby. And it's absolutely lovely. I spend most of my time with him just admiring his chubby little cheeks and legs. Delightful!!

Moving on....

This will be short, because I have a few minutes of FREE TIME (cue Hallelujah Chorus)... Hubby and son are at church, and baby is sleeping. It won't last, and I have a HUGE to-do list to work on and mess to clean up, so I don't want to waste time. But I wanted to check in!

Our first week at our (presumed) new church last week wasn't as bad as I anticipated - because the worst had really happened, I didn't have to dread it any more. It really reminded me of the time when I started noticing a ballet-caused foot problem, which had originally necessitated rather painful surgery, re-manifesting itself. I dreaded needing surgery again.... and dreaded it... and dreaded it.... and when I finally heard the doctor say, "Yes, this needs surgery again," I was giddy with relief - because the shoe had fallen and I didn't have to keep dreading it. That's what it felt like. I still haven't sent our goodbye email to our dear church family, but I will hopefully get to it this week - and I know that a growing number are finding out anyway through the church grapevine!

This has been an odd week. My poor husband has been dealing with some really, really ugly work politics. I won't post much on it, but.... If I did, you would laugh at the triviality of the complaints being made against him. The fun continues tomorrow morning, and we know it's probably going to get worse before it gets better - prayer would be appreciated.

Baby is murmuring - let's hope that's temporary! I'll check in again soon (I hope!). Love to all!