Prenatal Class Reunion

Yesterday mostly all the folks from our prenatal class assembled at the home of Jess Dobkin to ogle each other's babies and share the joys and horrors of labour, delivery and new parenthood.

It was actually a lot more fun than it sounds, despite the insufferable heat and humidity.

Tim and I were the second couple to arrive and we chatted a little bit with Jess (who is a new single mom to her daughter Yael, pronounced Yah-elle) and Pam and Ken. People arrived slowly and eventually the room was filled with babies, who really were all remarkably quiet and well-behaved (though I will mention that when the babies started their let's-see-who-can-cry-the-loudest contest, Istra won hands-down--go Istra!).

People drifted from group to group, comparing stories about birth, the challenges of diapering a newborn, and of course the ever-popular topic of sleep. Amy and Jason apparently lucked out as their Tessa (apparently) sleeps around 7 hours straight at night. They were, of course, the envy of every single droopy-eyed person in the room. Their theory is that Tessa is so fat that she can afford to sleep that long at night. She did indeed look quite chubby, but Istra is only one pound behind her and was born two weeks later.

It was interesting to see the slightly older babies, though--Tessa and Max. Max was born at the end of April and he too is quite chubby and looks a lot more "babyish" than the others who look, to me, more like little puppies with their bewildered looking eyes and slightly wrinkly and droopy skin. Max and Tessa both were holding their heads up quite well and also they seemed more able than many of the babies to simply be awake without crying. I will mention though that Istra seems to be increasingly heading in this direction. She sometimes can just lie on the bed or on a blanket and make her little noises and entertain herself somehow for maybe upwards of five or so minutes without crying for someone to come and get her. I know five minutes doesn't seem like very much, but it's better than nothing!

Istra is also smiling a lot more these days, especially during diaper changes which she used to hate. Now she seems to like them and smiles and kicks her legs and occasionally pees all over herself. What fun!

Speaking of diaper changes, Pam taught a few of us a new cloth diaper fold which I have been trying out since yesterday. Pam claims that her "bikini twist" fold keeps everything from leaking out onto the diaper cover. So far so good.

At the end of our little get together we decided that we moms would do something once a week together with our babies. Thursday is our designated day, which is the same day as the two other mom's groups that I've attended--but that's okay because I feel more connected with these people since our babies are all the same age and we're all more or less going through the same stuff at the same time. I'm actually really excited about seeing everyone once a week. This week we're going to the movies. There is a special "Movies for Mommies" event at a few Toronto theatres. It's basically just a showing of recent movies with lowered volume in a setting that welcomes babies so people can't get annoyed with you if your baby makes noise during the show.

It should be fun. I hope I can manage to keep up with this group during the school year. It will be good for Istra to have some little friends to play with when she gets a bit older and wants to play.