Weekly review: Week ending June 24, 2016

Posted: - Modified: | review, weekly

When I look back, I can see how this week turned out to be a pretty big week. I knew it had a couple of big medical things going in, but I was pleasantly surprised at how the week also managed to accommodate lots of socializing, lots of learning, and good progress at work.

We joined W-'s family for a Father's Day celebration at his brother's place, bringing the two chickens that W- cooked over the rotisserie. I called my parents to wish them a happy Father's Day too, and A- obliged with plenty of smiles for her grandparents and a family friend. After we were settled back in at home, W- decided to rotisserie another two chickens, which served us well through the rest of the week.

Having that food in the fridge turned out to be super handy, since it freed us up to focus on other things. Jen and E- visited us for dinner, a super casual affair involving sitting on the floor, spooning the babies solids, and grabbing whatever bites we could in between. Jen brought salad greens and mint from her garden, yum! Reading the Facebook-based parental support group for people with A-'s condition paid off in an amazingly coincidental connection: another Jen's daughter A* has left-eye microphthalmia and is only a few days older than A-. We've been exchanging notes, since we're basically seeing the same specialists. It's so nice to know someone who's going on a similar adventure. I'm looking forward to meeting them in person. I met up with a friend and his son from my grad school days, too. It was fun chatting with him about parenting and life.

A- had a very big day on Friday. We took her to Sick Kids for general anaesthesia so that the ocularist could take an impression of her eye. Sjhe was okay with the 4-hour pre-operative fast, only getting a little fussy near the end. It was much harder to console her in the post-operation recovery room, though. She was too upset to nurse. Skin-to-skin contact didn't help, and there wasn't much room to rock or walk since she had to be tethered to the monitors. Tylenol was taking a while to kick in. Man oh man, the time dilation effect of a crying baby is definitely something. W- swaddled her, and that calmed her enough to nap a little. When she woke up, she still wasn't keen on nursing, but she was open to being fed some breastmilk via eyedropper. (Good thing I packed that!) Then she napped some more, and then we were given the all-clear to go.

It's a good thing W- was there. It was great to be able to swap off: one person in the thick of things, another person thinking of the next trick to try. Having backup also made things a lot more comfortable, as the pre-op and post-op rooms were both no-food-no-drink areas. One of us could step outside for a drink or a snack or a bathroom break without worrying about missing anything.

Anyway, now that the ocularist has that impression, he can make a custom-fit ocular prosthesis for her. We also got an update from the cardiologist: A-'s ventricular septal defect is a little smaller (2.5mm, compared to 2.7mm on May 11), but there's a muscle bundle forming in her right ventricle, so Sick Kids cardiology may have to keep an eye on that for possible surgery. Ah well, that's life.

We've been feeding A- more solids, focusing on calorie-dense food such as sweet potato and avocado. She's still gaining weight slowly, so the next step is probably to cook her food in butter or olive oil in order to add more calories. I've been sewing lots of bandana bibs, and they've definitely been put to good use.

As for ourselves, W- and I have been exploring the world of bun, a savory way to remix sausages and lumpia into a fresh and yummy Vietnamese salad that takes advantage of the basil that's thriving in the planter boxes we have on the deck. We liked this nuoc cham recipe more than the first one we tried. Looking forward to doing this again soon. It would be nice to make it part of our regular rotation.

More ukulele practice playing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, which I can mostly play now. (With chords, even!) Time to learn another nursery song. Might be fun to practise every day. Babies love repetition, and so do learners.

Consulting: Figured out i18n, so it's all systems go for the add-on I'm making for my client. I also did a little web scraping. Hooray for automation skills! =)

Next week: more medical stuff (pediatrician, abdominal ultrasound, Healthy Babies Healthy Children). Onward!

2016-06-26b Week ending 2016-06-24 -- index card #journal #weekly output

Blog posts

Sketches

Focus areas and time review

  • Business (4.1h – 2%)
    • Earn (3.7h – 90% of Business)
      • ☐ Earn: E1: 1-2 days of consulting
    • Build (0.3h – 7% of Business)
      • ☑ Doublecheck business preauthorized debit
    • Connect (0.1h – 2% of Business)
  • Relationships (7.7h – 4%)
    • ☑ Research RV muscle bundles
    • ☑ Buy tripod mount for GoPro
    • ☑ General anaesthesia
    • ☑ Research high chairs
    • ☐ Book appointments with ocularist
    • ☐ Book 6-month follow-up with eye clinic
  • Discretionary – Productive (10.8h – 6%)
    • Drawing (3.5h)
    • Emacs (0.6h)
    • Coding (0.0h)
    • Sewing (2.5h)
    • Writing (0.0h)
  • Discretionary – Play (3.6h – 2%)
  • Personal routines (17.3h – 10%)
  • Unpaid work (67.3h – 40%)
    • Childcare (61.0h – 36% of total)
  • Sleep (57.2h – 34% – average of 8.2 per day)

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