A New Car!

This morning was kind of a crappy morning. It started with me buying a new car. I hate buying a new car. It's extra annoying because it's the fourth new car we've bought in the past two years.



The Wombats, in an inadvertent effort to make us spend all of our money on them, have necessitated the purchase of an additional car since their car seats only barely fit in our other car and that leaves no room for the assorted paraphernalia that comes with a pair of babies.

After picking up the car, in the pouring rain, I did not have enough time to set up the car seats so we needed to take the old car to the second consecutive daily doctor's appointment. This was Jen's (and the babies') postpartum check up.





The guys were particularly annoyed by this because I'm pretty sure they were thinking, "Didn't we just do this yesterday? What is the point of weighing us again. Don't you know we hate it?"

I've found that most of parenthood, so far, is doing what you think is right for your babies even though they hate every minute of it. The sad part is that they won't even remember any of this? What's the point of torturing your children if they won't even remember any of it?



After a traumatic (more so for us than them) mid-afternoon feeding where we managed to get them back on the schedule and asleep. This left me to make dinner. I used up some of the New Jersey beefsteak tomatoes with olives, red onion, lemon, olive oil, greens, and Marcona almonds.



Then I browned some beef in a pan, tossed in a jar of prepared tomato sauce (Rao's), and some ricotta cheese. I added some cooked spaghetti and topped it with fresh basil and grated Parmigiano-Reggiano.

It's one of the laziest dinners I am capable of conjuring up. Luckily it is filling and delicious.



For drink I poured this Verloren from Samuel Adams. It is a version of a German style of beer called Gose which is brewed with coriander and salt. The salt definitely gave it an interesting flavor. This is probably not the number one accompaniment to a spaghetti dinner but I enjoyed it nonetheless.

After dinner we should have gone directly to sleep. After all, they always tell you to sleep when the baby sleeps. However, it is demoralizing to not get a second's rest and just go directly to sleep.

Instead we drank tea, watched Sherlock and ate shortbread cookies.

Fun now. We'll pay for it later.

Shot in the Arm (or Leg)

Today we took the babies to the pediatrician for the first time. It had been a full 48 hours since they'd been in the hospital so there was really not telling what sort of things could have gone wrong.

Aside from being a big break in their normal routine it was pretty much without incident.



That is until the doctor gave them their very first shots. Here they are, legs out and ready to receive them. This was probably not among the top five things that has happened to them in their very short life. They cried for about a minute after the shot.

Mommy and Daddy cried for about ten minutes.



Since I got no sleep last night I took a sizable nap this afternoon then got to work on dinner. I started off by pouring Jen and her mum some rose and allowing them to snuggle and feed the babies. I got to work on this Exit 8 from Flying Fish Brewing Company. This is another in their series where they have a beer for every exit on the New Jersey Turnpike. I had their Exit 3 a little over three years ago. In that blog entry I talked about pacing myself and I think I did a pretty good job by waiting three years until trying another.

It was a fantastic brown ale and I would highly recommend to any lovers of the style.



I made another New Jersey themed dish with some New Jersey beefsteak tomatoes, Lioni mozzarella, basil, olive oil, salt, and pepper. This is one of Jen's favorite summer salads.



I also made a slaw with the Chinese cabbage from the farm along with red onion, farm dill, carrot, whole grain mustard, mayonnaise, hot sauce, and the remainder of the sauce from the zucchini fritters the other night.

Jen told me that the reheated fritters with the sauce tasted like McDonald's hamburgers. She thought I would be offended but I was actually quite complimented. They wouldn't have sold so many if they weren't delicious.

Also, she was absolutely right.





I roasted some potatoes in the oven then threw in a chicken after about 30 minutes above the potatoes on a wire rack to let the juices drip down and cook with the potatoes. It was pretty tasty though nowhere near as delicious as that Cob Cob chicken we had for Passover. Unfortunately that ruined us on all other chicken for the rest of time.



For dessert I chopped up some of the farm peaches and served them up with Longford's ice cream, farm currants, and balsamic glaze.





After dinner we had a good round of wombat wrangling which involved snuggling, feeding, changing diapers that would shock you to your very core, and putting them down for bed.



As I changed them I was reminded of the beginning of their day which they have long since forgotten but which still makes me cringe.

It's like they put on the Peanuts Band Aid just to make it seem even more cruel and unusual.

Not cool, Modern Pediatrics! Not cool!

Hats Off To Babies!

Last night went surprisingly well. We were awoken a few times by the Wombats but most of my lack of sleep was from the obsessive need to check on the guys to make sure they were still breathing. Occasionally I would poke at one of them if I thought they were too still which would result in them waking up and being annoyed with me.

I bet that didn't happen to them in the NICU.

When we woke up for the final time this morning Elliott's hat had migrated off of his head and was completely covering every inch of his face. This gave me a panic attack but it turns out he was okay!

I will never put a hat on either of them before bed again.



There was no more putting it off, I had to go grocery shopping today. Mostly just to buy foods to keep me, Jen, and her mother alive so that we could keep the guys alive. While I shopped, Jen and Grandma watched the boys while Jen explained the finer points of the Tour de France to Jen's mum.



I found some really nice cod at the fishmonger and I used the leftover zucchini fritter mix from last night to make a crust. This is a pretty old trick from just about any time I make potato pancakes. It uses up the batter nicely and is great match for cod.

I also sauteed up some farm spinach with garlic, as well as the remaining zucchini, and served it up in a tomato reduction. This is an old standard from my restaurant days but it just never gets old when there is leftover pancake mixture of some sort.



This rose was recommended to me a while back when I asked for a recommendation for Jen. I had planned on having a nice bottle ready for her when she could finally have some wine. This 2011 rose from Chateau Vignelaure was fantastic. I only had a sip but it was great for a nice hot day in the comfort of your air conditioned apartment when you know it was 96 degrees outside.



For me, I chose this Hopzilla from Terrapin Beer Company. This was a 10.3% ABV double IPA and a fine accompaniment to this seafood dinner. I was wildly impressed with this. It had a nice full body and did not taste nearly as alcoholic as it was. It was also a great prelude to baby bath time!



Mommy washed Elliott tonight, paying extra attention to his hair. Both the guys were starting to get a little rank so it was high time we bathed them.



Before Jen took care of Elliott I gave Martin his sponge bath. Here's the one picture of the batch where he doesn't look like he is thinking up ways that he will one day repay me with murder.



And, after one full day at home, the hamper is just about full. At the moment Martin is going through clothes at a bout a five-to-one ration over Elliott. Now that I'm fastening their diapers so tightly that they are pretty much airtight this should be a problem of the past.

With Elliott doing his best to take himself off our feeding schedule it's going to be an interesting night.

At least there'll be no hats to scare the crap out of me in the morning.

Homecoming

Today was the day we've been waiting for. The Wombats came home from the hospital. After nine days in the NICU the doctors gave htem both the green light to leave the care of their well-trained nurses and return home with their incompetent parents.



It was sad to bid adieu to the amazing staff at the hospital who not only took care of our babies but taught us a tremendous amount over the past nine days. I can't even imagine how parents leave the hospital with a baby that doesn't go to the NICU. How do they know anything? How do their babies even make it through the first night?



It was a bit difficult getting them into their car seats for the first time. I'm pretty sure they both will now hate me for the rest of their lives after the ordeal.



The only thing that may make them hate me more is when I wrestled them into the going home outfits that Jen had bought for them. When she wasn't paying attention I whispered into their ears that it was their mommy's decision and that I supported dressing them in nothing but old potato sacks lined with used socks.

It didn't work. They still hate me.



Aunt Lauren, unfortunately, had to fly back home after their first full day with us. This left Jen and I with the babies, unattended, for nearly three hours. This was some pretty scary stuff so I left after about an hour to go to the car dealership and finalize the purchase of our new car. This could be viewed as an escape except that I think I'd rather change one hundred poopy diapers than spend even ten minutes going through financing options.

I felt weird about calling them 'poopy diapers' until I spent so much time with the doctors and nurses in the NICU. They threw around the term 'poopy diapers' constantly. At first it was a little worrying. It would be like if your mechanic told you that the problem with your car was that the 'whatsit went boom boom.'



After our few hours of scary alone time with the babies Grandma arrived and we could breath a sigh of relief. It had been nearly ten hours and so far the babies still seemed to be doing okay.



We didn't really have much in the way of food. I haven't gone grocery shopping in about a week and I was left to make do only with what the farm share had to offer.

I made these zucchini fritters by julienning some zucchini, potato, and red onion. I tossed it together with some lemon juice, olive oil, salt, pepper, hot sauce, flour, parsley, green onion, and dill. After it sat for a bit I fried them up in some olive oil and butter.

I made a little sauce out of mayonnaise, whole grain mustard, relish, and hot sauce. As I previously stated, there was not much in the fridge.



And, finally, I had this Trippel from Green Flash Brewing Co. I figure this may be my last opportunity to savor a really nice beer in a while. I could be wrong but I don't think I am. Things are about to get very different and the opportunity I have to slowly sip a beer may begin to dwindle. As long as my mother-in-law is here I will try to enjoy a beer here and there.

Or maybe I'll just do it at 3:00 AM while I'm feeding the babies.

The REAL True Honest-to-Goodness Last Last Supper (Probably)

We returned to the NICU yet again this morning. We could have taken the boys home but the nurse said she recommended that we leave them for just one more day so they could work on their eating a little bit more. While Martin is being a bit of a pig Elliott gets very tired still and could use the benefit of five or six more hospital feedings. The nurses have better tricks than we do for feeding them.

Martin has been a bundle of writhing energy these past two days while Elliott has been pretty sleepy. It's the complete opposite of a week ago.

After a good visit this afternoon we reluctantly left the hospital and returned home where I spent the rest of the afternoon haggling with car dealerships to try to get a new car that will actually fit our car seats.



After that we ran out ot get the farm share. This week we got two pounds of summer squash, two cucumbers, a head of Early Jersey Wakefield cabbage, a head of red leaf lettuce, a bunch of parsley, a bunch of summer spinach, leeks, dill, a basket of sugar plums, a basket of peaches, a basket of blueberries, and a basket of apricots.





I started out tonight by grilling up the Romaine from last week and serving it two ways. For Lauren I served it with grilled leeks and creamy cucumber dressing. For Jen and I we had ours with grilled leeks, Caesar dressing, anchovies, and bacon.



I also sliced up the cucumbers from today's share and served them with a little red onion, green onion, salt, pepper, yogurt, and honey.



For a main course I made the unusual choice to make a soup. I browned garlic and onion in a little butter and olive oil. Then I tossed in potato, summer squash, chopped escarole, garbanzo beans, tomato puree, Berbere, and water. I simmered it for a while and we enjoyed another outdoor hot soup of the summer. Maybe our last summer soup for a while. Almost certainly our last outdoor meal for a while.



I enjoyed a Partly Sunny from Ithaca Beer Company along with what may be our last outdoor meal in a while.

After eating we went over to Longford's for some ice cream and came home to a screening of Back to the Future III. Well, we just watched it, really. I just call it a "screening" because I like to practice being an asshole.

If things go as planned (which so far they have not) the guys will be returning home with us tomorrow morning. Finally we will be able to have them in our home. This will be a little weird. At the moment it has just seemed like an odd experiment whereby some people let us go visit, feed, and change some babies daily in a hospital as some sort of experiment. Tomorrow things will get very real.

It's the only thing that makes me feel a little less confident about our hospital. What kind of doctors and nurses just let a pair of incompetent fools like us take some babies home to live with us for the better part of twenty years.

It just seems medically irresponsible.