Red, White and snot all over

Happy Birthday, USA!
Now for the non-patriotic portion of this program:
This week John was going out of town for two days and one of them was a day when O was supposed to go to the daycare at his work. It has been tres convenient that there is a daycare at John's work...until this week. Anyway, I went, on Monday, to pick Olivia up with him so he could give me a quick tour of what I need to do when I drop Olivia off on Wednesday. Put bottles here, sign in here, put Olivia here...easy enough.
Then I notice that every baby has caked green snot on their noses. Oh goody, just what I am sure I have to look forward to. Now, I did mention that Olivia got a cold last week, but she has been leaking the clear stuff. This was opaque and greenish...what we were supposed to look out for.
Well, not only has her nose been oozing the green opaque stuff for the rest of the week, but she has also been "warm". I actually had to do the rectal thermometer for the first time. (This stuff all seems simple enough when you are practicing on a doll that doesn't move, but when you have a stick like object in your baby's bottom and she insists on squirming....you start to panic...adding to the panic you are already feeling that she has a fever and you'll have to try and get a hold of the pediatrician.)
Luckily she only got up to 99.5 degrees (below the call-your-doctor-100.4). But that is the good news. The bad news is that I was otherwise ill-prepared for a baby with a cold. I had this Johnson's vapor bath stuff to help clear the passages, but that was it. I knew that I could sit in the bathroom with the shower on high heat to steam up the room, but, to my dismay, our water does not get hot enough (I guess I'll be happy when she's older that she can't burn herself on our water) I had to make an emergency trip to Walgreens to get a Vicks vaporizer among other baby cold accoutrement that excludes any kind of medication that they can't have at this age.
Along with the green gunk, comes the inability to breathe well and the inability to eat and sleep well....for everyone involved. I went two nights straight without any sort of deep sleep. I joke that I would confess to anything at this point, but sleep deprivation is practiced as torture. I mean, poor Olivia.
Again, I have to bitch about the nasal aspirator thing. Since babies cannot blow their own noses, we have to suck out the bad stuff. They should sell these things with a head restraint because Olivia is having none of it. Every time I come near her nose, she moves her head from side to side. I am surprised I have not poked her eyes out (knock on wood). I have gotten to ignore the doctor's recommendations of just putting the tip of the aspirator up to her nose, because that does bupkis.
I am finding out the hard way that being a baby nurse is mostly a mother's job. John assembled the vaporizer, but I get the bath and nose-sucking duties. I must have picked the short straw in my sleep....or during the sleep deprivation.
Luckily, though, last night, Olivia slept from 8-5am and then went back to sleep after a morning feed until 8:30am. I get to at least enjoy this holiday with some coherency.
On the happy side of life, Olivia is starting to laugh. Not the belly laughs that really make life worth living, but a laugh nonetheless. She was starting to whine about, I forget what, when I go to her "oh boo hoo". Apparently "boo hoo" sounds funny to her and she just smiled and started laughing. So now, to John's anti-enjoyment, I am saying "boo hoo" with some frequency. The other thing that makes her smile (not quite laugh) is when I say ma-ma. YESSSSSSS!
That's another thing, I sometimes think about the fact that I am a mother. I guess, so far, I have been a mom but just not thinking about it. When you stop to think about it, you really feel strange (good strange, but strange). Like when you stop to think about the fact that you are an adult. You know you have been working, you may be married, you definitely are able to drink adult beverages...but you just feel like you should BE older. I know I have this amazing, beautiful, baby girl, but I just don't always let it sink in that she's mine and I am her ma-ma. WHERE's my kleenex?!