Magic tea

So, I hold a lot of babies. Babies like me, more importantly, they sleep for me. After a couple of 8-hour screaming fits as the colic afflicted small child demands that her parents DO SOMETHING about this misery, what they do is burst into tears and call me. Over the 30 years since I had my own first colicky baby I have learned some things about colic that seem to have been skipped in both medical school and parenting guides. The most important one is that it IS NOT YOUR FAULT! Some babies never get colicky, some seem to be born with it. For some it lasts a few days, others have colic episodes for months. Colic seems to be an all purpose description for seriously painful gastric distress. When my oldest was born the pediatrician prescribed a 'wonder drug' called paragoric. When I asked the pharmacist what was in it I nearly fainted when he explained that it was opiates dissolved in alcohol. And I promptly went home and measured out some peppermint schnaps into warm water until I had reached the concentration of the medication, gave it to my son, and relaxed when he did. The old wives cure really works! Since then I have used the same method many times, but I really prefer the much gentler and non-alcoholic magic colic tea. It is very simple to make: Take two organic peppermint tea bags and two organic chamomile tea bags, place them in a quart mason jar, fill with boiling water, put the lid on and let sit until room temperature, then refrigerate until needed. To use, place 2 to 4 oz. in  bottle, warm by placing in a container of hot water, add 1tsp of REAL SUGAR for each 4 oz, shake until dissolved. DO NOT SKIP THE SUGAR! For infants, sugar is an actual, used by doctors, painkiller. Go ahead and use organic. NO HONEY! Honey is bad! Frequently contains botulin in concentrattions too low to harm adults and older children but very bad for infants. Magic tea really works. It doesn't replace thorough burping, or avoiding gas inducing food while nursing, but it really works on the twisting writhing screaming tummy pains. It works for older children and adults too! The newest baby, the magical Ellibean, swears by it, and her physical therapist took the recipe and posted it for all her patients and their parents. Just a little Nin madic.

I am Nin

Hi! My name is Nin. 12 years ago dear friends of mine had twins, hereafter collectively referred to as 'the blondes' 'the smalls" or sometimes 'the  small blondes'. Not yet having grandchildren and past the age of having new babies I spent (spend) a lot of time with the blondes. And I became Nin 'cause Aunt Helen was too hard for them to say when they started to talk. Over time the conversations and activities and comfort and advice accumulated, and the smaller blonde changed Nin from nickname to job description. And then, rapidly, nin-ning, nin-ness, nin-like and ninly entered the household vocabulary. To nin has become an active verb. It means to care for, to support, to champion, to challenge, to clean up body wastes, to hold for shots, to hug, to buy books and art supplies, to tell unpleasant and inconvenient truths, to cuddle, to listen, to be practical about the absurd. Everybody needs to be ninned occasionally. You can nin and be ninned. To be the person that cleans the kitchen and bathroom while other people hold the new baby is to be ninly. To wrap a ream of paper and the most complete collection of crayons on the market up as a 'sorry you are sick' is to be nin-like. Nin-ness is contagious, you can catch it by hanging around Nin and the ninned. and because she asked me to I will try to write down the stuff that happened and happens to Nins' kids for the smaller blonde. Names, dates and small details changed to protect the innocent, the guilty, and the embarrassed.