So sad

Today mommy is so sad.  She went to a funeral today.  These things are always sad because it means someone has passed away and they are no longer with us.  That is very sad because who wants to think of a friend or family member not being there anymore??  But this funeral was really sad because it was for a baby – a beautiful little girl that had been born too soon and the odds were just stacked against her.  Her name was Remy Elena and she belonged to my friends Pete and Mary.  Mommy can’t imagine what they must be going through right now – I think if anything happened to you there would be an ache and a hole in my heart that would never heal.  So I know this must be the same for them – and although I know that much, I don’t know what that pain feels like.  When my mommy passed away I was only five years old – not really old enough to understand what death meant and young enough to adapt to a life without her as if that was normal.  But a parent losing a child – it’s a pain that is inconceivable to me and I wish that my friends didn’t have to adapt to a life without their beautiful little girl.  I can only pray that the short time they had with her will have filled their hearts enough that though painful now, that love will help them go on.

I believe I’ve mentioned once before I started this blog as a way to let you know how loved you are by me.  I have this nagging fear in the back of my head that I could die young, like my mother, and you’ll get older and wonder what I thought about you.  I know people think I’m silly for thinking about this – but how can I not when that’s what happened to me?  I needed to do this so you know, you never wonder how much you mean to me and how much you are loved.  You’re my world  – that’s the only way I can describe it – and you really won’t appreciate it until you have kids of your own someday.  So on a day like today, as a mourn for my friends, I am so thankful that I have you and you are healthy and quietly sleeping in your crib as I type this.  I smothered you with a few more kisses then usual (hard to believe really since I normally smother you way too much as it is!) and tomorrow morning I’ll hug you extra hard.  You are my little monkey. Night night Christopher, sleep tight.

 

A Day of Firsts!

What a day we had today little man!  Today was your last day off from school – you’ve been off for over a week.  Mommy decided to take today off from work to watch you since I used up a lot of baby sitting last week with Grandma Angie and Marion.  I was looking forward to a day off during the week anyway – it’s always different then being off on the weekends.  And I figured I’d use it as a chance to book your first dentist appointment since it’s about time I took you in!

But first we started the day with some errands – we had to go to Orvis in Greenvale to pick up daddy’s birthday gift 🙂  That’s right, today was daddy’s birthday!  We got him a gift certificate so he could go back and pick out the fishing rod he wants.  Of course daddy has a bazillion fishing rods but he really needs a bazillion and one.  I really didn’t understand it until today when my friend Tara said,” it’s like a woman and her shoes.”  Then I had an A HA moment and it finally clicked for me.  Then we had to go to Walmart to pick up the drawing table I got for you – we have no idea where we’ll put it but I’ll find a place.  Time to get you playing with crayons and stuff.  Next we went to Tara’s house for lunch and then some playground action with her kids Amy, Johnny, Erin and Julie.  It had been a long time since we’ve seen them so they were so happy we were coming.  And it was like YOU had a birthday today because Johnny is going to give you his Thomas the Train train table and all his trains.  That’s another thing we’ll have no idea where it will go but I’m not passing up getting you that.  Right now you LOVE Thomas.  You point to the TV going choo choo all the time 🙂  We had a lot of fun at the playground.  You got to run around with the kids and go on the slide – they had so much fun with you.

After the park we had to head to the dentist for your first appointment!  I can’t believe I forgot to get a picture of you at the office 😦  Oh well.  You did great – you cried when they were brushing your teeth and poking around in there – but you recovered quickly.  The dentist said your teeth looked great.  Good thing momma got you used to brushing your teeth early.  We don’t have to go back there until November.

Then after that we headed home to get poppa so we could take you for your first haircut.  We were going to Rino’s in Elmont – that’s where daddy got HIS first haircut!  I was nervous about taking you there because I didn’t know Rino was used to cutting kid’s hair – daddy knew but he didn’t tell me.  He thought it was funny that I was nervous.  But once we walked in there and saw the kiddie chair and all the pics on the wall of the hundreds of other kids that had their haircut there, I knew you were in good hands.  I even saw pics of people I knew on the wall.  Rino did a great job and you were soooo good!  You didn’t cry at all.  Rino knew lots of tricks to get you to sit still.

This is pre-haircut.  Rino gave you a lollipop to butter you up.

How Rino got you to sit still while he had the clippers going is beyond me!

All done!  You look so handsome and even more like your daddy 🙂

Then it was off to the diner for dinner!  What a day 🙂

Mid-March Check-In

So things around here have been busy.  Time just seems to be slipping through the hourglass way too fast.  I seriously think some sand is missing and I’m not getting a full hours worth on my time.  Like I’m really only getting 55 minutes to an hour and those missing five minutes add up…to two hours!!!!  Those are two hours I could use cleaning…putting away the laundry…or cooking…or god forbid, sleeping.  I wonder if there is a repair shop around here for hourglasses so I can have mine re-calibrated.

Anywaaaaaaayyyy…..what is really on my mind these days is how fortunate I am and how it’s really important that I remember that!  I have friend’s whose daughter was born at 28 weeks and she’s in the NICU and will be for some time.  I just read a story about a couple in Brooklyn that were each diagnosed with a terminal cancer within days of each other.  They have an 18mos old daughter.  And I am sure there is someone out there with a story that is even worse then that.  So the fact that I wish my house was nicer or cleaner or that my furniture didn’t all look like it came from a garage sale…that isn’t really something to be wallowing about.  I have my health.  My husband has his.   My ridiculously precious son has his.  That. Is. All. That. Matters.

I was gonna make this post a bitch session about our experience with the Ringling Brothers Circus but I’ve just gotten finished reading the story about that couple in Brooklyn and it kind of put things in perspective.

Instead I’ll talk of happier things – like words!  Christopher’s gibberish is really starting to take on the appearance of real words.  Now dada has always been better at interpreting what the little man is saying, but now he’s saying stuff even I can understand!!  For instance, yesterday morning he was watching Sesame Street like he usually does.  I came in to the room to get him in his coat and he started going “Ernuh Ernuh Ernuh”….it took me a minute but then I saw Ernie on the screen and realized that he was saying his name.  I couldn’t believe it.  I’ve been trying to teach him everyone’s names for months and all he’s ever said was “Ehmo”.  He really loves saying “Appa” and walks around saying that all the time.  There are more words but I can’t remember what they are at the moment.

He’s a great mimicker.  He sees my keys, grabs them and heads right to the door to try and fit them in the lock.  He sees a telephone and puts it right to his ear.  He loves his shovel and pushes it all over the house. When he sees me open the hall closet he comes running to try and grab the swiffer to sweep the floor.

He also loves to brush his teeth.  Once I wrap a towel around him to take him out of the bath, he starts sticking his finger in his mouth and pretends to brush his teeth.

He loves to be surprised.  He gets a kick out of me jumping from behind a corner and go “aarrrrrgggghhh” really loud.    You have to see the way he flinches and starts laughing.  I’ll run towards him and then he runs in between my legs to get away from me.  We can play that game forever.

He’s close to 29lbs now.  I don’t know his height but he’s tall enough to reach over the table and grab anything that’s not in the middle of the table.  Every day his reach seems to get a little bit longer!!  And he’s strong as an ox.  Try wrestling something away from him that he really wants to hold!  And he just got over the croup again and yet another ear infection.  Hopefully that will be it for awhile.  We had him home from school for a week and I don’t want to do that again.

He loves school!!  Especially now.  They moved him from the 2nd baby room in to the toddler room.  Before he was the oldest in the room and now he is the youngest, but he is doing so much better in there.  He doesn’t cry anymore when I drop him off – he practically leaps from my arms so he can go play with his friends.  And he might be younger then these kids, but he’s the same size so you’d never know that.  In this new room he gets to do more activities, like finger painting and coloring and playing with blocks.  They’ve been sending him in there for a few hours at a time, and officially he started in there full time this week – but you can see a difference already.  I’d say this environment has really helped with him finding voice to so many new words!

Well I knew that was going to happen…..

Now that the pressure is off on the 365 day project I knew I’d take forever to update this thing.  Whenever I’ve tried keeping a journal I either gave up or I only wrote in it once a month.  Don’t know why I thought this would be different.  Well, actually I do.  I thought since I was doing it for Christopher I’d be more motivated.  I kept a written journal during my pregnancy, kept another written one during his first year, did the baby book, the 1st year calendar and this blog.  I know, seems like overkill right?  But having lost my mother at the age of 5, I know what it’s like to wish I had those things to look back on and see what she was thinking since she’s not here to tell me herself.  Now of course I plan on sticking around for a really long time so it shouldn’t be an issue – but I can’t help myself!  Gonna try to be better about writing this thing.  (and really God – please keep me here for a nice long time please)

Oddly enough the thing I haven’t stopped doing is taking a picture of him everyday.  Even if it’s just him playing in his play yard.  I have loved looking back and seeing how significant the changes are in his growth.  And these days with a digital camera it’s so easy to do!

The latest thing we’re dealing with are night terrors.  I hate it.  The monkey cries almost every night now.  Sometimes he just whimpers a few times and goes back to sleep.  Other times it’s blood curdling cries followed by him sitting up staring in to space.  I can’t tell if he’s awake or not – the books say to leave them alone, they’ll work through it and go back to sleep and not even remember the incident.  I’ve tried to do that – but really how can you????  He won’t stop crying and he tries getting up, but he’s half asleep so he falls into the side of the crib.  It’s so awful.  Of course I pick him up and he stops instantly.  But when I try putting him back down he starts crying again.  The doctor says it’s normal.  She said from her experience kids that grind their teeth or don’t nap enough during the day tend to experience this more.  When I’m holding him I think I can hear him grinding his teeth – but how do you stop that?  I try putting his binky in his mouth but when he’s that upset he just spits it out.  I’d say on the weekend the nap thing could be the issue – but he cries during the week and he gets plenty of nap time at school.  It’s only me that can’t get him to go down….unless I’m driving!   So now I take hour drives to no where when he does that just so he’ll get some sleep.  I thinking gas might be an issue too.  Sometimes I check the monitor before going in his room to see if he’ll settle in – and if he sits up then I go in.  And a lot of the time if it progresses to my picking him up, he’ll be crying, fart, then stop.   I keep telling myself to add the gripe water to his last bottle of the day but I always forget.  The last few nights I haven’t even gotten him in his crib – he’s been stuffy and it makes it hard to breathe so unless I’m cuddled next to him he’d just cry and cry.  But tonite he went down ok and keeping fingers crossed he’ll stay that way until tomorrow a.m……

This is one of the outfits Christopher got for his birthday.  I love it – he’s totally ready for fall 🙂

my friend Susan and I got together so I could do Christmas pics of her daughter Jordan and she’d help me with taking Christopher’s.  Jordan got in on the action and was taking pictures for me – I actually think I’m using one of the pics she took!

I had gone to this park in Garden City with my friend Anita once – it’s near her new house.  While I was out shopping the other day Christopher was a little restless so I figured I’d bring him to the park to burn off some energy.  Of course I didn’t realize the park is only for GC resident’s and their guests…..was hoping the whole time I was there the GC cops or better yet, some insane GC folk weren’t going to demand to see my driver’s license!!

speaking of Anita – monkey wants to thank you for the fridge magnets – he’s been having lots of fun with them.

and I finally got around to hiring my neighbor’s kid Megan to come over and be a mother’s helper.  She played with Christopher while I got some housework done.  Really need to do that more often!

yup – that’s Cap’t Adorable blowing on a duck call….he’s made daddy so proud