a place for my thoughts

Monday, August 31, 2009

breakfast

I've decided to try to up Abby's food intake a little bit. Not because she is underweight or anything, but because she's growing and I need to remember that her appetite is going to grow too. She has this habit of being happy with what we give her. If I only feed her an ounce of food, she won't really complain about it. So, that kinda makes it hard for us to tell how much food is too little or too much.

Anyway, I'm very excited about giving her more and more real food and trying new things. This morning, in addition to her first tastes of juice - she had these baby breakfast bars I made. Toast, yogurt, and berries.

Aren't they cute? I think they kinda look like cookie monster - but with the colors inverted. ...hmm? You don't see it? Well, all right. They were still yummy.

baby breakfast bars

Dear Aunt Jennifer,

Dear Jennifer,

Thank you for the new books you sent me! I think they are completely awesome. Mom was really excited too. She went on and on about how that word book really is the best word book ever. I tried to prove her wrong, but, nope - it had every word I could think of in it. I was sure that "Xiphias" "disc harrow" or "sandpiper" would be stumpers, but I was wrong.

Thought you might like some action shots

And the star book is pretty cool too. I think that the pictures are really really mesmorizing - like I could just stare at them forever. Usually, though, I just stare at them long enough to make me want to eat them and then mom turns the page before I can devour the pretty colors. But anyway, she said something about how you must really know her because it was like the

perfect book. I think she likes stars, and eric carle, and books, and you. So, perfect!

So, thank you Aunt Jen for the reading material - I promise to study and become a more literate infant because of them. Love you!

~ Abbykat.

Friday, August 28, 2009

ashes, ashes, and we all...

As previously blogged, Abby has been slowly readjusting to her sleep schedule again. Tonight, Kyle offered to put her down so I could work on dinner. I was kinda hoping that she would go down easier for him than for me - then we would have a solution for the tears we get to hear every night as we lay her in the crib.

But, just as with me, she was content and sleepy while in his arms, but as soon as he started to lower her into the crib, she started screaming. So, he tucked her in, shut the door, and we sat and watched the clock. I was hoping that it would last under 30 mins tonight.

So, we're sitting there talking and going about making dinner. Abby is crying. After about 20 mins, I can tell that she is no longer laying on her back tucked in. Her crying is louder - she's obviously on her belly, facing the end of her crib looking at the door. Every once in a while her cries would get muffled as, I'm sure, she rested her head on her mattress. Then, they would get louder as she lifted her head to cry some more. I told this to Kyle - how I could tell that her cries sounded different - louder, closer. I told him I wanted to go in an tuck her in again, but that I knew that it wouldn't help teach her either.

Kyle says that he'd go tuck her in again - he couldn't remember if he pulled up the crib rail or not, so he went to go check on that and tuck her in while he was in there.

So I go to the kitchen to start making the salad for dinner and I hear "Laura!" I asked, "what?" and Kyle says in a rather rushed but urgent tone "she - she's at the door!"

Oh my.

I ran to the nursery, and turned on the hall light so I could see in, and sure enough, there was Abby - on her belly in front of the door - on the floor, crying at us. I scanned her - she didn't appear to be hurt. She was propping her self up on her arms. I picked her up and continued to check her over. I brought her out into the light of the living room and sat on the couch with her. At this point - she was not crying anymore and, honestly, looked quite pleased with herself. She had managed to escape the crib and find us. Mission accomplished.

Kyle wasn't there - he had gone to our room - he was pacing back and forth and tugging at his face saying "I'm so sorry" over and over He. felt. Awful. When he came over to where we are, Abby looked up at him and gave him the biggest smile.

She was fine. Much better off than Kyle was.

I've often wondered if I would panic in just such a situation - when Abby fell from...something. I mean, it's inevitable - kids fall. That crib has never looked so high to me before though . As I rocked her back to sleep, I kept looking at the crib trying to imagine how she fell and how she managed not to hurt herself and how I could not have noticed. I mean, I could tell her cries were louder when she was at the door - but before then, we never noticed a break or a noise in her cries that would have indicated that something was amiss. I kind of surprised myself too, actually, once I saw that she was ok (and really even before that) - I wasn't worried at all. Not mad at Kyle or anything, just calm. I just needed to comfort her, that's all. Simple.

Well, I rocked her back to sleep, she cried when I put her down, but after a few mins of my hand resting on her chest, she was fast asleep and I snuck out successfully...after pulling up the crib rail of course. Y'know - you never realize how loud bare feet walking on carpet can be until you've tried to sneak out of a nursery. Anyway. We'll be lowering the crib tomorrow.

oh my child.

catch up

It's been a busy week. Let's see, where to start?

I guess first thing is that I think Abby is finally starting to readjust back to east coast time - thank goodness. It's been much harder adjusting back than it was adjusting on the trip. The first night she woke up several times all night, the next night she cried/screamed for 3 hours - yes 3. She. is. persistent. The next night, however, she only cried for one hour, and it was more whiney, less screaming. Last night she cried for 30 mins. AND she woke up on time and just went down for her first nap with no fight at all. So - crossing my fingers that soon I have my easy sleeper back. :)

Of course, in addition to the time changes, we've also started putting her to bed without her swaddle. It's bittersweet. She was busting out of it every night anyway, so it was really just a comfort thing for us and a cue for her - and we knew we wanted to transition out of it soon. Poor thing, though. Now, when I give her her bedtime bottle, when she finishes it and starts to fall asleep, she always takes one hand and grabs a fist full of my shirt or my necklace - as if to say "don't you let me go" (sigh) Of course when I do put her down in the crib, she cries. Hopefully, that part will get better soon too.

In other Abby news - we took her to the doctor the other day because she was so out of sorts and not her usual bubbly self. We figured it was mostly to do with the time stuff again, but we wanted to rule out any actual illness. She was fine. Cranky and emotional and clingy and lethargic - but fine. We did find out that she weighs 17 lbs now. :)

She's also re-discovered her wave. She waves at everybody now. She waves at her reflection. She waves at Kyle whenever he re-enters the room. It's cute. It's still that "I'm the queen of England" wave.

She's really close to crawling. While on our trip, she started getting her knees under and sitting in crawling position. She'll often rock back and forth like that now. She'll pull up on things, but usually only to her knees. She can climb over things no problem and is enjoying her new freedom to explore. Sometimes its nice that our apartment is small.

Next. House stuff. Long long story short - we were trying to decide if we wanted to put house hunting on hold to move into a rental this weekend because our current place offered to pay us 3 months rent to move out. It was a good deal. We found a really awesome place - a single family house (can you say rare?) in a really good location for us. Completely updated, it was huge, the kitchen was amazing. It was perfect and had everything we wanted. BUT. It wouldn't have saved us any money to move - it would have been slightly more expensive each month. We made the (we hope responsible) decision to stay put for now and keep house hunting. If we're going to be paying the same money - we'd rather invest it into something we own. ....But it would have been really nice to have a place for a kitchen table.

What else? I have phone again. We re-activated my old phone. It's the original iphone and it now feels like a big clunker compared to the new one I had. While I still think the phrase "ancient iPhone" is a bit oxymoronic - that is exactly what it is. I'm not complaining though - I'm happy to have contact with people again. I just can't take videos anymore. life goes on.

Oh, another Abby thing I've been meaning to document. She's getting really good at feeding herself. Her pincer grasp is about 80% accurate now. Sometimes she still grabs things with her fists and then can't figure out how to get it in her mouth - but usually she gets it. She's also showing more interest in "real" food and less enthusiasm about pureed things. She'll eat it, but not with the gusto she has for a fresh peach or something.

OK. I know that was a lot of random catch up stuff. I promise I have more interesting things to write about, but I had to get all of that out first. I have a completely open Friday in front of me. It's very exciting...so many possibilities for what to do today :) Hope you all have a great day too.

Monday, August 24, 2009

Australia

We're back!

I've been putting off blogging a little bit because I have not been able to figure out how to chronicle our trip. It was only a week long, yet we did so many things that I want to remember - I feel like I could probably write for hours and not get it all in. And besides, nobody would want to read all of that.

So, I think I'll just start from the beginning and summarize. It's gonna be long either way - I don't blame you if you skip around. ;-)

As written previously, our trip to Australia was more than stressful. It was awful. All I can say is that I'm really glad I overpacked Abby's diapers and formula or we wouldn't have had enough for the trip. We did eventually get there, after 60 hours of traveling and a day later than we had planned.

There was this one really low point - we were all exhausted, about 20 hours after we left our apartment and we were still only in New York. Awful. I mean, it's like 3 hours from our house. Anyway, I needed to make Abby a bottle, but we had run out of water. Since we had left security, there were no stores still open. I asked somebody where I could get water, and they told me there was a vending machine downstairs. Well, I only had aussie cash at this point. Kyle, luckily, had 2 dollars. So off I went to get water. I find the machine, and sure enough, it costs 2 dollars for a bottle of water. The whole top shelf of the vending machine is water, so I insert my money and push "D9" and what happens? Out come a bottle of black tea. But I didn't need tea - I needed water for my baby's bottle. And now I was out of money. Sigh. Y'know that point when you're just done? That was my point. Since there was nobody else in the hallway, I just sat down and cried and cried. Awful. Next thing I know, I hear a flight crew coming down the hall, so I hop up and head to the elevators. I couldn't beat them, so we end up in the elevator together. Of course, they notice that I'm not well. They all make a big fuss over asking me what's wrong. All I could get out was "I needed water for my baby and I got tea by mistake and it was my last 2 dollars" Looking back - I'm sure they thought I was insane. Turns out, one of the flight guys had a small 5 oz bottle of water with him and he happily let me have it. He then pointed to his little wings pin and said "see? I must be your guardian angel today!" Maybe he was.

In the end, we all got to Sydney and to Melbourne. As I wrote earlier, Kelsay and Ernie were just the nicest people ever. I'm so sorry that we hadn't met before now, but I look forward to seeing them again someday. They were simply amazing. We had a great time with them in Melbourne. We did some sightseeing and shopping. Kyle was brave enough to order a Kangaroo steak (yeah, I know. I told Kyle that the worst thing that could possibly happen is that it would be good, and it was) We went to a wildlife park and saw the koalas and the dingos and the Tasmanian devils (turns out that the loony toons "Taz" is not so well known down under and all our impressions were somewhat loss on the Aussies). Our time with Kels and Ern was all too short. Next thing we know, we're back at the airport and headed to Sydney.

Sydney was great. It's such a city, and in a lot of ways, we felt right at home. I mean, Boston and Sydney were kinda settled by the same folks so lots of street names and such had the same names. The first thing we did, of course, was walk from our hotel to the opera house. That's when you really feel like you're "there" I mean, it's so iconic. We took some pictures, but my camera died shortly after getting there. Kyle and I ended up going back the last day and got some better pictures at that point. :)

Of course, the Aussies have their own words and phrases for things. We all enjoyed hearing those. I'm thinking about adopting a few of my favorites. Instead of stroller, it's "the pusher" Said with an accent, more like, "pusha' " Instead of liquor stores, they're "bottle shops" Now, doesn't that sound nicer? Carseats are capsules. Diapers are Nappies (or napkins - which can lead to much confusion at a restaurant) I think hearing the lingo was part of what I enjoyed most.

Anyway, The next day we all hit up the Sydney Aquarium. It was really cool - definitely the best one I've been to. They had several different tunnel rooms and lots of cool animals. Sharks are always cool, and stingrays. Abby seemed to be pretty taken with the surroundings - lots to see.

Later that night, Kyra and Tony babysat so Kyle and I could have a date. We went out and found a nice restuarant on the water. We had a view of the Sydney bridge and the opera house at sunset. We ate outside and it was lovely. I had the best steak of my life and we spluged on a bottle of aussie wine with dinner that was also nice. Afterwards, we caught the bus back to our hotel and was glad to find that Abby hadn't made a peep for her sitters. Of course, that didn't last long and she was up several times the rest of the night.

kyle showing off our aussie wine

On that note - I couldn't have asked for a better baby. Abby did so so so well with the terribly difficult time changes. Most nights, she woke up a few times but went down easily. I usually brought her to bed with us - which is something I've never allowed here at home - but it seemed to work for most of the night. She thought her day should start at around 5am. once she was up, she was great the whole day though. She was great on the flights too. She only really melted twice - both on the last legs of the trip both ways. I couldn't blame her a bit.

Back to Sydney. The third day we took a ferry out to Manly Beach. We spent the day browsing shops, pubs, and beach views. At some point in the day, I reached in my pocket to grab my phone and it wasn't there. We looked and looked, and no luck. I sent the phone a message in case anybody found it, but after a day, we cancelled the service and wiped the phone clean. So, now I'm phoneless. Weird. I think we'll end up reactivating one of our old iphones since we'd have to pay top dollar to buy a new one now. No fun. But - Manly beach was great. Very pretty.

The last day we split from Kyra and Tony most of the day. Kyle and I had a nice breakfast and hit up several markets around town. We went back to the opera house for more pictures and headed back to pack for the trip home.

I have so many pictures. I can't even begin to figure out how to share them. I've tried to pick a few of the better ones, but I have so many that I'll never get them all on here. Nevertheless, here are a few from our adventure. I'll post more in another blog. Abby's crying again - poor thing. It's hard readjusting! I'll write later.

Melbourne