Major milestones

It's been a busy week for us. Other than the holidays, we've had some major milestones. Naomi has started talking non stop. And this morning, I just saw her bottom two teeth sprouting in!! Definitely explains why she's been fussier these days. Anyway, here's a quick video of one of Naomi's recent chatty episodes.

Weekend in pictures

Solids are a messy affair

First time using the sippy cup

Baby's first snow storm

Exersaucer and a fire, a girl couldn't ask for more

Posing after church, in desperate need of a nap

Had to pose with Daddy too

Playtime!

Stole Daddy's Patriots hat

Chris' 31st birthday party

With the birthday boy

All bundled up

Naomi can grab her own toes now

6 months today

Dear Naomi,
Today you turned 6 months old. When I left for work this morning, you were fast asleep and barely flinched when I cam in to say goodbye. I can’t believe how much you’ve grown this past month. It’s simply amazing to see how much you learn everyday, but to be honest it’s a little bittersweet to think about how quickly you’re changing. You’re no longer my squishy marshmallow. You don’t turn bright red anymore when you get angry. You don’t like to fall asleep on my chest anymore. But I love how you’re strong enough to grab your own toes. How you’re fascinated by your hands and could just stare at them for minutes, which in baby time is like an eternity! You’ve finally accepted the bottle and started drinking over 6oz at a time, a huge amount considering when I first started work we’d be lucky if you drank 2oz. You’ve learned how to roll over in both directions, so I can’t call you my little Zoolander anymore, but you still scream on the occasion that you get stuck mid roll. I love how when I come home after work, you stare at me for a minute, giving me a once over, then you realize who I am and give me that huge, gummy smile of yours. The past couple of days, you’ve started crying after I came home and went to the bathroom instead of coming to get you from grandma right away….probably not a good sign of things to come, but I’m glad you know it’s me even though I hardly see you during the day. You started eating rice cereal this month; so far it hasn’t been a huge success. You’re only eating about 1 tablespoon a day, and most of it comes back out. Every time you eat, you make a face as if to say, “YUCK I’d rather have fried chicken”, then you try and gag yourself so you’ll throw it up, luckily so far you’ve been unsuccessful.

You’ve also found your voice this month, you’ve always been somewhat of a quiet baby. Sometimes your dad and I say how we often forget there’s a baby in the house! But last night when we were getting ready for bed, you just chatted away. Blah blah blah blah you said. It was cute. Not only do you “talk” a lot, you’ve started screaming. Screaming sometimes because you’re angry that you’re cold, but often times because you’re happy!!!?. In fact, at first I was worried that you were upset or uncomfortable, but then I looked at you, you were SMILING while you were screaming. We tried to take you into the city to go to the Union Square Holiday market and Rockefeller to view the Christmas Tree. While we were at Union Square, you just kept screaming and screaming. We thought maybe you were cold, so we headed to Rockefeller. But in the subway, you were still screaming. Screaming mind you, not crying. Everyone was staring at us, looking at you screaming, and then laughing. To be fair, you were quite a sight, strapped to your dad’s chest wearing the puffiest snowsuit with your arms sticking straight out, screaming so loudly with a big smile on your face. Needless to say, your dad and I weren’t brave enough to trek up to midtown with a screaming baby, so we decide to go home. I’m happy you found your voice, but maybe you can learn to happily coo instead of happily scream.
You’re sleeping through the night for the most part, although, now that you’re rolling, you’ve been waking up in the middle of the nights, crying because your legs, arms, and on occasion your face, have been caught against your crib rails. It’s a little annoying to have to wake up and move you, especially since sometimes you roll right back and get stuck again and yell just as I’ve gotten back into bed. But I don’t mind, sleep is for the weak anyway.
I started work full time this month. I think I spend a majority of my days thinking about you. A friend of mine told me you’d appreciate it and think I was cool for being a working mom once you grew up. I hope he’s right. Why’d you have to be born in the worst recession since the great depression!?? Ok that’s not your fault really…
Anyway – happy 6 months. Can’t wait to get home today. We’re going to try feeding you a banana. You’ll probably like it better than rice cereal cause I’m guessing you take after me and have a huge sweet tooth (actually I already know you do cause I let you lick my chocolate popsicle and you loved it, shh don’t tell dad.)

Love, me

Things I've learned

I've been back at work for over 2 months now. A couple of observations:

- I don't need a full 30 minutes to make it to the Path now that I'm no longer carrying 25 extra lbs in my belly.
- "Facetime" before or after work is simply not worth it when you could be at home with your loved ones.
- When frustrated at work, starting at pictures of Naomi can immediately brighten your day.
- A LOT of time, we're talking hours, can be wasted, simply staring at pictures of Naomi.
- You immediately make a new network of friends at work since you've joined the ranks of working parent/mother.
- When frustrated at work, you can easily make yourself feel better by convincing yourself that without working, your child would not be able to go to college...OR wear pretty Ralph Lauren dresses.
- Just because you go to bed believing you have the winning ticket under your pillow, doesn't mean you'll wake up a megamillion winner.
- If it weren't for support from our families, I'd probably already be in the looney farm.
- If it weren't for my super duper mommy, I'd probably be in isolation at the looney farm.
- Being a working mom increases the number of white hairs you have exponentially.
- Being a working mom is HARD.

6 month checkup

Weight - 14 lbs 2 oz - 17% range
Height - 26inch 0 63%
Head circ. - 43cm - 68%

Like mom and dad, looks like Naomi is going to be a giant.

Where's Naomi?

Choices

Over the past couple of days, I've had to make some pretty tough decisions. They're made now, and while nothing in life is ever final, it's not one of those things you can go back and ask for a do-over for.
I've never been good at making hard and fast decisions. And even now I'm still wondering. what if...how do you ever know if what you decided on was the better option than the alternative?
I do know that having a child changes the way you think. My priorities and decisions are no longer based on my own pure selfish desire, but rather Naomi's well being.
Well here's to the future and the decisions we make.

Dedicated to Stacey

This post is dedicated to my sister-in-law and possibly one of the only ardent readers of this blog...sorry to keep you waiting!! haha
It's been awhile since I blogged, mainly because of the holiday weekend. We had a nice long weekend full of loved ones and overeating, two of my favorite things.
For Thanksgiving, we were lucky to have Fritz and Stacey come out. I hadn't seen Fritz since Naomi was born since he moved out to Palo Alto (lucky jerk) so it was a nice treat. Since he's last seen Naomi, she's become an actual human being instead of the squishy red marshmallow she was when she was born. I think they got along really well.
For Thanksgiving, we had 17 ppl over at our new house. In previous years, we've always had a ton of ppl, and the guests would be scattered throughout our townhouse, some people even forced to eat on the floor. This year, we had so much space! It didn't even feel like we had that many ppl. Guess we found our party home..haha yea right. My dad made his famous turkey, and Chris made a honey baked ham to rival. Have to say they were both deeelish. There was so much amazing food, I actually think I gained half my pregnancy weight back.
We have so much to be thankful this year. With the financial crisis that our country is going through, and with all the craziness and terror plots around the world, I have to take a step back and really count my blessings. Austin and I have been blessed with an amazing daughter and loving families that have both guided us and supported us through our somewhat clumsy transition into parenthood, friends that have been there with us through all of our ups and downs, and a partnership that has proven to be stronger than either one of us could have evern imagined.
Well the weekend has passed and it's back to the regular grind. There's something so incredible bittersweet about holidays. You spend so much time anticipating all the festivities and the time that you'll have with loved ones, but when it's over and time to go home you're filled with an immense sadness and longing that time could stand still just for a little while.
But enough with the sap...on other exciting fronts, we got our christmas tree! It's a bit crooked and definitely still underdecorated, but it marks the official beginning of the next marvellous holiday, christmas songs, hot cocoa, jingle bells, christmas gifts, here we come!

Random picture

Naomi on her 5 mth birthday

Family Time

Austin and I took last week off to spend time with Naomi. I think this is our first time we've ever taken an extended vacation from work, and just stayed home! It was pretty nice and relaxing though. We got a ton of errands done, drove into the city a couple of times, and even got some christmas shopping done. I also got to have some time away from Naomi, over the weekend, my mom and I went to a spa for some facials. It was so relaxing, and kinda cool cause the spa used all organic products (cue austin's eye roll right here). Even though I was only supposed to go in for a facial, I ended up walking out with a couple of organic skincare products...I guess the spa fed into my whole organic kick that I'm on right now. I sort of felt like the character out of "Confessions of a Shopaholic" though, somehow I managed to explain to myself that i NEEDED these new products! hah oh well. Austin and I also got to go on a date night. We went to an Italian cooking class in the city, courtesy of one of my co-workers, and then we met up with Priscilla and some friends visiting from SF for a night of karaoke. I think it was the first time I've stayed out past midnight since several months before Naomi was born!! It was nice to get out and do things that didn't center around Naomi. And the food we learned how to cook was delish!! And yesterday we had another playdate with for Naomi with her "friend" alli. This is their 3rd encounter, and I think they may have actually been aware of each other this time...can't say they actually played together yet.
This week starts phase 2 of my phaseback program. Now I work Tuesdays-Fridays, but thank goodness, this week is Thanksgiving, so I have Thursday off, and only a half day on Friday. I'm definitely loving phaseback!!

Here are a couple of pictures from our cooking class, and from Naomi's playdate


Naomi and Alli getting ready for Domino's

Naomi, Jaime, Alli and Gene

They actually looked at each other!!!

Cooking class at Rustico Cooking

Finished meal - lambchops yumm

Handmade pasta and spicy sausages

Rolling out Biscoti

Kneading the dough for the handmade pasta

5 months, and ready to celebrate

Naomi is 5 months today. In the past month, she's changed so much. She's learned to roll over like a pro, laughs and chuckles a lot, has found her high pitch voice which she likes to use in screams (usually when her head is right by my ear). She's eating up to 6 oz from a bottle now, a huge change from the 2oz she would begrudgingly take when I first started work. She sleeps through the night from 8pm - usually til around 7:30am. She stopped needing to be rocked to go to bed. She grasps her hands, she plays with toys and notices when you take them away. She's good with strangers, although if she's tired, she only wants to be held by familiar faces. She finally outgrew her size 1 diapers and is now onto size 2's. She also notices when we're eating and stares longingly at our food. (soon enough baby soon enough). There are just so many changes that have happened this month, I can't even list or remember them all to tell you honestly! It's been a whirlwind ride, but definitely the best ride of my life. Corny I know.

With the holidays fast approaching, we set up a mini photoshoot to get our holiday cards in order. Yep we decided on just a shot of Naomi, cause lets face it, she's so much cuter than Austin or I. I won't tell you which one we picked, and if you want to make sure you're on our holiday card list, make sure to send me your mailing address! But here are a few shots from the shoot. We even tried to get Lilo and Stitch in there...but once again, Lilo messed it up for Stitch and ran all over the place. stitch I must say is an excellent model though. He just plops right down next to Naomi and patiently waits for his shots to be done. Next time Stitch.

A season to celebrate

Two blogs in one day!! Both while at work...hmmm. Both about Christmas. Needless to say I'm more than excited for this year's christmas. It's Naomi's first Christmas. Our first christmas in our new house. And a Christmas where I can actually eat and not feel like I need to run and hug the toilet every time food comes within an inch of my mouth.
Anyhoooo I've been given strict orders by Austin that we are not to buy a christmas tree until after Thanksgiving. What the....
We're not supposed to celebrate Christmas until AFTER Thanksgiving has passed...Fine fine I finally caved in and said we'd wait. But low and behold - what did I hear while speaking to my anti-celebrating-christmas-before-thanksgiving day husband on the phone?....CHRISTMAS MUSIC. He had his ipod speakers on, and was already playing his christmas mix from 2007. Mind you, today is November 14th, BEFORE Thanksgiving. Hypocrite.
And did you know that today the Rockefellar christmas tree went up!? (see image below) Well if Austin can listen to Christmas music, and Rockefeller can have a tree, than I'm getting my tree before Thanksgiving. thank you very much.
(and we'll have presents to put under it already, see post below haha).