Vo-ka-BU-larry

The babe is getting older...and bigger... and more talkative.

This week, I was talking emphatically.

He stood next to me and imitated my tone and hand motion exactly.

Sigh.

A few weeks ago, I was lamenting his 'lack' of vocabulary.  Then I started listing his words.  They're not pronounced perfectly, but still.  We got a decent list down, and then... it was like he knew I was counting!  Because it just exploded.  He can mimic almost any word (when he feels like it) but here's his most consistently used palabras:

Hi

Bye

Mama 

Mooooommmmm

Dada

Bruh-bruh (brother)

Nana

Pop

Gran-ma

Kah-DEN (Kaden)

Yesh.

Go.

GO, GO, GO, GO!!

Peas (please)

Piz (peace) (at Mass)

Uh oh.

Done.

More

TA- DA !

It's the MOST wonderful time of the year...

So!  I've been be-moaning the lack of official photos for the babe... and made it a point to get one with Santa for his First Christmas (the babe's, not Santa) (at least I don't think this Santa is a rookie).  I was SURE that Sammy boy would cry his lungs out.  I was a bit nervous.  For the past few days, I've been saying "ho ho ho" in a deep voice, to get him ready to meet the big man.  Oh, and Kaden and I have worn a Santa-hat-with-beard and gotten in his face.  Dry run and all that.  Most of the time, we'd get little baby laughs in response.

You can see how well all that smiley preparation paid off.  There's our serious Sam, looking a bit bewildered.  It *could* be because it was 8:30 at night, and we're normally winding down for bedtime, not partying in a candy house.  Or it could be because he had just woken up from a 2 hour nap. Or... maybe it was Santa after all?  If you can click and make the photo big:  notice Sam's curls.  Also notice Kaden's tentative smile:  he was so focused on what to say to Santa, he was a bit more nervous than I thought!

And I'm not sure we'll get those Christmas cards out this year... or that I'll post before next Thursday.  So MERRY CHRISTMAS dear friends and net stalkers!  From our scraggly little love-filled tree to yours!

First Steps, First Turkey

It's been a bit busy around here lately... well, here and there.  So I'm just catching up!

For some family health related reasons, I was out of town the week before Thanksgiving... and flew in that morning.  Timed it perfectly (!) to arrive between Jim's annual Turkey Bowl game and the family dinner.  The original plan was to fly Wednesday and get bumped a few times, thereby scoring some free plane trips for the year... but snow came and I was happy to stay an extra day.  So no free tix, but no snow delays and an extra night with Mom:  I can't complain.

Thanksgiving was one of the normal large-family gatherings.   There was another babe present, maybe 5 months old?  And cute as could be in a little brown outfit, with a matching bib that said something about "first thanksgiving" or "mom's favorite turkey."  I can't remember now, but it was cute.  I realized, with a bit of a start, that it was Cubby's first Thanksgiving too!  So I looked over at my little bear cub, who rips off any sort of bib these days, and who was at the time, under a table growling.  Honest.  I sincerely feel for this second son, who is equally loved and adored, but has a LOT fewer cute photos to prove it!

He did take a few steps that weekend- his first on his own!  They were shaky and only 1 or 2 at a time, but still.  He thinks he can walk, and would pull himself up... then promptly fall in the direction he was heading.  There's a lot of little bruises this days.  He seems fairly determined.  Although, I must point out that his crawling is amazingly fast- especially when a "forbidden door" opens.  He can be in a bathroom quicker than you can turn your head.  And if you call out NO as he heads down the hall, he will put his head down and go faster.  Fun times.

The best month of the year...

What's not to like about October?

It's fall, but usually not too cold.

It has great birthdays:  a nephew, 3 friends, me, my godmother and my dad.

And then there's Halloween!

Our boys went as a bullfighter and a bull this year.

The idea came out of nowhere.  Our local library had a costume exchange, and Kaden fell in love with the bullfighter outfit.  Right away, he started yelling TORO TORO.  Of course we had to get it.

And then one of us came up with the idea of having SamCub as the bull.  His costume was super easy:  black sweats, a sock pinned to his pants for a tail, and a knit hat fixed up with felt.  He was kinda like Ferdinand, though- often looking anywhere BUT the red cape.  Inside was a different story- he'd crawl after Kaden, who was waving the cape and yelling TORO TORO again.  Fun times.

Around these parts, Trick or Treating isn't on Halloween Day (I don't understand, either).  So on 10-31, the boys wore other holiday-ish clothes.  I surprised Kaden with a teeshirt that had Darth Vadar and stormtroopers trick or treating.  He loves the Star Wars part, I love the incongruity:  win/win. And of course I couldn't pass up a Tigger costume for the babe.  He kept pulling off his hat, though.

Birthday selfie!  We adventured out to an alpaca farm... where a baby alpaca had been born an hour earlier!  and so they named her after me!  See?  BEST MONTH EVER.

Ten Weeks along...

It's hard to believe that LittleManSam is 10 weeks already.  It feels like forever! In a good way (mostly).  His crying jags have lessened.  We're rarely on the "level 3 alert" - which was eyes scrunched closed, mouth wide open and WAILING at the top of his lungs repeatedly.  Not fun for any of us.  He still cries and fusses, but at (usually) lower levels and (usually) not 3+ hours at a time.

We haven't taken too many photos of the cry jags.  I've been TRYING to get a photo of his smile, which is completely adorable.  But it comes and goes rather quickly.  His first smile was around 8 weeks.

You might think, from the photo above, that we entered him into some sort of old-tyme photo shoot.  Not at all.  He's not pretending to be a founding father (with their white wigs)- this is actually his baptismal outfit.  It was mine, actually, which is kinda cool.  (Kaden used a combination of my 2 brothers' outfits.)  I swear he looked much more normal when he was baptized.  That was around... 6 weeks old.

My thinking brain hasn't fully engaged yet.  It does, for brief spans of time, and then... it doesn't.  Very frustrating on some levels.  A bit worrisome since I ease back into work this week.  But most of the time, with those cute toes, a bit of aspirin and strong coffee- it's all good.

Here's the close up of our founding father.  I love all the expressions on his face here.  All these photos were taken by a (new) friend of mine... she offered to take newborn photos, but she has a toddler and it took us about 7-8 weeks to synchronize :)   She's pretty talented, though, and the day was a lot of fun.

Sam's face seems to be changing day by day this week.  Kinda amazing, watching him grow.  The 2 month doctor visit went fine.  We're still doing both nursing and formula.  Kaden is still over- enthused about his baby brother.  Spring has sprung, Easter's around the corner, and all in all, life is looking better each day :)

OH! and this week, Sam has started focusing more intently on stuff (and people, too).  He really likes patterns and the feel of flannel.  One day he was wearing a footie outfit, where the footies were little bears, and it looked like he was trying to grab them.  He hold his head up really well, and usually prefers to be in a sitting position.  If you try to lay him down, or just recline his head/back a little, he grunts and moves his head up.  It's kinda adorable to see him trying to do stuff, but not having the body control to do it.  I'm sure he'll get there soon.

And, even though it's way too early for him to be teething, we've noticed that sometimes he likes to bite down on stuff.  Interesting, that little boy.  Another fun tidbit- when he sleeps, he'll often still do the moro reflex (where his arms flail out for no reason).  He's almost 12 lbs of fun, that little boy!

Introducing...

In late January, our second son arrived!

Meet Samuel Joseph, 9 lbs, 2 oz, 21 inches long.

His birth story is a bit long- we'll get to it in another post :)

His older brother, born in a Florida summer, was 4 months old and traveled 4 states away before he saw his first snow- which was a light dusting.  This little guy, born in a Pennsylvania winter, was 4 days old, stepped outside his house and had over 4 inches on the ground!

Isn't he adorable?  Even when he looks like a little drunken sailor!

We haven't gotten a lot of great family photos yet. 

I'm working on it.   I'm also working on thank you notes, but then lost the list.  

And my brain is mush from sleep deprivation, so that put everything on hold until I found the list (which I did, earlier today!).

Kaden is thrilled to be a big brother.  There's a good many posts in the future about how sweet and gentle he is (and some of the funny things that come out of his mouth!).  Perhaps the next one we'll recount as much as I can remember of brotherly love from the last few weeks...

It is life with a newborn, though- so it's not all roses.  Like all new humans, he's a bit squirrel-y.  

True to his genes, he also has stomach/gas issues. Poor guy.

The good news is that his lungs are just fine, thankyouverymuch.  Very strong lungs, indeed.

Another "odd" thing (not really bad, just.. an adjustment) to having two BOYS in the house... all the nicknames I have for Kaden have to be adapted.  Because if I say "What's wrong, little buddy" - Kaden answers "nothing, why?".  Or if I say "are you hungry, goose?"  Kaden answers "no, Mom".  So we're adapting:  littlest buddy, baby boy, littlest man, littlest brother.  Geesh, I hope Sam doesn't get a complex.  Maybe we'll have to adapt those nicknames again!

One of the most fun side benefits is that we've recounted a lot of "when you were a baby" stories to Kaden.  I almost forgot what fun he was.  Especially when he hit the older baby - toddler phase. And the preschool phase.  And... oh, really, he's just a fun kid... a good son to have in the family.  

And now we have two of them :)

Still Thankful (long post about pumpkins and races)

There may be all sorts of stuff happening, but today is still the last day of Thanksgiving break.

Do you remember, a month or two ago, we went up to Pennsylvania and enjoyed Grandma and Pop's garden?  Here's a refresher of the mini harvest for the day:

The specimen (fruit? veggie?  I feel like I should know this...) that Kaden is holding below is a "neck pumpkin."  As in, it has a long neck.  It's also called something like a "dutch crooked neck pumpkin" and there's an official name for it.  Anywho, it pretty much grows only in central Pennsylvania. And it's perfect for baking pies.

Which is what we worked on down here in Florida, with one of Grandma's pumpkins.  Kaden was so excited to help - here he is carrying it across the kitchen:  "Mama, this is BIG and heavy."  (Yes, it DOES look like butternut squash on steroids.  But it ain't.)

Then we started cutting it up.  Well, I did, while Kaden manhandled one piece with a butter knife.  Anyway, here's WHY neck pumpkins are so good at baking pies-- the neck is pure pumpkin meat!

The little bump at the end is where you'll find the seeds, but even still it has a lot of meat there too.

Here's our yield-- one small dish of pulp and seeds (far left), one small plate of the skin for composting, and two large dishes full of chopped up pumpkin.  I think about 10 cups total.

Next step- cook it in a bit of water until a little soft.

We also spread the seeds out to dry.  We're going to try a few down here and see if we can get a plant or two growing...

Other steps included: draining well, storing in fridge until bakign day (within a week), then putting in food processor to get rid of the stringy bits, then measuring and baking.  We made about 24 mini pumpkin pies (think baby quiche), one pumpkin custard (think pie without crust), two pies and a loaf of pumpkin bread.  Pure heaven.  I forgot to get photos of those, but trust me.

And here is our little turkey on Thanksgiving day- this shirt has his handprints from 2009 and 2010.  I forgot to put one on this year, so I guess we'll add it when we do Christmas crafts...

Thanksgiving day we also did a "Turkey Trot" as a family.  Jim did a 5k first, with his personal best time (go Jimdad!), and then Kaden, Jim, my mom and I all did a 1 mile "fun" run.   We all gathered together, and when the race started, Kaden honestly took off and was in the middle of the back of the pack.  He ran for about a block or so, then started walking (My energy is gone, Mom). 

Kaden did a half mile in this walk/run/walk fashion.  We were in the absolute back of the pack, near a old guy with a cane (more power to him for going out!) and the peeps walking their dogs.  After a half mile, Kman took a break and rode in the stroller for a while.  Then, about 2 blocks (quater mile ish) from the finish line, we started to talk him into finishing the race on his own.  A nearby teen girl heard us and asked Kaden "do you want to run in with me? I'll run with you." Kaden said YEAH and jumped out of the stroller.

Poor girl.  We should've warned her that the toddler was faster than he looked.  He *took off*, people! The teen gave her friend a startled look, and then ran to catch up.  With the teen beside him and encouraging him, Kaden ran the rest of the way!!  When he turned the corner for the final homestretch, the crowd cheered for him!! and then he got a nifty ribbon and a bottle of water when he crossed the finish line.

Later, I asked him how it felt to cross the finish line and finish his first race.  His reply?  "It felt sweaty."   So then I asked how it felt when the crowd cheered for him:  "It made me feel happy."  Aww, that's the sound of my heart bursting with pride.

See?  Lots to be thankful for!  And this long post is just a few things :)

Water, water, everywhere

We've had a few days of rain here... unusual in that the skies are overcast almost all day, and the temp is below 92! So what do we do on one of the clear mornings?

Hit the "beach" of course. It's not the real beach, as it's on a river. Quite frankly, I find it hard to consider anything other than the Gulf or an ocean as a real beach! But Kaden doesn't seem to care. As long as he can "go digging, Mama".

This is what most nights have looked like. He loves his rain jacket, and insists on wearing it even if it's just sprinkling out. He's too cute for me to disagree much.

In other waterlogged issues, I can't believe I left you 'hanging' on the bathroom ceiling for so long! (To find out why I'm chuckling, scroll back to the last post photos.) Since then, the whole thing was removed...

and new drywall was patched into place. Next up: a little insulation in the attic and re-painting the whole bathroom. Not too exciting, I know.

What is exciting is Kaden's first days at daycare/preschool. He's been going this week for half days and seems to love it. I, on the other hand, have my heart both bursting with pride and breaking in two each morning. Classic story, I know, I know. Pray for us anyways, and all those moms letting go of their kids in some way (first day of school, new highschool, college...

Kaden goes for a ride

Isn't this cool? He was so excited, he kept yelling HORSEY, HORSEY while waiting in line. We had to calm him down so he could go on the pony (whose name was Tinkerbell).

Then, he gets on and the guy leads him around, with Jim walking next to it. I'm waiting near the start. As they come around the trees and Kaden sees me, he starts waving frantically and yelling MAMA! MAMA! When I wave back, he then yells HORSEY, and points down at the pony's head.

The sound you hear? My heart melting.

Another First - Haircut time!

I know it was necessary, but golly gee he looks older! Like all his boy cousins...

A First of the Worst Kind

So, this afternoon, we finally walk into our cozy condo after a long two days away... and little man walks through the entry way, looks around, and throws both his hands into the air, yelling: HOOOOMMMMEEEE!

It was especially heartwarming since we've been in the hospital these past 40 hours or so (is that all? It seemed much longer).

We went to the ER because Kaden was having some trouble breathing. They got us into triage and then an ER room *right away* (more anxiety)... two breathing treatments, some tylenol, a few chest xrays, and a short nap later... he gets admitted.

an exhausted sickie catching some zzz.

the thing on his arm is a "no-no" brace, to cover and keep safe the IV.

the wires on the bottom are the oxygen sensor on his big toe (!)

We all got a total of about 4-5 hours sleep (intermittently) between all the tests / meds / breathing treatments.... but the end result is that he had "restrictive airway disorder" which is a one time asthma incident. Apparently it has to be chronic to be asthma.

After a full day of monitoring, treatments, meds, and more sleep... He was well enough to earn him (and us) a well deserved trip home this afternoon.

A good use of time coming home...

Many, many thanks to all of you we texted and were praying for him... and especially to Kim, Elizabeth & Frank, and Nana... for suggesting we drive the extra 20 minutes for the peds hospital, as well as general support and visits.

happy to be home

One more "First"

So here I was, thinking that we were mostly out of "firsts" for a while... and then a very cool pkg from his godmother arrives: it's the 1st anniversary of his baptism this month!

hmm... a rubber band! oh, a very nice shell.

what do you mean by 'gentle touch'?

Mail? for me? wow!

get me out of here!

Mom, you get the kitchen, I'll sweep the hallway.

ps - you know I posted another so quickly because all those crying photos were bothering me!

To Stand or Not to Stand?

It really isn't a question, more of a developmental choice. Check out Kaden's newest pastime...

None of these last very long, but still... he looks rather pleased with himself, don'cha think?