We Love Webers!

The Webers came to visit while Chris was out of town this week to keep me company and help with the baby. I very much appreciate the consideration due to the expanding size of my belly and we had a totally bodacious time. Holden named Grandma "Apple" and Grandpa "Banana." We ate fondue, got pedicures (the ladies, at least), and spent way too much at Costco (for which Chris and I are eternally grateful thank yoooou). They leave tomorrow and we are all so sad:( It's hard getting used to having family around and that feeling of unity and community and then saying bye. But we will see them again soon so there are great thing to look forward to!

Holden continues to amaze us every day. He is almost a year old and the smartest, sweetest, most talkative little thing I've ever met. Today Chris and I played a game where we handed him an object then told him to bring it to dada (or mama) while in different rooms, and he would wheel his walker into the other room and hand the person the object! He brought me my sunglasses which rocked. Hahaha. He's so brilliant and so beautiful. He is the very sun. It is so hard to imagine loving another child as much, but I know it will happen. Today Chris and I toured the LnD at the local hospital in Cedar Park. It is small (only 4 labor rooms) but so homey and nice. We really liked it. Now for finding a dr that I like that delivers there. Yes, I am officially in my third trimester and still searching for a dr. Ugh. Hopefully this week that problem will be solved.

Holden and I have a gym membership and have been swimming almost every day! It is so nice to float around and he already starts kicking and trying to swim when in the water. I hold him so his belly is floating and he kicks right along! He loves the huge fountain mushroom:) It has been brilliant weather-wise here. We have been outside enjoying ourselves. It is maybe odd, but it is like I am experiencing the excitement of summertime and swimming and bbqs and all that as I did when I was a child. I have always prided myself on being able to maintain a childlike sense of wonder and perspective....but this is entirely different. It is truly the re-living of a pure sense of excitement, happiness, anticipation that I remember as a kid. I think it is obviously related to Holden and living life with him and Chris as our little protected family unit. And I think a large part is that I am fortunate to not have to work and have the dredging soul-sucking corporate politics involved in my life on a daily basis. Whatever it is I am breathlessly grateful for the lightness of my soul.

Oh, his 1-year-birthday. How I am so simultaneously proud and sad at the same time. We will be in the mountains with Grandparents McAloon. I can not wait to show him my waterfall that I named Baukie after my blanket as a kid and all the wonderful smells and sights!

We are thinking of naming our new boy Casey Finn. It basically means brave (casey) and fair or blonde (finn) in Irish. So right now that is our choice! We can't wait to meet our little man.


My beautiful man looks so grown up!

11 months!

i can't believe my little boy will be a year old in a month. he's popped another tooth (his 7th) in celebration. as is his personality, i didn't even know he was teething until i saw the little whitecap.

here he is "blowing raspberries" on chris's tummy. chris blows raspberries on his tummy every night and he was out for revenge.




and cracking up at the fact that i sneezed simultaneously with him

5/13/09

can't sleep. looking back on old pictures. this one just really struck me as so beautiful. and scary...oh the exhaustion! still, i can't can't wait.

Sickness

Holden got his first fever! Scare my hair! Seems it was just Roseola- a kind of virus in the herpes family ewwww! Must have picked it up during his first train ride. Or from that questionable lady Rosie down the block.

He has head-to-toe rash of the non-itch variety:



But you wouldn't know. My little champ just smiles and cuddles hardcore! Here he is in his bath tonight cracking up at my spitting his toys out at him like a dragon.

33 Years On This Rock and The Boy's First Haircut

My little boy was shorn while I slept! On Saturday Chris got up with the baby and I snoozed in to my heart's content. Upon waking I discovered that my 9-month-old had been replaced by a 2-year-old! Or so it appeared with his newly cropped do. I cried...there wasn't even any warning!



Then on Sunday thebestmanintheworld turned 33 years! Unfortunately he had to leave the next day (today) to restart his traveling regimen that has been stalled for nearly 3 months (we got spoiled). So we spent most of his birthday getting things done. But we did manage to watch some music videos and play with one of Chris's new presents:






I got him the Crayola Glow Dome. He drew The Edge a la U2 fame(or "the coolest person in the world" according to Chris) on the inside panel and on the outside orb that spins he penned the lyrics to "All I Want is You" and said that's what he'd give me if he knew me in high school. I thought it was even better than the best mixtape. I also got him an X-Men t-shirt and and Ipod Touch (affectionally known as "The Fondle"). But that last gift was on order so he has to wait for it. I even got to engrave it for free! He is super excited about his return on Friday not only to see us, but to play with his new fancy gadget. I also made him a shitty banana cake.

So the schedule is that Chris returns Friday from Little Rock, AR. Then I leave Sunday for Florida for a week while he is in Houston. I can't wait to show Holden the ocean, but I wish I could bring Chris with us to watch Holden watch his first seagulls.

If you're reading this, Rappongi...I love you you old man.

My First Baby Purchase

Ok so it is a double-sided coin of sorts that this new baby is the same gender as the last because it means that while we will have all the clothes we need, it also means we have all the clothes we need. I want to get the little one new stuff! And let me tell you little boy clothes just melt me. I love the sleepy blues and bright reds. Tonight at Babies R Us whilst spending ridiculous amounts of money on diapers (yeah, I wish I had the steel countenance to use cloth and be a-ok throwing crap into my washing machine but I don't and besides it's proven that the cloth is, pardon the pun, shittier for the environment) I managed to sneak in a few baby purchases amidst Holden's things.

To anyone reading this (does anyone read this? lol) who is expecting a baby or hopes to be in the future....GET THESE GOWNS:



They come in a lot of different styles and companies, I just happened to like the peace signs and alphabet soup. Anyway newborns look so freaking cute in them, particularly boys because they are sorta like little monk robes or unexpected dresses. And they have the hand/claw covers attached to the sleeves. It cuts down on the time you spend during those late night changes. You just pull up, do the biz, pull down. Fumbling with snaps in the middle of the night is such a pain. As a second resort get the zip up feetie pajamas. but these are the best. Ok yeah I am totally geeking out.

My little boy is so beautiful. He is really becoming a little toddler. He is so good at standing up nearly on his own or with barely leaning on furniture. He talks in some alien tongue which means he's trying to emulate our language. And he is such fun to be around. His real features are emerging now. And he totally has his father's perfect male jawline and elven nose. The cleft chin is his own. He's a total heartbreaker.



And my tummy almost halfway along. Everyone says you look huge really fast with the second but so far I feel bigger than I did with Holden but not too awful:



I think I am lucky in that I carry them high. But the game isn't over yet.

Baby 2010

I absolutely can not in a million years believe this was ever my little Holden:




This was during his first checkup before his first bath. Maybe 30 mins after being born. They start with the baby torture right away. Chris filmed this, apparently unaware that "I Want Your Sex" by George Michael was playing during Holden's first sponge bath. Listen for it. Just evidence that he's going to be trouble when he's a teen. I missed these firsts, given that my nether regions were being spliced back together and then I was dumped off in an empty room with nothing but the Tyra Banks show to keep me company while I waited for my baby and his father to return to me once more. I remember that being that most surreal feeling. Such indescribable exhaustion after being in labor for 14 hours, delivering a baby, and then abandoned to an empty room with nothing but some weird talk show. The world had changed forever.

And now once again, I prepare for yet another upheaval, a shapeshift into an even more beautiful form than that which my life has taken...

We are giving Holden a little brother.

Not only will he have a little brother. But he will have a little brother who is so near in age to him (15 months) that for all intents and purposes he will have a twin. A partner and friend in life forever. Someone to comfort him and for him to comfort when his parents have long since passed from this earth. Bunk beds, fireflies in jars, camping, capture the flag, whispered ghost stories long after lights are out, bikes, silly dances and video game cheat codes, to name a few.

It makes me weep with joy to even think of it. To think of welcoming a new soul into our home. To have an itty bitty infant again who is so helpless so tiny yet so microcosmically perfect in every possible way. I look back on those pictures and videos of Holden's first days and weeks on this planet and I think of how tired I was. How I moved as if swimming through thick air. How then, having had no reference point, I thought it would forever be like this.

And now I realize that during the sleepless nights to come, the endless diapers, cries you hear in your sleep, I will know deep down that this time is ephemeral and dear. Not only that, but I will have Holden there to share Chris and I's joy and love with.

It makes me so happy to think that he will never remember not having had his brother. It will have been to him as if his sibling was always there, always sharing his world. Jealousy about "the baby" will not exist.

And here he is, in all his beautiful 7 ounce, 5 inch form. 18 weeks along. Nearly halfway. And he already is the most captivating, peaceful creature ever to be. And he looks like his big brother. So he lucked out.

Right now our favorite contender for a name is Finn. Not only is it just a cool name, but if you review back a few blogs you will see that Huckleberry Finn was the book I was reading early in my pregnancy, maybe before I even knew I was pregnant. And I spent so much time daydreaming about my children being able to live a life like that: wild, untamed, in touch with nature, fully exploring the world and their imaginations. The fact that it is a book about boys is just a nice bonus. The fact that it is a literary reference and a famous boy protagonist is perfect with Holden. And then there is the fact that it is an Irish name based on an Irish hero who was a real-life Robin Hood makes it even more appropriate. Plus, it just kind of looks like him.



We are a blessed family. I can not wait to see our boys playing together. Hell, to be able to say "the boys." Holden is going to just be the most amazing older brother. And Chris is going to be able to put two more men on this earth who in his likeness are kind, gorgeous, smart, creative, and respectful.

Love, The Happy Mama M.