Uriah: 11 months (in related news: time travels at warp speed)

Can we all just relax, over here? Slow things down for a bit? I cannot believe that Uriah is almost 1! Aaaaahhhh! 

It is crazy how in just a few short months from my last post, Uriah has grown and developed SO MUCH! It is amazing how rapidly babies grow, especially in their first few years. I remember in high school how it seemed to take FOREVER to get to summer break - now, as an adult, the months and years are whirring by in a blur (the blur could also be due in part to sleep deprivation and rapidly declining eyesight, but I digress). 

Some Current Highlights of Uriah's Development:

-Uriah now has two bottom teeth and two top teeth. A third tooth, the incisor, can be seen trying to cut through the gums. This makes for a very "special" experience for everyone 
(see: KRACKEN BABY/MOMBIE zombie) For the past two and a half weeks, Uriah has been getting up at 1, and, despite feeding, rocking, singing, and diaper changing, will be up for 2 hours just uncomfortable and tossing and turning. Still gets up at 7:20 like nothing at all happened! 

  



-Favorite song currently - "The Itsy Bitsy Spider." If Uriah is fussing, all I have to do is sing a dragged out, "tttttthhhhhheeeeeeeeee......" and he stops and puts his hands together to start making his "spider." He usually claps along when I sing it, and now wants to do the hands himself instead of me helping him (fighting for independence already!) Also loves: BINGO, The Wheels on the Bus, and Twinkle Twinkle. He loves any songs that have hand motions and are interactive!

-waves "bye-bye"

-Understands many phrases - knows who "dada/daddy", "mama", and "sophie" are. Understands: water, bottle, kisses, come here, no (thought that doesn't usually stop him from doing whatever naughty thing he is doing), bye-bye.

Matching with Daddy

Helping in the kitchen, AKA getting into mischief!
(That is his naughty face, BTW!)

-Walking along furniture all day everyday! 

LOL. Just LOL. Chucky baby!!

-Loves playing with everything but his toys. Favorites include: phone and laptop chargers (sucked on one laptop charger and $80 later we have a new one), remote controls, plugs. I thought we had a dentist on our hands, but now I'm thinking we have an electrician! 

-Loves saying "DADA!" especially when he wants to play, and "MAMA" when he is fussy and crying. What gives, man? I do love that when he wakes up in the morning, he usually is calling "DADA!!!" and slapping Rob to wake up, and not me. :)

BFFs

-Eats some table foods! Scrambled eggs, avocado, cottage cheese, cheese, toast and peanut butter, baby ravioli! he still eats some purees but we are slowly getting him to try chunkier foods, of course still broken up in small pieces.

Here he is enjoying the delicacy known as "blanket"

-Loves storytime. Uriah has always been good about sitting through books. We do have some touch/feel books, and it's to the point now where he knows on the page where the "feel" parts are and will immediately put his finger to that part of the page. Smart boy!

-Still nursing, but only 3x/day. I cannot wait until 1 year which is my goal when I will officially have my body back to ME. lol. Yay for regular bras, tops/dresses, and taking whatever medicines I want! 

Uriah is such a joy for us. While he has never been a great sleeper (he wakes up during the night at least once if not a few times on most occasions), we are so lucky that Uriah being a zombie baby is the only challenge we really have had to deal with. He is such a pleasant, easy-going and calm baby. I really am enjoying being his Mom, and look forward to so many more memories and experiences with him!

 

Bring on that Blizzard, baby!

Being from Hawaii, I have always had a fascination with the cold and snow, since we don't experience that on our beautiful tropical paradise. When we took family trips as kids, we would have fun making "smoke" come out of our breath when it was cold. As an adult, whenever I was planning a vacation, I always tried to plan it for the winter so I could experience the cold. Am I a weirdo? Well, yes (and not just for this). Odd as it may seem, one of the things I was looking forward to when moving to Maryland was the change in seasons, and snow for winter. People have told me "Give it a year - you'll be over the snow." I honestly don't think so. When I think of the reasons why I love Hawaii, it is because of my family, the people/spirit of Hawaii, and the FOOD. Don't get me wrong - I love the beach - but the warm weather is not at the top of my list. So, being the weirdo that we have established that I am, you can imagine how excited I got for the prospect of a blizzard dumping lots of snow!

Reasons I can be excited for a blizzard:

1. I have a warm home, with an awesome heater.

2. I have a condo that shovels the walkways for us.

3. I have a husband that digs the car out of the snow (shoutout to ROB! HOLLA). 

4. I am a stay at home Mom, so I am not forced to go out and function in the snow in the frigid early morning.

5. sweatpants all day long. Bring on the stretchy pants!

January's blizzard brought anywhere from 18-30" of snow! In our area, I believe it was about 22". There is something peaceful and beautiful about watching falling snow from your window, and when the entire down is blanketed in white, it is so quiet and serene. One thing I was worried about was losing electricity (which means no heater, no hot water, no hot food, etc) but thankfully, our power stayed on the whole time. Rob was off for two days from work (the roads were snowy and not cleared), and we were able to just be home and enjoy some quality family time "cooped up" together in the house.

View of our parking lot (our car is the first car)

Project: rediscover our car, courtesy of
Skeletor

We came downstairs quickly just to take a pic of the snowberms,
then ran back up! Uriah - such a good sport. LOL. Within seconds, all that snow had
collected on the top of the stroller!

The aftermath - one of our park benches 

Before snow

After snow

 

Beth Comes to Visit / We Almost Die

Beth had been planning to visit us for months, and the time had finally arrived! We were super excited, not only because we would get to see Beth, but because she would be the first of our family to come visit us in Maryland! :D Little did we know, we would also be welcoming another visitor: STOMACH BUGPOCALYPSE 2016. 

These poor, unsuspecting souls. Although, Uriah definitely suspects SOMETHING.

A lot of planning went into Beth's trip (since Hawaiian air only flies to New York, she needed to figure out a way to get to Maryland), as well as money! She took a flight down to DC (which was half the price of tickets coming to BWI, the airport 20 mins from us vs. DC which is 1 hour away), and Uriah and I picked her up without a hitch! Beth started feeling yucky during her flight, but what she thought was food poisoning turned out to be a nasty stomach bug. We discovered this when, one by one, each of us started dropping like flies. We were pretty bummed that almost all of Beth's trip was altered because we each got sick. It was still really nice to be able to see her, and I was glad that Beth was feeling healthy enough to be able to see the Baltimore Aquarium and to prance around D.C. on her last two days, albeit alone. Then again, she did meet a friendly stranger (of course he was a guy - willing to help show around a cute girl) of whom I was convinced was a murderer, kidnapper, or both. Apparently, I'm a little less trusting than Beth when it comes to meeting strangers in one of the cities with the highest murder rates. Thankfully, he was neither a murderer nor a kidnapper, and Beth met a friend who doubled as both a tour guide and a paparazzi. Perfect!

Back to our near death experience with STOMACH BUGPOCALYPSE 2016. Rob and I both agree that in our 34+years of living, this was hands down the most sick we've ever been. We both each lost 12 pounds in 2 days (Kamuela said we should be thanking Beth for that part), and were completely LAYED OUT for four days. The sickness lasted about a week, but the first four days were most intense.  We experienced what Linda Blair demonstrated during her role in the Exorcist, namely, pasty sweat-sheened skin, projectile vomiting, and, as an added bonus, relentless diarrhea.   Thankfully, Uriah had only the mildest of reactions (yay for breastmilk antibodies!), a little vomiting (maybe 2x) and mild diarrhea. I am so grateful that he did not get the full fledged attack like we did. There is our silver lining! 

Beth and Uriah were even able to spend some quality time together! While I was down and out, Beth was able to take over giving Uriah his baths, reading stories, and feeding him his nighttime bottle. It was really nice to have the help, and Beth and Uriah really enjoyed the bonding time! <3

I went with Beth to try to eat some seafood on day four - I was able to eat a little, but my heart just wasn't in it. Obviously, I was still under the weather. I'm still glad she got to try Fat Boy's crab cake (my favorite so far) and their super yummy crab dip! 

Hopefully, Beth will come visit us again so we can have a proper do-over to do everything we wanted to do the first time around, with a lot less diarrhea.