Not My Favorite Age

Every age used to be my favorite up until Charlie hit 2 years and had to adjust to a little brother. He is defiant, whiney and his sleep as gone nuts. He is waking up at crazy hours and has refused his nap twice since Diego's arrival.

When he isn't whining it is fun having conversations with Charlie. I remember when he was piecing together a few words and now he tries to tell full stories (though you need to know the plot to follow along :)). And yesterday I noticed how he is trying to use the past tense - though he still needs some help with the conjugating...He answers almost every yes/no question with "no." Here is how the questions go:

"Do you want to eat your dinner?" 'NO'

"Do you want ice cream with chocolate?" 'NO'

"Can you say the word Yes?" 'NO'.

I'm not sure he even knows the word yes. On the flip side he likes to ask lots of questions but not listen to the answer:

"What are you doing Daddy?" "I'm working Charlie"

"What are you doing Daddy?" "I'm doing work"

"What are you doing Daddy?"....I guess he doesn't like the answer because he'll just keep asking the question over and over and over.

My favorite phrase these days is "go-seek-it" - which means he wants you to go hide or he'll hide and then continually yell "Where's Charlie?!"

Diego is doing great. He gained 1 lb 4 oz by his 2 week appointment! I wasn't surprised given how much he likes to eat. He is definitely turning into a chubby little baby. He loves being held and cruising around in the stroller. My two favorite times are when we take naps together in the afternoon and his naked time out on the porch. He enjoys checking out the trees diaper free as Charlie plays in the water and I use it as an excuse for happy hour. I noticed that he is getting infant acne and when I looked back on Charlie's baby pictures this was around the same time that Charlie had a terrible receding hair line and infant acne.

I'll add to the list of observations from last week that family is key. My mom was here last week and Carlos' mom is here this week. I'm not sure how we'll manage without them. In fact I burst into tears when my mom left. Charlie appreciates all the attention and I appreciate not having to wake up with Charlie in the morning!

From Womb to World

It is amazing how quickly I forgot what it is like to have a newborn. I thought I'd document some observations for next time around:

1) Always use a changing pad: I put Diego on the bed to perform what I thought would be a quick diaper change. A sponge bath, outfit change and change of bed sheets later I was finally ready to get out the door.

2) Baby voices are instinctual? Charlie even uses a baby voice when talking to Diego. He likes to get really close to Diego's face and in a high pitched tone say "Hi Diego, hi Diego, hi Diego, hi Diego" about 10 times.

3) Two year olds aren't babies anymore: Until Diego arrived we referred to Charlie as our baby. But in the last two weeks he seems to have become a giant. Despite his size (relative to his brother) he still needs some babying. He certainly is growing into his big brother role, but I need to remember that up until 2 weeks ago he was the little baby.

4) Newborns sleep a lot: Diego doesn't have many new tricks other than opening his eyes.

5) Budget way more time than I think I need to do anything. I always tease Carlos for how poorly he estimates the duration of house projects and yet I seem to do the same with the kids. I thought 30 minutes was enough time to get out of the house, but that was a joke. I also thought that the drive from Philly to DC would take the normal 2.5 hours. HA! Charlie, Diego and I drove back from Philly and got to know all the service centers along the drive. Charlie had to go pee, Diego was hungry, Charlie manuevered himself partially out of his car seat, Diego did a poo...We stopped 4 times and arrived an hour late.

5) Plan for things to go wrong: 10 minutes after my mom, Diego, Charlie and I had gotten out the door to go for a walk the house alarm went off so my mom went running home leaving the 3 of us at the pizza place. We got up to start walking and it started to pour rain so we went to Starbucks to wait out the rain. Charlie paced around Starbucks singing the wheels on the bus song and then demanded to go pee. It's not easy to help Charlie go pee in a public bathroom while holding a newborn! The rain caused flooding in the basement and caused all the power to go off in the house. 4 hours later half the house had power and so to salvage all the food in the fridge we had to pull it out and run an extension cord into the hallway. Here is Charlie eating pizza before the rain and singing in Starbucks.

6) Kimono shirts are key: I'm still cycling through the 5 kimono shirts I have - including 3 from the hospital (one from Charlie's birth, one from Diego's birth and one that Carlos talked the hospital into giving us)

7) I'm always going to forget something: No matter how well I think I packed the diaper bag I am always missing something. And whatever it is I forgot we are sure to need or want. Oh well.

8) Don't try to get anything done in a day: I'm much happier this time around as I don't bother to try to be productive. I usually only have one had free at a time and that's just enough to throw the ball to Charlie or read a book.

Week 1

For the last 2 years I've been declaring each age my favorite age so I was slightly worried about having a new born again. But they are the cutest ever! I love how little and cozy Diego is. When curled up he is about the size of a football and he loves to sleep on my (or anyone's) chest or lap. He was a terrible sleeper the first few nights home from the hospital but he may be figuring out night and day and now sleeps a whole 1.5 hrs at a time at night. Sadly that's great news to me.

Life with 2 sure is different. I tried to go somewhere this morning on my own with the two kids and it was a total failure. Luckily Jamie (with her 2 kids) and her mom were there to help. I still don't even get the logistics of managing 2 kids - what to do when one has to go to the bathroom or melts down or needs to nurse. Generally Charlie is doing alright given all the attention his father and grandmother are giving him though he doesn't like certain things like Diego using his stroller.

Charlie's friend Isaac gave Diego a cookie monster towel but he won't have much of a chance to use it because Charlie loves it. He runs up and down the hallway in it as if he were wearing a cookie monster superhero costume. He also loves his harmonica.

As for the house...well we still have a number of ongoing, unfinished projects. I guess double or nothing wasn't a good bet for Carlos. Maybe third time is a charm.

The New Arrival...

Baby Diego arrived on 8/9/10 - deciding that Friday the 13th wasn't the best due date. Despite his father's desire for a late arrival Diego decided monday rush hour would be a good time to make his parents head to the hospital.

I had been uncomfortable for a few days beforehand so I wasn't sure if the cramps on Sunday night were more of the same or the start of something more. And even the next morning I wasn't convinced I was in labor. I spent the whole night awake timing the contractions on an excel spreadsheet as I went about finishing work emails, eating ice cream, making sure my leave paperwork was ready, re-packing my hospital bag and anything else I could think to do in the middle of the night to keep my mind off of labor. By early morning the contractions seemed very regular and we waited for Sandra to arrive before taking off. The weirdest thing happened - as soon as Sandra arrived my contractions seemed to stop! I thought it was false labor and almost made Carlos turn back home. But when we got to the hospital I was 6cm dilated. After 4 hours of crazy sporadic contractions I was ready to push and out popped a beautiful baby. He immediately opened his eyes and looked at us - I guess making sure that we were suitable parents....He is really darling.

Charlie met baby brother Diego truck (charlie's official name for him) the next day and was super sweet. He is definitely a little jealous of my time and wants to get very close to the baby, but overall he has been sweet to him. Here he is singing him to sleep.

5 Days and Counting

Charlie had a fun weekend while his dad worked hard to get the house back in order. The guest bathroom remains unusable and a lot of our belongings are hanging out on the upstairs deck as my office gets worked on. "It's not going to rain for while" Carlos promised me. Famous last words....

Charlie woke up Saturday and read the newspaper. Here he is reading aloud and clearly debating whether or not he agrees with the direction of the policy in question.



On Saturday he was determined to play tennis so we spent much of the day hitting the ball around. For awhile he kept referring to it as a soccer ball, but I think he is finally getting his ball types sorted out.

In the evening he had a super special treat. A friend of ours offered to take him to Wolf Trap with her son to listen to music and see Bugs Bunny - thus allowing us to have a final date night before BB#2 arrives. Charlie has never had such an adventure with some one other than his grandmothers so I was a little nervous, but I packed his bag and put him in the car with them. I'm realizing that I am super emotional right now because as soon as I put him in the car seat and saw him cry when he realized that I wasn't going with him I lost it. Of course a block later he stopped crying and had a great time. He woke up this morning telling me about bunnies, music and clapping. I was much slower to recover.... Here are some pictures they sent:

And finally - who says this generation only likes text messaging?! Charlie had a 15 min. phone conversation yesterday and didn't want to get off! Of course only about 5 minutes of it makes any sense...Like his father, he paces when he talks on the phone. Here is a short clip of him walking and talking.

I'm feeling ready to pop. I'm crampy and I can't sleep well because of bad back pain. But we're hoping that he stays in for another few days!!

More Birthday Wishes

Charlie got to celebrate his birthday this whole weekend with family and friends. Nathan, Soogy, Wallis, Eli and my mom came down for the weekend which was super nice. Charlie loved playing with his older cousin Wallis and even seemed to be in a sharing mood. It definitely made me realize how fun it will be once he and the new baby can play together. On Saturday some of Charlie's friends came over to celebrate. It was chaotic with so many toddlers, but so fun. Having lots of kids around definitely makes the house seem alive and fun. Charlie really enjoyed himself. The kids dismantled Charlie's toy set, got messy with the crafts and ran circles around the adults (at least around me). My mom brought a kids table with two little chairs and it seemed that there were 6 kids sharing the chairs at any one time. Their little butts shared the chairs as they studiously worked on the playdough including grinding it into the rug. Our friend Lisa Kopp had her baking debut by baking a cake for Charlie which was so sweet of her and so yummy! As you can see here, baby Eli especially loved it. I'll post better pictures from my brother soon given that Charlie had more control of the camera than I did this weekend.

When he woke up on Sunday and went downstairs Charlie disappointedly asked "where's all the people?" Luckily Wallis and Eli were still here so he got to play a bit longer with them. After playing with balloons, eating oatmeal, testing out the crayons and playdough Charlie and Wallis set out to another birthday party at a nearby park. The rest of the day was consumed by cleaning the house, eating leftovers, re-assembling his train set and playing with new toys. Oh - and we sang Happy Birthday again after his nanny Sandra brought over the cutest cake with his photo on it!

Who doesn't love a week long birthday celebration?!