Imagination

"Our son has imagination," said Nick as we watched Nat walk around the house with an empty cup in his hands.  Notably, one of the things he was doing with the cup was holding it up to his mouth and tilting his head as far as he could.  He was clearing doing what his dad does when he is finishing a cup of juice.  And then we took it to the next level.

"Why don't we give some water to Winnie the Pooh" I said and held Nat's cup up under the bear's nose.  (This particular Winnie the Pooh does not seem to have a well defined mouth.)   Nat liked this very much.  He proceeded to "give water" to his tiger, another bear and his zebra.  (Covering their protruding muzzles with the cup seemed to qualify.)  

A Long Weekend in Philadelphia

A couple of weeks ago we visited Philadelphia--our first time traveling with Nat to a place we have never been before.

Overall the trip was definitely a success:

• We visited Brooke (Even IF we did not drive her crazy by our slow pace and loud banter late into the night, we surely drove her cats crazy.)
• We saw a little bit of different parts of the city
• We ate some excellent food
• Nat did not have too much of a hard time with all the traveling, and he loved the kitties

Hopefully, this trip was our first, but not our last trip to Philadelphia.  We strolled around different neighborhoods, admiring the all the different row houses.  We walked by the Independence Hall, peeked at the Liberty Bell through the window, and stopped by the Reading Terminal Market for lunch.  Nick even had time to explore the Philadelphia Museum of Art with Brooke, while Nat and I walked along the Schuylkill River and learned a little bit about the first water works in the country.  We even said "Hello" to New Jersey from Penn's Landing area on the Delaware River.

A view of New Jersey from Penn's Landing across the Delaware River

Philadelphia definitely holds a lot more for us to explorer.  My only pet peeve was how unfriendly the city's public transit system seems to be to traveling with babies.  And I am not even talking about elevators at every subway station--that would be luxury.  When we boarded a bus, we were immediately asked to fold the stroller.  The trolley doors are so narrow, that it is hard to walk on just carrying a folded stroller.  These issues did not present a problem for us because there were three of us, and because Nat is not tiny baby anymore.  However, it seems that a parent traveling alone with a child under 6 months could not use the bus or the trolley system unless the child was in a carrier and not a stroller. 

Nat really enjoyed eating out--being held hostage by the high chair is much easier when there are all these interesting things and people to look at.  He also really liked the two kitties who are temporarily living with Brooke.  It did not take Nat long to start chasing the cats around the apartment trying to grab their tails.  We kept trying to teach him proper cat petting etiquette, but the wagging tails were just so enticing and just at the right height.  I have to say that these two cats were extremely nice--they did not retaliate against him not once. 

Martino

The trip marked the second time that Nat traveled on a train. 

He did pretty well, minus a tantrum on the way back when he woke up crying inconsolably.  On the way back Nat also met a very nice 13 month old girl, Menea.  This little girl was clearly used to spending time with other babies.  She alternated between giving Nat her toys and taking them away.  When prompted by her mom, she would also give Nat and me hugs.  Nat, who has not had a chance to meet other babies, mostly just stared.  Clearly curious, but also a little bit afraid, he just did not know what to do.

More Socks

Here is my third attempt to make it to the finals of the Design A Sock contest, held by Sock It To Me.  Wish me luck!

Point!

Sometime this morning, Nat took a sock out of my boot and carried it around for awhile.  In case you do not know, socks are excellent for shaking, holding above your head, covering your eyes with (especially while walking), and stuffing into your mouth...  When he was done, he put the sock back in my boot.  When I went to put on my boots this afternoon, I found 3 toys stored in my boots.

In other news, Nat started pointing today.  When I tried to rock him to sleep for his nap this afternoon, he held his head up and pointed to his crib.  He wanted me to put him in his crib, so that he could walk around on his mattress while wearing his sleeping sack... 

Time Just Flies - Recapping the Holidays

There is so much to write about and so little time to do it.  In the meantime our baby is rapidly turning into a toddler.

First of all I have been meaning to recap the holidays--they were great. All three of them!  (Hanukkah, Christmas and New Years).  We lit candles for Hanukkah every day--a first for us.  Of course Nat will not remember any of it, but it still felt nice to do.

Our Christmas might have been a little frenzied, but we hit all the "essentials": family (one of the bigger turn outs this year), rolls, Christmas jello, sugar high, interesting cocktails (ok, Nat might have skipped those last two...).  

Clearly Walla Walla deserves a lot more coverage than just one sentence.  In contrast, there is not much to say about our New Years celebration--just us at home, with a little bit of cake, strawberries and champagne.  

Of course there was also Nat's first airplane ride, and he was a trooper.  He fussed a bit, but not unreasonably.  During take off and landing, he fell asleep instead of screaming.  

Unfortunately, our car ride to and from Walla Walla, which is only marginally shorter than the plane ride, was not nearly as pleasant.  Nat hardly slept, and screamed bloody murder for over an hour each way.  The short periods of time he did not scream were all due to Aunt Brooke's creative entertainment.  (Thanks, Brooke!)

In addition to meeting a lot of family for the first time over the holidays, Nat also got to spend quality time with several dogs.  Being a very small animal himself, he was cautious at first.  While Mojo, the energetic pug, scared Nat out of his high chair for good, Roo, the super mellow Newfoundland mix was the favorite despite his enormous size.  After a couple of days in the same house, Nat chased Roo with happy squeals.  He also maintained what he must have deemed a safe distance of about a foot when the dog was facing him, and promptly "ran" away with similarly loud squeals if Roo moved towards him. 

Now over a month has passed.  While Nick and I have barely had time to recover from the holidays, Nat grew two more teeth, started walking on his own, and stopped being a vegetarian.  He is still attracted to kitchen cabinets, but has discovered how to open and close the bedroom door, and grew absolutely obsessed with lifting the flaps in his Toes, Ears and Nose! book.

Donating Bone Marrow

Five years ago I registered with the National Marrow Donor Program.  It is notoriously difficult to find a match for someone needing a bone marrow transplant, and I wanted to help.  At the same time, because it is so difficult to find a match, I did not really expect to ever be contacted. 

So you can imagine my shock when last October I received an email informing me that I was a possible match.  I followed the instructions and got in touch with the people in the donor program.  I had to make some difficult choices.  For a variety of reasons the program provided me, the perspective donor, with limited information while asking me to make an unconditional go/no-go decision upfront. 

For example, there are multiple methods for extracting bone marrow.  The least invasive and the most common one used currently requires the donor to take medication for at least a week.  For a breastfeeding mother like me, 7 days of medication implied 7 days of pumping and dumping, while my baby ate frozen breastmilk or formula.  I knew my baby would be in no danger of malnutrition, but I worried that he would inadvertently be weaned by the time I was ready to breastfeed him again. 

Many questions whirled around my mind.  Who is more important to me, my baby or a leukemia patient I have never met?  Can I compare the benefits of breastfeeding to an attempt to give someone another chance to live?  Can I subject my family to the extra work that will result from my pumping around the clock, having to feed the baby from the bottle around the clock, not to mention dealing with me potentially feeling weak and/or sick from the medication and the donation itself? 

Feeling overwhelmed, I called my very good friend whose brother has now been cancer free for two years after having a bone marrow transplant.  Talking to her made the decision easy.  I never wanted to wonder whether someone could have lived but died because I was worried that my baby might wean too early.  I never wanted to wonder if parents lost their child because I was worried about the possibility of having to feed formula instead of breastmilk to my baby.  I never wanted to wonder if children lost their parent because I was worried about having to do more work while feeling tired.  My concerns fizzled away in comparison to losing someone who could have lived.

So I agreed to proceed.

As it turns out, my bone marrow was not needed this time around.  Perhaps a better match was found, or the patient decided against the procedure, or the doctors decided against the procedure for this patient.  I will never know what really happened, but I am glad that I will never have to think back to this episode in my life and wonder "what if..."

Our First Sensory Bag

Since I never have enough time to write for the blog, I thought I would try a more visual approach.

Here is what I did last night after putting the baby to bed, baking some shortbread and making my lunch for the next day.

Later Edit: This is NOT blood (Это НЕ кровь.)  This is food coloring!

This is our first "sensory bag", something I came across on the internet (where else).  This taped Ziploc bag contains baby oil, water and food coloring.  It is squishy. The color blobs change shape.  It is supposed to be a great thing for the baby to explore.  Nat liked it, but I think I was more excited about it than he was.