Shopping in SF with Uncle Dubs and Aunt Amy Kate

Wore the little guy out!
With Uncle Dubs outside the dressing rooms

Easter Weekend

A weekend or two ago I left my digital SLR at my mom's house (I can't believe I did that since my camera is my 1st born...goes to show you what having a baby does to you) and was able to pick it up at my sister's this weekend.  Here are some pics from our visit at her house. Of course, hauling around all of Charlie's stuff at the other houses I forgot to get out my camera :-(

For the last couple of years when I was teaching and had limited breaks during the school year Jose and I have taken Easter to travel or have a small celebration together and now I remember why. We had a really great weekend with family but driving out towards Dixon for our last visit we realized how bad the traffic was going home (around 5:30). We didn't end up leaving until 9:00 and still hit really bad traffic, not getting in to the condo until after 11:30 pm. We used to make the late drive ALL THE TIME and yet we can't do it anymore. Both of us are zombies this morning - I told Jose after my 6 am wake up call with Charlie talking that I feel like I got hit over the head.

Charlie sharing a blanket on the lawn with Logan (Carter's nephew). Charlie had never sat on the grass before and instantly tried to, with persistence, eat the grass until I had to pick him up.

Nothing beats a sidewalk chalk welcome :-)

Allison H. (Carter's sister) with her son Logan, Tia Ryn with Charlie....the boys reaching for each other :-)

Charlie's 1st easter basket full of big boy clothes! Thanks Nona!

Happy boy on his blanket - in what was supposed to be his thanksgiving outfit :-) Judging sizes can be tricky!

Tia Ryn & Charlie enjoying the shade

Carter and his daughter Isabella

Isabella in her play high heels that my mom gave her :-)

Aaryn & Carter

Oprah's show on Motherhood's Dirty Little Secrets

Just finished watching Oprah's show for Mom's (on DVR of course, I have to catch up on everything during Charlie's nap or nighttime sleep!) and if you haven't seen it, it's a must watch for mom's, preggies, hell anyone even remotely thinking about having children.

Some of my favorite things are:

"It's easy to love your child but motherhood is very difficult"

"I had to mourn who I was before I had my baby." (You have to reinvent yourself and sacrifice much of who you are in terms of time)

Favorite Confessions:

One mom who peed in a diaper on a 7 hr road trip to avoid waking up her 2 kids

I'd trade my husband for a housekeeper - hilarious!

One of the moms is a famous blogger (note to self: MUST look her up and post a link to her site) and she started blogging to combat PPD (Post partum depression). I wonder if that's why I started....I definitely felt the need for an outlet especially with the new mom isolation.

I'd love to explore this line further but need to get ready so I can go pick up Charlie's big boy car seat that came in today. (We decided on a britax boulevard CS) I'll post some pics after I get it inspected at Stanford tomorrow, good thing I got that 8am appt just in case!

LPCH Car Seat Fitting Station (approx only 1 in 10 car seats in installed correctly by parents)

Thanks for the Seattle imports Kate!

Hibernating

It's something I do when I've bitten off more than I can chew - hunker down with the boys.  This weekend we had the first real and full weekend together in I don't know how long.

Saturday Jose surprised me with a mani/pedi gift cert and I was so excited. He took Charlie and had some boys time - and it was so nice to finally get a mani! I haven't had once since Charlie was born because when I go in the shop I have to be super quick and there's not someone there to do them at the same time or I have Charlie and I need my hands to pick him up etc. when he gets fussy. We then took a drive out to Half Moon Bay where my heart REALLY lives to drive by a foreclosure condo. It needs a lot of work and I'm concerned about the HOA so I'm investigating further....it's cheap enough to warrant the research.

Yesterday Jose had to work in the morning so Charlie and I ran some errands and then played in his office until we were able to take off for SF. We bought Charlie a kelty kids backpack after mucho research and he loved it. On Jose's back he can see everything and at Crissy fields, one of our fav. spots there is always great people & pet watching. It's nice to be able able to hold hands again too :-)

7 months old today

I can't believe our baby boy is 7 months old today...I'm still in shock over the 6 month mark :-( 7 months in my mind sounds like such a big boy, not the tiny little guy that still needs me all the time.  Charlie is definitely getting bigger: cammando crawling/scooting, proping up like he might crawl then belly diving toward the toy he wants, leaning/reaching for Jose and I when he wants us, or scooting to us, definitely has stranger anxiety (though he gets over it if you let him warm up), the "elvis" (hip thrusts while laying on his back), fake coughing/squealing/"talking" to get the attention that he needs. Developmentally it's an exciting time and it can be difficult to keep track of all the milestones. I get emails from multiple sources about baby development (including our hospital which is so helpful so I can read up in short format) and this is a great chart for 7-12 month development...I especially like that it breaks it down into 3 columns: mastered skills, emerging skills and advanced skills because every baby truly is different.

We're recovering from all the travel, yep, it's caught up with us...so no fancy pics for the blog entry today but here are a few from this afternoon. I'll put up a cute 7 month pic in the next few days.

Quite Expressive...