Kornese Guy

Christian is a Kornese (Korean + Chinese). Ev and Jeff came up with this hybrid term and I thought it was hilarious. I presented it to Dae and he felt that Chi-rean was better (Huh? I beg to differ).

Anyway, our little Kornese has had a very active past few days, with many family members coming and going. Firstly, we fed him his first spoonful of solids (homemade rice cereal) on Friday without much fanfare. He tasted, puckered his face, and swallowed. We captured it on film, but haven't fed him solids since. In all honesty, I was hoping that solids would fill him up a bit, with the ultimate goal being a better night's sleep. After realizing the insignificant quantities that he would actually be ingesting the first few weeks (1 Tbs or less), we put the kibosh on the solids until 6 months, or as long as we can hold out.



In other related news (and in keeping with the tradition of reading about 25 parenting books before finding what sticks), we have discovered a guy called Ferber. Probably better known as the 'cry-it-out' author, I re-discovered this book a couple days ago and stumbled across magical chapter 6. Feeding during the night! The bane of our existence! In a nutshell, I tried this technique for the first time last night (grandpa and great-grandma were spending the night, but luckily great-grandma's hearing isn't top notch and grandpa isn't fazed by crying) and can say, with caution, so far so good. The past week Christian had worn Dae and I to the ground, with 5-8 wakings per evening. Last night: two!!! For tonight, I'm hoping for the best, but expecting the worst. We shall soon see...

Meanwhile, cousin Wade (aka Didi) celebrated his first birthday! Pics to come, but for now I am off to bed for a (hopefully) good night's sleep.

Bob and the Lees

I had insisted (insisted!) that I didn't need anything for my birthday...besides a subscription to People magazine (I have been coveting one for years, but always thought it was too expensive - strange, since I will easily waste $50-100 regularly on other miscellaneous junk). Dae kept asking and asking what I needed. I finally caved when the REI flyer arrived in the mail yesterday, advertising a 20% off labor day celebration on BOB strollers. These being the trendy strollers that I always thought unnecessary. Well, now that I have decided to once again give jogging a go, the BOB stroller it is and I couldn't have been happier with its inaugural run!

Dawn's Family Photos

Dawn came over to our neck of the woods last week and photographed my mom, Ev, me and the 3 grandkids. She did a wonderful job (not in the least surprising!) and we were all so excited with the results. Memories to cherish forever!

Happy Birthday Dae!!!

Happy Birthday to Dae!!!

As you can tell from the cake, he is all of 18 years old! hahaha Actually, 33 is more like it. Isn't this cake hilarious? I think the guy went a little crazy, and then after all that he totally forgot to put the Happy Birthday Dae inscription I had requested. Oh well, I guess he was perfecting his artistry craft. We gobbled down turkey burgers, by request from Dae, and Baskin Robbins ice cream cake (strawberry ice cream and vanilla cake - boring if you ask me but Dae loves his strawberry). On an altogether unrelated note, Christian is fully rolling over now. Astounding! We place him on his back and he rolls over onto his stomach in a heartbeat (so far this has only happened in the past couple of days when he is upset and kicking/screaming. Coincidence? We shall soon see). Happy, Happy Birthday Dae!!!

Dae Just Trimmed My Bangs

I think the title just about says it, no photo needed. We've really reached an all-time low! Dae and I could not stop laughing the entire time. Miraculously, he did a decent job!

More Miscellaneous August Fun

We just got back from Babies R Us where we bought Christian a new travel swing. There's always the question of "where do we put him down" when we are in a hotel room, traveling, or basically anywhere but home. He seems to love his full-size swing, so we are hoping he takes to the travel one as well. Here he is testing out the merchandise at Babies R Us.

With Christian's approval, we settled on the Boppy brand swing. He seemed quite content.

In other news, Christian had his orthopedic evaluation yesterday for his hips and came back with a clean bill of health! No intervention needed, the orthopedic surgeon assured, so we are relieved. As an aside, leaving his appointment I decided to nurse him in the front seat of my car. As I was nursing, I heard some telltale "noises" coming from the diaper region and very soon after felt quite a bit of warmth. I thought hmmm, that's odd, I can't usually feel this much warmth through his diaper. Well, it turns out the 'goods' had not remained within the confines of his diaper at all. They had, in fact, literally exploded up and out the back of his pants, all over his pants, my pants and the leather front seat. My pants were so wet it felt like I was the one who had had the accident! (they were also a lovely hue of bright mustard yellow) I scrambled around the trunk for any absorbent material I could find and ended up using his sleeping bag carseat insert as a mop. Christian's trusty white summer jeans were white no more and he made the trip home in a diaper. I made the trip home with pants saturated through and sitting on a sheepskin sleeping bag insert. All the while, (naturally) Christian was happy as a clam, oblivious to the mayhem he had just put mom through and in a state of post-blowout bliss. That stinky guy.

This week brought two visitors and a photo session: My mom came and taught me and Ev how to make the fermented rice concoction which is supposedly good for nursing (it was a success!). We also met up with Dawn at a park in Northeast Portland where she generously spent about an hour and a half taking photos of 3 adults, 1 toddler and 2 infant/babies. Whew! Brave, she is :) On Thursday night, Lisa came and brought almost-1 year old Zach with her, who was smiling from the moment he arrived. It was the first time he and Christian had met, and we can already tell they are going to be old, best friends! Zach was truly one of the most smiley babies I have ever met and he seemed to thoroughly enjoy maneuvering his little "car" around the house, even managing to reverse like a pro.

This weekend has also been filled with work on our old 1-bedroom unit across the hall. We finally got approval to rent the place so our poor little abandoned condo will be home to new tenants at last! We needed to spiff up the place a bit so Dae spent the morning painting...

Leelee was relegated to the bedroom by himself to avoid the fumes. Poor little guy.

Finally, some other related (and non-related) news:

1) My computer is running at Snail's pace after that nasty virus, so it's time for a system-wide reset or a new Mac!

2) Christian has graduated from his swaddle to a sleep sack. Arms are now outstretched at all times, and legs are contained within the sack (but still frog-like, I am sure)

3) We have regressed: Last week I prematurely posted about Christian's "one wail" prior to bedtime. Well, tonight was another story altogther. After about 1 1/2 hours of full blown wailing, Dad went to retrieve Christian and he emerged from his bedroom a sweaty mess. We took pity, fed him and he dutifully went down to sleep. The saga continues...

4) Christian loves to play with Dae...I feel like I can get a token laugh or smile here and there, but he seems to have the loudest and most prolonged laughing sessions with Dad. It is hilarious!

Mover and Shaker

Christian is a mover and a shaker, in most areas of his limited life. The guy just does not like to sit still. I remember when we went to the craniosacral massage, the midwife even commented "Wow, he sure is an active eater, isn't he?" as I was nursing him (Yes, he is). Anyway, thank goodness for crib rails. He inevitably ends up perpendicular to the way we placed him, snuggled up against the crib wall. His "swaddle" is usually a disaster by this point as well, with legs and arms flailing to and fro.


There are a few new developments in our house that I have been very excited about: 1) Our new deep freezer 2) Our new file cabinet and 3) Netflix. The old freezer just wasn't cutting it. Between Leelee's frozen milk stash and Dae's frozen pizzas, it was busting at the seams (I'd like to eliminate the latter, but that's another story altogether). Regarding the file cabinet, anyone who knows me knows my need for organization of paperwork. Unbeknownst to me, Dae had been sneaking into my old file cabinet and haphazardly placing his important documents into mis-labeled files (the horror!). This was, obviously, unacceptable, so we mapped out a trip to Staples a couple of weeks ago and Dae sweated through putting the thing together (he made sure to let me know it was at least twice as hard as putting together any of our Ikea furniture, in case I thought it was a breeze). And Netflix...we love it. Having kids (a kid) does not seem compatible with finishing movies in a timely manner. Neither does dropping off movies at the movie store. Enter Netflix!

Never thought I would be so excited about a deep freezer

The joy of filing!

Lastly, a photo of Leelee in his Harvard shirt from Auntie Ev. Looking very scholarly if I do say so myself! haha

Summer Continues

Last weekend Grandpa (Gong Gong) came into town and treated us to an early-Birthday brunch at Salty's celebrating Ev and Dae's August birthdays. Christian enjoyed the views of the Columbia and some quality time with Gong Gong.

Our pediatrician noted Christian's "male-pattern baldness" - this shot displays his mohawk well

Leelee and our bucket of evidence

New bangs, cut Saturday by yours truly (never a good idea)

About two months ago I took a photo of Christian with 2 of his friends from Baby and Me group, Ronan and Quinn. We met up again last Saturday and re-created the shot, this time with ever so slightly larger babies (understatement - Ronan is weighing in at a cool 20 pounds, and Quinn is right up there! Stinks is a petite little guy at 15)


Some random musings:

1) We had swim lessons yesterday in the 68 degree overcast weather. Christian was used to slightly warmer conditions (try 30 degrees warmer, as it had been above 90 at every prior lesson). Poor little guy was shivering by around 18 minutes so we bundled him up and sped home for a nice warm bath. He made a speedy recovery and all is well! Speaking of swim, he did awesome yesterday - backfloats, head dunks and side to side water sweeps didn't phase him.

2) New thing: Screaming (I think he likes the sound of his own voice). Personally I think it's pretty funny :)

3) My computer has a virus - from China of all places! Those Chinese...
Dae has been my personal Geek Squad, staying up all sorts of hours to try to figure this bug out.

4) An outline of our typical night these days:

7:00pm: Dad swaddles Christian and places him, crying, into the crib.
7:02pm: Christian emits one wail, and usually promptly falls asleep (woohoo!). Dae and I watch Jeopardy (right now it's Teen Jeopardy - we love it and feel smart because we can actually answer some of the questions), eat dinner, and catch up on all of our reality TV.
10:00pm: Dreaded wake-up. Dad or I bring Christian into bed where he nurses for, seriously, as long as humanly possible (he's onto us, we're convinced). If any of the three of us are conscious after this nursing session, stinky guy is brought back to his crib for Round 2. Crying is usually not involved in this round, thank goodness.
12 midnight - 1:00am: This begins the hazy period of our night. None of us are sure what time it is, nor where we are, who we are, etc. Christian wakes up for the second time, at which time he is now allowed into our bed (victory!). I fall into and out of consciousness for the remainder of the night, allowing Christian to nurse at will. It is truly a smorgasbord.
4:00am: This part is new. Christian wakes up, cries, and is inconsolable. The only thing that works is for one of us to pick up him, bring him out into the living room and place him in his swing. He passes out immediately for another 3 hours.

Big sigh. Everybody says this too shall pass. What I would do for an uninterrupted 8-hour night!

Christian at 4 Months - Photos by Dawn

I was eagerly anticipating Dawn's second set of photos, and they most certainly did not disappoint!!!