One. Week. Baby.

Just one week from today the NFL season kicks off.

Luke can't wait.

(Oh,and his mother is a little bit excited too)

My Siamese Twin

This is Luke's new favorite place to play in the mornings. My son is totally enthralled with his reflection. He laughs out loud when he first stands up and sees himself, then immediately leans in for a long passionate mirror kiss with his better half. He will play there by himself for a good 15 or 20 minutes. I can't even believe how quickly this "standing" thing has become a part of our life. Crawling, I felt ready for, standing....not so much. It results in a few loud head crashes a day now, which are hard on both Mom and baby. He climbs up the dishwasher, the baby gate, the coffee table, and any and every freestanding object on the floor (like Nate's toolbox in the pic above, which he then proceeded to climb OVER to get to the next object of his attention, the unopened paint cans behind them) He is Luke, Monkey Boy extraordinaire.

I am still not really better from the weekend. This is starting to get long, and annoying.

Tonight I am getting out with Jeannie and going to Carolines SL Party.......(Hi J and Luke says CONGRATS again on making PARTNER!!! He is so proud of you ;)
Nate is staying home with the critter. Isn't it funny that Nate is "watching the baby" ~ If Nate goes out no one asks if Melissa is home "watching the baby" ~ or asks if I "watch the baby" all day long. But somehow when a Dad is the one home with their child they are "watching" them, like a babysitter. Its funny.

6 Month Portrait

My guy.

Weekend Woes

I suffered from "Panera's Revenge" all weekend. Lost 5 lbs the not fun way. Ate at Panera for the first (and last) time in my life on Friday with Maryanne and Jen, and spent the rest of the weekend very sick. Ugh. Saturday was spent on the couch entertaining the baby and trying to keep down toast while Nate slaved away painting the house in the 100 degree heat. Luke is a great companion while sick, he is such an easy going little guy who vacillates between playing by himself on the floor, crawling everywhere, standing up and falling over, and then coming over for cuddles on the couch. His weigh in last Thursday at my nursing group showed that he gained a pound and a half in less than two weeks, so my guy is getting big. He had stayed at the same weight for about a month, so it was nice to see him gain. 18 and 1/2 lbs now. Wow.

We have been listening to the new baby's heartbeat with a Doppler, it's so amazing to hear that little heart thumping away in there. It makes it start to feel more real to me that we are having another baby. (One would have thought that the fact that I am already having to wear maternity clothes might have done the trick....but no, hearing the heartbeat is making it hit home) As I was so sick I was a little panicked on Friday night about it harming the baby, so its great to hear that heartbeat, very reassuring. For those that put any stock in the old wives tales, this baby's heartbeat is way higher than Luke's always was in utero. (Luke was always 145-150, this baby is in the 165-170 range.) We also listened to Luke's heartbeat with it, much easier to find now that he is sitting on the couch instead of in utero :). We were cracking up to hear it, then us laughing got Luke laughing, and his heart rate went up. We are easily entertained in this household.

I need some help. I am sick of referring to the baby that I am pregnant with as "the new baby", "The baby that I am pregnant with" "the coming arrival" etc etc.....
Please help me give this little peanut some sort of reference name. Something relatively genderless. That way I can specify if I am talking about Luke, or this baby. Anyone can play. I know lots of my friends and family read this, so please, add a comment! Please? There is a place to add your comment right at the bottom of this post. Thanks in advance :)

Singlemindedness of Purpose

I am officially annoyed that I cannot make this sequence of pics come up in the order I want them too......but oh well. Look at the pics from the bottom up. This was Luke last Monday, on his 1/2 birthday, at the beach. He WANTS the yellow slobber fetch ball. He NEEDS the yellow slobber fetch ball. He crawls to the yellow slobber ball, only to have the long arm of Mom snatch it away out of reach.

This is what my son's day looks like these days. He chases the dog, or me, around the house, all day long. The dog totally humors him, lets him get right up to him, maybe even allows a little fur grab or two, and than backs up about 10 feet and lays down again, looking at Luke with this bemused "I bet you cant do it again" on his bearded dog face. I have a little ankle biter constantly pulling up against my leg while I am cooking, or emptying the dishwasher (and lets not even talk about the fascination with the dishwasher.......its his mecca. All of those lovely SHINY things inside (like knives).......)Its a bit like living with a Crow.

And I love it.

Gifts from my Boys

Yes, this is a picture of Nate teasing the baby with fatty pork products.

But that isn't what this entry is about. This is about the gift that my guys gave me in the past 24 hours.

Yesterday I had a Dr's appointment. At this stage of pregnancy that consists of sitting in the waiting room for one hour, experiencing the indignity of handing a nurse a cup filled with your own urine, and then seeing the Dr for about 3 min (after the 65 min wait), long enough for him to tell me that my blood work looks great, and send me on my way with a pat on the ass. Just kidding, no pat on the ass. But it feels like a verbal pat on the head ~ great job! keep it up! see you in four weeks! DING. Next patient. Baaaaaaa....the assembly line of pregnant sheep continues to wind through the office. Anyway, that isn't what this post is about either.

We went to King of Prussia mall to meet Becca for some lunch. As I was driving home, Brooke called me and cancelled. She was supposed to babysit Luke last night so that Jenny and I could take advantage of the awesome right-behind-home-plate diamond club Phillies tickets that Dad had given me. Nate was in DC and planning on being home later that night, so I was relying solely on Brooke so that Jenny and I could go. As it was about 60 degrees and raining, it was NOT a night that I wanted to take Luke to the game with us. I was so disappointed.

I texted Nate the bad news and he said that he would take care of it. Turns out my sweet husband left DC early to come home and take care of Luke so that Jenny and I could go to the game! The depth and breadth of notes that I left was a little embarrassing (This is Luke's food, this is his bib, remember to change his diaper, his pajamas are laid out etc etc etc.....) Anyway. Nate got home right at 5.30, we performed the "hand off the baby" routine, and Jenny and I got to the game well before the start. It was a great game, and the Phils won 5-4, Ryan Howard stole his first base ever, and Nate took Luke to watch his first ever football practice down the street at Henderson. It made me so happy to think of my boys hanging out together at home, and it was just so great to have several uninterrupted hours with Jenny without one kid or another pulling at our leg.

I got home and Luke was safely tucked into bed (still breathing too, I checked) and appeared to be in one piece, as did Nate. How proud was I? It was great.

Anyway. I haven't really gone into it here as I have been away so much, but we have been having some sleep issues around this house lately. In the wake of two weeks of Luke sleeping with me most nights on our vacations, the little critter seems to have taken a liking to having a warm food source nestled up directly against his little face all night long. Imagine his dismay when we got home and aforementioned food source and nurturer extraordinaire was nestled away next to Dad in another bedroom. Agony. Luke was up several times a night lately. So we started the whole "sleep training" thing on Sunday night to get us back to the happy place of Luke sleeping through the night.

Cutting to the chase here, Luke slept from 8 PM till 7 AM! I was THRILLED (although I admit I woke up in a panic and rushed into his room when I woke up and saw that it was light outside........he was sitting up happily looking around his crib when I entered his room....it's funny to think of him having this little 'secret life' of alone time in his room, looking around at his stuff and thinking whatever little thoughts babys think)

So. A night out alone with a girlfriend, and a FULL night of sleep for this pregnant Mama. I am over the moon with happiness. I love my boys.

We have playgroup today so I need to get it into gear, we had to miss last time as we were recovering from the "blood in diaper" incident, so I am so excited to see everyone, chow down and have our kiddos play (I have to brag that our playgroup has the best potluck lunches in town ~ we know how to eat!!!). Now that Luke is crawling playgroup is going to be a whole new world of exploration. I cant wait.

Boy in a Bubble

Not content to simply crawl, Luke now wants to be standing up as much as possible. Slight issue......... he has the attention span of a flea. One of his latest most ghastly tricks it to crawl over to anything taller than his head (which is most things), pull up to standing, then promptly get distracted by either the dog, a noise, a breath of air, WHATEVER, and crash dramatically to the ground. Sometimes this creates the lovely spectacle of the "Double Bang" whereby first his face crashes into whatever he was holding on to, then the back of his head hits the floor.

As a mother I have two distinctly different, yet equally insane reactions.

One is to immediately get him fitted for a plastic bubble, insert him in it, and then reintroduce him to the world at large in another 6 months or so. Maybe 6 years.

The other is to play the "don't look directly at him and talk in an overly enthusiastic scarily high pitched happy voice" game when he falls down, hoping that he simply keeps on keeping on, picks himself up and climbs yet again..... and doesn't fall victim to the 'cry over everything because you have a hovering overprotective mother who treasures your beautiful still-scar-free-unmangled face' syndrome so common amongst children.

Drat. The little critter is crying. Must go. He will be standing in his crib looking for me. Ah. That reminds me that I have a little story to tell about the "lowering the crib mattress" debacle. I will do my best to delete the worst of the obscenities from the story as I know all of Luke's Grandparents read this.

We are finally home!

I am way way behind here on the old blog. It was a wonderful week at the beach. Some firsts :

First ever family portrait on the beach with Dave Campli, can't wait to see the pics
First swimming in the Atlantic Ocean.
First time pooping all over the carpet.
First firstfulls of sand in Lukes mouth.
First ride on the boat ~ Luke even got to sit in the captain chair of the Three Pete
First time in Stone Harbor shopping.
First pair of shoes!
First cheerios and rice crispies ~ great for entertainment value.
First time pulling up to standing entirely alone. This includes Mom and Dad waking up to Luke standing up in his crib looking at us.

But for now I am in the basement hiding out from the cleaning lady, have to foodshop, have still packed suitcases hiding in closets, and really dont have time to recap. It was a wonderful week.

Dawg Days

Well, its officially August "down the shore". The corn is sweet, the days are so hot, and the shoobies have migrated en masse to the sandy beach.

The water has hit 75, so Luke was fully submerged in the Atlantic Ocean for the first time in his little life today. He delighted in it. This child, like his Mama, is destined to be a beach baby. He went for a long walk on the boardwalk to start his day, took a nap on the beach, swam in the ocean, and now rests, weary and smelling like sunshine downstairs in his crib. I left the beach early today, claiming that the baby could really use a nap in the sanctity of his crib......but in reality this is my chance for some quiet downtime and to watch the finale of the PGA Championship. The guys are out on the boat trolling for Tuna, so hopefully they will bring us home dinner......

Pregnancy is helping me really slow down and enjoy each moment. These days pass too quickly, and this pregnancy is a great reminder to take it easy, sit back, and soak them in.

I love the beach. I love the summer. And I love this town.

Rocky II

Yesterday I overheard heard Nate talking to a friend on the phone. He was telling him what was new with Luke, when I heard something like this..........

"Yeah, he's all over the place all of a sudden"

"Yeah, we are going to have to do some hard core baby proofing"

"Yeah, I'm going to have to lower the crib now........It's just like in Rocky II, where Rocky was fighting Apollo, you know, the one where Rocky wins? And he was climbing up the ropes at the end, and then he got up?? You know? Luke is doing that now in his crib. Its crazy."

I love my husband.

In other news, little Luke is suddenly the King of Anticipation. His favorite games at the moment are anything that involves either peek a boo, or repeated silly noises (and if Mom couples those noises with bizarre-o African or Indian-esque dances, well, that's just a whole nother level of unadulterated joy. I am endlessly grateful for the plantation shutters in our house, if the neighbors saw me whirling around my kitchen like a dervish I cant even imagine what they would think). He squeals with delight and squirms all over when the thing that he "knows" is going to happen, happens. For peek-a-boo I sit him in the middle of our bed and then get on my hands and knees, hiding my face below the bed and then POP up. He jumps every time ~ then starts cracking up. Much like his Mama, his short term memory isn't really all there. Of the two of us, I will freely admit that I'm not sure who is playing with who ~ sometimes I get the distinct feeling that he is humoring me.

Luke's girlfriend Brook was here last night babysitting as we went out to dinner with Jeannie and Tim at Teca. MMMMM Teca. We went there all the time when I was pregnant, but it was the first time since having Luke that we had been back. It was POURING, so we drove up and had a wonderful dinner ~ Thank you again Jeannie ~ you spoil us! (and I already tried the "tummy bar" and I love it!!!)

Its a grey and rainy day today, perfect to stay inside, watch the PGA Champoinship, entertain Luke, and pack for our trip to the beach. I remember last year, being in the office, totally not focused on anything work related, simply looking up baby or maternity things, and watching the ESPN live update leaderboard for all of the golf majors all day long. I remember thinking "this time next year I will be home with a baby and can watch this live on TV instead of silly numbers on a leaderboard". Well, here I am. And I can honestly say that I am enjoying the privelage of motherhood (and live Golf viewership on a Thursday or Friday) even more than I have ever even allowed myself to hope.

I scream, You scream

We all scream for Ice Cream.

Now we know that Luke screams FROM ice cream too.

Bad parents. Lesson learned. No matter how cute that wide open pleading "I want a bite of that" face is, no matter how fervent and insistent the "feed me that" cues, we must resist feeding the baby ice cream at all times.

Its been a long couple of days. On Monday night Luke had a few bites of Rita's ~ some of the vanilla custard part of a Gelotti. Didn't think twice about it. My adventurous little eater is flat out fascinated with all things food and has not balked at a single thing we have fed him. So, a few small harmless bites of soft serve from Dad...great idea....right? Cute and funny how delighted he was at the taste, right? Wrong. That night I was up about 3 or 4 times with a crying baby ~ very unlike Luke. That morning as I was changing his third poopy diaper of the day (again, not like Luke to go so often) I noticed some snotty like mucousy blood in the diaper. Ugh. Not normal, not good. Luckily Jenny was about 2 minutes away from our house as we were getting together that day, so I greeted her at the door with an "I need you to look at something gross". Luckily Jenny is not just a pediatric nurse, she is also one of my best friends and shares my penchant for OCD~like worrying. She confirmed that it did appear to be blood, and told me to call the DR but not panic, it was likely absolutely nothing. I wracked my brain to come up with some potential cause, something new in his diet. I had let him suck on a pickle when Dee and I were out to lunch the day before, could that be it? When Dad was over for dinner that night we had handed Luke a roll to gum away at, could that be it? Never thought of the ice cream.
Anyway. Long story short, Luke is fine. It appears that the blood in the stool (ew, and sorry for the explicit grossness that telling this story mandates) was caused by what will likely turn out to be a dairy allergy. Babies are not supposed to have dairy before at least 9 months of age. Add to that the fact that I had a dairy allergy as a child, and it is likely that this is the culprit. I did take Luke to the DR......sheepishly confessed what we had inadvertently done to our innocent child, and she made me feel a lot better with an admission that her husband fed their son ice cream with nuts in it at 7 months! Doh. The part that was stressful was that the DR said that I should eliminate all dairy from my diet as I am nursing and this is likely a dairy allergy. This was like a bomb going off for me. I am pregnant, and nursing, and love me some milk.
After much soul searching, talking to Nate, and Jenny, and Leanne, I have decided to keep a close watch on Luke and continue to follow my normal diet. Luke pooped a whole lot of times yesterday, all of them normal. I feel as though the ice cream was a jolt to his little system, and that it worked its way through, and things are (hopefully) back to normal. I will continue to keep a close eye on things and hopefully all will be normal from here out.

I find it ironic that a post or two ago I was complaining about changing diapers with morning sickness, and then mere days later I was literally examining each and every part of gross dirty diapers to ascertain what exactly what was, or wasn't, in them. Nothing so stomach clenching as sifting through baby poop with your heart in your throat hoping not to find any blood.

It was really scary. I take it for granted that Luke is healthy, strong and thriving. The moment that something caused me to question that, it hit me full force how fragile and tenuous that presumption of perfect health is.

It was so much fun to have Jenny over as Maggie and Luke are almost exactly the same age spread as Luke and our new addition will be. This new baby is also due on the exact same day as Maggie was! I can only hope for a little one as sweet, beautiful, and easy going as little Maggs is. It was just a surreal feeling to watch Maggie walking around like a little Frankenstein as Luke sat around and watched her ~ its like fast forwarding a year.

Nate and I have been driving around and looking at areas that we would want to live in, the DC condo is on the market now, and we are getting ready to get this house ready to list, although we are in no huge rush to get this house on the market. It will likely sell quickly as the borough is very desirable. Maybe by the end of September or early October. Anyone interested in a Mclean VA Condo?

Carbon Monoxide Mania

Just look at this little cutie crawling across the table to his Mama. What a big guy all of a sudden!

Last night I had one of my worst bouts with "New Mama Paranoia" ~ the air conditioning unit thingy (what is this thing called? The heater? Whatever runs the central air) was making a strange noise so Nate was sent down to the basement to investigate. He turned everything off, and then turned it back on. Soon some weird smell started coming out of the unit.....like a burnt engine sort of smell. It also no longer seemed to be working. I came down to aid in the investigation (since I don't even know if its a heat pump or a furnace or WHAT you can imagine how helpful and logical my input was). Anyway, I started reading the warning sticker on the side of the 'thing'. It had all sorts of dire warnings about how if you smell gas run for your life, and how carbon monoxide is a DEADLY gas that quickly and silently kills you.....especially if you are a baby. Other warnings about how, and I quote here "Substances in the fuel or from fuel combustion known to cause cancer, birth defects, or reproductive harm". Well Yippee. What an awesome bunch of things to read while pregnant and as a mother to a sweet 6 month old baby sleeping away upstairs above this harbinger of death machine.

I was ready to grab the baby and run for the hills. Not kidding.

A couple of LOGICAL thoughts did remain in my head though (if Carbon Monoxide is so deadly because it is odorless, than I can logically deduce that it is not carbon monoxide that I SMELL, nothing is leaking, it's simply broken etc etc.....) But all I could picture was going in in the morning to pick up sweet Luke and sweet Luke having been silently suffocated in the night by C0 fumes. I was sick with it ~ could not stop picturing it. My heart was overriding my head, which said that the air conditioner/furnace/heat pump/mystery machine had simply broken, and I was smelling harmless broken byproduct smells.

Was so paranoid that I demanded that we check all of the C0 Monitors/smoke detectors in the house. (good job us, by the way, we bought them and installed them right before Luke was born).......The one in our room appeared normal, but of course we had never really looked at it before......I hit "retest" about 5 times, listened to those ear piercing BEEPS over and over, and still was not reassured. Made Nate get out the instruction book on the alarm so that I could read it, and also insisted on checking the one in Luke's room.... but that meant going into Luke's room and turning on his light....which of course woke him up. Whoo hoo! Nothing better or more logical than waking up a peacefully sleeping baby at 11 pm ~ RIGHT as I was hoping to go to bed! He went back to sleep after nursing, but then decided to enact his sweet revenge on us by waking me up about every 2 hours.
It was a long night, and I have been up since 5 am with the little critter. I am happy to say that we all made it through the night, appear to be in no imminent danger, and that our C0 Monitors do work properly. I read the entire monitor instruction manual. Now on to the next fun challenge....getting someone over here to fix whatever it is that is broken.

Ferris Wheelin

Luke went to his first small town, local fair last night. He got his first spin on a Ferris Wheel, saw some prizewinning cows and sheep, checked out the 4H produce and flower competitions, and got hot and sticky in his Bjorn. I included the pics of the cows...I would like to say that we, as parents, are very mature.....but it would simply be a lie. We had to take the pic of us with the cows out of sheer childish red faced giggling over those massive udders.......as a nursing Mom I have a whole new level of admiration for those babies. Wow! And the milkers that they were hooked up to ~ full scale industrial engine powered milk suckers! Sheesh! Anyway, I digress.

Some of MY earliest memories of rides are from this same fair when I was a little girl. I remember how big and exciting it seemed back then...I have to say I was shocked at how, um, dirty and small it seemed now as an adult! And jeez, I wish that there was some way we could maybe just skip the middle school era of Luke's life..........its almost painful to see these herds of gangly pimple faced kids running around trying to act so cool for one another ~ I cant decide if its funny or tragic, but, like the proverbial train wreck, I could not stop watching. My sweet little baby will some day be some gawky hormonal trying-to-be-cool 13 year old......Ouch. Did they really do away with those "Mothers Little Helper's" pills from the 70's? I may have to start lobbying for those to be brought back. He's only 6 months old and I already have anxiety about puberty. Oy.

I made my sweet husband humor me by taking Luke on the Ferris Wheel ~ I love all of the utterly (udderly?) silly and corny things that being a Mom allows me to do! And all under the guise of doing it "for the baby" :). It was such a hot night but the view was beautiful as the sun was sinking down into the trees ~ I like to think that Luke appreciated it, but who really knows. I sure did. We then went into WC for "First Friday" and walked around town together while Luke slept like the dead in his stroller. I love our little town. I am really going to miss it if we are unable to find another house in the borough.

I almost forgot.......

Look carefully at the above picture and see if you can catch what's going on.

Luke is barefoot.........

And I am PREGNANT!

We are thrilled to announce that Version 2.0 of the Melis/Nate collaboration is on its way. We had an ultrasound yesterday and were introduced to the little grey blob that we cant wait to welcome into our family. I have to add that it is simply the strangest way to meet someone that you already love more than life itself. "This is the brain, and the heartbeat is that flicker there......" Can you imagine if you had met your husband that way? Or even your family pet? Its so otherworldly to look at that grainy picture and imagine all of the joy that it encompasses.
We are due March 23rd, which we just realized is Easter Sunday. We have a thing for holidays, I suppose. We are just festive like that. Although it is still early, seeing that little heart flickering away made us feel great, and we would appreciate all of the good thoughts and prayers you can muster for a healthy pregnancy and baby.

The maternity clothes that I just packed away a couple of months ago are on their way back out (That whole "you show sooner the second time around" thing is no joke, by the way)......

I have been more nauseous this go round....and inadvertently created the perfect storm of disgustingness by introducing solids into Luke's diet at the same time as I am dealing with morning sickness......something about those diapers and my stomach ~ Oh my. Its ugly. I am still nursing Luke full time so you all may want to be careful not to get any of your body parts near me when you see me ~ I may eat them. Sorry and consider yourself forewarned. Growing a baby while nourishing another is hard work and creates QUITE the appetite.

Anyway, we are thrilled, and we are going to be VERY busy with two babies only 13 or so months apart. We also have a lot on our plate with two houses to sell, buying a new house, and moving while pregnant......But we are up to the challenge and thrilled to see our family grow. Thank you all for the love, and support, and prayers that you send our way! We feel so very blessed to have such wonderful family and friends.

Minnesota Musings

We are safely home from Minnesota, after a wonderful visit with the Otto's. It was so much fun seeing Luke interact with Will and Julia! He was particularly enthralled with Julia and watched her whenever she was in the room with him, and she doted on "Baby Uke". Will was verrrrry interested in Luke and delighted in "patting" Luke on the head. The awful bridge collapse happened while we were out there ~ This whole becoming a mother thing forever changes how you react to any sort of tragedy. All that I could imagine is "what if" we had been on that bridge.....with 3 babies strapped into car seats in the back seat.....I got teary just thinking about being in any situation where Luke was behind me in his car seat and I could not get to him. Loving someone so much makes you just oh so vulnerable. Its not something you can dwell on for long or you would go crazy, but every now and then something happens that gives you a brief glimpse into the "bad place" where something horrible could happen to your child. I just hug him tighter and pray a lot. A whole lot.

The flight situation was a bit of a nightmare, as we had over a 3 hour delay on the trip out, and over an hour delay on the way home. Luke was a total trooper, and I felt pretty well prepared with various diversions like food, toys, books etc....we basically camped out on the airport floor on a blanket to kill the time. Luke was great on the flight out, although he was a lot tougher on the return flight. Ugh. I am really looking forward to our NEXT flight being all together as a family.......two sets of arms will be much appreciated when flying. It's really hard to eat your meal with a baby in your arms (read: impossible), its really hard to sit still with a baby in your arms, its really hard to change your babies diaper on your seat because the aircraft is not equipped with a baby changing station.....(especially in first class, I felt like I had snuck up from the cattle car based on some of the looks that I got for that move...but what choice did I have, thank God it was just wet?!?) its even hard to just have a glass of water with a baby in your arms, especially a 17 lb 27 inch ball of energy with flailing limbs just aching to knock it over into your lap. I found myself staring at people who were drinking a beer and leisurely reading a magazine.....not that I would trade Luke for a beer and a magazine....but still. I'm not sure that I was fully appreciative enough of the ease of pre baby travel.

I loved meeting Jen's girlfriends, I fell in love with "The Green Room", I am almost angry that I had Punch Pizza because I don't know that I have ever had pizza that great before......and now I don't know how to get it again. I miss "The Cabin" and my lazy afternoon naps in the cool dark with my naked little baby beside me. Thanks guys. We love you.