Colorado 2012 & Charlie's First Plane Ride.

A couple weeks ago, we flew out to my parents lake house in Colorado with Charlie and his cousins. Even though it was a bit crazy at times having 3 little ones together, I think it made it a little easier. They were able to entertain themselves a bit by chasing eachother around. I think if it were just Charlie, it would have been a bit more challenging to keep him happy.

Overall, Charlie did better than we thought he would. There were times where we wanted to pull our hair out (especially around take off and landing where the attendants insisted on having him in a seatbelt even though we'd be taxing for awhile). Often times we would let him not be in the seatbelt and then when the attendant came by, we'd try to put it back on so we wouldn't get in trouble. After we landed in Colorado we rented a big car and the 7 of us drove 2 hours to the cabin. It was a looooong travel day. Did I mention we also had a 2 hr layover in LA?

We stayed in Colorado for 4 nights and did a lot of hanging out and playing in the snow. Getting Charlie to agree to wear snow clothes just didn't happen so we had to stuff him in the clothes. By the time we were done, Rob and I were sweating and swearing. It was awesome! ;) I think the highlight of our trip was sledding. My dad bought 3 sleds for the kids but the adults had fun with it, too. There is a little hill by their house that we walked to and played for awhile. Charlie didn't want to sit in the sled but I held him down and went - he looooved it.

I love this one. Rob accidentally went over a bump and they totally went airborn. Rob is trying to slow down with his hand, and Charlie has his hand over his forehead as if to say "geez dad, what are you doing?!" I think I might frame this. It makes me laugh whenever I see it.

The day we came home, we had to leave the house at 5:30 am. It was snowing and super windy so it took us 3 hours to get to the airport (almost 3.5 after getting gas). In the morning when we left, Rob checked the flight and it was on time. We pulled into the area to return our rental car around 9:00 am and Rob checked our flight status again and it said, wait for it...CANCELLED. WTF? Rob called the airline and they said they could get us on a 1:00 pm flight but we wouldn't land until 8:00 pm in San Jose. Rob told them that wouldn't work so they ended up getting all 7 of us on a non stop flight to San Jose and ended up landing hours before our original flight was to land (our original flight had a 3 hr layover at LAX). It caused some stress for a short time but in the end, the travel gods were working for us.

All in all it was a good trip but its always nice to come home and to come home to almost 80 degree weather was wonderful. There's no place like home!

We're Losing This Battle.

Special Rug.

Charlie below is laying on a puppy rug my mom's mom (grandma) made me when I was little. I didn't know my mom held onto it over the years and its held up great! I think it would be special if Charlie's younger sibling had a handmade item to snuggle with. You got that, mom? :)

Naked Baby.

I love bath time. Bath time means bedtime is coming soon! I know, that sounds mean but I think a lot of moms would agree its pretty great when the little ones are tucked in bed and you can do whatever the heck you want to do with the few hours left of the day. Most of the time for me its making a decaf cup of coffee with creamer and getting in comfortable pants and watching tv with Rob. Once in a while, I'll opt for a warm bubbly bath. Just me and Oprah catching up and sharing some quality time.

Charlie is quite the book warm. He can't resist flipping some pages in some literature even in the comforts of a soothing bath. I think he got that from me.

Washing hair comes last in our house. Charlie is not a fan of having a wet head.

 But sometimes he surprises me.

 What a ham!

Leg on the tub = get me out

12 hours mores until bath time, but who is counting?

Charlie's Baby Brother.

My mom got Charlie a baby boy doll because he loves his cousins' dolls. He was very sweet with baby brother...

 "What's that you say, baby brother?"

and then it got weird...

I was ok with my mom buying him a doll. I'll also be ok with it if Charlie wants to play dress up, play with my makeup, wear nail polish, etc. His interest in these things is bound to happen with 4 girl cousins by his side.

15 Months Stats and Self Feeding Dramatizations.

Charlie had a dr.'s appointment last week. Here are his stats:

Weight: 24 lbs (55th percentile)
Height: 31 inches (50th percentile)
Head Circumference: 18.5 inches (50th percentile)

Charlie feeds himself things like toast, cheerios, etc. but he doesn't use a fork or spoon. She told me to start this now.

First attempt was with mac n cheese which was a semi-new food for him. I'll let you decide how it went down...

Then we switched to his all time favorite food: yogurt.

What a stinker!

Oh and per the doc, we need to work on: losing the bottle and putting milk in the sippy cup, getting him to sleep on his own (I know, we are long over due on this one), encouraging him to talk more, self feeding (see above on how that's working out for us) and dropping 1 bottle of milk a day (going from 3 to 2). Fun!

A Year Ago Today...

I'd like to put some butter on those rolls.

He Kills Me.

There is not a basket in our house that hasn't had Charlie's butt in it at some point.

Another Charlie Trick.

Charlie has some foam letters and numbers that he plays with in the bath and he has a new trick with the number "1" foam. He folds it in half, puts it in his mouth and makes noises like mwa mwa mwa mwa over and over again. I remembered to bring the flip with us in the bath but he was being a stinker and had his back to me but I was able to get a good side view of his new trick. Video is better with sound.

Sick Charlie.

This is our happy, normal Charlie.

And this is our 102 degree temperature Charlie.

Unfortunately, we have the latter Charlie today. :(

Yes, those are Christmas jammies. They still fit, so he still wears them. Deal with it. :)

Someone Got a Haircut!

Peekaboo! Charlie's New Game.

Charlie's new thing is hiding behind the curtains. He does this over and over again so I posted the shortest video of him doing this because its pretty much the same thing over and over again. :)

12 Month Dr.'s Appointment

We've been to the dr.'s too much lately bur thats ok. Today was Charlie's 12 month checkup. We finally got to see our regular pediatrician. She's hoping his skin will clear up in a week or so. With each day that passes, Charlie's skin is looking better and his personality is shining through. He's almost back to himself again.

Here are his stats:

Weight: 22 lbs 10 oz (50th percentile)
Height: 29.5 inches (55-60th percentile)
Head Circumference: 18.25 inches (50th percentile)

Charlie's dr. is pretty sure he's going to be one of "those kids" with lots of allergies. She gave us a prescription for an epi pen to keep in the diaper bag in case he is exposed to peanuts. She told us to not give him any kind of nut. We're going to re-test his allergies when he is two. She said most kids who develop a peanut allergy early on in life, typically don't outgrow it. Bummer.

We received the green light to drop the formula and bring in the whole milk. She also wants us to start weaning him from the bottle. Sure, like thats gonna happen! Well, I guess we'll need to work on that but its not going to be fun. Maybe we can introduce a pacifier while we get rid of the bottle? Yeah, probably not a good idea at this point.

I realized the other day that the day he was supposed to have his birthday party was a year to the day that we took him home from the hospital. Freaky, eh?

Love.

Possibly the Saddest Birthday Ever.

Charlie turned 1 on Wednesday - I am still in shock. Deep breaths...

So around 3:45 am on his birthday, he wakes up (normal) but he wouldn't go back down to sleep (abnormal). I realized his diaper leaked and as I was changing his diaper, I noticed some red splotches on his body. Weird. I later realized he was wearing his new pjs from our friend Jen and thought maybe they were to blame (they were warm and 100% polyester). I figured it was a heat rash or a polyester allergy (don't laugh, I googled it and it exists). After Charlie woke up for good, I called the advice line and they told me to give him some baby benadryl. We did that and it wasn't getting better. I called our Dr. and they said to come in at 3:00 pm. Did I mention this is Charlie's birthday? Poor little guy.

Dr. tells me its probably an allergic reaction to Amoxicillan (not sure how to spell, will call it Amox going forward), the medication he was taking for his ear infection. She said to stop taking the Amox and call if it gets worse.

That night we still had my family, and my sister and her family over to celebrate and I use that term loosely. Charlie was not himself - he was not happy and he was tired.

I don't feel well, mama.

Rob made homemade spaghetti and meatballs and halfway through dinner, Charlie went to bed. We sang him happy birthday while he was upstairs sleeping. We ate his birthday cake and didn't save him any.

He hung out with us via monitor.

Mama, pretending to be happy.

He still hasn't opened up gifts other than the (awesome) unwrapped radio flyer wagon Mimi and Poppy brought over.

The next morning, Thursday, the rash/hives appeared a little worse and the Dr.'s office told me to come in at 11:00. We saw a different Dr. this time because Charlie's Dr. was off. She looked at Charlie, checked his heartrate, temp (102 degrees) and said we need a plan of attack, and  take him to the Emergency Room now. No one, especially no mama, wants to hear that.

So off I went with a sense of urgency and waited an hour before we were seen by anyone. Rob met me at the ER and we were finally released 5 hours after getting there. They pumped Charlie with a bunch of drugs, gave us a prescription for a steroid and told us to go home because they've done all they can. They too think its probably the Amox.

So here we are three days later, keeping our little monkey at home so he can rest up. He's slowly acting more like himself but he gets moody pretty quickly and tired. He still has hives all over his body. Some areas are clearing up but he's still very red and welt-y. We were supposed to have a birthday party today at Rob's parents house with his side of the family but we cancelled it, and we cancelled his "friends" birthday party tomorrow. We're hoping to have birthday celebration do-overs within the next month.

Please think of Charlie and send over some Get Well Soon Vibes if you have any to spare. :)

Charlie in his hospital gown.

The Many (Funny) Faces of Charlie.

Clothes.

Poor Charlie is going to start having self image issues. His nonni bought him this cute outfit sized 6-12 months and the zipper won't zip. He never got to wear it. :(

Luckily he is spoiled and had a back up outfit from nonni.

Look at them teeth!

Its good to know he'll never be without the necessities like Janie and Jack outfits. And good thing he has a nonni because his mama cannot afford to shop there on the regular!