Happy Half!

6 Months ago today the best little thing imaginable came.  Gabey took his sweet time, but after 22 hours of the absolute hardest work ever he was ours.  I am freaking out that just 9 more of these little time-spans will have him kindergarten age.  For real, if you want time to fly have a baby -- or better yet, have the most beautiful funny and happy baby.  To celebrate the best 6 months of my life, here are a few of my biggest memories:

1.  Being so wiped out after labor that I forgot to count fingers and toes (Luis didn't forget and yes they were all there).

2.  Being woken up at any ungodly hour of the day or night only to be greeted by the happiest face.

3.  Giving him his first bath and inadvertently finding one thing that he loves to do as many times a day as possible.

4.  Feeding him in the bathtub to make sure that I kept MYSELF calm during feeding.

5.  Starting the countdown to go back to work and making sure that I spent every day I had left at home loving that boy -- I still rush to pick him up after work and find that I really don't want to be apart from him if I can help it.  

6.  Realizing that he loves bass and at the rate he's going he's probably going to be a DJ in some club just so he can laugh and shriek when the bass comes on.  He can't get enough of it and the only way bass can get better for him is if he's dancing to it.  Don't believe me?  Start singing some Run DMC "Mary Mary" to him... just don't leave out the beats!

7.  The way his normally always active little body slumps over into a bottle coma after we read Good Night Moon for the 121st time (we've read it every night since his 2nd month). 

8.  The way he meets my eyes and smiles with his tongue sticking out because he's to happy to keep it in.

9.  The way he goes from zero to RAGE when he realizes he's hungry and the bottle is not in his mouth.

10.  The way he makes me glad to be alive just so I can be the one who knows what a wonderful person he is.

Happy "Half" my beautiful little bug!  Thanks for giving me the joy of being the one who loves your guts!

A Few of MY Favorite Things

Grab your heart-attack pills because I'm finally blogging again!!!

I was scanning through my favorite blogs and my friend, Erin, did a nice blog about some of her favorite things.  While Erin is much more meaningful with some of her things, I thought I would swipe her idea and list some of my (updated) faves:

1.  Gabe (duh of course I would say that).  There is nothing about that little beast that isn't the best.  I love every inch of him and I am so lucky to know him.

2.  My job.  I know that is one of the crack-headed-est things ever but I love it.  I work with a great girl (b.c she's so dang young) named Kathryn who makes my life easy and who appreciates the great kids we have in our class just as much as I do.

3.  Cake.  I love cake with good icing and I will ditch any diet ever to eat good icing.  

4.  My bed.  Ok putting cake and my bed together makes me sound like a 400 lb recluse but that's a risk I'm willing to take.  We picked out our mattress after A LOT of comparison shopping and even a couple of years later I feel like I'm sleeping (or watching tv or feeding my baby) on a cloud.

AND LAST BUT NEVER LEAST

5.  Friends who are good at things that I could never do.  I love that my friend Cheyney can handle sick people with their blood and guts without puking and that my friend Ryan can deal with the mentally un-great and that my friend Jamie can love people in other countries enough to give up comforts and that my friend Erin values and enjoys the sweet time she is able to spend being the 2nd most beautiful boy's mom.  

I'm a stresser and a worrier by nature but Erin was really right when she said that it is important to remember what you have and why life is good.  

Now what are your favorite things?

Videos of Gabe the Babe

This is the video of Gabe at his favorite eye candy's house while I had to work on a SATURDAY.

Gripe.

This picture of my nephew having a fabulous meltdown is to illustrate how boiling this instance made me:

So yesterday I called the MD to make an appointment.  I spoke with the person who schedules the procedure that I needed and who (by the way) was unncessarily impossible to reach.  I finally got her on the phone after leaving oh about infinity messages without getting a call-back (despite her message that said she'd call back within 24 hours -- maybe she meant 24 days).  You'd think after hearing and ignoring my messages for the the last week my name might kind of ring a bell.  You'd think wrong.

When she answered I clearly said "This is Christy Velasquez... I spoke with you about ____".  I didn't say my name fast because Lord knows it's not like Smith or something easy to understand.  She let me say all of the shpeel and then she said (and this is what I'm blogging about) "What is your name?".  

DID I NOT JUST SAY IT AT THE BEGINNING OF THE PARAGRAPH OF WHAT I JUST SAID???  DID I NOT JUST LEAVE IT ON YOUR VOICE MAIL 16 TIMES A DAY FOR A WEEK?  HAVE YOU REALLY NEVER HEARD MY NAME -- EVER???

The moral of the story is that I CAN'T stand when people skim past names to get to the point of a call.  If I take the time to give my name PAY ATTENTION... write it down if you're slow... just don't ask me what my name is 15 seconds after I just told you.

Portraits

Our friend, Andres, is a fantastic photographer (who actually sells pictures for unbelievable amounts of money) and he offered to take pictures of the most beautiful baby available.  

Obviously we knew that only our baby could be described as the most beautiful baby available so we excitedly said yes.  We only did black and white shots this day and we still have colored shots to do, but here are two of the pictures: 

Since he took film pictures (instead of digital), we had to wait for the negatives to be ready for him to upload -- it was well-worth the wait! 

What a DORK!

I might just be the most obnoxious person I have ever met.  

Since Luis's mom left he has been feeling a little husky and recently the best thing ever happened:  he had to admit that (in his own words) "my jeans hurt my body".  HA!  I have been on diets several times during our marriage.  He NEVER has.  He just breaths out and loses 5 pounds -- or at least that USED to be true.

So, last week we started Weight Watchers and being the competitive-about-pointless-battles person that I am I whopped him hardcore with the score 5 pounds to almost 3 pounds.  So last night I decided to plan the week's menu.  I made chili that was very WW friendly and planned to make 4 other WW things for dinners.

Tonight, while waiting for him to come home from work, I started on the Black Bean Lasagna.  He took longer to get here than I expected (but considering the times of economic downturn and joblessness I am glad he was working) so I started on the Clam Chowder.  He got home and instead of quitting I made Italian Lentils too.

THAT WAS NOT OBNOXIOUS ENOUGH -- nooooo, I had to pack each serving into a ziplock bag so that the food would be portioned and ready so we wouldn't be tempted to eat crap.  In the end I packed 27 meals.  Gag.  I am such a D O R K!!!  

HOWEVER be very clear -- next Monday when we weigh ourselves, I will continue my winning streak.  My goal is to have him in tears.  Not really, but I am considering the logistics of creating a score board (that will mysteriously disappear the week he beats me).

Some of my (newest) favorite things

I have a list of things that I have just realized that I like now that I have my handsome little one with me.  Here they are.  Please do enjoy:

1.  Family bathrooms-  Before Gabe (from now on to be referred to as BG) I walked by those and wondered what kind of freak family needed to go to the bathroom together, now I know that people use them to change diapers and not feel like a burden cleaning up their kid's business.  My favorite family bathroom so far is at Target because it doesn't have multiple stalls.  Second place goes to Crabtree Valley Mall for having a couch that I used to hold all of my crap (no pun intended) while I made sure the boy was fresh and clean.

2.  Elevators-  Also BG never realized the percentage of the population that rely on those.  I never even paid attention to where they are.  Now I hunt those things down like the metal beasts that they are.  No way am I trying to balance the stroller in some awkward angle so I can ride the escalator -- especially after I saw what those things did to that kid's Croc.

3.  People who hold doors-  BG I just thought it was a nice courtesy to show that I am not so wrapped up in my own wonder that I can't think of others.  Now I want to offer to buy someone a cup of coffee when they hold doors for me when I have the stroller or carseat.

4.  Sleeping more than 2-3 hours at a time-  BG I could rack up a nice 10 hour night of sleep and still take a nap the next day.  Now I feel luxurious if I get 3 1/2 hours at a time... what kind of crap is that?!

5.  Delicious Accessories-  I love my boy in sassy shoes or a snappy hat more than just about anything.  I might look like I picked my clothes up off of the bedroom floor (and I really actually might have), but I love how fabulous my boy can look without even having to try.

This might be a first installment entry.  I kind of like this topic.  I'll start paying attention to more things I like.

  

One month old

Today Gabe the Majestic is one month old.  Besides having a milk mustache, he celebrated the day by making my life.  

So, this is what happened:  I went to school to 1. return the laptop I borrowed to work on report cards with since I no longer need it since I'm Mac-ing 2.  visit the 23 best creatures at Leesville 3.  to attend a staff meeting called so that staff could fill out a survey about the principal (I'm a big fan so I wanted to be sure that I got to express my appreciation for her).

I was gone about 3 hours by the time I drove there and did all of the things I needed to do.  When I got home, the mother-in-law a.k.a "the reason I don't have bags under my eyes" reported that my boy had not slept AT ALL while I was gone -- this from the woman I was considering getting an agent for so we could get her a show on National Geographic called the Baby Whisperer.

She proceeded to try to feed him, give him his passy, talk to him -- nothing could shake his fussiness.  Finally she passed him to me and... swear on a stack of David Sedaris books that boy closed his eyes and went to sleep.  A few minutes later he opened his eyes a crack and smiled this very satisfied smile and went back to sleep.  Kind of reassures me that if I were to ask him "Who's your mamma?" he'd actually know. 

So help me if one person says one word about that smile being gas...  

Making Lemonade

So, here it is report card time (and yes I do have to write those on maternity leave) and the hard drive in my laptop died.  Like, it put a blue screen up and shut off and didn't even say goodbye.  

Well, Some people would have cried or joined the army -- me?  I bought a MacBook.  Yes I think I'm fancy and yes my report cards will probably be the greatest ever written.  

No gratuitous pictures of Gabe the delicious since I haven't loaded any pictures on this computer, but suffice it to say that he's wearing grey snowman pajamas tonight (the pajamas are grey, not the snowmen).

Don't want to know

One phrase that I've heard over and over since the day I told people I was pregnant was "oh just wait until...". I understand that people who have been through a certain experience have broad memories of certain times of their experience, but why can't I just enjoy the point that I am at in my own experience.

FOR EXAMPLE when I started to feel little kicks, I right away started hearing "wait until you start getting kicked in the ribs and it bruises them" -- okay, take my new and kind of nice experience and fast forward me to when I'm going to dread it. I found that I kept fast forwarding my pregnancy to the end in my mind instead of focusing on and enjoying what was happening in that moment. Then suddenly my pregnancy was over and I hated that I spent so much time waiting for ________ to happen.


So, the point of this blog is: even if you've raised 16 kids and you're mom/dad/caregiver of the year, do not you dare react to one of my baby observations with "just wait until...". I'm determined to enjoy this day by day and I don't wanna fast forward to when he's ______. It'll happen quick enough as it is.


And now the gratutitous picture of Gabe the magnificent:

After 10 years

After 10 years of living here in the land of the free and the home of the brave, you will be interested to know (I know I was) that when woken up suddenly, my husband reverts back to the language of his forefathers...

During the noche (see how I differentiate for both language-speakers?) when I didn't hear the wonderous Gabe wimpering or making other Gabe-sleeping-noises and I was sure that we had just experienced a SID-attack (for real I did think this) I jumped up and the first words out of that cute thing's mouth were not words that people who pledge alligiance to the flag usually wake up saying... they were the words of Juan Valdez suppliers: "Que Hubo?".

I am happy to report that once his eyes cleared and he realized that he was sleeping in a bed and not in a hamock**, he started speaking the king's English again.

** j/k, he didn't really sleep in a hamock in the motherland either.

And this would be a gratutious baby picture featuring the duck slippers from Cheyney since she already had to hear the above story once. Thank goodness for friends like Cheyney who knew duck slippers were just what everyone needed when she got them for Gabe.

Gabe - Boy Wonder

What you see here is baby Gabe holding his bottle (with one hand). Obviously this was not a surprise that our little genius would do this, but with such style??? Just kidding. Totally a fluke, but we did learn a big lesson about the formula we've been suplementing with: it's not all the same crap.

When we left the hospital, they gave us tons of formula samples and since we had such good luck with the first formula brand when we had to use formula (like when we went out and I refused to pack the liquid gold that is really the best for him since if it went bad I'd be throwing away hard-earned liquid) we thought that the next can of a different brand would probably be okay. Nope. He's been miserable because the second kind is way harder for him to digest. Poor little man.

Hopefully this will not deter him from performing acts of skill and precision like the picture above in the future -- although I'm sure he'll be unable to avoid being such a prodigy.

First Bath Time

Gabe had his first bath today. As soon as we saw that his umbilical cord had fallen off we pulled out our super cool bath tub. No tears and we think he actually liked it!

The nighttime is the right time

Don't be fooled. This is NOT what he looked like from 1:00-2:15 OR from 3:47 to 5:13 this morning. No, apparently this morning he had some concerns that his lungs might need a little work out and that I might need a few diaper drills (I guess I wasn't fast enough on the first 2).

Luis finally went back to work today so I purposed in my mind to let him sleep as much as possible during the night so that he could be fresh and minty for work. I guess Gabe is a two-parents-waking-up-with-me kind of guy.

So far, his bewitching hour is 4:00 every morning -- cannot and will not go back to sleep until at least 5:00. I wish we could get him to change that till 5:00 when Luis sets his alarm!

Skinny Feet

One of the very few pregnancy side effects that I had were FAT feet. My ankles and feet got so swollen that I had to wear socks or husband-crocs to work since my own shoes didn't even close to fit. I never had morning sickness or any of the other horrors but believe me, I will NEVER take skinny feet for granted again.

So this time a week ago, I was hardcore into my 22 hour labor and here is a list of some of the more memorable points of the experience:

1. 4:30 in the morning wake up to water breaking (after a dinner of pizza @ Cici's -- connection? You be the judge).

2. 6:30 arrive @hospital in no real rush since contractions have not started.

3. MD can't get a sample PROVING that I really broke my water so we have to make the decision to go ahead with the drug that starts the contractions anyway (she later determines that, yeah I was right).

4. Contractions got to 20 on the monitor and they gave me the 1st epidural that didn't take.

5. They gave me the 2nd one and I was feeling good ... I apparently even felt good enough to call my college roomie D'Arcie (although I don't remember calling her).

6. I threw up and threw up and was encouraged to "get used to it, vomiting is part of life" by the kind and generous nurse named Cheryl.

7. They pulled Gabe out and put him right on me with all of the stuff still on him for Luis to cut his cord and Ryan had a good point about that. It is all about presentation and if they were wanting me to take him home shouldn't they have cleaned him up first?

8. They cleaned him up and he was absolutely PERFECT.

We've survived the first week as parents and we have loved looking at every expression (especially the way he moves his forehead and mouth) and hearing every squeak and sound and changing his little diapers. And the one thing that I never thought I'd say: I love having skinny feet again.

Pregnancy Update

Judy, this one's for you.

I chose this picture because that cute little thing holding his heart on the front row is 1/2 of the DNA involved in this pregnancy update -- preschool age.

So I look like I'm ready to pop but apparently there has been ZERO dialation -- even though he's a big boy and size-wise already in the 90th percentile. I'm waiting patiently because it seems like my boy is just smart enough to know what is good. He doesn't really have to worry about anything right now. He's comfy, he's fed, and all he has to concentrate on is getting bigger and bigger.

In other pregnancy news, the mother-in-law arrives on Wednesday so we had a cleaning lady come and clean the house today. WONDERFUL idea. I walked in and since I am not accustomed to leaving a grody house and walking back into a clean house I walked around like I was in a daze seeing what someone else was able to do in a few hours. If I had even sort of approached the cleaning greatness that this lady was able to achieve I would have been too wiped out to be able to enjoy it. So, here goes a shout out to Barbara for reminding me how good my house can look!

In still other pregnancy news, the dogs went for a bath today -- for the same reason we had the house cleaned. The mother-in-law is a fun one, but not such a fan of dirty things so even though they don't bother us I'm sure she would've been calling them names in spanish (which she still will do but probaby b/c they will get on her nerves). Now, at least the spanish names will be about my clean dogs instead of my dirty ones.

Anyway, the boy will be hatched any minute now and we are so excited to meet him and we just hope that we can do a good job teaching him to be a sweet, caring, smart, funny, creative, analytical, imaginative, thoughtful, sincere little creature -- no sweat, huh!

It passed!!!

At 4:10 this AM the mighty beast of a kidney stone passed... actually it was TINY. It measured only about 2.5mm (about the size of goldfish food in the pellet size). Amazing what havok a little thing like that can cause -- I could get all philosophical about a butterfly's wings causing a tsunami but the meds are already wearing way off. Guess my run with the psychodelic Vicodin is over. We had a good run -- the most consistently I've slept through the night in months since becoming pregnant!

And for the record, when I went to the Ob's office, she (not the idiot-speedy-diagnoser-from-Satan) said that if the baby was born with Vicodin in his system, they have something that completely reverses the effects -- although the drug is safe at all stages of pregnancy. So, baby got his first taste of narcotics in a totally approved manner!

Down 5!

So Thursday night I felt a little crampy but 9 months pregnant will do that to a girl. Friday I woke up and felt gnarly but 9 months preg will also do that. Luis got home on the early side so he decided to join me on my list of jobs for the day starting with him getting a hair cut.

While waiting for that poor woman to work through months of hair growth, a lady who (this may or may not be germaine to the story) smelled really bad came and sat beside me. I got up and did a pregnant-y stretch so that she wouldn't think I was getting up b/c of her and immediately, I needed to hit a bathroom STAT.

I rushed to the back of the hairdresser's where I thought some deep breaths would help and it was all I could do to not throw up in their sink... did I mention that I have a bad time throwing up in strange (and even familiar) toilets?

We quickly ran by school so I could drop some stuff off and we agreed that if I didn't feel better, we'd run by the Ob's office... I didn't feel better so we did. Now, usually I'm down for a little Dr. Henderson House-like briskness, but he was in a hurry and he quickly pulled a diagnosis out of his... butt and sent me out with a prescription for an antibiotic -- completely ignoring the fact that I told him that I felt pain in my back near a body part called the KIDNEYS?!

I have not puked so much in YEARS. A sip of water would send me running for the tub to throw up (see I don't even wanna puke in my own toilet). Finally he called in a prescription for some suppositories that usually can knock out a full-grown bull and I even puked through those.

The next morning I went to the urgent care (where maybe I should've gone in the first place) and the doctor automatically said, that's not a UTI (Henderson's 5 minute or less diagnosis)... it's a KIDNEY STONE!!!!! That's why you've been so sick! She wrote me a rx for vicodin and now I'm just waiting to give birth to a little kidney stone.

When I went to the Ob for my normal appointment, the wonderfully careful nurse practicioner noted that I had lost 5 pounds since Friday!

Carving out new ways to lose the baby weight, this is Christy signing off.

Getting Real

Yesterday I had the count at 37 days, but I forgot that October had 31 days when I was counting. Of course b/c of my mom's b-day and Halloween, I knew there were 31 days -- just forgot. So, as of today, there are 37 days until the little Velasquez is due. Suddenly (as if this belly didn't give it away) reality is hitting.

* I had to get the official letter from the OB giving the due date and estimated time of recovery for my maternity leave -- I actually have it in writing that this isn't a beach ball. Katie Holmes should've gotten such a letter and it would've saved her so much Suri speculation.

* We had to fill out papers to add baby to husband's insurance -- and PS how do you even fill out a lot of that stuff since it hasn't happened yet??? Well, no bother, that's what the benefits lady at his work is earning money to know.

* In that vein, I have a tour at noon of a pediatrician's office to see if they are the chosen ones to take care of the blessed Velasquez child. Also, Cheyney and I are going to look at another office on Tuesday night and believe we might play the life-partner game if someone looks like they could fall for it.

* We had to figure out a solution to this (on the surface) clean house that is really probably a haz-mat zone to my mother-in-law and we found someone who will clean it before she gets here since (being totally real here) I can't get into small places and if I could I sure wouldn't be focusing my efforts on the problem spots of this house.

* All of a sudden all of the crap -- I really mean cute baby things that I would love if they were in their places -- really does need to find the way to proper places. Letters spelling boy's name need to go on the wall and not on the changing table, for example.

So, here it is 6:33 AM on a vacation day and I am not sleeping in b/c I know there is stuff to do. Maybe if I ge-ge-ge-ge-get busy I can take a nap, but for right now... yikes, we're about to have a baby!

Saving My Pearls

Aside from getting a good high-five and a "you are such a punk" from my husband, I don't know what I expected from my fighting-for-the-rights-of-greatfulness post but I sure got something stirred up. I am happy to report for the sake of human decency that overwhelmingly the response was supportive -- and believe that Kathryn and I loved reading all of the feedback the next day at school. I appreciate Ridge and Wendy offering to meet me at the aforementioned flagpole if needed (especially kind since we've never even met face to face and I could really turn out to be a total wimp that wouldn't be able to pull my weight if that ungrateful little girl did decide to throw down).

I am sad to report that despite my (what I thought) clearly outlined argument for thankfulness which I generously provided in a numbered fashion, the girl at the root of this topic replied that she did not appreciate my comments and that she thought I was being unkind. Clearly this girl is beyond any help that I can offer her. Which brings me to the lesson I learned out of all of this: not everybody is out to be a quality person.

Some people have been taught that they are the one who is right and anyone who tells them that they are wrong is just trying to hold them down. You see this even as early as Kindergarten. Some kids get in trouble and instead of getting them in trouble, the parents look for why it was not their fault. As soon as I read her reply, I could imagine her in Kindergarten with her mom scooting her fanny-pack to the back so that she could really have a go at the teacher who complained that her daughter cut other children's hair -- when clearly, the children's hair was too long.

So, to wrap up this lesson, I just want to say that I learned a lesson in being open to what people say about you -- but I learned a bigger lesson about pearls and swine. I know what I had to say was braziliant -- next time I'll save my genius for someone who can appreciate it. I mean, what did I expect: a choir to bust out "Just As I Am" and ungrateful idiot girl to have a revival? I guess a girl can dream!