Buns comes to life

This week we stopped by our local Build A Bear to add a new addition before our store in Columbia relocated. Alex is in love with any stuffed fury animal. He is fully aware that we our the ones making the animals come to life, but he is still is delighted to see them jump up and down.

In full disclosure I had  every intention of picking the cutest stuffed animal in the line that matched his safari themed room. Preferably a lion, monkey, etc. I mean he's only one year old, you would think all of the animals would be the same.

 No. Alex grabs the ugliest bunny imaginable and proceeds to slob all over it. Clearly this beasty rabbit had to be a mistake. I tried to have him repick by presenting other viable and more presentable options and even hiding the bunny, but he still reached out for the rabbit. The rabbit moved from hand to hand and was chosen again every other contender. The decision was made there was nothing left to do but stuff him and name him Buns.

I was really amazed that he has such a strong personality  already. Maybe that mom wasnt lying when she told me her son picked out  those tie dyed blue shorts?  He's only one but I feel like he's suddently a full individual already. Weird.

Trini Christmas

Hope you guys had a good holiday! Alex celebrated his first active Christmas this year. He was super excited to open his gifts and eat official trinidadian Christmas food. He was all about his pastelles, sorrel and Beef Ham. Yes that is correct ham made out of beef...who knew such as thing existed?

All week Alex has been pulling down the ornaments on the tree (and other people's trees) and passing the boxes around wondering what was inside. Finally he was able to tear open the paper.

Sometimes I forget that he is just 15 months, he is transitioning so well into being a big boy.

 

 

Have a good New Year!

 

Snip Snip

It became apparent that Alex's hair was growing too long when the majority of my morning routine became picking lint out of his hair. No matter how much time I spent taking out little strands of lint here and there, new pieces always appeared. The hair was also a point of contention when Alex decided he wanted to throw a temper tantrum. After banging his hands on the ground to no avail, his next move was always self deprication. A small tuff at the front of his hair usually received a good tugging.

So my plan was put into place...Snackanimals please? Check. Entice the boy with his favorite oatmeal cookies. I have no shame in using sweets to get results. Final results: A perfect boy

I must say that it makes his face look much older. I'm feeling 10% of regret.
What age did you cut your childs hair?

For my top blog reader

Here are some of the pictures from Alex's Birthday party as promised. Are you happy now Sheikha?

A little baby turns a boy

Alex is 1! I'm so excited for my little baby boy. I can't believe that a year has passed so quickly. He can not walk, run, climb, and do just about everything else that mischievous little boys learn how to do.  Months ago I was super amped planning for his party, then I realized that he probably wont even remember this day. I looked like a crazy person saving pictures of invitations to make, and threatening family members who said they may not attend.

I took a step back and realized that it would be best to conserve my birthday aspirations for future years, and decided to have a small party at the apartment. To my surprise a lot of ppl showed up (those family members that I threatened took me seriously and even sent offspring). We had fun playing games and reconnecting with old friends. Alex may not be able to remember the day in the long term future, but I am certain that he had a great time this weekend. Everyone did such a nice job helping out the day of the party and your efforts were moooorrreeeee than appreciated.

Let's all wish Alex Pie-Pie a Happy Birthday!

Pictures coming soon of the party

Black & White

There is something about Black and white pictures that I love. Yes I'm that cheesy person at the Kodak picture Kiosk placing special effects on each picture. I  just got back some of Alex's baby pictures. Its  so  great to hold an actual picture in your hands. Although the photos are clear on screen, I noticed so many new details once they were actually in my hands. Im always afraid that my memories can be deleted in a matter of seconds with digital pictures.

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Caught In A Lie

One bad thing about writing everything down is that there is always accountability for your actions. One of my friends came over last month and totally caught me in a lie. So we fell off the Ferber sleeping bandwagon around month six and I began rocking Alex to asleep. Well...it wasn't really a lie since we were using the method for a while, just not currently being enforced. It some how was thrown under the couch with the start of teething and Alex getting sick. No matter how many times we placed him in the crib, he would just stand up and scream until we came for him. I felt so bad for him not being able to breathe with his cold...so I picked him up.

After he got better there was no turning back, he had won the battle back into our arms. When she came over she saw a sad showing of a baby clearly sleepy, but refusing to go to bed.  That's when I got the speech; "I see parents with children much older unable to put their child to sleep. They end up spending a lot of money paying for sleep therapist to get the child into a routine." In the end I was guilt tripped into following through with my word.

Alex was sent back to his own bed :( It has been a difficult month, but he seems happier with a full night of sleep from 8:30-6:00.  The only one who seems to be missing his sleepy dance is me. 

Junk Pile

I'm in love with Historic Ellicott City. The town used to be synonymous with Dental Board studying, since I spent a month hanging out at the local Barnes and Nobles. My only other trip to was during graduation weekend with my mom. It reminded me of when I was younger and would beg to go into the store in hopes that I would see something cool and casually place it into her cart. I was usually no match for her marathon shopping excursions. My plan backfired after an hour of following her around the store and I would retreat to the car.  Main street is my mothers dream row, a street lined with antique stores, vintage clothing and cafes. 

Venturing with my family and friends I stumbled into a lot of great shops this past weekend. I love being a tourist it my own area! Where else can you find a Subway Cafe?  Yes... Ellicott City is too posh to have just a regular Subway, their Subway serves Tazo chai latte with a full pastry menu.

Even Alex had fun hanging out in the antique stores. Can we say baby wooden chairs?

Here's Mr. Patrick and one of our friends at one of the local stores. 

I found the coolest cast iron hooks at A journey from Junk.  There was no need to spray paint them, since they were already lime green. I already made a spot for them on my wall

The Destroyer

At nine months, Alex has now been given the nickname of "the destroyer." He is moving so fast I can hardly catch him before he gets into something.  He has no interest in playing with his own toys; only destroying whatever is in your hands. Hopefully he will learn to build and not destroy soon.

You want to watch TV? Nope. I stole your remote

No... Its not a mistake that his hand is pushing my face out of the way. I was in his picture, so he tried to move me.

Sofa Table

I found a cool sofa table at the Main Street Festival in May. I loved the style, but it had a certain Grandma flare with the outdated flowers and forest green color.

I sanded the table to get it ready for the spray paint (I have been a little spray paint happy lately... I may have my priveledges revoked soon). Will post the other spray painted items soon.

I used the hammered Rust-oleum rosemary spray paint to give the table a goldish green look. Still green, but no more granny flowers.

$10 stroller?

If someone had told me last year that you needed more than one stroller I would have laughed and called them fancy folks. Walking, umbrella, pram, terrain, jogging, all too many names for one purpose... carrying a baby. Right now my Graco stroller is doing great, the only downside is the size. The stroller sometimes occupies more then half the trunk. This can really be a deal breaker.

I was in Marshalls the other day and I happened to peruse through the baby aisle and caught wind of a 19.99 Cosco umbrella stroller marked at half price to $9.99. Very small and compact and could easily fit under your seat. The deal sounded too good to be true, so I quickly searched to see if there were any recalls on this model. I didnt want Alex to be put in harms way with my cheapness. Nothing was found and I couldn't resist. I decided to give it a try; even if the stroller breaks in a month its money well spent.

 We decided to hangout in Alexandria and I felt it was a good time to breakout my new stroller to cut down on car space. Walking through old towne I got the strangest looks from people. I didn't notice at first until Mr. Patrick pointed it out. " Everyones looking at me because of our stroller. They don't realize that your the cheap one that bought it."

 Now the stroller did leave a little to be desired in the plush department, but it was definitely functional. I never thought about it before but I guess a stroller could be compared to a car... and we were in the hoopty. On a hot summer day, it didn't have nice shade like the midsize strollers, but was definitely functional.

To make up for our lack of overhead shade, I decided to get alex a beach hat. He was too cute for VA. Alex totally pimped out the stroller, with one leg up in the air.

Its not about the ride, but the dude that's inside. Right Alex? Despite the looks, I think this Cosco stroller is here to stay. Has anybody heard anything bad about this model?

Sitting pretty

It feels good to be on top, and by on top I mean the favorite parent. This post was actually written in January, discussing my sadness about being ignored by Alex. It went something like this...woe is me. Why won't he laugh at my jokes? When I mimic the same thing dad does I get no response! Why does he only want me to put him to sleep and feed him? How did I fall from his heart?

 In the end I was too distraught to even voice my complaints. My son thought that I was lame, and I didn't want anyone to know, the publish button was never pressed. BUT now I am sitting pretty on the favorite throne. Mr. Patrick and I made a bet six years ago about this same scenario. The favorite parent would win the amount of our first paycheck..yes we are competitive people. Now Mr. Patrick is saying that he technically is the winner since Alex made his preference known earlier... I’m surely not coughing up any mula while the tides have turned. 

Humor aside, I actually love to see Alex and Mr. Patrick bond. It is good to use humor in these types of potentially painful situations. No parent wants to be booted to the bottom. Alex understands that we our both his parents, and we have different personalities to express our love. I hope I haven't done my victory dance too many times in front of Mr. Patrick. One thing is for sure babies seem to be fickle. 

Are you smarter than a fifth grader?

Have you ever felt so dumb you didnt know what to do with yourself? This is how I felt using the Stanley TR45. This staple gun is mind numbing. I had to wait until my anger subsided to describe the hatred that I feel for this product.

I recently moved and could only locate one of my two staple guns. I could not recollect why I had two staple guns, but I remembered that the this one was not my favorite. Too lazy to look for the other one, I decided to make do with what I had. When I opened the back of the gun I could not figure out how to load it. Puzzling...what to do?

Google it. There had to be some other like minded individual out there that could not figure out how to load a simple staple gun. Yes! My results produced a myriad of responses out there from similiar users like myself who perhaps were not as smart as a fifth grader.   One user wrote: If you are asking this questions then perhaps you should't be using it." LOL. This was indeed funny in the first fifteen minutes of my challenge, but not in the last. After reading all of the post my staples still wouldnt load! Frustrated I jammed the staples in manually, but still no luck. Duh.

After failing over and over again, the only thing left was to admit my defeat to Mr. Patrick and ask for help.
I was given the look at first. You know the one that I'm talking about....The Are you SERiously asking me this dumb question? Mr. Patrick removed my jammed staples and then told me that I probably had the wrong size. "Why don't you just buy a new gun?" Nope. Too cheap to invest more and too lazy to look for my other gun. I proceeded to venture to Target to get replacement staples. When I returned the staples still wouldnt load! Frustrated I decided to sleep it off like a bad dream. I questioned my mental capacity. Maybe I still had pregnancy brain. Who knows...anything is possible.

The next day I went to Home Depot for help. The associate gave me the same look I received the night before. He proceeded to show me how to load the gun, and look perfectly satisfied in his achievements once loaded. The staples then flopped in and out and came out of the back end. "This never happens!" he stated. He looked completely humiliated. "There must be a defect in YOUR gun." Right. I happened to glance at the shelf and noticed that this gun was marked at 7.99, about ten dollars cheaper then the other guns. THIS must be why I bought the thing to begin with.

Later on I realized that other people have had this same problem. There is no defect in my gun, this is a common problem. Nex time dont waste your 7.99, because it will cost you more in the long run.  As my mother-in-law always says "Cheap things not good and good things not cheap". I will never learn.

Yes. I DID just spend a perfectly good twenty minutes ranting about a staple gun. Hopefully you wont make the same mistake.

Forever Sleeper

Don't you just love a good hand-me down? They make you wonder what the other baby was doing when they wore them. The baby may outgrow the outfit, but the clothes will live on!  Alex is going through his clothes so quickly so I was super excited when I received a shipment of clothes from my sister. I'm refusing to buy any new clothes for a while. Mr. Patrick however believes I should trade in my shoes to sponsor fresh gear? Hahaha

Here he is Alex wearing him hand-me down and trying to jump in his exersaucer

                                   

Here's my nephew in the same jumper looking sweet as can be... Alex should take notes.

Ikea Chair Revamp

Spring is here and everyone knows that Mrs. Patrick loves any excuse to redecorate (Phaedra RHOA). I went shopping last weekend in search of a good bar stool, and found a great find at IKEA.
The BOSSE stool leaves a bit to be desired in terms of looks and was almost at the cusp of being overpriced for IKEA at $39.99 (yes there is a limit to how much I will spend at stores where I have to build my own furniture). But it was a great blank slate to redecorate and personalize the stool Patrick style.

The stool is a bland birch wood with a slot in the middle. Is this a piggy bank or a stool? They say that it allows the stool to be moved easily. Either way it doesn't matter because it will be covered up.

First step is to stain the chair to go with my chocolate and cream color scheme. I used water based MINWAX mahogany stain to darken the stools. The stool will absorb most of the first coat, so you will have to probably add three different layers. Here is the second layer:

After three coats the color doesn't really get darker. Here are the stools at three with a polyurethane semi glossy coat

Now to deal with the silly piggy bank top. I used 2 inch foam for the cushion that I got on sale from Hancock Fabrics for $4 with a 40% off coupon. The fabric is from Paradise fabric in Suitland Maryland...this store literally has thousands of fabric choices in one small storefront and extensive west African prints.

Open Wide

Ever since having Alex I see baby teeth differently. I couldn’t understand why children had early childhood caries, but this is not the case anymore. I have true empathy for parents (you know the characteristic that you write on all of your dental school applications, but you don't really have... that's the one). I completely understand the plight of the new parent brushing his/her child’s teeth. Before his teeth erupted it was pretty easy to wipe his gums off after nursing. Now the little boy has teeth, and he will use them! You don’t want to get stuck in the chute.

 I have found that the best way to brush his teeth is by holding him while I brush mine. He is so eager to do whatever mommy and daddy does that he will usually open for his own toothbrush...or just eat it. He interacts with the world by eating everything. Our next battle is the tongue.

The Bully

Alex isnt really a bully, I titled it for the Harvey Weinsteins new documentary, The Bully coming out this Friday and mid April in D.C. Here is Alex trying to bite his dad's head off.

He HAS been using his new athleticism to take control though. How are babies so strong?

Its hard to believe the little guy is now 6 months. His personality has truly blossomed.

6 month checkup:
Height 28 inches, 90%
Weight 17 lbs 8 oz, 50%
Head 17. 75, 90%


This baby goes by a myriad of nicknames: Alexi, Gaby, Bunny, Buns, Pie-Pie, Ale. What were some of your nicknames growing up?

Ferbie I love you

Back when the pacifier was King

Does he sleep through the night? This seems to be the question that every parent LOVES to ask us. "Sometimes"," Almost the whole night for the most part", " Kind of" These are the responses that I hear from fellow parents. I'm not sure why we don't just say no. The length of time your baby sleeps at night even becomes bragging rights. I'm not afraid to come out and say that he does NOT sleep through the night. Well he does, he just wakes up a few times. lol.

We have tried all of the commonly used methods to put him to sleep and have been crossing them off of our list these past sixth months. Our plans are usually thwarted in five minutes, by a suddenly awake baby with no plans of going to sleep.

Soothing method- Singing and rocking baby to sleep.
Alex: Why are the lights suddenly out? Where did everyone go? Wahhhhh

Rocking-rocking baby to sleep in a chair, or walking
Alex: wahhhhh. Rock me the whole night!

Driving down- Drive around until baby falls asleep. When you return home lift baby out of carseat and into crib. (Five minutes later.)
Alex: what's the plan for tonight guys?

Wear down- Feed baby to prevent nighttime nibbling.
Alex:I'm greedy. Didn’t you know this? Wheres my milk woman!

Nestling down- Rocking baby to sleep follow by snuggling him in your arms.
Me: Yay he's sleep! ...Wait I am too.

Calming down- Warm bath before bedtime to relax and calm baby before going to sleep.
Alex: I love to play in the water. Playtime! No bedtime for me.


The nurse down
The nurse down worked for a long time. The trouble came when it was time to move him from my arms to his crib. With the change in surroundings he usually woke up and we were back to square one. He also became dependent on being nursed to sleep even when he wasn’t hungry.

Although many of these methods worked to put him to sleep, he did not STAY asleep. Two weeks ago we started the Ferber technique. Don't Judge me, I was desperate. This method really hurts in the beginning. Alex is particularly stubborn and believed that we would eventually pick him up if he cried forever. The first week he cried for atleast thirty minutes.

I was convinced that he would harbor resentment in the morning for not being held, but he was his usual jolly self. Lets cross our fingers that he doesnt outgrow his new sleep technique.

Splash Splash

I love that little drool on the side

How to React to An Ugly Baby

Names and situations have been changed to protect the innocent

I was visiting one of my friends from dental school this weekend and she inquired about Alex. She was not ready for my picture attack of snapshots on my phone, and I certainly was not ready for a rebuttal. Another phone was quickly pulled out with pictures to match mine (the nerve). Somehow the conversation amounted to: "No my son is cuter", "No my nephew is cuter!"

Since she was not the actual parent, I made sure to tell her how I really felt about her nephew. Jabs were thrown back and forth, that I am too ashamed to reveal, and there was no apparent winner announced. What to do? Call it a draw? I think not! An unassuming stranger was sighted and caught in the cross fire.

"Which baby is cuter? Baby One?....or Baby Two?" The lady was stunned and quickly tried to regain her thoughts. After much deliberation she gushed "they are both soooo precious." No winner.

Perhaps the stranger was trying to break is to us, that neither baby was cute. I came home to find this hilarious article on wiki. Maybe Precious equals snuggly?



http://www.wikihow.com/React-to-an-Ugly-Baby