Spring Blooms Festival

Last year I missed all the tulips at Longwood.  This year I was determined to see them.  Nathan and I made a little trip out to see all of the spring flowers and we enjoyed our little mommy and son day out together.

Going to the Zoo

We decided to get a pass this year to the Philadelphia Zoo (#12).  We went for our first time a few weekends ago and Nathan loved it.  I loved seeing the wonder in Nathan's eyes as he was seeing so many new things.

The lioness came over to snuggle with the lion and everyone let out a collective "Aww!" at seeing them cuddling.

I thought Nathan would love the monkeys most of all.  They're one of the few animals Nathan recognizes and knows the sound for. But as it turns out Nathan loved the turtles.  He picked right up on saying turtle and he says it in such a cute voice and gets both t's in there.

I'm glad we bought the zoo pass because I know this little boy will be asking for more zoo, zoo, zoo!

Penn Boy

Nathan's very first Penn shirt

We were picking up Brad from school one day when Brad got called in on an emergency case.  We had about an hour of free time on our hands so Nathan and I went for a walk around campus.  Penn is exactly what you picture when you think of any Ivy League university.  I love all the old architecture around campus.  Nathan also liked visiting Ben Franklin.

Easter 2014

Back before Thanksgiving, Brad was having a conversation with friends from school about their favorite holidays.  Brad was talking about how much we like Easter at our house and one of Brad's friends, Amy, said that she hated Easter.  Brad invited her to join us for Easter and we could show her how we celebrate.

Well, 5 months later, we had Amy and a few other classmates join us for Easter.  We went to church together and Brad and I sang in 3 pieces with the choir.  After church we went home for our easter feast.

Nathan enjoyed his easter egg hunt in the backyard and was so pleased to find goldfish and teddy grahams in his eggs.

Nathan's favorite gift in his easter basket was his very own bubbles. He loves trying to blow bubbles and then running around and popping them.

Happy Easter!

Post Op

Let's go back to a time when Nathan was learning to crawl.  Nathan was having a grand old time crawling, but would occasionally head dive. And one of these times he happened to go right off the rug we had him on and hit his noggin on the hardwood.  Nathan got quite the goose egg.  And over time it didn't go away.  We got it checked out with the pediatrician and the bump turned out to be a cyst that got bigger with the hit.  Not a big deal, but for cosmetic reasons (it's right on his face and people were starting to ask about it) and since he wouldn't remember it if we removed it now, we scheduled surgery.

They had to verify the side to operate on and mark it with a big red X.

Bye bye bump!

We had quite the early morning (6:50 arrival time.)  We actually arrived a little early and the first patient was late so we got to go first.  This was especially nice since it made our stay an hour sorter.  As soon as I changed him into his surgical jammies he knew something was up and he did not like it.  I don't blame him.  It was early.  He wasn't allowed to eat or drink.  He was wearing purple jammie bottoms for goodness sake.  To help him relax before surgery they gave him some "giggle juice" aka. valium for kids.  When they gave this to him they told me to hold on to him tight because he would go limp afterwards.  Nathan just melted back into me.  I gave Nathan a new stuffed doggie for him to cuddle with.  Nathan loved patting the soft fur and holding on to his doggie for support.  I was able to talk to the doctor and the anesthesiologist before the procedure.  Then it was time for him to go into surgery and me to wait.

I had about a half hour to wait for the surgery.  The doctor came out and let me know everything had gone great.  It was about 1.5 cm wide cyst and they had removed all of it.  The anesthesiologist came out also and let me know that he didn't have any problem with the anesthesia, but he had been pretty upset and cried himself to sleep. Poor buddy.  She said he was in recovery now and that I would be able to see him in about 5 minutes.

When I was able to go back to see him, he was still asleep.  I wasn't quite expecting to see him the way he was.  The plan was that he would wake up in the next 15-30 minutes.  He went the whole 30 minutes and didn't want to get up when the nurse roused him.   She gave him some apple juice to make sure the anesthesia hadn't made him nauseous before she released us.  Nathan drained the whole sippy cup and he was so mad when it was all gone.  He wanted more, but we didn't want to make him throw up by giving him too much.  After 10 minutes and he hadn't thrown up we were allowed to leave.

Once we got home I made us some eggs for breakfast (one of Nathan's favorite foods.)  Nathan was so furiously hungry.  I've never seen him eat so fast!  He ate through all the eggs, strawberries, blueberries, and toast I could put before him.  We let him pick out a movie (Up) and he then proceeded to zonk out.  Nathan NEVER falls asleep on the couch.  Never ever.  Poor bug was so tired.  So it was right off to bed.

Day after surgery

The next few days the trend of being really tired continued, but when he was up he was back to his happy self.  I can already see the scar de-puffing and becoming thinner.  He really doesn't seem bothered by it.  We're happy that we're done with surgery and that there's no more bump.

21 months

- Nathan is in a phase of handing us stuff to hold. It doesn't mean he's done with it, just that he wants you to have it for safe keeping and you better have it when he comes back for it.
- I was listening to some music while cleaning and "Eye of the Tiger" came on.  For the first time ever, Nathan started to dance.  Mostly it's some knee bending with some head bobbing.  But one thing is for sure, that kid has no rhythm.
- Bath time fun is back!  It took awhile but he loves bath time again.  He splashes, kicks, spins, squirts, throws, and just expels energy while he is in there.

- Nathan has always been fascinated with opening and closing doors.  It wasn't until recently that he's discovered the doors to our bathroom closet and that it has the perfect little Nathan sized hiding place.  He loves to play peekaboo in there.
- He likes to push the swifter sweeper around.
- Loves to climb up on his step stool in the bathroom and brush his teeth.

- He got a wagon full of legos for Christmas and it's hard to say what he likes more, pulling the wagon or building with the legos.
- I've started taking Nathan to the library and he loves it.  He loves grabbing a book and bringing it to the little bench to read right then.
- We're back to teething again.  He has 2 canine's coming in right now.  That means he's down to two missing teeth.  Brad thinks they are coming in soon too.

- One night I told Nathan it was time for dinner.  Instead of going to his high chair, he pulled himself a chair out from the table and climbed up.  He has a booster now and loves sitting at the table.  He's so funny about it too.  He likes to push himself away from the table with his feet and then has to stretch to grab his food.  If you try to push him in he pushes himself back out.  He also likes to put his feet up on the table while he eats.
- He has figured out that chapstick goes on your lips and if he finds ours he will try to put some on.
- We finished physical therapy for his tortacollis.  He's head is in midline most of the time and he's been doing so well that we don't have to go anymore.  Yay!

- He's never been very fond of stuffed animals, but lately he has been so lovey to them.  He'll give them hugs and kisses.  He sleeps in his crib with 3 animals: his bulldog, lamb, and elephant.
- His speech is coming along.  He's been a little bit behind with talking and so we've been doing some speech therapy to help him.  He can now say cheese, teeth, mom, dad, giggle, moo, chicken, car, got it, did it, and thanks.
- About saying moo, he only says it while kissing his wooden cow and at the top of his lungs.  He thinks its hilarious.
- I tried signing with Nathan, but he didn't pick up anything so I stopped trying.  He loves the Baby Signing Time videos so I've let him watch those.  Well all on his own he picked up the signs for more and all done and started using them without any prompting from me.
- He has started giving kisses to his mommy.  Melts my heart.

- So much more independent in wanting to do things.  I can see him transforming into a little two year old, power struggles and all, but he's usually a pretty fun loving guy.  He thinks he is the funniest thing and will laugh at his own silliness.

We're So Glad When Grandma Comes

We're so lucky that Brad's mom was able to come visit us a few weekends ago.  I was still getting over being sick with a nasty flulike bug and Janet was getting over having pneumonia so we kept our plans pretty low key.  Nathan loved playing with Grandma.  Janet had been worried that Nathan would be a little standoffish after not seeing her since Christmas, but from the moment she walked through the door to the moment we dropped her off at the airport Nathan wanted to be playing with Grandma.  Nathan especially loved being Grandma's special helper when we made banana bread.

We did make one venture out to Longwood.  They have their orchid festival going on which is my favorite.

We took Nathan to the children's garden where they have lots of water works for the kids to play in.  Nathan had the time of his life.  I brought a long sleeved bib hoping to minimize him getting wet.  It was no use.  He was so in love with playing in the water that he was soaked all the way to his shoes.  Good thing I still brought an extra set of clothes.

"Look Mom, no feet!"

We're glad Janet could come and spend some time with us.  We love her visits!