Back At It

A couple of nights before Liz went back to work, Huelan kicks back fully on the couch, taking in some Jake and eating a snack, without a care in the world. 

The night before D(B)-Day, the other one must have sensed something was different and cut us some slack- he went down around 10pm and slept through til 5am! Six ounces of bottle and 30mins later, he was back snoozing in his crib. I left for work shortly after, but Grandma and Grampa took over and juggled getting Huelan ready for school and Vansen duty like champs. 

Liz strategically decided to go back to work on a Wednesday to set herself up with a short week, so we only have two days left this week. If it continues to go like this, I'd give our chances of survival at least 40%. 

Update: Haha just kidding it's 1:56 and the three of us are up, about to cave in and feed the boy. 

Hand in Hand

Makes me feel feelings. 

Rollin' / Tired Rant

He's been verrrrry close for a few days, but today when Liz walked into the kitchen, where Vansen was supposed to be staring up and batting at his toys, he was on his belly.  Up until now, he's been foiled in his attempts by his right arm, like in the third pic above.  Up until now, we've been more-or-less comfortable leaving him unattended on the couch, changing table, our bed, etc....  Well, that's over forever.

With Liz going back to work next week (!!!), we're focusing on trying to get Vansen to sleep longer at night. His first stretch of sleep is often good, as he goes down around 8:30 and can sleep through til 1:30, sometimes a little longer.  But that doesn't do us a ton of good because we often don't get to bed until 11:30 most nights, so it's effectively 2 hours of sleep for us.  And then he's up every 2-3 hours after that.  Liz hasn't slept for 5 hours straight more than once or twice in the past 4 months, and for the most part a 3 hour stretch is standard.  Sounds crazy when I say it like that, but that's the reality.  And now that Huelan is mostly potty trained, she will sometimes get up in the middle of the night asking to get taken to the potty instead of filling her pull-up, so that's another impediment to being well-rested.

I won't catalog all of the strategies we're trying, but Vansen just got moved from the co-sleeper to his own crib in his own room, so we're hoping that helps somehow.  Not sure what the logic there is, but we're game to give it a try.

Also on the subject of sleep, there was a study recently publicized about the role of sleep. It's now believed that during sleep, the brain cells open up and allow fluid to wash out toxins from synapses, perhaps maintaining and improving function.  No sleep = dirty synapses = low functioning.  So science is finally catching up to what new parents have known for eons.

Before Huelan, I rarely drank coffee in the morning.  Haha that was a long time ago.

To me, the most obvious effect of chronic sleep deprivation (isn't that how they torture P.O.W.s & force false confessions?) is difficulty with anything creative.  It just seems to take too much energy.  Or maybe it'll get to a point where we're so tired that we'll reach some uber-creative state, like a hallucinatory, muse-inspired fugue.

Until then, here's what we've been up to in list form, and in no particular order:
- Pumpkin patch! Kind of like a cross between a pumpkin lot and carnival with rides and snow cones.  After Halloween, they truck in the evergreens and gear up for Xmas.  We didn't ride the giant slide this year, which I am regretting.
- Swimming at Anh &  Patty's new pad - warm Walnut Creek and Ly Family Chicken.
- Gosia's family came over for dinner- her twins were here for a month from Warsaw, but went back last week.
- Hannah's third Bday party, with Liz and Karen being nursing twinsies.
- Housewarming at Viv and Jason's- plenty of room for the girls to run around.  It'll seem small once the boys are big enough roam, though.
- FaceTime with Great Grampa.  He only has these two great-grandkids, and he loooooves them.  This was super fun and we'll be doing it again soon.

Pics here

Showtel

We went to a wedding this weekend, only this time Huelan wasn't a flowergirl. She found a way to have just as much anyway, even though we banned her from teaching the other kids her patented Run & Slide®. 

She somehow got Show & Tell at school confused with "hotel," so we spent the night at a "showtel" in Stockton. In addition to her mini bed, this time she also made use of the showtel stationary, drawing a Dora-style map for baby brother. 

She's probably stayed at more hotels and attended more weddings by age four than me at age 20. 

some wedding pics here

Baby Lawrence

There's no shortage of people who tell us that Vansen looks like me, but in this pic you can totally see the Lee side, specifically his namesake. 

Namaste

Huelan found Liz's old yoga mat today, so we dialed up some youtube Cosmic Kids Yoga, perfect little 15 minute kid-friendly sessions that she just loved. 

If she can keep this going maybe she'll inspire the whole family to shape up. 

Pumpkin Patch

7th Ave Sunset Pumpkin Patch. Halloween is fast approaching, and Huelan's been working herself up for weeks. 

She got her hands on this Halloween catalog from Oriental Trading Company- decorations, costumes, and of course candy. She's been slowly circling her favorite things with her red marker, which she calls shopping. 

I don't want to know what's going to happen when everything's all circled. 

Tale of the Tape

At three months, Vansen's meeting all of the expected milestones. Our favorite is the social smiling, which he's realized gets him a lot of positive attention. He tracks us across the room and positively lights up when we smile at him.

Though he doesn't quite have control of his vocal chords yet, he's experimenting with squeaks, squeals, and gurgles. And as you can see, he's discovered his hands, though it'll be a while before he figures out how to use them.  

With his robust belly, sausage arms, marshmellow thighs, and generous cheeks, he's like a little cherub. Describing him as an angel might be going too far however, at least until he can bless Liz with more than 3 hours of sleep at a time. 

He weighed in at the doctor's office today at 26.25 inches & 16lb, 10oz.  A growing boy indeed. We're not sure whether he's growing so quickly because he eats all the time or if he needs to eat all the time because he's growing so quickly. 

First Day

We all visited the school a few months ago- a home-based place just four houses down the street from us.  It's been there quite a while, and most of the neighbors sent their kids there, so we felt that it'd be a good place for Huelan to start preschool.  It's set up like a preschool/daycare, with around 8-12 kids there at any given time with Ms. Jan and her twenty-something daughter Ms. Michelle.  You get the feeling from her voice and cadence that Ms. Jan's been at this a long time.

Huelan was so excited the day of her first visit that she wanted to stay (It helped that two girls told her that her dress was pretty).  We went home, but have been talking about preschool periodically since and ramped up the talk in the last week or so.  Her excitement ramped up too, but she let some trepidation show through. When we told her that she wouldn't be going to story time at the library, she said in a soft voice, "But I don't want things to change, I want everything to stay the same."  I would too if I was her- she has it pretty good.

The actual logistics are pretty easy right now.  Since it's just a 5 min walk away and she can pretty much show up any time before 9, we didn't have too much of a time crunch.  The first morning Huelan had the full escort- Mom, Ba, Vansen, and Gosia.  Huelan was a little shy when we walked in at 8:30, and there was just one other kid there, but in a few minutes half the kids had shown up and we were barely able to coral her for a goodbye kiss.  She had jumped in with both feet.

Mom and Ba did okay, too.  We were probably more anxious about how she would do than sad or nostalgic.  I was fully expecting to get a phone call in the middle of the day asking me to pick up Huelan because she was doing atomic knee-drops on the other kids during nap time or she wouldn't stop making fart noises with her mouth until all the monsters were gone.  But no, she did great, and especially loved art time.  Actually the only one of us to shed a tear was Gosia, who's also moving on to another chapter: Vansen.

Some more pics here

Lucky 7

It's amazing how much you can pack into just seven years.  Time sneaks up on us as it does on everyone, some days marked with significance, some just calendar pages we turn with our eyes on the next. Regardless of the kind of day, having a wonderful partner has made each of these 2,556 days so much better.

Flying Solo

I

(Huelan at her sleepover)

(Cursed with my hairline but blessed with Liz's dimples. Can't win 'em all.)

Tonight is the last night of a short work trip to LA.  

Last weekend I had both kids by myself for the first time. For about five hours. I was a little scared, but managed it ok. Maybe we watched a little more TV than we usually do and perhaps I held Vansen during his nap so that he'd sleep longer. The details are fuzzy....

Well Liz has had both kids since Monday, and she had the brilliant idea of setting up Huelan with a sleepover at Grandma's Tuesday night. I tell you that woman is a genius. 

So, yes, we are both scared of being alone with our kids for extended periods of time (me more so than Liz, to be fair). 

Oakland al Fresco

Sometimes the only way we can get Huelan to stay put for a picture is tell her that she can make a funny face.  Most of the time, she makes this one, and I make that one.

This was taken tonight after dinner on the pier at Lake Chalet.  Something we haven't had a ton of recently is spontaneity, but tonight the weather was perfect and we felt like eating outside.  We also felt like having someone else make and bring us food, and then clean up; a great combination of those things can be found at this spot.  Even Vansen approved.

Little Buddha

Smaller babies nurse on him.  

Flipping Out

Where we live, it doesn't really have sense to have a swimming pool- we'd probably only use it four weeks a year- but we do have sprinklers, which in some ways is more fun. With the dog days of summer upon us here in Oakland, temps topped out at around 85, which was perfect for a few sprinkler runs.  

And with the latest Picasa feature that stitches consecutive shutter releases together like a flip book, we can share the fun.

Selling It

This is not typically my M.O., and Liz was surprised that it I allowed this to happen, but since Liz and Ba Noi were going to get a mani-pedi before Anh and Patty's wedding, I allowed Huelan to attempt to sell me as to why she might have earned a mani-pedi herself.

She was positively beaming during the polishing, and was dancing around for days after showing off her nails.
Gradually over the last six months, she transitioned from a dino-loving, rough-and-tumble girl into a princess watching, necklace wearing, beauty shop playing girly-girl.  That's the way it goes I guess.  She still likes the rough-housing and being tossed around, so I've got that going for me. I might as well stop pretending that I have any control over this at all....