Sunday, April 19, 2009
Saturday, April 18, 2009
Someone is....
standing up all by herself (started a couple of days before Easter) and as of a couple of days ago, taking tiny steps....
I don't think it will be long before Giulia starts walking!
I don't think it will be long before Giulia starts walking!
Friday, April 3, 2009
Newsletter: Month 11
Dear Giulia,
On 3/30 you turned 11 months old. This letter will have a bit of a different format than previous ones, because you’ve developed so much this month that I want to make sure that I capture as much as I can here, so that when you have your own babies, you can show them how advanced, smart and extremely cute you were as a baby (qualities, which I am sure you will continue to have for the rest of your life):
· We are still working on having you sleep in your crib by yourself: sometimes it works, but most times it doesn’t. You have, however, begun to let go of our hand in less and less time, once we put you in your crib. Part of the problem here is that your daddy and I love it so much when you hang on to us, so even though we know that we "should" be letting you sleep on your own, we just love it when you cling on to us and don’t let us go. I have a feeling that, consequently, this process will continue to develop slowly...
· You are standing on your feet more and more – you’ll be walking any time now. In mid-March you stood in the big girls tub all by yourself. You are letting go of our hands and trying to walk on your own. When you crawl, you do a funny crawl/walk, because I think that you can't stand not being able to walk yet!
· You are really enjoying bath time again and are doing great in the big tub.
· Santana brought our Pilates ball upstairs and she has been playing with you by rolling you on the ball. One morning, as I was going down the stairs to go to work, I heard the most contagious laugh coming from downstairs. I stood by the room where you 2 were playing and Giulia; you were laughing so deliciously hard and having so much fun, that I couldn’t stop looking at you amazed at how happy you are. I thank God every day that you are so incredibly happy - it's contagious, really.
· You started eating real apples, home-made baby food, yogurt melts (you can’t get enough of them), crackers…. You have graduated to real food now, little one.
· You are quite vocal and you make the funniest sounds. You have said: mama, dada, papa, esse (“this” in Portuguese), you will say: eeeeeeeeeeey!, trrrrrrrrrrrrra!
· You blow kisses, wave good-bye, make fishy-mouth.
· You clap hands, you sing, you play with Charlie and Daisy. It took this long, but now Charlie actually loves to play with you! I know, our puppy was jeaulous of you at 1st, but now, he can't get enough of you - as we knew he would.
· On weekends, the 2 of us have been going out on mommy and daughter trips: we go to the stores, supermarket, walks… and everywhere we go, people can’t believe how happy, smiley and beautiful you are. .Daddy still loves to put you to bed at night and is spring loaded to run into your bedroom when you make the slightest peep. In the morning you are typically waking up before us so we go and get you and cuddle with you for 10 or 15 minutes before you start your day. This is the best part of mommy and daddy's day.
· When we come home from work at the end of they day you are always very happy to greet us. We can't tell you how wonderful the feeling is to see your smiling face after the workday.
· You are staring to understand what 'no' means. Since your baby teeth (you have 6 of them now) came in you can no longer chew on our hands without hurting Mommy and Daddy so we have begun telling you 'no, that hurts Mommy (or Daddy)' and you usually stop when we say this to you.
OK, my little genius. Mommy is planning your 1st birthday party and part of me can’t believe how fast this time flew by and I feel nostalgic about my little baby that was so tiny, only 11 months ago, but the other, more prevailing one, feels so lucky and so blessed to have had the best – almost – year of my life. You and your father have made me complete.
On 3/30 you turned 11 months old. This letter will have a bit of a different format than previous ones, because you’ve developed so much this month that I want to make sure that I capture as much as I can here, so that when you have your own babies, you can show them how advanced, smart and extremely cute you were as a baby (qualities, which I am sure you will continue to have for the rest of your life):
· We are still working on having you sleep in your crib by yourself: sometimes it works, but most times it doesn’t. You have, however, begun to let go of our hand in less and less time, once we put you in your crib. Part of the problem here is that your daddy and I love it so much when you hang on to us, so even though we know that we "should" be letting you sleep on your own, we just love it when you cling on to us and don’t let us go. I have a feeling that, consequently, this process will continue to develop slowly...
· You are standing on your feet more and more – you’ll be walking any time now. In mid-March you stood in the big girls tub all by yourself. You are letting go of our hands and trying to walk on your own. When you crawl, you do a funny crawl/walk, because I think that you can't stand not being able to walk yet!
· You are really enjoying bath time again and are doing great in the big tub.
· Santana brought our Pilates ball upstairs and she has been playing with you by rolling you on the ball. One morning, as I was going down the stairs to go to work, I heard the most contagious laugh coming from downstairs. I stood by the room where you 2 were playing and Giulia; you were laughing so deliciously hard and having so much fun, that I couldn’t stop looking at you amazed at how happy you are. I thank God every day that you are so incredibly happy - it's contagious, really.
· You started eating real apples, home-made baby food, yogurt melts (you can’t get enough of them), crackers…. You have graduated to real food now, little one.
· You are quite vocal and you make the funniest sounds. You have said: mama, dada, papa, esse (“this” in Portuguese), you will say: eeeeeeeeeeey!, trrrrrrrrrrrrra!
· You blow kisses, wave good-bye, make fishy-mouth.
· You clap hands, you sing, you play with Charlie and Daisy. It took this long, but now Charlie actually loves to play with you! I know, our puppy was jeaulous of you at 1st, but now, he can't get enough of you - as we knew he would.
· On weekends, the 2 of us have been going out on mommy and daughter trips: we go to the stores, supermarket, walks… and everywhere we go, people can’t believe how happy, smiley and beautiful you are. .Daddy still loves to put you to bed at night and is spring loaded to run into your bedroom when you make the slightest peep. In the morning you are typically waking up before us so we go and get you and cuddle with you for 10 or 15 minutes before you start your day. This is the best part of mommy and daddy's day.
· When we come home from work at the end of they day you are always very happy to greet us. We can't tell you how wonderful the feeling is to see your smiling face after the workday.
· You are staring to understand what 'no' means. Since your baby teeth (you have 6 of them now) came in you can no longer chew on our hands without hurting Mommy and Daddy so we have begun telling you 'no, that hurts Mommy (or Daddy)' and you usually stop when we say this to you.
OK, my little genius. Mommy is planning your 1st birthday party and part of me can’t believe how fast this time flew by and I feel nostalgic about my little baby that was so tiny, only 11 months ago, but the other, more prevailing one, feels so lucky and so blessed to have had the best – almost – year of my life. You and your father have made me complete.
Thursday, March 19, 2009
Saturday, March 14, 2009
Friday, March 13, 2009
Abby came to visit from NYC! ~ 2/29
We had so much fun and mommy and Aunty Abby had some girly-grown-up time together! Fun times!
Monday, March 9, 2009
Monday, March 2, 2009
Newsletter: Month 10
Giulia, on the 28th, you turned 10 months old. The reason we are celebrating yet another month in your life so early, is because this February only had 28 days. Don’t worry, once you get older, you will not want to celebrate your birthday a couple of days early, but for now, I’m sure you won’t mind.
In the beginning of the month you had your 2 bottom teeth. Then after a couple of very difficult days, mommy found that you, all of a sudden, had six teeth: 4 upper and 2 lower pearly whites. Now, level with me, kid, why did you have to go and grow those six teeth and did they really have to sprout at the same time? You are usually such a good-natured baby, but I had no idea what teeth could do to a human being, even to the sweetest of them all! And to make things even more exciting for your daddy and I, people everywhere would say, “oh, don’t worry, things will get so much easier…”, and then in the same breath “…but this will last until she’s 3 years old!”
In the last month we have met Miss Personality: you love certain things and really, really don't like other things. You love banana puffs. You do not like spaghetti baby food and you will make the cutest “this-is-so-yucky” face when we try to feed it to you. You like applesauce. You do not like to be kissed. You love to watch Xuxa (so much that mommy and daddy have are now singing Bila Bilú in their sleep!), but hate it when I try to clean your nose.
You are crawling everywhere; putting every single thing is your mouth, testing your limits… You are curious, happy, tenacious… You’ve learned to stand really well and you are trying to walk. You’ve become a biter but you are also learning that that’s not an OK thing and when we say “no”, you actually stop. You are playing with Charlie and Daisy a lot more and they seem to want to play with your toys and you seem to want to play with theirs, making it very difficult to keep them separate. Every morning you wave us goodbye, and you are always smiling and that reassures us and enables us to actually leave our home, because Giulia, even though we’ve been back at work for some months now, we can’t tell you how difficult it is to leave you every morning. But knowing that you’re OK makes it so much more bearable.
Daddy has finished working on the condo and he is back feeding, bathing, playing with and putting you to sleep every night. During the time that he was working on the condo, daddy woke up every single night and morning to feed you. It was your special time with him and something that your daddy learned to cherish and look forward to.
One day you started coughing and to mommy it was obvious that something wasn’t right – sure enough, you had swallowed a little piece of plastic, which was causing you to choke. Thanks to a very quick reaction from Santana, she was able to dislodge it from your throat. The whole thing lasted 5 or 10 minutes, but to us, it felt like an eternity, because right then we both realized how precious your life is to us, and that just our knowledge that you were not OK, scared us tremendously. Right then, we further realized that ensuring your well-being and us protecting you from any and all harm is much more than just another job of being parent, it is our essence and an integral part of who we are.
In the beginning of the month you had your 2 bottom teeth. Then after a couple of very difficult days, mommy found that you, all of a sudden, had six teeth: 4 upper and 2 lower pearly whites. Now, level with me, kid, why did you have to go and grow those six teeth and did they really have to sprout at the same time? You are usually such a good-natured baby, but I had no idea what teeth could do to a human being, even to the sweetest of them all! And to make things even more exciting for your daddy and I, people everywhere would say, “oh, don’t worry, things will get so much easier…”, and then in the same breath “…but this will last until she’s 3 years old!”
In the last month we have met Miss Personality: you love certain things and really, really don't like other things. You love banana puffs. You do not like spaghetti baby food and you will make the cutest “this-is-so-yucky” face when we try to feed it to you. You like applesauce. You do not like to be kissed. You love to watch Xuxa (so much that mommy and daddy have are now singing Bila Bilú in their sleep!), but hate it when I try to clean your nose.
You are crawling everywhere; putting every single thing is your mouth, testing your limits… You are curious, happy, tenacious… You’ve learned to stand really well and you are trying to walk. You’ve become a biter but you are also learning that that’s not an OK thing and when we say “no”, you actually stop. You are playing with Charlie and Daisy a lot more and they seem to want to play with your toys and you seem to want to play with theirs, making it very difficult to keep them separate. Every morning you wave us goodbye, and you are always smiling and that reassures us and enables us to actually leave our home, because Giulia, even though we’ve been back at work for some months now, we can’t tell you how difficult it is to leave you every morning. But knowing that you’re OK makes it so much more bearable.
Daddy has finished working on the condo and he is back feeding, bathing, playing with and putting you to sleep every night. During the time that he was working on the condo, daddy woke up every single night and morning to feed you. It was your special time with him and something that your daddy learned to cherish and look forward to.
One day you started coughing and to mommy it was obvious that something wasn’t right – sure enough, you had swallowed a little piece of plastic, which was causing you to choke. Thanks to a very quick reaction from Santana, she was able to dislodge it from your throat. The whole thing lasted 5 or 10 minutes, but to us, it felt like an eternity, because right then we both realized how precious your life is to us, and that just our knowledge that you were not OK, scared us tremendously. Right then, we further realized that ensuring your well-being and us protecting you from any and all harm is much more than just another job of being parent, it is our essence and an integral part of who we are.
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