Luke's first birthday gift...

all the way from London! a girlfriend from school) who has recently moved to the UK, was so thoughtful and generous enough to search high and low for this gift for Luke. my friend is from Peru so this gift has sentimental value ;) it was so much fun watching Luke open his first birthday present.... OMG i can't believe he's turning 1 in just one week!!!! eeeekkkkkk!

here are the pics (Luke in jammies and all)! warning: there are a million pics to follow.

so what's so exciting about this?

ooooh, it peels off?!

i get it! if you pull here, it comes off!

wow! there's something underneath the paper!

weeeee! this is sooo much fun!

i don't get it?! what am i supposed to do with this?

hmmmmm?!

coool! it opens!!

and there're postcards inside!

yay!!! so many to play with!

and a cool book and bear too?!

but hey! don't you look at my postcards! these are mine!

you'd better not even think about it!

what're you looking at?!

i'll show you!

there! get your own postcards!

fine! since mommy says i have to be nice... i'll share my postcards if you show me these cool boots of yours?!

and bag... i thought only girls carried bags?! oh... it's luggage?!

eh! no thanks. you can keep 'em. i'll stick with my postcards.

hmmm. wonder what it says in here.

my cool birthday gifts from my peruvian auntie ;)

the end!

thanks for stopping by!

Luke's 11 months!!! + ramblings

well, actually he's 11.5 months but who's counting?! i've been such a horribly bad blogger but have had so much going on around here lately. i still don't have my laptop back to tip-top shape and it's hard working from a brand new computer that needs some major love... all while planning luke's birthday party (which seems to be taking up every waking minute that i'm not doing everything else!). so, i'm putting aside 10 minutes to say "hi" and give a short update of what we've been up to.

luke is super crazy at 11.5 months, lol. he's into playing really rough, like charging me and biting me... he's in to leaping into our arms and has just started taking steps/leaps at 11.5 months (anywhere from 1-2 steps pretty infrequently, still, at this point). he's kind of doing it right along with standing alone. he's still a super super SUPER nosy kid, just loves to people watch (so much so that i'm often quite embarrassed when, while in my arms, he whips around me, strains his neck and contorts his body just to look at someone on the other side of me.... all just to STARE EXPRESSIONLESS when they talk and coo and caaa at him!). seriously, he's sooo rude!

let me put this into bullets since that's an easier read (skip it if you must, this is for me ;)

11 months

- 25 lbs, 30.5"

- eating three balanced meals/day + 1 afternoon snack

- mommy has stopped pumping at work/during the day (::chanting:: allelujah!). my feelings about this (excitement, liberation, joy) surprise me! i totally thought i'd be saddened about the weaning process but let me tell ya... margarita here i come ;) i'm still nursing him in the mornings when he wakes up and in the evenings (to sleep still). i'm sure the morning and nighttime nursings will be a lot harder to drop.

- at 11 months Luke started sttn, about 10 hrs/night and still taking two naps (a 2-hr morning nap and 1.5-2 hr afternoon nap).

- luke babbles "mama" and "dada" often, usually repeats us when we say it but will sometimes surprise me with a "mama" and then a kiss. melts my heart!

- showers us with wet, slobbery kisses all day long, love it!

- he's practically running along the sofa and ottoman, definitely a risk-taker m little boy (hits his head a lot on the way down, too :(

- has 7 teeth now. 4 on top, 3 on bottom.

- he loves begging for food, lol, seriously. he'll eat all of his huge dinner (protein, veggies, grains AND fruit) and still comes over to ask us for food.... AND eats as much as we give him. i just don't get it.

11.5 months

- sleeps a solid 11-12 hours every night without interruption! i'm still nursing him to bed but think he's trying to put a stop to that (refuses the breast and doesn't cry or fuss when i put him in bed, awake).

- has recently been shortening his afternoon naps so may be starting to transition into 1 nap/day.

- since he's taking a short cat-nap in the afternoons, he's yawning by the time we get home and start dinner.

- LOVES solids. i'm still making all of his food and he seems to be loving it. it's a lot of work now that i'm back to work but the rewards (his enjoyment) are so worth it!

- instead of giving him cow's milk twice/day, i'm mixing Enfagrow with breast milk (i still have a stash to take him well through his 12th month). he seems to really love it!! yay!!! my mil no longer has to chase him around the house to get him to drink his milk!

- drinks from a sippy (since 10-months). that transition was easy since he never took a bottle.

- he's talking so much at 11.5 months (what a change from a month ago!) and has such a...... determined personality already (takes after his mama!).

- still takes daily/nighttime baths and loves them (though he's afraid of the new bubble machine :( he'll actually jump up into my arms, in like .2 seconds, if he even catches a glimpse of it :( i've since removed it from the tub but he's still afraid of the spot it was in, boo, i traumatized my son with a dang bubble machine!

- he's just such a big boy already! he's long and appears to be thinning out (but again, i don't understand how when he eats so dang much!). he's losing his baby chunks and it makes us sad :(

- he has such a little personality on him, kicks his legs/feet and flails his arms whenever in protest... which seems to be more and more often these days, lol.

- he understands "no" perfectly well, though he isn't always so obedient.

- for the most part, like 99% of the time, he's a happy, nosy, calm boy who loves to play "chase" with mommy & daddy and give kisses. we can't wait to see what this next month has in store for us and him!

mama

- it's hard to consider myself; where i am, where i want things to go, even who i am without luke sometimes. this past year (heck, year and a half really!) has been dedicated to luke. taking care of his needs, trying to do all the "right" things, all while neglecting my own (what?! i have needs?!). now that i've started the weaning process it actually feels good to consider myself an individual again. i know that must sound strange but really, it's how i'm feeling. instead of the sadness that i thought i'd feel, it's been rather nice not having to strap a machine to myself for 10-15 minutes twice/day (go figure). i think i was glowing with excitement the first day at work, pump-free, feeling a sense of oddity and loss of identity without my trusty pump-in-style at my side, worrying about where i'd be at 10:30 and 2:30 to pump!

- which brings me to... WORK! ahhhh! again, i worried this would be so hard but oddly enough i find it so natural. i love the routine of it all, in all it's craziness of course. i love that M-W-F's i take ds to the grandmas and T & TH the hubbs takes him. i love that we both want to be the one to pick him up at the end of the day, to see the joy and excitement in his face when he looks up and sees our face and/or hears our face. i'm sure this won't last.

- i hate that i feel work compromises my efforts at being the "best" mommy i can be. i'm tired at the end of the day and though i give luke my "all," realistically, the "all" at the end of the day is a crappy second to my "best."

- i love work, though i just started my "real" work this week, but yeah. i love the work i set out to do everyday. it makes leaving luke a little less painful that i leave him for this "job." i do hope, however, that i never regret my decision to be a "working" mom. it wasn't until i had luke that the thought of being a sahm ever even occurred to me. i came from a single parent home (a little self-disclosure there ;) and so i never knew that not working wold ever be an option. anyway, my ultimate goal is to work shorter hours/day (whose idea was it to work 8hrs/day, 5 days/wk anyway?!) so i can be home more for/with my family.

- to be continued, so much for a 10-minute post.....

i leave you with Luke's 11-month pictures, and again, i can't control my crazy click-happy finger on the shutter... i'm definitely making up for the lak of pics/posts by putting all 20 pics here :0

nosy!!

love love his expression here... again, nosy ;)

the end....

Omg, Luke is hilarious!!

Not sure if I've ever mentioned this before but Luke's transitional item of choice is a burp cloth. He has two different types, both cotton but one textured and one super soft. He seems to like both the same, no preference between blend. If I offer both to him he grabs the one closest, lol.

He's loved his burp cloths since about 4 months but has really taken a noticeable love interest these past couple months. So, whenever he sees a burp cloth laying around (yes, we have them spread around the house like furniture) he grabs it and drags it around with him. If I put one on my shoulder to burp him (yep, he still spits up at 11 months!!), he snatches it from my shoulder, puts it in his mouth, all before he's even in the upright position (from nursing).

So... another {more recent} love interest of his is laundry. I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this, lol. Ok, laundry. He stands at the washer/dryer as we load clothes to wash. Typical laundry-Luke.. I put clothes in the dryer, he attempts to pull them out. I fold them in the basket, he knocks over the basket, cute right (in a somewhat irritating kind of way)?! But omg, today he took laundry to a whole 'nother level!

I folded all of his clothes, had them neatly piled in the laundry basket, ready to transport to his room to be put away and hung, when I saw him, out of the corner of my eye, dart for the basket. I threw his towel (in the basket) on top of the clothes, hoping he wouldn't mess up the neatly folded piles, and the kid pulls the towel off! he catches a glimpse of his burp cloth pile and makes a dive for the stash! I throw the towel on top of the cloths again and he yells/grunts, throws the towel off, and aggressively attempts to grab a cloth. Fine! I give him one. Is that good enough? No! He reaches his hands, both of them this time, grabs as many cloths as he can get his grubby little hands on and takes off like a bat out of he'll! Half way across the room he stops, looks back at me (frozen; my jaw to the ground) yells/grunts w/attitude something at me and takes off again, out of the room. Omg!! It was the funniest.thing.EVER! Guess he's showing me who's boss...

11-month pics and update to follow :)

i'm baaaaaaackkkk!!! again ;)

and i'm so exhausted :( every available minute is spent working on Luke's birthday party "stuff" or... sleeping. seriously! i've been hitting the sack every night about 8:30-9 pm. my laptop is still being worked on at the apple hospital (the second time in the same month) but it's ok because we got a new... iMac!

(i apologize for the mess!)



and luke helping daddy take the new comp out of the box ;)



but now my butt hurts, it's numb, from sitting here for about 30 mins, i'm not used to sitting at a desk. i already miss my laptop, where i could crawl up in bed, bent over, legs underneath me, elbows on the bed with my hands under my chin.... boo! i miss my laptop!! :( not to mention all my LR presets and PSE actions (sharpening and resizing for web, especially) that i miss! oh, and this monitor isn't calibrated... yet! so please excuse pink Luke and Orange hubbs ;)

so you wanna know why i'm so exhausted when my little 11 month old boy has been sttn, successfully, for over 2 weeks now?! stress from work and throwing this birthday party! what a horrible horrible thing for these two to come up at the exact.same.time! seriously, i've been in training for almost 2 months now and will be going out into the field, working full-time as a children's social worker in the ER unit (that's the craziest unit to be in right now, ok, ever! the unit where workers have the reputation of "baby snatchers" ugh, but i digress!) right at the same time we'll be throwing the biggest party since, oh, our wedding!

i'm trying to focus on the joy and celebration of Luke turning 1! with all that's going on, though, it's a lot to handle and it seems the only way i've been able to deal with it is by sleeping :( which, of course, is so NOT conducive to getting ready for "the biggest party since our wedding!"

and since i've been laptop-less for over a week now, i haven't taken many pics (hate the idea of images sitting on my card, piling up!). but here are a few pics of what we've/Luke has been up to lately. we'll be taking his 11-month pics tomorrow so i'll be updating with those and his monthly stats in a couple days.

hubbs turned 33 on 7/21... but it must've been my birthday because i had 2 margaritas! TWO!



luke's 5 thousandth injury... ran right into a bedroom door, started getting swelling right away but hubbs was able to keep it at bay by holding a cool compress (ice pack) to it for 15-20 minutes (while Luke was entertained by Yo Gabba Gabba).

and the end result... you can barely see a thing!! besides my boy in desperate need of a haircut!

mommy playing hide-n-seek with Luke



and how cool do his eyes look here?! too bad it's super soft but oh well, love the cat eyes anyway ;)



btw - he thought it was fun to shut the door in mommy's face.. then i'd "reappear" and scare/excite the bejeesus out of him. we've been playing everyday since!

luke playing it off like he's just reading his book (and not about to get the speaker that he's forbidden from!).



and checking out the fish



and mommy lovin' on his yummy rolls ;)

and playing with his friend, Maddy :)

that's it for now. hoping i'll be able to transfer over all my photo files, get the iMac calibrated, and find a better (padded) chair for my buttocks and i'll be able to blog more often, without interruption.