9 months old

Dear Maxim,

You are 9 months old and Mommy and Daddy are still completely in awe of you.

So what have you been up to in the past three months? Well, you finally rolled from your back to your front. You have done it a few times, but really don't see the need for it. You much prefer to sit. This is your favorite thing to do, sitting. You are starting to spin around on your bum, more from wiggling than from willing, but I think you are starting to think about moving. We now put you on your belly when you are in a good mood and you push yourself backwards around the floor. We really should put a Swiffer on your belly to help pick up all the dog hair!


You pushed through one tooth, and there doesn't seem to be any more on the near horizon. It wasn't a terrible experience for either of us, so I am hoping the rest come in with little fuss. Only time will tell on this one. You now go down for your naps all on your own, and in your crib. You rarely cry, and if you do it is very short lived. You tend to just babble to yourself and kick the aquarium on and off, and then finally drift off to sleep. The one thing you do need to sleep is to put your blanket over your head. The first time you did this freaked Mommy and Daddy out, but now we just go unwrap it when we go to bed, but you always manage to bring it back up in your sleep.

Your nights are on the majority really good. You go to bed around 7:30, wake up about 4 or 5 for a bottle and will usually go back to sleep until about 7:30. And when you do wake up you don't usually cry, you let us know you are awake by babbling to the aquarium or your stuffed cougar. You love bath time and splashing Daddy. Now you are starting to cry when Daddy takes you out. You experienced your first time at the pool, which you weren't too sure of at the beginning but really warmed up to the whole experience by the end of it.

You continue to love to eat and now insist on feeding yourself. It gets really messy, especially when you are eating yogurt.


Our routine is busy. We have Olga and Matteo over most Mondays, Tuesdays we go to play group, and Wednesdays is Karen's. Soon we will be starting swimming lessons on Tuesdays and I hope to go to family swim on Fridays when we can.

You are still a really laid back kind of guy. People just gravitate to you and your easy going ways. You are starting to cry a little when Mommy leaves the room, but on the most part you are a pretty happy little guy. And for some reason, you love to watch Mommy and Daddy fumble and drop things. This really sends you into side splitting laughter, and of course, we are more than willing to perform for you.



I have three more months to spend with you full time and then I have to go back to work. I am already starting to be a little sad that I won't be spending so much time with you, but know that Daddy is going to love every moment he has with you this summer.

I love you Jellybean!

Mommy

More pictures of Max

Here are a couple of pictures of Max and friends.

This is Max's girlfriend Sara. He always has eyes for her, but she tends to blow him off.
This is Max consoling Sara, after he stole her toy.

This is Max playing with his favorite blonds: Zoey (curly haired one) and Andi (straight haired one). These two beauties are the wonderful daughters of our friends Dave and Andra.

This is Max and Olivia. He really has a thing for curly hair. Marty is also in love with Olivia. Josee and Brian are expecting another. I think Marty wants them to have another girl so that Max has a better chance!

This is Max and Alex. Max really has a think about stealing toys. Ack! Is the only child thing already kicking in??

We're heading to Texas!

That's right folks, Max and I are heading to Texas! Mom called at New Year's to see if Tam and I wanted to head down and see them. She has enough points to fly us down. Warm weather, free flight? Heck yes!

Oh oh, snag... Max needs a passport. Why do baby's need passports? I really find it a little ridiculous. So last week while Marty wasn't back I school I went to the passport office to apply for Max's first passport. What's the most ridiculous thing I think is the picture. You have to have their eyes open and can't show that you are holding them (if you need to). Now at least Max can sit on his own, but what about a new born? Or a three month old? I met a woman while, waiting for two hours in line, who had her eight month old with her. She said it took about 25-30 tries to get an appropriate picture! Max did it on the first shot. That's my boy! The photographer was very impressed. He even thought that it was ridiculous that you have to get passports for babies and he is getting 20 bucks to take the picture. He said in his country (not too sure where that is) the children go onto the parents passport until they are 10 years old. Now that makes more sense.

So now I have something to plan. Seeing that I haven't had anything to plan for a while I think this trip might get planned to death. Marty is already rolling his eyes at me. Oh speaking of Marty, he has to write a letter granting me permission to take Max out of the country since Max doesn't have my last name. Marty is loving this "having to give permission" thing and now walks around the house granting me permission to do every little thing. I hope that grows tiresome for him soon as it already has for me!

Home at Last!

Phew! We are finally home. It seems like we have been gone forever. The holidays were a little crazy but filled with family and quite a few laughs 'til you cry.

We headed to Toronto a little earlier than usual this year as Glenna took her retirement on December 21st and the whole Detto clan when out for a lovely brunch at the Old Mill. This is a swanky brunch with scampies and prime rib. They didn't have a crepe or omlette station, but it was so busy that you would have had to wait for hours if they did.

Being in Toronto gave the fam time to get to know Max a little better and Max got to spend spend some time with his big cousin Connor. Max seemed to take a liking to Connor and Connor seemed to like playing with Max's toys.


I don't think Max much understood that he was experiencing his first Christmas day. And true to baby form, he preferred to play with the paper and packaging than the gifts themselves. Connor, on the other hand, totally knew that there was good stuff inside the packaging and struggled to get into them as fast as possible.


The day ended with the traditional Christmas turkey feast and Christmas crackers. I find this picture really portrays the three Detto boys well. Marty: always the ham, Mike: "look what I have to deal with!" and Kevin: always at the ready with a smile (and quite the perfect smile now that his braces are off).

Something different Marty and I did this year, we got up on Boxing Day and were in line to shop at 7:45! Glenna was kind enough to watch Maxim for an hour while Marty and I braved the shopping crowds so that I could get a new leather jacket. Half price on a beautiful leather jacket is really hard to beat. We were in and out and back at the house by 9:00. Pretty impressive if I do say so myself. We did see some line ups that were probably a 100 people long. Now that is dedicated bargain shopping.

We headed back to Ottawa with a quick stop at Dave and Andra's in Oshawa. We had a great day with them and the girls. Marty and Dave played Guitar Heroes III for what seemed like hours. Oh wait, it was hours! Thank goodness we do not have a PS3 or I think Marty would be dropping out of Teacher's College to pursue a career playing air guitar.

We were in Ottawa for a mere two days before heading to Montreal to ring in the New Year with Tam, Matt, the kids and Danielle, Adrian and the kids. I didn't make it to midnight though, I was completely exhausted. Max didn't seem to think sleeping by himself was a good thing for the past few nights, and when you are away from home and do not want the entire household to wake up to piercing baby cries, you will do anything to keep him quiet. I wonder how tonight is going to work out when he realizes he has to sleep alone in his crib for the night.

While in Montreal I was planning on going to see my grandmother, but the weather was bad on the 31st in the morning and didn't end up going. On New Year's day the weather was not great but we decided to give it a shot, packed up the car and headed home. The weather went from not great to incredibly terrible. It took us over an hour to get about 70km. We were having a terrible time trying to stay on the road so we called Tam and told her we were heading back. 3 hours and 2o minutes later we were back in Montreal and unloading the car.

This morning it was sunny, clear and cold and the roads were better. We were home by 12:30 and unpacked by 12:35. Not really but I made short order of it after we had a quick lunch. I just wanted to be home.

So now here we are, sitting in the living room staring at a dead TV. The TV isn't dead itself, but the satellite got busted by ice falling off the roof. Now we try and decide on a movie to watch. Wish us luck.

I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday and Marty, Maxim and I wish you the very best for 2008.