Marty or Quagmire?

For anyone who watches Family Guy, I think you might get a kick out of this. Doesn't Marty look like Quagmire?


Note: I love Marty for letting me post this picture of him.

Marty's day of surgery

Today, Marty had all four of his wisdom teeth surgically removed. They were impacted, one in the bone. Needless to say, he was under general anesthetic for this. When I picked him up he was so swollen, you could barely recognize him. My heart broke.

Chili didn't leave his side the entire day. Edgar, saw lap opportunity, and Max finally fell asleep in my arms at 4:30 this afternoon. After sitting on the floor with him for a half hour, my ass was numb and I needed to get up to make dinner. I managed to get both myself and Max off the floor and Max onto Marty's chest, STILL SLEEPING! Sometimes I amaze myself.

Marty finally had a little bit of soup tonight, and the swelling has gone down. I think I will sleep in Max's room and let Marty snore to his heart's content tonight. Hopefully tomorrow he will be feeling better.

Nurse, mother, dog walker and cook are off to bed now.

Snow, Snow and more Snow

56 cm of snow on top of the 350cm we already had. That was our weekend. This is the house pre-shovel. Actually, pre-snowblowing (god bless Daryl!)

This is the shed. No way of getting into it and getting the second shovel.

This is the garbage can. On Saturday, it was NOT covered.

This is the arbor, the one we got married under. The wind chimes are half covered in snow.

This is what we saw when we dug out the gate and tried to get to the driveway. Chili seemed to be the only one that was truly enthusiastic about the mounds of fluffy snow.

This is after Marty shoveled a little path from the backyard to the half of the driveway that is shoveled. The other half is holding the snow, which had nowhere else to go.

Swimming

Today was swimming class. The three little bums on the side of the pool are Sara (with Mummy Heather), Max (with cousin Dominique), and Matteo (with Mummy Olga). Notice Max's bald spot.

Regardless of the look on Max's face, he really did enjoy doing the swim class with Dom, and Dom said she had a good time too. It was a little hard for me to sit on the side of the pool. Not because I was nervous about Dom having Max in the pool, more because I wanted to be in there having fun with him.

After swimming Max had a two hour nap. Dom and I actually started making noise upstairs to try and wake him up. He still had to have his lunch and we wanted to get to the Market. We finally got out of the house around 2. We walked around the Market, checked out some funky shops and then hit the Tea Shop. Then we had to rush to the train and Dom made it with 15 minutes to spare! It was a great couple of days with Dom.

Our trip to Texas

Finally, a chance to give you our trip to Texas in pictures.

Here is Max at Chicago's O'Hare. We had one flight down and were waiting out the first of the 2, 4 hour lay overs. You know what happened for there rest of the day.Here is dad playing with Max on our first day. It was a beautiful sunny day (notice Max in shorts and no socks!). We took it easy on our first day, checking out the RV park and doing some outlet mall shopping in the afternoon.
We went to the Gladys Porter Zoo. It was a nice zoo, not too big and it is part of a Species Survival Plan, which basically means they are helping to breed endangered species in captivity. Tammy had the great idea of renting one of the strollers at the zoo, which made it easier for Max to sit up and check things out. He really seemed to like it. I think he is looking at some tiny monkeys in this shot.
Stopping for Max's lunch break.
After the zoo we headed into to town (Brownsville that is) to look around and have some lunch. Max was wonderful and slept through the whole thing! We had some incredible Mexican food. You get fresh salsa and tortillas when you sit down. And I am talking just chopped up fresh salsa and warm out of the fryer tortilla chips. We didn't know what was on the menu, so we all ordered something different and loved all of it.
On Wednesday we went to Mexico. It's the most surreal thing. You park your car, walk across the Rio Grand, which is the natural border between Mexico and the US, you put 35 cents into a turnstile, and... you are in Mexico! No, seriously. Coming back into the US is obviously a little more complicated with border guards and US customs. We shopped and had some more great food. Max was great considering he really isn't a fan of shopping. At the restaurant, Max was manhandled by everyone, which was something I got used to very quickly. Good thing I am not weird about strangers touching my child. I went to the bathroom and when I came back Max was in the arms of a strange woman. She was the owner and we had seen her while eating, but Tammy said she basically walked over and took him out of her arms.
This is Max showing Hobo his new rattle that Tam bought him in Mexico. Oh, and Mom and Dad on the patio.
On Friday we went to the beach. We packed up a lunch and the whole family, Hobo included, headed to South Padre Island. The weather was gray and windy, which was probably better than full sun. When the sun did peek through a couple of times, it was really hot. I don't think Max would have done very well in the full sun. The beach is hard packed and you can drive up on it. This made it very easy to push the stroller, so we went for a nice long walk. Max loved watching the waves and the birds flying around.

Max even got to dip his toes into the Gulf of Mexico. It was a quick dip as the water was really cold. He didn't seem terribly impressed by it all but seemed to like the fact that his toes were sinking into the sand.
On our last day we went to see this very impressive basilica, where Max discovered that if he yelled his voice would echo. He got louder and louder and I tried finding an exit faster and faster as there were several people in the chapel praying. Max thought this was a wonderful game. Mom also took us to her favorite Texan barbecue place. It's basically a shack made of plywood and corrugated metal, but man the food was good and you got a whole lot of it. So there you have it. A week of flip flops and palm trees. It was a great vacation which went by super fast. Thanks again Mom and Dad. And a huge thanks to Tam, whom made the two very long days of travel possible. I don't think I could have done it without you.

Vacation coming to an end

Our little vacation is coming to a very quick end. It's been a nice get away from the cold weather, but it will be nice to go home and see Marty. I know how much he is missing Max.

The past few days have been nice. The zoo was OK. I am not a huge fan of zoos, but this one is small, well maintained and part of the species survival program, so there were a lot of little baby animals which are always fun to see. Tuesday we went to Mexico. Basically just walked around, I bought some silver rings (had to stop myself from buying a gorgeous necklace, but living on credit means sacrifice! ;-) ), we had a nice lunch and made it home for dinner. Wednesday was a blah day. Grey and rainy. We did some laundry, ran a few errands, that's about it. Today we went to South Padre Island. Typical sea side town. It would have been really nice if the sun was out. It was super windy and grey. The sun did peek through a couple of times, enough to get a little colour in my cheeks and Max got to play in the sand and dip his feet into the ocean (no swimming as the water is only about 18 degrees). Now we are all tired from being out all day and I am looking forward to bed.

I think tomorrow will be spent getting some last minute shopping done, going for one last Mexican food lunch (they have been amazing so far) and packing. Then up at the crack of dawn on Saturday for the LONG journey home. I can only hope that Max is half as good as he was on the way here. All week he has been his usual laid back guy, only melting down when he is really over tired. My parents have been flaunting him all over the park, and all the other grandparents seem to like having a little snuggle from a wee one, reminding them of the ones they are missing at home.

Stay tuned for Tiny Moments from Texas when I get back.

Travelling Hell with an Angel

Here we are in Texas. The sun is warm and the sky is blue. Couldn't ask for better. How was the trip dow you ask? Hell. Well actually, Houston was hell. But let's start from the beginning.I woke up at 2:30 with Max and didn't get back to sleep. I knew it was going to be a long day. Up at 5:00am, out of the house at 6:30 and off to the airport. Went through the ridiculous US security and customs. Had my letter of consent to travel from Marty (they did ask for it), was allowed through with my 4 bottles of water for Max's formula. Everything was going well.First flight, 2 hours to Chicago. How did Max do? He was an angel. He didn't cry at all, even napped for a little bit. Wow! Have I told you we have the perfect kid lately? Four hour lay over in Chicago. How was Max? He was an angel. Again, have I told you how perfect our kid is lately? Three hour flight to Houston. How was Max? He entertained people, laughed and napped again. Have I told you... you get the point. Then we hit Houston.First of all, the George Bush International Airport in Houston is a pit. It is old, ugly and the people are not friendly. How long did we have there? 3 1/2 hours. First thing, we had to change terminals. No problem, right? Ha! In this airport, you have to go through another security check, full on with taking off your shoes, getting your bag swabbed for explosives and NOT allowing ANY water through, even for baby formula. Can you believe this? We just went through O'Hare, one of the largest airports in the world, and we had three bottles of water with us, no questions asked. No questions, because we had already gone through a security check. Where the heck does Houston think you have been between terminals that all link together and in which you can't get out of?! How was Max through all this? You guessed it, an angel.So now we are getting ready to get on the plane. After we are all on board we are told that 6 people have to get off the plane or it can't leave. They had to put in extra fuel to make sure we would get to our destination an hour away because of bad weather and strong head winds. Well, 30 minutes later, they finally had 5 volunteers and they figured that was good enough. In that 30 minutes the weather changed from light rain to full on electrical storm. We were stuck on the tarmack for 4 HOURS! So long that we had to pull back into the gate to get the toilet drained because it was full! 4 hours in which Max slept. Did I mention her was an angel? (yes I know, it's getting old, but this was a very long day and he never cried once) We had to wait out the weather, not a single plain was leaving or coming in. Once things cleared up, there was 100 plains waiting for flight path approval. The pilot was really nice and gave us updates every 30 minutes or so. Did I mention it was a tiny little plain? Only 80 passengers.When we finally got off the ground, the flight was pretty bumpy and made me hold on to Max really tight. I was actually nervous for the first time flying. We landed, everything was fine. Mom and Dad were waiting for us (they had been at the airport for the 5 hours of delay), they didn't loose the car seat (another worry of mine), we got to the RV, everyone plopped into bed and as I closed my eyes I realised that I had been awake for 24 hours. Ugh.That was day one. Yesterday we went outlet shopping. Yes, I spent an obscene amount of money and today was the zoo. So far so good. Tomorrow Mexico and Thrusday the beach. Sounds good to me!

Bye Y'all

We head off tomorrow. I am still packing. Feels like I have been packing for weeks. It really is incredible how much you have to pack when traveling with a baby. Especially a bottle fed baby. Especially when your travel day is 18 hours! Hey, we're traveling points and beggars can't be choosers.

I am really looking forward to the trip. Not only because the temperature for the week is in the mid 20s, but because my mom is going to have so much fun with Max. He is so interactive now. One of his favorite things to do is pass you stuff. I think it is the cutest thing ever.

I am sure that I will have the chance to post a couple of times while in Texas to let you know of the adventures we have been on. I don't think I will be able to post photos, so there will probably be a huge photo montage when we get back.

I am still a little stressed about the flight. I know that I tend to worry, and Max ends up being a really trouper, but this time the travel can be painful for him. He still has a cold and is pretty stuffy. I just don't want him to be in pain. I have bought some saline drops and will put them in before each flight to try and at least have a little moisture in there. We'll see what happens.

OK, off to more packing. Bye y'all!

A Winter Day

Yesterday was a great day. A great winter day. It didn't start off great, but definitely made up for it by the end.

Our friends Dave and Andra and their two girls Zoey and Andy were in town for Winterlude. We were supposed to meet up with them at the Snowflake Kingdom with Kev, Sab and Kathryn. The first problem was finding parking, which we finally did at the museum. Then as we were unbuckling Max, we realized that the backpack was not in the car as I thought. Crap. Marty said he would be fine carrying him around, but I felt terrible.

Second problem, the number Dave gave us for his cell didn't work. You see, there are hundreds of families, all dressed up in their winter gear. Trying to find one family is basically like trying to find a needle in a hay stack. We met up with Kev and Sab (using the cellphone) and ended up walking around for just over an hour trying to find the others. No luck. We enjoyed the time but it was noon and we were all getting pretty hungry so we decided to head home and wait to hear from Dave and Andra. We did hear from them, just as we were getting to the car. It was decided that Marty and I would go to Kev and Sab's for lunch and Dave and Andra would call us when they got back to the hotel. The second part of our day was to go swimming with the kids at the hotel pool.

Once we finally all got together we were eight adults and six kids. Mike, Julie and their kids Jayden and Harrison arrived as well. Thank goodness it was a suite. We all hung out for a while and then headed down to the pool. Holy crap it was cold!! I was surprised that Max didn't complain. He is used to much warmer water when he swims. It was Marty's first time with Max in the pool and they both had a great time. I was very happy that Marty decided to swim.

After the swim it was back to the hotel to hang out again. We ended up ordering pizza and stayed until Max could barely keep his eyes open. He did so well even without any nap.

It's interesting how kids can bring friends together more than before kids arrived. You'd think it would be the other way around, that kids would make it more difficult to get together, but it seems that they are the ones that bring you together. We are so fortunate to have friends with such great kids. Marty and I will learn a lot from them.

This is Jayden the oldest, with Max the youngest. Is Max's head bigger than hers? Ack!

Knitting

I am learning to knit. Actually, I am taking a class in learning how to knit. It's actually a lot of fun. Five women sitting in a living room, drinking jasmine tea and eating whatever goodies Karen brings with her. I guess you could call it a "Stitch 'n Bitch" but it's an actual class where we are learning how to do stuff. There is a small period to bitch at the end of the class.

The first project we are doing is a scarf. A scarf that I have had to rip out three times. I am finally making some progress and have learned how to fix my mistakes (excellent reason to take a class might I say), though I am finding it extremely long and somewhat boring. Once you learn to knit sstraight rows, there isn't much excitement in it. So Karen suggested I try a dishcloth. She had this great easy pattern and a ball of cotton. Yesterday I sat down during Max's three hours of nap (yippee!) and knit myself this lovely little dishcloth. It was extremely satisfying to have finished something. Unfortunately the scarf we are making isn't the nicest of colors. I am pretty sure it's going to end up in the Goodwill bag if I ever get to finishing it.


Aunty Iris, I am now one less person you will have to knit these for!

Mystery solved

The mystery of the baby halitosis has been solved. It seems that the nasty breath is an indication of teething. Max had the stink on Wednesday again and it got me thinking, "didn't he cut his tooth the last time he had this?" Karen had the same thought process. So, two days after the stink arrived, Max cut his second tooth. It's not the only sign, but it seems to be the first one to show up. Yesterday he was drooly, a little cranky and wanted to chew absolutely everything. And then lo and behold, his second tooth arrived over night.

Another milestone today: we lowered the mattress in Max's crib. "You haven't done it yet?!" I hear you scream at the computer screen. Don't forget, Max isn't really showing much interest in mobility and there was no real need to. But yesterday he had his toes on the top rail, and Heather told me today that Sara was standing in her crib this morning. That was enough to stress me out and the mattress was dropped. My little guy is getting bigger. The next step is the big boy bed! Ack!

As I sit here in tranquility, Marty is upstairs dealing with a screeching Max. Max loves his bath. So much so, that when Marty takes him out he pretty much has a melt down until he is dried, lathered and dressed. Looks like swimming lessons next week will be a hit.

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.