A tooth! A tooth! Finally a tooth!

Sylvie has experienced two breakthroughs this month: 1) she can pull herself into a standing position and 2) her lower left central incisor! Ladies and gentlemen...she FINALLY HAS A TOOTH! And it looks as the the lower right central incisor will be popping through the gum any day now as well. Luckily, she's had no obvious discomfort while teething and I'm hoping that holds true for all the rest of the pearly-whites-to-be. As for the weaning, it has gone extremely smoothly for both of us. I had the one bad day early on and I finally went ahead and boobed Sylvie to ease the pressure. Then we went another couple of days without and I developed a sore spot on one side, (presumably a blocked duct), that I again relieved with nursing Sylvie. I coud tell though that my milk was just about gone. At this point, I'm pretty sure that the dairy has closed down until future child(ren). Bye bye, boobs....Thaaaaanks foooor the maaaamarieeees...hyuck, hyuck.

March update

A lot happened with Sylvie this past month: She turned one, travelled to Savannah for the first time where she finally got to meet her Uncle T, attended her first bridal tea and (extra-utero) baby shower, had her hair cut, started bah-ing when shown pictures of sheep, learned how to sit-up all by herself AND...she's started talking to us in a second language--well third if you count baby jabber--by signing! So far she knows the signs for "more" and "milk". Sylvie and pal S also had their first visit to the Children's Museum.

Sylvie's first haircut!!! (Before and After)

The peer-pressure became too great so today we jumped on the haircut bandwagon. Here are the results.

Just a quickie...

Yes, yes, I KNOW I've become less than regular with my blogging but any of you who have or have had small children probably know why. I promise a much longer post about our trip to Savannah for M's baby shower and J's bridal tea v. soon but right now all I have time for is a little bit of bragging about our baby girl. New skills she has aquired recently include: *spreading arms wide (or sometimes just one) in response to the question, "How big is Sylvie?" *pointing at herself in response to the question "Where's the baby?" *self feeding with spoon (see photos in post below) *having her blood drawn in a much more nonchalant and mature way than her mother was able to do until she was in her late teens. (She had a blood draw yesterday that lasted for a couple of minutes because they needed to take quite a bit of blood. She never cried once but only fussed impatiently at being restrained during the procedure. If I didn't know better I'd wonder if she were really my child since I am and always have been a big whiner about needles.)

She got skillz

Sylvie's first birthday!!!

Wow. Has it really been a whole year already? Has it really been 365 days since our wee one switched from quasi-amphibian to full on oxygen breather? Wow...just wow. Amazing to think how different she is now from when she first came into our lives, all blob-like and covered in cream cheese. Amazing to realize that so many of the feelings that I'd felt before her birth, and thought were the deepest most profound emotions one could have, were but ripples on the surface of what I realize I am capable of experiencing now. A couple of people I'll call "Stinky-Goo-Head" and "Slimy-Muck-Ball" (please know these are actually terms of great affection) have told me that I worry too much about Sylvie's various and sundry health issues. I don't agree; I think I worry about as much as your average new parent. However, I do probably harp on the more negative things health wise with Sylvie on this blog...mostly because I need to vent about them. And I'll admit that I've worried incessantly about Sylvie's growth and weight gain (or lack thereof) and I've filled sheet after sheet of paper with the details of Sylvie's diet, what she's eaten, how many calories she's taken in in a given day. I've worried about how she's yet to crawl or pull up or stand unassisted especially when I've been around other moms whose children, though a month or two younger than Sylvie, are 10 lbs heavier and toddling around like pros. I know that all kids develop differently and at their own rates, yet I've worried. But the other day, I was paging through What to Expect the First Year, something I do only rarely because it has so often fed my fears rather than soothed them and I happened to read the milestones for a kid her age and I gotta tell ya...she's above average on just about everything but the standing up thing. I've been afraid to be "that mom", ya know, the one who goes on and on about how gifted her kid is and such. Well, forget that, because I'm going to take this opportunity to puff up with mommy pride and relate to you all of the things our Sylvie is doing. She speaks! momma, daddy, kitty, doggy, Izzy, booby (and yes it means she wants mama juice), hi and bye (with a wave!) and mmm! (which doubles for "I'm hungry" and "that looks tasty can I try some?") Sylvie the Action Figure! clapping, pointing, "conducting", "singing" and bouncing to music, can roll a ball back and forth to us, plays peekabo, stacks/unstacks rings, recognizes people in photos AND she's finally started pulling up into a standing position with a little help from Theron and I. She's just incredible, our girl. Everyday she grows more and more amazing and beautiful and...wow. Just wow. Happy birthday baby! Love, mommy and daddy.

Our visit to Toronto and two visits from Pepe Le Pew

Recently, we spent a week in the company of some of our Canadian friends and Sylvie's quasi- ex-pat grandparents. Here is our story. (THUNKTHUNK!) No, there are no actual Law & Order elements to this story (thank goodness!), I just couldn't help myself. Our pal S, soon to be wed to the lovely A, drove us to the airport bright and early for our 9:30am flight...which morphed into our 11:55am flight. As a result, we were stuck at the airport for about 4 hours having arrived 2 hrs early for the international flight as recommended. Sigh. The flight itself was uneventful and Sylvie was a perfect angel the whole time. Upon preparing to deboard the plane, a guy sitting behind us noticed our girl and said in a slightly shocked voice, "I had no idea there was a baby there! I've never had that happen before!" We took a cab to mom and dad's new home. Dad had taken off of work early in order to meet us as mom was herself flying back from a florist gig in DC the same day. It was our first time seeing their place and it's really, REALLY nice; spacious and airy, with plenty of wall space for their extensive art collection. They also have some great neighbors, several of whom we met while attending their weekly card night. Theron, Sylvie and I had the bad luck to all come down with some variation of cold/flu/infection which wasn't fun. Sylvie especially was wheezy and coughing and her nose was running like a faucet. (I bore many a shiny snail-trail across my chest from being a convenient nose wiping device while holding her.) We bought her some infant cough and decongestant drops which a) did little good and b) kept her awake allll night which did us little good. We took her in to see mom and dad's GP who kindly agreed to see her the next day and he diagnosed her with her very first bronchial and ear infection. (Not only does our kid like to get sick at less than opportune of times...she also does a very thorough job of it!) We got a prescription for amoxicillin aka that "yummy" pink goo as well as not one, but TWO inhalers. Sylvie was much more amenable to taking the pink goo although she was apt to let it ooze out of the side of her mouth if we don't keep an eye on her but she was not a fan of the breathing treatments which had to be administered through an Aerochamber MAX (with mask). Luckily with a little encouragmetn (read, lots of cheering and hand-clapping afterwards) Sylvie began to take her breathing treatments like a pro and now claps cheerfully for herself after completing them. Only a few more days to go and she's done with 'em. Despite her illness, Sylvie had great fun beating up on G'pa Dave and learning a new fave song from G'ma Judy: the Banana Splits theme song. She also made out like a bandit gift wise. Some of the things she received include: a stuffed cat, stacking/nesting boxes, a set of instruments (most of which stayed with the g'parents for future visits), a prism to hang in her window back home and even two dolls from a friendly neighbor lady. During our visit we also went into Toronto proper for an overnight stay with the always awesome W-C family, aka D, A and O. D and I have known each other since we were angst-ridden (is there any other kind?) teenagers and it was kinda neat watching our two offspring playing together...or at least playing near each other. I guess we'll have to wait a few years before we'll get to hear such cries as, "Mooom! s/he took my toy! Moooooom! I don't want to play with a (snear of disgust) girl/boy!" D took us a for a walk around a near by honest-to-god working farm where Sylvie got to see her first real live farm animals. Another old highschool buddy of mine, D, lives in the same building as D and was able to join us all for dinner at a little pub around the corner later that evening. By keeping the kids placated with tastes of our food (esp. Sylvie who loved bits of my steak and mushroom pie as well as Theron's liver and mashed potatoes), we five adults managed to carry on quite a lively conversation although I know Theron and A had a few (ok, several) eye-rolling-there-they-go-again moments when us three gals reminisced about our school days. The next day, D, A and O took us for a long stroll through some of the local places of interest including Kensington Market where they treated us to some fantastically tasty portuguese custard tarts from a neighborhood bakery. Their generosity did not stop there as later D purchased two gifts for Sylvie: an Ugly doll and a beautiful tutu made out of sheer red ribbon tipped with tiny red ribbon roses, which I can hardly wait for Sylvie to be dancing around in. Thanks again Doah! Alas, our time together had to come to an end and so we said our goodbyes, grabbed our overnight bag and hopped a streetcar-subway-GO train back to Ajax to spend one last night with the g'parents before our return to the States. Meanwhile, back in good ol' MA... Cousin C, who was kind enough to dog/cat sit for us while we were out of the country, was having quite a run of bad luck. First, Izzy got into a box of chocolates, which as any dog owner knows is not a good thing. Luckily Izzy puked up most of what she'd eaten and and while under careful observation by C exhibited no further symptoms of chocolate poisoning. Then poor C had a bout of food poisoning herself and while still recovering from it had to deal with Izzy who had a run in with the business end of a SKUNK. Yikes! After a couple of dousings with tomato juice and Pantene Pro V, Izzy smelled less skunk-like and more as if she'd just had a perm by the time we got back home. You'd think that Izzy would have learned her lesson from the first skunk incident,,,but no. We'd been home only a few days when she came in from being in the backyard drooling, pawing at her snout and reeking of skunk musk. Theron bravely took it upon himself to bathe our pungent pooch, using another recipe (as seen on episode 16 of Mythbusters) of peroxide, baking soda and dog shampoo. Then thanks to Oust, scented candles and occasionally cracking the wondows despite the freezing temps, our home no longer stinks of parfum de pepe le pew.