Learning to eat and walk but not at the same time.

Alex is perfecting the art of eating all tastes and textures AND taking those first few steps. She's up to about 8 or 9 unassisted steps now but eventually plops herself down on the floor. She had another bout of stomach flu last week which only lasted a few days this time. Three days later I got it then Mike got it too, so another exhausting week for us! In other news, the saw slipped out of Mike's hand while he was working on the house and he ended up with 40 stitches in his hand - he was lucky! Jess made the AAU Extreme basketball team so she (we, actually!) has 9 weekends of tournaments in the following weeks - my head is spinning at the schedule but I'm proud of how hard she works on the court.

Brushing our teeth

The McCoys in Italy

Recent pics of Alex

Award for worst mother of the year award

And the award goes to........ME!!!! So I´m driving along the Washington Beltway at 70 miles an hour about 8pm with Alex in the car seat. We had been visiting my friend Sue who moved to Virginia, and needs to move back to New Jersey because I miss her! Anyway I was driving home late because I wanted Alex to sleep all the way home, so she´s drinking her bedtime bottle in the back and all goes quite. I settle in for the long drive home and out the corner of my eye I see movement in the back seat......then I see Alex´ little head pop over the top of the car seat and she´s laughing her head off! She´s now standing up and trying to crawl into the front....yep, Mom forgot to strap her in for a four hour car ride! She was so excited to be free and was jumping up and down while I´m hangin on to her for dear life until I could pull over and strap her in....quite traumatic and embarassing I might add.
Alex will be 10 mths old in a couple of weeks and is no longer content to crawl - she is already standing and trying to take steps to get where she needs to go (which is usually to reach the dog food for a snack)....she´ll be walking any day now. I´m in baby bliss every day with her but have to confess I´m completely exhausted....Sarah you are right, it´s tough! But you´re younger thatn me so you should be fine:-)

Alex' first trip to the hospital

Well we had a rough weekend - Alex got some type of stomach virus, so after 4 days of no food and vomiting the doctor admitted her to the emergency room, right back at the hospital in which she was born! I arrived there at 4.30pm Fri afternoon and she was attached to an IV about four hours later. It was pretty traumatic as they couldn't find a vein in one arm, so then had to start all over again in the other arm. Needless to say Alex was not too happy and I was trying to stay calm for her. We spent a long night sitting on plastic chairs, while Alex alternated between sleeping and screaming - she just couldn't get comfortable with the IV attached to her arm. I had just returned from Europe so I was battling jet lag and sleep deprivation and we think Michael might have been battling the stomach flu himself, all in all we were pretty miserable!! At 6am Saturday morning we were hoping she would be released, but unfortunately her sugar levels were still too low and she was put on another IV until 6pm that night when we finally went home. We had a sleepless night after we got home too, poor Alex was just miserable and I think a bit nervous as she clung to us all weekend and cried anytime we tried to leave the room! By Monday night we were insisting she sleep in her own crib, as she had slept with us for two nights, so we had another night of crying because she wanted to be with us - to all the parents out there - once they come into your bed they do NOT want to leave! I've attached two quite pathetic videos of us at the hospital, oh and did I mention it was my birthday in the Emergency Room too, not much of a celebration except to say the best present for any Mum is a healthy baby. She seems better now and has just started cereal again after a week of no food. Actually she is just shoving cheerios into her mouth and seems quite happy, so I'm keeping one eye on her for either vomiting or choking!

my favorite video

This video is i think my all time favourite - not since this day have I seen Alex laugh the way she does in this, it puts a smile on my face everytime I see it - my baby girl is happy and healthy, what do I have to complain about!!! (apart from that world peace problem and the Iraq War that I spoke about in my other post).