Meet Me In St. Louie, Louie

I know, I know. It must seem like I've vanished. Both from this blog, and from my actual life. So where have I been? Well, three weeks ago I came up to St. Louis for what was supposed to be a week long trip. Only... I'm still here. It happened something like this.

Three weeks ago, Hudson and I drove (well, I drove and Hudson rode) to St. Louis. We were planning to attend the wedding of a family friend. In addition, I've been trying to get Hudson over to Kansas to visit my extended family there, whom he hadn't seen since Thanksgiving. So we decided that I would come to St. Louis, spend a couple days, go to this wedding, and then drive with my mom to Kansas, spend a few days there, then drive back to St. Louis, then Huddy and I would go on home to Nashville. In the meantime, Ben was supposed to have been on this big work trip to New York and California, so we would be gone at the same time. 

Still with me? All this happened according to plan, except while we were in Kansas, it turned out Ben's work trip had been canceled, so he decided to fly to St. Louis and we would meet there, spend the weekend all together with the families, and then drive back to Nashville together.

Except THEN, when we were in Kansas City visiting my cousin, we found out that the next weekend was their baby's first birthday party and my OTHER cousin who I haven't seen in two years would be there. She lives in Boston and rarely gets back out to the midwest. So when we got back to St. Louis and met up with Ben, we decided it would be better if I just stayed an extra week so I could go BACK to Kansas City and see her. Except I wouldn't just stay ONE extra week. I would stay TWO extra weeks. Because we had already planned to be BACK in St. Louis this coming weekend when we had tickets to a ball game and The Lion King. I really hated to be apart for so long ("People are going to think we are having marriage problems or something," I said), but knowing Ben had a crazy time of work ahead which would mean long hours home alone, we decided it was for the best that I stay put. Ben would take the car (which I had originally driven to St. Louis -- please keep up, dear reader) and go back to Nashville since he had to work. Then when he drove back for our baseball/musical weekend, we would all finally drive back together.

Do you feel confused? I feel confused. Suffice to say, we haven't been in Nashville in what seems like forever! But we are, I promise, coming home this very Sunday. 

We've packed a LOT into these past three weeks! We've been to the zoo (twice), Kansas City (twice), southern Kansas, Forest Park, the pool, a wedding, a baseball game, a 30th birthday party, and more. In the meantime Huddy turned 14 months, Ben turned 30, I turned 29, and my parents celebrated their 41st wedding anniversary. Sheesh! Hopefully I can get my act together and blog about all of it. Or at least some of it. Or maybe none of it. Gotta keep your expectations low, people.

Quick, let me distract you with a pictorial sampling of our adventures from the past month:

Playing with second cousin Knox

Now claps for himself every time he plays the piano

Teaching him to pet a horse at Forest Park

Hudson with Auntie Ashley at a wedding. Let's just say this outfit was a big hit.

We watched a lot of Olympics. Go America!

Reading with Great-Grandma Anita

We now require a cape for most activities.

I'm only turning 29! No, seriously. 1983. Check it.

Skyping with Daddy makes us happy!

At the Cardinals game two weekends ago

Train ride at the StL Zoo

Ch-ch-ch-changes!

I'm fairly certain I've used that as a previous blog title. #creativity

Speaking of, do you think it is weird that we use hashtags now outside of Twitter? I see them all the time on Facebook and other places online. I love it. I kind of wish there was a way to use them in actual conversation. Would you say the word "hashtag," like people say "quote" and "unquote" or would there be some sort of gesture you'd do? "Hey! Wanna go get mani/pedis this weekend? Hashtag AKA margaritas." I don't know if it would work. Something important to consider.

Anway. Yellow is probably my favorite color, but I just needed a background change! I'm trying out blue waves for now. Seems nice and summer-y. Refreshing. Like the pool or the beach. Or anywhere other than my house where I keep getting barfed on by my poor sick baby.

And if you needed an explanation for why I sound a little crazy, you just got one. 

#motherhoodyall

Hudson Lately

I'm a terrible mommy blogger. Seriously. And the worst part is, I know if I don't write it down, I'm going to forget all these wonderful milestones and sweet moments. I don't want to forget! So here's a few bullet points and photos of the past month and a half.

• Can say "mama" and "dah-dee."
• Points to eyes, ears, nose, and mouth.
• Understands lots of what we say, especially the following words: Up, down, upstairs, downstairs, outside, snack, ball, toy, gentle.
• Finally learned the sign for "more" and uses it adorably. I can never turn him down now! He is also getting the hang of "all done" and "milk."
• Loves to clap his hands proudly when you tell him "Good job!"
• Taught him how to get down off the bed/couch by himself (get on his tummy and go feet first), and he's very good at it! He's slowly also learning to go down the stairs. As soon as he has that mastered I'll be relieved.
• Still has no teeth. I saw this chart recently and had to laugh. What if when he finally does start teething he gets all the ones he is supposed to have by now at once?! Yikes.
• We were down to nursing about once or twice a day. However, in the past week he's been acting a little off, like he's either sick or (maybe, finally) teething, and he's been refusing to eat almost anything. So I'm thankful that I am still nursing and can offer that to him a little more. At least then I know he's getting some calories and hydration.
• He loves to find our shoes around the house, put one on each hand, and run around with them. I don't know. He's weird.
• Such a little reader! Not only does he love for us to read books to him, but he really likes sitting by himself with his books and "reading" them on his own. It is SO darling and thrills this book-loving mama!
• Going through some separation anxiety - church nursery is pretty much right out unless mommy or daddy is in there too. If a mom friend is in their working, I feel a little better about leaving him even if he is crying. I know he'll get over this phase soon but it is tough.
• Figured out how to give blowbellies and thinks it is very funny to make me laugh by giving them to me!
• Still waffling between one and two naps daily, depending on when he wakes up and how fussy he is. Bedtime is usually 7:30-8 and he sleeps until about 7 the next morning.
• Can "throw" a ball and tends to do it with his left hand. Not sure if that means anything yet.
• Getting a little more picky with his eating. I have to remind myself that pickiness can come and go in waves and is a pretty standard toddler challenge. I am an incredibly picky eater and I just don't want him to end up like me! 

Hopefully in the next couple posts I will be able to recap his birthday as well as our recent trips to Washington DC and Atlanta!

Hudson: A Year in the Making

Ben surprised everyone (including me) at Hudson's birthday party with this video he made chronicling year one of our sweet baby's life. He even recorded the first song you hear, and he used Huddy's little instruments - his baby guitar, Fisher Price drum, monkey bell, and toy maracas. He's a pretty wonderful guy, that husband of mine. :)



The second song in the video is "Umbrellas," by Sleeping At Last. The words are pretty great: "Give me your hand, it's time/It's time to show new eyes their home/We'll bring a child into this world/We'll say the one thing everyone should hear/You were meant for amazing things."

Happy Birthday Baby!

One year of life with Hudson. Every tear he (and I) cried, every giggle, every diaper, every cuddle, every moment... seems like too much for one little year to hold. My son is such a joy in my life. I feel so special that God allows me to be his mother.

Here's a little bit about Hudson at one.

He loves books, balloons, bathtime, and airplanes. This morning I got him a balloon at Publix, and except for naptime, he literally has not let it go.

He eats a lot, but favorites include strawberries, bananas, oatmeal, and pretty much anything else so long as it comes off someone else's plate. If you're eating it, he wants some. We call him the Baby Vulture. Right now he is trying (and succeeding) to get some of the cupcake I am eating.

He still nurses a few times a day, but mostly at night/naps and in the morning. So strange, this whole breastfeeding thing - in the beginning, it is all you do and it is so frustrating and difficult that you want to quit. And now, every time he is nursing I see how much he has grown and how independent he is becoming, and I don't want it to end. I think if it was up to him, he would just do it at bedtime and in the morning. I think I will slowly try to let that happen, though it is bittersweet for me!

He has zero teeth. Zilch. Nada. Toothless.

He walks almost exclusively; even if he falls down, he rarely crawls anymore. Just picks himself up and continues toddling along.

He doesn't talk yet, but makes lots of sounds and knows several objects by name and can point to them when asked, like puppy, mama, and daddy. Just this past weekend he finally started saying "mama" but not to or about me. He just says it while he's playing or jabbering. I still love it!

He had his first major sickness a few weeks ago, when he somehow caught Hand, Foot, & Mouth Disease. And then I caught Hand, Foot, & Mouth Disease. And Ben was out of town. We were a pathetic mess. It was awful.

He takes one nap, usually around noon, and it lasts for 2-3 hours. He goes to bed about 7:30pm and sleeps basically all night. Sometimes he wakes up around 5am, nurses, and then I can usually get him to go back to sleep for another couple hours. He sleeps in his own crib in his own room, and that is the way HE wants it. He's not a snuggler and he won't sleep in our bed anymore, not even in the morning like he used to. I miss it. But sleep - for everyone - is also wonderful.

I'm reading back over this and it seems like such a surface-level summary of who he is. Hudson is so much more than a list of his milestones. He is our baby-becoming-a-toddler, a little boy of quiet confidence and curiosity, with smiles and happy laughter to spare. He is everything I was terrified he would never be in those first few months when all we knew was crying and exhaustion. And while motherhood is still exhausting, most days it is from having too much fun and trying to keep up with Huddy and housework. I'll take that trade in on sleepless nights and endless sobs!

I am so excited to watch him grow and learn each day! Here are a few pictures of our new one year old.

11 Months!

Bad mommy blogger, bad! I'm woefully inept at getting updates written and posted. But we're having too much fun around here to stop for very long!

Hudson turned eleven months old this past weekend and I just can't believe it. He is growing and changing so quickly. Right now it seems like he inhabits this interesting space between baby and toddler-hood.

Sometimes he needs me so desperately - like the other night, for some reason, he was just sobbing as Ben tried to give him his bath. This is totally unlike him. Hudson loves bathtime and he loves Daddy. But for whatever reason, he didn't want either of those. He only wanted me. I knelt down by the tub where he was crying, and he stood up and put his little wet arms around my neck and kept crying until I finally picked him up and snuggled him in a towel. My baby. And then other times, he is so big and independent. He likes to eat what he wants (and throw the rest on the floor), pick which books to read, and play by himself.

He is getting very good with the walking. He can make it all the way across a room, and can bend over and pick something up and then (usually) stand back up. Just in the past couple days, he added the skill of being to stand up without holding onto or pulling up on anything. When he does fall, it's often because he got so excited that he tried to go fast. He looks like a drunken zombie, arms out in front, staggering side to side. He still prefers to crawl though, because it is much quicker.

Walking led to his first major boo boo. He tripped and fell, hitting his forehead on one of the vintage brass pulls on his dresser. It instantly swelled into this huge purple goose egg. There was much crying - some his, some mine. Thankfully there was no permanent damage and he was back to his old self in no time. This phase of development is full of falls, and with it come lots of close calls. I'll be grateful when he's a little more stable on two legs!

Ouchie. 

Hudson's new obsession is pointing at everything. It is darling and also hopefully helping him to identify items and file away the words for each one. The zoo is a blast now, as he points animatedly at each animal he sees. He also knows the sound of an airplane and anytime he hears one (whether we are outside or not), he points up in the air and looks around for the plane. It is so stinkin' cute! He also knows some people by name and will point to them when asked. Mostly this is reserved for "Daddy" and "Puppy," but this past weekend when my parents were in town, he also pointed correctly at my dad when we asked "Where's Gpa?" I'm pretty sure this was the highlight of the weekend.

Speaking of highlights, the pinnacle of Hudson's life thus far was last week when a Publix employee gave him a balloon while we were grocery shopping. He points at balloons any time we see one, but to have his own bouncing around at the end of a string was almost more than his baby brain could handle. I think I could've grocery shopped for hours and Hudson still would have been content just pulling on his balloon and bopping it around. I decided I must have tons of balloons at his birthday party.

Hudson is beginning to understand that "no" means to stop what he's doing, or at the very least to look at me before he continues to do whatever frustrating behavior he is engaged in. Just in the past few days, he seems to make the connection that when I say "no" in a certain tone, I am upset. He reacts by scrunching up his little face and starting to cry, which is so utterly heartbreaking and adorable that I am simultaneously trying not to laugh and doing whatever I can to get him happy again. He's got me hook, line, and sinker, that ornery baby!

He loves to read stories, which we do before every nap and bedtime. Sometimes when we are playing in his room, he will bring me a book, as if he wants me to read it to him (which I always do). He also likes to sit by himself and look at his books, focusing very hard on opening each one and turning the pages. As someone who loves to read so much, this trend makes me one happy momma. His favorite books right now are "I Am a Bunny," "Jamberry," "King Bidgood's In the Bathtub," and "Goodnight, Baby."

 

He loves to empty and fill containers. Mostly empty. He has figured out how to open the drawers in his dresser and loves to pull out the clothes, piece by piece, and throw them down until the drawer is empty. He also likes blocks (chewing on them and putting them in and out of the toy box), paper, and his toy drum and the accompanying drum sticks. He has gotten into "sharing," which means he wants to hand you a toy and then you hand it back, and this can carry on for quite some time. He has the funniest little "pose" he does when he holds out something he wants to share. It looks like this:

Hudson also loves to eat! He still nurses about 4-5 times a day and eats three meals of "people food," along with some snacks here and there. He likes to eat with his hands, and is also still happy to be fed with a spoon. Faster food-to-mouth delivery is a-ok with him! He saw his friend Jack eat a strawberry while they were on a playdate and now this is a favorite snack of his. His other favorite foods are Chick-fil-a grilled nuggets, any kind of fruit, puffs, sausage, and bread. He will eat veggies but I have been trying to find a way to get more green stuff into his diet (and mine, for that matter), and a friend had the idea of making baby-friendly green smoothies. Hudson is great at drinking with a straw, so this worked great for us. His first green smoothie was strawberries, spinach, pineapple, and banana. And he loved it! (Me too!)

Chicken nugget!

Strawberry!

Mmm, green smoothie!

The most frustrating part of this month has been that Hudson is possibly transitioning to only one nap a day. I know this will make our schedules more flexible, but it will be hard to give up all the time that two naps allowed me! He was taking two two-hour naps a day - four hours a day that I could do chores or get online or catch a few winks of my own. But over the past couple weeks naptime has become a huge fight and so we are going to try one nap for a while and see how that goes.

I can hardly believe that my baby is almost one year old! He is such a joy and we have so much fun each day together. Here are a few more pictures from the past month or two.

Happy Easter! 

Little Boy Blue

Roadtrip with Mommy

Snuggles with Aunt Ashley

Grandma warms up his bath towel!

Laughing at Daddy on Skype

Fun in the Bath

Hanging with his BFF Jack

Zoo with Gpa and Grammy

Swinging

Picture This

Today I took a really cute picture of Hudson on my phone and as I was trying to upload it to Instagram, something happened and the photo was deleted. I thought about what would happen if I didn't have a camera or all the photos I had of him were lost somehow.

There's a John Mayer song, "3x5," off his first album. In one verse he writes, "Oh today I finally overcame trying to fit the world inside a picture frame." As a person who loves to document life in photographs, I have to come back to this idea now and then, and when I do, I close my eyes and just try to burn the image I want to remember into my heart.

So when I'm old and grey, and many things have slipped away from me, I pray that God in his rich mercy will recall to my tired mind this picture: my beautiful boy, sitting at his highchair, with his pale blonde curls looking silver in the sunlight, and his bright eyes just blue and blue and blue, and his little mouth just about to smile, and his fist full of sweet potato fries, reaching out to offer one to me.

9 Months

Well I started this blog post when Hudson turned 9 months old but it's been about 2.5 weeks since then. Oops! Better hurry or it'll be time for a 10 month post. Time is flying!

First, the stats. At his 9 month check-up, he weighed 18 pounds, 13 ounces and was 28 inches long. That's around the 35-40th percentile for both weight and height. He is healthy and as happy as can be!

Hudson is on the move constantly. He loves to crawl and climb all over everything. He is really good at cruising along furniture and has even taken a few steps, though they seem to be unintentional. His favorite things to do are to pull all his books off the shelf and all his stuffed animals out of the bin. Really, pulling stuff out of any kind of box or bag is fun for him! The other day I was folding clothes and putting them in the bottom drawer of his dresser. He crawled over and pulled up, then proceeded to take each article of clothing out of the drawer, shake it with glee, and throw it over his shoulder. It was so cute I let him empty the hole drawer, even though I had to refold about thirty onesies.

He makes lots of different sounds, and they are more responsive, which is fun. I swear he is trying to mimic me when I say "Oh-oh!" No "mama" or "dada" yet, though! He also knows how to wave "bye-bye" which is ADORABLE. Of course, he will never do it on command. Same thing with giving kisses. When we are out and about he always makes friends with everybody, and doesn't seem to show any real stranger or separation anxiety, even though he prefers me when he needs to be comforted or is sleepy.

Hudson LOVES food and puts it away like you wouldn't believe. He still has no teeth, so he prefers stuff that is still pureed or well-mushed. But he does love to eat with his hands, especially bananas, puffs, and pieces of bread.

And, saving the best for last, Hudson has finally FINALLY slept through the night! Cue the angel chorus! He was still waking up to nurse twice a night, and then one night he just... didn't. And the next night he did it again! And again! He does still wake up between 5-6, but then I nurse him and bring him into our bed and he will usually sleep a little longer. On top of that, he is taking two good 1.5-2 hour naps every day. Wow! I actually called the pediatrician because I was worried he was sleeping too much! She reassured me that this was normal and I just wasn't used to it. He is just doing so much growing and learning that he needs a lot of time to rest and recharge. I'll take it, gladly!

Here are a few pics of adventures in months 6-9.

Skyping with Daddy is our favorite way to stay in touch when he is out on the road.

First real big snow (in St. Louis). Not a fan!

First tortilla chip! He doesn't get these any more because he choked on one.

First cornbread.

First pancake.

Hanging with Daddy.

He learned to climb the stairs! He can go all the way up!

First trip to the Nashville Zoo.

Loves being outside and riding in his stroller.