1st Night Away From My Boy

What a week we had! Marino came down with a stomach bug on Wednesday afternoon. Thankfully, he was just vomitting (no other GI issues, no fever, not even really acting sick except while he was vomitting and directly after) and he was back to himself by Friday. The pediatrician said Rotavirus is everywhere right now and his being vaccinated would explain the fairly mild case of it (Evan and I have both been exposed to it as kids, so thankfully we didn't get sick). It was an interesting experience, though, since this is the first time I had to deal with him vomitting a lot and I had the predicament of not knowing where to have him vomit. I didn't want to scare him by trying to rush him to the toilet or expecting him to throw up neatly in a bucket. I finally settled for keeping a towel nearby (it didn't really help all that much). Poor guy!

Saturday, I got up early and drove to Long Island to visit with some friends. It was a long drive (5.5 hours), especially since it was pouring and my GPS took me through Canal Street, which may be the most direct route, but not the fastest! First, I went to my friend Kim's baby shower. Kim was my first college roommate in 1996 (yes, I am old). I hadn't seen her in a couple of years, so it was great to catch up and see her with her adorable baby belly. The shower was gorgeous and her baby girl, Charlotte, is a very lucky girl.

Here we are at the shower. Me, Kim and my friends Lynn and Gail are on the right.

Kim - how cute is she? I love her.

Admiring one of Charlotte's many adorable gifts!
Lynnie - I just love her!
This was a nice gift - one of her aunts gave her this empty storage container with a poem about using it to hold some of the baby's things as keepsakes. I just started reminding myself to put away things that will remind me of Marino and special memories, so I thought this was a great idea!

After the shower, I was off to visit my friend Cheryl. Cheryl was my roommate at the second college I went to in 1997. I hadn't seen her for 11 years! Her son, Calibur, is 3 months older than Marino.

Here's Calibur with his train set (he loves that thing!)

I also got to meet their dog, Tank. Very appropriate name, but he's a sweetie!
Cheryl and Calibur

I cropped myself out of this one since I looked awful but Cheryl and Cal look cute!
An attempt at a self-portrait

My plan had been to come back home on Saturday night (I know, kinda crazy) because I REALLY did not want to spend the night away from Marino. I haven't been without him overnight since the NICU days, and I wasn't feeling ready for that. So, I left Cheryl's around 8pm, expecting to go home, but the weather had other plans for me! About 20 minutes into my trip, I had to cross the Throgs Neck Bridge between Queens and the Bronx. Traffic was stopped at the exit to get on the bridge, and I assumed it was just congestion at the toll. Wrong! The road was completely flooded in all lanes. Cars were abandonded in the water! I had to drive on the elevated shoulder of the road to get to the bridge (just out of curiosity, I checked to see if they closed the exit and they did...at 11:15! 3 hours after I was there and it was completely flooded! WTF!!).

After that, I was totally freaked out. I got on the NJ Turnpike, and that was starting to flood, the rest stops were closed because of flooding. I called my best friend Sonia and thankfully she was home, awake and willing to take me in. I spent the night there so I unexpectedly spent my first night away from Marino. I was sad and had a minor meltdown to Evan over it. But we all survived.

Needless to say, I was very happy to see my boy on Sunday morning! Please excuse the state of my house in these pictures...the last thing I wanted to do was clean when I got home!

Evan had bought Marino this inflatable tee ball set (the handle of the bat is solid but the rest is inflatable). It cost about $7 and he is in love with this thing! He played with it for hours on Sunday...I highly recommend it! They sell it at Toys R Us.

As you can see, he is sort of in-between pajama sizes. We moved him into 24 month size (for length), but this happens.

Evan also got him a little sandbox and he is completely in love with this thing...and there's not even sand in it yet! He likes to bounce his ball around in there, so it stays in there and he doesn't have to go chase it.

Happy boy!

I have more pictures to share from yesterday, too...coming soon!

More Pictures and Port Discovery

OK, I couldn't just show you 5 of the pictures Dave took, because I love so many of them. I just love showing off my boy!

Here Evan was tickling him, but he was so sleepy, he started falling asleep once he was laying down on the ground!

Toddler photography bloopers...the boy is clearly too skinny still for 18 month size pants...

Full moon (aka embarassing shot to show future girlfriend)
Happy guy!
There's ducks in this lake, mama!

Our little family

GQ pose

He loves it when we kiss

Handsome Marino

Family snuggle time

Wednesday we had off for Veteran's Day, so the 3 of us went to Baltimore to go to Port Discovery, the children's musuem. We had a lot of fun, it was very toddler friendly.

Here's Marino playing with some animals. In Marino's world, animals say "badup badup badup."

There were apples and bananas in this little house, so Marino was a fan.

Jazzy barn scene.

BAWWWL pit...he went nuts for this! There's a little video below of him in the ball pit...he didn't want to get out!

"gentle" petting the cow

Where do I start, mama?

Marino as a cowboy...

Riding a horse with mama

Playing ball on the big soccer field with Daddy.

Ball pit video...he's swimming in these balls and loving it!

New things this week:

Marino started saying "bear" this week, but for some reason he says it with a Boston accent: "beyahhh." It's ridiculously adorable. Beavers are bears, too, by the way.

Marino started saying "night night" this week, too, and resting his head down when he's tired. Today, at nap time, "night night" was the first thing he said before he fell asleep...it was precious.

He also started telling me when he is going "poo poo" (yes, if you're not a parent, this is probably not all that interesting and maybe gross). We're going to slowly start potty training, although I expect it to be a long road (he's young, especially for a boy).

Medical Issue of the Week:

So...the children's museum was fun but possibly not the greatest idea I ever had. Thursday afternoon he started vomitting and stopped eating. He just kept asking for "wa wa" (water). Friday, he was still sick (throwing up, downing Pedialyte and not asking for milk, he slept for 5 hours during the day), but luckily it never progressed to a fever or breathing issue, so I think it was just a 24 hour stomach bug. Today, he was eating and napping normally. I literally have no more sick leave, so the illnesses and other minor medical disasters really need to stop for a while, mmkay?! !!