Dr. Mom

It's official, Abby got her first fever at 1:00 AM today of 101.3 F.  Unfortunately she caught whatever crud I had all week (only I never got a fever).  I feel so much to blame and I did my best to wash my hands, etc. before handling the baby but it was inevitable, I suppose.  I still feel 100% at fault but at least we're building up Abby's immune system, right?  Luckily she was a trooper and slept through most of it and I made sure to hydrate the heck out of her.  Saw the doctor just in case, everything checked out OK, just the usual viral stuff going around and we'll have to let it run its course.  We did get a quick 10 month, 3 day stat update.  She's now 21 lb. 10 oz. and exactly 29" tall.  So she grew ~1 lb. and 0.75" since her 9 month check up.  The nice nurse gave Abby some Disney Princess stickers on our way out but as you might guess, those are going in my sticker stash!!  For those that don't know, I'm a huge Disney fan and besides, Abby's too young to play with nickel sized stickers. 

Back to Dr. Mom duty of cuddling, consoling and making my little baby feel as comfortable as she can!  Man, she really doesn't like getting her nose wiped.....

Update on February 28, 2010 - Bryce got sick on Friday night so we just had our first joint family sickness!  What a weekend....

Abby is 10 months old!

I've got less than an hour but Happy 10 Month Birthday, Abby!  Today Abby started to sing to the songs on her Baby Einstein exersaucer.  This isn't the best picture but I can't post without a quick Abby pic! 

The Return of the Tickle Monster!

There is nothing sweeter than the sound of laughter from your baby.  :)  Abby loves Daddy's whiskers and tickle nose - it just cracks her up! 

So much in the last week!

What fun for Abby - we did so much in the last week.  A lot of people have told me that this is the fun age and boy were they right.  I love that Abby's personality is really starting to come through more and more each day.  She is learning to do so much so quickly.  She went through another growth spurt too and she looks like such a big girl now.  And I miss my little baby so of course I went through her old pictures and took a stroll down memory lane.  I really gotta stop doing that because I tear up every time.  Pathetic, I know but I can't help it! 

The weather has finally warmed up enough so we brought Abby out to play in her Pack N Play while we raked the front yard.  She is really good about keeping herself busy and you can tell she enjoyed being outside in the sun/shade and fresh air.  :) 

Grandma and Grandpa came over and Abby got a Valentine's book!  We got to spend quality family time outside while Daddy kegged his latest beer (Dogfish Head 90 Minute IPA clone - delicious!). 

Xiao Xiao was playing peek-a-boo - it was so cute!

I guess Xiao Xiao got bored while we were having our Valentine's Day dinner....

Daddy was in CA for work last week so Abby and I packed up to spend the week at Lao Nian and Lao Yie's.  We had so much fun!  My mom and I took Abby to see the ducks and geese out by the pond.  The ducks weren't very nice.  One kept charging at the geese and then sort of started charging at me so we took off.  Xiao Xiao is such a people watcher so she just soaked this up.

We spent one afternoon doing what girls do best - shopping!  It's a time old tradition for my mom, Ruby and I to go shopping so it was nice to be able to shop with Abby too!  Here is a picture of some random, ornate chair in Nordstrom.  Believe it or not, I didn't take Abby to the shoe section - shame on me.  Next time, for sure.

There happen to be a choo-choo train in the Galleria so Abby and I went for a ride in the caboose!  Choo-choooo!  We had lots of fun riding around and waving at everybody.  :)

Abby doesn't really cry, she makes a fat-baby-lower-lip face to let you know she's unhappy.  She made this same face the second she was born.  :)

Jo Jo lent Abby a keyboard to play with and she went to town!  BANG! BANG! BANG!

One big milestone this week is that Abby can officially feed herself now!  It started out with 1 out of every 10 cheerios, then every other and now anything goes!  Mommy and Daddy are proud of you Abby!

There are so many pics of Abby with my mom, here's one of Abby with my dad!

We're at the phase where Abby starts repeating what we say so no more accidental cussing!  :o  She is more responsive to what we say too - it's pretty neat.  In addition to "pai yi pai", she will clap her hands when we say "pai pai shou", she will wipe her own mouth with a burp cloth when we say "cha cha zui ba", kiss you when we say "qin qin [fill in the blank]", she knows she's in trouble when you say "no-no" and my dad taught her "er duo" which means ear!  She just stood on her own for 6 seconds - somehow that brings a ridiculous amount of enjoyment for us.  :)  I feel like I'm leaving something out but that's it for now. 

My Valentine...

My valentine got me a pack of Twizzlers, a pint of Blue Bell Cookies n' Cream and a piece of chocolate cake for Valentine's Day.  And our sweet, sweet Abby fell asleep in my arms at 9:30 PM.  What a perfect evening.  Happy Valentine's Day!

Hiiii!!!

Abby learned to say "Hi!" only it's more of a "Hiiiii" - it's so cute!  She saw herself in the mirror and said "Hiiii."  I've just had no luck with taking videos - so you'll just have to believe me for now!  :)

Happy Chinese New Year!

It's the year of the tiger!  Chinese New Year is tomorrow but we celebrated as a family today.  :)  For lunch we made homemade dumplings and they were delicious!  My parents made lots of other yummy food too - always good to eat home cooking.  Meant to take pictures but was too busy eating instead. 

Then we went to our favorite restaurant, Peking Cuisine, for dinner.  Again, more yummg food.  We brought along Abby's booster seat so she had her own seat at the table like a big girl!

Abby hasn't quite figured out how to use chopsticks but she will some day.  :)

This was Abby's first Chinese New Year and also her first time to receive a hong bao (Chinese for "red envelope").  Thank you Jo Jo, Ruby a-yi and Matt!

You can tell better from the following picture but for those who don't know, inside Ruby's belly is Abby's future cousin!!!  We're SOOO excited for Ruby and Matt!!  :D

And of course, thank you Lao Nian and Lao Yie! 

Xin Nian Kuai Le! 

Wan Shi Ru Yi! 

Nian Nian You Yu!

9 month pics

Abby had some 9 month pics taken just as we did for her 6 month.  They aren't the BEST pictures but it's our effort to keep a log of our growing girl outside of just home pictures on the little pocket Canon camera.  Here are a few of the pictures - enjoy!

Buttons, Cheerios, dancing, almost standing on her own, pai yi pai, windows

Back when my dad taught Abby "bi zhe" and she would point at your nose, he also taught her "ko zhe" which means button in Chinese.  If you say ko zhe, she will point at your shirt buttons.

We started feeding Abby Cheerios a week or so ago and she LOVES them.  :)  Say "aahh!"

I have been unsuccessful at capturing a video of Abby dancing when she hears music so the rest of the post is really for documenting purposes.  She pretty much started doing this ever since she could stand up around 7.5 - 8 months.  My parents have this dancing Santa (I'm sure you've all seen these before) who's hips swing back and forth to 'Jingle Bell Rock' and every time Abby sees it, she starts bebopping away and now she's gotten to where she bebopps to any song she hears!  Stay tuned...I will post a dancing video soon enough.  

Again, I haven't gotten a picture of this but Abby has been able stand on her own for a few seconds at a time now.  She's done it a few times in the past week or so but it's so quick and I never seem to have the camera on hand.  Stay tuned for that as well.

Recently Abby learned something new.  One day when I was burping her, she decided to pat my back and burp me too!  So I taught her "pai yi pai" which means to pat in Chinese and now when you hug her and say pai yi pai, she will gently pat your back!  It's the cutest thing ever and way cooler than her high five now.  :)  Again, no picture....yet!

This post is really random but we got some more windows installed over the weekend.  The guest room and living now have new windows in addition to all the other windows we replaced earlier.  Yipee!  Should see a difference on the gas/electric bill now (and you know me, I'm tracking it all on my spreadsheet!).

 

Teeth!

I was finally able to get a picture of Abby's 2 bottom teeth (look close - they are tiny!).  Daddy was tickling her and I actually took this picture upside down but rotated it for your viewing pleasure.  :)  These little suckers are deceivingly sharp!

Let there be more carpet!

We finally got the carpet installed in the living room and hallway leading to our room.  As you can see from the picture, the existing floor tiles are original 1969 floor tiles.  I've hated it since we moved in for several reasons.  First off, it's red and the grout was dirty.  Blah.  It made the livnig room cold and I had to wear house shoes all the time.  Coming from an Asian household, it was a huge adjustment.  We finally feel like this is officially our home now that the carpet is in and most importantly, Abby has so much more room to roam.  She actually crawled from the living room to our bedroom this morning.  Being the cautious baby that she is, she was looking all around and taking her sweet time but she had a huge smile on her face too!  :)

Abby has plenty of room to play now too!  :)

And we changed up the sectional.  It is now shaped like an "L" vs being symmetrical to allow for better seating.  Don't know why we didn't do this long ago. 

Abby Update

I will begin this post with a correction to a previous post 'Houston, we have a tooth!'.  Upon closer inspection, there are actually TWO bottom, middle teeth coming out instead of just one!  The right tooth was about 12 hours behind the left tooth, is all.  We are thoroughly enjoying Abby's new smile.  I'll miss the gummy smile but there is just something so innocent about little teeth smiles too.  :)

We tried out lots of new stuff this past week.  Our kitchen is too small to fit a high chair so we got a little booster seat thing and we finally got it out for a test run.  Abby seems to like it enough. 

After purchasing a few different sippy cups, I finally found the one that works for Abby.  She can use it but still prefers her little bottle.

Bryce and I were both tippy toe walkers as kids and I just think this picture of Abby's tippy toe was too cute. 

Another big milestone - Abby had her first trip to Chinatown!!!  My dad  met us at Classic Kitchen for lunch before my eye appointment yesterday.  We ate some yummy food, as usual, and Abby enjoyed people watching and smelling the delicious smells.  My dad has been talking about taking Abby to Chinatown since she was born.  He is so anxious to be able to share a bowl of noodle soup with her.  :)

Blue Steel.  Nuff said.

Bryce made peaches for Abby and her reaction is priceless.  I can't tell if she thought it was too cold or too tart?  But as usual, she ate it anyhow.  :)

Abby can keep herself busy with velcro for about 15 minutes.  It's pretty awesome.