another day, another milestone

this weekend was one of those perfect weekends in a way that only a cold, frigid january weekend could be. it was filled with doing a whole lot of nothing except being with good friends, snuggled under blankets, watching the nfl playoffs.

we managed to squeeze in a hair cut for my scrunch who was starting to look like a hippy, and now he is quite dapper. but oh, it hurt a little to watch my baby get his first haircut. 

*before and after*

*sad mommy whose baby is becoming a little less baby*

we also squeezed in some family outdoors time. the husband threw a big snowball at the back of his pregnant wife. he was then shamed into doing penance by putting his face in the snow. it almost made the snowball worth it 

*3-2-1*

*let that  be a lesson to you: never harm, in the slightest, thine pregnant wife!*

hello 2014!

i am a little sad to say bye to 2013. 2013 has been kind to the carlsons. more than kind. 2013 has been an explosion of happiness in a way that we could have never even known to wish for. actually, to be honest, i am a little afraid to leave 2013 because it has been so great. the arrival of alexander brought husband and i joy that has been indescribable. sure, there have been a few marital spats here and there (no really, more than a few, we're not perfect here), and yes, we are still in the midst of dealing with the fallout from a crook of a contractor (that makes my jaws clench just thinking about it), but, motherhood, and alexander, and seeing the husband embrace fatherhood has satisfied me in a way that leaves me so full and yet craving more at the same time. in 2013, i have felt sated with life, so sated that i would feel guilty wanting any more out of life. now if only i could find the "pause time" button...

yet here we are, day one of 2014, and the champagne glasses* are sitting in the sink waiting to be washed after the ceremonial clink (at 12:01 a.m. because we were too busy looking at old pictures and videos of alexander to notice that midnight had struck). they remind me to toast to the things to come - to look forward with hope, and with an openness to receive all the good (along with the not so good) things that await us this year. upward and onward as the saying goes. and in this 2014 adventure onward, i sense exponential happiness on the horizon even as we leap from the great known happiness of 2013 to the yet to be defined 2014. BUT 2014, the carlsons are ready for you...mostly. so happy new year from our family to yours! may 2014 be the best year yet!

*champagne glasses filled with sparkling grape juice because...baby carlson #2 due july 2014. hear, hear to exponential happiness!*

you're gonna hear me roarrrrrrrrrrrrr....

it's been a while. i've been struggling with this blogging thing. firstly because i think i have watched one too many episodes of law & order special victims unit for my own good. too many creepsters out there and here i am blasting the whole internet with pictures of him in all his adorable goodness. secondly, it is just hard to be consistent. but december is upon us, and mr. alexander just turned eight months on friday. and as usual, we let it pass without any fanfare. if it's possible for a first child to have second child syndrome, alexander will definitely have it. i can just see him telling his friends later in life, "yeah i tried to find photos of myself from a baby, but there aren't that many. maybe i'm adopted??"

but anyways, here we are, on this cold, gray, post snow, post ice monday morning. and i think by now you all know how we feel about mondays generally. but i have mustered up some energy to present unto you all my little scrunch: snotty, sick, with a clump of spit up in his hair, and fighting an ear infection. yet despite it all he is ready to attack this monday. RRRROOOOOOAAAAAARRRRRR!

 

*photo courtesy of the talented aichuan kwong*

rockin' the vote

when i was growing up, i distinctly remember one day when my grandmother and i stayed home while my mother, father, and older brother packed up a big file of papers and headed out the door. i was indignant that i was being left behind. but i later learned that i didn't have to go because i was born in the united states and was therefore a u.s. citizen. and the salient point being, i am the only one in my family that could be president. CARLSON 2016! no actually that is not the emphatic point. i remember that as soon as my father became a u.s. citizen, every year, no matter how big or small the election, president, governor, mayor, local county member, my father would come home from work, wait for my mom, and then take us all to the polls, despite my mother's protests of being too tired. my father would say, "no. we have to vote. this is our right now that we are citizens. we are going to vote." so from a young age, i have always heard, every year, that it is important, as a citizen to exercise the right to vote. so when i turned 18, i registered to vote, and from that point on, i have voted every year, by absentee ballot when necessary.

i find this lesson important for two reasons. firstly, asians, especially of my parents generation, are not politically active. you'll notice that during election years, the asian vote is rarely courted despite making up huge "voter blocks" in places like nyc, california, and houston, because asians simply don't get out and rock the vote. secondly, i think voting is important, especially in this day and age when we can become very cynical (for good reasons!) about politics and politicians. i'll be the first to admit: politics is dirty and politicians are generally slimy, and there is NO perfect candidate out there (except for CARLSON 2016!!!), but still there are important issues out there. i know it is easy to think that your vote doesn't count, but our government makes policies that affect our daily life. i have student loans. i have concerns about the public school system. i have concerns about how much traffic is in northern virginia and what my new governor will do to alleviate this problem without increasing VA's expenditure. etc etc etc. the list goes on. so this morning, i reiterated to the husband, one of the aforementioned cynical people who doesn't believe his vote counts, just how important it was to me to pass on the importance of voting to my little bunny. and even though our fire alarm went off twice! last night (and yes, we were pantsless both times) and we were exhausted, and running late for work, and it was on the nippy side out, we bundled up ADC, and trudged down to our polling center, and began what i hope will be many years of voting together.

*all bundled up and waiting in line to vote and all smiles after voting. we wrote papa's name in for VA Attorney General!*

summer's last hurrah

now that we've gotten past the rottenness of mondays and we've entered the acceptance phase of the grieving cycle, let's relive the weekend. weeks ago, a good friend and i planned to officially kick off the unofficial start of fall by taking our families out to cox farms. between work schedules and travel schedules, our families could only have gone on this joint outing one weekend in october, but we felt confident about it. after all, it was listed as a prime weekend on the cox farm event calendar. being a prime weekend means only two things: firstly, you pay extra for your ticket (yippeee! said no one ever) and secondly that we would have prime fall weather. you know, not too hot, not too cold, but just right, in that baby bear goldilocks way. warm with just a bite of crisp air.

i was so looking forward to this, because as you may know, it is a rare opportunity for me to get the husband and the best friend to do any kind of physical activity. but muahahahhaha, i could trick them into the corn maze walk-athon. (backstory, shortened version: two years ago when we all went to a farm out in maryland to do a corn maze, we followed the leader, a.k.a. husband, and circled the corn maze for an hour and a half before we made it out. it was glorious, but only for me. i'm pretty sure everyone else was ready to shoot a rescue flare up.)  but oh mother nature, she just likes to throw wrenches into my best laid plans. all week long, i faced steadily climbing temperatures, which is not always a bad thing, if we had started the week out at 55 degrees. but we started the week out at 75 degrees and peaked at 92 degrees on saturday - just in time for our fall festival day of fun. in case you're wondering, 92 degrees is not conducive to trekking through an unshaded corn maze (and most likely getting lost), nor is it optimal for drinking hot apple cider. i couldn't even wear the cute fall outfit i had mentally chosen all those weeks ago when we first made plans to head out to the farm. pretty much, the best thing you can do in 92 degrees at a fall festival is sit in the picnic area under a roof, a.k.a in the shade. $17 per ticket! money well spent!!

and now, our fall festival story in pictures:

*one of us is determined to have fun, one of us is highly skeptical, and one of us is thinking, "i cannot believe they made me skip nap time for this."*

*first stop: hay ride time

*alexander looking his scrunchy-licious skeptical best, theo: "oooh prickly grass. i should grab it!"*

*waddup ladies. check out my ride...yeah i am not impressed either. *

*a picture for our fall family postcards. oh wait, we're all sweating, dressed for the beach...thank goodness for the gourds!*

*so excited about forced friendships and forced pictures with an abundance of squash*

*"lucas, what was the best part of the day?"

"it's a toss up between ice cream..."*

*"...and tractors."*

*highlight of alexander's day: tummy time on a blanket on top of wood chips, under the shade!*

*the birth of a rock band drummer. every asian parent's dream come true!*

*wait, what did you say? we're going after this? in the air-conditioned car?...*

 *S-M-I-L-E*

let me give you some medicine for that bad case of mondays you have

every sunday evening, a slow feeling of dread sinks in because soon it will be monday. as if the anticipation of the weekend coming to a close is not bad enough, monday rolls around, as mondays are wont to do, in that particularly nagging monday way. and bam, we are smacked with a serious case of the mondays. today is particularly monday-y, in the dreariest ways possible. coming off a weekend of 90 degree weather and miles and miles of endless sunny skies, in october no less, we woke this monday-est of monday mornings to clouds so thick they clawed at my skin when i left for work. it's just gray outside, which makes me feel gray on the inside, which does not make for a winning gray-gray combination.

but i have found the cure to a bad case of the mondays. now if only i could bottle it up and sell it! yet here i am, giving the cure out for free. just call me a purveyor of happiness and wonder.

ready for the cure?

5

4

3

2

1

TA-DA!!

tell me that didn't bring a smile to your face? happy monday and happy fall - may your autumn be the pumpkiniest of pumpkins, with happiness to boot! *photo cred to the talented, loving auntie to alexander: aichuan kwong*

you'd think we needed to call poison control

on saturday, alexander turned five and a half months. now before you think i am one of those crazy moms who celebrates insignificant milestones, i just want to say two things: first we did not celebrate alexander turning five and a half months, we just used that date as the rough time around which we would introduce solids. and second, we celebrated alexander turning one month old by lighting a match that we stuck into a brownie square. and we took a picture, so just in case future babies feel like we love them less, we can show them just how much or little rather, fanfare alexander received. so anyways back to five and a half months. the time has flown. look at my baby at five and a half weeks and now at five and a half months.

on friday, i went to trader joe's and brought my scrunchy bunny an acorn squash. i spent part of nfl sunday roasting that thing and puree-ing it - i missed part of the redskins game, which it turned out, i didn't really need to stay and watch anyway. here is a chronicle of our first try at "solid" food.

*proud pureed squash maker and clearly a first time mom. check out that serving size!*

*a giddy alexander sitting at the grown up table, pre-squash*

*post squash GAG! he's thinking, "someone call poison control, my parents are trying to off me"*

*please mommy, no more squash. please."

never forget

*baby alexander remembering grandpa alexander*

i often think back to september 10, 2001. life pre-9/11 and how i can never go back. i think of how starkly divided my life is -  my soul before september 11 and a different, wounded soul after. i use to believe that this rip in my soul could be fully healed and the two versions of my being could be reconciled, but i have come to realize (and accept, a little bit) that there will never be a time that my "now me" will not long for the carefree, whole september 10, 2001 version of me. but that version of me was a lifetime ago.

there is really something amazing about the human ability to go on living; a new normal takes shape and we stumble our way into it. at first, it seems impossible. the grief is blinding. but one hour, becomes one day, and then before we knew it, we had survived the grief and loss by a week, and then a month, and then a year, and suddenly ten years. and now it has been twelve years. twelve incredibly long and incredibly short years. twelve years of big events: birthdays, graduations, weddings, babies. twelve years of mundane events: work, emails, phone calls, family dinners. when i look back, it hardly seems possible that we have made it twelve years without my father, but then what other choice did we have? we had to go on. so yes, this resilience is amazing.

but my father's absence these twelve years makes our new normal bittersweet. in this new normal, we are always aware: dad. isn't. here. new memories keep getting created and none of them include my father. now when a memory of my father pops up in my head, it seems so long ago because it is so long ago.

so today, 9/11/2013 we never forget the lives lost. we always remember. but for my family, it is not just today - everyday, as part of our new normal, we never forget.

have i mentioned?

that the carlsons looooooooove fridays? the weekend is on the horizon, so close i can smell it - almost touch it! i've already got  a mighty to-do list for tomorrow; as usual, i am sure i have planned far more than we can get done, but at least i am good at something. it's called overreaching and overestimating my capacity. it's a real good self esteem builder when i fail time and time again.

but before i start shouting commands at husband and strategically mapping out my saturday, i am going to sit here, drink my black tea, and savor the thought of the weekend - oh so close! (as my blackberry rings off the hook)

what better way to kick off weekend than this?

is there any other more appropriate response to the onset of the weekend? 

finding the "ade" when given a lemon

as some of you know, husband and i have really been going through it with the house remodel and the crook of a contractor we hired. i have been going to bed angry, and waking up with clenched teeth, wondering to myself, "where is justice and righteousness in this world? and might it be ok if i carried out my own form of righteous punishment??"

but this week, as repairs and redos continued, we had fresh concrete poured in for new steps and a new driveway. progress! no more mud piles (for now)! husband had the brilliant idea to make our imprint and mark this momentous occasion/create a semi-permanent reminder of the h-e-l-l we have been going through.

so our little family marched out in the hot virginia sun, fyi, we have been going through a pretty killer heat wave. i feel that you must know this fact in order to appreciate how dedicated we were to turning a lemon of a situation into something more akin to lemonade.

**papa getting alexander's hands nice and moist to optimize hand imprint**

**papa unfurling little hands. surprisingly hard**

**and because it is so hard to unfurl those tiny hands and you can't exactly mash baby hands into mostly dry concrete, the finished product only displays alexander's knuckles. but isn't it the cutest knuckle print you ever did lay your eyes on? just say yes. **

and now, something totally not related. i had a special visitor at work yesterday. i think my boss thought i was kidding when i said i was going to go home with him. but i wasn't. but oddly enough, alexander went home and i had to stay at work.

**this little visitor definitely turned the lemon of working into more of a lemonade kind of day.**

the (not so) deep, dark secrets of new motherhood

whenever there is a sad face such as this, i catch myself, daily, as i make every silly attempt to turn that frown upside down, including cooing to alexander, making ridiculous faces at him, or massaging his belly to get his poops and gas out, thinking, i am overqualified for this gig. i have a law degree afterall! (forget the fact that i wasn't even using my law degree pre-ADC). and then i feel terribly, sickly guilty for thinking this, because the truth is, i am hardly qualified. it's much easier to worry about whether he has pooped today, how many times he has pooped and peed, and examining the color of his poop, than to really delve into and worry about my qualifications to be a mother. to be his mother.

as you all know or have come to know (hopefully/hopefully not), though i am not certifiably, in need of medication crazy, i am definitely vice mayor of crazy town. it's much scarier to think about all my shortcomings, all my flaws that i will inevitably pass on to my perfect baby. (side note, as one who use to think babies were annoying, needy, dispensers of disgusting bodily fluids, and social-life ruiners, trust me when i say that my baby is perfect. for instance, he has spit up exactly twice in his twelve weeks and two days of life. he has been sleeping through the night and goes down each night without a fight. not to brag or anything, but yes to brag. my baby is perfect). but in all seriousness, or more seriousness, because i was quite serious about my baby being perfect, it's terrifying to think that husband and i, all our imperfections, the obvious ones and the dark hidden ones, will be manifested in one way or another, on this mostly blank slate of a baby.

lately, when alexander gets frustrated, he has begun to exhibit a baby temper in reaction. he raises his left arm and slams it down in frustration. this usually happens when papa is playing with him when he is hungry. alexander is done with play time. he wants it to be eating time, and so he grunts in protestation and begins the aforementioned display of frustration and temper. it's sort of cute now, but having quite the vile temper myself, i can honestly say, this kind of temper, manifested out of frustration, looks, quite frankly, psychotic in an adult. and as much as i like to say, "oh he gets that from daddy," i am not fooling anyone - least of all myself.

so i return to my original point, it's much easier to worry about whether or not he is getting enough tummy time, and therefore whether or not he will ever have the strength to hold up his neck for a sustained period of time (and thus think, i am wasting my education!) than it is to come to grips with the truth: husband and i are grossly under-qualified to be parents. even though failure is not an option on project alexander, failure is most certainly around the corner. i know, when we meet failure face to face, i'm sure any day now, it will look eerily familiar, and, as if on cue, husband and i will turn, face each other and point - "he gets that from you!" we'll say in unison. and then we'll laugh, because that's how we do. but secretly, not so deep down inside, we'll both be terrified that he is, in fact, turning into one of us, if not both. the horror! seriously.

until that day, we take each moment, step-by-step, with so much joy, and so much trepidation, and by the grace of God, he won't turn into a serial killer. like how i set the bar real low? success = my son not being a serial killer (reference above point about being vice mayor of crazy town). but really, if only ted bundy's parents had had this small, but very appreciable aspiration.

the nanny diaries

today, alexander met his nanny, we call her miss lulu. she came a week before i go back into the office so that we could sort of play a game of shadows. she shadowed me to see how i like things done, and what schedule we keep him on, and i shadowed her, like one of those nanny cams, but only super visible. to be honest, it was sort of lovely. i had the chance to run out to the bank, and only had to grab my wallet. when was the last time i did that? and i was able to put dinner together without but one nursing interruption. but at the end of the night, long after nanny lulu left, long after husband and i put alexander down for bed, it hit me, i hardly spent time with my baby today. and it ached a little. husband says, "well babe, you won't be spending time with alexander when you're in the office." husband had to go all logically cruel and rational on me. i just looked at him with my, "ARE YOU TRYING TO MAKE ME CRY?!?!?!" look - yes, there is an actual look which i have perfected. 

so now, while husband sits at the kitchen counter, playing a game on his phone, i've been perusing pictures of alexander from the day he was born. apparently, husband is not trying to make me cry; turns out, I AM TRYING TO MAKE MYSELF CRY. but seriously, is it possible that my baby was ever this small? 

the twist is, i never thought i would like motherhood, much less love it. i honestly viewed it more as an inconvenience. and i never thought i would want to be a stay at home mom, but now i want to be one of those women that i use to pity. now, i would give anything to be that woman whose universe orbits around her baby. so tomorrow, i am going to snuggle him a little bit more, kiss on him a few extra kisses, and maybe hold him through one of his naps, babywise be damned. cause my days are numbered. 

remember....?

what's that thing called? the thing that comes between friday and monday? what is it again? oh yeah, a weekend? remember that? and remember what we use to do on weekends? sleep in until the sun was setting? it is all a vague blurry memory now.

remember staying up past midnight?

remember having time to do laundry?

remember watching tv?

remember having time to make the bed? 

ok that last one never really happened even before mr. alexander came into our lives, but you get the picture. i had the luxury of time and freedom to make the bed if i had been disciplined enough to do it. 

now "weekends" consist of pretty much the same thing as the week. wake up, feed a baby, wipe his poopy butt, play with him, make silly noises and silly faces. wipe his butt. cross our fingers that we do not get pooped on. we don't sweat being pee'd on anymore. diaper that cute little butt, and try to put him down for a nap. all this before 7:30 a.m. if we start this ritual at 7:30 a.m., we have "slept in." and it is glorious! not having to get up on a saturday until 7:30! and even feeling well rested. 

i can't remember the last time we stayed up past midnight. once the little dictator goes down for the night, i start counting how many hours i have to sleep before having to wake up between four and five a.m. those four and a half hours of sleep go by way too quickly to squander on something as frivolous as staying up past midnight.

laundry?? what does having clean clothing feel like? now, we throw clothes in the wash. it ruminates for a few days, and when someone finally remembers to put them in the dryer, they need to be washed again. if we're lucky enough to get our own clothes in the dryer, then, out they come into a basket they go, where they live unhappily ever after - not fulfilling their wrinkle free destiny. but the dictator's clothes? they get washed, almost daily, and folded. 

tv...ah yes tv. i suspect the next time we watch our tv, it will be a machine that the smithsonian will ask to be donated for an exhibit. 

but honestly, i don't really miss my old life. i mean, really, for this face, i will pretty much do anything. wouldn't you???

indulge me won't you?

 

i am going to go out on a limb on this lovely, sunny, breezy friday and guess that you all want to see pictures of my adorable not-so-new-anymore baby boy. this week, we retired the newborn onesies. it was like taking a bullet straight to the heart. stop growing so fast baby boy. could you please stay warm, fuzzy, and cuddly forever? except with the ability to sleep through the night?

 

without further ado, please indulge me, and yourselves, quite frankly, in the many faces of adc.