Vaccinations

Julian got his vaccinations today, poor thing. They are for the two month mark but he just turned three months. We had to wait because of different scheduling conflicts when he first turned two months and then for the next three weeks he had the sniffles which turned into a phlemy cough and congestion and finally he seems over it so we could go. Seems like he's not getting any fever or anything, just a little upper thigh tenderness where they injected him. He had one in each leg and also an oral one. Oh, how I wish they could all be oral drops! One of the leg ones was for 6 different diseases, wow. They've really come a long way on these vaccinations, thank goodness. Julian is such a happy baby. All morning he just ooohs and ahhhhs and coos and smiles and it's so cute. He's such a flirt. I read somewhere that newborns and young infants in general really know how to turn on the charm and flirt with their eyes and facial expressions especially with their mother. It's a survival instinct to make the mother want to nurture and care for their baby. He does it well, I must say!

Matthew is being as sweet as can be. He says "I love you" very often without me even saying it first, it's so adorable. He's really coming into his own little person. The other night we were totally cracking up laying his bed reading a book. There were two things that happened but one of them was that he was trying to tell me something that happened at school and he was saying the word "doctora" (Spanish for woman doctor) and I COULD NOT understand him for the life of me. Sometimes when I can't understand something he says, he gets furious with me but this time, I started laughing because I thought he was saying "the toilet" instead of "doctora". He started laughing too and he would repeat it and it was obvious that I just didn't understand him so I just kinda stared at him and said...."OK".....cause I didn't understand and this just went on and on. He repeated it about 50 times. We just ended up with the giggles and I was laughing SO HARD that I had to cover my face and tears were coming out of my eyes from laughing so hard. He was too and he was just rolling around the bed laughing. For some reason we just got the giggles. I don't remember the last time I laughed so hard that I couldn't stop and tears were coming out of my eyes. It was great. We still mention that even though it was over a week ago that it happened. I hope I never forget about that moment.

First Tooth Already?

Julian will be 3 months in just 2 days but for the last 10-15 days, I have suspected/seen what seemed to be the first tooth coming in. It is confirmed now that there is a little white point of a tooth that has just barely broken through the gum on his bottom left center. I just don't know what to do with this because Matthew didn't get his first one until he was 9 months old! He hasn't really bitten me while nursing but he has kind of pressed down a little harder than usual and if the tooth were actually in, it wouldn't feel too good. So far, it's bareable. I think at 9 months, Matthew could understand that biting hurt Mommy, but I'm not so sure a 3 month old will get that. I will somehow make sure that he gets it though because we're not planning to stop nursing anytime soon.

Last Sunday we had a family pool day at my sister in law's ex husband's hotel. This is Hotel Curime where we also got married and had our baby shower for Matthew. There were about 18-20 of us. Julian pretty much stayed in the restaurant area in the shade where various family members had fun babysitting. Matthew wasn't too keen on getting into the pool but he sure had fun hanging out around it while everyone else was in it.

Matthew the Astronaut

He has an oxygen tank on his back that you can't see.

One of Matthew's homework assignments this week was to dress as an astronaut in a costume made only by recyclable materials. I, of course, had a great time doing it and Matthew got excited about it in the end. I'm just not sure if he thinks he's REALLY going to the moon or just pretend. Earlier in the week I said that astronauts go to the moon and so he got the idea that he was going. Every day he told me in the morning that he didn't want to go WAY UP HIGH today to the moon. I told him, no, no, it's on Friday, not today but you're not REALLY going to the moon, it's just pretend. Today he mentioned going to the moon like he wanted to but I told him, it's just pretend. I hope he doesn't get disappointed......

After the pic with the helmet, he started to warm up :)

First Field Trip

Matthew went on his first school field trip today. They asked three mothers to go as chaperones and I was very excited that I was one of them. We went to the nursing home here in Nicoya where they actually have farm animals. They didn’t have much but it was certainly plenty enough to entertain 13 three and four year olds. They had about five or six huge pigs and one had eight babies. There were four or five deer and one baby deer which of course was named “Bambi”. Also, there were a few cows and one little calf. It was a nice little visit with all the animals (they could pet the baby deer) and then we all sat down for snack time. After that we were walking down one of the corridors and I was so proud of Matthew when he was saying good morning to the senior citizens that were sitting down on benches there. The smiles on the men and women’s faces were priceless as they watched this group of little people walking so well in a nice line all dressed in their cute little uniforms. Matthew was very polite and courteous saying good morning and good bye in the end. I am so proud of him. He’s really developing into quite a nice little boy. He’s grown up a lot in the last 6 months, that’s for sure.

Matthew has his back to the camera with a blue beach hat on an the Sesame Street Elmo backpack on. They're checking out the pigs and the babies.

Matthew is at the far end with the blue hat on. They are waiting to be able to pet Bambi.

Checking out the cows and baby calf.

10 1/2 Straight Hours, YES!

Julian slept from 7:30pm till 6am the other night, yippee!!! Now since then, he's been sticking around the 8 hour mark and sleeping from 7:30pm till about 3:30-4am but he nurses and goes right back to sleep, so it's not too bad. He's really smiling a lot more lately and occasionally letting out some little laughs, it's pretty cute. He is so darn HEAVY!!! He's weighing somewhere around the 17-18 pound mark but we have to go get him weighed. He's due for his vaccines (and get him weighed also) but haven't gone because he's got a cold which reminds me......Did anyone know that breast milk clears up congestion??????? I am so serious, I had NO idea and it really does work. A few drops of that liquid gold and a few minutes later, he's all cleared up! I thought it was just a Tico myth, I mean they believe lots of weird stuff here but I tried it and it works. They say it works for all kinds of things and I may need to give them more credit than I have in the past on this one.

Matthew has been really maturing and developing more and more every day. I can't believe the changes from just before Julian was born until now. He surprises me all the time when I ask him to do things that he used to really fight me on and he just does it. He says please, thank you, excuse me and sorry all the time. I can't get over how polite he is sometimes. Of course, this is not ALL the time but I am seeing it more and more, it's amazing. Telling him that after he finishes the next Disney video that he has to take a bath and before I know it, he's showing up in the bathroom ready to go. That never used to happen before and I'm so proud of my little guy. He picks up his toys before moving on to other things more than he used to, he sweeps the front porch and does a pretty good job, he cleans his plate when I walk away from the table for a minute, he helps me cook, etc. Speaking of helping me cook, I really may have a little sioux chef (I'm sure that's spelled wrong but I'm talking about a chef assistant) on my hands. I mean, he is so excited about cooking with me! He is GREAT at taking off all the spinach leaves so we can wash them in the colander, stirring the pot on the stove (it makes me so nervous I'm watching him like a hawk), measuring and adding the ingredients, washing the dishes afterwards (I re-wash but still), operating the Cuisinart (pushing the buttons), etc. I'm so proud of him and I tell him all the time.

Matthew's homework last week...."The Farm" (he didn't want the picture as you can tell)

Julian showing off his muscles!



Matthew explaing to Julian how you put together the toy plane.

Various New Photos

I know I have plenty to post about but I'm really too tired to get into that at the moment so I'm going to just do some easy picture posting for today. Matthew went to his first movie in the theatre this past Sunday with a whole bunch of family. Dani, Julian and I didn't go. Instead, we went to Samara beach for a sunset drink and dinner! I'm kinda sad I missed his first movie (Beauty and the Beast) since the movie theatre has been such a big part of my life. Lots of years working there and hanging out there for sure. It was just too much to travel over an hour, go to lunch and the movie and travel back with a two month old. Maybe if I were more caught up on my sleep I would have. Also, Dani was coming off a 24 hour hospital shift so he wouldn't have gone with us. In the end, the dinner at the beach occured to me and I think that was a good choice. Here are some pics of us at the beach and Matthew at the movies. Thank goodness we have lots of photographers in the family to capture this FIRST for Matthew :)

Julian and the Car Seat

Julian slept for a nine hour stretch last night. Granted, it started at 6:30pm until 3:30am but still. It's good to know he has it in him to sleep that long and later we'll just have to adjust what time he starts that stretch of sleeping. The thing about it is, two of the three times he's had the long stretch of sleep, it's been in his car seat (obviously the car seat comes out of the base of the car and into the house). Hmmmmmm, I really feel like a bad mom letting my son be in that car seat for that many hours, but he seems fine. Every time it happens I always think, well, when he wakes up in a little bit, I'll put him in his bed. Sometimes he doesn't wake up though and you hate to risk waking a sleeping baby so you just let him sleep there. Next thing you know, 8-9 hours have gone by.....oops!