The latest....

The past week or so has literally flown by, here is the latest with us:
*Last Thursday Calum and I fell down our front stairs. I was carrying Calum facing forward to the car to take Mark to the train station in the morning and missed the bottom two concrete steps, landing on my knees. Somehow Calum escaped with only a few little scrapes and bruises but the fall was still bad enough for us to both visit the A&E to get checked out and luckily all was fine. Things could have been a lot worse and this has served as an important reminder to take things a lot slower and not be in a rush all of the time.
*Calum weighed in at 15 lbs 7 oz on Tuesday (13 weeks + 3 days) and is getting bigger by the day. We might have found an answer to his fits of unpleasantness lately, acid reflux! We saw the doctor on Tuesday and she's got him on these new colic/gripe drops which don't seem to be doing a lot. Next step is Galvascon (the stuff adults use) which will be a pain as it's a powder that needs to be taken with each feed which will entail either a bottle of water pre-feed or lots of pumping!
*Our post natal group is still getting together for weekly coffees which seem to turn into 3 hour chat fests. I really look forward to seeing this new group of women and this week was especially rewarding as Calum has taken notice of the other babies and was smiling and chatting away. As one of the mums said, he likes to talk like his Mom!
*We've got 10 days until we leave for the Algarve in Portugal. YAY! The weather out there at the moment is hot and sunny which will be a welcome break from the less than ideal English summer we've been having. I'm already stressing about travelling with a 3 month old but am looking forward to new experiences with him and Mark and am crossing my fingers that I get to spend some time in the sun. With the whole Verghese family on holiday together, I'm sure we'll have loads of helping hands.
*I finally chopped my hair last week and am now sporting the Gwenyth cut and loving it. When you're carrying some extra baby weight still it's nice to be able to do something to help you look a little better and feel a touch more like your old self.
*On Monday I had my first post-baby massage and it was fantastic! I had been sending Mark to this really nice hotel spa at the One Aldwych in London and was lucky enough to find out that his regular masseuse does house calls. She told me I had to wait until 12-weeks post C-section and it was totally worth the wait. The past few weeks my back has been killing me lugging around my little chunk and this really helped!
*Calum is thisclose to rolling over, he's been arching his back and pushing lots with his feet so we're almost there. Let's hope this comes soon so he can give the back of his head a break, it's flat as a pancake!

That's about it for us right now. As the baby books say, this seems to be the golden age for babies and we are loving every minute of seeing Calum literally change in front of our eyes. Here are the latest pics:

Look at those lashes!

One of the best bits about baby boys-baby bums in jeans!

Calum and Mommy

The "Gwenyth"

Birthday weekend...

Last Friday I turned the big 2-9 which wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be. Friday afternoon Mark's Mum came over early so I could get ready for my dinner out with Mark. As soon as she arrived Calum threw a massive fit and for a brief moment I thought about cancelling but he soon calmed down and I headed up on the train to London. Amazing how relaxing the short train ride can be when you don't have to rush into work!

I met Mark and we took a black cab to Kennsington to one of Gordon Ramsay's restaurants called the Boxwood Cafe. Mark and I had gone there before for our anniversary last year but since I was pregnant last time I didn't get to enjoy wine with my meal nor did I get to have the rare tuna that I was dying to try on the menu. Dinner was AMAZING-I had the most perfect baked scallops, followed by a tuna and cilantro salad and Mark and I shared fresh made donuts with "espresso ice" for desert. Mark's Mum had encouraged us to stay out and enjoy ourselves but by the time the meal was over all we both wanted to do was head home and see Calum so that's what we did-we were home by 10!

On Saturday night we had our friends the St. Martin's over for drinks which was really nice, we hadn't seen them since before Calum was born. Calum went down like clockwork so we were also able to have some adult time. Sunday afternoon we had dinner with Mark's family and they gave me my birthday gift, a Mulberry wallet to match my new purse. How spoiled am I?!

Calum has continued his streak of sleeping through the night (10.30 p.m.-7.30 a.m.). On the weekends when I don't have to wake him up to take Mark to work he seems to like to sleep until 8.30 a.m. or later which is great. On Monday Calum had his second round of shots and was a little trooper. Today we're back to the hospital where he was born for a general 3-mo follow up. I'm a little anxious about taking him there since there has been a massive break out of swine flu around here and I don't want to expose him, but I guess we will just have to get on with it.

Otherwise Calum has been keeping us very entertained with lots of smiles and even his first giggle. He loves to talk and just yesterday found particular enjoyment out of seeing me with and without my glasses-this brought on a fit of giggles. In the bath for the first time he's started kicking his feet and really enjoying it and we spend lots of our day playing games which is lots of fun but also tiring, too. Below are a few of the latest pics, thanks to all for the birthday wishes-my 30th will definitely have to be celebrated in Seattle! x

Calum playing in his crib

Michelle & Calum-he LOVED her!

Smiles!

Ye Olde Fighting Cocks

On Sunday Mark and I took Calum up to St. Alban's, a cute little suburb north of London where Mark's younger sister Tracey lives. Mark's whole family went up there for the day since Tracey has lived there for almost a year now and we hadn't even been to see her flat. We walked from Tracey's through the cute stereotypical English town to what is claimed to be the oldest pub in England (it's even in the Guiness Book of World Records) called the Ye Olde Fighting Cocks (seriously!) of which the actual structure dates back to the 8th century and the pub itself dates back to the 11th century (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ye_Olde_Fighting_Cocks)! We had a lovely lunch there and then walked through Verulamium Park which is 100 acres big to a place called the Waffle House where we had the best ever waffles with fresh strawberries (here in England waffles are only served as a dessert and never at breakfast, they think we're crazy for having sweets like waffles and pancakes for breakfast!). The weather was perfect and it was a great end to the weekend.

Since Friday night Calum has been sleeping in his crib in his own room and sleeping through the night every night (from 10.30-7.30 a.m.). This has been fantastic but we've traded a good night's sleep for some trying times during the day. For whatever reason Calum has really been out of sorts and not himself, spending most of the days since being unsettled and difficult to please. I try putting him on his playmat, putting him in his swing, putting him in his crib with his beloved mobile and while he will be happy for about 5 minutes he then starts crying and just can't seem to be happy. He's not smiling as much as he was and he's not talking as much either. Yesterday I felt as if our bond was gone, like I was looking at a stranger and Mark came home to me in tears feeling like I had failed as a Mom. As he's nearing 12 weeks this Friday I'm hoping it's his 3 mo growth spurt but am not entirely sure that's it. I've tried everything to cheer him up and even gave him Gripe Water (an old English medicine made up of dill oil which is meant to calm their little tummies) which didn't do much to help. Would love to hear if anyone has any similar experiences and if there is anything else I can do to get us out of this funk.

Hope the rest of the week gets better, we're off on Friday for my birthday dinner at Gordon Ramsay's Boxwood Cafe and I can't wait!

Mark and Calum in the park-Calum loves to be carried like this now and Mark and his brother carried him for most of our walk like this

Family photo in the park (with my new b-day present-a Mulberry bag from Mark!)

Smiles

As Calum approaches 11 weeks this Friday he has become an even happier little boy then ever before. Every morning when he wakes up he graces us with lots of big smiles and is thisclose to letting out a little laugh. At first I was admittedly jealous as Mark was the only one able to get smiles out of him around week 8 but these days he's full of them not only for the two of us but for other people, too. I know I spent the first few weeks of Calum's life wishing he wouldn't get any bigger but Ashley was right in that there really is so much to look forward to as babies get older and more interactive. The little goos and ah-goos that he's been giving us are enough to make hearts melt, too.

Yesterday I had my third post natal group meeting and today a group of us are getting together for coffee which should be fun (not as good as getting together with my "real" friends at home, but still a big step!).

This morning Calum slept until 6.50 a.m., this marks a full week of him sleeping past 6 a.m. so fingers crossed, my days of middle of the night feeds might be coming to an end. Our healthcare visitor (Calum's nurse) said this can change when they go through their 3-mo growth spurt but let's hope it doesn't! Friday will mark another big milestone, we're officially going to retire the Moses basket and Calum is going to start sleeping the nights in his crib. It's a big step and I'm going to miss being able to get up and see him first thing but he's just too big for his basket and already loves taking naps in his crib so I'm sure he will be happier and we will hopefully get even more sleep!

Showing just how big he is in his basket!

Ick! Still hate pics of myself but here is one of Calum & I... 20 lbs to go (but maybe my boobs make up 10 lbs of those?!)!

Heat wave!

It's been a great week to be a housewife in London as we've had a mini heat wave and I've been able to enjoy every minute of it with Calum. The past few days have been in the 90s which is about as rare here as it would be in Seattle so we've taken every opportunity we can to enjoy the sunshine. Calum LOVES being outdoors and is such a good baby, all I do is spread a blanket out on the grass and he's happy for hours.

Calum has some cute little tank tops he's been wearing to help keep him cool in the heat. On Tuesday we had our second meeting of our post natal group and I had him in a pale green one; the guest speaker was a dentist and she thought Calum was a little girl! She covered it up by saying he was going to be a lady killer but I still thought it was pretty funny.

The post natal group has been great; I even made the initiative last week to see if anyone wanted to get together for coffee so this Wednesday a few of us are going out and I'm really looking forward to it. I also found out about a "power stroller" group that meets locally to me every Friday for walks and am going to start doing that so slowly but surely I'm making new friends and finding new things for Calum and I to do to keep busy during the week which is making the adjustment to stay at home Mom a lot easier.

As for a general Calum update, his latest love is his mobile, he could spend ages in his crib looking at it and gives us his biggest smiles then. He's found a new talent for puking on Daddy when he gets home from work which is pretty funny-I can be with him all day and not have any problems but at least once a night Mark gets showered on which is probably down to all the bouncing around and playing he does with Calum. This is definitely our last week with Calum in the Moses basket, he keeps me up in the morning stretching out and pushing out the sides of the basket. Calum is now also managing to sleep through from about 10 p.m. until 5 a.m. every night which means there is a light at the end of the tunnel in terms of him sleeping through the night. He is just such a good baby, all of the women in my post natal group have remarked on how contented he is and I feel very lucky. Yesterday he weighed in at 13 lbs 14 oz which means he gained only 3 oz from last week and might be slowing down since he was in the 98th percentile for weight!

Hope you all have a great 4th-I will be thinking of you and wishing I could celebrate. I'm going to have a barbecue but it just won't be the same without the fireworks. Enjoy x

Calum crashed out in the grass

Calum in one of his tanks


Calum & Daddy after dinner