Happy New Year!

The Birkett's 2009 in Review

How time flies. It feels like I was just writing our 2008 in review and anticipating the arrival of Anderson. So much has happened this year - good and sad.  As usual Bri and I didn't stop traveling, but it's the first in recent memory we didn't use our passports. However, that was not for a lack of trying.  We were all set to head to Mexico with Anderson and friends in September when hurricane Jimena struck. The silver lining is that we *think* we are scheduled to go in April (need to check on that) and Anderson has his first passport.

We started the year off by taking a short babymoon over to Oahu.  Bri and I haven't been to that island in about 4 years and had a great time hanging out in the sleepy North Shore and walking a long beach to come across the "Lost" beach set among other things.

Of course the biggest event of 2009 for us was the arrival of Anderson.  We've been enjoying these last 8 months adjusting to our new life of a family of 3.  He is such a joy to be around. We're also very lucky that we have a sleeper.  Sure the first few months were brutal, but just around the time I was headed back to work Anderson decided to grace us with 12 hour sleeping. His naps always the best, but I'll take him sleeping from 7pm - 6:30/7am every night over a good nap. Our daycare provider may beg to differ.

While we didn't head out of the country we did do our fair share of traveling.  Anderson spent about 3 weeks total in New Jersey on two separate trips. The lucky little guy flew 1st class on his first ever plane ride and once more on another flight.  I wish Bri and I could say we've flown 1st class on 50% of our flights.  The year was filled with other happy moments: Abby was married to Travis in August down the shore in a beautiful ceremony, the Toy family relatives threw Anderson a wonderful Red Egg & Ginger party, my mom made several trips out to CA to visit Anderson,  Bri threw me an awesome 30th birthday party complete with lobster and we've been blessed with many family and friends who we care about deeply.

Shortly after Anderson was born, my Uncle Mike passed away suddenly.  He was a wonderful husband, dad, uncle and friend.  My Aunt and cousins have handled his passing with more grace and strength than can be imagined.  I'm sure as 2009 wrapped up they were none to happy to see it pass by because of this and other challenges presented to them throughout the year.  The year did, however, end on a good note for my family - Michael, my cousin, proposed to his awesome girlfriend Jenn.

That's it, a very brief wrap up of our year - 2009 was more than we could have hoped or expected.  We've witnessed our child being born and go from little more than a "blob" (to quote Angelina Jolie) to a sweet little baby boy who changes daily in front of our eyes and can't even being to imagine what the next year will bring.

Christmas 2009

Christmas has come and gone but we'll always remember this one. We had a great holiday and consider it a success. We started off the holiday by celebrating Christmas Eve at Uncle David and Auntie Linda's house. They cooked a fantastic dinner straight out of Julia Childs cookbook. Anderson liked spending some quality time with everyone. He can't wait for his next cousin to be born in January! Jen & Steve are having a baby boy.

On Christmas morning we woke up and spent time as our small family. We loved every second of it! Anderson opened his stocking first and then some gifts from Santa, Mom & Dad, Nan and G-Pa & Grammy. What a lucky little boy - he made Santa's nice list for sure. Lots of awesome toys and clothes. Poa Poa and Tai Poa Poa came over for breakfast and brought along some presents as well. Anderson had a lot of fun opening all of them and especially liked chewing on paper and boxes. He say "Thank you" to everyone who thought of him. It was very generous and thoughtful.

After hanging out with Poa Poa and Tai Poa Poa for a bit he headed off for a nap and then it was off to celebrate Christmas day with his cousins! Hannah and Jesse, with their parents help, hosted all of us for Christmas dinner. Again we were spoiled with such a wonderful meal. Nate and Julie cooked up a Christmas ham and lots of fixings. Anderson enjoyed himself and then got a bit cranky since he skipped his afternoon nap and some soon-to-be teeth decided to give him a problem. All in all he was a champ and loved playing with his cousins, Hannah, Jesse and Griffin. So many toys! So much to chew on! Despite his mood in the picture to the right, it was a complete success! :-)

8 months old

We're 6 days away from "Baby's 1st Christmas". I'm kinda excited. Christmas had lost its sheen as we became jaded adults. Now that we have a child, a few nieces and a nephew it is hard not to get into the spirit. I've been in Toys R Us more in the past two weeks than I could have imagined. Bri and I took Anderson to meet Santa Claus about two weeks ago. It went really well, we didn't expect him to cry or freak out but I did expect him to reach out for the impressive long grey beard Santa has grown for the occasion/job. Anderson is a big fan of his uncle Jamie's beard and G-Pa's mustache but not so much of Santa's. We purchased a great shot of Anderson looking up at him probably thinking, "Who is this guy that my mom dropped me off with?" or "hmmm do I yank the beard or the glasses first."

As you can guess by the posts title, Anderson is 8 month old today. He's no longer content sitting on the chair posing for a cute picture with Julius. No. Not at all. He is my kid. The apple didn't fall far from the tree when it came to independence. He wouldn't allow a good picture until he was on the floor sitting by himself, and not in a sitting pose I put him in. He had to crawl around and sit himself down before he wanted to even be near Julius for his monthly picture. *sigh* I love him. Who wouldn't though! I caught up with a blog post earlier this week about all the happenings that have been taking place.

I can't wait to take advantage of two back-to-back 3 day work weeks. I'm going to try and sleep in as much as possible (pipe dream, A wants breakfast usually no later than 7am) but other than that I plan to lounge around and catch up on enjoying all the little moments with Bri, A and Evita. Happy Holidays!

TV Debut

I forgot to blog about this! Anderson made his TV debut back in October on a local news magazine, Eye on the Bay. We were recruited to participate in a baby wearing segment. Anderson was a little less than three months old at the time, so when it aired my heart melted! He was so itty bitty. You can view it here: Anderson's TV DEBUT! Let it load and scroll to the 4:45, 5:26 or 6:00 minute marks to see him. As a thank you from CBS we were sent an Ergo Baby Carrier in their new Grey/Star pattern in July- it didn't hit store shelves until October. It's actually a great carrier for him right now. It does a front, back and side carry. I still really enjoy the carrier I bought before he was born.

The bag of tricks explodes

So this is a few days earlier than the usual monthly update but I needed to record this so I didn't forget. The last 2 weeks have been jam packed with new tricks from Anderson. Besides his repertoire of physical skills he also has two teeth! So cute, they are the center two teeth on the bottom. They are hard to get a peak at but if you stick your (clean) finger in his mouth, you'll yelp - those suckers are sharp. kind of like puppy teeth.

As for for everything else - whoa. This kid has been army crawling for a while now and getting up on all fours and rocking for some weeks. Well he finally put it all together and he's just hustling about going wherever he wants. No longer is he content to stay on the carpet. Nope, I left him in his bedroom and he followed me to the living room. What else you say? Well he can now sit all by himself. He crawls, finds a toy and then sits. When he's done he moves on and crawls away. We found out about his sitting when I heard him crying in his crib when he was supposed to be napping - I open the door and he's sitting upright in the middle of his crib. Good times. Bri has it on his to-do list to lower the crib, as we've been watching him get on his knees and try to pull up on a variety of items. While this is so exciting and new, it's also bittersweet. He'll be 8 months this week - totally more little boy than baby at this point.

He's also putting on some more weight. As of Saturday he weighed in a an ounce shy of 15 1/2 lbs. yeah! Favorite foods include Yogurt (organic, plain of course!) and any variety of winter squash. I've been making almost all of his food from scratch. It's not hard at all I use these little steam bags and pop the food in my mini prep. In about 20 minutes I have enough food for the whole week. We're becoming more adventurous in our offerings and starting to add spices to the mix. So far there is not much he won't eat.

Enjoy a video of Anderson performing his new tricks and Evita getting a little freaked out he's on the move.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We hope you had a good one - as you can see in the picture above Anderson enjoyed himself. What does a 7 month old do to celebrate the Pilgrims and Indians? Eat of course, just like everyone else. Anderson had a tasty meal that consisted of Oatmeal, Sweet Potatoes, green Beans and Apples with Cinnamon. Cinnamon is the new food/spice du jour.

Anderson crossed the 7 month mark last week. We had our weight check and he's now a whopping 14 lbs 12 oz - up slightly over a pound in the last month. That still puts him in the 1st percentile in weight, but at least he gained more in one month than he did between Aug & Oct.

Weight aside, he's just kicking ass and taking names. Have I gushed how rad this kid is? Cause he is, and I know I might be biased and all, but really you need to trust me. He is dragging himself all around - no more leaving him alone or he'll wind up in the dog bowl, in the fireplace (don't worry it's just empty brick) or somewhere that hasn't been mopped. Work has been kicking my ass this month, so I haven't seen him as much as I would have liked. Throw in an overnight (our first!) wedding in L.A. and I really feel like I missed a lot of November. Let me tell you, that overnight was a long time coming - Bri and I had a blast celebrating Andy and Tracy's wedding. Maybe too much - oh champagne, how I have missed you in such large quantities. :-) That said, we got hosed and weren't able to catch any additional sleep. I think Tai Poa and Poa Poa got more sleep than us. A goes to bed at 7pm and doesn't wake until 6:30 - 7:30 am. Bri and I stayed up way to late and I being the good mom got up at 6:15 to pump and then off to the airport we went. One day I will sleep in and have Bri feed the kid. one day.

I'm so excited Thanksgiving has come and gone - cause that means only one thing. December!! Christmas music, the smell of pine trees and non-stop viewings of A Christmas Story and Love Actually. Two movies that just get me in the spirit. I also can't wait to ship our Christmas Card this year - Jen and Aaron of Tidbit Designs (and wonderful cousins on Bri's side), helped us create what I think is the best.christmas.card.ever and that's not an exaggeration.