One of my favorite shows on TV is Glee. While I played one of the episodes, I noticed that Nathan was dancing to the music.
Since he kept going in circles, he lost his balanced and fell on one of the balls. But he managed to get up again and kept twirling himself. When he got up and danced again, you can tell he was dizzy.
Nathan in the back seat having his snack while we were driving back home from Corte Madera.
Since Nathan is our first child, I always wonder if Nathan’s behavior is common in some babies. After watching this documentary film called Babies, it actually answered some of my questions. Babies is a very interesting and funny film. I watched it more than once now. Even Nathan likes watching it with me because when he hears a baby talk or cry, his eyes never moves away from the TV screen.
At first I couldn’t understand why Nathan always cry and get frustrated whenever something goes wrong while he plays. I thought his toys are supposed to make him happy or something. After watching Babies, I guess it is common for a 1 year old to behave this way.
Since my husband went back to work today, it was my first day to take care of Nathan by myself. He was busy playing with his toys most of the day. He will cry at times especially when he has to take a nap. Even though he cried, he actually fell asleep quickly once I laid him down inside his crib. His nap time is usually 1 hr on average. Shortest nap time was 30 mins and longest nap time was 2 hrs.
We buy his Gerber food at Target. I buy both the 2nd Foods and 3rd Foods. The 2nd Foods is more smoother without the chunky pieces of fruits/veggies/meat. The 3rd Foods has some chunky pieces of food. Usually, I serve him the 3rd Foods for his dinner. I do give him rice with small pieces of fish, chicken or steak for dinner at times. We also buy him Gerber oatmeal and rice cereal.
I don’t allow him to go in the kitchen especially when I am cooking. Our kitchen has an island. Since he is a tiny boy, at times I don’t see him sneaking into the kitchen because he is walking on the other side of the island. If I do see him in the kitchen, I tell him to walk back to the family room which is next to the kitchen. If he doesn’t obey, I point towards the family room. When he sees me pointing to the family room, he actually walks back to the family room with a sad expression on his face of course.
He got this toy on Christmas day and has been playing with this particular toy the whole day today.
This is the picture we took as a family in Hong Kong Disneyland. At Hong Kong Disneyland, we bought a picture frame which is now displayed on top of our fireplace in the family room. Before we had Nathan, our family room was filled with pictures of me and Nelson and our cat Smeagol. Now we have a picture with our first child in the family room.
Year 2010 seems to have past us quickly. It feels like it was yesterday when I watched Colbie Caillat perform Begin Again on stage at the Aria hotel for the 2010 New Years Party in Las Vegas on TV.
So far, Nathan is adjusting with us. He will eat just about anything even vegetables which is good. But he doesn’t know when to stop eating. When I feel his stomach, his stomach is like bloated! But for some reason, he doesn’t know he is full. So when I take him out of his booster seat, he cries because he wants more food. I want a growing healthy baby. I don’t want a fat baby. :-0
Once in a while, we bring him along when we go grocery shopping. He loves sitting on the shopping cart. He actually behaves while sitting on the shopping cart.
He is teething a lot lately. We put mittens on him when he takes a nap or sleeps at night because he tends to pull his hair or scratch his ears and face. When he does those things, it is usually a sign that he is very tired. So when he has mittens on, he bites on it. He doesn’t like the teether I bought him. He prefers to bite on a blanket, stuff animal or his mittens instead.
Miyasaki family visited us today with their 2.5 year old daughter Kaya.
While I was cooking dinner, I noticed that Nathan was clapping and babbling while sitting on his booster seat.
Today was Nathan’s first Christmas in US! Of course since he is only 14 months old, he has no clue how special today is.
This morning, he got a nice bath.
Then he put on his best holiday clothes and posed in front of the Christmas tree
Since Christmas was at our house, I baked chocolate with vanilla frosting and red velvet cupcakes with cream cheese frosting the night before. I also made chicken pasta with broccoli and garlic alfredo sauce. My husband wanted seared ahi tuna tacos with mango salsa. So I made that too with my husband’s help with preparing the ingredients. My in-laws brought chicken drumsticks, mix vegetables, and ham. My mom baked turkey and brought mashed potatoes with turkey gravy. 
Play time!
Nathan’s appt at the Craniofacial dept was originally on Jan 3. Since Nathan is adopted, the appt was moved up earlier to today so that we can take care of the paperwork and a team of specialist can see Nathan asap. The appt took over 2.50 hrs! First we met with the receptionist who gave us the paperwork. Secondly, a nurse talked to us and asked questions about why we decided to adopt a special needs child, if Nathan is our first child, if we have information about his family history (since he was abandoned, we do not know his family history), how much we know about cleft lip/palate, where he got his cleft lip surgery, where and when we adopted him, etc. The nurse also talked about cleft palate surgery like what to expect, how long it will take, etc. Thirdly, we met with a Orthodontist who looked at Nathan’s teeth to make sure that his teeth are growing well after he had his cleft lip repaired and to see how many teeth he has. Last person we met was the doctor who will perform the cleft palate surgery.
Nathan’s surgery will be Jan 21. The surgery will take about 1 hr and 10 mins. One hour for the actual surgery on palate and 10 mins to insert a microscopic tube inside Nathan’s both ears. Due to Nathan’s open palate, there is some liquid inside both of his ears. Luckily, he has no ear infection. Since there is some liquid inside his ears, the nurse said that Nathan may not be hearing us properly. This microscopic tube will help drain the liquid out of his ears. The tube will eventually fall out on its own without surgical intervention. After the surgery, Nathan will need to stay at the hospital for 1 or 2 days and the nurse will make sure he will be able to drink liquids because for two weeks after surgery, he will only be able to eat liquid foods. No fruits, chicken, fish and rice for him until his palate has healed. The stitches in his mouth will dissolve on its own. Nathan will wear some type of elbow restraint for two weeks or until his palate has healed from surgery. The elbow restraint will prevent him from bending his elbow and touching his mouth after surgery.
After his palate is repaired, he will have a follow up appt with the doctor and we will meet another specialist who will work with him. I believe this other specialist will be the speech therapist. Since Nathan is adopted, there are special services that are free for him such as speech therapy. Since we live near Napa, driving to SF for Nathan’s future speech therapy sessions will be a hassle. I want to find a speech therapist closer to our home. The nurse told us that a new law was passed in which children born with cleft palate will be covered for orthodontic expenses. It is good to know what health coverage and free services are available for children who are adopted and born with cleft lip/palate. This will save us some money.
After Nathan’s appt, I did some last minute Christmas shopping in downtown SF. Plus we went to Safeway and Costco to get some things for our family Christmas party.
Nathan is getting better at taking his milk (regular vitamin D milk). In our first week in China with him, he was fine drinking his formula. In the second week, he would finish his milk formula but not all the time. After coming back home in US, he would not drink his milk formula and regular milk at all. He would only take a few sips and he refuses to drink afterwards. Our doctor told us that we have to give him his milk since he is lacking in vitamins. To make Nathan drink his milk, we use a dropper. First time we tried the dropper, he would cry and keep his mouth closed. But once he cries and opens his mouth, we put the dropper into his mouth and pour the milk. He cried until the milk was gone. Today, he made a little fuss when we gave him his milk but he eventually stopped crying and allowed me to pour milk into his mouth.
We did some Christmas shopping today with Nathan. We made sure he ate a big meal first then had a little nap before going out so that he doesn’t make a lot of fuss. We went to the Old Navy in Vallejo and parking there wasn’t hard to find. Going through the cash register wasn’t too bad because the line wasn’t long. If we had gone to the Old Navy at the Fairfield mall, I am sure parking would be a problem as well as standing in line to purchase some items. Normally, I would have been done with my Christmas shopping by now. However, my life is definitely different having Nathan. I am sure my husband would let me go to the mall and do some Christmas shopping but I just prefer to stay home with them.
After we did some Christmas shopping, we visited the Alvarez family so they can meet Nathan. They live about 5 – 10 mins drive from our house. We have known them for at least 10 years. They always make us feel very welcome in their house. At first, Nathan didn’t walk around as much inside the house. Once he got warmed up with everyone, he started to walk around more and babbled at times. He was quite taken with Pumpkin, the Alvarez’s cat. I was taken with Pumpkin too because he has pretty eyes and his fluffy fur would definitely keep someone’s legs warm. We still allow our cat Smeagol to sleep with us in bed. Good thing he doesn’t jump into Nathan’s crib. When Smeagol sleeps with us in bed, he either keeps my legs or Nelson’s legs warm at night. Nathan liked playing with the box of Ghirardelli chocolates that was on the coffee table. In one instance, he managed to take the top off and some pieces of chocolates fell onto the floor. Good thing the individual chocolates were still wrapped in plastic. Even though I took the box of chocolates away from him and placed it back onto the coffee table, he would walk back to the coffee table and grab the box again.
Neftali… aka ‘el magnifico’… and Nathan
Maria with Nathan
Back at our house, I changed Nathan upstairs in our bedroom. In our master bath, we have this mirrored closet door. Not too many house owners like having mirrored closet doors (yes, I watch a lot of house hunters on HGTV) , but I actually do because it is a space saver. I don’t want a standing mirror on the floor. But anyway, while I was drying my wet face, Nathan was staring at me in the mirror. While he was staring at me, I started to stomp my feet. He then started to stomp his feet as well. Downstairs in the kitchen, I told Nelson about it and told Nathan to stomp his feet again. Since Nathan didn’t understand what I was talking about, I stomped my feet again to show him. Afterwards, he started to stomp his feet and even took his stomping further. He began to dance! See the video Nelson took. With the music Nelson added to the video, it even made Nathan’s dancing even more enjoyable to watch. 🙂
This is a video of us putting up the artificial Christmas tree days ago.
Christmas will be at our house this year. Today, we put up our fake Christmas tree in our living room. Last time we celebrated Christmas at our house was at least more than 4 years ago.
My nieces is spending the weekend at our house. They helped us decorate the Christmas tree and even babysit Nathan. They really kept Nathan busy while I had more time to put our clean laundry away and clean a little. They are actually very good babysitters. But of course they will never change his stinky diaper. 🙂
Joy and Jewel playing and watching over Nathan in our family room.
Joy and Jewel decorating the Christmas tree in living room.
When I was hanging the Christmas wreath outside our front door, I notice this big box on our porch. Since I don’t recall ordering anything online, I asked my husband that he received some package. He doesn’t remember ordering anything online either. When we opened the box, we were surprised to see a baby gift basket from Pixar. The baby basket has some stuff animals, dried fruits, baby bottle, baby lotion and other wonderful stuff. This was very thoughtful of Pixar to send us this baby gift basket. We thank them for sending this wonderful gift.
We went to my in-laws house for dinner. I brought my two nieces (Joy and Jewel) with us. Today was their first time meeting their new cousin Nathan. Also today, it was my nieces first time meeting Nelson’s 1 yr old niece Selena. Selena started to walk too. Now she can follow Nathan anywhere.
Nelson told his parents that we plan on adopting a baby girl (also with cleft lip/palate). We hope to start the adoption process sometime in mid-2011. I get very excited just to even talk or write about it. One of the bedrooms in our house is already decorated with a Disney Princess theme. We will name her Isabella. Our adoption agency releases a waiting children list (special needs list) every few weeks. So our chances of being matched with another child would definitely be faster unlike adopting a non-special needs child which is still a 4 – 6 year wait.
After dinner, we went to Pixar to watch Tron with my two nieces while Nelson took our son to his office to play. Nelson told me that Nathan really kept himself busy playing with some toys. My mom-in-law made Nathan some extra porridge in case he got hungry while they waited for us until the movie was over.
We have been back from China for almost a week now. Still, I have a hard time waking up early. My husband forces himself to get up between 8:00 – 8:30am so he can feed Nathan his breakfast. Nathan is usually still asleep at that time (he is still in China time) but we don’t want him to wake up too late in the morning. As for me, I stay in bed for a while and sleep. Before we left for China, my wake up time was between 6am – 7am. Now, I get up after 9:30am.
