Thanksgiving/Sarah's Birthday

Sarah’s Birthday fell right on Thanksgiving this year, but we still went to my brother’s house for dinner as usual. My mom brought some presents that she had received in the mail. One of them was from Brittie, my ex-husband’s mom. Great to have awesome inlaws. She sent a book with Thomas Kinkade art and inspirational quotes, as well as a card with 40 bucks, the part Sarah liked more I’m sure. The other one we weren’t even sure who it came from – a box from Amazon was all we knew. That turned out to be the strangest gift ever. It was from my ex Rusty and he sent Sarah every CD the Beatles ever made. Really weird considering he never even talks to her. My brother was sure excited though. He offered her $100 for the whole box- not too bad of a ripoff – the bill was in the box for $183 and Sarah was much happier with the money. Orion was a good boy. He even let me sit at the table with everyone and eat. He sat on my lap most of the time and with Sarah at the end.

Teething

Now we think our giant son may be teething already. For the two weeks or so after he got his shots, he kept running a low grade fever. I finally took him back to see Dr. Krumian , He checked him over and pronounced him fine and said to not bother with any more Tylenol. He said sometimes babies just don’t regulate their temperature very well at first. But considering the excessive drooling he is doing and the constant gnawing of fists or whatever else he can get in his mouth, early teething seems to be a likely culprit. Hopefully the actual teeth won’t appear too early. I don’t want any surprise chomping during meals.

First Play Already?!

Orion went to his first play yesterday! Frank at Buena High School adapted The Nightmare Before Christmas for the stage and a number of people Sarah knows were in it. She had asked me to take her awhile ago and then Ron’s sister Chris planned a dinner party the same night as kindof a housewarming. Plus Sarah had to work until right before the play started, so a bit of confusion, but it worked out pretty well. Rose was cooking the turkey because Chris doesn’t have an oven yet. So I went and visited with the family there for a little bit before heading over to Buena. The play was surprisingly good and Orion was pretty quiet through most of it. I stood in back with another mom who was bouncing her boy around for part of it. It was a pretty short play so Sarah and I were able to stop by afterward as well and see the new place. Right on Poli with a view of the ocean supposedly – it was dark so we didn’t see that. The inside is quite lovely, with wood floors and some nice stained glass pieces. A great investment no doubt.

Another Outing

Last night Orion and I went to a Baha’i gathering with Fanny. She was born in Columbia, but raised in this faith, which originated in Iran and fosters brotherly love and peace through a belief in the unification of all religions. In November they celebrate the birth of their founder, Baha’u’llah, and they hosted a nice dinner at a local community center. The people were all very nice and Orion was a pretty good boy. There was a presentation by the children about the life of Baha’u’llah, and I had to stand up with him through part of that, but overall he was a quiet boy.

Holiday Tamales!

I went to Fanny’s house today for the annual holiday tamale making. I love tamales and have always wanted to see how they are traditionally made. They vary all over Latin America and the Columbians do a great job I must say, or at least Fanny's family does! She makes them with chicken or beef and capers, bell peppers, garbanzo beans, cilantro, onions and raisins soaked in red wine. Yumm! Also, they wrap them in plantain leaves instead of corn husks. Her whole family is really nice. Her sister, daughter, nephew and nephew’s girlfriend were all helping. I got assigned the same job Fanny was doing – the hardest job – which was forming the masa around the filling and wrapping the finished product up in the leaves. Orion was pretty good. I did a few with him still in the car seat, but of course that didn’t last long. Then I fed him for a bit and put him in his sling. He settled down in there so I got to make quite a few more. They cook for a long time, so I had to hang out awhile to wait for some chicken ones to be done. (They had started the beef ones first - yuck). Fanny was nice enough to give me 6 chicken ones and a couple beef for Ron and Sarah as well. Lunch for a week!

Two Month Doctor Visit

So Orion had his 2 month appointment with Dr. Krumian. Everything went pretty well, except for the shots. :( He did confirm that Orion probably has some food allergy. I have been excluding different foods, but haven’t figured out what it is yet. The other red flag that came up was a “click” in his left hip. Sometimes this can indicate dysplasia. It is extremely unlikely, but we will see a specialist just in case. His shots were really sad. I had been reading about spreading out vaccinations or delaying them, but Dr. K didn't seem to think there was anything to be concerned about. He has pretty tough skin so the nurse had to jab the needle in really hard. Sarah was freaking out. He tensed up a lot after the first one so some of them really bled. When we got home, within a couple hours his temperature was up to 100.5. The doctor had said to call if it went above 100.3, but when I talked to him, he just said to stack acetaminophen and ibuprofen and that now we will know to expect a high fever next time. Great. I am thinking this was not such a good idea.

Samhain

Well, nothing too eventful to report here considering Orion’s young age. We ordered a bat costume for him. It definitely looked cuter in the pictures. It came with wings but no way to attach them. Would have been great if he was a baby that hung out in a carseat, but getting carried they didn’t really work. It was still pretty cute. I took some pictures that have disappeared somehow so we need to put him back in the costume and take some more. The only place he wore it was a Day of the Dead themed celebration our church did on Saturday night. That was cool. We built a community altar and did some singing. There was a potluck after the service.

Sunday night we were all set with a ton of candy. There are so many kids in our condos and yet we got about 4 groups of trick or treaters??? I was sad about that. At least I got to make my traditional dinner. I bought these spider goblets at the drugstore that were pretty cool and went well with the spider napkin rings I had picked up last year at an aftersale. I didn’t quite get to make all the dishes I had planned, but I did pretty well considering all of the breaks I needed to breastfeed. The menu:

Pumpkin cheese ball for an appetizer
Salad – tried to dye the cauliflower orange, but that didn’t work out too well LOL
Chicken with pomegranate walnut sauce
Spiced carrots
Pumpkin Pie

A little scarce I know, but I had to cut some corners because of other stuff that came up. Really looking forward to next year when he can run around in some little costume and maybe even have a few sweets.