Harrison's First Christmas

As you can imagine, this Christmas was a special one at the Casa de Sullivan. Harrison was
adorable as he looked at our lit Christmas tree and said "wow". [It's one of his only words, but he seems to use it very appropriately. For those of you wondering, other words include: Dada, Momom, whoa, achoo (like a sneeze), and hello. There might be others, but we don't recognize them yet.] We had a steady stream of visitors and holiday cheer, including all six of Harry's grandparents. We ate lots of yummy cookies and snacks, and had a few tasty beverages. Harry tried to eat the wrapping paper, tissue paper, and basically anything else he could get his hands on. He received many wonderful gifts, and Brendan and I said over and over that we needn't have bought him a thing! Santa brought him books, the Bee Bop Band in a drum, and new socks to keep his piggies warm.

Santa was good to Mom and Dad, too, and we've been spending our week listening to new CDs and playing with our fun new gadgets. We still feel we got the best present ever possible back in July, and most of our week has been spent enjoying him.

'Tis the morning of Christmas...

...and all through the house
only two creatures stir,
a mom and her mouse (er, rabbit).
The stockings are filled
and the tree has been lit
I sure hope the pants
I bought for The Dad will fit!


Ahh, poetry is not my thing. Harry was up quite a bit last night, but is finally sleeping well so I am enjoying a moment of peace before the houshold stirs and the coffee starts brewing. How very thankful I am, and how very blessed, to have this little family today.

Merry Christmas to you and yours...may you all have a moment of peace in which to count your blessings.

Harry Houdini, reincarnated

As witnessed earlier this week, Harry is pushing his boundaries around the house. He climbed the stairs, he's scrambling over our chairs, crawling into our cupboards, and he's trying like mad to get onto the couch. He wants to be up, uP, UP!!!

And yesterday he decided to be ouT, oUT, OUT! That's right, he climbed out of his pack'n'play, fell headfirst toward the floor, and broke his fall by hitting his head on the wheel on hthe way down. He's sporting some very red road rash on his forehead, but is otherwise fine. Brendan and I were much more traumatized by this than Harry was...our dear boy was actually a little pleased with himself, especially when we proceeded to read his favorite book to him repeatedly all day long (to soothe him, er, ourselves).

Our big question now is: How do we contain an avid climber? What if he climbs out of his crib? We're not ready for a toddler bed, as he's only ten months old. How will Mom shower and get dressed each day if she can't put him in something for a minute or two? Ladies and gentlemen, it's the end of an era, the Era of the Contained Baby. It was nice while it lasted, but things are going to have to change around here now...

Oh CHristmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

Today is the Winter Solstice, the shortest day of the year, and I am so happy it is here. After today we get more sunlight day by day until the snow melts back into water, soaks into the soil, and the world around us is reborn with the arrival of Spring. Today is also the first official day of Winter, so we have a long way to go.

The Winter Solstice is also the beginning of the Twelve Days of Christmas (December 21 through January 1) & the official start of holiday related festivities and traditions. In keeping with tradition Brendan and I took Harrison to cut down his first Christmas tree this past Saturday. After my rant about the Santa Claus photograph tradition I won't go into my feelings about cutting down a tree so we can decorate it and keep it in the house for a week, after which we toss it...I can justify it by saying trees are a renewable resource, we were supporting a local farmer and the local economy, and when we're done with it we put ours in the woods behind our house where wild critters can use it for habitat...and there's nothing quite like the smell of a real Christmas tree wafting through the house. We dressed Harrison in his new puffy snowsuit with matching booties, grabbed our saw, and headed into the trees of Stiles Farm in Fort Ann just as the sun was beginning to set over the mountains. It was a warm afternoon for the first time in weeks, and Harrison enjoyed the opportunity to be outside after so many days of being cooped up in the house.

We chose a smaller tree this year...last year we had to tie our tree up from the top because the it was a little too tall for the stand. Harrison looked at us like we were a little bit nuts as we carried our tree to the car and put it in...I guess seeing this for the first time would be strange! As we were leaving the tree farm the sun finally set, and the sky was amazing...the pictures really don't do it justice.

On the way home the lights on the slopes of West Mountain looked like a strand of Christmas lights, and our cozy little family of three snuggled a little further into our coats while the temperatures outside dropped. We sang along with the carols on the radio and counted our blessings the whole way home.

Adventures in stair climbing, or, Mom's first official heart attack.

I was on the phone for a little while this morning, and Harrison was playing at my feet with a ball of yarn from my knitting bag. And then he was halfway up the stairs! Within seconds, he moved from my feet to the stairs and then climbed them at lightning speed, chasing Charlotte of course. It's as though he'd watched the pups enough times to see how it's done, and then just decided to get up and do it. "Oh no!..." I thought as I raced to the scene, my baby's short life flashing before my eyes, "...he can't be climbing flights of stairs yet, he's only ten months old!" I made it to him before he fell to what I was sure would be his death, or at least major bodily harm, and when I made it to his side to catch him he laughed. Little stinker. I was shaking and scolding myself for bad parenting, and he thought it was a grand lark, something fun to be repeated later. I sat him down at my feet again, and he made a beeline for the stairs. We played this new game for a little while, and finally I gave him a bath as distraction. Quite obviously, it is time for us to buy some baby gates. And no more talking on the phone with one eye on the baby, I promise!

Santa, Baby

I've been having an inner debate for the last few weeks as we head into the full blown Christmas season: to have Harrison sit with Santa, or not to have him sit with Santa. It's a traditional American thing to do, I know, but in many ways it creeps me out. You go to the mall at this time of year and there is a line that stretches, seemingly to the horizon, of children with runny noses dressed in their Sunday best waiting to sit on the lap of a man their parents don't know who is dressed as a plump old elf. And then they have their photo taken with said stranger, and pass copies to all of their relatives who ooh and ahh over the cuteness of it all. If there is intelligent life on other planets, they probably avoid earth for reasons such as this!

Who is the man behind the mask? We all hope he's a nice grandfatherly type who finds this job something fun to break up the monotony of his retirement, or something along those lines. Do they do any sort of screening for the position? A background check? I know I must sound crazy and paranoid, but you never know who your neighbors really are, let alone the guy who plays Santa at the local shopping mall. We've all seen stories on the evening news about the guy/girl next door who turned out to be a murderer, child molester, etc. These things worry me now that I'm a mom...it turns out that motherhood makes you think twice about a lot of things that used to seem normal.

It also turns out that I'm not as cynical as I sound. While shopping yesterday with Harrison's Aunt Brooke, we ran into Santa. And there was no line at all, just one child ahead of us, and Harrison was the one with the runny nose. So I caved, and I now present to you, for your oohing and ahhing enjoyment, a photograph of Harrison sitting on Santa's lap, gazing with wonderment at his very bearded visage.





















Ooh! Ahh! He is so darned cute! I think he was actually trying to figure out a way to pilfer Santa's glasses, but to the naked (non-parental) eye he seems awe struck.

It wasn't so bad after all. I got over my fears of Santa being less-than-wholesome, and let my baby participate in this strange American tradition. It turns out that motherhood also teaches you to let go and enjoy the moment. He'll only be a baby once, after all.

A runny nose and a fat lip

After a few days of swapping germs with his cousins and our extended famillies, and almost a week of no naps and random bedtimes, Harrison is sick with a bad head cold. And, unlike most adults I know, he's smiling through it like it's no bother at all, except when we swoop in with a tissue to mop up his drippy face. When we must clean him up he screams at the top of his lungs and makes us feel like the worst parents in the world. But the alternative is...yuck. We've been giving him Benadryl to clear up his nose, but it makes him very sleepy and dopey. Poor little guy. I hate seeing him like this; even if he seems cheery I know it's no fun to lose the ability to breathe through your nose.

To top it all off Harrison pulled a chair over on himself just before bedtime and split his lip open...blood all over, screaming, tears, etc. It was awful. And I was two feet away but couldn't get there in time to stop it from happening. Brendan, who was working on the basement at the time of The Accident, rushed to our aid, cleaned up our boy, and hugged the poor mom who felt awful that she let this happen to her already ill child. We let him suck on an icecube, which helped stop the bleeding, made him smile with our endless games of peek-a-boo (his puffed out bottom lip still touched his top lip when he smiled...my poor baby), and promptly sent him to bed. We're hoping for a less dramatic, and less drippy, day tomorrow.

Coming soon....pictures of our basement project! Stay tuned...