Brady's first Christmas party at nursery and visit with Father Christmas. Brady was certainly the life of the party and spent the first 20 minutes entertaining all the parents by laughing, squealing, crawling, standing and talking to them all (would have been embarassed that I couldn't control him but they all seemed to enjoy his entertaining skills). There was a lull in the party while everyone was waiting for the toddlers to get dressed for the presentation so it was good having something to break the ice for all the parents who were sitting around the room very quietly. At least that's my justification! Oh I forgot my camera (sadly) so I had to use my blackberry so the quality of photos isn't great but you get the idea. I got the chance to talk to Santa's parents (the little girl who Brady plays with all the time at nursery). They were really friendly and we obviously had a lot of common stories. They suggested that I should try giving Brady blueberries. I'm really excited to try that out because he loved the peas so much and the spaghetti I gave him on Monday evening.

Earlier in the day I had taken Brady to the Health Visitor to have him weighed since when they weighed him at the doctors office last week it appeared that he'd lost weight since his last weigh in at the end of September. Fortunately...it was wrong he curently weighs 20lbs ~8oz (oh man I can't remember the ounces exactly). I got there early so I was looking at the programs that were posted on the walls and noticed a sign about a "sleep help clinic/group" so I asked her about that. She asked about his sleep habits and then what his routine was. I got my wrist slapped I think for putting him to bed with a bottle - well he falls asleep in my arms at night drinking his bottle and then I put him down to bed and he may startle but goes straight back to sleep. Then I got told that he's almost a year and I need to get him off the bottle and should give him his milk and other liquids in a cup. She also suggested that he doesn't need all the liquids he drinks through the night (he drinks 19 ounces between 7 p.m. and 3 a.m.) so I'm supposed to try substituting water or a very watered down milk. I told her about the ear infections and that when he wakes up screaming he's pulling on his ears so I feel awful not giving him anything and the swallowing really seems to ease the pain. She asked if I'd given him Calpol for the pain and I told her I tried that Monday morning at 2 a.m. when he got up and was in pain and it seemed to wake him up and he was up for the next three hours crawling around the flat refusing to go back to sleep (until he crashed on me just after 5 a.m.). Anyway - she decided that since I'm a single mom she didn't want to leave me in the lurch and would refer me to the sleep clinic and I would probably hear from the lady in the new year.

Last night Laura came around for dinner and to spend the night. Brady was in a great mood once he saw her and was in no hurry to go to bed. Since I decided I should break the drink milk to fall asleep habit I gave him the bottle to drink while he was up playing with us in the living room. After he finished it and it got closer to 7:30 I decided it was time to put him to bed so we changed him (skipped the bath last night because I didn't want to warm the milk in his tummy and result in him getting sick) and put him into his cot completely 100% awake and screaming. He screamed for about 15 minutes but then was out for the night. We ordered Chinese and then enjoyed watching an episode of Grey's as well as the movie "I now pronounce you chuck and larry" - while I attempted to write all of my UK based Christmas cards. We finished up around 11 p.m. and then decided to get ready for bed. Just a few minutes after the movie finished we heard Brady making noise so since I had to move him into my bedroom anyway I got him up and put him in my bed and left him drinking his bottle. After Laura was all set I helped him finish up his bottle and he quite fussy but eventually fell asleep on me....and believe it or not the next thing I knew I turned over feeling quite awake and refreshed and it was 6:28 (two minutes before my alarm) - my turning over woke up Brady and he started babbling quite happily! Ahh a full nights sleep!!! How wonderful and amazing is that. So either he likes it best when there is someone else there when he goes to bed or there really is something to putting him to bed awake (which I know since I've read all the books). Tonight I'll try attempt number two on my own putting him to bed awake - fingers crossed!

Tomorrow we fly off to Colorado so I've got a night of packing, washing & cleaning ahead of me - sadly the landlord plans to come and visit the flat while I'm away for two weeks to check on the damage from the leak in the ceiling so I've got to clean the flat so he isn't astonished at the state of the flat. Honestly it isn't that messy but I definitely need to clean the bathroom. Since all the rooms have keys on the I think I will probably lock my bedroom door and leave all my valuables in there while I'm away.

Ahh I can't wait only ~30 hours until I land in the good ole USA I can almost taste the Jr. Bacon Cheeseburgers....

First time standing! :) Today we got home from nursery school and Brady was trying to reach for me and for the first time he let go and stood on his own! He did it again about fifteen minutes later. Now I have to admit he's not standing for a long period of time but it was the first time he's stood without holding onto anything and it was the most exciting thing for me! Now I guess it'll sink in that if he's standing he's probably only a few weeks away from walking and with that a few days away from running but I'll savor my little moment of happiness over this awesome accomplishment!

This Saturday morning as I was getting ready to dress him Brady started clapping for me all on his own - every weekend I'd been trying to teach him to clap and also to do "high fives" and it was so cool to see him just start clapping completely unprovoked. He's picking up so much now. Everytime I go to feed him something he thinks he'll like the arms go flailing out with excitement. When I feed him and he's had enough he shakes his head no when I try to give him more. It's so cool to actually get some communication from him - and even though he's been doing it for a few months its still great to see him wave bye-bye to me everytime I leave him at nursery. The other thing he's been doing the past few weeks is opening and closing doors - now he can't open the handles but he can get his hand around the door and pull it open. After the horror stories I heard in Scotland about one of the girls losing the tip of her finger in a hinge I'm glad that we have the door protectors on our doors so they can't close fully. He's also really into the cupboards and opening and closing those - unfortunately the one with all the detergents seems to be one of his favorite to open so I've had to temporarily put his playpen in front of it so he can't get to it. Finally he's all about opening all the drawers - unfortunately that means my clothes typically end up on the ground but it's still fun watching him walk about the house holding onto everything and then getting into everything! Ahh the little milestones are amazing. Here's hoping that he will behave Thursday when he and I take our 10+ hour flight to Denver - thank goodness its non-stop.

Time flies...I just finished reading up on my girlfriend Jen & Anne's blogs and I came back to my own blog and looked at the opening page and realised its been three years and two months since I left Baltimore. It feels like yesterday. I read on Jen's blog about a Girls night she had with tacos & milkshakes and again it just all seems so recent that I was in Baltimore having girls nights weekly with my best girlfriends. It's hard to believe how much time and events have passed since I moved permanently from my home in Baltimore. I miss my girls - we had some wonderful times there and I will always count those girls amongst my best friends. Sunday Bruce & I had a talk about our future and what we'd be willing to do - we were weighing options related to a potential job opportunity with a Government agency. The three options would be a permanent position in DC, a two year stint in Boston or a two year stint in DC - we went through weighing pro's and con's and when he asked what my preference would be I came up with DC. I really thought I was over the DC/Baltimore thing and had no desire to return but as I thought through it I decided that was the silliest thing ever - some of my best girls are 45 minutes from DC and moving there would be as close to coming home as a move back to SLC. It just surprised me to hear myself saying yeah I want to move back to the DC area...I have always loved travelling and making opportunities to experience new things and meet new people but I guess there is a part of me that does want to have roots and does want to have some consistency.

At the same time I must admit for the first time since moving to London this weekend I felt like I belonged and could see myself living here permanently. Strange I know!!! Only took three plus years to discover my place - well actually it took moving into a new lovely two bedroom flat, with a massive kitchen, beautiful communal garden/tennis courts, shared lobby/stairs - where I ran into my downstairs neighbour on Friday morning who has a son two weeks older then Brady. Actually she was the turning point, she asked if I knew about the Mums & Youngs group they have within the mansions and she ended up inviting me to their Holiday party which was at her house on Saturday morning. So Saturday morning Brady & I headed down the stairs at 10 and met a bunch of moms, dads and kids. I can't remember a single name (except the lady's two sons Joshua and Jeremy) but everyone was so nice. They were from all over the world - Australia, Italy, Columbia, Spain, France . . . and it felt like I was finally part of a group. I can't wait to find out about the next meeting so I can bring Brady along to make more friends.

The rest of the weekend was also great. Friday night was our works annual party and Brady's minder, Zara, from nursery brought him over from the nursery and stayed with him while I went to the party. I was able to see him for a little bit before I left and then she gave him his bath and put him down for the night. The party was great - made even better probably by the fact that I attended with Gergana (two single mom's on their night out). I had my one glass of sparkling wine, a glass of coke to keep me up and several glasses of water to keep me hydrated. The party itself wasn't all that but we did eventually get on the dance floor and I was happy taking staged photos to try to win the photo competition! I don't know that I'll win for any of my photos but fingers crossed. After a few dances we left at 11:15 hoping to be home by midnight. Unfortunately someone pulled an emergency alarm on a train in front of us so we were delayed but I managed to get back to the flat by 12:15. Brady had been asleep the whole time so after talking to Bruce I was in bed by 1 a.m. and was anxiously anticipating a 2 a.m. waking....but for the first time in months Brady decided to sleep thru the night - at 6:30 when he started crying I was amazed that I didn't feel exhausted and was relieved when I rolled over and saw the time on the clock. We got up I showered, he had some breakfast and we played a bit before he got tired at 8:30 and went back to sleep - as did I! We actually woke up around 10 a.m. to the noise of kids arriving for the Christmas party downstairs.

After the Christmas party I packed Brady into his stroller and then headed out to the bank and then to Partridges (the American store where I was looking for Grape Jelly and I also found that Hot fudge stuff for ice cream) then we went to Waitrose and I bought so many groceries that I wound up getting a cart so I was pushing the cart and pulling Brady in the stroller behind me. Luckily enough I had brought a big bag and was able to pack all the groceries into enough bags that I could carry them and push the stroller out. Regardless I decided catch a taxi home. Brady was still asleep when we got home but woke up shortly after I got into the lobby. We spent the rest of his waking hours playing games - his current favourite being a game where he tries to pull the cord of my big Boston hooded sweatshirt and I pull it away on the other side before he can grab it or I let him get it and then tug it away from him (softly of course). He was laughing and it was so contagious! Needless to say we had a blast sitting on his bedroom floor playing. After he went to bed I started the preparations for the party - which included making the peppermint cake base and organizing groceries and the table.

Sunday morning Brady let me sleep in until 8 a.m. (unfortunately he didn't sleep thru the night). We got up and immediately started doing party preparations. I got him into his stroller around 9 and we walked over to the little Tescos to pick up some baking powder and other last minute items - on the way we ran into one of the dad's and his son! Again that awesome "I belong here" feeling came back over me. We got back from the grocery store and Brady was asleep which was great because it gave me freedom to prep. I put the last layer on the peppermint cake. I took the time to take the chicken off the carcass. I also chopped and peeled carrots & cucumbers for the sandwiches and dip. I prepared the spinach dip - and it was surprisingly easy. The first time I did it I used frozen spinach which was so difficult...this time I bought the ready washed spinach and it was soooo easy! Just threw it in the little chopper and five minutes later it was done and in the fridge chilling!

Annie was coming over at 12 but called to say she was running late. She showed up around 1 five minutes after Brady woke up. So she tried to feed Brady while I continued rushing about getting things prepared. He wouldn't eat so instead she played with him while I took the trash and last boxes to the outside rubbish. I also took a quick shower but didn't bother to comb my hair or put on make-up. Instead I was busy making PB&J sandwiches, cucumber & cream cheese sandwiches and chicken salad sandwiches when Selena arrived at 2:20. I put her to work cutting bread and putting out cheeses, then Brittney arrived and I put her to work as well. Leilani arrived and then Gergana & Oscar so it was a full busy house.

Everyone got their first cup of tea and then that was forgotten. Annie wasn't feeling well so she left quite by 3 and so the rest of us enjoyed sitting around the living room and Brady and Oscar provided most of the entertainment. Oscar is about 6 months and it was amazing to see how he could make old toys seem really exciting to Brady. Gergana put him in Bradys old bouncing chair and Brady decided he wanted to be in it so he tried to go head first under the arch and climb on top of Oscar. Fortunately we were there to prevent any pain. It was pretty funny though to watch. Everyone seemed to have a good time - I have way too many leftovers of course and the cheeses never got touched. Around 4 all the girls helped me clean up and then we all gathered in the kitchen trading birthing stories - hopefully Brittney & Selena haven't been completely put off from having children. Anyway by 5 or so everyone left and there was very little clean up left to do. Brady was pretty well wired so even though I tried to give him his bath at 6 p.m. to get him to bed he was happy as a clam after so I gave him a bottle and we hung out until he finally dropped off at 9. Hopefully tonight he will go to bed a bit sooner...

Well that's the recap from the weekend - not much happened during the week after Laura's visit and I shouldn't expect much to happen between now and Laura's visit on Thursday but we'll see. Only about 10 days until we leave to fly home to Denver for the start of our two week Christmas whirlwind. It's going to be so wonderful to be home! Now I just hope I can get the last of my Christmas shopping done soon and that I can get my Christmas cards started - I kept putting it off waiting to determine the perfect Brady picture but now I'm running out of time...so maybe it'll have to be a New Years card! : )

20 November to 1 December 2009

The last blog entry was on the 19th of December, the day before Bruce arrived from the US for his Thanksgiving break visit and as usual a lot has happened since the past blog entry. I will try to recreate the past two weeks but I’m sure it won’t be perfect. I’d been meaning to note a few things about Brady that Bruce had pointed out so I will take the time to do that here – the top three teeth continue to push their way forward (the front left is already in so it’s the other three for now), Brady loves to knock over towers that we build for him and he does it by crawling up to it and deliberately using his head to knock them over, and finally while we were in Scotland Bruce observed Brady’s method of taking toys with him – apparently he wanted to go see Uncle Paul but didn’t want to let his block go so he threw it in front of him crawled up to it, threw it again and eventually made it over to Paul. He’s a smart little guy if only I could get him to stand on his own…he’s very happy to walk along anything and pulls himself up on everything (including chairs in the kitchen), his favourite place in the house in the bathroom where he finds plenty of things to drop into the tub or bang against the toilet, walls, bathtub. For now though it seems he’s completely content with crawling to get to places – and he is too fast as I’ll put him down in one room and turn around seconds later to a little hand pulling against my leg. Anyway – onto the entry.

Bruce arrived on the morning of the 20th of November. Fortunately since our Virgin appointments were cancelled he was able to come in, take a very long nap and just relax. He did take care of picking up Brady after work which was good because I wound up working late on a project and didn’t get out of the office until almost 6:30. Laura had also decided to come over for dinner that night so when I got home Brady had just been put to bed. We had pork tacos for dinner and relaxed. Saturday was a relaxing day as well – we didn’t have anything really planned other then some errands so we took Brady out and picked up things for the house and took a taxi home with the microwave while Bruce stopped at the butchers with Brady to pick up some meat. Sunday I got to go see my first movie since Brady’s birth! It was of course Twilight – New Moon (no surprise to any of you who were following the blog this summer as I was quickly making my way through the books). Laura & I met up at the cinema and both really enjoyed the film. As we left we were both commenting on how much we needed to see it again. It was still bucketing rain down when we left to head to Piccadilly tube station. I then stopped and picked up milk, beer for Bruce and some food at Waitrose before getting a taxi home – only to find out that Bruce had also picked up milk for Brady and beer for himself. We had the last of our leftover steak tacos for dinner and relaxed.

The week itself was relatively uneventful – I worked Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday at the office. Monday evening I had my style session so that I could figure out based on my body type what types of clothing I should be wearing. She didn’t tell me a lot I didn’t already know (I have a long waist and average legs) but I did find out that I was wearing straight skirts which apparently don’t work on me because my hips jut out too low. Thursday (Thanksgiving) I worked from home so I could get my hours in before Bruce and I left to pick up the rental car at the airport. When we got back to the flat it took us forever to pack up the car but by 3 p.m. we had picked Brady up at nursery and had begun our drive to Scotland. The drive itself seemed long the bit up to Birmingham was the worst part. It rained most of the drive but we made very good time even after running into a stop for an accident. We arrived in Scotland just after 10 p.m. giving us enough time to pick up some milk for Brady at Tesco’s. Paul & June had waited up for us which was really nice given that Paul had to work the next morning. Brady had slept most of the ride up but luckily enough he went to sleep at 11 with us and didn’t wake up until 6:30 a.m….I was astonished. We actually got a full nights sleep – even if he had to sleep inbetween us. After checking the internet and seeing that my jersey wearing had brought the Cowboys another win I was really happy. Friday June had the day off so we took our time getting showered…we were up but literally were not all showered until about 12:45 – then we went to the Chinese for their lunch special. We knew we’d be going back on Saturday but it is that good that it’s ok to have it twice. I had come up with a list of things I wanted to get done while in Scotland so we went about town checking things off – new watch battery check, present for Dean check, cash check . . . pretty good we didn’t get home until 4 p.m. at which time I called my aunt Linda to find out when we could come over to Hawick and visit. As luck would have it she was planning to come and pick up my cousin Fiona on Saturday so she offered to come to Galashiels and visit us. It’s funny because a big part of the reason for renting the car and not taking the train was so we would have the flexibility to drive over to Hawick and visit. Uncle Paul returned home from work a little after that. We ended up dining on Indian for dinner and I put in the movie House Bunny – but after about 25 minutes it was so uncomfortable to watch (Paul had taken off for the computer) that I turned it off and the three of us watched Body of Lies (with Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe) it was a better movie. Then we all went to bed – Brady fortunately slept in his cot for the first bit of the night but eventually ended up in bed with us. Now that Brady is pretty much solely on bottles we have learned to keep prepared bottles with the milk powder in them next to the bed so all we have to do is pour water in, shake and then feed Brady.

Saturday we got up and showered much earlier. Just before noon Auntie Anna arrived with Courtney. By 12 we were all happily seated at the Chinese with Jamie, Dawn & David joining in for a belated birthday lunch. Again Brady enjoyed snacking on his prawn cracker (he loves those). When we were just about done Fiona, Jack & Linda showed up so we returned to the house for tea and the three little one’s played with Brady’s toys in the living room. I tried and tried to get a good picture of the three of them but it’s impossible to get three kids to look up and smile all at once! Brady enjoyed playing with his cousins though. After Fiona, Jack & Linda left Anna offered to take Brady on a walk through the town so that left June, Bruce & I in the house relaxing so we put on the movie Mall Cop – which was also not very good but watchable at least. We didn’t finish it because everyone came back but I’m sure I’ll finish it eventually. The Christmas lights were being lit in the town centre at 5 p.m. so at 4:40 we all walked over to the centre near bank street and watched the fireworks display which went on for about 15 minutes. Brady wasn’t upset at all by the large bangs but he was more interested in looking at a lighted street sign and the kids behind us then the fireworks. It was really cold out so he was very well bundled up. After returning home Bruce, Paul & June started the dinner preparations. Angie & Darren came by for a visit and so I chatted with Angie about XFactor until dinner was ready. Angie’s a vegetarian so she had the veg option, I don’t eat deer meat so I had chicken (along with Darren) and Paul, June & Bruce had a deer roast – which they seemed to enjoy. During dinner we had to put on the XFactor and once we finished eating we moved to the living room to finish watching it. Luckily Brady fell asleep after 7 so he was up in his cot during the meal.

Sunday was a sad day because we had to pack up to leave. We made a run out to B&Qs and Matalan to pick up a suitcase, curtain rod and trash cans for the new flat. The rain was pouring down so it was quite a challenge to keep Brady dry. At noon we headed over to the Kingsknowes where we had a special lunch in honour of Paul’s 50th and June’s 60th birthdays! I had the fish & chips and Bruce had the steak pie. We then hurried home and packed up the car so we could be on the road no later then 2. I think we were out by 1:45.
The commute home again took about 7 hours – which was quite remarkable for a Sunday evening in the rain. I drove the first hour and then let Bruce do a two hour stint – another full drive was not in me. Brady & I took a nap while he drove. I then took over for the rest of the drive home. Brady slept for most of the drive and when we got back to London he was still asleep so Bruce made about seven trips up and down the stairs with the stuff from the car while I circled the block – apparently parking in front of our house on a Sunday evening is impossible and our road is so narrow that when the other cars come you have to move. By 9:15 we were back in the house and after a bottle Brady went back to sleep. Bruce’s thanksgiving visit went far too fast! Monday morning he walked Brady to nursery and me to the tube station before returning the car to the airport on his way home. Monday night I had the pleasure of setting up our BT internet – which wasn’t too difficult and now our US phone is up and working again. I also got to set up the Freeview player Christmas present that Uncle Paul & June got for me.

Tuesday night Laura came by for a visit and we ordered pizza because I couldn’t be bothered to plan anything else. We watched several episode of Greys Anatomy and she remembered her overnight bag so she got to try out sleeping in Brady’s room (he slept with me). It sounds like now that we’ve turned up the heat and put the curtain over his window that it is warm enough in his room but it does get dry so it’s good that we bought him a humidifier. Now if I can just get him accustomed to actually sleeping the night in his bedroom we’ll be all set. Unfortunately Brady did wear his jersey to bed on Monday night - well he went to sleep and 10 minutes later I realised I hadn't put his jersey on so I woke him up while I was putting it on him...he eventually settled again but wearing the jersey did not bring the Patriots enough luck this time :(

9 November to 19 November 2009

Last week is a blur. I know that I wasn’t feeling great and I was ignoring the signs of sickness and just trying to get through the days. I think now that we are in the new flat I can’t mentally think back to our days in the old flat so its very hard to remember what we were doing in those few days before the move. Ah so now I can refer back to my blackberry text messages! Laura came by on Monday night. We were waiting on the cleaners to come as they were supposed to inspect the flat and give me an estimate for the clean. They were scheduled to show at 6:30 but didn’t arrive until almost 9 p.m. – and Brady was kept up that entire period so they could see the whole house. Unfortunately their estimate came in at the very top of the range they provided (fancy that). I can’t remember what Laura & I ate – I think Chinese but we did watch America’s Next Top Model and an episode or two of Greys. Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday were just a blur of action, packing, cleaning, organizing etc. The highlight came on Thursday though when my boss asked why I hadn’t just hired the movers to do the boxing as well as moving instead of paying for Bruce’s flight…Yeah hindsight is amazing. I told my mother-in-law about that and she offered to cover the difference so we were able to move up the movers from Monday to Saturday – hoping that we would have all day Sunday to unpack and relax. Friday was the big day – I picked up the keys on my way into work in the morning.

For the first time I felt like we were finally making progress – granted moving into another flat in London was definitely not the progress I had hoped to be making this fall it was certainly necessary. The day went very slow and my 3 p.m. meeting ran quite long so I didn’t get home to pick up Brady until almost 5:45 (much later then I’d planned). I had picked up a bunch of his toys and books on the way along with the stroller. I put him in and we walked over to the new flat together. By the time we got to the flat the little man was completely asleep so I had to lug the stroller up the two flights of stairs while he was still in it. Luckily the keys worked! We were in and I wheeled Brady into his room while I put his toys down in hopes that he’d wake up and we’d play with them. Then I went through the flat checking it out – a) because I couldn’t remember exactly what it looked like and b) to find any defects and photo them so that if I have any issues when I move out they will all be documented. Luckily the flat is in great shape – a few chips in the kitchen tiles, many picture hanger nails on the walls, some frayed carpet in Brady’s room and in the hallway but pretty much the rest is good. Somewhere around 6:30 the Ocado people buzzed with my groceries delivery. I managed to get everything put away in the flat including his nappies & wipes before he woke up. Typical he wakes up just before we have to leave. I fed him quickly and then we headed back to the old flat. He wasn’t tired since he’d had such a long nap so he was up until 10 or so when Bruce arrived to help us for the weekend.

Saturday morning came really early. We got up around 7 and literally changed the baby packed up more of the baby’s stuff into a suitcase and then headed over to the new flat. Zara his babysitter at nursery had agreed to come and watch him so she arrived promptly just before 8 a.m. We walked her through the very vacant flat – thankfully all Brady’s stuff was there so she had plenty of things to entertain him. Unfortunately we didn’t have much to offer to her other then water, milk, OJ and fruit tea. We left her just after 8 and returned to the flat. On our walk from the new flat to the old flat at 8 a.m. we got caught in a torrential downpour. The movers came just after 8:30 – two men from Brazil. They were really nice (ironically they were Mormons one of which had actually been to Utah). We spent all morning boxing stuff and trying to organize everything. Around 12 I decided I needed to head back to the old flat so I could order lunch (pizza) for Zara. The estimate of 3 hours total – 1 hour to box everything in the flat was clearly well understated. We had been boxing for four hours and they had decided we would need two trips with the van. I went along with the movers to show them where the flat was and Bruce waited on Laura so he could walk over with her once she arrived. Eventually we were all in the new flat waiting on three large pizzas & garlic cheesebread to arrive from Papa Johns. Brady was doing well with Zara – of course! He’d slept quite a while in the morning so it was a good thing I left her with my US weekly to entertain herself. The pizza took forever to arrive and the movers had brought everything into the house so we had them unpack some book boxes. Finally we were all eating pizza around 1:15 and drinking water. Not a bad start. Bruce returned with the guys in the van and Laura & I walked down with Zara & Brady. Zara took him for a walk and Laura and I went to the flat and helped do some more packing. The second pack was much quicker and by 3 something the van was packed and Laura & I were walking back to the new flat again.

Brady was sleeping so I let Zara go after a good 7 hours of entertaining Brady. Then Laura helped me do some of the kitchen unpacking, followed by the assembly of the crib (this time Laura & Bruce tackled it), the movers left around 4 and Laura left around 4:30. So there we were the three of us exhausted, tired, sick (for me), and boxes everywhere. We went to bed at 10 after a long day and unfortunately my sickness was a lot worse – I had been having some pains in my jaw and they got much worse. It didn’t help that Brady wasn’t sleeping through the night and I didn’t sleep much that night as I spent most of the night debating whether or not the pain in my jaw was really worse then labour pains – I think I concluded that it was actually worse. The next morning we motivated and I found out that I didn’t have to go into work at 10 a.m. but instead could arrive at 2 p.m. I wasn’t feeling great but we picked up some pastries and headed over to the old flat to clean up a few things and pack away the last of our stuff to move to the new flat. We then ran out to Hammersmith and picked up some bedding supplies for the new flat. After feeding Brady some jarred food, since our new flat doesn’t have a microwave and we can’t defrost his frozen vegetable cubes, we cleaned him up and headed into the city. Bruce & Brady left me at Sloane Square to go to Peter Jones to do some shopping and I continued to Westminster and work. I was in a lot of pain but the afternoon passed very quickly. By 5 I had to just tell Bruce to take the baby home and I’d be there as soon as possible. The conference prep we were doing took quite a while so I didn’t actually get out of the office until 7 p.m. By that time I felt dead we hadn’t had lunch and I was going on very little. On the way back I had to stop at the Chinese to pick up menu’s and since I was walking past the old flat I picked up the last of our stuff and brought it over. We ordered Chinese and did the Brady routine before going to bed around 10. Again Brady didn’t sleep well and finally at 1 in the morning Bruce got up and made him a bottle since I wasn’t apparently making enough milk for the little one. My left jaw and left side of my head were again throbbing so it a rough night.

When the alarm went off at 5:30 I snoozed it but at 5:45 I tried to take a shower – tried but the water was freezing cold. So instead I had to run a bath. By 6 p.m. I was sitting on the couch trying to prevent myself from passing out from a dizzy spell. After talking with Bruce and debating whether to take a taxi to make it to the meeting for 7 a.m. I finally decided that I was in so much pain, my nose was running so much green and I was in no shape to go into work. Instead I went back to bed – at 7 Bruce took Brady out of the room when he woke up and then took him to nursery. I called the doctors at 8 and wasn’t going to get an appointment until the next day. I called back at 10 and they put me on the emergency list and when the doctor called back (waking me up) and heard how awful I was he had me come in immediately. He prescribed me some antibiotics and said within a few days the pain should reduce and that I did indeed have a sinus infection. I’ve had two of these in my life before this and this one was so much worse. The pain is indescribable – I literally wanted to pull the teeth out of my jaws but obviously that wouldn’t have done anything. When we got back I took my medicine and Bruce made me a lunch of toast, bacon & eggs. I then went back to sleep until he left at 3. After he left I went back to sleep again and at 5 I finally motivated to go and collect Brady. Fortunately he was very good and after going through his routine, play, eat, bath, bed he was in bed by 7:30. By then I had a bit of energy so I got on the internet to check in on work and make sure I hadn’t missed too much.

Tuesday the pain was still quite severe so I decided to work from home again. I did some work but also had to some resting. That night the routine again went fine – of course he still got up several times through the night but now I have a system with a bottle ready to just add water to when he wakes at 1 in the morning. Wednesday I made it into work and the day went quite quickly. Unfortunately that night he got up at 10, 11, 1, 3, 4, 5, & 6:30 – from 1 a.m. I had brought him into my bed so I didn’t have to make as much effort. I’m not sure what to think – I know it’s really dry in our new flat so I think I may have to buy him a dehumidifier for his room. The other option is to turn off the heat but I worry that he won’t be warm enough so it’s a bit of a double-edged sword. Any suggestions….Ahh and tonight is the last night before Bruce arrives tomorrow. We were supposed to have TV, internet and phone installed tomorrow but I just found out that there has been a problem and they can’t provide us with phone and instead Virgin wants to charge me 50 pents more a month to have just TV and internet. I’m not stupid I said no and cancelled but now we have to come up with a new provider and I’m just not sure how much I want to spend given that all these things come with a one-year contract….ahh the joys of moving home. So for my American family & friends alas I will not be able to talk to you again until we get the internet up and running.

Brady & I had the delightful pleasure of spending three straight days at home recovering from his latest virus. "The one that never goes away" as I refer to it finally progressed into his lungs during the week combined with a cough. After a horrid night’s sleep Thursday evening I decided to call the doctor’s office Friday morning and schedule the earliest appointment. Though I had the follow-up appointment scheduled for Saturday I was interested in having Brady seen by another doctor, since the current doctor has had over a month to put him back together unsuccessfully. As luck would have it when I called the appointments line at 8 a.m. they had an appointment with Dr. Abrahamson at 9 a.m. so I took it with a big smile. This is the doctor who was recommended to us by Dr. Nurse when Brady was just a few weeks old. Anyway as Brady has had 4 dozes of antibiotics since August I was not looking forward to another round and fortunately I didn't get given more antibiotics instead the doctor determined that Brady has a virus and that since it was causing issues with his breathing that he should get an inhaler. Since he's a baby and cannot take an inhaler you get an inhaler and a tube fitting thing which can cup over his face. Supposedly you can turn this into a game with kids so they like having it done - not with Brady though.

Basically I have to give Brady six puffs of the inhaler (ten seconds each held down over his face) every three to four hours until the inhaler runs out. As of Monday morning we were still going strong with the inhaler. Apparently it only has 100 doses so they may finish it off today at nursery. The doctor also let me know that Brady is at the age where he is going to come down with these viruses over and over again and it shouldn't have anything to do with the teething or with the mould in the flat. I wish they had the swine flue H1N1 shot over here in London because I certainly would like to get one for Brady as that's probably my biggest fear; though I really do think both of us have had it and probably have immunity to it. The doctor also told me Brady was infectious and I should not take him into nursery; so much for my productive Friday.

The weekend progressed and by Saturday I was feeling miserable myself which I suppose has its own benefits at least I know what Brady’s symptoms are: very sore throat, headache, congestion, coughing. Since we are still doing the nursing/formula routine I am unable to take medication, especially decongestants, so I made due with a ton of mentholatum under my nose, saline nasal spray and cup after cup of hot orange juice...so far it’s not worked but fingers are still crossed. Fortunately a fever did not come with this and so it didn't drain me as much as some of Brady's other shared illnesses. As a sign of how ill I was feeling the pizza delivery guy came by at 3 on Sunday afternoon and let me know that the keys were in the door (we hadn't been out of the flat since Saturday around 12:30 p.m.) Thank goodness we're in the basement flat and no one felt like climbing down our stairs and robbing us. :(

Throughout the weekend while Brady was napping started in on the packing. We are effectively moving flat next weekend so I needed to get a jump start on some of the boxing before Bruce arrives at the weekend. I can't believe how many books I have - I'm definitely going to have to go to the post office and see if I can ship some of them back to the US without incurring hundreds of pounds in postage. I also started going through the underbed drawers and emptied half of them. It was during that process that I realised I could send half of it back with Bruce to the US - most of the stuff was comfortable or work-out clothes and I can't remember the last time I worked out let alone lounged in anything other then the same pair of sweats or jeans on a weekend. Most of the stuff I haven't touched since I brought it over from Baltimore. Some charity is going to be very happy when I return to the US and go through my stuff! I also decided to use my new colouring scheme and put all the clothes out of my colour scheme in a bag as well. Given how many boxes these few things took it'll be interesting to see whether or not I can actually get everything into the boxes we currently have.

Other then that I watched several movies, episodes of Extreme Make-over Home Edition, US TV shows and the XFactor this weekend. I was extremely disappointed to see my second favourite in the competition get sent home last night (Lucy) she was beautiful (looks just like the girl from Twilight) and has an amazing voice - and to add insult to injury she was up against the "Terrible" twin boys who can't sing and can't dance. Simon who's complained about how bad the twins are the entire competition - saved the twins and put the decision up to the peoples votes which he knew would mean that Lucy (one of the best - and also one of the strongest competitors against his boys) would be sent home. I'm almost mad enough to stop watching - but Olly is still in so I'll continue. I also watched Marley & Me - I've had the movie for ages but finally decided to put it in on Sunday - so you can imagine between that and the home makeover show it was a very teary weekend.

As for events leading up to the weekend - I'm still waiting to upload my photos from the 1st of November on. Last Sunday (1 November) Brady and I took the train down to Arundel and Graziella joined us on the train at Horsham. It was a miserable wet rainy start to the day. Brady was good enough to sleep for part of the train ride down. But was happy to see Graziella when she boarded. We got off the train at Arundel with the intention of walking 10 minutes to Arundel Castle - when we got off we changed our plans. The rain was coming down in sheets - and not straight down either more in a slanted horizontal direction. We pondered it for a while - went out for a little bit to see and got very wet. Considered waiting it out but it was cold and windy so eventually we decided to load up in a taxi and get inside as quickly as possible. I put Graziella into the car with Brady and I quickly folded up the stroller and got all the bags and essentials into the boot of the taxi. It was a very quick ride up to the castle and we got Brady back into his stroller with very little rain getting him. Graziella took care of our entrance fees and we quickly took the walk up to the Castle. Once inside we decided we should dry out a bit so we went to the cafe and got some hot chocolate and coffee to start the morning - Brady really enjoyed tasting the cream from my hot cocoa and then sat and ate some of his crispies which I had brought along.

After the tea I had to change Brady - sadly he really does not enjoy this anymore so I'm sure Graziella must have thought I was torturing the poor boy while he was screaming from the changing mat. Amazingly I got him put back together and we then took off on our walking tour of the castle - it was mostly stroller friendly but there were a few areas (the officers areas) where I carried Brady around. The castle itself is really beautiful and still has the family living in it. We weren't able to see the Keep since the rain was making the steps too dangerous but what we did see was really lovely. Even better when we finished up our walk around the castle we had lunch in their cafe - I opted for chips and a baguette. Brady slept through my meal and when he woke we put him in the medieval looking high chair and gave him some of his sweet potato bake - he ate a bit of that. After a quick stop in the shop we decided to venture outside and as luck would have it the rain had stopped and it was just a bit windy. The gardens were beautiful - especially behind the cathedral so we enjoyed a quiet walk around. With an hour before our train we took a short walk through the town and then made our way to the train station. We opted for the 4:16 train since daylight savings has not been providing us with much light after 4. We said goodbye to Graziella at Horsham and then continued on to London. The train itself was 30 minutes late coming into London but fortunately we caught the right tube immediately upon hitting the platform. Once back at the flat Laura was already there so I was able to shout down to have her come up and take Brady so I could safely get the stroller and other bags into the flat. It was a lovely trip to the castle and actually the last opportunity this year since it closes on the 1st of November for the season so we were grateful to get it in! And we will probably go back with Bruce in the Spring.

Laura had come by for dinner and it was great having her there on Sunday night. She helped with Brady's bath and we relaxed and rewatched the Xfactor performances before seeing the live results show. She'd been at a hen night before so the pizza was the perfect meal for her. After the results show Laura had to head home which left me plenty of time to settle in and still get to bed at a relatively early hour. The rest of the week is a bit of a bore - Brady was slowly getting sicker and sicker. Wednesday I had to go to an all day training session in East London so that was something different. Thursday night Laura came by again and we ordered Chinese food and watched episodes of Grey's Anatomy - it's awesome to rewatch the episodes with her since none of my friends appear to watch the show anymore so I like having someone to discuss the episodes with! It's also so nice to have someone else to chat with - I love talking to Brady but he doesn't really interact as well! Plus we both got the chance to make some money and earn some points harvesting each others farms (yes fake money).

And the rest has already been blogged above. Bruce comes in the Friday and hopefully we will spend our first night in the new flat on Friday and by Sunday night we will be all boxed for the movers to come first thing Monday morning....fingers crossed!

My best friend's mother died last Tuesday. I was so excited to see my best friends name on the caller ID, as I had not heard from her since the last time I'd called her for medical advice regarding Brady, that I was completely taken aback by where the conversation went. Her mother had been ill for a few years but the family was quiet about the illness and so details of her condition were hard to come by. Unfortunately she had taken a turn for the worst the past few weeks and so the family was told to prepare for the worst. Fortunately the family was able to be there by herside when she passed, my friend was literally at her side.

My memories of Lynette, Andrea's mom, are pleasant. Andrea lived kitty-corner from us most of my life and we were always making the trek back and forth to their house. Lynette introduced me to some of the finer things in life like Tang and Nintendo. It was at her house that I first experienced the piano. I was messing around on it one day at a young age and she came in and complimented me asking if I'd had lessons, I was fully embarassed as I didn't know one key from the other but she was encouraging none-the-less (or maybe it was her way of sneakily getting me to stop playing). She was one of the first people I knew who was active with a computer - there were always banners being printed at the house to be used for events at the church. I also got my first trampoline experience care of Lynette - we had multiple sleepovers on that trampoline as well as jumping on it in the summer with the sprinkler underneath. Lynette was so nice to us and always made sure to always have an abundance of good food around. Though both families had moved to new houses in the past decade my childhood will always be full of memories of Lynette and her house. I spent so much time over there as a child that she really was like a second mom and its hard to think of memories pre-high school that didn't take place at her house.

It was a shock to my system to have my first close friend lose a parent. Reflecting on this event over the past week has certainly made me realise life is far too short to have regrets. I can't predict the future so I might as well enjoy every moment of the present so that when I get to those plans 10 years down the road I won't look back and realise I wasted my todays.

28 October to 31 October
Since the shutterfly site is temporarily down I decided I’d better get the Halloween photos posted so Bruce can see his son all dressed up in costume. I’ll post more from the weekend once I take them off my camera but these are from the week– starting with the end of GG’s visit on Monday the 26th and ending with Halloween which was spent with Annie at Hampsted Heath. I can’t believe I’ve lived in London for three years and have only just discovered Hampsted Heath – it is an absolutely delightful forest in the middle of London. Parliament Hill overlooks the city skyline and even though we had rain all morning by the time we left at 1 to head to the Heath the skies and cleared up and it was actually quite warm out. Brady did a great Winnie the Pooh impression – nothing better then putting little Pooh back in the Hundred Acre Woods. Though we didn’t go trick-or-treating and no trick-or-treaters came by our flat we thoroughly enjoyed taking Brady out in his costume and listening and watching all the reactions of the people on the tube, in the forest, at the tavern – completely 100% worth the effort. Next year we’ll make sure to take Brady for some real door-to-door American-style trick-or-treating but this was as good if not better! Nothing like having the chance to breath fresh air in London. On another note Brady is up to three full teeth with a fourth starting to appear – unfortunately that means very little sleep for us and rounds of Calpol to help him deal with the pain. Brady officially turned 9 months on Saturday and he’s quite the mover these days – pulling himself up on everything and plopping himself down to sitting constantly. The mum sounds are coming a bit more frequently but dad (dahh) is still the favourite. In two weeks we move into our new two bedroom flat and that day can not come soon enough. The landlord sent builders around on Saturday to have a look at repairs that need done but I’ve told her she’ll have to wait until we move out before she can do the repairs. Brady finished off his antibiotics (4th round since August) on Saturday and I’m keeping my fingers crossed that the infection that was causing his ears so much pain has gone away….now if only I could tell the difference between teething pain and actual cold/flu sickness.

Wednesday 21st October – Wednesday 28th October

We’re back to a house of Brady & Lara again. GG left on Monday morning after seeing Brady off to nursery she got on the Piccadilly line tube headed to the airport while I headed into the city. Only one slight mishap with a suitcase getting stuck in the tube turnstile (the people weren’t manning the gates so she had to go through the turnstile bit). Other then the suitcase it appears she had an uneventful return to Colorado and is safely back at work. I think Brady was disappointed Tuesday morning when he came into the living room and GG wasn’t there to play with him. He really enjoyed having his GG come to visit and we’re both looking forward to Christmas when we can spend some time in Colorado & Utah with both sets of Grandparents. Now let’s see if I can remember the rest of the week while Gail was visiting. . .

Last I left off on the blog it was Wednesday morning – nothing too exciting must have happened on Wednesday because I can’t remember much. What I do remember is that I’ve started watching True Blood on Wednesday nights at 10 p.m. when it comes on. Everyone from the US was raving about this show so I thought I would start watching it. This was the third episode and since GG was staying with us she got roped into watching it as well (only one TV in the flat). Anyway … I think it was somewhere about 10 minutes in when I was trying to describe the point of the show that I realised wow this show is not really something you’d want to watch with your parents. Anyway I also managed to get her to start reading the Twilight book series while she was here – she’s only one book in because she was reading a John Grisham when she arrived and after she finished that she grabbed another John Grisham from my shelf so it wasn’t until she finished the second book that I could put Twilight in the pile.

Thursday was another work day and when I got home GG had sewn extra velcro straps to the bumpers around Brady’s cot so that he can no longer move it up and get his head stuck between the bars and the bumper. I haven’t tried the sleeping through the night thing again with him but hopefully this new security will help. When she first arrived she helped me lower the crib from the “infant” position to the “I can stand up and lunge myself out of the cot so you better lower it” position. It wasn’t nearly as easy as I’d hoped it would be but between the two of us we got it lowered. Other then it being quite a distance to put him down into the cot Brady seems to have taken well to the change. Thursday night Laura came over and joined us for dinner – I decided to go easy which meant ordering Chinese (it was really good – I just hope they will continue to deliver to our new address). Brady hadn’t done such a good job eating his cereal/yoghurt so he came crawling along (in his real crawl position –yes Brady has learned he can go much faster if he gets out of the army crawl position) and started giving me those begging eyes so I shared my plain rice with him. Actually I put a little bit of the sweet sauce from the veggie spring rolls on his rice and he ate quite a few spoonfuls. Sadly there was no way I could share my Kung Po chicken with him it was far too hot for me and I’m sure he would have had repercussions had he had it. We had a good night Laura helped me with his bath and then we watched the latest episode of Bones before Laura had to head back to her flat.

Friday I decided since I had reported a half day the week before and ended up doing work I would take the half day this week and spend it with GG doing errands. We met for lunch at Piccadilly Circus around 12:30 and then walked up to my favourite Indian in Covent Garden. It was another successful meal there – I think she really enjoyed it and so far I haven’t had a bad meal there. We had a bottle of sparkling wine with our lunch since Brady wasn’t there and that was the end of me . . . two glasses of sparkling wine (Spanish style). My body is definitely not used to alcohol and even though I can drink champagne with Bruce the cheaper wine is not good for me. We then took a long walk up to Oxford Street and towards Oxford circus stopping at Bruce & I’s favourite baby clothing store where we picked up a few new things for Brady. Then we stopped at the baby Gap and GG got Brady a new super warm winter coat (perfect for Utah & Colorado). I got him a few sweaters and a pair of trousers that were on sale (I need to stay away from the GAP I just can’t say no). We then went to Mama’s & Papa’s and GG picked up a new bumper which she later cut and sewed a piece to put into his crib so that there are no longer any gaps around the crib. After our errands we returned to the flat and since I was not feeling quite right I took a short power nap before going to pick up Brady from nursery school. I can’t remember much from that evening just that I was definitely not feeling well at all – a migraine and stomach pains. It got to the point where I couldn’t even stand up straight my stomach was cramping so badly. I went to bed relatively early and of course Brady woke at 11:30 p.m. so I had to get up and nurse him at that point my migraine was still there but the stomach was a bit better. Luckily enough when he woke at 2 a.m. GG heard him and actually made him a bottle and put him back to sleep (and you wonder why I didn’t want to let her go home). He then woke up at 6 a.m. but if I recall I was able to get him to sleep for a little bit longer until about 7.

Saturday we had the doctor’s appointment. We were running a little bit late so we hurried out of the house with Brady all wrapped up in his stroller with the rain cover on since it was “spitting” rain at us. The walk to the hospital actually doesn’t take too long so we arrived about 10 minutes early for our 10 a.m. appointment and our doctor strolled in about 10 minutes after 10 – so we didn’t actually get seen until sometime after 10:15. Sadly it wasn’t great news – his ear was still quite irritated as we had noticed since he was pulling at it so much and so she decided she wanted him to continue on with the antibiotics (actually she gave him a stronger medicine twice a day smaller dose) for another week. Since the weather was so bad we dropped our initial plans (which were to try and locate Tom Brady’s hotel so we could attempt to get a photo of Brady with his namesake – chances weren’t very high that we’d have found the hotel or him anyway) and decided to do some errands and then return home. We walked up to Gloucester Road and I got some money at an ATM. For lunch we stopped at Byrons (oddly I think the burgers and portions are actually smaller at that Byrons then the one on High Street Kensington) I got my usual Oreo milkshake and this time I had the bacon cheeseburger & fries. Brady got his second macaroni & cheese with French fries and it also came with some cucumber and carrot slices – which he munched on. He enjoyed eating his real people food. After we finished up there we stopped at Boots to see if we could get him some probiotics supplements that the doctor recommended but we didn’t have any luck. We then went to Waitrose and picked up some groceries so we wouldn’t go hungry back at the house.

Saturday afternoon Brady was really good he played and kept himself entertained while we watched the movie “Love Actually”. GG actually had not seen it before – and of course it’s the perfect Christmas/Hugh Grant/Chick Flick/Rom Com movie. Granted again watching it I realised there are several bits that are definitely British Humour that wouldn’t carry as well to the US but GG seemed to enjoy it enough. The rest of the day was good we stayed in due to the weather. That night we watched XFactor and had chicken on rolls for dinner.

Sunday we got up early (daylight savings time took effect – an hour extra sleep – not with a baby!!!!). Brady was ready to go before 6 a.m. Around 9 we were all showered and so we took Brady out in the stroller and went to the French café for breakfast. Luckily enough Brady was awake but happy for our stop at the café. After our pastries (two each) I decided I would take GG by our new flat. We couldn’t go in but she got to see the area and agreed it was a lot quieter neighbourhood. On the way back I found £1.05 on the sidewalk so maybe that place will be really lucky. We then returned to the flat for a little bit before heading out again just before noon. We had a few more errands to run so we caught the bus up to High Street Kensington. I managed to pick up four new shirts at my shirt store that are in my colour range and were on sale. Then we went to Boots and managed to find the probiotics for Brady (sadly I add these sachets to his bottles once a day and honestly he must notice it because he won’t drink them). Then we went to PC World where we did some research and picked up a video/microphone attachment for the PC so we can do Skype with Bruce. From there we did the walk down to South Kensington and went to GG’s favourite Scandinavian restaurant for a late lunch. Brady had been asleep but pretty much woke up within minutes of us getting settled in at the restaurant. Fortunately they had a chair with a booster seat in it so he sat in that and was able to be level with the table and us. As a good mom I had brought an endless supply of toys and a bottle. I got the meatball special which came with new potatoes and purple cabbage and we got Brady the kid’s meal chicken fingers. He was really good about trying everything including some of GG’s green beans. He ate quite a few bits of his potatoes and chicken.

After the meal we were quite full but we stopped at the gelato shop and picked up two tubs of gelato to take home for later. We took at taxi back to the flat and then settled in for the evening. That evening I tried to Brady some fancy foods but he wasn’t having it – GG was shocked when I started feeding him the jar of carrots/potatoes and he actually was gulping it down. He loves his veggies most of the time. Surprisingly he didn’t want any of the gelato later in the night when we offered it to him. GG packed up her stuff and I tried to organise the flat a bit since they were scheduling showings. We watched the XFactor results show – just goes to show the Brits are like the Americans in that they keep some of the worst acts in the show just because. There are these two twin boys on the show who can’t carry a tune, attempt to dance but are never in synch, and are just plain annoying yet they continue to be safe week after week. Monday morning we got up and as I said GG spent some time with Brady before we had to take him to nursery to drop him off. During that time we finally got him to “feed the bear” with the balls that go into his mouth and then go down the slides to the pool at the end of the ramp. She also got him practicing mumm and mommm sounds – we’re getting closer. Then she headed back to the airport and I headed to work. Monday night I picked up Brady from nursery and fortunately his eating habits had started to improve. Unfortunately I had to sign an accident report since he had decided to pull himself up on the toy piano and it hadn’t been able to hold him steady and had fallen on top of him so he had a nice bruise on his leg. After we got home he sadly took a nap from 6 until 6:45 – but I used that time to steam him some carrots since we were out of those. I tried to feed him his favourite yoghurt but he wouldn’t have any of it – also only drank about one of his three ounces of milk (mixed with probiotics). He didn’t go to sleep until about 8:45 that night (which would have been 9:45 two days earlier). I had to make myself dinner while he was awake and I made tomato soup with leftover chicken thrown in. He came over and begged so I shared with him and he loved it – probably ate the equivalent of me if not more given the weight ratio. He still got up through the night and at 6 a.m. he was up and ready to go Tuesday morning.

Tuesday when I picked him up apparently there was another incident – though she didn’t get me to sign the form yet. Brady decided to take a dummy/pacifier from one of the other children (a girl – yes who is almost a year old) and she was not happy so she took both hands and went at his face! They were explaining how they put some cold compresses on his face and all I could ask was did you tell him no and that you don’t take things from other children. I definitely don’t want him to become a bully or think its ok to take toys, etc from other people. Fortunately I didn’t see any marks on his face from the incident so we’re all good. That night he did eat his yoghurt and I made him stay awake until after his bath at which time he went to bed at his usual 7 p.m. Ahh…time for me. Since he went to bed so early I had time to talk to Evie, my mom and Bruce. I was able to watch the Greys Anatomy episode – holy cow was that a good episode. I also made myself dinner – tomato soup with chicken bits and was in bed this time by 10 p.m. Hopefully tonight when I pick him up there won’t be an incident report to sign . . . I’ve got to remember to take some dummy’s in for him just in case he decides he wants them again.

(PICTURES TO FOLLOW)

I can't believe it is already Wednesday...my mother-in-law is here visiting us and it’s been so nice to have company in the evenings with Brady. As much as I wanted to have Brady in his perfect routine prior to GG's arrival his health put the stop to that. Thursday he didn't eat very well at Nursery and Friday was even worse so Saturday morning after we met GG at the airport at 7 a.m. we came back and I was able to get an appointment with Brady's pediatrician for 10:20 a.m. So we left GG to take a nap while the two of us walked over to the Cromwell Hospital for his appointment. I'm sure the doctor was surprised to see us as it had only been nine days since she'd last seen Brady and we were supposed to come in for a follow-up after three weeks. His mood wasn't the same, he wasn't eating and his head was significantly congested so it was the right decision to take him in for a doctor’s visit. She looked in his ear and one was apparently much worse then the other which made her think this might be a bacterial and not a viral thing. Given how long he had been battling it she prescribed a round of antibiotics (his third in as many months and in his lifetime). After the appointment I made the stupid mistake of deciding I didn't want to wait for the Rx at the in-house pharmacy because last time I waited more then an hour. So I took him to Boots on the way home but they didn't have it in stock and the local pharmacy didn't think the prescription existed... so after getting Brady back to the flat I had to leave him with GG and run back over to the hospital to pick up the prescription before they closed at 2 p.m. This time my wait for the fill was only 30 minutes but still frustrating. On the way back I picked up some more Calpol for Brady and also got a roast chicken so GG & I would have something to eat. That day we stayed in to let Brady recoup some and we had a lunch of chicken, baked potatoes and sweet baby peas. For dinner we had the tuna fishcakes I'd made the night before. It was a very relaxing evening and we watched the XFactor performances.

Sunday we got up and decided to go on a walk. We packed up the stroller and walked up to High Street Kensington. On the way we stopped at Home Base and bought some cleaning products to deal with my bathroom. We then had lunch at the burger place and Brady had his first macaroni & cheese with french fries. He really seemed to like both the french fries & the mac & cheese. I really think he was into the fact that he could hold the food in his fingers by himself. Though I'm sure our waiter wasn't as thrilled by the number of noodles and fries on the floor beneath his high chair but it was fun. He of course also drank water from a nice glass. After the meal we walked down the street to do a few more errands and Brady drank his 4 oz bottle with no problem on the walk. Probably because there was salt in his food. After the errands we caught a taxi back to the flat and gave Brady his medicine. One of our errands was to pick up a really cheap high chair for the flat at Argos. So once we were home I put it together and Brady now eats his food in the high chair. GG insisted that we should have a high chair and I was reluctant so I found the cheapest option with good reviews and I have to admit it is much easier. It has a great big tray and now that he's feeding himself cheerio’s & puffs it is much easier to put a handful of those on his tray and let him pick them up and feed himself. So yet again GG is right. The rest of the day we relaxed in the flat. I had dressed Brady in his Tom Brady Patriots Jersey so I of course had to take plenty of photos - turns out he might be a good luck charm since the Patriots annihilated Tampa Bay.

Monday GG got to take Brady to nursery with me and then we picked him up together so she could meet everyone and get used to the routine. We then did the Brady evening routine, food, medicine, playing, bath time and then bed. Once he was in bed we ordered pizza and sat down to watch America's Next Top Model. Tuesday we did the same but GG was in charge of picking Brady up from nursery by herself since I had the colouring session with the consultant. I got home around 7:35 and Brady was in his bathtub so I helped hose him down and get him dried. He apparently hadn't had enough mommy time because he didn't go to sleep until almost 9 p.m. I have to admit I'd rather he did that so we can get him prepared for the daylight savings change on Sunday. I'm certainly not looking forward to getting up at 5 a.m. if we do not reset his internal clock! Now I've got to decide if Brady is healthy enough to be sleeping thru the night again or if I will continue to get up and nurse him through the night...I'm thinking more and more about just letting him cry it out again. Now that the top tooth is coming in can be a bit more painful to feed the little dude.

Skeptical as I was about letting Brady cry it out - well we've now had two nights in a row where I did not have to get up once to feed Brady so I'm a believer. Monday night we attempted the cry it out method from the Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child book (also known as the Extinction or Going Cold Turkey method). Bruce had stayed home taking care of a million phone calls for me so that evening he read up on the book while I was feeding Brady. Since I knew I wouldn't be strong enough to do it alone we decided to give it a go. Basically the book said the longer you've been encouraging the bad sleep habits the easier they will be to break. We put him to bed after his bath just before 8 p.m. and at 10 p.m. he woke up whimpering, coughing and then crying. We turned up the tv and watched an episode of Heroes to try and drown it out and surprisingly by 10:20 p.m. he was quiet. The rest of the night there was no more full on crying; only a few wimpers. He woke up at 5:40 a.m. really crying because he'd got his head stuck between the border and the edge of the crib again so we had to pick him up and I tried to nurse him back to sleep but at that point it was too late as he'd been screaming. Last night was night two of the Extinction method and again we put him to bed just before 8:00 and this time there was no 10 p.m. crying session instead there were just a few whimpers on and off throughout the night - one of which we both know we would have jumped out of bed to deal with previously but we were amazed that none of these whimpers lasts more then a minute or two. This morning he woke up around 6 a.m. crying and whimpering but I got to him before it was screaming and nursed him back to sleep! Which gave me time to shower, Bruce more time to sleep and he got up just a bit after 7 much happier then he'd been the previous morning. So it seems this method is successful and I will certainly continue with it when Bruce leaves this afternoon and with any luck by the weekend the whimpering will have disappeared and we'll be in a solid routine just in time for GG to come visit us!

As a side note and more for documentations sake. For the past several weeks Brady has been obsessed with being on his feet and holding onto couches, bathtubs, tables and walking along them to get at cool things like blackberry's, remote controls, ipods, phones and the all important laptop computer (the space bar has been removed twice now but so far I've been able to reattach). Now he is fully able to pull himself up to the standing position on his own. It's amazing it won't be long now until he gets balance down and can start walking by himself . . . but I will enjoy this crawling and standing against thing time for as long as I possibly can.

The weekend was successful. After meeting Bruce Friday afternoon we went and saw two properties with two different agents - I fell in love with the first property immediately. It is in the Queen's Court Gardens which is about a 1o minute walk from our current flat. It's two bedroom, has a huge kitchen (with a table to eat at) and has a communal gardens with tennis courts. It's a bit farther away from the tube station, his nursery and the supermarkets but those are small sacrifices for quality. After seeing the second place we immediately went to the first agency and put a bid in - unfortunately they didn't accept it and we had to go up in price but again we'll find a way to make it work since the place will be perfect for us. Friday night we took it easy at home and Brady was up about every two hours through the night. Saturday late morning we got the call about the counter-offer and so we packed up and went and put the deposit down to take the property off the market. With any luck she should be sending the paper work over this morning and I'll be able to get all the little details out of the way. We don't move in until the 13th of November (yes Friday the 13th) so hopefully that will give us plenty of time to organise for the move.

With the flat out of the way the weekend was really relaxing. We ran some errands on Saturday - stopping for lunch at the Mexican restaurant in Covent Garden. Brady was a big fan of the shredded chicken in my taco - though not as big a fan of the guacamole (surprisingly). We also picked up some more socks for Brady at the GAP and looked into a muff for Brady's stroller since he has outgrown the baby cocoon. After that we made our way home where we were both so full from the Mexican that we had ice cream for dinner instead of food.

Sunday morning Bruce let me sleep in while he entertained Brady. We got up and had eggs, bacon & toast and then packed up to head into the city. We stopped at Harrods to run an errand and then caught the tube to Wimbledon and then a train out to our friend Blessings house for lunch. He's sadly leaving to go back to Uganda in a few weeks so it was a good-bye lunch he was hosting - Gergana brought baby Oscar (who's almost 4 months) and Annie showed up as well. The food was excellent, so many options including a few Uganada specialties. Brady tried to play with Oscar but I think he was a bit rough trying to feel his face (why the face is always the most interesting thing to a baby). It was a really fun afternoon and I took loads of pictures (no surprise). We then caught a train back and were home a little after 7. Brady was really good and ate almost a whole jar of sweet potato bake for Bruce. He was quite tired though so we skipped his bath and just stuck to a bit of reading to him and some milk before putting him down for the night. Again he was up every few hours - we even tried to give him a bottle of formula at 1 a.m. thinking it might be heartier then breast milk but it didn't help he was up two hours later again demanding milk. Maybe tonight we'll give the let him cry it out all night a try - though I am not sure how my nerves would hold up to that.

Bruce is here for three more days, leaving on Wednesday, so hopefully we'll have some more good family evenings before he leaves.

30 September – 9 October 2009

Bruce arrives in the country this morning so I’m trying to get caught up on the blog. I last posted a blog entry thru his doctors appointment on the 29th of September. That evening Laura joined us for dinner – she brought sushi and it was perfect! We got Brady to bed and watched ANTM and I think the Jamie Oliver takes America program (It’s quite an interesting show to see how all the different areas of the US cook – but its also insight into how people live and act this episode was about the South and we got to see white trash in the a trailer park as well as snooty upper class women who “bake” and have many taboo topics they don’t discuss). Through this date I was quite confident that Brady & I were leaving on the 30th of November and Bruce & I had been talking about how this would work with his Thanksgiving Break and of course I’d already started moving stuff back in my last trip to the US. Wednesday morning I was faced with the decision to take a complete 180. As I was walking to the bathroom to put on my face walked past the one of the Global VP’s offices and he asked me to come in for a minute. He’d had dinner with a colleague, who’s the COO of my practice, the night before and she’d told him that Josef had told her that I wanted to stay in London thru May and that she thought they had the need and the budget for it. So basically he asked my situation and was surprised to hear that I hadn’t gotten the position with EY Boston so he told me he’d have a formal conversation with her that morning and let me know what was going on. About an hour later he pulled me back into his office said that they were both happy that everything was there and that they were putting me in the budget thru 30 June but that this was a 90% certainty that still needed buy in from management (yeah there are several levels of management at my company).


Needless to say I had no idea what to do – I e-mailed Bruce and we talked several times during the week and decided that as long as I was getting exposure to new things that would help with the resume for the future that it would be ok to take the position, but we still didn’t know if the position was a certainty. Friday I was in the office working on a few things when I got the 12:30 call that Brady had had two runny nappies and that I would need to pick him up. I had to pack up my things and head home (annoying that this was the second time this has happened in the last three weeks). I was (am) convinced that these runny nappies have to do with teething and the fact that Brady has not been eating many solids since we returned to the US. Since the last time I’d taken him to the doctor right away I decided not to be the idiot that runs to the doctor at every sign instead on Saturday I called the NHS nurse line and they told me it could take up to seven days to pass and if it continued that long I should take him to be seen – of course they thought it was a viral thing. He didn’t have a fever but through the weekend he refused to eat anything. I tried all of his favorites – yogurt, sweet potatoes, I even made myself mashed potatoes and broccoli with chicken and he took one bite and then refused anything more. We started him on formula over the weekend so he was getting plenty of fluids between the two forms of milk.


Monday came and the nursery again refused to take him because he was still having runny nappies (7 between the hours of midnight and 8 a.m. – lucky me). I was so frustrated that I decided instead of just a GP I wanted him seen by a paediatrician. I pay enough for that insurance that I might as well use it… I called and got an appointment at the Cromwell Hospital Outpatient pediatric centre for 5:40 p.m. which meant I spent the rest of the day entertaining him and trying to work on the sofa (emphasis on the trying). We got to the waiting room five minutes before our appointment but weren’t seen until about an hour later. He was ridiculously happy – watching some of the other kids and just standing on their couches smiling at everyone. Every one of the three nurses/assistants and the other doctor made excuses to come by and say hello and check out Brady. He was loving it – sadly making me look like I’m bringing a perfectly healthy kid to the doctor. Then we met his doctor (she’s a lovely lady) and again he was all smiles for her. She asked if he was always like that and I said pretty much and she said well then I hope it continues when he grows up. It turned out he had a slight fever and then she checked his ears which were really red and then his throat which was really swollen and very red – she even had me take a look. So at least we now knew why he refused to eat anything – there was no room in that throat for things to get down and he must have been in a significant amount of pain. The doctor didn’t want to give him antibiotics since he was so happy so instead I was told to give him some nose drops for three nights and then some Calpol (Tylenol equivalent) for the pain during the first day. She also suggested that I should get him some pudding like the rice stuff or ice cream, etc. Then she gave me two containers – one to collect a stool sample and one to collect a urine sample – talk about impossible. We then went to pick up his prescription which took another hour wait – by 8 p.m. I had stopped and picked up some Mueller rice dessert on our way home. Surprisingly enough we got home and he ate quite a bit of it – but that was the only time after buying several more he refused to eat another bite of the rice. Unfortunately they’ve started track repairs again behind our flat this week so Brady wakes up like usual through the night but then occasionally the noise wakes him or it wakes me.

Tuesday I couldn’t get the urine sample – even though I tried. Brady was quite his usual self during the day except he still refused to eat anything. The one positive that came out of the day is that I got the message from HR confirming that they had indeed received the approvals to extend my contract thru the 30th of June! So I was able to send an e-mail out to all my friends and family to let them know that we would be staying and I was able to start seriously looking for two-bedroom flats in the area. Over night I had an idea come to me with regards to getting the urine sample – so early Wednesday morning I stripped him down wrapped him in a blanket held the cup in place and started nursing him – within five minutes I had a clean sample of urine without any spillage! Yeah I’m still thrilled with my ingenuity. We dropped the samples off at the hospital and then came back to the flat. Through the night Tuesday he had woken at midnight and was cold to the touch yet his head was soaking wet with sweat. This continued all night and I was so worried that I had him sleep on my arm in bed with me – which of course meant that I didn’t sleep more then three hours the whole night. As a result I called the doctors office and was able to get an earlier appointment for Thursday at 1:30. Wednesday night I attempted the challenging process of listening to a webcast on Revenue Recognition with a needy baby in the background – not brilliant. Then I gave him some ice cream which I had to force the first spoonful down but after that the mouth opened easily. After he was in bed I turned on the TV and found that they were starting the True Blood series here in the UK so I watched the first episode. I have to admit I really enjoyed it and will probably tune in next week.


Thursday Brady re-entered nursery and apparently ate all of his breakfast cereal – unfortunately not his lunch or his tea. I took him to the doctor and she was quite happy with his progress – ears were still red but the throat was pink and swollen now so much better. She was happy with the progress and suggested that I should bring him back in three weeks for a follow-up but she thought he was definitely on the road to recovery. That afternoon I heard from a few estate agents and I did see one property that I didn’t love but would have settled for so I decided to call my landlord and see what her plans were. Fortunately she didn’t even know my lease was up and was surprised the estate agents hadn’t contacted me so she agreed I could stay another month and she would get in touch with them to negotiate the extra month. So now Brady & I have six weeks to find a new flat (two bedroom), arrange the movers, pack boxes, transfer services and move into our new flat. What an exciting process! Painful probably but I’m sure it will be worth it when I can sleep at night without startling awake with the little one squirming. Ahh so that brings us to today – Bruce has arrived and is sleeping at the flat. Later today we’ll look at some flats and then we’ll have five days of fun daddy & Brady time.

23rd -27th September
As far as anniversary gifts go Bruce went above and beyond. I knew he had something planned at 11:30 in Boston and I secretly hoped he'd scheduled a massage for me but little did I know that he would have scheduled a full day of treatments for me at the spa. We took our time walking up Newbury Street and then we arrived at the spa (where I expected we would). He wouldn't tell me anything other then follow the lady and I'll see you when you're done. I did what I was told and was first taken to this Turkish bath thing. It was pretty relaxing spending 20 minutes in a bath that had these jets that moved up and down your body massaging your muscles. After that the lady told me what I was in for. The next step was a body scrub followed by a Turkish shower - which is a shower that has three faucets aimed at you - well actually six because there were two shower heads on each shower. The scrub was really relaxing as was the shower and after that they rubbed lotion into my skin. It was so pampering. At this point I had an ear candeling done on both my ears - I'd wanted to try this for about six years ever since a radio station in DC did it on air but I have to say I was really disappointed. I had to hold my head still for twenty minutes on each side while a lit candle was balanced on my ear - and after it all for about 24 hours I had the water in your ears feeling you usually get after swimming and I don't think I felt any of the beneficial effects she said I would. Regardless I'm glad I've tried it and know what its all about now I won't need to have it done again.

Next I had an hour to kill in the lounge - I was so disappointed that I didn't have a cell phone or have Bruce's mobile number memorised because I couldn't call and check in on my boys - but I got over it and just read one of the Glamour magazines they had in the rack...note I'm a TV watcher so I was disappointed the women's locker room didn't have a TV and even more so when I found out the men's did and the men’s had a peanut mix with chocolates where as the women’s had dried fruit (seriously not all women want to eat healthy). The next thing was an hour long massage...it was awesome. Bruce had signed me up for the Swedish massage but the lady asked why I'd chosen such a light massage - I told her I hadn't chosen it so she said she'd assert more pressure on the massage. It felt wonderful and I really think she got out a lot of the knots in my shoulders, neck and lower back. She told me I have the typical new mom tension in all those areas and I need to be careful not to favour one side while carrying the baby (easier said then done). After this I went downstairs and had a pedicure. It was also really nice but I have to admit at this point I was starving and all I really wanted to do was see my boys. They showed up about ten minutes into the pedicure and Bruce took Brady up to the men’s lounge. After the pedicure I met them up there and then we decided to head home so we could have some dinner. It was a really awesome day. Once we got home we quickly changed and then got in the car to head out to meet Bruce's mom for a final dinner before she returned to Boulder, CO. We met at a seafood restaurant (one of the best in Boston) I tried their fish & chips but I have to say I wasn't that impressed the UK definitely does fish & chips better! After the meal we took a wander through a furniture store nearby (sadly they didn't carry cribs). We were saying goodbye and amazingly Brady actually gave GG a kiss on the cheek when we were departing. This was the first time he'd ever done anything like that and it was so sweet! He is a lot smarter then we know he certainly knows who the important people are to keep happy!

Thursday Bruce had to teach but he stayed home in the morning with us and then we all took the tube into the city together and had lunch at U-Burger. It's a burger & shakes place that has wonderful food! I always like to get in as many burgers and milkshakes as I can while I'm in the US. After the food we walked Bruce to his office and had the chance to meet a few of his co-workers including the office assistant who is due to have her own baby in December. Brady was all smiles for them (which is always a good thing). Brady & I left Bruce to work and we walked back down to the Prudential center where we stopped in at Isis maternity and picked up eight big blue foam puzzle squares for the floor. Then we hauled them back to the Arlington T station and caught the T back to the house. I put together the squares so Brady would no longer fall and hit the hardwood floor and then the two of us exhausted from our busy day took a nap while waiting for Bruce to come home. That evening we tried to take Brady to get photo's at the Kiddie Kandids but he was exhausted and wouldn't smile at all for the poor guy so we had to reschedule for Saturday. For dinner we stopped and picked up Wendy's (it wasn't very good) and I watched the Grey's Anatomy season premiere. I'm so sad that I won't be able to keep up with the series as well as I had in the past... I may even have to purchase the Itunes season pass but all that depends on how long I stay in London for.

Friday Bruce had to go into the office again in the morning but Brady & I got ready and came into the office a little after noon to meet him. The three of us then took a walk down to Charley's on Newbury street where we got our usual table in the basement bar and I got the chance to eat spinach & artichoke dip (Brady really liked the dip) and buffalo chicken tenders - they were really spicy which was great. After that we did the anniversary shopping and Bruce got me some clothes at one shop and then we stopped in at Cole Haan and I finally got my replacement boots!!! They are black, zippered boots that come up to my knee. I've had the same pair of Nine West boots for the past 7 years so it was about time I got a new pair and these are so beautiful!

After the shopping we returned to the flat and for dinner that night we decided to do easy tacos. It was a relaxing evening and we watched a movie and then saw Numbers (yet another wonderful US television show). Saturday morning we got up early and took Brady into the Kiddie Kandids and finally got some photos of him mostly smiling. Then we stopped in at Costco and I was lucky enough to get an 11 a.m. eye exam appointment. After that we stopped at a Chipotle for lunch - we actually went inside and had the food warm which is the better way to have it. Brady slept through the whole meal in his car seat which was a relief. After lunch we returned to the flat and I started the packing. At some point we took a quick trip to Target so I could pick up some zip lock plastic bags which I use to store Brady's old clothes after he outgrows them (which is happening too quickly). With everything packed we had a relaxing evening at home and had another round of tacos.

Sunday morning we had to leave very early to catch an 8 a.m. flight. Bruce dropped us off at the departure level while he parked the car. He then met us and we said goodbye before heading into the waiting area. I had called weeks in advance to confirm I had the bulkhead/bassinette seat but when I got there they were apparently all given away and so they gave me a seat in the back with and promised to leave an empty seat next to me. Talk about a rough trip - as a single mom its next to impossible to keep a kid out of things when you have them on your lap. I couldn't have the hot food so ended up just eating the side salad since I didn't want Brady to get burned on it. Even having the second seat its not like I could just strap him into the seat like you can with the chair he kept falling over and banging his head on the arm rests (I could put up the one next to me but there was someone sitting in the seat on the other side). Fortunately Brady is a good baby and so other the having to let him stand for a while in the walk way and two nappy changes during the last hour of the flight it was a pretty uneventful flight. He didn't sleep too much but we were able to play and read his books together.

I had been smart enough to arrange a car pick-up ahead of time so I got our bags and stroller put them all on the cart and met the driver up on the departures area. By 8 p.m. we were home and I fed Brady, bathed him and put him to bed then I started the fun task of unpacking and sorting through things. It's always hard when you return Sunday evening knowing you have to go to work Monday morning.

5th - 11th September 2009 (Paul & June's visit to London)

This was the first weekend alone together since Bruce left. Brady & I got up early and went on an errand run we walked up to Earls Court and got some money out from the ATM, since the bank branch was closed we then took the Piccadilly line tube to Green Park and then walked up Piccadilly street. Brady fell asleep quite early on so I stopped and got a Starbucks chai tea on our way to the bank. We made a quick stop at the bank and then went into one of the bookstores where I bought the other Stephanie Meyer book as well as the first two books in the True Blood series. We then walked down to Jermyn street where I picked up one of Bruce’s anniversary presents. After that we made a stop at my chocolate store for some sweets and then went to a luggage shop on the street and I bought a small red suitcase that meets the carryon luggage requirements. I had a lovely gray American Airlines one that met the requirements but the top handle broke –literally a very sharp metal bit was pulled out along with the side of the handle and it was dangerous so it went out with the trash. After that Brady & I caught the number 9 bus to High Street Kensington. We stopped and picked up some vegetables for Brady and returned to the flat where I spent the next several hours steaming carrots, potatoes, broccoli and sweet potatoes while Brady took a nap – he woke up when I was blending the last set of vegetables so he had to sit tight while I finished up. I had purchased a new (regular looking) ice cube tray for putting the veggies in and it worked perfectly. He had some of the sweet potatoes I’d cooked up and we spent the evening relaxing. Sunday we relaxed around the flat and around 3 in the afternoon I got a call from Uncle Paul saying that after long debate June & he had decided that they would come and visit us in London for the week. I was thrilled. They arranged to come on Monday evening which was perfect for us – I had them take the train that got them into London Kings Cross station at 4:45 p.m. so that I could meet them and still have time to pick up Brady from nursery on time.

I met them at the train and we swiftly caught the Piccadilly line train to Barons Court Road. This gave me the chance to point out all the landmarks to get to and from my flat. After I got them settled into the flat June & I went to pick up Brady from nursery and Paul stayed home to wait for Graziella who was coming for dinner. When we returned Graziella & Paul were there and we all had a lovely time catching up over Papa Johns Pizza and a bottle of white wine. Well I was able to catch up with them once I got Brady through his normal routine. The Papa Johns pizza seemed to be a success and I had picked up salad and M&S while waiting for the train so it was even a bit healthier. I’m always nervous about offering Graziella non-italian Italian food but she seemed happy enough with it so it was a successful night. After Graziella left we chatted for a bit before I showed them how to set up the sofa bed. Most nights the biggest complaint my visitors have is the snoring from upstairs but for some reason this night Manuel was hosting some form of party so we had to listen to chatter until 5 in the morning. I was really annoyed at 3 a.m. when one of his visitors was so loud that he woke Brady and I had an awfully hard time getting back to sleep since I was so infuriated by having to listen to their noise! Oh well at least it was only one night.

Tuesday June & Paul took the day to venture out into the city. They covered a lot of ground and I was thrilled to see that they had gotten out on a boat in the Serpentine in Hyde Park – something I still have yet to do. That night we stayed in and had stuffed pasta shells with sauce, garlic bread and salad for dinner. June & Paul and never had them and I think they enjoyed them well enough. Wednesday I took the day off from work and the four of us ventured out into the city to do a tour of the South bank. We started at Westminster and walked the length of the water to the Millennium suspension bridge. Along that walk we stopped at an EAT and had sandwiches for lunch. Once we got to the Millennium bridge we crossed over to St. Pauls and continued out walk on the North bank of the Thames River. We attempted to buy some yoghurt for Brady so we could get some food into him but he had about two bites and was fed up with eating. We continued our walk and eventually got all the way down to the Tower of London. Here we stopped for ice cream while Brady was napping – the little guy has a sense for ice cream though and woke up about half way through my cone so I of course had to share my ice cream with him. To say he loves ice cream would be an understatement…he never can get enough of the stuff. We then continued our walk and eventually came to the end which was a place I’d never been called St. Katherine’s docks. It was this beautiful secret inlet which housed massive yachts, beautiful flats and expensive stores. We took a tour through the area and then headed back towards the centre of London. Given the timing we decided to stop at South Kensington and pick up some cupcakes. I’d been raving about the Hummingbird cupcakes so we stopped and ate a few and picked up a few to go. It was luckily enough getting close to 6 p.m. so we then took the tube into Covent Garden and went to my favorite Indian Restaurant the Punjab. I thought Brady would be good so we ordered food but he woke up and wanted to be fully entertained. We tried toys for a while but once the food came it was impossible. So I took him outside to see sites and then when Paul was done eating he took Brady out in the stroller for a walk until I finished up. Not the most relaxing meal but I think everyone enjoyed the food. We then returned to the flat and put Brady to bed.

Thursday I had a training course for work so I asked June & Paul to pick Brady up at 6 p.m. from the nursery. During the day they stayed pretty local but when I came home they had taken care of several annoying things around the flat that needed done like making the pull cord longer on the shower fan, buying a non slip shower mat and fixing a light fixture. I got home around 6:20 and Brady was quite happily playing with June & Paul. Since Papa Johns had been such a hit on Monday night I decided we’d do that again so we ordered pizza for dinner. Friday Paul had discovered the Discovery channel so he sat about watching program after program. I ran to the store and got some croissants for breakfast. At lunchtime they had to head off to catch their train back to Scotland and I took Brady into nursery so I could spend the rest of the afternoon catching up on work stuff. It was so much fun to have Paul & June visit we can’t wait to head up to Scotland to see them again.

I'm still two weeks behind on the blog (June & Paul's visit to London and the rest of Brady & I's trip to the U.S.) but I will hopefully get that done at the end of this week. Brady turns 8 months this week. He is interested in everything which is wonderful and challenging at the same time. We recently bought him the Pat the Bunny book which I had growing up. It's a great book and Brady loves doing everything that Paul & Judy do including patting the bunny and smelling the flowers - its adorable to watch him mimic the characters in the book. Yesterday I got a call from the Health Visitor, apparently the A&E unit of the hospital alerted them that Brady had been taken in for the head injury a few weeks ago, and they requested that I bring him into the clinic this morning. I was already considering taking him in so it wasn't a problem but it was a bit sad to think I'm on a list somewhere in the UK as a potential child abuser :( I'm happy they do this but it won't encourage me to phone the doctors office as quickly next time. Positive things came from the appointment though I now know what he weights 19 lbs 2 oz (8.63 kg). He's getting quite heavy but I'm happy because he's still less the 25 lbs so I can still use the bjorn - though I just moved it to the biggest size and it fits so much easier now. She made me feel a lot better about the milk question - I'm going to start supplementing his diet with formula which one is the big question Cow & Gate, Aptimel or SMA (the UK brands). Unfortunately they cannot recommend one and the nursery will provide whichever one I chose but also will not recommend one. Guess I'll be doing some research. She also eased my mind and told me it was perfectly acceptable to use cows milk to make his cereal - so now I can go back to that because he certainly liked that much better then the water. She did think I should work harder on getting him to sleep thru the night by eliminating night feeds - she suggested that I give him the milk in a cup instead of letting him nurse or giving him a bottle and she also suggested I give him water on some of these feeds (which is what Bruce & I had tried last month). I'll try to be strong but she also said I might want to wait and try that when Bruce comes to visit in a week. Honestly if it'll get him to sleep thru the night I guess the price of getting a little less sleep for a few nights is worth getting full sleep going forward. Well I will try to get photos posted on the family shutterfly site and also some of my favorites here. Ahh the life of a full time working mom.

12th September – 19th September

June and Paul left on Friday around lunch time and I dropped Brady off at nursery while they took off on the tube back up to Scotland. After they left I returned home to get some work done. It was a busy afternoon and by 5:00 I thought I was done but I got one last request that kept me busy up until about 5:45 so needless to say I was the last mum to pick up their baby. Brady was all alone in the nursery when I showed up to pick him up but he was happy enough to see me. The weekend itself went really quickly and was not very relaxing. Saturday we ran the usual errands we took the stroller over to Earls Court and picked up some money from the Barclays ATM we then converted £100 into euro’s for the upcoming Germany trip and then caught the Piccadilly line tube from Earls Court to Green Park Station. From there we wandered along the street to the NatWest and deposited the money to cover the credit card, rent and nursery bills while we were going to be away. We then walked up Regent Street to Oxford Street so I could stop in John Lewis to see about picking up a new suitcase – they were all far to expensive so we continued on stopping in the baby section and not finding anything and then stopping in the women’s shoe department to see if we could find a nice pair of black shoes to go with the dress for the wedding. We actually spent about an hour going in and out of shoe shops on both Regent & Oxford Streets to find shoes for the wedding but we didn’t have any luck. It was close to noon and Brady was getting hungry so we returned to Piccadilly street and caught the bus to High Street Kensington. There we did a few made a few more stops and then caught the bus back to the flat.

Brady had his lunch and eventually fell asleep. At this point I had not eaten all day and so when he woke up at 3 p.m. we went to the Co-Op right around the corner from the flat – I picked up two small baguettes and a 2 ltr bottle of Dr. Pepper (because it was cheaper then the small bottle). Brady was in the Bjorn facing out so he could smile at everyone and take in the world. We came down the stairs to the flat and made it thru the first door and were coming thru the foyer when I lost my footing and started to fall I instantly grabbed my hands out to the door frame to catch myself which started a pendulum motion with the bag of soda and inevitably the cap came up and caught Brady between the right eyebrow bone and the eye as he was heading forward from the force of the fall. He was crying and it was awful. I calmed him down after a few minutes and at first thought he was just scared from the motion and hadn’t been hit but then I saw his eye. The eye ball itself was fine but between that and the eyebrown was a white circle surrounded by redness. I was so upset with myself - I called the out of hours emergency doctors service and they told me to take him to the A&E at Chelsea and Westminster hospital (we’re all too familiar with that).

We called at taxi and got there within 20 minutes. Brady in the bjorn again and me carrying the diaper bag. He was in such a good mood we were sitting in the waiting room and he was talking away to his toys and smiling at everyone who walked past. The nurse took us in to take our details and she had a quick look and told me it looked like it was just a bruise and that the eyebrow bone is one of the hardest bones on the body to break and its really the back of the head that you have to worry about with a baby. But I still had to have him looked at by a doctor so we could be released. The doctor took a look and again thought he was completely fine – of course he’s fine smiling and flirting with the lady doctor and nurses. She gave me a pamphlet on head injuries told me to read it and if any of the symptoms occurred that I was to bring him back or call the number on the back of the card. The symptoms included lack of appetite, too sleepy, not sleepy, throwing up twice in 48 hours, loss of balance and a few others.

When I got him home I fixed him some yoghurt and some cereal and he ate it all. We then played for a while and suddenly he started throwing up – quite a bit. I then gave him a bath and he was so happy that I put him to sleep and decided to just watch him and see if he got sick again. Sunday we stayed in since I didn’t want to take him too far in case he was sick. We played around the house he had his breakfast no problem, his lunch no problem and it wasn’t until I gave him yoghurt again for dinner with his cereal that the problems arose again. The throwing up started within 15 minutes of the food and I called the A&E and they told me to bring him in immediately – I called that taxi but after waiting 15 minutes I called Bruce and said I didn’t think it was related to the head injury and that I’d rather wait until the morning and take him to the doctors office if he was still sick. Bruce agreed and I cancelled the taxi. I then took him inside and gave him his bath and within minutes he threw up again. He started to get tired so I put him to bed and called the NHS Nurse hotline. I got put through to the nurse and explained everything including my thoughts that it might be a dairy allergy – she completely agreed and said that I should take the yoghurt out of his diet for a while and just keep an eye on him. I felt so much better after talking to the nurse. I started some of the packing for our trips before calling it a night and going to bed.

Monday thru Wednesday was work. Monday was an exciting evening – Brady’s first tooth (bottom right front) came thru and along with that came a lot of drooling and crying. Wednesday I had my monthly technical presentation and I was halfway through my presentation when I got a missed call on my work phone and then a follow-up on my blackberry – turned out nursery was trying to call me. I called them back after the call and was told Brady had had two runny nappies and that on the third I was required to come and pick him up. I told my boss and packed up to head home. Once there I called the doctors office and she said as long as he was happy it probably was just a 24 hour thing and not to worry. I picked him up from nursery and shortly afterwards he threw up so I ended up taking him in to see the Emergency on call doctor. She gave me a prescription for some fluid stuff but said he seemed completely fine and healthy so I probably didn’t have to worry about it.

Laura came for a visit on Wednesday night and was finally able to inspect my handi-work with the crib. We watched some silly movie I think the Amanda Bynes movie where she pretends to be a guy to play on the soccer team. It was a fun night and Brady was really happy to see Laura again – he’s certainly a big fan of hers. After Laura left I made sure all the stuff was packed for Germany, cleaned up the dishes from the Chinese and then put one last load of laundry into the washing machine so that Brady would have a clean sheet when we returned from the US. Thursday Brady woke up with a bit of the second tooth showing up (front bottom left tooth). It’s really strange because his two teeth make a V pointing into his tongue. I talked with Evie and apparently Dean’s teeth do the same thing and the dentist thinks he got banged in the mouth at some point and that caused it but I don’t think that ever happened to Brady so I think it’s more likely genetics.

Thursday morning I got up around 5 a.m. and the taxi came for us at 5:45 a.m. The trip to Gatwick took a lot less time then I’d expected only about a 45 minute trip. We got through check in for Easy Jet really quickly as well and security was a breeze. This meant we just had to wait around the terminal for a while until the flight was called. Luckily enough I’d found on their website that Easy Jet did allow a stroller in addition to your checked bag so I was able to move Brady around the airport in his stroller. The 8:10 a.m. flight to Basel was not very full and since we were one of the first to board we took an aisle seat on the fourth row and no one wanted to sit next to us – amazing what having a baby with you does. Brady was magic on the flight completely quiet – sleeping most of the flight. We got into Basel and had to pick between the Swiss side and French side I chose Swiss and went to the information desk only to be told that the bus to Freigburg was on the French side so I had to return to the 2nd floor cross the border to France come back to the ground floor and exit to the bus stop. Luckily all this took no time at all and we pulled up to the bus stop around 11:10 and within a few minutes the bus showed up and we were able to get the front row seat on the bus and get all of our stuff put away. A nice lady in the seat next to us held Brady while I messaged to let mom & dad know we’d made the 11:30 bus and by 12:35 we were in Freiburg and Grandma and Grandpa were waiting on there for us.

Grandpa took Brady immediately carrying him around and mom & I got the rest of our stuff and we walked the ten minutes into downtown and to our hotel. After checking into our hotel we wandered to one of the departments stores and went to their upstairs restaurant/cafeteria where I got the breaded chicken stuffed with ham and cheese and some French fries – it was really good. We tried to pawn Brady off with some of my peas and French fries but it was really just the chicken that he liked. We then stopped in the kiddie department and picked up a few undershirts for Brady as well as a cool blue stripped hat that will do him for the winter! Finally we went to their food hall and mom & I picked up some German baby food specifically some apple sauce and some cereal. Since Brady was still having the runny nappies we thought we’d try to get him to have some apple sauce to stop up his system. He wasn’t a big fan but we went for ice cream shortly after and he of course was a HUGE fan of that. He ate about half of mine and then was upset that it was all gone so Grandma had to share hers with Brady as well. Talk about a spoiled little boy. We returned to the hotel to get ready and Brady took a bit of a nap. We then went up to the Theimann’s house for dinner. It was so great to see all everyone there – Maria, Max & his girlfriend, Laura & her boyfriend Jillian, and Philip (his fiancé was busy with her family). The dinner was excellent Brady was trying to make some noise so Philip went and found him some bread – and so Brady made a new friend. As the meal went on salad, followed by mashed potatoes and roast Brady was pretty active so I had to walk with him and then pass him off to Grandma. Max unfortunately with his facial hair must have made a face at Brady at some point and that was it for Brady the rest of the night if Max got within eyesight of Brady he started sobbing. It was hilarious – he’d never done that before. When dinner was over and Brady was getting tired Philip offered to drive us back down to our hotel which was really nice. Luckily with the time change Brady was tired so he went straight to bed as did I.

Friday morning we got up later then expected – jetlag going the other way. Mom & Dad came to the room and I’d just finished drying my hair so we had to quickly put on some clothes and head to breakfast. Brady was quite vocal during breakfast and they had a Stokke high chair for him to try out. He did ok in it for a while as long as the bread lasted but eventually he just wanted to be carried by Grandpa or Grandma. After breakfast we returned to our rooms to prepare for the wedding around 10:30 we started our walk over to the registry office. When we arrived the car had just pulled up carrying the bride. There was some time to chat with people outside then we were taken up to a hall inside to chat and wait, then we went into this big room with a table and a few chairs in it –which is where the ceremony took place. Brady was being held by Grandpa and I was trying to take photo’s/video’s. Unfortunately Brady started to get fussy so I had to give him the flip video to play with (ie, put in his mouth) that worked for a while but as the wedding wrapped up and it was really hot in there he started to get very very very fussy and was making noise. The door was closed and we didn’t know if we were allowed to open it and dad and I were getting nervous when from the otherside of the room a dad and his three year old came running over and opened the door so we took the opportunity to follow them out. I’m still not sure if the boy was behaving badly or if they were just helping us but we were grateful to get Brady out of there. We then waited outside for 20 minutes until the wedding party rejoined us. Ironically I had managed to leave the bottle I’d prepared for Brady on the counter in the hotel room – so I ran back to the hotel to pick it up while the wedding party took some photos. After this we all walked up to a little bar by the Munster Cathedral where we had drinks and bread. They also had a tradition where everyone wrote a wish (or something you’ll do for the new couple) on a postcard and put it on a balloon. The balloons were then released into the air and if they made it into hands of people who would return them to the couple then you had to make good on your postcard.

After the drinks the four of us headed to a little ice cream café and had some more ice cream. Brady fell asleep and we then returned to the hotel. Unfortunately Brady slept just until I had taken out my contacts and was ready to take a nap so for the next few hours I had to entertain him by myself in the hotel room – plus he managed to have a very big blow-out and I ended up having to take him down the street to pick up more baby wipes so we would make it through the rest of the weekend. Around 5:00 mom & dad came down and we wandered up to the Theimann’s house again where we met for rides up to a restaurant in the woods where the reception was being held. Up at the restaurant they had drinks outside and an accordion player – who definitely entertained Brady. They also took photo’s of the couples/groups and had everyone write a page about themselves to put in a book for the couple. Throughout the night the parents each gave a speech and showed photos from the couple as they grew up (embarrassingly enough Maria had a photo of Philip and I sucking our thumbs at too old an age). The brother also had collected video clips from some of the friends saying congratulations to the couple so he played the movie he’d put together. The night went quite late . . . we left at 11:30 and they had just finished up the meal and hadn’t even started the dancing or the cake. The food was excellent, Brady was exhausted and wound up sleeping in my arms for three hours which meant dad had to go to the buffet table for me and also had to cut up my meal for me into small pieces so I could eat it. It was a really fun day and experience for us and it will be fun to see how all the pictures turn out in the future.

19 September to 23 September (a.m.)
I scolded myself for getting so behind on my blog in the last entry and now its been even longer and not only am I behind on blogging about our lives I'm also behind on posting photos. Hopefully I can find sometime over the next week while I'm in Boston to catch up on the blog and also to post some photo highlights from the past month or two. Today is Bruce & I's 2 year anniversary and we're actually spending it together - well in the same city he unfortunately has to work all day today but he took yesterday off to spend time with us and will take tomorrow off as well. The weather here in Boston has been amazing so far high 70's and today it will get into the low 80's. Brady & I couldn't be any more fortunate and I brought a lot of his shorts and short suits to leave here in Boston so he'll actually get a little more wear out of them before they go into storage! It’s the small things in life that make a mom happy. Since I haven’t blogged since the 3rd of September I’ll start from the most recent events and try to work myself back as a lot has happened since the last entry so I have some ground to cover.

In the summer the U2 concert tickets went on sale and I joined the U2 fan club site so that we could have first rights to buy tickets for their upcoming 360 concert series. We joined too late for the London concerts but there was one in Boston on the 20th of September so we decided that we would try to buy tickets for that concert and call it our Anniversary present. Bruce’s mom was kind enough to volunteer to schedule a trip to come into Boston and watch Brady while we went to the concert so Bruce stayed on line and purchased tickets for the two of us – at the time he purchased the tickets the only available were nose bleed seats or General Admission so he went for the latter of the two.

Saturday morning at 5:45 a.m. Brady and I got up, packed our suitcase in Germany, showered and wandered to the bus station with my mom and dad. They saw us off and we took the one hour drive to the Basel airport in Switzerland/France. Brady slept the entire bus ride. In the airport he was more vocal and probably scared all the passengers away from us. After sitting for a couple hours they finally opened the line for the plane and we were given priority boarding and it was at this point that Brady fell asleep in the Bjorn. Unfortunately he stayed asleep only until the plane started taxing up the runway and he was awake and needy for the remainder of the flight into London. It wasn’t screaming annoying crying but it was chatting and needing constant distractions – the fact that Brady is now mobile makes travelling a bit more difficult. We arrived at Gatwick airport right on time. We picked up our suitcase and our stroller and proceeded to take a bus from the North terminal to the South terminal so we could catch the train to Victoria station. Two men on the train were very helpful getting me onto the train and also getting me off the train. From there we had to take two sets of stairs to get to the District line platform and in both cases as I had a stroller and suitcase it was women within 10 years of my age that stopped and offered to help us carry the stroller or my suitcase down the stairs – since the bag was heavy I let them take one side of the stroller to help me. I have to admit I was surprised at all the able bodied men who didn’t offer to help. Thank goodness for kind women. Once we arrived at West Kensington it was a grandfather who offered to help me with the stroller carrying it up the stairs – I didn’t’ want to accept the help but since I needed it I couldn’t say no – again surprised as all these able bodied men ran up the stairs not offering to help.

We arrived at the flat around noon which effectively gave us four hours to unpack, repack, laundry, feed, eat, sleep and wash. Saturday was a hectic day thankfully I’d been putting things in piles in small suitcases all week so I at least had some things put aside. Brady took to playing on his large play-mat area immediately and I started a laundry and unpacked. After a while I was so tired that I decided we would take a nap so Brady and I passed out – me for about 40 minutes and him for about an hour which gave me enough time to finish up the packing. After he woke up I had just enough time to give him a bath and get him dressed before the taxi came. I then made five trips up and down to get all of our stuff to the taxi – two small roller bag suitcases, one duffel bag wheeled suitcase, one stroller, one car seat, one diaper bag and one computer bag. . . we were definitely not travelling light. We got the Heathrow Airport Terminal 5 with about 2 ½ hours before our flight. Once there I realized I’d brought the wrong attachment for the car seat so it wouldn’t fit on the stroller. We checked in one roller bag and the duffle bag and had to drop the car seat off at the oversized luggage check. We then headed through security and found a Pret where I bought a baguette sandwich and some crisps. Brady gummed on a chunk of the bread while I finished up my lunch/dinner. Eventually they posted that the flight would be taking off from Terminal B so we took the shuttle over to the other Terminal and I took the chance to use the restroom. Unfortunately Brady waited until it was an hour before the flight to have a blow out so I had to rush him to the baby changing room to clean him up – luckily I caught it early enough.

We were able to board first and as luck would have it we had been upgraded to the next cabin on the plane because someone else had wanted to have their family sit together so they had moved me and Brady so that the family could be together. Unfortunately they had split up another family and the father was sitting next to me with the two year old and his wife was back in the other section with their 7 month old. I’m sure I’m going to have bad Karma for it but I didn’t offer to give up the bigger seat to his wife and move back to the economy class seat so they could sit together. I contemplated it but by the time he’d shown up I had got all my stuff settled in and was chatting with the really nice grandmother/Boston financial executive who was sitting in the seat next to me. I chatted her for an hour or so at the beginning of the flight and luckily enough Brady slept the entire flight – with just a few feeding breaks! She was really nice and had just been in London to visit her daughter and granddaughter. She also is an executive for a company in Boston and a member of FEI so she said if I e-mailed her she might be able to get me some information on financial jobs in Boston – talk about luck. I don’t know many people in Boston at this point and I was certainly trying to figure out how I was going to find a job so I was really grateful to have the chance to meet her.

She was also kind enough to help Brady and me with our bags after the flight. She certainly went above and beyond – she waited for us to get through passport control – when we ended up in the wrong line where the passport guy disappeared to walk someone somewhere. After that she held Brady while I piled all of our luggage onto a cart and she even offered to take the stroller on her cart so I wouldn’t have as much – unfortunately when we went to hand over the customs form the guy figured out that the stroller wasn’t hers and asked who she was carrying it for at that point he sent both of us over to the agricultural screening line – which was huge and not moving. We lost about 30 minutes and when we got to the front of the queue they just sent us through and didn’t check anything. Oh well at least she still had time to make her 11 p.m. bus and Bruce was there waiting for us. We then caught a yellow taxi back to Bruce’s flat and barely got everything inside before we passed out.

Sunday morning we woke with Brady but somehow got him to sleep for a while. After Bruce took a shower and we washed my dirty jeans we took Brady in the stroller and caught the bus to Harvard Square where we picked up a rental car for the week. It took a bit too long to settle down with the rental car but we eventually got everything sorted and headed back to the condo so I could take a shower and we could repack the small suitcase and get all of Brady’s things together for his first overnight stay with Grandma Gail (now known as GG). We then drove over to Gail’s friend Jan’s home. They had some really good cinnamon rolls so we took time snacking on those while explaining the bags of stuff we’d brought for them to entertain Brady. I didn’t forget much – but we did forget the frozen sweet potatoes and carrots that Bruce had slaved over earlier in the week so we all took a drive over to the grocery store and picked up Gerber baby food jars and then we went into the center of town and stopped for a quick Panini lunch. Brady was a little fussy so GG took Brady out in the stroller for a stroll while the three of us finished our sandwiches. We then stopped at the toy store where I picked up Brady’s first set of keys (it’s a chain with three heavy keys on it but the chain has a remote that has a light and makes cool sounds if you push buttons) and a set of plastic blocks.

We then returned to Jan’s house and after a quick Brady feed Bruce & I took off for the concert venue (Foxborough Stadium) around 4 p.m. The trip was really quick and we didn’t hit any traffic so by 4:45 we were parked in the General Admission (GA) lot across the street from the stadium. Along the 2 mile drive in we saw several unofficial parking lots charging upwards of $50 for event parking. We thought it was crazy that people would pay that much and that they would actually be parking in those satellite lots that much before the concert…later we would see why. People were tail gaiting in all the parking lots as if it was for a football game. We headed over to the stadium so we could check out the grounds. The gates were supposed to open at 5 but they didn’t open until after 5:30 and we could actually hear U2 doing a bit of a warm up. We stopped at the first merchandise tent and I was planning on buying a sweatshirt but they didn’t have any so instead I got a red t-shirt. We then found out where the GA entrance was and got the fluorescent green wrist bands put on. Since there was a huge non-moving line we decided to check out the CBS store and then the Patriots store – but didn’t find anything we needed to have. At this point we found another tent selling official merchandise – only this one had sweatshirts. So I got a black hooded zippered U2 360 sweatshirt! Later in the night I was very happy to have this as it started to get cooler. We then decided to join the GA queue. We only stood in line about 40 minutes before they opened the doors and we got in fairly quickly.

It was fantastic we were able to stand with only two people in front of us from the outer stage. The venue was set up with a huge circle stage in the centre of the stadium and then a ring stage around it with four moving bridges that connected the two stages. The people next to us were really nice and we picked up a beer for Bruce and a bottle of water for me. We didn’t move from this spot for the next five hours. I didn’t want us to lose our place or lose each other so we skipped having dinner, the restroom and more drinks. Luckily Bruce confiscated my bottle of water when it was half drunk because he’s smart enough to know that I always have to be doing something so if I’m holding a huge bottle of water I’ll be drinking it without even knowing that I’m doing it. The opening act was Snow Patrol (another Irish Band) and they were fantastic. The lead singer was really funny and I was happy to realize that I knew more then one of their songs. In fact we liked them so much that we are planning to buy their album(s) at some point. Snow Patrol played for about an hour and around 8 p.m. they left the stage – U2 was reportedly going to go on around 8:30, then 8:40 but didn’t go on until about 8:50 – it was said this was because a lot of people were stuck in the traffic trying to get to the stadium so they had held off. I was really annoyed with that since if you really like U2 you get there early to make sure you don’t miss them and given there was an 11 p.m. noise ordinance the band had to cut a few songs from their list since they had less time to play.

Everyone was guessing when they were going to come on and when they did finally show up it was amazing. I should know what song they sang first but it’s all a bit of a blur (I’ll chalk that up to excitement or jetlag). They sang from 8:50 until just after 11 p.m. – and they hit all the greatest hits as well as their new stuff. During the third song of the bridge moved right in front of us and Bono came down and sang while standing right on the bridge looking at us. It was amazing – I got some fantastic pictures. Throughout the rest of the night all the members of the band came down on the stage by us so I was able to see them all up very close – I’d do General Admission again in a heartbeat. There was just something so cool about seeing these icons within feet of you. So close you knew they could actually be seeing you. The night was really fantastic and I’m more in love with the band than ever before. After the concert it took about 20 minutes for us to make it out of the stadium and back to the car – when we got to the car park it looked like all the cars were moving so we quickly got into our car and pulled out. We made it about two car lengths immediately and then were stopped for the next two hours. So the downside of the concert was the fact that by 11:20 we were in our car but it wasn’t until 3 a.m. that we finally made it into the house. The drive itself should have taken about 45 minutes to an hour but the parking and the traffic were so bad that Bruce decided he would never attend another FoxBorough event – though I’m hopeful that maybe we can go to a Patriots game one day and use the train system, which apparently Kraft only pays to run during Football games. Once we got home I had to pump for 30 minutes to try and save some of the milk for Brady. Then it was off to bed – not to wake up again until 9 a.m.

We woke up Monday morning and checked in with GG and found out that Brady was still doing well and more importantly he still had milk for two bottles left. Given that news we decided we had time to take showers to try and wake ourselves up. We quickly got ready and then headed out to Jan’s house to see our little Brady. We arrived just as they were pulling the stroller back into the driveway. Brady was in a good mood and definitely seemed to recognize us still. We then all walked to a French pastry shop down the street and had some breakfast (I had an éclair). After we returned to the house we took a bit of time getting Brady’s stuff together and packing up the car. Brady was exhausted and fell asleep before we left the house. From there we headed into the city and Bruce stopped at Boston University to pick up the Pack-N-Play and do a quick work errand. Then we went back to the condo and Bruce took all the stuff we’d accumulated upstairs. We then got into the car and drove over to the area where Tom Cruise was reportedly going to be filming – unfortunately there was no sign of him so instead we went to Target and picked up a few things (yes DVD purchases were involved). After Target we decided to get some lunch so we went in search of the Chipotle in Harvard Square. Unfortunately while driving there Brady woke up and he was not happy so I had to run into Chipotle and place the order to go. We then rushed back to the condo and fed Brady some sweet potatoes. He definitely likes those best and I can see why all the mom’s in America use those Gerber baby products…its so much easier to flip one of those open then to defrost the frozen home prepared veg.

We got a chance to eat our food too and we spent the rest of the evening relaxing and playing with Brady. This week is premiere week in the US for most television networks so we were able to catch an episode of Bones and also an episode of Gossip Girl (Bruce skipped the latter).

Tuesday Bruce had to go into the office so he left around 9 a.m. and Brady and I hung out around the house. He fell asleep in my lap for a while which gave me some time to play on the computer – I say play because I spent most of the time working on my farms on Facebook and reading the Entertainment news. Unfortunately blogging requires two hands so I wasn’t able to get much of that done. Around 10 Brady and I packed up the stroller and wandered over to the mall – he fell asleep for most of our journey through the mall which gave me the chance to pick up a ton of clothes for him at the Baby Gap – he officially fits into 12 month clothes… they grow up far too fast. He’s not even 8 months yet and he’s already too big for the 6 to 9 month clothes. So now we’re buying big. For lunch I picked up the California Pizza Kitchen Waldorf Salad that I love and then the two of us returned to the condo where I fed him some sweet potatoes and carrots – he ate bout half of both. We played for a while but both of us were exhausted so around 2 p.m. the two of us went down for a nap and I didn’t get up until 4:30. It was a nice lazy day. Bruce returned around 6 and then we went out to Babies R Us to pick up a little chair for him to eat from and some other miscellaneous baby stuff that you never know you need until you see it. On the way home we stopped at Wendy’s so I could get that fix in and we got home around 7:45 just in time to get the tv set so we could watch the season premiere of NCIS and NCIS-LA. Brady was kind enough to go to bed around 8:30 so we only struggled to hear the first half of NCIS. After the shows we watched parts of the new Christian Slater program – it wasn’t bad but I’d have to see a few more episodes to know if I really like it.

Today Brady got up around 5:45 and that was it – crying at full volume. We tried food but he wouldn’t have any of it so we caved and gave him a bath – which he loved. We hadn’t made time for that the past two nights so it was good that he got one this morning and he’ll get one again tonight for sure. He then played for a while before we noticed he was trying to eat out of all of his cups and was throwing them aside when he didn’t find drink in any of them. At that point we re-attempted the feeding and he ate quite a bit. Shortly after we cleaned his hands he was ready for a nap and went down very easily. Bruce then took the time to make us our anniversary breakfast (a day late) of bacon, eggs & toast. Now we’re just relaxing while I blog before Brady wakes up and we begin our day of Anniversary celebrations – Bruce has stuff planned so we’ll see what the day has in store for us.

Brady's now seven months (officially on Monday the 31st). It's hard to believe how quickly our summer came and went even staying local for most of August yet the end still came and on Monday morning Brady and I escorted Bruce to the airport for his return to Boston. Brady and I have had three days alone together now and its actually not going as bad as it could be. Last night he only got up once during the night somewhere between 2 and 3 a.m. so that was good. We have our routine down with me picking him up at nursery, his food, some play time, his bath, changed for bed, his medicine, a book and then sleep time. Then its my routine of baby dishes, making dinner, my dishes, baby laundry or regular laundry, checking e-mails and then bed. Hopefully I'll motivate soon to do some other things like my pilates dvd or some television but my guess is by the time I get really together and organised it will be time for the US television schedule to begin and you all know that I'm hooked on about half a dozen tv shows and that'll take up quite a bit of my time.

As for the last few weeks since I last posted we've been quite busy. I'll start from where memory serves me best, which is the most recent events. Yesterday I worked from home and Brady's Stokki Sleepi crib was delivered. We finally realised that Brady certainly doesn't fit in his current crib so we decided we'd buy one crib in London and one in the US - not the most economical decision but if we do decide to and are fortunate enough to have another baby then it will have a crib as well. I spent an hour or so putting it together and had it all done when I found I had a bag of 20 plastic bits which unfortunately were supposed to be placed on the braces - sadly this piece of the instruction was on another page with the smaller model of the crib (which we did not buy) so I had to take apart three of the key pieces a piece at a time and put them back together. It's all together now though and looks quite good - I'm just letting his mattress air out for a few days before he gets put in the new bed.

Tuesday Laura came by for her weekly visit and we attempted to watch this Jamie Oliver in America program (which is about cooking for you non-Brits out there). I say attempted because I've recently become hooked on a facebook application called FarmTown and I had to show Laura how it worked so she could become addicted and we could send things back and forth to each other to make our farms better. Oh well we did manage to take care of Brady before I showed it to her and also to cook up spaghetti, pasta sauce with chicken bits (left over from the roast chicken I bought on Monday) and garlic bread. Not a bad night and Laura spent the night. Wednesday morning Brady was all smiles to see Laura was still there! :)

Monday was Bruce's return to the US - so after seeing Bruce off at the airport Brady and I returned home. While he was napping I took a shower and then the two of us went on a very long walk up to High Street Kensington in search of a dress for the wedding we have in Germany in a few weeks time. I found one fortunately at the first shop I tried. We then walked part of Kensington Gardens and down by the museum of Natural History. Since we were too close to catch a taxi I decided just to continue the walk home and stopped at Waitrose to pick up some groceries - including a Roast chicken. Once we returned home I snacked on some bits of chicken and let Brady have a few bites - he really seemed to enjoy it. When he took a nap I managed to thoroughly clean the bathroom. That evening he wasn't eating well so I gave him some of the guacamole I was eating and he loved it so I disguised his potato/carrot mix with guacamole at the tip so he'd eat more - success he ate all his veg. After giving him his medicine I put him down for the night and spent the next four hours cleaning the kitchen, bathroom and living room. It looks more organised now then it has in ages.

Sunday . . . well really it starts at about 12:15 a.m. when Brady woke up crying and I went to feed him - only to find out that he was burning up. The temperature was in the 102.3 range on the one thermometer so we decided to give him CalPol (Tylenol equivalent). Within 30 minutes I took his temperature again with the other thermometer and it was closer to 102.5. We ended up calling the NHS direct number and got put through to a nurse - well that was after trying to call my sister, mom/dad and finally getting through to my best friend Andrea (and mother of two young boys). She gave me the advice to take his clothes off and give him a damp cloth on his forehead. The nurse gave us the same advice so it was good that we were on top of that. We then got put through to the out of hours doctors service. By this time his temperature had come down to 101.8 so it wasn't as bad. They told us to bring him to the hospital if his temperature went up again. It did but Brady was asleep (as was Bruce) and Bruce suggested to wait until morning. So we did. At 6:45 the temperature was still close to 102.3 and we gave him another dose of Calpol and called the out of hours service again. They got us an appointment with the GP service at Chelsea and Westminster hospital and we took Brady there around 12:15. It turned out Brady had a red throat and red ear so he was battling some form of infection but honestly I think it has more to do with some teething that is probably going on. He was doing a lot of drooling on Saturday and these all seem like the symptoms I've heard of. With Brady being sick we picked up some new antibiotics made a few quick stops and went home for the day. Sadly Bruce's last day in London was not the quiet day we'd planned. Luckily enough I had told him to pack on Saturday so he didn't have a lot of that left to do. We spent the rest of the day around the house and Bruce made up some of his great guacamole so I'd have some for the week and we had taco's for a late lunch early dinner.

Saturday was a better day we got up and it was so beautiful outside that I decided we should go to the park. We were already planning on going to Mothercare in Kew Gardens to check out cribs/highchairs/bumpers/etc so we decided to go to the gardens afterwards. I sent messages to Gergana and Leilani to see if either of them would like to join us. Gergana was up for it so she brought little Oscar out and we met her around 2:30 at the entrance and five of us had a nice walk and some time on the picnic blankets we'd brought. It was a lovely afternoon and perfect way to spend the day. That evening Bruce started his packing and I played FarmTown.

The week before that was uneventful I stayed home with Brady on Friday and he got to taste Yoghurt and Banana's for the first time - both went over really well and he ate as much as I could give him. We got Brady a new playpen from Argos which he sadly didn't seem to really appreciate - we had to go in search of bumpers for it as he hit his head twice on it within his first two times sitting in it. Laura came by on Wednesday and joined us for dinner - Brady was in an especially good mood so I took a video which I posted to YouTube (but really to the family shutterfly site). We continued with the water bottle and trying to get him to sleep through the night but since we've started that route we've only had two nights with 7 hours straight sleep - here's hoping he will get there eventually. I honestly can't remember anything else exciting from the week but maybe my memory will be spurred when I post pictures.

The weekend of the 22nd/23rd was spent doing some shopping for safety supplies to baby proof the house. I'm sure we must have done something more exciting then that but it's all I can remember... oh yeah that's right Friday afternoon (21st) we met Bruce for lunch and went to the grassy bit in front of the Natural History museum it was Brady's first picnic and first chance to play in the grass. Surprisingly he pulled up the grass but didn't put it in his mouth - must be one of the few things he hasn't put in his mouth.

I'm so behind in my blogging its embarrassing - fortunately I have the new photo site otherwise I'm sure the grandparents/aunts/uncles out there would be harassing me about my delinquency. For those of you who haven't accessed it its sojkaandersonfamily.shutterfly.com the password should be obvious but if you can't guess send me an e-mail and I'll give it to you. I do still plan to post pictures here but honestly I can only load three at a time and it takes about five minutes to do each set of three so I've been putting it off - enough excuses I'm finally starting to breath a little bit more at work and hopefully by next week I can get caught up.

I might be jinxing myself but last night Brady slept from 10 p.m. until 5 a.m. without interruption - seems like we're making progress on the sleep situation. YAY us!

Energy levels are low in our household this week. Monday we entered the two week mark - two weeks until Bruce flies back to the US to resume his teaching at Boston University. The news about my future job prospects within this firm seems to get bleaker with each phone call and e-mail so today I've decided to mentally shut off that portion of my brain off and give myself a day of respite to leave the stress of not knowing where my career is going.

Since Monday Bruce & I have been trying to get Brady to sleep thru the night. In order to do this we are attempting the water for milk substitution. Someone told me that if you give him water when he wakes up for food instead of milk he'll eventually realize he's not getting what he wants and he'll quit waking up. So we decided to start a new routine - we pick him up from nursery just before 6, feed him baby cereal, play with him, give him a bath, play with him some more, give him milk and then put him down for the night somewhere around 7:30 giving him more milk around 10 when we go to sleep - around 1:30 he woke up looking for more milk and got water, he was up again every hour until 6. The second night we did the same routine but this time I dream fed him at 10 p.m. and he woke up at 1 got his water then didn't wake up again until 4 for his next round of water...we thought progress had been made. On the third night unfortunately (last night) he slept from 10 until 2 a.m. but then was up at 2, 3, 4, and 5. At 5 he decided he was up for good and really didn't settle back to sleep. To say Bruce & I are exhausted is an understatement. This morning while I was watching him/looking for a sweater in the drawer under the bed he managed to fall off the bed - head first - you'd think I'd have learned my lesson from the last time he fell off the bed. But of course I only took my eyes off him for five seconds and boom. Fortunately he seems alright was smiling, moving all the right digits and was playing with his toys for the rest of the morning, but of course I'm still feeling terrible about it and am definitely wishing I could take it back.

I realized this morning that I haven't blogged in almost two weeks. I guess it's because I don't seem to find the time anymore. Work has gotten much busier as I volunteer to help other people around the office with their projects while the bosses are all off in the US on holiday. The last blog took us up thru Saturday the 8th of August and we've done quite a bit since.

On Sunday the 9th we took the train (with car seat & stroller) down to meet Graziella in Pulborough to see a country house and gardens called Parham House. It was a short drive from the tiny train station. We first had a nice walk about the gardens. Since I had just picked up a new replacement camera for the camera I had broken the flash on - Bruce and I each took photo's of the gardens using both camera's so we could compare and see the difference (if any) in quality of photos. Something I still plan to do but as of yet have not found the time. We then had a small tea outside - they sold a millionaires slice that was the most awful thing Graziella and I have ever tried - the caramel layer was so hard you literally could not bite through it. Fortunately the tea was good. After the food we took a tour of the house - which was massive. It was fun to see the type of "summer house" that is referred to in all the books like Pride & Prejudice. You could imagine the family packing up their London house and coming down there for the summer season. After that we took a walk back to the church and then Graziella returned us to the train station so we could get back to London.

The rest of that week is a bit of a blur. I do know that as usual Laura came by for dinner one night and we watched several episodes of Grey's Anatomy - we're now well into the final season and even though I've seen all these episodes this year its still fun to watch them again. Thursday we took a train up to Berwick-Upon-Tweed and met June & Paul at the station. We then went for fish & chips - of course Brady was very interested in the food but we managed to keep him entertained enough. Our weekend in Scotland was just what I needed to get away from all the bad news I'd been dealt recently. I'm sure there are details I'll forget but it was such a nice weekend.

Friday I got up early with Brady (when he got up) and I went downstairs and Uncle Paul joined the two of us for a walk (in his stroller) around Galashiels. We did the outer loop followed by a quick stop at Asda's for some cash and then a return back through the center of town. Once settled back at the house Auntie Anna stopped by for a short visit and caught up with Brady (unfortunately she'd planned to head to Berwick on Saturday with Courtney so we weren't going to be able to catch up with her again). After she left we heard from my cousin, Fiona, and made plans for her to come to Gala at lunch with her son Jack. At noon all of us made our way to the Chinese and had a really nice lunch. Brady sat in a high chair for the first time and seemed really content to hang out in there watching everyone else. When the food came though we traded him out so Jack could actually eat in the chair. It was raining pretty terribly on Friday so we then went to the children’s' play center "scotia kids". It's a two-part play area with a place for the little children to play and a bigger place with slides and climbing things for the bigger children. Brady seemed to enjoy playing with some of the little kid areas. At one point I had to tell a little three-year old to quit being so mean to Brady and that he was the bigger kid so he should be nice - Brady was playing with these three spinning plastic birds on a little play-house and this kid came over and kept spinning them really fast so Brady's hand would get hurt if he touched them. I was so livid it took everything I had not to yell at the child. Fortunately my scolding him was enough for him to let Brady play with them again and eventually the kid toddled off over to the big kid area and I didn't have to see him again the rest of the time we were there. Jack is also a bigger kid (2 1/2 years) so he was running Fiona ragged in the big kid play area. It was a lot of fun though. Fiona then dropped us off back at June & Pauls. That evening we had a really great meal of a Roast with garden vegetables including potatoes and peas! and carrots (from the store). It was great - Brady tried a few bites of the potatoes and peas but wasn't really that interested.

Saturday we got up and went for a brunch at Rhymers Tower followed by a quick stop in Jedburgh where we picked up some new toys for Brady including a spinning top courtesy of his uncle & aunt. Back in Gala we relaxed and watched movies most of the afternoon. Paul had to run an errand in the evening so while he was out June, Bruce & I had another round of Chinese food - though it was not quite as good as it had been the day before.


Sunday was our return to London day so we got up early and decided to spend some time in Edinburgh. We left around 9 and were in Edinburgh close to 10 a.m. The rain was coming down pretty heavily when we left the car park and entered the park - we made a quick dash for the nearest coffee house -which happened to be a Starbucks. The shop was on the second floor on Princes' Street and had a great view of the castle. We dried off there and had a relaxing coffee before heading back down onto the street. Our first stop was at Boots. I wanted to see if they had a baby department and they did and their baby clothes were on sale 50% off - I took serious advantage of this and Brady is well stocked with clothes for the next six months. We then took time to visit Jenners department store where we got Brady a shape sorting tub with colored circles, stars, squares and triangles for him to sort. After Jenners we walked up to Lakeland where June & Paul were hoping to pick up some refills for a tape dispenser but unfortunately they were discontinued. We then attempted to go to Garfunkles for lunch but it had closed so we ended up at the french place Cafe Rouge. The food was pretty nice and Brady got to sit in another high chair. After that it was time for us to catch our train so the men went back to the car to collect the luggage and June, Brady & I headed to the train station. It really was a fun weekend and we were certainly sad to leave.

Anyway this week has been pretty quiet. I went and visited Gergana and little Oscar on Tuesday night and Laura came by last night for dinner & more Grey's Anatomy. This weekend I think we'll just relax and try to baby-proof the flat...he'll be crawling in no time and with Bruce leaving I don't think I can manage on my own without some added protection from the obvious things!

[Eventually I will post some photos to go along with this post but its too much effort right now...]

Brady is now 6 months. Quite the milestone as it now means he can officially eat pretty much everything with a few small exceptions (nuts, drinking cows milk, strawberries and runny egg yolks). So far he's officially tried carrots, broccoli and courgettes though he was certainly not a fan of the latter (which suits me just fine). At nursery he gets three meals the first rice/cereal followed by a noon vegetable and a 5 p.m. vegetable! All that and he's still drinking several bottles of milk per day. Apparently this is alright as he still needs to consume at least 20 ounces of milk/day so I'm trying to figure out how to increase his milk consumption during waking hours so that we can eliminate milk consumption at night.

We have spent the last two weekends in London which was very necessary after all the travelling we've been doing this summer. On Friday the 31st Brady turned 6 months. I spent the day taking video's of all the little moments (eating, napping, walking, playing . . .) during the day and will eventually put together a home video of it all. Since Brady had developed a cough through the week and had been potentially diagnosed with swine flu on Wednesday we decided to take him to the doctor on Friday to see if they could give him something for the congestion and coughing. He ended up with a prescription for amoxicillin. He loved the stuff - banana flavored liquid. He literally would suck the stuff out of the syringe. Friday we were timing him with the sitting up and got to about 15 seconds but all of a sudden Saturday we noticed it had been a few minutes and he was still sitting up by himself! Such an exciting development. Also on Saturday he rolled over from his back to his stomach for the first time. He'd been trying for so long and now he's made a habit of it.

Saturday Jane came round for a barbecue and catch-up. She hadn't seen Brady since March so it was a fun opportunity for her to see how much he'd grown. Bruce grilled up some fish for them and I had chicken. After Jane left we put Brady to bed and had an early night. Unfortunately that evening I developed the cough and sore throat and eventually a bit of a fever. I was feeling terrible on Sunday with no energy so we stayed in for the day and I tried to rest.

Monday I wasn't feeling much better but I decided I didn't feel as bad as I had in May so I went into the office and the same thing on Tuesday but I started to feel poorly and came home early on Tuesday and Wednesday. Wednesday afternoon I got bit by an insect (or spider) and my finger swelled up and was quite painful to the touch. Since it hadn't gone away by Thursday I went to the doctor and got put on a round of amoxicillin which they decided would cure both my bite and the sinus infection. Friday I stayed home with Brady while Bruce went into work for the afternoon. Unfortunately on Friday I also got the call from my boss telling me that Boston had got back to them and that they would not have room for me to join their office so now Bruce and I have to decide whether I will stay in London with Brady for 9 months while he's in Boston teaching or if I'll come back and either be unemployed or try to find a job in Boston. Ahh the joys of an unpredictable future.

Today (Saturday) we decided to take Brady on a tour of the London sites. On a rare sunny day in London the tourists were all out in fine form so it was a challenge to get a photo without tourists. We started out at Piccadilly Circus then wandered over to Leicester Square, by the National Art Museum and Trafalgar Square, then down along the Thames River and the south bank by the London Eye and then Westminster & Big Ben, past Westminster Abbey, through St. James Park and finally by Buckingham Palace. Brady behaved really well and on the way home we picked up some chocolates for me and had lunch at a little Italian place. Now we're just relaxing after eating a hamburgers Bruce grilled up. Brady had his first bed wedding - or I should say faulty nappy. Ahh the joys of parenting :) Never a dull moment.

[updated with photo's to go along with the post]
Weather certainly puts a damper on things. Friday we left the house around 3:30 to catch our 6:10 p.m. flight. Traffic getting onto the M4 (which is literally on the other side of the block from our house) was absolutely insane took us about 20 minutes just to go around a corner. We got to Heathrow about an hour and 30 minutes before the flight. One World alliance flights are such a hassle – we bought our tickets on Swiss Air but after standing in line waiting for our turn they told us since we were going to Milan we needed to go to the Lufthansa ticket counter on the other part of the Heathrow Terminal 1. We then had to wait in line there and when we were seen there was an issue with Brady’s ticket so we had to wait for that to settle. By the time we got through security we had an hour before our flight but when we checked the monitors our flight was delayed for an hour. Eventually after subsequent delays we made it into Milan at 11:45 p.m. which was about 3 hours later then our scheduled 8:45 p.m. arrival. I had to rush with Brady over to the car rental counter because they closed at midnight and were reluctant to stay open later for us. Fortunately I made it and was able to finalise the rental stuff – sadly they upgraded us to a larger car, which when you’re driving in Europe on tiny mountain roads is the last thing you want but they said they had nothing smaller available for us. About the time I finished up with the rental car Bruce showed up with the stroller and car seat and we headed out to our Peugeot station wagon. We then started our drive to Bellagio on Lake Como – fortunately it was a very dark night and Bruce had done all the research on the roads so we were able to follow the path to Bellagio even though it wasn’t perfectly marked and we didn’t have to see what was on the other side of a very steep mountain road (my fear of heights would have been seriously tested had I been able to see that I was driving on a road which was basically a cliff). We arrived at the hotel around 2 a.m. checked in and went straight to bed (after a little work getting Brady to sleep).

Saturday morning we had no choice but to get up around 8 a.m. when Brady decided he was getting up (7 a.m. UK time). We headed down for breakfast which was definitely of the “continental” style – after having breakfast delivered to our rooms last week in Wales with fresh fruit, croissants and fancy yoghurt the breakfast was a bit of a let down. After our breakfast we took our showers and then had to pack up our stuff and move to a smaller room on the other side of the hotel – the partial lake view was only available for the one night which is what you get when you book the day before! After moving we left the hotel to take a tour of the town and try to get tickets to a 11:00 a.m. villa showing. After finally locating the ticket office we determined that the walk through the villa’s gardens – which was over rough terrain and was several miles was a bit much for us with the stroller and our lack of sleep so we decided to head down to the other villa in Bellagio. The Mezi villa was right on the waterfront. We wandered through all their gardens and at one point Bruce had to pick up the stroller with Brady in it and carry it up some rock stairs. What can I say strollers aren’t the easiest things to manuever through fancy gardens. After our visit to these gardens we purchased €11 all-day water shuttle tickets to travel to the next villa.

On the way to Varenna the ferry had one other stop at a town on the otherside of the lake so we were able to see the lake from several vantage points. It was really beautiful with the blue skies and calm water. There were two villa’s to see in Varenna and it was already around 1 when we arrived. Brady was starving so we stopped on the little walkway that takes you around a cliff face from the dock to the main town and villa’s. We found what we thought was a secluded bench to feed Brady but within a minute of starting to feed him an entire bridal party started their trip to the otherside of the island – and when I say bridal party I mean including all the guests. About 80 people walked past me while I was feeding Brady they all saw the stroller and tried to peak in for a look – of course he was underneath the cover being fed. Pretty funny to watch. Anyway after the feed it was time to start thinking about our own food. The first villa was on top of a hill and was actually converted into a hotel and dinning facility. It was so beautiful had an amazing view of the lake and Bellagio. We decided to have a late lunch on their patio which literally looked out over the lake and was the perfect location for a wedding – which they actually were setting up for when we left. After our lunch we took a nice walk through their gardens and took photo’s of the next villa Monastero which was just down the beach. Once we’d been through the gardens we collected the stroller and headed over to the Monastero villa – which apparently has a Summer International Physics school being run out of it (seriously ironic). We strolled through these gardens and at this villa we were actually allowed to go inside the villa and see what it was all about. It was quite beautiful and a nice shady break from the hot sun.

After finishing up the villa’s we picked up some ice cream which was hand made in the store – when I say ice cream I really mean Gellato. Sadly they didn’t have pistachio so I had to settle for mint and cinnamon – odd flavour but they were both very refreshing. We then took the water taxi over to Tremezzo via Bellagio so we could see the Carlotta Villa. This one was also really beautiful and we were able to take the stroller with us because they had elevators to get you to the top of the hill where the villa was. We were feeling a bit tired after a day in the heat so we wandered through the villa checking out the rooms and then did a shortened walk through their gardens – which were a much more green variety from some of the other gardens we had seen. After this we caught the water shuttle again and instead of taking the quick route back to Bellagio we decided to catch one that would take us down the lake and back up so we could admire the different views of the lake. Upon returning to the hotel we all took showers to cool down – since there wasn’t a bathtub I had Bruce hold Brady in the shower with him so we could cool Brady down. Around 8 we headed down to La Punta – a pier area on the otherside of Bellagio for a nice dinner. The place was secluded and took some walking to get there but was obviously in a lot of tourist books – there were a lot of locals there but also several tourists. Brady wasn’t too thrilled so Bruce spent most of the meal walking Brady along the pier as we sat at our outdoor table. The food was all right – I ordered a fried Place fish and somehow I got the fried fish platter (yuck). I ate the place piece that was on the plate and some chips but the rest of the fishes had heads so I skipped over them and took Brady for a walk. We then returned to the heart of Bellagio and stopped for more Gellato (this time pistachio) for dessert.

Sunday morning I was a bit nervous about timing and getting back to the airport to return the car etc so we got up and had a quick breakfast. By 9:45 we checked out of the hotel and took all our stuff to the car. Then we walked through the tourist shops and bought some Italian scarves for Bruce and myself, a hand painted thimble for my collection and a xylophone and wheeled wooden toy for Brady. At that point it was almost 10:30 and I wanted to catch the 10:45 car ferry across the lake so Bruce ran to get the car and I made my way back down the treaturous stairs to meet Bruce at the car. There was a lot of confusion with buying the tickets and needing to know the model of the car you were driving. After waiting in line I didn’t know the information so I had to run back to the car and then send Bruce up who had to wait in line all over again. Luckily enough we got our ticket and even though we didn’t think there would be enough room on the ferry we were able to get on and get across the lake. We then drove back along the otherside of the lake sticking to the shore roads so we could see all the different views – we even drove through Laglio (George Clooney’s town) but didn’t have any sitings. After the drive we still had plenty of time but decided to just head to the airport so we could get the car returned and relax. We had some issues getting fuel – no easy fuel station in range of the airport and the one we eventually found after double-backing on the airport road wasn’t open between 12 and 2 and you could only use cash to pay so we were going to have to lose €10 since we only needed €9 worth of fuel and only had a €20 and the machine gave us back a ticket for €10 in change that you had to collect during open hours. Fortunately Bruce talked a taxi driver into giving us €10 for it. We then returned the rental car, checked in for our flight and waited on the flight. With our travel luck there was an hour long delay in our flight – probably longer but we made some of it up in the air. Apparently there was a plane issue on a runway at Heathrow which caused 50% reduction in take-off space. We finally got home around 7 p.m. and spent the few hours we had sorting clothes, ordering pizza and putting things away before calling it a night.

This week has gone by far too quickly. Brady has taken to waking up every two hours per night as opposed to the usual three hours. Monday we had the nursery start him on a new solid – broccoli but they also gave him courgettes. He tried them both wasn’t a fan of them at first but eventually took to eating them. Tuesday we had them cut out the courgettes and just stick with the broccoli and carrots – I’d been told to introduce one veggie at a time so we can tell if he has an allergic reaction to something. Tuesday night after his bath I noticed a rash on Brady’s tummy and under his arms but since he was eating ok and playing all right I didn’t think much of it. That night he developed a cough and when he woke at 5 a.m. he was really hot and had a slight fever of 100.4. When Bruce changed him for nursery the rash had pretty much disappeared so we didn’t think anything of it until I got a call at 3:00 from the nursery to tell me the rash was all over his legs and on his face. So I had to call the doctors office. I ended up picking him up and taking him in at 4 to the doctor’s office. Turned out he didn’t have a fever and his pulse was normal when I took him in and of course he was his playful happy self. Since he’d had the fever and a cough mixed with the rash the doctor was require to tell us it could possibly be swine flu – but the UK is no longer testing for it so they cannot tell for certain. She was convinced since he had the other symptoms that it wasn’t a food allergy (as I’d hoped). She was required to offer me Tamiflu but I could tell she really didn’t want to. He has a mild viral infection and will probably be over it within a few days and since he was acting so healthy I agreed that there wasn’t much point in giving him unnecessary medication. Of course within 30 minutes of being home he became tired, fussy and less playful. Through the night he was up every hour and forty-five minutes with the cough and the sinus congestion came on strong. Fortunately the fever didn’t come back and the rash didn’t appear to get any worse. We didn’t get up until 7:15 this morning since we were all so exhausted from the amount of times we had to get up through the night. We tried to steam Brady in the shower so hopefully whatever he has will cure itself quickly and we’ll all get a good nights sleep soon. Tomorrow Brady will be 6 months so it would be nice to kick it off on a happy note.

I don’t know where the weeks go but the past week has been a particularly busy one. Last weekend we decided to take the train up to Wales. We decided up on this destination due to many factors the primary one being that the US embassy had Bruce’s passport since he was running out of blank pages and needed to have them added so we could not leave the UK the other rationale that I like castles and Bruce is a big fan of mountains so Snowdonia made for an ideal trip. Wednesday we booked everything and then spent Thursday night packing our suitcase. Friday I went off to work and Bruce did a few last minute things around the flat, trying to work but ultimately looking after Brady before meeting me at 6:00 at Euston station. The train journey was a little over 3 hours to Bangor, Wales. The train itself was not too busy and our seats were at a table so we were lucky enough to be able to take over all four seats around the table including putting Brady in his car seat for most of the journey in one of the window seats. It was the perfect height for him to be able to look out the train window as we went along. Bruce and I read through the Snowdonia/North Wales travel guides and attempted to plot our Saturday journey. One guide gave a 9-hour drive that covered quite a few things – we altered that slightly to fit in three of the four big castles. During the day my colleague, Josef, had warned me that all it does in Wales is rain so we tried to keep that in mind as we made our plans.

Once we arrived in Bangor the car rental lady was waiting on us and we were able to quickly pack up the rental car and head off to Beaumaris, which is a town (& castle) on the island of Anglesey (which is connected to the mainland by a suspension bridge – apparently another site to see). While finalising the rental agreements we realised two important things – one Bruce’s license had expired on his birthday in June (so I’d be doing all the driving) and two the car literally was below the Empty line. Honestly who rents a car to someone without any fuel? The lady gave us awful directions to the petrol station but luckily we managed to find the filling station and had to put in £50 to fill up the tank (inevitably we were unable to use even ½ of that by the end of our weekend so the company made money on us with the fuel). We then got directions to the island which took us on a direct route with many “sleeping policemen” – it wasn’t until the next morning that it sunk into Bruce what the guy had meant by sleeping policemen – it wasn’t that there were a lot of policemen hiding on the road to catch speeders like he’d suggested to me when he got back in the car but it means the humps in the road. That road must have had about a dozen humps. Eventually we made it over the beautiful suspension bridge around the island to Beaumaris. Once there we could not locate our hotel we drove around for ten minutes until I finally said that’s a funny looking bull on that building – we were staying at the Old Bull’s Inn. Fortunately it registered for Bruce and we were able to park and check into the hotel. The hotel itself was very old but they had recently renovated the building across the way and we were staying in those rooms. The rooms had just been opened in May so everything was new. We were staying in the Pearl room and it was very luxurious. Unfortunately I made the mistake of putting the baby in the car seat down on the round table which was directly under the bright light (at 10:30 p.m. – yep he woke up). We spent the next hour settling in and trying to get Brady back to sleep – eventually we managed.

Saturday morning came pretty early – fortunately Brady didn’t get us up at 6 and we actually all slept in until 7:45 (ok that’s still with the 3-hour feeds throughout the night). Our breakfast was scheduled to arrive at 8 a.m. (which it did) so we waited on showers until it arrived. The breakfast was supposed to be a traditional Welsh breakfast but I think that must have changed. The breakfast was really good a few croissants each, a yoghurt & granola bowl, a fruit bowl and some coffee/tea. We took turns eating/showering/watching after the little one. By 9:30 we were ready to start our day (which was set to be a long one). The first castle was Beaumaris, which was on the other side of the hotel so we wandered over to it getting there a little after 9:30 – luckily enough it turned out the castle hours were 9 to 5 (not 9:30 to 4 and 11 to 4 on Sundays) so we had even more time to see the castles. We got a three-day all access visitors pass for the Wales attractions and then wandered through the castle. Contrary to the norm the weather was actually really pleasant a bit warm and sunny skies with a few clouds. We really enjoyed this first castle it wasn’t crowded and we had plenty of time to wander through the different walls up and down and around. Plus this one had the working moat which made it that much nicer. After this castle we started our drive to castle number two Conwy castle.

The drive was an easy one mostly motorway with very little to see along the way but Conwy was a quaint town actually surrounded by the stone walls. We found parking on the outer side of the wall and walked along the wall down to the Castle. Conwy castle was nice but it was our least favourite of the four castles we saw on the trip – probably due to the fact that there was a large group of Spanish or Italian students wearing bright orange shirts who had no manners or respect for anyone. I was avoiding cigarettes and smoke with the baby around every corner. The castle had one of the better views out over the water though and from the other side of the water was a beautiful look back on the castle. After the castle we walked over to an Elizabethan house that was on display. It had come recommended so we took the opportunity to visit the house and see the way rich people lived. They had a beautifully laid out garden and Bruce was taken with the way they actually used the ceiling with intricate moldings as opposed to just flat plain walls. After the house we picked up a slice of caramel shortbread (thought we were getting two slices) and returned to the car and our journey to our next destination which was the Swallow Falls in the Snowdonia National Park near Betws-y-Coed. Based on my short visit to Wales I’m convinced that the Welsh do their best to put as many consonants in a word as possible often times just doubling up on a letter. The falls were quite nice though different then I expected more like a river of falls then a short stream coming out of a mountain like I’ve seen in previous occasion – still beautiful and of course terrifying for me having Brady anywhere near the slippery rocks. After this stop we headed straight through the park around the mountains towards the last of our three castles. This journey took us through some very beautiful scenic views and since the weather was staying nice we got some gorgeous views and pictures. Brady slept on most of our drives and was awake for most of the stops – so it was a good mix.

We arrived in Harlech a little after 3:30 p.m. and made a bee-line for the Castle. It was a gorgeous location though a little frightening with a huge drop off the side of the castle. Underneath were beautiful views of the Ocean and also of the golf course down below. It was one of the smaller castles with not much surviving but it was still nice to look around – given the prime location of the town on a hill I’m sure they light it up in the evenings and it must look wonderful. After the castle we picked up some ice cream (apparently it was “probably” the best ice cream in Wales) and then did a stop at the tourist information. While walking around we heard all these sirens and saw this helicopter nearby and we were wondering what it was – sadly we read the next day in a paper that a father and 3 year old girl had fallen into a waterfall in Harlech- touched a little too close to home for me. We will not be taking Brady to any waterfalls once he can walk until he’s 7 or 8 and maybe then he’ll still be on a leash actually we probably won’t take him to any castles either the stairs were very steep and worn and an accident would be so easy with a young child. It was now almost 5 p.m. and so all the castles would be closed and shops would be closing so we decided to stop at Portmeirion, which was a town built to meld with its natural surroundings as opposed to taking away from them. The brochures said it was open until 7:30 and that they had a store that sold the famous welsh pottery (which we later found out is made in England but the founder was from Portmeirion). When we got there the rain finally caught up with us – but we still ventured out. We found out that we only had 30 minutes (the stores closed at 5:30) before the stores closed so we ran in and bought a really nice serving dish and a juicer made from the portmeirion pottery. We determined this was a useful souvenir not like our magnets and thimbles. Brady was hungry at this point so we stopped and fed him before taking a short walk back through to take some photos of the little town (we did this because we had to pay an entry fee to get in so we figured we’d better enjoy the town).

After the town we droved the peninsula and drove to the southern end town of Abersoch where we stopped for a fish & chips dinner. It was excellent the store was quite popular so we knew we were going to get something good and they put the fish & chips in when Bruce ordered them so they were very fresh! We couldn’t find a beach to eat them on so we ended up in a lay-by but it was still a really good meal – probably even better since we’d managed to skip lunch entirely. After this town we tried to continue driving along the coast but wound up not finding the correct roads we made it as far south as Aberdaron which is almost to the tip but then lost track of the roads so we ended up heading out since we were hoping to catch the sunset. On our drive along the western coast of the peninsula we got some great photos of the sun reflecting off the ocean (which was the closest we got to seeing the sunset). We returned to our island and drove around to the western side of it to try and find a beach to catch the sunset the first beach we came to had closed and was barred from entry so we had to continue farther along eventually we were high enough to see over the water only to realise that there wasn’t going to be a sunset since there were clouds on the water. At this point it was 9:20 and so we turned around and returned to our hotel in Beaumaris. Another late night for us we didn’t get to the hotel until 10 and at that point I got in the bath with Brady so we could get him calmed down and hopefully to sleep. Bruce ran out and did a few quick errands beer for Bruce and chocolate for me we went to sleep.

Sunday morning we got up at 7:30 early enough for the shower process to be well under way before the breakfast arrived at 8:00. By 8:30 we were all ready and heading out the door. We had decided that we would save the biggest castle for today so that we would have plenty of time for exploration. The Caernarfon castle is right on the coast and is the place where Prince Charles was made 2nd in line for the throne by his mother – there was a big ceremony. We got there just after 9 and I believe we were the first people to arrive – the place was completely empty when we got there which was just the way we like it. We must have been up every tower and walkway we were permitted on – some of the steps were quite steep but they gave magnificent views. While we were there the misty rain started on and off. After about two hours we’d finally seen enough of the castle and we headed back to the hotel to feed the baby and check out. The rain really hit on our drive back. We quickly packed up and then went to a baby toy store we’d seen along the street from our hotel – there Brady got a bunch of new bath toys as well as his own calendar – when he’s older he’ll be able to put the date, weather, season up on his very own calendar. We then returned to the hotel where we settled in to have a lunch – Bruce got some form of liver or stomach or something and I got another round of fish & chips! YUMMY. Brady was pretty fussy so Bruce walked him around most of the meal but eventually I calmed him down by sharing my fish with him – he loved eating the fish but unfortunately I forgot that when I had him laughing 15 minutes after eating and the fish made a re-appearance all over his sleeve. After the meal we took a quick walk of the town and then headed for the train station. It was bucketing down when we arrived at the train station but we managed to get everything out of the car and onto the platform. The train ride was pretty uneventful after we ran down the platform from one end to the middle when the “B” car was in the middle instead of up the back end where they told us it would be. We then called a taxi, returned home and ordered pizza to finish off our weekend.

With such a busy weekend you’d think I’d learn to take it easy during the week….of course not. Monday night I left work, picked up Brady and went to Richmond to see Gergana and meet little Oscar (who is just a month old). We initially were going to eat along the river but the bars apparently don’t permit children after 6 p.m. so we ended up walking up to the main street and having a really nice meal at an Italian restaurant. Both of us took turns feeding our babies and putting them to sleep. Brady was a little fussy early on but finally passed out for the remainder of the meal. Around 8:45 I caught the bus home from Richmond and Brady pretty much went straight to bed and after cleaning some bottles I went to bed as well.

Tuesday Graziella came for a visit. She hadn’t seen Brady since he was about 6 weeks old (March) and since our travel schedules are both so hectic we decided having her over for a meal during the week while she was in London was the best arrangement. She came over around 5 and the two of us went to Brady’s nursery to pick him up. After talking with his minder I decided that starting tomorrow Brady would be fed carrots for his lunch time meal and continue with the baby rice-cereal for his breakfast. We then took Brady home and Graziella got to experience first hand a night in our lives post birth. Brady made sure to complete all the elements – smiling, laughing, playing, crying, eating, bathing, a messy nappy and finally sleep. Bruce was even able to put together our favourite steak salad so we all munched on that with glasses of the Italian red wine Graziella had brought with her. After the meal the three of us chatted about recommendations for nearby sites to see in Europe – Graziella highly recommended a trip to Lake Como as she had recently been for a conference. The evening passed far too quickly and Graziella had to head home for her train and we had to head into the kitchen to complete some baby dishes before going to bed ourselves.

Wednesday was my quiet day if you can call it that. Instead of going to work I had to go to a training course – which turned out to be one of the most awful courses I’ve ever attended. The course was all the way on the other side of London near our other office so it took just under an hour to get there. Fortunately Jessica was there so it made it bearable. They also were able to find a room that I could use to express milk and I decided to spread it out and just do it once. After the course I returned home and had to quickly pump so that we would have milk for Brady’s nursery on Thursday. We gave Brady his bath and eventually tucked him into bed for the evening. After Brady fell asleep Bruce and I spent an hour or longer looking through our Europe books trying to decide where we could go this weekend. After searching the internet the cheapest flight we could get was to Milan – i.e., Lake Como. We looked for hotels in the area but weren’t sure if we were comfortable with what we were finding so we decided to hold off and just do the dishes and see how we felt in the morning about a trip.

Thursday morning we inevitably decided if the fights, hotel & car rental was available we would go to Lake Como for the weekend. As luck would have it they all were – not only that Jessica had already done research for her trip next week and we were able to get a room at the hotel she will be staying at. Thursday Bruce had an evening on his own with Brady after work I did a LastMinute.co.uk dinner & theatre night. The restaurant was the International right across from the Portrait Gallery. I didn’t know what to expect but they had happy hour cocktails until 8 for £3.75 so it started off well. The drink I got which was a mandarin Mimosa was very good and the meal was a set course so I had veggie spring rolls and chicken which was also good. I think the restaurant is an Asian-fusion type of place. Anyway other then the chicken being a little bit dry everything was really good. On our walk over to the theatre we walked through Leicester Square as they were dismantling the premiere barriers for “the Inglorious Basterds” – yes totally depressing fifteen minutes less chatting and I probably would have seen Quentin Tarantino and Brad Pitt (assuming he made the premiere). It was at this point that the heavens opened and a torrential downpour started – we only had three blocks to walk to get to Piccadilly Circus and the theatre where 39 Steps was playing but it seemed to take forever and our coats were all soaking wet by the time we got there. The show itself was really really good. Prior to Annie sending us the three options for shows for that evening I hadn’t even heard of the show and until the show was over I had no idea what it was about. It was a comedy play with four actors and to say it was well worth it would be an understatement. I would certainly see it again and would recommend it to anyone. I will say for £20/person for a show and a dinner you really can’t beat the evening out we had. When I got home at 10:15 Brady was just being fed his 10 p.m. bottle so I was able to spend a few minutes with him before he fell back asleep. Bruce washed some dishes and I attempted to pull together some of the supplies we would need for the weekend.

We are currently attempting to get Brady to sleep through the night. We thought with the added food during the day it would encourage him to feel fuller and sleep better but it’s yet to be proven. Bruce is so much better at this training then I am. I’m terrible when Brady fusses too much during the night I find it impossible not to just grab him put him on me and let him fall asleep on me so that I can sleep to. We had to agree on a term for using with him when we put him in his cot – somehow I came up with “night night Brady”. So we put him in there at 7:30 or whenever his bed time is say that phrase a few times and then walk away. Of course they’re supposed to be somewhat sleepy when you put them down but they are not supposed to be fully asleep. If they wake up you’re just supposed to come in pat them say the phrase and leave them for three to five minutes of crying. Apparently if we do this for five nights he will be cured and will sleep through the night. But we’re still feeding him through the night so I guess that will have to change as well. They said to start this at six months so right now it’s just getting him used to the idea of going to sleep alone. In a week, when he’s six months old, we’ll get the nursery to give him three meals a day and then we’ll implement the no feeding through the night – which means I’ll have to pump one more time and we’ll have to determine his bed time and wake-up time. Oh the things we have to look forward to.

This evening we fly to Milan and then drive up to Lake Como –with any luck we’ll have beautiful weather and some nice pictures and stories to share next week…maybe we’ll even run into George Clooney or Richard Branson. For those of you who want to see all our photo’s we started a new site (sojkaanderson.shutterfly.com) since I’m quickly running out of room on this blog – yeah apparently there are limits. If you want to access it let me know and I will send you the password, since we put all our photo’s out there I didn’t want the world to have open access.

As parents, Bruce and I have certainly had a challenging and exciting few weeks at home in London. As you read in the swine flu blog last week that was the low point of the last several weeks but there have been some new challenges and adventures in parenting. Last Monday (6 July) it occurred to us that we had not seen a #2 in Brady’s nappy in at least a week – we had to actually refer back to his nursery book to figure out the last time. We started to get worried and did what any 21st century parent would do and hit the internet as well as the various parenting books I’ve acquired. After reading conflicting views on constipation in 5 month old babies we determined that a week was not completely normal but not out of the range of normal for a solely breast-fed baby. I still couldn’t shake the worry that maybe something bigger was wrong like maybe he wasn’t getting enough to eat or maybe he was dehydrated. Bruce agreed to go to the Health Visitor clinic on Tuesday morning with Brady to get him weighed and to ask about the constipation as well as weaning.

After Bruce’s visit with the health visitor we were told that at 5 months if Brady was interested in food then we could certainly begin giving him regular food. Also, he was sticking on the 50th percentile for weight line coming in at 16lbs 14oz so there was no real concern about his weight. There is a process for weaning so they suggested we start off with two teaspoons of baby rice mixed with two tablespoons of milk or boiled water at 10 in the morning and then attend a weaning course the following Wednesday (15 July). For the constipation they recommended that we give Brady fresh squeezed orange juice mixed in equal parts with boiled water. So that evening at home we attempted to get Brady to have his first drink of OJ. Well that couldn’t have gone much worse between the two of us trying to feed him a two-ounce bottle of fresh OJ we got about ½ an ounce actually into his stomach and it did not have the desired result.

Wednesday we let the nursery begin giving Brady the baby rice (yes I was devastated that I couldn’t be the first to give him baby rice but I guess I can take comfort knowing I was the first to give him solids in the form of the rusks we had tried the week earlier). When we picked him up they told us how he had really taken to the baby rice so that was good but still there was no progress with the other problem. We tried OJ again that night but he remembered the taste from the day before and adamantly refused to take the juice – I tried having him suck on oranges and that worked for about 10 minutes then he tired of that also.

Thursday I picked Brady up from nursery around 5 p.m. and went off in search of baby rice and prune juice. Everything I read suggested that prune juice would kick the system into gear so I was determined to get some and since I hadn’t been able to locate any at the shops near our house the night before I took him down to Hammersmith to have a look. We were able to easily locate the baby rice and picked up two varieties so that Bruce would be prepared for his Friday at home with Brady. We also picked up a set of blue plastic baby spoons – since the bowl-spoon set I ordered randomly showed up in pink and not blue. After a lot of searching I finally had to settle on prunes in juice (apple juice that looked pretty dark purple) with no added sugars, preservatives . . . When Bruce arrived home we tried giving Brady a bath and I had also tried doing the “bicycle” movements with his legs but nothing had worked so Bruce made up the 1 part prune juice 1 part water and within 15 minutes (while I was on the phone with Evie) we had success! Yes the things you look forward to as a parent… It wasn’t that bad on Thursday night but we went through six nappies and a thing of wipes in 10 minutes Friday morning before I left for work.

Friday I joined Bruce & Brady late afternoon to attend baby massage class with them. It was the three of us and about 16 other mothers and their babies. It was pretty hectic but the hour long course taught us the basics of baby massage. They seem to encourage the use of olive oil for doing the massage but we had brought one of the natural chamomile oil that I got at my shower. Brady seemed to be alright with the massage though he did require some food mid-way through to calm down. After the massage class Brady passed out which gave Bruce and I a few hours to finish up our work and settle in for the evening. That night we gave Brady a bath to wash off the excess oil and prep him for bed (baths are now a part of our regular evening routine with Brady and when he doesn’t get them its even more difficult to get him to sleep).

Saturday was my works annual barbeque. Brady got us up early so we decided to head down to the french café for breakfast. We got there just after 8 when it opened which meant we had our pick of pastries – I even got my favorite apple pastry which is a half moon shaped pastry filled with apple sauce. After our breakfast we stopped at the butcher and picked up two pork chops for our Sunday dinner but also wound up with bacon for our Sunday breakfast and a bunch of other random bits like cheese, eggs & salami. We eventually got all settled and headed off to the bbq arriving about an hour late. The weather was your typical London dreary, misty, rainy mix. A few of my good friends were there including Annie, Blessing, Josef (Leilani & Timo) and my boss Craig and his family (I finally met his children). The food left a lot to be desired but it did the job of filling us up and there was beer which kept Bruce happy and plenty of water to keep me hydrated. Brady was on his best behavior smiling at most people. He only got fussy around 5:30 when we were already packing up to leave. That night we took it easy and relaxed on the sofa watching Nights in Rodanthe with Richard Gere – excellent movie.

Sunday was a good morning with bacon, eggs & toast. Brady was fed again his baby rice and then we took a nice trip up to High Street Kensington where we picked up a bunch of new books for Brady. We spent most of the afternoon around the house making phone calls to family members and just relaxing. Bruce cooked up the pork chops and we had them with some mashed potatoes.

Monday Bruce worked the afternoon from home and took Brady in for his third round of shots – notice how after my first experience with Brady and the shots I’ve conveniently been unavailable to take Brady in for another round of shots. He did really well with them and again had no side effects (fingers crossed this continues in the future). That night we were both exhausted since I had decided that maybe we could start to get Brady to miss a feed or two if we gave him water instead of milk for one of his feeds – so Bruce tried this at midnight. It took him 15 minutes to get Brady back to sleep and he didn’t drink much of his water but it wasn’t successful he still got up for the other feeds. Tuesday night we had some teriyaki chicken that Bruce had picked up from the butchers along with the leftover potatoes and tried to go to bed early.

Wednesday I worked from home and attended the weaning course from 10 to 11. The course was taught by the same lady who did the baby massage course so that was good. I was the only person in attendance who did not bring their baby – I’d tried to call all morning to find out if you were supposed to or encouraged to bring your baby (oh well didn’t end up mattering). I basically found out that I could have started Brady eating this baby rice at 4 months (if he was interested and he was) and that at 6 months the world is his oyster and he can pretty much eat anything (except GRAVY (yes Poland was a small mistake), soft-boiled eggs (my favorite part of the egg), strawberries and whole milk). I did figure out that everything I’d been doing was fine – that letting Brady drink from our glasses or get used to having a glass on his mouth is all very good since they need to learn to use different mouth muscles to drink like a normal person. We also are supposed to buy sippy cups (but preferably topless cups) so he can get used to holding a glass and we’re never supposed to give him anything but water or milk out of the bottle...(strike one and two for the oj & the prune juice experiments). So now I’ll be picking up some cups and I just bought a food processor which won’t really be that necessary since at 6 months you really only have to mash up their food not puree it. Oh well maybe it’ll make good milk-shakes.

Laura came over early that evening and we watched a bunch of Grey’s Anatomy episodes finishing off Season 4 and starting into the most recent season. She also got to experience two firsts. . . (one of which she probably would like to forget) – Brady hadn’t had a nappy with a #2 in it again since Thursday so we were starting to worry again but on the way home from nursery I smelled this foul odor in the steps down to the flat so I hurried inside only to realize that I could still smell it. Eventually I identified the source of such a foul odor and immediately rectified the situation. Since Brady was in his nappy we sat him down in his chair with his tray and gave him some baby rice and this time we also let him try some mashed avocado with it. The avocado wasn’t a big hit but we’ll keep trying since they say it can take up to 20 times for them to get used to it. After the eating session we gave Brady a nice bath. Bruce arrived home and within minutes Brady decided to show daddy his new smell with another deposit in his new nappy. To say that this new development is one we could have lived without is an understatement – as Bruce tried not to gag at his first whiff of changing these new nappies we both said a small thank-you that these are weekly occurrences and not daily. To think this will probably only get worse with time…I’m all for potty training early! As we were cleaning him up dealing with one end he decided that he was quite relaxed and sprayed his new clean outfit. He hadn’t done this in ages so it was time for a quick shower before getting him into his bed clothes.

At the weaning course I’d been told that we should not be encouraging him to go to sleep with a dummy (pacifier) and that we should not be putting him to sleep before he is placed in his cot. Unfortunately he has a dependency which only came about in the past two weeks on his dummy and he also refuses to go to sleep by himself – eventually I managed to get him in a mostly asleep state and put him into the cot – dummy in place. We’ll take baby steps on this one I guess! Unfortunately last night was another rough one Brady got up every two hours – at one point actually getting his leg caught between the bars on his cot and certainly letting us know about it. I think I’m going to call the childcare advisor to see if I can’t get some more advice on how to get him to sleep through the night - everyone seems to have their ideas and I’ve read two different books on the process but having someone with multiple real world experiences who could walk us through it would be really nice.

Wednesday evening I was perusing the internet looking at weather forecasts and since the weather looked good for Belgium for the weekend we decided to book a trip on the Eurostar to Brussels. We picked up our guide to the four cities in Belgium – Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp and settled on Brussels & Bruges for our weekend. The Lonely Planet guide recommended various hotels and as we looked online even the high end hotels were offering very reduced rates. The first one I looked to book put up an alert at the end telling me they do not accept children at the hotel – frustrating since the guide book had the baby sign next to the hotel description. We ended up at the Royal Windsor hotel in Brussels which was just a few blocks from all the major attractions and the central train station. We packed up our stuff and took a Eurostar on Friday to Brussels. We walked from the midi train station (20 minutes) to our hotel and checked in. I was a bit nervous when our hotel room was on a smoking/non-smoking split floor but it smelled all right so I let it pass.

We then set out on a quick site-seeing tour of Brussels. The town actually had a lot more sites then I expected but we stayed on the outside looking at all the old buildings, churches and views. Though there is a lot of graffiti in Brussels the buildings were still impressive. For dinner that night I wanted french fries so we stopped at a restaurant on a tight street that came recommended by the book. Bruce got the traditional mussels and frites and I got a roast chicken and frites - both were good. That night we went to bed quite early after watching Murray lose to Roddick (very sad moment). Around 3:30 a.m. I woke up and could smell smoke and 15 minutes later when Brady woke up for a feed Bruce also woke up and confirmed he could smell the smoke. I was so upset and worried that I told him we had to change rooms immediately. The front desk manager tried to tell him we were far enough away from the smoking rooms that we shouldn’t be able to smell it but he told him that we had an infant and could certainly smell it. So at 4 in the morning we packed up our stuff and moved up a floor to a much nicer room, with a queen-sized bed on a completely non-smoking floor. Fortunately we were able to fall back asleep.

Saturday we got up around 7 and by 8:30 we were rushing our way out of the hotel to the train station to catch a 9 a.m. train to Bruges. We caught the train no problem and found ourselves a nice place to sit for the hour long train ride. We spent most of the journey planning out our trip. Since most of the sites have a siesta from 12 until 2 we decided we would try to start with two of the churches (Saint-Saviours Kathedral and our Lady "Onze-Lieve-Vrouwekerk") that were on the southern end of the town on the walk from the train station to the centre of town. It was yet another beautiful day in Belgium – sunny skies and no rain anywhere. The walk was beautiful and the churches were as well. The one church has an early statue by Michelangelo the Sculpture of Madonna and the Child, the church itself dates back to the 13th century and is the tallest structure in the city (though during our visit the tower was under construction). After the churches we decided to take the canal walk described in our guide. We were starving but the first two locations in the book for eating were closed so we continued our journey trying to find the perfect place to eat. We were trying to avoid places where the menu was in five or six languages. We found a perfect bar off the beaten path but they permitted smoking inside and out so I didn’t want to expose Brady to that. Eventually we stopped at the first food serving pub in Bruges. It was a quaint place and certainly didn’t serve fancy cuisine we both opted for the cheese & salami platter to start and the croquet monsieur (ham & cheese) to eat. The place was perfect though outside so that Brady’s loud talking would not disturb too many people and it wasn’t too busy which also helped. After that we went to a lace shop that was recommended in the guide and then we continued our canal walk eventually winding our way back into the central Markt – which featured heavily in the Colin Farrell movie “In Bruges”. I have to admit the city definitely has that old feel to it and I love that it isn’t just one street here or there it literally felt like the entire city was old. They call it the Venice of Northern Europe since it literally has dozens of canals and bridges. It was really impressive and I slightly regretted that we had chosen to stay in Brussels and not Bruges.

Since we were a bit tired from all the walking and the heat we took a mid-afternoon break to have a snack - I finally got my belgian waffle with chocolate sauce and a strawberry milkshake and Bruce had a beer. Once we were rested we decided we did want to try a canal tour so we went and got in line for a tour. The tour lasted 30 minutes and the boat was full of people. They gave the tour in multiple languages and it was a nice view of the city and gave us a few more bridges that we wanted to inspect more closely before we left. After the boat ride, which Brady slept through, we started our journey back to the train station stopping at the smallest bridge in the city to take some pictures. We also walked through a pretty convent and along the shopping streets where I picked up various souveniers and chocolates. [Speaking of chocolates I made it my mission to find the best Belgian chocolates on this trip. I bought chocolates from five separate stores on the trip and have been working my way through the different bags to determine which are the best - sadly to this point none of them have lived up to the Charbonnel Et Walker chocolates I get in London.] We caught a 6:30 train back to Brussels and were back at the hotel by 7:30. We were relaxing in the room debating whether to go out as a family, send Bruce out or just skip it but since it was a trip we decided to all go out. We did a nice walk back through the fancy shopping mall (which is the oldest shopping arcade in Europe) and then stopped at a pub on the other end which again came recommended by the book. After Bruce finished his beer there we moved back down into the big square in the centre of town. I should note that up until this trip in my opinion Bruce did not suffer from allergies - unfortunately something in the air hit him around lunchtime in Bruges and he was sneezing heavily for the entire day. It was so bad that we had to stop and buy packets of tissues for him. Talk about bad timing for allergies to come on! In the square I insisted that Bruce do one of the beer samplers that we'd seen at a bar so we stopped and Bruce ordered the sampler, which came with five different beers and I ordered a chocolate mousse. Brady was fussy so I ended up doing some walking around the square while Bruce made his way through the beers. They weren't too bad but the fourth beer was a berry flavored beer and the fifth was peach flavored. Since Brady was fussy I ended up taking him back to the hotel with two beers to go. When Bruce came back to the hotel he informed me that he'd given up on the berry flavored beer but that the peach beer had been drinkable!

Sunday morning we got up and packed up all of our stuff. We requested a late check-out for 1 p.m. so that we wouldn't have to move our stuff before our 2:30 train back to London. I wrote my postcards in the morning while Bruce showered and then we set off to see a bit more of Brussels. Bruce stopped and had a waffle with chocolate sauce for breakfast and then we found a good souvenier shop to pick up a few last minute things. Since it was still early we decided to head back to the big cathedral and take a look inside since it had not been open on Friday. Unfortuantely we walked in and it was mid-mass so we stayed for ten minutes in the back of the church and admired the inside of the church before making our way back to the hotel. By 1 p.m. we had taken a train back to the midi station where the Eurostar departs from and were eating lunch at a very fancy restaurant, which conveniently had some outdoor tables. Brady was quite fussy so there was a bit of walking but I enjoyed a steak and Bruce had a fish dish and we managed to finish off the last of our Euro's on a very nice meal. We boarded the Eurostar - only to find we were in the first carriage of the train which was the farthest away - and to make matters even more exciting we were in the special "family" carriage which is a block of 4 rows of seats that is enclosed in glass so the rest of the train doesn't have to hear you. Brady was asleep when we got on but within a matter of minutes after being awoke multiple times by the baby across from us and the toddler next to us he gave up and decided to be up too. The two hour train ride wasn't so bad but Bruce did have Brady out inbetween the trains for a while keeping him quiet. After the train we easily caught the tube back to the flat and got home just in time to catch the final set of the Wimbledon final with Federrer beating Roddick. Unfortunately our Virgin TV was still out from Wednesday and when I called nothing could be done so we had to watch the last set on Bruce's computer - but it came through alright.

The rest of the evening was unmemorable as we unpacked, did some laundry and cleaned up the kitchen. I think we are both looking forward to being home this weekend and having two straight weeks to relax and get back into a routine. Brady is a very good traveller thankfully but it is definitely nice to be home.

Subject: swine flu - sender Brady's nursery.... not the way I wanted to start my week. Apparently one of the children in Brady's nursery was affected with the swine flu. They didn't do the blood test but the doctor confirmed that the child has cold symptoms and a high temperature and has what he believes is the swine flu. Talk about a "sinking" feeling in your stomach that refuses to go away. The infected child hasn't been in nursery since last week on Monday but all I want to do is run home to rescue Brady. I'm sure it's fine - he hasn't exhibited any symptoms and he's a strong boy so even if he did contract it this summer it would probably be a good thing in that it would give him immunity to the much worse strain that is supposed to hit this fall. Regardless, I'm feeling pretty ill at the thought.

That was the icing on the fact that I found out that after all my research on BPA bottles and making sure that I selected the right bottles for Brady. I was using a set of bottles that were not BPA free : ( I bought three extra in the US that had a cloudy plastic to them and they are BPA free but the other half that I had were clear plastic and made in China. Honestly I'm feeling like a pretty crap mother right about now. I should have just gone with the bottles I bought initially that I knew were BPA free but I took the advice of another mother and now have exposed Brady to the BPA bottles for the past five months (though only the past two continuously). So now we've dumped the non BPA free bottles and will switch over and hopefully he hasn't been affected too much by the chemicals in the old bottles... Being a mother hurts!

After two straight weeks on the road it has been nice to be living in our flat in London this week. The drawback to the house this week is that the temperatures in London have sky-rocketed – reaching the mid-80’s today though I think we must have got into the 90’s earlier in the week. Not that heat is a bad thing but when your flat has no air-conditioning it can be pretty hard to deal with. Bruce & I can handle it but the past two nights Brady has proven that he is not a fan of the heat. He has had two very restless nights of sleep which have landed him back in our bed the past two nights. Though he’d fallen asleep in his bed I think the cot with its location against the wall does not get the air circulation we get in our bed so after he woke at various points during the night we finally caved and let him lay in our bed where the fan circulates the air much more effectively. To say that Bruce & I are exhausted would be an understatement – Brady has been waking much more frequently then every three hours. We’re trying but I really do hope this heat wave is behind us and that we can get back to the damp, cool, wet London weather we’ve become so accustomed to.

On a more exciting note Brady is now 5 months old! Hard to believe though people who see him sometimes mistake him for 6 to 8 months, though I doubt how anyone with any experience would think he was 8 months old. Over the past several months I have been working on his taste buds letting him try the odd slice of lemon, beet, cucumber, french fry, gravy, bread with butter . . . and since he seems so keen on it all I decided he was definitely ready for some solid foods. The family in Scotland highly recommended Farley’s Rusks (which are little biscuits that go very soggy with liquid) as a starter food so yesterday Bruce went out and bought a box and we let him try one out. To say he enjoyed it would be an understatement. He sat and gummed it for about half an hour – and inevitably ended up with a bath/shower when all was said and done. Tonight I will try to break it up in the bowl add milk to it and give it to him as a mush and see what he thinks of that. My guess is that he’ll prefer the handheld method where he can gum on it. Every now and then those two little teeth buds on his lower gum appear but they haven’t quite broken the skin so we’re still waiting for this first phase of teething to be completed. We’ve got his teething toys armed and ready in the fridge to numb his gums and he is forever trying to reach out and grab any glass we are drinking so he can put his bottom gum against it and feel the cool glass on his gums. Unfortunately we are typically drinking out of beer glasses, so no we are not feeding the kid beer but we do let him suck on the glass – I must admit he isn’t adverse to the smell of beer so I guess we’d better not leave little cans of beer in the fridge when he gets older.

It’s amazing how quickly he is changing – he still absolutely loves to stand and if we need to calm him down that is the easiest way. He can also hold himself up against the couch for a little bit. Bruce will lay on the couch and Brady will actually take little steps up his stomach so I’m sure he’d love to be walking (I’m happy to wait another 7-8-9-10 . . .months on that one). His nails are still sharper then ever and even though I cut them regularly they grow back far too quickly and I’m forever looking at scratches on my arms, face, and neck. He’s really enjoying his time in nursery – they’ve even had him out in their little paddling pool and apparently he was really keen on that. His favourite book is the black & white animal book that provides a really good contrast for him. He loves the little taggies ball that Aunt Jigisha & Tejal got for him and fortunately the little motored caterpillar they got him that moves around with a spinning thing on the back also keeps his attention. His laughter has to be my favourite sound – he breaks into giggling fits which are contagious! The downside to him finding sound is that somewhere he picked up a high pitched screaming that last week became his way of communicating – unfortunately it sounds like he’s in pain but he’s actually smiling while he’s making these sounds so it’s just his way of talking, hopefully he’ll find a lower pitched sound soon. All in all we’re really enjoying our last summer in London and first summer with Brady. In five months he’s already visited five countries (England, Scotland, USA, Poland and Germany) and taken 13 flights. This weekend we’ll add another train journey and country on with our trip to Brussels & Bruges (Belgium). He’s a good little traveller and though he won’t remember much of these towns and cities we enjoy the chance to experience new adventures with him!

A mother’s first trip without her baby…when I left the flat at 4:30 a.m. on Monday (22 June) morning I was crushed. The exhaustion was bad but the idea of leaving Brady for a whole three and a half days was awful. He had been perfectly content when I left so that helped and the supply of frozen milk appeared to leave Bruce exactly enough for 8-four ounce bottles per day which was clearly more then enough. It was also comforting to know that Bruce would be there and he’d be able to continue on with his nursery routine for the week. The flight to Germany was really quick and before I knew it I had landed in Frankfurt and was busy seeking at taxi to take me to the Ernst & Young office (located outside the city in a business park). I arrived at the office and the days went very very quickly. This review was so smooth I was able to easily sink right into the work and though I had to break twice a day at work to express milk for the baby and several times throughout the night it felt really productive to be entirely focused on work again. I thought I’d enjoy full nights of sleep but instead it was horrid trying to get up in the middle of the night to express milk- the exhaustion was worse then getting up with the baby since I had to be fully awake to work the machine. I missed Brady a lot but I checked in with Bruce several times a day and other then some leaking milk bags early on everything was always going very smoothly. The first two days were work-work-work with two very quick dinners in the hotel lobby. Wednesday after work I took a break and went down to Frankfurt and caught up with Kate (a former EY Baltimore colleague), her husband and her beautiful little girl Morgan (who just turned 6 months). Kate was leaving to return to Baltimore the following week but even with all the hassles of moving she offered to let me freeze the milk in her freezer for the week(end). We went out for dinner at a Mexican restaurant on Wednesday night and the fajitas were great. With the new baby we called it an early night at 7:30 and I was happy to have plenty of time back at the hotel to clean all the bottles and supplies – being a mom out of town is tough (see picture of hotel bathroom).

The next day work went by rather slowly – I think knowing that Bruce & Brady were just hours away from leaving London to join me in Frankfurt made the day so much longer. We finished closing up our review comments and finalised most of the information and at the end of the day I took a taxi with one of the other reviewers, Wendy, down to the Marriott – where I was checking in for the weekend with Bruce & Brady. I checked into our hotel room, changed and then walked to the train station to catch the train to the airport. It seemed like forever before the two of them managed to get their baggage and come through the doors. Brady was so happy and all smiles which made me feel so much better! We took a quick taxi ride back to the hotel, where I thought I’d have a 10 p.m. call but fortunately they had put it off until 8 a.m. We ordered burgers and fries from room service and then went straight to sleep.

Friday morning I had work to do on the computer and also on a phone call so I let Bruce take Brady out in the stroller for coffee and some walking. My work took a bit longer then expected but I made a clean break by 11:30 and we left the hotel with our stuff to go meet Kate & Morgan for brunch at a nearby café. They served traditional European breakfast food and I enjoyed the “healthy start” breakfast though I had them substitute a croissant for the whole wheat roll. The kids took turns napping and the sun was really warm. After brunch we went to Kate’s place to drop off a little bit more milk. It was fun for the kids to see each other but I think Brady’s still a little bit away from really engaging with other kids. Right now he prefers to just take everything in and I mean everything. We left Kate’s place and immediately headed to the train station where we took a train to Heidelberg for an afternoon of site-seeing. I still haven’t determined if I’ve been there before but it all looked very familiar. We wandered about the castle and then down the town picking up some Christmas ornaments and a puppet for Brady. Brady slept through the entire journey up until we stopped at Starbucks (3 ½ hours after we’d arrived) and I ordered a cold strawberry drink and fed Brady while Bruce went off to buy some salami’s, cheese & bread from some stores we’d seen that looked really appetizing. We then caught a 7 something train back to Frankfurt and ended up snacking on meats, cheese & bread in our room for dinner.

Saturday morning we got up early and packed up our bags so we could check out of the hotel. We then went to the post office and picked up some postcard stamps before heading to the train station to see about renting a car – four car rental agencies later we finally found one that had a car available immediately with an infant car seat. The downside was the car had not been cleaned yet but we didn’t care we were just happy they had something available. We picked up the car, drove to the Marriott and checked out of our hotel. Before we left we had to figure out how to change the sat nav into English but once we did that we were golden. We stopped in the morning in the town of Mainz on the Rheine river. There we spent some time walking around the city center and picked up another little wooden toy for Brady. The town was busy with a huge market and fireman’s festival. We ended our time there by having another picnic on our car with salami, meat and cheese. After we loaded up the car we decided to head over to Rudesheim a place Kate & Shaun had recommended because of a special Christmas store they had. We tried to navigate on our own but wound up missing the only two bridges across the Rheine so we put it into the sat nav and were on our way. The first thing in the town was the tourist information so we stopped in for some directions and a map. We then went through the various sites in the town stopping for pictures and shopping along the way. It was a quaint little town but very touristy – I’m sure there were far more foreigners then Germans there. The Christmas shop did not disappoint and I spent quite a few Euro’s picking out things for our tree. We have a lot to compete with as far as the Christmas tree goes since both Bruce’s parents and my parents have a variety of ornaments including Germany ornaments, but we’re up for the challenge. We were in the town until a little after 5 and then we had to hurry and head back to Frankfurt where we were meeting my cousin Jacob after his work.

Jacob was happily waiting for us at the Exposition centre where he was working. He took us on a walk through so we could see the work his team was doing on setting up two of the stalls. It was quite impressive. We then jumped in our Ford Focus and drove north to Bonn (it took about an hour and a half). I felt bad because Jacob joined us in our car and sadly the air conditioning was not working in the car so it was a warm ride. It was so nice driving though as there were various places I could get the car up to 160 kph as there was no speed limit. Jacob took us to a Polish restaurant in Bonn where they served these massive steaks. The food was excellent – unfortunately Brady was quite unsettled during the meal so everyone took turns holding and entertaining him. Whether that was feeding him beets or later paper brochures. We also were lucky enough to meet Jacob’s wife Isabella and his daughter Olivia. They were so nice and spoke English very well. It was a great meal and later we returned to Jacobs house were they put us up for the evening.

Sunday morning we spent a bit of time in Jacob’s garden before heading into town to dine at Olivia’s favourite breakfast place. The food good and we followed it with a walk along the Rheine river before we had to head back into Frankfurt. We arrived back in Frankfurt with plenty of time before we had to return the car and head to the airport. We used that time to feed the baby and write postcards. Eventually it was time to get moving so I ran over to Kate’s house and picked up the frozen milk. We then went to the train station and returned the rental car and caught a taxi to the airport. The trip went far too quickly and sadly Brady’s 13th flight was very unlucky for us. I’m not sure what caused it but he was miserable from start to finish. About 20 minutes into the one hour flight after I had tried feeding him and playing with him Bruce took Brady to the back of the plane (10 rows away) and tried to calm him down. It was sort of work but of course then he started to get fussy and there were two carts preventing me from getting back to help. Eventually I relieved Bruce and stood at the back with the baby until the plane hit some turbulence in its initial descent into the London area. I had to return to my seat with Brady and the seat belt sign came on. We both took turns trying to keep him quiet but nothing was really working well. After we landed he’d had enough…I was trying to call the taxi service, we were stuck on the tarmac waiting for a gate and Bruce asked me to take him since he’d been doing so well with me earlier (we were both very anxious and stressed out) I took him and tried to show him the window and that’s when he completely lost it!!! The screaming was as if he was in severe pain and he started the uncontrollable sobbing so loud that you couldn’t hear the captain in English or German announce that we were waiting on a gate (or we assume that’s what he said). For ten minutes we had to endure the screaming and could do nothing to calm him down. We waited until everyone else had disembarked before we got off the plane and by then Brady had passed out in his Bjorn. The issue was probably partly due to a very heavy nappy – which I was forced to change after my jeans developed a wet spot under the Bjorn. We got a taxi back into London and fortunately he was a perfect angel when we got home – though it was already starting to get very warm in London.

Saturday was an errand running day and we walked up to Earls Court and stopped at the bank to get some Euro’s and mail a DVD to uncle Paul. Then we went to the bank to get some money. I had planned on getting a pedicure since my feet were in bad shape from all the sandal wearing. Bruce was nice enough to watch Brady at a bar while I went and got a pedi-mani. It was very relaxing. We returned home around 1 p.m. and had our leftover pizza. Around 3 we decided to head into the city to pick up a few things at Harrods. Once back home we continued to do laundry and relax. The weekend went so quickly that I can’t remember much but I’m sure we went to bed early. Bruce made steak taco’s with guacamole for dinner which was excellent.

Sunday was Bruce's first Fathers Day and he received several fathers day cards from the families in Utah, from Brady and from me. I made blueberry muffins for breakfast and we enjoyed those while I also continued with the laundry. After we'd showered and packed up Brady's stuff we headed off around 1 p.m. to Selena & Matt's house. Last year I had purchased two tickets to see Hamlet performed by Jude Law and the date had finally arrived for the showing. This was our first date since having Brady! We dropped Brady off with two bottles, two bags of stuff and a big smile on his face. We then took a taxi to Leicester Square and made our way to the theatre to pick up our tickets to Hamlet. When we got to the counter we found out that I’d purchased tickets for the following Sunday’s showing. I was devastated to say the least and asked if they had any other tickets for that day they said no but as we were making our way outside, discussing how terrible our luck was, the lady came out to get us and it turns out they were willing to let us buy two of the tickets that were reserved for the theatre (ie, for the stars families/friends/etc). We had to turn in our tickets for next week and they will try to resell them and then send me a check. The seats were unbelievable!!! Fifth row centre. The play itself was remarkable. Bruce said he'd be thinking about that one for a while to come. Everyone did an amazing job but Jude Law clearly is now on the top of my list of actors for performances seen live in London. He was amazing and during the curtain call he made eye contact with me not just once but he looked back a second time – which of course made my day! After the show we took the tube back to Nottinghill and picked up Brady who was in the process of laughing when we showed up which was a good sign. Matt & Selena seemed to have had a good time with him and he’d drank both bottles, slept some and played some so that was comforting. He had also shown him his king of the bed routine where he throws his arms wide when he sleeps and takes up as much space as possible! We then returned home and I started the process of packing for my work trip to Germany. It was hard to think about leaving Brady for four days. We got to sleep around 10 p.m. which was as early as we could as I had to wake up at 3:45 a.m. in order to shower before the 4:30 taxi pick-up. All in all it was a really great weekend and it was so much fun to go on a real date!

Ok so almost two days to load all these photos from Sotland and Poland and now I'm a week behind on our Germany trip but here they are - and honestly these are the best of the best there were over 400 photos as Uncle Paul unfortunately found out when he got the bill for processing copies of the entire DVD I sent him. It was a wonderful trip though and memories to last a lifetime! One thing I noted while looking through the photos was how much Brady enjoyed the Polish gravy - we might have to take him back just so he can try that again!