Friday, November 28, 2008

Turkey Day

Ahhh... Thanksgiving.
A time for roasted turkey smothered in gravy,
hot buttered mashed potatoes,
homemade cranberry orange bread,
and pumpkin pie with a dab of whipped cream.

At least that is what it means to most of us.
If you are a baby on a milk, fruit, and veggies diet...
it simply means you get to eat celery
and hang out with family.

This year, we spent Thanksgiving at Nana's house.
Grandpa Ed was there,
trying to convince us to give Orin a chicken wing instead of a celery stick.
(Ed is concerned that Ori might grow up to be a vegetarian,
a dietary choice which is simply unacceptable 
to any man who owns a Traeger grill)
Orin also got to visit with his uncle Tony and aunt Katie
As well as with Casey's cousins, aunts, and uncles.
He was a real hit with cousin Cory
and cousin Tyler
(the feelings were mutual)

The food was wonderful
and, although Orin's spirits were not quite as high a usual
due to a persistent ear infection,
he still seemed to thoroughly enjoy himself.
Although we did have to promise that next year,
he could have a little pumpkin pie.
Happy Thanksgiving!

Monday, November 24, 2008

A Letter For You

Dear Orin,

A couple days ago. we celebrated your six month birthday. It is hard for me to digest that half a year has gone by since your birth. Life is moving so fast right now that it feels like I could blink and miss a week. Last night I woke up in the middle of the night, my mind overflowing with things that I wanted to tell you, scattered thoughts I have had over the last couple months. Thoughts that have never fit cleanly into a blog entry, but that I still think you should know.

Before you were born, I spoke with a lot of people and read countless books about parenting. I was thoroughly warned about how hard it would be in the beginning... the stress of being a first time parent: trying to figure out why your baby was crying all the time; attempting to remain calm and clearheaded through serious sleep deprivation; adjusting your life to a whole new rhythm to accommodate your baby. I heard all about how there would be times when I would want to scream and cry and run away. I was told it would be okay, that I should just know everybody goes through it... it would all turn out alright in the end. 

But it wasn't like that at all. 

From day one, you slept like an angel. Yes, you always got me up at night... every two to three hours... and you still do, but you just want to be fed and changed and then you immediately fall back to sleep. I have never had to battle you to go back to bed, so getting up every couple hours hasn't been so bad. There have been very few mornings in the last 6 months when I have woken up tired and I can't remember one that could have been blamed on you.

You are also incredibly easy to read. You cry when you are hungry or hurt. You fuss when you are bored or dirty. Thats it. There was a time for a couple of weeks in the very beginning that you would cry at night and I wasn't quite sure why, although I think it was from tummy pains. But that stage came and went without any major scarring and there has been nothing like it since. We have an understanding. When you cry, I figure out what is wrong and fix it. You don't cry often.

You go everywhere with us. If I have counted right, you have been to 17 states since you were born. We go to concerts, restaurants, museums... people have come up to us and said "good for you getting out of the house with the baby, I know how hard that can be." It isn't. Because its you.

We never hesitate to include you in things. You are (almost) always very well-behaved. The pictures that we have taken of you do not show how much you smile. Up until about a week ago, you flat out refused to smile when there was a camera around. We always had to trick you to get you to smile for the camera. But when the cameras are out of sight you smile at everything. And you love to cougar... that's your special thing. It makes everybody laugh.

You love to play. You like to be tossed up in the air. You scream and laugh when we swing you upside-down. Every time you are in someone's lap, you want to be bouncing... always bouncing and singing. Your daddy holds you like a football and runs with you around the house. You can't get enough of it. You like to grab me by the cheeks and pull my face towards you and then scream at me. I scream back at you and you laugh. People think that we are nuts. We don't care.

You do not have a bedtime. You do not have a nap time. You fall asleep wherever you are when you get tired. The more noise it the background, the better. You love to sleep with blankets pulled over your face, even when the lights are off. I let you fall asleep like that and then I go and dig a little tunnel to your face so that you will get enough air. When you sleep too long, I miss you. 

If you could, you would eat everything. You love to sit on our laps during mealtimes and try to steal our food before it gets to our mouths. We don't let you. 

You defy the normal baby convention: you do not like your car seat. At all. The whole drive-around-the-block-till-he-sleeps wouldn't work with you. But we never try to get you to sleep anyway. 

You teach me something new every day. 

Like how there is absolutely no limit to a mother's love. It grows with each passing day... every moment that I spend with you is a blessing. I feel privileged to have watched you grow these last 6 months... being there to witness your eyes open for the first time, seeing your first smile, hearing your first laugh, watching you grow and learn everyday. It has been, without a doubt, the best 6 months of my life. And I have you to thank. 

So thank you for being such an amazing person. Thank you for redefining love for me. Thank you for all of the moments we have spent together and all the ones to come. Thank you for being you. I love you from the bottom of my heart. 

Love, 

Your Mother

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Happy Half Birthday Orin!

Today was Orin's Half-a-Year-Since-Birth-Day!!!
-cue cheesy music, confetti rain, balloons-
To celebrate, we headed off to the coast for a day of fishing.
Orin loves fishing.
I think.
We didn't catch any fish,
but we weren't too worried about it because chocolate
makes a better birthday treat than salmon any day.
When we got home
I whipped up a brownie cake and we all put on our birthday
hats and sang to Orin.
What we didn't realize was that we had made a terrible mistake...
only the birthday boy is supposed to wear a birthday hat,
we just didn't know any better.
Luckily, Orin fixed the problem.
Once Orin had reclaimed his rightful place in the spotlight
it was time for some gifts.
A mysterious package had arrived in the mail that day.
It was addressed to Orin Zawicki,
but nobody knew anything else about it.
Further inspection was in order.
At first, Orin wasn't sure what to do with the package,
So he fell back on his number one strategy for 
investigating new objects: He stuck in in his mouth.
When that didn't work (not very tasty), we decided to help him out.
After tearing open the package we found:

A rescued sea turtle from the Turtle Hospital's
rescue, rehabilitate, and release program!
It had been sent directly from Florida
by Ori's Grandma and was still salty and fresh from the ocean.
Yummy birthday turtle!
Happy half birthday Orin!

 I can't believe it has been
6 months already...
Time goes by too fast.

The noise machine

It has recently come to my attention that our child is not normal.
Far from it, in fact.
I suppose that for a long while now I have harbored the delusion
that all babies are as, shall we say, "enthusiastic" as Orin.
The other day, while walking through the grocery store, it hit me:
Orin is the only baby that I have ever seen/known
who can continuously cougar call the entire time we shop
(sometimes over an hour)
That's right, Orin will all of a sudden get it in his head that
he is excited and he will just start screaming
(happy screams) at everything.
Nothing will slow him down.
He screams at the rows of juice,
the walnut display,
the old lady on her cell phone,
and, of course, the other babies.
The other babies who, for the record,
are not screaming (unless they are crying).
The other babies that gurgle and coo and smile as I wheel by
with my maniac baby screaming like it is going out of style.

It completely cracks me up.
We are definitely blessed.

Friday, November 21, 2008

Birth Control

For the record, we really like Relk and Kara.
They are good people.
We would never wish any type of unpleasantries upon them.
Really.
When we dropped Orin off for his first non-family babysitting stint,
we had high hopes.
He was asleep, we figured he would stay that way for a while.
Earlier that day, Casey had carefully packed
 all of Orin's favorite books and toys, 
his mesh feeder, a banana, his sippy cup, 
and an entire box of rice cereal.
"Just take him on a little walk if he fusses," we advised them,
before rushing out the door to make our dinner reservation.

As soon as we finished eating, we called Relk and Kara 
to see how it was going. Kara picked up the phone, sounding frazzled.
"Well, ummm... Orin really misses you guys. Yup.
He sure loves his mom and dad."

Uh oh.

Apparently, our docile little giggle machine had vanished as soon
as we had walked out the door and had been replaced by his 
impossible-to-comfort evil alter ego, Mr. Brussels. 

  Yup, he had cried pretty much 
non-stop the entire time, 
except when he was in his stroller, and then he only cried on and off.
When we got to their house, Relk,
who is normally cool as a cucumber,
looked as though he had just passed through an
industrial sized blender.

"It was definitely a learning experience," he said.
I think that we might have inadvertently guaranteed 
that they are never having children.

I really hope not.
Sorry again guys... We love you!
Now that Orin has been happily reunited with his parents,
he has made us a deal.
If we promise never to leave him with a babysitter again,
he will make us dinner.
Every night.
Agreed.

A New Look at Dinner

The other day, Casey and my definition of a great dinner
was changed in a very fundamental way.
Why? 
Because we went to Beast.

Beast is a hole-in-the-wall restaurant in NE Portland.
When you walk in, you enter this room:
The place is tiny... not much bigger than what you can see in the picture
There are two large tables which collectively seat 24 people.

You do not get to pick where you sit.
You do not get to pick what you eat. 
There are 6 courses, you can not make any substitutions.
But you are fed. And fed well.
After about an hour, you are in a total trance.
Food is placed before you.
You eat it.
Everything bursts with indescribable flavor.
Indescribable because, under normal circumstances, 
you would never even think about eating the parts of animal 
you are eating.

You don't worry about it.
And it tastes amazing.

This is the actual description of one of the courses:
FOIE-GRAS BON-BON, SAUTERNES GELEÉ
STEAK TARTARE & QUAIL EGG TOAST
CHICKEN LIVER MOUSSE WITH CASSIS, HOUSE CRACKER
PORK, PORK LIVER, PRUNE & GREEN PEPPERCORN PATE
2 and 1/2 hours later, the last bite of desert is gone.
You sit there thinking, hoping, maybe there will be something else...
but there isn't.
Sadly, you shuffle out into the night,
already missing the noise of the kitchen, the smell of food,
the dim lights.
Like a drug, you plot the next time you will be able to experience
such a thing.

You realize the answer is probably never.
But, wow, what an experience. 
We will certainly never forget it.

But through all this where was Orin?
Well, even though he came to all of the other restaurants
we went to this week,
generally sleeping soundly on the seat next to us,
we thought that Beast wouldn't be the best place to bring a baby.

So we decided to leave him with out trusty friends Relk and Kara,
who live a few minutes away from the restaurant.

Just a couple hours... how bad could it be?


Monday, November 17, 2008

A visitor from the East

This week, Grandpa Jack is visiting us from Massachusetts.
Feeling the need to show him the best Portland has to offer,
we have gone into a mini-vacation mode, filling our days with some
of the greatest things in life:
 Good food, good hiking, and --of course--
 Golf.
Our friend has an inside connection with one of the local golf courses,
allowing me and Orin to tag along for nine holes.

I was really excited at the opportunity to play
Orin, not so much...
After golfing we cleaned up and set off for Andina,
our favorite restaurant in Portland...
The food there is out-of-this-world amazing.
If you ever find yourself in NW Portland, 
give it a try, it will not disappoint.

The next day, we drove out to Eagle Creek 
in the Columbia River Gorge
It is absolutely beautiful out there.
This time of year all of the salmon are running upstream.
After spawning they turn bright red 
and splash around lazily in the river.
The water was packed with them,
I think I could have jumped in and caught one with my bear hands.
We hiked all the way out to the spot where Casey and I 
got engaged...
Last time we were here, it was just the two of us...
now two has become three
and life has gotten significantly more interesting,
to say the least.
With each passing day,
Orin is finding new ways to make us smile


Life is good. 
Tomorrow we are off bright and early for a day at the coast.

See you then.