Creed Update

Oh, this has been the most disgusting week of my life! I can't even count the times I've been coated with Creed's bodily fluids. I took pictures to show Larry how bad things have really been, but I'll spare you and just say that Creed finally stopped throwing up on Wednesday, but he was still having major problems, and I went through 25 diapers on Wednesday. 25!!!!! That's horrific!

He's finally doing so much better today and seems to have really perked up, but we did get to have a lot of cuddle time this week.

And here's a little update for the grandparents. He loves to curl up with anyone who will read to him. His favorite books are lift-the-flap or touch and feel like Where's Spot? and anything by Matthew Van Fleet.

We started him back on solids slowly so I let him go to town with applesauce and a spoon yesterday. He was very entertained and gave me half an hour to clean while he was concentrating. He kept filling the spoon and getting it to his mouth only to turn it upside down at his lips and dump it on his chest.

He has recently learned how to climb up into his little armchair and loves to hang out there by himself. He also surprised us last night with another trick that he learned on his own. He walked over to his elephant and just jumped right on and rocked himself and then got off on his own too. We pulled out the video cameras and he totally repeated it. Pardon the sideways videoclip, it was too cute to skip posting!

And speaking of cute videoclips, you have to watch this one. For weeks now Creed has been doing a few things at the dinner table to to make us crack up. He has three classic moves: sticking out his tongue, opening and closing his mouth as wide as he can like a hippo, and wiggling his eyebrows (which is really just blinking, but he thinks that he's wiggling his eyebrows).

He babbles all the time, and we can't understand most of it, but every once in a while, something stands out and shocks us. In the last two days, we've repeatedly heard pizza, all done, camera, and David (our two-year old neighbor that he's been dying to play with all week while we kept him inside).

He also has a new favorite accessory of choice; glasses! He only wears them for a few seconds at a time before he hands them back to you and wants you to put them on him again. He tries to put them on himself, but they always end up on his neck or behind his head.

Umbrella, ella, ella

Candice is taking pictures of all the people who visit her in New York to hang in a collection on her wall. The only rule is that they have to be holding an umbrella somewhere in New York. Our picture was while we were visiting Coney Island, which is why it was impossible to get Creed to look at the camera with all the craziness in the background.

Anyway, here's our portrait, stolen straight for Candice's blog. And yes, Larry wanted to be forever remembered in his gnome shirt.

Creed takes a trip to the emergency room

Since Saturday night Creed hasn't been able to keep any food or water in his little body. He slept most of the way home on Sunday, but he's been miserable since then. Larry had to work on Monday so I spent the day at home just holding him and doing my best to mop up the mess that kept coating us both. He seemed to be getting worse, not better, so when Larry got home this morning(after working a night shift while struggling with the same virus) and tried to feed Creed one bite of a muffin, which immediately came back up, we decided to take Creed in to the hospital just to make sure that we weren't missing anything and there wasn't anything else that we could be doing for him. Our doctor's office couldn't fit him in until the very end of the day and we didn't want to wait another eight hours or we would have opted to bring him to the ER first.

I'm sure every mom hates seeing one of these on her baby. He laid there listlessly and put up with everything until they tried to look at his ears and our suspicion was confirmed that his ear infection never cleared up completely, but he can't start another round of antibiotics for a few days because he won't be able to keep them down. So sad! He's also lost at least four pounds and I'm surprised how light he is every time I pick him up.

He was still tossing everything back out tonight, but he seemed to have perked up a bit so here's hoping tomorrow is a better day!

The Rest

The last time we went to New York, I was over six months pregnant with Creed and the city was decked out for Christmas with tourists bustling everywhere. Larry and I walked everywhere, which was a little hard on my pregnant body, and we did a lot of site seeing so this time we didn't feel like we had to see it all. We took our time and headed back the the Stringham's most afternoons for Creed to catch a nap.

Tuesday we spent the morning in Chinatown. I was happy to visit Muji, which was one of my favorite stores in Japan. It's not quite as affordable here, but it's still worth a visit.

We bought Creed this little set of New York In a bag to mix in with the rest of his building blocks. They also make Paris, Tokyo, and London and I'd love to collect them all. Randomly, the next day. It was funny to get back and read this post on a blog that a love and learn that the author, Jordan, was in New York at the same time and picked the same souvenir for her son.
There was a CB2 store next door and of course we had to visit the Pearl River Market a couple of doors down to pick up some of our favorite Asian treats and sushi supplies.

Candice Babysat for us so we could have a night out on the town. She pointed us to Max Brenner for dinner, which was great. They are known for their amazing and creative chocolate and I could have stayed there all night eating it (except that the lady at the next table decided to join her boyfriend on our little side of the bench and was literally sitting on me). We stopped at the TKTS booth to pick up tickets and I should have done a more little research ahead of time because my top choices were not even playing that night (theaters are traditionally closed on Mondays, which I remembered, but I didn't even think about the fact that some shows also opt not to open on Tuesdays too). After some debate we ended settling for the Little Mermaid because it's Disney and we knew it would be a safe choice, and we both had to admit we were a little curious about how they would pull it off (plus, it didn't hurt that the theater was across the street so we didn't have to worry about finding it, and who can complain when you're buying half price tickets the day of the show?)

The mermaids had fake tails that stood out behind them and swished back and forth and then the skated around the stage on Heely's to make it look like they were gliding through water. Ursula and her two eels were my favorites. It was fun being in an audience with so many kids who were so excited for the show. There was huge applause at every break.

Wedenesday we opted to start off with something that would be fun for Creed since her had a rough night without us so we headed to FAO Schwartz. When we got off the subway we were rigth in front of the plaza hotel.

I couldn't resist the chance to go in to see the portrait of Eloise, which was just moved back into the hotel. As predicted Creed loved FAO Schwartz! He couldn't resist giving a "love" to every big stuffed animal that he passed.

And check out all of these uglydolls!

We had to play the huge piano ala Big. They sell these pianos for $250,000.00. There employee told us he thinks the last time they sold one was in 2004.

Since we were already on Fifth Avenue, we headed down for some shopping because I wanted to pick up some Statue of Liberty pieces for our Mr. Potato Head collection, which they only sell at the NYC Disney Store, and Larry needed a hot dog from a street vendor.

We stopped at Saint Patrick's cathedral.

Sat on the steps for a snack while we people watched.

And eventually made it down to check out the lions at the public library Every time we enter a building, Creed check for an echo and he gets so excited when he discovers abuilding with a good one.

It wasn't so exciting when we were trying to take a look at the reading room!

Somewhere along the way we stopped for lunch at the Original Soup Guy and it was just as good as they made it out to be on Seinfeld, but they are a lot more friendly now that they are a chain.

That night was sushi night at the Stringhams' because Candice wanted a refresher course.

We made California rolls and Hawaiian style musubi.

I don't get to make sushi a lot because Larry's not the biggest sushi fan so it was fun.

Thursday, Larry stayed home with the boys so I could shop a little with Candice. She introduced me to Fishs Eddy, which quickly became one of my new favorite stores. I wanted twelve of everything, but a settled for a set of polka dot glasses since we're moving soon, and I had to carry my purchase for the rest of our shopping trip.

After that we headed to the Park Slope neighborhood in Brooklyn to buy some huge cupcakes and Downtown Atlantic.

We also stopped at City Foundry because they have the coolest letters from old signs (but not a single "&" for my collection) They actually rent things to magazine like Country Home for photoshoots and I swear I've seen some of their antique globes in a room in a catalogue, which was fun.

Candice found some letters to take home so she had to walk home like this.

That evening Larry and I took Creed to walk around Soho and sadly this picture at the Scholastic store is the only one that I took. he was so excited about the big Clifford (not that he knows who clifford is, but he loves dogs).

We made our way back down to Chinatown where I was taken in to a back room to check out some knockoff purses (which I did not buy because I'm not really into supporting the back market, but it was a fun experience) and we found some manapua for dinner (roast pork buns that I grew up on in Hawaii and I have no idea what the real Chinese name is. Instead of an ice cream truck, there was a manapua man that would drive his truck around town like once a week).

Friday brought us to Madison Square Park for the Shake Shack. I don't think you can even begin to get an idea of what the line was like from this picture.

Larry and I both agreed that it was worth it.

After walking around Washington Square and listening to the street performers, Candice and her kids headed home and Larry and I took Creed to MOMA. It was crowded because it's free on Friday evening, but we didn't want to go when we had to pay full-price because we weren't sure how entertained Creed would be. We saw a little Van Gough

Creed slept among some Waterlilies

And Larry saw the Rothko he has proclaimed as his favorite painting in the whole world so I think we were all happy.

They had these crazy yellow lights by a photo exhibit that had Creed very confused.

We went over to the Guggenheim too, but decided Creed would never make it through the line winding around the block so instead we enjoyed it from the outside while we watched joggers in Central Park and Creed snacked.

Then it was time to mmet the Stringham's in Brooklyn so we thought what better way then the Brooklyn Bridge on foot? There's an elevated walkway in the middle with cars down below on both sides.

It was a beautiful day for a walk.

At the base of the bridge, we met the Stringhams to watch Enchanted for free at the park. The little girl from the movie was there and it was fun to see all the little kids lined up for her autograph.

We stayed long enough to see the bridge light up in different colors to celebrate its birthday.

Saturday, we spent the morning just hanging out and then we went with the Stringhams to Coney Island.

The whole week, the only time I felt a little worried about safety was at Coney Island, because there were so many police officers EVERYWHERE. It made me think bad things must have happen to require that many to be there. I'm still glad that we got to see it before they tear it down next year.

And we couldn't leave without having hot dogs form Nathan's, but it was hard to get Creed to stop people watching long enough to eat a bit.

Sunday we were sad to go. We opted out of church since Creed spent the night throwing up and that seemed to be a good choice because we had some ugly moments on the way home.

He loved have two older cousins to follow around.

And we will miss this awesome family (with two little boys we struggle to take pictures of, which is why I included the previous photo of them so you will know they are actually quite sweet).

New York, New York

We found ourselves in an odd position this week. Larry had a whole week of vacation and we had absolutely nothing planned. We'd been holding off at first because we didn't know what would happen with selling our house and once that worked out we held off making plans in case we had to head to Utah to find a place to live, but then that worked out. So what's a family to do with a free week? . . . Visit the Stringhams of course. This is not the first time we've called them spur of the moment and asked if we could crash with them, but this time it was especially exciting because they no longer live in rural Ohio or Louisville (which we love but have already explored). No, now the Stringhams live in Brooklyn! Nine ours later, we were sitting on their couch.

I'm worn out and should be sleeping so you just get a few pictures from our first day. Candice was at the Stationary Show with some other Creating Keepsakes editors so Mark had the day off to watch Cole and they headed to Central Park with us. Creed got to travel in true New York style, listening to an Ipod on the subway.

We trekked through Central Park. Spending time at one of the playgrounds and then the boat pond.It's always so weird being in New York because everything is new and yet familiar because it's been in a million movies so you begin to feel like you're living inside of a movie. There were even filming this one as we walked by the main fountain. (We have super cheesy smiles because we had to hold that pose while other curious onlookers walked by and Mark waited for a pause to snap the photo)We walked by the Strawberry Fields Memorial and had to snap a photo for our brother-in-law Mike, the biggest Beatles fan that we know.Then we had to let Creed check out Time Square.We were happy to head back to Brooklyn a little early because Creed and I were still feeling a little under the weather. I love this picture of the Stringham boys on their stoop because it totally shows their personalities. I don't know how Candice takes such amazing photos of them because they are constantly making faces like this.We stayed home with Grant and Cole for the evening while Candice and Mark went out and our evening involved fort buildingAnd eating pizza. which Larry insisted that we eat folded in half New York style.Creed doesn't care how he has to eat it as long as he gets pizza. I swear on our trip home today I heard him say the word "pizza". He is absolutely Larry's son.