Shortly after getting back home, we let Ada take a bath sans infant tub. We think this looks like approval, yes?

As seen by Daddy. =)

What a whirlwind 2 weeks it’s been for Ada and her mama! Ada’s Uncle Will and Aunt Jess recently returned from Germany after a 3-year station there, and it was really important that we spend as much time as possible with them before they move (again!) to Georgia in a couple weeks. So rather than spend a number of hours with an unhappy Ada in a car, Mama and Ada flew to DC! The best part of the flight was the duration: just under an hour. For comparison’s sake, it took much longer than that to drive in a car from our house to JFK airport! But we made it, and with a nod of thanks to the kindness of strangers, managed to get ourselves, all of our baby gear and luggage to Virginia.

Ada did very well on the short flight. It wasn’t a full flight and we mercifully got the whole row to ourselves. Good thing too, because Ada had no interest in cat napping, but wanted to jump on the seats, climb the back of the seat in front of us, and hop back and forth between the seats in our row.

Someone’s a window seat baby!

Grandma Barb meeting us at the airport. Hooray for a second pair of hands at last!

We settled in nicely at Grandma Barb’s house and began a week of many visits to friends and family.

With, you know, some sleeping in thrown in here and there.

Grandma Barb set up a HUGE play area for Ada downstairs. Her favorite is the music table just like we have at home and the train that actually pulls circus animals.

We even had a Friday dinner at Wegmans. Ohh, mama misses Wegmans.

“I’ve called you all to this morning meeting,” Ada said, “to discuss unacceptable workplace bullying of other toys that aren’t as cool as you.”

We were really sad that we couldn’t be together with Daddy for Ada’s first Hanukkah. We lit candles with Grampa Joe each night, and when we were able we Facetimed with Daddy so we could see the candles at home in New Jersey too.

First night in Virginia

Third night with Daddy in New Jersey.

In the meantime, we had lots of time during the days to visit with Uncle Will and Aunt Jess. We went shopping for remaining Christmas gifts,  baby gear for their daughter-on-the-way (due in April!), and generally made the Northern Virginia circuits. This was Ada’s first opportunity to meet Jess and Will, and it was clear early on that they had hit it off nicely.

Ada thinks Uncle Will has great taste in sandwich shops.

For one of our outings, we visited Mama’s old law firm in DC and had lunch all together with Jess Vought and Linda. Afterwards, we ran some errands in DC and stopped in Georgetown for BOTH Georgetown Cupcakes and Sprinkles cupcakes. We had to do a taste comparison, naturally. (In case you’re interested in the verdict, GC had better – albeit slidey – icing, but Spinkles had the better cake and the larger cupcake. My vote is for Sprinkles.)

“Yeah, yeah,” Ada said. “Are we at the cupcake shop yet?”

Ada clearly had NO FUN AT ALL with Uncle Will at the toy shop.

Or in the Daddy’s sports section of the maternity clothes store.

We also got to spend a whole day with Ada’s great-Nana, and her Granddad Dave and Grammy Pat joined for dinner. There we learned that Ada LOVES pomegranates, and that Granddad Dave is a tireless popcorn-car lap leader. Let’s just call it: grandparents are the best!

Snuggles with Nana

Mmmmm, pomegranates. Doesn’t she look sophisticated?

Nana didn’t even mind that we had about a million pomegranates under the floor that pop like crazy when you step on them. (Mama cleaned them up, thanks.)

Back at Grandma Barb’s, Ada is taking advantage of a kitty who actually wants to hang out with her.

This will NEVER be Mable.

Vampire baby! You guessed it… leftover pomegranate seeds.

And a big girl who prefers to hold her own watermelon.

At the end of the week, Mama got to go to a fancy law firm holiday party with old friends and co-workers. It was a spectacular shindig, and a fun night out. Unfortunately just a couple hours after I got back, Ada started throwing up nonstop. It was the beginning of the end of a week of socializing and busy bee baby and Mama. It seems that on one of our adventures with Jess and Will, somehow Ada, Mama and Aunt Jess got some sort of nasty stomach virus. We were all three down for a day or two, not happy campers.

Well, to be more specific, the Mama Jesses were down for the count. Ada was sick for about 6 hours and then made a miraculous recovery. She woke up after a night of vomiting and was cheery, no longer vomiting, and wanted to play. Hey, we’ll take it! Mamas would much rather be the ones sick.

We’re preparing for another fun week, because DADDY comes into town tomorrow! We’ve missed him so much and even though Facetime helps to allay some of it, we’re looking forward to having him with us.

For those needing an Ada fix here are some photos I took last week. Dinner and bath time with mama. Don’t worry the bath time photos are rated PG =)

Or: why you should always carefully cut up your kid’s spaghetti

Last night I was giving Ada a snack, a few bites of leftover spaghetti. She was doing well with it but started coughing afterwards. I didn’t think much of it, gave her some water, but then the coughing escalated. And sneezing started. And her nose starting running all over the place. It just wouldn’t stop, the poor thing. Eric wasn’t home and I was starting to worry, like is this what a food allergy looks like, who am I going to call, what’s going on, why is she still coughing... and then she sneezed again, and I saw a booger start to come out of her nose. I went to grab it, and she sneezed again, and look what shot OUT OF HER NOSE and directly into my hand. 3 inches, folks. Heaven help us. I don’t even understand how that’s possible.

For the little things.

“I would maintain that thanks are the highest form of thought; and that gratitude is happiness doubled by wonder.”
― G.K. Chesterton

Thanks to Hurricane Sandy, we spent real Halloween helping our friends move house. (Movers weren’t able to come at the last minute, so we and a few others helped Owen and his parents move from a second- to a fourth-floor walk-up apartment.) Our governor also tried to reschedule Halloween for the following Monday, since most of northern New Jersey wasn’t in any shape to go trick-or-treating last week. We say “tried” because most of our neighborhood went right ahead and went door-to-door on Halloween anyway, which meant that we dodged cute kids in costumes as we carried boxes and furniture to moving trucks and cars. The best costume by far was a Dad who dressed as Psy and hit the nail on the head, spot-on. Why we didn’t ask him to pleasepleaseplease dance for us, I will always regret.

I digress.

We opted to celebrate on the re-do Halloween rather than can it and wait for next year. See, a year ago or more, I discovered a whole industry based on adorable and hysterical baby animal costumes. Baby owls, baby octopi, baby rhinos… you name it. I was thrilled; Daddy, not so much. Something about “undignified” and “humiliating for the kid.” We met in the middle. Costumes are acceptable on Halloween, animal outfits ok year round.

Our dear friend Alberto knew all about it and before Ada was born sent us the baby lobster costume. Like, hours before Ada was born. Here’s a photo of Mama in labor, having dressed a bear in the just-arrived costume.

Yes it’s an unflattering photo but I was in LABOR, thanksmuch.

So all this is to say that we weren’t going to miss this Halloween with Ada. And we found out that the mall was hosting a few hours of trick-or-treating. This was particularly fortuitous because it helped us avoid awkwardness if we went ringing doors of people who weren’t expecting trick or treaters AND it was a warm place to be on an otherwise cold evening. So off we went!

A lobster-child is this season’s must have fashion accessory.

Mama carried a soup pot for candy collection and oven mitts. You could watch people put it all together in their mind and smile a moment later. =)

Daddy wishes he had a lobster costume of his own.

Cute lobster teeth! Can you see the tiny tooth on the bottom right?

Checking out her lobster booty back at home! And no, she’s not going to get to eat it all. We won’t tell her that this year trick-or-treating was essentially a racket designed to fatten up Mama and Daddy.

A ring pop is almost like a binky, right?

Thanks for all the love and congratulations yesterday, on our marriage’s first birthday. There was no better way to celebrate than spending the day having adventures with our Adabug. (She’s the best part of… pretty much everything.) We voted – all three of us, of course! – and then picked up an anniversary cake from Grandma Barb.

All stars and stripes for election day! Everyone thought she was a boy… but what else is new?

“Yeah, yeah, the democratic process,” she thinks. “Now where are my crackers?”

Afterwards we went into the city with our friends Eric, Meghan and baby Ellie to see the sunset from Top of the Rock (the observation deck at Rockefeller Center) and explore MSNBC’s Democracy Plaza. There they had all kinds of interactive exhibits, including a newsroom and camera where you could record your own presidential speech, a replica Oval Office and podium for photo taking.

President Ada would be very clear about her position on foreign policy.

They also had some massive features for watching the election results come in. First, a huge US map of states on the ice rink that would light up individually red or blue as each state’s results were called. And Rockefeller Center was lit half red, half blue and had a window washing lift on either side with a counter that rose as each candidate received electoral votes, up to a finish line of 270. How cool!

See? Half red, half blue. And those white boxes toward the bottom are the window washer lifts.

At Top of the Rock with Mama Meghan and baby Ellie.

What a view! Empire State behind Daddy’s shoulder.

Baby friends!

We ended the evening with a nod towards the dropping temperatures (cold baby toes and fingers are heartbreaking!) and early baby bedtimes. We walked to the PATH from Rockefeller Center, pausing in Times Square to see all the excitement there.

A jaunt through Times Square

Pooped.

Hooray for Ada’s first Election Day! She’ll be lining up to vote too… in 2032.

Holy smokes, we’re overdue for a post. It will be a long one, covering a long walk in Central Park with Grandma Barb, another visit with Grandma Nikki, a new tooth(!), a hurricane, a black-out, and two new exciting skills Ada’s picked up along the way.

We’ll get there. It’s our new motto, and one shared by most of our state: one step at a time.

In the meanwhile, here’s a bit of brightness.