November highlight was obviously Max's first birthday. It was a very stressful time as all the emotion of the last year descended on us. We also were planning a birthday party and had visitors (who are always welcome, by the way!), and to top it all off, Max wasn't well on his actual birthday. We were emotional anyway, and had heard of several cases of gastro (including one little guy who had to be admitted to Flinders for two nights), so we had this horrific dread hanging over us - that Max was sick and we'd have to face hospital again and also cancelling his party.
But, although his actual birthday wasn't a great day for him, he rallied and was much more like himself on his party day. We were very blessed to have such a group of people attend - family, friends from the unit, my very cool mothers' group and their babies (and some dads, too!), some Bureau people, neighbours etc etc. It was a good day. Max was very spoilt, but loved ripping the paper off his gifts more than the gifts themselves (sorry!).
Then we focussed on readying the house and ourselves for our departure - to NZ for two weeks and Melbourne for one over Christmasses. Madly cleaning, packing, anticipating Max issues etc etc until be finally got away. We spent a week travelling around the South Island with my brother & his partner, then a week with my parents in Palmerston North for December Christmas. All great fun - Max acquitted himself extremely well, even sleeping through the night twice! He loved Christmas Day - again he loved ripping paper. (His gift from us was three rolls of christmas wrap scrunched up, then wrapped in more wrap. He loved it! And, yes, we're cheap.)
Then on to Gisborne for Max's Blessing Service and Uki
Christmas. As he was baptised in hospital, we wanted to have a service to include his godparents. The service was lovely, Max was fascinated with everything, it was a stinking 37-degree day, there was too much food (good!), his godparents were exactly the right choice (thanks Myron & Felicity), and people were very generous. We loved it.Uki Christmas was mad, as usual - two big dinners over two days - but lots of fun. Max got very tired, and we were probably worse. It was a great time, but we were ready to go home.
Now we're back - our house was immacuately cleaned by the housesitters (thanks, Mark & Fi), our cats didn't seem to miss us at all, the lawn and some plants are nearly dead (hot days, water restictions), but we're home.
Max has decided that sleeping for more than 40 minutes at a time is just not de rigeur (except at night when he'll stretch to
90 minutes). I'm not sure if it's the heat, the 'big bed' or somethng else, but I am exhausted. He's also started crawling - yes, proper crawling on all fours - and while he's pretty slow going, he can't be left alone for more than a moment or two. He's also (in the last two days) discovered climbing. He can't really get a hold of our furniture, but loves climbing up me and gets very upset if I put him on the floor and move away.He's babbling much more clearly, though there is absolutely no attempt to copy anything. It's the same with physical action - he watches intently, but makes no copying attempts at all. I had a very clear "mama" the other day, which was a huge shock as the 'm' sound is one he hardly ever makes (occasionally a 'nananan', or 'dadadad' but, sadly, no 'mmm' or 'tatatat'). I was stunned and have been begging ever since for a repeat. However, I have to concede it was a random sound, with no intention at all!
Feeding is interesting. he was brilliant on holiday - ate everything, drank reasonably well, but now at home he's all over the place. Not sure what it is. But, he's beginning to 'get' finger foods - Arrowroot biscuits are easily demolished, grated cheese is good, if messy, and yesterday we tried bread crusts, with which he was fascinated. However, he has started regurgitating fairly frequently (much to Mark's horror) - which, again, is new for Max.
The 'tiny.lives' campaign stock is building well, but our first listing on EBay isn't garnering much interest at all. Maybe this was a bad idea? My other method of sale was perhaps to package each item up neatly in bags and hangers, then go to the local car boot sale and sell the items individually and regularly (that is, every Sunday when I can go), so I can get a 'following'. I'm not sure what's the best way to go. EBay seemed really easy to administer, but there is actually quite a lot of work to do just for one listing - cleaning/preparing clothes, sorting them into bundles, taking & editing photos, enticing write-up, logging listing, dealing with PayPal and buyers online, packaging & postage... I'm not sure I have the time to do it all properly. I will keep trying - they will be sold!!!
I have tons of photos from our trips - too many to easily edit into a blog - though I'll try to throw the odd one into future entries! Here's a couple, to start off -
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