Momma's Baby

Momma's baby from the moment I first held you.

Jonah Samuel Probst was born 2 years ago, this Saturday, December 18th. He was born at 6:48am, weighed 8lbs 9oz, and was 21 1/2 inches long. What a memorable day that was for me (for more reasons that one!)


Its your Birthday! Its your Birthday!

I was going to wait to post this till his actual birthday, but this weekend is going to be really busy, and I was afraid I wouldn't have time, so I decided to go ahead and do the post... in honor of Jonah's birthday week.

The past two years have, clearly, been the most amazing years. Jonah has taught me so very much (without even knowing it!). He has helped me learn about a whole new depth of love. His young life has given new meaning to my life. He made me a mother, the BEST job I could ever ask for, dream of, or wish to be. What a privilege and honor it is to be his mother.

Jonah has helped me understand the love of God more fully, the love that would cause one to give their life for another. Love that goes beyond the surface, to the depths of the soul.

Each day and every moment that I have the privilege of being Jonah's mother is truly a blessing. He is my baby, and wether he likes it or not, he always will be. I have often said to him, "Jonah, you're Momma's baby". I will say this to him when I am holding him, espeically when he is sitting in my lap. Well, recently he will climb into my lap, look up at me and say "Momma Baby". This brings pure joy to my heart! What a little love he is!!! He also will run up to me (or Mark) and say "Bi Ugg!" (meaning Big Hug). How could anyone resist?? After we are done with our hug, he will hold up all of his fingers and say "Twhoo Uggs!" He wants another hug. How precious! Jonah, you can have all the hugs you want!!! AND if you so desire, you can continue to climb in my lap and say "Momma Baby" (even when you are 18 years old!).

Jonah, you are the sweetest boy in the whole world. You mean the world to me. I would do ANYTHING for you. You have no idea how thankful I am for you. Thank you for every kiss, every hug, every smile, and yes, every tear and scream. I love every moment of it. I would go to the ends of the earth for you. Thank you for being Momma's Baby.... you always will be. I love you with all my heart!


One more baby picture - Jonah a couple of weeks old.


Look at me now! I'm getting so big!


I love Christmas, just like my Mommy!


Yup, still Momma's baby.

Buses, Taxis, & Subways, Oh My!

This post is for my (few) readers out there that do not live in NYC.( Actually, I only have like 5 readers total, so maybe 2 of you are reading this.. :)) If you live in NYC, you are welcome to read this, but you already know about the things I am going to post. I have been thinking about posting about this topic for a quite awhile because I think that until you have lived in NYC or some other very large city, you have no idea what it is like to get around the city with children. I still don't have all the pictures I wanted for this post, but I decided to go ahead and write the post anways.

I am going to attempt give you an 'insider's' view to getting around NYC with a baby &/or toddler. Now, I must first give props to my NYC friends... as you read this post, you will see why I am giving them props. I have several friends that have 2 children and a few with 3. Its hard to get anywhere with 3 kids, but in NYC, its even more difficult. Yet, these fearless moms navigate this city like pro's! (Susan and Carmen!)

Around the 'hood.....
When I am just in my neighborhood, getting around is not so difficult. Jonah rides in one or our two strollers and I walk everywhere we go. On a typical day, I'd say we do stay in our neighborhood and we stay within a 1 mile or so radius of our apartment.
We go to Central Park, we go to different playgrounds in the area, run errands to stores, etc. This aspect of getting around is not so bad and in general, I enjoy the walking. We have a BOB jogging stroller, which is an awesome stroller, and I prefer to use this one unless I am going in a smaller store or a really crowded area. We also have a Maclaren stroller which is the stroller I use pretty much anytime we leave our neighborhood. Here's a picture of each of the strollers I use. I couldn't resist posting the one of Jonah sitting in front of a big fan in a store we went in, hence the crazy hair. :)




Taking the subway....
I'd say that on average, Jonah and I take the subway (just the two of us) once/week. You may think, oh taking a subway, so easy... you just hop on the train at the station and you get off the train where you want to go. Well, yes, in some ways it is easy, but throw a stroller and subway stations without elevators into the mix, and no, its not so easy. I generally carry the stroller with Jonah in it up and down the stairs to get to the train. There are, by far, more subway stations without elevators than there are with. Here are a few pictures of me getting to the subway. At first glance at this picture, I look happy, but look a little closer -- under my breath I am cursing the person who thought it'd be a good idea NOT to put elevators in the subway station. ;)

Once I get down the stairs into the train station, there's another challenge. In this picture you can see the turnstiles that you have to go through to get to the train. There is a locked gate for the handicapped or for people that have something that won't fit through the turnstiles, such as a stroller. Convenient, right? Well, not really, you have to get the MTA worker behind the window in the 'office' to open the gate for you. Let me tell you, they are generally more than happy to accomodate [insert sarcasm here]. In some cases there is no one in behind the window, so then you have to try to beg someone who has already gone through the turnstile to open the gate for you so you can get your stroller through. Some people look at you like you are trying to keep from paying your subway fare....NO, that is not the case people!! I am just trying to get around NYC with my child! Here's a view of the turnstiles and the gate:

Once through the gate, we are finally ready to go get on the train, unless of course there's yet another set of stairs to get down to the platform. Then I will once again pick up my stroller with my 28lb toddler in it and carry him and all our stuff down the stairs... pretty hard to look graceful doing it :) (But just imagine if you have 2 or even 3 kids!) When we are finally on the platform, the excitement begins because Jonah loves waiting on the 'choo-choo'. Here are a few pictures of him waiting on the train...


And here is a picture of Jonah on the subway. You can tell his little lips are saying 'choo-choo!' The boy loves his trains!


Taking the bus....
So, if I am by myself and not in much of a hurry, the bus is definitely my preferred method of transportation in NYC. In most cases, I can find a seat, its somewhat relaxing and there is something to look at out your window. However, Jonah and I rarely take the bus. In order to take the bus, I would have to get Jonah out of his stroller, make sure there's nothing in the bottom carrying compartment of the stroller, fold up the stroller, while somehow keeping tabs on my (almost) 2 year old, and then get Jonah, the stroller, our stuff and myself up the bus steps and onto the bus. NOT easy. The times I have taken the bus with just me and Jonah, I have used my Pikkolo carrier which is probably one of the best purchases I have made since having a baby. If only I had known about it sooner... I would've bought it earlier!! Its great! I can carry Jonah on my back using this carrier. I don't have any pictures of just me and Jonah on the bus, but here is a picture of Jonah on the bus one of the times all three of us took the bus somewhere. Jonah seems to enjoy the bus too, but I think he prefers the 'choo-choo' if given the choice.


Taking a taxi:
This is probably the second easiest means of transportation in the city. I'd say the easiest is just walking everywhere you go. However, that is not always an efficient (or warmest) way of getting where you need to go. Riding in a taxi still means that you have to manage getting your child out of the stroller, the stroller into the trunk of the taxi, and then both of you and all of your stuff safely into the taxi. When I am by myself, I usually set Jonah in the taxi, throw my stuff in the seat with him and then quickly put the stroller in the trunk. Its either that, or have him stand on the side of the sidewalk while I put the stroller in the trunk. If you can manage to not have a stroller with you, getting a taxi is much less complicated. As some of you may know, and others of you have asked, you do not have to have a car seat to take your baby or child in a taxi in NYC. I know this sounds horrible and is definitely not the safest, but just think about the level of complication it would add if we did have to have a car seat everytime we wanted to take a taxi.... I for one would never be taking a taxi. Here are a couple of pictures of Jonah in a taxi... we just hold onto him for dear life and pray that we don't get into an accident. We don't take taxis all that often, but living in NYC, its almost inevitable that we will take a few taxi rides.




Well, there you have it. I think I have covered the major modes of transportation here in NYC. Not as easy as you thought, right??

The Today Show

My friend, Jill and I, had been talking about and planning on taking our kids down to the Today show for the Halloween Costume contest. Her idea was to dress Jonah and Even (her baby girl) as BamBam and Pebbles. I thought it was a great idea! So, We ordered their costumes from Etsy and continued making our plans.

On Thursday evening, I was in a costume shop looking for a club for BamBam to carry. I stumbled upon costumes for Betty Rubble and Wilma Flinstone. Jill and I had talked about the idea of dressing up too, but hadn't really followed through on it. I called Jill from the costume shop on Thursday and we decided to go for it with the costumes!

So, on Friday morning, Jonah and I met Jill and Even at a Starbucks (at 6:30am) to get our costumes completed and head to the Today Show audience together. Once we got to the audience area, we were just standing in the crowd. The kids were pretty good considering we were packed in like sardines trying to get our moment of fame from the Today Show audience. Jonah was insisting on being held the entire time, which was not the most fun for me, considering he is about 27lbs. My arms and back were killing me!

After we stood in the audience for about an hour, someone from the Today Show (behind the scenes) staff came and asked for Betty, Wilma, Pebbles, and BamBam! We had been chosen for the Costume contest!!! Can you believe it!!??? We couldn't either. Although we were thrilled to be chosen, it was quite obvious that our costumes did not hold a candle to the others that had been selected. You'll see what I mean when you watch the video. Anyways, much to our surprise, we DID get our moment of fame on the Today Show.

Click here to watch the video.

While we were up on the stage, during the commercial breaks, we got to talk to all of the people on the Today Show!! Ann Curry was especially interested in the children. She was very sweet and talked about how cute the kids were. We also talked to Natalie and Meredith. Al didn't talk to us so much, but that's ok. Will Ferrell and Tina Fey were the guests hosts for the Halloween show, so we got to talk to them too! They were so nice and it was so fun to be able to talk to them!! Will Ferrell is probably one of my favorite actors. I love the movie ELF! and I just love his humor!! Tina Fey offered her wrap (that her assistant was holding) to Jill in case baby Even was cold. Sweet, huh?

Anyways, the whole experience was great... well, except the first hour of standing in the audience being packed in like sardines, ... but I guess I have to say it was worth it! Now the question is, do we go to the Today Show next year for Halloween, or do we call it quits since we got lucky this year.. assuming we wouldn't get that lucky again! :)

My 2nd Sewing project

Ok, so if I am completely honest, it's probably my 3rd sewing project. (You can read about my other sewing project here.)

When I was in 8th grade, like so many other girls, I took Home Economics. I actually remember really enjoying the class. I am not sure how much it paid off though, because I don't really think of myself as the ideal homemaker, but hopefully I learned something.

I do distinctly remember that our final project for the class was to sew a 'jumper' and then wear it to school... yep, you read that right, we had to wear them to school. I wish I could find a picture of me in that jumper becuase I am pretty sure I took a picture of myself that glorious morning I had to wear it. What I am more certain of is that the picture would be not only hilarious, but also quite hideous.

I remember that one of the girls in that class somehow ended up with a large hole in the side of her jumper. The teacher still made her wear the jumper to school, pretty cruel, huh? I believe she wore another dress underneath her (attempt at a) jumper dress.

Just to give you the best mental picture possible of these jumper-style dresses, keep in mind that I went to a school where we had to wear knee-length dresses, which already forced us to be unfashionable. I was in 8th grade, so it was that awkward phase of life (did I ever come out of that??) and my hair was neither curly, nor straight... it was frizzy! I still had my baby fat (not sure if I ever got rid of that either :))I found this picture of a pattern, and from what I remember, it is pretty similar to one we used in that life-changing Home Ec. class. The fabric that I used was cotton and had small flowers all over it. awesome. trendy.



So, on to the more important topic of my 3rd sewing project! Thanks to the guidance, or should I say, complete instruction of
Susan, I have accomplished a project that I am quite happy with and I would wear it to school proudly, if I could! Seriously, though, due to Susan's help, I have successfully completed this project and have also rekindled my love of sewing that was dimly lit during spring semester of 1993.

Here are a few pictures of the (nearly) completed project.




Its a car caddy to carry Jonah's matchbox cars when we are on the go. When folded out, the caddy doubles as a playmat/road for the cars. If you look closely at my sewing, you can see multiple flaws, nevertheless, I am quite pleased with the end product. Coupled with Mark's vintage matchbox cars from the 1970's, Jonah and his car caddy will travel many miles!

Stay tuned for future sewing projects! :)

222

So after about 3 months of living in our "new" apartment, I finally have the apartment in order enough to post some pics on the blog. There's still a few things I'd like to do to the place, but who knows if I'll ever get them done. The important thing now is that it is feeling like home!

Here are the pictures of the place...with a few of Jonah thrown in... had to make it a little more interesting! Enjoy


Jonah 'cheesin' for me in the kitchen (nearly 21 months old)


Kitchen (duh)


Desk in entry way


View from Front Door


View out of Living Room window


View of LR from opposite side of Living room


Jonah on Mother's Day 2009 (almost 5 months old)


Jonah today at the playground. "Cheese!" (nearly 21 months old)


More of the LR


Bathroom... I know you were just dying to see my toilet


Bathroom wall, yup, you were dying to see that too...


Jonah in early spring 2010 on our trip to Poughkipsee (15 months old)


One more of the bathroom for ya!


Jonah's room.... notice, I finally got the book sling installed!


Still has the 'Bee Happy' theme in his room, but it probably won't stay around too much longer.


Jonah chillin' in his room drinking his juice (20 months old)


Jonah in late May 2009, 5 months old... how did he get so big so quickly!!?? seriously!! Where did that baby go??


Our bedroom... it was really hard to get pics of our bedroom, so it looks like all we have in there is a bed.. that's close to being true, but we do have a dresser and our nightstands in there too, you just can't really tell in these pictures.


Bedroom


One more pic of the bedroom.


Jonah in early March 2009, 2.5 months old

We are enjoying our 'new', bigger apartment. The extra room to run and play has been great for Jonah. We are all happy and thankful! Come visit so you can see it in person!

Water Baby

Here are a couple of videos from this summer. They don't fully grasp how much Jonah loves the water, but at least it will give you an idea.

The Story of Phoenix

I am way over due for a blog post. I have been wanting to blog about my trip to Phoenix for the past couple of months and for some reason or another I have just not gotten around to it. Some of you have heard about my trip to Phoenix and others have not... but here is the whole story with all the glorious details!

I decided to go out to Phoenix for the AANP (American Academy of Nurse Practitioners) conference. This would be a good thing for my career and for me to polish up on my NP skills. I asked my sister-in-law, Susie, if she wanted to meet me out there to help with Jonah and then to have some fun once the conference was over... she agreed, so the plans were made.

Jonah and I left for Phoenix, AZ on a nice Thursday morning. Our first flight out of LGA in NYC was on time leaving... but we were not on time landing... we were diverted to Tulsa, OK due to weather in Dallas. Long story short, we ended up just sitting on the ground in Tulsa for about 3 hours. That is WAAAY fun with a 18 month old! We did finally make it to Dallas, but when we did, we had already missed our connecting flight to Phoenix, which Susie was on. We had it planned so nicely.. Susie was going to be on the second leg of my traveling to help me with Jonah! How happy I would have been to see her in Dallas, but she obviously had to go on... she couldn't miss her flight b/c ours was delayed. Well, once we were in Dallas, our next flight was delayed for about 4 hours. We just wondered around the airport. I was actually trying to keep Jonah awake to ensure that he would sleep on the flight to Phoenix. It was nearly 1am EST when we boarded our plane for Phoneix. Needless to say, we both slept pretty much the whole way from Dallas to Phoenix. Once we landed in Phoenix, I had to get myself, Jonah and our stuff over to the rental car center to pick up our rental. Exactly what I want to be doing around 4am. Luckily, Jonah fell back asleep in the stroller, so at least he wasn't screaming during this glorious event. The bigger task for me, came next.... finding the hotel once I had the rental car. Yes, I had printed out directions on google maps before leaving NYC, but if you know me...that didn't make it much easier. I am QUITE directionally challanged. So, on top of being lost driving around Phoenix, AZ at 5am, my cell phone battery died. I had a sleeping toddler in the car, so it wasn't very easy for me to get out of the car and ask for directions. I finally did find the hotel. I'm not sure how. I did drive around Phoenix for about an hour before finding it. The hotel was about 2 miles from the airport, so that tells you just how lost I was =)

Once we made it to the hotel, the next few days went pretty smooth.... I went to my conference, learned some new stuff, refreshed my NP skills, and then Susie, Jonah, and I had a little fun in the evening. We went swimming at the hotel pool, we would go to dinner, etc.

Sunday morning I went to the last portion of the conference. While I was at the conference, Susie sent me a text message saying Jonah was throwing up. Oh joy. So, I left the conference a little early to get back and make sure he was going to be ok.
When I got back to the hotel he seemed to be alright, he had only thrown up once and was pretty much acting like Jonah. So, as planned, we packed up the car and headed to the Grand Canyon. None of us had ever been to the Grand Canyon, so we were really excited about this little side trip! Jonah did fairly well in the car ride up to the Grand Canyon, which was about a 3 hour trip. If I am remembering correctly, he did not throw up anymore that day.

We made it to the Grand Canyon area, checked into our hotel and headed straight to the Grand Canyon to watch the sunset. It was beautiful, breath-taking, and awe-inspiring. Jonah seemed ok that afternoon, excpet that he was acting unusually clingy to me. He wouldn't ride in the stroller, and he wouldn't let Susie carry him, so I carried him pretty much all that evening, which was not great on the back.

The next morning, we headed back to the Grand Canyon. Jonah seemed to be feeling pretty decent that morning. We rented bikes and got a bike trailer for Jonah to sit in. He loved it. Although, he was acting as if he felt ok, Jonah did have diarrhea several times that day. One time we had to change the lovely diaper on the side of the road at the Grand Canyon, b/c it was while we were on the bike ride. That was another fun moment with Jonah! Even though Jonah was a bit sick that day, we all had a great time. Jonah really enjoyed riding in the bike trailer and Susie and I had a blast riding around part of the rim of the Grand Canyon. It was probably one of the most fun and enjoyable things I have done in quite awhile.

That afternoon, we drove back to the Phoenix area to get ready to fly back home the next morning. Jonah did NOT do well on the ride back. He was just not happy. He continued to have diarrhea that day, but other than that, he did not seem to be becoming more ill or anything like that. He was just NOT a happy camper in his carseat... despite Susie and my numerous and ridiculous attempts at keeping him entertained. We sang songs, we did silly things, we gave him toys, books, etc... nothing was cutting it.

We checked into our hotel near the Phoenix airport and got Jonah to bed... not before changing one last poopy diaper for the day. He continued to eat and drink pretty well throughout the day despite the diarrhea, so I wasn't too concerned. I guess I should've been though....

The next morning was a disaster! We woke up around 5am to get ready to go to the airport. When we woke Jonah up he threw up, he threw up again before we left the hotel. He threw up in his carseat on the way to the airport. He threw up in the stroller waiting on the shuttle from the car rental center. He threw up riding the tram at the airport. He threw up in the security line at the airport. Needless to say, I also had puke all over me. During this whole time, I was really stressing about whether or not to get on the plane to go home. All I wanted to do was get home, but that involved about 8 hours of traveling, which I was not sure if Jonah or myself was up for. Due to all this puking, Jonah really started to look sick. He was so pitiful and just not himself at all. I was having a hard time getting him to wake up and he was looking very dehydrated. Susie and I talked things over and since it had been about 10 minutes since he had thrown up, we thought just maybe he was done throwing up and we would be ok. Susie was going to be on the first leg of my travel with me again, so at least I had that comfort. Well, the final kicker was... Jonah puked again all over the both of us while we were boarding the plane. I more or less had a freak out moment and got off the plane. I am now so glad I did!

Susie had to stay on the plane b/c again, she couldn't miss her flight because of us. She would've had to pay for another flight... and no one wants to do that!
When I got off the plane, I was a bit panicky... Jonah was really scaring me at this point and I just didn't know what I could do for him there in the Phoenix airport, so I had the US airways desk agent call for the paramedics. Jonah was obviously (to me) pretty severely dehydrated and he would not wake up to drink anything, so I was pretty sure he was going to need IV fluids to get him rehydrated. So, we ended up taking an ambulence ride to the Phoenix Children's Hospital.

When we arrived at Phoenix Childrens they took good care of us. They had a difficult time getting an IV in Jonah because he was so dehydrated. They did a couple of tests to make sure he didn't have anything more serious going on, and thank God he didn't. He did have a really low blood sugar of 39, which confirmed to me that I definitely did the right thing by getting off that plane.

Needless to say, after our stay (about 4 hours) at Phoenix Children's Hospital, we were going to be stuck without anywhere to go or any means of getting anywhere. Fortunately, my in-laws have some friends, the Andrews, that live in Phoenix. These precious people really took care of me and Jonah. They picked us up from the hospital, got us food, gave us a bed to sleep in, did our laundry for us and then brought us back to the airport the next morning. They were truly a blessing and I am not quite sure what I would have done without them!

Below are a few pictures from the whole event. The pictures are in a very random order b/c I was having trouble getting the computer to cooperate with me!