Laid-Back Thanksgiving on the Road to Recovery...

We knew London would not be up for much this year on Thanksgiving so we planned to have dinner at our place this year. Kary's parents came here and brought a gigantic picnic of goodies! They made all the food (minus our tofurky and a few dishes) and went completely out of their element to be able to make sure their little guy was not overdoing it after surgery. We had a great day of drinking, sitting outside enjoying the beautiful weather and eating until we could not move. Unfortunately, London did not have a good day. He had a few moments of happiness while enjoying the Macy's Day Parade but for the most part he felt awful. He didn't even end up eating a bite of Thanksgiving dinner and went to bed right after we finished. I ate my dinner with him on my lap...which was tricky but I didn't mind.
London has become very attached to me (more than normal) since the surgery. He has been giving me giant hugs, kissing me, and doesn't let me out of his sight. I'm sure it will pass soon and he'll be back to his independent self once he feels better but I sure am enjoying the cuddles and love.
We had a little scare yesterday where we thought maybe the surgery had failed and there was leakage (ick!) we called the surgeon and things seems to be fine, false alarm, we hope! If there is a problem, that means he would need another procedure and NONE of us want to go through that again.
I have been home with London for 9 days straight and I have been LOVING it! It's like I finally have my baby back, he is really digging waking up to mom everyday too. He finally started calling me "mama" this week instead of "dada." That was just getting confusing...haha.
London has added a few new phrases/ words to his vocabulary and we are so impressed with how well he is communicating. It is so awesome to be able to figure out what he wants/ doesn't want. He now shakes his head no, says "yeah", "cheese", "hi da", "good", "gol (goldfish crackers), "bye da" and of course he's still obsessed with saying "whats that?", "car", and "dog" All the words are used in context too :-)

He still is tantruming, screaming, and hitting when he doesn't get his way, but we are calmly redirecting him and hoping as he starts to understand the world around him a bit better, the behavior will improve.
London got an adorable elmo mohawk hat and mittens from his grandma and grandpa as a get well present and although he doesn't wear the hat, he loves to look at it and say, "was zat?"
My parents sent a get well package in the mail and London loves the stuffed bear they sent. My mom named him "Mr. Bear" and said she sent lots of nana love to him. I know it is so hard for my parents to only see him a few times a year. Babies just grow so fast and time flies! :-(
London is trucking along with recovery and we still don't know for sure how the surgery went. He'll get his catheter out next week and once things start to look a bit better, we'll see if it all worked. We are keeping our fingers crossed!

Surgery Part 2: Complete!

London underwent the second part of his hypospadias repair surgery yesterday. He also had a lip mass removed while he was under. His ENT doctor didn't think it was anything to worry about but figured since he was going to be hospitalized and put under anyway, we might as well get that taken care of too.
We were up at 4am to make it to the hospital by 5:30. The procedure was scheduled for 7am and since we were coordinating with 2 doctors we didn't need to worry about our time getting pushed back, we got right in, which was great because we wanted it over with quickly and London was very hungry!
Even though we knew what to expect, we were still very anxious and nervous about the procedure. No parent wants their child to endure any kind of pain. We are sure there may be people that think it's wrong to make him undergo such pain for cosmetics. But, it is more than that, we feel the benefits of the surgery outweigh the pain and London will not remember this as he gets older.
The procedure lasted about 2 1/2 hours and I was bouncing my legs uncontrollably the entire time. I, of course, cried when they took him away and just wanted to grab him and run out of there! They did give him a little medicine to take the edge off but he was miserable prior to surgery anyways. He was tired, hungry, and totally freaked out by all the people poking and prodding him and he was completely tweaked out by all the male doctors standing around (he is totally freaked out by men~ even his uncles and grandpas) He had a death grip around my neck.
I was expecting the worst when I got called into the recovery room. I was expecting to see a very sick, screaming baby. To my surprise he was calmly being rocked by a nurse and looked up at me and grabbed onto me. I rocked him as he sucked down juice and even stopped for a second to ask in a very raspy voice, "was dat?" as he pointed to his IV. I was so happy to see he was ok and feeling a bit like himself already. We only had to wait in the recovery room for about 20 minutes and then we got moved to another area where Kary got to join us. We were able to get London dressed and were discharged shortly after that. We stopped and got London's prescription filled and headed home. He cried a lot in the car due to the discomfort but did better than we anticipated.
We were feeling pretty good about his recovery when we got home until about 2 hours later. London started to scream and thrash in pain. We laid him on the floor because holding him was too painful for him. We laid on the floor and held his hands and kissed him as he screamed and yelled what we can only imagine was a giant stream of baby-language profanities. Poor little guy.
The pain meds are working pretty good and high London is quite hilarious. He whispers to himself, seems fascinated by opening and closing his hands and drives his cars in slow motion along the wall. As long as he's pain-free I am a-ok with a high baby ;-)
Tomorrow I take him back to Dr. Perez to get the bandage removed. The catheter will have to stay in about 2 weeks. London currently wears 2 diapers, one to hold poop and one to hold the pee coming from the catheter. It is extremely painful for him to pee. Why, you ask? Well, just to elaborate a bit about what this condition is, and how it was repaired. London basically was born with his "rabbit still in the hat" as Kary puts it. His penis was encased in skin and not pulled out all the way. The pee hole was also not at the tip. So, procedure #1 pulled out his penis, and attempted to move the pee hole, that did not quite work so part 2 was an effort to accomplish this again, and success! Dr. Perez, rerouted his urethra so he can pee like a regular boy and circumsized him and completed the final construction. He has a very expensive penis :-) The new pee hole is a wound, hence why peeing hurts so bad.
And just as a side note, no, my son was never both sexes, hypospadias has nothing to do with a baby's sex. It is a birth defect that affects 1 in 200 boys, he was always a boy, he just needed a few procedures to get his peep to look the way it is supposed to. We have no problem talking about it and will tell him as he gets older. We have nothing to hide and he has nothing to be ashamed of. We look forward to his full recovery and moving on to the next phase in the amazing life of London James.

Welcome Baby Jude!

Yesterday, November 19th at 10:35am my oldest sister, Jess gave birth to a beautiful little baby boy. They named him Jude Michael. He is sooo cute and already has a ton of hair and looks so much like his sibs Mason and Isla. We have about 5 weeks before we'll meet him in person but we are looking forward to skyping when they get home from the hospital in a few days. London smiled at the picture of him and kissed my phone...so cute. We jumped up and down and I yelled "baby Ju Ju" and he laughed. Hopefully, he will be sweet and gentle to baby Jude at christmas. We may need to work a little on that. I can't wait to squeeze that little nephew of mine! Congrats Filos!!! Now the babies outnumber the parents!...yikes!

The Toddler Tantrums

It must be tough to be a toddler. Your body is becoming more mobile and you are starting to communicate but all the big things you want to do require much more speech and movement than you are capable of~ hence, the tantrum! London has perfected the high-pitched blood-curdling scream that can be turned on and off like a switch and the tears can dry up as quick as they came...under one condition, GIVE ME WHAT I WANT AND NOOOOOOW!!! London is a very independent little boy. He loves to be just like mom and dad and loves to share food. He will attempt to feed us what he is eating and if we are eating something, he is sure as shit better get some too. Hahaha...the problem with this is that what we are eating is not always suitable for a little one. We may be eating something hot, spicey, or not very healthy (not fair, I know but we don't need him joining our "fat-boy" nights of eating fries covered in fried eggs)
We have sought some advice to remedy this behavior and embarrassment in public. We decided we are going to say no and give a reason why, such as hot, danger, yuck, mommy's, etc and then redirect him. So far, so good. The biggest obstacle with that so far is keeping cool. Especially, since earlier this week he bit me so hard in a fit of rage that he ripped open my skin and turned it purple and that was through my pants!!
He has been doing pretty good the last few days and in his defense, he does have some giant molars cutting through. Besides, who can stay mad at a kid as cute as this one?!

little sicky sicky

London managed to stay healthy for 9 months, he hasn't had as much as a sniffle since his horrible experience with RSV when he was only 4 months old. We've been lucky. Unfortunately, working in an elementary school I am constantly swarmed with sick germs. A few kids in my class had colds, I ended up catching it, and with all the kissing and cuddling London and I do, it was unavoidable.
He started with a sniffle and stuffy nose, the developed a cough and a slight fever. Being London, he never really slows down so I probably would not have known if he didn't have those obvious symptoms. Luckily, it only lasted about a week and is on it's way out. We kept up with little noses, cough meds, and tylenol. We also ran his humidifier and kept him cozy and well fed. We're hoping we won't have to deal with too much sickness this year. Hopefully the flu shot will help too.
London learned a few new words this week, "cat", "stop", "done"...he says them for real now and he may have said, "cold" the other day too. This boy loves to talk. But, that's a given with me as his mama.

13 Months!!!

In the beginning, London grew physically at an astounding rate. We could not keep up with his clothing or food. It was crazy. Now that he is a year (and 1 month!) he can actually wear the same clothes for quite a few months before his legs and arms poke through. There are so many fantastic about this age: he can eat real food which means if we're out and he's hungry, he can have a snack cup of goldfish/ cheerios or we can all go out to eat and he can get something off the menu :-) no more bottle washing, no more expensive formula, and he's more mobile so I can ask him to come and he can walk himself.

London is changing so much intellectually, it's crazy. He now says "dogs" when we get home, "stop" when they play too rough, "done" after he's done eating, he says "baby" when we pass his baby pictures in the hall, he says "daddy" and points to Kary when we pass a picture frame with pictures of us in it, he says, "dell" referring to the computer, and also says, "cat", "guard", and "mama" (finally!). He also is obsessed with asking, "What's that?" about everything he sees. He is a little smarty pants and I will be sure to supply him knowledge whenever he asks, even if it is explaining what a bra is...haha.
He has an amazing appetite, is walking more than crawling, is sleeping through the night (mostly) and is so calm and laid back in public. We really are lucky, he's a great kid to have. His surgery is scheduled in 16 days and I am getting nervous. He is also going to have a cyst bubble removed from his mouth while he's under. I am mostly worried about him being scared and the horrible pain he'll be in afterwards. It is going to be rough but I will be so happy when it's all over. For now, I'm going to not think about it and go chase little man around the house.

First Trick or Treat

We had high hopes for Halloween this year but alas, it was very uneventful. Kary and I have always loved Halloween and always dress up pretty amazing. This year was the first year in a very long time (maybe ever) that I did not dress up at all. It's crazy because last year I had only given birth 26 days ago and was wearing a cowgirl outfit. We had planned on being Bride of Frankenstein, baby Frankenstein and a Mad Scientist. But, my wig was on back order, London HATED his costume and Kary just wasn't into it without us.
We did take London out trick or treating for a bit. We hit about 5 houses and he carried his bucket with such excitement. He ended up wearing the shark costume and looked cute as ever in it. People in the neighborhood thought he was adorable. They were laughing as his fin shook as he slowly walked up to a house and very indecisively selected a treat. He was a little creeped out and kept close to me and kept hugging me. I even let him try a reese cup. He loved it.
We decided we may try the same costume idea next year when we are feeling more ambitious. Life is always a bit unpredictable when you have a wee one. He runs the show and comes first. Perhaps we'll get back in the spirit of things next year when London has more stamina and we can prepare a little better. But, all in all, London had a good first experience with Trick or Treating and that's all that matters :-)