Things I'm thankful for this year....(in no particular order)

• The family leave act
• Friends that cook, very well, and share their gift
• Friends that order take out, very well, and share their gift
  
• Friends that don't mind a lot of banging on the high chair during thanksgiving dinner
• The distance between my house and Maria's is only a 10 minute drive (makes a big difference after dark when Hai is howling in the back seat....)
  
• The bouncy chair and the friends that gave it to me (thanks to you, I shower regularly)
• Screw tops
  
• waterproof mattress pads
• Christina, Cristian and Jake, Hai's new friends and their patience with a little "brother"
  
• NAPS
• balls that rattle and make a really good noise on the hardwood floor
  
• hand-me-downs
  
• Friends that don't mind visiting me after dark (so we don't have to get in the car/car seat)
• wash and wear
• Baby Einstein and The Wiggles (so far)
• Our adoption agencies
  
• The dishwasher
• Peet's coffee
• Maria, Jaap and Josie and the time they took from their lives to go with us to Vietnam
  
• safeway.com
• Kate, for taking care of business while I'm gone
  
• My parents, and the fact that they are coming here next week and we will celebrate Thanksgiving again!

• And of course... everyone that has been so incredibly supportive of me and of Hai this past year. Work friends, family and extended family - we love you!

I hope everyone has something very special to be thankful for this year, I know I do.

With love and gratitude,

Melissa

At the park

Video for Grandma... playing at the park

Mirror, mirror

Christina and Hai

Breakfast

Car seat meltdown causes major crimp in social plans...

We had a big weekend. Yesterday we went out in the morning and ran some errands (Hai kept falling asleep in the car 2 minutes before we got somewhere, so he got woken up a lot) and then my friend Bob and his daughter Katie came over and also Lila and Karl. Lila and Karl got the crash course in children as Hai was just waking up from a nap and also decided to have a big poo for them. I'm sure the newlyweds are rethinking that whole kid thing right now.

Today we had a big play date with my friend Susan and her son, Bryce. We went for a long stroller ride and played in the park and then we had lunch at Susan's and stroller'd home. Funny thing is, Susan and I worked together years ago and now we live less than a quarter mile from one another and both have sons that are about 6 months apart.

Tonight we were all set to go to auntie Lisa and uncle Mark's house, but Hai had other ideas. The second I put him in the car seat he started to cry. No, make that bellow and cry. No make that scream and cry and sob and howl and generally act like the car seat was cutting his arm off. Yes, I pulled over. After checking for spurting blood, and removing him so he could calm down, I tried to put him back in. Same thing, before I even had the harness snapped... Well, I hitched him in, opened the sun roof to drown out the noise, and went home.

He went straight into a bath, had some dinner and he crawled around the condo for an hour or so. Now he's happily sound asleep. I'm not sure what it was all about, but I really hope it's not a pattern. Tomorrow I will either be buying some car seat toys or a year's supply of ear plugs, or we'll be playing ELMO CD's really loud for a while. If you see us driving down the street, I guess we won't be hard to miss...

I wonder if it's because yesterday our last stop was the doctor's ofc to get his ear checked out? (It's all fine, by the way. In fact, all his tests from the dr. look good from what I can understand...) :-)

Here's to happy commutes to you all...

Melissa