Playgroups, Trucks and Easter

We hope that everyone had a blessed and beautiful Easter! Here are some updates from the past few weeks:

Sebastian and I went to go visit with my friend Jen and her son Finn. Finn is 8 days younger than Sebastian (Jen and I worked together at Scholastic Book Fairs for a while). The boys had a good time playing and the mommies had an even better time catching up. =) We took a walk to a park off of the West Orange trail and the boys had a good time swinging.

Mommies and Sons.

Both Finn and Sebastian love Elmo. Now this is a very intriguing phenomenon to me. Sebastian watches no television and his only reference of Elmo is the fact that his picture is on some of his diapers and a bath toy we bought him back in January or Elmo in a submarine. In the past few weeks, he will not get out of the bathtub unless he can take his Elmo with him. He plays with Elmo constantly and when we got to Finns house and he saw the Elmo book he went bananas. I've talked to other moms about this and they all just say the same thing...it's just the power of Elmo. (Note: Please do not proceed to gift Sebastian with Elmo toys...we really don't love him the way Sebastian does and it's just so much commercialization!!!)

Sebastian is turning into quite the little reader. We've been working more on our nighttime routine with him and here is Daddy reading books with him before bedtime. He certainly has his favorites and he likes to turn the pages himself.

By far, his favorite book is called I Love You Through and Through. Cristina has been reading this book to him since he was a wee little guy and now he just lights up when he sees it. He will even bring the book to me if he wants me to read it to him. He knows when the funny parts are coming up and he will laugh in advance. It is the cutest thing ever. I hope he grows up to love books as much as I do and I am so thrilled that this is one of his favorite things to do with Mami.

Playtime with Friends

Last week I hosted a 30th birthday for my good friend Julia. We had four mommies and boys over to play and hang out. Five hours flew by in no time after we ate our hearts out and talked about everything under the sun. Now Julia is from Australia and I know that she misses her country dearly so I wanted to make her birthday extra special. With the help of another Australian friend, we decorated my dining room with an Aussie theme and my friend Kirsty even made a typical dessert called Pavlova. Let me tell you...pavlova is like a gift from heaven. It was this delectable light-as-air meringue cake with whipped cream and fresh kiwi and strawberries on top. Embarrassingly, we devoured the whole thing telling ourselves that no one would know...well, now everyone does! It couldn't be helped! So much for losing the baby weight...

Julia with the Pavlova and her son Owen who was born the same day as Sebastian!

The boys playing at our house.

Sebastian and Michael pushing the truck around.

Sebastian loves this little chair at Abuelita's house. It was a garage sale buy and has been worth every penny! He loves to sit and listen to the chair sing and light up. Too cute!

On the Go...

Sebastian has finally discovered the joy of pushing things around. He will push his toy truck from one end of the house to the other and it's so funny to see him "walking" around the house like this. Once he hits the wall he starts to scream for me to turn his truck around. I'm trying to teach him to say "Mama" instead of screaming, and it's actually worked a couple of times, but more often he just screams. He also wants to push anything else that can be pushed around...this includes other toys, the laundry baskets and any type of chair. Whew...

This is a few days before he made the discovery and his Uncle Corey is pushing him around on the truck. He thought this was spectacular!

Big smiles!

Loving the ride!

Easter - Alleluia - He is Risen!!!

Keeping with our tradition, we participated in the full Triduum of the Catholic Church, our favorite time of year. We decided to attend Vigil, which in the Catholic Church is when we welcome new members into our church through the sacraments of Baptism, Eucharist and Confirmation. We have infant baptisms often, but it is at the Easter Vigil that we get to welcome kids, teens and adults. It is my favorite Mass of the year, despite it's generally 3 hour length, so we decided we would try to brave it with Sebastian. We took him in his best white PJs and hoped that he would fall asleep during Mass. Well, he had other plans. Our little party animal, knew this was a major party and was not going to miss a single thing. It was so funny because he was clapping and singing and raising his hands like he knew what was going on. He read his books quietly when it was time to be quite and was the most awesome (and only) 10 month old baby at the Mass.

Here Daddy is trying to get him to drink his bottle and fall asleep, but that is clearly not in his agenda...

Yeah, it's almost 11 pm and I am a happy boy!

The Giammarinaro's First Easter.

On Easter morning, we brought Sebastian out to the living room where the Easter bunny had left his basket. He knew about this new Elmo fascination so he had an Elmo basket filled with big plastic eggs and some plastic balls - both of which he loved. We also gave him a popper and a few stuffed animals. He seemed okay with it.

Sebastian discovering the whiffle balls in his Easter basket.

We went to Cristina's mom's for a brunch of arepas, eggs and fruit salad. It was yummy and we ate outside on my mom's new screened porch.

As you can see, we've been very busy and life will just get crazier once Sebastian starts walking. It seems like it will be soon, but really we have no idea. Please continue to keep our friends Steven and Betsy and Baby Andrew in your prayers. He is still in the hospital and although he is doing much better, they are still waiting to find out when his next round of heart surgery will be scheduled. You can keep up with them on their blog - the link is on the right hand side of our web page. Children are such an amazing blessing...such a precious gift of life. We praise God everyday for giving us the opportunity to raise Sebastian!

We must be busy...


I think this is the longest we have gone without posting! Ekkks...I can't let this continue to happen! Hopefully now that we have a new computer (yeah!!!) I will have my photos better organized and be able to post more quickly. Here is what we have been up to this past month!


We had quite a bit of visitors these days - two of my cousins from Colombia came to visit for about one month and Paul's Aunt, Uncle and cousins from Michigan came down for spring break. So we have been busy catching up and just hanging out with family! We are also entering a busy birthday season so it seems we have a birthday party almost every weekend!


Sebastian is doing great - he is into everything! I just can't believe how fast he is sometimes. And of course he always wants anything that is note a toy. He has started to say "da-da" much to Paul's delight too!

On a picnic at Kelly Park/Rock springs. Daddy and his little buddy!

This really captures Sebastian's spirit - he is such a happy boy!

First time in the hiking backpack with Daddy.

He still loves his sling though...we had a nice day at the springs.

We spent a day at Disney (Epcot and Magic Kingdom) with my Colombia cousins Alina and Yolandita. You can see what Sebastian thought of Mickey Mouse...hahah.

Our youth group hosted a professional drama on the life of our parish namesake St. Maximilan Kolbe. It was a lot of hard work and was a huge success with about 300 people attending the drama! We were so proud!

The cousins visiting from Michigan.

BirthdaysAlina's Birthday

Angelica's Birthday

Great Grandma Giammarinaro's Birthday - 89!

Jackson turns 1! My best friend Sarah, her husband Nathan and Jackson with us at Jackson's 1st Birthday! It was so exciting, but I can't believe how fast it has gone! The boys are three months apart.

Nana's Birthday

Monica's Birthday

Just Playing

Sebastian (9 mo) and his friend Emilio (7 mo - what a big boy) at one of our playgroups. We didn't pose them for this, they were just sitting like this!

Happy boy.

Uncle Corey and Sebastian share a laugh.

Getting sleepy in the swing at the park.

On the go!!!

In the swing on our porch.

Sebastian is on the move!

With Sebastian on the move there has been less and less time to update the blog since we spend more and more time vacuuming our floors! =) We've hit several big milestones in the past few weeks:

• He's saying ma....ma.....ma (although I don't think he makes any connection)
• His slither moves to a real crawl! Yeah!
• Now cruising around on the furniture
• He's starting to use a sippy cup (no where near mastering it, but it's a start!)
• His top two teeth are coming in!
• He's almost waving bye-bye (only when he feels like it)
• We think he may be signing "milk" back to us (but again, we're not really sure - might just be wishful thinking)
• He's giving "high-fives"

So a lot has happened and fast! Here are a few random photos.

Taking a break from the hard work of crawling.

Riding on my airplane that Abuelo made for Mami when she was a baby. He loves spinning the propeller!

Playing with the activity table at Nana and Papas.

"Cruising" on the sofa at home in his favorite outfit. =)

Sebastian still loves to be in his sling with Mami. On one of his cruising adventures he grabbed the sling off the couch and dragged it over to me like "Mami, pick me up and cuddle!"

Nephew Tyler (almost 5) and God-daughter Angelica (almost 6) at Uncle Corey's for Nana's birthday.

Sebastian was cracking up at Uncle Corey's duck puppet.

Taking a nap on his little bed at Abuelita's house. He looks like such a big boy!!

Video

Sebastian giving Daddy a high-five. Click on the image or play button to watch.

Special Visit from Boston

On Friday we had a special visitor from Boston...my Titi Arlyn came in at 11:30 PM on Thursday, visited all day Friday and left at 9:30 pm! All because she really, really, really wanted to see Sebastian!!! We are so glad that she made such a special trip to meet such a wonderful little boy!

Sebastian with Titi Arlyn.

Daniel and a happy Angelica.

Make your own pizza night with Titi Arlyn and family.
For the past two/three weeks Sebastian has been very interested in trying to climb up us. He will do anything to be in the standing position. He is not too interested in crawling, but if it involves standing up he wants to do it! He is incredibly strong...

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Now for some new videos! We haven't taken many recently, but here are two. Just last week he discovered how to say ma ma ma ma ma. Now, I don't think he associates this with me, as in Mami, but that's okay, I'm thrilled anyways! It's very had to catch him on camera saying it so this is the best we got for now. He is also on to saying ba ba ba, ah ah ah, wa wa wa and working diligently on da da da. =)

This video shows a quick view of his crawl/slither/scoot that he does. Notice he is headed to the vacuum. Maybe he'll be handy to help with the housework when he gets older...

Thanks for all the prayers for our friends Betsy, Steven and Baby Andrew. Today, they took him off the ventilator tube and he is breathing on his own! Praise God and thank you for all the prayers! Please keep praying for his health and recovery. We know that he is a miracle from God!

Please pray for Baby Andrew

Please continue to pray for my friend Betsy, her husband Steve and their baby son Andrew. He was doing very well last week and they even began to wean him from the tubes and medication, but yesterday he had a serious set back and he is once again connected to the machines. You can keep up with them on their blog - link is on the right hand side under 'The Page's'. We believe in the power of prayer and I ask that each of you that read this remember this young family and lift them up to our Lord. It's amazing that our lives continue with such regular events when there is so much heartache so close - yet unimaginable...

Epiphany - Fiesta de los Reyes

Yesterday, the final day of Christmas, we celebrated Dia de los Reyes. Los Reyes (The Kings) left Sebastian 3 great presents! He got a submarine bath toy (he's really starting to like the whole bath thing!) and...

He got this cool Tonka Truck ride-on and push toy. It's pretty cool and he seems to like it although he looks very serious in this picture.

He also got a "big boy" car seat! He's outgrown his carrier-style car seat and he hates it too, so we found the best car seat around. The thing is a monster and takes up like half of our backseat, but those are the things you do for safety I guess! The good news is he should be able to use this seat until he's like 5 years old. Again, he looks very serious in this photo, but he really seems to like it so far. There was not nearly the amount of crying in the car seat as usual.

After church on Sunday, the Hispanic Ministry hosted a Fiesta de Reyes. We had a great time with some good parranda (Puerto Rican Chrismas Carols) music, great food and a visit with gifts from the three wise men - Fr. David, Luis and Nandy! Paul got asked to be a wise man, but he turned it down - he would have looked great in that long beard and turban...darn! Actually, he couldn't because we had to leave early to meet up with my former Lockheed Martin friend Amy that was visiting from New York. Anyhow, so the wise men gave gifts to all the kids and Sebastian got a cute stuffed Donald Duck. I think it's his first Disney item! Not bad for a Florida native! Us and part of Donald Duck in the lower left. =)

Sebastian's first parranda (kind of...). Video - turn up the volume.

Also, Sebastian is definitely on the move now. He isn't actually crawling, but he does this slither, scoot thing and can get to where he wants to go. Sometimes I let him go exploring on his own around the living room as I watch him from a distance. The other day he slithered over to his exersauser and I watched him very carefully crawl himself half way underneath the exersauser. to grab his toys. Then it was quite comical because he couldn't figure out how to go in reverse to get himself out. I missed the moment with the photo, but it's the best I could do since I was making sure he didn't hurt himself and also trying to get him out from under there. I took this one right before he got "stuck." Kids just get into the most interesting places! Getting into trouble...