A Few Quick Pics

Thought I'd load a few pics from Thanksgiving.  Baby got a new toy from Grandma's friend Dorrie.  It is the greatest thing ever - an octopus that plays a different note when you squeeze each leg.  I think I love it even more than SB does.  I played Do-Re-Mi...all those years of piano lessons are paying off in spades.

Here she is in her little school girl outfit Papa T picked out for her.  Too cute!  She liked it so much she wore it for a few hours before spitting up all over it.  Good girl!

Flying baby!

Father and Son Reunion: Part II

Happy Thanksgiving all!  And boy, do we have a lot to be thankful for this year.
I understand that some of my followers are anxiously awaiting Part II.  Not everyone appreciates a good cliffhanger, hmm?   Patience is a virtue, my friends.
When we last left our hero, Kurt, he had just gotten the most fantastic voicemail ever.  From his Dad.  His real Dad.  Later that evening, there was a 2 hour phone call followed by many more phone calls and emails over the following weeks with Terry and his lovely wife Patricia.  We talked to our newfound family about everything from 'what have you been doing for the past 39 years' to the weather and of course all about Miss Sarah Beth.  Little does this sweet baby know that not only has she made Kurt a Daddy, but because of her, Kurt has found his own father.  She has brought a wonderful unexpected light into the lives of her new grandparents, who couldn't wait to meet her (and us), so a few weekends ago, they drove all the way from Texas to see us.
We thought it would be nice to cook a simple meal at home with plenty of wine available for this momentous occasion.  They called when they got into town and said they'd be over to our house as soon as they knocked off the road dust and freshened up.  I proceeded to stand at the window like a kid waiting for the ice cream truck.  I tried distracting myself but it was no use so I just stood there fogging up the panes until headlights lit up the driveway.  Kurt played it much cooler, watching TV and giving some love to Savannah Dog, but I'm almost certain he had no idea what show was on or what the characters were saying.  He was about to meet his Dad for the first time ever.   We'd talked to them so much on the phone and they had read all about us on our blog, we couldn't believe they were about to be in our kitchen in a matter of moments.
As soon as they pulled up we walked outside.  They were first greeted warmly by the doggy welcoming committee bellowing loudly from the backyard.  SB was still snoozing so Kurt and I met them halfway up the front walk and exchanged hugs and teary-eyed stares as we sized up Terry and Kurt.  There is absolutely no denying that Kurt is Terry's son.  It was the strangest thing to look into someone's eyes and see an older Kurt looking back at me.  The good news for me is that Terry is still a handsome man!  Kurt definitely got his thick hair and height from him.  Eyes, nose, mouth, chin...Kurt inherited it all from Terry.  See for yourself...here's a few from the photo shoot in our backyard:

See what I mean?  Later over the weekend, Terry and Patricia shared pictures of their wedding when Terry was in his mid-thirties, and I swear it was Kurt with sideburns in a groovy seventies white tuxedo.  Other similarities we noted:  they both married left-handed redheads.  They have the same speech patterns. They are interested in the same type of books and movies.  They both love pickled okra.  Coincidence?  Perhaps, but it sure would be an interesting study, wouldn't it? 
We had no idea how it would be, meeting them in person.  We figured there had to be some level of awkwardness and tension given the circumstances, but there wasn't.  It was strangely comfortable sitting at the dinner table with these folks, like we had known them for years.  Sarah Beth, of course, was the highlight of the weekend.  She dazzled her new grandparents with flirtatious smiles and was a perfect princess sitting in the lap of Grandpa Terry (aka Papa T.)  Good thing our Texas grandparents have such a big SUV because they needed it to haul all the cute new clothes they brought for our tiny fashionista.  Wait 'til you see the photo of her in her Ralph Lauren plaid dress. All her designer clothes come from grandparents.  Mommy and Daddy shop at Target.
The weekend flew by too quickly.  Friday night we enjoyed a wonderful meal at our favorite restaurant, Fiamma.  Everything was delcious from the Salmon Tartar to the complimentary Limoncello.  (If I haven't said it before, this is the finest establishment in Charlotte.  The food is incredible yet reasonably-priced and the people there are unpretentious.  Zagat's can quote me on that.) On Saturday, my parents came down for a meet-the-new-in-laws dinner and everyone hit it off splendidly.  Sunday afternoon we took a driving tour of Charlotte to show off all the changes since they had lived here last.  Along the way, we stopped in at Barbara's Canine Cafe for the super-duper special dog food we feed our mutts.  It was there that we learned about baby's fascination with ceiling fans.  They had quite a few in the store and she was mesmerized.  If our ceilings weren't so low we'd have bought one for her room already.  Sunday night was pizza and champagne (why not?) and great conversation before they headed back to Texas the next morning.  We all feel so lucky to have connected and have this second chance at being a family.  Never in my wildest dreams did I think it would turn out so wonderfully.  I knew Kurt's Dad had to be a good man based on how Kurt turned out, but who would've thought he and his wife would be so excited about us! We talk to Terry and Patricia at least a few times a week.  Let me tell you, it gives me chills to hear Kurt answer the phone and say "Hi Dad." Such simple words but a profound meaning.  This void in his life has been filled by a real father who is proud of him and loves him and his family.  They're an important part of our lives now and we feel so blessed to have them.

SB with Me-maw and Papa T

Family Photo!

Bonus shot of our little princess...ain't she sweet?!

Father and Son Reunion: Part I

For those of you who don't know Kurt's family history, Kurt's parents split up before he was born and he never had any contact with his father. It's complicated. We'll just leave it at that and save the details for the screenplay. His mother’s 3rd husband adopted Kurt when he was a kid (where “Newsom” came from) but no longer has any relationship with him. Kurt knew that his real father's name was Terry and he was an airline pilot and that was about it. Years ago, when Kurt was a teenager, he got curious and asked his mother to find his Dad. Lo and behold, Terry was living here in Charlotte, but being a teenage boy, Kurt hesitated too long, not really knowing how to approach him, and before he knew it they had moved away.


When Kurt and I first met he told me the story of never knowing his own father and it blew me away. Being the inquisitive person I am, I could not believe that they had lived in the same town for years and Kurt had never met him. I for one would have at least stalked him. Parked across the street from his house and watched him mow the lawn or something, trying to figure out if I looked like him. Kurt even worked at the Harris Teeter where his Dad shopped. How crazy is it to think he could have bagged his Dad’s groceries and not have known it. Humorously, when Kurt was swinging single he was always sure to find out about a girl’s parents right away just in case he had a long lost sister around town. (Hey, stranger things have happened – have you seen Maury Povich lately?)

So years went by and next thing Kurt knows he’s up and married and about to become a father himself.  During the pregnancy, we had to do genetic counseling and a battery of tests since I was declared “ancient” in pregnancy terms (their euphemism is “advanced maternal age.”) Come on, really? At 35 I am old and decrepit? Should I just crawl in a hole and die instead of bringing a shiny new baby into the world? Talk about a blow to your already fragile pregnant self-esteem! Anyway, part of the counseling was to sit with this cute blonde genetic counselor (clearly NOT advanced-maternal-aged) and draw out your family tree to get a medical history. Kurt’s poor tree looked like one that Duke Power lopped in half because it was too close to the utility lines. Ouch. It was then that we truly realized we should find this man, even if all we got out of it was a complete medical history.

Despite Kurt’s unknown pedigree, genetic testing went well and before we knew it baby arrived on the scene -- life as we know it is a whole new ball game. Instantly she is all that matters and it drove home the importance of family. Kurt’s not an overly sentimental guy and I’m not exactly a big sap either, but I overheard Kurt saying once that our baby would never not know where her Daddy was, and it broke my heart a little. We talked about how this little one should know her roots. So a few months ago I played Magnum P.I. and scoured the internet for Kurt’s dad. A few real estate records, a news article and some people searches later…I found him and his wife in Texas. Well, at least I found someone that could very well be him. We wrote a letter, stuck a stamp on it and mailed it. Actually, Kurt may have sat the letter on his desk for a day or two and stared at it before he mustered up the guts to drop it in the postbox. But off it went. I guess I hadn’t really thought through what would happen next. Would it be the right Terry? What if he never told his family about Kurt? What if he doesn’t want anything to do with us? What if he never responds at all?

About a week went by and I put it out of my mind until Kurt walked in from an evening run looking white as a sheet. “Guess who called me?” he said, “Terry.” Holy crap. My stomach dropped. Terry had left a message saying that he had sent Kurt an email but he knew how yahoo mail overdoes it with the spam blockers so let him know if he didn’t receive it. Of course we make a bee line for the computer but as expected, no message. Kurt had his mailbox set to immediately delete junk mail – curses, Yahoo! We paced around the house debating what we should do…call him back now? Wait until tomorrow? He hadn’t left a clue as to whether or not we even had the right Terry so we were absolutely dying. There was no way I could bear waiting for the next day so Kurt called him back after much rehearsal of what he should say if (a) he answers or (b) it goes to voicemail. He ended up with scenario “b” and left a message asking Terry to resend the email. And then Kurt sat there staring at the computer until it popped up in his inbox.

Turns out we had the correct Terry. He had indeed been married to Kurt’s mother, and they split up before Kurt was born. In fact, for several years Terry did not even know Kurt existed, and he wasn’t positive that Kurt was really his son. Terry also wondered why he had waited so long to contact him. He did mention that he and his wife would be interested in meeting us at some point. So Kurt responds, explaining how fatherhood had compelled him to find his own Dad. He also shared a link to the blog so Terry could read about our little family and see photos.

I don’t know how either one of us slept that night. It was such a flood of thoughts and emotions and still so many unknowns. The next day, Kurt called me while I was at the park with Sarah Beth. He said he got another voicemail from Terry. This time, he said “Hi Kurt, it’s Terry. Your Dad.” Apparently the photographs of Kurt on the blog left no doubt in Terry and his wife Patricia’s minds that Kurt was his son. Kurt is the spitting image of him. Holy crap.

Long Time No Post

Holy cow it's been over a week since my last post!  I suck.  But wait.  I have a good excuse.  We had a monumental weekend, I mean, a weekend that would make a fantastic Oprah episode or dare I say Lifetime movie.  I would like to think that I would be played by the redhead from the movie "Wedding Crashers" who's married to that Borat guy but I don't know if she does made-for-TV movies anymore. Oops there I go off on a tangent.  Back to our phenomenal weekend.  I'm afraid you're going to have to wait on that story until my next post.  I know, I'm such a tease, but trust me, it will be worth it.  I have had zero time to blog this week.  I can barely make it to the bathroom these days without the baby hanging on.  I have learned to do a lot of things one-handed but there are some tasks I just have to handle alone.  Speaking of baby...she had her four month checkup today, and the doctor's diagnosis was that our baby is awesome. That's right folks, the unbiased opinion of a trained medical professional does not lie.  She is officially awesome.  And getting bigger.  Sarah Beth weighed in at a fighting 13 lbs 10 ounces today and 25 1/2 inches long.  That's 50th and 90th percentile, respectively.  If she can keep up this long, lean physique she'll have the 25th season of "America's Next Top Model" in the bag.  As Tyra would say, our baby is Fierce!  We got the ok to start her on rice cereal - her first solid food, can you believe it?  Probably won't be as exciting as the taste of ranch dip she accidentally got a hold of when Aunt Elaine was trying to eat her lunch with baby on her lap, but it's got to be better than plain old milk, at least from a texture standpoint.  I'm trying to save all the latest baby tidbits for the next blog entry, but I will mention that we found out she loves champagne!  No, we didn't feed it to her, but Mommy was drinking some in a fancy bubbly flute and baby thought it was the most remarkable thing ever.  She was bouncing out of Mommy's lap to grab at it and making the most hysterical noises.  Kurt filmed her antics so if he gets around to editing it I'll post a video.  It's not as entertaining as that baby dancing to the Beyonce song on YouTube but it's pretty darn funny.
In other news, those of you paying attention may have noticed that Moosey was supposed to go under the knife this week.  Well the vet rescheduled him for the first week in December, and now we are having second thoughts.  It took a while for his little skin infection to heal up, and Kurt and I both have this gut feeling that the surgery will end up being the death of him.  The vet thinks he'll make a full recovery, but we're facing the cold harsh reality that Moose is no spring chicken and he's also a neurotic weirdo.  Really.  The dog is weird.  In a loveable way, but Moose is not your average sit at your feet kind of dog.  He likes to hang out on the couch and will lean on you but if you touch him first he'll get mad and jump off in a huff.  He barks like a ferocious beast, but when anyone comes in the house that looks the least bit threatening he'll run and hide.  He's just a very jumpy canine - probably could use a xanax along with his rimadyl.  So now that we're down to the wire, I think we are going to hold off and see how he does with just the pain meds.  He seems to be managing fine; we'll just have to check his liver counts regularly. As much as we want Moose to run around like the Six-Million-Dollar-Dog, we think the surgery will be too hard on him mentally.  That sounds really silly to say about a dog but if you know Moose you know what we mean. 

I am going to continue working on the mother of all blog entries, complete with photos, but right now I'm off to bed.  Baby went to sleep early (11:45!) so I better take advantage of the extra sleepytime. 

'Night Everybody!

Showtunes and Highchair High Jinks

I'm sitting here listening to my Pandora showtunes station and the rain pouring down with baby snoozing in her bouncy seat.  Ahhh...good stuff.  She fell asleep to my rendition of Beauty and the Beast.  I don't take it personally though.  Ooh Edelweiss is up now...boy do I l-o-v-e Pandora and having a baby to sing to.  You can't really belt out of Edelweiss for any old reason, but have a baby around and you can release your inner Broadway Star without fear of ridicule.  We also had a piano lesson this evening.  She hit her first note.  I'm so proud.  I can tell she's a natural.
I sound like I'm in a calm peaceful mood, don't I?  Why?  Because I took the afternoon off.  I wasn't feeling too hot this morning so I came home and took a long nap instead of long conference call.  Let me tell you a nap can do wonders.  If everyone could take an afternoon nap the world would be a better place. Since baby was nice enough to take a little nap herself, I have time to load some more pictures of the cutest baby ever.  We didn't take pictures at the park as I had hoped because we had Moose and Savannah with us and they were crazed with excitement since they hadn't been to the park in ages.  We saw lots of other dogs, some bratty kids and one small snake.  I thought having a baby would make me like other people's kids more but I find most of them annoying as ever.  Do you really need to scream and yell and roll by on your dumb wheelies so close that Moose nearly has a heart attack?  Our child will NEVER do such things, I'm sure.  She is perfect, as I have mentioned once or twice.  Anyway, here are a few of the latest:

How cute is this outfit.  Baby Hoodie?  Too Much.

Daddy just walked into the room - look at that smile.  4 Months old tomorrow!

Moose just had to get in the act

She's doing this new thing with her bottom lip - hilarious

Daddy Time!

Our little girl is growing up.  She is now an expert highchair sitter.  She looks so small in there but definitely prefers it to lounging in her bouncy seat.  She can see all the action and play with toys on the tray.  It will only be a matter of time before she starts throwing them on the floor and teaching Mommy and Daddy to play fetch.  Oh won't that be fun!

Big girl trying out her highchair

Wow..."Annie" is on now and baby is waking up just in time for my big finish..."Tomorrow tomorrow I love ya tomorrow you're always a daaaaaay aaaaaa-waaaaaaay..."  Baby loves her some jazz hands!

Week 3

It doesn’t seem to be getting any better. If possible it’s getting worse? I mean, there are some nice moments about being in the ‘real’ world again…coffee, meeting friends for lunch, wearing clothes other than sweatpants and t-shirts…but by and large this whole working for a living thing is crap. Apparently it’s making me rather cranky too, as pointed out by my darling husband the other day. Can I help it if I’m a little tired from going nonstop morning, noon and night?  I had a glass of wine with a coworker after work the other day; Kurt said I was in a much better mood and I should consider drinking every day before coming home. Isn’t he hilarious?
So let's see, what other exciting news do I have to tell? Oh yes, Moose. He is scheduled for hip replacement surgery on Nov 19. We figured it would be a good idea to schedule it right before Thanksgiving since we'll both be off that whole week. We (aka Kurt) have to take him to Raleigh 11:30 the day before for tests and surgery prep. He'll go under the knife that Thursday and then we pick him up by 9AM on Saturday. Which means we (Kurt) have to leave at like 6AM go get there in time, then turn around immediately and drive home with a miserable Moose. Oh and that'll be $4600 thank you very much. If he weren't so darn cute he'd be off to the glue factory.
And because we won't have enough chaos in our lives with bionic dog recuperating from his ordeal, we thought we'd have our furnace replaced that same week. One may affectionately call our furnace "vintage" or "antique"...the heating and air folks called it a dangerous heap of junk. Cha-ching! $6000..   So Kurt gets the furnace for Christmas and I get the new dog hip.  Or maybe it's the other way around.  Either way it's not how I'd hoped to spend ten grand but what are we gonna do?  Baby needs to breathe healthy air and keep her tootsies warm this winter, and Moose, um...well he's had a rough life so he deserves to live out his golden years pain free.  We'll be holding a telethon in the near future so stay tuned for details.
I don't mean to be such a wet blanket, we've got plenty of great things going on and one of them is sitting right here asleep in the bouncy seat, thumb in mouth, dressed head to toe in fleece pajamas.  And it's not Kurt.  (Kurt just got a new iPhone, btw, so I may never see him again.)  Our sweet baby girl is growing like a weed, a very pretty flowery weed, and does new tricks every day.  She has mastered the art of rolling over on her tummy and is working hard on the reverse maneuver.  The play yard that the Grandmas bought is her favorite thing nowadays.  She loves to party with the jungle animals and dance under the blinking lights. Freddie the Firefly has fallen out of favour, however the Vibrating Chicken, (which incidentally we noticed is really a Duck but we keep calling it Chicken anyway) is still amusing, according to baby.  We'll try to take some pictures of baby tomorrow - it's supposed to be 75 degrees and sunny so we'll be at the park.  Which reminds me, as I was running errands on this glorious warm day, I heard Nat King Cole on the radio singing The Christmas Song...seriously?  It's not even Thanksgiving yet.  I thought we had at least until Thanksgiving week before we'd hear Nat.  Now I'm super excited about baby's first Christmas and all but it is far too early for 104.7 to be playing all-Christmas-all-the-time.   By the time Christmas rolls around I'm going to be so sick of Nat and Bing and Feliz Navidad and Santa Baby that I'll want to rip my radio out of the dashboard.  Merry Christmas Everybody!

More Monkey and Milestones

Our little monkey

Hi there!

  Saturday afternoon we had Jenny and Alan's neighborhood Halloween party, which was mighty impressive.  Blow up bouncy things and beer on tap.  Frankly, I think that qualifies as a Halloween festival.   It would have been great were it not for the fact that it was a balmy 70 degrees and we picked out the most adorable furry head to toe monkey costume for SB.  Thanks Mommy, why don't you just throw me in a sauna?  When has it ever been above 60 degrees on Halloween in this city?  Certainly not for the many years when I was swingin' single and dressing up in cute little halloween costumes for the parties downtown.  Kurt and I met right before Halloween 4 years ago and we went to Dixie's Tavern's big bash for one of our first dates.  I dressed up as Pocahontas and vividly remember freezing my moccassins off, wondering how these trampy girls dressed as "Victoria's Secret Angels" were walking around in their underwear without dropping dead of hypothermia.  (Incidentally, ladies, you are at a bar in your underwear.  Donning angel wings does not a costume make.  For the love of pete have some self-respect and put some clothes on.)  Anyway, Sarah Beth was a good sport and wore the suit for pictures and a stroll through the party before I felt guilty about the sweat forming on her brow and ripped it off of her.  Unfortunately, soon after we got there, it started to rain so we headed for the car.  We had several nice people comment on how beautiful our little monkey was and one stranger, of course, felt the need to rub our baby's head.  Why???  For good luck?  So annoying!  Never mind the Swine Flu.  What about personal boundaries?  What if I reached out and rubbed that lady's head?  Would she find that inappropriate?  I think I'm going to try it next time and see what happens.  
Sunday was considerably cooler so we stuck her back into the monkey suit for photo shoot #2 (hey, I gotta get my money's worth  - not like she can wear it again next year.) Moose and Savannah got strapped into their banana costumes and off we went into the backyard to capture some priceless moments on film.  You know that showbiz saying about not working with kids or animals? Well, our experience backs up that theory.  Trying to get two dogs and a baby monkey posed in one shot was impossible, but we did the best we could.   Moose, always suspicious, was leery of the whole event.  Savannah was all over it.  Being the center of attention is her specialty.  If it weren't for the darned baby in the way it would have been a perfect day for her.

Here she is...the number one banana ready for her close-up

Great pose, but where is Moose?

Moose.  Not participating.  He comes around though eventually...

Savannah, less than thrilled with her monkey friend

Moose decides to join the party

That's a little better

Our bananas splitting.  Hahaha!  Couldn't resist.

The costumes came with hats but as I think I mentioned in a previous post, it made them look like they were going to a Klan meeting, which I found a little unsettling.  Judge for yourself:

See what I mean?  Not really the look we were going for.  They didn't care for the hats anyway; however they did enjoy the rest of the ensemble.  In fact, they wore them all day.  I think Savannah may sleep in hers tonight.  Our dogs are weird.  Oh wait, we're the ones who dressed them up as giant fruit.  What does that make us?

In other SUPER EXCITING NEWS...guess who rolled over all by herself tonight?  That's right!  Our Sarah Beth is growing up!  I put her in her crib for a few minutes so I could put some clothes away and heard her making all kinds of noises so I went back in and she was almost rolled over.  With a little cheering on, she got enough momentum and rolled over onto her tummy, and I was there to see it!  That was so nice of her.  I was afraid I'd miss that milestone while I was in a conference room somewhere discussing status reports or financial forecasts.  Yay baby!  She was so proud of herself!  Smiling and laughing like she knew she hit the big time.  So flippin' cute.  I love that girl!