Blogger Vacation

We are headed to Japan tomorrow. Don't know if we'll be able to post while we are there but we will try. Veda decided to sprout a tooth today. It's a sharp little sucker and I'm sure its surfacing felt something like childbirth or passing a kidney stone - at least you would think so by the way she was carrying on last night. Nana and Grandpa Bull made it to town today for their babysitting adventure and got the full scale run down of the Veda dos and donts. She seems pretty excited to have new people around to give her attention. She needs a lot of it these days.

UPDATE: While Veda was nawing on my finger before bed I discovered she has not one but two teeth. One on the top and one on the bottom. I wonder if it feels like giving birth to twins?

We bought her a "cage" so she wouldn't venture out to the tile floors, knock her head on the floor and end up with a goose egg like she did last night. I let her sit on the bathroom (tile) floor. Big mistake - she went down backwards and the impact shook the house;) She has offically started to crawl. She figures it out and then gets sheepish and needs her training wheels back on.

We've also figured out this fun toy. She kept fighting Dad for the remote control (a battle no one can win) and so we just took the batteries out of an old one and now it's hers. I think she feels like she's getting away with something.

Well - wish us safe travels and we hope to return with lots of good stories!

Mommy and Me

I rarely get my picture taken with sweet Veda because I'm always the one snapping the pics! This is after dinner out with Jen and Steve (at a bar watching March Madness) while our neighbors Kathy and Tom watched Veda.

Spring Fling

It's nice and balmy here. We are having spring fling here at the Laabs house. We've moved Veda's exersauver outside and I've transformed the front porch into my office. We are going shopping for new porch furniture this weekend (although Todd doesn't know it yet).

The top picture is proof that I put Veda in Green on St. Patty's Day - at least for an hour before she spit up all over herself.

Veda Updates

She is sooooooo close to crawling. In fact, she can crawl backwards. She gets up on all fours and rocks back and forth and then usually gives up and lays down like she's exhausted from the very thought of trying to move forward. She is also really into pee-a-boo and I'm totally impressed that she covers her own face with the blanket and pulls it down and laughs.

The Colorado Trip! Fun Times!

Girls Trip

I'm in Colorado with the girls to celebrate Brooke's bachelorette party. We are staying way up in the mountains near Boulder at my Boss' cabin. Veda is at home with Todd and Todd is experiencing his first all day solo daycare with V. I hope she is treating him well;) Here's a pic I took last week before I left - she has discovered the toy in her crib and she just bangs and bangs on it until it plays music for her.

It's been a rough trip. I ended up in the emergency room on Friday. I was in a meeting and started to feel extremely uncomfortable. An hour later I was practically crawling into an urgent care. Long story short - I ended up in an ambulance to the emergency room where they eventually treated me for the severe pain (with lots of good drugs) and diagnosed me with Kidney Stones. A MRI showed a healthy stone in each of my kidneys. I passed the one that was causing me the pain and the Dr. said I have another episode to look forward to in the next 10 days or so. Hopefully before we leave for Japan!

Getting Around to My New Year's Resolution

I've recently been invited to volunteer for the Ventura County Wine and Cheese Festival (http://www.cpwineandcheesefestival.com/) that will be held just miles from our home at the Cal State Channel Islands campus. I'm so excited. This is exactly what I've been missing from my life in California - community, volunteer work, and networking. The festival procedes benefit Casa Pacifica (http://www.casapacifica.org/) - a home for abused and neglected children (also located a few miles from our home). I've passed this shelter many times on the way to the beach and often thought that it might be a bed and breakfast or some type of retreat. I'm warmed to know that good deeds are being done so close to our home and that children in serious need are getting the love they deserve.

If you live in So Cal you should plan to come to the festival and support a great cause (or fly in from wherever you roam and spend the weekend with us)! If you want to help me out you can donate something for the silent auction! Anything helps - we will be bundling baskets of goodies together if we need to. We are also looking for baskets and containers.

Big Foot

We bought these monkey PJs for Veda because she has outgrown her others (and because they are funny - they say "I'm not tired" on them). They are size 18 months. She turns seven months on Thursday. She blew right through the 9 month clothes and her 12 months fit perfectly now. I am very curious to see how she measures at her April 1st Dr. Appointment. Her infant car seat only holds up to 22 lbs. I think we might have to retire it well before her first birthday.

Here's her new exersaucer - one of the many many hand-me-downs from cousin Savannah. She LOVES this thing. For some reason it requires her to use her "outside voice" though. Not sure about the screaming... She is on the verge of crawling. She mysteriously moves several feet while I'm not looking??? I have to put her in this when I leave the room to make sure she stays put - we haven't baby proofed the house yet - a project we will need to tackle SOON.

Dad's Rules

So, Kathy is off wine tasting today with her friends in Ojai, CA (about 30 miles from here). While she is away, I thought I would share some of the rules that we have when dad's in charge:

1.) No Horsey rides before naps - Veda loves bouncing on my knee and pretty much insists on it. This tends to fire her up vs. wind her down.

2.) No Veggies - mom insists on cereal and fruit for breakfast and veggies for lunch and dinner. We throw that out the window when dad's in charge. Fruit is way better.

3.) Watch lots of movies (but dad always gets to pick the movie)

4.) No screaming...we always use our inside voice.

5.) Limit of 1 poop (or less) per day...this has been hard to enforce, but we both understand the importance.

6.) No playing with the talking cell phone toy...we prefer non verbal stuffed animals.

7.) Lots of Horsey rides AFTER naps...(but never after eating...always have to wait at least 45 min - we learned that the hard way).

Veda's Plane Trip

On the flight home from Denver, Veda got her own seat. I think she liked it quite a bit, its gonna be hard to go back to sitting on mom's lap on future flights.

Frequent Flyer

Veda has logged in 18 flights now (20 by the time we fly home on Friday). She is a relatively good traveller. I have to tell you that I'm surprised by how helpful and gracious people are. Of course there are always the grumpy business men who are noticiably irriated by every grunt, squeal, and scream. Mostly people will offer to help with my bags, the stroller, or even the baby. When Todd and I flew home from Mexico in November we pawned Veda off on some lady who offered to walk her up and down the aisle. Ok by me. She was in heaven and I had at least two other passengers ask to be put on the Veda waiting list.

Things I've learned:

The flight attendants will gladly hold the baby while you use the restroom.

They have lids for the cups they serve you your beverage in on the place - this is quite helpful when baby is grabbing at your drink. Who knew?!

An empty extra cup is a fun fun toy for baby.

Some planes have changing tables in the bathrooms over the toilets but if they don't... you can change her on the toilet seat but this is a circus act - much easier to do it on the floor somewhere if you can find room.

Always pick a seat on the right side of the plane (seats c or d on the small planes) because they will make you move over there anyway because that's where the extra oxygen masks are located.

Don't bother bringing reading material - not going to happen.

Be prepared to do everything with one hand... take down the stroller, make a bottle, change a diaper. Go ahead cut off my arm - I can handle it.

I CAN participate in a conference call, change a diaper, and drink a latte at the same time;)

Having a baby is like having a VIP pass - everyone lets you cut in line and generally feels sorry for you - use it to your advantage;)

When Dad Gives Veda a Bath...

Rough week

We traveled to Arizona this week. I had some work dinners to attend and Todd's Mom flew down to take care of Veda and help Auntie Kel celebrate her 30th birthday. Turns out she had to take care of me as well. I ended up with a horrible stomach flu and fever near 102. I couldn't move and was so grateful to have someone taking care of Veda! We are home and in bed by 8 and looking forward to a weekend of recovery. I have work in Ohio next week and Veda will be spending time with Nana Sayre and Grandpa Bull. She going to go Platinum with her frequent flyer miles soon!

Pic 1 Working on Uncle Chris' computer

Pic 2 Veda meets Mom's boss Jim

Pic 3 Grandma Laabs teaching Veda to walk

Veda laughing at Grandma Choking

Veda meets Uncle Joe

Todd's good friend Joe is in town. Some day we will tell her wild stories about Uncle Joe and Todd and a few that involve Mom and Heather too- he he. Poor Joe - being around miss Veda makes him his son Ryan - we wish he and Heather were here too;)

Party Time

Last night we went to celebrate with our friend Jon who turned 30. Dad lead his flippy cup team to victory while Hilding watched baby V. Hilding is in town for the week - the last time we'll see him before he ships out to Iraq for the second time;(

Tutu

I picked this up in Seattle at a little shop near Pike's market. So sweet. I let Veda play with this while I took a shower. When I came out the tag on the tutu was half gone - she had eaten it - ha ha - I guess we are at THAT stage now;)

Weekend update

Todd put up the posts yesterday so now it's my turn to recap the weekend. I went out with the girls in Pasadena on Saturday night. Sunday night Todd and I went to the movie "Confessions of a Shopaholic" and had dinner at Fabio's resturant Cafe Firenze. The movie was bad bad bad - I kept leaning over during the film to apologize for making him go with me. The resturant was much bigger and busier than we had expected. The food was great - traditional Italian - we didn't see Fabio unfortunately. Andrea - I grabbed you a menu. Thank you to my beautiful neighbors for watching Veda while we had our big date.

Today Veda went to her first Birthday party. She even wore her Thomas the Train party hat;) Tomorrow morning I take off for Seattle for work. Veda will have her first night alone with Dad and our neighbor is watching her during the day (her name is also Kathy). Todd asked me tonight if Kathy has a key to the house. I said she would get it when she came over tomorrow. He suggested that I give it to her now - just in case he forgot about Veda and just got up and went to work in the morning. I'm sure he was joking;) Right?!

Piggy back rides from Dad

Shoulder rides are fun, but pulling Dad's hair is way more fun. By the way, dad has a really big head....

Too Tired to Eat

Freezing Ice Balls...

Freezing ice balls falling from the sky today...they call it hail back in Iowa, but not sure they have a name out here, so freezing ice balls it is. Not too often that you get palm trees and freezing ice balls.

Fashion Show

So dad was at Fashion Week in NY last week, so Veda had to put on a little show of her own. Note that the last picture of Veda with her "hat" is actually her pants on her head. Quite the fashionable accessory.

Cupid's photo shoot

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY EVERYONE! XO - SWEET VEDA

Chunky Monkey

Valentines Date

Todd and I are huge fans of Top Chef. Fabio - our favorite contestant, has made it to the top four! His resturant also happens to be near where we live. I've made reservations for the two of us for Sunday night - Todd doesn't know this yet and I'm guessing he won't read the blog before then so it will still be a surprise;)

Fashion Week

Todd left for NYC this morning to attend Fashion Week. Sebastian is sponsoring four of the shows including Charlotte Ronson (pic above with LLo who is sure to be in attandance). People ask me if I'm jealous and the answer is yes - of course I am. Just as I was jealous when Sebastian sponsored the movie Hairspray and Todd got to walk the red carpet at the premier. Although I can not think of anything more horrifying than trying to find something to wear to the Mecca of fashion. We slept through his alarm and he woke at 5 and still made a 6:30am flight out of LAX - amazing - I laid awake for an hour worrying about him getting there alive - I know how fast he had to have driven to make the flight!

Be a rockstar...

A little shout out for my friend Janice... everyone has heard of Bagolitas... anyone want to sell them.? They are looking for consultants. Do you recognize me in the ad;)? If you don't want to sell them you should at least have one... www.bagolitas.com!

Bad Habit

I'm not sure if this was a good idea but we last weekend we went to the cable office and got a second DVR for the bedroom. We never spend anytime upstairs and we thought having one up there might lead us to spend more time cleaning our closets, filing papers, and all the other random things you do that you can't do when you're glued to your tv in your living room. I find it a bit depressing that we watch so much tv. It has me thinking about how I will handle this with Veda when she's older. How will I tell her she can't watch tv when her dad does? Will this be the first "because I said so"? To top it off - I called to add a phone line to our cable package today and the lady gave us a bunch of new free channels. The last thing we need!

Here's Veda in her new bumbo with green beans on her face - gift from her cousin Savannah who grew out of it (the bumbo not the beans).

Ventura County Wine and Cheese Festival

I've recently been invited to volunteer for the Ventura County Wine and Cheese Festival (http://www.cpwineandcheesefestival.com/) that will be held just miles from our home at the Cal State Channel Islands campus. I'm so excited. This is exactly what I've been missing from my life in California - community, volunteer work, and networking. The festival procedes benefit Casa Pacifica (http://www.casapacifica.org/) - a home for abused and neglected children (also located a few miles from our home). I've passed this shelter many times on the way to the beach and often thought that it might be a bed and breakfast or some type of retreat. I'm warmed to know that good deeds are being done so close to our home and that children in serious need are getting the love they deserve.

If you live in So Cal you should plan to come to the festival and support a great cause (or fly in from wherever you roam and spend the weekend with us)! If you want to help me out you can donate something for the silent auction! Anything helps - we will be bundling baskets of goodies together if we need to. We are also looking for baskets and containers.

Mold, Mildew, and Grime oh my!

So ever since Todd and I moved in together out here in California I have noticed that our towels smell like mildew. I figured it was because Todd soaks the towels when he dries off getting out of the shower. So I've been complaining to him about how to hang his towels so that they will dry more completely. Yesterday I approached the Internet in hopes of finding a remedy for our smelly towel problem. Turns out -it's our washer.

Google returned so many links for frontload washers and mildew that it had me immediately freaked out. Apparently mildew and mold form in and under the rubber seal in the washers. Towels are dense so they tend to absorb the mildew and don't often completely dry when put in a regular dry cycle so the mildew grows!

So I went to take a look at our washer and was disgusted by what I found! It took me two hours to clean it! This is a pic of the finished product - I wish I had though to take a photo of it beforehand. A lesson to all of you with frontload washers. I washed all of our towels in a cycle of venegar followed by OxyClean and they are as good as new now. Now I have to rewash everything else in the house!

Stuffed Capybara?

So Veda got a stuffed Capybara for Xmas from her Uncle Ryan (small ears, tiny feet, huge nose). Apparently they are all the rage in Japan.

You're probably wondering what a Capybara is (as we were)...its actually the world's largest rodent and probably one of the ugliest living animals I have ever seen...but, it's super soft and Veda loves chewing on him...

p.s. they also come in a life size "huggable" version if anyone is interested : )

Baby Cabana

We took advantage of the VERY nice weather the other day. I sat outside while studying for my insurance license exam and V played happily in her play yard (a gift from my aunt Di;). It's a rainy day today - we don't get many of those!

Recession

So many times during the day I feel heartbroken for all the people that are struggling right now to get on. I don't take it for granted that I have a home, a great job, and don't have to worry about how I'm going to feed my kids. I'm trying to follow all the details related to the bailout plan but it is all just a bit confusing to me. They just approved a $15k tax break for homebuyers in order to stimulate home purchases. If the people who are losing their jobs are the ones that need help paying for their homes - how does this help them - other than giving an extra incentive to the home buyers (clearly those that have jobs) who are purchasing homes that are in foreclosure? Anyway - I sure hope these politicians know what they're doing. I found out today that a family member has been let go due to cut-offs as a result of the recession. It has hit home and I am sad.

On a lighter note, Veda's "system" is back in order after a second day yesterday of dealing with the side effects of prunes;)

Prunes

Yes prunes. I want to talk about prunes. Little Veda has been a bit "stuffed up" lately due to the increase in formula intake and the introduction of solid foods. So I fed her an entire serving of prunes for breaskfast yeasterday. Let's just say this is the seventh outfit she wore yesterday and there were a few that followed. It was coming out both ends but she didn't seem to mind - I think she liked all the attention and watching me run around trying to clean up after her. Bottom line - prunes work;)

For the 4th morning in a row Veda has gotten up at 5 am! Ughhhhhh. She falls back to sleep in spurts but for the most part one of us has been up at 5 am. She's been such a miracle sleeper and now I really appreciate it. She also has been waking up at random times throughout the night - crying for about 15 seconds and then just falling back to sleep - wierd.

Touchdown

Veda was an unofficial Steelers fan for the day. Steve let her borrow his Terrible Towel and he also made sure we had our 3D glasses for the Monsters vs. Aliens commercial. I could hardly handle three minutes of 3D let alone 2 hours - made me dizzy. Veda liked it though.

Superbowl Sunday Funday

Veda has reverted back to being a super cuddler. She went through a phase where she didn't want to be held. I think she realized how warm and cozy it can be while sleeping on my chest on the airplane. We are loving every second of it. She woke up at 5 this morning - still on Iowa time - Ughhh! But went right back to sleep on Dad's chest until 7:30. Of course she did go to bed at 7:30 last night too. We couldn't keep her up any later no matter how hard we tried.