May/June

We left on a jet plane

Do you know one of the great disadvantages of having family everywhere in the world....world travels with a baby. Now, before we subjected dear Callum to over 14 hours of flights we figured the smart thing to do was test him out... right? What is our darling first-born but a much-loved social experiment?

When our bank dropped a leaflet in our mailbox about a special deal with Virgin America, we figured it was a sign. We booked tickets to LA, I have a cousin there, we had some consular business to attend to (the grand process of Callum acquiring 3 birth certificates and passports) and there was some sightseeing to be done.

We left on a Friday morning, it was cold in Seattle and we'd collected oodles of advice from friends, mother's group and blogs.....what to do/what not to do on a plane was on repeat at our house.

• Do wear onesies - no fancy outfits
• Do feed on the way up and down
• Do try to get baby to sleep
• Do gate-check the stroller and capsule
• Do pack plenty of outfits for the plane
• Do prepare for the tiny airport toilets
• Do prepare to be stopped every 2 minutes by strangers who want to ogle, ooh and ahh at your baby

We felt prepared!

Rookie error #1
First rookie error happened less than an hour in....did you know that the airport has a family line? We found this out after waiting in the super-long regular line for....oh I don't know....about AN HOUR!

Rookie error #2
Second error, we were under some ridiculous illusion that airport security cared about sleeping babies. We had to break the cardinal rule of "NEVER WAKE A SLEEPING BABY!!" so that Callum's capsule could be up-ended onto the security belt. As we tried to get myself, Nuwan, Callum, stroller, capsule, nappy bag and a backpack through security I was incredibly greatful there were two of us and we weren't trying to manage single-handedly. Whether is policy or just general lack of awareness the staff sit firmly behind the conveyer belt as we try to manage all this by ourselves. I heard a woman travelling alone, with a nine-month old, wondering out loud why no-one was helping her.

All aboard!

We boarded the plane. We took our seats and Callum was immediately fascinated by planes outside the window, he wanted to stand and settled right in!

We fed on the way up and Mr C promptly fell asleep, and asleep he stayed for an hour and a half. About 45 minutes before landing he woke up, he played a little, looked around a lot and fed on the way down. He was so good, the lady in front of us asked us for our secret....admittedly we chalked it down to luck.

Rookie error #3

We thought we were in the clear. We took a shuttle into the Thrifty office to pick up our car. As Nuwan did the paperwork I fed Callum, and as I fed Callum his stomach made some joyous and odorous rumblings. When finished I put him back in the stroller and got him to lean forward, as I did I saw all the signs of a number 3. So it happened that the first thing we did in our new car was conduct a thorough nappy and outfit change.

LA was the hottest places that Callum has been and he coped beautifully. He coped with the napping on the go and even coped (reasonably) well with sleeping in a hotel room in his travel cot. He coped with feeding in all manner of weird and wonderful places. He coped with long drives and even coped with his first trip to the ocean.

All in all it was a successful first plane venture and first holiday venture....and it wasn't a fluke....he was fine on the plane home as well!

Everyone told us we had to have In N Out burger when we were in LA. It was pretty good...!

Jumperoo, Bumbo, Antilop

Some quiet reading in the Bumbo

Supervising the outdoors from his favourite vantage point

A question for your non-parentals out there ; do the above words sound like jibberish? Well, a few months ago, they did. Now, they're part of our everyday vocabulary. 

Callum has been slowly discovering these additions to his toybox and it's fascinating watching as he approached each gingerly at first, with extreme caution. He slowly increased the amount of time he spent on each, and reaches further, played longer and engaged more eagerly. Today he is jumping with both feet in time and playing with the attached toys in his jumperoo. He's reaching and chatting in his bumbo and enjoys staring at leaves and looking out the window in his highchair.

The rainforest jumperoo, complete with shoebox to add that extra height.

First Softball Game

One of the charities that Nuwan sponsors, United Way, sent us tickets to a charity softball game this weekend just gone. It was our first time at Safeco stadium and Callum's first sporting even (I don't think Appachchi's volleyball playing last weekend counts)