pesky teeth

Poor baby R. He has 4 teeth coming in at the same time. He's been extra whiny these days and last night he was up quite a bit crying. I checked his belly and his temperature and everything felt normal so instead of soothing him, I barked "GO TO SLEEP ROCCO" and kept "shuuing" and "chishing" him to go to sleep. He wouldn't so I barked, and he screamed and no one slept. Of course this morning I saw all the teeth coming through. Poor thing. Now I feel like a horribly insensitive mother.

Other than teeth and more teeth breaking through the surface of his gums, he is doing really well. He had his pediatric check up and he is doing really well. Doctor said he's healthy and looks great! Those are ALWAYS the words you want to hear.

We are back to a routine. We were very active this week. He went to Kinder Gym, Gymboree class, Rock in Kids Music class and swimming. He also went to Lydia's 2 times this week and had a great time playing with Maya and Noam, his two friends at day care (Lucas being the 3rd but didn't make it to Lydia's this week). He painted and played and had a couple of time out's for misbehaving. Lydia makes the toddlers sit on a pillow for 3 minutes in the corner when they don't listen or throw things or hit or bite or....
I didn't think Rocco would actually sit still for 3 minutes but he did. I saw it with my very own eyes. On Wednesday night at home he had a time out. I pulled out a pillow, put it on the floor and the next time he threw something across the room, I put him on the pillow. He sat there for 3 full minutes. He knew he was in trouble. I tried not to smile or laugh which was so incredibly difficult. He looked so cute. He didn't move; he just sat there looking around waiting for his time to be up.
Did it work? Kinda. He stopped throwing for a whole 5 minutes after wards.

Well I have to go out and run some errands. I will post pictures of the little man soon.

Rome is the shizzle

Rome is amazing and I want to go back and see all of Italy. The food was so good, even the little man who is a pain in the ass when it comes to food ate everything he encountered in Rome.
The pizza is good but really it's all the specialty foods that made my fat belly smile. My favorite was green olive stuffed with cheese and ground beef. We ate well in Rome.

We stayed with friends we hadn't seen since 2000. Jade and Romano lived in the city then and we used to see each other at bars and party's. Because of FB we reconnected and they were kind enough to let us stay in their living room. We stayed up at night drinking beer after we put the babes to bed and during the day Daniel, Rocco and I traveled by bus and on foot to see a little of everything.

Los Angeles, Rome, Paris and Rodgau

We spent a good deal of time at Anne's house in Rodgau. Her home is so comfortable and we slept upstairs in the attic surrounded by family photos, an antique doll and all our stuff which as you can imagine was a lot. I tried to pack light but then again that's like asking Chili Garcia to use his kitty litter box.
Did I just compare myself to my incontinent cat? humm. Well let's move on.

Anne had so many toys for Rocco. It was great and easy for him to motor around the downstairs. He especially loved the staircase - he climbed all three floors daily and then settled down for pretzel and yogurt.


Picture 1: A family that smokes together, stays together.
Picture 2: Samuel and Rocco playing. Samuel is the mayor child of Rodgau. He welcomed Rocco with open arms and let him use all his used tights and winter clothes.
Picture 3: Tante Anja and Rocco
Picture 4: Oma Anne and Rocco
Picture 5: Daniel, Rocco and Opa at the local fancy cafe in Rodgau where I ate not 1 but 2 desserts.
Picture 6: Rocco touching snow for the first time in Anne's garden.

La Selva Negra

Here it is - the Black Forest. It is really a beautiful place and I'm so glad I had a chance to see it and be there. From a distance the trees do appear black. This place could could swallow and spit you without even a blip on the radar.
For years I was a big Herman Hesse fan and he always wrote about the magic in the forest. While I didn't have a life changing - coming of age (too late for that) moment, I did experience new things:
I walked down the road and ate it a couple of time holding a pot of meatballs without losing one; I went sledding with Daphne; I ate lots of traditional breads and sweets with Anja; I learned more about my camera settings (thanks to Gunter) and I learned how to dress my baby for a blizzard.

Christmas in Durrenbuhl

Anne and Anja organized Christmas in the black forest. We had two houses in the town of Durrenbuhl. The village consisted of a church, 3 homes, a barn, diseased farm cats and lots of cute edible farm animals.

Settled in

We returned from Germany last Sunday and we are officially settled in. I put all our clothes away, stored the suitcases downstairs, washed dirty clothes, Daniel is back to working 65+ hours per week and we all tackled jet lag successfully. And the most important marker that we are home is that Chili is back to terrorizing us. It's amazing how easy it was to adapt - one day we are in Anja's apartment and the next we are drinking coffee in our kitchen and cleaning cat shit off the carpet. Truly amazing.
Rocco is still saying "agua" for everything. He laughs when I give him his water bottle each time he says it......we are both finding joy in our ability to understand each other. Two days ago he began saying "casa" and while we were in Germany he began saying "Danke" and "shoe." He actually speaks a lot, or babbles a lot. We don't fully understand what he is saying but he goes on and on and on like an evangelical preacher speaking in tongues. God only knows what he is saying but we are sure it is divine.
I will post photos of our trip soon.