First Mother's Day

We had a very nice Mother's Day weekend.  First, Friday night, Ben went to bed at 8pm.  He woke up briefly at 6 and 9 to eat, then slept till noon!  And went down for a nap at 1:30.  Ben and I did some shopping with a friend on Saturday afternoon, and the shopping was all for me!!  Well my friend was shopping too, but my shopping was all for me, first time in a long time!  Got a few tops, a skirt and a swimsuit.  Tried on a bunch more, but I'm still trying to figure out Italian styles and sizes.  Oh well, I had fun.  When I got home, Tim had flowers waiting for me!

Ben had another good night Saturday night and slept until 9:45 Sunday, and had two 2-hour naps!  I think he has too much fun at daycare to sleep as much as he needs, so he catches up on the weekends.  This works out great for us, so we can do the same thing.  Was feeling extra motherly Sunday morning, so I made Ben homemade oatmeal with cooked apples and cinnamon.  Had a relaxing day Sunday, pasta and Chianti for dinner, and watched a little baseball.  Ben made me this necklace, it says "Momma ti voglio bene" (I love you).  Ben (and Tim) got me these flowers and new wine glasses.  Love you guys!



We are still doing P90X.  Two weeks in.  A couple of our friends are doing it too.  We were really sore the first week, could hardly hold Ben, and definitely couldn't walk right.  But the second week was much better.  I guess it feels good to work out again, because we haven't done it at all since we've been here.  I just have to be careful with my abs.  They are pretty much the only thing not back to normal that I'm not happy with after having Ben.  I'm still working to get them back together. 

Early morning workouts, we get to see the sunrise.

My parents are coming Wednesday and staying for 2 weeks.  I can't wait to show them everything about how we live!  And we will be going to Tuscany to see the beautiful hillsides.  Then we send them to Rome, and we go back to work.  We'll all have a long weekend together again before they have to leave.  Two days after they leave, Tim's parents come!  We will go to Cinque Terre and the lakes in northern Italy and Switzerland.  Can't wait to see everybody! 

Ben’s Daycare Report, Haircut

 Ben loves his daycare.  He still gets excited when we drop him off in the morning, but is also very happy to see us when we pick him up at the end of the day.  The teachers all seem to love him too.

For lunch he eats vegetable soup broth with pasta, ricotta or parmesan cheese, and some meat (chicken, turkey or ham with no preservatives).  They say that he is eating more every day, and will be eating like other (older) babies in few days.  Apparently he is one of their most enthusiastic eaters!

We started giving Ben teething biscuits (cookies) at home about a month and a half ago.  A few weeks after that, we got a (light-hearted) report from the daycare that he was trying to steal bread from the baby next to him at the lunch table.  So we told them they could give him his own bread, in very tiny pieces of course.

Afternoon snack is apple, pear, or banana mousse.  He also gets usually two bottles per day.  They still give us a daily report of when and how much he eats, sleeps, and poops.

They are working on his tummy time, like we are at home, and have noticed his recently increased rolling.  They also say that he scoots around on his bottom some, though not very far or very fast.  He does this at home a little, but with our marble floors, we try to keep him on rugs and blankets, which don’t really work well for scooting.  We’ll have to see if we can work in some scooting time.

The daycare only goes up to age 3, when the kids go to public preschool.  When there are more than a handful of kids there, the youngest ones like Ben have a side area, so they are separated from the kids running around.  They each have their own bed.  There is also a reclined bouncy seat that Ben likes and sometimes sleeps in.

They have a nice grass area outside, with toddler-sized toys and playground equipment.  Now that it is getting warmer, they get to go outside during the late afternoon.  

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Ben got his first Italian haircut!  We found a very nice barber with a tiny chair for Ben.  The barber was great with him, and Ben was a champ!

After photo (with egg). 

I finally did a little planting.  It felt so good to do gardening again, even if it is only containers.  I planted some herbs, a few flowers, and a couple tropical plants.

May 6, 2012

New pics of Ben, 9 months

 Ben's official eye color: grey, with hints of green and brown.

We finally found some baby swings at a park nearby (discovered while we were taking his Easter pics).  He loved it!

Ben’s newest trick is pulling himself into a sitting position from laying on his back, like he’s doing a sit-up.  And he's starting to realize that he is mobile.  He's been able to roll over for a few months, but never showed any real interest in it, until now.  All this hard work!  Yesterday for lunch he ate 4T rice cereal, over 1/2 baby food jar of fish, 2T carrots, 3T ricotta, several bites of my pear, and 2 cookies.  Then he slept for 3.5 hours!  And that was after a 2 hour morning nap.

Since we couldn’t find cheerios, we gave him rice krispies (thanks for the suggestion, Trish!).  He first has to scatter them all around his tray, and a few on the floor, but then he starts eating them.  Once we gave him banana pieces and krispies at the same time.  Not really a good idea, because the rice krispies got sticky and all over everything!

Roman Holiday

We had a series of days off work for Italian holidays, so we decided to take advantage of our very long weekend to take a trip to Rome.  We were most looking forward to seeing the Colosseum and the Vatican.

We took the fast train to Termini station (through beautiful Tuscany, can't wait to go there in a few weeks!).  There was a little monitor near our seat, and it showed us moving at 243 km/hr (about 150 mph). 

 

Our hotel, Hotel Morgana, was only two blocks away. 
 

After getting checked in, we walked towards Ancient Rome.  When we first saw the Colosseum, we were quite impressed.  It's the size of a big baseball stadium, but it was built 2000 years ago, and a good part of it is still standing.  Pretty incredible.  On the other hand, it is sad to think about everything that happened here.




We did some more walking, and saw the Forum, beautiful churches, and a refreshingly tranquil park full of locals.  We finished the day with some really good pizza.
 Santa Maria Maggiore

Ruins in the park

Thursday we headed back to Ancient Rome, to tour the landmarks.  We went inside the Colosseum, through the Roman Forum, and across Palatine Hill.  We really enjoyed all of the fascinating history.  Palatine hill was a nice surprise, because hardly anyone goes there, so we were by ourselves among all the ruins.

Ben has no idea that he is seeing so much history and culture.


Inside the Colosseum











The Roman Forum

On Palatine Hill


 Also on Palatine Hill, my favorite statue.

After another delicious dinner, we went through several of the piazzas to see the fountains and monuments under the lights.  This was a great way to see them.  We later saw the same ones during the day, but we decided that they were better at night.
 Trevi Fountain


Friday, we went to Vatican City.  Another beautiful area!  The Sistine Chapel was beyond impressive, as was St. Peter's Basilica. 
 The Sistine Chapel.  I cannot even begin to capture it with the camera.

Afternoon sun in St. Peter's Basilica.

St. Peter's, later, from the elevator across town.



Our last full day we had reservations for Borghese Gallery.  They wouldn't let us bring in anything, including our camera. 

This picture is from the internet, of our favorite part of the gallery, the Bernini sculptures.  This marble sculpture of Apollo and Daphne was executed between 1622 and 1625.  The detail is unbelievable.  They discovered while they were cleaning it, that if you ping the leaves around her fingers, they ring like crystal.  

Rome is so full of amazing history.  From Ancient Rome to the Renaissance works, we kept saying "how did they do that?"  It is so hard to imagine how they were able to build the phenomenal buildings and carve so intricately in the hard marble without the tools we have today. 

We got back Sunday evening, and now we have two days at home to catch up on grocery shopping and laundry.