In this video, you will see everything we did with Charlie leading up to his September birthday. It was a glorious early fall (felt like summer, really) celebration surrounded by our family and friends.
Here’s the video:
IT’S BEEN EXACTLY A YEAR to the day since I updated this site with a blog entry. And so much has happened since! We now live in Manhattan — and after much reflection decided to keep this site running after all, even though we no longer live in Woodlawn.
For starters, Charlie is 16 months old, is bipedal, eating solid foods, and going to daycare.
(I’m going to be posting a slideshow of photos and videos shortly — so you can vicariously join in on all the fun we’ve had.)
Our little one is growing so fast!
“He hasn’t yet realize that he’s not a part of you,” said Dr. Levitt, René-Charles’s pediatrician, on his last check-up. “It’s what we call Part-Object Awareness.”
My wife hadn’t given much thought to the idea of “attachment,” since the whole mother-son relationship has been inseparable, as it were. Conversely, my wife is very much attached to him — quite literally, at the hips.
At four months and two weeks old he still thinks he is part of his mommy. Sometimes he would stare at her when she walks around the room as if to say “where are you going, please hold me!”
Yes, today Charlie is three months old. My wife and I still can’t believe how fast he’s growing.
His biggest pet-peeve at the moment is his teething pain. His pediatrician puts our collective worries to rest, only suggesting that we rub a raindrop-size of Orajel on his gums with a Q-tip. His teething pain leaves him, at times, totally out of breath because the pain infuriates him. I try to keep composure while my wife starts to weep silently.
Then the pain goes away — and he’s back to his wonderful, gentle and sweet self again.
Today my wife called to tell me that his first word is officially “angu.” After my mother-in-law and grandma kept repeating the word “angu” several thousand times to Charlie, my wife couldn’t take it anymore and told everyone to shut up. After a brief silence and pause, out comes this little dude with “angu” — and everyone was rolling on their seats. And he kept saying the word with a smile after everyone repeated the word after him.
He’s become our performing monkey!
Who would have thought that was to be his first word! Then I realized it’s an abbreviated form of “Mangú” — which is a traditional Dominican dish made from boiled green plantains and mashed together to a delicious gobbledygook. I sincerely hope he likes Mangú — but I have no doubt that he will, since that is Laiza’s favorite breakfast even when she was pregnant with Charlie.
It’s been sort of a roller-coaster these past two months and I realized I haven’t been updating this blog. But just this past weekend we baptized him in a beautiful Catholic ceremony with friends and family. René-Charles “was reborn of water and the Holy Spirit as a child of God at the Sacred Font of Baptism.”
Here’s the video: