Take your baby to work day!

...which I declared so myself ;-).

Daycare is closed all week so we had to make special childcare arrangements. Elle spent the first couple of days during the week at Grandma & Grandpa Jarbs' house where she had a blast. Grandma Jarbs took her back home on Wednesday and watched her until Thursday. Since today is Friday and it's the day before New Year's eve, things were slow at work. The office was scheduled to close early so I decided to take Elle to work with me. She behaved really well in Mommy's office! She sat on a chair beside mine and happily ate the graham crackers while I checked and sent emails. She worked on her own laptop while I worked on mine :).

She had fun walking up and down the hallway! 

Mommy Jarbs' assistant for the day

Christmas morning!

This is Elle's second Christmas. She is still too young to understand the whole concept of Christmas but she is old enough to appreciate and get excited with new toys :-). That said, we did not want Christmas to be all about toys so we told Santa not to go overboard.

Santa came and left these toys :).

Elle slept in until 10 am this morning! I was so tempted to wake her up so she can open her gifts :). Since she LOVES music, she got a junior grand piano, Fischer Price Music Parade Ride On. She also got a bunch of books that we got while we were in Hawaii, a set of Karen Katz books (she loves her lift the flap books), a Washington Wizards jersey, Chatimal, the talking hamster (actually, Daddy Jarbs used Elle as an excuse to get this :P) and Baby Ugg boots :). She also opened a bunch of gifts that her other titas gave her. She loved all her gifts! It was fun to watch her get excited and play with her new toys.

Daddy Jarbs and I agreed not to exchange gifts this Christmas but we still ended up getting each other little stuff. I can't really ask for anything more since I already got the best gift of all, my little Elle and my amazing little family :).

The Jarbs family on Christmas morning

Elle loves brushing her teeth

Elle now has 10 teeth so brushing them is definitely a must! I got her a toothbrush that lights up while we were in the Philippines. She enjoys brushing her teeth everyday! Or shall I say, she enjoys sucking the toothpaste :P. She brushes her teeth when she wakes up in the morning and before she goes to bed. She has seen me brush my teeth so she tries to copy me. She would move her elbows up and down while holding the toothbrush but the toothbrush does not really move lol. Here's video I took while we were both brushing our teeth.

Elle's kissy face

It's my turn to stay home with Elle today while she is recuperating from HFMD. Even if she's sick, she did not act like it :). She seemed happy that Mommy got to spend the day with her :). We played all day, listened and danced to her favorite music! She gets mad at me when I don't carry her and dance together lol. We were also able to do a quick trip to Target so Mommy can buy her more Christmas gifts :).

Here we are being silly and playing with the camera on the ipad :). She loves to do her kissy face when she wants a kiss lol. I sent this photo to Daddy Jarbs while he was at work and apparently, it is now his work laptop screen background :P.



HFMD!

Before I became a mom, I did not even know what that acronym meant! To those who are not familiar, HFMD stands for hands, foot and mouth disease. Apparently, a lot of kids get HFMD during this time of the year. We got an email announcement from Elle's school a couple of weeks ago that there was a case of HFMD at daycare. I thought Elle will be spared but since the kids all share their germs at daycare, she wasn't! Elle initially had a small bump right above her mouth. It looked like a pimple. I did not think too much of it and just let it pass. The next day, there were a couple of small bumps on her butt cheeks. Again, I did not think too much of it until I was washing her hands and saw a couple of tiny bumps on each hand! As the day progressed, she had another new bump on her upper lip and on her elbow. Some looked like blisters. I told Daddy Jarbs I think something's up. We were not sure if it's HFMD or chicken pox. I read the symptoms of HFMD and she did not have all the symptoms. She did not have any fever or sores in her mouth and no bumps on her feet. Also, she was in good spirits and did not act like she was sick at all. I called her doctor and she said that there is a big possibility that it is HFMD and it is possible that not all symptoms will show up. Since Elle can be contagious, we kept her home today. Daddy Jarbs took off work today and took her to the doctor. Daddy Jarbs told me afterwards that the doc's visit did not go very well. He said that as soon as they entered the exam room, Elle started freaking out :(. It seemed like she remembered the bad experience she had during her 12 month visit where she had several shots and had blood drawn. Daddy Jarbs said Elle would not stop crying especially when the doctor started examining her. The doc had to check her throat so Daddy Jarbs sat her on his lap, facing out. When the doc put the stick inside her mouth (while she was crying), she then threw up :(. She had puke all over Daddy Jarbs' clothes and got some on the doctor too (ha!). Poor baby :(. Who knew that she can now remember stuff? The doc did confirm it's HFMD. Since it's a viral infection, there's no medicine for it so we just have to ride it out and wait for the blisters to crust over.  I heard some kids who had HFMD had high fevers, loss of appetite and blisters inside their mouth! Good thing whatever she had was just a very mild one! Hopefully, she will be well enough in time for Christmas!!

Elle loves her Christmas books!

Lately, I have been reading Elle a bunch of Christmas-themed books during bedtime. I did not think she was paying much attention but I still read to her anyway. Last week, I had to go to my work holiday party so Daddy Jarbs was home with her and did the bedtime routine. While he was reading Goodnight Hawaii, Elle started whining and squirmed out of his lap. When she got down to the floor, she walked to the side table (where we keep the books for bedtime), grabbed this book, handed it to Daddy Jarbs and extended her arms out so Daddy can pick her up, sit her back on his lap and read the book! lol. I thought it was hilarious that she did that!

Wizards game!

With the NBA lockdown finally over, we got to take Elle to the Wizards pre-season game! Now that she is bigger, it's much more fun to take her to the games. If you remember, she was less than two months old when we first took her to her 1st Wizards game! We carried her in the Ergo then and she pretty much slept the entire time. Now, one year later, we still had her in the Ergo but she watched the entire game :). She contently sat on my lap while eating french fries. She would clap her hands whenever the ball goes inside the basket..umm even if it's the opponents ball lol.  

Looking forward to taking her to more games this season!

She did not want to sit on Daddy Jarbs' lap

Towards the end of the game, she wanted to go up and down the stairs!

Holiday party!

It's holiday party season and even Elle has her own party to go to ;-). Elle's daycare is having the holiday party for the kids today. The little kids ill have their own gift exchanges. Elle picked out her bff Lucy's name so she will give her a gift. Here she is in her festive red Minnie Mouse outfit given to her by Aunt Terri.



Back from hiatus...

I know I haven't given this blog much love for the past month. Things had just been crazy between planning her birthday party, our big trip to Manila/Hawaii and the upcoming holidays. Good news to Elle's fans, now, I am back! I have a lot of catching up to do so please bear with me. I may have to back date some posts so keep checking back for new posts for the past month.

Toddler room

Last week, Elle started her transition to the toddler room. Yep, she's not a baby anymore
:(. Since we were on vacation in November, we held off her transition until we got back. For the month of December, they will slowly transition her to the toddler room. The teachers will have her spend a couple of hours each day in the toddler room each day to get her familiar with the teachers and the new environment. The "big" kids in the toddler room are only down for one nap/day. Elle is still not consistent with having one nap a day yet but I am sure eventually, she would. It will also be interesting to see how she'll adjust to napping in the nap mats vs the crib! Elle is a creature of habit so it may take her a while to slowly get used to the new environment. I am sure she will miss her teachers in the baby room (especially Ms. Sylvia) but I know that she will eventually have fun seeing her "old" friends who have earlier moved to the big kids room.

Here's the snapshot from the webcam of the toddler playroom/eating area.

Elle now joins the big kids during meal time.

Got our Christmas tree!

We finally got our Christmas tree! For two years in a row, we have gotten our freshly-cut Christmas tree at Big Bear. Daddy Jarbs just carried the tree and we all walked home. This is becoming a Jarbs family tradition ;-).

This was our photo from last year with Elle comfortably tucked inside the Ergo!

Now, the question is, when will I find time to hang up all the ornaments? Hopefully, I'll be able to before Christmas :-P.

Nice and warm...

It's definitely winter here in DC! Elle finally got to wear the coat that Aunt Kim gave to her last year. I had to quickly take photos of her wearing it before we left for daycare. These are not very flattering photos since I used my camera phone to take them and Elle hates the flash from the phone. You get the idea though :). How adorable does she look?

Goodbye milk bottle!

This past weekend we finally transitioned Elle out of the milk bottle! We were originally going to do it before we left for vacation but it's just too many changes for her all at the same time so we held off. Since she's starting her transition to the toddler room this coming week, we decided to go cold turkey and ditch the milk bottles! First couple of feedings, she hesitated drinking in the straw cup thinking there is no milk in there (in the past, she only used straw cups for water) but when she finally realized that there is milk in there, she happily sucked away. Now, she takes all her milk from the straw cups :). Finally, we can say goodbye milk bottles!!!

Elle meets Shrek...

...Fiona, Puss, Kung Fu Panda, and the Madagascar characters!

We went to the Gaylord Hotel for Grandma Jarbs' birthday dinner and we were lucky enough to see these characters! Elle does not "know" them since she hasn't seen any of the cartoons but I was pleasantly surprised to see her get excited when she saw them. She kept waving at them :). I brought my DLSR camera but realized it did not have the SD card so I took these from my camera phone:

 

Future Costco worker?

Elle is into pushing things these days. Look at her pushing the cart at Costco in Hawaii Kai. Before we took this video, she was also pulling the boxes of macadamia nuts out of the pallets lol. Daddy Jarbs had to pull her away from the macadamia nuts because she was putting the boxes on the floor. As soon as he set her down, she walked right back to where the macadamia nuts were :-P.

Elle pushing the stroller and Pororo!

I previously mentioned Elle is into pushing things these days. Look at her pushing her stroller while we were waiting for our flight to Honolulu at Seoul airport.

See her backpack? Elle fell in love with the Korean chartoon character Pororo while we were on the flight from Korea to Manila. Elle does not care much for cartoons but when she was fussing on the plane, the flight attendant went to our seats, turned on the video monitor and tuned it in to Pororo. As soon as Elle saw Pororo, she started waving to the video monitor and kept kissing it lol. This was the first time that we saw her ever like a cartoon character. Since she LOVES Pororo, we made a note to get her anything Pororo related when we had the layover in Korea. We got her the backpack along with a Pororo toy mic from the store at the airport. I cringed when I first saw the price ($48 for that tiny little thing!) of the backpack. As soon as Elle saw the bag, she kept waving, hugging and kissing Pororo. I was on the fence paying that much for a tiny little bag but after seeing her reaction, Daddy Jarbs happily paid for the bag for her little princess! :)

My little pumpkin

Since Halloween is just around the corner, I had Elle try on the pumpkin costume that Grandma Jarbs bought for her. It's a family tradition that all the grandchildren have a photo taken wearing a pumpkin costume on their first Halloween. Elle's older cousins Kaitlin, Zach, Ryan, Kelly & Kyle all wore the same pumpkin costume for their first Halloween photo. Well, except cousin Ryan. Grandma Jarbs said they had to get a new one for him coz he was a chunky baby. We couldn't find the same pumpkin costume that the older cousins wore so Grandma Jarbs bought a new one for Elle. Hopefully, she will pass it down to her future sibling :-).

At first, she looked at me as if saying "what's this thing you put on me mommy?" lol



And then she warmed up for the camera :-). She normally does not want anything on her head so I was pleasantly surprised she did not take the hat off.



We officially have a walker!

A couple of weeks ago, Elle was just making a couple of steps but two weeks later, she's become a pro in walking! Her teachers at day care told me that Elle's been busy walking around the place all day. Now, she's been taking more than 8 steps which was the most steps she has taken a week ago. I do not even count how many steps she can take since she can pretty much walk across the room now. That said, if she wants to go somewhere faster, she goes back to good 'ol crawling :-).

Big girl car seat!

We finally transitioned Elle to her big girl car seat. She was getting too small for her Chicco infant car seat. The weight limit for the infant car seat is 22 lbs and the height limit is 30 inches. We have not weighed her recently so I do not know for sure what her weight is. When we went to the doctor last month, she already weighed around 19 lbs. Now, just looking at her belly, I bet she's close to 22 lbs lol. As for the height, she was already 28.75 inches during her 9 month appointment so I bet she's at least 30 inches by now. The straps in her infant car seat were already in the highest setting. They were sitting below her shoulders so we knew it was time to move her to the convertible car seat. Last night, Daddy Jarbs finally installed Elle's new Britax Boulevard convertible car seat. It looks big and comfy. I feel even I can fit in there :). Elle is one baby who does not like change so she fussed the first time she sat on the car seat. She was fine afterwards though.

Elle takes more steps!

Since Elle started "walking" a couple of weeks ago, she has not taken more than 3 steps. The other day, her teacher at day care told me that Elle tried to walk and took more than 3 steps! Too bad we did not see it though. However, last night as I was playing with her, she took not only three, not only four but EIGHT steps towards me :). Daddy Jarbs wasn't home yet so he wasn't able to see Elle walk but when he got home, Elle showed off her new skill ;-).

Here she is at day care today practicing walking with the help of the toy walker.