The Return of the Ho

Hi friends!
I'm baaacckkk!! I stumbled upon my old blog entries and had a great time reminiscing. So I thought I'd start blogging again.

It's almost been a year since I last blogged and so much as changed. The obvious - my beautiful baby girl, Olivia! She is now almost 10 months old. She's crawling and trying to pull up on things. I love hearing her little voice make new sounds. Watching her personality develop is so much fun. We have come a long way since she was born. It's hard to put into words what the past 10 months have been like so I'll just say it has been a whirlwind adventure in babyland. And we'll just pick up the blog from there!

The Ho clan is just gearing up for the holidays. All the shopping has been accounted for (well, except for Mr. Ho) and the presents are wrapped. The immediate family decided to do Secret Santa this year so we are only responsible for one gift each. It makes life so much easier and it's recession-friendly!

My mom was supposed to fly up with my dad on Christmas eve but she was too excited to see Olivia so she's been here since the 11th. I try to have my parents Skype with her once a day. She gets super excited when they appear on the computer screen but it's totally different she sees them in person. She was pretty wary of my mom when she walked in the door. And I felt it took a couple of days for her to warm up 110% but now they are best buddies. I'm really excited for my dad to get here because he hasn't seen her in 6 months!

We took Olivia to see Santa Claus today at Tysons. I thought I was being brilliant by going on a Monday afternoon, but my goodness. It took 45 minutes for her to spend 3 minutes with him. It was pretty adorable though. Her bottom lip started to quiver and she just kept staring at him. She wasn't too pleased but she didn't scream bloody murder like some other kiddies.

Hmm... I feel like I'm just babbling. I don't have too many exciting stories. My day usually goes something like this:

Olivia wakes
Feed Olivia bottle
Play with Olivia (pump while she jumps around in her exersaucer and Mr. Ho keeps her company)
Feed Olivia solids
Olivia naps (most days we snuggle up and nap together)
Feed Olivia bottle
Play with Olivia (maybe run errands if it's not too cold)
Feed Olivia solids
Olivia naps (I'll do housework usually)
Feed Olivia bottle
Play with Olivia
Feed Olivia solids (prepare dinner while she she practices with finger foods)
Eat dinner and clean up while Olivia plays with Mr. Ho
Bathe Olivia
Feed Olivia bottle
Rock and snuggle
Olivia sleeps (then I pump, wash bottles, clean up some more, take a shower and go to bed)

Seems a bit redundant, huh? I won't lie - sometimes it gets to me. The days just run together and I lose track of time. Sometimes I just want to stab myself in the eye if I have to sing "Doe a Deer" one more time. But those moments are few and far between. She just changes so quickly and I know soon enough, I'll really miss these days. So I really try to relish each moment, each song, each milestone, each snuggle. For instance, I was rocking her at bedtime and her normal routine is to pinch my arms, neck, chin and cheeks and run her hands up and down my arms until she falls asleep. But today, she blew raspberries on my arms until she passed out. Ugh, I die.

Ok, I have to get some stuff done so I can go to bed at a decent hour. It's good to be back!