Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Year's and More Milestones!

As everyone can tell based on the last full update, we've been extremely busy with lots of events and living life. From spending Thanksgiving on a Cruise through the Mexican Riviera, to celebrating our first Christmas and New Year's in our new home, we've watched our little man grow into a smart and fun-loving person. Here's a glimpse of what we've been up to since the last update.



November was a special month. Erica's side of our family celebrated her parent's 50th Wedding Anniversary by going on a cruise on Thanksgiving week. We departed from Long Beach, CA and took a 5-day Cruise to Puerto Vallarta, then to Mazatlan and finally to Cabo San Lucas, before heading back to Long Beach.








Not only did we have a blast on the cruise, there were several milestones that occurred during the month of November. When either Erica or I sings "Row, Row, Row Your Boat," Derek motions his body like if he is rowing. Another children's song that he can do the motions to is "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes." Whenever the words "head" and "toes" is seen or heard, Derek touches the corresponding body part. Another milestone that he picked up on during November was recognizing and saying the word "bubble." We have a mechanical bubble machine and when he sees bubbles in books and floating in the air, he can say "bubble."






December marked the very first time that we spent Christmas in our new home. We did our usual celebration format in which we spend Christmas Eve with my(Dean) side of our family while we spend Christmas Day with Erica's side of the family. Everyone from my side of the family gathered at our home and Derek had such a good time that he fell asleep at 7PM. We were still able to take a family pic with him though, via his baby monitor. On Christmas Day, we drove up to Delano early in the morning and celebrated the rest of the weekend.









We've noticed and experienced several new revelations from our boy. On the subject of children's songs, when Derek hears the song "I'm a Little Teapot," he acts out the "tip me over and pour me out" segment of the song whenever its being played. He kinda looks like LaDainian Tomlinson after he scores a touchdown. Also, we noticed that Derek can say a bunch of new words, including horse, ball, cat, car and both the words light and ilaw(the tagalog version of light). Not only can he say and recognize all of these words mentioned, he also can play peek-a-boo. Finally, another huge milestone during the month of December was the conversion of his crib into a bed. Since then, Derek has been sleeping on a full-sized bed and sleeps the whole night in there. He sleeps from 8-9 PM during the night, wakes up for a couple of minutes at around 3:30-4:00AM, goes back to bed and then wakes up at around 6AM. He’s established this schedule and we’re so glad that he gets over 8 hours of sleep. We can’t promise that for ourselves, but at least our little guy is getting adequate rest.



The month of January has brought more interesting events and more milestones to our family. We spent our First New Year’s day in our home. Derek knocked out during his usual bed time. Erica and I stayed up until the New Year’s countdown and about 15 minutes later, we hit the sack. We never were the party/outgoing types of people during New Years. We’re home bodies so it didn’t phase us that we spent the evening at home.


There were lots of food, drink and mouth-related milestones this month. As for food and drinks, Derek actually fed himself and he can drink from a cup. First thing in the morning after he gets up from his beauty rest, he eats two small bowls worth of Cheerios and Milk. During the beginning of this meal, we’ll feed him tiny spoonfuls, but towards the 2nd portion of his cereal and milk, he grabs the spoon and feeds himself. Not only does he eat cheerios and milk on his own, he can also eat table food such as rice, chicken and meatballs. The other day while we were at IKEA, he ate several meatballs and mashed potatoes on his own. Also, he can drink water and milk in a cup unassisted. Speaking of food, we know that our little boy is Filipino when he can say and recognize the word rice (and the tagolog word, kanin). Finally, we’ve noticed that he’s grown a few teeth this month, included his molars. His teeth count after 17 months is now at 14! Oh and he’s picked up what certain animals say, including saying “moo” when we ask him what sound a cow makes and mimics a gorilla voice when we ask him the same question, inserting gorilla for cow.






Our boy is growing up so fast. Cheers to more milestones and feats!

Update coming soon!!

Hi All, Erica here!

Just wanted to let you all know that we're still here. We got a new camera in November and just now uploaded all 16 gigs of photos that we've taken since then onto my laptop. I'm sorting through them and hoping to put a new post up in the very near future. Here are a couple of photos that we took yesterday to tide you over until then. Derek is now 16 months old, and will turn 17 months old tomorrow.




Enjoy!

Derek's 1st Haircut

Last Saturday on November 14th, 2009, we took Derek to get his first ever haircut. We stopped by this place called Pigtails & Crewcuts, a creative kids salon, located in the Otay Ranch Mall in Chula Vista. The mall is literally a few blocks away from our house. Since Derek was born nearly 14 months ago, he's had his same locks of hair. We decided to get his hair cut not just because it was getting super long, but also in preparation for our parents' Erica's side of the family) 50th wedding day celebration. Check out the before and after pics. Enjoy!

Our Baby Can Walk!

We can't believe our little guy is already 14 months old! Time has flew so fast. One huge milestone that Erica touched on is that our little man can walk! Of course he sometimes needs assistance, but he can easily take about 15 steps. Since Derek turned 1, we've been up to a lot of things. We've visited our awesome friends, Elbert, Rina and their lovely family in San Pedro not too long ago. Also, Derek's Ninang and Erica's BFF, Nora came down for a visit along with her mom and her daughter. This past couple of weeks were also eventful. We headed up to Delano, CA, for Erica's parent's 50th Wedding Anniversary. The following week, Erica's parents took the Amtrak to visit us. This past weekend, we headed to an HOA event in our community where Derek won a costume contest dressed up as a penguin.

Catching up...

It's Erica :)

Just putting up a quick post to highlight what we've been up to since Derek turned 1. He's now 14 months old and is just the most inquisitive, energetic, loving boy who loves Cheerios, his animal figures, books, and learning how to walk.

Yes, he's taken his first steps. On Tuesday, Octoer 20th, Dean's dad calls him to tell us that our son took 15 steps unassisted. 10 minutes after we dropped him off at their house. Of course we were happy cause we've been waiting for this milestone, but the first words that came out of my mouth were, "WE MISSED IT!! =( "

Here's the video taken by our cousins Don & Sam:


So since then, he still holds onto our finger when he walks (runs), but he'll take a few steps unassisted if he's walking towards someone or from one piece of furniture to another. I'm getting a glimpse of the type of energy that will be required of us once he's walking by himself all over the place, we won't be able to sit down much when at home, haha.

Other events through the last two months...
-He got sick with Roseola. It's a very common illness spread from child to child that starts out with a fever above 103 degrees, then ends with red blotches all over the body once the fever breaks. The blotchiness freaked me out, but luckily the blotches went away after a couple days.
-He's made up a word for bottle ("babap"), banana ("bop"), and Cheerios ("aiyah") to add to his vocabulary of mama, keys, and cheese. I've also asked him to say Derek, to which he replies "ek". :)
-We've gotten rid of his pacifier. Within the span of a week, we phased it out and he totally doesn't use one anymore. :) I'm ecstatic.
-He LOVES books! He chooses his bedtime books now, and during the day, he'll crawl up to any of his books lying around and quietly flip through them.
-He is holding up our phones to his ear. Pure imitation of his parents, haha.
-He's showing interest in using utensils to manipulate food and objects. We'll hand him a spoon while we're feeding him so he can get used to holding one. Unfortunately it ends up with food being flung all over the place, but it's all for the sake of him learning, right?

Ok that's it for now. There will be a picture post soon, once Dean gets around to it. Thanks for reading!