Simon Lev: A Story

If you have not taken a moment to read our friend Simon's blog please start with this story, it is absolutely beautiful. Simon is 5 days older than Isaac and has spent the last couple of months at Children's Hospital in Oakland with a heart condition. He is a sweet and special little boy with two beautiful moms. We feel blessed to know them. Their blog is so touching...

Simon Lev: A Story

Ella

Isaac with Ella and Maya

We are so lucky to have found an amazing woman to care for Isaac while we are working. Ella is from Eritrea in Northeast Africa and has been in the US for 26 years. She greets us every morning with a huge smile and big hugs and kisses for our son. She spends the day playing on his level and encouraging him to learn about the world around him. She is patient and loving and I most importantly, I trust her. As a first time mom, being able to have peace of mind that my son is being cared for by the best possible person is incredibly important. She adores our son as if he was her own. I couldn't ask for a better person for him to spend his days with.

Changing Seasons

Fall is here! This has always been one of my favorite seasons. I love the crispness in the air and the smell of the leaves as they change. It also reminds me of fresh starts, like the first day of school. This fall has been even more special because it marked Isaac's 6th month birthday and my return to work.

In addition, the fall brings the close of the Jewish year. This years High Holy Day services were more meaningful to me because I got to share them with Isaac for the first time. We attended both Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur services at Chomat with Shefa and Aaron. I found myself moved to tears several times as we prayed, sang and danced together. Isaac even wore my tallis for a short while and played with the tzitzit. This brought back very moving memories of me by my father's side during services and wrapping the corner of his tallis around my shoulder and running the tzitzit through my fingers as I tried to amuse myself and be as close to him as possible as a child.

Isaac continues to change on almost a daily basis. After a few weeks of practicing today he remembered that he could sit up on his own and proceeded to show off his new skill several times this evening. One thing that I recognize about my son is that once he does something new, like rolling over or sitting up, he takes a couple week break and then one day decides that he's ready to do it all of the time.

We have an appointment next week with a plastic surgeon to discuss his bump and make a decision if and when it should be removed. I'm a bit nervous about the pain that it might cause him. However, in the end I am sure it will be okay.

I will post more soon... I promise :)

Morning Lessons

This morning I got up early to get a shower in and a little work done before Isaac woke up. I have figured out that being a working mom means very looooong days, made up of lots of tasks to juggle. I always felt hard pressed to get myself out of the house on time, but now there are two of us to organize. In addition, tomorrow Marc gets the privilege of getting Isaac to Ella so that I can make an early meeting in the city. Which has meant that I needed to get as much organized for him as possible. WAIT!!! How did I become the expert on only my second day of work trying to coordinate this transition???

Anyway, after my shower I discovered that Isaac was already up and starting to complain that he's still in his crib and getting hungry. I get him changed and dressed for the day and then set up his play area in the living room. Once he's settled, lying on his back and playing with his toys, I start to tick off the mental list of things to do in my brain and try to get a few things accomplished while he plays by himself. After a couple of minutes I realize that he's being VERY quite in there and peek around the corner to see what he's up to. To my surprise I find him sitting up playing with a toy... SITTING UP?!? Yep, just sitting there, looking more like a little boy and less like my baby. We've been practicing sitting up for the last week or so, but today was the first time that he sat himself up from a prone position. I called Marc over. He and I oohed and ahhhed over the advanced progress of our little boy. And then a voice in my head said, "wait... don't grow up too fast... I want you to stay small... my baby... time is going by so quickly."