The Im Family

the kneehigh bugger doing his two favorite things: standing and gnawing. ozzy is FINALLY starting to go about 3 hours between feeds. well, at least it's been like that for the past two days. he is still doing short power naps that leave me very little time to get anything done. *sigh* at night he's still on some kind of marathon feeding schedule. last night he woke at 8:30 to feed, again at 10:00, again at midnight. he woke up again at 4 to feed, so i just put him in bed with me and he was latching off and on until 9 am this morning. he is getting really good at sitting up, with his head level with his body, for a few minutes before he begins that slow, slumping, descent off to one side. he can now comfortably roll from any direction, including rolling to his tummy when he's on his back. he's scooting around quite a bit. can pull himself up into a crawl position and move his legs, but hasnt figured out how to coordinate his hands to move forward yet, so he'...

mimi's grandmother asked her what she wanted for christmas. she said, 'nothing.' i asked her what she wanted santa to bring her for christmas. she said, 'i dont know.' we got pictures with santa the other day and when he asked her what he could bring her for christmas and she said, 'i haven't decided yet.' i wondered if she already had everything she could want and that's why she didnt want anything. but that just seemed odd to me because she doesnt have everything and often when we go shopping she can't stop looking at the things she doesnt already have and want them. so i wondered if the fact that she doesnt ever see any commercials and we rarely go toy shopping has anything to do with her just not knowing what's out there to be had? and what happened to that desire to have a real live rabbit? every time she refused to come out with me to walk the dog, i'd tell her that she couldnt get a rabbit until she could help take care of ...

the tree is such a happy part of christmas for me and i want it to be a happy thing for my kids as well. when people say they aren't putting up a tree, inside i'm sucking in my breath, aghast at the notion that some people dont want to put up a christmas tree. i have such happy memories of my dad putting up our old fake christmas tree and my sisters and i hanging up all the ornaments we ever made in grade school and the garish silver and gold garlands, and stringy silver 'icicles', and multi colored lights that my dad set to a timer so that you could adjust the blinking rate. and then gathering in front of the tree for holiday pictures. ( i have got to find those old pictures when i go down to hampton next time!) and so when it's time to decorate the tree, i always start with enthusiam, but when faced with dealing with all the tree parts to put together and all the branches to fluff (this is definitely one example of why a real tree is so much better!), that enth...

thankfully ozzy was not feeling so great either, so we've both been spending the day laying down and sleeping. along with this cold that i have (headache, nagging cough, postnasal drip drip drip, utter exhaustion), i have also developed a 'milk blister' (when skin grows over a milk pore and the milk collects behind it...it's quite painful!), the technical term being 'blebs'... what a misnomer! a bleb. sounds kind of like something drab and boring. bleb. whoever was in charge of naming these suckers couldnt have picked a more inaccurate sounding word. this hurts like hell, is torturous to latch a baby on, and is just the thing to annoy the living crap out of me because i'm one of those people who can't leave a zit alone when i see one (even rob's breakouts are not safe around me...it's a compulsion...i can't help it). so i see this milk blister and the desire to pop it is astounding. but it hurts too much to even pull my shirt over it,...

my sister from indy informed me that i had no pictures posted from thanksgiving weekend at my cousin hae's house. i didnt get very many pictures while we were in richmond, but here's the few i was able to get:

mark this day! exciting news! ozzy slept on his back and there were NO tears...TWICE today for his naps! the planets must have been in perfect alignment because i just put him down while he was still awake with a pacy in his mouth, and he just lay there quite happily and just eased into sleep on his own. he did that twice today! i am afraid this is probably just a fluke and may never ever happen again, but it thoroughly gladdened my heart today. i am holding out hope that it may happen again in the near future. it was magical. almost as good as those moments when our kids are sleeping sweetly and rob and i will lock eyes with each other over our children's heads and exchange one of those looks of sheer contentment with one another...it really doesnt get any better than that.

nothing gets me into the holiday spirit like vince guaraldi trio's 'a charlie brown christmas', some festive greenery, and of course, this dance video starring the Im Family!

remember that story about the monster looking for his hairy toe? i read this book to mimi for the first time when she was three years old and when i got to the end where the creature looking for his hairy toe yells out "you've got it!" i pounced on her suddenly, yelling out 'you've got it!' and grabbed her. anticipating a good laugh, i was taken aback by her reaction. oh, man, did she scream. then her face crumpled up. then she started to cry. i remember LOOOVING this story as a kid! my sisters and i enjoyed scaring each other with that surprise in the end. but, mimi was terrified. sheesh ! i guess, in hindsight, my sisters and i were older than three when it was such a big hit with us. after calming mimi down and apologizing for scaring her (we put that book away and she refused to read it for many moons) i got her to sleep and the next day when i took her to school she told on me to her preschool teacher, saying that mama read her a really scary boo...

i was airing out ozzy's diaper area the other day and he was loving it. FREEDOM! FREEDOM! he was doing all kinds of acrobatics on the floor by himself, so i had to take some pictures...esp of all those cute rolls of fat. i do love those rolls...i can't help but pinch them whenever i see them. i have no self control. must. pinch. rolls. here is my four and a half month old doing asanas...i think there's plank, full locust, downward facing dog, cobra, and not sure what that last one is, but it reminds me of the kind of pose you might expect from a picture of a hindu god or a swami. (he will probably never forgive me for posting his naked ass on the world wide web).

it's that time of year again, when we all gather together as a family and we count our blessings. this year, as with every year, there is much to be thankful for. family, friends, good health... really, what more could you ask for? this is also the first year that i think mimi really understood about Thanksgiving. recently at school the kids made a chart that showed what they were thankful for. pretty much every kid in mimi's class said they were thankful for their mommy, daddy, or family. mimi was the only kid who said she was thankful for God. later, i asked her what she was thankful for and she again answered God. i asked her why she was thankful for God. she says, "mom. did God make people?" "yes," i answered. "And did God make all the birds and sky and trees?" "yes" i answered. "And did God make you and Daddy?" "yes, God made everything." i told her. "Mom? Do you know why I'm thankful for God?...

you give and give and give and they just take and take and take. yeah, you. i'm talking about you ozzy. i love ya kid, but this feeding nonstop business is going to turn me into Mean Mommy. dont make me angy. you wouldn't like me when i'm angry. ( eyes change to Mountain Dew radioactive green, and skin starts to turn green and swell under rippling muscles as the button front shirt turns into a car wash strips and pants become too tight Hobbit pants ). the past couple of nights it's been milkfest 2008. tonight, latched on at 5:30 pm, latched on at 6:30 pm, latched on at 7:30 pm, latched on at 9 pm, and latched on yet again at 11 pm... he is down to sleep right now (it is currently 12:45 am), but i am wondering if he'll be up again at 1:30 am to feed yet again like he was last night? it's been insane how much the kid wants to eat. i get it... you're growing. but geez, cant you slow down just a tad bit? i dont think i have nipples left!!!

when i was young and single, the last thing i ever really wanted to do was spend my free time with someone else's kid. maybe it was because i was a teacher and spent ALL DAY with a lot of somebody else's kids that i didnt want to extend it into my free time. so i find it so amusing when people say they would love to spend time with my kids. really? wow. and you mean we dont have to pay you to do it either? so when rosanne said she would love to babysit mimi and take her to the mall to play and watch a movie, no arm twisting was needed. rosanne and eric arrived bring gifts for mimi and ozzy. ozzy got a thanksgiving onesie and a redskins jersery onesie. mimi got a book about being a big sister. she very nicely thanked rosanne for the book and she after telling her she loved the book, she then told her that she already had it. (i need to have a talk with her about admitting to stuff like that.) after discussing safe to eat foods and epi-pen demo, transferring of the car ...

when i found out i was pregnant with ozzy, i promised myself that this time, everything would be different. this time when this baby was born i wasnt going to be a 'helicopter parent' spending my days hovering, just hovering, over the child, worried about every little thing he did or did not do. this time, i wasnt going to be all paranoid, crazy, psycho mama, worring about this child not reaching milestones at an advanced rate...this time, i was going to ENJOY being in the moment with my child instead of always worried about the future. i promised myself that this time, i wasnt going to hurry this baby to grow up because in hindsight i realized how fast it all really goes. except this morning, as i willed myself up out of bed bleary eyed from a rough night of a very fussy, stuffy nosed ozzy, who decided he would only sleep so long as i was awake from 3 a.m. until 7:30 a.m. this morning, this morning that found me barely functional, trudging down the stairs to help mimi get r...

took mimi to her second ice skating lesson on tuesday. i couldnt believe how much she had improved from the first class after just one practice session with rob! she was much more confident on the ice, was gliding (though still doing the one foot skating, but really moving forward this time, and starting to alternate feet!), and able to do turns too! i couldnt believe how well she was doing! i love how at the end of this stretch, she yells out: i did it ! yes, you did, my girl! yes, you did!

mimi begged to hold ozzy. she is so proud to be able to hold him. it makes her feel so grown up and capable. guess kaya wanted to get her picture taken too. after i took the first picture, kaya, nonchalantly, sidles up to the kids and is like 'ho-de-do-do-hum, i'm just going to stand here for a second. oh, are you taking pictures? i didnt notice.' saw the ped for his 4 month check up. all is well. i was concerned about his weight gain, which i think has slowed a lot. at first he was gaining a pound a week (the ped told me to slow it down), then we went on all breast milk and he gained barely a pound a month! he does seem to be fussing for more milk though, so i am latching him on an additional feed or two in the evening. the doc says i can start him on rice cereal, but i am worried about starting him on it and having allergies crop up ('they' say starting on solids too soon leads to food allergies in some kids). mimi started on rice at 4.5 months and has...

ozzy is reaches for everything now. he's not talking, but as he's staring intently at the object in his hands, his eyes are saying, oh yeah. mmmhum. it's time to get my swerve on. while 'reading' a cloth book about dinosaurs, he grabs hold of the pages and pulls it tightly to his chest, caressing the pages with his finger tips, mouthing and drooling all over the dinosaurs, crushing the pages in his arms and gnawing all over the textured parts of the dinosaurs. if they were real, i think they would have looked violated.

Happy Holidays from the Im Family to yours!

rob took mimi to see laurie berkner perform today after korean school. he picked her up from school, they ate lunch at home, then headed off to see the show. a few hours later they return and rob says that at one point he loses sight of mimi there at the concert and he's looking around for her everywhere and finally someone has her and brings her to him. as he's saying all this my heart is racing (even though she is standing right by me and i know the outcome of it was fine) and i started to feel a dizzying trepidation. it's weird how that works...just the very thought of losing her makes me feel SO fearful! i think that's the sort of news i'm better off not hearing. i know she is fine. i know nothing happened. but my brain and body go into an involuntary response at even the suggestion of it and it's a horrible feeling. ------------------------------------------------------------------ just this past friday evening, rob and mimi went to the ice arena f...

a few days ago, i hauled out mimi's old exersaucer and put ozzy in it. he can sit up pretty well in it on his own. some times he'll grab a toy and try to put it in his mouth. some toys dont flex far enough to go into his mouth, so it looks more like he's got a choke hold on it and is shaking it for emphasis ( 'd'ya hear me? get in my belly! ). it's not long before he ignores the toys and resumes the sucking of the fingers and drooling everywhere. i have often longed for those suction tubes they have at the dentist for sucking up spit and fluids in your mouth. wouldnt it be nice to just 'sluuuuurrrrp!' up all that drool with one clean pass or just shove it in his mouth and hold it to one side of his mouth for continuous suctioning? when even the hand sucking is no longer pleasurable, it's time for a change of scenery.

i love Ozzy's singular devoted attention to the manner of pooping. how he'll suddenly stop babbling, get still and then let loose a ginormous rattling fart that sends out shockwaves from the epicenter of his rear which is immediately followed by an eruption not unlike vesuvius on pompeii. impressed by the sound of it, i take several fistfuls of baby wipes and prepare myself, going into disaster relief mode and ready to face whatever he's got packin' in that diaper. but am surprised to find but a few schmeres of mustardy track marks. all sound and fury, but no substance. i find it endearing.

Dear Mimi (4 years and 8 months old) yesterday i saw you at your first ice skating lesson and my belly hurt from laughing so hard. you and your peers all looked very cute in snow pants and helmets, arms flailing and little bodies falling all about. i was proud to see that you were the first kid to stand up from a sitting position on the ice and while others were falling down all over the place around you, i watched as you tenaciously held your footing even though you were ever so slowly gliding OUT of the teaching area, passing the orange cones and inching into the open skate area where adults were practicing their axles and double toe loops. but you refused to lose your balance. knees bent, every inch of you tensed to hold your upright position, leaning forward with hands outstretched and determination in your face, you stayed standing. your teacher had to come and ferry you back to the rest of the group before someone triple salchowed right into you. during the marching exercis...

i wont pretend that i remember anything about DNA and RNA from Mrs. Trent's high school physiology class (the only thing i remember is the " protayne ahsburgs in a sea of lipids " said in her north cakalacky accent, and i think that was in refrence to ATPase...aaaaaannnnnnddd let me stop there before i display my astoundingly breathtaking lack of scientific knowledge). but i do know something about genes...that is, to put it in layman's terms...the apple rarely falleth far from the tree from whence it germinateth. every now and then i'll get glimpses of the Robert Im genes in our kids. not just in the way they look but, more worrisome, in their behavior. taking for instance the other night as we were heading home from dinner out with rob's parents. rob says to me, as he's driving, "when was the last time mimi took a bath. she stinks." mimi is in the back seat and her little ears perk up when she hears her name, and as she is wont to do whene...

it's fall. the trees have finally reached peak color on our street and some have already shed their leafy vestiments leaving a technicolor shag on the ground to mold and launch an invasion on my sinuses; elections have come and gone, with obama campaign signs being stolen from lawns and appearing on ebay and demands for the original wednesday morning Post going for up to $100 and prompting an additional 300,000 issues of that wednesday's Post to be rerun. and of course, what would fall be without the advent of parent-teacher conferences? rob and i went to mimi's school this morning to meet with her preschool teacher. conferences dont worry me too much because i usually know what's up with mimi at school...it's generally not too much different from what's up with her at home. and because mimi is in a cooperative preschool, we're there often enough to know her school persona quite intimately. so, much of what is said is not news to us and the conference is...

dear kaya is getting so old. her muzzle is showing up white in the photos these days. she goes up the stairs sloooowly and sometimes her back legs will give out on her while trying to stand up and she'll lose her footing and fall. very sad. tomorrow she goes to see the vet for her annual. we are taking her there instead of the usual home visit (which is an extra $45) because we want to try to help her get over her fear of the vet hospital...but now seeing her show her age, i almost want to just do what's easy for the old girl and almost feel bad about stressing her tomorrow.

i've always thought it was a good thing that i never experimented with drugs, never got into smoking, because i KNOW. i know that i can get compulsive, addictive, and totally sucked into anything that i like. the many benign compulsions/addictions that i do have stand testament to that fact. i do regularly give into is sugar, and those of you who know me know how there aint no such thing as 'just one' for me in that realm. and dont let me start obsessing over a t.v. show. or even worse a possible illness. i will take it and launch like mentos in a bottle of cola with it, and there's no slowing me down...in fact, any intervention will swirl me into battling back with defiance...dont tell me not to eat another jalepeno...i'll eat the whole damn jar of pickled jalepenos just cause you told me not to. so there...nhyah! ( sticking out tongue ). yeah, so everyone is like facebook is addictive. i'm like, sure, whatever. the first time i get on it, i do so just...

well, we finally went to visit my cousin hae's baby born October 21st. he's a little cutie. looks like james with pretty blue eyes. i can't wait to see how he will look when he's older...will he look more korean but keep his blue eyes? he's such a tiny little peanut...soooo cute. hae seems to be doing really well after having the baby. i'm so glad it went well for her. i wouldnt wish any of the crap that happened to me with my first child on anyone. i think having babies should be a beautiful experience and i am thrilled that it was a good one for her. (well, as positive as it can be when youre pushing a bowling ball out the vajayjay).

this is my favorite part of our daily afternoon walks...watching these two together.

halloween day pounced upon me like a stealthy lioness on a poor unsuspecting ungulate, springing up out of nowhere, taking me down with a ferocious, neck breaking bite, and then devouring me whole before my sleep deprived brain could even summon up the words: 'whaaa...?' you mean TODAY is halloween and i have YET to finish making kaya's horse costume or even BEGIN to make ozzy's prince costume??? how came you this day, oh sneaky Halloween, without my note? whatwhat??? with just a few hours before trick or treating begins and getting sweatingly frantic, i do what i always do in such times of great crisis. i get on the phone and call rob. i call his office and get a message that he is not going to be in the office today. i'm surprised by this because he didnt tell me that he was taking the day off. i saw him leave this morning with all the purpose he normally does when he goes to work. so i call his cell phone. goes to voice mail. so i hang up and call it agai...

mimi enjoys collecting autumn leaves. mimi loves to hold ozzy. tonight mimi was introduced to Charlie Brown for the first time...It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown! was on t.v. tonight. i wasnt sure she would want to watch it, but she said she did. i hadnt seen that in years! i remember wanting to watch it when i was a kid, but my parents always made me go to bed before it ended and it was so disappointing to me. rob said it was a tradition to watch it every year when he was a kid. so it was neat to have mimi watch it. she didnt comment on it, but i think she enjoyed it. maybe not to the same extent that i did. every time charlie brown announced, "all i got was a rock" i could not help but guffaw...literally i was braying , i thought it was so funny.

rob came home later this evening than usual because he wanted to get some time in the gym. sometimes when rob comes home from playing soccer (or other sport), i'll ask him if he got hurt. it really worries me that he'll get totally incapacitated one day from playing so rough. not so long ago, his eye got smashed with a ball and now his vision is all messed up in that eye. he's messed up his shoulder. sometimes he hobbles around b/c his ankle or back hurts him. if he were a car, i wouldnt buy him. too many banged up parts. anyway, he comes home from the gym this evening and mimi sees him in his gym clothes and she asks him, "daddy, did you get kicked in the eye tonight?"

some pictures of ozzy. he's getting better and better at grasping and putting things in his mouth. still not very good at it, but slowly improving. he's not able to sit up on his own yet, but can sit with some props around him for support for a few minutes. i dont like to sit him for too long because i dont think it's good for his development to be forced to sit up on his own for very long when he's clearly not physically strong enough just yet. but he continues to get lots of tummy time and we're practicing rolling over front to back and back to front. if i get him started, he can usually follow thru to change his position. he continues to sleep well at night, logging 7 hours before waking to feed, then sleeps 2-3 hours, feeds, sleeps 2-3 hours and then wakes up for the day. he still sleeps on his tummy, but i am trying to get him to learn to be a back sleeper. once he goes into a deep sleep, i'll try to keep him on his back for awhile. i still worry a...

kaya is 6.5 years old now. she is now a senior citizen. rob says she's not, but rotties only have a 9 year life span, so 6.5 means she's 2/3rds of the way thru her life! she may have 3 years left with us! (i hope we get more years with her, but not at the cost of her health/wellbeing. i'd rather lose her while she is still comfortable, rather than after much suffering.) anyway, while trying to make sure we have as much video of ozzy as we did of mimi as a baby, i realized that we stopped video taping kaya and her antics after she grew out of her puppyhood. and given the limited amount of time we have with her, compared to the lifetime will have with our kids, i thought it was important to video tape some of kaya thru her years with us. so here's a video of one of kaya's best characteristics...fetching. that is, she gets me stuff through out the day. i like to say that i have her do it because she needs to feel like a contributing member of the family and nee...

we have really been enjoying ozzy's happy nature. he loves to look at people, babble with you, and smiles and laughs readily...things mimi rarely ever did as a baby. i fault myself with mimi's demeanor as an infant. i really think my depression and unhappiness, along with my inexperience with caring for an infant, made her into a very sad, emotional baby. i feel like it's my fault that she didnt have a happy beginning...these thoughts burn holes into my heart... that i did this to my baby girl. i can't change the past, so i have to just try to do better by her from now on. i know some days, i still have moments when i'm probably too tough on her and i need to lighten up. i love to see ozzy so happy. i love these moments when he laughs. it fills me with so much joy. but these moments also remind me so much of how little mimi laughed as a baby and that joy is always tinged with some sadness too.

mimi playing one of pieces in her new piano book mimi has plunked around with the piano by herself long enough...about a week ago, i finally decided to give her piano lessons myself. previously, i had tried out this company called Musika. got matched with two teachers and both of them ended up standing me up. so, fed up with them, i decided to just try to teach mimi how to play the piano myself. i found a beginning piano book on amazon that got good reviews and when the book arrived on our doorstep, i showed it to mimi and got her excited about learning to play real songs on the piano. i decided that playing the piano would just be a normal part of every day...like brushing teeth, or reading books, or walking the dog. it just was something we'd do together every day. the first day, she was really gung-ho. she sat there and really wanted to play and did everything i told her. found the black keys, found the white keys, identified the pattern, identified the keys, learned the...