Separation Anxiety

Baby K has developed a bad case of separation anxiety. I don't know if it's as a result of the trip and spending the entire week with us, or if she's just at the age where she recognizes us, but for the past three days, she threw a tantrum when I left her at daycare. The second she couldn't see me, she started bawling (even if I was just across the room putting away her bottles). I felt terrible leaving her crying, but it had to be done. It got a little better today, as she was preoccupied with looking at the other babies around her, so I was able to make my escape with little resistance. But baby K is pretty independent; I'm sure she'll be fine by next week.

Vacation in Los Angeles

We survived our first week-long vacation away from home. More importantly, we survived baby K's first flight! It wasn't easy, but we made it through, and I would do it all over again if I had to. It was worth all the stress, packing, heavy lifting, and frustration dealing with a crying baby on a packed plane just to see the smiles on my grandparent's faces when they saw baby K. Too bad I didn't know, otherwise I could've coordinated the trip better and made it there in time for my grandma's 90th birthday celebration the week before.

We did not visit any of the theme parks this time around since baby K is too young to appreciate them. Here are some of the places we went to instead:

• California Science Center
• La Brea Tar Pits
• Griffith Observatory
• LA Farmers Market
• San Diego Zoo
• Old Town San Diego
• Gaslamp Quarters
• Coronado
• Santa Monica Pier

Throughout the week, M and I were worried about the rental car we were driving. I rented it at Hertz through Priceline, and got a Pontiac G6 with over 40,000 miles on it. The first day, it drove fine from the airport back to my uncle's place, but soon after that, the car started making funny noises upon initial acceleration, and we suddenly heard squeaks on the brakes. M called up all the neighboring Hertz locations in the area (there must've been at least six of them), but none of them had any full-size cars we could exchange it for, and the drive back to LAX would've been too far. The closest vehicle they had was a compact car, which would've been too small. Fortunately, we got through the week without any extreme car trouble (just had to add some air to one of the tires). I don't know if we'll rent from Hertz again given all the problems we had, but I guess if we do it through Priceline, we won't really have a choice. It almost isn't worth the hassle just to save on a few bucks, but we'll see.

Baby K didn't seem to suffer from much jetlag on the trip there or back... she was just more tired than usual, but at least she was up during the day (aside from nap time) and slept through the night. She did get very fussy on our way back and was crying halfway through the red-eye flight. It seemed as if her gums were bothering her b/c she kept trying to eat my hair and put anything she can into her mouth (except she didn't want her toys). We're used to her putting things into her mouth, but constantly trying to eat my hair was something new. We just kept stuffing her with the Graduate puffs. She'd quiet down for about two seconds, and when the puff was depleted, she'd start crying again. There were quite a number of babies on the flight (I saw at least four strollers parked on the walkway before the plane), and ours was the only one I heard crying on the plane. Ah well. At least we didn't hear anyone verbally cursing us out (even though they were probably doing it under their breaths).

Hmm... our next trip... I wonder if it's too ambitious to shoot for Asia. =P Maybe so, but before I get ahead of myself, I have to renew my passport and get one for baby K.

US Open 2009

The Y family enjoyed the day at the US Open yesterday. M was afraid it would rain, but the weather held up and we had a great time. We caught the tail-end of the men's doubles semi-final match at Arthur Ashe between the Bryan brothers and Dlouhy/Paes. We would've gotten there earlier, but it took us a half hour just to go around in circles to park the car. After the match ended, we walked around for a bit, checked out SmashZone and watched while other people attempted to whack the tennis ball coming at them 70 to 120 mph, then eventually made our way to the Louis Armstrong stadium to watch the women's doubles semi-final match between Black/Huber and Vives/Sanchez. By this time, it was mid-afternoon, and baby K was napping away in her stroller. We weren't too into the doubles matches (I had no idea who the players were), so we left Louis Armstrong and checked out some of the teen players in the open courts.

Baby K woke up just in time to eat. After we fed her, we went back to Arthur Ashe for the match between Novak Djokovic (my favorite) and Fernando Verdasco. I was holding a diaper bag and baby K in my arms (M behind me with the folded-up stroller and formula bag) and about to ascend up the stairs to our seats when someone grabbed my arm. It caught me by surprise and my initial thought was that we bumped into someone we knew (what are the odds of that happening on a weekday?). But instead, I turned around and faced a woman I've never seen before. This stranger says to me "you have a beautiful baby!" to which I responded a simple thank you, smiled, and walked on. It was totally weird. I'm thinking... why would you stop someone just to tell them they have a beautiful baby when they obviously have their arms full and want to get to their seat?

Baby K would not sit still during the match. She kept babbling and wanting to move around. I'm sure the people sitting around us were cursing us out and wondering why we'd bring a baby to the US Open. Eventually, we just decided to head out so that we'd get home in time to feed baby K. We didn't get to watch too many matches (ironically, we see more of it on TV), but it was a day well spent. Maybe next year we'll bring baby K back on Kid's Day, and hopefully by then, she'll be old enough to appreciate it more.

Two Mishaps In A Week

Earlier this week, baby K got a little boo boo when one of the other kids pushed her as she was trying to pull herself up using a bar on those buggies they put the kids in. She ended up hitting her lip against the bar. This happened late in the day, so part of me felt bad -- if only I had gone to pick her up 20 minutes earlier, it could've avoided the accident. I know she's going to get little injuries here and there (especially considering how active she is), but I try to keep it to a minimum as much as possible. The daycare filed an incident report, but not much else came out of it. I guess they see little things like this happen so often that to them, it's not a big deal. My little girl getting hurt though -- that's a big deal to me!

This morning, I got a call from the daycare (my heart always races when I see the number pop up through the caller ID), informing me that one of the other kids bit baby K on her finger. I got very upset about it, and even more upset when I called M and relayed the message to him. I went to see baby K during lunch, and she appeared to be fine, but now I can't help but worry (more than usual) when she's not with me.

I'm sure part of the reason for the incidents this week was because baby K's regular caregivers were not there (who allows them to take vacation anyway??). The people watching her were teachers from another room, and they probably are not as familiar with the children's behavior (or misbehavior, in this case) as the regular caregivers would be. I know I can't shield baby K from getting hurt forever, but what bothers me is that in these two cases, they were provoked by other children; it's not even as if baby K caused the injuries to herself (not that that would've made it any better). This just makes leaving her so much harder when I drop her off in the mornings now.

Back To School

Seeing school buses out on the road is a sure sign that school is back in session. Where did the summer go?? I normally don't mind stopping for school buses since it's usually a pretty quick encounter: blinkers go on, stop sign comes out, bus comes to a complete stop, child(ren) get on, parent waves, stop sign retrieves, blinkers are shut off, and the bus carries on to pick up the next child. All this happens in about a half a minute, sometimes longer if the child is not already waiting by the curb.

Today however, the parents decided to have a full five-minute conversation with the bus driver, turning a 30-second delay into a huge traffic jam. Vehicles were backed up as far as I could see. It's so different living in the burbs... people patiently waiting in their cars, not a honk to be heard. This would definitely not have flied had we been in Manhattan. Infuriated taxi cabs would've probably went around the school bus, ignoring all traffic rules in search for their next fare. That's one thing I do not miss about NYC.

Ah well, summer's coming to an end. I guess I should now anticipate spending extra time in my commute to work.