A Christmas to Remember...

What a wonderful day! Home with family and friends. We are exhausted, but so happy to have had such a special memories of this incredible day.

Our most favorite gift of all.

So much for cutting back this year...

Grandma and Blaze with matching hats.

Proud Daddy,

And Mommy too!

Such a happy, happy boy.

Standing tall with Papa.

Opening gifts...

gifts...

and even more gifts...

Silly Daddy, that's Blaze's hooded towel.

I am going to really like this thing they call Christmas !?!

Fun with Papa...

And Grandma too!

Playing cards with the adults.

More silly hats???

Note to self...'do not hold Blaze over my head after eating!'

We are both so very happy to have such an amazing gift this holiday season. He has brought such joy into our lives and to all those that he meets. It is really something that such a small child can be the light of our lives. He has brought us such a renewed sense of purpose to our lives. He brings so much happiness to us every moment of every day.

No other gift could top having Blaze with us for Christmas, but Gerry definitely brought tears to my eyes with a gift of a guardian angel locket with a photo of our Frankie girl inside. I just know that she was with us here in spirit on Christmas as she always is each and every day.

We talked on the phone with family throughout the day and even got to Skype with my big sister and her girls so they could see how big Blaze is getting. Gerry's Mom in Canada, had a great Christmas Day visit from his youngest daughter Kristin, then on the day after Christmas (Boxing Day in Canada) she was joined by his sister Rhonda, along with her fiance and son and also his older daughter Jessica and her husband and 3 boys, they all came for a visit. Her house hasn't been that full in years! Now that's what the holidays are all about, enjoying time with family.

We are looking forward to the New Year, which will be here before we know it. Blaze has his Doctor's appointment on January 5th. He will be getting his 4 month checkup and also his next round of immunizations. We are really excited to find out how much he has grown both in weight and length.

Christmas 2009, definitely a day in Blaze's life that we will remember.......with many, many more to come.

'Here comes Santa Claus, Here Comes Santa Claus...'

Getting ready for Christmas. What does Santa get for a little guy who seems to have EVERYTHING!!!!

I just can't get enough of my little fella. I tell him everyday how much he is loved and how lucky I am to have him in my life. Still after almost 4 months I look at him and can't believe he is here. He is simply amazing. I know everyone thinks their children are amazing...but he really is. We are SO, lucky to have such a great baby. He sleeps through the night, he is happy, healthy, fun and smiles and laughs all the time.


He truly grows by the day and he really getting heavy. He loves lights and music and this time of the year is perfect with all the Christmas lights and music. We had been watching that new special on TV 'The Sing Off,' and Blaze liked to sing along too. He just makes us laugh all the time. He is now mimicking us with our mouth movements and sounds and stands tall with just a little help from us.

Blaze enjoying his peas with Daddy and wanting more, more, more...

He still loves the water and Gerry and I laugh at how we will soon need to wear our bathing suits to bath him as he is splashing up a storm.

Gerry surprised me the other day at work and brought Blaze in for a quick visit. I came around the corner and there was my little Santa. He melts my heart...yes Gerry too, but my son, I just love seeing him.

We are so excited about this very special Christmas. We will miss our Frankie girl dearly, after having her for 13 Christmas's. However, Blaze's first Christmas is one we will not forget, even if he may never remember. We will have lots of pictures to show him in years to come. Last year we hoped and prayed that we would have a little one for this Christmas and our dreams came true. We are blessed beyond words and will enjoy every minute of this holiday season with (as the outfit states) our most favorite gift of all.

Reading 'Twas the night before Christmas'...a Family tradition

We are wishing all of our friends and family all the very best for a happy, healthy and joyous new year.

A Little Of This And......... A Little Of That

Where has the time gone? We are so sorry for the long stretch between posts, the days seem to be flying by, and now low and behold it is December and soon time for jolly old Santa to make his deliveries.

Since our last post, we have celebrated Thanksgiving. We celebrated quietly at home with Rhonda's Mom and Dad and just spent the day enjoying each others company, watching some NFL football on TV, a bountiful feast of turkey and all of the fixings prepared by Rhonda's Mom complete with homemade pumpkin pie Yummy!, and of course the incredible Arizona winter weather with lots and lots of sunshine (the temperature got up to 84 degrees!)

Rhonda is still trying to shake off the effects of her bout with pneumonia that she has been dealing with for the last 3 weeks. She has a lingering dry cough that just won't go away. I feel sorry for my girl, she has been such a trooper with all of this and has only missed one day of work (that's dedication to helping others!) That's what makes her such an incredible nurse.

A great big "Congratulations" goes out to Joy and Kelly on the recent birth of their son. We are so happy for both of them. Rhonda had the opportunity to talk to Joy just after the birth when we called the Docs. It was a coincidence that both of the Docs were with Joy and Kelly and their new little one in their hospital room at Hiranandani. Dr. Yash was busy feeding Samuel while Rhonda was able to speak with Joy. We look forward to talking with them once they get their newest bundle of joy (no pun intended!) back home safe and sound.

Another "Congratulations" went out to our amazing Doctor and Blaze's Indian God Mother, Dr. Yash. She celebrated her birthday this past week and it was great calling and wishing her the best for her "special day'. The entire SI staff were all going out to celebrate at a favorite restaurant of hers and ours, Mainland China in Powai.

And yes it seems that all good things come in 3's. We have to give one more very big "Congratulations" out. This time it is for the fertility clinic that made our dreams come true, Surrogacy India in Mumbai, India. They gave us our miracle, our beautiful boy Blaze. This past week was their anniversary. There are so many couples lives that they have touched and like us, they have been able to make their dreams come true.

Well with those updates out of the way, it is time to tell you what has been happening lately in the life of our "little monkey" He is now 13 weeks old. Wow! It just seems like yesterday that we excitedly emailed SI with a multitude of questions and then I spoke with Dr. Sudhir about getting the process started. There were ups and downs and a few disappointments along the way, but each and every time we pick Blaze up in our arms and squeeze him tight and look into his beautiful brown eyes, it was all worth it.

As each day passes Blaze is more and more active. He really enjoys laying on his back and playing in his Fisher Price Rainforest Activity Center. He kicks and grabs at his toys and stares at the flashing lights. He really enjoys sitting on his Mother's lap and leaning back on her legs and smiling and talking (well making lots of noises) and reaching out and grabbing and playing with his Mommy and just eats up all of the one-on-one interaction with one of his favorite people in the world (me being the other favorite of course).

Being able to spend so much time with my boy is awesome. At first it was a bit difficult I will admit. Not the actual taking care of him (I'm pretty good at that!), but trying to take care of him and continue to do all of the things that I used to do around the house as well. As a guy, I always have a bunch of projects on the go and before the birth of our beautiful boy, I had plenty of time to work at them. That all changed when our little guy came along, but thankfully that was only short lived. It does get easier and lately, I have really gotten good at using the time during his naps to at least get a few things done and crossed off of my list.

As usual our little man is continuing to grow like a weed. For the last month now he has been routinely sleeping completely through the night. We bath him around 7 pm, then feed him his evening bottle and then it's off to sleep around 8 or 8:30. And we usually don't hear him stir until around 5:30 or 6 am. We had read about the importance of a routine in a babies life, so we came up with this routine for our Blaze and have been sticking to it as best as we can, and it really has paid off. We are still putting a teaspoon of rice cereal in his evening and morning bottles which he usually drinks 7 to 9 ozs. Just over a week ago I started him on strained bananas at his lunchtime and suppertime feedings along with his bottle, and he really seemed to enjoy them. He now has moved on to sweet potatoes. The look on his face when he tried his first taste of them was priceless, but just like the bananas he really seems to be enjoying them and smacks his lips between spoonfulls. And just this morning to go along with his mid-morning bottle, I made a small bowl of rice cereal to feed him and you guessed it, he enjoyed that too! I think he is going to be just like his Daddy and eat almost everything. I was never a fussy eater growing up.

With Christmas fast approaching we are in search of a few gifts for our boy. What do you get a little guy that seems to have everything he really needs right now? We are kind of leaning towards some things to help keep him occupied during the day in between his naps. Maybe some sort of sit-in activity center. Evenflow makes a nice one, the Exersaucer that seems to have a lot of things to catch the babies attention and keep them occupied.

Today Blaze and I started to put up some of the outdoor lights around the house. Well Blaze did the supervising from his stroller, and I did the work. As funny as it may seem, even though we live in the desert and don't get any snow, the majority of people take the time to get into the Christmas spirit by putting up lights and decorating. I have an 18 ft Saguaro cactus in my front yard that I put lights on, and you know it looks pretty good when it's done.

Well , my boy is waking up from his nap, so I will end this post for now. Hope you enjoy the latest pictures of the many faces of Blaze.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Watch Out Michael Phelps!!!

Well our boy Blaze continues to grow in leaps and bounds. Each day we are amazed at how he is changing and turning from a once small fragile newborn baby to our "little man." He now is a whopping 12 lbs, which means that he doubled his birth weight in just 11 weeks.

Lately, when Gerry is home for his stretch of 4 days off after working his 48 hour shift at the firehouse, he has been taking his boy for a few short outings around town. These outings include quite a few trips to the local mall for some window shopping (a favorite of Gerry's) . The proud Dad reports that Blaze really enjoys getting out, especially visiting the pet store and of course the toy store.

Gerry and his Father-in-Law recently rolled up their sleeves for a bit of work and washed all of the windows of our house inside and out including washing the sun screens. Even though my Dad is retired, he hasn't lost his touch when it comes to doing windows. He owned and operated his own window washing business for over 40 years.

We are both missing our Frankie girl so very much. With Christmas just around the corner, this will be our first Christmas without her in many, many years, and it will definitely be sad, but on the other hand it will be our first Christmas with Blaze and a time to celebrate. Life sure is full of ups and downs. This past weekend we took Blaze to see Santa and he was great, no tears and he waited in line patiently with all of the other children. He loves all of the bright and flashing Christmas lights, so Daddy is VERY excited to get the house decorated for his little boy.

Blaze just LOVES television, especially animated movies and NFL football. He sure watches them intently.

From the very first time we put Blaze in the tub for a bath, he just loved it. He continues to enjoy himself so much in the bath, kicking wildly and making lots of noises. We both definitely believe that we are going to have a great little swimmer on our hands. Check out the video and see what you think.

WARNING the following video contains some nudity and goofy Mommy voices...

Well, I am officially out of Quarantine...thank heaven for Grandparents and N95 respiratory masks. I started coming down with 'something,' early last week and decided to get myself to the Doctor right away. I am not taking any chances with our little guy. The Doc said it wasn't contagious but we didn't want to take any chances and so I wore my N95 mask around the house and Grandma and Papa came to stay while Daddy was off at the firehouse for his 48 hour shift. Just yesterday this pesky cough wouldn't go away and I was still feeling very tired, so I went and got a chest x-ray and low and behold, I have pneumonia! I was never so happy to have an abnormal test result as I just want to get better and find out what was wrong. So I rushed back to the Doc after work to get a shot of Rocephin in my butt to kick start my feeling better and then I will start a course of 10 days on oral antibiotics tomorrow. WHEW! It's been a long, tiring week. I can't wait to be all better soon!!!

Playing with Papa

Snuggling with Grandma

There is another round of amazing parents welcoming or soon to be welcoming their little ones into the world with the awesome clinic Surrogacy India...Jackie and hubby, Joy and Kelly (any day now) and so many more (Stan and his wife, Todd and Alper, Rob and Greg, Johnny and Darren, and I am sure I am missing a few more) to come over the next months. We have been a part of each of their journey's (and so many others) from the beginning and also have been in contact over the past year. It is so great to know first hand of their abundant joy and excitement. We couldn't be happier for these wonderful people, so deserving of parenthood.

So for you photo junkies, here is our boy...

The MANY faces of Blaze:

Tummy time makes me tired!