My little Angels

Nora at 2 weeks old Nora Caroline Shannon was born on May 4th at 545pm.  She weighed 7 pounds, 8 ounces and was 20.5 inches long.  It's been quite the few months since my last post for our whole family and, while I constantly regret not being able to get here and write down my thoughts, when I look back I understand that we've been running on fumes for months.  Rachael and I both just finished our respective undergrad degrees and I spent a month doing 60-hour weeks to try to bank some money to tide us over while Rachel isn't getting a full salary for maternity leave. Rachael had the birth experience she wanted with Nora and I couldn't be happier for her.  She delivered at a midwife practice on King Street on Old Town Alexandria in a bedroom, not in a hospital hooked up to all the monitors we dealt with for Joe.  She was able to labor on her own and go for a walk with me around town early on and did a lot of her heavy labor standing or on all fours in bed. ...

Joe feeling Nora kick for the first time Today is Joe's 3rd birthday.  It seems like a lifetime ago that he was born and we met him for the first time, and in some ways I feel like it was the start of a whole new life for me.  I can't imagine a world where I come home and don't have a familiar 'Dada!' and a big hug waiting to greet me. Things with Joe have been wonderful lately, despite frequent temper tantrums in the evening that I think we can attribute to his changing sleep schedule.  He frequently plays on his own and often has entire conversations with his toys or other objects in the house that just crack us up.  Last night, for example, he was asking his asparagus, "What's wrong?" and petting it before eventually just popping it in his mouth and continuing on with dinner. Joe's vocabulary has expanded significantly in the last few months, and I feel like we're at the point where he pretty much understands everything we're say...

Little Joe seeing a space shuttle for the first time This week we found out that we will be having a little girl and we decided to name her Nora Caroline.  Nora was a name we had picked out before we knew Joe would be a boy, so there wasn't much work to be done on that end.  We chose Nora because it derives from 'light' in Arabic and Hebrew, but it also means 'honor' in the Anglo-Saxon origination.  Caroline is Rachael's step-mother and we decided to name Nora after her. We've been talking to Joe about Nora and we're pretty sure he understands that a sibling is in mommy's tummy, but he keeps talking about a door for the baby to come out.  He's also been talking up a storm and has been very much into space shuttles, rockets, and trains the last few weeks.    We took him to the Udvar-Hazy Smithsonian museum last weekend and took the photo above when he saw the space shuttle for the first time.

Hiking in the mountains with mom and dad Things have been insanely busy for us lately - I'm still working two jobs and have two classes left for my degree and Rachael is working more.  In addition to all of that, it looks like we're going to be having another baby around the beginning of May next year.  I regret that my time commitment here has fallen off but I've been enjoying spending as much time as I can with little Joe. Joe's at the point that he can understand just about anything we ask of him and can formulate some sort of sentence response to us.  He loves talking about trucks, cars, airplanes, rockets, and trains and enjoys every chance he gets to get out and be outside.  He just started sleeping in his own bed in the last week, even though its still just next to ours, and still sleeps through the night most nights. His health issues have all but disappeared to this point, with the exception of a minor ear infection every once in a while.  It lo...

Little Joe dressed up for Easter Keeping with the common refrain from the last year, the last few months have been insane both for little Joe's development and our schedule with school and work, preventing me from writing here anywhere close to as often as I would like to. Since my last update little Joe has had a ton of language development.  He can count to 10 on his own with little prompting, recognizes all the letters and numbers, many of the basic colors, and can construct basic sentences on his own to communicate with us.  Mornings typically have "Dada, yummy toast now" or "Hi Dada" with a hug, while car rides are "ooh, green trees" or "Dada, outside please". He absolutely loves his time outside and cries at the mention of going inside even after many hours at parks.  I'm looking forward to the summer with longer hours, nicer weather, and chances to play with him outside more often.  I have a break in school coming up after ...

Little Joe enjoying the snow Little Joe turned two today, and what a whirlwind year it's been.  Again I find myself regretting that I've been unable to keep up with the amazing progress he's made but with our busy schedules I'm barely keeping my head above water with my school and work, let alone having the personal time to keep something like this up. For Joe's birthday Rachael and I both left work early to take him to the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum because it was unfortunately a little cold for us to do much of anything else.  We'd hoped to take him to the zoo or to a playground but I don't think he minded the museum.  He still absolutely loves airplanes- just like dad- and he spent the better part of almost two hours wandering around and looking at the planes.  "Aaaah!  Shoom!" Yesterday we had a little birthday get together with Rachael's mom and two friends, Nick and Priya, along with their son Zack.  It wasn't much to sp...

Baby Joe reading with Pop-pop and Grammy on Christmas It's been a good long while since I've had a chance to update little Joe's status.  Since my last post we've moved back to the US to Alexandria and have had a lot going on that has made it incredibly difficult to make the time to devote to a good post, which I sincerely regret since little Joe has been changing so much. In the last 2 months he has picked up quite the vocabulary.  He can say words like 'banana', 'apple', 'bubble', 'pop', 'kiss', 'firetruck', and his most recent favorite 'aaaaa', which means 'airplane'.  He's really been enjoying videos of airplanes and boats on top of his go-to favorite firetruck videos.  He also has started doing puzzles and has been getting good at manipulating pieces and blocks, which he'd had problems with in the past. Little Joe has been sick lately and not doing very well, but I'm hoping that he ...

Little Joe and Rachael enjoying visiting the Roman Forum We're finally at the end of our little experiment of living in Belgium.  We leave next week and are looking forward to little Joe finally having that chance to meet his cousin Emily for the first time.  It looks like we are also going to have the chance to spend Christmas this year with Rachael's father and his wife Caroline, which will be the baby's first real Christmas with family. As always, he has changed quite a bit since my last post.  He is regularly eating at the table with us on a regular chair rather than in a high chair and has been very engaged with what he wants when eating his dinner.  He also has been doing a great job starting to learn to tell us what he wants when he is frustrated and has learned how to say 'please' using sign language. Little Joe also really loves playing games like hide and seek and just recently started hiding from us to try to scare us.  He also plays peekaboo ...

Little Joe playing with pillow forts with Rachael Little Joe is 19 months old... just about time for me to stop referencing his age in months to other people.  I don't recall hearing anyone saying 'My son is 23 months old.'  It's usually a fraction of a year for a bit and then whole year increments.  I would like to try to keep this blog fresh, though, so I may stick with the monthly convention for now or just convert to the name of the month and year instead.  I'll see how I feel about it over the next few months. Lots of changes going on here in Belgium for us recently.  We are officially moving home on November 5th and have already scheduled our moving arrangements for when we leave.  It is bittersweet in a lot of ways, but for me the one thing with little Joe I will regret is that he is just now finally in toddler day care instead of infant and seems to be really enjoying his new playmates.  Since he's on the low end of his group he seems to ...

Little Joe enjoying Trafalger Square in London Little Joe is now a year and a half old, which seems like an insane concept to me for a lot of reasons.  First, the math in my head says that he has been alive for nearly 5% of my life span; I feel like my life is just flying by and I have already started living vicariously through my son.  Second, it means that he is approaching the age when I have my first memories- I very distinctly remember my 3rd and 4th birthdays- and the thought that the smallest things we do could end up with him as a fond and distant memory for the rest of his life is incredibly humbling and emotional for me. In the last month little Joe has learned to love going outside, especially on the backpack carrier that we bought for me to use with him.  He frequently begs us to take him downstairs to the main level of the house and then will try to open the front door or will point at the backpack for us to take him outside.  Unfortunately most of...

Little Joe enjoying Paris in the summer The last month has been an hot and exhausting month for us and little Joe.  It's been in the 80's and 90's for the last 3 or 4 weeks and without air conditioning it's been pretty tough on all of us, especially at night.  Fortunately for us it also means it's an opportunity to travel a bit more than we have been recently.  We all visited Paris a few weeks ago for Bastille Day and will be going to London this coming weekend to escape another hot few days. I really do regret that Joe is not old enough to remember all of the things that we have been doing since we've been here.  By the time we leave Belgium we'll have visited at least 7 countries and I don't know that he will ever have that opportunity as an adult.  I surely hope he does, though, and will encourage him to travel on his own in the future. Little Joe's been walking all over the place now and it's pretty rare to see him crawl anywhere more...

Baby Joe modeling his outfit before heading out for the day The last month has seen quite a change in our little guy's ability to comprehend the world around him.  He understands quite a lot of what we say and do, even though he isn't necessarily able to communicate back verbally.  For instance, he understands what it means when we say that we're going outside, sitting down for dinner, going to sleep, or changing his diaper (which usually involves him trying to crawl away as fast as possible). He is also able to recognize motorcycles by sight or sound and makes his little hand motion as if he's revving the engine himself.  He seems to be infatuated with motorcycles at the moment and usually wants us to take him over to touch one if we see it parked on the street. He's also doing really well at starting to be self-sufficient; he almost exclusively eats and drinks on his own at mealtime - we just need to put the sippy cup and plate in front of him and he'l...

Little Joe plays with one of his toy fire trucks at our cabin in Normandy, France. Little Joe turned 15 months old over the weekend.  He's come a long way in just the last month, both physically and developmentally.  He has grown at least two inches since he left for Florida in March, which has partially reduced our concerns about possible hormone issues and his short stature for his age, and seems to be eating and sleeping more than he had been even just a few weeks ago. On the development side, he can now stand on his own without any support or assistance from a person or object and can walk (cautiously) across a room if there is nothing in his way.  He generally prefers to be near a box or wall that he can grab onto for assurance but just in the last few days has been walking a lot more and crawling only when he gets tired from walking.  He can also climb stairs on his own, including the steep, twisting staircase in our home. He also has been doing a ...

Baby Joe and 'Uncle Firetruck' Baby Joe is now a little over 14 months old and has had quite the adventure over the last month.  He traveled with Rachael to Florida last month to spend time with Holly and Mike and their new daughter and was supposed to go see Melody for a few days before coming home.  Unfortunately, my mother got into a car accident on April 12th and I had to cut their trip short so they could meet me in New Jersey.  Mom is recovering well and she got to see the baby before we left, albeit for only a few minutes.  He was also able to visit with Rachael's mom in Delaware for lunch one day and made his rounds with my aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandmothers during his time in New Jersey. On his trip we learned that baby Joe loves firetrucks - he got to visit one with Mike at his firehouse and also my friend Pat in New Jersey and he now owns several firetruck toys.  He can also say 'firetruck' in his own way and refers to his Uncle Mike a...

Baby Joe, courtesy of our friend Adriana Baby Joe is now 13 months old and is making great progress with his motor and language skills.  In the last week he has learned how to take a ball and give it back to us and just last night started putting objects in a bag when Rachael asked him to.  He's also a lot more attentive with things like buttons and switches on his toys and knows that pushing certain buttons will activate music or lights on his toys and even anticipates it.  He also dances quite often when music plays from his toys and usually wants Rachael or I to join in the fun.  He has also had his first interaction with chocolate, brie cheese, and a dab of wine and seems to love both - the start of what I'm sure will be the life of a connoisseur of fine foods if he's anything like mom and dad. Baby and Rachael left today to visit his cousin Marissa for the first time and will be there for 3 weeks - I'm very anxious and interested to see what many changes h...

Baby Joe enjoying the Ath Winter Carnival parade Our little Belgian town had a parade to end their winter carnival, which we took the baby out to see before we had cake to celebrate his first birthday with a cake and a Google Hangout with the family.  He enjoyed being outside with the bands going by and was pretty indifferent about his opportunity to get messy with his birthday cake.  He managed to get blue icing all over his face and our laptop but it wasn't the all-out food fight that I had imagined when we planned it. He got a lot of new toys from the family, including his new favorite thing in the world- a little sit and push motorcycle that my mother gave him.  So far he can only go backwards on the thing, but it plays music and he enjoys scooting around the living room and bouncing to the music.  He has also learned to stand on his own and unsupported and has done it for up to about 2 minutes at a time, but still hasn't made the move to start walking just...

Baby Joe enjoyed his dinner so much he decided to wear it Baby Joe turned 11 months old this past weekend and is just about at that magical year mark for us.  He's been getting ever closer to walking on his own; he can stand unsupported for a few seconds at a time and does well walking when we are holding his hands.  I'm hoping that he will at least be taking steps on his own by his first birthday in 4 weeks. He has also been teething again - his molars coming in on the top have caused large hematomas to form on his gums and he's been pretty unhappy about it on most nights recently.  His diet has changed significantly, though... he's eating solid foods a lot more and breastfeeding a lot less and, aside from the teething, has been sleeping more at night.  He really enjoys eating sauteed spinach and avacado, but also really enjoys ground up chicken, broccoli, and mashed potatoes. When I come home from work or he sees me for the first time every day he usually h...

Baby Joe opening his first Christmas present Things have been quite busy in the D'Angelo household the last month and a half.  Baby Joe passed 10 months and celebrated his first Christmas and New Year.  They were rather muted celebrations for what we are used to, due in part to the fact that we had a 10-month-old with us and also because we're still trying to get settled into our new home in Belgium. Baby Joe enjoyed his Christmas and we got lots of toys for him to play with from Rachael's family.  As is typical for kids his age he enjoyed the boxes and wrapping paper significantly more than the gifts themselves.  He's put some good mileage on them since Christmas, though, and has been enjoying his toys quite a bit lately. On the development side, Joe has been progressing pretty quickly lately.  He can full-out crawl anywhere he wants and will stand on his own or by pulling himself up on furniture or boxes.  He still has a problem standing on his ow...

Baby Joe enjoying the scenery on the train from Brussels to Bruges Little Joe is coming up on 9 months old and is officially an ex-pat American living in Belgium.  He did fairly well on our overnight flight here last weekend, aside from fussiness prior to taking off.  After that and about an hour of play time he went to sleep and was out for most of the rest of the flight. Our first week has been a period of adjustment for him and he has been trying to get over jet lag as much as we have.  Initially he hadn't been sleeping much at night but after a week it looks like we've got him on a pretty good schedule and he's back to sleeping overnight. We've been driving a lot with him checking out the local towns and cities and he has generally been quite good.  Just like in the States he gets cranky after 8pm but it's not something we can't accommodate with some good planning on our part. On the development side he has been getting very good at picking up and ...

Baby Joe enjoying his first packpack trip with dad at the Iwo Jima Memorial  Little Joe turns 8 months old tomorrow and has an exciting few years ahead of him; I recently accepted a position in Belgium and will be taking him and Rachael to Europe with me for what will hopefully turn out to be several years of travel, education, and excitement for him.  Rachael and I have always wanted to raise our children overseas and I'm hoping that we can hold out over there long enough for him to experience school in a foreign language and learn about the different cultures the world has to offer before we make a permanent move back to the US. On the development side, he's progressing along quite well.  Still in the 25th percentile for height and weight but in the 98th percentile for head circumference, which has me confident he will fill out as he gets older.  He recently had his top two teeth come through and has been eating solid, albeit mushed, food on a regular basi...

Baby Joe after his first encounter with mashed potatoes Little Joe turned seven months last week and he's been making some great progress.  He recently started turning himself around on his stomach to face whichever direction he wants, along with fully pushing himself up with his arms.  It should be any day now when we see him starting to crawl off to get him where he wants to go. He's also started becoming significantly more interested in interacting with the world around him.  For instance, he's started reaching out when he wants to be picked up and wants to pick up and either throw or eat just about everything he sees.  He also has started making speech-like sounds... 'mama', 'baba' and other sounds when he's alone or excited.

Baby Joe visiting with his great-grandmother D'Angelo Little Joe has finally got his bottom two teeth fully in, but not without a lot of pain, drooling, and fussing about it.  He's just starting to explore his new tools and is constantly running his tongue on them, sucking, and biting whatever he can find, which sometimes includes Rachael when she's feeding.  Not the most pleasant experience, it seems.  There look to be several more trying to make their way in soon, and not even Ora-Gel can relieve my poor little son's constant aching gums.  There have been plenty of distractions for us to provide that on occassion let him forget what he's going through; he's been laughing a lot more, exploring new types of food (mostly sweet and soft fruits like peaches, strawberries, and watermelon), getting closer to crawling, and enjoying his bouncy seat that we set up for him in the doorway of the bedroom.  He's even learned to turn the seat when we are behind him...

Taking a break from watermelon to smile for dad Little Joe is just about 6 months old and has changed significantly since my last post.  I regret that I haven't been able to update this blog recently, but we've had a lot going on with work over time for me, Rachael's father visiting for a week, and, of course, little Joe demanding more and more attention. While Rachael's father visited at the end of July - little Joe was around 5 months - he started rolling when we left him on the floor.  By the time he left, it was common for us to see he had rolled over 3 or 4 times before we noticed he had moved at all.  Since then, he has been pushing himself up and has been attempting to crawl, to no avail at this point. He also has started eating some solid foods - watermelon, peaches, and other fruit to this point.  He's really just putting it in his mouth and tasting it a bit before spitting it out, but it's great to see him starting to eat and take an interest i...

Little Joe taking in Yankee batting practice at Nationals Park Little Joe is now a little over 4 months old and has been surprising us every day with changes.  Recently he started sticking his tongue out us and trying to mimic our raspberry that we do for him every day and has been laughing and smiling a lot.  Mornings are a great time for him because he seems to always wake up happy with a smile on his face and waiting for us to show him something new. He's also started standing with our assistance and rolled over this morning for the first time.  He's also trying very hard to get his knees up under him so that he can start crawling and will grunt and get frustrated very quickly that he can't.  We generally don't let him try this for more than a few minutes because once he starts to cry he can be pretty difficult to calm again. He recently topped 13 pounds which is slightly down from his pace earlier of an ounce and a half a day but is still quite healthy. ...

Little Joe will turn three months old in a few days and things have been going well, minus a few speedbumps we've encountered along the way.  He was recently diagnosed with several issues that have impacted his ability to breathe properly which has caused us to take him out of daycare after only a few days so that we can monitor him more closely.  Rachael had noticed that he made gasping sounds and seemed to struggle to breathe at times, despite the diagnosis of severe reflux from our pediatrician.  This led to some prudent online research and a visit to an ENT last week who used a camera scope down little Joe's nose and throat to diagnose the issue.  It was a very stressful week for all of us, but in the end we are happy to have a diagnosis that both accounts for the issues we've noticed and gives us a path forward.  As long as little Joe continues to eat well and his breathing issues don't get to the point where he cannot breathe we will continue monitoring h...

Little Joe is 6 weeks old today and has been doing very well so far. His original due date was last week and he weighed in at an even 7½ pounds - right about where he would have been had he been born on time. For all the worry about having a premature baby, the fact that our biggest concern 6 weeks later is the reflux he seems to get in the evenings is a wonderful thing for Rachael and I. In the last few days Joe has become a lot more responsive to Rachael and I, including looking at us when we talk and what I think was a smile last night when I was holding him. Small things, but considering that up to this point he's been mostly sleeping or crying it's great to see some personality come out a bit. Now that he's up to a normal delivery weight the pediatrician has told us that we can work some flexibility into our feeding schedule. We're trying to figure out how we might be able to get him to sleep longer overnight and we've had a few nights where we could get hi...

Little Joe is just over 3 weeks old now and doing great. From what we can tell he's exceeded doctors expectations with his health and ability to gain weight. He was 5lbs 10oz when Rachael took him to the doctor on Monday and at that rate should be over 6 pounds by now. It looks like by the time he would have been delivered after 40 weeks he'll be somewhere between 7 and 8 pounds, which is right where he should be. So far things haven't changed much with him except his appearance - he's got some chubby cheeks and a bit of a double chin. He's still feeding every 2-3 hours depending on the schedule and amount of food we put him on, and it's been working quite well. Since he's still quite early on we hadn't expected much, and at this point we're just thrilled to have him home with us. Rachael's started taking him out for walks during the day while I'm at work and we just had our first real outing with him last night when we took him out to ...

Last week on March 2nd we took Joe home for the first time. He'd gained back most of the weight he had lost to that point - he'd been down to 4lb 5oz before getting back up to 4lb 10oz - and Rachael and I have been enjoying spending as much time with him as possible. Joe spends most of his days as most newborns do - eating and sleeping. Since he is still a good deal under what doctors would like his weight to be at we have been feeding him every 3 hours night and day. It's been a rough adjustment for the two of us, especially since I went back to work this week. I've been spending my nights on the couch while Rachael feeds the baby throughout the night and I've been getting up around 5am to feed and change him before I head to work. It's definitely been more taxing on Rachael, and tonight I've offered to take care of him through the night so that she can try to catch up on her sleep. The next few weeks look to be more of the same; we don't have any ...

On Friday, February 24th, Joseph Wayne D'Angelo was born at 7:24PM. It was quite the eventful week for us; Rachael was diagnosed with pre-eclampsia over the previous weekend and was admitted to the hospital when her blood pressure jumped after our dog Mojo died on Tuesday morning. The doctors determined that the best course of action was to deliver early to mitigate any possible long-term damage to baby or mom. Joseph has been in the NICU since he was born; he was born at only 4lbs 11oz and was quite underweight for his age. Since then, he has been steadily learning to eat on his own and today was finally taken off the IV that the hospital had been using to give him nourishment. We are hoping that he will soon be coming home - the hospital is waiting for him to be able to eat regularly and to maintain his body temperature and metabolism without external assistance. Rachael was finally discharged from the hospital today, and we have spent the day planning our schedule to see ou...

It turns out we are having a boy and decided on Joseph Wayne as a name. I come from a long line of Josephs, all with different middle names and up until me all DeVaul. I wanted to honor this tradition regardless of my last name change, and we decided on Wayne to honor Rachaels father. Rachael's been getting quite big lately, to the point where she is uncomfortable laying or sitting in the same position for any length of time. She's also outgrowing most of her coats she's had and some of her maternity clothes she'd bought at the beginning of the pregnancy. She's mostly in my clothes in the evening; baggy for her but comfortable I'm sure. Rachael has been feeling Joseph kick since week 16 or so, and I was able to start to feel it around week 22. It's been getting very powerful recently, and we can even watch her stomach move when he kicks hard. It's been amazing to see, and most of me isn't quite able to process what's been going on and how w...

Last night Rachael and I decided on a Natural Birth center in Chantilly for baby delivery. She's been immersed in baby books and documentaries since we found out she was pregnant and I know that she's been wanting to find a great natural birth center. I could tell from watching her last night that she can see herself having the baby there and that she's getting very excited about all this - unfortunately we still have 20 long weeks to go. We've decided to schedule an ultrasound for 2 weeks from now to hopefully determine what gender the baby will be. Rachael's been going back and forth for some time now on what it'll be ... some days she feels its going to be a girl, but recently it's gone back more towards boy. Basically... we won't know until the ultrasound. Rachael's belly is definitely starting to show; you can tell that she's actually pregnant now and not putting on a little extra weight for the upcoming winter. She's been starting ...

Rachael and I met with Dr. Lashgari on Tuesday for our first prenatal appointment and sonogram. We were able to catch our first glimpse of the baby on the sonogram and, much to our relief and joy, the baby's heartbeat came up right away. So far the baby's growth is right where it ought to be, which gives us a due date of March 29th, 2012 and means that Rachael is right at 8 1/2 weeks as of today. At this point we're both being cautious about things; not many people know that we are expecting yet and we're going to keep it that way until after our next appointment on September 16th just to make sure we've gotten out of the first trimester without any problems.

Four weeks I came home from an evening out with Ian and the guys to the most life-changing news of my life: Rachael was pregnant, and in an instant we went from newlyweds to parents. I cried. A lot. True, some of if might have been attributable to the two or three drinks I had just consumed, but 95% of it was joy mixed with surprise and shock. I suppose that some of it had to do with the fact that I never really fully grasped the idea of me being a father. Sure, I was married; and sure, we were trying to have kids. But the sudden realization that this was real, that a new life had been created from me -- and parts of my parents and all of my ancestors before me -- was truly amazing to me. We've spent the last few weeks looking forward to our first doctor visits; our first one is tomorrow at 1130am in Arlington. We've both been reading books, blogs, articles, and suggestions from friends on what to expect, how to care for our new addition to the family, and what risks we m...