A New Calling???

For awhile I've wanted to sew a winter coat (some of you are aware of) but haven't found the time to finish especially since Izzy is now here.  However, I've found some time to wipe together two dresses for Izzy.  The one on the left was for her 18m pictures and the one on the right was for Christmas.  I'm now considering changing careers to having a little girl's dress boutique… aren't you excited Abe :-)

Merry Christmas!

Christmas for the Bures side would not be complete without making Oma's famous sugar cookies.  Decorating them has grown to incorporate more family members.  I guess that just means more & more cookies every year!

Even Izzy got into the decorating… we may have missed the cookie but we sure had fun shaking those sprinkles. 

 Not too bad for a timer and little ones looking at the camera!

 Here are the cousins.  Izzy had a great time playing with all of them.

 Santa came!  Everyone was excited about their gifts.

 Every time Izzy sees a Rody, she wants to play with him.  So Santa brought one for her.  I think she likes it!

 Izzy trying out cousin Amelia's skate with help from daddy & Oma.

Capturing a moment with Oma and a few of Izzy's favorite things… books, silky & Elmo.

Bubbles!

Yes, every night since Oma left mommy has to strategically save non-breakable dishes to wash so Izzy can play in the bubbles.  Tonight Abe was quick enough that we caught her delight on the video camera.  Apologizes for the beginning being sideways… it was corrected.  Enjoy Oma!

Oma Visits

 This past 2 weeks, Oma's presence was requested in the Barkoudah house.  Abe currently works nights and I was schedule to be the night float (8pm-8am) for the 1st two week in December.  We figured it would be a small feat to find a babysitter overnight and therefore asked Oma if she could help out.  So Izzy got to spend a few days at home from daycare.  One of her favorite activities was washing the dishes with Oma.  She loved to play in the bubbles.  After Oma left, she now pulls the chair up to the sinks, points and says "bubu".  I may have to forgo the dishwasher for Izzy's sake.

Much to Abe's dismay, I think Izzy may have some girlie-girl tendencies.  At times all she wants to do is play with jewelry, hair accessories and put on lip gloss/chapstick.  Time will tell on that one.

Santa!

 Call me a kid at heart… I still enjoy sitting on Santa's lap.  Or maybe because I'm bored.  A few weeks ago, I flew out to Chicago for a quick practicum.  In the airport, you could get your picture taken with Santa for free.  After I saw a flight attendant pose with the jolly man, I figured I could too.  And just to liven it up… I asked him if I could give him a kiss for the 3rd shot.  The tech who then produced the picture for me started signing… "I saw mommy kissing, Santa Claus".  At least others have a sense of humor as well!

Christmas would not be complete without seeing Santa for Izzy.  You would think that a huge city like Boston would have several options to choose from.  But the closet daily Santa was in a mall ~45mins away.  Good thing the local toy store in JP had a night when Santa came.  Last year, he visited as well and we were the only ones who came at that particular time.  This year, we had to put our names on a list and wait.  He was popular this year.  And I'm proud of my baby for not even showing the slightest sign of being scared.  I may get away with never having the crying picture with Santa :-)

Izzy's World

It's fun to be a traveler on Izzy's road to growing up.  I miss the baby at times, but when she does these things, I just smile and get excited for what's to come.

As I've mentioned before, Izzy is a stuffed animal fanatic.  Her crib is full of them.  After she woke up from nap, she wanted to place them on the railing… with mommy's help of course.  She giggled so much as this she woke daddy up from his sleeping (he worked last night so was sleeping during the day).  It was hard to get her out of the crib after we did this though.

Tunneling!!!!  If only we could build more!

I find these the funniest… what position will I find her in the morning???

When Izzy was just a babe, Abe was worried that he was going to harm her.  That never turned out to be true.  Clay is now one of Izzy's favorite "friends".  She will scoop his food for him, give him treats AND toys.  Her favorite is trying to get him to wear his last year's Halloween costume (the hair).  And Clay just takes it all in stride… not one hiss.  Gotta love the fuzz ball!

Happy Thanksgiving!

We are blessed this year to spend Thanksgiving with Abe's parents, Habib & Salwa.  Even Clay was not forgotten!  Wishing everyone a warm and safe holiday season.

Busy, busy, busy with Izzy

As the weather is growing colder up here day by day… we have to take part of the times when it is still nice enough to be outside.  So on a rare day when all of us had off, we took a mini-trip to Providence to visit their zoo.  They have the bigger animals that the zoo in Boston does not have including elephants which was Izzy's animal of the week.

Capturing a family picture on the elephant.

 We took a break and went inside the gift shop to warm up a bit.  Izzy & daddy had such a good time.  Between the two of them, I didn't who to tell "keep your hands to yourself".

 Izzy is a stuffed animal fanatic!  She just couldn't get enough of all the animals in the store.

 Yes, we were "that family".  You know, the one where you wish they would just leave because of the mess they are making.  But it was short lived.  Izzy helped clean up after overdosing on the stuffed animals.

Izzy's new favorite thing is pull toys.  We have plenty here allowing her to choose which ones.  She will go round and round the apartment and even enjoys when mommy picks up the other ones and chases her.

Life with Izzy

Life with Izzy is ever changing which I always expected but didn't know quiet how it would play out.  Here are a couple things that she loves to do.  If you try to prevent her from doing so, a little metldown may be happening.

Since Izzy figured out how to feed herself with a spoon & fork, she insists on feeding others as well.  Many times, breakfast is mommy feeding Izzy her oatmeal while Izzy feeds mommy her oatmeal.

 One of daddy's favorites… I think he melts into those big blue eyes!

Last year when Teta & Judo visited, they gave Izzy this robe.  You can imagine we didn't use it for awhile because she was just too small.  However, now is not the case.  And if you forget to bring it when she gets out of the tub, you cannot substitute a towel at all.

Happy Halloween from IzzaBEE!

 Happy Halloween!  This year I decided to put those 4-H skills to work and make Izzy's Halloween costume.  I remember as a kid thinking about how to create the costume you wanted which was half of the fun.  Now I get to do it all over again.  I found several ideas and had Abe take a look.  He thought the bumblebee was the best and so that is what Izzy was for Halloween this year.  Izzy is sitting on the stair with our neighbor's kids, Alex & Phaedra. 

 JP does a great job with Halloween.  The area businesses all provide candy for the kids to trick-or-treat in safety.  And it occurs at times that all ages can enjoy.  We headed out early with Teta & Judo before the evening crankies came out.  Izzy enjoyed all the animals that wear dressed up as well.

 Izzy was somewhat particular about which candy she would take.  Most people didn't mind & just giggled at seeing her.  We also were able to catch-up with my friend / co-trainee Kiran and her daughter Leela.  You may remember that Kiran was one of the seven that was pregnant with me.  Leela was born ~6 weeks after Izzy.  We trick-or-treated together last year as well.

 Friday was Izzy's daycare's Halloween party.  They have all the kids dress up and head over to the nearby park to celebrate with music, food and festivities.  Unfortunately, I had to work and wasn't able to attend.  Daddy did make it though getting all these pictures.  Here, Izzy is dancing with Miss Stacey whom she adores.

 Izzy & daddy waving hi from the party.  Gotta love my fun hubby!  And isn't he a sharp dresser!

Just a few pictures captured at the daycare Halloween party.  Izzy has always loved the music.  And on Friday's a gentleman comes to play the guitar for the children making their Halloween party no exception. 

This is one of my favorites… this is Izzy's class.  The park is only ~1.5 blocks away from her daycare.  But you can imagine what it would be like trying to get that many toddlers safely there.  Whenever I see the rope, it just makes me laugh.  We also get daily reports about her day.  Most of them recently have been saying that Izzy loves their walks picking up leaves.  I guess the rope doesn't bother her too much.

It's finally over!

As part of my training, we are all encouraged to do a "scholarly project" which usually translates to some type of research.  I decided to pick a project that involves looking at a small chromosomal deletion and what it looks like clinically.  My abstract was accepted at the Child Neurology Society meeting that took place this past week in Providence, RI.  This was my 1st time presenting a poster thus I wasn't quite sure what to expect.  All in all it was a great experience.  I even a past medical school classmate and residency classmate that were also attending.

The last night there, fellow Children's Hospital Boston neurology residents and I partook of a night out eating at "The Melting Pot". 

Here I am standing at my poster.

More fun with Teta & Judo

This past weekend, the Barkoudah's headed to the zoo to enjoy a day out since it was in the 80s up here. Izzy had her entourage with her which she fully took advantage of.  Smack dab in the middle of the zoo is the carousel.  We can't get by it without her wanting a ride.  This time, she chose the rabbit.

 The barnyard was alive with new animals.  We had never seen any donkeys before as well as little pigs. And her favorite was the chickens.  I'm trying to convince Abe that we should get a pet chicken now.

Here uncle Wael is helping Izzy drive the truck into Christopher the Lion's area.  

Anytime we do laundry around here, Izzy knows the laundry basket it out and loves to take rides in it.  She is always on the lookout for a certain gray fuzzy passenger that can fit in with her. 

What makes one of my babies happy, makes the other one stressed!

The Beginning of Teta & Judo's Visit

Recently, Teta & Judo (Abe's parents) arrived to stay with us for several weeks.  This was partially because they haven't seen Izzy since she was born and because we needed so "built-in-babysitters" this next month due to our work schedules.  Sine their arrival, Izzy has had nonstop attention which she loves.  Here is just a couple of pictures of our adventures since they arrived.

We decided to spend this past weekend out side since it has been in the 80s.  After that it drops down to colder weather so we might not be as active outside.  Izzy & I took Teta & Judo to Drumlin Farm as she really enjoyed our last visit.  She recognized the tractor right away and waved each time it drove by.

Our first stop was the chicken coop.  This time that noisy rooster was not around and Izzy had a ball with the chickens.  We even tried to leave twice but ended up back there after she realized we were walking away from the coop.  At one end they have a set-up for children to learn about the different size & types of eggs.  At one end the wooden eggs could be weighed and dumped into their respective bins.  Izzy enjoyed collecting the eggs as they fell into the bins with Judo helping.

 Izzy likes to help mommy with cleaning on the weekends especially sweeping.  We were also lucky to nab a couple of snow suits for Izzy at the local 2nd hand children's store.  Here Izzy is modeling her "flight suit" as Abe calls it.

The Barkoudah's are a group of September babies.  Teta's birthday was this past Tuesday while Judo & mine are tomorrow, so we decided to celebrate all 3 of them today with a wonderful ice cream cake from JP licks.  Are you salivating mom?