10 Months Old

Gabriella turned 10 months old last Friday. Kevin and I didn't even think that she would turn 10 months old already. Times flies so fast! We have about two more months until we celebrate Gabriella's first birthday. Wow...wonder what she will be like when she turns one years old! We are looking forward to it.


Before Gabriella turned 10 months old, she had been changed a lot lately and developed new milestones unexpected for us to see at that time. Whoa...Gabriella needs to slow down for a minute. Here below are pictures of what Gabriella has developed since her 9 months old:

Gabriella now has two teeth and is expecting to have other tooth pop up. Our dentist gave us a new baby toothbrush for Gabriella. How kind of the dentist! However, I bought baby toothpaste and decided to try to brush Gabby's teeth. At first, she rejected me brushing her gum/teeth. I held her hands and put toothbrush into her mouth. All the sudden, she loves it!! I brushed her gum/teeth, and then taught her to brush herself. She did excellent! Gabriella brushes her gum/teeth two times a day.

Unbelievable that Gabriella is able to stand on her own as long as she wants!! When she stands and hears music, she dances with legs bend down and up. It is funny to watch her. I didn't video her that but will try next time if I can. Besides standing, Gabriella needs to work on her feet down first, not head down first when she is on a high surface like couch. We don't have stairs in our apartment. Gabriella did try to do stairs at Aunt Marta's from our vacation last month. Gabriella did not really do well at going up the stairs but she did two to three stairs. Her Cousin Aniela supported Gabriella by encourage her to keep going up the stairs. What wonderful support Aniela was! Gabriella always did head down first. I tried to teach her to do feet first. She still needs to work on that when she is on couch.

Last Friday was Gabriella's 10 months old, and the outside was so beautiful! I decided to take her to the rooftop of our apartment and looked out the beautiful view. Gabby enjoyed the beautiful weather and pointed to everything what she saw out the view!

Here, below, more pictures of Gabriella:

Aaahhhhh.....guess what Gabriella is capable of!! Yeah.. you see that picture showing it on the left. Gabby figured out about the cabinets and realized that they can be opened. She has learned how to open the cabinets and take all things inside out and play with them. Oh boy....Kevin and I need to buy new cabinet locks for some cabinets that are not safe for Gabby to play with. Right now, we don't need it because we will move soon. Some of the cabinets are empty since I packed them. Whew... Once we look for a house to buy, we of course will buy cabinet locks to prevent Gabriella from opening them.

Guess what this final milestone is!!! Yeah...Gabriella is walking while holding something!!! Unbelievable!! Kevin and I were so thrilled and loved to see her holding the toy mower that her Grandma Trish and Grandpa Mike bought for her Christmas gift and walking behind it! She did excellent and was smiling! Also, she was able to walk in front of me while holding my hands. I did try to let go of one of my hand and had her holding one of my hand while walking. She did pretty good. Lately, Kevin and I were trying to see if she is able to walk on her own, but it is not happening yet. It looks like she will be able to walk on her own SOON!!

Visiting Watts Family

On February 12-21, Gabriella and I flew to Ft. McMurray in Canada to visit the Watts Family while Kevin had to work on his "Go Live" Project for a whole month. We were excited to see the Watts Family, especially to meet my new nephew Charles (Gabriella's new cousin) for the first time. He is so adorable and is always smiling, which I love to see!

Beside these outlines from below, most of the time, Marta, the kids, and I were relaxed at home. We talked to catch up, played with kids, and did things around the house. Gabriella and her cousin Aniela enjoyed playing together. Also, we all went out on errands and shopping. Here are the outlines of what we had done all of these days:

• Marta's friend invited us over for her daughter's birthday party (sorry no pictures). We had a good time.



• On the weekend of Valentine's Day, Marta's husband, Charlie, was busy building a rock climbing wall to put things together in the garage, and then Charlie and his friend, Dayven, carried the rock wall to the basement to attach to the wall. Aniela was their supervisor, observing them to make sure they did assembled the wall correctly. Hee..hee.. It looked so awesome, and Charlie did a good job!! After the guys were done with it, all the sudden, Aniela started climbing the rock wall. She did incredible to climb from the bottom to the top. She became an rock climbing expert!! Gabriella wanted to try it too. How cute! Who knows, Gabriella may become a rock climbing expert just like Aniela.



• On Valentine's Day, Marta, the kids, and I made Valentine cookies and put icing on them. We enjoyed doing them and ate one of them. Ohhh how delicious they tasted..yummy!!



• Marta, the kids, and I went to the Girls and Boys Club where all the kids played together inside the gym since it was too cold and snowy outside. While all of the kids were playing with two women who watched them, all of the mothers were sitting together to talk about everything. Gabriella met one girl who was two weeks younger than her and they played together. It was adorable to see them crawling and playing together. That girl's older sister liked to play with Gabriella for a while. We stayed there for about one and half hours.

Gabriella and I had a great time with Marta and her family: thanks to you, Watts Family for having us to stay while Kevin worked and needed good sleep without interruption during daytimes. It was wonderful seeing them again and unbelievable how much the kids had grown big since last time we saw them. By the way, we will see you soon!!

Here showing pictures video below:

9 Months Old

Gabriella turned 9 months old last Friday!! Three more months to go until she turns one years old. We can't believe how these 9 months have gone by so fast already!! On that day, Daddy and I took Gabriella to her 9 month's check-up. Gabriella is now 18 lbs. 5 oz. and 27.5 in. length. They gave her a flu shot. It was not so bad. Dr. Sheridan said that she was doing great. It was sad to say goodbye to Dr. Sheridan since it was our last day with her. We will move back to Illinois in a month. Dr. Sheridan was the best Pediatrician we could ever have for Gabriella. We are going to miss her dearly!

Gabriella & Dr. Sheridan

Again, there are few new development Gabriella had done since 8 months old, and here is the list:

- Finger points to this and that everywhere.

- Able to stand on her own without holding for less than 30 seconds.

- Able to eat by using her thumb and finger point to grasp the foods and drink sippy cup with handles.

- Has one tooth pop up already and expect other one coming up anytime soon.

Here are the pictures of Gabriella funny expression:

Nose Surgery

The month of January, I encouraged Kevin to attend Ear, Nose, & Throat Doctor to check with his nose situation. Kevin had difficulty breathing through one side of his nose and believed his nose septum was not straight. Kevin met with doctor and had x-ray and scan for sinus. Luckily, he didn't have sinus problems. That was a relief because if he had sinus issues from the scan, then he couldn't be able to get his nose fixed up because sinus issues can cause infection after he had lasik eye surgery in December. However, his nose x-ray showed that his septum was not in right place and needed surgery to fix it. Kevin was scheduled to have surgery at the end of January.

Two weeks ago in the morning, Daddy, Gabriella, and I went to the Pre-operation area at the First Hill Swedish Hospital for his nose surgery appointment at noon. The nurse transported Daddy to the surgery room while Gabriella and I waited in the waiting room for about four hours. During the waiting room, several people loved to see Gabriella about how adorable and happy she is. They approached us and talked to Gabriella. It had been a long day for me and Gabriella. Daddy's surgery was taking about an hour and then they took him to the recovery room for another hour. After waiting for two hours, the nurse was supposed to come to get us so we would go to see Daddy. Unfortunately, we had been waiting for other two hours. We were wondering why took so long until found out that Daddy had difficult with low oxygen in recovery room. That was why we waited that long. After four hours, the nurse finally called us and took us to the recovery room to see Daddy. He was doing great. Surprisingly, I didn't see any bad bruises or even swelling on his face!! He had no pain from his nose because he was on medicine. That was good!

After Daddy recovered, they discharged him the same day. We all were looking forward to going home in the early evening. I was his "nurse" to change the pads for his nose until his nose bleeding stopped. However, I put air mattress up in living room so that Daddy could lie down and listen to television while he put an ice packet on his face. Also, we slept separately for a few days because I didn't want to punch or hit his nose accidentally during night.




So far, his nose is almost fully healed and is still stuffed up. Last Thursday, Daddy had E.N.T. Doctor appointment for nose check up. Doctor said that his nose was great and pulled out some dry blood and boogers out of his nose where it was hard to reach. After he took them out, Daddy could breath easily. Doctor said that it would stuff up again but it was normal. It will take about two weeks to a month for it to heal before it becomes normal and he is able to breath better. Again, he has E.N.T. doctor appointment for his nose second check-up in two weeks.

8 Months Old

On Jan. 6th, Gabriella turned 8 months old. Unbelievable!! She is such darling little girl! There were a few new developments that she had done, and here is the list:

- Clapping hands
- Pulling up to a stand and getting down
- Bathing in the regular tub without using Infant Bathtub.

Last time, we put the muscial table on the floor without four poles to attach the musical table because Gabriella was not able to pull up. Well.. now Gabriella is able to pull up and get down, so we attached the four poles to the muscial table. Gabriella did do well and enjoyed pulling up to play with the music and getting down to crawl. She does that repeatedly. It was fun to watch her doing that.

On Jan 5th, Daddy, Gabriella, and I went to see my Ob Gyn Doctor (Dr. Foltz) for my thyroid check-up. We were thrilled to see her because we hadn't seen her since last June. However, the reason I wanted Dr. Foltz to check my thyroid was because I was sick with terrible cough in Illinois and went to the Prompt Care. The doctor felt my thyroid and said it was full. She recommended me to go to my doctor in Seattle for check up to make sure it was normal. So, my doctor checked my thyroid and noticed nothing wrong with it. The nurse drew my blood for a test, and it was all normal. Nothing was wrong with my thyroid. That was good to hear that. By the way, Dr. Foltz was so excited to see Gabriella and couldn't believe how much she had grown since last June.

Wii Addiction

On Friday, Jan. 2nd: Dad got his new Wii as Christmas gift from all the families. At first, Dad was unsure about the Wii because he had no clue what was it. We explained to him about it. It would be fun for him to have Wii set up at his home so he can play with adults, grandchildren, and whoever come to visit. After set up Wii, Dad and Kevin played bowling and golfing almost every day. They became addicted to it. While they played, I was in guest room to pack the rest of it before we left back to Seattle the next day. Gabriella was with Grandma Anna playing. While I took a break from packing, I went downstairs to join with men to play Wii. Gabriella joined us, too, with Grandma Anna. It was funny to see how men were serious on playing golf and competed with each other about who scored the best!

NOTES: Finally, this is the end post of our story what we had done over our holidays in November and December with friends and families. Whew... Now, the next posts will be what we need to catch up about our time in here Seattle that we got back home from Illinois. Please be patient with us when we have time to do our next posts.