Adrian's 1st birthday - Part 1 from Laura Hamilton on Vimeo.



Adrian's 1st Birthday - Part 2 from Laura Hamilton on Vimeo

Happy birthday to my baby boy! This has been the longest and shortest year of my life. And hey, I'll bet you can say the same.

Your arrival was not quite textbook. Oh, if I had it to do over again! I would have taken you in my arms and nursed you as soon as I could have crawled into that NICU. I'm sorry things turned out the way they did.

Now that I know you better, I know that you were just FREAKED OUT at being suddenly removed from your nice cozy home without warning, and then...no mama! You are the world's happiest baby until you are removed from your mama, and then all hell breaks loose. You hyperventilate, scream, lose your mind. For all I know, your blood chemistry goes nuts too.

If you were being monitored in a hospital setting on the average day, you'd be committed to the NICU for evaluation every time I walked out into the garage to feed the dog, or took something out of the freezer. I'm LEEEEEEAVING YOU! Just for a sec, but still....unacceptable! Separation anxiety is just your thing. I know you'll grow out of it.

Anyway, my heart still breaks when I think of you laying in that plastic bin at the hospital with an IV stuck in your head, and then later in your tiny heel. Those tiny hands, black and blue from blood draws. Not even being able to hold you for two days! The agony....I'm positive that you just needed your mama to hold you. A high respiratory rate? Yeah, no kidding! You still do that when you are upset and not comforted immediately. Hyperventilation and total flipout. Deafening screams.

When you came home you just slept and slept and slept. Poor thing, you picked up a cold from your brother within two days of arriving in your new home, so life wasn't exactly easy once you got out of the hospital. Sorry about that. Not much I could have done. Your brother was not really having fun either. His mama left and went to the hospital, and then cried and cried and cried until her eyes swelled shut, and then she came home and got very busy with you, and has been very busy with you ever since.

After you were done sleeping all the time, you started screaming all the time. I wrote a Post from Shitville around that point. THAT was rough. I thought I was going to lose my mind, and I'll bet you weren't having fun either.

I went into major research mode to figure out what to do with you. I gave you probiotics, stopped all dairy consumption, and used every technique in The Happiest Baby on the Block on you. Thank GOD for the swing, that's all I have to say. And the Miracle Blanket. I think I would have sold you on eBay otherwise. Jesus Christ.

But you got better and better, and screamed less and less. You grew, and grew, and grew...amazing darn near everyone with your size and weight. Now you seem to have settled down at about 28 pounds, thank goodness. Before that you were putting on pounds at an astounding rate.

Juggling two kids has not been easy for me. It's a whole new level of multitasking, and you know, shhhhh....don't tell anyone, but I'm not so good at multitasking. I'm the kind of person who needs to sit down to a task and focus, without any interruptions, without anyone bothering me. Interruptions throw me for a loop. My life is now a constant series of interruptions. I have a maximum of 5 minutes to do anything before I get called away to attend to something else. It's a killer for me. Sometimes I deal well, sometimes I get mad at you guys for driving me nuts with your constant neediness. Oh well. I'm getting better at it. I'm becoming more patient. You and your brother are also getting older and easier to care for too. The future looks bright.

The good part is...you and your brother are a ton of fun. You are super-duper-cute together, and you mostly get along really well and love each other enormously.

Your big brother is so proud of everything you do. "Look! He's walking! He's standing up by himself!" We hear that daily from him, even though you have been standing up by yourself and walking for some time now. He's still totally excited for you.

You adore him too. If the two of you are sitting together, you will suddenly launch yourself onto him and take him down in a giant bear hug. Then you try to eat his nose, which is your idea of kissing. The two of you stay locked together, cooing like doves and happy as clams. Your big brother pretends that he doesn't like baby hugs sometimes, but the big grin on his face says otherwise.

I still can't believe what good hair you have. Damn, you had it right from the very beginning, and it's not over yet. You still have great hair. Lucky kid...most kids are still cueballs at your age. May it last a good, long time, and may Male Pattern Baldness not rob you of your prize too soon.

Everything else on you is ultra-cute too. You have great everything. All parts of you are enormously delicious. Smooth creamy skin, pretty blue eyes, round little butt, pudgy dimpled hands, rosebud lips. The only thing on you that ever *wasn't* adorable was your umbilical hernia, but we even missed that for a while once it was gone. Your belly button looks normal now. No one will ever know that you once had a Nub.

Of course you are brilliant, and have a burning curiosity towards everything. Once I show you how to do something, you figure it out FAST. Today you were bouncing on the trampoline and you went to get off. Normally you try to come down face first, but I've been showing you how to get down legs first, and today you did it effortlessly, all on your own. Easy as pie.

The only thing that you haven't picked up immediately has been sign language. I've been signing to you for a while now, not as consistently as I should, but fairly often. You know that the signs mean, and you have done "milk" and "more" a few times, but you seem to know that pointing at things will clue me in, so why both with signs?

I'm not worried, your brother did the same thing. He ignored all signs until one day he began to sign like crazy. It made life much easier to know that he wanted a "drink", for example, and not more food. So let me clue you in right here...signing is a good thing. It will help me figure out what you want, and get it to you faster. Work with me on that, OK?

You do use pointing very effectively. The other night you woke up and started crying and screaming, then you pointed to the floor next to the bed, where I had your potty. I took you out of bed and you did a huge pee in the potty. When you were done, you pointed to the bed again. Roger, loud and clear! You make yourself understood very well for a year-old baby.

I like it when you show me things that you find interesting. "Dat!" you say, and you point to a bird, or a dog, or a tree, or whatever is piquing your interest. You're a very sweet, generous boy, and you like to share your pleasures with others.

You like to brush your teeth, and you like to brush my teeth too. You like to eat food, and feed me food. You were enjoying looking at your birthday card from Julian earlier, and when you see it again (in the video above) the first thing you do is pass it to Daddy so that he can see it too. So thoughtful of you. You are such a little sweetheart.

You came down with a cold last night after your party. Sorry about that. It's so miserable for you to be sick. You ooze goo from all orifices. Your eyes tear up, your nose runs like a faucet, your poop gets runny, you drool like a maniac. Not so fun. You don't sleep either. I have to hold you in my arms all night, propped up so that you don't drown in your own snot. Rough on mama and rough on you. Get well soon, OK?

Alright, well it's time for you to go potty, and I need to put you on my back and get some work done before the mail carrier comes.

I love you, my baby. It's been rough at times, but I can't imagine life without you and your sweet little smile, your soft fluffy hair, your little voice. Stick around, something tells me that this is going to get even better as time goes on.

Just think, next year you will be able to kick a ball! Ride a trike! The possibilities are endless....