Expressions, May 2007

So here we are approaching Nio's third month... and what have we learned?

That Little Nio enjoys his outfits... specially when we are talking about cool pirate outfits that come with excellent details on the derriere.







We've learned that in less than a month, Little Nio can nearly double his weight. Have a look at how he's filled out in this brown outfit.



We've also learned that while Little Nio enjoys bathtime with his Daddy, he doesn't take too kindly to being scrubbed hard down in the nether regions, south of the border.



We also know that Little Nio has hit an important milestone in his mobility — by being able to lift up his own neck while lying on his belly.





He's come a long way with a little help from Mommy, and lots of love too.



Here he is taking a quick nap on his Mommy's shoulder.

We've also been incredibly amazed at the range of expressions Antonio has developed.



















We're going to be posting more of these for you all very soon.

Daily Schedule, April 2007

So what exactly constitues a daily schedule for a growing baby boy? We took time to interview Little Nio to find out exactly what it is he does on a daily basis. The schedule is a wee bit flexible but it pretty much stays the same.

The day starts early with a bottle feeding at around 3:00 AM in the middle of the night. Nio's mother is the one that usually wakes up to take care of this. Nio's father sleeps through this first main event like a rock. At around 7:00 AM, Nio wakes up and requests for another feeding in his unique outspoken manner.



By around 10:00 AM, Little Nio is having a great bath in his bathtub, complete with a special foam liner that prevents any slipping in his tiny blue tub. He used to get upset getting into the water, but lately he gets upset about getting out of the water.



Right after changing, Little Nio listens to a bit of classical music for about an hour or two and then he spends time with his mommy and his auntie, Pa Kut. She is the older half-sister of my wife, who has come to stay with us and spend time taking very special care of Little Nio.



So, from around 12:00 NN noon time till about 3:00 PM in the afternoon, Little Nio spends quality time "freaking out". At least that's what my wife calls his fits of bawling, eating and passing out. This is usually punctuated by a diaper change somewhere towards the end of that intense activity period.

You can see from these more recent photographs that Little Nio has put on a bit of weight and his skin has become fair and pale. A strong, healty, handsome baby with quite a bit of character.



At around 5:00 PM, Little Nio gets his evening bath and then he spends time with his mom knocking back a few more bottles of milk. Sometimes he gets breastmilk, sometimes he gets an infant formula called "Dumex".



Here he with his mommy, looking a bit wired in his Pirate themed outfit. Shortly after this photo was taken, Nio decided to put in some solid "freaking out" time ending rather abruptly with a major diaper incident. Then he passes out for an hour or two, waking up at around 9:00 PM for another bottle.



Then at around 11:00 PM, Little Nio decides to fall off to sleep after finishing off yet another bottle or three... only to wake up again at around 1:00 AM in the morning to start the whole cycle again.

Travel Gear, April 2007

Yes, we've managed to get matching outfits. It isn't bad enough that the poor kid inherts most of his features from my side of the family, but he's stuck with the influence of bad fashion sense to boot.



The only thing though is that I don't get to wear light blue gloves and my shirt doesn't have three snaps at the crotch. Seriously though, there's nothing wrong with having matching light grey shirts.



Antonio all locked in safe in his travel basket with his little stuffed toy, "Blue". He's got a really cool pillow over his head that helps keep his head propped up preventing it from rolling around. I think we purchased that from "Le Pétit Pumm" over at Siam Paragon. His incredible basket locks in securely to both a base in the car and his heavy duty trolley... and it helps us to create opportunities for travel and adventure.



After his pediatrician's appointment, we took a long detour to visit the office so he could say "hello" to everyone. Unfortunately, he slept through most of the visit. He seems to sleep very well when there are crowds and lots of things going on. Here he is surrounded by some of my colleagues at the office. From left-to-right — Khun Jeab is crouched down in front, then Khun Puen, Khun Ros, Khun Pair, then my wife Kanittha, beside her is Khun Parn and then my friend, Khun Jae. Antonio looks very happy to be surrounded by all these ladies.



Part of all his travel adventures to date include a brief visit to the newly renovated ZEN department store, which is part of the enormous Central World shopping complex.



Here we all are at Iberry at La Villa, very near to our apartment, with one of our very good friends, Tata Montilla — Little Nio's "Tito Tata". I know that I look a bit oversized in the photo, but that's just perspective making everyone in the back of the shot look small. I think. All the sherbets and gellatos are finished, but we're bound to come back for more. Definitely sometime in the future Nio will be enjoying a sherbet with us.



Late at night my wife, Kanittha, snuck in to snap this photo of myself and Nio fast asleep together. It's not the most flattering photograph in the world, but she laughed herself silly when she pointed out how much we looked alike. Again, the slight double chin there is really an odd positioning of the camera and gravity being unkind. Besides if I really have put on a bit of weight I only have my wife to blame.

One Month Old, March 2007

It's been almost a month already and Little Nio is getting bigger. From his original 2.964 kilograms, he's now at 3.995 kilograms. That's a lot of growing in a very short span of time.



Here we are together at home in a rare family photo. He's also gotten quite a few visitors to come and see us here at home. Among them was my good friend, Kenny Marshall, his girlfriend, Khun Tai and our friend Khun Jum. Too bad we weren't able to get any photographs from their visit.



Earlier this month, my colleague, Khun Jae and her husband, Khun Sak, came over to visit Nio and spend time with us. Nio was a little spooked by the visit with all the new faces, but I think that Khun Sak was even more stressed out. He's a big guy and he's a little scared about handling tiny babies.



Later that same evening, Nio's cousin, Khun Toy came to visit him and pick up Nio's grandmother to go back up country to Sakhon Nakorn. Khun Toy came by bus on a ride that took twelve hours for him to get to Bangkok. He stayed for less than eight hours, and then got on a bus with grandmother for another twelve hour trip.

Everyone at my office, my clients and a lot of the other people I work with on site have all been delighted with Nio's birth... and they have been sending gifts... and more gifts... and more gifts. There has truly been a tremendous outpouring of love and sharing.



One of Nio's favorite gifts at the moment is this stuffed animal — a dog with a music box that you can wind up by pulling on his tail. Kanittha and I have named him "Blue". This cute toy is a gift from my officemates, Khun Jeab, Khun Ros and Khun Mouth.



The biggest downside to the miracle of having a son around is that I don't have as much time to work on my online computer projects. But, Nio is very understanding, so he comes in to visit me whenever he can take a break from his busy schedule. Although we do try to keep the exposure from all the high tech gear down to a minimum by keeping the visits short.



One of the amazing things about Antonio is his tremendous range of expressions. We haven't figured out exactly what this cute expression is all about, but he puckers up his lips into a real tiny mouth and then opens his eyes wide and lifts his eyebrows high. We call this his "kissy face". Simply hilarious.



Even though he's barely a month old, that hasn't really stopped him from taking a tour of Bangkok. He's gotten tucked in securely to his basket which has an effective five-point harness, which in turn locks safely into a base unit that transforms the basket into a car seat. The basket alternatively locks into his trolley, which has gotten him to Central World, to La Villa, to Big C... and most recently he's gone to visit Siam Paragon.



Here we all are together having a late lunch at Café Chilli over at Siam Paragon. Nio really enjoys riding in the car, and in his trolley as well. He stays nice and quiet, except when he's hungry or needs a quick change of underwear. I suppose that as his needs get more complicated, he's going to get a bit more complicated as well. We're ready for that too.

Nio's Summer Fashion Collection, March 2007

We really can't help ourselves. Between my wife and I, we are really enjoying dressing up our son and having him model all his different outfits. It helps to have a digital camera to keep things updated really quick.



This is the pale yellow outfit with the light brown gloves by Good Bear. Nio is doing his froggy feet in this image.



This is Nio with the "Soleil" bird print on a white outfit by Absorba, with the blue mismatched gloves from De Bon.



This pale blue outfit with matching gloves has little bear prints on it, but I'm not sure who made this one.



This single suit with short sleeves in blue with matching gloves is also by Good Bear, but the bright red socks come from MotherCare. Kanittha says that Nio really looks like a monk here.



This white outfit with yellow trim and little duckling patterns was given to us as a gift. The gloves are from Good Bear and the socks from MotherCare.



Not afraid to be a fashion deviant, Nio strikes a curious pose wearing a two-toned green stripped outfit given as a gift by one of my officemates. The mismatched tan gloves and dark blue socks are from Good Bear and MotherCare respectively.



Fresh after a morning bath with his hair all slicked back, Nio sports his light grey Good Bear outfit with his favorite light brown gloves and wearing spotless white socks from MotherCare.



Fast asleep in an all MotherCare ensemble in neutral browns, with a stylized dragon insignia on the chest.



One of the most fun sets of outfits we've gotten for Nio is from MotherCare, which is a set of seven white outfits... each labeled from Monday to Sunday... one for every day of the week.

You're all probably going to get very sick and tired of all the baby pictures that are going on this site, and eventually we might get sick and tired of them as well. Although I doubt that very much though.

In the meantime, we are all just going to have to deal with it and enjoy it while we can.

Baby Pictures, February 2007

Lots of people have been asking how my wife, Kanittha, is doing.



Here she is still in the hospital, hamming it up for the camera. This was taken on Sunday morning, the day after the delivery. You can see that she is in extremely high spirits. Still a bit weak, but very much on the mend. Lots of fluids, soft foods and plenty of rest are on the agenda for recovery.



This is Nio with his second visitor, Khun Taw, or "Uncle Kenneth", who is the Design Director at the firm where I work. Taw brought us a beautiful arrangement of flowers that really brightened up the whole room. Nio's first visitor, however, was our very good friend, Tata Montilla, or "Tito Tata" to my son. Tata was extremely helpful and we probably wouldn't have managed the easy homecoming without his invaluable help. Unfortunately, we still don't have a photo of Nio with Tata.



Of course Nio's day wouldn't be complete without the visit of our good friend, Gerald Gonzalez, or "Tita Gerald". We have all jokingly agreed that he's going to be Nio's fairy godmother. No enchanting fairytale would be complete without one. And whom better to choose than a person with a beautiful spirit.



All swaddled up and tucked in tight with his mommy.



The next day, Monday, 26-Feb-2007, we brought our son home. The silly looking person with the insanely happy expression is me.



Here he is all tucked into his own bed ready to spend his first night at home. My wife really likes this grey outfit and says that our son looks like a monk in this photograph.

On the evening of Tuesday, 27-Feb-2007, after a late night change of diapers we were concerned about some slight bleeding around the area of the circumcision operation. Not wanting to take even the slightest chance, we all piled into the car and headed off to Vichaiyut Hospital early Wednesday morning, 28-Feb-2007 at 01:00 H.

We were relieved when his pediatrician, Dr. Wanasiri, who just happened to be on duty that night, told us that it had just gotten scratched by his diapers. She prescribed some antibiotic topical ointment to prevent any possibility of infections, and to help soothe the wound.

Unfortunately the trip to the hospital and the four fights of stairs in our apartment building took it's toll on my wife, Kanittha. I had to miss another day of work to make sure that my mother-in-law and I could take care of both mother and child.

The next morning, our son, was definitely feeling much better...









In the image right above he's busy watching the teddy bears on his musical mobile go round and round. He can't quite see them yet, but the shapes are blotting out the light and he can see that happening. It appears that he takes after his father, in that he is easily entertained.



Fresh after a bath, here is Nio all dressed up in an oriental inspired outfit with super baggy pants. He's getting ready to do what he does best...



... sleep!

Another day in the life of our son, Antonio.