Robbie has always been a pretty reliable guy, especially since he started daycare at nine weeks old. Within a week of starting, he took a bottle at 9:00 and 1:30 and slept from 10:00 to 1:00. And he translated this schedule to the weekends, much to the delight of Justin and myself. He goes to sleep at 6:30 every night and politely entertains himself until between 6:30 and 7:00 every morning. I rely on this schedule. I live for this schedule. It defines my day and gives me time to recharge.

Today, for the first time I can remember, Robert Gaetano Manna refused to take his nap, and my entire day was turned upside down. Robbie went down at the usual time and cried for an hour. Since we had a lunch/play date scheduled for early afternoon, I decided it wasn’t worth the effort to keep trying to get him down. So, at 11:00, our scheduled chaos began.

Robbie (and I) survived lunch out with Robbie’s best friend Pete and his dad without incident. Robbie was even fun at the playground, although he was a little fussier than normal on the swings. We played on the jungle gym and tore up grass, throwing it in the air. Robbie held himself together with more class and style than I would have expected. I, however, was another story.

Robbie finally went down for a nap around 3:00, and I was spent. It was all I could do to make it up the stairs to put the cherub down in his crib, where he cried for about ten minutes before finally crashing. I had no idea how much I relished those three hours every day when he naps. It’s my “me” time. The time that I should use to clean the house (and usually do just a little) and write overdue thank you notes for end-of-the-year student gifts and Robbie’s birthday. In all reality, it’s the time I use to catch up on shows on my DVR and, if I’m really lucky, take a little nap. It’s the time I waste on Facebook, catching up with friends who live too far away to see for lunch.

Tomorrow’s a daycare day, and, if I know Zhining, Robbie will be back on schedule by 10:00 tomorrow morning. And, as I lay on the couch Thursday afternoon, I’ll be grateful for the period of calm during our day of scheduled chaos.

We know all of the big milestones babies make and furiously write them down in baby books. Or promise ourselves that we’ll remember to write them in baby books – and then forget. The first time he slept through the night. The first time he smiled (of course that wasn’t gas!). The first time he rolled over. The first time he held his own bottle and slept on his belly (these happened to fall on the same cold, February day in Kentucky). His first tooth and first word. The first time he crawled. The first time he pulled up. The first time he stood on his own. You see where I’m going with this…

But what about the less important accomplishments? Tonight I marveled at Robbie as he sucked his water through a straw. Can you believe it? My genius child figured out how to get the water to his mouth from a straw! And he looked like a pro. Like he’d been doing it for weeks. But there isn’t anywhere in Robbie’s baby book to write about that (well, from what I can remember when I looked through it before Robbie was born). In a few months, I’ll take this new skill for granted and it will no longer be a magical feat.

Robbie has also figured out how to sit in a mini-recliner. That was our big yard sale purchase yesterday (a very well-spent $2 if you ask me, although Justin has yet to see the red pleather chair in our living room). I looked over and he was sitting cross-legged, arms resting on the chair, staring off at the TV. He looked like this cool guy hanging out watching football. Except he was watching Baby Wildcat, propaganda we’re using to brainwash Robbie into attending UK. Soon, he’ll be throwing himself onto regular-sized furniture, and I’ll be irritated at how he does it. But for today, I’ll marvel at the fact that he figured out how to sit in his own chair. Granted, learning how wasn’t a smooth trip. It involved climbing from the chair onto the coffee table. And there was the sitting-backwards-in-the-chair-and-falling-off incident… But he’s finally hit the half-milestone of sitting in his own recliner. I think I’ll be adding a page to that elusive baby book. Now if only I could find it…
http://www.youtube.com/get_player

There are few things as important to a mom as a good friend, particularly a good friend with a child close in age. She can fully appreciate your child’s tantrums (and your sure-to-be-rational responses to them) and your husband’s stupidity. She is savvy enough to never mention any of your husband’s shortcomings in front of him. She is up at 7:00 in the morning when you need to vent about your hellish night, and she’s willing to take your kid so you can get a night out. She comes over to keep you company and run errands with you when your husband has been out of town for four days and you’re dying for adult company. And, most importantly, she still likes you after all of this.

I wasn’t sure that I needed “mom” friends when Robbie was first born; I already had a nice selection of friends. Surely they could understand when Robbie had an explosive diaper or threw up in the middle of the mall. And I’m sure they do understand, but it’s on a different level. A mom friend not only understands but is equipped to deal with these potential disasters. She has extra wipes and doesn’t squirm when she gets covered in poop or vomit while trying to help. She has food and toys in her bag when you run out of the house without anything. And she doesn’t judge you when that happens more than once.

Find these friends and hold on to them! When I think about the past year with Rebecca, Anne, and Cathy, I’m not sure how I would have survived without them. We took our kids to see Santa together, and they were prepared when Robbie vomited an entire bottle all over the mall sitting area. They invited Robbie and me over for meals when Justin was out of town, and I was at my wit’s end. They volunteered to come sit with me when Robbie was sick and Justin was in class. Most importantly, they’ve kept me laughing at all the mishaps along the way.

We’re having a joint birthday party for our boys next weekend (they all have close birthdays: 21, 27, 28, and 29 July). While I’m sure the boys will enjoy digging into yet another piece of cake (or pie for Pete, since he doesn’t like cake…), the celebration will really be for us. We’ll celebrate finding each other and surviving our first year. And we’ll celebrate the future — together.

Robbie isn’t really walking yet, but he sure is trying. We went swimming at the reservoir today, and the little man kept forgetting that he didn’t know how to walk. He would let go of the railing and lunge toward me in a Frankenstein-like gait. It absolutely melted my heart. This guy wanted to be next to me so badly that he was willing to propel himself away from the safe railing and through the water to me. And then, when he got to me, he needed a big hug to comfort him after his scary experience. It’s the moments motherhood are made of.

I needed a few of those moments after the last two days Robbie and I have had (apparently I wasn’t able to fully forget!). We needed a little out of the house fun. And boy did we have fun! Robbie enjoys the water, but that’s not his passion at the beach. He lives for the sand, for shoveling handfuls of it into his mouth. He crawled all the way down the beach today, making friends and irritating younger children who were trying to dig holes. Robbie befriended a woman who was building a sandcastle; she let him destroy everything she had made, reveling in the fun of sand castle demolition. After all, as she reminded me, isn’t that what making sand castles is for?

While playing in the water, I witnessed an interesting phenomenon. Even now I’m still not sure exactly what it was that I saw. A Brazilian woman carried a heavy duty shovel and a large laundry bag of beach toys to the water’s edge and she was followed by three children (one of them was Lorenzo, and I think he was in trouble the entire afternoon — all I heard was, “Lorenzo! Lor-EN-zo! LORENZO!”). The woman dug a huge hole, making sure to build up the sides. She then placed her children inside the hole and lined all the toys up around the edges. She finished by digging some water toys into the sand to make sure they didn’t float away. And thirty minutes later, they’d packed everything up to go home. It took almost as long to set up as it did to actually play.

Now, don’t get me wrong. I’m all for kids being entertained at the beach, but isn’t this a bit much? Isn’t part of the reason we take our kids to the beach for them to experience the fun of digging their own holes and making up uses for the obscure tools in the beach toy kit? Doesn’t digging for our children and lining up their toys take away the imagination and fun that the beach is supposed to be? Or am I just one of those moms who wants to read a book while her kid digs his own holes in hopes of reaching China? Because, you know, he’ll be able to speak the language…

Robbie and I are two days into Justin’s five-day trip to Wisconsin. And we are surviving. Barely. I have not spent this much time alone with Robbie without having the respite of work since my maternity leave. And rest assured that it actually is easier to spend five days alone with a six-week-old who doesn’t move too much and gets up once during the night than it is with a one-year-old who has a mind of his own and wants to be everywhere.

Things really started to go down hill around 11:00 last night when Robbie woke up screaming. Blood-curdling, body-racking shrieks, the likes of which I have never heard before. I felt the screams in my bones. Nothing soothed him. Not Tylenol, not a new diaper, not a damn sippy cup. Anything I gave him was immediately thrown over the side of his crib. The only thing that eventually made him feel better was being held. So, I did what all the experts advice against (Well, I’m assuming; I’ve never read anything they have to say. I’ve been too busy actually being a mom to read about being one). I brought him into bed with me. He drank some milk and then had the nerve to laugh and play. I mean, seriously? So I put him back to bed, only to have the horrid screaming start again. The vicious cycle continued for an hour and a half until I finally broke down. Yes. I gave him a bottle. It didn’t work immediately, but he finally fell asleep.

I sank pretty low this afternoon. Out of things to do and armed with a cranky baby, I actually went into work. There was some legit paperwork that I needed to take care of. And some women stuck at work who wouldn’t mind being entertained by Robbie. Thank God I was right! We killed a little more time at the park, where we ran into a show-off. Jacob, who turned eight on 23 May (no idea what day that is, by the way), educated me on the best game ever (www.clubpenguin.com, in case you’re interested). Robbie found him amusing, but not as amusing as the leaf that he took swinging with him. All of this bought us enough time for it to actually be bath time. Only three more days to go without another adult in the house.

Totally changing gears… Today is the one year anniversary of the day we brought Robbie home from the hospital. I remember bringing him home to an empty house and all of a sudden hearing our front door open. Mom had been at the grocery across the street and saw us pull in. In a totally un-Mom move, she left the cart full of groceries near the check-out, explaining that she had to go meet her new grandson who had just come home from the hospital. I don’t think there’s any way Justin and I would have survived those first few days at home without her here. She’s the reason Robbie started sleeping in his own crib and not our room. I completely credit her to his excellent sleeping skills. She’s the reason I didn’t give up on nursing, even when it seemed impossible (31 July 2009 ranks in the top ten worst days of my life — maybe even the top five — but more on that tomorrow).

I clearly remember the four days before Robbie was born, his birth day, and the five days afterwards. And then I’ve blanked out until sometime in mid-September. I remember bits and pieces here and there, mostly the good stuff. It’s probably some sort of survival mechanism. Maybe that’s what will kick in tomorrow morning to get me through until Monday night when Justin gets home. I’ll remember going to the park, playing with the leaf, and swinging, but I’ll block out the… Wait… Was there even anything bad that happened in the past two days?

http://www.youtube.com/get_player

For the past two months, I have been handing Robbie sippy cups and he has been throwing them to the floor. In an ironic twist, I have been trying to force a big boy cup on Robbie while desperately wishing he would stay a baby just a little while longer. I’m not sure why I felt like he should be moving onto sippy cups, other than the fact that his friends were starting to make the move. It just seemed like the right thing to do, but I didn’t know how to go about it the right way. I would try to give Robbie a sippy cup and, when he refused, would give him a bottle instead. I know, novice mistake.

Bring in our appointment today with Dr. Fisher, Robbie’s pediatrician. I asked him how I could best transition Robbie from bottles to sippy cups. I’d heard a parent suggest taking away one bottle a week and replacing it with a sippy cup. Within a month, her child was totally off bottles. Zhining suggested keeping one with his toys so he could see it and play with it and use it when he wanted (a little too Montessori for me, and this approach surprised me from the Chinese parenting guru). None of these felt particularly “Erin-friendly.” And then Dr. Fisher told me his solution: “I hate that word, transition. Don’t transition. Just do it. Take away the bottles and give him sippy cups. When he’s thirsty enough, he’ll drink.” I guess he’s one of “those” doctors!

When Robbie and I got home from the doctor (one stick to the finger, one stick to the leg, and three Band-Aids later), it was nap time. I decided that since Justin was out of town, it was time for me to fight the final battle of the Sippy Cup Wars (he’s too weak and would become a casualty). I put Robbie down with a sippy cup full of milk. He cried for a little while, but he finally slept. He’d only had half an ounce of milk…

During lunch, Robbie didn’t want anything to drink. He shoved the cup away from his mouth and fussed every time I brought it near him. This is probably where Justin would have faltered and told me to just give the kid a bottle. But I would have made Dr. Fisher proud, the way I held strong.

Now, this next move was probably stupid, but I am one of “those” moms… I left the house to run errands for a few hours. All I had with me was a sippy cup of water. Please note that my son also hates to drink water. Part way through my haircut, Robbie got fussy. Really fussy. Embarrassingly so. I pulled out the only weapon in my arsenal: a sippy cup of water. And. He. Drank. It.

That’s right. Robbie drank from a sippy cup. For about five seconds. And then he started fussing again. I finally realized why when he yanked the cup out of my hands. You see, I was holding a Toy Story 3 sippy cup up to Robbie’s mouth because I didn’t want him to throw it on the floor (please picture this: I am in the chair getting my hair cut, leaning over to Robbie in his stroller – it was awkward at best). In fact, all this kid wanted was to hold his own cup.

For the rest of the day, Robbie was into his sippy cup. He drank from it in the stroller, in his car seat, on the kitchen floor, in the living room, in the bathtub, and in bed. He put it in his mouth and carried it around the house as he crawled from room to room. And, in a move that can only signify defeat, he cried when I took it away from him to fill with milk.

At 7:22 this morning, Robbie turned one! It was so nice to actually enjoy Robbie’s birthday this year; last year it was really a bit of a blur. This year we were celebrating the little boy we’ve gotten to know and love over the past 365 days instead of introducing ourselves to a virtual stranger. I was able to physically function instead of waiting to get feeling back in the lower half of my body. Unfortunately, there were noticeably fewer flowers…

Justin, Robbie, and I had our own little family birthday party tonight. Robbie opened two or three presents and then got distracted by a box, so I helped him out with the rest. As the gifts were opened, Robbie got excited about them, particularly anything that made noise. At one point, he bent his head down to pick up a puzzle piece with his mouth. He may be part dog. At any rate, he really enjoyed the fun of presents. We watched 1 2 3 Count With Me twice and Robbie bopped along.

And then it was time for the real show-stopper. That’s right, ladies and gentlemen! It was cake time. Robbie has really gotten the hang of eating cake. Mostly. He hasn’t necessarily gotten then hang of getting the whole piece into his mouth. Roberto was covered in cake, frosting, and sprinkles. And I took about a hundred pictures of it. Just like any doting mother would!

So, young Robert is in bed in toddler dreamland. And I’m downstairs thinking of all the adventures we had in his first year. He traveled to/through more states than I did in my first year, hitting Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Kentucky, and Ohio. Robbie visited the beach and went swimming in a lake for the first time. He ate about a pound of sand. He went to three Red Sox games and saw at least a dozen homeruns. He toured Fenway. Robbie met a Thanksgiving turkey and Santa Claus, got christened, and flew in an airplane five times. He took a 17-hour road trip to Kentucky (and back). Oh, and he was on Good Morning America. It’s been one heck (Justin’s edit!) of a year for this kid, and I can’t wait to see what his second year holds for us all.

Below is the Good Morning America video.

http://abcnews.go.com/assets/player/walt2.6/flash/SFP_Walt.swf