CJ's First Pokemon Tournament

CJ is crazy about Pokemon. It all started right before our move. CJ found a trainer pack of Pokemon cards that Maki had purchased for him a long time ago. Since they had never been used, I was going to donate them to Goodwill but CJ found the deck and asked Maki to play with him. The rest is history.

Turns out that this is the age when boys and girls get interested in Pokemon. A bunch of CJ's friends from school also love Pokemon, but most of them only collect cards. CJ and Maki, however, actually play the card game.

CJ also plays Pokemon in his Nintendo DS, which he got for his birthday. All he plays are his Pokemon games.

I downloaded a Pokedex (Pokemon index) on the iPad for him, he watches Pokemon videos on the computer, he watches other kids talk about their cards on YouTube, and he studies his cards intently. As a result, CJ seems to know his cards very well and talks non-stop about them. He talks about attacks, which cards evolve into which cards, which types have a weakness to which types, etc. It's pretty funny and amazing how much information he's stored in his brain about Pokemon.

We were supposed to go to Boston this past weekend to visit Uncle Kevin (Maki's best friend from high school) and let Maki, CJ and Kevin play in a Pokemon tournament. We canceled our trip at the last minute because of Hurricane Irene, which devastated the East Coast from North Carolina to Canada.

CJ was so upset when I told him we had canceled our trip so as a consolation prize, Maki offered to take him to a tournament in Warrenton, VA. The boys tried to prepare hard for the tournament. Maki and CJ played a lot of games and Maki made CJ practice making his own decks in 30 minutes.

So on Sunday morning, the boys braved the rain (which was tapering off) and made it to Warrenton in time for the tournament. There were about 50 people at the tournament, of which 6 were in the Junior Division (under 11) and over 20 were in the Masters Division (over 16).

CJ took 2nd place in the Juniors category! He won his first game with a bye and then won his 2nd game against a kid who was about the same age. I cannot believe it. CJ was beyond thrilled because he won a game and, most importantly, he got to take home 16 packs of cards (8 were from Maki).

CJ won with a Cobalion card (see above). The boys are so into Pokemon that I think I'm going to try my hand at the game this weekend. Stay tuned.

MJ is holding his bottle!

At around 11 months, MJ started holding his bottle. He's not consistent and he has a tough time when the bottle is about halfway full (then the nipple is only half full of milk and he gets air in his tummy) but he's really doing it.

Sometimes he gets lazy and won't do it, so then we get lazy and just hold the bottle for him. So we need to remember to always position the bottle so he can hold it himself.

A Week at the Outer Banks

This past July, we spent a week at the Outer Banks. We stayed for a week in the town of Corolla with our friends, the Widnells. The Widnells usually vacation with family but plans fell through, so they invited us and lucky us! Our week at the beach turned out to be so much more fun because was with one of his best friends!

The trip down to the Corolla was pretty hellacious. Kathleen warned us that we needed to be crossing the bridge onto the island by 11am or noon, but we didn't get going until 8:00am. I consider it a minor miracle that we left at the hour because we had been in temporary housing for two weeks while the elevator shaft was being completed (I didn't want to be in the house during the worst, dustiest part of the construction). We checked out of the apartment on Sunday morning, dropped off some stuff at the new house, stopped at McDonald's for breakfast and we were off. The ride down to North Carolina was smooth and uneventful but when we got to the bridge, everything stopped. At one point, MJ was screaming because he was overdue for his bottle but I didn't have any way to warm up his milk. Desperate, we stopped at a random house and asked for hot water. The nice couple gladly gave us hot water and offered to let us come in, but once MJ got his warm milk, he was a lot calmer. The trip down took 8 1/1 hours!

Even though the ride down was tough, we had a great time. We got along famously with the Widnells (you never know how if you're going to hit it off with another family when vacationing) and CJ and Liam were two peas in a pod. The boys shared a room and often slept in the same bed; they showered together; they ate together; they read books together. They had a blast.

We managed to squeeze in a ton of activities while we were out there. At the end of the week, CJ wailed, "mommy, it felt like we just got here, why do we have to leave so soon?" We could have stayed another week and not gotten half the things done that we wanted!

MJ had a great time. Aside from the long car ride, he had a ball. He doesn't mind being in the car, he got to go the beach and the pool, we went for lots of walks around the neighborhood and to the nearby outdoor mall, he had lots of people doting on him, he loved the decks and the hammock, he took naps with mommy (he napped, I read, it was awesome!), and he loved crawling around on the sectional sofa.

Turns out that Nick and Kathleen are total foodies. We went to a great crab place, a great sandwich place and a wonderful seafood restaurant. One night, Nick made an incredible fish entree. Yum! Going on vacation is fun when you're with people who love food! And it helps that our boys are good eaters, too! Even MJ was tasting everything! One night, he noshed on a piece of celery for a half hour and enjoyed himself thoroughly.

Some of the highlights of the trip:

• MJ playing in the sand for the first time
• CJ and Liam riding go carts around a track
• The boys renting wave riders and going out on the water
• CJ catching a jellyfish, naming him Jerry and wanting to bring him home (I said no)
• Me finishing the first book in the Twilight series
• Playing Settlers of Catan (me, Maki, Nick and Kathleen) at night

Another long car ride with a toddler would scare me but we'd go back to the Outer Banks in a heartbeat!

This was MJ's first visit to the beach. He didn't really know 

what to do about the sand but we think he had a good time. 

MJ just loved the hammock!

Check out that smile!

CJ and Liam loved the hot tub and 

begged for hot tub time every evening!

Maki enjoyed lounging on the hammock, too!

I couldn't believe that CJ could drive a Go Cart on his own!

The boys conned me into buying them some rock candy.

The boys were inseparable. We'll never 

vacation without friends with kids again!

MJ loved banging on things so we gave him plenty of material.

Here's MJ sucking hard on a piece of celery.

MJ and Maki at the beach.

CJ and Liam used metal detectors to try and find treasure (no luck!)

MJ absolutely adores his dad

What kid doesn't like to play in the sand?

Here's Jerry the Jellyfish

The Problem with a Foodie Child

Maki, CJ and I went to Rustico last Friday with some friends (MJ stayed home with the nanny.) CJ loves Rustico and loves their kids' menu. He likes their pizza, mac n cheese and chicken tenders. But that night, CJ was listening intently when the waitress described the specials, which included a grilled red snapper over a bed of Isreali couscous. CJ, without hesitating, said "I'll have that."

The waitress was a little unsure but Maki assured her it was fine. He looked at me and said, "I'll eat it if he doesn't want it."

Well, the entree came and CJ at it all up. He ate every bite of the fish and nearly all of the couscous. He ate the mango bits but left the squash.

CJ's entree was $26, while my tortellini was $18! That's the problem with a foodie child: he's an expensive date.

Oh well, what are you supposed to do? I can't exactly say, "no, you can only order off the kids' menu" and then complain later when all he eats is chicken tenders and mac n cheese." God bless the good eaters in this world!

What Does 10-Month Old MJ Do These Days?

MJ is 10 months old! Actually, he'll be 11 months old in a few days. He has changed quite a bit and is very active these days.

He is good crawler. At around 9 months, he stopped crawling on his belly and started crawling in his hands and knees, belly off the floor. He is fast and he can wiggle through small openings.

At around 9 1/2 months, MJ started pulling himself up. He can now pull himself up easily and can sit back down on his bottom. He's not yet cruising but he's close and he's trying.

He sits up well. He can sit on the floor and play with his toys. I can give him a bath while he's sitting in the tub.

He babbles non-stop. He has a few words but not really. He says dada a lot. He says yaya when he sees Goring. Goring says he says "tita" when he sees Tita Pressie, another nanny in the neighborhood (tita is aunt in Tagalog) and we use it as a polite form when addressing grown-ups; we use tito for male elders.) He also says nana when he is eating a banana. Occasionally, we'll get a mama out of him.

He is a good eater. No, he's a great eater. So far, he's had: bananas, cherries, blueberries, apples, pasta with sausage and peas, sausage tortellini, rice and smoked salmon, rice and raw salmon, bread, chicken salad, miso soup, ikura, orange chicken. Basically, I give him a little of what we are eating each night, unless it's too spicy, chewy or hard. So far, he loves everything we've given him. In fact, he gets really mad if we are eating and he's not. He complains loudly by saying, "aaah, aaaah" and pointing at the food or at whoever is eating.

We have discovered that MJ has a mild allergy to egg. I made scrambled eggs one night and gave him some. His cheeks turned all red and splotchy. He didn't have trouble breathing and no other part of his body got splotchy, but we're not avoiding egg straight up and only giving him egg in other things (e.g., cooked in pasta, in sauces, etc.) The doctor says he could outgrow this if we give him egg a little bit at a time, starting with the yolk since apparently, most people are allergic to the while part of the egg.

MJ loves to go outside. He starts getting antsy in the morning after breakfast, meaning he wants to go for a walk. He seems to like being in the car and he likes going out for lunch or dinner. I try to take him somewhere outside the house at least once during the weekend, even if it's just to the grocery store.

Where Does the Elevator Go?

So where does one put an elevator in a home? Turns out you can put an elevator wherever you want to. Our contractor says that most people put an elevator where they have stacking closets (think coat coat closet on 1st floor, linen closet on the 2nd floor, etc.). You can put an elevator in a corner of a house and have the contractor punch holes through the ceiling all the way up!

In our case, we decided to put the elevator in the stairwell of our new house. This location made the most sense since it was mostly square, it was unused space and it was space that went from the ground floor to the 4th floor.

Maki was sad to lose the beautiful staircase and stairwell. I was sad as well but also glad that I didn't have to worry about kids and babies falling into a stairwell. A neighbor also told us that the stairwell had a tendency to carry sound throughout the house.

So our new elevator will be where our beautiful stairwell once was.

Building the Hoistway

When you're building an elevator, the most important part is the hoistway or the elevator shaft. In our case, we needed a hoistway that goes up all the way to 4th floor. Building this hoistway has been a major undertaking.

First, we had to choose an elevator company. After interviewing several companies, we chose Residential Elevators out of Florida. We considered Ashley Elevators because they had a clear elevator without a hoistway but it made me too nervous.

Next, we picked our general contractor. We got a recommendation from Residential and went with Hofmeister Services, who ended up subbing the work to Caputo Construction. Bob Caputo and Mike from Caputo did the bulk of the work, which involved:

• Reinforcing the foundation
• Ripping the carpet off the stairs
• Cutting into the stairwell to make more room for the hoistway
• Removing part of the floor on the 4th floor because there was an overhang in the stairwell that would have prevented a straight hoistway
• Framing out the hoistway
• Closing the hoistway with drywall
• Painting the hoistway
• Creating the custom trim in the baseboards and crown molding
• Repositioning the powder room
• Building out the machine room

Building the hoistway took months, literally and it was dirty, dusty work. We started the work as soon as we were able after closing on the house. The work was delayed by confusion over permitting because we needed to move a sprinkler on the 4th floor so it's now the end of July and the hoistway is finally done.

Here is a view of the hoistway from the 1st floor. Note the doors in the hoistway.

Elevator door in the guest room on the 4th floor.

The elevator will open directly into the guest room.

View of the elevator door in the guest room.

View of the elevator door from the 3rd floor bedroom level.

View of the elevator door in the dining room on the 2nd floor living level.

You can see how the hoistway closed up the stairwell.

View of the hoistway from the 4th floor.

That's Bob at the bottom of the hoistway.

Note the 3 doors in the hoistway.

The New House

Sometime last year, I visited my friend Judith, who turns out to have an elevator in her townhome. Oh, what a glorious thing! The elevator was tucked neatly beneath a stairwell and it made visits by her mom, moving furniture and grocery shopping, so much easier. So I went on the hunt for a home in Alexandria with an elevator. I wasn't really serious about it since we loved our old house, we loved our super easy commute and CJ is thriving at his school.

On a whim, I called our Realtor, Gary Chute of Weichert Realtors, who had helped us buy our house and sell my condo nearly ten years ago. He took me around town to see a bunch of single family homes and townhomes, a few of which had elevators. There was one crazy house in Ford's Landing that felt like an Escher painting; there were so many small, cramped staircases going in every which direction, it was awful!

There is a fairly new development behind our house and I asked Gary to call the builder to find out if it was possible to put an elevator in any of the models. I had previously walked into the sales office to ask just that same question and was told no. But I figured it didn't hurt to have an expert give a ring. As it turns out there was one (exactly one) model that COULD accommodate an elevator and there was one still available. Trouble was, that one last home was already sold, but with a home sale contingency.

So Gary and I waited, followed up with the builder, looked at the house several times, showed the house to Maki, waited, followed up, etc. And yep, the day the contingent sale fell through, Maki and I made an offer and we made a deal! We had to close fast (in less than 30 days) to get the price and upgrades we wanted because it was the end of the quarter and our house was going to be THE last house to close in the entire development! We decided not to put in a home sale contingency because we felt comfortable we could sell our house and we had already been pre-approved by our mortgage banker.

So on March 31, we closed on our new house. It's gorgeous. It's about 8 short blocks north of our old house, it's got a similar floor plan, it's about 500 sq. ft. bigger, and it's got taller ceilings. The appeal of the house are the guest room on the 4th floor that has a closet and bathroom, the sitting area on the 4th floor (separate from the guest room), two closets in the master bedroom, the laundry/utility room, and larger island in the kitchen. New house, hooray!

Maki in front of the fireplace in the 1st floor/basement.

View of the front door.

Windows in the front or the house.

The entire house has hardwood floors.

Giant island in the kitchen.

Sitting area/family room off the kitchen. This room faces East.

Another view of the kitchen.

Looking into the dining room from the sitting room. 

Note the two-sided fireplace.

View of the dining room and living room.

View of the living room. It looks dark because

it was so bright outside. This room faces West.

Living room.

Boys' bathroom on the 3rd floor.

Balcony/deck off the 4th floor.

Guest room on the 4th floor.

Guest bathroom.

View from the dormer in the guest bathroom.

Closet in the guest room.

4th floor deck.

View of the stairwell from the 4th floor.

CJ's bedroom.

Closet in CJ's bedroom.

Master bedroom.

One of the master bedroom closets.

View of the bathroom in the master bedroom.

We had the carpet removed.

Separate toilet in the master bathroom.

Master bath shower.

Double sinks in the master bath.

Tub in the master bath.