Preschool

"Welcome Dylan!" At school, they put up some pictures of Dylan so the other students and parents could get to know him.

Whenever I come pick him up, he runs over to the play area and it takes me 15 minutes to get him out of there.

This kid has never had a real haircut (shocker, I know!) and we are waiting until we get to the U.S. where we can go to one of those kiddie haircut places

After school, we usually go get gelato in front of the church in our neighborhood. He's obsessed with the church bells and he wants to stand there every hour and half hour to hear them ring. He's kind of a sloppy eater...

With papi

We had a baptism on Sunday for our friends' little girl, but since I still looked like the Elephant Man at that point after having gotten two wisdom teeth out, I stayed at home so as to not frighten anyone. Here's Dylan eating a prosciutto panino with papi.

This cracks me up

This hospital (which is not the hospital where Dylan was born, but is where I was treated for post-partum depression - TMI? Sorry!) is touting itself as the "first hospital in Italy with Skype phones in the maternity ward." I don't know why I find that so funny, but wouldn't it just be easier to provide WiFi and let people Skype from their own computers? It might also be more sanitary. I don't see anyone Purell-ing before using the shared Skype phone and while holding a newborn. You can see that the maternity ward is clean if a bit sterile and sad. Where I gave birth was very similar. What do you want to bet that within a couple of months all of the phones will be "out of order"? That's the way it always seems to work...

Still here!

The blog is not on hiatus. There has just been a lot going on, and I haven't been taking many pictures. For one thing, Cristiano FINALLY got his Green Card (well the immigrant visa - the Green Card will be issued when we are in the U.S.) after an emergency return trip to Naples because the U.S. Consulate there made a mistake with his fingerprints. Aargh. We've both been busy with work, and I just got two wisdom teeth out this morning.

In Dylan news, he got his first bloody fat lip at school. He retaliated the next day by hitting back on the playground. Though he hit another kid not the kid who had hit him originally. The teachers say that he is very sweet and overall very good but is still disruptive in class. They say he provokes other kids, which is why he got the fat lip. He still has issues with playing rough with the toys and smashing things on the ground. There can be three kids in the little kitchen setting the table and Dylan will run up and turn the table over letting everything crash to the ground. I'm hoping this is a phase and the "disruptive in class" thing is not going to follow us into elementary school and beyond.

He's as active as ever and sleeps as little as ever. The funny thing is that now he realizes his not sleeping is an "issue" so he makes jokes about it. He'll say "Mommy, I'm not tired" right before bedtime and then laugh his head off. I have come to the conclusion that he really doesn't need that much sleep. The good thing is that now I'm pretty used to it.

Back to icing my face!

Easter

This year we braved the avalanches, mud slides and driving rain (which turned to snow by the end of the weekend) to celebrate Easter in the mountains with Cristiano's parents and some family friends. Dylan got a new car to add to his collection and, of course, lots of chocolate. We colored eggs and then had "egg wars," which apparently is a yearly tradition invented by one of the lunch guests (he also happens to be my dentist; did I mention I have to get two wisdom teeth out in two weeks? :( ), and which consists of smashing hard-boiled colored eggs into each other to see whose will crack first. It's not all that interesting, but I was the "reigning champion" from last year and made it to the semi-finals this year.

Easter 2010 from Michelle Marie on Vimeo. Dylan with his chocolate eggs and Polda the labrador.

This kid is giving me gray hair

I know I'm a broken record on this, but getting this rebellious kid into bed every night is such a struggle. Switching to daylight savings has also thrown him for a loop. I really don't know what we are doing "wrong" because we have our nighttime routine and do the same exact things each night. When Cristiano is gone for his sommelier course (and thus I can parent however I want without any comments from the peanut gallery), I experiment with moving up Dylan's bedtime to see if perhaps going to bed earlier will make a difference. Doesn't change a thing. Every once in a blue moon we will go out to dinner or take him over to my in-laws for dinner, but compared to your average Italian kid who stays up to all hours and has no regular schedule, Dylan is incredibly regimented. We've really had no alternative but to let him cry it out each night (he's crying now - sigh), and last night he decided he was going to make good on the "promise/threat" he made not to sleep in his bed. When I finally heard him quiet down, I went in there and this is what I found:

Dylan sleeping on the couch cushion I usually sit on when I'm reading him his bedtime story. He swore he wouldn't be sleeping in his bed...