December's Greatest Hits

Hi Everyone! How did it get to be the end of the year..again? I can't believe I haven't written in nearly two months. A lot has been happening around the Burling household, but the more important happenings have to do with Mr. Sasha Burling. 

Sasha will be twenty months on Saturday and I still can't believe it. He's a walking, running, laughing, screaming, airplane/bus/truck watching machine and we love him for it. As of two months ago he weighed a whooping 25 lbs and was 33 inches tall, that would be more than half of my height. 

Sasha loves jumping, throwing anything and everything, feeding himself, building towers and playing with his cars. He's saying three syllable words (elephant) and several two word sentence combos (Hi Daddy), has sixteen teeth and is just overall a fun and (sigh) exhausting little guy with a great sense of humor. Fortunately he still is a fantastic sleeper, but for every second he's awake, he doesn't stop moving. 

I hope everyone has a happy and healthy New Year. 

Sasha's first photo project with Papa. The subject - airplanes. 

The big boy started sleeping on a mat at daycare - buy buy pack n play. 

The love of books (yay) continues. Thanks for this one Aunt Lex!

Sasha learned how to climb up on chairs and stand on them. 

First Hanukkah present from Uncle Marvin. Cool. 

Second present from Mommy and Daddy. I heart Elmo. 

Sasha at his second Hanukkah party eating homemade applesauce at the toddler table. 

His first art class. Bring on the projects!

Second haircut in the big boy chair. Didn't even shed a tear. 

More to come in 2014. 

Our Romantic Getaway....er....sort of

October 3rd was our third anniversary and Ari planned a surprise weekend away for just us sans baby. This would be the first time we'd be away from Sasha and while we were nervous to leave him we were excited to sleep in until at least 8am!

At the last minute an unfortunate personal issue came up and we no longer had child care for Sasha. We debated for all of three seconds whether we should bring Sasha since our trip. Of course the verdict was YES. He is really fun.  

The surprise trip was to Block Island, a lovely island 13 miles south of Rhode Island. We couldn't have been happier to have our little guy along for the ride, he made us laugh the whole time. Sasha really loves to go on vacation as much as we do, so we plan to do many more family trips. 

On the ferry to Block Island. Sasha kept saying Agua. 

A little snack at the local pub. The beer was for mama. 

As luck would have it our hotel had a farm.  

Blustery wind in blondies hair at the light house. 

A little milk and cheese at happy hour.  

One last look at the animals. 

Catching up on some zzzz's after a fun weekend. 

Clean Clean Clean

Having a toddler,  is downright messy. Now that Sasha is attempting to feed himself and what seems like the floor, the ceiling, the walls, you name it, things have gotten messy. He's great with the spoon and the fork and now has moved onto overall house hold cleaning. He watches me constantly sweeping and wiping up his toddler messes, so he too wanted to join the fun. Basically, whatever we do, Sasha wants to do...PERIOD. 

On a recent field trip to look at studio space for Ari we of course brought our trusty decision maker. Good thing we did since one building was clearly much more dirty than the other building. Our Mr. Clean found a broom and dustpan and got to work.

Good thing I found a broom this place is a mess. 

I better check down the hall, I suspect it's messy there too. 

I'm working so hard, I hope I get a snack after this. 

A toddler's work is never done. 

All in a days work.......

A Day with Sasha

Like most toddlers Sasha is very busy from the moment he awakes until the moment he hits the crib every evening. Now that he takes one mid day nap we have to get him out of the house early so we can do something fun before his nap.

This past weekend while in Connecticut we ventured out in the early morning to a local petting zoo. Sasha loved it so much he continually tried to stick his fingers in every fence blocking himself from the animals. 

Hi Bird Hi Bird....

I'll put my fingers right where you can bite them. 

Um, why can't I stand up in this? (Wood play structure at the petting zoo)

Apparently going to the Petting Zoo was not enough for this Super Hero Toddler, he had to go and wash the car too! As it turns out Sasha prefers playing with water on concrete verses running through the sprinklers on the grass. We got ourselves a real city boy. 

I'm soaked, buckets full, let's do this.

I'll get the lower part of the car dad, it's all good. 

Why am I the only one working around here?

Daycare Check In

Sasha experimenting with Papa's shoes. 

A recent love of peaches. Notice mouth open in preparation.

Sasha's new found love of coloring. Yay!

As many of you know I started working three months ago. It was a tough decision to leave Sasha with strangers, but he's loved it since day one.

When I pick Sasha up at the end of the day I get him out quickly since I want to spend as much time with him before his early bedtime. I have a few words with teacher: Nap? Yes, Eat? Yes. Change of clothes? Yes. More Diapers? Yes, then we walk home. She will text me if anything serious comes up and she gets back to us in minutes, which I love. 

When I arrived at daycare yesterday Sasha and his teacher's four year old daughter were hugging. It was beyond cute. His teacher told me he was hugging everyone all day, but mostly her daughter. That's our boy!

Since it was a quiet day I figured it was a good opportunity to check in on more of his day to day toddler adventures. 

So the review begins:

Me: Who does Sasha play with? 
Teacher: Everyone.

Me: What does Sasha play with? 
Teacher: Everything.

Me: What does Sasha eat?
Teacher: Everything.

Me: How does he sleep?
Teacher: Great.

Me: How is his general mood throughout the day?
Teacher: Always happy never a problem.

I mean seriously, what more could I want. As a prior teacher I know children tend to act different in school but it was comforting to know that Sasha acts the same. Okay, so we don't have an adorable four year old girl around for him to hug, but otherwise we're doing great and he has great taste in women. 

15 months

Sasha turned 15 months this past Sunday. Today we had his 15 month check up. Somehow my child is in the 91% for height at a whooping 32.5 inches (up from 30.5 in at 12 months) and in the 33% for weight at 23.5 pounds (up from 21 lbs at 12 months). As you can imagine both myself at 5 feet and Ari at 5 feet 6/7 inches are thrilled about the prospect of a tall son. Now we know this could change and his rapid growth rate will level off in the next year or so, but it's nice to dream. 


Think of the possibilities of having a tall child. Well, he could get me stuff down from the shelves. He can date Swedish women. The list goes on and on. Not only is Sasha in perfect health, but well, he's sorta, well let me just say it...he's a ladies man. He's really took his flirting out of control today when he tried to lift the doctors skirt while she checked for ear wax. I felt oddly proud that he's so bold, but that's another story.


Every time we have a check up I love hearing that Sasha is right where he should be. We are always pleased to tell the doctor that we couldn't be happier. Sasha eats, sleeps, poops, plays, runs, walks, talks and is just a very happy outgoing toddler. What more could we want? 

Look at me, I'm 15 months and tall!

I'm so strong!

Mama is trying so hard to get a good photo, but I can't stop moving.

Rainy Day

Today we are having some much welcomed rain which is cooling off the city from the extreme heat we had for too many days. Lucky for me it's my day off, or as I call it "Mommy and Sasha day."

After an eventful morning of baking and eating chocolate chip banana bread, I decided to venture out to our local library. I also love putting Sasha is his yellow raincoat any opportunity I can get before he outgrows it. 

Fortunately when we left it wasn't raining so I let Sasha walk for a bit. It's so fun walking together, it always makes me smile when I see him running ahead of me. When did he get so big?

You know from earlier posts that I love opening and closing the gate.

I love pushing all these buttons, too bad Mama won't let me do this at home. 

I took off my raincoat so I could show off my shirt from Aunt Sarala.

Now I know I'm bias, but I have to say that I think my son is one handsome devil. He really works blue and gives a sultry stare. How does he know how to do that? 

Sprinklers!!

The best thing about NYC playgrounds is that they all have amazing sprinklers which is quite fortunate with this scorching heat we've been having this summer. 

I've taken Sasha to many playgrounds with sprinklers and he tends to be happy at a distance. He loves to play in the water, but has not be so into running though the sprinklers. 

This past Sunday we went to a playground in City Island, which is located in the Bronx. Sasha immediately ran full on right into the sprinkler action. We just never know what that little guy is going to do. 

He really made us laugh and he had so much fun. It brings us so much joy to watch him having fun, not to mention I like going in the sprinklers too, it's hot out there people. 

What is this crazy water thing 

This is so much fun, I wish I knew about this sooner. 

I am soooo excited! Hooray!

First Haircut

Well, it had to be done. We changed our minds several times but realized we had to cut those precious baby curls. I got asked twice last week if Sasha was a girl even though he was dressed very much like a boy. Plus his head is constantly sweaty. I'm not sure why our little toddler is a hot head.


On this very hot summer day we took Sasha to his first ever haircut. When we arrived at Lulu's Sasha immediately played with the train table in this awesome hair salon/toy store. While waiting for Sasha's turn there was another little boy getting his haircut and he was screaming at the top of his lungs. I thought, please be done soon so you don't freak out my guy. 


Fortunately once Sasha met the lovely ladies who would be giving him his new awesome baby doo, he was in flirty heaven. If that wasn't enough he got to sit in this cool firetruck while getting his hair cut and watch a video which he was totally not interested in. They put the apron on him, sprayed his hair and snipped away. We watched our little baby transform into a big boy right before our eyes. Sasha not only looked much more mature, but he had a super cool hair style. 


Needless to say Sasha loved getting his hair cut and we love how handsome he looks. 

This is the before shot, still looking a bit skeptical, but hand on the steering wheel.

Of course Sasha loves looking at himself in the giant mirror. 

A little last minute styling.

Voila, one handsome toddler ready to hit the town on a hot day.

Stroller Fun

It's come to our attention that our child is not going to play with his toys. It's been about a month since he has played with them. Occasionally he'll humor us by tossing a toy here and there, but for the most part Sasha is all about playing in, well, the recyclables (aka, the trash) to put it bluntly. 


Not only does he loves the trash, but he is also a big fan of his stroller or any large object that moves and isn't, well, a toy. We go to the park and what does he do, he plays with all the junk we keep in his stroller. So I say, why schlep to the park. Let's park that baby right out front our place and play away. 

I can't believe my luck, it's a giant red object right before my eyes...wahoo

I'm so excited and I look adorable in orange!

I wonder what happens when you pull this squishy thing?

Oh, cool, that's what happens when you pull this squishy thing.

Strawberry Picking!

In honor of Father's day I thought it would be fun to highlight a messy, er, special papa and son moment. This past weekend when visiting the grandparents in Connecticut we were fortunate enough to take Sasha on his first strawberry picking adventure. 

En route to the fields. 

We had to take an open truck to the field where we picked the strawberries. As you can see Sasha is holding his container in anticipation of the fun. Please note his slick back hair is not a fashion statement, but rather massive amounts of sunscreen for our hat less wearing toddler. This came recommended from the experts, Aunt Kim and Uncle Brooke, parents of three grown children who survived toddler hood. 

No mistaken whose the papa here. 

Here's my handsome guys in the incredible strawberry field. It was a beautiful Saturday, perfect for picking berries. (Take note of Sasha's clean shirt) Once we put him down he was in berry heaven. 

The ride back to the car from the field.

Sasha consumed a considerable amount of strawberries as did the entire Burling clan. They were outstanding! As we departed we read the sign that said blueberries will be in season for picking in July/August. Considering blueberries are Sasha's all time favorite food we will return, but not with a pale blue shirt. 

Happy Father's Day!