Quick update..

Here are a couple pics from our attempted trip to the zoo yesterday. I say attempted because we jumped in the car to capitalize on the gorgeous day and forgot to check what time they closed... we got there right as everyone was leaving. To make the best of it, we enjoyed the little wooded area outside of the rainforest and got these pictures of Jack sitting on animal statues.







And-- it's finally happened. Jack can turn the cordless phone on by himself. He's sitting on the floor next to me as I type and I've had to "hang up" the phone about 10 times in the last few minutes. He gets very excited when he gets it on speaker phone and then turns it on and gets the dial tone, looks up at me with this surprised and then so very proud look on his face. Sometimes, he gives a little shrug, as if to say "I dunno, it just happened.. but isn't it great!" Right now, he is making little clucking noises to himself as he concentrates. He is a very cute little monkey today...

Now, to convince him to put down the phone so we can go for a walk.

Stormy weather...

Before the rain hit...

and right before we left Blossom...


Doesn't he look so grown up in this picture??



Crawling around... 42 weeks old!



As I type, it is hailing out. Hailstones the size of marbles, falling like rain. It's pretty wild, and pretty loud up here in my office, as I am very close to the roof. I am hoping we don't lose power, but have my laptop unplugged just in case.

First, Jack updates:
*He is starting to get "into" everything. He gets annoyed when I close the fridge without letting him explore inside. He loves taking things out of "his" cupboard, the one with tupperware and travel mugs. He zooms over to investigate when we open ANYTHING. I'm sure he is working on figuring out how to open it all himself. Cabinet locks, here we come.
* He is saying Mamama consistently now when he sees me or wants me. An endearing new habit is when he crawls over, saying mama, then pull up onto his knees by holding my leg. He's like a little puppy these days.
*One of his favorite toys is a string of house and tree shaped beads. He is very proficient at taking the beads off the string and will stay engaged in this task for a surprisingly long time.
*We are pretty sure there are some more teeth on their way, on the bottom. He's been much more whiny than normal the past few days. Still not bad, but we're just not used to happy boy being this vocal about things.
*Speaking of vocal, a new not-so-nice habit is screaming when he is laid down for a nap or at night. I say habit because he gave himself away today. When I first laid him down for his morning nap, he stretched a little and was relaxed. Then, he looked around, looked at me, and starting wailing. I think he is under the impression that he should cry at this time. We'll have to work on that.
* He is staring to get excited about looking at books. A current favorite is "Henry's colors".
* He will imitate us when we sing a little tune to him, with the "words" la, la, la... he'll give his little sweet voiced la, la, la back. It is incredibly adorable.

For the most part, the weather this weekend has been ideal, just punctuated by spectacular storms. I spent Monday thru Thursday attending a math assessment conference at CSU, which was actually very informative. And, it was a lot of fun to spend time with th folks on the math cluster. But, it still led to my first week of summer break feeling an awful lot like work. I felt like Friday was my first "real" day off. It was not only the longest day of the year, but really very lovely. We went for a pleasant, meandering bike ride in the morning, and then Melinda and Will came over and while Melinda and I laid around and entertained baby boy on a blanket in the yard, Nat and Will ran around with a chain saw and made a tremendous amount of progress on consolidating and cutting up all the dead wood we've brought down recently. We got up into the tree house and got all inspired to fix it up... of course, it's still pretty low on the priority list, as even NEXT year the kiddo will still be under 2. But we may at least shore up one of the railings and waterproof it this year...

Saturday was a full and wonderful summer day. We rode out bikes to the Shaker Square farmer's market, which was perfect except for the fact that we didn't have any device to tote around the extremely heavy baby, once he was out of his bike trailer. So, we didn't stay too long! After Jack's first "nap" (in quotes because he never actually fell asleep, we just gave up on him napping after he alternately fussed and played for an hour) we went to a few moving sales in the neighborhood, where we were fairly restrained in our spending. We got a very unseasonal new ski bag and more appropriate window fan, and I got a great new necklace. Then, back home where M and W (who'd joined us for the sales) loitered on the porch with us for a while. To top the day off we headed to Blossom for Prairie Home Companion. We'd decided to attend last minute, on Friday, when we heard the Wailin Jennys were going to perform. It was supposed to be an idyllic evening of lounging and picnic-ing on the hill in the summer sun, but approximately 4 minutes before the show was to begin, we were hit with-- you guessed it-- a doozy of a storm. We all went and hid in a pavilion just over the edge of the hill, where we enjoyed a great picnic meal and stayed nice and dry, but couldn't hear much of anything. So, at around the one hour mark, as the rain let up a bit, we donned garbage bags and stood under some trees and we were able to enjoy some of the show. If we looked hard enough, we could make out the general outline of Garrison Keillor. :) The best part of the show, in my opinion, was the "after concert" given by the Jennys after the show. We had to wait around for a while, while they retaped a portion of the broadcast to make up for when the power went out during the show (!) but as we waited, a rainbow came out and it was really pretty spectacular. Poor little Jack was pretty exhausted but held up like a champ so I could see my favorite singers perform, at close range! Little man was up for about 8 hours all told! We give him a lot of credit for being a very sweet, happy baby almost the entire time, despite being tired and slightly damp. Good kid.

Today we've stayed home and cleaned and played in the playroom a lot and kiddo is napping like a fiend! We're having friends over for supper tonight so, off to put finishing touches on dinner...

What a sweet boy

I find myself thinking that about Jackster multiple times a day, these days. He is just the nicest little baby recently, all smiles and so well behaved. Not to mention the fact that he slept through the night last night, 7pm to 6:30am. :)

We had a lovely weekend. Saturday the three of us went down to Hiram for Alumni weekend. Jack was amazing, and showed off wonderfully all day. We went down in the morning so I could participate in a reading from Hiram, USA, "redux." We weren't sure how long we'd be able to stay, whether little guy would nap or not... turns out we were able to stay all day. Jack was a little bored during the reading, and spent most of it out in the main part of the library with his daddy (and the rest of the Hiram "playgroup", as it turns out -- Josh was there with Liam, and there were 2 other alums with their little ones at the reading, too!). But Nat did have him back in the room when I finished my portion of the reading, and he gave me the most wonderful, joyful smile when I came back to my seat. I never imagined I would feel so very in love with this little baby...
After the reading. we went out to lunch with some old friends and then walked around campus, checking out the future Writing house (there will be a writing department! I am so jealous!) and the new dorm that is in the old gravel parking lot behind Booth. At some point on the walk, little man crashed in his stroller and took about an hour nap. Amazing! We were able to spend the afternoon relaxing, drinking margaritas and reminiscing, and go to the outdoor reception. We headed home after that, all 3 of us ready for bed. :)

Sunday we had a "special day breakfast" to celebrate Nat's first Father's day. Then we took Cor to Rocky River beach and had a splendid time. The weather was perfect, Cor swam and swam, we lazed about on a swing at the top of the hill-- lovely. We also spent a lot of time shopping around for a good price on the new Ratchet and Clank game for the new PS2-- Nat's Father's day present. :)

Here are some recent Jack updates:
*He's becoming quite the accomplished crawler these days. He crosses room boundaries! We've had to use our baby gates and close doors to keep him in. This is all quite unfamiliar!
*When he smiles, he really shows those bottom 2 teeth!
*He is becoming more opinionated, objecting if we take a toy away without giving him a toy of equal or greater excitement in return.
*He's saying ma-ma-ma and da-da-da so very clearly these days and I beleive that he says them with some intention. :) He also says mmm when he wants to nurse.
*His new cute trick is holding the toy he is playing with right up over his head, arm out straight, with a huge, triumphant smile. Adorable.

A few notes on sleep

I realized that we have not provided updates on the state of Jack's sleep in a while. Pretty amzing considering the depth of our obsession with the subject in days gone by...

All things considered, sleeping is going well.

* Jack is a belly sleeper these days, and thanks to our heat wave, he's kicked the swaddle habit. He is absolutely gorgeous, soft arms and legs splayed out as he sleeps on his tummy...
* He is sleeping at least 10 hours on most nights, usually waking only once between 3 and 5 am to eat.
* When he wakes up, he sits up in his crib. Sure makes him easy to pick up!

Habius crawlum!

Yes, it has indeed happened. The famous non-crawling baby now crawls! I will attempt to post a video soon...

It was pretty amazing to watch-- it just...happened. We were relaxing in his playroom on Saturday morning...one moment he was doing his usual sit-reach-go the knees-sit-back-up routine, and the next, he was motoring along, little fluffy butt sashaying back and forth as he crawled. Like he'd been doing it forever! Guess all the practicing paid off! He does seem to forget what he's doing at times. He'll pause and go up on his toes, waggle his bum around in the air for a minute... then back in action. I don't think he realizes yet that the world has been opened up to him and he can crawl anywhere he wants. He only does it sometimes and (typical male) will do it mainly to get to the remote, or other electronic object. He did crawl over to me tonight, though, which melted my heart. ( He seems to be doing that quite a bit recently. Endearing little fellow these days.)

In other news, we took a day trip to Ikea yesterday, to escape the heat in air-conditioned consumer paradise, and to spend massive amounts of money (chagrined little smile here...). Jackeroo was a fabulous and patient baby while we shopped. Melinda and Will came along and took care of him for much of the day. He was a sweet little bug and chilled in his stroller most of the day, but did enjoy crawling around on the concrete floor (a new experience for him). In addition to the playroom storage unit we intended to buy, we came away with a new sink, new butcherblock counters, and a schnazzy new faucet for the kitchen. As well as various odds and ends, and the 3-pack of scissors we get every time.. :). I am super excited about the kitchen remodel we have planned. I have my work cut out for me, though, as the plan involves painting or replacing every surface in the room except for the floor. I don't know what I am thinking.

Two more days of school, with students! I can't believe it's the end of the year. I guess its a good sign that I am not totally ready for the year to end. Nat points out that I technically have another quarter of teaching in me, having missed first quarter for our little man. It also doesn't quite feel like the end of the year to me because I am actually not really done working on Thursday. Silly me, I have signed up to go to a 4 day math workshop and then teach summer reading for 2 weeks. It will pay well and it is a big change from the norm, so I know it will be fine.. but again I wonder what I was thinking! One thing is certain-- time will speed along toward our trip to the lake in July. It is stiflingly hot right now and I cannot wait to be by the water again and really ENJOY summer. As I run around after my mobile baby. Crazy!

Losing another friend...

Poor baby Jack is losing a friend for the second time in his young life-- we keep meeting fun people with babies Jack's age, and then they keep moving away. Sigh. First Shannon, Paul, and Ethan. Now, its Annie and Grady (and his daddy Drew). We've known them a long time (at least in the world of "baby time")-- I first met Annie when Grady was 16 weeks old and Jack was 6 weeks old. He was one of the older babies at the Tuesday/Friday breastfeeding group. I looked up to her as a successful breastfeeding mom; she envied how much Jack weighed (he and Grady weighed about the same amount back then!). We talked at each group and she invited Jack and I to attend a playgroup she was starting. This evolved into what I think of as the "doctors wives" playgroup ( with the exception of me, and later, Nat, all the ladies are wives of residents at UH). I went 2 times before I had to return to work. Nat has been going since then. We've met lots of fun ladies and babies through the group but have been closest to Annie and Grady. And now, Drew's residency is finished and they are moving back to their home state of Kansas and we are all sad to see them go....
This week's playgroup was an early birthday party for Grady and a farewell to their family. Nat got some great pics of Jack and his buddy. It's fun to look at them bu melancholy too, knowing we won't be able to pull them out and embarrass the boys when they are 16 and still best friends. Sigh. We'll keep trying to find a lifelong buddy for him...

The stats are in...

Jack had his 9 month well-baby visit on Tuesday... turns out he's a big baby. Here are the official stats:
Height-- 30 inches (97th percentile!!! egad!)
Weight-- 21 pounds, 7 ounces (not quite as much as we'd expected-- 78th percentile)
Head-- 44 centimeters (why is the height measured in standard, and the head in metric? We may never know... anyways, 75th percentile)

He was also given a clean bill of health, pronounced developmentally on target, and had no shots. So, a great visit! :)

In other news, we have gotten our bikes out of the garage for the first time since we moved in to this house. A year ago. Jeesh.
We got a baby bike trailer from one of my colleagues and got it hooked up for the Jackmeister, (on Nat's bike-- very much the Dad thing, to pull the bike trailer. We're so damn conventional in our gender roles. hee hee) and Sunday we tooled around the neighborhood for the first time, went down to Coventry. Today, a gorgeous, very summer-ish afternoon, we went out riding for close to an hour. We meandered around some back streets near us, starting with some that we've walked down before, and then ranging farther and farther afield. We quite unexpectedly found ourselves in the Cedar/Fairmount neighborhood and so we stopped for a drink at Starbucks. Lovely.

On the way home, Jack turned into a bit of a giggle monster. He'd been having a pretty grand time the whole ride, cooing and laughing, reaching out to touch the air as it rushed by. As we headed down Somerton towards home, I rode next to the trailer for a while, to have a look at the boy. When I turned to face him, and said hi, he began to squeal, nigh chortle with glee, clapping his hands and belly laughing. I turned back to the road and the giggles subsided... until I turned back to him. Chortling commenced again. Nat and I could hardly pedal, we were so busy laughing along with him. There is something absolutely irresistible about a baby laughing. This may in fact be the true reason that people have children.