Special treats for a sick boy

Popsicle at lunch, to cool the fever and get more fluids into Shorty, then pizza for dinner, because he's been very finicky and it's been tough to get him to eat. 

But the dinner video is really less about pizza and more about this vocal little devil, showing off his smarts.

weekend videos

Junior's first college gameday of the 2010 season, complete with his own bowl of goldfish snacks.


And the result of an encounter with the neighbor's friendly black lab, who did nothing but wag his tongue and pant at Shorty Sunday morning.

Mr. Mobile

First, the prelude...

And then, the big show.  (Caveat) Please disregard: the messy room (Cayden just unloaded his toy cradle and the comforter over top...Mama's unflattering decolletage/bosom in an old, stretched out nursing tank...Daddy's inappropriate commentary (suddenly, "in-a-pwohp-wee-uht" is a regular part of our vocabulary; maybe Daddy should grow up, or maybe he should stay just the way he is: the jury's still out)...a little Miss Jackson (Together Again) in the background -- remember that radio station I mentioned before? Yeah, Cayden still rocks it.

Holy balls

So here we are, just nine days ago, still a little wobbly with the hippo walker.
(Ooh, disclaimer: PopPop is not a fan of Spike, who is a perfectly nice and loving pet.  Well, at least to those who know when and when not to taunt him, pet him or look in his general direction.  Please ignore all the heartless side commentary.) 


Fast forward.  Through an incredibly challenging series of days at work.  Did I mention that in the span of a month and a half I went from being the middle person in an office of three to being the "acting" boss of an office of five, where two vacancies in my old work environment leave me pretty much solo for 95 percent of what I've got to get done in a day?  OK, reading that back, it sounds confusing.  Oh, it is.  But enough about me.

Guess who took his first steps for Grand-dude today, at one year, four weeks old. 

This guy, who is also learning how to feed himself. And who now uses all eight of his teeth to chow down on peaches.

The dishwasher is apparently an attractive target for this kiddo.  Then Chicken came home and demonstrated his wobbly -- yet completely solo -- three steps in a row (gimme three steps, gimme three steps mister, gimme three steps to'ad the do) toward the diswasher for Mama. 

Who is completely punch drunk, and perhaps a little bit real drunk, celebrating the near-end of a PR nightmare.  Dammit -- again, back to the point at hand -- Cayden is becoming MOBILE.  Exciting, yet terrifying at the same time.

And I can't wait to see and hear the reactions from the other grands and great-grands.  Because I know that secretly, deep-down (in places you don't talk about at parties), there's this competitive grandparent-caregiver thing going on, and they're all trying to one-up each other with the tricks they teach and milestones they enable.

Or maybe that's all in my punch-drunk head.  Yeah, right.  It's there, at least a little bit, and I love it.

Holy balls, he took his first steps today.

Gourmet FAIL

So there's still one parfait in the fridge, because Cayden was more interested in playing with his, than eating it. He got a few bites down, but Mama ate most of this one after scraping it off the tray and highchair.




But he really enjoyed all the other new recipes from this weekend!

Nine Months

Can't wait for group tomorrow (it's been way too long), to chat with the girls and Mary, and to see how much Chicken weighs at nine months old.

Only major news at this birthday is that we're packing up the swing this weekend. Monday morning Mama strapped the Chicken in the swing for a few minutes while she got dressed, and Daddy discovered the boy moments later, hanging forward out of the swing, the straps holding on for dear life not to tear out of the apparatus and release the baby headfirst onto the floor. Cayden was reaching for a toy below the swing, and apparently threw the balance completely off, thereby dangling himself from the nearly inverted seat for a minute or two. One scare was enough for us, so into the attic goes the swing.

A couple of photos from today, and a video from earlier this week...

Showing off the new, rocker hair-do we discovered works so well for the boy:


And showing off the sock/shoes Grammy got him for his nine-month birthday:


And here is Mr. Grabby hands, who now gets a real kick out of squeezing parts of your face as hard as he can, to get an "owie" reaction. I'm sure this is exactly what we're NOT supposed to be doing (encouraging him to squeeze, hurt, entertain himself through rough play), but his laughs get us every time, and we can't help but play along.

Tough Day until Bathtime

Baby's first fever (101.1 when we called the doc; down to 100.7 at bedtime after Tylenol), and Mama needs glasses for the first time in her life. Only for driving (to see long distances ahead). Baby was much more upset all day than Mama was, as could be expected. But tough day all around.

That is, until the Tylenol, nap and dinner took effect, when we got a few moments of happiness.

The step before crawling

Dad calls it dryhumping

Baby's First Christmas

What a fantastic long weekend with Cayden.

He was a near-perfect baby during the children's Christmas Eve service. He was very tired though, so eventually I gave him a little snack to help him calm down his minor bruitzing. Which really freaked Brian out, since I didn't pack a hooter hider. But one of Cayden's blankets worked perfectly to cover everything discretely, and Mama just sang along to the hymns seated, while everyone else stood with their candles. It was a really special moment for me, actually. Nursing my love in church on Christmas Eve while singing to him by candlelight. And boy oh boy did my boys look handsome.

Went for dinner and presents to Grandma and Grandpa's house, and baby will surely love his activity table. He was a little too tired for it on Christmas Eve, but the sounds, lights and colors will entertain him in the coming weeks and months.

And while Mama will appreciate the baby food cookbook and Beaba cooker more than Cayden will, he'll certainly enjoy the fruits (but first veggies) of the machine's labor. :) (Thanks for the suggestion, Molly -- we can't wait to spend a weekend steaming and pureeing baby food!)

Christmas morning was spent at Grammy and Grand-dude's house, and Cayden much preferred eating bows to actually playing with his new toys. But he's starting to get a kick out of his new jumperoo, and we know he'll love having his own train set next Christmas season. Mama was particularly thankful for the new bedtime stories; now our collection is big enough that I shoudln't get too sick of reading any stories too often.

Christmas dinner for baby included homemade sweet potatoes, his first non-cereal food, for the first time. He wasn't so sure about the first bite (what an adorable look of confusion when he realized this stuff wasn't rice cereal or oatmeal), but he decided he likes sweet potatoes and ate all 2 TBSP. mixed with milk.

Then a little naked baby for desert. What a hoot.

And then we hit the road to East Hanover, to spend the evening with the Fasnacht crew. It never ceases to entertain me how all our family members continue to proclaim how advanced and intelligent their grandson, great-grandson, cousin and nephew Cayden is. What a proud, doting, loving family -- although probably a little biased and presumptuous. In any case, Cayden waved bye-bye to everyone at bedtime, whether he did it knowingly or coincidentally.

And Mama and Daddy got to spend some relaxing one-one-one time the day after Christmas, getting massages and enjoying a romantic dinner.

A great holiday, all around.

Rice Cereal!!

Raspberries

Dad calls them competitions, Mama calls them conversations.

I drink alone

Yeah, eah, with nobody else.

OMG, Thanksgiving CUTENESS!!!

This makes me so happy

Within the last couple of weeks -- somewhere around 3 months old -- Cayden has really started looking around with amazement and curiosity. Imagine my delight when I picked him up, put him on his feet on his changing table and realized how excited and enthralled he is with the bulletin board I made him months before he arrived. He loves it! My hard work and craftiness resulted in more than just wall art; that bulletin board is a visual extravaganza for my little boy's growing brain!

He's also a big fan of the tree on his nursey wall and animal burp cloth Ruth got him in Canada. I layed the cloth over the top of the glider, so Cayden stares and smiles at it when I burp him over my shoulder in the chair.

First laughs on video

Wait for them, they're a little more than halfway in. But I liked Dad making raspberries, so I kept that part.

I got a hickie at Bobby's 40th birthday party

Apparently my cheek tastes and feels a lot like another part of my body. Dad took a little longer to get a bottle than Cayden would have liked. I tried to calm him by talking soothingly in his ear, and this is what happened.


Happy birthday, Bob!

Cayden is two months old!

Sometimes I feel like time has flown, other times I feel like this was the longest two months of my life.











Here's Cayden watching his new favorite toy -- the light-up smiley star that plays music on his playmat. He doesn't yet grab the toys on the bars, but he's starting to get a kick out of looking at things.

Baby noises and rolling over

Oldie but Goodie

This made me smile this morning (then cry), so I'll share it. I needed the smile.

Some of Cayden's first cries. So scared and so innocent, not at all sure of the world he was just thrust into.

One more video: leaving the hospital

...because Brian may well turn out to be one of those annoying parents who wants to capture everything on camera. But I thought this one from Thursday was cute...