Wanderlust

He eats!

Recently we began to consider starting Owen on solids. He seemed to be keeping an exceptionally close eye on my plate at dinner time and kept trying to drink or eat anything within reach. I had intitially been waiting for his six month mark, when American Academy of Pediatrics and World Health Organization recommend starting solid foods, but I was concerned about his voracious appetite and that if we continued to deny him, he might one day devour a dog and since we are NOT Vietnamese, this would be wildly inappropriate. So a few days ago we bought some organic, non GI rice cereal at Good Earth and when his new Chicco Polly highchair arrived and was assembled, I knew we were in business.

I'm not sure what I expected from Owen's first encounter with cereal. I guess I thought he'd follow along the lines of what I had read on the internets. Hesitant, eating a few spoonfuls at first, reluctant to the consistancy and the whole weirdness of the activity. From the moment I put that first spoonful in his mouth, Owen opened wide and swallowed. And after that, if I didn't make it from the bowl to his mouth in what he deemed a reasonable amount of time, he would fuss and grunt like a wild boar. Everything I read said a baby would let you know they were full by turning their heads away or pushing the spoon away and that you should respect this repsonse no matter how little they had eaten. But Owen never does either of these things. He just keeps on gulping it down, even attempting to help by shoveling the spoon in his own mouth and making akward little grunts and pleas for more. On the three occasions we've fed him thus far, I've stopped simply because I don't believe he can possible have any room left in his little tummy. This cessation of feeding is always greeted by cries and extracting him from his highchair Owen seems to regard as tortorous and a infingement on his civil rights.

Stay tuned for more adventures in feeding and a never ending stream of pics with food plastered all over Owen's face. Because after all, isn't that what parents are for?

TV is Evil

This picture is proof that TV is evil. Owen is actually watching BabyFirst TV, a new channel on Dish Network that is free for a month. The shows are like a bad acid trip. But Owen thinks TV is the coolest thing and completely focuses on it. I've always heard from parents how TV makes kids become drones, but I didn't really believe it until I saw Owen, a five month old, become a couch bed potato.

Four years ago...

Four years ago today George and I were standing in a field of green grass on the lip of a sparkling little lake, surrounded by a circle of stone, getting married in the mellow sunshine of a beautiful waning afternoon. Afterwards, we danced by moonlight on the lawn of the lodge, barefoot, a bit tipsy, and delirious with happiness. This weekend, two of our dear friends (Rory and Amy) are embarking on their married life together at the same place, Mountain Acres Lodge. Here's to them and to a beautiful evening in the woods four years ago. Happy Anniversary!

Letters to the O

Five Months

I've begun to catch glimpses this month of the ways in which I am certain you will drive me crazy someday. The first inklings of your extraordinary stubborness and perpetual mischeviousness have trickled through. This, combined with your demanding personality and what is certain to be your early mobility has me looking toward the future with eyes squinted in apprehension. That being said, you are still the happiest, best baby I know but I am terrified this will mean you might be the worst, most difficult toddler the planet has ever seen.

The very first day after your four month mark, you rolled over on our bed independently as if you had been doing it all your life. You were completely unimpressed by this skill until I wreathed you in cheers and smiles and you realized this might be a useful manipulation tactic. Several times you rolled over in bed accidentally while sleeping and were decidedly unhappy with the results, waking in tears and with a perplexed confusion, staring at an unfamilar ceiling. Your sleeping patterns, as a matter of fact, were a source of constant confusion for the both of us this month as you continued to catnap your way through your day at twenty and fourty minute sleep bursts. Our attempts to resolve this by taking away the comfort and the annoyance of your pacifier only yielded a decidedly grouchy baby for two weeks. Your sourness wearied us into the inevitable restoration of the pacifier and you seemed immensely satsified with your victory and lapsed back into the pleasant little man we both know and love.

You've begun to use your long, terribly unattractive toes as handles this month, a fact which has delighted your father who thinks this is the cutest baby thing in the world. I am not nearly as enamored by this new development as it makes you nearly impossible to diaper when coupled with your new found squirminess on the changing table. But your fascination with your feet has extended into all areas of your development. You prop them up on anything and everything- the stroller tray when your ride, the edge of tables when you sit on my lap, the lip of the cover on your infant seat. You curl your little toes around things like a monkey and I'm certain if we had taught you to, you would have been able to grasp things with those digits long before you picked things up with your hands. You've also become very grabby lately and everything I carry in conjunction with you in my arms becomes a tug of war. You've begun to take my glass and bring it to your lips, letting the water wash down your chin in a long gurgle. We've bought you a cup of your own recently but you seem fixated on my beverages still, which makes me nervous since I'm sure one of these days you're going to down my morning gin and tonic and I'll never forgive you for it.

Speaking of downing things, everything goes in your mouth now, including any part of my body you can reach. You are especially fond of my shoulder and chin, however. I'm delighted by the way you approach things you want to mouth. It's like a soap opera scene. You get fairly close with your hands but then lose all patience and fall on the object of your desire, covering it in your drooling, eager mouth.

You've gotten a fairly full head of hair this month, coarse and dark. Strange, longer infant hairs from your early days still reside on your head though and poke out in wispy strands from all angles. And while you appearance has yet to mirror that Michelin tire baby, your face and thighs have gotten a bit chubby and that double chin grows daily.

One of the most hilarious things I discovered about you this month is that lowering you into warm water makes you poop immediately. Nearly everytime I gave you a bath this month, you released your bowels with a smiling sigh and giggled with relief. In addition, you seem to be under the impression that the best time to pee is when your diaper has been removed, which is decidedly unconvenient for me.

My favorite moments this month were when you grasped my thumbs in your tiny fists, shored up your wobbly baby legs, and took off through the grass or down the hallway. This new concept of putting one foot in front of the other delights us both. And while I would have liked you to learn to crawl first for the sake of your developmental milestones, I don't think there's a chance in hell you'll ever be interested in mobility on your hands and knees anymore. I've already begun to mentally scan the house, looking for tender and sharp objects to put out of disasters reach. I don't think it will be long before we'll all be under seige in our own home,

Some of the most endearing moments, for your Daddy and I both, have been when you've reached out to us with both hands. You love to pet our faces with your soft baby palms, as if memorizing our funny features, angles and curves. And when we bring you in close, you lay your cheek against ours and wrap your arms about us, an unmistakable gesture of intimacy and love. It's in these moments that I understand how it might be impossible to deny you anything.

Air Show

There seem to be very few advantages to living in the shadow of an airforce base. The constant drone and keen of bombers and jets buzzing back and forth across your afternoon airspace is definitely not one of them. But this past weekend we got to experience an air ahow in our own backyard and, while the noise meant restless if not impossible napping for Owen, we got some pretty spectacular shots.

George should really be the one writing this since everytime the jets turned and swooped close by overhead, he raced down the hall and fell out of the sliding glass door onto the porch, practically falling down the deck stairs because his eyes were already skyward. He would come inside, breathless. "Did you see that? That was a B (insert number of your choice here because they all look the same to me)?" This went on for several hours on both Saturday and Sunday and by the time it was over, I would have been glad to never hear the sonic boom of a low flying jet again. But wouldn't you know it- I happen to live here.

Revenge on the Razeccas

Some of you may remember a certain incident this past fall involving Timber, Miles, a collie and a very irrationally, foaming at the mouth, irrate owner with a broken leash. Just a few weeks ago, we spotted the collie and owner as we embarked out of the garage for an evening walk, hustling his dog across the street as if he expected ravenous, bloody tongued beasts to come streaking out of the yawning mouth of our garage and tear into his dog's carcass with glee. I didn't realize at first what the situation was until I recognized the crazed owner, HOLDING his forty or so adult pounds of collie like a little poodle while he veered all the way across the street to avoid us. Chuckling to myself, I put the stroller in power step mode and proceeded to follow him like an avenging stalker.

I walked in his nervous wake all the way to his front door, on a cul-de-sac that I walk the dogs down nearly every day. There were tiles gracing the front wall of their terra cotta house- "Razecca." George and I discussed all the various ways we could enjoy this new found knowledge- sending holiday postcards, encouraging the dogs to poop on his lawn, and stalking his every walk until he cowered at home in fear of our vicious labradors.

Our revenge came soon enough- last evening in fact. I was on the second round of my jaunt with Timber in tow as I turned down Mr. Razecca's cul-de-sac. If I had been drinking liquid, the sound that would have come out of my mouth then could only be described as a chortle of satisfaction. For there was Mr. Razecca, calmly wheeling his trash bin out the curb for tomorrow's pickup, collie in tow. UNLEASHED.

As Timber and I approached, the collie began to bark. Timber, to his credit, although he pulled, didn't make a sound. Then the collie left Mr. Razecca's side and began to approach to hassle us. An unleashed dog- a menace to society, off of his own property and barking at a defenseless woman and baby with a LEASHED dog! I was clearly in the right here. Mr Razecca struggled to control his barking, unleashed canine. And right before I turned my back on him and walked away, I said cooly-

"You know, you should really have that dog on a leash."

Two year old Tog

Yesterday marked Timber's second birthday. We celebrated the day with frosty paws, a new bed, and a visit to the vet for bordatella vaccinations. Just what Timber wanted! We also discovered the lump on Timber's head (yes, he has another lump but we haven't been discussing it in hopes it would just go away if no one paid attention to it like the other one. So far no luck.) probably isn't a growth and doesn't seem to be attached to anything. Most likely a mass of scar tissue or inflammation from ingrown hair follicles.

So happy birthday to the Tog. And may all his school buses be little and yellow.

Freak Show

Owen has been an avid fan of standing since he was two or three weeks old. Put the kid on any hard or semi hard surface (bed, desk, counter, stomach, grass) and he locks his knees, throws his arms out to the side and gets a look of such rapt enjoyment and pride that it's impossible not to smile to yourself. Crazy kid.
In the last month or so, Owen seems to have recognized that by putting one foot in front of the other he can get somewhere faster. This revolutionary idea doesn't usually occur to babies until well into their ninth month. But Owen, at four months, seems to be a bit ahead of the curve on this one. Last night when I set him down in the grass, he just took off. Check it out!

Now, if only he could balance that enormous head. Then he'd really be on his way.