Your call is important to us

Sometimes he even opens up the flip phone before putting it to his ear. Silly little man.

What do May showers bring?

Apparently they still bring pilgrims -- in this case, from Texas.

It's hard to believe that already nearly a year has passed since friends M & K moved to Fort Worth. We've kept in touch through phone calls, e-mails, and duelling blogs, and I had that visit soon after they arrived, but it was still wonderful to find out that they were coming to town this weekend for an M-delivered lecture tomorrow. And it was even more exciting when we learned that they are expecting, and that Meh and I were allowed to host a baby shower for them!

Meh of course had been planning for months, but everything really came together in the last few days, with amazing efforts both artistic and culinary. Art-wise, Meh's crafting generated a vast array of cute baby-themed decorations adorning everything from windows to the dining room chandelier; a trivia game matching character names to children's books; and tiny vials of mints and chocolates for the attendees. Which brings us to the food, which was simply beyond -- tea sandwiches, scones with fresh whipped cream, a lemon tart (thanks to friend S for his recipe!), brownies, cookies, cupcakes... Wait, why am I enumerating them when one of Meh's artistic deliveries was a lovely menu?

Zachary had taken a long morning nap (a side result of his continuing 5 am wakeups?), so he was rearing to go for the afternoon, running around between (and occasionally into) people's legs before moving outside and circling the porch and yard with or without his pushcart. I think he went in his swing about four times as well. Entertaining him was a pretty fulltime job, so I didn't get to spend a ton of time with the other shower attendees, but it seemed like everyone had a wonderful time and enjoyed getting to catch up with M & K, celebrating their pregnancy, enjoying the incredible spread, and soaking up some of the beautiful summer weather.

Never tell me the odds

Yesterday we headed back to ye Swedish flat-pack furniture store to pick up the little man's new table and chairs, an early birthday gift from mima and papa! They're super cute, tiny, and he of course has little interest in sitting on/at them at the moment. But still, the chairs got approval when he tried to push them around the room. Time to pick up some felt pads for the feet.

On the drive down, we were listening to a little man CD that we hadn't heard in quite some time. When "Old MacDonald" (heh, gotta dig the Wikipedia link) came on, Meh mused that we had at least five versions of it, including pseudo-James Brown and Italian-translated covers.

So it was of course statistically bound to happen: this morning, Zachary's randomly shuffled music mix on the Xbox happend to pick three separate versions in a row - out of 200+ tracks no less. When the third rendition came on, I had to skip to the next track. There's only so much barnyard music one can handle at 5:45 in the morning.

As you might have noticed from the super-clear (and actually new) images in this post, our new camera arrived on Thursday! It's tiny (I know, we'll try to avoid a repeat of our last small camera's fate) but otherwise very similar to the last camera. The main new feature I found was that you can actually zoom while shooting videos. But it's digital zoom only, and no refocusing, so our mileage may vary. All of the pictures so far have of course featured Zachary. Yesterday, Zachary and I played at the park, and all three of us were hard at work preparing the grounds, house, and tasty foods for our friends M & K's visit and their baby shower later today!

Monkey See Monkey Do

Zachary finally broke out of his three animal noise rut yesterday, and was monkeying around (oh, the pun!) for mommy. Here's a video she grabbed; apologies for the quality, we're still back to our old camera until the new one arrives (hopefully later today!)


Meh also tried some trivia out on the little man to surprising results; she asked him where his hair, ears, eyes, and nose were, and he was able to point at all of them successfully on the first try. (For his nose, he 'pointed' by jamming his thumb up into a nostril - so cute, though hopefully not the start of a habit!) In general we've been working on getting him to identify and count items in his books, though he prefers to hold our finger and make us do the actual pointing.

Despite the blackout paper on his curtains, Zachary has been getting up earlier and earlier, often seemingly even preceding the crack of dawn. Meh was wonderful about getting up with him yesterday so I could get a bit more sleep - at this rate, the little man is going to drive us to a 9 pm bedtime of our own! At this point we still can't really get him to stay up much later than he does; he's always ready for sleep by 6:30 at the latest, and attempts to stay up later generally lead to lethargic semi-play with toys and books. Some child care folks say the key to sleeping in later is going to bed earlier, which I think would really get crazy for the little man - when would we put him down, 5:45? Other friends suggest a little top up of milk before bedtime, which we may attempt if this trend continues. *yawn*

Change he can't believe in

Zachary is certainly a creature of habit, and at times he will become very displeased if things aren't just so. We've seen this in his choice of books (bedtime has specific favorites; if you offer him a book he doesn't want, the hand sweeps across and pushes it away), the way he wants to play legos (we assemble them, he disassembles -- though lately he's started snapping them together himself), and of course the specific foods that he most enjoys (though again, he does occasionally try something new, even if it's just bringing it to his lips before an outright rejection).

His drinking cups similarly must conform to exacting dimension and delivery requirements; milk in a sippy cup (or if we're feeling adventurous, occasionally in an open air cup), juice in one of these nearly airtight straw/lid cups. (The air-tight seal is a double-edged sword; lately he's been pushing on the springy plastic lid, which forces up juice through the straw and makes a mess. It also doesn't work so well in pressure changes on planes; on the flight home from Florida, the juice cup soaked his shoes and socks, which were sitting alongside it in the seat pocket.) On the occasions where we've forgotten to bring the right cup and try to serve milk in a juice cup or vice versa, he looks at it suspiciously, will occasionally take a sip, shudder, and then hand it back to us while shaking his head.

Incidentally, we've been noticing lately that Zachary will always carefully put his cup on a table or counter top if he's done drinking from it. The other day I found one on the front window sill that he likes to look out of. The converse is also true though; if I'm filling his cup on the counter, he's been starting to make attempts to grab it before I can get the lid on.

Anyway, the straw juice cups are certainly rugged, but they were bound to eventually start to fail after nearly a year of constant use and dishwashing. The straws started to crack, and rather than let the little man get his first taste for plastics, we started to pitch them. When we got down to one last week, I took the little man to the store that allegedly carried them. No dice, though he did have a fun time looking around at everything and checking out things I put into the shopping cart. The next day, we ran to the next-closest store, and again no dice - and then struck out for a third time stopping at a store on the way back from lunch with friends S & J. Of course, this was the moment I noticed the third straw was starting to split.

I finally found some stocked at an online store, and purchased three, feeling mildly silly that I was paying as much for shipping as for the cups themselves. Still, it seems worth it -- today, Meh tried to give him juice in a 'flip straw' cup (exact same brand! exact same cup shape!) we had in the house, and he frustratedly rejected it. He also shook off three other cups, and Meh eventually had to revert to the old on, from which he happily drank his grape juice/water mixture.

It's my potty, I can cry if I want to

I keep forgetting to mention the milestones - Zachary's cuspids (canines) are coming in on both the top and the bottom, which of course means more hands in the mouth and occasional unhappiness. On the verbal front, he's still very talkative, and has started to say 'uck!' at times, which we think might mean 'truck'. On the food front, he's actually been seen using a fork to pick up food (often just to pull it off the fork with the other hand, but we'll take it one step at a time), and will very occasionally surprise us by eating something we offer him that isn't on his top ten list.

In the playtime department, he continues to be more and more interactive -- books, singing, dancing, playing the piano, and going to the park are among his favorite activities (the way he runs to the stroller when I ask if he wants to go to the park or for a walk is priceless). He and I have also developed a fun little bathtime game where we take turns saying various sounds and words that end in 'ah'. He of course starts with the classic 'Dah!', but then moves on to 'blah', 'crah', 'quah', 'xa', 'hnah' (a very impressive one), and other sounds. The game almost always gets him laughing, particularly when it takes me a second or two to come up with one I haven't already said (my extra rule to keep things challenging for daddy).

Meh brought home a little potty the other day, donated by one of her generous coworkers. It's very cute and multi-colored, though I'm not sure about Zachary showing an interest in training any time soon - he's still completely satisfied running around wearing a diaper comprising at least half his weight. And he often gets angry when it's time for said diaper to be changed, despite songs, distractions, and games. Not entirely related (though who knows?), both Meh and I have been subject to, um, 'accidents' in the past few days when we remove the diaper and wait more than a precious few seconds before grabbing a new one from the other room (Meh) or getting him into the bath (me).

Blog reader (or at least blog commenter :) demand for pictures of the flipped rooms and our portraits has been high, so I busted out with our old camera (and yup, a new one has been ordered) and snapped a few shots.

As the final part of the flip (well, for now at least!), I installed three new overhead light fixtures -- and no electrocutions to show for it. Score.

Make money in your sleep

It was bound to happen at some point - as I went to create our last post, I noticed a shiny new tab labelled "Monetize" had popped up in our blogging website. Yes, now you too can add targetted advertising to your blog readers. But if that isn't working out for professional news sources, why should it work for blogs with like two readers? Granted, there are plenty of blogs with enough hits that you'd think maybe some ad revenue would be possible, but you've got to wonder just how much money they're going to generate. For that matter, I'm wondering what kind of ads AdSense would serve up based on the contents of our blog. This may be worth the experiment just to see how confused and inappropriate the ads might be.

Portrait gallery

For the past few months, Meh has been hinting excitedly about a surprise that she's been planning for me for our anniversary. Our anniversary is in July, so I was impressed and/or worried that the project was being worked on this far in advance. Granted, I've done the same to her for years, with what she apparently considers maddening hints of 'I think you're going to like this' and knowing (but not revealing) smiles. Anyway, so I figured turnabout was completely fair play, and I looked forward to July. But then it was explained that it was actually both a father's day and anniversary present, so was it okay if she gave it to me in June? And then, I think Meh got a little impatient and excited to show me, because this morning, there they were, displayed beautifully on our fireplace mantel!

Meh commissioned an artist to create a portrait of us (for our anniverary), and a second of the little man (for Father's Day). What an incredibly wonderful, personal, and totally unexpected gift! She apparently worked with her on picking out pictures, drawing approval sketches, picking the color palette, and creating the final portraits. I was completely oblivious to what might be in the large cardboard tube that arrived a few weeks and her several trips to Michaels last week for matting and framing.

Here's the little man pic, along with one of the photos the artist used as a reference. (Portraits without even meeting the subjects in person? Impressive!)

The pictures are simply perfect on the mantel, and we've all been enjoying them. Best presents ever, and I certainly don't mind if they're a month (or two) early!

Flip that house

I've mentioned that the fireplace project was one of the few big things we'd really wanted to change when we first moved in. But Meh had many more plans around the room; the fireplace was just the catalyst or centerpiece or something. Anyhow, this week, we flipped that room (which was the dining room) and Zachary's play room (our 'music' room, though the number of toys made stepping to the piano a bit treacherous at times). Friends J and S graciously came over and helped me lug the heavy upright piano and the awkwardly wide dining room table around, and we moved Zachary's toys and their related storage as well. Yesterday morning he was mildly confused when I brought him down to breakfast to sit in the same high chair in the same spot, but with the whole room transformed around him. And after breakfast, he was confused and annoyed when he couldn't find his books and trucks; Meh had moved the books into a cabinet and the trucks into what had been his treasure chest of books. Once we showed him where everything is, he took to it well, and was zooming his push cart through his new much larger play area much of the day. His behavior around his "library" is my favorite; Zachary now casually walks over to the book cabinet, opens it, and browses his collection fairly thoroughly -- before bringing us the exact. same. book. every time.)

Today we drove down to everyone's favorite (well, perhaps not everyone's? :) blue and yellow Swedish store to pick up a few more pieces to complete the room transformation. Naturally Zachary fell asleep on the way, and we busted out the old classic ergo (I hadn't worn him in months!) for an attempted transfer. He was awake, but happy to snuggle with daddy for the walk around and through the store. We stopped for lunch at the halfway point, where I enjoyed a yummy pear cider and Zachary sang in between snacking on cookies and strawberries while sitting in a fashionable European high chair.

(With all of these sporadic links, I'm starting to feel like this post is the blog equivalent to that scene from Fight Club.)

In the end, we got a new chandelier (featuring both electric lights and candleholders) for our now-dining room, a little love seat that the little man will practically climb onto for story time, and a nice big shaggy carpet on which the little man likes stomping around, scattering his legos, and pushing his cart, which thankfully doesn't get stuck. I really do think he likes the larger space, as he spends a lot of time playing in a room that just a few days ago was very boring indeed for him!

Head case

I wish I could say that every time we travel it gets a bit easier to sort out the logistics. More accurate would be to say every time the logistics change a bit; on this trip, I thoughtfully attached that stroller converter wheely thing to Zachary's carseat so we could wheel him around the airport, only to have to disassemble it at security and add an extra fifteen minutes to our checkpoint experience. But one thing that I have figured out (to the apparent amusement of fellow air travellers) is that when the wheels are attached, the most effective way to lug around his car seat is perched on my head. This actually gives me back both of my hands for bags, and I only really lose a minor bit of peripheral vision. This even works when boarding the plane, though checking row numbers is a bit of a challenge.

This background is offered as a preface to our return trip from Florida. Again, we connected through Houston (thankfully thunderstorm- and delay-free this time). Zachary of course had waited to fall asleep until 30 minutes before the previous flight had landed, and somehow he remained asleep through the entire taxi to the gate. When he was still asleep as Meh pulled him out of his carseat, I became that dad, lugging four bags on my shoulders and the car seat on my head as Meh carried sleeping Zachary and a backpack through the terminal heading for our connection - naturally at the furthest possible gate. Impressively, he continued to sleep solidly through the entire intervening time, as well as the boarding, takeoff, flight, and landing. Only when we left the jetway and entered SeaTac airport did he wake up and start a round of loud 'Dah!'s as he looked around happy but bleary-eyed. I think it'll be a few days before the jet-lag wears off; after collecting our luggage and car, we got back to the house at 1:30 in the morning, and he was up by 4:30. Good times. But all in all, Zachary was an incredibly good travelling little man on this trip!

Incidentally, the return trip set a new record for questions and compliments about that Travelmate seat adapter -- I think we may have single-handedly sold a dozen more of them, if the company wants to send along a finders fee...

We had a wonderful rest of our trip to Florida, spending some excellent time with mima and papa and enjoying some quality beach time (where Zachary could quite possibly have slept all day if we hadn't decided that a 4-hour visit was about enough) and excellently kid-friendly parks in southern Florida. At one park in particular (which we visited twice, it was so enjoyable for the little man), Zachary got to walk a nature trail (really more of an interpretive walk based on the way he kept doubling back and zigging back and forth), controlled an enormously complex mechanical lego ferris wheel contraption, rode a carousel with papa and myself (he loved it, we'll have to get mima and papa's pictures!), and ran around a giant wooden castle-like structure with water features in the middle. But of course, his favorite feature remained their giant swingsets. Consistency, consistency.

A very clean shot

We've long debated the merits of our digital camera. It's a handheld and very convenient to take with us, but we don't experience the excellent focus and crisp quality that our D-SLR-bearing friends get. Not to mention our camera (along with most other non-professional/non-prosumer cameras) doesn't even take photos in a standard print ratio, leading to partially cropped images when we send them out to get printed. (My favorite new feature of the photo-printing sites is the option to actually print in a 'native' ratio, even though that's like 4" x 5.3")

The thing about a camera being able to fit in your pocket is that, well, it will occasionally be found in said pocket. This morning, Meh went to do some laundry, and both of us forgot that the camera was still in the pocket of a pair of shorts that ended up in the washing machine. By the time I realized, it was already in the spin cycle. Papa had the excellent idea to use a hair dryer to help dry it out, but there was liquid behind the screen and it wasn't responsive. I've been occasionally trying out the camera during the day as it dries off, and for a while, each time something more happened: a quiet buzzing noise; all of the indicator lights coming on; the lense partially opening; and at long last, the screen allowing me to view pictures on the memory card (those at least seem wholly intact), though with a very retro vertically rolling screen. But it hasn't gotten beyond that, and I think we may indeed have to move on to the next family camera soon. For now, it'll be up to mima and papa to document the continuation of our Florida adventure, which has been very fun for the little man, us, and his grandparents alike!

Alas poor PowerShot, we knew thee well. Here's what could be its final picture, little man doing his silly little upward-squinting 'smile' in response to the camera and mommy's high-pitched "smile!" suggestion.

Medical tourist

Zachary has had a cold since, um, his first birthday? It's not quite that bad, but he's definitely gone from cold to cold - sometimes a cough, sometimes a fever, sometimes a runny nose, sometimes a stuffy nose. We've taken him in to the doctor after a few of the rougher days and nights, but they've generally said he just needs to keep getting rest and liquids. A few weeks ago, he actually got something different - an ear infection (in both ears actually) - and he got to do a round of antibiotics. As he recovered from that, he developed another cold and cough, which seemed to be on the mend until just before our marathon travel day on Friday. Then the nose began running again, and the, um, productive sneezes resumed. We exhausted at least a box of tissues before leaving for the airport, and it continued into our Florida trip.

After another rough evening last night, we decided it would be best to get him checked out to make sure the ear infection hadn't come back. So today we went to the pediatrician that one of mima's coworkers uses. I knew we'd approve from the moment we walked in the door; the lobby was set up like a cute little main street, with a sign saying 'Well St.' in one corner and 'Sick Ave.' in another, and cartoonish storefronts and traffic lights on the walls. (I actually incidentally sat with Zachary in the middle of Sick Avenue before I even noticed it, though I did notice another parent with a coughing kid sitting on Well Street.) And Aladdin on the TV screens for us to sing along with while Zachary smiled in our laps.

When we were led back to the exam room, the main street theme continued - the central nurse station was decorated like a giant truck (to Zachary's approval), and the room we waited in was brightly colored. Oh, and the theme of oranges was everywhere -- now I know oranges are a major Florida product and symbol, but would you walk into a doctor's office in Seattle and expect to see coffee beans or Microsoft logos even on the information signs? (Incidentally, nice rendering of steaming and heavy-looking briefs.) The little man wasn't happy to be weighed or measured, and hollered every time the stethoscope came near him, but the friendly doctor was happy to report it was just another cold that rest and liquids would help cure. The trip did give us the opportunity to update Zachary's stats - up 2 oz. and 1" since his last visit. (And yes, the doctor reassured us that it's perfectly fine that his weight is fairly stable for the last few visits.)

Taking the need for good old fashioned home remedies to heart, mima and papa took us to one of my favorite New York-transplanted kosher delis for lunch afterwards; true to form, Zachary declined both soup and a tasty looking potato latke. I'll admit it, I forced myself to finish the latke for him - yum!

A Minor Diversion

We're in Florida! Zachary, Meh, and I braved the journey to scenic West Palm Beach to visit Mima and Papa, as well as (let's see if I can enumerate them fully) nanny (Zachary's great-grandmother), poppy (Zachary's great-grandfather), Aunt K, Uncle H, and Aunt M. Oh, and we met cousin E as well, as part of a gala family barbecue dinner at mima and papa's house this evening. But first, on to the epic adventure that was our journey to the Sunshine State.

Unfortunately, none of the airlines seem interested in plotting a direct route from Seattle to the Palm Beach or Fort Lauderdale airports. Not that these are gigantic hub cities or anything, but still - shouldn't every other city in the country have a direct line to beaches and sunshine? The only real 'direct' option is Miami, which is still about 2 hours to Mima and Papa's house, and has fares that truly reflect the non-competition, going for $650+ when I checked months in advance. So every time we visit, we get to enjoy a different airline's hub city and a few extra hours tacked onto the journey. Sometimes this is actually a nice break. Not so this time.

One big problem I have with the hub and spoke model is that you end up flying to arbitrary locations that may or may not be even remotely close to a straight arc from departure to arrival city. We at least are usually able to avoid the ones that are obviously in the wrong direction (though a friend once explained how this is a great way to exploit the airlines via mileage runs. Honestly, I fly enough that I don't want to invent additional flights just to get more miles.) This time, we picked scenic George Bush Airport in Houston. Unfortunately, we also picked a week where the airport would apparently be fully shut down multiple times due to thunderstorms -- and yup, we got to enjoy one of these events.

Zachary for his part was amazing on the flights - happy, talking up a storm, playing with his toys, and eating occasional snacks in between walking up and down the aisles with us. We did have a wardrobe malfunction, where his outfit leaked onto mommy pretty early into the first flight, creating some early stress (only one backup outfit) and discomfort (no backup outfit for mommy) that was a good preview of the stress of the extended delays that would ensue. As we approached Houston (on time), the captain came on the PA, announcing Houston was closed due to thunderstorms, and we were going to do circles for the next 30+ minutes waiting for it to open. When it didn't in 60 minutes, we were rerouted to Austin to refuel. Of course, every other plane heading for Houston had been rerouted as well, so we sat on the tarmac waiting for the 2 fuel trucks on duty that day to deal with the thirty planes sitting around us. 90 minutes later, we were done refueling, and had to wait for clearance to land in Houston before we could take off. 30 minutes later, we were back in the air for the short flight back to Houston.

By this time, the crew had exhausted most of the onboard supplies (not to mention themselves; an attendant had to waive his right to go off duty 16 hours after starting his shift, in order for the flight to not get scrubbed in Austin), including drinkable water. So Zachary got his first taste of fizzy water with a splash of juice. The faces were precious puckers and shivers of surprise(unfortunately not photographed), but he clearly wasn't a fan. We landed in Houston to an obvious state of bedlam - lots of cancelled, delayed, and still-not-arrived flights. And here came the second problem of the hub & spoke model: when every flight connects through a single city, late incoming flights mean later outgoing flights. Our own outgoing flight (due to leave two hours before we'd landed) hadn't even arrived yet.

Zachary still handled things pretty well, first strolling around in his car seat's wheeled adapter and then taking the adapter itself for a push around the terminal. But even he was totally fried and eventually needed to be held by mommy while she sang the same song over and over. The flight finally arrived, unloaded, re-boarded, and left, and Zachary again did very well and even slept a bit (in between more wokka wokka-ing) as our now long haul to Florida wrapped up a little after 3 am, more than 4.5 hours after we'd been scheduled to arrive, and 15+ hours after we'd headed to the airport. Oh, and here's a time lapse set of videos of Zachary's in-flight commentaries:





We all slept pretty late today; even Zachary wasn't up until 10 am. He's been very happy to see mima and papa, and has played a lot with them and their fun toys (including a toy piano that he plays and sings along with in a very cute way). And when the family arrived for the barbecue this evening, they brought his new favorites of this trip: pushable cars and trucks (did you expect something else?), both finger-sized and Zachary-sized! Through most of dinner he was pushing his Spiderman pushcart around the patio, to the delight of the guests. He was still pretty exhausted and was ready to crash before folks had left, though I think we'll get to see nanny and poppy again later in the week. A wild and full first day!

Home is where the hearth is

At last, our long-term fireplace remodel project is wrapped up! This was the one feature of the house that Meh really wanted to replace when we bought it; the previous owners (or perhaps two or three owners ago?) had turned their fireplace into some kind of altar/shrine thing (see below), complete with pipe organ-looking tile and a giant but only mildly effective wood-burning stove.

Various other projects (many invisible - crawl space, insulation, etc.) had distracted us, but finally Meh put her foot down and we got things rolling back in, um, Feburary. Unfortunately, when they went to install the new gas fireplace insert, the company that makes the inserts had gone bankrupt, and the model we'd planned on using was nowhere to be found. A futile search ensued (since other models were more expensive), but we finally switched models to one that was nice-looking but not bank-breaking, which thankfully didn't require the fireplace to be re-reframed first. Then the fabrication of the hearth and sides, then the mantel, and finally repainting.



The construction crew wrapped up the final paint touchups on Tuesday morning, and we enjoyed a cozy fire that night that warmed up the entire downstairs. Zachary isn't quite sure what to make of it; Meh says he'll hover just beyond the hearth and smile at the insert before running off in the other direction.

The birds and the weeds

Our neighbors tore down their fence in preparation for building a new one. This did two things: made me mortified that the dishevelled state of our backyard is now on display, and allowed me to get at some of the weeds and brush near the property line. While Zachary swung happily this afternoon, I raked old leaves and dead brush. While I was working, a tiny bird flew suddenly out of the stone wall. When I peered at the place she had been, I saw a nest with three tiny eggs in it.

Friend T showed me a website that helped me identify the bird as a dark-eyed junco.

I have spent Zachary's nap time for the past two days doing yard work and weeding the front garden. It's no fun. It was even less fun since the neighbors hired three professionals to do it for them. So, as they quickly and efficiently tidied the neighbors' yard, I yanked weeds pitifully with my tuchus in the air, making little progress. One of them actually asked me "who was winning." So tonight, I decided to take revenge. We ate the weeds. Dipped them in honey mustard and ranch. So there.

We didn't take a photo, they were gone too fast!

Baby's First Revisionist History Board Book

One of the fun things about being a parent is getting to introduce Zachary to things that we remember and enjoyed from our own childhoods: going to the beach (as we look forward to next week with mima and papa!), meeting fun animals at the zoo, enjoying a trip to the park, swinging, and most especially reading books that we recall our own parents reading to us. (Indeed, as I've mentioned some of the books we read to Zachary's grandma, she can drop right into a rote recitation of them; clearly Zachary isn't the only one who likes to hear the same book repeated ad nauseum!) Of course, all of Zachary's experiences are unique, and his perspectives and memories of them will be different than ours were. But at least the core content of the experience is the same, right?

Apparently not -- the books of our youth look to have been subtly changed from under us. Meh registered for one of her favorite children's books as a birthday gift, but the artwork had been dramatically updated and the text itself is labelled as a 'retelling'. And Meh thought she noticed a few updates to Zachary's current favorite Richard Scarry book (about trucks, of course), and while I chuckled at some of the dated vehicles (fuel oil trucks, anyone?), I didn't realize that his entire series has actually been politically corrected in the last few years; check out this fascinating before (1963) and after (1991) comparison of another book in his series.

On the same topic, as we discovered at Passover seder, even the classic haggaddah of our youth was updated last decade -- though the most major thing I noticed was that some of the archaic English language translations were updated. Is nothing sacred? :)

Please shine down on me

Someone found the 'summer' light switch for Seattle and flipped it on this weekend, skipping right past spring; Sunday through today have been glorious and in the 70s. Of course you know it can't last; we're supposed to be back down into the 50s and cloudy by tomorrow, and rainy by Friday.

But in the meantime, we've been enjoying the great weather! Zachary and I played at our favorite local park on Sunday -- he ran around and around the play area, talking loudly to himself, and then enjoyed a stroller ride the long way home. When the great weather continued yesterday, the two of us drove over to a
local state park, which has the most incredible kids play area, with some kind of oddly Bavarian-themed towers, slides, and swings. (Apparently everything there was donated and constructed by local community members.) He was pretty pooped by the time play time wrapped up, and conked out for a mini-nap at home before having more afternoon play time and a giant dinner featuring his favorite, extra-messy blueberries. This picture, believe it or not, was taken after I wiped his mouth, while he was singing to his cup of water:

Trust falls

Zachary has a new favorite activity at the local mall's play area. He climbs up the multiple levels of the faux ferry boat, looks back at us, smiles, and then steps/leans off into our arms. I'm mostly worried for the day when he doesn't notice that we're not there and attempts this feat; we try to at least instruct him to wait, and then count to three (taking the lessons he's learned from swimming time, where he doesn't go in the pool until mommy says it's okay). For now, it seems like he's all ready for a Ropes course or something.

The little man has been super high energy so far this weekend, and was yelling and hollering as we enjoyed the play aream, after happily chatting his way through lunch at our local kaiten sushi restaurant with friends K, J, and visiting LA friend E. And speaking of his trust falls, K and J have been taking their 2-year-old daughter N to this kids' gymnastics studio - it looks fabulous, and we'll certainly have to have Zachary check it out at some point in the near future. Perhaps the jumping off high surfaces thing will be the start of a career in male gymnastic tumbling?

A moment of silence

Whether it's CDs, portable media players, or mix tapes, there's always a clear delineation between tracks of music. We like to call it 'silence', and it often lasts up to one or two seconds. Zachary prefers to think of it as the end of the world; as a track ends, he'll look at us and frantically sign 'more' (and depending on his mood, perhaps accompany this with a good whine), only relaxing and enjoying the music again when the next track kicks in.

Zachary still really does love his music. He even sings (and not just in the way illustrated in last week's swing song), doing little descending two note melodies. (Is it a melody when it's only two notes?)

I keep meaning to bring this up, but I've found the music he's exposed to in kids' toys continues to be a little... uneven. Okay, now I feel like a music snob. :) (And this after I just got back from speaking at a conference where I learned that a now highly successful game audio director got started with the sound for Teddy Ruxpin!)

I remember chatting with T about this when we were in Arizona, and she agreed. Though then again, she was another music major, so we're not getting a great sampling here. Anyway, it just seems mildly sinister that "London Bridge is Falling Down" is present in multiple toys with the same incorrect added note ("...my fair ley-EY-dee"). Did just one person notate the song and then all of the toy manufacturers grabbed the same program? Zachary once had a mobile that had some interestingly incorrect rhythms and notes for some pretty well-known classical music. His Passover board book (one of his favorites, and just in time for the holiday!) provides music for the Four Questions melody but misaligns the lyrics. The Chanukah board book has a bunch of wrong note values. And then there's a toy we had that has knobs to play music by Mozart, Bach, and Beethoven, but it actually plays Bach's Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring for the Mozart option. Whoops.

Granted, none of this matters to the little man, who loves all music. When we get in the car and I ask him if he'd like to listen to music, he makes a happy little 'huh' sound and smiles when the tunes start to play. At home, he'll run over to the stereo system and lean on the plastic fence in front of it, waiting for the first song to start. Sometimes he'll even run over to the piano and plunk out some notes while looking at us and smiling. Even the end of meal time is accompanied by the "Zachary's Done" song, which generates smiles and laughs from Zachary. Such a little music man!

Swing song

I think this video really says it all (or at least Zachary does):

Four score and seven wokkas

Most mornings, when we hear Zachary wake up, we bring him into bed with us for a bit of snuggling before we properly wake up. Sometimes he makes a few cute noises or says "Dah!". Yesterday though, he gave a ten minute soliloquy only using the word "wokka". As I've said before, he's clearly a Fozzie Bear in training.

The last few nights, he's been waking up very angry a few times a night - definitely a change of behavior. While we were usually able to comfort him with snuggles and rocking in his rocking chair, something seemed a bit off. Meh noticed that one of his ears was a bit red, and we figured out that it was an ear infection. One of the home remedies for this is warmed olive oil, so Zachary smelled like a yummy pasta dish as I put him to bed last night. Meh took him to the doctor this morning, and sure enough, he has his very first (and hopefully only) ear infection - in both ears. Poor little man! He's now on the same outrageously pink amoxicillin that grandma mentioned my brother and I spent much of our childhoods taking while fighting off strep throat.

This week's new activity: clapping. The claps are usually pretty silent, and occasionally degenerate into 'all done' or 'more' signing -- no particular rhyme or reason to when he claps, but it's still pretty darn cute.

Build up

We were mildly concerned at Zachary's doctor appointment last month when the nurse asked a series of questions about which activities Zachary was currently capable of doing and we had to say no to many of the asks. The doctor dispelled our worries by explaining that these are all just milestones, and they wouldn't be worth asking about (or would be cause for actual concern) if they were things that all kids his age were capable of doing -- everyone does them in his or her own time.

Which leads us to the last two days - one of those questions had been "does he stack blocks?". On Friday or Saturday, Meh had flipped over his trainset toy tabletop, which has one of those oversized Lego-like things on the underside. On Saturday, he was picking up the legos and slamming them down on the table, only occasionally getting them settled in a 'correct' position. Yesterday, he was having more success, and when I looked over, he was suddenly building towers nearly as tall as himself! He got more and more accurate and sophisticated with his lego placement, fixing blocks that were misbalanced, and built several precarious towers over the course of the afternoon, getting very upset when one would accidentally get knocked over before he was done, and mildly frustrated when the rounded dog- and cat-faced top pieces (which don't have the connectors on top to continue to build up) couldn't be stacked on each other. Quite the change from when he used to be all about knocking blocks over. Oh, and he's still managing to reach under the table and play with the upside-down train track toys too. Now where's the milestone for playing upside down?

Gut check

Meh taught Zachary a new trick this past week:



He still hasn't done it for me in person, though we do have the video proof. This week Zachary has another cold -- this time he's got a little frog in his throat, which sounds very sad indeed. He also partially woke up a few nights ago when he was extra-congested; we listened over the monitor to the sad sniffles and mouth breathing, though he was able to get back to sleep pretty quickly.

Mommy braved getting Zachary his second haircut yesterday; this time there was no delay before he got very unhappy with the scissors and clippers. Meh said that multiple staff at the kids' barber tried to assist with distractions, but he still ended up having to be on mommy's lap and little man hair got everywhere. Hopefully next time I'll take him so we can spread around the, ah, fun a bit.

Part of Zachary's morning routine involves running up to the front windows of the house (or the door to the back deck), pulling up the shades if they're still down, and then looking out of the window while holding the sill for several minutes at a time. While at times he'll just quietly watch the world go by, other times he discusses his feelings about how the day is looking:



Even as I type this, he's doing just that, watching the hail/freezing rain (in Seattle, and in March?!?) falling -- but thankfully not sticking -- in the front yard.

Da is the word (still)

(Here's a post from the first go round of this magic word.)

The other morning, Zachary added to the truck/plane snuggling complexity, by really wanting to also snuggle with his dog pull toy. I'm starting to run out of lap real estate (let alone hands).

Mommy works this weekend, so Zachary and I have been brainstorming fun things to do. He said "dah!" yesterday, and I agreed that it was a good idea to meet friends J & S (and J's visiting parents) for lunch at what's quickly becoming Zachary's second-most popular restaurant choice. Afterwards, we of course went up to that Kids' Cove play area on the top floor of the mall. Even though it's usually the most packed on weekends, Zachary always manages to find plenty of space to play. Occasionally that space is at the bottom of a slide that kids want to slide down, but he's generally pretty easy to redirect.

Evening bathtime continues to be one of Zachary's favorite activities of the day, between grabbing at the faucet (as the shower/faucet toggle switch is right on the faucet, I'm convinced that one day he'll flip the filling tub over to shower mode and give himself a good startle), splashing (thankfully not too much yet), chewing on/playing with toys, and talking about his day. He also really appreciates it when I put in my own feedback; here's a pretty good recap of the week that we co-authored:



As seen in the video, Meh picked up some bubble bath last week, and he's been enjoying his fluffy nearly nightly bubbles, splashing and giggling when he gets a bubble beard.

Truck stop

Zachary has a new favorite pasttime: he encourages one of us to sit on the ground (preferably with his favorite blanket), gathers up and brings us his toy truck and toy airplane, and then climbs into our lap for snuggle time while holding his toys and kicking his feet happily. Super cute! Though it makes it a bit harder to multi-task when the little man requires our laps' full attention. The only interlude occurs if we send his truck out for a short push into the hallway; then he'll get up, race after it, and bring it back to us with a big smile on his face. Meh caught this first-person perspective video:



Fear not, the wipeout was minor and he was laughing the whole time.

Immersive reading

Grandma flew into town yesterday morning for a weekend visit! The two of us picked up Zachary from his nanny, and he burst into a big smile when he saw grandma. We came home and he had to introduce her to his favorite toys, including climbing into his cute treasure chest of books while she read him a story.

Of course grandma had a flurry of fun gifts for him. His favorite at the moment is a squishy red ball -- he waits for grandma to throw/roll it to him (apparently mommy or daddy just don't do it correctly), then he picks it up, and waits for a cheer from grandma before running the ball back to her ecstatically. Witness a round of this challenging sport here:



Meh is at a scrapbooking retreat today, so grandma, Zachary, and I went to the mall first thing in the morning to play and then grab some lunch. Well, Zachary spoiled those plans by setting a new in-car napping record of 2 1/2 hours. Crazy sleeping man! Thankfully we both had books to read, and it did help us all build up a bit of an appetite; when he woke up, we had a nice time having lunch together at this high-end dining establishment. Then we took the little man up to the children's area, where he ran around, talked, climbed, and played with all of the interesting toys around the circumference of the squishy climbing toys, while occasionally checking back in on all of the mall goings on below.

Back home for more playtime with the now infamous red squishy ball, books, music, outdoor swing, pushcart, bus driving time - a jam-packed day for Zachary, and one that left all three of us pretty exhausted!

Law of averages

This morning was Zachary's 18-month checkup! He had great fun in the waiting room playing with toys and looking at the aquarium of fish (but of course not tapping on the glass; there used to be a great sign in there asking children not to be a Darla). But for the first time, he actively got upset and cried from the moment we brought him into the exam room. He was fairly hard to console; I'm not sure if he was remembering previous shots or was just unhappy to be taken away from the fish. He was occasionally distractable, and even gave the doctor a smile or two, though as soon as the stethoscope and otoscope came out, he was right back at the hollering. Somehow between the crying and kicking (and that was before the shot, which is ostensibly the last one for the next few appointments, hooray!), they managed to get his vitals:

Weight: 25 lbs. 1 oz. (25-50th percentile)
Height: 32" (25-50th percentile)
Head circumference: 19" (50th percentile)

So right down the middle for all of his stats. In addition to talking to Zachary (in between his tears of course), the doctor had some excellent explanatory reasons for his love of the same book over and over -- it's potentially a case of comfort through object permanence and routine. This makes sense, though it still won't stop us from occasionally hiding one of his books after we read it for him the tenth time that morning. Incidentally, his book preferences have changed over time; his favorites at the moment are a Doctor Seuss alphabet book (he echoes the 'H, h, h' when we get to that letter's page) and a fun book about mice and colors, though he also brings us some of his classics from time to time; Goodnight Moon remains a favorite bedtime volume.

Little Britain

I'm just back from a trip to the UK, where I got to meet up with several of Zachary's young friends (well, two of whom I don't believe he's actually met yet) in between participating in this conference.

The night I arrived, I got to visit with friends N & S and their boys J & R. R was the first to arrive home from the evening activities, and is a very happy and mellow 8-month-old. We played and he smiled at my silly accent. J is 3, and full of energy - he was very happy to see me (I think he maybe vaguely remembered me from my last visit?) and kept chatting and wanting me to lift him up in the air for crazy gymnastic jumps; apparently his favorite character is Sportacus from an Icelandic kids TV program called LazyTown. (I haven't yet seen it across the Atlantic, though how much Nickelodeon do I really watch?) We had a lovely baffy time (the two boys share a bath; R is extremely cute and smiley in his little bath seat while J madly plays with toys around his brother) and bed time, and then N's parents watched the boys while the three of us went out for a lovely kosher Indian dinner.

The next evening, I was so glad to be invited to visit with T & B and their son T, who had moved back to the UK nearly a year ago, having been good friends from Zachary's parenting class. T is several days older than Zachary, but of course has a completely different skill set and personality. He was happy and talky, and knows a bunch of animal and vehicle sounds. He also uses utensils a bit and kicks a football (an American one at that; B is a 49ers fan), and eats a fair number of fairly sophisticated/adventurous foods. We all had a really nice time, and then the adults had a wonderful dinner together, including a delicious British sticky banana pudding for dessert.

The conference dominated the next few days, but my last night before leaving, I was back at N & S's home for a lovely family Friday night dinner, this time with S's parents (it's wonderful that both of the boys' sets of grandparents live so close by). J was absolutely adorable, helping to light the Sabbath candles and then leading all of us in rousing song after song -- he really does enjoy his Jewish traditions!

It was so good to catch up with our friends and their children, and I thank them all so much for their wonderful hospitality. I'm also looking forward to hopefully welcoming them back to Seattle soon!

While the trip was productive and it was lovely to catch up with our friends, I was still very happy to be back home yesterday afternoon. I arrived during Zachary's dinner time, and he had a giant smile on his face and seemed very happy to see me - though he was also sad to see his temporary nanny leave; we stood in front of the window and he waved as she walked to her car. So cute!

Swing kid

It took many months, and multiple trips to the hardware store, but Zachary finally has a functional swing of his very own! Seriously, with how much he loves his swings, I feel bad for not installing it sooner. Meh had gotten the actual swing several months ago, and I lamely hadn't done the research or gone to the store to figure out how to attach it. Meh took it upon herself to hop over to the hardware store and pick up what looked like the correct parts. Upon closer reading of the directions and looking at all of the parts together, we had to return to the hardware store (and of course, as always, multiple times; the required hole was large enough that I had to switch from drill bit to spade), but finally had the right stuff for tool time.

The apple tree in the middle of our yard has the perfect branch for a swing - nearly horizontal, fairly thick, and out of the way of things to swing into. When Zachary saw the swing nearly complete, he got very excited - and then vocally objected when I still had to tighten a few bolts before the ride could begin. But a few minutes later, he was secured in his new swing and very happy to be rocking back and forth:



We've already used it multiple times. I'm hoping that this will give Meh one more tool to entertain the little man while I'm out of town at a conference in London all of this week (I fly out tonight). It's tough to be away from them for so long, though I'm sure much more difficult for Meh. Thankfully friends have offered to help watch him a few times, and my company's backup care will be providing a nanny for the days Meh works. But I'll still miss them very much and be happy when I get to come back!

Put a fork in it

More firsts for the little man! First, he decided he wanted to go for a drive; Meh watched him climb into his school bus all by himself.


Next, he ran around talking up a storm for Meh. Of course he quieted down as soon as the camera started rolling, but Meh did catch him saying several of his new favorite words; "H" and "wokka" are among his favorites.


And lastly (and the subject of today's post), while we've gotten him to eat off a spoon or fork that we've held out to him, he wasn't interested when Meh offered him sweet potatoes on a fork tonight. Until she tried handing him the whole fork:

Hooray for Zachary's first self-silverware-fed food!

Open door policy

When getting Zachary ready for baffy time in the evening, I often let him run around a bit upstairs ("let" generally means he escapes in varying states of undress) while I get out his pajamas, get the tub running, and so on. He often plays with toys in his own room, brings me books to read, comes to check on the tub and make sure the water is filling (he loves to put his hands on the edge of the tub and peer in, often even bouncing with excitement about baffy time), or plays with the sliding hallway closet doors. Of course, as he is a curious little monkey, if any of the other hallway doors are inadvertently left open, he's off to explore. A few times he's ended up in the bedroom going through our drawers, or in the office playing on the computer keyboard or music keyboard.

So to help keep him out of too much trouble, I generally check to make sure all of the doors in the upstairs hallway are closed. Last night, he ended up in the office for the first time in a few days, and I just shrugged it off as not looking closely enough to make sure the door was actually closed. But this morning, Meh brought him up stairs, and she heard him grabbing the office doorknob and and opening the door himself! Oh no, is any room safe anymore? Is it time to invest in more of those baby gates that even grownups can't open? Though he's been thoughtfully eyeing and fiddling with those as well...