Merry Christmas!

Will's second Christmas was very busy...and tiring for a little guy! Thankfully he slept until almost 7:00 on Christmas morning (a present for Mommy and Daddy), and then we all trooped out to the living room for presents, Act 1. We were on a bit of a timetable for Act 1, as we needed to get all 3 of us ready and out the door for a full day in Wallingford with Dave's family (Act 2 and Act 3!). Anyway, Mr. Will pretty much inspected every present he got, and appropriately threw puzzle parts, Fisher Price Little People, books, tissue paper, bows and wrapping paper all over the place. By the time we got to the end of Round 1, he looked a bit overwhelmed by all the new toys, books and puzzles, so it was probably good that we packed up, bailed out and headed up to Wallingford. Let's call the car trip "intermission 1", complete with power nap.

Act 2 - Aunt Melissa, Uncle Lenny, Abby, Aaron, Auntie Jenny, Uncle Bobby, Oma and Gumpa all together for lovely breakfast and presents (thanks for cooking Uncle Lenny!!). This time we had fewer presents for Will (thank goodness), and he got the opportunity to see his cousins in present-opening action. This was Christmas morning at its finest - paper tearing, squeals of delight and everyone talking at once. Will spent most of the morning in my lap, either sharing my breakfast, or "helping" us open presents. Intermission 2 - Mommy and Daddy made a Starbucks trip on the way to Oma and Gumpa's house for the big finale - Act 3 (includes 40 people...). Intermission 2 includes a power nap.

Act 3 - We arrived at Oma and Gumpa's with a sleeping Will - I carried him in the house and up the stairs, praying he'd go back to sleep for awhile in the guest room - quick, while it was actually quiet. But no. Will saw the ceiling fan in the guest room and was WAY too excited to sleep (never mind that it wasn't even ON). Anyway...that meant that we went downstairs for exploring. Will inspected the set up of each and every room downstairs, talked to Oma and Gumpa for a bit, and said hello to both the cats. Mean Mommy made him get dressed in his nice clothes (getting dressed is always a wrestling match when there are better things to do). And then...everyone started to arrive. And Will did a GREAT job - there was no screaming, no freak out - and he got kissed and hugged and had about 30 strange faces to greet! It was a lovely afternoon/evening. At about 3:00 Will was starting to melt, just a little bit...and I was hoping he'd just last through dinner - to be served at about 3:30. He finally looked up at me and started saying "all done", over and over again. And finally, I got it (duh!) - I said "are you all done being awake?! OK, let's go upstairs and see about a nap". Mind you - there were 40 people in the house - so I fully expected NO SLEEPING. He was out like a light. Slept for 2 hours - thank goodness Oma was upstairs when he woke up (strange place, by himself!)....

So a very lovely Christmas was had by all - we had a quiet day today, and should have a nice quiet weekend (woohoo!). I spent a good portion of today trying to figure out where to put all the new toys/books/puzzles - I'm not done...it might actually require a shopping trip to get some bins....

Laps

Will's new favorite toys (in addition to the piano/xylophone of course) are things he can push. We spend a lot of time helping Will do laps across the basement or the living room these days, walking behind something - first a push toy that our friends Joy and Ken gave us, and now behind his very own wagon. Horton and the teddy bears are currently riding back and forth across the basement in the wagon. A couple of notes on the complilation below (I just can't seem to post video without notes...):
1. Uncle Doug is helping Will walk at Nonni and Poppa's house at Thanksgiving in clip #1. He was just starting to get the hang of 1 foot in front of the other at this point.
2. The rest of the clips are the progression that has taken place over the last couple of weeks.
3. To get the last 2 clips I had to get Will set up at one end of the basement (one end of the route) and then RUN to the other end and quickly start the camera, as Will starts as soon as I start moving. You can see how we might manage 20-30 laps in an evening...

At some point I suppose he's going to get up the nerve to stand without holding on to something, and then we'll probably have about a week before he's running based on the current pace...

In the clear...and a little music

We stopped in for a scheduled "ear check-up" this morning at the doctor, and it seems that this go-around, the antibiotics did the trick. We have clear ears, a little bit of a cough and some left over congestion, but the doctor was actually quite nonchalant about all of it. So we're in the clear for now, but the doctor did mention that we can expect an average of 8-12 colds over this cold season, which would be about 1 every 2 weeks (awesome?!), so we're armed with a bit more information/instructions for the next cold so that we can hopefully avoid the antibiotics.

After the doctor Will got to take a trip to Toys R Us for Christmas shopping for him and for all the nieces and nephews (we'll add one more in January, but we don't know which flavor yet...). Anyway - this will for obvious reasons probably be the one and only trip that Will gets to make to Toys R Us to pick out his own Christmas presents. :) It was a pretty short trip, Will was quite cooperative in the cart (it was busy, so I was half expecting him to be insistent about being up with Mommy). And most importantly, he is now the proud owner of his very own piano/xylophone. The toy was with him in the front of the cart and he was playing away as we hurried out to the car. Imagine my surprise when I pulled him out of the cart to get in the car - and I got back-arching screams (even parked in the cold, the inside of the car was at least 30 degrees warmer than the outside air!). Seriously?! So I strapped him in quickly (a small amount of negotiation required) and grabbed the piano/xylophone....yup - HUGE grin, and he started banging away again. So I got to listen to the musical "stylings" of 1 William Bostrom all the way home. Lucky me. The funny thing is that he's started to sing too. Well at least I think he's trying to sing anyway. He's terrible! But it is quite cute to hear him chime in from the backseat when he likes a Christmas carol. And tonight, he was in his crib listening to a CD (goes to sleep with some sort of music every night) - and sure enough, on the monitor, we got to listen to Will, singing away, until he fell asleep. Love that kid!!

So we are now in the deep freeze - post snowstorms - and I for one would like it to warm up by about 15-20 degrees. Less ice that way. And I seriously had forgotten how bad parking lots can be when there are big piles of snow - what a pain!

The tree is up!

So yes, the tree is up, and decorated. No pictures yet...but I DO have pictures of Will in the snow to make up for it...my guess is that you'd rather see Will in the snow anyway!! :-) We are at home this weekend, Will is recovering from a double ear infection, Dave has a bit of a sore throat, and we're featuring not one, but two snowstorms. We were planning on going to DC to attend Doug's graduation - we're very excited - his PhD!!!! But between the snow and my 2 slightly under the weather boys, we decided it would be better for us to stay home. The drive was potentially going to take on nightmare proportions and that's no way to start a vacation. Or attend a graduation. So....we're home, and enjoying the snow instead. We spent just about 10 minutes out in the snow this afternoon - enough time for Will to take in the fact that 1. it is cold, and 2. someday, it might be fun to play in. He did manage to keep his hat and his mittens on for 10 minutes...not sure we'll be so lucky next time!! All the pictures from today are in the 14 month album.

We had the best of intentions...but the Christmas tree is still naked. Tomorrow - with pictures!

It is only Thursday?!

We thought that this week would fly by. And I can say "we" with authority, because Dave has said it out loud as well - we thought this week would fly by, but it is dragging. And we're tired! Or at least I'm tired anyway. Dave has been at training in the city all week, and instead of staying, he's been commuting. I don't think the commuting has been so bad, or the training has been so bad, and the great circle route wasn't so bad for a couple of days. It has just made for very long, very busy days. Alarm going off at 5:30 every morning, the house empty except for 2 cats, 1 fish and an undecorated Christmas tree by 7:00 every morning (Dave has been leaving at 6), and no humans returning until 6:00pm. That's a long day. We have had some interesting highlights though...
1. I managed to completely freak Will out with the shower the other night. Oooops! He got sweet potato in his hair, so he definitely needed it washed...and the fastest way to get the soap out was to turn on the shower...and he screamed, at the top of his lungs, until I had finished rinsing his head, turned off all the water, wrapped him up in a towel, and got him most of the way in his pj's. We won't repeat that for awhile if I can help it.
2. Will can now sit in a chair at a table and eat an entire meal. Of course it is a little tiny table and a little tiny chair, and I have to say it is remarkably cute to see him sit there and grab french toast and melon out of a little bowl and chomp away on it while sitting up very straight in his little chair. We have daycare to thank for that little feat.
3. Will hasn't learned to say "Christmas tree" yet, but I keep trying. In the meantime...Nonni and Poppa got us a great very kiddo friendly Advent calendar last year for Christmas, and we got to put it up this year. I found the perfect spot for it - out of reach of the 4 footed monsters, and at the perfect height for me to hold Will and let him help. The calendar is a Christmas tree, with velcro and a whole bunch of ornaments (one for each day), so Will has been putting an ornament on the tree every night before bed. He's figured out that magnets will stick to the fridge, and his foam letters will stick to the side of the tub, so velcro ornaments on the Advent calendar are just about perfect for this year!
Tomorrow night we'll be decorating the Christmas tree, so I will try to post pictures over the weekend.

"In" experiment, William style...

I will admit that I turned my back for just a moment, so it is totally my own fault...when I turned back, Will had put his bottle IN Dave's water glass that was sitting on the coffee table, and tipped it over, water everywhere!!! He was so pleased that he'd figured out that the bottle would fit in the water glass that he was bouncing up and down and squealing with delight. Whoops!

I'm not exactly sure where to start, and I'm sure I'll miss things that have happened in the last couple of weeks, so please bear with me! Will is quite the charmer these days, though we seem to be careening toward walking and talking at the same time, and that's created some interesting situations for us. The latest developments....

We had a bit of a word "expansion" over the last 2 weeks - all done, uh oh, again, get down, and cheese have been added to Will's vocabulary. He figured out how to "use" all done in multiple situations while we were in Atlanta for Thanksgiving - sometimes entertaining, sometimes not. Entertaining when he would finish his bath and would say all done as the water finished draining out of the tub. Not so entertaining when he was sitting up in the bed at 4:30 in the morning trying to say "all done sleeping". In that situation he did say all done while grinning at me with that cute little dimple so I had to bite my tongue so I wouldn't laugh...He's now progressed to telling us when he's all done in the car seat, the stroller, eating, sleeping, or snuggling. "Uh oh" was used correctly for about 48 hours before Will started saying uh-oh for absolutely everything - everything that has dropped (whether he's thrown it or not!), when he bumps into something, when he sits down...etc. etc.

And now for walking....Will figured out that he could push the high chair all over the place while we were visiting my parents in Atlanta. Thank goodness Nonni and Poppa didn't mind! It was his absolute favorite activity....he started the visit by pushing the chair on his knees...by day 2 he'd gotten brave enough to stand up, and push whille walking.

Up to now we'd had spaghetti legs - why learn to walk when you can crawl everywhere with great speed?! Well, he finally got some interest in walking while holding someone's hands. Thanks for your help Uncle Doug!!We had a lovely visit with Nonni, Poppa, Aunt Lindsay, Uncle Doug and Ella in Atlanta. It was actually pretty quiet - a very nice respite for us from the craziness that is our usual day-to-day. We're hopefully off to get our Christmas tree this afternoon, take it a bit easy for the rest of the weekend, and launch into our work week. Pictures from Thanksgiving posted!!

Our friends...

Need your help!! We have been very blessed in the last year to have met a whole group of new moms (and dads) through our pediatrician's office. I don't mention them too often (I should mention them more often!), but "the mommies" are a wonderful support system for me in particular. Anyway, our friends Katharine and John have been trying to adopt Molly for years and they're stuck in political red-tape. As our friend Shannon says, normally our little Will is the star of the blog (in her case Millie is the star!), but in this case...Molly needs to be the star!!

Please take a moment to read their story and help if you can. Katharine and John's blog

And since Shannon outlined the relationships much better than I did...here's her post too! Shannon, Scott and Millie's blog

Thank you.....

Bottomless pit

So it seems that this particular growth spurt is going to require a whole lot of food! Will has stepped up eating to about every 2 hours when he's awake - we finally figured out why he was starting to get whiny every 2 hours, he was hungry (duh!). He's definitely protesting sitting in the highchair that often, but once you put the food in front of him he's content and eats away. And yes, he IS growing like crazy - his pants are suddenly much shorter, and the arms on his shirts are starting to get a bit short. I think we'll make it to Christmas (maybe) in the current round of clothes, and then we'll have to size up (again).

In other notes - we have a new sign!! I asked Will if he was all done in the highchair, and he said "ah duh" and made the sign for all done at the same time (the same sign an ump makes when a player is safe in baseball). I was so astonished I asked him again, and he did the same movement, so we know it's real.

I finally read last weekend about the "steps" to walking - I don't think Will is behind, but I wanted to know what to look for. Since Will is a pro at crawling, I figure it will be a little bit before he starts to walk - no incentive as he can get pretty much everywhere he wants to go by crawling. Anyway - he's definitely making progress - he's brave enough to transfer from holding onto the sofa to holding onto the coffee table, and is starting to turn to put one foot in front of the other when he cruises. He's finally gotten the hang of letting go and sitting down once he's tired of standing up. And last but not least, he's learned to turn around and slide on his belly to get down 1 or 2 stairs, or off the bed, or off the sofa. We can thank daycare for that move, as I am quite sure he didn't learn it at home.

And I can't possibly post without mentioning teeth. ;-) Will's 4th tooth on the bottom has finally popped through, though it seems to have slowed down a bit now that we can see it (probably just perception!). He's also working on his first year molars, so the fingers are back in the back of the mouth now.

I am off to Florida tomorrow for 2 nights for work, home on Wednesday in time for dinner.

Yaaaaay!!!!!!!

We're watching election returns...and in the middle of everything we heard "Yaaaaaayyy!!!" coming from the "playroom" portion of the basement. Socks (one of the cats) has figured out how to make Will's basketball hoop cheer for her, instead of cheering just for Will. Will "helped" me vote this morning, by sitting patiently in my lap as I filled in my ballot. He was great as we stood in line (at 6:30 this morning!!)...

Dinner for 3 and pumpkin guts!

Will has started to boycott baby food (hooray!) and is a lot more interested in feeding himself. I wasn't so sure he was getting there until today - he ate burrito and corn at lunch, and yesterday he tried fig newtons and loved all of it. Go figure! So...tonight, we made chicken stir fry dinner for 3. And Will ate some...not a lot, but he ate some. It's a start...

And now, pumpkin guts!! We decided that tonight was the night to carve the pumpkin that Dave and Will picked out last week. Will had a great time feeling the pumpkin guts, Mittens waited patiently for us to leave the pumpkin alone so she could chew on the stem, and I accomplished somewhat decent carving. Pictures posted...and a little tiny bit of video below. Please pardon Will's paparazzi (Dave) as we weren't sure the video would actually turn out!! As usual, my commentary leaves a bit to be desired... ;-)

Jack-O'-Lantern Spectacular!

Imagine 1000 pumpkins, carved to look like everything from dinosaurs to Frank Sinatra (and everything in between!)...we were lucky enough to see the Jack-O'-Lantern Spectacular at the aquarium in Norwalk this evening (thanks Shannon & Scott and family for a great evening!). I think Will enjoyed himself, and Dave took lots of pictures. I just got to look at the pumpkins, and help Will reach out and touch a few of them.

The rest of the weekend was just as fun....our very best wishes to Karen and Andrew - it was a lovely wedding on Saturday night, and I was quite happy to "share my birthday" with everyone for such a momentous occasion! We owe Bob and Jen a big thank you as well - they were babysitters for the evening....and thank goodness, Will was angel baby for them. :-) Of course he was NOT angel baby after they left....we ended up with all 3 of us in our bed last night, not ideal, especially since Will is like a jumping bean in his sleep these days (I had no idea how much he flip-flops in the night until last night...).

I've posted new pictures of Will's trip to the farm up the road to pick out pumpkins with Daddy, one picture from the wedding (scanned in Polaroid...) and some from the festivities this evening. Back to work and school tomorrow morning...

From "scared to climb the first stair" to...

Climb the entire way up the stairs with Daddy following slowly behind. No problems. I'm not exactly sure when this skill arrived but it means that we will actually have to start to use the gate at the bottom of the stairs now! It is "poised for action" but we haven't been using it because we had the "scaredy cat" factor in our favor. The only reason we even figured it out today...I went upstairs to put some milk in a cup for Will, and he decided to follow me! More as the weekend rolls on - we've taken a family day off today. It is so nice to not have anywhere that we "have" to be, and to just spend the day hanging around the house. Of course it means I keep on coming up with things I "should" be doing, but I'm resisting temptation, and watching Will drop blocks down the elevator shaft of his garage for fun...Tomorrow we have a wedding in the late afternoon for a great friend (a DATE! woo-hoo!!!). In between I hope I can get a few more videos/pictures posted (we seem to be constantly running out of batteries in the camera and memory in the video camera!). Happy Friday!!

When a picture is worth just a few words...

I downloaded this picture from the camera tonight, hoping that I really had caught Will, mid-squeal of delight (Mid - "eeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!"), while playing with his garage. Seems that I was successful...

Mama, Dada, ah duh, rug, cat, uck

Translates to...Mama, Dada, all done, rug, cat, truck. And so it begins...the babbling is constant, the real words are few and far between - but they're there. And as we watch (in utter amazement at times) - we seem to be experiencing a communication extravaganza. Much much more to come I'm sure!!

In other notes, we went to the doctor on Wednesday morning for Will's 1 year check-up, and walked out with new stats, and 5 band-aids. New stats: 19lb 1oz, 29 inches long. Clear ears. "Looks great" (per the doctor). Of course he's still a peanut by today's standards - about 4th percentile on weight, and 20th percentile on height. But he's our healthy peanut...and we wouldn't have him any other way! 5 band-aids were required for the 4 vaccines (one in each limb!) and the toe prick to test iron/lead. I hate the shots - he always gets so darn MAD - and most definitely blames me for whatever is hurting him! He still gives me a "how COULD you?!" look when they're poking him that just is enough to make you cringe!

And now...for the current favorite game in our house...chase a naked baby. Will has started to completely boycott all diaper changes and getting dressed in general. I can usually get him in his diaper (most of the way) before he manages to break free and tries to launch himself off the changing table. In the interest of saving us a trip to the emergency room....I scoop him up and put him on the floor in just his diaper. And the game begins.... "heh heh heh, eeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!" and Will takes off crawling for no particular destination. I walk behind (laughing), pajama parts hanging over my shoulder, and usually spend the next 5-10 minutes getting him dressed, in bits. Often, we end up with "mad scientist" hair to complete the "ensemble". Lovely, really...

The birthday celebrations continue!

Will has been celebrating his birthday in fine style - I often joke that all birthdays should be celebrated for at least a week, and on his first try, Will managed to celebrate for about 4 days. An excellent start! ;-) He's got some practicing to do though...he's not exactly sure what to do with cake...There was a whole lot of squeezing the frosting through his fingers and basically no eating.

We had plenty of enthusiasm for toys, eating, birthday cards, birthday presents, bithday hats, and napkins this afternoon. I was a little concerned though, as the party started, family and Will's godparents started to arrive...and this was Will.

I have no idea how he managed to fall asleep like this, except he was pretty mad at me when I put him down for a nap around 11. He settled down though and I heard him playing with the toys (all smooshed behind him in the picture). Eventually, silence, no more rustling, so I figured - "GREAT! he's sleeping!". I just didn't know he'd be sleeping sitting up....

I've posted more pictures from today. And finally...just because it makes me laugh...who needs to walk behind the lawnmower when you can push it while you crawl?!

Maybe bubble wrap IS an appropriate solution...

I am concerned that at least for the moment, Will seems to lead all forward motion with his face. This means that yes, we've already had our second bloody lip moment - all in a week! Friday morning around 6, Will completely missed with his hand when he was crawling and landed on his face, again. I figured no biggie - he didn't fall very far - not so much. At least I knew exactly what to do to get him settled and cleaned up quickly (since I now have some experience in these things). I understand that it is entirely unrealistic to think that Will is going to make it through this learning to stand/walk phase without bumps and bruises. I also wonder if there is a way to safely wrap him in bubble wrap until he's gotten to the point where he can reliably walk on his own! ;-)

On a separate note - ears still aren't 100% from the ear infection, so Will is on a 5 day "zap it" course of antibiotics...let's hope that everything is clear when we go for his 1 year check up on Wednesday.

Will post again tomorrow night with pictures and video from all the birthday celebrations....

Happy Birthday Will!!

It has been one amazing year, watching you grow like crazy and learn and become quite the amazing little personality! We'll never forget the day you joined us and made us a little family of 3. :-)

As Dave said tonight...just think, a year ago, we were eating Wendy's! I often have a hard time believing that it has been a whole year already...it has absolutely flown by!

And now instead of this little tiny "loaf of bread" that did nothing but sleep, eat and require lots and lots of diaper changes, we now have a little boy...

And this little boy is taking after his daddy - he always has a good story to tell...and he's very busy!
So now, back to my usual newsy self.

Last weekend was very busy (seems to be the norm these days). Saturday I had a party for some friends getting married in November. It was a lovely afternoon "out" for Mommy (and a bit of respite from a very needy William). On Sunday we went to Will's second birthday party - this one for his friend Jonathan. It was lots of fun - Will played and also saw his friends Millie and Cole, and had macaroni and cheese for lunch. He also managed to fall and give himself a fat, bloody lip. Mild hysterics ensued...but we did manage to get him cleaned up and headed for home. Oh, but I suppose I didn't mention...this is WILL...so the lip was just the beginning. He played in the kitchen when we got home, which meant that he bumped his lip a couple of times in his enthusiasm to stand up, or sit down, or grab something and chew on it. He was mad at me when I tried to give him Motrin with dinner, and grabbed the dropper as I "pushed the plunger" - which meant Motrin all over his face, and in his eyes. So into the bathroom we went for a little eye flushing - additional hysterics. He sort of forgave me for that episode when he was standing at the tub watching the water run for his bath (one of his current favorite activities...). Of course he was so excited about the bath that he started to bounce, and bounced his chin right on the edge of the bath - and bit his lower lip, so that started to bleed - yes, additional hysterics. The good news...his memory is short, and his lip healed very quickly, so by about Tuesday all was pretty much back to normal.

On Monday evening we made a family trip to Toys R Us for Will's birthday. I'm honestly not sure who was most excited when we walked in the door, Mommy, Daddy, or William. Several purchases later (lawnmower pictured above, a dump truck, a big bag of "mega blocks", and a little people garage)....we headed for home. Turns out the dump truck and the lawnmower are the current favorites. Of course we haven't opened the other 2 items yet....

Will has been "transitioning" this week to the big boy room at daycare. He's really quite adaptable, and seems to have taken to the new schedule, new toys, new room, new teachers quite well.

And now for this morning...when Will woke up we sang him happy birthday (he was very confused!). Nonni called this morning and sang happy birthday. Aunt Lindsay and Ella called and left a happy birthday message as well! Will had birthday balloons and multiple cards when we arrived home from work/daycare, and I brought home several other happy birthday messages from friends and family. I think Will had a nice day - for his very first birthday!!

I have quite a bit of video to download and edit - some very nice samples of the constant conversation in our house. Too tired to do this tonight, so I'll have to try for this weekend. In the meantime...new pictures posted!

Oh and one more thing...Happy Birthday Chase!!!!!!!

Turning a corner

It is amazing to me that in the space of almost a weekend my attitude can change completely! Especially when it comes to sleeping, and Will's current troubles with it. After much thought, and several conversations over the last day, I came to the conclusion that I should stop fighting Will on sleep and just go with it. Help him the best that I can, using the strategy that seems right at the moment (in other words - trust your instincts Mommy!). As I was reminded - there are as many sleep "strategies" as there are kids out there, lot's of "experts", books, etc. Will and I generally make a really good team - we can almost always work through it to get him to sleep, whatever "it" happens to be. So thank you to all of our friends that gave us suggestions over the last couple of days - I've used bits of everyone's strategies to help us turn the corner on this phase and we seem to be better. Phew!

On a completely separate note - I went to a party yesterday by myself - it was a "honeymoon funding party" for friends that are getting married in November, so it wasn't really Will friendly. And...I probably needed a break from being front-and-center for Will for a couple of hours. I spent just a few hours in the company of friends - and I came home refreshed and very happy to see my 2 favorite guys! Funny, when I get a chance to be out, and see people that I don't talk to on a regular basis, everything comes into perspective (I think this helped me get to my "zen" sleeping moment too!). I really do "have it all" - a very happy little family, lots of love and lots of laughter.

OK, now that I'm done with my cheesy moment...

Sleeping? What sleeping?

Will has reverted to some time around 9 weeks old when it comes to sleeping. We've had one rough week when it comes to sleeping at the Bostrom house. So much so that I actually sent a "help!" email to "the mommies" (our newborn group friends) this morning to get some feedback. We've been up every 2 hours, or up for multiple hours in a row in the middle of the night, and today Will actually slept in his rocker with the little motor on (zzzzzzzzzzz)...NOT ideal when you're about to have your first birthday! Fingers crossed that we're going to turn a corner, cause I'm just not sure how many more days/nights of this I can take and still do a good imitation of a functioning adult.

Double ear infection?! No wonder!

Just a very quick update as I must head for bed!! Will has a double ear infection...fever is down today, and he seemed to feel a bit better. Sleeping is still our trouble at the moment - getting to sleep and staying asleep. So bad last night between 9 & 10:30 that I made the call - Will and I shared the pull-out sofa in the basement so that Dave could get a decent night's sleep. Will and I got an ok night's sleep - I probably was better off just because I didn't have to be "vertical" every time Will was up and it meant we could both sleep until 7:45 this morning. Please keep your fingers crossed that we round the corner tonight, as we're on night 5 of this craziness! I suppose eating is still an issue as well - in that Will has not much appetite for solid food, and needs to take antibiotics twice a day and is on a steady diet of Tylenol to keep the fever down. I expect he's not going to make the 20 lb mark by his 1 year appointment (the goal), since he was 18 lb 9 oz at the doctor yesterday. In other notes...Will has decided that now is a good time to launch into cruising, and trying to string babbling syllables together, with appropriate inflection, at the top of his lungs. I'll see if I can catch it on video - the conversation he had this afternoon with the baby in the mirror was pretty amusing...

Wow, I have no idea where this week went...

so here goes...I think I probably get an "A" for being Mommy this week and an "F" for blogging. ;-)

While we were out at the zoo last Friday we got a voicemail, or I should say I got a voicemail, from the director at Will's daycare - they would like to transition him to the older infant classroom. Requirement - must be mobile (not a problem for us!). I think they'd left him in the current classroom just because they could - until he decided to start making friends with the younger babies by "patting" them - which in real life means hitting them...so I expected this phone call was coming. So on Monday I left the office a little early and headed for daycare to meet with Dave and the director to talk about "transition". Mind you - I felt like everyone that I talked to about this was trying to sell me on 1. the fact that it needs to happen and 2. the process in general. Now I understand that this can be traumatic for kids, but I think I know Will well enough to say that he's going to be just fine. It will be an adjustment, and I'd like to meet his new teacher (we'll be doing that this week!), but I don't need to be sold....Anyway - the conversation was fine, agreement made that Will would be moving very shortly to the tiny turtles room.

Tuesday evening we had a lovely visit from our friend Jeffrey. Will was supposed to be sleeping when he arrived....but since he wasn't, Jeffrey got a small glimpse into our world as Will crawled all over the place, pulled himself up on everything, and babbled constantly.

Wednesday, ummmm....well, Wednesday was Wednesday. Thursday I went back up to pick up Will so Dave could play soccer, we stopped at Babies R Us to buy "overnight" diapers, as the current ultra-absorbent ones just don't seem to be working (more on that later). We then headed for home, thankful that the week was over!

Friday we left for Washington to visit Aunt Lindsay, Uncle Doug, cousin Ella, and to celebrate the baby in JEM's tummy (baby shower for Jill). Will was a bit out of sorts, but his top teeth seem to be coming in at top speed, so I figured that was the reason for the clinging and general crankypants attitude from Will. Oh, but I was so wrong...So we arrived in DC, a bit of a rainy drive - Dave drove, I ended up riding in the back seat with Will to serve as entertainment & "the soother". We had a lovely evening, and a terrible night. So bad that poor Uncle Doug used earplugs and Aunt Lindsay and I had a conversation about just what might be bugging Will at some point in the middle of the night. So... a very tired crew on Saturday morning....went to breakfast and then the daddies took the kiddos to the zoo and the park and the mommies went to the "baby party". A lovely afternoon was had by all!! Will had his first ride on the baby swings at the park. For a kid that doesn't feel well, he's definitely trying to enjoy himself...Uncle Doug is supplying running commentary for this one (thanks for being camera man!!). I think we'll need to try this one again...


In another part of DC...Lindsay and I were so glad to see Jill and happy to be there to celebrate this wonderful time for her and for our brother. Our time together was definitely too short, but we'll take what we can get! On Saturday evening Lindsay and Doug had a wedding, so Dave and I ordered Thai from the local restaurant (literally next door! Lindsay and Doug have a GREAT location!), and stayed in with Ella and Will. The little ones took a bath together (Will totally crowded Ella's end of the bathtub! he was soooo excited to have someone else to play with in the tub!). Both kids were asleep by 8. Dave and I were snuggled into bed and sound asleep by 9. Will woke up with a 102 fever at 11. We were all awake (I'm sure everyone in DC was awake because of Will's yelling) until 12:30. He finally fell asleep in between us, and slept until the Tylenol wore off at 4:30. Awake again, yelling, this time fever was 102.7. More Tylenol, back to sleep until almost 8 this morning. So...I'll be taking the day off tomorrow to go to the doctor and let the professionals sort out what is ailing our little guy. In the meantime, we did manage a little play time this morning and a not-so-bad ride home. He didn't sleep enough today, so he fell asleep at 6:06 tonight (I only remember because it was so early!). Let's hope that tonight is easier than the last 2....

Oh and about those diapers...Monday and Tuesday morning Will was up around 4:15 (hunger, teeth, just couldn't get himself back to sleep) and both mornings required diaper changes, full pj changes for both of us and at least 1 load of laundry. So I decided that "ultra-absorbent" wasn't enough. So we were off to try "over-nights" instead. Unfortunately, same result. So...we're going to be sizing up to see if that helps...I'm sure more information than pretty much anyone needs, but there it is. :-)

Happy Brithday Cole!

The first of the newborn group kids turned one this week, so we attended Will's first birthday party for a friend. Happy Birthday Cole!! It was a lovely afternoon for everyone (many thanks to Donna and Peter for their wonderful hospitality and generosity!) - and Will did a great job interacting with the other kids and grownups. He was a little bit shy at the beginning, but seemed to get his bearings, and then said "see ya Mommy!" and played for most of the afternoon. By the time we left, he was absoutely exhausted, and dirty! He was an absolute dirt magnet today - not exactly sure how that happened, but I suppose at some point I'll have to get used to it! Unfortunately not all of the kids/parents could make the party, but we did manage a picture with everyone that was there - from left to right below: Emmerson, Cole (the birthday boy!), Jonathan, Millie and Will. :-) Other new pictures posted in the 9-11 month album as well...

The zoo, and the latest skills (well, sort of skills anyway)

So it was good that we decided NOT to trek down to the Bronx Zoo this afternoon! We got a bit of a late start, Will wasn't such a good napper this morning (75% my fault!), and he fell asleep in the car on the way to the Beardsley Zoo. I figured this would be a power nap and we'd have a totally awake baby for the entire zoo trip. Ummmm, no. Dave successfully moved Will from the car seat to the stroller and we made it through 1/2 the zoo while he slept. So he missed the wolves, the condor, the bison, and the prarie dogs. He DID get to see the tigers, bears, ducks, and the farm animals exhibit (the pigs were great!). I think the goats were a little scary for him (they're loud when they figure someone might feed them) and he seemed to think everything else was a bit ho-hum. He's just learning to "follow the finger" when I point to something, so I think he missed a lot...Pictures of the zoo posted as soon as I go back out to the car to get the camera (oops!).

On a completely separate note - a skills update! Will has gotten MUCH better at pulling himself to standing over the last couple of weeks. He's now progressing to climbing (notice no mention of walking, just climbing!). When I walked in to pick him up at school on Thursday afternoon, he was busy scaling a bouncy seat. This morning's activity was attempting to climb the stairs. Video of the latest and greatest is below...and what would Bostrom family video be without my explanation!? So here goes:
1. Exhibit 1 - we should be using the 12 inch rule for all table top items that we don't want in Will's mouth (everything should always be 12 inches away from the edge of the table). His current favorite thing to grab when he should be sleeping...the baby monitor. Socks is quite distracting, but he's determined to take the monitor with him (not exactly sure where he was headed...).
2. Exhibit 2 - just crawling, but it includes a sample of the plastic ring dropping that is a constant amusement these days. I have to admit, it makes a pretty good loud noise...
3. Exhibit 3 - "now that I'm up here, what do I do?!?!" - Will takes a stab at crawling up the stairs, but once he gets to the second stair and he's blocked by the gate, he's pretty much done. Notice that one of the cats has strategically placed herself on the other side of the gate....

Perpetual motion

This will be brief, as it is late. We've had a relatively quiet week, but it seems our challenge has been sleeping. Sleeping during the day hasn't been so good. Sleeping at night has been ok - but getting Will to sleep has been a challenge. He's been over tired, and his teeth have been bugging him, so there has been a lot of crying at our house. Tonight, I tried, then Dave tried, then I went back at it. So what finally worked? Humming nothing in particular (I think multiple Christmas carols and favorite camp songs made it in tonight), while gently rocking, standing up, for 15 minutes after he settled and eyes were closed. I only know about this as a strategy from being a nanny for a summer - the youngest of the 3 kids was 6 months old when I started, and he did nothing but cry for the first week. I finally managed to get him to sleep a couple of evenings by walking up and down the driveway with him in my arms and humming (no words required!!), until he'd been asleep for 15 minutes - if I put him down before then he would wake up and I'd have to start all over again. So thank goodness, when I reverted to this very old trick, it has worked!

Anyway, to explain the title...for the last 2 nights, as I rocked Will and hummed, there was one thing that I noticed often - perpetual motion. His legs and arms didn't stop moving for a second until he was really asleep.

Tomorrow - 1/2 days for both Mommy and Daddy, so we're going to the zoo! Which zoo is TBD, but we're determined to see some animals. We'll post pictures....

Laps

It all started with laps - crawling laps - from the nursery, into our bedroom, around the far side of the bed and back,stop to giggle at the fact Mommy was following behind, then out to the living room, squeal at a couple of cats, then into the kitchen to check out the cats' water dish - and just when he would get close...I would scoop him up and carry him back to the nursery. We'd sit down in the rocking chair, and Will would fling himself at the floor (face first!) and I'd put him down and we'd start the process over again. So tonight we had a first...well I think it was a first anyway...Daddy was able to get Will to sleep after Mommy tried, off and on and in vain, for almost 2 hours. As Daddy said, "pretty empowering". :)

Mommy goes to Boston...

So I've been very quiet this week as I had off-site meetings for most of the week, and then went to Boston with my team from work. A well deserved treat for the team, as they work very hard all year! That said...it meant that we were up and out the door by 7 every morning this week, and I had dinners after work on Wednesday night and Thursday night. We left for Boston on Friday morning - for my first 2 nights away from Will...honestly, I was dreading it. Reality - Dave and Will had a great couple of days AND nights (Will was on his best sleeping and bottle behavior) - and they even weathered tropical storm Hannah! For a tiny sample of Will's activity while I was away, see the video below...

I actually had a great time (I shouldn't be surprised - a good group of people!) - it is always nice to be able to connect with my team out of the office, and we "did" Boston, which I hadn't done in awhile - Duck Tour on Friday afternoon....very nice dinner on Friday night...slept for 8 straight hours....AMAZING whale watching on Saturday morning (I'll post pictures as soon as I have them!)....a bit of very productive shopping on Saturday afternoon....another lovely dinner....and an ok night's sleep (I was pretty ready to be home!)....and then home to my 2 favorite guys by lunch today. It has been a whirlwind of a week, and we start it all over again tomorrow morning.

And while I wasn't paying terribly close attention...Will has gotten pretty good at pulling himself up to standing, and top teeth #3 and #4 have really started to pop through. Amazing how we've gone from no teeth to 7 in what seems like no time! Very hard to believe that he'll be 11 months on Tuesday....and Dave was commenting that it will be pretty scary to have him toddling around on 2 feet soon. I hope we have a little time, since he just seems to have mastered crawling.

So we're back to "regularly scheduled programming" tomorrow morning - thank goodness....and one more thing - HAPPY BIRTHDAY POPPA!!!

I re-read my post from yesterday and it sounds a little "woe is me"...or maybe it should be "woe is Will". Anyway...thought I would add some positive stories from yesterday to brighten things up! (Fever is down a bit this morning as well - wahoo!)

Story # 1- After a good nap yesterday, Will and I played a little bit outside and then decided that we'd go downstairs and pull out ALL the toys for a little bit to play before dinner. I've been trying (somewhat in vain) to get Will to drink Pedialyte over the last couple of days, trying to make sure we fend off dehydration. My latest trick is to mix 1/2 unflavored Pedialyte with 1/2 the only formula that he'll drink. Into a sippy cup and hope for the best was my plan. For about 20 minutes Will sat in my lap, signed milk, and drank Mommy's "anti-dehydration concoction" - a good 2-3 ounces of it - out of the sippy cup. This is remarkable for a couple of reasons: 1. Will is still convinced that anything that isn't Mommy's milk tastes funny, so usually we mix 1/2 formula and 1/2 Mommy's milk in bottles. 2. He'll drink out of a cup, but has absolutely boycotted the sippy cups to date.

Story # 2 - "he claps" - I really do wish I had video for this one...Will woke up last night around 9 and couldn't go back to sleep. I wrestled with him until about 10 (anyone else tried to get a feverish 10 month old to sit still while you're in a rocking chair?! I was a jungle gym!), finally got eyes closed and put him in the crib. Walked downstairs with the chocolate chip cookies and wine to have a few minutes of relaxation before I headed for bed. Turned on the monitor - to hear Will, yelling about the fact that he was by himself, in the crib, and was bitter about it. So back upstairs I went, mumbling under my breath and trying to figure out which "go to sleep strategy" I was going to start with...knowing full well I would be using more than 1! Anyway....after another 10 minutes of wrestling, I put Will down on the floor. His look said "wow - so I didn't expect she'd do THAT!". And of course, he crawled away to the edge of the nursery rug to check to make sure there was nothing hiding under the edge of it (for about the 200th time - this is one of those things that Will just does...he looks under the edge of the rug...). After peeking under the rug, he looked up at me, signed for milk, looked down at himself signing, and then started to clap, as if applauding himself on his signing capabilities. At this point...it was 10:30...and I was a little punchy - so I had a really hard time keeping a straight face as he did the same thing 3 more times - crawl a little bit, sit up, sign for milk, congratulate himself. Hopefully we can catch him showing off again before we're back to work on Tuesday.

We're now on day 5 of this lovely little stomach bug. We've been to the doctor, and been assured that this too shall "run its course". I for one am ready for it to be done! I'm quite sure Will feels the same way. The look I've seen most often in the last couple of days is to the left...a sort of look that says "I don't really feel good, but I'm trying not to be too cranky about it. I will put up with you a little while longer, but you're trying my patience". The fact that Will now has a fever as well means that we haven't been anywhere except the pediatrician and "the coffee store" (Starbucks) for Mommy's decaf mocha. So our little family is having a quiet weekend. We uninvited ourselves to a couple of gatherings, and at the moment, I think I am the only living thing in our house that happens to be awake (what am I doing?! I should be sleeping too!).

In other notes...The 2nd top tooth has broken through, and I believe that top tooth # 3 is close behind - Will has shifted his gnawing to the other side of his mouth...crawling has gotten faster, even with the stomach bug. For the first time ever, Will has actually been slightly clingy and whiny. Not terribly attractive behavior, but understandable. Lots of love, hugs, snuggles and diaper changes going on at our house currently...And just so you don't think we haven't seen that silly smile for days...here's a sample (about 5 minutes later in the same meal!).

Hope that you're all enjoying a lovely Labor Day weekend...

Just when I thought things might quiet down?!

That noise you hear, it's me, sighing. I thought...that we might have a quiet week - Will has sort of mastered crawling, sleeping seems to be going ok, schedule seems to be going ok in general...but NO! As these things always go, the minute I think we'll have a quiet week, something happens - I told Dave today, I should author a book "Famous Last Words"!!

So enough with the drama - Monday was a lovely "usual" day. Yesterday started with a "diaper catastrophe" - at 6:30 in the morning. I will not horrify everyone with the details, let's just say there was a shower required for Will and laundry required for everything else. Yuck. I figured it was a one time occurrence and sent Will off to daycare with Dave. Uh, no - by 1:45 Will was officially "sent home". We got (I think) only the second ever "please come pick up your son immediately" phone call from one of his teachers. "He may not return until he has been symptom free for 24 hours". Unfortunately for Will, he is still not "symptom free"...so he has won the "get out of daycare free prize" until Tuesday.

In reality, you'd never know he was sick. He's crawling all over the house, pretty much like he owns the place. ;-) This afternoon he decided that crawling was old news and that pulling himself up to standing should be his new accomplishment. I recognize the look of determination, so I expect we're going to spend a lot of time standing behind him, trying to protect him from himself, over the next couple of weeks.

Oh yeah - and I peeked in his mouth this afternoon - I think there might be 2 more top teeth on the way in. Tonight's really interesting moment (at least for me!)...he fell asleep just after 6:00pm. No dinner, no bath, no bedtime routine. Who knows what the middle of the night is going to bring...I had better get to bed now!!

My what a difference 3 days makes!

So instead of napping this afternoon....Will has decided that he needs to repeatedly show off his growing "crawling prowess". This was the point in the afternoon where he hadn't begun stopping, sitting up and rubbing his eyes (that was about oh...2 hours later). I decided to take a little break and share a few snippets of our little crawler baby. These are parts of the laps he did back and forth between the living room and the nursery - I just picked an appropriate location at one end of the route and sat down with the camera. :-) He's a little quiet, but if you listen carefully, you can hear him make a little motor boat noise as he's crawling along (most appropriate!).

The "big blue ball" has been a hit since I brought it home this week - I figured if I bought the big size he'd be willing to play with it for several years instead of several minutes - of course I had no idea it would be as big as Will!! Along with this "leap" we've gotten another top tooth (or at least 90% of it has broken through anyway). Last night's sleep was not so blissful (up at midnight, 3:30, 4:30 and 6:10 - for good). Let's hope that tonight is better since we're back to work tomorrow...Dave just arrived downstairs - with a silent baby monitor. Wahoo - a nap!

Allow me to explain...

So this week was "moving week". Will has been steadily working on moving his bedtime from 7:30 to 8:00. Not a big deal, but does cause us to rethink our evening logistics a bit. Of course I fought him on this bedtime change for about 5 nights in a row before I finally gave up. Most evenings this week, it meant putting Will to bed between 7:15 and 7:30, sleepy, but still awake (seriously, the kid was 95% asleep every time I put him down!)....heading for the kitchen, monitor in hand, only to make at least 2, sometimes 4 or 5 return trips to the nursery before he would finally really settle and go to sleep. Without fail my last trip would be about 8:00. You'd think that after the first couple of nights I would get it, but no....Wednesday night was classic...we had listened to Will fuss, groan, squeal, yell at us "BA BA BAAAAAA, WRAH WRAH, LA LA, BA BA, NA NA" (you get the idea) - for close to an hour, between my trips to the nursery to try to settle him and get him to sleep. Finally, I decided it was time to just give in. Very obviously Will needed to get down on the floor and move - he wasn't done for the day. So I put him down on the floor in the nursery, left the door open, and walked back out to the living room where we were watching a baseball game. The video below is the result....A couple of notes: 1. this is about 20 minutes worth of William shenanigans, condensed to 2 minutes. 2. yes, that is Dave laughing at Will's antics (and therefore totally encouraging said antics!!). 3. yes, that is me, walking away and putting the monitor far enough away that he had to crawl to get it (hey, I was trying to get it out of his system as quickly as possible so he'd go to sleep!) 4. I don't know why there are always cats running through the video, but it seems they are constantly running for their lives from Will these days. Apologies for the bad lighting, didn't think to turn on an extra lamp!

So today we're off to have lunch with friends while Dave plays golf...hope you're enjoying the weekend!!

Too much olive oil can make you gain weight!

And since that's what we were hoping for...we've been feeding Will lots of olive oil, yogurt, and anything else that is loaded with good fat and calories. Seems that it has done the trick. Weigh in today - 18 lb. 4 oz. up over a pound from the last visit a month ago! The doctor is pleased, and we get to keep Will on the "fatten me up" diet. Good news all around. Happy Friday!!!!!

I always want to remember...

We're always so darn busy...but I've found myself stopping and trying to really take in and remember some of Will's "finer moments" over the last week. Below are a couple things that I always want to remember....

1. The way Will sighs and settles into my arms right before bed and when he first wakes up in the morning, in the middle of the night, and from a nap. It is about the only time he is "reliably cuddly" these days.
2. The way he looks when he is truly sound asleep.
3. The beyond excited grin he gets when he realizes that it's bath time.
4. The way he wiggles and waves his arms and kicks his legs to say "faster" in the high chair during dinner.

On a separate note...we've been living through a bottle strike for the last week or so. Honestly, it has probably caused me more angst than anyone else, including Will. I thought he might be weaning from the bottle, but he's really not ready for a cup all the time yet - you can imagine the conversations that have been going on with daycare...We'll keep you posted, but it may have actually been the bottles. Figures. So now we're on "bottle experimentation". Lovely. Nothing like a little bottle strike to keep Mommy on her toes...

And last but not least - my 2 favorite moments so far this week (I think!).

Moment #1 - On Tuesday morning I put Will down on the floor outside the bathroom door with a classic toy so that I could finish getting ready for work. The plastic rings that stack on the little pole (I think I had this toy when I was a kid too!). Will has figured out how to throw in the last week. OK, let me re-phrase that - Will has figured out how to pick things up and drop them (hard) to make a fun noise, and how to wing his arms back and forth across the high chair tray to send the Cheerios flying. Anyway - after I put him down he took one look at the toy and immediately dumped all the rings on the floor. He then spent the next 5 minutes picking up the blue ring and flinging it at the floor so that it would bounce all over the place and spiral to a stop. He was very very serious about the whole process. It was absolutely amazing to watch him learn, repeat, try again. The only thing I thought as I was watching him - "I love to watch you learn".

Moment #2 - Will is actually getting quite efficient at the military crawl. No, the belly isn't reliably up off the floor yet - he's going for speed, and he thinks that means keeping his belly on the floor at the moment. He's also starting to try to pull himself up a little bit. This afternoon, he spent about 10 minutes chasing me in the kitchen. Literally - I was on the phone and trying to get us out the door to the grocery - and every time I moved, Will would crawl over to my feet and start yanking on my jeans to try to pull himself up. I never moved far, but far enough that he'd have to move to get to me. It was the first time he'd really done anything like it.

So...our tired tired baby is sound asleep - time to go check...we will hopefully have a quiet day tomorrow - bottle strike is hopefully "off". Friday is weight check, so will update after our appointment.

Will's first Olympics

I decided to "let" Will stay up and watch a little bit of the opening ceremony for the Olympics tonight. It was amazing to watch Will watch the drummers at the beginning of the ceremony. Will sat next to me on the couch in his pj's and after just a few minutes (and very little encouragement from Mommy), he was trying to drum along with the drummers...the grin on his face was priceless, and we even got a few little giggles. Well well worth breaking our no TV rule for our little guy!! I'm 99% sure that will be all for him until the closing ceremony, but I'm quite glad we did it.

William and Mommy have a little unexpected adventure

I should start by saying - WE'RE FINE! But I was not a happy camper last night driving home...Thursdays Dave plays soccer after work, so I do the great circle route and leave from work a little early so I can pick up Will and head for home. Last night, picked Will up at the usual time and it looked like there was a nasty thunderstorm brewing. I figured we'd take it slow, and just hoped that Dave would get to play soccer. Having grown up in the Midwest where real thunderstorms are a regular occurence, I have a very healthy respect for the weather, and how quickly it can turn ugly. (Dave might call it an obsession with the weather, but that's a story for another day!) So we took off, and by the time we'd made it about 6 miles into the trip, it was raining in big drops. I decided at a stoplight that 4WD in the Jeep would be a good plan, so shifted over. About 10 miles further down the road, after driving through blinding rain and several blinding puddles on the road, thanking my lucky stars that I was in the Jeep, and had switched on the 4WD, I had to pull over because of the hail. At this point, I was pretty much white knuckled. Will - was sleeping. Figures. Anyway, I managed to get about 10 miles from home before the emergency broadcast came over the radio that there was a tornado warning. Then I was REALLY white knuckled. Seriously, the sound of that emergency bulletin is enough to make you stop in your tracks, even if they're just testing it!! That's what it's supposed to do...To make a long story short, I reviewed in my head all the possible public locations to take shelter between there and home (it was a very short list), listened to the broadcast and was pretty sure the worst of the storm was in front of me, and made a beeline for home. We arrived safely, I grabbed Will out of the car and ran to the house, and straight for the basement to turn on the TV. The storm had tracked east, so we were lucky - but I seriously do NOT want to do anything like that again...

uh oh...

A new day, a new move

Today's accomplishment - going from crawling, to sitting up, like a little pro...if we keep going at this pace we're in big trouble...

Phew! What a week...

We've had an extraordinarily busy week...Saturday afternoon Oma and Gumpa came down for a visit. Will was quite happy to see them, pull on Gumpa's beard, and laugh at Oma (and kick her repeatedly for being "in the way"). We did make it to the beach, a wonderful first outing for Will! He loved the water, and the sand, and even the waves. Of course the waves were about 2 inches high (if that) and the tide was going out...but his reaction was much better than his first encounter with waves that he didn't make...Sunday we went up to see our friends Ken & Joy and a bunch of other friends as well for a little afternoon BBQ. It POURED, so we ended up inside after everyone ate, but a good time was had by all...


Monday was a family work at home day. Dave's car was in for some repairs, so we all "commuted" to the basement...thank goodness for wireless and laptops! Tuesday we trooped into the office, but found out early that morning that Dave's grandmother had passed away. She had been ill for quite awhile, but it was still hard for everyone in the family. So on Wednesday we all headed for Massachusetts for the wake and funeral. I have always known that Will is a pretty flexible kid, but we really put him to the test over the last couple of days!! He managed to make it through 3 hours at the wake without melting down...he ate in all sorts of places that were NOT a highchair (the backseat of the Jeep, a chair in the hotel room, and on a towel on the floor of the hotel room). He did a great job not screaming at any strangers (a bonus, as he has a tendency to get a little upset when strangers get too close - screaming is usually accompanied by clinging to my shirt). He slept remarkably well in the car in small doses both days, and after not getting to bed until 10 on Wednesday night, slept straight through until 5, and was cheery and wonderful all day on Thursday. He did pretty well in church as well. It was a wonderful celebration of Memere's life, and she will be missed. It was a bit of a whirlwind though, and we're quite glad to be home.


So today we're laying low and making sure that Will gets good naps (we're on good nap #2 at the moment!!). In between...we're making solid progress on the crawling. He's getting quite efficient at the military crawl, but is still trying to figure out how to crawl with that belly off the floor. The motor boat noise hasn't lost it's appeal (imagine that in church!?). Hopefully we'll get another trip to the beach this weekend, before we're back to "regularly scheduled programming" next week. To be honest...I'm kind of looking forward to it! The last couple of weeks have been very disjointed with being sick last week and being out this week.


New pictures are posted...and for your viewing/listening pleasure...a bit of baby belly laugh and motor boat...
3 notes - yes diaper changes are quite funny at our house, and yes, he does have a nasal aspirator (clean!! this one is useless at it's intended purpose but Will thinks it is a great thing to chew on while he's getting a diaper change). And finally yes, I have changed his diaper while he's on his belly, actually we've done that quite a bit lately...

Here we go...

I'm trying to type with 1 eye out, watching Will, so this will be quick. We got a new TV a couple of weeks ago to replace the TV in the basement (footprint was big, and I was concerned Will might try to use it as a jungle gym). Anyway, new TV is hanging on the wall, and the cable box, receiver, etc. are on the floor. Extraordinarily enticing for a 9 month old!! We watched this morning as Will inched, scooched, got up on all fours and thrust himself forward to get to that cable box. And now he's complaining, at the top of his lungs, because he's started only moving backwards, and would really like to move forward...so I guess we'll be furniture shopping this week....

Motor boat, a little peek-a-boo and a little rocker...

I have heard nothing but the motor boat noise for the last 48 hours. Every waking moment for Will (it seems) has been filled with bbbbbbrrrrrrrr. bbbbbbrrrrrrr. bbbbbbbrrrrrrr. bbbbbbrrrrrrr. At every pitch, almost like a conversation. I will find the video camera and record this noise, in the bathtub, standing up, sitting down, in the crib, on the floor, on Mommy's lap, outside and inside. I know, he's practicing. And it is remarkably cute, but there is a part of me that hopes he moves on to a new noise tomorrow morning!

We moved the crib mattress down one setting awhile ago. At some point when I was convinced that "pulling up" and crawling were imminent. Obviously I had no idea what I was doing! Anyway, we might be a step closer at this point (famous last words...). The other night I put Will down for bed, and still had sandals with heels on (must have been Monday, as I don't think I've worn shoes since really...). So I leaned down to take off a sandal, and Will pushed down just a little bit on the crib bumper at the same time. He saw me, I saw him, and smiled. That was it - a new game of crib bumper peek-a-boo was born. Will thinks it is absolutely hysterical to push the bumper down and peer through the crib rails at me or at Dave. Oh the belly laughs!!!


And finally...our little rocker...it seems that Will has been working slowly but surely on getting that belly off the floor. I knew he was really working on it the other night when I checked on him and he was practicing in his sleep. I have read about this, but was a bit skeptical...yep, I caught him practicing the move to get his knees under his belly in his sleep. I had to chuckle, knowing that our days without mobile baby really are numbered. I remind myself every time I put him down on the floor and turn around to grab the phone and come back, or my coffee and come back or a toy and come back...you get the idea. I think it was Wednesday (or Thursday, they're kind of running together!) - Dave left for the office at the usual time. Will and I settled into the living room for a day of working (for Mommy) and playing (for Will). We've definitely got a groove going for work at home days - Will on the quilt on the floor with a basket of toys, Mommy on the sofa with laptop, notebook and 2 phones (house and blackberry). Within about 3 minutes of Dave leaving the house, Will pulled his little belly up off the floor and started to rock on those knees. And he then proceeded to practice this move, constantly, for the next almost 10 hours (between naps and eating!!).

We're hoping for a quick trip to the beach in the morning (with pictures of course)....

Yes, it has been 22 days...about the longest we've gone without an update!

So prepare yourselves...actually, I'm sure I'll have to do this in parts, as I won't remember everything!

First things first - our trip to Georgia. Fourth of July was wonderful! Will got to "swim" at the pool, he took lots and lots of stroller rides with Nonni, he played with his cousin Ella, and he kept his Daddy up at night! Sharing a room with Will means really waking up every time Will wakes up, something that Dave is not necessarily used to. And unfortunately, sleeping in a pack n' play meant that Will woke up more than usual. We had a couple of long nights, but all things considered, Will did a pretty good job sleeping. He thinks Ella is absolutely fascinating, which was quite funny to watch! Aunt Lindsay is quite tired from chasing a 2 year old around, so it was great for us to be able to "trade kids" on occasion, as she kept an eye on Will and I chased Ella. :) If only I had a penny for every time I heard "Aunt Emily?" while we were there...It was great fun to spend a whole week with Nonni and Poppa, enjoy relaxing at the lake, and for me, a whole week *just* being Mommy was absolute bliss. Dave got in 4 rounds of golf, several trips to the pool, and some good relaxation time as well. On the 4th we were able to watch the fireworks from the tee box behind the house (remember last year?! I waddled out there...). This year, we watched from the same spot, with a nice glass of wine and the baby monitor to 1 ear. Will slept through the whole thing. I have no idea how we managed that one, but I was thrilled!

We've been using baby sign language with Will for the last couple of months - meaning that Dave and I sign for everything from milk to bath to car to cat, and Will watches us patiently. Finally, a small reward for our efforts, Will signed milk a couple of times!! The only other major milestone on the trip was the major change in Will re: eating solid food. He shifted from a take it or leave it attitude to a relative bottomless pit in the space of 2 meals, and we've never looked back.

We arrived home on Sunday, back to work on Monday! A relatively abrupt end to our vacation, but we all managed ok. I sent at least twice as much food to daycare as I had been sending before we left. Will just didn't nap, and he didn't really nap on Tuesday either. I figured I was in for a really long night on Tuesday night, but no....Will slept for 10.5 hours STRAIGHT. Yes, our little guy, the 2-4am snacker, slept all the way through. I figured, this is a fluke, it can't possibly happen 2 nights in a row. And then it did. So at this point, I seriously considered writing a post about sleeping, and decided that I had better just stay quiet, or I'd regret it! In the midst of all this Will popped his 3rd tooth on the bottom. Of course after our 2 nights of sleeping through, he's only done it one or 2 other times since, but we know he CAN do it.

Work has been downright bananas for me, and for Dave, so we've been pushing it a bit, and we've both worked at points on the weekend and in the evenings since we've gotten home. We managed to take a break for our friend Greg's graduation party. Funny...the only pictures we have are of naked Will, as he decided to roll over in the midst of a diaper change on the grass in the back yard. We will be sharing only the cropped versions of the pictures (we'll save the full version for embarrassing Will later...)!

And now, for the last week (phew!). Last Thursday morning around 4:30 I checked on a soundly sleeping baby...a soundly sleeping furnace of a baby. He was running a fever of 102.8 when I checked at 6:00, so off to the doctor we went. No other symptoms...so the doctor looked at the palms of his hands, the soles of his feet, in his mouth and in his ears. No ear infection, lungs are fine, and no spots on the hands, feet, or in his mouth. But she put us on "spot watch". Seems hand foot and mouth disease is going around....a nasty little virus that is very contagious! We were house bound for a couple of days, but no spots, so we seem to have dodged that bullet! Back to the pediatrician on Saturday morning for Will's 9 month check-up. He's grown an inch (28 inches now) and still weighs just about 17 pounds. Looks great all around, but we're going back for a weight check in 4 weeks as he's not gaining as fast as he has been. In the meantime, I've been given all sorts of lovely ideas for adding fat and calories to Will's diet without increasing volume. Let's just say that dairy and olive oil are now staples in Will's diet! He was fine on Saturday, fine on Sunday, ok on Monday, though I was starting to think that maybe he's allergic to something, or spending too much time in the A/C (it has been hot here!). Scratch that...he has a cold. So Dave took him back to the pediatrician yesterday to double check, as he'd started to cough as well. He's on the mend at this point, seems a bit better today than yesterday and is sleeping like crazy. That said, we know that hand foot and mouth is still an issue at daycare, though not in Will's classroom, so we've kept him home longer than I normally would have for a cold. He needs to sleep, and he won't sleep at daycare (not the way he sleeps at home anyway!), so I've been working at home.

New pictures are posted, all in the 8 month album. I'll get us rolling on the 9 month album this weekend I guess, we haven't taken any new pictures, so we're over due.

We have teeth. And a visit to the pool!

Thank goodness our travel was pretty uneventful. Will cried more than he normally does, he was incredibly over-tired and his teeth were seriously bugging him - but he finally fell sound asleep in my arms on the plane. That said...having a 17lb baby sleeping on your lap is a totally different ballgame than a 9 or 10lb baby. After about 30 minutes I was constantly shifting until I finally managed to move Will to a spot that was comfy for both of us. He had ridiculous bed head when he woke up in Atlanta...

And now, we're at the lake - Dave has played 2 rounds of golf with my Dad. Both were "good" - his description. :) We made it to the pool once. Yesterday. And the big news - we have 2 teeth!! I promised I would post when they finally made their appearance...it is official. ;) We had to spend most of Friday night awake to get them, and the last 2 days have definitely not been "picture perfect" sleep. Given the new surroundings, the new sleeping arrangements, and the teething pain, not terrible. Will is, as usual, going at everything with his usual gusto - sleeping, the pool, eating, crawling attempts, hanging out with Nonni and Poppa. We'll post as we have new developments. We expect there will be quite a few over the next several days!!

Hooray! Vacation!

We had quite the week this week, counting down the moments to v-a-c-a-t-i-o-n!!!! In the meantime...We were momentarily back in our normal work/school routine for Monday/Tuesday. On Wednesday I did my daily check-in later than usual, and found out that Mr. Crankypants was having a rough day. Slept a little, was downright refusing food, and didn't want to do anything, except yell. So Dave went and got him a little early and we all tried to go to bed a little early. Except...Will tugged on his ear a couple of times...and then did it again in the morning....so off to walk-in hours at the pediatrician on Thursday morning! It turned out to be a very quick trip - Will weighed in at 17lb 1oz - almost a half pound heavier in 10 days! Ear is fine. But the teeth...after all of our wondering - is he EVER going to pop those first teeth?? I can feel 1, and there is a good possibility that we're going to see 4 before this little episode is over. Yes, 4. I would be Mr. Crankypants too if I was working on 4 teeth at the same time!

So now...we're on vacation. Well at least I am, and Will is. Dave has to finish out today and then he's on vacation too...we are really looking forward to a nice relaxing week...

Allow me to clarify...

Will isn't crawling - yet. Emphasis on the yet. I am sitting on the floor of our living room watching him play. He started next to me (in 1 corner of our living room rug). He proceeded to roll/push himself on his belly with his feet in a large oval all the way around to the toy basket that is actually next to me on the other side. Guess he decided to take the long route...I'm in the process of baby-proofing. Doing everything that I can before I have to make a trip to buy all the safety gear (baby gates, more outlet covers, locks for cabinets, etc.). It is amazing to watch the "getting mobile" process unfold. With it have come a couple of interesting tactics and issues...
1. Some babies use their arms - not a huge surprise, but Will uses his legs. I will find a way to capture this stage - toes digging into the floor, legs pushing up and his chest & belly firmly planted on the floor. If he didn't have a shirt on, he'd get rug burn on his chest as he pushes himself across the carpet! Even if he's rolled onto his back to enjoy the latest prize he's managed to reach, the legs are still kicking away.
2. He uses the "edges" - whatever it is that confines his space - the sofa, a chair, a table leg, he'll use them as leverage to push himself along.
3. Rolling IS a mode of transportation. Who knew?
4. Frustration!!! I hear more whining about the fact he can't move forward...
5. He must have a constant headache - even when we put him on the floor without a quilt to cushion him, he wings his head onto the floor without a care constantly....I keep on waiting for him to miscalculate how hard he's "going for it" when he rolls and end up screaming.

The 2 pictures from the last post were from the last week. And he's made even more progress in the last 48 hours...so we are in for it!!!

Oh we're in big trouble...

Ummm...teething + ear infection = yelling at our house!

So after we listened to Will yell at us for multiple days in a row, I started to doubt my "mommy instinct". Maybe it wasn't just teeth??? So I took Monday morning off and headed to walk-in hours at the pediatrician. Any seasoned parent probably would have had a good giggle at my description of symptoms for the doctor...

diapers - normal

appetite - normal

temperature - normal

sleeping - sort of normal (but since we really don't have "normal" this is debatable)

attitude about life - terrible

nose - a little stuffy (but not enough to really even think about it - no hoover even required!)

I basically said I could be totally off the mark, but I just couldn't chalk his obvious discomfort up to his teeth alone. And sure enough...ear infection! So Will is on antibiotics and Tylenol to keep him comfy. And I am praying that he sleeps for longer stretches than he did last night - he was up every 2 hours from 11:00 on...it was a looooong night. After 8 months, I'm pretty good at it, but last night, I was as mad as Will was about being awake! I feel bad - getting teeth and an ear infection has got to be stinky. All things considered, he's been Will - still smiling and giggling, just not quite as often. So pardon us...we're probably going to be quiet for the rest of the week!!

Happy Father's Day!!

Happy Father's Day!! We had a lovely day today, visiting with our family. A little brunch, and a nice walk this afternoon completed our day. I'm headed for walk-in hours tomorrow morning at the pediatrician - I've decided that I need someone with a degree in medicine to confirm my teething diagnosis. The added bonus is that we'll find out how much he weighs...

Teething = Yelling at our house!

Where the heck have you been you might ask.....To be honest, I'm not exactly sure! I've meant to post multiple nights but I've been tired and consistently said "will do tomorrow night". So my apologies... here's a brief catch up on the "goings on"! (OK, maybe not so brief)

Last weekend was lovely - HOT, but lovely. We had a pretty quiet day on Saturday, and then I had a Mommy's night out with some of the mom's from the newborn group. It is always nice to catch up with everyone in person, and these days it feels a little daring to be out on a Saturday night! The big story of the weekend was our trip to the park on Sunday. We'd been planning for a couple of weeks to get all 7 babies from the newborn group together for a group "photo-op".

Yes, I know, there are only 5 babies in that picture! We're missing Anna and Emmerson, both for good reason! :-) We're still very determined to get a picture of all 7...in the meantime, left to right: Jonathan, Millie, Will, Chase, and Cole. Cole is the oldest of the bunch, and that's Donna's (his mom) arm in the picture - he's crawling and won't sit still! Was a great preview for the rest of us (and made me very nervous about Will's impending launch into crawling). It was a remarkably hot day, but we had a great spot under a huge tree (thanks to Shannon and Scott I believe!). Spread out a bunch of blankets and let a bunch of 8-9 month old kids have at it - was really fun to watch!

This week has brought teething, and yelling, to our little family. Will has a volume control problem when it comes to telling us about his teething pain, at all hours of the day and night. So we've had some rough nights, and some rough days in the last week or so. I've gotten a bit creative, as Will doesn't really like teething toys, so we now have apple, pear and banana "popsicles" in the freezer, and we've been feeding him pretty much everything (except milk!) cold. In an interesting turn, Will has been harder to get to sleep, but once down has done a decent job sleeping (all things considered). He's also been eating like a champ! So once we actually get the teeth that are causing all this trouble, we'll let everyone know. Let's hope the rest of them come in with slightly less fanfare...

In the meantime, he's also desperately trying to figure out how to move. On all fours. At this point, it doesn't resemble crawling AT ALL - but there are definitely "pre-crawling" (or what I would think would be pre-crawling) moves that have been added to the repertoire in the last week or so. Rolling in both directions is now old news (and Dave and I were commenting today about the fact that happened in a flash...). We now have to be careful as Will flings himself backwards toward the floor if he's being held. If he's not put down immediately, he arches his back even further, just to make sure you get the message. Put him down, and the reaction is immediate - a big grin, and he goes to work, legs flying, hitting the floor with his hands...the other morning he managed to roll his way over to the edge of the area rug in the nursery - from his perspective, experiencing hardwood floor was a major accomplishment - giggles and squeals of delight for the next 10 minutes!!

Pictures have been updated, a new 8 month album has been added (frightening). Millie is the lovely lady with Will in a good portion of the pictures...we went on a family hike with Shannon, Scott and Millie a couple of weeks ago, and decided to compare size once our hike was over. Will hasn't learned about sharing yet (the pictures are proof!) but we'll keep on working on it... ;-)