And The Nominees Are

Well, It's been a busy weekend and a busy few days since my last post. But I just now discovered my blog was nominated for a Mix Pix Father's Day Blogger contest. Here is the review. Thanks, Margie! I'm honored.

The Boy got to go on his first boat ride this weekend. Which was quite a treat for me since I'm such a lake rat. Just like his dad as a baby, the boat lulled him to sleep and he napped up in the cabin while we enjoyed the boat ride. Babies always look so uncomfortable in those life jackets, and he was no exception. However, he didn't protest too much. We also swam in the lake which was a blast.

I got a great photo album/scrap book for father's day. It's really cool and I proudly display it at work. I've had several people look at it and it gets a lot of compliments. I also sort of got a grill. Our old grill shot craps a few weeks back and since I grill so much, we bought a new one and called it a father's day / birthday gift.

Oh, those teeth are really busting through! He has two little incisors on the bottom. They're cute, but sharp! I have a feeling the first time he accidentally uses those on the boob, his breastfeeding days will be over! The Wife told me that she gave him a little piece of frozen bagel the other day and that there were little teeth marks in it.

Separation/stranger anxiety seems to be kicking in. I hear this is just a phase, but I'm wondering how to best deal with it to make sure it's a short term thing.

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Dinner Conversation

I really love that The Boy enjoys exploring his voice. His ba-ba-ba's, la-la's, raspberries, etc. are all very fun. But I really could do without the screaming in-between bites at dinner time. Especially in a restaurant. But, I won't complain too much, it could be something worse.

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Tooth Fairy

Apparently, The Boy has sprouted the tiniest little bit of tooth on the bottom left. The Wife discovered this tonight during bathtime (we "brush" his teeth every night). I was not present for the discovery, so I'll have to check it out in the morning.

Good job, Buddy!

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Stubborn Bastage

I'm sitting next to my dad at Missouri Baptist. We'll be headed back to Barnes West soon (Hospitals).

He's had recurring pancreatitis (sp?) for a long time now. His doctor recently noticed something and had him go in for a CAT scan. They noticed some issues and sent him in to have some endoscopic procedures done. There are more details, but that's not the point of this post.

He drinks 8-10 drinks per week, that's a conservative guess. It's actually probably quite a bit more than that. He smokes 2 packs per day. He says he wants to quit, but it's not really true. If he really wanted to, he'd at least try. I know these are both addictions/diseases (depending on your point of view) and are very difficult to quit. My mom died from drinking at 52, and went through several "clinics". So I've seen these things destroy people. But he doesn't even try, so he doesn't really want to quit.

Case in point. He's got a couple stints in his heart because of the blockages due to smoking. His pancreatitis is from all the drinking and the pancreatitis caused diabetes. So now he's in the hospital to figure out the latest deal with his pancreas. The first chance he got to get up and walk around - yup, he went out to smoke. Had 3 or 4 yesterday. And I guaran-damn-tee he's going to have a drink or two first chance he gets.

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Rotten

It seems like there's a pretty strong potential for The Boy to be a bit spoiled and/or shy with The Wife being a SAHM. Anyone got any advice and/or read any good books on this?

On a different note, I've seen hockey series turn around in the flash of an eye. But if the Oilers don't get their shit together, they are done. In their favor, they do go back home for the next two games. Of course, if Cam Ward keeps playing so strong in goal, I don't know how anyone will get a puck past him.

FILE UNDER: PARENTHOOD, SPORTS

You Over-Estimate My Sneakiness

The Boy let out a little fuss around 5:50 am this morning. Earlier than I'd like, but it could have been worse. I let him fuss until about 6:10 or 6:15 when it was clear he was not going back to bed. I got up, turned off the monitor so The Wife could sleep in a little longer, went to the bathroom and then went downstairs. When I got to his door, it was quiet, so I stood there for a few seconds. I knew if I went back up to bed and laid down, he would immediately start fussing. So I decided to crawl into his room and lay on the floor until he started fussing again. I got to the spot where I planned to lay down and I heard him babble. I glanced over and he was on his stomach, with the crib pad pulled down so he could see over it, and he was looking at me as if to say, "Hi Dad! Whatchya doin' down there on the floor?". I just laughed out loud. Outwitted by a 7 month old!

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An Open Apology To The Boy

After posting about how cranky The Boy has been, I come home to a gleaming, gold star report card about how good he was today. To top that off, it was The Mom's night off so it was just me and The Boy tonight and he was such a good boy. Sure he fussed a little, but he was really a very good boy. Thank you, Boy. And I apologize for the previous post.

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Calgon, Take Us Away

It seems (at least to me) like The Boy has been more cranky than happy for around 3-4 weeks now. We keep blaming it on teeth, and they do seem to be right there at the surface, but it's starting to feel like that's just a scapegoat. He's going to bed fairly well. And he's sleeping through the night, he's just been waking up early. Of course, a couple times it's been because of a diaper leak. I don't think he's nursing all that well (The Wife would have to comment on this). I mean, I think he's getting enough, he just doesn't always go for very long and still seems to have frequent fits when nursing. He still eats from a spoon well, it's just that he screams between bites. Sometimes he seems cranky, other times it just seems like he's exploring his voice. He's started to hate (scream when) having his clothes and diapers changed. Is it teeth? Is it something else? Is he just a cranky baby? Is he a good baby and I'm just a wussy? Is it going to get better? If so, will it get worse first?

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Blog Name

I was trying to help The Wife come up with a name for her blog and I had two great ones, but she didn't agree.

giggleswhensquished

pterodactylhiccoughs

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Janice

Sometimes, when The Boy laughs, it sounds just like Janice from Friends. We're really, really, really, really hoping that's not his permanent laugh.

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I Think I Can, I Think I Can

It seems like The Boy is just seconds from crawling. If you put him down on his hands and knees, he can sustain that position for some time, he just can't get moving. He can hold himself up with his hands. He can army crawl (drag himself). He spins and rolls. Today he had his butt up and his legs going in the right motions, he just couldn't get his front up off the ground.

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Buzzword

I've got to do something with my computer cables. At least I think that's the problem. I have this erratic, obnoxious, all be it barely audible, buzz in my speakers. It's associated with mouse movement, CD activity, etc. It's annoying as heck.

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Baa-Baa Black Sheep

The Boy has started opening and closing his mouth when he babbles and also repeating noises. Like ba-ba-ba-ba and such. At first, it seemed like his jaw had a "catch" or a "pop" to it every time he opened and closed it, but that doesn't seem to be happening as much now. It was kind of odd. He also seems to have abundant energy. We were all hanging out last night and he was just rolling and rolling and spinning and pulling and trying to crawl and babbling his brains out the whole time.

Now that the pursuit for Lord Stanley's Cup has been narrowed to 4 teams, our INHD channel is carrying more games. I'm finally getting my hockey fix.

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Subject Not Related To Post Topic

Went to a BBQ last weekend in St. Louis. It was fun. Good to see KD & Not A Slacker, which doesn't happen often enough. The hotel stay was a bit rough. We got a suite, but it was one bedroom and one living room. The bedroom was furthest from the door, which is a great design to keep out the hallway & lobby noise. But we were too paranoid to let the boy sleep in the living room since it was closer to the door than the bedroom. So he slept in the crib in the bedroom with us. So we didn't sleep much because we could hear every little noise.

Apparently, The Boy rolled and wiggled his way about 10 feet across the living room today. No crawling, but it's still kind of neat.

He has started having fits when we wipe off his hands & face after mealtime. That's quite annoying. Sponge baths have become quite a chore, too, as he wiggles, rolls, & screams during them. I think we need to move to regular baths since he seems to enjoy them more.

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And Knowing Is Half The Battle

We had boys night in tonight while The Mom took a little break. I set him down on the mat and there was something a few feet in front of him that he apparently wanted. He leaned forward and up on his knees, quickly collapsing and launching himself forward at the same time. Then he proceeded to do a little G.I. Joe Army crawl, pulling himself forward primarily with his arms while his legs flailed around trying to help.

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Gimme' Five

The Boy likes to flail his arms up and down as he is figuring out that he owns them and has some degree of control over them. Sometimes, he'll hold his hand flat when he's doing it and if you hold your hand out flat, palm up, it's like he's "giving you five".

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Buttnanas

All the baby fruits and veggies we've been feeding the boy have tasted (for the most part) like mashed up fruits and veggies with water added. Which makes sense considering that's the ingredients. But curious minds need to know so we've tried pretty much all of them. Then there's the bananas. Wow. They have some extra ingredients, presumably to keep them from turning brown, but I don't know for sure. Well, they taste and smell like butt. So I'm officially renaming them to buttnanas. So far, The Boy doesn't care for them much. We'll have him try them a few more times, but I can't blame him if he rejects the buttnanas.

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What's That Ringing?

We had our first weekend away from The Boy last weekend. It was our 5 year anniversary and we went to Hermann, MO. It rained all weekend and there wasn't a lot to do, but we had a nice time. All the green grass & trees were nice, as was getting away from the city hub-bub. We visited some wineries and learned interesting things about their history. As much as we enjoyed the weekend and each other, we couldn't wait to get back to him.

The Wife came up with this great analogy. Imagine there's this thing on your desk at work that just rings and rings and rings VERY loudly and VERY frequently and you don't know how to make it stop. A lot of other people have this thing on their desk, but they have other problems with it, like it just flashes all the time. And there is no expert with the answers on how to fix it. People can say, "oh, I've got one of those, and it does this. but I don't know how to fix that ringing problem". So that doesn't help much.

The Boy is having fits during mealtimes and diaper changes. We don't know if it's gas, teeth, cold, allergies, etc. We just know it's painful, stressful, and 3 solid days of it is really starting to take it's toll.

But he sure is cute when he smiles & laughs & spins himself around to get to things & coos & lays his head on you when he gets worn out & stuff like that!

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Take Me Out To The Ball Game

We took The Boy to his first baseball game. And the Royals actually won a game! We had a blast and he was pretty good. He fell asleep in the 7th & slept through the fireworks at the end of the game.

The other morning when I was changing him, he wasn't done pooping and with his diaper off, he actually made two turd shaped turds. (As opposed to the wedges of poop that get formed because of the diaper.)

He's starting to move around in the crib while he's sleeping. It's our fault. We were with friends who have a son 5 weeks younger than The Boy. They were telling us how he moves around all the time in his crib. We said how The Boy never moves an inch - wakes up exactly how you left him. Two or three days after that comment he wakes up once on his stomach with his head at the foot of the crib and once sideways.

There's been a couple times in the past few days where I've been able to sooth The Boy when The Mom could not. It's kind of nice to be able to sooth him, but I do feel bad because I know how terrible it feels to not be able to sooth him.

He likes to roll from back to front, front to back, back to front, etc. etc. etc. But so far he just does it back and forth and stays in one spot. As soon as he realizes he can keep rolling in the same direction - look out!

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On The Charts

6 month check -
Damn near 21 lbs., which puts him at 93rd percentile (as opposed to >95%, which id what they've written every other time)

About 29 inches long, >95%

His head is about 17 inches, moving him up to 65th percentile

So we still have a giant baby, but he is averaging out some.

He had a different nurse that was slow with the shots. Not at all like the regular nurse that does all of them so fast that it's over before you know it.

We're embarassed to say his circimcision was stuck in one small spot. The doc fixed it with a little tug, but now it's irritated. Baths & diaper changes will be painful for all of us for a bit.

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