John to the extreme

Lately John has been learning to communicate the concepts of more or less. But he communicates it in terms of distance. If he wants to indicate very "something," he says "all the way to Seneca." If something is very extreme or intense, it's "all the way to Texas" or "all the way to Mimi and Pa's house." When we were driving out here, Christopher spit up after we got a couple miles down the road from lunch. I asked if it was a lot or a little, and he said "all the way to Mimi and Pa's house." I asked him if it was just "all the way to Seneca." He said "No way. All the way to Texas." Unfortunately, John was right...


Here are some pictures of John and Christopher sharing toast while waiting for Tony to come home from work.

Quick Christopher Update

Christopher is doing well and is just such a joy to have around!
He's sprouting three teeth these days. In this order: One down, one up, one down. Strange, but everything is different this time around, naturally. Thankfully.
He is a champion sitter and REALLY wants to crawl, but hasn't yet. He's starting to lean forward a lot more, and is getting braver and not as afraid of falling. He also works at reaching things by sort of oonching on his bottom. And he spins himself around to see or reach whatever he needs.
He babbles a lot, and makes lots of mouth noises with his tongue and cheeks. He also likes to hold things in his hands and turn them over and back using his wrists. I am holding a tiny bit of hope in my heart that he could be left-handed, because he does sometimes reach with that hand, which John never seemed to do.

He eats lots of baby food (2-3 tubs 3-5 times a day), as well as bits of whatever allowable solid foods the rest of us are having. I usually nurse him right when he gets up in the morning and right when he goes to bed. He can entertain himself in 20-30 minutes spurts (like when I'm doing my morning yoga) as long as he has toys and is near us. His favorite activity these days are building blocks.
He loves watching all the "big boys" whenever we get together with Henry and/or James.
We're including him in the bedtime routine now. Bath with John, then reading 2-3 books, then nurse, then bed with his monkey nightlight (thanks a million, Miss Kerri), pacifier (which he chews rather than sucks), his afghan, and Ikea stuffed puppy. He is still mostly sleeping through the night, although the past couple nights, he has woken up between 3 and 4am and needed some TLC from Daddy and some tylenol from Mommy to get through the night. I think his teeth might be troubling him...
We're all enjoying him very much!

At Juliet's request

I articulated my stance on marriage and expectations to Juliet a while back. Apparently it made some sense to her because she asked me to post it here.

This came up around the time of father’s day this year. These days we’re pretty busy with the kids, so things like getting cakes and cards in advance tend to slip through the cracks. I don’t get as upset about it as Juliet does. When she asked me why, I gave her this analysis…

When it comes to birthdays, father’s day, etc., one of two things will happen…
A) My family will get me a card/cake, or
B) They will not

Now, if I hope that they will get me a card/cake, I will be setting myself up to either be (respective to A and B above)…
A) Pleased, or
B) Disappointed

On the other hand, if I do NOT hope that they will get me a card/cake I will instead be setting myself up to either be…
A) Overjoyed, or
B) Pleased (because what I expected to happen indeed did happen, or I guess I should say it didn't happen)

So I can either set myself up to be pleased/disappointed or overjoyed/pleased . Which would you choose?

Just so that my posting date isn't "one week ago" on everyone else's bloglist

Everyone at their respective work stations.







For the record, Christopher is sitting down in the bassinet, not standing up. I was reminded by Mimi tonight that he doesn't need to crawl or pull up, he's got his royal bearers (me and Tony) to move him from place to place!