Christopher's Thankful List

Inspired by his cousin cousin, Liz, and her fun "Sain Nation" blog, Christopher wanted me to help him compose his list of things he is thankful for as we are approaching his very first Thanksgiving. Here is his top ten list, in order, from most important on...

1. Kasey
2. Mommy and Daddy
3. My extended East Coast family
4. Milk
5. The ladies
6. Things to chew on
7. My new jogging stroller
8. Diapers
9. Bath time
10. Baseball

On this lovely day before Thanksgiving, we passed the time by going to the Parkside Cafe for a playdate with some older children and their mommies. Christopher had a conversation with a grandma who was visiting from St. Louis and was entralled by a brother and sister (maybe 2 and 3 years old) who were having a conversation with us that I am still trying to figure out. The older brother showed Christopher how to go down the slide and our little man got a chance 3 times too! (I wish I had my camera!). Chris then napped during our visit to Babies R Us and Sonic and then visited with our neighbor Dave (who was mowing his lawn--it's 54 degrees here) when we got home. Christopher also took his first bottle from Mommy today which was very sweet...We are looking forward to our holiday tomorrow with Dan, Mary and Tristan (and their puppies) and would like to wish everyone who reads our blog (and those who don't) a very happy Thanksgiving!

#1 Parents' Detective Agency

Being a parent sometimes reminds me of being a forensic scientist... you have to go through a mental list of clues and possibilities to nail down the answer to a "baby case." This is especially true when the baby in question has not yet mastered the English language. We all know that our dear Christopher has never really been a great sleeper. Many people will tell us that this is to be expected, considering the boy is only 4 months old. Well recently it seems as though Little Wogs has been waking up more frequently (gasp!) but with more frantic cries that seem to say "I'm really uncomfortable Mommy! Do something!" At first we thought our man was teething. While I still think this could be part of the problem, I also think that he has a bit of reflux that is just getting worse and worse. It's hard to say for sure so I took him to the doctor today to check. Dr. Kerry (one of the PA's) prescribed a reflux medicine so we are trying that tonight. In addition, we have Christopher's car seat in his crib where he is presently sleeping to keep him upright for a while. In addition (again!) we tried giving him rice cereal before bedtime. Hopefully one of these things will prove effective in keeping Chris full/comfortable/happy at least for a little while... Brief note: Mommy went shopping for her first pair of post-pregnancy jeans today. For someone who really doesn't like to shop to begin with, this started out being a bit depressing until I finally found something that fit at Banana Republic. I'm going to go ahead and think of these as my transition jeans until I train for my next marathon!

Hail to the Victors

We would like to say that the "victors" were, in fact, the Michigan Wolverines but as we expected, Ohio State walked all over us. Despite this outcome, Christopher maintained his team loyalty and wore his "M Go Blue" onesie even with the absolutely dismal performance. We had Dan, Mary, and Tristan and Matt, Jaime, and Olivia over to watch the game with us. Dan and Mary brought their two doggies over so Kasey was extremely happy to have a play date. She is now officially exhausted because we ran 3 1/2 miles this morning and then she bounded all over the place with Oliver and Coco. Here are some pics of the puppies...

We set up a "children's playland" in the open space next to the family room downstairs for Tristan, Olivia and Christopher. Tristan is getting so big and he was having a blast rolling the exercise ball. At the same time, Olivia was having a great time on Christopher's tummy time mat. She is getting to be such a big girl!...


Christopher had a lovely time hosting all his friends and got a kick out of all the doggies. He especially enjoyed Oliver and tried to put Oliver's long, floppy ears in his mouth. Kasey got some practice of what is to come in the future as Tristan sat on her paws and climbed all over her. It was a great time with our great friends despite the loss and we look forward to a rematch next year.

Look at me, I can be center field

No, our baby has not shrunk! He is actually sitting next to an extra large baseball sent to him by Aunt Sue and Uncle Geof. If this kid ends up not liking baseball, I will be shocked what with his parental history and outside influences. Christopher thinks this ball is extra cool because it has a rattle inside so when you shake it or bounce it, it makes a noise. Last night before bedtime, I was bouncing the ball and Chris was just cracking up--almost as much as he does with Kasey. Daddy tried tossing the ball to him, but he was not yet able to catch it. Ah, something to work on this weekend. Today's entry will be short because we are off to walk at the mall. (Even we have to draw the line at 10 degrees!) Chris has a date with Olivia!

The Cow Says... Shazoooo

Today I had to put Christopher down next to me so I could have my hands free to open a package that came from UPS. I decided that he could do a little tummy time so I put him on a blanket and decided to bring in a toy for him to look at and play with. The toy was a foam cow given to Brian at work from someone at UBS a while back. The cow can be seen below...
Well, there is a button on the utter of the cow and if you press it, the cow says "moo." So I thought Christopher would find this very interesting. I pressed the button and he looked at the cow...looked at me...looked back at the cow...and started hysterically crying. I thought perhaps he was upset because he was in tummy time. He has been getting fussy while on his tummy recently because he is constantly trying to get his hands in his mouth and cannot figure out how to do that and hold himself up at the same time. Next I put him in his Bumbo seat and continued what I was doing. The cow was on his blanket and Christopher was looking at it and smiling. "Great!" I thought. He must like the cow now that he is sitting up. I decided to give the "mooing" another try. The cow mooed... the baby smiled. The cow mooed again... the baby lost it and broke down crying again. I felt so bad! I guess we've found the first thing Christopher is afraid of. Our boy needed to cool down so we bundled up and went for a walk in the jogging stroller. We had to use the all weather sheild because it's freezing and Chris was quite warm. Upon our return, he went down for a nap. As I was putting him down, I look into our bedroom and there is Kasey attacking the cow! As you can see from this picture, she was only trying to protect her little brother from the evil bovine...
The cow met an awful fate as Kasey decided to rearrange its face and then work on its backside. That was all before Mommy intervened and told Kasey she was a good girl but that the cow had enough. I suppose this is what you get for messing with Christopher...

Beefcake update

Yesterday was Christopher's 4 month well child appointment. The last time we visited the doctor was on Halloween because we thought our boy had a little bit of a cold. When they weighed him then, he was 15 pounds, 2 ounces. So in a month he had only put on about a pound. We figured he is finally starting to level off a bit in the weight department. Needless to say, I wasn't expecting much more weight gain at this appointment... Well, our little beefcake proved me wrong again. Drum roll please... Christopher weighs 17 pounds! He has nearly doubled his birth weight at 4 months. He is also 26 inches long and his head is 16 3/4 inches around. (That must be due to his manly size brain!) The doctor also said Christopher seems to have strong abs (at least one of us does) so he wouldn't be surprised if little man sits up relatively early. Ah wouldn't that be nice! Christopher looks healthy and happy and the doctor remarked about how cute he is getting. It was a great visit!

Fun with Grammy

Christopher has had a blast over the past few days with his Grammy and I think it's safe to say she has had a blast with him as well! Mommy and Daddy also had a blast because they got a nice break over the weekend and were able to go out to eat. Although I have to say, maybe these dates aren't such a good idea--we usually end up eating a lot of not-so-healthy food and then getting ice cream to top it off. This is not helping either of our training programs! Anyway, Grammy sang songs with Chris, shared some nursery rhymes, entertained him, changed him, and had a magical way of burping him. (I needed to have a lesson in that department!). She also cooked us some yummy meals. I like it when both our moms visit because we usually end up with a stocked fridge and freezer for at least a week... Today, our dear boy turned 4 months old--can you believe it? His Daddy is expecting a cake in celebration of this big event (and also Daddy's half birthday is tomorrow), but I don't know where he is expecting this magical cake to come from. We have Christopher's four month appointment this afternoon after we bring Grammy to the airport so we'll let you know tomorrow how much our little man weighs. I'm also going to talk to his doctor about this whole teething situation because I have this motherly sense that a tooth is coming soon. Of course, I also had a "motherly" sense that Christopher was going to be a girl so that tells you a bit about my motherly senses... Here are some more pics from the weekend...