Pictures and Videos

Kristen and I have not been very good about blogging or taking pictures and videos recently.  I did take a few last week and here is a sample.

We've been just a little too busy to keep the blog up at the moment, but Davis is a ton of fun.  He has said a few sentences and continues his fascination with trucks, trains, planes and firetrucks.  He has also been pushing the boundaries a little bit.

Anyway, here are a few pictures and videos from the last couple of weeks.   There are more on YouTube and Picasa.

Playing soccer in the house.

Playing soccer in the house.  Trying to draw a penalty I'm sure.

Playing "soccer" in the house.

Throwing the ball

Charging the Camera

New Photos - Blog update

Kristen and I have fallen off the blogging wagon pretty hard in the last month.  With the stupid amount of snow that has fallen so far, and a few colds, we've had to take a lot of days off of work, or had a lot of early mornings and late nights splitting days off with Davis.  Davis is growing up fast, so hopefully we'll get back on the blog wagon soon.  Until then, here a few new pictures.

Getting blocks out of his toy chest.

Opening the blocks

A quick cuddle with mom

Hamming it up while mom cooks

Going for a walk. Two snow storms ago.

Skiing at great brook farm.

Watching babies.

Cooking (and eating) with mom

Trying to fill mom's shoes

Cool new tricks

I've had this post sitting around for a while, but haven't had the time for energy to finish it.  But, I've got to make my end of the month push to get our blog post quota up.

Davis really seems to be growing up fast.  A few new things he can do and say are below.

Some of the things he can now say that we recognize:

• Dinner - pronounced "ninner"
• Monkey
• Up please (sometimes, usually this is tugging or putting his arms in the air)
• Yes please
• Thank you (not new)
• All right (not new)
• Grandma, Grandpa and Grammie (but not pronounced like that, he has distinct names for all of them and recognizes them all on Skype)
• Sarah, Avi, Lucy (his daycare providers)
• Domino (not Lilly, I'm not sure he knows we have two cats)
• This
• Read this

Some cool things he does:

• Gives hugs and kisses.
• Walks down stairs holding our hands.
• Walks home from daycare, starting from the top of the stairs at daycare.
• Can walk up a step without holding onto anything (just the first one).
• Runs really fast.
• Puts toys away (sometimes).
• Puts sand in his dump truck.
• Builds elaborate structures with his blocks.
• Stands on a footstool to wash his hands and brush his teeth.
• Throws balls really well.  He nailed me in the head tonight from about 4 feet away with a tennis ball.

Some things he likes to do:

• Get each child's lunch box and coat when their parent arrives at daycare.  
• Play fort with mom.
• Be tossed in the air.
• Be tickled.
• Chase around the living room.
• Naked chase in his bedroom after a bath (this doesn't always end well).
• Watch work crews and trucks.  The other day, he got to sit in a big truck on the way to daycare.
• Watch and pet dogs.  Last weekend we went to minuteman national park and he loved the young lab that was running everywhere.
• Pick up domino.
• Pick up leaves.

Some developmental milestones:

• For 18 months, he is in the 95th percentile for height and weight
• Will soon be in size 5 diapers
• Wears a lot of three toddler clothes (see a theme)
• Has at least 12 teeth (its hard to see!)
• Has started to try and get out of his crib.  We might be going to Ikea this weekend for a "big boy bed".

Since he is now migrating into 2 and 3 toddler clothes, we put a bunch of his smaller and summer clothes away.   While doing this, we found his costume from last year and amazingly he a) wanted to wear it and b) it still fit.  Here are the results:

June Updates

Kristen and I haven't been good about blogging lately -- some of this is laziness -- but some can be contributed to the fact that we are getting out and doing more and we've had less time to sneak in a blog post here or there.  As Davis has grown and we've gotten more used to this whole "parenting thing" we are taking a lot more half and full day trips on the weekend.  For instance, this weekend, we took our first camping trip with the little guy.  This of course we preceded by two days of finding our camping gear, making lists, packing and cleaning.

Anyway, enough of the excuses for the lack of posts this month.  Here are some recent updates.

Davis:

• Is teething.  There are lots of fingers in the mouth, drooling and chewing on things at daycare.
• Loves the new daycare provider Lucy.  
• Says hi and waves to: random people on the street, cats, dogs, cars
• Understands and can say "shoes"
• Can feed himself with a spoon and fork
• Either loves or hates his bath.  If he loves his bath, he can be in there for an hour, if he hates it, we are in and out in a couple of minutes.  
• Plays his belly like a drum (taught by dad)
• Is gaining hair at the same rate I am losing it
• Loves the little piggy song and playing with his toes
• Loves his sand box
• Loves water
• Tries to combine his sandbox and water

We haven't been taking a lot of pictures lately, but here is one from a recent evening:

The Home Stretch

As of today, Kristen has exactly 5 weeks to finish and turn in her thesis.  It promises to be a busy 5 weeks.  A few of the big things on our plates for the next 2 months:

• Davis' first birthday
• Prepare poster / presentation for conference in Lisbon (Kristen)
• Plan and take a 1 week trip to Portugal and somewhere else in Europe (Both)
• Come up with a thesis title.  Current working draft is: "Biological systems and stuff" (Kristen)
• Write thesis (Kristen)
• Prepare resume (Kristen)
• Job Search (Kristen)
• Prepare thesis defense presentation (Kristen)

Most of these are typical things that happen at the end of a PHd.  We've certainly seen a number of our friends go through crunch time in the last part of their degrees, but it was kind of shock when we realized there were only 5 weeks left until her thesis was due. 

Kristen has been working very hard for a long time and it is hard to imagine where we'll find the extra time.   We're planning on taking Davis to daycare for an extra 3 hours a week which will help a lot, but it means trading off Davis time for work time for a little while.  

Our typical day goes like this:

• 5:30 - Wake up, hopefully sleeping through the night
• 6:00 - Parent #1 showers and gets ready for work
• 6:00 - Parent #2 takes care of Davis (fed, changed, playing - yay!)
• 6:30 - Parent #2 prepares breakfast for Parent #1, #2 and Davis
• 7:00 - Breakfast
• 7:15 to 7:30 - Parent #1 leaves for work
• 7:30 to 9:00 - Parent #2 and Davis time (yay!)
• 9:30 to 10:00 - Parent #2 arrives at work
• 5:15 - Parent #1 picks up Davis
• 5:30 - Parent #2 arrives home, starts dinner
• 6:15 to 6:45 - Dinner
• 6:45 to 7:15 - Playtime (yay!)
• 7:30 - Davis goes to bed
• 7:30 to 9:00 - John cleans, does laundry, chores, etc, Kristen works
• 9:00 to 10:00 - John on the computer, blogging / doing finances, etc, Kristen works
• 10:00 or 11:00 - Bedtime

Its going to be a busy and exciting time.

1 year of blogging

We've now been at this blog thing for a year and I think it has been a great success.  We've managed 210 posts over the last year, some large, some small.  Here are a compilation of photos from the last year, 1 per month.

February 2009

March 2009

April 2009

May 2009

June 2009

July 2009

August 2009

September 2009

October 2009

November 2009

December 2009

January 2010

February 2010

Davis almost sleeps through the night

Recently, Davis has almost slept through the night. Earlier this week, he only woke up once during the night and Tuesday, while he woke up a couple of times, he went the whole night without eating. Sleep has definitely been getting easier, tonight I put him down on his back (crying) and he put himself to sleep. I don't think we've done anything, I think this is mostly Davis growing up and getting used to our bedtime routine which we've been pretty consistent about for the last month and a half.

I'm sorry for the lack of posts lately, we've been adjusting to taking daycare and have both been swamped with work recently. Hopefully we're both out from under the heaviest work loads for a while and will be able to post a little more often. This blog is very important to both of us.

TMI Mom blog 'goes live'

Well, I finally decided on a name for the blog I started that contains parenting tips and local resources. I called it TMI Mom...I came up with the name when I was talking to our friends AJ and Susan. AJ always teases me for sharing way too much information (slang: TMI for too much information). AJ isn't the only one, it's a personality quirk of mine. I realized it was a nice double entendre with the fact that I started a blog to hold information for which I was receiving/reading/learning too much of to keep track of it all. I have enough posts and I'm happy enough with the layout that it went 'live' today. In other words, I sent it to people and I hope they like it!

Here it is: TMI Mom

Leaving Davis is hard work

Davis turned 11 weeks old this weekend! When Grandma M. gets here in a couple of weeks she's just not going to recognize the little guy. A real turning point in his weight came the last couple of weeks when he put on a couple of pounds in a short time. I realized how much he changed when the instructor of our new Mommy and Me class said "Hello Davis, it's nice to meet you..how many necks do you have??" Talk about making a Mom self-conscious for her little one! We are still get comments about how beautiful his eyes are, this weekend a stranger at a restaurant called them 'devastating'.

I don't have much time to blog anymore..right now I'm posting something quickly while some of my code runs in the background and I can't do much in the way of work until it's done. I guess the biggest news is that we did start a new Mommy and Me class. It's amazing how different this class is. We've moved on up to the alert baby stage and so the class is all about 'circle time', music and games and much less in the way of quiet discussion. I don't know about Davis, but I was pretty overwhelmed. The other thing is that today has definitely been my hardest day to leave Davis. I've had to fight back tears all morning. I don't know what I would do if I didn't have a yoga Tuesday to look forward to with him! John and I have started to struggle with who gets to hold him when we are home. Both of us seem want to make up all our time away from him on the weekends and at night. I'm really excited that John gets to take next week off for a whole week of just Daddy-Davis time. I think it will be a great experience for both of them.

I could use your help on naming a new blog I've started! I kept finding myself absorbing new information from other moms and different resources and then retelling it to other people. One woman actually asked me if I was in education..which, I am in a way, but not in the way she was thinking. Anyway, my hope for the blog is to post one factoid or tip a day with an occasional resource post for the local area (like things to do and free drop in groups, swim groups, etc.). I called it the Parent's Water Cooler to start, which seemed like a good idea at the time, but now not so much. So please send me your suggestions! John has suggested "Kristen's quick tips", but their not really my tips, they are tips from other people and books, so I can't claim them as my own!