Little Man's Birthday

Baby has turned 1! And therefore from now on he will be referred to as "Little Man." So, Little Man is 1. Here's a report on our day.

8:00 a.m.: We have a birthday breakfast of chocolate chip pancakes and bacon. Then he finds his gifts on the floor and checks them out with Grandma.

10:00 a.m.: The photographer arrives to take his 1-year-old photos as well as a few family photos. This goes okay. He manages a few smiles before he gets serious for the rest of the session. We'll have the proofs in 2 or 3 weeks.

11:30 a.m.: This happens:
11:45 a.m.: But not for long, 'cause DUH, Mom, toddlers don't nap.

After a healthy lunch of peas, 'cause that's the only thing Little Man eats anymore, he checked out the teepee we got him for his birthday. Hmmm, do I really want to go in there?
My wonderful green punching balloon is in there, so I suppose it's safe.

3:00 p.m.: Party Time! Little Man puts his party pants on to greet our guests. The guests were: Abi and Pop, Grandma, Mimi and Grandpa, Uncle J. and Aunt L., Friends J & E and B & C, and neighbors A with little girl C. Some party shots:

5:30 p.m: Singing and CAKE! Little Man got his own cupcake to himself, with which he was very pleased.
UNTIL duh nut. duh nut. duh nut duh nut Duh Nut Duh Nut DUH NUT (Jaws theme song, please note the circling omnivores below:
He held the cupcake out to show Daisy, who of course ate it. The no-nap-day came back to haunt us and we had a partial meltdown. Luckily Mama had backup cupcakes at the ready (note the sad eyes here, even with the backup cupcake).

But Noooooooo! The little omnivore, Pepe, stole the backup cupcake out of the other hand! Full blown meltdown time.

Nothing a bath can't cure, and we're on to gift opening. Little Man only has eyes for balloons, though.
This is good for babies:


Aw, MAN. So uncool.

You keep opening, I'll be in my teepee if you need me:

YEAH! It's my birthday and I can stand up all by myself!

Mama's going to dress me silly at the pool this summer:

Other assorted gift-opening pictures:
When are these people going to leave so I can go to bed? I ate a lot of cake and now I'm tired.


Some teepee time with Daddio before bed:

8:00 p.m.: We proved that babies can go from 60 (screaming and jumping up and down in his crib) to 0 (asleep on his tummy) in 90 seconds or less. I wish I could witness that sometime. Does he actually pass out? Or does he give up the battle and lay down nicely?

All in all Little Man had an amazingly good birthday, especially considering it was nap-free. Thanks, all!

Things I Love

I love punk music




And I love BEANS. Black beans, red beans, and today, chili beans.


Is it hot in here or is it just my cheeks? This is from Grandpa J.'s camera.

Happy Easter!

It's Baby's Second Easter, believe it or not. Here is Baby's Easter Basket set up last night. The duck basket was part of a baby gift when he was born. He also got a stuffed rooster toy, his first puzzle, and some empty plastic eggs. Hey, he doesn't know they should have something in them!


He spent most of the morning making sure all his eggs were present and accounted for.


He found some time to eat Hot Cross Buns before church.

His Easter outfit:
Also, as there's no end to bathtime cuteness, T. took this picture of them after bathtime the other night.

Reluctant Napper

Since Baby is getting to be less of a Baby these days, he no longer falls asleep like a sack of potatoes in our arms. Instead he's usually awake when we put him down for a nap. At bedtime he's always so tired that he just rolls right over and goes to sleep. But at naptime he's a little more reluctant.

Yankees vs. Hokies

We have 289 (seriously, 289) photos of the Yankees vs. VT game from yesterday. T. and his dad were able to attend. T. reported that most of the Yanks were great and spent a lot of time signing autographs for the fans. In fact T. got Jeter to sign a baseball for his brother, and several signatures for our friend Matt, a Yankees fan. (Click to expand any photos.)

The Scene:

We are rich and famous (Jeter, ARod, Shelly Duncan & Johnny Damon):

Jorge Posada is rich, but not rich enough to buy pants that fit:


Jeter at bat:

First Hokie Hit! (Shelly Duncan patted his butt and the crowd went wild)


T. said all the guys in the dugout were laughing when the Yankee batters had strikes.

Once the starters were done, Alex Rodriguez went into the VT dugout and (according to the news) signed bats and batting gloves for the VT players.Check out Hokie Bird in the dugout:

Yankees 11, Hokies 0. Good game, Good game, Good game.

Yankees (Scott Patterson, Joe Girardi, Jason Giambi) signing Matt's hat, until the camera battery died (bummer):

Back in My Day

I know it's hard to believe, Son, but there was a day when all greeting cards did not play music. It was a dark, troubled time.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I don't want to wear these glasses.


This is how much I don't want to wear these glasses.

But it is HILARIOUS when Mama wears the glasses.

More Florida Pics

Florida pics from others' cameras. These first two chocolate cake pictures crack me up.

My Baby, My Dog

Today I confirmed for myself that I'm training Baby in the same way that I trained, with debatable success, the dog. I was giving Baby a bath. He stood up in the tub and I said,

"No, Baby, Sit. Sit. Good Boy. Where's your ball?"

And he got his ball, put it in his mouth like a dog, and stood back up. That seems about right.

And here, for your viewing pleasure, is a token cute picture. I like to not use the flash when the light seems good enough, but then I have trouble with focus. I still like this picture, though.

Baby and Dog

Some of this week's pictures from home.

I tried to think of a clever title for this first one but couldn't come up with anything. Let me know what you've got:

Baby continues to think he's a puppy:

This is my usual view of him:

We had another messy encounter with chocolate chip pancakes this week:

Here he's supervising the guys fixing our deck:

In other news, we started swim class this morning. I don't have any photographic proof of that for you. Baby's been in the pool before and he likes it. He did try to crawl through the baby pool and wind up floating on his face which he didn't enjoy. Then we had him go under water a couple of times and he didn't enjoy that, either. They say if you blow in the baby's face he holds his breath. That didn't seem to be the case for us. We did know some folks in our class. Classmates of T 's from grad school and their fearless little girl M. And I'm sure over the next couple of months we'll get to know all the kids and parents.

Florida Vacation

Baby and I went to Florida for 5 days. We celebrated Baby's Grandma's birthday and also saw Aunt ME and Uncle S, and Aunt J and Uncle S.

But before we get to those pictures, any suggestions on what to do about this? When I went in to get him this morning Baby was happily gnawing on his crib.


Okay, on to the vacation. Baby and I drove Tuesday night and stayed at a hotel near the cheaper-but-further-from-home airport. We stopped on the way and had Cracker Barrel.


Wednesday Baby had his first two airplane flights. Here he is on the first flight (no, we didn't have the luxury of an empty seat near us, this was just before the plane filled up)

I upgraded us for the second flight and my strategy paid off! We got the wide, lovely, near the front Business Class seat (my first time in Business Class as well), plus an empty seat next to us!

That day we celebrated Mom's birthday with steak and chocolate cake.

Baby was fascinated with the shiny "Happy Birthday" sign.


Thursday was chilly but we went to see the ocean anyway.


Friday we went to St. Augustine. Baby played in a fountain and we walked down the water to the fort.


That afternoon we soaked up some sun (with no less than SPF 45 on, natch), reluctantly (for Baby) played in the yard, and went out for dinner. Here Baby is voluntarily sucking on a lemon.


Each day got warmer, and by Saturday there were actually people laying out on the beach, and a few in the water.

Sunday we made our daily trip to the coffee shop then relaxed at home until it was time to leave.