and we're mobile!... sort of..

So getting Grant transitioned from sleeping in his swing to sleeping in the crib seems to have been much easier than I imagined. The last few nights he's slept all night in the crib. He doesn't like to initially go down in the crib, but I think it's more to do with him wanting to be up socializing with the adults. If I've learned anything in my 3 months as a parent it's not to celebrate these small milestones too prematurely but it's been 3 nights out of the swing cold turkey and he's doing well so I'll do my small celebratory dance quietly in the corner. :)

Now that he's got all this wide open space I keep coming in to find him in completely different places to where I placed him. At first I thought I was losing my mind or that Pete was putting him to bed sideways in his crib for some reason. But yesterday I walked past his room to check on him and his head was on the right hand side. I went back to the kitchen to get a glass of water and heard him starting to stir. I grabbed his bottle and heated it (to his exact preferred temperature :P) and when I got back to his room he'd completely flipped around. So he's mobile.. but circularly mobile. And he's not so great at working out his path of travel. Sometimes I'll come in and his legs are both hanging out the slats in the crib. Sometimes, like tonight, his head is against the railing and he's gotten himself stuck (don't worry - he lets us know when this happens). I can't work out how he's really doing it. I know when I change him he's like a snake in reverse on his back slithering away from me. So anyway, I'm thinking he could make some decent snow angels in motion (more like snow circles) when we get back to Nebraska this winter. :)

He's starting to smile and talk a lot more and wow is it ever cute. He's also taken an interest in actually LOOKING at the person holding him. He's normally Mr. Take-Everything-In EXCEPT the person holding me and is constantly looking around the room. The last couple of days it's actually startled me to have him in front of me studying my face and staring intently at me. It's kind of silly but today it actually made me a bit teary. I was so full of love it was leakin' out my eyes. :) I can't remember what our life was like before we had him.

-misty

happy thanksgiving & mysterious flying socks!...

We had a good Thanksgiving yesterday and Grant celebrated by having blowouts all day and going through 4 different outfits in about 3 hours time. He had Thanksgiving cheer coming out the rear.

When I put Grant to sleep last night he was in a little outfit with socks on. He'd been particularly fussy and woke up a few hours later. When I went to get him I once again, found one sock flung up by his head and the other up by his arm. I have no idea how he's doing this. I know he kicks his feet a lot when he's fed up and that his legs are really strong for a baby his age. But I've never seen him do high kicks with enough force to fling a sock. And while his legs are really strong he doesn't seem to have any interest in working out his hands and arms. He does occasionally grab at my hair and shirt but if you put a rattle in his hand he just lets it fall out. I really want to put our video camera in his room to find out how this is happening. If he's juggling socks when we leave the room I'd like to capitalize on that now and book him into the nearest circus. :)

On a more serious note and in the spirit of Thanksgiving I'd just like to say what I'm thankful for this year. I'm thankful for our great friends and family around the world who all send their love and well wishes via email and phone calls. It's incredibly hard to be so far away from our families especially now that we have Grant. It's nice to know you're all reading to keep up with how we're doing. I'm of course incredibly grateful and thankful for being blessed with Grant and his wonderful father, Peter. Everyday Grant does something funny and I love having Pete to share all of this with. From the time I was pregnant we referred to Grant as "our little chicken" and Pete and I were the sole members of Team Chicken. Having Pete there to encourage, share, and take care of me after a rough night has made this parenting gig that much easier (Though I do wish he'd jump up and take the early morning feeding a bit more often :) ).

Hope you all had a great turkey day!

I'm not sure if I mentioned this before but please feel free to leave comments here or on flicker. It lets me know someone is actually reading our blog and if anything will guilt me into posting and adding photos more often. :)

-misty

Grant and Family

Grant and his Granny - My Mum is in Seattle visiting Grant - He actually smiles for her too which is better than for his Mum and Dad!














Misty, Grant and myself at Deception Pass, Whidbey Island near Seattle.










Here is Grant laughing at his favorite friend - Lampie (a lamp in our living room!)

More photos from the above sets in our photo album - link on the right of this page.

Battle of the Bottle, Round 2.....

I think we have a little Chef Gordon Ramsey on our hands. Grant is now very particular about the temperature of his milk and will make no qualms about sending his dinner back to the kitchen if it's not perfect. If he eats his meal in a leisurely fashion then by the time he gets halfway through the bottle the temperature of the milk is suddenly UNACCEPTABLE. He'll put his mouth around the nipple to gauge the temperature and then squeal and kick and put his face up in a scowl until we make the trip to the kitchen to warm it up to his liking. If he thinks I'm warming or chilling his plates when he's on solids he's going to be sorely disappointed.

He's getting on well with Granny and Brian and slowly getting used to hearing more voices in the house. We've had a few challenging bedtimes but last night he did quite well after he finally went down. Pete also wanted to note he took his first trip to the Ballard locks on Sunday. (I'm not quite so sure why this was worth noting considering he was sleeping in his stroller covered from the rain the entire time). He also did amazingly well when we all went to lunch at Ray's Boathouse and only let the entire restaurant know he was there at the end of the meal when he had to get strapped into his carseat.

We're off to do some shopping today :)

-misty

Mum and Bryan visiting

Grant met Granny for the first time this last Fri - Pics to follow!

well that was a whole lot of nuthin'...

So for the past week I've had tons of anxiety over Grant's 2 month doctor visit (where you get your 4 vaccinations at once). I actually lost precious sleep worrying about it all. So we get there and do the normal doctor Q&A bit and Grant is totally happy and smiley. He really noticed the mirror along the back of the table this time and seems to LOVE how the paper underneath of him crinkled when he kicked and moved around. Then the nurse came in with her tray of needles while I held his pacifier in his mouth. I felt so incredibly deceptive knowing he was going to get jabbed. So she jabbed him and he of course screamed and looked at me like "How could you?!". And I cried and then picked him up and gave him his bottle and that was it. He cried for maybe 30 seconds while I was getting out his bottle and then he conked out. His pediatrician said he may sleep for 4-6 hours this afternoon. I didn't expect myself to be that affected by it all. I know it's quick pain and the benefits of the vaccinations obviously outweigh the 30 seconds of pain but I guess I don't have much experience with the "I'm hurt" crying. I didn't realize how I'd become used to the I'm hungry, bored or tired cries until I heard him squeal on that table. That made me feel more like a mom in that minute than anything I could imagine. I would have done anything to make it better. So, yeah, 30 seconds of crying and the most peaceful, angelic looking nap I've seen afterwards. Not so bad.

-misty

SCREEEEEECH.. If this were a movie this is where the record would screech and then I'd eat my words.

So an hour after this original post all hell broke loose and Grant screamed that "I'm hurt" cry for 2.5 hours straight. Poor little guy. By the time Pete got home at 5pm with the Infant Tylenol we were both crying our heads off. Fortunately the Tylenol only took about 15 minutes to work and he was fine.

Oh! he's 12lbs 8oz and 24" long and really advanced in his motor skills. 2 more inches and he's outgrown his infant carseat. And this morning I came in to find him practicing his escape out of his swing. One leg was completely over the edge of the swing and the other was over the center hump and he was lying all crooked and scooched over.

Sun, what sun?

his timing and aim are impeccable...

Grant peed on me again today... twice. It's one thing to be peed on so often and quite another to get peed on and then look down to see Grant grinning from ear to ear after he did it. One of the few times he's ever smiled at us. Pete thought this was genius.

Every time I tell someone Grant's peed on me they invariably say "Don't you cover him up?!" like I'm somehow taking off his diaper and leaving him naked for hours, dipping his fingers in warm water and running water near his head and THEN he wees on me. I know I'm supposed to cover him up. The thing is he's really squirmy. First of all, I think he'd ditch his clothes all together if he had any say in the matter. The minute I start unsnapping his clothes he starts kicking his legs. I have to capture them one at a time to get them out of his jammies. When I pull down the diaper I have seconds (or less) to get him covered. Sometimes as I'm pulling it down he starts peeing and its a quick "duck and cover" job. When I do have time to cover him up he kicks his little legs back and forth and the cover falls off. Covering him is like trying to put a sweater on a worm. When I was pregnant I saw these PeePee TeePee's advertised in the back of a magazine and considered it. But the distance and force in which it comes out leave me with images of the old cartoons with Bugs Bunny sitting on top of "Old Faithful".

So I'll keep trying to cover him as quick as I can and stay out of the line of fire as much as possible. If he grins at me again afterwards I'm going to know it's not so involuntary.

-misty

I just had a look at those PeePee TeePees.. the Santa Claus ones are great!

another one bites the dust and hand-sandwich at last!...

I realized the other night that another one of the parenting resolutions we made went out the door. I was so sure I would uphold this one because seriously, how hard could it be?

#6 Don't tiptoe around the house while he's sleeping so he gets used to normal household noise.

After spending hours trying to get the little bugger off to bed I find myself tiptoeing out of his room and doing everything in slow motion careful not to make any additional noise. I've even thought of reading the microwave manual to see if I can turn off the bleeps (I've already become a pro at doing the microwave countdown and stopping it with one second left to avoid the loud triple bleep telling me my food is done). If he happens to hear there's anything going on outside of his room he wants to be out in the mix living it up with everyone. It's going to be a sad day when he realizes the party going on outside of his room is really mom emptying the dishwasher. Pete on the other hand never puts him back to bed so he's great at stomping around, clinking dishes and doing whatever it is he normally does with lots of noise. I'm sure it's quite comical to watch me whisper-screaming at him to be quiet and use his "inside voice". He doesn't get it.. or maybe it's me that doesn't get it. :)

In other news, Grant has found out he can pacify himself pretty good with a hand sandwich with a side of fingers. It seems to take a great amount of slurping and smacking to get a good enough portion of his hand in there. His slurping can be heard in our room across the hall with both doors closed. He seems to prefer the thumb all the way down to the second knuckle and a portion of his pointer finger though on occasion I have caught him with the starfish face plant (thumb in mouth, fingers open and sprawled across his face).

Other than that not too much news to report. He's getting cuter by the minute.