Category Archives: Jack

>Then and Now

>We had a big weekend of milestones and one of the biggest was Jack’s first haircut! It’s always so bittersweet when a baby gets their first haircut. With just a few snips, wisps of baby’s sweet downy hair become the bangs of a little boy. As the hair gets taped into the baby book, you realize how fast those nine and half months have flown and you realize they will be in kindergarten before you know it. (Or maybe you realize that you haven’t really started the baby book and it’s impossible to tape baby hairs to a blog.) It’s nice that his hair is out of his eyes, but so sad that my snuggly baby is growing up so fast. Or maybe the sadness, the melancholy, is just summer turning into fall, the days shortening, the steady march of time towards the long, dark, night of winter. Or maybe the problem is that his haircut is quite terrible. And really, it’s hard to be seriously sad when I find myself laughing about it a lot. In a laughing at you sort of way. Poor kid. He slept through the haircut, which the barber though would make things easier… I’m not so sure.

Luke before his first haircut:

Luke After His First Haircut:


Jack Before his First Haircut (also note how much he is eating! That was just his first helping):
Jack During:
All the boys getting their hairs cut:

Jack After and Foreshadowing about Tomorrow’s Post:

>The Balance Myth

>I have a lot to say about the B word. (Balance.) But I don’t really have time to write the whole post now. I was thinking about it on the way to a work meeting at around 7:10 am this morning, at Jack’s 9 month check up, on and off during work, while I was riding my bike to the school meeting where I volunteered to be the kindergarten liaison, and I thought some more while I was nursing Jack to sleep, and then while Dave and I were picking up the house. Then I rode my bike to Andrea’s house to make a peanut butter sandwich for Luke’s lunch box since she lives halfway to the grocery store and we were out of peanut butter. So ideas are percolating about the balance myth. Just an FYI about what I am working on, in my little, sleep deprived brain.

Jack Report: He is meeting milestones like a champ, and he weighs 17 pounds, 6 ounces. This is slightly below the 10% percentile. He’s been right at 10 for his whole life and a little drop at 9 months is to be expected since he is so active. Of course, he is 9.5 months, but whatev. 50% for height and 25% for head size.

Luke Report: He did not get the milk! My powers are not as strong as I thought. I am just going to get him a thermos, I guess. At the meeting today a subcommittee was formed to discuss why 15 minutes isn’t enough time for lunch and what can be done about it. If Luke doesn’t want to waste precious eating time, trying to buy milk, I guess I can deal with it. He also came home yesterday and the day before in a very good mood and he made a friend at after school care so all is right with the world. (He now has $29.50 in his online account but I suppose he can use that up over the next 12 or 13 years.)

Megan Report: Speaking of milk, the daycare has been saying I am not sending enough milk and I have been stressing. Jack’s weight drop stressed me even more. I asked the Dr. about it, and I said the only thing I can think to do is add a late night pumping session. He said mother nature is in charge and Jack is doing fine. Whatever I pump is enough and I would be better off going to bed instead of trying to pump one more time. Yea! A tremendous weight has been lifted!

>What’s Jack Into These Days?

>So what’s Jack into? Oh, the lazy susan. He literally got into the lazy susan. He was wrist deep in the potted plants, he got his stomach in Bean’s water dish, he crawled under his crib when the side was down, and under Luke’s bed. He napped quite a bit on Wednesday, which was good because when he was awake I could only work in 10 second intervals.

What is Luke really into though? Playing with his cousins! Yea! The cousins are here! Pictures to follow as the weekend progresses.

P.S. Jack had roseola last week – that was what caused the fever and the rash. Febrile seizures are a side effect of roseola, which I did not know until the danger had passed. But I did think that Jack felt hot, and immediately gave him tylenol. As he was swallowing the fever reducing nectar like a baby bird, I was remembering what a febrile seizure was like and hoping to never observe another one. Which reminds me! Happy half birthday to Luke! In six months he’ll be too old for a febrile seizure. At 14 months, it was not at all a relief to hear that the seizures stop at 6 years. I am glad that there was just the one!

>My Son, My Son, The Younger One

>Poor Jack, in all this excitement and stress about kindergarten, there has been nary a post about Jack and his many accomplishments.

He now eats crackers:

That’s really such a short lived milestone because after one, you realize how disgusting they are.

He pulls up to standing, and as you can see, has three teeth on top:

He looks cute is his fall wardrobe:

But he hates last year’s winter wardrobe because he’s like Ralphie from A Christmas Story, combined with a turtle on it’s back:

And the biggest news is this: He said Dada. Dave was playing peekaboo with him through the car window while we waited for our carry out pizza at the start of our camping trip (we camp in style) and when Dave disappeared Jack said, “Dada!” and looked for him out the window.

And at dinner tonight he made something that vaguely resembled the sign for “more”. He hasn’t been too keen on learning the signs because he has found that screaming at the top of his lungs is an easier and very effective way to get more food.

>Party Time

>I have a great Now and Then post but it will have to wait for tomorrow because the videos are taking forever to upload and I want to go to bed. So instead I am going to talk about a really fun party we attended on Friday.

The party was for a bunch of people who used to work together, (pre-layoffs and outsourcing) and that is great for me because I do my best networking with a beer in one hand and a baby on my hip. “Sure it’s a 24×7 job, but don’t you really need someone to work just until 3:00 pm? My customers love me, you know that!” And this wasn’t just any beer, this was Michelob from the kegerator on the porch. The kegerator next to the cotton candy machine.

Oh, and did I mention the zip line that went across the pool?

We stayed until about 9:00 (late!) and Jack fell asleep at his normal time like a good boy.

OK, I’ll be honest, this post is just to annoy my co-workers (one of whom is knitting a voodoo doll as I type) by flaunting my sleeping baby. Speaking my my co-workers, it’s time for another get together with Baby Katie, aka Pinchy, because I get a lot more hits when I feature Jack’s girlfriend. I mean because we have such a good time!

And I am sure I am jinxing the sleeping through the night thing that we have going on!

>One More Post About Camping

>I never finished my camping post, but I didn’t need to because it was summed up so well here. But I did want to share one funny story. The first night of camping, Jack was on day 5 of sleeping all the way or mostly through the night. I was a little worried about setbacks, but our sleeping arrangements worked out perfectly to keep the stretch going. Luke slept upstairs and the rest of us slept downstairs, but Dave slept in between Jack and I, which prevented me from sleep feeding him. I am sure I would have assumed that Jack was hungry when he started crying at 3 am, when in fact he was just cold. Dave and Jack just snuggled up and we all went back to sleep. But why was he cold? Well, I guess at some point earlier in the night he was hot, so he took off his pajamas. He woke up dressed like this:

And this is how I found his pjs in the morning:

I have a Baby Houdini on my hands.

Everyone slept so well that Luke even had a sleep over on Saturday night:

Good morning everyone!