Go! Go! Go!

We are going to have a walking baby on our hands soon. Once he figures out that tricky balance thing, he will be on his way. This is where we are at right now...

The amusement of walking from the living room to the kitchen and back to the living room seems to be neverending. Walk walk walk walk crash into the cupboards...Walk walk walk walk crash into the coffee table. Squealing and laughing the entire time.

How do you like the smile of pride at the end of the video? I think maybe just maybe he likes walking better than crawling. Speaking of crawling! I cannot get over the speed this kid has! And yes, I will enjoy being able to catch him while I can.

Sad baby

Drop off at daycare today was not fun. Alex was sleepy. And really really didn't want to go to anyone. One of the teachers tried to sit down and rock him. No way Jose. Not an option. I didn't have to leave immediately, and he was hanging on my pant leg, so I scooped him up. Immediate snuggles. Alas, I did have to leave at some point, so I handed him back to the teacher. Scaaaaareeeeeaming. He grabbed my hand and was crying and trying to pull himself to me, or me to him. He was hanging on for dear life. Like I had to use my other hand to free my fingers from his Ninja Baby Death Grip. And there was more screaming...and tears...from him, not me this time! I realized I just needed to go. Staying wasn't going to do any good for either of us.

The door is about 2.7 feet outside the baby room. That is the amount of distance it took for him to completely forget about me and stop crying. Obviously he was traumatized.

Summer's Here!

Saturday was be-a-utiful outside. And we celebrated with our first official trip of the season to the terrace. Good friends, sunshine, Euchre and good beer. Alex liked it for a little bit too.
But only for a little bit. He was a snoozy baby. So the boys went home. And left Kari and I to get our butts kicked in Euchre by Maggi and Mariah. They think they're good. We know they cheat!

Anyway, the point is...The terrace is open, the beer's a-flowin'...Summer is officially here.

Defiance...it comes early

How is it possible that an almost 11 month old baby can already be defiant? Like on purpose defiant. This kid already has it down pat.

Most times I am good about moving the dog dishes out of sight before I let Alex loose to destroy the living room and kitchen. But there is a lot of stuff going on these days and I sometimes forget. When he spots those dishes on the floor, he giggles and shifts the crawling into overdrive to get to them. More than once, Travis and I have seen him going for them and we firmly say, "Alex, no." And that little shit will stop just short of the dishes, sit on his cute little butt, and turn and look at us. At which point we repeat, "Alex, no." And then? Then?!? He will look right at us, smile, and reach his fat little sausage-finger laden hand right into the dog's water dish.

He is not even 11 months old!!! What the hell is he gonna dish out when he is a teenager?

Sneaky little sucker

As has been previously noted, Alex does not hold his bottle when he eats. He lays there, either grabbing everything within reach, or with his arms splayed out to each side. Either way, there has been no attempt at holding his own bottle. He is perfectly happy with his slaves feeding him thank you very much. So I have foolishly assumed this whole time that he wasn't aware that he could hold his bottle and feed himself. I assumed he just hadn't figured it out yet. I also assumed that I had cause this little delay in development because when he was very small I used to hold his arms down in an attempt to actually keep the bottle in his mouth. Oh, dear sweet silly mommy.

Last night, as I was rocking him and feeding him his bedtime bottle, he reached up and pushed the bottle out of his mouth so he could tell me a story. A very long, animated and funny story. Lots of eyebrow action. At the end of this story, he stares straight at his bottle, reaches up with both hands and a devilish grin, and pulls the bottle perfectly in his mouth. And then, just to really show me how much he has tricked me this whole time, he repeatedly took the bottle out of his mouth, giggled, and then put it back in.

But of course, as soon as the novelty of showing me that little trick wore off, he was right back to King of the Rocking Chair. Feed me woman. And make it snappy.

That's news!

Alex can pull himself up.
The kitchen chairs are not very heavy or sturdy.
Ipso facto: Alex can pull himself up using the back of a chair until it topples over on top of him.

What a lovely Wednesday morning learning experience. Please don't call CPS.

Summer hours

Working in the lovely world of HVAC for a company that focuses more on the "H" than the "VAC", my summer work load is a bit light. Lucky for me, my boss really likes to play in the summer. So we get to go on a different work schedule for the summer. Since the boss man still wants his 40 hours of work from us and he kinda likes the customers to be able to contact someone during normal business hours, schedules get a little creative.

We have to work 9 hour days Monday through Thursday, and then Fridays...one week I will work a half day in the morning, the next week a half day but during the afternoon, and then the third week? The glorious third week? I get Friday off. So every third week I have a three day weekend. During the entire summer. When it's sunshiney and warm outside. It is fabulous.

Previous years the creative schedule was not an issue as there was no beast child in the mix. No daycare to worry about, with all their having to schedule teachers to work and possible not being able to bend to my every whim and fancy. The nerve! Basically what all of this means is Alex is going to have longer days at daycare Monday through Thursday and shorter days on Friday..or no daycare at all...on those special Fridays, he is stuck with me. So Monday through Thursday when you add up the 9 hours I am actually working + 1/2 hour lunch + 15 mins from daycare to the office + 15 mins from the office to daycare, it all works out to 10 hours at daycare. That's a lot of hours each day.

I am having some guilty feelings about this. This morning he was only awake for 45 mins before we had to leave to drop him off. And then tonight I won't pick him up until about 5 and he goes to bed by 7. That works out to 2 hours and 45 minutes of awake time each day, 4 days a week.

I have realized I need to get past my guilt for a few reasons.
-He loves it there
-He has other babies to play with there
-They love him
-When you add up the hours, he is there the same, if not less hours per week as he was before

I actually just did the math and realized that last point. That is making me feel a truckload better. Huh. Whaddya know? This blog thing with all the writing down my thoughts is actually productive sometimes. Weird.

Anyway, the way I see it, this is the long and short of it all. Both Travis and I have to work. And the lottery isn't nearly as reliable as I would prefer, so it looks like both of us are going to have to continue working. So... Is he safe and in caring hands while we have to work? Absolutely. Does he love it there? More than at home sometimes I think. Are we going to miss some pretty important milestones the first time they happen? Been there, crawled and rolled over that.