Alex Goes Belly Up

Alex surprised me today with a new skill. I put him on his tummy for tummy time, and he lifted up both of his arms and wiggled them around, which is his usual pattern. Then, he lifted up his left arm and leg, and, just like that, he ended up on his back. I was stunned. He hadn't really shown a gradual progression towards this (from what I could tell, but what do I know?), he just decided that today was the day! He doesn't really like tummy time all that much. He giggles and coos and looks happy for about 1-2 minutes, then he seems to get tired and grumpy and ends up crying (see last post for examples of this progression!). I guess he decided that if I was going to keep making him be on his tummy, he was going to learn how to rectify the situation on his own.

So, it happened. I ran and got the camera and documented the following:

Oh, not tummy time again. Mommy, you know I don't like this. I guess I can play for a minute, though. OK, one arm up, other arm up, giggle, giggle, coo. One leg up, other leg up. Hmm...a new combination. How about one arm up and one leg up? What happens now?


Whoa! What's happening? Whoooooaaaa!
(And when did that dog get in the picture? That Sydney is a ham!)


WOW! I don't know what just happened. All I know is that I'm no longer on my tummy (which is good) and now I can see the fan (even better). Amazing.

Two Months!

We've been having so much fun lately! Alex has started to really interact with us, communicating both with smiles and with an adorable range of "oooooooooo"s. I call it a range because he has almost a language of ooo by itself.

There is oooooo-I'm just checking out the place, and ooooing to myself.
There is oooooo-I want your attention, but in a happy baby way, so please just imitate me, so I can imitate you imitating me, so you can imitate me imitating you imitating me (yes, this goes on for minutes at a time!).
Then there is ooooooo? ooooo?-you have left the room or at least my vision. I want you back! (There is a small urgency to this, and it almost sounds like it goes up at the end, question-style as in "Hello? Are you there?"
Finally, there is ooooooOOOOOOO, ooooOOOOOOO-I am still ooooing, but this is your 30 second warning that I am going to change to crying if you don't get back here and entertain me! The animals on my bouncer won't keep me content forever! PARENTS. DO YOU HEAR ME??

So, learning 00000 has been fun. There are some other variations, as everynow and then there is an aaaaaaa or even the far complex ooooo-aaaaaa.

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On Sunday, Alex and I went to San Antonio to return Sugar to Aunt Sarah. Sugar is a cute little maltese-and-other-stuff mix that had been staying with us while Aunt Sarah was in Hawaii (both of Alex's aunts were in Hawaii last week, but only one lucky one gets to stay there permanently!). Alex is a very well-behaved visitor at this point. He was asleep when we got there, woke up to eat, went back to sleep, woke up and ate some more, and was pretty smily for the 20 minutes or so that he was awake before we left. What a great kid!

Oh, and he wore his Yoda outfit, but I didn't get any pictures, so that cuteness will have to wait for another entry.

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In other news, Alexander had his 2 month check-up on Monday. Guess who weighs 16 lbs, 3 oz and is 24 inches long! The Dr. Said he looks great (of course). Then...he got 3 immunizations. Poor guy, but he handled it like a champ. He cried when she stuck the first one in him, and then through the other two (the gal who did the shots was super-efficient...all done in about 10 seconds, I'd say!) and he stopped crying as soon as I picked him up. So, no lingering whimpering, just a kind of shocked look, which my guilt translated into "Why does my mommy hate me?" During Alex's exam, there was a girl in the room next door who was crying and banging on things like she was caged up and trying to get out. The Dr. apologized and said she needed some shots, and this was the anticipatory fit she was throwing. I guess one good thing about a baby is that they can't anticipate and they can't remember. Give him all the shots in the world right now!

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Oooooooo. Look at me on my tummy. If I move my arms a little, maybe I can actually get somewhere! I'll have to try that.













Ah, yes, I've heard of this. It's called "crawling." Just thinkof the trouble I can get into when I can coordinate these limbs!! Don't I look like I'm cooking up some crazy scheme?











Uh-oh. As I get tired, "tummy time" becomes less fun. My head starts to droop. Mommy?
Is it "back time" yet?













That's OK. Even if my mom is too busy taking pictures to help me, Sydney will come over and lick my head to make me feel better.

I love Sydney.












Don't worry. I wasn't sad for long. Here's a happy baby again!














So, about those 16 pounds. Do you think it's all in my cheeks?

OK, catching up:


Last week Alex attended his very first party that he was actually invited to, not just as a tag-a-long to his parents. Granted, he slept through part of it, and didn't even know he was there, but it was monumental nonetheless. It was a Kids' Halloween Party, complete with a break in the action for Trick-or-Treating.
Alex was dressed as a pumpkin, in a costume sent to him by his Grandma Bette and Aunt Cate. He was adorable, of course!

We didn't get any good pictures at the party, so here is Alexander, back at home, propped up on our couch. I couldn't get him to smile or even look happy, but this was the best I could do!


And, speaking of being propped up on the couch, Alex's latest trick is holding his head up. He's pretty good at it now, and only slumps a lot when he's tired, or sometimes when he's cranky. Look for a few more propped up on the couch pictures to follow.

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So...what else has been going on in Alex G's Galaxy? Well, in addition to holding up his head, Alex has started to notice objects. This makes his play time much more exciting, and means that he can now use all of the fantastic toys that he received as gifts! For example:

Look at me, I'm hitting these hanging toys! And don't think that I'm just swinging my arms and getting lucky every now and then. Look the concentration on my face, I'm whacking this butterfly with everything I've got!

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Other big news is that the game Dan has been eagerly waiting to arrive finally came. Civilization IV has been on the horizon for months now, and Dan and Alex have had some time to bond both in reading the manual together and in actually playing the game. I don't have any of them playing together (this father-son bonding time is when I go and do...anything other than hang out with the baby, if only for a few minutes!) but here they are, prepping for building their empire. Dan and I figure that with a name like Alexander, he's got to be good at this game!


Alex: I'm so excited about starting our empire! Let's get to it, Dad!

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A few other pictures, just to show off:






It may look like I'm looking adoringly at my Mommy, but really I'm looking past her, at the fan, which I really like.
















Ok, I'm done taking pictures now.

A little weekend get-a-way

We went on a little family vacation this weekend to Fredricksburg, Texas. It's a little town about 1 1/2 hours away. Mostly known for its antiquing, good German food and flair, and a lot of Christmas hoopla--tons of decorations, shopping, etc. Luckily, we went on the most off-weekend of the year (seriously, we looked in their local paper and this was the weekend when nothing was happening!), so we didn't fight traffic or crowds. It was perfect!

We spent Friday wandering the town-a winery, a fabulous store called Chocolat which had about 50 varieties of 'liquid center' chocolates among other chocolate wonders, and a jerky store (they also sold jelly, but it was really mostly about jerky!), and a couple of historical sites (churches and old houses as well as the site of a treaty between German settlers and Native Americans-the marker said that this treaty is the only one in the country considered to not have been broken-that was sort of sweet and really sad at the same time). For dinner we ate at a German restaurant. I had schnitzel. I've never had schnitzel before, so I was amused to find out that it just meant 'breaded.' I thought it was a secret German food--like bratwurst or saurkraut. I didn't know that chicken schnitzel was just a breaded chicken breast. Don't get me wrong, it was delicious, but not as exotic as I was expecting.

We spent the night in a cute little B & B. It was an old German house, so it was built with field stones. It had an addition, as the original house was just the kitchen and a small living room area. This was Alex's first vacation and first hotel stay! Alex was glad to see that the bedroom had a fan. He really likes to stare at fans. Not moving fans, just a still fan with dark blades agains the light ceiling. He finds them captivating.

Saturday was the big adventure. We went to Enchanted Rock State Park. The main attraction here is the big granite rock. And the main activity is climbing this big granite rock. So, we'd like to claim the "extreme parenting" award for the weekend. We walked up the rock with Alex in the front carrier. Of course, this took a while, so by the time we got to the top, he needed a change. Then he wanted to eat (I felt like a real hippie-nature mama, feeding him outside, with the wind blowing, next to a patch of grass, on top of a big rock!). It was Alex's first picnic :-) Then we ate our sandwhiches, and by then he needed to be changed again!

Then, it was back down the big rock (trickier than up the rock, although less physically demanding), into the car, and home again. All in all, a great weekend, and a great way to end Dan's time off.
Daddy and Alex were exhausted after the long car ride.


Alex decided he was hungry at dinner, too. Luckily we had decided to bring a bottle for just such an occasion. Don't they both look so happy?

Alex finished his whole bottle and turned to pose for a picture as Super Alex!


I am the luckiest baby! I found the only spot on this whole rock that is in the shade!


Daddy and Alex are ready to go back down the rock. I'm going to pick on Dan a little here--so, he's ready to go back down with the kiddo, but guess who carried the little guy up? That's right, his mom managed to hike all the way up with the baby, and as we were getting ready to hike back down, Dan says, "You want me to take him on the way down?" Yeah, now that the hard part's over :-)


Just wanted to sneak in a picture of Alex's big sister, Sydney. Her ears aren't really that funny-looking. It was just surprisingly windy up there!