I love books!

They taste so much better than rice cereal!

Sitting independantly

Now that Anthony can sit independantly for extended periods, we've been getting out more of his toys. This weekend we played with the toy Uncle Dave and Aunt Julie got him for Christmas. It has stacking elephant parts, but the best part is when you drop balls down inside it there is music and blinking lights. Anthony enjoyed chewing on the balls while I dropped them down the chute.

Its amazing how quickly his sitting skills have developed. Two weeks ago he could sit, but couldn't reach or manipulate a toy. He also was in danger of crashing any minute.

Now he can sit, pick up toys, manipulate toys, etc. He doesn't know how to "un-sit" gracefully, nor can he pull himself into sitting, but I'm sure that will come soon.

Never go shopping when you are hungry!

Anthony's formula habit is a bit expensive. Normally we buy the 25 ounce cans for $25 each. Those last about 5 days!

Today Target had the 30 ounce cans for $26. This is about a 3 1/2 month supply.

When Anthony asks us why his college fund is so low, we're going to show him this picture!

Food!

Anthony is turning out to be a good eater. He doesn't terribly like rice cereal made with just formula (do you blame him???). If I add in just a little apple juice he gobbles it right up.

Today we tried carrots for the first time. It was his first taste of vegetable and he pretty much gobbled them down. The first bite or two he wasn't quite sure what to make of the strange taste, but then his little mouth was wide open. Most of it also goes down, very little actually mushes back out. He ate about 2 Tablespoons worth of carrots and then I decided he was done for the day. (That was on top of a few Tablespoons of rice cereal.)

We have about 2 more days worth of carrots open. Then he'll probably have green beans next week.

Right now he's eating Gerber first foods. I intend to make his food reasonably soon. Not everything, but probably sweet potatoes and green beans when they come into season here. I also see no point in buying jarred bananas when they have perfectly good bananas at the grocery store that just require a little bit of mashing.

One bad thing about carrots. Carrot colored spit-up is just a little gross!

Signs of Intelligence

Time for a post about my cat.

Nobody has ever, ever accused Tigger of being the slightest bit smart.

Today, however, she displayed signs of intelligence for the first time. Anthony has started showing interest in her. And she doesn't let him touch her. That might not sound like a major milestone, but he's been caught by children far too many times.

(A smart cat would run and hide, rather than being caught repeatedly.)

We'll see if it becomes a trend (or was it just an accident)!

Edited Sunday to add:
Nope, she's as dumb as ever. Anthony has gotten a few handfuls of fur so far. We're working on "pet the kitty nicely", but given that grabbing is what he does....

Likes the Exersaucer

We've been getting good use out of the exersaucer Janet gave us. Anthony is usually up in the mornings while we're trying to eat breakfast/make bottles/assemble lunches, etc.

He has pretty much outgrown (or lost interest in) his swing and bouncy chair. The exersaucer, on the other hand, keeps him plenty entertained. It even has an iPod.

He rolled over!!!

Easter Sunday Anthony finally rolled over. (Bob witnessed it, and it has been repeated at day care. I have yet to see it happen, though.)

He rolled front to back and seemed utterly shocked when it happened.

Even though he's been pretty slow to roll, I'm not terribly worried about it. Since he usually doesn't like being on his belly, he hasn't had too much opportunity to practice.

More Family!

Our last day in Colorado we were able to get together with some of the Moragues family (the rest of the trip was the Matreci side). We drove down to Colorado Springs to have lunch with Bob's Uncle John, Aunt Dena and their daughter Jennifer and her family who were visiting from Texas.

Its always a nice time visiting with that crowd. Anthony was not at his best (something about being overtired and improperly napped), but he was still pretty charming.

A nice bonus is that Jennifer's oldest was happy to carry Anthony around the restaurant so that we could eat in peace!

Separation Anxiety Already??

Interesting happenings at daycare this week. I can't imagine that the problem is separation anxiety already, though.

1. Monday I picked Anthony up two hours later than normal. (I had a class on Monday and Tuesday). When I picked him up he was crying. Teacher said that the minute Emily's mommy picked her up, he started crying. Normally he's the first one to leave.

Was the problem
a. deviation from routine = bad
b. "my mommy is supposed to come before these other mommies"

2. Today I was late (again). Standard routine on arrival: I say Hi to Anthony and wait for him to smile for me. Then I go around the corner to grab his carseat. Usually he handles my disappearance just fine. Today he started crying.

Hmmm....

Hanging out with Uncle Dave

I'll be catching up with pictures from our Colorado trip for awhile.

Is this a great picture of Anthony and his Uncle Dave or what??

Good Night's Sleep

Anthony was not a good sleeper on our trip. He got up early our first day home, too. Fortunately he and Bob decided to go back to sleep.

Happy Easter!

We got home from Colorado just in time for the Easter Bunny to arrive. Anthony got some neat stuff in his basket--some marshamallow Peeps, some See's chocolate eggs and a Chocolate bunny and a new wooden toy to chew on. He got some neat "dude duds" from Grandma Donna and "The Golden Egg Book" from Grandma Elinor.

He wore his new clothes to church where he was a handsome little guy. He did great (again)! He smiled at everyone for the first ten minutes or so and then slept through the rest of the service.

He was even good when we went out for brunch afterwards. He's getting the hang of sitting in restaurant high chairs and let me eat half of my food before he decided to be held.

Notice how good Anthony is getting at sitting!

(By the way, we plan on stealing his Easter candy. How long do you think we can get away with it???)

Ready for Skiing!

This week we're in Colorado for Bob's family's annual ski trip. Unfortunately, Anthony's participation has been less than successful. We did have a nice day skiing while the little guy stayed at the cabin with Uncle Dave and Aunt Julie. Unfortunately, when we got home we discovered that Anthony was coming down with a cold.

This one left the little guy feeling pretty miserable, the altitude here in Colorado probably didn't help. We had several nights where we were up a lot. The second day he was sick we found a pediatrician here who was willing to see him. Fortunately, his check-up went well. His blood oxygen levels were great (an issue in the mountains) and his lungs, ears and throat were all clear. So, all we could do was feed him tylenol for the fever and pedialyte to keep him well hydrated.

Each of us got to ski two days out of four, so that was okay. It was just too bad that we weren't able to ski together more than one day.

I'm thumping

That's why they call me Thumper!

(Anthony's current favorite trick is thumping his legs up and down. It can be really loud in the middle of the night.)

Going to Grandma's House

Anthony's first commercial airplane ride was to Grandma's house in Colorado. We got off to a poor start with a 4:30 am wake-up call. Anthony wanted nothing to do with that, he knew that it isn't morning yet.

The flight went very well. We didn't buy him a seat, but there were lots of empty seats on the plane so the gate agent rearranged things so that we could all sit together. Anthony was a good boy nearly the whole flight with just a little fussing at the very end.

Oh yeah, we flew Frontier airlines and his airplane had four penguins on the wing.

Swings!

It was a beautiful day today. Bob came home early so we could go for a walk together. We ended up at the park and let Anthony play on the swing. Unfortunately the sound quality is kind of poor, he was giggling the whole time. Well, the whole time that we weren't shooting the video. (It was also a windy day.) I think we need to take him to the swings more often!

(Treo does video, too!)

Tahoe!

We had a nice weekend in Tahoe with Celisa and her gang. Unfortunately, Anthony woke up when we got to the condo (around midnight.) He was awake and rarin' to go. Alas, his friend Ellery wasn't the slightest bit interested in him. He smiled at her with everything he had, even tried chewing on her foot at one point. She just wasn't interested in a younger man.

Anthony did make friends with Archer, who thought he was pretty darn neat. Socially the weekend wasn't a total loss!

We were equally unlucky in getting the little guy to sleep. Everything was just too darn interesting. We brought him into bed with us, which does help. Except then he was pulling my hair and poking at my face. I woke up in the morning and saw that Bob was hunched at the opposite end of the bed.

Skiing was good, though. Anthony was stuck with a babysitter, though. When he turns 3 he can learn to ski, too.

Still practicing eating

Sometimes he'll open his mouth up for more. Sometimes he won't.

But, he doesn't seem to mind cereal on his face!

Tongue like a giraffe!

I swear, Anthony has the world's largest tongue. Part of chewing his toys includes wrapping his tongue around them. It really reminds me of a giraffe. (Is that an okay thing to say about my boy??)

By the way, his keychain was a big hit.

Rice Cereal

We decided to start giving Anthony rice cereal this weekend. I don't know if he was completely ready, but he started being grabby towards my food, which is a sign.

I'm not sure he liked it. We'll keep trying periodically. At least he didn't make too much of a mess!

PlayDate

Anthony had a playdate at the park with his friend Eoin. Eoin is 3 weeks younger, we met his parents at our adoption group. Eoin had played on the swings a lot before, but this was Anthony's first time. We put them in the bucket swing together. Anthony seemed to like it, we thought they looked like a "Push-me-pull-you".

(Sorry about the image quality, we took this using Bob's Treo.)