Back to Work

Obviously this photo has nothing to do with my return to work. I love the smile though. And that same smile greets me every day when I pick up Mr. Anthony from daycare.

So far, work has been going very smoothly. I've dropped down to 80% time (and unfortunately 80% pay) so I can have more time with Anthony. I am enjoying being back, I enjoy my work!

Day care is going pretty well, too. Anthony smiles at his teachers every morning and appears to be getting settled in. Its been 2 1/2 weeks and he's still healthy. I got sick two weeks ago, and Bob caught my cold last week, so we're really, really hoping that Anthony doesn't get it. So far, so good, though.

Favorite Games

Anthony's current favorite way to play is to sing "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes". Of course, the real fun in the game is Mommy making his hands wave around. The singing is fun, too!

Not a Newborn Anymore!

Well, clearly he's not a newborn, he's three and a half months old!

I found myself pondering some of the changes I miss:
The way his whole body would fit when he lay in my lap
How he would desperately root into my elbow looking for dinner while his bottle was poking him in the other cheek.

But then, there are things I don't miss:
The SCREAMING that accompanied every diaper change (being naked was really, really awful)
Rocking and rocking in the middle of the night as he had to be sound asleep before being put back down. (He outgrew that one by two months, fortunately. Now its bottle, diaper and back in the crib.)
Waking up multiple times a night. Technically, Anthony is sleeping through the night as he can go 7 hours. But, that's not literally STTN. He'll be there soon enough, though.

Playtime

Is this fun or what???

Got my Bear Blanket

Anthony is in the habit of clutching and playing with his burp cloth when he's done with his bottle. While its kind of fun to watch, I really don't want his "transitional object" to be a burp cloth. We're getting in the habit of swapping in the bear blanket that Jayne gave him instead. The edges and the backside are satin, so it should feel good in his hands.

Three Months Old!

Can you believe he is three months old already??

How has he changed?
Truthfully, I don't think he looks that much different than he did at two months. I'll try to weigh him on Monday, but I don't think he's gained too much more than a pound. (Its about time that his growth slows, otherwise he'll be an elephant when he starts kindergarden.)

But, he can do so much more...
1. Smiling. He loves to smile. He will return your smiles and he will spontaneously smile when something amuses him. (Daddy singing the Rubber Ducky song, for example.)
2. He can purposefully grab things. He has no interest in grabbing rattles, but he will absolutely grab someones hand. He can also grab some of his toys.
3. He's figured out how to make some of his toys go. That was fun watching him go. Anthony's favorite toy for over a month has been his play gym with the blinking star that plays music. Its motion activated and he just figured out that he can kick it and make it play. That is exciting! He can also grab the hanging toys on his Jungle Bouncy Seat and make the music and lights go there, too.
4. Squeal in delight. (I hadn't realized that was a separate milestone.) That blinky star makes him sooo happy!
5. He's got pretty amazing head control. We started riding him front facing in the Bjorn and he did great.
6. He can support his own weight standing, he's gotten really good at that.
7. He thinks the baby in the mirror is absolutely fascinating. If he smiles at the baby, the baby even smiles back.

What he's on the verge of doing:
1. Giggling, he does it once in a while but not consistantly. Either that, or maybe I'm not funny enough.
2. Pushing himself up with his hands. He'll do it occasionally, but not consistantly. Generally, if I put him on his tummy he'll stick his fist in his mouth. (Its much easier to do that on your tummy, the fist is limited to where it flies.) Then when he gets tired of sucking his fist he'll start screaming that its time to flip over.
3. Sleep unswaddled.

What he might be considering:
1. Teething. He is drooling up a storm!

First Day of School

Anthony has his first day of school this week. We have him enrolled at a daycare center not too far from the house. He's slowly getting settled in. First day he didn't nap well, second day he didn't eat well. He should adapt pretty quickly, though.

The teachers all seem really nice and they greet him by name every morning when he arrives. He's pretty much the youngest kid there. Everyone else we've met are girls, so he should have a girlfriend soon.

Visiting Friends

On our way back home from visiting Anthony's grandparents we stopped to visit our friends Jeff and Charlotte in Arroyo Grande. (We seem them every year, some years in Omaha, others in California.) The kids were just fascinated with the baby. They all took turns holding and feeding him. Kelly even helped him get dressed in the morning.

It was nice spending New Years Eve with friends, even though we didn't make it 'til midnight. We decided that celebrating East Coast time was just fine with us!

We've got a great picture here of Anthony sitting on Charlotte's mother's lap. Isn't his smile sweet!

Happy New Year!

I am awake and ready to see the New Year! I may have slept through midnight, but here I am ready to have fun!

Anthony's Baptism

Anthony was baptized today at Grace First Presbyterian Church, my family church. He pretty much slept through the ceremony, he didn't even stir when Pastor Steve baptized him.

I had a hard time finding appropriate clothes to wear--little boy white suits were incredibly awful. We settled for a little sweater vest with a polo shirt and khakis. He ended up looking absolutely adorable.

Everyone at church thought he was just precious and so well behaved.

We're going to the zoo zoo zoo

We went to the Santa Ana zoo with Anthony's cousin Kurt. Kurt is almost 2 and LOVES the zoo, especially the elephant ride.

Anthony spent most of the morning asleep and missed his opportunity to ride the elephant. Maybe another year. He also slept through most all the monkeys and the birds.

After lunch we went on a train ride and visted the farm part of the zoo. We saw sheep and pigs and goats and horses.

I'm getting better at smiling

Anthony is getting more and more smiley. We haven't gotten a great one on camera yet. (But, when we do we'll be sure to post it.) Here he's flashing a bit of a smile at Grandpa. In the mornings he's all smiles, but once in awhile he'll give you some nice toothless grins in the evening, too.

Merry Christmas

Anthony's first Christmas was very nice. He was a great boy at church, slept through the whole service. Grandpa showed him off at the social hour afterwards. He woke up just long enough to get his picture taken in the Narthex.

When we came home after church Santa Claus came, can you believe that?? Santa Claus was pretty darn good to our little guy. He got some dude-duds to wear to school in January, some neat books from Grandma and Grandpa Moragues including Big Red Barn and from Grandma and Grandpa Stein a "Me Do It Chair" from Community Playthings like his cousin Kurt has. He even got some toys including a cell phone from my cousin Andy and a toy airplane from Grandma and Grandpa M.

Anthony pretty much slept through present opening, I'm not sure he even noticed the chocolate Santa Claus in his stocking. Just as well because I plan to eat it.

Over the River and Through the Woods

To Grandmother's house I go.... Well, really we went on a road trip down to Southern California to visit my grandparents. I was really, really good for most of the trip.

Mommy says: We got an early start as I was worried about traffic. It wasn't quite as early as I had hoped, but we got through the 152 hassle before any traffic built up. We stopped for a prune juice breakfast bottle at Casa de Fruta as the little guy was a bit constipated. There was some real traffic on I-5 in the middle of nowhere which got us worried, but things picked up.

We had an early-ish lunch at Carl's Junior where we had our big adventure. Huge poopy blow-out diaper with a big mess and a screaming baby. In retrospect the prune juice may not have been a great idea. (In the past it took several days worth of prune juice to make anything happen.) I particularly enjoyed the parenting advice from the 16 year old busing tables.

We got in a little traffic at the end. Motion stopped and Anthony woke-up. We thought we'd have to stop for a bottle 20 minutes from my parents but he fell back asleep.

Truthfully, the trip went really, really well.

Trip to the Tech Museum

We went with Grandma and Grandpa to the Tech Museum. Unlike our previous trip at Thanksgiving, Anthony was amazing. He was snoozy in his stroller for about an hour, then it was time for the IMAX movie, Wired to Win. He was starting to fuss a bit, and I was ready to take him out. Then the movie came on. He was ENTHRALLED. The colors and surround sound kept his attention. It was actually remarkable about how he sat on my lap, chewing my finger and staring at the screen.

Afterwards we went back and played in the computer area. Amazingly, there wasn't a line for the Adept robot, so it drew a picture of Anthony sitting on Daddy's lap.

Grandma came to visit

Grandma and Grandpa Green came out from Colorado to meet Anthony his weekend. Here's a picture of Grandma and Anthony getting to know each other. (He's wearing his dude-duds Celisa gave him.)

We had a great weekend! Grandma gave him lots of bottles and plenty of snuggling. (And he didn't even spit up on her too much.) We also had an early Christmas. I'll have to be sure to take a picture of Anthony wearing his little Santa hat with the Pooh-ears.

We went for long walks every day. We also went to the Tech Museum (I'll post about that later.) On Saturday evening we drove out to Half Moon Bay to explore the shops and have chowder for dinner at Barbara's FishTrap.

Anthony is very excited about the adventures he's going to have with his Colorado Grandparents when he gets older. We'll ski in the winter and get him a little PFD so we can sail in the summer on Grandpa's sailboat.

Fun Duds

Check out the sweater and hat that Miss Ercilia (Daddy's former housemate) sent! Am I styling or what??? They are decorated with llamas, just like in my book Is Your Mama a Llama?

I wore this to the airport to pick up Grandma. She'll want to know that I'm warm enough. (She's always pestering Daddy to wear a neckwarmer when they ski.) Funny thing--when she got off the airplane she told Daddy that I was too warmly dressed!

Mommy's Good Sleeper

Generally, Antony is a really good sleeper. For the past two weeks (maybe longer?) he's really only been waking up once during the night. Then we had a really nice stretch of sleeping essentially through the night. He woke up at 4:30, the next morning at 5:30, then at 6:30, then, well, back to 5:30. Still, though, sleeping through the night is in sight.

Bob and I have made the deal that if he wakes before 5:00, its my responsibility, but after 5:00 it is his. We have not yet had one of those moments where we lay in bed debating whether he started fussing at 4:59 or 5:02.

By the way, check out the little sleeper that Aunt Erika gave him. (My mom loves the little sleeping bags as they kept me in my crib.)

Visiting Santa Claus

We went to the mall with Victoria and Anthony's birthsiblings to visit Santa Claus. Anthony as obviously unimpressed by Santa, even if his beard was real.

Poor Yesenia, she was very excited to see Santa Claus up 'til when she got in close. I think she found him a little intimidating. Tatyanna really liked him, though.

Storytime with Daddy

Daddy and Anthony had a nice story-time last night. They were reading my favorite adoption book, Tell Me Again About the Night I was Born by Jamie Lee Curtis. Daddy was adding his own editorial, though. He doesn't think that baseball is the perfect sport, but he explained that airplanes are pretty darn cool.

2 Month Check-up

Anthony had his two month check up on Wednesday. He now weighs 13 pounds, 5 ounces (90%) and is 23 1/2 inches long (75%). Growing like a weed. He wears 3-6 month clothing all the time now.

He got four shots and an oral vaccine, too. Unfortunately, shots were not quite as easy as when he was a newborn and didn't even seem to notice them. He calmed down pretty easily, though. He was a bit grouchy for the rest of the day and spent the day sleeping on my chest. He slept all the next day, too. Now he's back to normal.

Warm and Snug

Winter is coming! Well, winter in California, but it still gets nippy. Today Anthony wore the bunting that Grandma Kay gave him for the first time. Is he absolutely precious or what??

Two Months Old

Can you believe it? Our little man is two months old!

Things Anthony can do now:

Stuff his whole fist into his mouth and suck on it

Stand up (he can support his weight but clearly requires balance support)

Control his head while standing or sitting (most of the time)

Smile (but only in the mornings)

Coo (mostly vowels, but once in awhile I get a goo)

He's starting to learn that its easier to life your head if you use your arms, too.

Sleep, only waking once in the night. (We're really looking forward to when he can sleep through the night.)

I think that's it for baby tricks.

Our Little Elf

Check him out!

We made the bulletin board

Our first trip into the IAC office last year we admired the bulletin board of families who had recently adopted.

Today at the party we admired our own photos on the board. They just post the "Dear Birthmother" letters, we need to send them a picture of our little guy to show off to everyone how cute he is.

We're looking forward to our opportunity to take him to an information session and show him off!

Christmas Party

Today was our adoption agency's Christmas party. Anthony got to sit on Santa's lap. Daddy thinks that Anthony wants a 42" flatscreen television for Christmas. Mommy thinks that Daddy is silly.

Needless to say, Anthony was a little underwhelmed by Santa Claus. He was a good sport about doing the Christmas craft, I'm not sure he even really noticed the wet squishy paint. At least he didn't keep his fingers balled in a fist.

We showed him off to the social workers who helped make us a family. Of course, everyone admired his full head of hair!

Starting to Enjoy His Toys

Anthony is starting to enjoy his toys. He likes his little play gym that the Thurgates gave us. He doesn't bat at the toys on purpose yet, but he swings his arms and sometimes gets them. What he really likes is the star on top that plays music and has flashing lights. That totally gets his attention every time.

Anthony also really enjoys his Winnie-the-Pooh mobile over the crib. Of course, nothing beats the ceiling fan for a cheap fix.