The Aquarium

AJ's Chicago grandpa took the week off from work, so AJ and I went with him one day to the aquarium. AJ was into the large fish tanks and loved looking at all of the big fish floating by. The highlight for him was definitely the Wild Reef exhibit that had a clear glass ceiling to view the fish through. He craned his neck around in all sorts of positions that would give any adult a neck ache. The dolphin show, on the other hand, was not a hit. AJ wasn't able to anticipate where the dolphins would jump, so by the time he turned his head toward the noise, all he saw was the splash, if anything. He let his displeasure be known, and we had to beat a hasty retreat out of there for an early lunch break.

My mom, brother and I have been talking about taking AJ to the aquarium for a while now, so I am looking forward to going again with them when they come in December to visit. The first two pictures are AJ's reaction to the Caribbean Reef exhibit (fish! rays! sharks!) The other two shots are of AJ with his grandpa.

All I Want for Christmas...

is a Red Ryder BB Gun. AJ looks like the little brother from The Christmas Story in his winter coat. His sleeves keep his arms stretched out to his sides at all times.

Sunset

AJ and I enjoyed this gorgeous sunset tonight. The photo is my first attempt at a mother-son self-portrait. I need longer arms.

The Blueberry Face

For awhile there I thought it was going to be very hard to find a food that AJ did not like. He's into all sorts of crazy fruits and vegetables that his dad wouldn't touch with a 10-foot pole, such as carrots, winter squash, apples, avocados, bananas and prunes. Everything that went into his mouth was met with the same bouncing in his seat and opening of his mouth like a little bird who wanted more, more more.

Then we discovered blueberries. I went to the grocery store and was so excited to make them for him that I came home and had them cooked and on his spoon in less than 30 minutes. I made a big batch, too, because one of my Tummy Time friends reported that blueberries were her favorite food as a baby. Who doesn't like blueberries? My mouth waters just thinking about blueberry muffins, blueberry scones, blueberry pancakes, and (the best of all) blueberry pie. Perhaps what these all have in common would be blueberries + lots of sugar for baking purposes.

Back to AJ, the first spoonful of blueberries went in, and we got the faces that you see in the pictures above. I even tried sneaking them into his cereal this morning, but he was not having it. My friend, S., recommended that I keep track of AJ's food explorations in a win/loss column. This one is definitely a loss.

The only other loss goes to pears. AJ's Chicago grandma cooked a batch for him on Thanksgiving. Joe fed them to him in front of the entire family at the dinner table. AJ made his pouty face and then started to cry when everyone laughed at him. Oh, the shame.

Thanksgiving

For the first time since I left for college, we stayed home on Thanksgiving. It was an odd feeling not to be heading home to Iowa, and I definitely missed my family a lot. But then we woke up and didn't have to rush off anywhere, spend 12 hours round trip in the car, etc., and it felt really nice. We had celebrated Thanksgiving with my family in Iowa the weekend before, so I did get my family fix in. AJ spent Thanksgiving Day soaking up all of the attention from his uncles, Chicago grandparents, great-grandmother and great-uncle. He was in heaven. The highlights of his holiday included rolling a red ball back and forth on the floor with his uncles, eating sweet potatoes, getting licked on his hands and face by Uncle Will's dog, Wrigley, and "wrestling" with his dad (see photos above). Life is good.

Surprise

AJ is into a new stage where he loves to be surprised. His favorite game is peek-a-boo because he loves the surprise of things popping up, but he keeps upping the ante on what it takes to get him to laugh. The regular old hands-in-front-of-the-face version barely elicits a bored half-grin from him now, so we keep going to new heights to top ourselves and really surprise him. When you do find something that he is not expecting, though, he physically startles with his arms and legs jerking upward and back, and then he dissolves into giggles as if he is saying "boy, you really got me that time." I personally hate scary movies, but based on his enjoyment of being surprised, I have a feeling that AJ is going to like watching them with his dad someday. The only thing we have to be careful about is really surprising the heck out of him, which happened one time when we jumped out from behind the opposite end of the couch and startled him so much that he cried.

The pictures above are the before and after shots when his Grandma Julie jumped out from behind a bush on her front porch.

All Grown Up

We just spent another week in Iowa with my family, and Joe commented again when he came to pick us up that AJ had changed so much in one week. His manual dexterity is getting noticeably better, and he likes to try to feed himself. AJ is also finally growing some hair. As his Grandpa Liss told him, "Hey, you're not follicle-challenged anymore!" The hair makes him look more like a little boy and less like a baby.

Moles

Recently my brother visited us in Chicago. AJ and his Uncle Andy were playing in the other room when Andy called out to me "Hey--these two little moles on his neck are super-cute." My first reaction was to think how sweet it was that my uber-hip brother would comment on something like that. Then I wondered what the heck he was talking about, because AJ doesn't have any moles. So I inspected AJ's neck, flicked off the two "moles" and told my brother that they were just dried peas from AJ's dinner. We had a good laugh about it!

The picture is of AJ with a faceful of dried prunes, which may have later dried into new moles.

Five Month Update

Although we didn't have a pediatrician's appointment this month to get AJ's official height and weight, I weighed him on my friend's baby scale, and he is somewhere around 22 lbs. His latest milestones are cutting two teeth, rolling over to push up, and sitting unsupported for a few seconds at a time. He is into eating, likes to try to feed himself and is fascinated with trying to drink water from a cup. He has yet to reject any food that has been set in front of him, much like his mommy as a baby. His favorite food is "picado," which is a homemade mixture of peas and avocado invented by his Grammy Julie. I like to tease Joe that AJ now eats more vegetables than he does. I am hoping that in the next month AJ will be able to sit up, sleep through the night and maybe grow some hair. We'll see!

The pictures from top to bottom are months 5 through 1.

Sleep

We are trying to make more progress on the sleep front, but it is very hard for all of us because it involves so much crying and sleeplessness. AJ generally goes down now at bedtime with relatively minimal crying, but our main issue is that he still wakes up 5-6 times in the night. The sleep books indicate that he should be waking up once a night at most at his age. Last night we tried feeding him only three times in the night and letting him cry it out the other times he woke up. The plan is to eventually weaning him down to two feedings and then one. This seemed to work okay with only 2-10 minutes of crying during most of the wakeups. The only glitch was after I fed him for the third time at 5:15, he cried all the way until I went in to pick him up at his normal wakeup time of 7:00. The worst part was that his jammies were wet around his neck area from all of his tears, and instead of being a happy, smiling boy ready to greet the day, he wanted to be held and did 10 minutes of the gulping and jagged intake of breath that all little kids do after crying. Even though I believe that we are doing what is best for his long-term ability to sleep, I feel awful listening to him cry when I know that I could give him short-term comfort.

Genes

People often ask me if AJ looks like me or Joe. I am posting pictures of both of us so that you can decide for yourself. The pictures from top to bottom are AJ, me and Joe each at about 4 months old. For fun, we will run a little poll for a week to see what everyone thinks--you can vote on the right hand side of this page. As they say in Chicago, vote early and vote often.

The results are in--3 out of 4 people (including me) think AJ looks more like his daddy.

Have You Ever Seen a Tiger Snuggle Up to an Elephant?

We were hanging out with our friends from our tummy time group, C. and J., on Halloween. Little J. is about a month older than AJ, so I am always looking to him to see what AJ will be up to next.

Nicknames

When Joe and I were choosing a name for AJ, it was important to us to find one that had a nickname we liked. I love the idea of nicknames, because it is like having a second identity with the people who are closest to you. So we chose Andrew John in part because we liked the nickname AJ for a family name. Then, like half of America, we started referring to our baby as the Peanut after seeing that first ultrasound image. When he was born, the nickname stuck at first, in part because Joe used it and I thought it was so cute that a guy like Joe would call his son a peanut. It also seemed to just fit, since AJ was a tiny newborn. After it became clear that AJ was a relatively big baby, he seemed to outgrow the nickname Peanut, and others came along. So far they have included Bubba (due to his large size), Messy Marvin or Marv (due to his lack of table manners), and Squealy Dan (due to his love for testing out his voice, loudly and often). Odd nicknames seem to have a way of sticking in families, so I am curious to see if any of these are still in use 20 years from now.

The cute Lil' Peanut onesie was a gift courtesy of my Dad and Susan.

Go U! NU!

AJ attended his first Northwestern football game today. It was a big family grudge match of Northwestern v. Iowa. Joe, Uncle Dave and I went to Northwestern, and Uncle John, Aunt Annie, Uncle Will and Uncle Andy all went to Iowa. We tried not to completely brainwash AJ and so dressed him in an Iowa t-shirt, although it was concealed by purple pants, purple booties, a purple hat and a purple sweater. We offered to bet any family Iowa fan that the loser had to streak the winner's campus, but since AJ was the designated streaker for Northwestern, we seemed to have an unfair advantage. Something about a baby running through campus in his diaper is not very embarrassing. When Northwestern was up by 14 in the first quarter, I offered to bet Uncle Will that the loser had to clean the winner's bathroom, but he did not take me up on it. I lucked out that he did not take the bet, because Iowa roared back in the fourth quarter to win 28-17, and Uncle Will's college house bathroom could use a good scrubbing!

Breakthrough

We have confirmed multiple sightings of a tooth! Unfortunately, capturing photographic evidence of this tooth appears to be about as easy as getting a clear picture of the Loch Ness Monster or Big Foot, but trust me, it is there. And you don't just have to take my word for it--Joe, the ultimate skeptic and umpire of "truthiness" at our house, has indeed confirmed that the tooth has made its appearance. I will post a picture as soon as we can get a good one.