Happy Halloween!

Since Clay and I have no plans to do anything Halloween-y tonight other than pass out candy, we won't  be wearing our Raising Arizona costumes again. This means that Benito can spend the day being a little tiger (if he'll wear his costume that long). We already had a major crying break down right after I took these pictures. Maybe he's sad he won't be eating any candy this Halloween. I already told him not to worry that I would enjoy his candy for him this year.  :D

It's weird, but this is the first Halloween in ten years I haven't dreaded. In a sad, sad way holidays are kind of ruined being a teacher. You know the students are going to be way wound up and wanting to act out, so you can't enjoy the holiday yourself. It's extra nice this year to think that I don't have to try to keep twenty-three ten-year-olds interested in math, science, and reading today when all they want to think about is candy, costumes, candy, costumes and more candy.

After just a few pictures with the  tiger gloves on I had to take them off because he thought they were soft and delicious.

On a non-Halloweeny note: despite eating about 40 oz of formula a day (I've started tracking just how much he's eating now) Benjamin didn't show any weight gain last week. In a way maybe that's good, because he did seem to be growing at an alarming rate for a while there. It's hard to try to predict when I'll need the next size up of diapers though.

Even though we have never slept with Benjamin in the bed, I keep having ultra-realistic dreams in which I'm wearing him in the baby backpack IN BED, and I suddenly realize he's not safe and I need to find him. This often means finding something warm (Clay) and trying to scoop him up. Needless to say it's not helping either of our sleep!

Well last night around 2:00 a.m. I took the whole thing to a new level by "actually" finding the baby in the bed, and carrying him to the changing table in the nursery. I turned on the light only to see a befuddled Oz cat on the changing table and Ben asleep in his crib. Luckily my antics didn't wake the baby, but sheesh! I wonder when this is going to end! 

Halloween pjs from Gramma and Grandpa

Mama voted

Benjamin's own book

Benji's Gramma Jan created a wonderful personalized book for him which he (& The Colonel) enjoyed hearing and looking at this morning. It's such a pleasure to read to him, especially a book like this!

After the read aloud this morning he was in a very good mood and "talked" to me for a while. It's funny, some times he makes so many varied noises and raises his eyebrows in such an expressive way that it really seems like he's talking. I talk back, of couse, but it's such a shame we're not speaking the same language! I can't wait to start the baby sign language in earnest when he's about 6 months old. 

"Ooh ooh ahh" 

wearing a bib decorated by Elicia :)

Rally De Los Muertos

Benjamin enjoyed his role as "Official Rally Baby" during the "Rally De Los Muertos" Clay and a few of his friends were running today. His duties included looking cute and not getting fussy while his daddy attended to important rally business. I'm pleased to say he fulfilled these duties quite well.

We missed most of the races at the Dignowity Hill Pushcart Derby this weekend, but enjoyed coming out all the same.

Dignowity Hill pushcart derby

#0: the OFFICIAL rally baby

After watching "Raising Arizona at least three times, Clay finally convinced me that these costumes were meant to be.

"Let's just preserve the moment in pictures, Ed," H.I. McDunnough 

"Babywearing" to the rescue (mostly)

After a couple of lovely weeks of 8 straight hours of glorious sleep, Benjamin has decided to change his sleep patterns the last few nights (going back to 5-6 hours at a time). He's also stopped falling asleep during his last feeding of the night and instead wants to be up and cheery when I'm ready for bed.

So now he and I walk around the house (him in the baby backpack) for about an hour until he totally conks out. It's a bit tricky to unbuckle and lift a limp baby out of a backpack without waking him, but I'm getting pretty good at it.

I don't know what I would do if I couldn't "baby wear" a lot of the time. It's almost always a complete cure-all for him. Although yesterday when he was in the babyback at Walmart, I didn't realize that we had a diaper malfunction until I looked down and realize I had a HUGE wet circle on my shirt and jeans and that one of his pant legs was soaked. I guess the his weight in the baby backpack tends to squish down on the diaper causing it to hold less than it might otherwise. That's ok though. It's still more than worth it.

yawn 

Babar onesie!

Benji's startle reflex has also gotten more sensitive lately. Depending on his mood, even the slightest noise will cause him to fling out his arms and get a terrified look on his face. The other evening, I made an unlady-like burp, and he got so scared he started to cry! That'll teach me.  :)

the eyebrows say it all

Baby chains, smiles, and freak outs

 
As of today, Benjamin is now 13.4 pounds (up about half a pound from last week). If he keeps this up he'll have doubled his birth weight by next week! Since next week he'll only be three months old, this is about a month sooner than the "average" baby. The onesie he's wearing in the picture above is a size 6 months. It's a bit too wide for him, but fits well in the length.

It's taken him about a week, but from the time I attached the baby "chain" to his bouncy chair to now he's already gotten way better at hand-eye coordination and can grab onto the chains almost every time he tries. He keeps trying to pull them into his mouth (which isn't possible since he always grabs the chain links that are up high), but he seems to enjoy the challenge.

Another new little development has been him trying to smile around the bottle during a feeding. Of course that makes him stop eating, but it is extremely cute.

pulling on the bouncy chair chains

Lately his freak outs seem more wild and extreme than before. When he really gets going with a crying jag it's more difficult to calm him. However, when I do finally get him calm, it is such a happy relief that I really feel like I accomplished something.  :)

enjoying the mobile

Benji and his giraffe

This morning I took a few more photos of Benjamin while he was enjoying his favorite toy, Stanley the giraffe. They don't do his cuteness justice, but are still pretty adorable.

Last night Clay and I left Benji for the first time to go to a banquet for Clay's work. I felt a bit weird and incomplete with out him (kind of like I'd forgotten my purse or something), but it was good to get away. Our friends Tina and Mark did a fabulous job with Benjamin while we were gone. We are so lucky to have great friends!!

The pictures below compare a photo from last year to one from last night. They definitely highlight how much difference a year and a baby can make!

the banquet a year ago

the banquet last night

news tidbits

Benjamin is turning into a real charmer. He's smiling a lot more now (mostly during the day; he still gets a bit fussy in the evenings, so sadly Clay usually misses the best of his happy time), and I might have heard him laugh for the first time this morning. Just like with his first "real smile" I wasn't sure if it was the real thing or not. He's enjoying looking at things, and when his hands happen upon a toy, he enjoys holding it and putting it in his mouth, too. He especially loves a stuffed giraffe toy/blanket given to him by a friend of his grandma Irene.

At the moment he's sitting in his bouncy chair behind me, holding on to a rung of a plastic baby chain, and saying "Aoooh?" then kicking his legs. Every time he kicks his legs it makes the other dangling toys dance around, which makes him kick harder. Good exercise and pretty darn cute.

Gramma's first book

In other news, we've been trying to be better about taking The Colonel for evening walks every night. It helps that mostly the weather has started cooling off. Benjamin enjoys the walks almost as much as The Colonel. If he doesn't fall asleep, Ben likes looking around with huge eyes at the sky and trees as from the vantage point of the baby backpack.

He's also still enjoying being read to and stares hard at the pictures. His Gramma Jan has been working on modifying books to make them special for him. Yesterday she sent us a copy of "On the Night You Were Born" in which she had labeled all the pictures (so when he's older we can have fun reading them together). I'm so excited about her future book-modifying/making projects! My Nana did that for a book for me, and it always made me feel so loved.

I just finished reading a book called Brain Rules for Baby which I definitely recommend to anyone who is thinking of having a baby (the first section is about pregnancy), who has a baby, or is just interested in child psychology. It is written by a brain scientist and is all about what scientific studies say about the growing brain, happiness, and intelligence. Definitely worth the read!

In some not so good news, last weekend I got an e-mail from my bank that my debit card had suspicious charges on it. Sure enough there were 4 different charges that I didn't make. They only amounted to about $35 total, but (of course) the bank had to cancel my debit card and send me a new one, which was kind of annoying to be without all week. The weird thing was, one of the products ordered by the fraudulent charges was a skin cream that was actually shipped to me yesterday. So today I called my bank to tell them and mailed the cream back. Sheesh. I hope this is the last of all of the banking trouble.

"learning tower" step stool

Today I did a bit of investing for Ben's future fun by buying a gently-used "Learning Tower" from one of my former co-workers. It's a toddler/preschooler step stool that is apparently great for kids "helping" in the kitchen and elsewhere around the house. I'm excited about it's future prospects!

Tomorrow night Clay and I plan to leave little Ben for the first time while we go to a banquet associated with Clay's work. I had imagined this would make me a bit nervous, but we're leaving him with one of our good friends who already knows him and is great with babies, so I'm know it will be fine. It will certainly be weird to have dinner and not have him near us though!

milk drunk

getting ready to go for a walk

Big Ben

I realized yesterday that Benjamin can already fit into size 6-9 months clothes (even though he's two weeks shy of being three months)! His Grandma and Grandpa Cannon bought him some pirate onesies that we thought he'd be wearing this spring, but I realized yesterday that they already fit! He is quite a long little thing!

He's also been enjoying thte bouncy baby chair (finally) we keep in the nursery. He's discovered that if he kicks his legs the little plastic animals bounce around (as the video shows). Yesterday he spent almost an hour being entertained by that!

Yesterday I also attached a baby mirror to the wall by his changing table and just this morning he discovered it. Mostly he was looking at me looking at him in the mirror, but he was definitely turned towards the wall and smiling when I smiled. I love it when we find new things to make him smile.

Pictures pictures pictures

Just some Friday and Saturday pictures...

dressing like his old man

Saturday morning's read aloud

Puttin' on the Ritz

sleeeeeeeepy milk face

My little bibliophile

Yesterday for the first time Benjamin was interested in books (well looking at the pictures anyway)!! He and I lay on our backs on the nursery floor and I read him some of Jack Kent's nursery rhymes. He stared and stared at the pictures. Then later that afternoon we read Where the Wild Things Are the same way. Technically Where the Wild Things Are is his "first book", since it's the first book we've read him all the way through. It's such a joy to be able to share reading with him, even if only in small chunks for now.

Yesterday the new Target which is only 2 minutes from my house finally opened (it's next door to the Earl Abel's restaurant), and Benji and I spent almost an hour perusing the aisles. (He slept the whole time in the baby backpack.) I got him the soft little puppy blanket and the colorful car seat hanger in the picture. Hopefully both will help make him more entertained in the car. He hasn't noticed the colorful hanging toy yet, but he loves putting the puppy blanket in his mouth.

Happy baby, happy Tree

After such a wonderful family-filled weekend it has been kind of hard to go back to normal life, but luckily Benjamin has seemed extra contented yesterday and last night. Night before last when he woke up around 5:00, I came in to feed him and he gave me the biggest smile (normally he's a bit befuddled and fussy during night feedings). That made 5 a.m. wake-up not matter at all! Then last night he actually slept EIGHT hours! I woke up several times to go check on him, but he was sleeping happily. I'm not counting on that happening regularly, but it sure was nice!

He's getting better at following objects with his eyes (as evidenced in the video of him in his swing), and he is happier for longer periods in his bed (looking up at the insect mobile) and in the swing. He still loves being in the baby backpack more than anything, and that's our only sure-fire way of calming him down if he is inconsolable.

Another exciting thing happened lately: the teacher workbook I wrote and published a few years ago is now back in print (the company is doing a "print on demand" thing). So you can look me up on Amazon.com now!