Onto the Second Year

It's the 17th of March, and today we celebrated Sofian's 1st birthday with his Grandmother Linda (aka, Mamalama) and Ann (aka, Tutu) as well as his Grandfather Tom (aka, TomTom). (Unfortunately, Mamalama's husband John -- aka, Papalapa -- wasn't able to join us as the two of them literally just got off the boat from a cruise around South America.)

The birthday was really spread out over the weekend, with an open house here at the LemonDrop on Saturday, and we had a huge crowd for our tiny house. It was great to see everyone, and everyone went away very satisfied with a taste treat from the new king of cupcakes here in Seattle -- Trophy Cupcakes. Since butter and eggs are still new to Sofian, his Mama made him a vegan carrot cupcake that he quite enjoyed, both during Saturday's open house and today's proper birthday party.

Wow. It has been quite a year. That's an understatement. We've certainly had some challenging times (specifically those that were sleep deprived), but by and large the learning process of the last year (for both the boy discovering the world and his parents figuring out how to be parents and what makes this kid tick) has been pretty dang wonderful. At the one-year mark, Sofian is really exhibiting some distinct personality traits and it's going to be a lot of fun to see how they continue to manifest.

Now onto the pics and vids:

Sofian's Birthday Cupcake

Sofian unwrapping birthday gifts

Holy Cow, It's March Already

Things are busy, to say the least, around the LemonDrop. Parie is minding the boy four days out of the week, and then trying to finish the plans for the addition on my day of Daddy Day Care as well as during nap times and such. And I've been inundated with loads of work that has taken my eye off of blogging of late. Oh, and it's tax season and we've been prepping an application for a refinancing to fund the coming addition... and we need to get some things figgered out for the big birthday weekend that is fast approaching. So yeah, things are a little crazy.

Here are some quick updates followed by recent pics:

• Went down to Portland a couple weekends back and had a great time with Tutu and Tomtom, as well as had a great time with various and sundry guests at all the meals. Also got a chance to visit our pals Adam and Korey and check out how their kids Owen and Amelia are doing (Amelia liked putting her feet in my goatee).
  
  
• Sofian has graduated from just a GI Joe crawl to full-on hands-and-knees crawling (though he can go between the two pretty easily). He's also getting pretty fast.
  
  
• New teeth are coming in on the bottom, slowly but surely, so soon Sofian will have eight teeth in total (four on top, four on the bottom).
  
  
• The boy is starting to pick up some habits from his old man, which aren't very endearing. Sofian is starting to get a little picky with his eating habits, refusing vegetables for the most part. We've resorted to trying to hide some veg within fruit purees as well as yogurt, but it hasn't been completely successful.
  
  
• We're losing one of our PEPS pals -- Henry and his parents Beth and Pete are leaving Seattle for Kansas City. We'll be saying goodbye to them this week.
  

And now, for a cavalcade of pics:



Jeff and Kim visited with Ellie the other afternoon, and Jeff was showing off his block-building prowess to Sofian -- who left nothing stand.



Henry stopped by for awhile last week as well, while his Mom did some prep work for the move. Unfortunately, Sofian napped during all of Henry's visit, but they'll get a chance to play again this Wednesday.



Sofian got a great new hat and a pair of pants as an early birthday present from Anne, Eric, Mari and Clara. Here are the two boys showing off their hats.



A snap of Tutu and Sofian from the recent Portland visit.



And finally, the boy on the swings (again), taking advantage of some of the great weather we've been having this month in Seattle.

Another Successful Daddy Day Care Day

Thanks, Glenn

Sofian and I went shopping at our local co-op last week and ran into Wi-Fi/Mac guru and fellow Dad, Glenn Fleishman (who was in the neighborhood to see Doc G), and Glenn snapped a couple of photos of Sofian with his iPhone and uploaded them to his Flickr account--which is also chock-full of cute photos of his sons Ben and Rex. (FYI - Sofian is sitting in a BuggyBag, which helps prevent the boy from trying to chew on the grocery cart's straps and handle.)





Also, funny grocery shopping story... it seems we have a little thief in the family. A couple weeks back, I was shopping with Sofian and let him play with a bag of frozen blueberries. As we got up to the check-out, I took the bag and put it in with the rest of the pile of groceries in the main part of the cart. But, as it was a very tall pile, he was able to grab the bag off the top when I had my back turned. When we got out to the car, I noticed that he had the blueberries hidden next to him in the BuggyBag. Whoops.

 

Wow

Tonight, Parie had a late meeting starting at 6:30, leaving me with a boy who hadn't napped much during the day. Luckily, he wasn't being much of a crabpot, but I could tell he was getting tired. Parie was going to shoot to be back by 7:30, but I decided to call it at about 6:50. I got him into his jammies and read to him for well over 20 minutes, at which point he was rubbing his eyes more and more. So, I turned off the lights in his bedroom and held him, hoping that he'd feel soothed and ready to go to bed.

Not exactly. Instead, some beastly screaming ensued. So, I put him down in his crib and slunk off as the screaming continued. It was about 15 minutes till Parie was due to be home, and I was ready to let him go for that length of time.

But it only last about 3 minutes. And he was out.

So, someone other than Mama got the boy to go to bed. That's huge.

I'll do some more updating in the next couple of days on our trip down to Portland this last weekend, but for now I'm just going to bask in the glow of this very special night.

 

A Pictorial Gift from Cousin Lauren

My cousin Lauren was playing around with the LOLcat picture generator over at I Can Has Cheezburger, and she came up with this old nugget of me testing out the Baby Bjorn with our cat Wompus.


moar funny pictures

And let's not forget the one that Jeff Carlson did last year:



That darn Wompus!

And while we're on the subject of LOLcats, I love this one:


moar humorous pics

And this one:


moar humorous pics

 

Long Day, Part Deux

The babbling started early this morning, and I looked at the clock and couldn't believe it... it was fanoozling 10 minutes to 4am!!!! We let the boy babble awhile, but then he started making some serious noise about 4:40 so Parie got up with him. She tried to nurse him back to sleep, but that was a no go. This kid was wired!

Ostensibly, I should have kept napping, but that didn't happen -- I was weirdly wired as well (considering I'd been so tired the day before). But I guess 5.5 hours of sleep was enough for me.

So we got an early start on the day, and Parie and the boy drove me downtown where I worked in several different libraries with free Wi-Fi before I had a meeting at Amazon this afternoon. I heard reports from Parie through the morning that Sofian still was averse to sleeping, taking only a 40-minute micronap. The duo picked me up later in the afternoon, and I got into the car to find Sofian slumbering... but that only lasted until we got home. I then took him out for some errands and finally got him to sleep after driving nearly 30 minutes. I let him snooze while I worked on my laptop in the driver's seat of the car parked outside our house, but it only lasted about 15 minutes.

So, today has been a struggle -- moreso for Parie than me, for certain. She's pretty darn tired. And the boy was wired and flailing as she put him to bed (but curiously, he didn't scream in resentment). So fingers are crossed that we get to sleep in tomorrow morn... till at least 5:30!

Here's a vid I shot tonight of the boy and I playing the Where's Sofian game. I was hoping he'd demonstrate his knee-crawling abilities, but every time I turned the video capture on, he reverted to his GI Joe stance.

Where's Sofian

Also, here he is from last night as we ate dinner... never let the boy nap during dinnertime. You'll regret it later.

 

Rooster Boy

Been meaning to post this -- I love this new shirt we got from the local high-end baby/toddler clothing store (it was half-off):

 

Long Day

Sofian went down pretty hard on Sunday night at about 6:30PM, which is a little early for the boy. He'd also not wanted to eat much solid food during the afternoon (he's decided to get started being picky). So it was not a surprise to have him greet us through the baby monitor at 5AM this morning. And with Parie still not feeling very good (her coughing and subsequent request for me to read to her to soothe her to sleep kept me up till almost 1AM on Sunday night), I was up and tending to the boy after letting him babble for a half an hour until he got really pissed off.

I decided that it should be a Daddy Day Care day so that Parie could stay off her feet and rest up to try to beat this bug, so the boy and I headed downtown to the central library (the really cool one that was designed by Rem Koolhaus). We did some walking around and riding of elevators, and we also hung out in the playroom of the children's section for a good long time. He really enjoyed crawling around and discovering the different textures around the room.



We also went out on some errands this afternoon, and by the end of the day I'd successfully worn him out. After taking a short nap around our dinner time (on the play mat in the living room), we woke him up by clattering our plates and he was not pleased. Parie gave him a bath and he was still not very pleased. And so, he went to bed around 6:45PM. I'm going to be turning in early tonight, as I'm sure tomorrow will be another early day (though he did do better with the food intake today).

 

MiniGym Adventure

On Thursday, I was hanging with Sofian on my weekly Daddy Day Care day and got a call from Beth (PEPS pal Henry's Mom) saying that they were going to be at our neighborhood community center for the toddler MiniGym (which is basically a playtime free-for-all with various and sundry toys strewn about the gym -- it's also a great way to get the kids to run around and tire themselves out). So we met up with them as well as Ellis and her Mom, Amy, and had a pretty good time -- save for a rather disturbing moment that I'll get to in a moment.

Both Ellis and Henry are much more into movement and are trying out walking (either on their own or with the help of some kind of walking toy). Sofian, on the other hand, was quite content to hang with the various puzzle boxes (like the looping wacky abacuses and such), and I had to make an effort to get him to crawl around. I also placed him in a couple of the vehicle toys, which he seemed to enjoy.




Here's Ellis:



And Henry (aka, Lobster Mitts):



And some video of Sofian tooling around the gym:

Sofian at the MiniGym with Henry

SpeedRacer Sofian

Our PEPS trio was pretty much the youngest of the bunch, and there were several Moms there each with multiple kids. They had most of their kids out in the foyer feeding them a snack at the beginning of the gym time, when two of the kids (a 2-1/2-year-or-so girl and a nearly 4-year-or-so boy) came in to play. They picked up some plastic bowling pins and started attacking a large-sized baby doll with the pins, the boy screaming "Kill it! Kill it" and the girl yelling "Cut off its head!" Amy and I were gobsmacked and google-eyed at this. Were we witnessing some weird toddler version of A Clockwork Orange?

Their Mom did come in a few seconds later, after the yelling had died down but the bowling pins were still hitting their mark, and she put a stop to that. On one hand, I kinda wanted to let her know that she had some rather thuggish brutes for kids, but then decided better of that. Just one more reason to keep the telly away from Sofian. But the sad thing is, he'll learn all about Pirates of the Caribbean and the like all too soon from kids in pre-school and such.

 

Busy Weekend

This weekend feels like it's been lightning paced, especially with my duties as the Precinct Caucus Chair for the Washington state Democratic Caucus on Saturday (for more on that, see my political blog Cracks in the Facade). Sadly, I was so busy I didn't think to snap any photos or vids while I was there, even when Mama and Sofian made a quick visit to register Parie's vote (Sofian had a pretty high temp on Saturday, but happily it's back to normal on Sunday).

On Friday, Sofian and his PEPS pal Ayana headed off to the Children's Museum at Seattle Center (which also houses Key Arena, where the massive Obama rally was taking place). Seems that Sofian slept through a large chunk of the morning, but he finally did wake enough to get some playing in:

Sofian & Ayana @ Seattle's Children's Musem, part 1

Sofian & Ayana @ Seattle's Children's Musem, part 2

Friday evening we hung out at the GO-Team's house (Anne Gienapp and Eric Olson) as they were having a potluck for the all the travelers who were planning on an annual cabin weekend in Eastern Washington that got canceled due to avalanches and such in the mountain passes. I've never gone, largely because I'm suspicious of the great outdoors, so this was the next best thing to having tromped our way through the snow.



And on Sunday morn, the boy and I headed over to Babu's for a viewing of the Liverpool v Chelsea game (which, unfortunately was utter rubbish, as Andrew McCombie -- in for a quickie Seattle visit -- noted several times). Here are the Chelsea boys before heading out.



Sofian did great with all the toys I stuffed into his bag (including orange measuring bowels, stacking rings, and a couple of books), and I got to hang out for the entire game (which was wholly unexpected).

We also did some errands this afternoon -- getting the car washed and picking up a few things at Whole Paycheck (during which Sofian napped on my chest as I toted him around in the Ergo baby carrier). Unfortunately, he probably needed a bit more napping and I took him off of his schedule a bit too much, as he's refusing to eat the solid food we've prepared for him (this has been cropping up a bit lately, though -- he often starts out a dining session by refusing to even try the food, but once we get some into his mouth, he realizes it's delicious). And Parie has been still feeling rather under the weather, so I hung out with the boy for some playtime this afternoon:

Stacking Stuff

 

Sofian's Intro to Politics

Yesterday, Barack Obama was in town at the Key Arena (where the basketball Sonics play), and it attracted over 17,000 people. Sofian and his pal Ayana actually headed down to the Seattle Center (where Key Arena is as well as several theaters) to visit the Children's Museum, and they took a look at the line to see if they could get in. Fat chance. You had to have been there before 9:00am to have had a chance to be one of the lucky 17K.

Here's Sofian napping through the excitement outside the arena.



I hear that The Boy slept through much of the Children's Museum visit, and I'll post some more pics and vid later in the day, but I have to get myself prepared to lead our precinct in today's Democratic Washington state caucus (I'm a little nervous). So stay tuned for more on that and other happenings from the past week...

 

Comings and Goings

Got some exciting news yesterday that Sofian has a new pal -- Eliana Wren Carlson, born to Jeff and Kim Carlson on Tuesday morning. I had been iChatting with Jeff late Monday night and he told me he was timing contractions, so things looked like they were on the way. But it went pretty darn quick, as Ellie was born at 8:48am on Tuesday. We'll be stopping by to see the new family later today with some requested goodies from our favorite French bakery, Bakery Nouveau.



Sadly, we also got news that one of our PEPS families -- the Thomases (with Henry and his parents Beth and Pete) -- will be moving from Seattle to Kansas City. Pete's going to do the startup thing back in Kansas with some people with whom he's worked in the past (and he's from Kansas), and the family is looking to move probably by March. We actually had our PEPS gathering over at their condo last night (where the Moms got to go out to dinner and the Dads hung out with the kids and talked tech and politics as the Super Tuesday results were coming in). We'll certainly miss the trio, and wish them the best of luck. But we'll miss Lobster Boy the most.

our new baby gate

first one of two gates to be put up -- this one is at the entrance to
the kitchen.

More on Sofian's Big Day Out

Yesterday was a whirlwind of activity for young master Sofian J.H. The morning started with our PEPS pals Amy and Ellis coming by to pick up Sofian and Parie, and the four of them trekked down to Tacoma to visit the Museum of Glass. Sounds like the babies had a great time at the museum, even though they were followed closely by a nervous security guard throughout, and there was much napping done in the car.



When Parie and Sofian were delivered home, the boy was fast asleep, but we had to get our stuff together to head out to haircuts at Salon Moxi. So, Parie transferred him into the house and into his crib successfully while I transferred his baby seat out of Amy's car. Then, 15 minutes later, we transferred him from crib to car without too much fuss. And then, upon arrival at Capitol Hill, we transferred him from car to stroller, where he continued to slumber for about another 40 minutes or so (see picture in post below).

We ended the day by going to a new discovery--a modern French bistro with a love for (European) football called Cafe Presse. Parie had the daily fish dish while I had a salad of endive, Rocquefort and walnuts as well as a wonderful croque madame. And Sofian, while reticent at first, became a huge fan of the classic French baguette.

Unfortunately, perhaps due to not eating enough (his napping got in the way of his regular eating schedule yesterday) as well as being cooped up a lot yesterday, the boy woke up at 5am this morning. Ugh. At least it's a sunny day in Seattle.

Speaking of sunny days, here's a pic from last week with me trying out Sofian on my back using our Ergo carrier -- 'twas very comfy for both of us, and the boy ended up napping out. (Also, that's the Youngstown Arts & Cultural Center in the background, the one that Parie worked on while at DNDA.)

 

Big Day Out

Here's Sofian totally napped out at Salon Moxi while Mama and Papa were getting their haircuts. More on Sofian's day a little later, but I wanted to try out some mo-blogging from my iPhone.

 

Amazing, and Wholly Unexpected

Yes, that could be your reaction to seeing a new post so soon after my last post. (It's certainly Parie's.) But the title refers to what happened this morning. Parie had to go to Doc G.'s office (she's got a nasty cough) and I was feeding the boy. After we finished, I picked him up and was dancing slowly around the room, and noticed he was burying his head in my shoulder and chest, telling me he was a little tired. So I kept swaying slowly to some music I'd just popped onto the iPod (the new one by slowcore band Radar Bros.),and then eventually sat down. Sofian didn't make a peep of frustration at this. So we hung out in Mama's favorite chair (the recliner) and listened to more of the album (quite a luxury for me these days to just sit and listen to music without doing something else).

After a few tunes, I could tell his breathing was heavier and that he was more deeply asleep. So, I got up, brought him to his crib, and put him down. And there he stayed for nearly two hours.

The significance of this is that it usually takes a feeding from Parie or a drive in Bertie the Bio Bullet to get this boy to sleep. He doesn't just decide to nap out, it takes work. Maybe this portends to better self-soothing-to-sleep in the weeks to come?

Speaking of eating, here's Sofian and his new food plate/tray (with farm animals with their names written in French). (But don't get too excited about his spoon skills -- he's still quite happy just squeezing the food through his fingers for the time being.)

Hungry Hungry Sofian

 

Catching Up

Wow, I've been pretty awful in the blogging arena of late. For the most part, things have been pretty quiet around here... save for the exploding pyrex dish.





That occurred while Parie was making a delicious dinner for our PEPS Gang gathering last week. We quickly ordered pizza, and kept the babies out of the kitchen.

Sofian's been moving around a lot more, though still just doing the GI Joe crawl:

Ground Perspective

And he's experimenting with new surfaces:

Playing around the table

Parie's also been pretty busy finalizing the plans for our addition, which we're planning on starting this summer. So I'm taking over Sofian duty for a full day each week. Here's what happened at the end of Daddy Day Care last week - I plumb wore the boy out!



Other tidbits from the last couple of weeks:

• Our pals Megan and Lindsay (who are expecting in a couple of months) came over on Sunday night and brought dinner in exchange for loading them up with some baby gear that Sofian has grown out of (a swing, a bouncy chair, and the infant car seat). And they stuck around after Parie got the boy down to sleep, and the two of us went out on the town for awhile while Megan and Lindsay listened to our iPod's selections and graded papers. Sofian never made a peep. Parie and I went to a West Seattle pub with a lot of European and micro brews, and played some scrabble. We know how to kick out the jams!
  
  
• Sofian is still loving his Water Babies class at the YMCA, and Parie told me he was doing quite a bit of kicking in the water last time. I get to do the class this week with the boy.
  
  
• Some of the things he's been eating lately: lots of Purely O's (an organic brand of Cheerios-like cereal), mashed potatoes/parsnips with some garlic (we were worried he'd be turned off by the garlic, but he plowed through it), small chunks of carrot and broccoli.
  
  
• If Sofian crawls into either the kitchen or one of the other rooms, you can call out, "Where's Sofian?" a couple of times, and he'll come crawling back with a smile on his face when he sees you.
  
  
• I'm doing the South Beach diet (lots of protein) and have lost over 7 pounds, but man am I craving some carbs right about now.
  

How's That More Blogging Resolution Going?

Ahhhhhhh, welllllll... OK, maybe not so hot. But the past two weeks have been monster busy for me with freelance work (it's high time of the year for technology products, and I've been busy covering new stuff from the Consumer Electronics Show and Macworld for Amazon -- for example, the luscious new MacBook Air, for which I did Amazon's detail page content).

Both Parie and I have been settling into our new routines -- me working about 4 days a week, and Parie tending to the lil' guy at home (and going out and about with him, too). This week, Sofian and I went on an afternoon adventure to Ikea (now that's big fun!!!), and starting next week I'll be hanging with him for a full day to give Parie time to finish plans for our addition as well as just chill out a bit.

The biggest thing of the past couple of weeks is how much Sofian is moving around. He's doing the GI Joe crawl, and it's getting faster, but there's not much sign of him getting on his knees to crawl quite yet. It turns out, we hadn't been offering him the right motivation to get moving, as you can see from this video:

The Sweet, Sweet Cell Phone

I also want to show off this video from our most recent PEPS gathering (last week, at Ayana's) -- the babies have certainly come a long way since our first meetings, and it's quite a circus of movement.

PEPS Goes Crazy

I'll try to get back on track this weekend. But for now it's back to trolling news about Apple for my weekly Apple blog post at Amazon.

 

Dinner with Jeff and Kim

Our good pals Jeff and Kim (who are expecting at the end of the month -- check out their January Project Flickr photo album) came by last night for a long overdue get-together. Parie made a fanoozlin' fantastic manacotti dish that she got from watching the newest Jamie Oliver show (full of creme fresh deliciousness as well as healthy cauliflower and broccoli). And Jeff brought over his Nikon D80 digital SLR and grabbed some excellent photos at the table.







This last one was sort of shot by Sofian, who was helped in operating the clicker by Jeff.

Speaking of Jeff, I gotta get back to helping him finish up his latest book project (a bit of a baby shower present).

More Swinging

Mama loves to take pictures of Sofian in the swing at our nearby park. Here a sampling from the most recent photo shoot:





Note also that Sofian is wearing his new "lettuce hat" (as it looks like a leaf of bibb lettuce), which was knit by Aunti Keri. We love it.

 

He's In the Jailhouse Now

We got a late Christmas present to ourselves delivered today -- a baby jail! This should actually be a really good thing for Sofian, as he can roll around and practice moving himself without us having to fish him out from underneath the furniture when we take our eyes off of him for just a second (he's getting really quick at the rolling).

Baby Jail

 

More Christmas at the LemonDrop

Tutu and Tomtom (aka, Sofian's grandparents Ann and Tom McElligott) made their way north from Portland on the Thursday after the official day to share Christmas with the denizens of the LemonDrop. Sofian was gifted a motherload of board books that were thoughtfully and artfully researched and chosen by Tutu. Here's just a sampling:





The boy loves his books, and I think he's really gonna like these.

That said, here's Tutu with Sofian after opening his presents -- and he's back to being fascinated by the floor mat letters.

Christmas with Tutu and Tomtom

He also got a great set of Uncle Goose blocks, and Tomtom was showing him the ropes:



And here's the boy wondering what might be coming next:

New Year's Theme

A group of my friends (primarily from St. Olaf) have had a tradition of coming up with a theme for the coming new year on New Year's Eve. Some of the best have been Nutty and Nude in '92 and Take Your Passion, Make It Happen (stolen from Flashdance, and I think that was for '94). I got the proposal from Sue Unkenholz last night via email for this year's theme, and I'm all over it:

Why Wait in '08?!?

I'd say that works perfectly with my resolutions posted below.

 

Resolutions

I'm not usually one for doing the yearly New Year Resolutions list, but as a new Papa who leads a busy freewheeling freelance life, I've come to realize I need to be better about setting goals and to-do lists to make sure the things that need getting done get done. Also, 2008 is going to be a busy year for the entire family, with Parie leaving her job to be a stay-at-home-Mama while also completing plans for the addition to the LemonDrop and finding/negotiating with contractors. (I'm still going to be taking care of Sofian for at least a day a week, so that Parie has time to get the addition going as well as give her some downtime.) So, here are some things I'll set to blog to help remind me of what needs doing in the next year.

• Blog more. Yes, I'm going to do my concerted best to be much more regular at keeping you up to date with Sofian's activities and growth. I'm also hoping to get back to doing more regular political blogging over at Cracks in the Facade.
  
  
• Get out of the house more with Sofian. We need to be better at introducing him to the wonders that can be found in Seattle, from the Children's Museum to the Zoo to the newly rejiggered Seattle Art Museum to just walking around the Pike Place Market. He loves getting out and about, it really energizes him in a fun and exciting way.
  
  
• As a corallary to to that, we also need to get Sofian together with other folks, like his PEPS pals or just meeting Mama/Papa pals for coffee. He really feeds on seeing other people.
  
  
• Get out of the house more without Sofian. Mama and Papa need to do a better job at not being so housebound. We need to get out and grab a restaurant meal or go see a flick or just hang at a coffeeshop on our own without worrying about taking care of Sofian's needs. And while we need to do this together as much as we can, we also need to understand we may have to go our separate ways from time to time to get this accomplished, leaving the other home to hang with the boy but making sure the away time balances out between the two of us.
  
  
• And as a corallary to that, we need to get together with our peeps more often -- with and without Sofian.
  
  
• Lose 20 pounds. And that means more consistent use of the YMCA membership. And biking more (not just to work, but up the West Seattle hill to do errands).
  
  
• Be more conscious of our finances. While we're losing one half-time income and I'm hoping to more than make up for that with longer, more consistent freelance hours, we still need to be better about our finances, since we hope to pay for a decent chunk of the addition in cash. Plus, with the macro economy on shaky legs, it's time to start pulling in and stop feeding Sofian caviar-topped Purely O's.
  
  
• Get the LD addition started... first by finding contractors and then actually building it.
  
  
• Be more consistent in my usage of to-do lists to manage my swirl of work and activities. I've been using the online Remember the Milk to-do application, and it's been helpful. I just need to make it a daily practice.
  
  
• Niggling projects: organizing my British food magazine clips collection; making improvements to our Mac Mini entertainment system; creating a manageable system for keeping our shed organized; getting rid of the junk in the backyard; finishing up the top to our compost bin system; etc., etc.
  
  Oh yeah, and baby-proofing the house. I think that goes to the top of the list.
  
  
• Work hard to ensure a Democrat (Obama, Edwards, Clinton, Dodd, or Biden in preference order) is elected President in November. This is the first election that means something to the boy's future, and there's a lot of crap to work through after the last 7 years.
  

Christmas at the LemonDrop

It's been a nicely quiet holiday here at the LD. Christmas Eve we went over to Tina & Ryan's for dinner, bringing along Parie's awesome salmon/sweet potato pie and a flourless hazelnut cake that I baked. Here's Ryan and his two boys, Grant and Orlando, showing Sofian how to play with the wacky abacus.

Ryan and the Boyz Show Sofian How It's Done

Here's the three of us after our massive feast (which also included mushroom bread pudding from Tina):



This morning, the boy must have known Santa had made the rounds as he decided to wake us up at quarter to 6, after nearly a week of lying in between 7 and 8am. We didn't have a whole lot to open, but here's the obligatory baby-with-the-wrapping-paper video:

Christmas Morning with Sofian

He got some new blocks from Santa and was quite pleased with them:



But then got a little tuckered out since he was up rather early:



Aunti Kerri came over at lunchtime and we hung out with her while it snowed for about an hour outside. But, this being Seattle, it didn't stick for very long, and the roads were fine enough for us to drive over to the GO-Team house (Anne Gienapp and Eric Olson) for their holiday open house. Then back home for more blocks and finally to sleep.

Got some work to do tomorrow, and Parie has a final half day at DNDA on Thursday before she becomes a full-time Mom. Then Tutu and Tomtom come up from Portland on Thursday to continue the Christmas celebration (there are 12 days of Christmas, you know).

 

PEPS Holiday Party

Sadly, we did not bring our broken camera to the holiday party over at Ellis' swinging pad this last Thursday, but luckily Sammy's parents were able to capture a great video slice of the proceedings (it's a private video, so you'll have to traipse over to SammyWammerville to view it). Had we brought our camera, though, we could have captured Sammy actually trying to climb over the back of the mellow, sitting Sofian. Ellis and Henry were also covering a lot of ground (with Henry quite the lil' lobster, trying to grab everything within reach). Meanwhile, Sofian and Ayana (who's 2 months younger) were content to watch the cacophony of movement.

It was quite a contrast to our first meetings back in June, when all the babies were lying on the floor like a bunch of grubs.

 

O Baby

Sofian had his 9-month checkup this week, and happily there was only a second flu shot that had to be administered. The official height recorded was 29 inches (2', 5"), but Parie says that Val, Dr. G's med assistant was being stingy with the measuring tape and that he's really 30 inches. His weight is 22 pounds, 6 ounces. So his exponential growth has definitely slowed down. Still, he's a big guy.

Also this week, after I was chatting with our PEPS pal Charlie (who I met for coffee with his son Sammy), I decided to try to introduce some Cheerio-like cereal to Sofian. Both Parie and I were a little nervous, since Sofian just has four teeth, but Charlie said that the Os that they use (the organic Purely Os) and even Cheerios break down pretty easily with saliva. We've been giving Sofian some food to play with -- pieces of rice, some steamed carrot bits -- but while he loves to put everything in his mouth, he just didn't seem interested in putting actual food in there.

After an initial play period yesterday with the Os, though, Sofian was able to start getting them into his mouth pretty consistently. Here's some video documentation: