Weekend visitors

This weekend some of my friends from grad school at UNC were in town for a conference, and they came over one night to visit. Fortunately Jack was able to stay up long enough until they arrived so he could meet everyone.

Here's Jack with Gretchen--they've actually met before, when he was just 3 weeks old. I posted a picture from their first visit under this picture. Jack's changed just a little bit since then!



Here's Jack with our friend Tiffany.


And, last but not least, here's Jack with our friend Jeannette.

Being silly

Congratulations to our friends Mary and Eric whose baby girl, Hannah Grace, was born a couple days ago!!!

Here are a couple videos of Jack doing some tricks. The videos are very short--it's always real hard to predict when he'll do things. Plus as you can see in the second video, once I start filming he stops what he's doing and just stares at me like I'm an idiot.

He's in his "excersaucer," which helps us out a lot by keeping him entertained for a while. The first video shows what Jack does when he gets excited. He waves his arms around and yells. Usually he does it for longer, but in this case he got distracted by the TV.

I've had the hardest time getting Jack to clap for the camera. This video clip isn't great, but he at least cooperated for a few seconds.

He's also starting to "talk" more and more. I know he's not consciously forming words yet, but he babbles a lot saying "ba-ba-ba" or "da-da-da." I've got to start training him on how to pronounce the "ma" sound...

Birthday party and sleeping

Yesterday I took Jack to Chuck E. Cheese, where a friend of mine's daughter was having her 2-year birthday party. That's the birthday girl, Diana, in the picture above with my friend Lily. If Jack could have stopped sucking on his shirt for 2 seconds it would have been a great picture. This was actually the first time I had ever been to a Chuck E. Cheese, since back in my day it was Showbiz Pizza. Not much has changed--still an overwhelming chaos of loud noises, flashing lights, and those creepy singing mechanical animals.

We've done some work this past week on adjusting Jack's sleep schedule, and so far it seems to be working. We had been having trouble over the past couple months; he would wake up sometimes 4-5 times per night and often wouldn't stay down very long once we put him to bed. I did some reading and figured out that we'd been putting him to bed too late at night, which wound up with him being too wired to stay asleep for very long. Plus I was also getting up with him every single time he cried, and he wasn't learning to go back to sleep on his own.

We backed up his bedtime a couple hours, and now he goes down around 7-7:30 pm (so for anyone calling our house phone--please call before 7:00!) We had some crying at first, but now he entertains himself until falling asleep if he's not already asleep when I put him in the crib. We also let him cry through some of his wake-ups when I knew he didn't need to be fed, and now he's not waking up nearly as much in the night. The past few nights he's slept all the way through until about 4 am, taken a quick feeding, and then gone back to bed until 7 am. So now all of us are starting to feel more rested :)  

I feel bad because looking back, I realize that many evenings when I thought Jack was just being cranky, he was actually tired and should have been put to bed! Oh well. We'll just chalk this up to another learning experience as first time parents!

Funny face

Jack has been making a new face for a few days now, and I've been struggling to get a shot of it on video. We can't predict when he'll do it, and as always he doesn't like to perform for the camera. But this morning I did manage to record him for a few seconds.  He screws up his face and kind of makes snorting noises. I remember my brother John used to do this a lot when he was an older baby.  Pretty cute and funny.

Bye Grandma and Grandpa!

Thursday night we said goodbye to Grandma and Grandpa Nold, as they've now gone to Florida for the winter. We'll miss seeing them so much, but at least we'll get to visit when they come back to Chicago for the holidays. We hope they're having a great time in sunny Marco Island, and we'll try to not be too jealous in a couple months when it's snowy and freezing up here!

Jack was his usual chaming self during their visit Thursday night, and he showed Grandma and Grandpa how well he can sit up and play now. Louie was jealous of all the attention Jack was getting, so he crept over to lay beside him. Here's Jack petting him (actually he's probably pinching him).



We've had a sports-filled day today. Unfortunately one sporting event didn't go well--we just watched the Bears blow what would have been a great comeback against the Falcons. I know that makes all the Georgia relatives happy, but we're feeling a little irritated up here.

At least this morning we were in a better mood, when Jack got to watch his first Chicago marathon. The marathon course runs right through our neighborhood, so it's very convenient for us to see it. We're by mile 14, so we got to watch people at a little more than halfway through the race. Here's a picture of the elite men as they ran by:


And here's the women. The woman in the tan-colored outfit was the Olympic gold medalist this year, but she didn't win today.



Here's a couple shots of Jack with mom and dad




And finally, Jack seems to have been worn out just by watching the race!

7 months old!

Hey there, this is Jack. I know mom usually writes these things, but I wanted to say hello to everyone today. Yesterday I turned 7 months old, which is pretty cool. I have a pretty good set up here in Chicago. Mom and Dad are always playing with me, except when they have to work. But that's okay because when they're gone my nanny Melly takes care of me. Last week she even started taking me to a program a couple days a week where we play with other babies and do all sorts of activities. Melly says I'm the smartest baby by far in the group. We also play at home with my dog Louie. I sometimes like to pat his fur, but the most fun thing to do is poke his eyes and pull on his ears.

I'm not a big fan of tummy time, but sometimes I humor mom and will lay on my tummy for a few minutes. I move my legs a little, but not much seems to happen yet when I do that. Mom says we will have to "watch out" when I start to move my legs enough to crawl, whatever that means.

My arms are getting pretty strong--as you can see in these before and after pictures where I'm doing pushups. I must say, my pushup ability is quite impressive. I can do 10-20 reps at a time.

Besides doing pushups, I can also sit up by myself now. Another trick I like to do is clapping my hands. Mom keeps trying to get a video of me doing it, but I've been able to foil her plans every time.

I've gotten a little better about eating baby foods, and so far I haven't had reactions to anything besides peas. I've tried sweet potatoes, carrots, peas, avocado, and white potatoes. Sweet potatoes are by far my favorite. I thought avocado and white pototoes were incredibly disgusting. Mom says I will eventually like them after I try them lots of times, but I'm not sure if I believe her. Right now I eat baby foods a couple times a day, but I mostly still eat breastmilk. I'm definitely a boob man, and whenever other ladies besides mom hold me, I always check to make sure they have boobs too.

Well, so long everyone. It's been fun writing. Wish me a happy 7-month old birthday!

More laughing

The other day Jack laughed the hardest we've ever heard him laugh. He was getting some tummy time on his blanket, and for whatever reason he thought it was hilarious when we would drop one of his little plush toys near his head. I was really glad to catch this--I had been afraid by the time I got the camera he wouldn't think our antics were funny anymore!