You're So Vain

Congratulations to my youngest brother Paul, on his graduation from St. Michael's College! He also just found out that he got accepted to medical school at the University of Vermont. Way to go! We're very proud of him.


We've long suspected that Jack is vain. (Of course, since he's the cutest baby there ever was, it's hard to blame him!) I think this sequence of events proves his vanity beyond a doubt.




The reason we had that picture down off the wall is because we were rearranging things and hanging some new pictures. For Mother's Day, Andy got the 2 collages below custom framed for me. I know you're not supposed to take a picture of a picture, but I think you can see them well enough to appreciate how beautiful they are!

Standing!

Jack's started standing on his own! (That's our nanny's daughter in the picture; she's up from Belize visiting her mom.) So far I think about 5 seconds is the longest he's stood by himself so far, but he's getting stronger by the day. I know walking won't be too far behind now.

Here's a very brief clip of Jack standing that our nanny took. I think he maybe lasted all of 1-2 seconds!

Happy Mothers' Day!

Congratulations to the Words on the birth of their daughter, Leah Maureen!! Best wishes to Dave, Megan, and Aubrey. Jack is even more surrounded by women now...

Jack says Happy Mothers' Day to all the wonderful moms out there! These pictures were from last night, when Grandpa Nold treated us to a Mothers' Day dinner at the country club. Jack behaved beautifully, even though we wound up keeping him out past his usual bedtime.

I like the way it looks when the sun shines on his hair.


We spent the night at Grandma and Grandpa Nold's house after dinner, and I took these pictures this morning. Jack's getting much better at moving around on his horse, and he's almost able to get on and off by himself. Not very gracefully, but that's okay.


Not sure what he's thinking here as he eyes Aunt Lisa's dog, Coco.


Andy and I were involved in a really cool experience yesterday. We were looking at some houses--just browsing; we're not planning on moving anytime in the near future. We know our real estate agent, Jeff, fairly well, since he lives in our neighborhood and sold our condo last year. While we were looking at a house, Jeff got a phone call. He and his partner have been in the process of trying to adopt a child for 2 1/2 years, and this phone call was THE call--that they had been selected by the birth parents to get the baby! It was obviously a really emotional experience, with hugs all around. Jeff was very happy he had people there to share the news with, rather than if he had gotten the call when he was alone. His life is about to be turned upside down, since the baby is due at the beginning of June!

That made me think of our friends, the Wagners, in North Carolina, who are also in the process of adopting a child right now. We wish them the best, and can't wait for the day when they get that phone call too!

Crackerface

Happy Cinqo de Mayo! I had to laugh at Jack tonight during dinner. He did one of his usual tricks of kissing a flat, shiny surface. But unfortunately for him, the surface was his booster seat tray table, which had a ton of cracker crumbs on it. When he brought his face back up, it was coated with crumbs. Only the big crumbs seem to show up in these pictures; it looked much worse in person.

Last night Andy and I went to a Cubs game. Andy's boss very generously hosted an event on one of the Wrigleyville rooftops for his coworkers and their families. The weather turned out to be pretty chilly, so we actually watched most of the game from the indoor bar part of the rooftop facility. But despite the cold, the Cubs won, and we had a great time! In fact, I had so much fun getting to spend a night among adults that I forgot to take any pictures, other than this one of Wrigley Field. This was before the game started, when the Giants were on the field warming up. You can see they're competing for space in the outfield with a bunch of seagulls.

New tricks

Happy birthday to Grandma Nold! We look forward to seeing more of Grandma and Grandpa Nold soon, since they're coming back to Chicago tomorrow for the summer. Also happy Kentucky Derby Day!

Every day Jack seems to get stronger and develop better balance, so I thought today I'd see if he could walk with some support. We unfolded his little car into the pushcart mode and let him try it out. I was impressed at how well he did! But I think we'll keep the cart-walking on the carpet for now, until he gains a little more control of himself.

Here's another video from today of Jack "cleaning." His Uncle John will be glad to see that Jack appears to throw lefty most of the time.

Playing around

Not too much is going on around here. Just thought I'd share some pictures I took of Jack earlier this evening. He still loves playing with his blocks; usually the more mess made, the better. But he did something new tonight that Andy and I are excited about--he put some of the blocks back in the box. Jack has never done that before. His mission has always been to take small items out of their containers as fast as possible and throw them around. He never showed any interest before when I tried to get him to put toys in bigger boxes or bowls. Maybe he's finally turning over a new leaf.

Peekaboo!

This is one of Jack's favorite poses, though he'll only hold it for a second or too, so I've had a hard time getting a picture of it. If there's a toy behind his legs, sometimes he'll reach through and try to grab it; almost twisting himself into a pretzel.

Go Dawgs and congrats to Matt Stafford, the number one NFL draft pick! Hopefully "Do you Know Shon" Moreno, as Andy likes to call him, will be picked in the first round as well.