Picture of the Day: 8/31/11

Simon bonding with Britni, America's Next Top Nanny

Picture of the Day: 8/30/11

Simon is sporting a retro look today with lemon leg-warmers showing his willingness to run the extra mile, grey socks to keep the tootsies warm and a classic yet adorable frog onsie.

Rollin' Rollin' Rollin'

Simon has been awesome with tummy time lately. He plays and does a little half pushup (aka 'sphinx pose' - we've been going to lots of yoga classes lately). I've really just been happy that he hasn't been crying when we put him down on his belly and that he moves his little arms and legs almost like he's crawling. Then two days ago Simon suddenly rolled over. I was sure it was a fluke, maybe I just laid him down off balance or something so gravity took over.

Today he showed me how much I had underestimated our extraordinary young man. He easily rolled over six or seven times this morning. He had already done it maybe four times before I went to get the flip camera that Grandparents Basque loaned us. I love the one when he just looks at the camera and then rolls over! What a smart boy!

Three more roll overs after the jump.

Whew - We Have a Nanny

Simon has been worried sick that we didn't have a nanny set up for him yet. 'Mama,' he screamed, 'don't you worry about these things?' By this morning he had enough and gave me physical evidence of his concern. A lot of it. All over his face and his clothes (his pjs, not the cute red onesie he is wearing below) and his fun new play mat. So I gave him a bath by myself for the first time. He had fun and kicked/splashed around and was at least marginally cleaner at the end. Certainly wetter. Then we had a little baby massage, put him down for a nap and I got right on that nanny thing.

We made an offer to a lovely young lady named Britni who we think will be wonderful. She has lots of experience (mostly with infant twins so our single Simon should be a breeze) and is from Michigan. She has been in Chicago for a while and is finishing up her degree in writing in the evening. She loves Simon and is excited about all the things we are trying to do more naturally, like cloth diapers, making our own food and baby wearing.

Simon is finally sleeping peacefully.

PS Don't you love the socks?

August House Progress

We've been pretty busy throughout August and haven't been great about taking progress pictures.  The main work over the past few weeks has been mainly on HVAC, plumbing and electrical.  These are obviously pretty important things to have in the house but don't make for as dramatic a picture.  So to inject a little excitement into these progress pictures I tried using a new app on my iPhone that takes 360 panoramic pictures.  They're not the most clear pictures in the world since I'm still getting used to the app, but they give a pretty good view of how things are looking as of August 22.  As always, click on each one for a larger version.

Standing in the middle of the kitchen, with the center of the picture looking at the window over the kitchen sink

July House Progress Part 2 (July 14 - July 31)

Lots more constructions pictures here, including nearly-complete framing on the first floor and partially done framing on the second floor.

Standing by the front door looking all the way back to the kitchen window

July House Progress Part 1 (July 1 - July 7)

After the discouraging sight of our house basically completely gutted at the end of June, we were happy to see things really start coming together quickly in July.  It was a very tough month for construction due to the weather, which was the rainiest July in Chicago on record.  At least we weren't living there at the time, but having to deal with the aftermath of a mini-hurricane a couple of times a week for most of the month definitely slowed things down a bit.  Despite that, we were happy with the progress. We went from a house with practically no floors or walls to one with plenty of both in just a few weeks.

Standing in the first floor family room and looking out through the second floor master bedroom window.  Wait, what?

Post-Simon June House Progress (June 20 - June 29)

After Simon was born we couldn't bring him back to the house which was still so far from being liveable.  Emily and I could deal with the construction noise and dust but we didn't want to subject Simon to that.  So we ended up renting a tiny studio apartment just down the street from the house.  No longer restricted by needing to make sure that we had a place to live inside the house while it was being built, Contractor Larry took full advantage of his new freedom by basically gutting the inside of the house.  We knew all of this had to happen in order for the construction to proceed but seeing it all at once like that was pretty jarring for us.  Here we were with a brand new baby and our house looked further than ever from being complete.

Looking past the stacked chairs you can see the old back wall of the living room has been removed, leaving it open to the temp laundry room.  Off to the right you can see the initial framing for the new doorway between the future dining room and the future family room

Pre-Simon June House Progress (June 1 - June 14)

For the first two weeks of June we continued living in the house while the construction continued and more and more of our house became unusable.  By the time we headed to the hospital on the 14th for the beginning of labor we were pretty much reduced to just our bedroom and the bathroom.

On June 8 they built out the frame for a big window in the temp kitchen (which will eventually be a small family room off of the kitchen)

Play time!

Simon loves his play mat. I don't know if he realizes that it is his hands that make the hanging toys move, but he sure likes it when they do! He isn't much of a fan of tummy time on the mat yet. Though he definitely has the crawling motions down he isn't quite strong enough to support his weight for long and he doesn't have the know-how to spread his hands to distribute the weight.

Basement Floor (May 19 - June 1)

I just realized I hadn't posted any house pics since May, which means it's time for a ton of house construction posts to catch up.

First up, let's jump back to the end of May for the basement floor.  It had been just wet sand since they tore up the old concrete earlier in the year, but now that the foundation was finished and the sewer and water pipes were in place they could pour the new floor.

Our basement in May 2011: wet sand and the occasional pit

Picture of the Day: 8/21/11

Simon shows off his "Cubs Fan" face

Poor Little Boy! (aka 2 Month Dr Visit)

Simon had his 2 month doctor visit on Friday and got a weigh in. I thought he was close to 15 pounds. He almost doubled his weight the first month so I figured he'd come close to doing the same in his second. He didn't. He gained on average an ounce a day - which is nothing to scoff at I suppose. He is now 11 pounds and 13 oz (at 1 month he was 9lbs 8oz). He is now in the 50th percentile in both height and weight.

Unfortunately, his 2 month doctor visit is also when he get a first round of vaccines. Four as shots and one orally. The poor guy held up to the shots quite nicely. (It was more traumatizing to dad who had to hold him while the nurse gave him the shots.) A few horrified moments when he tried to figure out what was going on, a couple unhappy shouts and then nursing and his first shots were done without much drama. Or so we thought...

Guy Smiley

Right on schedule, Simon is learning how to smile.  He first started trying it out when Grandma Cindy and Grandpa Ken were visiting at the end of July, but it was rare and his smiles were still fairly small.  While I was watching him alone on August 5 so Emily could enjoy a well-deserved night out (interestingly enough, the same night these pictures were taken), he showed me his big new open-mouthed smile for the first time.  That was the last time we saw that look for a while though... the next week he was back to just the occasional little grin.  At one point that week Grandma Kiki was in the backseat of the car with him while he was in the car seat practicing his smile, and she managed to snap the first (I think?) picture of his new expression:

Hey, this is so much easier than frowning!

And suddenly last weekend he must have finally felt confident with it, because he has started smiling a LOT.  He seems to do it the most in the early mornings after he's fully woken up, but we're starting to see it at other times of the day now as well.  It's so rewarding to get a big smile when you're talking to him or playing with him.  Now we don't need to guess when we're making him happy because he can tell us in a way that we can understand.

Pictures and videos of our beaming little boy after the jump...

Napping on the Boppy?

The other day Simon was super cranky for some reason and Emily was trying whatever she could to calm him down.  Finally she figured out that he could lie on his belly draped over the Boppy... combined with his pacifier, this seemed to make him pretty happy.

Yelling all day is so tiring

Click through to check in with him to see how much he's enjoying it two minutes later ...

Waking up is hard to do

Simon is a noisy sleeper a lot of the time, but never more than when he's just about to wake up early in the morning.  He does all of these big stretches and weird faces, making squeaks, wheezes and little cries as he struggles out of sleep.  He's not upset in this video even though he looks and sounds like it sometimes, he's not even fully conscious. That's just how he acts first thing in the morning.

I probably shouldn't make fun of him, though... Emily says I act the same way when I have to wake up to go to work.

Picture of the Day: 8/18/11

Simon loves his new play mat.  He was happy on there for almost 45 min, batting at the little hanging toys

Grandpa Ken and Grandma Cindy One Day Visit – June 24th

Eager to see their new grandson for the first time, the Grandparents Basque flew out from Boston early on the morning of June 24th to spend the day with us before flying back home later that evening.  It was a short visit (I think they spent more time traveling than they were able to spend with the baby) but it was worth it for them to see Simon when he was still so tiny - only one week old and barely 6 pounds.  By the time they came back for a week-long visit in late July he was practically a different baby.

Basque family

 More pictures of happy grandparents and incredibly tiny babies after the jump...

Tears of a Clown

We've heard from a few people now that since all of the pictures and movies we post of Simon show him happy or peacefully sleeping, then he must be such a little angel all of the time.  But that's just the face he wants you to see: Simon as the happy bouncing baby.  People don't realize there is another side to Simon, the angry little SiMonster that he keeps hidden away from his adoring public.  Finally we have proof of the existence of the real Simon:

Click through to see more terrifying video and photographic evidence... 

First bath - 8/14/11

It wasn't his first bath *ever*, but since we didn't have a real baby bathtub we've been dipping him in a flimsy plastic bucket or just wiping him off with wet facecloths.  We finally bought him a bathtub last week, and Sunday night was his first-ever bath where he got to lounge comfortably in the water.  He didn't quite know what to make of it at first, but by the time we took him out (which we smartly did *before* he got tired of it) he seemed to really be enjoying himself.

Thanks for the strategically placed facecloth when you're posting mostly-naked pictures of me on the internet, dad!

More pics of bath and post-bath Simon after the jump...

Picture of the Day: 8/17/11

He has a play date with Holden (9months) and Julianna (mom) this afternoon so he is dressed up...  Emily chose the shirt.

Date Night! Dad and Kiki babysit

Dad and Kiki took care of Simon while we went to a nice dinner and a movie. We saw Cowboys and Aliens, which was just not as good as I wanted to be. I didn't expect something so dark and violent - neither did all the parents who took their small kids to the theater.

Kiki did the lions share of the babysitting and feeding. She was a natural!

Picture of the Day: 8/14/11

He's getting a little too big for these PJ's, so for a while he was wearing them like flannel chaps

Picture of the Day: 8/10/11

Well-behaved boy out at dinner with Mom

Wait a minute...

Simon slowly realizes that my thumb is not actually his pacifier.  My favorite part of this video is the end when he pulls it back to inspect it and figure out why this isn't working.

Picture of the Day: 8/8/11

Emily's been making an effort to take a picture of Simon every day... some of these have been emailed out to people but not all so I figured I'd try to post them up on here for everyone to see.  I will be backdating the posts for the earlier pictures to make them show up on the correct dates, so to see all of the Picture of the Day posts, click the "POTD" label below this post.

Sleeping soundly in the stroller during a long walk

Picture of the Day: 8/7/11

Simon doesn't like to share his pacifier

Picture of the Day: 8/5/11

Lounging in the Boppy

Hat and CTA rides

Simon is sporting his new hat today! All the cool kids are doing it, but mostly I'm scared his little head will get sunburned now that we are more mobile. I can definitely see the sun on my arms already. His hat has built in UV protection and the brim is so big that it covers his arms too. As if that wasn't enough, we are also taking our first CTA ride!! There was some concern when we got into the elevator, Simon wasn't such a fan, but as soon as we were on the train he calmed right down. It is bouncing without me having to do anything! Wonderful discovery. We are out today to go to a new crepe place way north because we can. I'll let you know how it is!

Post amendment:

Crepe place we were going to up north is taking the week off. Just our luck! But we will try it again next week and maybe find someplace else good for today.

Picture of the Day: 8/4/11

Working hard at tummy time

Picture of the Day: 8/1/11

High five!