Cal turned 5 months today! I know, I know...I always thought it was annoying when parents counted in months...and still do (except for my own of course!).
Cal was with Autumn today (the sitter we hired to watch him on Wednesdays from 9am-5pm while I work), but we whisked him to the park as soon as she left and had a nice mini-afternoon together before bedtime! Quick video of him on the swing.
Updates on Cal these days....
LIKES: - Peekaboo! - Singing (us singing to him...no matter how awful I am...he hasn't exactly started to belt out tunes yet) - "Airplane" - Horsey - Bathtime - Drooling (gallons, people...gallons!) - Getting undressed - Rolling onto his belly - Red Sox (the kid has no choice...his grandparents and CT friends have provided an entire wardrobe!)
DISLIKES: - Getting dressed - Not being able to roll OFF his belly onto his back (he is stuck like a turtle right now)
Oh...and another major "like"? Daddy. Kiddo can't get enough of him. He lights up at the sound of Dave's voice and cracks up with ANYTHING Daddy does!!! It's really sweet.
We're going to start going to Storytime at the library soon too. There are a bunch in SF, so my friend Mary broke it down for me on which ones are ridiculously crowded, which ones are ghetto, and which one has a great hippy-guitar-playing singer (surprisingly, North Beach, the "Little Italy" of SF). Maybe I'll even learn the proper lyrics to "The Wheels On The Bus" since my version includes cows on the bus, coins on the bus, ducks on the bus, old ladies on the bus ("go yack-yack-yack...yack-yack-yack....yack-yack-yack"...hey, I'm not so far off, right?).
I surprised Mom & Lindsay two weeks ago in SD and we had a blast! So much so that we stayed an extra 5 (!!) days! Lindsay & Jon worked while I got to do Auntie Duty and spend as much time as possible hugging on (aka CHASING) my active, active 11-month-old nephew! My favorite things I learned about Riggs while there:
1) He's a chatterbox (with only one word). Aside from "mama-mama-mama" and "dada-dada-dada" (which are used completely interchangeably), Riggs first official word is "JACK" (their beloved dog). If you ask, "Where's Jack?", he'll point to where Jack is and say, "Jack. Jack. Jack. Jack." It's absolutely precious. I couldn't believe Lindsay didn't TELL ME that Riggs was saying that! I told her she was the worst aunt on earth. So there.
2) He is the tidiest 11-month-old you have ever met. He came into the bedroom where I was hanging with Cal, took a shoe out of the diaper bag, put it in his mouth (obvi), then proceeded to put it BACK IN THE BAG and crawl away. He is his mother's son!!!
3) He loves to help Cal. It's freakin' adorable. Cal uses a pacifier...Riggs does not. Riggs would crawl over, attempt to claw Cal's eyeballs out and then find the paci and try to put it in Cal's mouth (or ear, but who's counting? point is...my nephew is a genius). Nana had her hands full watching both of them!
4) He's a looker. He could stand and look outside this window forEVER. Lindsay & Jon have a small ottoman/stool in front of the window and Riggs loves to climb up and look outside. It's soooo cute.
5) He gets his grub on. Favorite food is probably yogurt. Mommy and Daddy sneak in tofu and all sorts of other crap that Riggs, being the neat-freak that he is, politely takes out of his mouth and hands back to you. He'll even put it back in the container (I tried to mix the tofu into the yogurt...he would eat the yogurt and put the chewed-up tofu back in the yogurt container until I could trick him into eating it).
6) The kid loves to laugh. Riggs' middle name is after my aunt & uncle in Chicago (so it's Riggs Brady Rynearson). The Brady's decided that a simple middle name wasn't enough credit, so they made this shirt for Riggs (if you can't read it...it says, "r.B.r. (just call me BRADY"). So cute!
7) Bath time is AWESOME. Check out this video we did for Dave (Dave came several days after me, so we inundated him with videos and texts and emails every day!!).
8) Bedtime is one of the sweetest things. After his bath, Riggs gets into his PJs and then typically Jon takes him around the apartment to say "goodnight" to all of the things in the apartment. "Goodnight, painting...Goodnight lamp...Goodnight window...." When they get to the front door, Riggs opens and closes their peephole door about 10 times. I swear it's the highlight of his day. So darn adorable!
9) Cal is transfixed by him. He loves to watch Riggs crawl all over the place! Ahhh, the jealousy of being mobile. Cal just learned to turn over consistently (as in every two seconds), where he quickly gets stuck and cries until you flip him back over...and then repeat. He is like an upside-down cockroach...it's sad and adorable at the same time.
10) He loooooves his mommy and daddy. I mean ADORES them. His face lights up when they walk in and it just melts my heart!
Mommy and Riggso
Family Photo (and Riggs looking nothing like what I claim in #10, so you'll have to take my word for it.
I loved every moment of our trip. We stayed with Lindsay & Jon (they generously gave us their bedroom while they slept on the pull-out couch) and it was wonderful to be able to wake up in the morning (6am comes mighty early) and really maximize our time together! We get to go back next month for Riggs' 1 year birthday!
One more quick video of our sweetie-pie. He just started really giggling last week and it's awesome! Here is Dave while we're across the street from mom's new digs (downtown San Diego...she is LOVING it! valet parking, huge workout room, swimming pool...ahhhhh).
I didn't know what Sleep Training was before Riggs was born, but Cal is 3.5 mos and we are READY! After our friend Jen gave me a 20 minute pep talk, we started sleep training on Monday night and.........it's going well!!!! The gist is that we're attempting to teach Cal to self-soothe (hands to mouth, rolling around, whatever keeps him calm) and removing one night feeding at a time. So if he typically wakes up to eat at 12am, 3am, 5am, we first eliminate the 12am feeding. And yes...for us, that means letting him Cry It Out (CIO). The first night he cried for 45 mins, the second night about the same, and last night only 20 mins and it was a really light cry. Hopefully he is getting the hang of it! After he masters sleeping through that 12am feeding, we'll do the same process to eliminate the 3am feeding, etc.
Per Jen's recommendation, we bought a video monitor. BEST INVESTMENT EVER!!! It is such a relief to be able to SEE Cal in his crib and know he is okay (i.e. he isn't stuck in the corner or have something wrapped around him). We got the most basic one ($80 on sale at Babies'R'Us) and it's just perfect. No need for anything fancy, just something that works!
Anyways, wanted to share this excitement as I feel like my sanity will return very soon now that sleep is (almost) here!
We did it! We took the little guy to CT and Charleston to visit family...and survived the flights! We had a full rig set up with his mobile. During the last few weeks, he's been totally enamored with this one particular "guy" on his Stim-Mobile. We dubbed him "Big Boy" because he looks just like the Big Boy Hamburger image. For whatever reason, the mobile (which we typically have above his changing table) will spin around, then when it gets to "Big Boy", Cal starts CHEESING so hard! He'll then follow that particular circle around and just keep smiling, smiling smiling. So cute!
Here was our rig for the airplane. The flight attendant said that never in her 25 years of flying had she seen anything like this - ha!
This is Cal's reaction to his BFF:
Anyways, we got to CT first and Cal saw his first snow! He was not very impressed, but we thought it was beautiful. We had a fantastic week visiting with Dave's family (all 2,000 of them!). His parents even took Cal overnight...twice! The first night I was a wreck (crying as I left him...I mean COME ON!!!) and the second night I was running out the door! How quickly we adjust. Our plan for the first night (Dave and I were staying at the neighbors' house two doors down who don't live there during the winter) was to go out BIG with Dave's sister and cousins, who are all about our age. We get a great start with martinis, then had a wonderful dinner at Luce's in Middletown. While we were discussing which bar to hit first after dinner, it was 9:45pm and all I could think was B-E-D. I haven't had a full, uninterrupted night of sleep since November 14th and I just couldn't pass it up! Fortunately, Dave's sister and hubby were heading home too, so I hitched a ride and was asleep before my head even hit the pillow!
Here are some pics from the week in CT:
SOME of Dave's cousins!
The Bryand Men
The onesie says, "My Dad Is Rad" - love it!
Grandma hanging with Cal and Cal meeting his GREAT-grandparents!
And then here are some pics we took of Cal one morning when we woke up....
We had an AWESOME trip to the east coast. It was so wonderful to be with family, family, family! After CT, we headed to Charleston and loved introducing Cal to the Dirrrrty South. He had his fill of beautiful Southern women, accents and foooood! I'm not sure why, but we hardly took any pics in Charleston! Here are a couple from a delicious dinner at Rue du Jean:
Can't wait to go back (minus the 6-hour flight...5 of which were spent with one of us Bjorning Cal and pacing the aisles!!!).
Oh yes. It happened. Mama Dianne (aka Nana) came up to SF at the beginning of February for THE concert. We planned it months ago - DIONNE WARWICK WAS HERE!!!! Yes, THE Dionne Warwick. "Say a Little Prayer"..."You've Got a Friend"...and about a million other huge hits. And yes, Whitney Houston's aunt. She was OUT OF THIS WORLD. We splurged and got 4th row seats (thank you, Mom!) and just loved the theater (Castro Theater...in the Castro, which is known as the largely gay section of SF). The crowd was totally pumped about Dionne, including a 10 MINUTE standing ovation! Here are Mom and me outside the theater:
Mom also cooked over the weekend (yummmmmm) and generally just held Cal as much as possible! Uncle Jon & Auntie Lindsay sent Cal this cute hat, so we snapped a few with him in it:
Yes, that is what I've become. Or rather, what this blog has become. Updates on a human that can't walk, talk or do anything of "substance", yet captures our complete attention and hearts. But who could resist this little guy??
Elizabeth in Raleigh drew on this diaper for Cal - so cute!
Dave rocked a few pull-ups with him last week too. Whoever invented the Bjorn is a godsend!
I/we hosted the mom's group today that I mentioned in the previous post! It was absolutely great to have everyone over today (although a weeeee bit crowded with 30+ women + babies in our apartment!). I've never seen so many carseats and diaper bags in my life!!! I just started thinking...what do we do when they start CRAWLING in a few months??? We'll adjust.
While they were here, I decided to snap a few pics of the kiddos and used Cal as my test model. I just love that smile of his! He is giving us more and more everyday, which is a blast to watch.
I took two classes with Cal last week...one was about SLEEP (how to help babies sleep through the night) and the other was called PLAYFUL PARENTING (what to do with babies when it seems they can't "do" anything). Both were great! We have been trying to put suggestions into practice (routines at night, napping in his crib, etc.), but it's easier said than done as that means we have to be HOME for those items to occur. Instead, we're going about normal life and integrating when we can. Fingers crossed!
That's all from here for now, though I did want to share this video of my adorable nephew, Riggs. He's been crawling since 4 months (is about to be 9 months in a week) and is a MINI-JON!!!
Cal is SMILING!!! Not the "we got lucky because we take 4,000 pictures a day" smile, but REAL smiles!
We did a quick 30s video last night at the end of one of his smile-fests. We are overcome with how darn CUTE this kiddo is!
Things are going well. B-feeding has improved DRAMATICALLY (as in, it actually works now and is (gasp) a pleasant experience for all involved!) and Cal and I are finding a groove of our day-to-day activities. I went to my first Mom's Group with 19 other women (!) and loooooved it! We are meeting once a month with the big group, then we have smaller groups that are closer to our neighborhood. All of the babies were born in Nov/Dec/Jan and there are actually 72 women (!!!) in the group that live in SF, but "only" 20 made it this week. Upon meeting these ladies, I definitely found several that I'm scoping out as new-friend-material...very exciting!
PS - one more video...because I'm completely obsessed!
