Seven months

It's hard to believe that Gabe is more than halfway through his first year. Doesn't seem possible! On the other hand, it seems like he's always been here - it's hard for us to imagine life before his arrival.

Since the last update, Gabe has been very busy. Some highlights:

• Gabe learned how to canonically crawl (though still mostly prefers to scoot)
• Standing up is now an automatic activity. Anything is fair game for something to pull up on, and his new goal is now getting on top of said object. So far he's been successful with stairs, but tables and chairs are too tall for climbing.
• Tooth 1 has emerged! Gabe was a champ about this, only fussing a bit. We have yet to actually see it, but the tooth definitely broke through as we've both felt its wrath already :)
• Gabe continues his US travels, adding TX to his list of states visited

I spent my 30th birthday teaching and then flying, but the day was still a good one. We had a nice dinner at the airport (mmm, California Pizza kitchen), flew to Dallas, then spent a couple of hours with family (Mike's parents, Aunt Marilyn, and crazy Uncle Cliff) and friends (Tommy, Ted, Ed, Deb, and Dan). We even had cake! Gabe stayed up long enough to meet everyone (quite late for him!) but went to bed soon after so that we got some time to catch up.

The rest of the trip was quite a whirlwind, but very enjoyable. I spent the second half of it (and currently still am) sick, but we still managed to see almost everyone we wanted to. We had a very enjoyable Wed night Thanksgiving (of course Gabe was the hit of the night), a nice family Thanksgiving, caught up with more friends, Gabe met some more babies his age (Parker and Sam) and ended the weekend with a big reunion by seeing the Archer, Bracy, and Hoffmann families simultaneously!


Gabe's new friends: Erin + Gabe and Natalie + Sam, Mike + Gabe and Ali + Parker

Since I've been sick all week, we've tried to get festive for Christmas to make things a little more pleasant. We bought our first Christmas tree on Thursday at a little family-owned lot down the street and are enjoying the smell of our frasier fir in the living room. So far Gabe has shown interest (especially in putting lights in his mouth!) but we've avoided disaster. Zoe does love to drink the tree water, despite our best efforts.

As always, you can find updated pics in the web albums.

Happy end-of-November birthdays to Amanda H and Mike G. Happy early December birthdays to Jacob and Sara. And happy 6th anniversary to Meg & Lucas yesterday!

Standing up

All of the practicing Gabe has done lately paid off today: he learned how to pull himself up to standing! The video is about his 3rd successful attempt at the task. We now have to find a new storage place for the laptop.

Gabe learns how to pull up to standing
23 November 2009
6.5 months

We've had a busy but great last couple of weeks. Gabe's last babysitter left on us unexpectedly, so Grandma Nette flew out here for a week and a half to take care of our monkey for us. They had a great time hanging out and relaxing at the house. I could tell that Gabe really enjoyed staying home with her - he slept less and ate more in our absence and was always very happy when we came home from work. We also enjoyed having some time with Mom - she cooked dinner for us a lot of the nights, we watched some movies, did some shopping, and just enjoyed her company. Plus is was so much easier to get things done in the evenings with an extra set of hands!



Gabe is also becoming a champ at eating. He loves his dinners so much that we've added breakfast on the weekends and will also add it on weekdays starting after Thanksgiving. So far his favorites are rice cereal, oatmeal, applesauce, pears, peaches, carrots, and sweet potato. We're still working on the green beans and peas - he dislikes green veggies just like his Mommy :)

There were lots of November birthdays in my absence, so I'll get right to it. Happy birthdays to Natalie A, Cousin Ben, Eliot, and Nick K (on his honeymoon to boot!) :)

6 Month Checkup

Gabe went to the doctor today. He measured 27.25" long, 43.5" head circumference and 16 lbs. 6 oz. He also got an ungodly number of immunizations and vaccinations. I can't even list all the things he is now protected against because many of them were cocktails for multiple things. All I know is that he got one oral vaccine and FIVE injections. He took it like a man... which is to say he cried and screamed, but got over it way before Erin and I did. I'm still not really happy about it 5 hours later.

6 months!

Gabe celebrated his half birthday on Friday. To commemorate the event, we went to Chili's where Mike and I took advantage of the 2 for 20 and Gabe ate some sweet potatoes (his first commercial baby food experience). Here is Gabe at 6 months, sporting the outfit that M and I bought for him nearly a year ago on the evening we found out he was a boy :)



Gabe's first Halloween was a huge success. On Friday, Mike brought him up to our building's Halloween party where he got to meet a lot of my colleagues and show off his costume. On Saturday, we had Jacob, Jess, Matt, and Kelly over for some Halloween-themed D&D. After the game, we dressed Gabe up as Link and he got to walk around the neighborhood a bit. Then it was back inside for dinner and more gaming with J&J.



Since our previous babysitting arrangement ended last week, we are trying out a new sitter starting today. I'm really hoping that it works out for us because I hate moving Gabe around right now - he needs some stability (or maybe I need him to have it so that I don't worry about him so much while I'm at work!). Mom is flying out on Wed to watch him for a week and a half, so if things don't work out we have a chance to find an alternative. At least he'll have some good Grandma bonding time!

Happy birthdays to: Bubbie Diane, Jason K, cousin Stella, Hanna, and Sophia!

A busy October

We've been running around like crazy people lately. As aforementioned, two weekends ago we got together with Sarah, Danny, and Mia. Gabe was having a bad evening teething, so was a little fussy (very unusual for him) but still managed to have some fun with Mia in the rainforest. Though they are two months apart, Gabe and Mia are almost exactly the same size right now!



The following weekend, Auntie Erica flew in from NM to meet Gabe. We had a really laid back weekend. She stayed home with Gabe on Friday for some quality bonding time while Mike and I went to work. We spent the rest of the weekend relaxing, hanging out, and making a failed trip to the Carolina Brewery Oktoberfest. Hey, operation: hang out with Gabe was a complete success!



Last weekend my parents were in town. They also spent 2 days taking care of Gabe, Dad cooked lots of great meals, we all played some games, hung out, and tried to relax. Mom and Mike made Gabe's Halloween costume which we can't wait to show off. As always the weekend was way too short, and Gabe loved the Grandparent bonding time.



In closing, Gabe's laugh has gotten even better (something with we thought was impossible). Here is a video of him after dinner last night playing peek-a-boo with Mike in his high chair:

26 October 2009
5 1/2 months old

Finally, lots of birthdays to celebrate. Happy 30th to Meg and to Alysia. Happy non-30th bdays to Rick, Matt L, and to our niece Alaina!

Gabe <3 his kitties

As you can see, G is getting quite adept at moving around the house in his half-crawl half-scoot. I think he'll be crawling very soon - at night I'll catch him up on his hands and knees rocking back and forth like he could launch forward at any second. Nighttime is when, by the way, he learns all of his new tricks. Months ago I'd wake up to him practicing rolling. Then it was laughing. And scooting.

We have a bunch of photos to upload, but Erica is coming to visit today, so it will have to wait until she leaves. Then I'll catch you up on Gabe's eating and teething, Erica's visit, and Gabe's playdate with Mia.

Happy birthday today to Uncle Jim!

5 Months Old

I know, two posts in two days. Don't get used to it :)

Today marks 5 months since Gabe was born. For those of you keeping score, he's 25.5 inches long and 15 lbs. On this momentous occasion, Erin and I took advantage of two free sandwich coupons from Fridays and had a "birthday" dinner for Gabe. He also had a "birthday" dinner of his first vegetable, sweet potato (plus a hearty amount of breast milk). Additionally, as we have said before, he is trying desperately to crawl. Today he chased a ball across the room in a mostly scoot plus a partial crawl (I apologize for the crappy quality iPhone video, but I'd already missed 5 or 6 rolls and scoots and didn't want to miss more finding the video camera).

Also, I don't want to leave you with nothing. Here are a few of the gems I've heard Erin say recently (extra funny out of context):

• "I think Quin's meower is broken."
• "I'm not counting those ducks yet."
• "It's more happeningable."
• "Careful, the sink's full of wet water."
  

Gabe vs the Atlantic

Gabe wins!

We took Gabe on his first roadtrip in mid-September because I was giving a talk at the Plant Molecular Biology conference in Wilmington. On Friday we packed up the car (with so much stuff!) and drove out to the beach - the weather was ok, though overcast and chilly when we arrived. The event didn't kick off until 8pm, so we took a walk on the beach, introduced Gabe to the ocean, and ended up ordering a room service dinner because we couldn't find any reasonably priced food and didn't want to wake up Gabe to leave the hotel. The welcome reception was nice and we got to hang out with a lot of our friends from the Bio department. On Saturday I went to some talks, we spent our break on the ocean and lounging in the shade by the pool (sun finally came out!) and I gave my talk right before dinner. On Sunday we left early since Gabe took a nap and we decided driving home would be easier during naptime. All in all a pretty stress-free and relaxing weekend.

Once we returned home, we gave Gabe his first taste of rice cereal.

He's been grabbing at our plates for weeks and really wants to eat, so it was fun to indulge him. We waited a few days before his second dose and now he's eating a bit every night. He doesn't need the nutrition but boy does he like eating "big boy food" from a spoon :) It's quite a mess, though, and often requires a bath after we're finished.

We spent last weekend babyproofing the house as Gabe is more mobile every day. He's still just scooting but he's very good at it - he's started chasing the cats and is trying to grab them. Surprisingly, Zoe has been the most tolerant - even letting Gabe grab her fur as long as we're there to pet her at the same time...


Congrats to Jan & Nick who got married yesterday!!

Mobility

I'll post about the beach trip (with photos) this weekend. In the meantime, I wanted to share Gabe's newest activity. Gabe has been rolling over and scooting on his front for quite a while, and while he works on building up the muscles he'll need to crawl (something his doc was quite surprised about - we're pretty sure he'll pass that milestone before his 6 mo checkup), he's been developing alternate ways to get around the living room. Lately he's been combining scooting on his front with rolling to get where he wants to go. And he's gotten pretty effecient at it.

Yesterday I stayed home with Gabe, since we are all sick and he'd been running a fever (no worries - M took him to the doc on Tues and it's not the flu or an ear infection - just a cold). That didn't slow him down any, though - once I put him down in his rainforest (which was next to the entertainment center) and spent 2 minutes in the kitchen cleaning out the cat box. When I came back, he was here:



For those of you familiar with the layout of our living room, you know how impressive this is. What's even more impressive to me is that he traveled all the way to the table with his Rainbow Fish book. He loves that thing - somewhat for the pictures but mostly for its satiny texture - he could chew on that book all day long :)

So I guess it's time for some more babyproofing - I'm not worried about the stairs yet, but the fireplace with its marble hearth needs some blocking so that he doesn't crush his head on it mid-roll!

Finally, happy late birthday to Emily!

Beach-bound

I'm giving a talk at this year's plant molecular biology retreat in Wilmington, so tomorrow we're packing up everything we could possibly need for a weekend in a hotel and driving to the coast. It will be Gabe's first trip to the Atlantic, so I'm really hoping that it doesn't rain all weekend like the mean weatherman said it will. In packing, we've realized how much harder it is to travel to a hotel than to visit friends or family in their houses. I've been especially spoiled by traveling with or to see my parents - we don't have to worry about a bed, diapers, soap, wipes, babyproofing... in fact over Labor Day we were able to travel with just carry-ons. Not the case this weekend!

I got to talk to my cousin Jonah this evening and Gabe was babbling away in the background. Jonah is so sweet - after he invited us to go on the Nickelodeon cruise with him next summer (though warning me that I'd have to ask my Mom and Dad if I wanted to go swimming), he kept asking about Baby Gabe and stressed that he really wanted to see him playing with his toys. I snapped a pic with my iphone and sent it to Jan so that Jonah was able to see it in near-real-time. He was pretty thrilled with the technology - maybe next weekend we can set up the webcam so he can see Gabe live! Anyway, here is Gabe playing with his toys so that you can see him too.



Apparently it's a birthday-tastic week: Tuesday was Sam's birthday and (get this) happy birthday tomorrow to Moen, Sarah, and Tyrell and on Saturday to Nguyen and John Bracy.