2.29.2012

Time to talk about the new kid


When I tell you that Cormac is happy, I need you to understand what I mean by "happy." This child suffers painful reflux, teething, and neurological growth spurts simultaneously. These are things which would individually adversely affect the mood of any person, not to mention a baby, if just one of those things happened to them. This kid takes it all on at the same time, gets kind of grunty and fussy (and probably barfs on you a few times), but then he's ready with a gooey chuckle and a grin that will melt you, the second you give him an ounce of attention.

None of these pictures show his smile, I know. You have to understand that if Cormac is smiling, he is moving, and he usually only smiles really awesomely if he's also being held. Not conducive to photo-taking.

Things that make Baby Mac smile: fake bite his hands, nuzzle his neck, tell him he looks like Alex Trebec, make buzzy-zerbert noises with your mouth, play airplane with him. The thing is, when he smiles, he laughs, and when he laughs, his whole body moves. He also opens his mouth in a big gummy grin and you can see the TWO (!) teeth which are about to pop out on the bottom.


Cormac rolls over, army crawls a bit, aaaaalmost sits up on his own (I know, right? crazy.), knows his name, recognizes Iris' name, grasps chunky objects and brings them to his mouth, supports his weight on standing legs if you hold on to his top half, and of course, he still does that thing where he says "Ehhhhhh" in greeting when he first sees you in the morning/after a nap/when you get home from work. He's in the bajillionth percentile for everything as far as his size goes.

I seriously need to get more pictures of this kid. Every time I post anything here, they've all been viewed to death on facebook and everyone's all "meh" about them. I mean, even I'm not all that stoked about them...

His six month well-baby check-up is in about a month (I can't even process that information), at which point we have Iris' 3-year check-up (again with the incomprehensible information), so I'll have all sorts of fun statistics for ya then. Meanwhile I swear I'll get better photos.

P.S. I hear Grammy is organizing the Pink Birthday photos and we'll get access to those soon, so stay posted for that!

2.26.2012

Party Time!

EXCELLENT! (had to do it) So here are some snaps of Iris' Pink Party! There are a few unremarkable shots still living on my phone, but these are some that I stole from facebook (raise your hand if you're suprised I did that... is that crickets? just checking). Anway, as such, I know almost all of you have already seen these, but what the hey - I'm sure someone out there is still resisting the pull of the great FB (lookin' at you, K-Lonzo).


I took this before the party started. The rainbow-arms? Yeah, those are legwarmers specifically ordered for this party. Apparently they are sleeves now.




After her school birthday party, Iris came home all aflutter that her friends sang a song about her birthday, just for her. She was so touched by that. When it happened again, at her house (!!!), she turned to me right after she (we) blew the candles out, hugged my neck super hard, and, with tears in her eyes said, "I'm so happy!"



Kyle manned the present-opening portion of the afternoon. Please note the serious, "I am now dispensing Fatherly Advice" scene portrayed here. Also do please note the Pink Panther t-shirt (thanks Grammy!).




Iris' Pink Party







2.19.2012

Really Very All Right

So what does everyone think of the new layout? Nice, yeah? I think I might tweak the colors/fonts/background, but otherwise, I think it's good. Notice the little tab options near the top there? It makes for a really interesting set of view options. I like it.

The Whiz Abides

FBK: Was that BANANAS? You've been holding out. Feed me. (translated: love the blog; good job, mom.)

2.18.2012

Don't Panic!


I'm playing with the blog template. Things might get a little shifty around here for a bit.

Kashmir says, "chillax, everything is rad."

2.12.2012

Something Actually Happened

In 1969.

It mattered then, and it matters now: kindness. Thanks, Fred.

Blishhhhh

Once upon a time, these web log thingies were supposed to be online journals. I could be mistaken, but I feel that perhaps journal indicates a level of attention to detail heretofore untouched by this tiny pocket of the internet.

I didn't set out to intentionally gloss over life, but responsibility for this kind of thing tends to lead to the kind of circular naval-gazing which pretty much always ends with, "well nobody cares about THAT, so never mind...." Do you care about the mundanity in El Chap? Well, you're here, so I guess you do. Let's take these new shoes for a lap around the store, folks.

Cormac started waking me up this morning around five, five-thirty (read: smacking me in the face and grunt-shouting repeatedly till I woke up and noticed that morning nursing time had run its course). I finally gave up at quarter to six. Slinking past Iris' room revealed her to be awake, still in bed, singing full-belt a song I have no doubt she composed on the spot. I peeked my head in, invited her to get up and hang out with us, and she, like the precious good-hearted child that she is, looked over to her night light (which shows a moon when it's time to stay in bed, and switches to a sun when it's time to get up), saw that the "sun" was up, and said, "Okay, Mommy, the sun said it was okay, right?" MomSigh forever.

Change Number Two's diaper. Recommend potty break for Number One. Liquid ice cream/cake batter bottle for FBK (gentlease formula/rice cereal), chocolate milk for the Whiz (carnation instant breakfast), Coke Zero for myself (weight watchers zero points!!!), then morning PBSKids time is afoot. By this point, Cormac has vomited at least 10 times since the smack/shout party began back in bed, and the span of time this marks is somewhere in the 30 minute range.

Change Cormac's clothes; apply bib. Don robe because it's cold; admonish Number One for getting naked, again, when it's clearly colder than satan's toes over here. Agree to live and let live, change diaper, change Cormac's clothes, spot-clean the carpet where barf splattered, again, think about making breakfast.

Walk to the kitchen to make breakfast with robe open and trailing behind, Iris shouts, "You're like SuperMom with your cape! Cormac has a cape too (fingers his hand-towel-bib which drapes evenly over front/back), he's like SuperCormac!"

Indeed.

Prop baby up in bouncy seat on the counter. Frighten firstborn with speed of omelet execution with the hope of avoiding FBK meltdown. Iris, would you like ham in your omelet? Yes! Would you like green peppers and garlic? Yes! Do you want to help me whisk the eggs? YES! Chop/sautee/mix/pour/wait, wait, wait... omelet!

Mom, can I have some toast? momsigh....Yes.

Diaper, change clothes, new bib, nurse, bottle, nurse, nurse, re-dress the big one, locate coffee, repeat.

8:10 AM, Kyle emerges from his allotted one day of sleeping-in per week. Sees remaining (still warm!) omelet waiting on the counter for him, eats bowl of cereal. WifeSigh?

Kyle takes the dog out, Iris dances and sings some more, Cormac screamybarfgrunts several thousand more times, then finally takes his morning nap. As do I, on the couch, while dreaming about nursing and getting smacked in the face, and being intermittently woken up to tend to Iris' random motor skill limitations.

Looks like this whole journaling thing really is as mundane as I thought, and you only got the first couple hours of the day. I'll be kind and leave it here. Please remember this when you ask me to blog more, friends. For no other reason than I'm sure you had better things to do with the last several minutes of your life, let's agree I'll leave that "publish post" button alone till something actually happens.

2.02.2012

Ok, So

It's been a minute. Got that. Sorry dudes. Not a lot to recap over here, really. Here's some pictorial narrative to ease your mind:


Cormac wants to sit up now! He can't, mind you, but the exersaucer provides him with some moments of greatness. Also note the drool. He's teething. Already. Teething + reflux = ?? I'll tell you what it equals: laundry. Let's all applaud Kyle's tireless efforts in that department. He's like the linen whisperer.

Iris has many babies. They all have names and they all must go to bed before she does. Usually she locates various individual locations throughout the house that would actually be somewhat appropriate places for real babies to sleep. They are always lovingly wrapped in blankets and propped up on pillows, in various (actual, live human, family members') beds, on boppies, etc. This photo documents the first occasion that a small segment of her babies slept on a pallet and had a slumber party. Meet Baby Alex, Baby Cormac, and Baby Iris (left-right). Yes, the long red-headed girl-doll is Baby Cormac. Discuss. This photograph by no means captures all of the babies in their beds, btw. There are probably another four babies (at least) not pictured.


I was afforded the opportunity to sit outside DURING DAYLIGHT HOURS recently. Because of this awesomely catastrophic global anti-winter situation we're in, I was very comfortable in the 50+ degree weather, and I got to watch the sun set. This is the view from my back porch. Please feel free to express your jealousy in the comments.


Since Logan and Iris are in the same classroom at CMS, I get to benefit from all of Rebecca's photography of various school adventures. Iris' class went on a field trip to one of those "paint some ceramics"-type places today. This candid shot, while beautiful, doesn't quite relay the joy I know Iris felt once she began painting her plate. She's turning out to be quite the artiste (!); once she got home, all she could talk about was how she painted her plate with pink and white, and also purple! And she decided not to make any shapes, she just wanted to see what the colors all looked like next to each other.