camden-town

We went to Camden this weekend for an informal Thanksgiving. It was nice to have hot dogs and hamburgers after a whole day of turkey. Eliot loved hot dog slices and potato salad, and real baked beans made in a real live cast iron dutch oven. He also loved playing with all of his Camden cousins. You can see the pictures here.

ten months old

Eliot turned ten months old this week. He's grown a lot in the last month! He is roughly 24 pounds and 29 inches, but that's according to my most unscientific measurements on a squirming baby that clearly does not care about his weight. He is not eating baby food anymore - it's all chunks of real food, now. Just this morning, he had eggs, cheese toast and pears for breakfast.

He also learned how to crawl this month. And I'm here to tell you, as soon as he learned that, he was GONE. It's like he'd been waiting for nine whole months to be mobile, and when he figured it out, he could finally do all the things he's been wanting to do! Almost as soon as he crawled, he was pulling up. So now we have baby guards in all the outlets, baby gates at all the stairs, fences around the plants, and we still had to dig cat food out of his clutches.

eating us out of house and home

Well, Eliot is pretty much eating all finger food now. No more baby food for him, no sir! Whenever I try to feed him baby food, he hollars and pushes the spoon away with both hands. So, as you can see here, he's quite pleased with his meat sticks, green bean slices, and apple dices.

for Tracey

Poor Aunt Tracey had to take a business trip to dumb ole Pittsburgh. So she requested a few new pictures of Eliot to brighten her day. So, here they are!

Dark Shadows in the Night

Kim and I have been very fortunate with Eliot. He has been really good at sleeping in his own bed and sleeping through the night ...that is until recently. For the last few nights Eliot has been waking up around 1:00 am to 2:00 am screaming for someone...anyone to come to his aid. Last night I decided to watch him on the video monitor and saw some interesting behavior. Even though most of these parenting books recommend that you don't place a nightlight in your child's room, we put one in his room. Yes, I know, we are horrible parents. How could we fall into that trap? Well a couple of midnight stubbed toes are all you need to convince you otherwise. Light is good for us diurnal mammals.

So I'm watching him on the monitor while he is screaming at the top of his lungs. Yes, I know this sounds really cruel, but I am a Daddy and Daddy's try to figure things out. We make things better through logic and reason. And what do I observe? Eliot's had his arms through the crib rails and was attempting to grab the nightlight off of the wall! He can't actually reach it, but he sure was trying. I walked across the hall into his bedroom, he turned around and waited to be picked up. Once in my arms, he was fine. No whimpers even, but lots of twisting and turning around --looking. But as soon as I would do something that meant he had to go back to bed (sit in the rocker or move towards the crib), he would immediately start screaming again. By this time, Kim went downstairs and got him a bottle of watered down juice. That helped A LOT. He calmed down enough for Kim to rock him while he sipped his juice. She was able to get him close to sleep. But when she got him in his crib, he started screaming again. Then it was my turn. I began to rock him. Slowly, he calmed down again and was beginning to fall asleep. I felt his arms fall against his sides. I slowly picked him up and put him in his crib. But as soon as he hit the mattress, he started to whimper. This time I walked out of the room hoping that he would just fall asleep. We gave him ten minutes, but he was not going to sleep now. He was quite awake again. So Kim went in and rubbed his back for a while. He finally gave up about 2:30 am. With a sigh he rolled over and fell asleep.

While rocking Eliot I noticed the complex shadows on Eliot's ceiling caused by the nightlight shining through the rocker and his crib. It made me remember how scared I would get as a kid. I would create all sorts of horrors from the dark places. There was a witch that lived in my toybox and a ghost outside my window. I got to thinking about those shadows that scared me and could possibly be scaring him now. And I realized what Eliot was doing earlier. He was trying to get rid of the shadows by getting rid of the light that created them. But he couldn't. So he did the next best thing. He got Mommy to make it all better. And she did, as she always does ...with comfort and love. Sometimes logic and reason just doesn't cut it, especially against dark shadows in the night.

But I still think tonight we'll try things without the nightlight.

Japanese cuisine

We took Eliot to the Japanese restaurant Saturday night, to see the cooking on the table. He was very good, and sat in his seat the whole time. He tried some new things - rice, noodle and a tiny bit of zucchini. He even had some miso soup and a taste of ginger dressing. Of course, he devoured every morsel that I offered. He really enjoyed the show, with the exception of when the chef lit the giant fire. That scared him a good deal. He started to cry a little, but recovered quickly. For a few minutes he would remember the moment and stick his bottom lip out, eliciting several "AAAwwwwww"'s from the table.

expanding vocabulary

Eliot learned a new word this weekend. That word is "no". As in, "no, Eliot, don't play with the power cord" or "No, Eliot, don't pull that shelf over" or "no, Eliot, don't play on the stairs." I think it's time for some baby-proofing.

the activity room of doom

There's a room at daycare called the Activity Room. It looks kinda like a gymnasium, with lots of brightly colored balls, mats and blocks everywhere. They even have a ball pit. You'd think that it would be a kid's paradise! Heck, I'D even like to spend a little time in there, running around all crazy-like, blowing off some steam. But for some reason Eliot HATES this room. His teachers report that when they enter the room he has a look of serious concern on his face. If they attempt to put him down, he cries and cries and crawls back to the teachers until they pick him back up. This is such strange and quirky behavior for Eliot. He's usually so easy-going and happy. We can't figure out why he hates this room so much. Our only guess is that it's just too big and it scares him. Any theories from you guys?

little jack horner

Eliot figured out a new trick this weekend. He has a habit of poking everything with his thumb. He will open his hand up and turn it sideways, palm facing outward, and poke at food, toys, textures - whatever. Well, on Friday, he was poking at his Cheerios, but his thumb was somewhat slobbery, as it had previously been poked in his mouth. So the Cheerio stuck to the tip of his thumb. He was AMAZED! So he stuck it in his mouth. He continued on thusly - sticking Cheerios to the tip of his slobbery little thumb and transporting them to his mouth.

(Update: His teacher reports that he loves to eat his crackers like that at school, too. They think it's hilarious!)

movin', groovin' and practicing yoga

Well, Eliot learned how to crawl last week. One day I went to pick him up from school and Ms. Kela said, "Guess what Eliot can do?" And just like that, he crawled his little fanny right over to me - like he's been doing it for ages. So, as the natural course of action would dictate, he then started pulling up. He has a big blue bruise on his noggin because he was trying to pull up on my chair Saturday night, and bumped his head on the seat. Also, he can pull his bottom off of the ground, into the air, while keeping both his feet and hands on the floor - like he's trying to stand up, but just lacks the balance to get all the way up. For those of you who know anything about yoga, it looks like he's doing the Downward Dog position, and he's much better at it than Mommy!