September 2014

In the month of September, our family was host to 2 separate but back-to-back colds, a bout of hand, foot and mouth disease, and a ruinous norovirus.  During this time, Moss popped 2 molars, learned how to stand up, took his first steps, spent his first night away from Mom and Dad, learned roughly 30 new words, and tonight may or may not have broken his nose falling off a tricycle (diagnosis and photograph forthcoming).  Consequently, I have way fewer photographs from this month than I thought, but here they all are.  Most recently completed Dad PROJECT post coming soon.  <3 <3 <3

I love how his lips still puff out when he sleeps like they did a year ago

Mouth-breathing

Moss likes to play with charcoal from the fire pit

It's like the inverse of chalk

Still not standing without support, Sept 5

Moss is an intrepid explorer

Green eggs and ham are seriously a huge hit around here

Especially if you let him put it on his head

Who needs a trip to a whole aquarium when you've got one single awesome fish tank at the library?

25 minutes of pointing and looking back at me to make sure I see the fish too

He's saying "bloop bloop bloop"

Moss is really into helping people take things out of the fridge lately.  He helped me take an apple out to use in some oatmeal I was making.  I got caught up with something else for about 2 minutes and looked down and saw this.  I don't usually give Moss whole fruit or other large chunks of food because for a long time he did this thing where he would put as much in his mouth as possible and then choke to death.  Well apparently that was a phase and now he can be trusted to eat hand fruit.  Which is great because it's adorable.  So I took several dozen pictures of it.

Ok, Mom, you should probably stop taking photos at this point...

I think this is sometime between head cold #2 and hand foot mouth

Trying out the whole "can be trusted to take responsibly sized bites of larger servings" thing

Which went swimmingly.

So we tried it the next day too.

Wraps are the easiest lunch to make ever.

The day after the Mommy Mossy a-puke-alypse

Ah yes, new skill = taking lids off of things

At least my vacuum smells like basil now.

Park nap selfies

Finally done with all the illnesses, only to be attacked by molars

Water play at the park and no change of clothes makes you turn into a gnome.

There are worse fates.

Moss does not like ketchup, as it turns out.

Moss climbs

And we have a climber.  He can't walk yet, or really even stand up by himself on purpose, but if I leave him unsupervised for 90 seconds, I'll come back and he'll be on the nightstand or some such nonsense.  Ben is building him and A.W.E.S.O.M.E. Moss-sized climbing wall to this end, and is about halfway done with the work (epic Dad-PROJECT post forthcoming).

We've been going to various playgrounds a lot this summer, and because of his climbing penchant, Moss has decided to be really really into slides lately.  Really anything vaguely ramp shaped, or providing any sort of accessible upward trajectory is enough to keep him busy for a long time.  I have a lot of photographic and video proof.

He also loves swings.  I think.

the sheep romper

Am I, like, in trouble or something?

Because I feel... bad about this romper.

Is it cute?

I knew it.  I look ridiculous.

Under the weather

We're all a little congested and cranky tonight, so no full update until later in the week. A post-blackberry-picking photo to tide you over:

Dad PROJECTS: Episode 1

Since I was 8 or 9, I've often thought about what I'd do when I had kids to show them that I cared about them, that I supported their interests, and that I could be relied upon without question. One of the aspects of fatherhood that I've most anticipated is the PROJECT -- that random Saturday morning when I announce that I'm embarking for the hardware store only to return and work all day on something that I'm trying to keep secret (but not really).  The one we'll all be able to enjoy with the hope that when they're older, the kids will want to help and learn what it feels like to build stuff.

I've always kind of known what the first project would be, and now that I've got a dad-beard, I figured it was time to make it happen.  This past week, I built Moss a sandbox.

Aforementioned dad beard

The sandbox my dad built us on Birnham Lane is one of my earliest memories.  I definitely enjoyed the Fisher Price sandbox we had on Heathrow (the lid had canals for boats that you could fill with the hose), but the square with the splintery corner triangle seats and their daddy long legs has always stuck with me.

We have a bunch of cats in the neighborhood, not to mention the mutts, so an open box wasn't an option.  I did a search for sandbox plans and found a photo of nice design with a clever built-in cover that folds out to child size benches.  It looked doable, so I drew up some plans, went to Home Depot, rented a truck, dumped all the materials at the house, and took the truck back, triumphant in the knowledge that this would be the first and last trip for this project.  I was super-planner dad and had considered all contingencies, eliminated all doubts, and explored all options.  (/sarcasm)

David arrived for a three day visit about the time I got everything home.  He spent the entire day (and most of the next) alternating between visiting with Calla and Moss in the house and slapping on SPF 60 to brave the burning California sun and watch me cut and stain boards.  Calla did not step foot outside the house this entire weekend because it was 95 degrees, so there is no photographic documentation of the building process.  She regrets nothing.

By midday Sunday, it was clear that my time estimates were a little off and I'd already had to go back to Home Depot for a second pass.  There would be several more trips over the next few days.  It took most of the rest of the week to get everything else finalized, and I probably put a lot more effort into it than I should have, but now that it's together, Moss has been playing in it everyday.

and possibly also eating some blackberries from the bush

Must.

Bury.

Foot.

Which is fine, since he almost simultaneously figured out how to tell us he wants to take a bath, using adorable baby sign.  (Check back next week for a video catalog of all of his adorable signs).

Because I'm at work, I of course miss a lot of his day to day.  Calla keeps me filled in when they do fun stuff, and it's been really special seeing photos of him really, truly enjoying something that I put a lot of effort into just for him.  

It's easy to get caught up in everything that's happening these days, which makes it hard to savor how well things have been going.  On top of making me feel like I've always thought a dad should feel, this kind of thing has been really grounding -- maybe even therapeutic.  I think I've needed an excuse to look for creative outlets for a while, and the immediacy of parenting has provided a fairly compelling motivation.

We'll work on it...