Back home backlog and privacy "issues"

Another good thing about being home is that I got see some of the old gang, or at least those that are left in town. We had a little get-together at my parents' house the night before we left town. Dave and Aleta's daughter Clara was there, who is now just past a year old. So was Zoe Schnell, but Sarah and Evan (her parents) weren't there. Anne and Dan brought her, but it was never properly explained to me where Evan was, while Zoe said that Sarah was in Kansas(!).



My brother Justin and his wife Becky live on 5 acres in western Wisconsin. I won't even tell you how many bedrooms the place has. Many. They have cute little Jamie, Finn's cousin, who is 2 (and sassy). Oh and they also have chickens.



One of the most fun, and surely the most annoying, events was when Finn, my mom, and I went to the YMCA outdoor swimming pool! Finn had never been in a pool. After some initial hesitation (too hungry to swim) he loved loved loved it, and splashed all around, and he liked looking at all the other kids. Certainly sounds like an afternoon that you'd like to catch on film, right? WRONG! Cameras and video recorders are not allowed at the YMCA pool. Why would that possibly be? As explained to us by our young lifeguard, there are "privacy issues" involving those that may not want to get their picture taken. Probably worries about who is taking pictures of kids is wrapped up in that.

Another issue tied to paranoia is that the kiddie pool has "safety breaks" every 30 minutes (maybe?) where everyone has to get out of the pool and sit and do nothing for 5-10 minutes. Wha? Another lifeguard told us that this gives the kids a chance to take a break if they need it, to make sure no one gets exhausted and into a dangerous situation. My mom and I have never rolled our eyes harder. It also encourages you to get bored and go home. Together with Finn not having the "proper" swimming diaper cover, the annoyances left a really bad taste in my mouth, from a place that I loved growing up and have probably visited 500 times. And then later in the week Katie and I read an article about "free play." Apparently it is not possible for kids to go out and play anymore. Who knows what might happen!? Activities are structured or parent supervised. Nor can kids walk to school by themselves anymore. Every day on my way to campus I see armies of parents walking their perfectly capable kids to school. Is this a trap that Katie and I will fall into? My God, I hope not. Will we be parental outcasts if we don't know where Finn is every second of every day? Maybe all kids will be under constant GPS parental monitoring by the time Finn starts school. At the pool, my mom did manage to get this picture, once we got inside. Amazing how privacy issues can change so dramatically on either side of a glass door.

We're back!

Finn starts his first week of four-days-a-week daycare this week, instead of two. He doesn't know yet, and I'm curious to see how much he notices the change. I just started my new semester, had a one-hour online class session tonight, have my internship all day tomorrow, and have a four-hour in-person session once a month. It's going to be an interesting fall, and Jonathan leaves for Switzerland Saturday morning. Whee!

Hey, anybody have Labor Day plans? 'Cause Finn and I don't.

Here's my new favorite picture of Finn, who decided the other day that the spray bottle I use for cat discipline and pie-crust-making is the awesomest thing ever. He thought it was hilarious when Jonathan squirted him in the tummy and hair. He also seems to think it's delicious. He drinks out of his sippy cup much better if there's a little juice in the water, but apparently high velocity also improves the water's flavor.
He's gotten much faster at scooting than he was pre-vacation, so we're finally doing that whole baby-proofing thing, starting with Finn's room. Yes, it took us this long. We needed the storage space, I guess.

He's also getting reasonably good at cruising, and I wouldn't be shocked if he was walking by 10 months. I also wouldn't be shocked if he wasn't. He's getting more adept at pushing himself up on short objects, like suitcases. Tonight he tried to use his high chair, but we didn't have the brakes on at first. Ooops. He likes to lean against the glass sliding door in his room, too - and lick it while he stands there. Good times.

Favorite new toy: the music/motor piece of his mobile, which hasn't been on the crib in months. It looks more or less like a hockey puck with a little knob and small plastic hook, and when I wind it up to the play the Winnie the Pooh song, he holds on to it with both hands like it's a little treasure, and shakes it and smiles at the music.

Favorite new habit: when he's nursing, especially if he's tired, he's taken to either stroking his luxurious locks or pulling on his ear. This is both cuter and less painful than the old practice of digging his tiny little thumbnail into the space between wrist tendons and wiggling it, so I'm a fan.

More pictures at Flickr, and Jonathan should have some up sometime this week, too.

Family Ties

As you might imagine, Finn was a big hit all across the midwest. Below is Finn with my mom's mom, great grandma Dolores. We only had a few hours together because she flew to CA for a family wedding.

I like this pic below of Finn on the farm. One thing that I really wish we had at our place is a yard! (We have a little yard, but it is all our landlord's plants--no grass--so it doesn't really count.)


Now we're working towards getting back to real life, which is pretty difficult. It's tough to go from being with family and the back-home friends to getting back into life in far off California. Don't get me wrong--we like it out here a lot--but being so far away from "home" is the toughest part.

Katie is at the first day of her fall internship at the Stanford law library. Finn's daycare is closed for training today and tomorrow, so I'll be home with the little man back-to-back days! So I guess Daddy Fridays aren't over just yet. I have a TON to do before I leave for Switzerland a week from Saturday (for a conference) so next week I'll be working nearly round-the-clock, maybe. I'll try to get a few things done this week too, but the house is, ah, messy, so that needs my immediate attention.

Flying monkeys

Some highlights of the trip so far:

Last Friday: Flying with 9-month-old Finn is both better and worse than flying with 6-month-old Finn. He's more alert, so he's easier to distract and entertain, but our plan of taking off shortly before his bedtime so he'd sleep on the plane was kind of a washout. Anytime he was close to falling asleep the captain would come blaring over the intercom with something helpful like "Look, Montana." Finn squirmed all over the place and spent most of the flight watching Drillbit Taylor on 15A's laptop while peeking his head in between 15A and 15B. This activity was curtailed once he decided he wanted to check out what 15A's hair felt like and the guy noticed he was there.

Last Saturday: Breakfast with Finn's Great Grandma Dolores, followed by a 3-hour drive down to Iowa.  Everything was green and gorgeous, but it got kind of hard to enjoy it once Finn woke up and wanted OUT.  Saturday night - BBQ at the farm!  I had rhubarb custard pie.  Best line of the night award goes to two-year-old Wesley K., whose middle name is apparently Fearless: "I'm gonna pet a cow."  1300 lb animals, not exactly cuddly looking, but pet one he did.  

Last Sunday: Iowa State Fair!  I forgot to eat anything on a stick, but we did have cinnamon rolls, cheese curds, smoothies, and a bite of my uncle Kevin's deep fried Snickers.  We got up at about 5:30 to make the 3-hour drive, thinking that since Finn wouldn't get up until about 8:00 under normal circumstances, he'd sleep the whole way down.  So much for that plan.  He did sleep the whole way home after what was apparently the funnest bath ever.  Playing with super-entertaining cousins (once removed) Ashley and Haley really wore him out. 

Monday: Mom watched Finn in the afternoon and Jonathan and I went to see Wall-E.  Whee!  Finn got to play with some of my old toys, go for rides on the Gator and apparently ate some pie, so he had fun too.

Tuesday: Lunch at Waterloo's premiere destination eatery (featuring a spray-painted tribute to the Sistine Chapel ceiling), followed by visits from Ben (who drove over from Waverly) and Nick and Kory (who drove up from Des Moines).  This was not Finn's favorite day since there were no cousins to watch or Gators to ride, and he got a little whiny, but Jonathan and I had a good time.

Wednesday: We spent the afternoon with my brother Allen and his wife Keisha and their boys, then went out to dinner with more Bennett family.  We tried to get a nice picture of Allen with his cousins Brandon and Jacob, but... well... they're little.  Later, back at the farm, my mom's cat made the last of her several dozen attempts to whap me in the head with her paw from the landing as I made my way up the stairs to bed.  She missed again, but it was unsettling every time.

Thursday: Drove back up to Minnesota.  Still pretty, still harder to enjoy once Mr. Finn woke up and started yelling about wanting out of the car.  After we put Finn to bed Thursday night, we went to ANOTHER movie (Tropic Thunder, FYI, which was Totally. Freaking. Hilarious.).  Yay us!

Friday: Jonathan's brother Justin, his wife Becky, and their daughter Jamie came over to Jonathan's parents' and we all had a nice dinner, featuring steaks Mom and Dan sent up with us from the farm.  Finn got to play outside on the swing set and loved watching Jamie run around.  Then during Finn's bath Jonathan decided he needed to get a better angle for trying to wash Finn's face by swinging his foot over to the other side of the tub and KICKED ME IN THE HEAD hard enough to break teeth off of my hair clip.  Good times.

Saturday: Wait, that's yesterday, right?  What did we do yesterday? Justin, Becky, and Jamie came over again.  There was lasagna.  Somehow the more recent days are the most fuzzy.  I think we ran some errands.  Finn stood for something like 10 seconds unassisted.  Also, he had a teething biscuit.

Sunday, today: We went over to Justin and Becky's place for dinner - chickens they raised themselves, which Becky can't bring herself to eat, but the rest of us enjoyed immensely.  

Two days from now we'll be home.  Huh.

Oodles of pictures on Flickr, with more to come, like the ones featuring Miss Jamie Lou.

Two Top Tooths

On the top of Finn's mouth he's got some big teeth dropping in. One is a little ahead of the other, but you can already tell that, um, he's going to have a pretty big gap between them.

The picture above we took last night while Katie was nomming on his tummy. The soft underbaby (2nd chin) is in full view, too. I had thought for awhile that it was shrinking, but now I'm not so sure.

We're leaving for Minnesota and Iowa in a few short hours. I think we're packed, but I have to load up all the bags, Finn, and his Finn's various goodies before we drive to Katie's work to pick her up on the way to the airport. We're flying at night, so hopefully Finn will want to sleep a lot on the plane. He're hoping! To those in the midwest, see you soon!


I thought that this was a fun one from Ikea. One thing about babies is that you can make them do silly things, cuz they're just little. Finn's amount of "stuff" is expanding so we got him shelves and bins for all of it.

We have forward motion!

I wouldn't call it crawling, more like scooting. But it works. When he remembers he can do it. Footage:

Scooting from Katie on Vimeo.

At first he mostly just seemed to think of it as an extra stretch, and was just as likely to give up as he was to scoot. But apparently this morning he crossed six feet of rug to go for Jonathan's shoes, so there you go. The house will never be the same again. First order of business after we get back from vacation is child-proofing, or else we're going to be wrestling a lot of dusty old Nintendo controllers out of his hands.

I was going to get this up on Thursday, when it happened, but I think our craziness level is slightly higher than usual right now. We leave for 10 days in Minnesota and Iowa on Friday (here we come, family, friends, and Iowa State Fair!). Friends are moving out of town. Out-of-town friends are visiting. Finals have arrived for the summer class that I'm taking. And I'm worried about Murray.

You may already have heard or gathered that although Finn loves the cats, it's not exactly mutual. Recently I've had to start facing the fact that although Murray's been part of our family for four years, he really hasn't been very happy since we brought Finn home, and that he might actually be better off without us. We've tried extra affection, drugs, sprays, diffusers... everything we can think of. If you know of any childless homes that might need a really loving, snuggly kitty, let me know, and we'll talk. When Jonathan took him to the vet recently, he jumped right up on the table in the exam room to meet her and give her a sniff, and she said that had never happened in all her years of practicing; he's a special guy. [okay, stopping the crying now].

In happier news, Finn continues to excel at standing up, loves his new xylophone, babbles more (and more strangely) all the time, and ate Cheerios yesterday for the first time. Eating Cheerios is really hard work if the look on his face was any indication. He wouldn't put any in his own mouth, but kept opening up for Jonathan to give him another. It was very "I have people for that."

I'm overdue for updating Flickr, and will try to get it done before we leave town. Did I mention the crazy?