Back from Massachusetts!

There's going to be some overlap with Jonathan here, because I see he just posted as I was writing, but I'll put in more pictures. :D

Boston, Part 2

Because I can't have a post called "Boston part 1" and then never have a part 2. It'd be weird. Friday we went to the zoo. Finn liked it pretty well (particularly the gorillas, the leopard, and THE FISH), but not as much as the aquarium. The animals were farther away and often not moving, so he didn't really notice them. He did get very excited about the enclosure railings, though. Whee.

Saturday we left Boston to go spend Memorial Day weekend with Ben and Martha. They have a labradoodle, Barcelona, and Finn wasn't quite sure to make of her - definitely interesting, but bigger than the cats and a much faster mover. He seemed to enjoy getting his hands licked, but not so much on the face. Saturday night I caught an awful cold - a send-Jonathan-to-the-drugstore-at-2am-for-cough-drops-and-Nyquil cold. Suddenly all the fun stuff we had planned for Sunday seemed (like "leaving the house" and "walking around") seemed way too ambitious, so everybody else went for a picnic while I napped. The worst of it was over within 24 hours and it was nice to just hang out with them and catch up for a while.

Monday we headed back to Boston and spent another night with Anne and Troy, who grilled us another lovely dinner. We were all set to leave for the airport the next morning (almost half an hour ahead of schedule!) when I picked Finn up and noticed that there was Poop Everywhere. Ugh. That was the third blowout of the trip, I think, and definitely the worst. We just took him to Anne & Troy's tub and hosed him down. He thought it was all great fun. We caught our plane with some time to spare, and Anne and Troy can probably enter their bathroom without a hazmat suit by now (thanks guys!).

Lots of people have asked how Finn is at traveling; it's a mixed bag.

• Finn has the opposite of stranger anxiety. He gets bored of being in the same place with the same people for too long, but if someone at the next table, or in the next row of the plane, starts making faces at him, he'll sometimes snap out of a bad mood. He loves making new friends. He had a pretty good time at the airport.
• Six hours is a LONG flight. Finn did pretty well. We entertainted him as best we could (yay free magazines for ripping!). I nursed him a lot and was very careful to keep him sleeping once he got that way. Jonathan kept him for most of the time he was awake, and did all the diaper changes (with no changing table. yikes.).
• Hotel cribs are not cool. Finn needs his own room. More sleep would have been better. On the bright side, we did keep him more or less on Pacific time, so we were able to go out to dinner and sleep in some.
• Hotel rooms get very boring very fast. But walks are always good.

So that's our trip. Many many photos on Flickr, plus ones from yesterday's trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium with Bridget, Keith, Tanya, Kiley, Sasha, and Tanya's parents.

Sleeping

Finn goes to bed these days around 6:30 and sleeps until 6 or 7 (or 8 on Saturday, or 4:30 Sunday - we're still working out the kinks). He's been getting up about 3 times, usually once before we go to bed and twice after. It's not ideal, but it's pretty workable, especially the long stretch at the beginning of the evening. We have nice, baby-scream-free dinners now, and Saturday night Gwen came over for dinner & the first stretch of sleep and Jonathan and I went to a movie. Like real people. This makes Gwen just about the awesomest person ever.

Getting older

The teeth are bigger. The sleep is better. The sitting and rolling skills continue to improve. He's a VERY strong lurcher. And he's getting more self-entertaining. I can definitely get more dishes washed/laundry folded/showers taken than I used to, which is nice. He's "talking" more, although instead of the "ba" or "da" type of sounds that books and websites claim are typical, his two favorite words seem to be "bvvvvvv" and "ghkehhhhhhhi." Jonathan's been standing him at the coffee table, which is pretty cool to see. He LOVES eating, not that that's new, but the cereal and bananas both are, and both have been a big hit. He only had half as much milk as usual at day care last Wednesday, and Ms. Lourdes said she fed him a whole bowl of rice cereal and he wanted MORE, and was not really interested in his bottle. This week we're trying avocados and sweet potatoes. His hair is getting thicker and darker.

Also? Cuter every day. I think that's mostly it for now.

Back to our regularly scheduled life

The photo above is from Poet's Seat, in Greenfield, MA. (Hi Ben and Martha!) Well, we're back and getting adjusted to life again. To those who may have been wondering, Finn got over "the crud" several days before we left for Boston, and he was fine while we were there. Katie got a cold when we got back to California, and it seems like Finn may have that now...but he's certainly better than he was in say, April.

Finn is getting better at sitting and standing. Sitting up is no problem, and he can even steady himself sometimes when he starts to fall. In the past couple of days I've been letting him stand up next to the coffee table, and he can hold himself up and even grab at stuff on the table. Any movement left or right and he loses it, though. We took a little movie which we'll post very soon.

Yesterday we went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium with some of Katie's NYU Law School friends. As expected, Finn loved it. His favorites were the silvery anchovies and the pink and orange jellyfish. He tries to grab them and even bonks his head on the glass.

Hey, it's June?! Yikes.

Fatherhood and the No-Hitter

A week ago Monday Red Sox pitcher Jon Lester threw a no-hitter against the Royals. We were at the game! (Until the 4th inning!) See, Mr. Finn had been having trouble sleeping in strange rooms and strange cribs, so we made the decision to leave to get ourselves back at around his normal bedtime. We left after the 4th inning. I was aware that there was a no-hitter going, but it didn't make much of an impression on me because it was early in the game.

However, when we got back to the hotel the laptop told me that Lester was one out away from completing the no-hitter! As Katie readied Finn for bed I stared in disbelief as the last out was recorded. Stared. In disbelief. Katie fed Finn and put him down while I quietly lay on the bed, shell shocked. I really like baseball. Katie went about her schoolwork and assumed I'd fallen asleep. I'll spare you the details of our conversation, but then, and now, I'm still coming to grips about how I feel about missing the game. Probably now I'll never see a no-hitter in person--I had my chance and now its gone.

I'm a big fan of having my cake and eating it too. I'm really quite good at it. I rarely have to compromise since I can usually figure out ways do everything I want to do. But now this is coming up against the hard wall (and giggly tummy) of Finn, and life has changed. Is it for the better? On the whole, absolutely. But just not in every instance. You owe me Finn! I better get some big giggles on Father's Day! (He does look so very cute in his Red Sox hat....)

Boston, Part 1

It's been a super busy week here for Finn. We're paying by the minute, so he's going to just give you a quick summary.

First (and second) hotel crib: Could have been better. [our son's very diplomatic, and much more polite than his parents]

First New Yorkers: Way fun! Received many tips from seven-month-old Casey on how to drive the parents nuts in the coming weeks. Also, traded pokes to the face.

First banana: Yum! More! [but mama wasn't so excited about the diaper]

First aquarium: OMG! @#$%#$^@!!!!!!!!! IT WAS TEH AWESOME!!!! [Yeah, we've got to start restricting his internet time. He was totally entranced by the fish, though.]

First baseball game - Red Sox v. Royals: Pretty cool, but kinda loud. It was a no-hitter, but Mama made us leave after just four innings. Something about "bedtime" and "baby self-destruct sequence."

First brewery tour: I slept through most of it, but mama seemed like she was having a really good time.

That's all for now! Thanks to Jessamy, Dave, & Casey; Anne & Troy; Shar & Gordon; and everyone who's been making this such a fun trip. Tomorrow, the zoo, and this weekend, western Massachusetts to see Ben, Martha, and Barcelona.