Tidbits

Tuesday, June 17
Caleb continues to work on his ability to push up and look around from a stomach down position. He is getting stronger and stronger.

Tonight we went out to eat before our Tuesday night bible study. Mom usually feeds Caleb while we wait for our food arrive. Tonight, we got a big kick out of him propping his foot up on the table while he ate.

We've only been giving Caleb a pacifier for a little over a week now. He has a hard time holding the pacifier in his mouth when he's not actually sucking on it. After the bible study, we drove to my office to get something I forgot. On the way over there, Caleb was getting tired and fussy, so I gave him a pacifier. Normally, I have to hold a finger in front of the pacifier to keep him from dropping it. He had fallen asleep and was holding on to it pretty well when Mom dropped me off at the restaurant to get my car. Apparently it was still in his mouth when Caleb and Mom got home. His ability to hold on to it that long without assistance seems to be another small first.

Seats of Honor

As I mentioned yesterday, I put together a new swing for Mom's office. Today was her first opportunity to make use of it. I have been looking forward to see how it is going to work because the swing here at the house has magic powers in its ability to calm Caleb and lull him to sleep. I hope the new swing will have the same superpowers.

Mom tried it out intially today, and Caleb seemed immune to its power. But Mom was eventually able to get Caleb to sleep in the swing. I messed up though. I followed the directions precisely. For some reason, the directions had me attach the tray to the seat before I completed the frame and base. Mom suggested I not add the tray, but I am a literalist when it comes to following directions as I perform the required assembly. She was right. I could have waited on the tray, and now it is in place and I'm not sure I can get it off. As you can see, the tray is pretty bulky. Hopefully it won't bother him, but I am worried it is going to constrict his movement.

Of course, Caleb also has a bouncy seat at Mom's office. It's a wonder mom has been able to keep her desk in her office with all of the necessities required to take care of Caleb during the day. But she manages. The bouncy seat has an arch with some toys attached to it. It's not completely clear in the picture, but Caleb is intently staring at the toys in front of him. He is working on his ability to focus on inanimate objects directly in front of him. The problem is, he goes a little cross eyed if the object is too close to his face.

Well, Caleb has recently discovered his hands, or more precisely, his fists. He often stares at his fists. Because his arms are short, he holds his fist close to his face. The short distance makes him go cross-eyed. The short distance also proves to lead to another problem. Although Caleb is aware of his fists, I'm pretty sure that he has not figured out that his fists are attached to his arms which are in turn attached to his body. He also has not mastered control of his limbs yet. So, holding his fist right in front of his face has led him to smack himself in the face numerous times. On the one hand, I feel bad when he smacks himself. On the other hand, it's pretty darn funny.

Father's Day

The first order of business is to wish a happy Father's Day to all the dads out there.

Of course today was my first Father's Day as a father. I got to spend the day with Caleb and Mom and that's all I can ask for. However, many people made a special effort to wish me a happy Father's Day on my first one. It was very special for people I care about to make me feel so loved today. Mom made a special effort to make sure this day was meaningful and I am truly grateful to her for that. But to me, and I know this will soundy really cheesy, but it's true, every day with Caleb is special. It is a tremendous blessing to be a father. That little boys is so sweet and cute and he has captured my heart. I love to listen to him, I love to watch him and I love to hold him. If this day had never been created, or we did not acknowledge it, I would still think, to borrow a phrase from Lou Gehrig, that I am the luckiest man on the face of the earth.

Of course, this day began pretty early in Naples. We left in time to be at worship here in Miami. Caleb did much better than Friday night and slept all the way to the church building. After worship, we had a nice lunch with friends from church. In the afternoon, I got a taste of what it must be like to be Santa Claus as we went over to Mom's office so that I could put together a new baby swing which was given to Mom for her to use this summer. We spent the eveing with our life group before coming home and getting ready to face another workweek.

This picture of Caleb is not of anything significant. I just wanted to show off some new pajamas he has been wearing and the dog on his rear end.

Water Baby

We had a nice day today. I had class this morning and during a break between sessions, I made a visit to the men's room. As I came out of the restroom, I just happened to run into Mom and Caleb wandering around the hotel, killing time. Of all the places in the hotel we each of could have been, it was pretty amazing that we end up in that same spot at the same moment. It was nice so see them so I could kiss Mom and snuggle with Caleb a minute before going back to the letures. Seeing them at that time helped me get through the rest of the morning.

After I returned to the room at the end of the conference, we went out to lunch and debated what to do the rest of the day. We finally decided to spend some time down at the hotel pool where we went for a swim...all three of us. Caleb got in the pool with me and stayed in for quite some time. He really seemed to enjoy it. We hung out in the loungers next to the pool util we got caught in an afternoon downpour which came up on us with little warning. We had all dried off from the pool and we were soaked from the rain by the time we got back in the building. We came back to the room and leisurely cleaned up. Caleb harldy said a word throughout the entire ordeal.

We headed out for dinner and then rushe over to the beach to catch the sunset. We got to the beach just before the sun was about to drop below the horizon. They sky was a beautiful combination of pink, blue and purple. We watched a pod of dolphins playing in the water just off the shore. While we stood at the edge of the water taking it all in, we held Caleb's feet down in the surf as the waves moved back and forth across the sand. Again, Caleb did not protest and seemed to be pleased with the experience. After soaking in as much peace and quiet as we could, we returned to the hotel to pack and get read to go so we can leave first thing tomorrow morning.

Today was a pretty long day for the adults, much less Caleb. As we were settliing in for the night, Mom put Caleb in his pajamas and fed him so that he could go to bed. While he was eating, I took a picture of the sweet feet that got into so much water today. I am looking forward to many more sweet days like today.

Vacation

We are lucky that we are getting to spend the weekend at a Ritz Carlton for the conference I am attending. Here in Naples, the Ritz has a golf resort and a beach resort. Whil I was in seminars all day, Mom spent the day with Caleb. She loaded him up and they rode the shuttle over to the beach resort so Mom could get some beach time in. When she got there, Caleb cried and cried, but eventually calmed down. The lady from school who has given us so many things gave us a playpen that is designed for outdoor use. It has a cover so Caleb can lay in the shade and not get sunburned.

Mom and Caleb also spent some time at the pool. Mom decided to let Caleb try out the water fully expecting him to hate it. But Mom said he seemed to enjoy it. This coming from the kid who hates having baths and will flip out if the water temperature is not just write. After a few minutes in the water, Mom wrapped Caleb up in one of the "luxurious" Ritz Carlton towels and took this piture of him lounging poolside.

I grew up in the water. Swimming pools, ocean, you name it, I liked to swim in it. Hopefully Caleb will like the water to so that we can spend lots of time swimming together.

Road Trip

This is where Caleb woke up this morning: in his bassinet, nice and happy. He was in a really good mood today and made it hard for Dad to leave for work. Today is Dad's birthday, so Caleb and Mom came to have lunch with me today.

After work, we packed up the car and headed to Naples, Florida for a conference for Dad. Caleb did not have a very fun time in the car. He cried himself to sleep as we left Miami, but he then woke up somewhere in the middle of the Everglades and would not cry himself back to sleep again. Mom pulled over in a campground to feed Caleb. After having a little snack, we pulled back onto the highway and Caleb cried himself back to sleep as we continued on into Naples. We wearily ate dinner at a nearly empty Carrabba's that was about to close. Our waitress was enamored with Caleb and would not let us eat in peace, but she was nice enough. Of course, she may have just been bored since we were by far the last people to leave. We are finally at the hotel and Caleb is sleeping in a hotel crib. It's a little roomier than his bassinet.

We are planning on leaving early enough Sunday morning to be back in Miami for church. At the rate we went tonight, we need to leave some time Saturday afternoon to make it back in time.

Class? What Class?

One of the challenges we are facing is how to deal with Caleb at church. He's not consistent. Sometimes, he will sleep right through class, other times, I have to rock him at the back of the room. During actual church time, he's only made it through one worship service. Mom usually spends worship service with Caleb in the cry room or the nursery. The problem is, we both like to be in worship and we both want to be in class. However, one of us usually ends up missing part of class or worship. One of the ministers at church has started a new Wednesday night class on Thursday and we are both looking forward to that class. Caleb slept through the first class last week. This week, however, he was having none of it. We had not been sitting a minute when Caleb started crying. I took him out, but within a few minutes, it was obvious Caleb was hungry. I got Mom and I don't think she made it back to class. Of course, irony of ironies, I was rocking Caleb shortly after class was over and he went out like a light. His sense of timing is perfect.

As you can see, Caleb has just about outgrown the bassinet. He will be moving to the crib soon. Guess we have to get into the nursery and finalize everything so Caleb can start sleeping in there. He's been with us in the same room since he was born, so that is going to be a really strange transition. I have no idea how that is going to go.

Sleeping on the Job

Caleb has been going to work with Mom the last couple of weeks. So far, Mom has had a hard time finding the right balance of paying attention to Caleb and getting her work done. He has been pretty demanding of her attention and has not allowed her to put him down very often. She spends much of her day in some variation of this picture.

In addition to Caleb's sling, we were given one of those trendy, preppy harnesses for carrying a baby. Caleb is just now getting big enough to ride in it. We tried it out this past Friday before the baseball game, but he didn't seem to like it. We decided that we needed to give him a chance to get accustomed to it before using the harness in public. Mom decided to give it a test ride today and I took this picture of Caleb when I got home from work.

Doesn't this picture look like it could be an advertisement for the product? Of course we think Caleb is a beatiful little boy. But we get so many compliments from friends and strangers alike. I've heard so many comments that I've considered checking out a baby modeling agency. I'll let you know if Caleb has a future in front of a camera (the professional kind).

A Picture is Worth...

We had a quiet evening together. After dinner, we headed to Babies R Us (FINALLY) to pick up a few items remaining on the baby registry. After we got home Caleb spent a few minutes playing on Dad's lap before Caleb went to bed. I am learning enough about Caleb that I can fairly easily coax a smile out of him and Mom was able to capture this picture of him. It is an amazing feeling to know that Caleb is my son and I understand him well enough to get him to look like this in a picture.

Overflow

Caleb showed no signs of a reaction to yesterday's immunizations, so I guess we are past this obstacle and on to the next challenge in this gauntlet called parenthood. We have said all along that we would allow people to hold Caleb after he had his shots. We had anticipated being able to pass him around today. To our surprise, no one held him at church this morning and a couple of people held him at our small group tonight.

It's a good thing no one held Caleb this morning. For some reason today, Caleb has been generating a lot of excretions. He caused three diapers to leak today. Mom got either pee or poop on both her dress and her blouse from this morning and had to change clothes when we got home from worship.

Mom had dressed Caleb in a white linen shirt, a little pair of khaki pants and his white shoes. Caleb's diaper leaked all over his pants, so he spent most of church in his linen shirt, white shoes and a diaper. Two different people bought us a pair of khaki pants, so Mom put the clean pair on him for small group tonight. Before we left small group, Caleb again filled his diaper so much that he soaked his pants and spent part of the time in just the shirt and diaper. This is a picture of Caleb in his shirt and diaper before Mom put on his pajamas.

I guess we are going to have to work on getting his diapers on securely