Landon Pictures: 6 weeks - 16 weeks

Well, it has been a while since I posted some pictures of Landon. Things got pretty busy and I never took the time to upload any new pictures. Today, I finally quit slacking and added some pictures to my Picasaweb site. Not counting the picture site link I sent you, I haven't posted any pictures since 11 January! Woops! With that in mind, here are some pictures from the last few months. Enjoy!

Landon relaxing



Landon after eating. Almost 6 weeks old.



Landon getting ready to go outside in some cold weather



Cheeeeeese!



All bundled up with Buddy Bear



I know it's a little blurry (dang camera! We need a new one!) but his smile in this one was too perfect not to post.



Landon smiling. About 7.5 weeks old in this picture.



Landon and I are about to fall asleep



Yawn!



It's a tough life being so cute



Christi and Landon sleeping hard



Landon and I sleeping. The funny thing about this picture and the one above is that we both took them without each other knowing about a day apart from each other. The next day we went to show each other and we were both surprised to see ourselves passed out too!



This is what Landon used to do when we tried to get him to play on his stomach






Landon sitting with Christi



Landon is 10 weeks old here. Again sitting on Christi. He like to sit on our stomachs while we play with him.



Landon eating his hand while we are playing on the changing table. He loves to eat his hands. He's 11 weeks in this picture.



As you can see he is taking up most of the changing table at this point (still 11 weeks). That was about 6 weeks ago. Growing so fast.



He's playing in his play center. 12 weeks in this pictures. He loves knocking the crap out of all the things that hang down. Then he will grab them and try to eat them. He usually ends up with a combination of his hand and the toy in his mouth.



Landon in his church outfit. He's 13 weeks here. He does really well in church. He either sleeps or sits with his mom and stares at everyone around him. It's pretty loud during the music (contemporary with drums, guitars, singing) and it doesn't seem to bother him. We have been out in at a place that had live music and it scared him. So far so good in church.



Landon wearing some yellow jacket shoes Christi found at a consignment sale. Obviously they are WAY too big right now, but we put them on him anyway to see what he would do. He kept staring at them like what the heck is on my feet. Then he started doing his feet like a cat does if you put shoes on them. It was funny.



Look at me in my shoes! Holding my head up really well too! 13 weeks old at this point.



Landon playing with the octopus that hangs down.



Me holding Landon last week. He's 16 weeks old here. You can see how much bigger he has gotten.



Why do you keep calling my name?!?!? We can never capture his smile on camera. I promise he smiles all the time. We just can't get a good picture of it, yet. Hopefully soon we can show it to you.

Hope you enjoyed the pictures. I plan on posting them more regularly, but I haven't done a good job of that to date. I would like to get a new camera, preferably a new DSL-R, but I'm not ready to fork out that kind of money. One reason it takes so long to take pictures and post them is that our current camera takes bad pictures close up. You see probably 10% of the pictures we take. Half get deleted and the other half I try to touch up to make them salvageable, but if you aren't just right it doesn't work well. Either the flash is way too bright or the non-flash exposure length caused blurriness. Our video camera does a good job of focusing up close and taking the picture well, but the picture definition is average at best on most (video is excellent though, especially for an SD camera.) Maybe the prices of the DSL-R camera prices will come down some like TV prices have.

I also have several hours of video that I am going to go through, edit, and figure out how to post. I'm considering YouTube or Google Video, but I'm unsure as of yet how I want to host it. I'd like some privacy if possible. I'm sure no one will really be looking at these videos except the people on here, you never know. If you have any ideas or suggestions let me know!

Yay for the weekend

Everything is going well with the wisdom teeth recovery. I'm so glad it's the weekend because this week at work was pretty busy. When I have more time I will post a few funny stories from when I was doped up on Demerol. Let's just say it's good I wasn't making any posts this weekend. It was tough the first few days back at work, but after about Wednesday it got better. The toughest part has been eating and the soreness after eating. From talking with other people who had their wisdom teeth out, no one really mentioned this. Everyone said it would take 3-4 days to recover, so I expected to be back to normal eating after 3-4 days. WRONG. I've been on soft food since the surgery, gradually progressing to tougher to chew but still generally soft foods. Also, if foods are hot (heat-wise), it makes them very tough to eat. I'm getting the hang of it, but definitely getting tired of yogurt and jell-o, although not tired of ice cream yet.

I hadn't worked out since the surgery and played some soccer yesterday. Wow. That week off killed my endurance. I was very disappointed and a little surprised, really. I know you lose it much faster than you gain it, but I wasn't expecting this much. Have to get back into the gym ASAP. Unfortunately i will be in an off-site training class all week so I will have to go to the gym very early or much later than I am used to. One of the great perks of working at Robins is that we get 3 hours of fitness leave each week - i.e., paid time off to go workout and the gym is free (and one of them is right next to my building, which is great). So normally I get to work around 7:45-8am-ish after helping Christi get Landon ready and telling them good-bye. I'll workout, shower, and be in work by 9 be good for the rest of the day. I am thinking of going on a run this afternoon to help, depending on how much yard work I get done. Speaking of which, I need to get off the computer and into the yard to cut grass, weed eat, gutter clean, etc. First time this year. It went from nothing to overgrown this week. All that rain and cold had kept it from doing much of anything until this week.

Have a great weekend.

Wisdom Teeth

Nothing too terribly exciting going on. Work has been pretty busy for me trying to balance various projects and some tasks that I feel supremely under-qualified for, yet my bosses think I can handle. I guess I should feel good about that, but all I do is worry about screwing it up.

Christi has been pretty busy also. They are starting to prepare the kids for the CRCT test that is coming up. I know it is a stressful time of year for her because how the kids perform reflect on her as a teacher. I don't totally agree with that, but that's the way it is currently. I'm glad I'm not a teacher. I couldn't put up with half the stuff they have to deal with.

Tomorrow (Friday) I am getting all 4 wisdom teeth taken out. They don't really hurt and all 4 are already in. However, my bottom teeth have gone from being diagonal to laying flat, something my dentist was was "unusual", and are now beginning to push on my other bottom teeth. It doesn't hurt, but it will eventually and will also screw up my lower teeth. My upper teeth are OK as is, but they will continue to grow downward until there is no more room. That is, until they impact my lower gums. Awesome. So, we decided now was the time to take them out. They were pretty sore during the cold last month, but more of a sensitive to cold water and air than pain. It was a weird feeling.

I am hopeful that whatever they knock me out with will wear off by 7:15 tomorrow night so I can coherently watch GT play Oklahoma State. My good friend at work, Wes, graduated from there so we will be mortal enemies for a few hours. It should be a good game. Thankfully I will have Christi to take care of me this weekend and I am hopeful that everything will go OK and I won't be a bad patient. Landon and I might have a drooling contest too. I think I could beat him.

That's pretty much all that's going on for us this weekend. I hope my bracket picks do well, but I really want to see some more upsets and some good games. I love the NCAA tournament. I should be able to get a decent amount of viewing in while I am recovering from my wisdom teeth. The plus side for all of my readers is that you might get some awesome drugged-up posts by me. We can all hope for that, right?

Have a great weekend everyone. Take care.

Landon Updates

In my last post I touchded some on what Landon has done, but I feel like I didn't talk about all he has done recently.

Yesterday morning Landon had a big milestone. I've been talking some time about him not liking "tummy time" and getting fussy after a few minutes of being on his stomach. Yesterday, he didn't get upset. He played! He's been almost rolling over the past 2 weeks, so we keep helping him and rolling him over. Yesterday he lifted his head up and pulled his arms underneath him and pushed up. It was great! We did it 3 more times with the same results. It's something that seems so small, but it really was a big milestone for us. We're proud. Now we have to work on the rolling over. He's close.

Landon is smiling a lot. He loves playing on his back and he'll give you what we call "gummy grins" - smiles so big you can see his gums. It is really fun to watch him do that. Playing on his back is not the only time he does them, though. He is doing them more often when he is happy and we talk to him, sitting up or laying down.

Speaking of playing on his back, he is doing a lot more that. We have setup a play center for him at home with things that hang from the bars that go across it and Mrs. Debra has one at her house also as well as an "excersaucer" that he can sit in and play in. When he is ready to play we will put him down there and let him go to town. He loves smacking the crap out of the things that hang down. Lately, he has been getting better at grabbing things. He is working on grabbing them with both hands and holding onto them. The things hanging down he will grab and then hit, or just grab and try to pull them down. He will also grab toys you give him and play with them. Before he would grab them and just flail them around until he let go, but now he will hold onto them and observe them (sometimes). Other times he will just try to put them in his mouth. He is a big fan of putting things he can grab in his mouth, and when he cannot find something to put in his mouth, he will put his hands in mouth.

He is now sleeping in his own bed in his room. He loves the mobile that hangs over when it is going. That and ceiling fans, he loves those too. He likes watching things that move and is really good now at following objects. When we go out to eat, sometimes it's a bit of sensory overload and he will turn his head left and righ trying to take a look at everything, but eventually he will end up looking at a TV or a little girl. Yes, he's already learned to look at little girls. He will just stare and smile at them. But back to him tracking things. He has really developed being able to watch and follow objects, especially people. Sometimes we will put him in his bouncy seat so we can get some things done around the house. He will follow you with his eyes until he has to turn his head, and then crane his neck around to follow you as far as he can see you. Sometimes if he can't see you he'll get upset. Other time if Christi and I are talking, he will start looking around all over the room until he can find us or if he can't, he'll get upset sometimes. He hasn't done that in the last few days, though.

Lately he is getting pretty good at playing by himself. He will lay in his crib or play on his play mat for a long time without someone else being there with him to keep him entertained. He will also wake up during the night and just play. We've walked in on him wide awake and he is just playing by himself, usually eating his hands or eating his blanket. If he's not doing that, he's blowing spit bubbles and then sucking them back in his mouth. No, really. He loves doing that. Of course he doesn't always get it back into his mouth and he gets drool all over the place. It's just love sugar.

Bath time is also becoming more eventful. He loves splashing around in his tub in warm water. The other day some water got on his nose and he was "ah... ha... chooh!". It was very cute and funny at the same time. He sneezes sometimes, but that was the first time he paused midway and got the second wind before unleashing a man0sized sneeze. When we sit him up or stand him up to wash his backside, he'll flex his butt cheeks really tight and he'll have dimples on his butt cheeks. It's pretty funny. Now he's getting to where if we hold him up and let him stand, in the tub or elsewhere, he will stomp his right foot. Not sure why, but he does. Other times he will do his right foot, and then try to pull his left foot like he is trying to walk. Of course he doesn't have nearly the balance to actually walk, but it seems like he is trying to move his legs in that manner.

I could go on and on, obviously. I haven't talked about how he runs marathons by the way he moves he arms and legs to fast all day or that he hold his head up with ease, but this is getting too long to be just a quick update on Landon. As you can tell, he is progressing quickly and we are having a fun time watching him learn new things. Keep checking back for more updates. By next week I think he'll be doing algebra. It's crazy.

Tax Time

I'm sitting here about to go through our tax information to send off to the person who does our taxes. I like to think if I took the time to sit down and read the tax code I could understand it, but I've never done it. How do you do your taxes? Own your own? Software program? CPA? Big tax company (H&R Block-ish)?

We've been pretty busy lately, which is par for the course. I think I'm coming down with a slight cold so I'm trying to stay out of Landon's face, but it's hard to do sometimes. Work has been crazy busy lately, which is good because the day goes by faster but also means I a lot of stuff to stay on top of. So far so good, but the more you get the harder it gets. Christi is doing OK back at school. It's been tough to get the kids under control sometimes because she was out so long it is like it's the 1st day of school all over again. They are testing to see if she is still going to make the abide by the same rules as before, and she has been cracking down on them. I know she definitely wants to be at home with Landon instead of school. The good thing is spring break is coming up soon and she will also have all summer with him, which really isn't that long because they have been cutting down on the length of summer break and adding those days into the school year.

Speaking of Landon, he is doing great. He is growing incredibly fast and changes every day. He's holding his head up easily now and is learning to sit-up. He can make himself sit-up if he is laying at steep angle, but not from the ground. Naturally, his balance isn't where it needs to be yet to let him sit-up by himself, but it is noticeably improving. He's become a fussy eater for reasons we cannot determine. We just have to fight him sometimes to get him to take the bottle. Other than that he hasn't had any "problems", if that is what you want to call it.

He is now in his room in his crib. The 1st few nights he was waking up a lot, but we are not sure if that is because it was a new bed or because he didn't eat enough at dinner (because of the whole fussiness thing, he takes about 1-2 ounces less than normal sometimes.) After that, he is doing better. I think makes it from like 10pm to 4-5 am without waking up now, but sometimes there are some visits in that time frame. Really, when I say waking up, he isn't getting up, but rather he is just being a little fussy because his pacifier likely fell out of his mouth. Put that baby right back in his mouth and he's fine. We will get him up around 7am to get him ready to go to Christi's mom's house (whom he will call Kaye-Kaye). He will get fussy because he is hungry, especially when you first put him in the car seat because he knows he isn't eating right then. Most mornings he is very happy and will try to talk to you when you are changing him and getting him ready to go. It's a lot of fun, really. The worst part is having to put him in the car seat and watch Christi take him because I know I won't see him again for about 10 hours. Very sad.

I need to get to work. Check back later for some updates. Take care everyone.