Happy Halloween and Happy 6 Month Day Zack!

Zack had a big day today. His 6 month check up and his 1st Halloween.

First a few other updates that Jess didn't mention before.

* Zack spoke...or at least Jessie and Meghan claim he did. His 1st word was "Whoa!" He hasn't said anything since though.

* Great news...I'm fairly certain Zack is left handed. He reaches primarily with his left and throws things with his left. I'll just have to keep training him to be a leftie.

* There is a toddler at daycare that has a massive crush on "Baby Zack." At a daycare party, she sat down next to him and started petting him and then upped the ante to kissing him on the cheek a few times.

*Sadly, we are going to have to part with the snap 'n go stroller and the bucket carseat very soon as he is just getting too big for them both. The "big boy" carseat and stroller arrived today.

Alright, so back to today. Zack is recovering fine from bronchiolitis and had his 6 month check up. He's healthy, strong, tall, and skinny. He fought the nurses any time they tried to get him to do anything and he's 75th percentile on height (27 inches) and 45th percentile on weight (17 lb 4 oz). I guess this is a good sign that he won't be a midget like his dad.

He had fun at the doctor (tearing up the paper and crawling on the exam table) until he got 4 shots. I wouldn't let him watch (and I couldn't either), but he sure screamed. He has a short term memory though, as a minute later he was smiling and flirting with a nurse.

In all reality he handled his shots better than I handled my flu vaccine today. So I'm petrified of needles and pulled away from the nurse 3 times when she was about to stab me, before I finally manned up. In my defense, I think if I wasn't holding Zack and he could have gotten away, he would have.

After the doctor, Zack got to help celebrate his 1st Halloween and up to his billing as our little monkey. Here are some pics...


"Ooh-ooh, ah-ah!!!"

"What's this? A tail? Yummy!"

"Alright, let me try this crawling again."

"How the heck do I open this thing? I'm hungry."

"Alright, I'll eat my foot now." (Why are the feet on this costume so big?)

"Now I have to exercise too?"

"If only I had teeth."

"Seriously, you guys have to be kidding me. What the heck did you dress me in? Do you really find this amusing? Oh, I just went boom-boom in my diaper. Let's see how funny you think that is."

Bad Blogger

I admit it, I have become a total slacker with the blog...and I am very sorry to my loyal readers who have called me out on it! Our camera broke and for some reason I just can't seem to bring myself to blog when I don't have pics...have no fear, we will have a new one by Halloween so we can take pics of our little monkey (yes, he will be a monkey for Halloween and we are so excited)!

There are a few things to update about...
Our little guy has two little bottom teeth now, sharp as can be! And he has a third one coming in on his top right side.
He loves eating rice cereal (plain or with bananas), yogurt, and sweet potatoes.
He has become pretty efficient at crawling backwards, but has not yet started crawling forward (he does, however have a pretty mean rocking stance and can scoot pretty much anywhere he wants to go!)
He still LOVES his dogs and will follow them around the room and put their ears, paws etc in his mouth (gross, yes I know, but kind of amusing too!)
He is sleeping in his crib now, not sure I ever mentioned that. It was a process to get him out of our room...first moving the pack and play to his room and then eventually getting him in the crib after he got used to his room.
He still goes to be at 6:30 despite our many attempts to keep him up later than that...and thus he still wakes up between 3:45 and 4:45. Some mornings he will go back to sleep and other morning we are just SOL! hahahaha :-) We are still trying to move his bedtime back but have not really had any luck ie: tonight we had him in the high chair while we were eating dinner and all of the sudden at 6:30 he was dead asleep in his high chair (music on, lights blinking, and toys everywhere!)

Last week, Jeff and I had our first encounter with "life would be easier if we had a nanny (or a grandma in town"...Zack got bronchiolitis (not to be confused with bronchitis, bronchiolitis is a virus that tends to occur in babies under 2). The good news is that he is building up his immune system, the bad news is that he had a nasty cough and runny nose, and was contagious, so he had to stay home from day care for the whole week. It was very difficult to juggle work and taking care of our little guy. Although we both love being home with him, it is pretty much impossible to get any quality work done during the day... it was rough. I stayed home 2.5 days and Jeff stayed home 2.5 days. We would put him to bed at night and then the person that stayed home would hop on the computer and work until late to play catch up. On Friday night, I think we went to bed at 10pm..we were so exhausted! The lesson learned is...Staying home is fine, working is fine, but staying home and working, not so fine!

We are looking forward to the week ahead...Zack has his 6 month check up on Friday morning and then we hope to hit some Halloween parades in the afternoon.

A Trip to The Pumpkin Patch

Zack's first trip to the Pumpkin Patch was definitely more fun for Mom and Dad than it was for Zack but he was a sport and let us take a few cute pics that we wanted to share.

The Fam (Dad just got back from Vegas, but he was a trooper since he knew Mom really wanted to go and he didn't want the wrath! :-))

Some pics of me amongst the pumpkins

Me and my girlfriend Sydney (She is still bigger than me but I am catching up!)
Me and Mom

Happy 5 month day Zack!

Dear Zack,
Mom and Dad love you so much! We can't even believe you are already 5 months old...where does the time go?! You are currently teething and drooling like a champ...today the daycare even asked us to supply our own bibs because they can't keep up with you!
This week we started feeding you yogurt for breakfast and you seem to be enjoying it much better than the rice cereal we give you at night. Bedtime has become much less of a chore...you always seem to be tired and "ready" for bed at 6:30 (we really wish it was a little bit later but you get a little cranky if we keep you up much later than that)...You are still a very very happy, smiley, laid back, and mellow baby! You LOVE people, "talking", playing in the exersaucer or your new car, or just rolling around on the ground! You love laughing at your doggies and grabbing for their ear and you are really trying to crawl but just haven't figured out that your knees need to be on the ground, not up in a downward dog yoga pose! Oh well...You are going to be sitting up and mobile before we know it!
You are truly our little angel and we enjoy every second that we spend with you!!!!
Love Mom and Dad

Fun weekend Pics!

I love playing in my new car! Thanks Aunt Diane and Uncle Tommy!

Sitting up in my rocking chair

Back to School...

In the immortal words of Billy Madison, "Back to school. Back to school. To prove to Dad I'm not a fool." After cutting class most all of last week to hang out with his grandparents, Zack was back at daycare Monday and very excited. When I dropped him off he went back to his staring at a baby crawling and proceeded to start his "swimming" (attempting to crawl, but with his legs and arms in the air).

It does suck to drop him off in the morning. I don't cry like Jess did...not even close, but it's awkward. "Alright, bye little buddy. Be a good boy Zack."

Picking him up at night is just as bad and maybe worse. When I walked in today, he looked over at me and went back to what he was doing. He could really give a crap that I was there.

The good news is that Zack seems to be getting back on a schedule. After daycare, he comes home and we feed him rice cereal and a bottle and he crashes. The past 2 nights he has been out like a light...he didn't even fight it. Now we just need consistency on sleeping through the night. I guess we're already "those parents" pushing him for more. Oh well.

Real Food

So Zack had a doctor's appointment Friday and he's chubbing up well. He seems to have gotten his February Fat a bit early, because he's up to 16 pounds. He's gone from being in the 16th percentile on weight to 56th. At this rate, he'll be sumo class by his 1st birthday.

I don't even think that we had to explain to the doctor how Porky is always hungry and wants to eat, as I think he went after her hand. She thought maybe it was time to give our little butterball some real food. Since I'm still getting overruled on steaks, Zack got rice cereal. Saturday morning he was in for a surprise and I'm not so sure he was a big fan. 2 days in, he's still not sure what to think and he probably spits out as much as he swallows, but he's getting better at eating real food. Here are the pics of his 1st adventure in eating food.

1st Bite...Open Up!

"What the hell are you guys doing to me?"
"Not another bite!"

"Stop it already."
"Ha, I have the container, no more of this crap for me."