Documentation of fatherhood insanity: February 2012

Things I have learned:

Several big lessons over the last 4 weeks:

1. When your child gets older, you no longer have the time to write a blog once a week. Most of your time is spent chasing after said child.

2. When you do have free time, you are significantly more tired.

3. When you stop writing a blog abruptly, people complain (sorry!)

Due to the increase in Sammy play time, and the tiredness, we will be moving to a more picture and video driven blog format. Hope that works for everyone!

1. The term : “Back-seat-keeper-upper”

Bak seet kee-p-er up er

1. –noun

Usually, the role one parent assumes when trying to keep a child awake in the backseat of a car ride so that they can nap at home instead of the car. A successful Back-seat-keeper-upper can save parents lots of precious time – an unsuccessful one will find themselves sitting in a car while the child naps.

Danielle did not find my “teach a man to fish request funny”. I think this is because teaching Sammy to “fish” involves a Kitchen Aid (or at least it used to – see below)

I say “used to” because in the past few weeks Sammy decided that he’s pretty much done with any food that he doesn’t get to put in his own mouth. And all over himself.

Sammy has officially been enrolled in Kenia’s (our nanny) School of Cheerio Motivation. By this I mean that there are basically 2 things responsible for Sammy hitting major development milestones: our Nanny Kenia and cheerios.

1. First, Sammy went through crawling boot camp. A constantly moving trail of cheerios had him army crawling in one afternoon! And that was that.

2. Up next? Pulling himself up. After days of practice with mom and dad and Kenia, some cheerios were put up on the rail of his crib and….boom. Pull himself up just like that.

Do not underestimate how much kids love bland cereal.

Sammy has loads of toys. LOADS! I know this because after each day our apartment is nothing short of a disaster. The thing is, there is no toy as cool as a tag. It can be a tag on anything. A stuffed animal, an article of clothing, his exersaucer, anything. If there’s a tag to be found, Sammy will find it. And put it in his mouth. Repeatedly.

As his personality develops, Sammy has become more and more picky about the books he wants to read. In particular, he is very partial to anything by Sandra Boynton (she of such new classics as Moo Baa La La La, Barnyard dance, and the borderline illegible Red Hat, Blue Hat). I hear that many other kids love her books too. It dons on me that this woman will have a massive impact on a new crop of babies – but what if her books are so silly that our kids end up thinking life is about hippos and singing pigs? I’m only mildly scared…

Sammy got his first bump on his head. He leaned over and bumped his head on our ottoman. While Danielle was freaking out, Sammy was giggling. Pretty sure he’s got a tough head.

Like many Americans, Sammy has decided he will pretty much eat until the food is gone, never mind when he gets full.

This kid is flying around in his walker with wheels (or as we call it the “walky wheely”). Three things I’ve noticed.

1. I need to be careful of my toes or he will run me over

2. He excels at 3 point turns

3. I caught Danielle putting a Swiffer in his hands while he was wheeling around!

Sammy is officially teething. This time, it’s real. I swear. There are a few signs that I will not mention but lets just say we haven’t had to change his pants since he was really little.

He also randomly wakes up in the middle of the night sometimes. While this is exhausting, it was hilarious to me that at 12:45am I had to explain to Danielle it was not 6:30am and that she was not getting up for the day.

The ability to sit up and pull himself up has made nap time a real challenge. Sammy can often be found pacing back from one end of his crib to the other instead of sleeping.

New morning tactic (that is working!): When Sammy wakes up at 6ish, if we leave toys in his crib he will often just sit and play for a half hour, much to the glee of his sleeping parents.

The Giants won the superbowl and Sammy was having none of it. He didn’t do so well with all the yelling, cheering, barking dogs, etc… He spent the first half rotating between crying, trying to calm down and yelling. Half 2 was spent sleeping.

Important statistics we are tracking:

- Longest nap of Sammy’s life: 3 hours

- Number of Kroos that went to the super bowl parade: 2 (and one was not me. And one did not care much (Sammy))

- Number of full pears eaten in a sitting (and it was not cut up!): 1

Pictures for your amusement: