Wednesday, February 28, 2007

Anti-dentite

We have it on good authority that Owen is teething. We'd been told he was for several months by friends, family and child care providers that all pointed to Owen's excessive drool and tendency to gum anything he gets his hands on as signs of the imminent arrival of dentites. We waited with anticipation, but to no avail -- apparently, Owen just has highly developed salivary glands and an adventurous palate. Now, however, teeth have been spotted just beneath the gum line and having spent the last three nights dealing with a screaming child, we can say with some confidence that his incisors are coming.

The official diagnosis came Monday when Allen took Owen in to check out a persistent cold that seemed to have escalated over the weekend (he would wake himself up coughing and then start screaming). After telling us yet again that Owen has a viral cold that we should probably just let run its course, his pediatrician noted that some baby teeth are on the way (hence the screaming).

Sadly, the doctor didn't offer an advice on how to deal with the fact that the coughing keeps waking Owen up and once awake, Owen becomes fully cognizant of the agonizing pain his mouth is in which causes him to cry for a solid hour in the wee hours of the morning. Just when he finally starts drifting off to sleep, he starts coughing and the cycle begins again. And to think it was only last week that he was sleeping 10-11 hours at night...

Sunday, February 25, 2007

Snowman!


Owen built his first snowman today! (Actually, mommy and daddy built the snowman while Owen watched with mild interest).

Mia Alena Brown

Congratulations are in order for our good friends Brad and Marlo! Mia Alena Brown was born this morning at 12:12 am on February 25th. She was an impressive 7lbs, 14 ozs and 20 inches long! Marlo went into the hospital for an induction at 8 am yesterday, so I'm sure the Brown family is all trying to get some much deserved rest.

I'll update this post when I hear more.

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Update - Here's a picture of the happy family!


Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Chinese New Year

Owen turned six months old today, and befitting his rather uneventful half year birthday, this blog post is not going to be about how our son has now made it half way around the sun. Taking a more lunar bent instead, this blog post is about the Chinese New Year. On Saturday we took Owen over to our friend Billy's mom's place to say goodbye to the year of the dog, and ring in the year of the pig.

It really was quite brave of Billy to have us all over. As soon as Billy's mom saw Owen, she fell in love, and the questions about when Billy would bring home a baby began. When Chad arrived with his daughter, Uma, the baby pressure on Billy only increased. To top it all off, when our friend Melanie started speaking Cantonese, Mrs. Kung thought she found the perfect woman to bring home those babies with Billy. Sadly for Billy's mom, Melanie's husband was also at the party, foiling her plans of a Cantonese speaking wife for Billy, and a lucky grandchild in the year of the pig.


(p.s. I know it looks like the babies were really tying one on, but all the beer was non-alcoholic, and neither of them actually drank anything anyways... ;-)

Sunday, February 11, 2007

Sit Ups


Elaine has been dutifully recording all of Owen's milestones in his baby book. Some of these are easy to keep track of (e.g. his first meal was clearly on January 1st), but others can be rather difficult to pin down a date for. Owen is clearly able to sit up on his own now, but when exactly did he acquire this skill? This picture shows Owen sitting up on his own, propped up in a chair way back when he was two months old. He certainly wasn't really able to sit up on his own then (he needed to be propped up, and even then he would only last long enough to snap a quick picture before toppling over to one side). The last few months he's been sitting up more and more on his own. Always with a hand near by to catch the inevitable tumble at first. Then gradually, he gained more control, staying upright longer, reaching for objects, and sitting back up after he'd lunge forward to grab a particularly enticing toy. We still prefer him to be sitting on something soft, just in case he decides to pitch over backwards, and we wouldn't want to be too far away lest we need to make a diving save, but I think this is one milestone we can check off the list.

Sunday, February 04, 2007

Catch Up...

Today is my birthday, which means one year ago today, we started telling people we were expecting. It also means that people have been calling me to wish me a happy birthday, and politely remind me that it's been too long since I've updated the blog. Well it's time to remedy that situation. Elaine already put up a post this morning (admittedly backdated) about Owen's first snowfall, and I'll try to catch everyone up on all the other events of the past few weeks.

The big news is that Owen is mobile. Gone are the days when we could set him down and know that if we turned away, he'd be right where we left him. He's not quite crawling yet, but he manages to get around with a combination of rolling and a little inch worm maneuver where he thrusts his but up into the air and lunges forward to advance towards whatever he's after. I tried to capture this with what I thought would be an adorable series of pictures of Owen inching towards his red block, but he thought it would be far more fun to roll towards daddy and the edge of the bed instead.

In other news, Owen has his first girlfriend. Last weekend we had a gathering of EPA babies over at Misha and Sophia's house. Eric and Kathryn brought their five week old baby Cole, and we brought Owen over for an afternoon of burgers and babies. Misha's daughter, Maria, was born one week after Owen, and they both seemed quite smitten with each other (although in typical boy fashion, Owen was more interested in the toys at first, and it took him awhile to catch on that there was a cute girl staring at him). Cole meanwhile was happy to simply admire the other babies' ability to hold their heads up and manipulate objects with their hands.

Since Owen is old enough for his first girlfriend, it turns out he's also old enough to start shaving. In the latest bit of one-upmanship in the generations long feud between the Grady's and the Egan's, Owen started shaving at a mere five months old. I have a feeling that it will be a while before he has to shave again, but hopefully Bernie and Pete will put the pictures to good use.

What are we doing for my birthday you might ask? Well, we're throwing a baby shower / Super Bowl party for our friends Brad & Marlo up at Mom & Don's house. So I'll sign off for now, and with any luck I'll have pictures of the shower up in less that three weeks...