Samuel is Cruising

Sam is keeping life exciting. He's now 10 months old, has had all of his shots. He's cruising well, with only a couple more efforts at unassisted stepping. He has 4-6 teeth (depending on how you count), and a bit more hair, although it's very fine. He's vocalizing a lot. The main words in his arsenal are "nyai-nyai," "da-da," and assorted grunting. Still, we'll take it!

He's still very good at church and in meetings, and playing by himself.

We now have a crib (not yet set up, in part because we have no directions). We'll let you know how it goes.

Sadly, Em's mom has now returned to OH. We hope the flight went well. The laundry is done, the house is clean, and we are all better rested. The baby is taking longer naps. We're sad to be back to just the three of us but are in better shape all around.

The Baby is My Hobby

I've been thinking for a while that I need a hobby. All of my hobbies are either self-improvement goals: [1] (I will take walks! I will learn to cook!), [2] earlier failed hobbies (I will play the trumpet!), or [3] dressed up ways to do more work (anything electronic, linguistic, or bookish). For the near future I will continue playing with photography, which may actually end up falling into any of the above categories. At some point in the next year I'll create a professional blog (#3), and it sort of goes with the whole new dad experience (#1), but then again it may fall by the wayside (#2).

Part of my camera kit was a telephoto, so I was playing with that yesterday. Here's a cardinal that was on my parents' porch:

Part of the joy of a camera is spousal harassment. Doesn't Emily have beautiful eyes and freckles? (And even when they are giving her husband the "stop taking my picture" look.)

Here is Sam, deep in thought. I like Emily's face in the background. (Unrelated note: while we have been peek-a-booing Sam for a couple of months, he just started peek-a-booing us back. Fun!)

Solid food is tasty!

A good game of giggle belly:

That's pretty much the news from here. I drove home today and am on my own for the next week. I'm very sad to be away from Sam and Em :( However, my goal is to write lots and lots every day, go to meetings, and have things squared away for the new semester. Emily's goal is to pawn the boy off on her family as much as possible and start working on the dissertation. So maybe neither of us really needs to be taking up any new hobbies this year...

Boy with Binky

I'm really enjoying the camera...

More Photos...

are uploaded here.

I am my Father's son

I realized recently that all of my paternal male role models have all carried around big cameras that they love. My aunt shot an album of inner city Baltimore. I've always loved cameras, but never took a class and always felt bad getting a big camera (I have a small history of losing and destroying electronics). Nonetheless, I finally took the jump. I have a smallish-slr and am very excited about it. Here are some recent Sam pictures. I plan to put up a new album on picasa soon.

I like this one of Sam at floor level.

Sam really pulls up well now.

This is his latest development--he is starting to take his hand off of things and practice balancing.

Merry Christmas

We’ve had a fun few days already. We’re now on leg two of our Midwest trip. Christmas we split between Emily’s family and my family. Sam is his usual charming self and is (a small miracle we accept) sleeping later into the morning (8ish). It’s been nice to have some extra pairs of arms to hold him and play with him.

Last night at the Christmas Eve service he played through about the first forty-five minutes but then was restless. I went downstairs and walked him around the fellowship hall. Holding his hands, he was able to step his way along with me for nearly the whole perimeter. He can also balance by himself on his legs—not for long, but for ten or fifteen seconds. I think he’s going to be a little runner soon.

We’re wishing you all a merry Christmas. This has been an exciting 2008 in our (expanded) family.

Storming and Studying

Sam loves to read--we did about 10 books today. I find No No Yes Yes a lot more fun than Western Civ.

The benefit of a popular name is that you get to see it on the cover of books.

He's now a selective crawler. If he sees something he wants, he can be there pretty fast. But he doesn't really just explore, and if the item he seeks is more than 10 feet away he's just not that interested.

Is that not the cutest smile ever? He knows he's learning some skills.

It's been an exciting few days. Yesterday we were snowed under. I took a long walk over to campus to pick up papers in the middle of the storm. It was a fun trip, and I talked to my parents on the way. One of my father's favorite lines for ministers is a quote he stole from the coast guard "we have to go out but we don't have to come back." I was impressed that the Post Office was open, so I mailed some things and picked up a passport app for Sam.

The other pictures above come from today's trip to the library. It was a lot of fun. I worked on the drive up and got some other work done in bursts throughout the day. I have no attention span lately, so I'm finding it very hard to stay engaged with work. I have the urge to spend money or watch videos, or escape the desk, but I can't quite pull it off yet.

I hope you reading this are all well. I can't believe 2008 is racing to a close. I have the feeling that it will be an exciting few weeks ahead of us.