And I thought he'd be my mellow baby...


I was wrong. Cheerful, yes. Aggressive, yes. But not mellow.

The other day I had him sitting in his high chair. I needed to keep him occupied so I gave him a quarter of a graham cracker, which I thought would buy me at least 5 minutes.

I watched as he took it, broke it in half, stuffed both halves into his mouth, waited a minute and then swallowed. He then proceeded to bang on his tray for more.

Then, when I didn't get more cracker fast enough to suit him, he dismantled his tray. He managed to unsnap the white liner, played with it for a minute, then tossed it onto the floor and moved on to the more challenging task of taking his tray off. I couldn't believe my eyes. It's like watching the giant baby in Spirited Away destroy the house. And, by destroy the house, I don't mean make it messy. I mean take the roof off and go after the foundation with a jackhammer. We've taken to calling him the baby dinosaur because, well, it fits.

the seventh street news

Well, Hucky finally cut a tooth. This is a little late - it was actually almost 2 weeks ago now. The one right next to it is well on its way to coming through now.
Also, he's started into some squash and graham crackers with vim and vigor. He LOVES food. We are also working on getting him to sleep through the night.
And just to keep up the tradition in our house of making everything happen at once, he has also been crawling around and therefore is very happy on his own for quite some time now, but also has discovered the world of "no-touches". He doesn't like "no-touches" or rather, he does, he likes them a lot, he likes them too much and he is rather upon his dignity at being flicked for trying to stick his fingers in outlets. Electrocution is sooooo much fun.
He also crawled into my lap all by himself this morning. There aren't words.

Flannery continues onward with the most bizarre and funny commentary on the world - pretend or real. This morning as I walked into the kitchen to make breakfast, she informed that "God made bunnies so that they can pick their noses."
Really.

Chai chi

Flannery on the guy who does tai chi in the funeral home parking lot
behind our house: "Mom, there's that guy doing chai tea behind our
house!"

Mint juleps, et. al.

Flannery says to her papa in a shy little voice, "papa, you need a
mint julep."

Brendan turns into a puddle of goo over his daughter's deep wisdom and
cuteness and says as much out loud to me.

Flannery says, "that's because I can speak in cute voice."

Then she put a napkin on her head. "I'm napkin-head!" Napkin-head, so
you know, makes frequent appearances at our table.

Then, a cup. "I'm cup-head!" The cup was a glass, so we bid her to
remove it from her head.

The cup safe, she scanned the table and her eye lit upon what remained
of the evening's taco filling.

"I'm meat-head!"

I believe that is when we completely lost it.

rummy vanilla and french kissing

I allowed Blaise and Flannery to taste my homemade vanilla today - dark rum with vanilla beans that sits...and sits...and sits...
They then proceeded to run around the house saying, "Hmmm..wow. Ummm. Hmmm. " and coughing.

Also, we were watching Chuck. There was a kiss. Flannery saw it and said in great confusion, "They're eating each other!"

cutest thing EVER

Flannery just requested the Dr. Seuss story "The Star-Belly Sneetches"....with a mouth FULL of peanut butter and jelly. You should try it, it will be hard, but it won't be as cute.

The rolls are rolling

So, Huckleberry is rolling all over the house now. He's very pleased with himself when he flips from tummy to back. Having this new ability to roll around has gotten him into some "tight" spots so far too - hand stuck in between the ribs on a laundry basket, feet under a chair and head under the coffee table, or my personal favorite: he rolled himself right up to Flannery's doll house in such a way that his body could have kept moving, but his head was bonking on the house. He found this very frustrating. Flannery was distressed. I, wonderful mom that I am, couldn't help laughing at it.

Flannery is sooo close to reading. I can't believe that my child almost knows how to read. I could soliloquize on this quite a bit, but suffice it to say that some of the best hours of my life were spent reading. Reading Laddie on the HUGE, puffy, comfy sleeping machine that we had for a couch, reading The Veiled Lady in my room on my bed while it was pouring rain outside, reading Elisabeth Barrett Browning outside by a creek under an apple tree in bloom, reading Mandie books late at night by the crack of light coming in under our bedroom door - don't let your kids do that one. I now wear glasses because of this habit.
I just realized that I went on about it anyway.
Oh well. I'm excited for Flannery and the fun she's about to have.
Anyone want to share their favorite childhood novels with me?