Our 1st Post - FINALLY!

YAY! We're going live!!!! It's taken me absolutely forever but I'm finally getting our family blog up. It's only taken a month to get going from the account creation and yet I'm still feeling pretty good about it. It's been so hard to keep in touch with people the way we'd like to and let everyone know what we're doing and perhaps more importantly, what The Max Factor is doing.

This first post will be a couple Max Milestones that I started to write about a while ago when they happened. I'll try to start with the most recent and proceed from there.

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FEET
Yes, it’s true, dear Max has feet and now that he’s found them what fun they are! He seemed to realize he had them about the first week in April and now he wants to grab them all the time. At first he’d pull on his PJ toes but we’ve now unleashed the feet so he can kick his legs up and grab those little piggies.

They seem to provide endless entertainment. I can’t wait to see how much fun he’ll have when he realizes he can get them in his mouth. (That happened a while ago and he loves sucking on his toes. Maybe because his big toe is SO BIG it's a lot like sucking his thumb. We went to Leesburg, VA this past weekend and he sucked his toe nearly the whole 1/2 hour drive. Of course, he couldn't decide left or right toe and kept alternating.) Those orange monkey socks were pretty wet by the end of the drive.

ALMOT SITTING (Mid-April)

Seems like he is close to sitting up on his own. He can sit in his bumbo. (Why do all baby accessories have to have SUPER STUPID names? Maybe it’s just us but we feel pretty dumb referencing a BUMBO in adult conversation though we are able to remain more straight-faced than when we referenced the My Brest Friend pillow.). Little Max can also sit pretty darn well in his boppy. (See above comment.) He can sit unassisted for a minute or so but then he does the slow motion lean/crash to the side and flips to his stomach. Six weeks ago he’d just slump to the side and was stuck. At least now he has a plan when he falls.

The funniest part of this whole learning to sit thing is eating. He started to eat cereal two weeks ago and was content to recline in his papason while impersonating a baby bird any time he saw the spoon. Not so content with the semi-reclined position any longer. Now it’s all about crunches and trying to sit forward while strapped into the papason.

It’s funny because he doesn’t really have control of his upper body yet and the momentum can get the best of him sometimes. He’ll be sitting there opening his mouth for cereal one minute and his torso starts flying forward the next minute while his head moves to the side. Much messier.

So funny to watch Max get acquainted with his body and the world at large. Every day brings something new and usually something pretty darn amusing.

As for the rest of us…Lyle sleeps and changes his position several times a day. He and Havers have a little face off every night at 9 pm, like clockwork. He is showing more interest in Max but not enough to stick around once Max shows interest in him.

Havers is still a little hurricane and has proven to be quite the escape artist. She can get out of the fence in less than 10 seconds and with no visible hole in the ground or disturbance in the fence. Part opossum, it appears. She now wears a shock collar in the yard so that if she leaves the fence, it starts beeping at her about 3 ft. out and shocks her if she goes further. Originally it was set up to shock her when she got to the fence but she got shocked twice and was terrified of the backyard. She wouldn’t leave a two foot zone near the house. Then we took the collar off and little Miss Smarty Pants knew that she wouldn’t get shocked so she shot out of the yard double quick. Now, we’re hoping she will see the yard as a fun playground but not the area beyond the yard. Thus, if she goes very far outside the yard – zap. She’s gotten out once since then but she paced back and forth in the 3 ft. no beep zone in the neighbor’s yard. Wouldn’t you like to be our neighbor?

As for Dan and myself…all is going well. We just got windows installed in the basement. It’s so much quieter down there now and you don’t feel that gust of wind when you get near the wall. Dan is getting ready to start finishing the basement, which is our major project for the summer.

We’re both working though we don’t really have late nights or early mornings for now. Dan is working on his abs of steel and I’m hoping to get started on abs of aluminum. In the getting fit column, I’ve started walking in the evenings with a gal I met through work. We both bring our babes in strollers and head out on the concrete path around post. Quite an enjoyable way to start the evening. Mostly, we are enjoying our time with Max. It amazes me how easy it is to just hang out and stare at him while he reaches, grabs, rolls, kicks, coughs, eats, coos, laughs and plays with his toys. It is really amazing.

Max and his MAN HANDS (End of March)
About 2 and ½ weeks ago Max began seriously contemplating his hands. After his early morning breakfast, he’d lay in bed with us and stare intently at his hands for ½ hour or so. Couldn’t seem to look at them enough. He would stretch his fingers and turn his hands from one side to the other. Look at one and then the other then hold them together.

They are pretty cute and we’ve yet to get a good close-up of them to share with friends and family and to document for posterity. We’re working on it and you can see the best we’ve got below. I’ll tell you one thing – the boy’s got MAN HANDS. He had the longest fingers when he was born and his hands have grown to match them in the months since.

He doesn’t just look at his hands; he uses them all the time now. It’s amazing to watch him concentrate on grabbing things. Most of his grabbing is directed at items we hold near him though he’s started to grab at things in his general vicinity. What he really seems to want but hasn’t gotten yet is a big handful of Havers fur near her ears. I’m sure he’d settle for an ear, but it’s her Farah Fawcett feathered hair right behind her ears that he eyes most determinedly. The only problem is that she is too quick for him with her long ol’ tongue. That thing comes flying out they moment he starts to move for her hair and she licks his fingers and tries to get his face, too. Maybe one day soon…

Monster post for our first one. I still haven't quite figured out the pictures yet. Hoepfully, we'll get better over time.