Sundays With Oliver - Week Forty-Six

Oliver experienced snow for the first time this week. We got about an inch of snow on Tuesday. I was home sick (I’ve been trying to beat a cold for a couple of weeks now... the cold is winning) so I got to see him in the snow. Oliver loves the cold and seemed to be really intrigued with the new weather event.

In true Texas style, the week began with a snowstorm and ended with a gorgeous weekend. We spent as much time as possible outside this weekend. The weather was unbelievable. Spring is on its way!

In other news, Oliver’s top two teeth have finally broken through! It took long enough. He’s been fussing and cranky for weeks. He’s started pointing at everything now. He loves to drop things from his high chair and then point at them. He also likes to clap with his two pointer fingers. It’s pretty silly looking. He’s also getting more and more verbal. He loves to gabber away. We thought he had started saying “ball” this week. He would grab a ball in his playpen and say “ba.” We were so excited until he grabbed his wagon and said “ba” and then grabbed his remote control and said “ba.” Oh, well. He’s started cruising around using the gates of his play yard but he’s still showing no interest in standing up on his own so I don’t think he’ll be walking anytime soon (which is unfortunate because he is REALLY heavy).

Here are the pictures from this week. Every single one of them came out blurry. Sorry. He’s looking super chunky this week. I guess he’s due for another growth spurt.

Sundays With Oliver - Week Forty-Five

Oliver was kind of a bear tonight (teething? diaper rash? overly tired? who knows?) so this will be a short post. We had a pretty good week. Ever since I got home from California, however, Oliver has moved his wake up time to 5:30 every morning. That’s making for some very tired parents. I’m hoping he’ll move it back to 6:30 soon although it has been nice to get into the office early and get stuff done.

Oliver and I spent Friday night at my parents’ house while Brian worked. We had fun playing with the grandparents. On Sunday Lindsey came over and we all met Laurie, Robin and Lydia at the Children’s Museum. Oliver terrorized the place for awhile and then got cranky so we headed back home. He’s such a goofy kid. He’s never calm. He’s either laughing and smiling and crawling all over the place or he’s fussing and cranky. So emotional! 

Here are the pictures from this week. His hair is ridiculous.

Sundays With Oliver - Week Forty-Four

It’s so good to be home! We had a great week spending time as a family. It took a couple of days but we eventually fell back into our “normal” routine. It’s so amazing to me how much he changed in one week. He learned new tricks, plays new games, and grew. He’s currently really into things that roll or things he can make roll. He takes toys and scoots them around the floor making what I’m calling car noises (you know that wound when you blow air through your lips? Some people would call it another kind of noise but not me). He’s also mastered “walking” behind his push toys. He walks around the house behind his wagon and train. When he can’t find a toy that has wheels that he can stand up and push, he resorts to moving the furniture around. He pulls himself up on our side table and pushes it across the living room. He also likes to move the barstools around. I keep joking that we watched too much HGTV when he was a newborn and now he’s got a flair for design. He’s showing no interest in actually walking yet, though. He won’t even try to stand on his own. He’s so fast at crawling that he just drops down and crawls wherever he wants to go.

We had an awesome weekend. The weather on Saturday was gorgeous so we went and hung out at the park. We brought a blanket and watched birds and joggers go by. After the park we went to lunch at Torchy’s (I haven’t been there since the green chili taco disaster of Oliver’s second week). That afternoon Lindsey came over and we spent the afternoon/evening/night celebrating numerous holidays in one. We baked a King Cake to celebrate Mardi Gras, had Chinese food delivered for Lunar New Year and baked chocolate souffle cupcakes for Valentine’s Day. Brian, Oliver and I spent a lazy Sunday together. I didn’t get out of bed until 10:30! Oliver woke up around 6 and he and Brian went to the grocery store while I slept in. When they got home around 8:30 Brian brought Oliver into our room and he slept with me for another two hours. When I (finally) got up Brian made me a great breakfast of Eggs Benedict. Yum! Sunday night Brian and I made coq au vin, drank some wine and watched a movie to celebrate Valentine’s Day. We were in bed by ten. What a great night!

In other news, Oliver has been really exhausted the last couple of days and has been refusing solid food (he’s been subsisting on breast milk and oatmeal cereal). He was also running a slight fever on Saturday and had a horribly painful diaper rash for a couple of days. Other than all of that, he doesn’t seem sick (he’s not crabby, he’s sleeping well, etc.) but we’re keeping an eye on it. If his appetite doesn’t improve in a couple of days we will take him into the doctor.

Here are the pictures from this week (Eight more weeks!):

Sundays With Oliver - Week Forty-Three

This update is WAY late but I swear the pictures were taken many days ago. I haven’t had much time to blog since I got back since I’ve been way too busy cuddling with Oliver. Last week was the hardest week of my life. I never stopped missing Oliver while I was in California. We Skype’d numerous times but it’s just not the same. Pumping went fine but if I never see that damned machine again it will be too soon (unfortunately, I’m still pumping twice a day at work). Oliver and Brian had a great week, which Brian will tell you all about sometime soon (he’s promised to do an entry about his week as a single parent). 

As hard as being away from Oliver was, the reunion was amazing. I got home late on Sunday night so I didn’t get to see him and hold him until he woke up on Monday morning (I would like to commend myself for the remarkable restraint I showed by not rushing into his room and scooping him up in the middle of the night). He seemed genuinely surprised and excited to see me when I went into his room on Monday morning. He was still pretty sleepy but after I had kissed him a few times, he leaned way back (as if to take in my whole face) and then smiled the biggest smile ever. I melted. We’ve been slowly but surely falling back into our family routine in the past couple of days. Any fear that Oliver would wean himself has proved to be totally unfounded. He’s nursing like a champ. Scratch that, he’s nursing like a newborn. He’s had quite a few marathon feedings since I got home (including one that lasted two hours this afternoon) and seems to be doing more comfort sucking than he’s done in a long time (I keep joking with Brian that Oliver would totally take a pacifier now if we offered it to him. We’re not going to, though, since I don’t want to have to wean him).

Here are the pictures from this week: