From Wit’s End

Sunday morning when we were in church, the congregation was reciting the Apostle’s Creed. Everyone said, “Amen” at the end, and a split second later, Jack said, “Ahh-mmm”. Wow! Up until now, he only used his one word at the end of grace at dinner. This was the first time he used it in a church context.

Then, just a few minutes later, Dr. Ferguson was saying something about baptism right before two babies were to be baptized. He mentioned something about people bringing babies to Jesus so that he could bless them, and out of nowhere, Jack said, “Ahh-mmm,” again! It’s sure to be a coincidence, but it’s still pretty freaky.

Then last night when we were sitting at dinner, Jack was sitting on the floor reading his books because he had indicated that he wasn’t really hungry for dinner. All of a sudden, he stood up with a book in his hand and walked over to us. He walked up to the table and reached up to put the open book up on the table. It was his little cardboard book about Jesus, and he had it open to the page showing a cartoon of Jesus blessing the little children that were brought to him. Okay, so now I’m totally freaked out.

Jack finished his last can of formula today! This last one took about a month to finish, because we just put one scoop in with the regular milk every morning and evening. Before then, he used about one can a week. I think that means that he used about 50 cans of formula over the last year! Each one was about $20-$23 each. You do the math. He’s definitely worth it.

Apparently while I was napping at midday, Jack took eight steps all by himself. His Uncle roused me with this news and told me that lunch would be ready soon. Rachel has officially deemed this as walking (since four steps wasn’t enough). I was a little annoyed that I missed it, until he broke that record right away by doubling it! He walked sixteen steps by coming to me in the kitchen. Watch out world, Daniel Jackson Wisdom is on the move!

[Uncle Nik is visiting for the week for Vacation Bible School at our church. He's staying at Aunt Jennifer's house.]

Aunt Jennifer, Uncle Nik and Future-Uncle Tim all came over for dinner this evening, and a good time was had by all.

Jack had a lot of firsts today. I think his Uncle Nik and company played a part in some of it, because Jack had more of an audience to perform for (and he just thinks that his Uncle Nik is the coolest guy around!):

• He took four steps on his own.
• Uncle Nik taught him how to jump! I wasn’t in the room at the time, but he watched Nik and then apparently his feet actually left the floor once or twice before he fell on his bum. The rest of the evening he spent being pretty proud of himself and “jumping” while on his knees and saying “Bah! Bah!” in time with his bouncing.
• Jack is off the bottle! For the past few weeks, we starting increasing his sippy cup usage so that the only bottle he had was the last one right before bed. TOnight, on a whim, I decided to give him his last milk in his sippy cup and he took it! And when he drank it all, he threw it across the room!

So all’s well with us, and Jack is coming right along. Especially when he has a big audience.

Jack took three steps without any aid this afternoon! He saw my cellphone against my ear and was sufficiently motivated to try and come over to talk to Grandma. So my mom heard my exclamation when he did the old one-two-three step. Hooray!

Meaning that he stood up on his own, barely shifted his weight onto one foot, shuffled his other foot a centimeter or two, and then promptly fell down. Rachel says that this doesn’t count, but I am the king of this castle, and I deem it worthy of a first step.

I was picking Jack up from Ellie’s today, and when I literally picked him up off of the floor, he put his hands around my shoulders and held them there. “He’s hugging me!” I exclaimed to Ellie.

Jack is usually a breathlessly-crawling chaos machine, but at least in one instance, he’s learning to be helpful. One of his fascinations is the dishwasher and all the shiny things therein. Yesterday evening, and again tonight, he picked a piece of silverware out of the bin. I took it from him and said “Thank you,” and he smiled and/or laughed and took another piece of silverware out. Realizing what was happening, I took all the sharp items out of the bin, then took the one he had in his hand and said “Thank you,” again. Thrilling him to pieces, he got another one out, waited for me to take it and thank him for it, and so on until the bin is empty. So Jack is only a year old and already he’s helping with chores!

Rachel and I were having a “how was your day” hug this evening, and then I saw Jack look at me and ask for a “HIGH FIVE!” I gave him a few HIGH FIVES, and then I mentioned to Rachel that “the green car is clean!” because I took it to the car wash at lunch time today (Sadly, it’s been a while). “High five, mommy!” I said, and Rachel and I high-fived. Rachel said, “Look!” Jack saw us giving each other his customary greeting, and he was applauding us. Yay!

…all by himself for the very first time tonight! Once in my sight, and once in Rachel’s sight.

The first time was while Rachel was changing his diaper right before bed. I wasn’t quite sure myself if he actually did it, but Rachel said that he was looking right at the object of his sign, so she was sure. I actually saw it for the first time when she was giving him his before-bed bottle. At our prompting, he did it again and again, and was pretty pleased with himself. What was his first sign, you may ask? I’ll give you one guess…

Before this, Jack would try to crawl but got his legs all tangled up. Many thanks to Anna & William Burk who coaxed him into crawling for the first time after our small group Bible study this evening

This picture was taken at Andy and Ellie’s house from their MacBook.

My son Jack has erupted his first tooth, and my Mom knew something about computers that I didn’t — namely how to enable posting to this blog past the new firewall on my computer. Will wonders never cease…

You know how I know? He can directly imitate his Mommy and Daddy when they say “Abba” (“Abba” translated means “Daddy”) He’s also uttering other consonants like “ga”, “da”, etc., but “Abba” is the first sound that he can imitate from us.

To celebrate Jack’s four month birthday and the fourth anniversary of the day Rachel and I first met, we went to the Riverbanks Zoo and Botanical Gardens, which was where I proposed to Rachel in the Rose Garden about three and a half years ago.

Jack rests up for the trip home..

August 12th: Bugaboo plays his music. (15.7MB AVI file)

August 21st: Hilarious Bubbles! (12.2MB AVI file)

More pictures forthcoming. Enjoy!

CAUTION: Painfully cute pictures ahead.

This evening I serendipitiously discovered that making a certain noise made Jack smile. So of course, not only did I do it over and over again, but I also attempted to get it on video. I got it on the third try, along with the great treat of Jack’s face going through a complete gamut of emotions in only a few seconds. Take a look by clicking on the picture below. I’m pretty sure you’ll want to watch it at least twice.

[31 seconds, 7.8 MB AVI file]

Oh, and as Dave Barry might say, “Goo-Gitchie-Goo and the Smile-Fuss” would make a great name for a rock band.

Well, Jack drank his last ounce of Momma’s milk early this morning. Rachel’s supply just kind of petered out this week, and she even got a little bit of mastitis, so that’s the end of that. Rachel’s a little glum that she couldn’t give him more than that, but we’re thankful for what she was able to give him, and we’re glad that there is a viable and nutritious alternative so that Jack can continue to grow.

Jack was weighed at the doctor today: 8 pounds, 12 ounces! That’s another gain of nine ounces in about four days. So Jack is back up into the 25th percentile in the weight chart. He’s still a little below the mean (about two standard deviations), but he’s growing apace with his fellow infants once more. Thanks for your concern and your prayers!

That was a bit of a scare. I woke up to Jack fussing a little bit at around seven-ish this morning, and fed him the bottle of formula on the nightstand as Rachel had instructed me. There was four ounces in the bottle, and it was the new type of formula that the “substitute” pediatrician recommended yesterday. Jack took three ounces of it, and then didn’t want anymore. Rachel woke up while I was feeding him, and we just hung out as a family. It was pretty cool. Jack was awake and in a good mood, so I decided to take him out to the den so that he could be with his “friends”, the plaid couch and the fan. I put him down on the couch and turned on the computer to check my e-mail. But I couldn’t stay away from him for that long, so I made faces at him and he was smiling and having a good time. Suddenly this white stuff came out of nowhere and flowed all over the couch cushion. I cried out in shock and dismay (I admit, more at the mess on the couch than anything else) and took Jack back to Rachel and to find a burp cloth to clean up his face with. He had spit up some of his breakfast, and it was the most spit-up I’d ever seen come out of him.

Rachel held him on her lap and cleaned him up okay. For a few minutes anyway, everything seemed okay. But a whole bunch of white stuff went all over the place again, more than the first time, and it was in his mouth and his nose. He didn’t make any noise, and Rachel cried out in shock and dismay. “This isn’t good,” she said. She immediately started the anti-choking measures that the nurse showed us before she and Jack were discharged from the hospital. “Where’s the phone? Call 911!” I found the phone and typed in those three digits. Just then Jack let out a good wail, so I didn’t press the green button that would actually call the number. “Get the nasal aspirator!” Rachel said. I got it, and Rachel sucked out his nostrils. He wailed once or twice more, and it was apparent that he was breathing properly. Rachel got Jack’s wet clothes off of him, and I held him against my chest the way he likes me to, careful to keep him upright in case anything else came up. He burped, sighed, and promptly fell asleep on my chest, wearing only a diaper.

Rachel called the pediatrician on call and he said it was too soon to tell if it was the new formula itself or that we just gave him too much. So I guess we’ll try again with less formula and some pumped breastmilk and see if that’s better. With lots of hugs and cuddles and a few tears and prayers of thanks, we should hopefully make it through the rest of the day quietly. Between this past week with Nik here, the spit-up incident this morning and spending this past weekend up at the farm, we have a bit of laundry and chores to do today. Jack’s waking up in his swing now. I think I’ll go hold him for a while.