Memorial Day 2010

Man to Man on Anders

It was just Anders and me all day. It went pretty well. He would not take a nap between his 3 and 7 pm feedings. That worked out in the end because he went to bed easily after the 7 pm feeding. I did take an extra morning walk to kill some time. I willingly got lured into a Roger monologue. He has been apologizing to the squirrels for cutting down one of the trees in his backyard. It really needed to be done, though. The power company would not do it, and some of those branches were weighed down with snow and ice last winter. I say this each winter to Anna, but it's amazing that we don't lose power more often considering how our power lines weave through the trees in our backyard.
Tomorrow we have pictures. I guess the family tie dye picture has been vetoed...

Correction

Anna was a well behaved child. I should not have qualified my allusion. If you disagree that Anna was a well behaved child, she will fight you.

Jumparoo

I took a video yesterday of Anders in his jumparoo. I have decided to stop trying to post videos here. Anna has had some success on facebook, so I will try there as well. I will have to learn from her how to do it. I feel like I'm close, but just missing a step or two. Anyway, I will continue posting pictures and writing on this page.

I think Anders might destroy the hanging banana and toucan hanging above him on the "Precious Planet" jumparoo. It's good to get video of it while still whole. Child 2 will have a diminished jumparoo. So far Anders has not been hard on this toys outside of this one, but I imagine that will pick up as he starts crawling. This morning he again rolled and wiggled out of the living room perimeter. I had to shut the basement door, just in case. We are going to have to decide what to do about Trudy's litter box, which currently resides in the basement. We will not be able to have the door to the basement open, but Trudy will need to be able to do her business.

Anna is going to a wine tasting a vineyard after work today, so it will be just Anders and me again until the early evening.

I'm going to grill some pork tenderloins for us (me). I think we will go on a shorter walk than yesterday when we probably traversed half of Athens. We went from the Currier Street entrance to the bike path down to the Richland Avenue bridge, then back through uptown and home. I did it in part because Anders was sleeping so well along the bike path. He woke up as we approached Richland Ave. and took everything in from there on home including much traffic and many sunbathers.

In DC, people go Maya Lin's artwork to remember the Vietnam War, in Athens they head to her artwork to sunbath--different strokes for different cities.

Anders on the Move

Best Behaved

Anders attended his first children's sermon yesterday. He stood and watched the whole thing (with my help). I am convinced that you have to reach up to about the age of 9 to find a child as well behaved as Anders. I will not take credit for his good behavior. I don't totally understand it and I realize that it could change at any time, but the more I see other little kids the more impressed I am by Anders comportment. Anna, however, will take credit. She says that she was a perfectly behaved little child. I have no way of verifying it, but it sounds like her so we will go with it. I, in the words of my grandma, was a rostabos (sp? It's a Swedish word that essentially means hyper little boy who gets into everything).

Anders is starting to teeth, but he is taking it in stride with a stiff upper lip, mostly. He has about four bottom front teeth coming through. He is also starting to cross his body with his limbs i.e. grabbing his right foot with his left hand and visa versa. I thought there was something else, oh yeah.

So, Anders was talking to Grandmaw on Skype. We had some technical problems, so we had to use the regular phone for audio. I put Anders on the phone and he said "hi" at the appropriate times!

On Friday, I took Anders to the History Graduate Student Association election at Brown House. He was totally quiet, until the president presiding over the election asked for objections to the VP nominee, at which point Anders let out a Wookie howl. That cracked up the room.

It looks like the weather will be nice this week, which means a lot of strolls. Anna gets out of school on Friday. Anders and I will be going to the Toyota dealer for a service check tomorrow. We have family pictures on Saturday. Anna is attending a bachelorette party in West Virginia on Friday night (insert your own joke here).

I better shower before Anders wakes.

Kashyyyk

It was only a matter of time before the planet of the Wookies titled a post. You will be surprised to know that Anna, not me, decided that the new noises Anders makes sound like those of a baby Wookie. I can't describe it any better than that. Had Chewbacca sired a son and had that son made baby noises, they would sound like Anders does now. We'll be driving along and he will just be back there talking to himself in Wookie. At least he doesn't speak Huttese!

It's really funny, which sets Mrs. Cough-y off, so then we have a car full of baby bellows and smokers' cough. It's something to hear!

What's really funny is that I used to bring up Kashyyyk in polite conversation after the 3rd Star Wars movie came out in 2005, which used to send Anna into orbit. Now, she's making Wookie comparisons! You just never know.

If I didn't tie this Wookie thing directly to my glorious past, it would be like a Paul McCartney song without the "Woohoooooo!" So, in high school one of my football teammates used to call me the Wookie because I was tall, hairy, and had a crazy laugh. Why not Chewbacca? Well, we already had a Chewie on our team.

Anders may end up resembling me a lot or not at all, but I find these similar threads interesting, and you must too if you are still reading this weblog or blog.

OK Computer

We purchased a Mac last weekend, as evidenced by the picture backlog. I tried putting up a video, but that didn't work. I'm hoping to find a website where I can consistently post Anders videos. We also have a skype account now, so if you add us, you can see Anders in action. I assume that I am the only Jon Peterson in Athens, Ohio. That's how you can find us.

Anders woke at 4:30 am today. I fed him a bit after 5. I need to stop bragging that I can count on one hand the number of times Anders has not slept through the night!

We had a nice visit with Brad last weekend aka "The Godfather." Dr. Brad, who no one will confuse with a kindergarten teacher, couldn't stop gushing, "Anders, it's been more than two minutes since you smiled, what's wrong?!" That Anders magnetism is powerful.

Well, Anders is kicking the wall. His schedule is messed up due to the early wakeup. I meant to write more, but gotta go.

Last Backlog

More of the Backlog

Greenzo

Old Blue Eyes

Ibid.

picture backlog

Kindermusic

I took Anders to his first session of Kindermusic today. Kindermusic revolves around your baby listening to music, dancing around, and working on coordination. Anders had a blast! He wouldn't stop smiling or shaking. He charmed the instructor and tried to woo the other baby in the group, Vera. We were supposed to have two other babies, but they didn't show. Athens is all sixes and sevens as they try to install a roundabout at Ohio's 78th most dangerous intersection. It was hard getting to the Dairy Barn. I hoped to finish this point before the Anders Meltdown owing to a lack of sleep, but it's coming so I must go.

18lbs. 10oz.

Anders now weighs 18lbs. 10oz. He is now 28 inches long. His weight is either at the 21% or 31% for a 10 month old baby. I can't remember. Something was one and something else was the other percentage, but I can't figure out to what the stray percentage relates. The most amazing percentage was that for a 10 month baby (Anders' adjusted age is 7 months and he remains more of a seven month baby) his head is at the 96th percentile!
Dr. Lepi was concerned about this development, until we talked doctor to doctor. He was worried that he had a premie head that was very long and not wide enough and growing too fast for the rest of his body. I then told him about how I had to special order glasses that were long enough to reach from my eyes to my ears and how I had to wear a high school red football helmet in 7th grade when everyone else had a white helmet. The other part of the football helmet story was in high school when they had a helmet big enough for me, but I didn't fill it up on the sides. So, like Anders, my head was really long, but not equally wide and I was late, not premature. His soft spot is closing up, so Dr. Lepi thinks the massive head growth should be coming to an end.
Everything else looked for with Anders. His lungs sound good. His right ankle and Achilles tendon are a bit tight, which happens in term babies, but is a bit more common in premies. He will have a physical therapy followup in Columbus this summer.
Sorry about the lack of recent pictures or video. When I load those items into our laptop, they disappear into the ether. Regarding the desktop, we had to delete some items for more memory. Then we tried to upgrade our antivirus software, but instead we now have no antivirus software on the desktop. The desktop is the same vintage as my senior year in college, so it has served us well for a long time. We are planning on getting a Mac in the next couple of weeks. We will have no viruses, no software to load, and it will have a camera built in, so we should be able to do all the things we have been doing, along with finally adding Skype to the equation.
We will probably also need to get a new car seat soon. Once he gets above 29 inches, we need to get an adjustable car seat, which could take him up to age 5, according to Dr. Lepi.
It's a rainy day here. I don't know if we will be able to go for a walk today. Anders is napping now. His morning nap was delayed by the appointment.

Annaders

Well, Anna continues to fight new allergies. She didn't used to have allergies before Anders. I'm pretty sure her body changed after Anders, which then afflicted her with allergies. Trust me, I'm a doctor.
Her hives are under control, but her smoker's cough continues to rage.
Anders continues to do well. We took Anna out to Lancaster for Mother's Day this afternoon. During Anna's time as a Zombie last week, I took Anders to Chipotle to pick up dinner. I have never seen him so excited. He flirted with a couple of coeds in line. Then, we he got to the front of the line, he did a full body Ando Shake so intense that I had to move away from the sneeze guard. The smells, sights, and sounds as they made our burritos was like nothing Anders had ever experienced before. One college guy asked me in all seriousness if I was getting a mini burrito for Anders. Perhaps, if he had teeth...
I took Anders to breakfast with our friends the Brunnings at the OU Inn yesterday. He had a calm, but enjoyable time. There were many people to watch there.
Anna is planning on going back to school tomorrow. They don't really do anything in May after testing ends in April, so there is no point in missing the month-long last day of school that is month of May.
Anders has his last appointment with Dr. Lepi on Tuesday. He is leaving Holzer Clinic at the end of the week. He helped our transition back to the SEO from Minnesota quite a bit. We will miss him. He is also my doctor, so I will have to find another doctor to prescribe my "sleeping on my arm medicine.
My contact just fell out, better go.

All's Quiet on West Hills

Anna saw a dermatologist today, who gave her some sort of horse tranquilizer, which pretty much laid her out from 1pm to now. She hadn't slept for three days. Her horrendous hacking cough came back, but she must have taken another dose or something because she is quiet now.
Anders went to bed just after 8 pm, a new record. Of course, he was up at just after 6 am. I ran out of ideas today for our extra hours together. We must have strolled 5 miles today. The weather was great for it, mid 80s and sun. I think Anders misses Anna, however.
Anna is planning on going to school tomorrow. I hope she and Anders can get reacquainted tomorrow as well. These hives are no laughing matter. I've never seen Anna so miserable.
Not much new on the Ando front...it seems that he doesn't like green beans as much as carrots. We made our daily trip to Kroger where Anders eyed our clerk suspiciously until he finally smiled at her.
Oh, and I think I may have finally totally submitted my dissertation, but who really knows? As long as they don't pull me out of the graduation line on June 11, I'll consider it good.

In this episode, Jon turns in his dissertation again, Anna contracts hives, and Anders squares off with a chicken

I know it sounds like a broken record, but I turned my dissertation in again to a different arm of the university. I should have everything cleared up on that front by Friday. In actuality, I don't think I will be done until they have mailed me the piece of paper weeks after graduation.
Anna contracted what looks and sounds like the 11th Biblical plague. I'm not sure who or what Anna is keeping in bondage, but I hope she lets it go soon. She contracted a virus that gives her hives that itch all over her body. In addition, she has had a hacking cough for the past 10 days. She hasn't gone to school this week and will not go tomorrow. Fortunately, she has some sick days once again. Her steroid cycle should ease the rash and itch in the next day or so. After that, I'm taking her down to the baseball field for some soft toss. Perhaps we can get West Hills Drive renamed Anna Peterson Boulevard just like that stretch of I-70 in St. Louis that is named for Mark McGwire. As a result of Anna's agony, I have been on constant Ando Duty. I'm not complaining and I would not switch places. I did not, however, realize just how important it is to be able to make the call to the bullpen for a reliever. Anna just called this hive-rash "torture," between coughs. We really haven't been able to take a deep breath since Anders was released from the hospital, or more accurately since July 25.
On a lighter note, I took Anders to the last baby story time at the library until the middle of June. There were a handful of babies younger than Anders there. Anders was doing his controlled stand in the circle when the woman who runs this activity broke out her recorder and started playing, which made Anders cry. I think the problem was that she was behind Anders. Anders does not like any noises that happen behind him, or really out of eyesight for that matter. She promptly stopped playing. I never tire of watching Anders focus those baby blues on someone and draw them into his world.
Anyway, our leader brought a chicken named Goldie from home to send us out with a bang. Most of the babies and tots cowered in fear. A couple of toddlers petted Goldie. Anders was the only straight-up baby who went in for the pet. He did the Ando Shake as a sign that he wanted to get closer, which looks sort of like R2D2 trying to get sold to Uncle Owen outside the sandcrawler at the Skywalker moisture farm on Tatooine. And a happy Star Wars Day to you too (May 4th be with you). He grabbed some feathers and looked the chicken in the eye. I understand that the chicken was scared, almost as scared as when Goldie plays Herkie in football (sorry MN Steve).
The other funny Anders anecdote came from last weekend when our friends Dan and Jessica visited us. Owing to a communications breakdown, I thought they were arriving on Saturday, while they were really coming on Friday. Anders did not like that I was on the phone Friday morning, clearing this up. He was making noise, which usually prompts me to put Anders on the phone, at which point he smiles and quiets down. While talking to Dan, however, he remained agitated and hung up on him! Upon arriving, Anders took to Jessica right away, but was more wary of Dan. He slapped and grabbed at his face more than he does to most people, and shot him some withering glances. Dan got even by taunting Anders. Yet, when it was time for his friendly rival to leave, Anders was demonstrably sad to see him go. I must say, I understand where Anders is coming from. It was a fun visit.
So, to sum up, a dissertation is never really done, don't get hives, and some babies aren't chicken.