Serif meets Jim

so the short version is we have been wanting a custom poster from Hatch for a while now and while they do custom jobs, they have a minimum quantity of 100, and we couldn't get it as large as we really wanted. DOH! i don't think i even know 100 people, much less 100 people who could appreciate/want a hatch print Serif related. the next idea was to see if Jim could do a piece for us. we finally got to talk to Jim today and he is so slammed he couldn't have done anything "before the kid went to college." so we are doing the next best thing, buying one of Jim's prints. Jim is the coolest! he oozes grace and humility, is full of great stories and it's an honor to own one of his pieces. he's even gonna add "for Serif" to it to make it unique and special. for those of you who don't know about Hatch, i highly recommend a trip downtown to check it out. it is by far my favorite place in all of Nashville. call me and i'll meet you there. below is Serif and Jim and the new addition to his room.

A Gripping Moment

Sunday we went to see Serif's buddy, Fox. Fox was just born a week and half ago and is so cute! They're going to have the best time together I just know it. Fox's parents are William and Karla and we met them early last spring at a church dinner and bible study. It's been so great getting to know them and to go through all of this new world together. We all feel that God lined this up and has also given our children playmates.

Anyways, on the car ride home I was riding in the back with Serif (of which I tend to do when Jeff's driving) and I was playing with him with this little frog toy. He normally goes to sleep in the car and especially once we hit the highway. He was being really content and just didn't seem tired so I was just taking advantage of that and talking to him and showing him different things. Something off the highway caught my eye and when I looked back at Serif he had grabbed the frog and was playing with it! He's got a great grip, but he hasn't held anything on his own yet until now. It was so cute and it totally shocked me to turn around and all of a sudden see him like that. It was an awakening moment of how quickly he picks up things and how many of these little moments there are going to be. I've learned to carry the camera with me just for this reason.

Mom and Serif

These were taken after we voted on Thursday, so he's 12 weeks in these photos! As I look back through photos of him, I realize there are very few of the two of us together. I thought these would be nice to add to the book. For those of you who don't know, our goal is to print this blog in book form so we will have this as his baby book. This has been the easiest way for us to keep track of our lives with him and what all's going on with the little guy.

This next week is my last week off work with him and I'm getting a little sad about that. Fortunately I'm able to go back slowly and not just whiz back in at full-time hours. That will help us both a lot I'm sure. I'm so grateful for my job and how understanding they are as a company. I'm so blessed and thank God daily for what he does for us!

First Pair of Boots

I was at the store the other day and saw these really great cowboy boots for Serif. I picked them up and looked at them and really liked them a lot but for some reason passed them up and put them back on the shelf. I was driving home from that store and just couldn't get them out of my mind and started kicking myself for not going ahead and getting them. The next day I was up at my work for a meeting and was talking to a co-worker about them. She said the place was on her way home and she'd be happy to get them for me. Well, Angela came through for us and they arrived at our house tonight. I guess it will really be a while before he can really wear them, but we were having fun with them for the time being. I guess the first photo is the best, but the second one turned out so hilarious I couldn't pass up posting it as well. His true feelings towards them? I guess time will tell.

I Voted Today

Okay so Serif didn't really vote today, but he did walk down to the school with me so I could vote. Unfortunately, they said that 12 weeks was too young to cast a ballot. Yeah, he's 12 weeks today! It's never too early to instill the principles of voting.

Anyways, for the record of the post. Today was the day Nashville votes on the issue of English being the official language of all government facilities. Basically the idea being that if you have to go to court about something (for instance) you have to be able to speak English in order to be presentable to the court. You could vote for or against this idea. I'm not going any further than that because this isn't meant to be a political post and I don't want to ruffle feathers or even go there. Everyone has the right to their opinion and that is why we vote. I believe that was stated in an earlier comment. ; ) So we'll just leave it at that.

up yours diaper genie!

NEXT

whether you like (or voted for) Obama, the "HOPE" poster Shepard Fairey created in support of Obama's presidential campaign is absolutely amazing. so much so the US National Portrait Gallery acquired it as part of their collection. in response to the success of these posters, Paste magazine created obamicon.me where you can recreate the look of Fairley's posters with your own photo.

here we have what serif might have looked like if Shepard would have painted him a poster (wearing Michelle's glasses of course). future president? maybe.

thanks to Chad for the link.

j

practicing our wrestling moves (traditional head-lock shown here)

first try at daycare

i had an eye appointment yesterday afternoon and the timing hit in the late afternoon before Jeff was due home for work. i decided it would be a nice opportunity to try out Serif at daycare. he was only there for a couple hours but he did great. he ate fine but fell asleep before he finished it, which is somewhat typical of him. full belly = tired baby. he normally wakes up after the 10-15 'stay-up' time though. i forgot the camera at home so i didn't get pictures of him in daycare, but here's a couple of good ones i took last monday (9 weeks). the shirt is one of my favorites and came from a website store called crazy8.com. they have super cute stuff for very reasonable prices. i think i'm finding old navy and crazy8 to be my favorite shops so far (for style and budget) the second photo is a little blown out on exposure, but the expression is too hilarious with this shirt!

Uncle Don

We really wanted this title to be 'Uncle Bubba feeds me oatmeal pies and Uncle Don feeds me deer', but it's a bit too long of a title.
Serif got to stay with his Uncle Don last week so Jeff and I could go out to dinner with some old friends. Uncle Don can't wait until Serif is old enough to take deer hunting and gets a little giddy over the little guy in camouflage. Of course Jeff and I aren't the camouflage type, but couldn't resist these little pants for when he goes to Uncle Don's. Now that will be the only place he wears them, but for 4 bucks (that's dollars - not deer) well . . . why not. Uncle Don even had a camouflage Christmas hat ready for him. Hmmm - would you look at that. Uncle Don, I'm not sure he's diggin' this whole camo thing. I think he's even looking a little scared with your Bambi's mom on the wall. I think he still loves you though and seemed to do really well staying with you for the evening. No deer jerky though please.

i gotta hold of mom's glasses

Please dad, no more Marilyn Manson!

i think we've birthed a giant

so here's dad and Serif at the big 2 month check-up. i had been dreading it for quite some time, but it turned out not so bad. (his new thing now is curling sideways into a 'C' shape.)

first of all, this visit was our first with this pediatrician. we have heard only great things about green hills pediatrics, so we decided to give 'em a shot. we were welcomed by this great little lady behind the front desk that totally new what she was doing (something i can't say for the other office we were at, sadly). then we were taken back to our room with our nurse, Wendy. she was great. she talked with us briefly and then weighed Serif and took his measurements. this was the one part we were looking forward to because we get tons of comments of how BIG he is - and we're just curious because he's heavy and is outgrowing everything! well, here ya go - he weighed in at 14lbs & 14oz., which puts him in the 97th+ percentile. his height was 24-1/2", which puts him in the 95th percentile. then his head measurement was at 15-1/4", which puts him in the 30th percentile. Jeff asked him if he'd been to see a witch doctor to get a shrunken head! perhaps they should've measured him around those checks and chin instead of the forehead! =o for those of you unaware of the percentiles, 50% is average, so him being at 95% on height means there are only 5% of boy babies taller than him - the 30% is below average so 70% of boy babies have a bigger head than him.

(we had to get a closer picture of those cute 'little' rolls down the side of his belly - the boy doesn't skip meals!)after all this we got to meet our new doctor . . . Dr. Ladd. he comes in the room, shakes our hands and introduces himself. he then hops up on the table and crosses his legs in an indian style position and says, okay lets talk. he was so informative, personable and energetic - we absolutely LOVED him! we talked about some questions that we had and then talked about vaccinations. he put us both to ease very quickly with all the talk about vaccines.he listened to his heart and heard no murmur. then checked out this little strawberry on Serif belly that he has developed. all that checked out fine and he said it will most likely go away by the age of 4. he talked to us a bit about that and reassured us it was no big deal. he then checked out all his parts and said all looks good. Serif even got a 'he's got a rockin' penis!' heeheehee. (ie. he got a good circumcision). =)after all this with the doctor, Wendy comes back to give all the shots. she walks in with this tray of syringes. Serif had been sleeping all afternoon and barely woke up for his weight, measurements and Dr. Ladd to check him out. Wendy woke him up to give him the vaccine that goes under the tongue, then did all the shots. yeah, he screamed with the shots but calmed very quickly afterwards and he was back to sleep again in no time. all this happened during his feeding time so we were fortunate that he was so lethargic and not crying for food! i did feed him before we left the office and he was out like a light by the time we got him to his carseat to leave. so far he's been doing good this evening and is sleeping most of the time. we are staying on top of the tylenol to ensure he stays feeling comfortable. so all in all it was a great visit and Serif did really well at yet one more doctors appointment.oh yeah - one more comment by the doctor. we are blessed to have a baby that likes to sleep. he said most parents at this stage are pulling their hair out trying to figure out why they still aren't sleeping through the night. we generally get 5-8 hours between feeding at night. we got 9 the other night. hopefully he'll keep that up pretty well. in general, he's always been a pretty good sleeper. we count our blessings!

one last photo that i thought would be worth posting. there was this note posted on Dr. Ladd's bulletin board that was so funny! apparently the medicine tasted awful!

Sleeping

this is one of my favorites that i couldn't pass up posting. this was taken after he ate this morning. (after the video) too cute. i could just stare at him for days!

he's been giving us anywhere from 5-8 hours sleep at night for the past couple of weeks. it's been so nice. he usually goes right back to sleep after that first feeding so we can fit in one more nap in the mornings. (atleast i can - dad's usually going to work shortly after that).

i have to add this. saturday night (01/03) was his first 9 hour night. yep - you read it right 9 HOURS!!! a friend of mine was in town from cincinnati (Jen Moots) so i didn't sleep for the first 4 hours of it, then i actually woke up wondering if he was okay and even waited up for a little bit. so i guess i didn't fully enjoy all 9 hours, but it's good to know he's got it in him! =)

9 weeks today!

week 8 has been the week of the fist, cooing and more smiles. he's beginning to try to talk to us a little bit. normally accompanied with a smile. just this morning i went to get him out of his crib and he looked at me and smiled. of course it made me melt. =) he's been smiling in response to things since mid-week 7, but this was the first from the crib like that. unfortunately i didn't get it on camera . . . just in my head. it was so sweet! we're realizing that he generally seems to be in his best moods in the morning so we were ready to film his smile and sounds this morning when it was time to eat. we got the smiles on the video, but the sounds are more like grunting rather than his normal cooing. oh well, can't have it all i guess.

the other big thing this week has been finding the fist. along with his fist to mouth connection comes slobber . . . and lots of it. it's his new way of keeping himself content and i have to say it's been quite nice. he's so fun to watch too. he's taking the pacifier less now (not that he ever took it much anyways though really), but gosh he's finding that thumb pretty quickly!! i've had to learn that the fist to mouth doesn't mean he's hungry anymore and has meant more learning on my part of other signs to watch for. i think i'm getting it down now though.

oh - and the noises you hear in the back ground are from Bingo not Serif . . . including 'peek-a-boo'. Serif's not talking quite that good yet. ; )