Memorial Weekend Day Trip and 7 Months Old!

Nathan is 7 months old today!!  In honor of that (incidentally) and (more so) in honor of the Memorial Day Weekend, we decided to take a day trip to Dan Nicholas Park, about an hour south of Winston-Salem.  We had a wonderful day and are even more excited because the park will even be more fun as Nathan grows older. 

We started out our tour of the park at the Wildlife Adventure.  The first exhibit probably was the best, an enclosure with two bald eagles.  Brian couldn't remember if he had ever seen bald eagles in person before, and I know I've never seen them so close.  We stood there and watched them for quite a while.

Next was the black bears.  We later saw this one much closer when he was swimming in front of another viewing window.  There was also a second bear in the enclosure that was much larger!

Brian and Nathan with the white tailed deer.  We all know what Brian would have done under other circumstances if he were that close to that deer!

There was also a wild turkey in the wilderness area, and Brian tried his turkey call ipod application on him.  We got a few gobbles, but I don't think he was fooled by us.

After seeing foxes, hawks, bobcats, a wild turkey, a wolf, chickens, a rooster, and more, we left to explore other parts of the park.

Have you ever seen such a funny looking cow or goat?

Farmer Nathan

One thing I found interesting: as we pushed Nathan around the park in his stroller, he would just sit there with a vacant stare on his face.  He wasn't unhappy, but just seemed resigned to life, and certainly not interested in what was going on around him.  But as soon as Brian or I would pick him up out of the stroller, he would get excited and eagerly look around.  I've also noticed this when I go for walks/jogs with him.  I wonder why that is?

Next, it was on to the Train Station for a short ride on a miniature train.

Nathan: Cheerful as usual!

A rare family photo

We were worried that Nathan was starting to get tired, so we decided to walk through the petting zoo before eating lunch.  Nathan's favorite was the turkey - he watched it for quite a while as it strutted back and forth for us.  Though we didn't actually pet anything, we also saw sheep, a pig, goats, a miniature donkey, doves, a peacock and more. 

To wrap up our park experience, we got lunch from the concession stand and then went for a walk around the lake.  By the end of our walk, Nathan had fallen asleep in the stroller, and we had done most of the activities that we could with Nathan this age.  We packed everyone into the car and decided to drive down to IKEA since it was just another 45 minutes away.  We expected Nathan to fall back asleep once we were on the road, but no luck. 

Nathan was so funny in IKEA!  We put him in a cart and he would sit there and play with the key toy we hung on the cart for him, or watch and grin at strangers, or (his favorite) bouncing in cart.  He bounced his way through most of the store, and I was just relieved that he was in such a good mood even though he hadn't had a second nap.  We had a snack of a "Princess Cake", which was a fluorescent yellow/green, and an open faced egg and shrimp sandwich - both were somewhat adventurous selections but turned out tasting pretty.  We bought a couple of things, then loaded up the car and headed for home, with Nathan sleeping the whole way.  It was a great day with the family!

Nathan's Favorite Things

I feel like lately I've been posting videos and photos without talking much about what Nathan is like at this stage.  So I decided to make a short list of some of Nathan's favorite things right now.  I'm sure I'm going to miss something, but this is a start.

Food.  Nathan is becoming a good eater, and he especially eats a lot at night.  I'll thaw a couple of ounces of food, and he gobbles them up and I have to go thaw more, or make some cereal or something. Two nights lately he's eaten almost 3/4c of food at night, which seems like a lot considering he's not 7 months yet.

Spoons.  Big people spoons, small "Nathan" spoons, wooden spoons.  It doesn't matter, he loves them all.  I took a wooden spoon to church for him to play with, and was sitting in the service wondering what people thought when I handed him a spoon to keep him occupied.  Like "can't they buy him real toys?"  But it kept him happy and quiet for a while, which was the whole idea, of course.

 Nathan loves playing with his spoon after eating.

Another spoon story: Nathan and I were sitting on the floor in the kitchen a week or two ago and I was eating a bowl of yogurt.  Nathan was playing with some toys but then got really interested in what I was eating.  I wondered if he was hungry, so I licked off the spoon and held it towards his mouth, expecting him to open his mouth for some food.  But no, he tried to grab the spoon out of my hands instead.  As I said, the kid loves spoons.

Tags.  As in the ones on toys that most people cut off before they give them to their child.  Luckily, I have quite a few toys with the tags still on, and Nathan loves them.  He will spend many minutes inspecting it, holding it in his fingers and turning it over, then he'll chew on it.  I bought him a "tag" toy, where there are lots of pieces of ribbon around the edges, simulating lots of tags (obviously my son isn't the only child with this obsession).  However, usually instead of playing with the dozens of ribbons that are on the toy, Nathan finds the REAL tag for the toy and plays with that.  Go figure.

This is Nathan's favorite tag, probably because its so big.

Yep, found the tag here too!

The cats.  Nathan gets really excited when he sees the cats, especially when he is sitting on the floor and they walk by.  Its even better when they decided to sit down close to him.  We working on "gentle" because he just wants to grab a handful of the cat's fur!

Look how excited he is!

Silly sound effects.  He loves it when Brian and I make weird noises at him, and within the last few days has begun to make some himself.  He cracks himself (and us) up when he makes his noises!

Anything involving his legs: bouncing in the jumper or on someone's lap, "walking" with Brian or my help, or just during tummy time when he kicks his feet against the floor.

Coughing.  He is finally almost over his bad cough, but he has resumed the fake coughing that he began quite a while ago.  He just likes the attention it gets him!

That's all I can think of right now!

Fun in the Kitchen

Here are some videos of Nathan in the kitchen: playing with his keys, looking at the cats and babbling up a storm.  His favorite sounds right now are "ra", "ba" and "la", though he sometimes it sounds like he makes other consonant sounds as well (occasionally I hear a "ma"!).

Nathan Loves the Bunny!

Hooray for Jennie and Sarah - thanks for taking pictures of my son when I'm slacking off.  So here we all are at the Branch Ranch two Sundays ago...

Don't you love the onesie?  Jennie bought it for me/Nathan for Mother's Day.  She's the best!

Sarah was a trooper holding Nathan, but eventually her arms got tired since Nathan loves to stand and bounce!

Oh, the bunny!  So much better then a cat because it can't get away as easily!

Yes, Nathan wanted to taste the bunny, but Leslie was too quick for him!

Such a cute picture!!  Nathan has so much fun with Aunt Jennie!

At the Park

Today Nathan and I went to the park. We visited with friends and got to swing and try to eat the wood chips.  I took pictures and a video!  A fun time was had by all!

Sucking on our tongue, our new favorite habit!

The closest thing to a smile that I got!

Eating, Reading and Playing the Piano

It was a rainy day today, so Nathan and I found lots of fun things to do in the house.

Breakfast: always a fun meal, especially if you get to play afterwards.

Reading is an important skill for any child to have. Nathan's off to a great start - he's a pro at opening and closing the book's cover.

What day is complete without a recital featuring an original score by the pianist?

Tomorrow I'll try to take some new pics with the still camera to share.

Coughing Nathan...

Ok, I'm sorry that its been so long since I've posted. Nathan's been sick on and off for the past two weeks. Two Sundays ago there was a snotty, sick kid in the church nursery and Brian predicted that Nathan would get sick from it. I was typically optimistic since he hadn't ever been sick, but unfortunately Brian was right this time.

Starting about a week and a half ago, we had a fussy and whiny Nathan with a runny/stuffy nose. By early last week, we could tell Nathan was feeling much better, but then on Thursday the runny nose was back with a terrible sounding cough. Poor kid! At least this time he didn't act like he felt as bad, but when the cough gets going, look out! He's doing better again, but was coughing pretty badly when he went to bed tonight.

Last weekend Brian and I spent a lot of time on the basement. We were working on cleaning and organizing the big room in the basement, and ended up with a big load of stuff for Goodwill and another smaller load for the construction dump. Now the remainder of the stuff in the room has been moved to the center in anticipation of painting the walls soon.

This past week, Byron and Sarah came back from Texas for a vacation, and we spent a couple of fun times with them.  Last Sunday there was a cookout at the Branch Ranch, which was a ton of fun and the weather was SO beautiful.  While we were there, Nathan was really excited about seeing and touching Leslie's pet rabbit, and I think someone got pictures of it, so hopefully I can a copy to post.  Then Tuesday night Byron and Sarah came over after dinner for the beginning of a video game duel between Brian and Byron.  Yesterday we went back out to the ranch for some more video game playing, while Nathan, Sarah and I hung out on the porch and played board games with Lesa (and Nathan got to pet the rabbit again!). 

Unfortunately I don't have any pictures to share from the past two weeks, but tonight we did get another good video of Nathan in his jumper.  Although he doesn't spend as much time in it as he used to, Nathan still loves his jumper, and tonight he was even more exuberent then usual.

Nathan continues to experience new foods, and overall he is a pretty good eater.  The two latest introductions were oatmeal and apples.  We've had the most trouble getting him to eat green beans so far, but after I mixed them with a good helping of rice cereal, he eats it much more willingly.  I guess green beans are more strongly flavored then some foods, and I think the texture of the homemade puree didn't help (he was gagging quite a bit!).  Next on my list is butternut squash, so I bought one on Friday and baked and pureed it today.  First time ever buying butternut squash, and I feel like if we are feeding it to Nathan, Brian and I should eat it also.  So I'll do something with it this week for us and we'll see how it turns out.  I guess this is a good side effect of making my own baby food - it will help me branch out past the typical fruits and veggies that I always buy.  In fact, I found out this week that Brian likes cauliflower, who knew?

Friday was Brian and my 5th wedding anniversary, so we celebrated in a memorable way by opening the cards that we got each other for our 4th anniversary.  Yep, that's correct.  After not opening our cards last year for a month or two after our anniversary, we decided to just hang onto them and open them this year.  The funny thing is that the card that Brian bought for me this year turned out to be the same one he bought last year.  And I almost did the same thing as well, but thought the card looked too familiar and kept looking.  So we opened last years' cards, but not this years'... I guess we are starting our own, unique anniversary tradition.  Thanks to everyone for the cards and well-wishes, we appreciate that you remember!

Well, I guess this comes to the end of my chatty post.  Hopefully this week I'll do better about posting and have some new pictures to share! 

Its Convertible Weather

Ready to take her for a spin, Dad.  Where are the keys?

Look at the intensity - this kid loves his sippy cup!

Sippy Cup, Ketchup and Mustard, Oldsmobile and more...

Sippy Cup

I finally bought Nathan a sippy cup with handles on it, and I wasn't sure how well it would go over.  However, Nathan seemed to love it!

Found my Feet!

Fun with Ketchup and Mustard

Another random event Nathan found hysterical. And when we tried to repeat it the next day, he looked at us like "what?".

Oldsmobile Ride

Nathan's first ride in the Olds, with the top down.