I can only hope that the rest of Mr. E’s life is this charmed. You see, he doesn’t realize that we don’t get a beautiful snow like this every year. As far as he is concerned, this is what Portland does in December. We took some shots of Elliott in his first real snow today (the rest of the week was kind of a tease). Don’t worry, we were outside for just a couple minutes — long enough for him to feel snowflakes fall on his cheeks for the first time.
Elliott's First Snow
Well, Elliott still doesn’t really *eat* food, but he does *play* with it. At dinner, I gave him some Cheerios to see if he might consider putting them in his mouth. I showed him by eating one myself and then he stuck one in his mouth for a second. But then his magnanimous side won out and he began feeding everyone at the table — Auntie Vanny, Momma and Daddy. Here’s a shot of him feeding Daddy.
Cheerio Dad
Elliott’s cousin Beatrice has generously lent us her rocking chair. And just today, Elliott discovered it. He tried to pull himself up onto it, so to avoid a spill, Mom picked Elliott up and sat him in the chair right next to the Christmas tree so he could play a bit. He obliterated a candy cane and then set his sights on the nutcracker in this photo. He was very gentle with it as Mom keeps telling him to be with everything. Look how he loves to study things!
Elliott and The Nutcracker
What do you do with a drunken sailor…when he gets into your recycling and finds an empty bottle of rum? Well, in our house you take a picture. Elliott is a big fan of the recycling area now that he is mobile. Tons of fun stuff that mom and dad never intended for him to play with. Thank goodness he hasn’t found the knives yet!
Drunken Sailor
I have seen many cute things over the past 9 months, but nothing melts my heart more than catching my 2 guys snoozin’ together. One of these is of Peat and Elliott asleep in our glider downstairs; another is of them catchin’ some z’s in the overstuffed rocker in Elliott’s room. And the third one is one of my favorite pictures of all time — Peat had just come back from his first trip away since Elliott had been born. He had been the co-pilot in a small plane (they flew all night making several stops) up from California. It was 6 in the morning and Peat finally made it to bed and I caught Elliott having a sweet dream now that his Daddy was back at home.
Sleeping with Dad
Boy and Dad
Sweet Dreams
Elliott is officially a little geek. He gets very frustrated when mom and dad tell him he can’t beat up on our laptops. He loves remotes, cell phones, anything electronic. Today, he found the Playstation 2, which we play our DVDs on. So I unplugged the controller, so he couldn’t do any damage and let him play with it. Soon after, he fell asleep, controller in hand. Definitely daddy’s little geek!
Little Gamer
Did you know Elliott has 9 aunts and uncles? 1 aunt and 2 uncles on Peat’s side and 3 aunts and 3 uncles on Nova’s side. That doesn’t even count all the cousins and friends who are unofficial “aunts” and “uncles”. This shot is of Mr. E and his Aunt Taylor. Aunt T Liz was his first regular babysitter, watching him a couple of days a week during the summer. Yesterday, was the first time they had seen each other for a while since she is back in school now. Elliott is a lucky boy to be surrounded by so many people who adore him.
Aunt Taylor
Many people have worn this “Heidi/Santa” hat — Nova, Peat, Gabe, Beatrice, Sam the Soctopus. Now, it’s Elliott’s turn. He knows it’s silly. Look at the look on his face. I put it on him while getting ready for our Tree Decorating open house. Our tree is quite beautiful (Peat picked out a beaut) and Elliott is mesmerized. More Elliott Christmas wonder in store.
Santa Braids
When I was pregnant, I used to think of all the ways I would maintain my regular life after having the baby. I wasn’t going to be one of those paranoid moms and I wasn’t going to put all my nice things away or turn my house into everything baby. I have been largely successful until about 3 weeks ago when life as we know it ended. Elliott started crawling and soon the entire house was under siege. My little librarian found my bookshelf with FAR more interesting books than are in his bookshelf. So, the last shelf or so will have to be Elliott friendly books. This parenting thing is quite the learning process!
Momma's Librarian
A victory for the parents! Dutifully, we put Elliott in his high chair and attempt to feed him solid foods. Rice cereal, sweet potatoes, peas, carrots, pears, applesauce. With mom’s milk, without. You name it, we have tried it. We have only had marginal luck with whipped cream — which he really can’t have much of. So today, I put him in his high chair with some cheerios and a teething biscuit. I went to pour myself some orange juice and when I came back — ta da! Mr. E had finally succumbed to the teething biscuit. Hopefully more food stories are in store!
Teething Biscuit Victory
