Arf! Cereal & Defense = Gone/Done!

Today was Brian's Master's Thesis Defense!  And he passed!  It was a nice, long presentation (powerpoint theme choosing credit due to moi) about the tests he has been doing for the past 1.5 years.  Unless you want to know more about fiber-reinforced polymers, steel orthotropic plates, and various wearing surfaces for bridge decks, I'll leave it at that.

Here's a picture of the two boys all dressed up for the occasion.

Prior to the presentation, Everett also helped out a lot with the prep work:

In other news, Everett figured out how to eat cereal for real.  He loves trying to help by grabbing the spoon and basically dive-bombs the spoon, your hand, and his bib anytime the cereal gets near his face.  And he's pretty proud of himself too.

Our silly little guy has also finally figured out that he can lay his head down when he's tired.   For the longest time, he would get tired when he was on his tummy and just cry.  Now he chills for a while in between heavy head lifting.  He rolled once more, but he really has more interest in standing than rolling.  He's also getting much better at sitting.  In fact, he was just sitting with his boppy, then leaned forward, then reached, then dive-bombed (he does this a lot...food, body....) Brian's Time magazine.

They shouldn't be allowed to choke.

Babies, that is. It is just wrong that they can choke and scare the living daylights out of their mommies. Ugh! Ever woke up at around 3am for his feeding this morning, and when I got into his room, he was fussing and sucking on his fists. I picked him up and walked over to our la-z-boy, and he started choking (presumably on drool from sucking on his hands). So, I put him over my shoulder and pat his back to help him out. Well, he keeps choking! So then, of course, I go into panic mode, flip him onto my lap and whack his back (probably pretty hard...can't really remember anything but the panic) repeatedly until he finally takes a deep breath. When I sat him back up, I had drool all down my left arm. Seriously. I guess I'm glad I've taken infant CPR 3-4 times because instead of screaming for Brian, I managed to help him out myself, but geesh! It's always the same feeling when a baby is choking - utter panic. I remember my brother choking once (I think I was babysitting, don't kill me mom!) and the same feeling taking over. When they finally take a nice deep breath, you realize how fast you were breathing and nearly cry. Yuck. He had better not do that again for a very very long time!
Moving on now. I finished my first full week of half-days at work today. Result? I'm pooped! It's great though. Instead of sitting around in yoga pants all day, I get a shower, get dressed, get stuff done (and make a tiny bit of money!), then come home and still have some motivation to make lunch, sew, pick up the house, play rock band, etc. Ev's been sleepy today, but I figure he's making up for yesterday when he decided he didn't want anything to do with napping after about noon. His bedtime was later last night because I took him to something at church, so he was quite pleasant for Brian this morning. He got up at 8ish and played, then went back down till about 10, had a bottle and played until I came home and put him back down for a nap. Now he's still sleeping! (Don't worry, I keep checking to make sure he's okay!) We're thinking of going down to Indy this weekend to check out a museum or something because we haven't made weekend plans in....since....umm.....right. Well, that's about all for now. Have a nice weekend y'all!

Fewer Pterodactyls

Everett has developed a new cry, for which, we are thankful! For those who cannot immediately bring to mind the sound of a newborn's cry, I shall explain to you its downsides. A newborn's cry is not meant to be pleasant to the ear, and it generally makes the hearer want to, A. Cry, B. Rip his/her hair out, C. make it stop, make it STOP!. In addition to this terrible sound, if a problem was not fixed quickly enough, we would be convinced that our dear little boy had turned into an ancient pterodactyl. Thus, our joy at Everett discovering his vocal cords and attempting to use them for good.
I guess he has learned that we try our best to fix whatever is wrong when he cries, so he has decided to reward us by using his new sound. Unfortunately, I have not yet caught it on video, but I will keep trying. Now, we are not entirely freed from flying dinosaur-era creatures in our house, and are still punished with their presence when dear baby either has very hurt feelings or is in some kind of pain. Maybe it is just my glee from not hearing the terrible newborn cry, or maybe this new cry actually is humorous, but I often bust up laughing when Everett is heartily trying to tell me that he is sick of playing, wants to be held, or would like his next meal. He doesn't seem too bothered by my laughter though, and sometimes stops his lamenting to smile at me in return.
In news about me (not that you care, but I'm writing about it anyway. My blog!), I have figured out some things about daycare/returning to work. We thought about using daycare and having both Bri and I work full-time, but I just couldn't accept the idea of half my paychecks going to some barely trained women to give my baby some bottles and try to keep him quiet all day.
I realized that I actually had some time on my hands after whipping this hat up in one day, and decided that maybe I was ready to start doing some work again. After talking with my boss (who is the nicest guy boss in the world, btw), I have decided to stay on leave (kind of) for the next four weeks and do some grading, editing, and random projects at home. I will do this while Brian continues working 10 hour days at the lab until the last week of Feb. Then, we are going to try splitting our time at home. Brian will stay home with Ev (and work on his thesis) until noon, while I go to work for four hours or so. Then, I will return home (with some projects to do) and Brian will go off to the lab until 5 or 6. I'm really hoping we manage to make it work this way, because there are no daycare slots available anywhere (we turned down the ONE slot that opened).

Back Home

We are back in Indiana after a 13 hour drive and a day of unpacking/grocery shopping. I think both Everett and I have had a tiny cold which has made me tired even after a great night of sleep last night (10pm-4am!). We are trying to slowly introduce the concept of the crib and separate bedroom to Everett and the new baby monitor is a huge help. We attempted to put Ev to sleep in his crib last night, but after about 1.5 hours of crying, consoling, and repeating, we gave up. Yes, yes, I'm a wimp and I let my baby snuggle up in bed with me instead of enforcing a bedtime and letting him cry, but neither of us are ready for it yet. This also means that I am not ready to return to work....I go in to talk to my boss next week but, with the exception of last night, Everett is not sleeping well enough at night for me to even consider going back full-time. We need to contact some more daycares since we still do not have a secured slot and that really means I can't go back yet. I'm hoping we'll be able to work things out with me going back half days or something....we'll see I guess.
I'll try to get some more pictures soon. Right now, efforts must be focused on cleaning the apartment and organizing. As you might guess, housework didn't really happen in those first two weeks and then we left for three more. So now....eek!
Since I failed again at putting Ever down in his crib for a nap, I shall go retrieve the fussing babe. :)