Carnivorous Owen

Today we celebrated friend Ros's birthday by helping eat all the meat she had smoked and grilled over the last few days - kind of a fantastic all-you-can-meat party. We sampled her dad's famous ribs, salmon, shrimp, beef tenderloin, two kinds of pork tenderloin, and chicken. O sampled all the foods and his 2 favorites were a pork rib, which he gnawed on for awhile and corn on the cob, which he chewed on for 20+ minutes. I think he was using both as a teether, but whatever, it makes for good photos (which I don't really know how to post).

A new low in IT productivity

Sometimes your computer doesn't really help you get your job done. Yesterday evening, going one step further, my computer kept me from going home by refusing to shut down.

Age and Treachery, 1Youth and Not Eating Broccoli, 0

Owen has started questioning the deliciousness of green vegetables. Green beans were always a bit suspect, but now spinach, broccoli, and any sort of leafy green are now food non grata at the high chair. But last night, he ate broccoli twice: once cooked into an egg, and once mixed in with hummus on wheat bread.

Editor's Note: As I have described not eating green veg as something of a pattern, you may question my assignment of zero points to Youth and Not Eating Broccoli. Surely Youth and Not Eating Broccoli must have had some previous success? Well, yes, but that was in earlier matches against Age and Total Lack of Guile. And besides, you can hardly claim to be treacherous and not fiddle the scoreboard a bit.

Showing off for Oma

My mom just spent a week and a half with us. It was wonderful to have such a nice, long visit with her. Owen got into it, too, developing all sorts of new tricks in honor of his Oma's visit. A quick list doesn't do justice to her whole visit, but I need to get these down before I forget:

- Owen is walking. I think it was last Wednesday, but whenever it was, it happened that fast. One day, he was occasionally taking several unassisted steps; the next, walking was the preferred method of getting around. Exit homo infantus, enter homo erectus. Of course he still falls at unexpected times, and he needs something to pull himself upright on, but he's starting, stopping, changing directions - he's a walker.

- Owen is dancing. When he hears music, Owen starts bobbing up and down, and waving his hands side to side, as if conducting the music (or scratching records, as the kids do these days). Actually, it's not limited to music. He'll start bobbing along to most anything rhythmical, such as the sound of Dad chopping vegetables. He also hums.

- Owen likes to push adults around on the floor. This goes hand in hand with the walking. If you're in a crawling position, he'll stand up and push on your hip or butt, finding it high comedy when you crawl away or collapse under his mighty strength.

- Owen has always liked it when I give him big, squeezy hugs. He's started giving them back. Of course he can't really reach his arms around me, so he just curls up, jamming his knees into my chest and his head onto my shoulder. He also says, "Rrrrrr," like I do, to make clear what he's doing.

- Owen may have picked up words for "cat" and "truck". I'll buy "Ka!" because it comes in a high pitch and almost only when there's a cat around. "Tuk" I'm a little skeptical of, as it's awfully close to his universal word. (A stopped watch is right twice a day.)

- Not only can Owen unlock and open the dishwasher, he's now learned to turn it on.

I'm sure I'm forgetting something, but I trust that Kerry or I will remember later.

What I won't eat again

White bread toast.

After spending almost a month in Venezuela, I will never eat white bread toast again. The included breakfast at my hotel was the same every day – tea, a small glass of juice, and 3 pieces of white bread toast, 2 pats of butter, and 2 jam packets. I actually haven’t eaten any toast at all since returning home. After awhile, white bread toast really starts to taste like cardboard. It's great to be back in the land of wheat bread!

A ‘do like….

Owen has alot of hair. He has Travis’s blonde locks. Yes, yes, I know that Travis isn’t blonde now, but he was until about age 8. Yes, I did have to tell Travis when we started dating that his hair wasn’t blonde anymore and that he needed to update his driver’s license from blonde to brown. But O looks a lot like Travis as a baby.

Anyway, Owen has several hairstyles. The young businessman, courtesy of nanny Carla, which involve a part and a side-slicked hairstyle reminiscent of a middle-aged businessman (surprisingly cute). He also sometimes looks like Pete Wentz, who is the lead singer for Fallout Boy and Ashley Simpson’s husband and baby daddy. Think pointy bangs on the forehead. Due to my first attempt at a haircut, he also looks a bit country, with a mullet/hockey hair – long in the back, party in the front. He briefly (1 day) had a mohawk, mainly b/c he got really sweaty at his first rock concert. Now that he's had a second attempt at a haircut, he's mulletless and looks like a little boy with baby hair in the front and little boy hair in the back.

Owen’s Birthday, Part Deux

We celebrated Owen’s birthday (observed) last weekend. Travis’s mom came to visit and my parents were here too, so O was very excited to see Oma, Mimi, and Papa. He seemed a bit puzzled when he woke up from his nap on Saturday to a house full of people who wanted to see him. He did enjoy his cupcake (even if it didn’t go up his nose like the cake from Bday, part 1). He had a great time playing with his friends Brooks, Molly, and Ethan. He particularly like playing with Brooks’s short fuzzy hair and trying to drink his bottle and take toys from Molly. At some point O will learn about ‘boundaries’ and ‘sharing’, but for now, he seems content to horn his way in to other people’s business. Happy Birthday to the young gentleman!

Seattle

We're back from four days in Seattle, where we attended the wedding of Dave and Jenny. They had a lovely service at Jenny's parents' home, a service that very much reflected their personalities and their hopes for their marriage.

Though various subsets had crossed paths, this was the first time in about four years that Dave, William, Eric and I had all been together. There's nothing like seeing old friends. I'm not able to put it into words well right now. I hope, faithful reader, that you know what I mean.

In a happy surprise, we got to stay with Josh, his wife A-P and 1.5-year-old daughter Emilie. We had only hoped to see them while in town, but they graciously hosted us, sharing their home, a stunning array of kids' books and Josh's fine cooking with us.

Owen was sleepless in Seattle like his name was Tom Hanks. It got better over the trip, but even when dog-tired, he had a hard time falling asleep outside of a moving stroller or car (and not always even in those vehicular tranquilizers). But for being short of sleep, he was quite chipper, making the most of his first trip to the West Coast. Stand by for pictures of Owen with his first coffee. (Kidding, of course. He had his first espresso months ago.)