Our Baby Size Life!

Well, whomever said that parenting was an ever learning state of being hit the freakin’ nail on the head. Another little nugget of information concerning babies and their digestive systems has just acquired some real estate in my ever expanding parental brain. Here’s the situation: Sam has developed a little cough over the past couple days, and last night it got a little… well… wetter. You know what I mean, he’s got some snotty action going on in there now.

So, Melissa and I figure a cold has set in and we proceed to clean out his nose before giving him his pre-bedtime bottle, which is one of the favorite moments of my day. Sam and I settle into the comfy rocking chair in his room, I dim the lights, throw on a little sleepy-time music and plug the kid into his dairy fix. Bliss folks… pure bliss. That went well, the problem came afterward. Just as Sam was finishing his bottle and I was easing him off to La-La Land, Melissa sticks her head in the door way and reminds me to give him some Tempra infant cold medicine before he falls asleep. Ah Mommy to the rescue! Insensitive and uncaring Dad would’ve put little Sammy to bed all stuffed up and snorting boogers all night. Well, no, of course I would not have done that, but Mommy was right as it would help him sleep.

So up we get, away from the warm and friendly confines of the rocking chair to Sam’s crib where I lay him down. Sam immediately sits up, then stands up gripping the edge of the crib. Great! He’s more awake now and he’s vertical which should make giving him the medicine a little easier. Turns out, it just gave him greater range. Let me explain…

So I kneel in front of him and wrap one arm around his body as the other hand feeds him the meds. I had barely twisted the cap on the medicine bottle when some very warm fluid soaked my shirt. Puke! Not wanting to drop Sam, I call for Melissa to come and give me a hand, which turned out to be a good call, because Sammy-boy wasn’t done. The second and bigger projectile-like wave hit the crib railing, my left arm, his mattress, the crib bars and finally dripped down on his carpet. Super fun vomit party! Sam’s head didn’t spin, so we didn’t all a young priest and an old priest…

Sparing you some of the details (like pea and carrot chunks), everything was covered in a nice pinkish liquid, due to the fact that the milk and Tempra, a red colored cold medicine, had mixed… And the smell…whoo baby! I think I prefer the foul odor of a full diaper sitting in the hot sun. Melissa took Sam and cleaned him up as I worked on the room. After we got done, Sam fell asleep right away. Poor little guy was up way past his bedtime! Despite his rosé reflux, he slept great!

Dad, on the other hand, felt a little guilty about making his son behave like a super model on a diet, but now I know the rule not to mix red and white applies to kids too!

…and knowing is half the battle!

I know this post is long over due, but I figured I’d tell you about our Thanksgiving anyways, because we ended up in the hospital again!  Man, when it rains it pours!  I hadn’t been in a hospital in years, almost decades, and now it happens three times in a two month period!  So, with the American Thanksgiving right around the corner, I figured I’d sneak this post in now, while it’s got some relevance. My bro has some nice pics from that great Thanksgiving day, but I don’t have them with me now. It’s a bummer, but I’ll try and post ‘em later on.  We had some great family fun as my sis and her family made the drive up from Toronto.  My bro was there with his daughter and his new girlfriend and , of course, my parents were there… well we were all in their house.  So, yeah, it makes sense they be there…

Saturday was a busy day, we all had some fun on my Wii (Rock Band and Boom Blox), we played some street hockey in which my nephews once again felt the unforgiving wrath of their Uncle John as he totally and systematically destroyed their defense and piled on the goals without mercy.  I won (again) 53 to 38, and they were two on one! Yeah, I know I’m good, but what can I say… I’m a natural…  What? How old? Why they are 13 and 11… but that doesn’t mean anything! Have you seen kids nowadays?!?  They’re HUGE. My oldest nephew wears bigger sized shoes than I do! And you know what they say about a man with big feet… They wear BIG shoes! Let’s keep it clean folks!

So everything was going typically well, it was around 11 pm when things went south. My sis and brother-in-law were packing up the minivan to head back early the next day while everyone else was playing some cards and winding down after another great meal. Kudos to Mom and Dad who outdid themselves again! Check out some of the yummy food they laid out:

Mmmm... Look at that turkey. It was as good as it looks!	My plate...or I should say, one of my plates!
Apple, Cherry and Pumpkin pies!	Rollie-Pollies, a decadent recipe made of pie crust and brown sugar!

Colby, their dog, was out with my bro-in-law while he packed the car, when suddenly Colby bolts out towards the street after a couple strangers that were out taking a walk.  My bro-in-law reacted and spun to chase after the dog… but didn’t see the traveling bag he had placed on the ground.  He ended up landing hard on his left shoulder.  We walks into the kitchen, clutching his arm saying he can’t feel his fingers and arm, but his shoulder is in intense pain.

Luckily, my bro’s new girlfriend used to be a nurse and checked him out.  She thought we should get to a hospital to make sure everything was OK as she thought that his arm or shoulder could be broken!  So off we go, my Dad, my bro-in-law and me to the local hospital on Thanksgiving night, it being close to midnight.  We arrived at the hospital around 15 past midnight, and after a series of quick examinations followed by a couple hours waiting time, they recommended he get X-rays.  So we had to wait for the X-ray technician.  It was now 3 am. He got his X-rays and hobbled back to his waiting room for the doctor to give his diagnosis on the X-rays taken.  That took another 2 hours.  It was now 5 am.

Finally, the doctor came back and explained the situation to my bro-in-law:  his shoulder was broken… in two places!  No wonder he was in pain!  The doctor then advised him to go home and relax until they got into contact with a surgeon to evaluate how to proceed.  The problem was my bro-in-law had one clean fracture and another fracture that had detached a tendon.  They weren’t sure if the fracture would mend and the tendon would fuse back to the bone properly and needed the surgeons opinion.  My bro-in-law explained that he was leaving for Toronto in one hour and would have to pursue the matter when he got home.

And that’s what he did.  We drove home from the hospital and got back to my parents house around 6:30 am on the Sunday.  What an exhausting night.  My Dad and I were completely pooped out.  My bro-in-law, with his arm in a sling, climbed into his packed car with my sis and their two kids, and they left for Toronto.

Mind you, all this happened about a month ago now, so I can update you on his situation.  He was re-evaluated that Sunday afternoon in a Toronto area hospital and they ruled against surgery.  He was, and still is, under observation on a weekly basis.  Both fractures, and the tendon, seem to be healing OK, which is welcome news.  One thing I haven’t told you about my bro-in-law is that his job requires him to be on the road a large amount of the time.  And , yes folks, the day after they got home from the Thanksgiving trip, my crazy, yet dedicated, bro-in-law went on a road trip for his job!  He didn’t drive of course, but still, the guys got guts right?  Snaps his shoulder in two places and he’s out cutting deals with clients less than 48 hours later!

What a guy!  Hats off to you Mr. Bro-in-Law!  And that was our Thanksgiving 2008!

Thanks for reading.

It’s been a crazy busy week and I’ve been neglecting this blog!  I haven’t had much free time since Halloween, so I’m putting in a late night to post about one of the best Halloweens we’ve had here at our house!  What a night!  I took the afternoon off of work to get home early so I could set everything up and not be too rushed, which I seem to be every year! It was a simply gorgeous afternoon, a nice mild day with some sunshine.  Hardly a precursor to the death and carnage that would soon happen. By sundown, everything was set up, I had eaten supper and was in costume.  Melissa’s family soon arrived and not long after that, around 6 pm, the little kiddies started roaming the streets for some free candy.  And I was ready!

I do, however, give the little ones a scare free walk up the driveway.  I just can’t bring myself to scare the little lions, hippos, tigers that walk warily into my domain of death clutching their parents hand, saying they don’t want to go further.  As a haunter, that’s what I want to hear, but I won’t scare them out of pure malice.  When they leave their parents and head up to the door, and they are a good 20 feet away staring at my ghost in the window, THAT’S when I let the parents have it!  I jump towards them, scythe waving, eyes flashing red and screaming a ghastly yell!  They jump.  They scream! Oh yes they do!  Some parents even remembered me from last year and would not come up the driveway.  R.E.S.P.E.C.T.  I like it.  They do however, send their kids up all the while reassuring them “it’ll be OK, he’s not real”.  Then they get out the camera and wait for the pounce. Parents after my own heart!

I didn’t add much to the display this year as I focused more on atmospheric effects.  I bought a blue flood light and some orange lights I wrapped up in the cornstalks.  I also picked up a few more tombstones for the graveyard and got my fog machine working.  A nice little addition was this little ghoul that would fly from the house to a tree in my front yard.  He was sound activated and made noise as he flew.  So when I scared people, they screamed and set off the ghoul, which made them jump again!  Then my neighbor would pop out of the graveyard an give them another scare! Three good scares at one house. Nice.

We had all kinds of people taking video and pictures.  Lots of compliments on the decorations and the scares.  Especially my spider victim prop, whose hand moved when you got close.  Next year, I will have to set up a camera with night vision to capture some of the scares. The trick or treating lasted close to 9 pm, with me eventually grabbing a bowl of candy and walking the streets, giving out the last of our candy.  I would estimate we had well over 100 kids, maybe even 120.  It was a good year which just makes me even more eager for next year! Planning has started already. Oh what to do, what to do!

After the decorations were put away, I headed in for a little horror movie fest and ended up watching The Grudge, Halloween (the original) and Halloween 2 all back to back.  It’s my little Halloween tradition after a successful night of haunting and scaring other people: time to scare myself!

What a great Halloween!  I didn’t see the great pumpkin flying around this year, maybe next time!

Here are some pics of the evening:

Happy Halloween!  That’s right folks, Halloween is finally here!  Time to let out those inner ghouls and demons so they can frolic and play!  Get dressed up! Scare people! Have fun!  I’ve got a very busy day and haunting night ahead of me as I’ll be disguised at work and will hopefully scare a couple people, then I head home and prepare the house for my victims tonight! So here’s a quick post of some of our costumes from the past… I’ve got some family in there as well.  Some are from the 80’s and some are more recent.  Also, we reveal Sam’s first Halloween Costume! So here’s to having fun on Halloween!  Enjoy!

It’s been a few days since my last post, but life’s been kicking up the busy recently.  I don’t know why, but Melissa and I just get stuck in these weird periods when we suddenly have a crazy influx of appointments and meetings and family events that just keep us constantly on the go for a few days.  Then, nothing.  Which is nice, cause now I can catch up on some posts!  Hence, the events in this post happened over 2 weeks ago, back when Fall was still nice and the bitter cold of winters’ creeping hands couldn’t be felt. It’s ironic too, that as I’m writing this, we are getting hit with our first dump of snow.  So, I guess this will be my farewell to Fall, even though Halloween has yet to pass!

About three weeks ago, I wrote about a walk in the woods near my place, and I said at the time that I might have been a little premature in expecting a vibrant display of Mother Natures Fall colors.  Well, after a busy Thanksgiving weekend, which I’ll be telling you about soon, we decided to head out for another walk, and this time we hoped Sam would stay awake and see some colors!  Well, he stayed awake and as you can see from the pic on the left, we got some serious color action!  We then found a quiet part of the forested area to sit down in some leaves and just let Sam explore.  We, of course took some pics, way to many to post here and way to many to be healthy. ;) The weather was nice and the sun kept poking through some shoddy clouds that didn’t offer much resistance.  It was quiet too.  No car noise or other people around being annoying.  Just us and a pile of leaves, and a few curious squirrels.

Sammy and Dad enjoying the leaves

Sam and Mom taking a seat

A good Samaritan squirrel took a family pic for us. He was nice, if a little nuts.

We spent a good lazy hour tossing leaves around, playing peek-a-boo and spinning Sam around and through the air a bit, then headed for home as somebody was getting a little cranky because he was a little hungry!  Yeah well, I only had a quick sandwich for lunch alright! I was starved!  Frolicking and merry making family style takes it’s burden on a man!  Should have brought some crackers and cheese… Mmmmmm… Cheese.   When we got home, we decided that five gigs of photos wasn’t enough.  So we propped Sam up on our decorative hay stack and pumpkin outdoor deco and took a few terabytes more pictures… You know, just in case the other thousand come out bad.  Ah to be trigger happy, gone gaga parents in the digital age.  Sam’s only 8 months old and he’s got more documented about his life than Jesus! ;)  And yes folks, Sammy-boy does look pretty kick-ass in his bomber jacket huh?  Before you say it, or think it, or comment it below, we didn’t buy it for him, his Aunt did.  So we are not that gaga.  Close.  But not yet!  OK, gotta run as I’ve got a few Halloween things to prepare and with only 2 days left… time is tight!  Take care!

Halloween is right around the corner and this year, Melissa and I have a little munchkin to dress up.  That’s right, we couldn’t resist.  I love Halloween and I look forward to it all year round!  Melissa and I decorate the house more than your average North-American (watch for pics soon), so it’s not a big surprise to friends and family that we just had to get Sam in on the act!  We saw a great little costume for him back in August, yeah I know, freaking August!  But it looked great on him then and, come to think of it, we haven’t tried it on him since, which could mean he doesn’t fit in the thing anymore… With Halloween a mere 10 days away, we’d better get him to try it on again else we might get a scary surprise come fright night!

For those of you who might be wondering, no I am not going to be taking Sam out trick-or-treating.  He’s only eight months old!  The candy would serve him no purpose… Melissa and I, on the other hand, could greatly benefit from the generous candy offerings people tend to give cute little kids in their cute little costumes… Hmmm, think about the possibilities!  We could clean house! Candy! Chocolate! Chips! Mine! All Mine! MUHAHAHAHAA!

Nah! That wouldn’t be right.  Besides, we always buy a little bit extra candy to ensure we have some left over at the end of the night.   A little “Hershey Insurance” for the candy givers. Actually, I don’t give out the candy, Melissa does.  I am usually disguised in my front yard, making kiddies stain their costumes and their parents swear like sailors. Don’t worry folks, I let the very little ones get by without any scares.  But those eight to fifteen year-olds are legal victims baby!  I love spooking the parents too as they get quite a kick of our Halloween setup.  Here’s a quick pick of last years “haunt” if you will.  That’s me as the Grim Reaper.  The eyes in the mask light up at the touch of a switch concealed in my hand. I let people get halfway up my driveway before turning the eyes on causing most people freeze in their tracks, unsure of how to proceed.  Then I usually jump at people either when they pass me to go get the candy or on their way down after they have the candy and they think they are safe.

I do so much enjoy myself on Halloween!

Today I thought I’d tell you about Sam’s favorite toy.  Like most babies, Sam has a bunch of toys that were either given to him as gifts from family and friends, hand-me-downs or bought by Melissa and I.  We do, however, try to control the amount of toys he plays with as not to spoil him.  So we have little batches of three or four toys on each floor of the house, so that no matter where he is, Sam’s entertainment is covered.  I recently purchased this little jewel: The Fisher Price Roll-a-Rounds Swirlin Surprise Gumballs!  It’s probably his best toy so far.  He loves it.  He sees it and he boots right over to give it a whack.

The great thing about this toy is it interactive.  It plays some funky music and flashes a nice little light show when Sammy smacks the lever on the side, which also causes those little balls to come spiraling down and out the bottom.  When we need a couple minutes, we plop him down in front of it and he sits there for a good twenty minutes before deciding to wander off and get himself into trouble. It comes with about a dozen different “gumballs” that are all decorated in various ways and textures.  Which is probably also the biggest problem!

These freakin gumballs roll everywhere! Thus the “Ankle Breakers” in the title of this post.  We are definitely more careful when Sam is playing with it, cause we know he’s sent a ball or two across the room… or through the kitchen… or at the bottom of the stairs… or just behind the chair your sitting on. You get the idea.  In order to keep things sane, and keep our butts off crutches, we’ve hidden most of the gumballs and have left him with five.  That way there easy to count quickly and we don’t spend too long looking for them around the house!

It is, however, really funny watching him go at this thing.  He grabs those gumballs and tries to fit them in his mouth, which is, of course, impossible, they are way to big.  But it hilarious to see him try! At first he had a little trouble figuring out how to put the balls into the open top of the toy.  He would smack the ball against the top edge, and end up losing his grip on the ball.  Now, he just grabs the top rim and pulls the whole thing down!  Smart kid eh? He doesn’t go to the hole… It comes to him!  That pic on the right, were Sam looks a little less than happy, was taken when I tried to show him how to put the balls in the top and not to topple the toy over.  Didn’t go well.  He’s started to do it the right way now, but he still likes tugging on the top… Which spills all the balls onto the floor at once.  Which is probably his plan… Hmmm… Does he know about our life insurance policy?

Well that’s it for today.  I thought I’d share about what Sam’s favorite toy is.  If you need a great baby gift for someone, I’d recommend it.  Just warn them about those killer ankle breaker balls!

Thanks for reading!

Hey folks! Let me tell you, it’s been a busy weekend! We had quite the Thanksgiving! I’ll be posting on that later in the week, because I just can’t let another good hospital story go unheard! That’s right, my long weekend was interrupted by another long wait at a hospital. Fear not, we are doing well, but that isn’t the case for everybody… But as I said, check back later in the week for that story.

So, to switch to a brighter note, here’s something I’ve wanted to talk about for a while now: the bath. One of Sam’s favorite activities has got to be taking a bath. Thinking back, asking Sam if he “wants to take a bath and go splish splash” has to be one of the earliest triggers for getting an excited reaction from Sam. Around 3 months old, just as he was getting out of that “lump on a log, I eat and poop” baby phase, I would say that magic catch phrase and Sam would start wiggling his arms and kicking both his legs. Now when I say it, he kicks and twists and squeals and giggles and smiles and… well you get the picture. This kid loves water! Well, except for the ocean, he thought that was freaking cold.

Bath time is now my little routine, and alone time, with Sammy. Melissa takes good care of the squirt all day, so Mom takes a well deserved break and Dad shifts into Mr. Mom mode. I won’t lie, I love it. It’s our father-son time where we can kick back, talk about chicks and have a coupe beers… yeah yeah…. you know I’m kidding. I don’t let Sam drink beer… from the can. I pour a little in his bottle, strap on a nipple and presto! Instant baby-sleep-o potion! Actually, after a big day of fun with Mom, a good bath and bottle are all he needs to send him off to La-La-Land, which I have the pleasure of doing.

Of course, bath time isn’t just all business. Sam has some friends to chew on. We have, of course, the staple of bath time toys in the rubber ducky. As an added bonus, not only does this rubber ducky provide immeasurable quacking fun for Sam, but he also tells the temperature of the water! Amazing I know… If the rubber ducky should be fortunate enough to escape the clutches of Sam’s ever searching fingers, there are a bevy of sea creature that will surely fall pray to his gaping, gum lined maw. He’s like the Sarlacc in the Great Pit of Carkoon! As you can see in the pic, Mr. Crab has fallen on hard times. Now I’ll have to find a little wheelchair for that legless crab! Sam rains down his “bath time martial law” upon the little sea creatures from his sturdy throne. It’s suction-cupped to the bath so it can withstand all of King Sam’s jerks, wiggles and leans. That chair is great, it makes handling a wet, slick baby a breeze. I just pull the suction release tab and lift the whole thing out onto dry ground. It’s a neat little thing that we’ve started using since Sam outgrew his infant bath. Plus, Sam’s a sitter now, he only lies down when he wants to sleep! The infant bath had a sloping bed that’s great for newborns, but not so much for curious, mobile babies.

Before Sam starts to prune up, I whisk him out of the warm water into his doggy towel. This thing has got ears, paws and a tail… which are totally there for the enjoyment of the parents. Ain’t he cute? Yeah well, I’m allowed to go ga-ga a bit alright!?! By this time, he’s getting a little tired and hungry. He lets me know by grabbing his belly and rubbing his eyes as I dry him off. To be honest, those are the least of my concerns. I’m busy watching down below. You see, Daddy has managed to stay dry this entire time, getting hosed now would not be a good thing. But I have to say, Sam’s been kind to me lately. I can’t remember the last time I got zinged during bath time. I must be doing something right!

After Sam’s been dried, creamed, diapered and dressed, we head downstairs for a nice warm bottle. Half the time, he’s falling asleep at the nipple. I don’t know where he gets it, I’ve never done that! It’s kind of funny watching him fall asleep in my arms, he likes to rest his hands on something, like my cheek or chin. Then, every thirty seconds, he keeps peeking out the corner of his eye to make sure I’m still there.

That’s when I whisper to him “Don’t worry Sammy, Daddy’s here. Daddy’s here…” and he nods off to sleep. I then bring him upstairs and gently lay him in his crib and tuck him in. By this time, it’s close to 10 P.M. and having a baby fall asleep on you is contagious. Melissa and I would love to get some Zs as well, but now that Sam is finally down for the night… It’s time to clean the house!

As always, thanks for reading!

A quick note to let you all know I’ve been in a professional training program for the past three days.  That, combined with the little squirt on the left, has reduced my posting time to … well this little post in the last three days! It’s just past midnight on Friday morning as I write this.  I had planned a nice post about Sam’s bath time fun, but that will have to wait for the weekend!

It’s also Thanksgiving weekend here! Turkey and stuffing here I come!  We’re having a nice family weekend over at the house, which means plenty of high-jinx and merrymaking with so many people around… with alcohol… and pies… and Sam now crawling a dangerous speeds!

So where ever you are, have a great weekend!  Check back in soon, and I’ll have a good old fashioned post for ya! As for now, follow Sam’s example, and take it easy!!!

It’s Fall over here in Canada, and I couldn’t be happier!  If you don’t live around here, you wouldn’t know that we just had one of the worst, crappiest, rainy, blah summers ever.  We could hardly get a weeks worth of sunshine and we were constantly peed on by some mean looking cumuli. So, bring on Fall!  If we’re going to sit through crappy weather like that, we might as well have some perks to go along with it right?  Yummy apples made for some great, crunchy apple crisp and the chilly weather made from some nice Fall colors.  We decided to take a walk and check things out, as we both love walking in the forest paths that are right at the end of our street.  This may sound familiar as I’ve posted about this before, this past March, while I was looking for signs of Spring.  you can check out that post here.  That post and this one, kind of make nice bookends to a sub par summer.  I would ask for a refund if I could folks, but all sales are final with Mother Nature.

Sunday was your typical Fall day: overcast with a stiff, cold breeze.  Melissa and I packed Sam up with a few layers of clothing, poor kid couldn’t move his arms. He was wearing his new Fall coat and he seemed to be totally… unaware that it was his new Fall coat.  Which, in retrospect, is perfectly normal.  It’s the parents expecting their 7 month old to notice that it’s his new Fall coat that’s the problem. We then “crow-barred” him into his super wheeled, off-road, full suspension, 4 wheel drive stroller that Sam’s Uncle Mike gave him, and set off on our merry little way.  He seemed to enjoy the chilly air on his cheeks, cause that’s all of him that was exposed, and soon fell asleep!  He always does this.  Whenever we bring him somewhere… he’s gone.  This summer, we went to the ocean, which is as you know one of the grandest of natures beauties, limitless in its expanse and inspiring wonder.  But Sam fell asleep right when we hit the beach. You can read that adventure series here, some here, a little here and lastly here.

As with every time I take a walk through this little forest trail, I spot little things that make me take pictures.  Curious things like the white berries on the left, or the known but no-less-beautiful things like a bee getting some nectar in his belly before the big chill of winter.  I even caught that “huge” dragonfly on the wall of my house, just sitting there starting at me.  He scared the crap out of me as I stepped out of the house.  Think that’s funny? Well it was H-U-G-E I tells ya! Just look at that pic! I was a little disappointed, however, that the leaves hadn’t changed colors as much as I had hoped.  Here are a few shots of what we saw.  I’ll try and get back out there this upcoming weekend and get a few more nice shots of the rainbow foliage… maybe even a few with Sam sitting in some leaves.  If he’s awake. :/

Melissa waiting for me to hurry up and take the shot	Some wild Fall flowers	A couple big trees turned red
Zoom on a leaf	A trail to...?	A bee getting some of the Fall flower

Overall, it was a nice afternoon to be together as a family.  Sam woke up after we had gotten home, which was about an hour after we had left.  The way the fresh air had affected Sam now hit us full force. Melissa and I were yawing and thinking about laying down for a quick nap when Sam woke up, full of vim and ready for an intense crawling and playing session.  So on the floor we went, playing with the little guy until supper.  We had great fun together, as always.  He’s just a giggle-puss that kid.  Melissa and I got creative and stuck him in his toy bin to give us a little break (and get a funny picture). Joke was on us as he loved it in there!  He had all his toys and buddies in there with him and he never complained.  And as you can see, he’s got no way out which let us get supper ready.

Whew, what a day! We were all pooped when bedtime rolled around.  We had nothing planned as of that morning, but it’s funny how things just seem to Fall into your lap during those lazy Sundays.

That’s it for now, thanks for reading!