Chicago!

We made it! The trip here was a long day, but we all made it just fine. We found a play space with lots of kids and excitement for Otto to play on at the Philadelphia Airport which made the fact that our flight was slightly delayed much better. Otto was not really big on napping during this whole day of excitement, but who could blame him, it was quite and exciting day. We drove from home to Philadelphia where we saw Nonna Jen and Sir, as he likes to be called. During the 2.5 hour drive he slept for 40 minutes at the most. On the way to the airport he might have squeezed in a mean 15 minutes which he was sure would hold him over for the day. After much coercing he closed his eyes for about 20 minutes more before we got on the plane. While on the plane we found that all the toys I had lugged around all day failed in comparison to the skymall catalog which he turned the pages on for 40 minutes. After about 20 minutes he supplemented straight page turning glee with page ripping, which also turned out to be a lot of fun. We managed to keep him happy for the rest of the flight with food, Signing Times video and finger puppets. He feel asleep in the car on the way to Northbrook and went down for a fairly good night of sleep considering he was in a new exciting place.
On Friday we did some visiting rounds with Rogers work and Otto visited with his uncles. Matt was here when we got here and Ben arrived that evening. We have since been hanging out around the house and seeing family in the area. Both Uncle Ben and Matt have been on a campaign to get Otto walking and today it started to look like they are getting somewhere. He took a solid three steps from Ben to Matt, or was it Matt to Ben, they were so excited they can't remember. He walked back and forth between the two of them a few more times in the hall and then came into the family room to show off for the rest of us. He did a few more steps to prove he still had it in him and did some really good standing while "reading" magazines and eating keys. Some of his favorite passtimes. I am surprised he did the walking today, he has not been feeling too well lately. I am not sure if it is a cold, or his second top tooth coming in but he has had a slight fever and it very snotty. Still he has been in good spirits if we keep him entertained which is never a problem here.
Tomorrow I am going to make our traditional Christmas Eve dinner for the Faden's which I am really looking forward to, standing rib roast, yorkshire pudding, the works. But more than that, I am looking forward to filling Otto's stocking after he goes to bed. I will be sure to capture all moments on film, well really an SD card and get the pictures up as soon as possible. Until then, I hope everyone is having a good holiday.

new tooth

So after much anticipation and drooling, I have finally cut my first top tooth. It broke through this past weekend. I am now enjoying chomping everything with it. I can't tell if the one next to it is going to come in soon or not. It looks close but sometimes it is hard to tell.
Tomorrow mom and dad and I are headed on our big adventure of the holiday season. We are flying to Chicago. It has been a while since I was on a plane and now I want to crawl everywhere so this may be interesting. I will get some posting done while I am there to keep you updated on how things are going in my world, but I just wanted to fill you in once more before we headed out.

so funny!

So for Christmas eric's mom sent Otto this car that you can use in many different ways. Otto only likes two modes:
1. He sits in it and either eric or I pushes him around the house at break neck speeds, preferably chasing a cat.
2. He stands behind it and pushes it on his own although this requires our help since it is not made for that and without any weight in the front it tips over backwards when he tries to push it.

Well we solved that problem yesterday. Otto's buddy Leo was over for a playdate. Megan put Leo in the car to see if he wanted a ride. Otto immediately came over and started pushing. At first he was on the side and it was hard trying to walk sideways, but he figured it out, went around to the back and the result was adorable. I only got two shots in because eric was home and quickly got out the video camera. He got some great footage of Otto pushing Leo all over the downstairs. It was hilarious! As soon as eric edits the footage I will get that posted, but here are some stills

7 hours

Well, as you may have guessed, Otto is not the greatest sleeper anyone has ever met. But I just tell myself that is because he is such an interesting person. That, and rest assured that when he is a teenager we are getting him a job on a farm that starts VERY early in the morning. Well last night he went a little over 7 hours without nursing. That is the longest ever. He nursed and went to sleep at 7:30, it took him a while to really fall asleep but he did it, then he woke up at 9:40 and nursed and went back to sleep. My new goal now that classes are over and Eric can stand to loose some sleep is that if Otto wakes up is that if it has been less than 4 hours after his first nursing of the night I am going to comfort him, but not nurse him until he goes back to sleep. I give him the first time even if it has only been 2 or 3 hours because sometimes he "tanks" up and sleeps longer after the first short stint. So anyway, at 9:40 he went back to sleep but woke up at 11:40, so I went in, and rubbed his back etc.. and he went back to sleep. Then he was up 20 minutes later, just whining. We let him try to work it out a bit but could tell that was not working so eric went in. He got him back to sleep and he slept for another 25 minutes at which point he was really whining and gnawing on his hand. That is the sign that his teeth are really bothering him. He had been showing signs all day of teething starting again so I was ready for this. Since he clearly was in pain and not able to sleep we decided to give him some Motrin. That worked, he fell right asleep and slept until 4:45. He made the smallest peep at 4:45 and I shot out of bed to nurse him. Forever now he has been getting up, for the day, at 5:15 and I was afraid if he woke up too much at 4:45 that would be it, he would not go back to sleep. So I rushed in and got him nursing ASAP, my strategy worked because he fell right back to sleep. It had been then over 7 hours since he had last nursed. I was so happy, I hoped he would maybe sleep until almost 6. He slept until 6:30!! and sang to himself until 7 when eric went in to get him up. It was glorious! There is a big difference between 5:15 and 6:30. Now today I think I see a white line where his left front tooth should be. But we all know what happened last time I thought he was getting a top tooth. I will have to keep an eye out on the bottom. I can only dream about the nights where I would only have to get up once or twice, in fact people have even said that at some point they sleep the whole night long. I am not sure I believe that though.

Blood Work

So at 9 months our family doctor recommends that babies have blood work done to test for lead and anemia. Both things that I think sound important so we got the paper work and planned a day to take Otto to have blood drawn at the hospital. In between the time when we knew we would have to do this, and when eric had some free time to go with us (I was not about to do this alone!) I talked to a friend who had just taken his 9 month old son in for the same thing. Now they went to the other area hospital but he told a horrible story about how the nurse could not find a vein and was jabbing all around while the baby screamed. In the end they left without having any blood drawn and have to go back a second time. Needless to say that did not make me feel any better about taking Otto in for this. Our doctor recommended that we take Otto in the mid-morning because that is when the best nurses are there. Well yesterday we did just that. All monday evening I was worrying about how this would all work. On tuesday when Otto woke up from his morning nap I called eric and we picked him up at work, then headed to the hospital. I was really nervous but eric kept saying how wonderful it would be. Right before we were called an adorable little girl probably about 18 mo. went in and you could hear her screaming in the waiting room, again, not making me feel better. When we finally took Otto back the nurse seemed really nice and it was looking better. Eric decided to hold Otto and I sat in front of him talking to him. The nurse showed eric just how to hold him so he could move his arms and quick as lightning she had the needle in and it was almost over. Otto cried, but not hysterically, and once the band-aid was on and I could hold him the crying stopped pretty much right away. So for what was days of worry on my part, there turned out to be very little drama for Otto. I am really glad it all worked out well. Now we just wait to hear about the test results, but I am not really worried about those.
that was this weeks drama here...

My first bubble bath

so mom and dad are always trying to keep me on my toes. Every night I get a bath and every night it is totally awesome with lots of splashing and me trying to walk around the tub. They keep trying to get toys that will hold my interest and keep me sitting down, but have you seen the amazing faucets on the wall, or the view from over the side of the tub? How could anything be as exciting as that. Two nights ago mom had a new idea, bubbles. No one told me about this ahead of time and let me tell you it was quite a shock to get into my normal tub only to discover that it had been taken over by white fluffy stuff. Both mom and dad seemed not to be worried, but I was still cautious. Then they were picking up the fluffy stuff and blowing it into the air. Once I realized that under it was the same old water I know and love, things were much better. In fact I even stayed on my butt for a while and played with my toys. But that didn't last too long, before long I was up and back to my old tricks. It was however quite the photo opp as you can see.

New York

So this past weekend Mom and Dad took me to New York city to see the Christmas Decorations. I keep trying to tell them that I am a city boy at heart, but we always go home after a few days. (-mom, otto is SO wonderful in the city. he naps, laughs, eats well, is generally an awesome traveler, even in the bitter cold.) We saw all of the good sights. Toys R Us in Times Square had lots of fun toys for me to play with, a giant Ferris Wheel inside which is lots of fun to watch and a GIANT dinosaur. I think Daddy liked it as much as I did, if not more. I really liked this helicopter thing someone was flying around more than the dinosaur, just don't tell Dad that. We also went to see the Tree in Rockefeller Center. That was interesting, but I really enjoyed watching everyone ice skating. We also went to FAO Schwartz. That was so cool. The whole ceiling was filled with colored lights, I loved that. Plus there are tons of big stuffed animals that I really enjoyed. Downstairs in the baby room they had some great toys for me to play with as well. (-mom, we found that taking Otto to toy stores was a great way to allow him to get out of the stroller and crawl around. Plus they have new toys that he can play with and the people working there actually like it that he is playing with them. He gets antsy all bundled up for too long so having a warm place where he could get out and move around made the day much nicer for all parties involved.) Whenever I got tired I just took a little nap in my stroller. One time I feel asleep in Times Square and while I slept Mom and Dad went into a hotel lobby and sipped cappuccinos trying to reverse the effects of my 5:30 am wake up time. It was quite civilized. We also went to MOMA which I quite enjoyed. I got to see Monet's Waterlilies which was cool, but the Mondrian's were my favorite. The Picasso's were good too. We were on a search for graphicly interesting paintings. The hallways at MOMA are also a great place to practice walking while pushing my stroller and just crawling around. Dad's friend David Francis was putting on a children's Magic Lantern show on Saturday at MOMA which we went to, the first half anyway. That was fun. Uncle Ben also met us in the city both Friday evening and Saturday afternoon. On Friday while Dad was at a meeting Uncle Ben, Mom and I went to dinner at a Greek restaurant near our hotel. I had my first taste of lamb, YiaYia would be proud, I really liked it. All in all it was a thrill packed weekend that I loved every minute of.

quick update

so Otto had his 9 month check - up with the doctor today. You will be happy to know that he is very healthy. We were pretty sure of that, but it is nice to hear it from the doctor. He weighed 20.8 lbs. and is 29 inches tall. When we were asked if he was making mama, dada sounds he replied with an ear shattering rendition of "Dadadadada", at the top of his lungs, one of his favorite songs. That answered that question. If only we had two blocks with us so he could demonstrate just how good he is at banging them together. Another major milestone he has mastered. He is not waving bye-bye, but he sure thinks it is cool when you wave to him. He also got the second part of his flu shot and did not cry at all. We had a good nurse and he was in a good mood, a great combo. Well, it is almost bath time so I must run, but that is news from Otto today. Keep your eyes peeled for his holiday card, they will be going out in the mail after this weekend and they are WAY cute!

9 months

so today Otto in 9 months old. For this occasion he has decided to give up napping. Yesterday it took 1.5 hours of screaming to get a 45 minute nap out of him. This morning it took forever to get him to sleep and he slept for 40 minutes. This from the kid who finally for the past two weeks was taking consistent at LEAST hour long naps. With many days having one two hour nap. Oh yeah, and he still doesn't sleep at night. This is getting insane!!

Kitty

Let me just start by saying that I have the two best cats in the world. Schmelig lets me lay on him and pull his fur endlessly. He is always coming up to me and snuggling me despite my beatings and he doesn't care how much I drool on him. Grendel gets close enough for me to "pet" her which really is amazing and loves to play with my toys with me. She also plays the stair game better than anyone. Whenever she sees me climbing the stairs she goes two stairs ahead of me and rolls around on her back to get me to come get her. As I move up the stairs, she does as well. Really I am a lucky kid. Best of all though is the laser pointer. Not only do I belly laugh when they chase it, I am now learning how to get in on the game. It is so much fun!!! Since they are so good to me there really is no excuse for why we made Grendel wear one of my toys as a collar other than the fact that it was really funny to watch her walk around while wearing it.

cuteness

here are some great shots of me and uncle Ben. We really had a blast hanging out together. He was determined to teach me to walk while he was here. I am not up and about just yet, but I did stand all on my own for a while multiple times which I had never done before. This weekend we are going to New York and we will see him again. He said he is going to take my to FAO Schwartz!! I am really excited about that too!

Pasta!

So while uncle Ben was visiting he wanted to learn how to make homemade pasta. Friday afternoon while I took a nap, mom and uncle Ben turned the kitchen into a pasta factory. Sounds like they really had a lot of fun!

back from the weekend

Sorry about the lack of additional pictures. Since dad was home for the long weekend mom was taking advantage of her extra time to get stuff done and we were busy, busy, busy to quote Eloise. Here are some more pictures of the big feast. Including me playing with a WAY cool sword. Snuggling with uncle Ben and mom and grandmom stuck on the couch after they ate way too much.

Thanksgiving

My first Thanksgiving. I can see why mom goes on and on about how this is her favorite holiday. It really was a lot of fun. My Uncle Ben came up on Wednesday night, although I didn't see him until Thursday morning. That was a fun surprise, I climbed up the back stairs and he was at the top! Then we drove up to the cabin for a full feast. My great-grandmother Hope, great-grandfather Paul, grandmom, grandpa, mom, dad, uncle Ben and I all sat down for a big meal that afternoon. I had turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, sweet potatoes and apple sauce. It was delicious! Blogger just lost the other pictures I had to post and I don't have time to get them again right now since it is time for lunch, but I will get them up tonight!

Crawling . . .

wait a minute

So remember how last night I was saying that Otto was working on getting his top tooth. Well just now when I was holding him I saw a new tooth! Except it is on the bottom next to the two teeth he has! I totally missed that one. He still has swollen gums on the top with a tooth SO close to the surface, but the one on the bottom beat it out. I can't believe I totally missed it!

where does the time go?/

from mom:

So sorry it has been so long since I posted anything. We are moving at warp speed here. Otto is crawling all over everything and it is all I can do to keep up with him. Right now we are having one heck of a teething fest. He has a major runny nose, super drooly and generally fussy. Actually for how bad he must feel his spirits are pretty good. Today I noticed his gums are really swollen where his front teeth hopefully will be. With any luck they will break through any day now and this will all be a distant memory. Needless to say all this has not lead to good nights of sleep so I have taken to napping along with him, which cuts into my blogging time.
Now he is sounds hungry and losing patience with a milk free Dad so I must run, more soon

books and sleep

Notes from mom:

So one thing that has happened over the last month that both eric and i are really excited about is Otto is really getting into books. He has always liked them, but up until now he has really only wanted to eat them. He still loves a good book snack, but he now also enjoys helping turn pages and listening to you read them. It is so nice to sit and read stories for him. We are still in a mostly board book phase but I can't wait to start with the many piles of fantastic books we have that aren't board books.

On a side not I would like to mention that who ever came up with daylight savings time did not have an eight month old who gets up before 6 as is!! Needless to say this has been a fairly foggy week here. Otto has been bright eyed and bushy tailed starting at 4:45 in the morning. Today we actually got him back to sleep at 6 and he slept until a little after 8! It was so wonderful. I woke up because I had had enough sleep, before Otto. I even took a shower while he was still asleep. That has not happened since he was born. It won't happen again for a very long time, but it was glorious. Between that and the fact that yesterday I swept and mopped the whole downstairs and made dinner for not just last night but tonight as well, I feel like I am on top of the world! It is amazing the things that seem important to me now.

Halloween

So even though I can't eat candy yet, I still made the rounds on Halloween. We went and visited so of mom's friends in the stores downtown so they could check out my fierce tiger ways. Then we went to the park so I could check out the scene there.

During my amazing weekend of putting the final touches on my mad crawling skills, my grandmother Turner was visiting. We had a nice time hanging out and relaxing even though the weather was yucky while she was here and we didn't get to play outside much. She did take me shopping and got me some really adorable outfits which are sure to grace the blog pages soon.

8 Months

Greeting from Mom

So Otto was officially 8 months old this past Sunday. Take a second and look back at your last eight months. I would venture to guess that few of us have done as much as he has. (I know, I know, certain grandparents built a house, but this is REALLY big.) He has...
mastered holding his head up, and turning it at the same time
learned to burb, still working on doing it to the alphabet
gained the gift of both color and distance vision
learned how to grab onto things, then direct them into his head.
learned how to pick things up without directing them into his head
learned to smile and laugh, seriously saved him a few nights
mastered sitting up on his own
got eating with a spoon down
became helpful when getting dressed by putting his own arms in the sleeves
got going on the worm and downward dog as an alternative method of locomotion
mastered the "pincer grasp" and now LOVES cherrios!
figured out how to crawl, and how to catch cats!
this led to crawling away at breakneck speed while being dressed, cross off helpful in that department
starting not just pulling up on furniture, but cruising around on it
practices everyday on driving me crazy one second and melting my heart the next

In between there have been countless other milestones, too many to count. I both can't believe that he has been here for only 8 months and feel like he has always been around with his adorable giggle and mischievous shoelace eating. He really is amazing, even when he only takes a 25 minute morning nap and whines until he finally goes to sleep at 2:15 (like today).

It is just amazing watching him crawl all over the house, which he is really doing now, and take a minute to think how much he has changed since he was born. I love watching each new development, but I also miss just holding him so still while he slept. So tiny cuddled in my arms. He doesn't go for that too much now. Although now he crawls over to you and climbs into you lap which is pretty darn awesome.

Pumpkin Carving

Due to the high frequency of mom's friends birthdays around Halloween, we went to a pumpkin carving birthday party. Here are some great shots from the evening. Leo and I got to play with all of Henry's AWESOME toys while he was napping. Bonus. Then we all had dinner together and Dave made hilarious noises that made me belly laugh. All in all it was a great night. Oh yeah, mom's pumpkin was the one with the cat.
From Mom, I should also mention that Jen made some of the best chili I have ever had. Eric had to leave early to go play soccer so I brought some home for him. He was dancing around the kitchen saying how it was JUST LIKE Skyline chili. This stuff from Ohio I have heard him talk about since we first met. Jen was good enough to give me the recipe so now I can make it sometime, but only if Eric promises to dance around the kitchen again. That was pure entertainment!