back and between

Monday morning I took my first ever "red eye" flight from Seattle to Cleavland, to Hartford and it wasn't as unpleasant as it could have been. At first there were two infants echoing each other's screams. One would cry then the other would screech back from some undisclosed location further up in the plane. But they settled down pretty quickly and I was able to catch a few hours. I'll post some pictures and tell some stories, but I am pretty spent right now. We're in the midst of IMpaCT 2009 and the Hartford Project starts this weekend, so I am a little overwhelmed. It definitely feel scattered - I better sleep. Goodnight

out...

Wednesday morning I'm on my first trip to the West coast. I'm attending a friend's wedding and am very excited. A few days with no responsibilities is pretty awesome and I don't feel too bad because Hillary has some help coming. There is a lot to do between now and 5am Weds. morning so I won't say much, but will write about the trip when I return.

smiles

It is pretty sweet when you see faces like these. Sometimes there is lots done to incite the smiling and other times it just kinda happens. Wesley is definitely putting on the weight and is on his way to being a chunky baby. He is just getting those rolls on his neck and it is pretty fun. Sleeping is coming along. Two times now he has slept for 6+ hours and we feel amazing when that happens. Other nights though aren't so good and we need to remember not to get discouraged. The next few weeks will definitely be a challenge for Hillary as I'll be away on and off, and she'll be on her own for some of it. I'm going to Seattle next week and am very excited to explore a new city and be on the West Coast for the first time.

growing - gardens and babies

Wesley is certainly growing and we think our garden is too. Wesley had his one month check up and weighed in 1lb heaveir than last time (8lbs 8oz) and you can see the difference in his chubby cheeks and chunkier thighs.

Our garden, unlike Wesley, is not so easily measured. I spent all of labor day weeding and trimming the various trees which efectively shadded our garden. We've got cucumbers, peppers (green and red), zuchunni, tomatoes, green beans and lettuce this year. In addition we've got a few herbs going by the deck. There is this neat sense of accomplishment in weeding and planting and I really enjoyed it. I think part of the enjoyment stems from the fact that elsewhere in life the results of what I do aren't immediate. I love working with people, but it is nice to spend a day in the garden and tear all this stuff out and put all this stuff in, but I guess it will still be a while to see if it grows.

If you are wondering about our sleep, Wesley isn't on a schedule yet. He has some nights where we only sleep four or five hours, but there are others, like last night, where we got about eight hours of sleep. Eight hours is amazing.

moving on up

The exciting news for this week is that Wesley has jumped up in diaper size to #1. It is interesting that until a few weeks ago I did not know there were various sizes of diapers. It defineitely makes sense, but there are all sorts of things you learn when you have a kid. Hillary brought Wesely to church yesterday and that was the first try of attempting to get to a certain place at a specific time. It was challenging. We don't keep much of a schedule since our plans plans are easily foiled by a hungry or sleepy or cranky baby.

Outside of baby stuff a highlight from my week was attending a graduation party for one of our students. It was unique in that only guys were invited (no girls except immediate family). We hung out and ate for a bit and then took time to encourage this student. Different men from his life talked about what they had seen and hope to see in him and many gave great advice for the next stage. It was interesting to be at this graduation party and think that I would be doing something like that as a Dad one day.

a little fussy

Wesley is clearly a cute baby, but he is following the path of most infants - not sleeping when he is supposed to. He is all swadled, being rocked, comforted, and all that good stuff and then he just looks up at you with these wide open eyes. Sometimes it is really funny, but when it gets to be the early hours of the morning my sense of humour seems to run out. Overall it hasn't been that bad - I can't imagine having a baby who just cries. I just think we were a little spoiled early on when he would eat and then go right to sleep. We are figuring him out a little bit more each day, but he continues to grow and change so sometimes it is hard to know what to expect. It is really interesting at moments to think, "Wow, I was a squirmy little baby just liket this and one day Wesley will hopefully be grown up with kids of his own." Those are my thoughts as I change diapers at odd hours of the morning.

first night home

We brought Wesley home from the hospital yesterday and are getting used to life together at home. It is great to have Wesley here and for some reason the adjective "fun" keeps coming to mind. Even though he basically eats, sleeps, and dirties his diapers it is a lot of fun to have him around. It is such a strange and wonderful thing that the mere presence of this person, even though you barely know him and he contributes little, can add so much to life. Now that he is here though, we are trying to get into a rhythm and figure out who does what and when we sleep. I'll try to get some more pictures up this week.