the eric update - day 331: the unofficial start of summer! or what to do about those pesky solar death rays?

the end of birthday week is punctuated by memorial day is the u.s. which is officially a holiday to commemorate u.s. service men and women who died in military service and unofficially the holiday weekend is traditionally thought to mark the start of summer; perhaps not suprisingly it's also the weekend that many americans choose to "open" their backyard pools in anticipation of A Long Hot Summer ( not that you can swim in a newly "opened" pool, mind you, as the water is freezing and dirty ).

but we did get a chance to sit on the diving board, admiring the sparkling bluish hues with odin who certainly hasn't seen anything like it in his entire life; it occured to me as i watched the pool reflect on his face that i only had the vaguest idea of how to keep an infant safe while out in the sun. sure wide-brimmed hats ( are sunglasses practical on an infant? ) are important, but what about sunscreen?

it seems like most sources follow the american academy of pediatrics recommendations and advice "caution" only if the infant is younger than six months; prior to six months , it's generally accepted that sunscreen isn't dangerous, but it hasn't been proven safe either.

so i guess it's o.k. to slather odin in sunscreen if the situation warrants. but surely one or two of you must have a hot summer tip for keeping your infant cool and comfortable while enjoying the outdoors.

the eric update - day 330: after the bedtime bath antics.

odin still gets his bedtime bath as part of the The Four Bees and it has been fascinating to watch him gradually become more and more enthralled with the baby he sees in the shower door mirror. while he's always enjoyed looking in a mirror, he's taken the post-bath mirror antics to a whole new level and he'll hoot and holler and happily yell and scream at the top of his lungs so loudly that you can hear him throughout the house.

he doesn't do this in front of other mirrors, so i have no idea what makes this one so special. maybe he's just extra happy after his bath? or perhaps it's because he can look into the mirror while standing on his own, which always makes him smile?

it's cute to watch him scream into the mirror, but i wonder if there's some way we can work in a lesson about the difference between "inside" and "outside" voices.

the eric update - day 329: not quite ready for cruisin' in the galaxie five oh-oh.

perhaps one or two people noticed that something was conspicuously absent during the recent lightening of the load.

but how could i possibly sell my 1965 galaxie 500? sure, i might not have finished many projects on the car in the past three years, but i didn't start any projects so it makes sense that i wouldn't finish any of them. and besides, if a car is 40 years old, it seems like you don't have to rush and get everything done in the first 5 years.

and yet, it's not exactly easy to be nimble with a two ton antique automobile to think about and since i didn't want to deal with the hassle or expense of storing it for an indefinite period of time, it looked as if the logical thing to do would be to finally give in and sell it to one of the many galaxie fanatics that has offered to buy it from me while idling at a traffic light.

but now that it's waxed and buffed and ready to be sold, i've decided that i just can't do it. it just doesn't seem right to deny odin the chance to learn how to operate the three on a tree transmission when he's old enough. and who knows, maybe in a few years, he'll even help me finish one of those projects that i've been always meaning to start.

what are we going to do with the galaxie during our upcoming travels? well, we've hatched a plan that in hindsight might seem so illogical and unwise that we might wonder what caused our temporary insanity. regardless, i'm sure it'll make for a great adventure :-)

the eric update - day 328: an adventure in the park! or playing at a neurotically safe distance.

seeking a little change of scenery, we went on an field trip to a local park . i thought that we'd get to spend some quality time playing our new "tackle pops" crawling game, but alas, it seems as if there were far more interesting things to focus on than boring old pops.

i had made the mistake of sitting up on a hill overlooking a expansive play area with lots of kids running around and yelling and making lots of commotion, which odin found endlessly fascinating.

so much for playtime with pops.

even though it's we've said goodbye to rsv season, we're still a little paranoid about him playing with the unwashed masses since we've had a few close calls with the cold/flu/mystery illnesses with friends and family and assume that there are still bugs of various sorts in the wild.

maybe soon we'll let our guard down, but not quite yet.

the eric update - day 327: odin - devourer of all that is solid.

maybe it's because he's burning a bunch of calories with his newfound crawling capability or maybe we should get prepared for another growth spurt or maybe he just likes the feel of his pudgy belly and he wants a little more pudge to play with; whatever the cause, odin has quickly progressed from eating a few spoonfulls of yogurt to hesitantly sampling a slighty wider array of solids to pretty much devouring anything and everything we put in front of him.

in just about a week, he's gone from eating just a few spoons of solid food to cleaning out two and three jars of babyfood. and he'll often top the meal off with more than a little bit of oatmeal!

you'll notice that if we can't shovel the food in fast enough, he likes to have a jenga block close at hand to help pacify his oral urges.

i haven't done a rigorous food intake analysis, but he doesn't seem to be nursing much less than normal so it doesn't appear that he's simply replacing milk with solids. he just seems to need a lot more calories than just a few weeks ago.

it might be time to start making our own babyfood so he doesn't empty our bank account with his new solid habit :-)

the eric update - day 326: meet odin. the super crawling, climbing edition!

i'm very proud to report that since we last visited the topic of crawling, slightly over a week ago, odin has definately moved out of the gray area of proto-crawling to full-fledged, one hundred percent, almost perfectly coordinated mobility!

on the front lawn today we played a new game where i'd lay down in the grass about 10 feet from where he was sitting and he'd zip on over and pull himself up on to me and look proud upon reaching his ultimate goal.

no, not me - the camera.

hoooraaaay for odin!

if you look close at the large version of the picture you can see his bottom teeth!

and i should note that in case you noticed his new sweater - we just were given this sweater the other day by a sister-in-law who had it finished after it was started for her son, odin's cousin, by their great-grandmother who passed away before being able to complete her last knitting project.

the sweater laid unfinished for 10 years.

the eric update - day 325: happy birthday to me! and the bestest birthday present, EVAH!

yes, sirree. today just happened to be my birthday. amidst the gifts and great food, it's hard to not think about just how much my life has changed in ways that i could not possibly have imagined a year ago. that's life, i suppose - learning how to make the most of the unexpected curve balls that it loves to throw at you.

of course, odin is oblivious that he's celebrating my thirty third birthday, and it would appear that his pudgy baby belly is far more interesting to him than my rapidly advancing age!

he's getting very attuned to his body and lately has quite a fun time pushing and pulling and tugging at whatever might be at hand :-)

i'm not making this up - he did surprise us by giving me the bestest birthday present a father could ask for.

today he said, "dada" for the very first time ( much to mamma's chagrin )!

the eric update - day 324: on tempting the gods of sleep.

ahhhh, the trials and tribulations of infant sleep habits.

i'm as surprised as anyone to be able to happily ( if somewhat nervously ) report that odin seems to have developed a relatively stable sleep schedule, almost despite our best efforts; from the first days of being home from the hospital when we discovered that we needed to simulate the neonatal intensive care unit to realizing that we had a 139 day old infant with a newborn's sleeping habits who could benefit from a regimented sleep routine to a brief stint of associating mamma with sleep which necessitated a quickly improvised almost-no-cry sleep solution to ditching the crib in favor of a big boy beds, regardless of the increased mobility if affords, to teething angst; with all the changes over such a short period of time, it's almost easy to miss the forest for the trees and miss the fact we have, relatively speaking, a super sleeper.

these days, more often than not, odin gets ready for bed at about 5:30 p.m. with about the same sleep routine that he's enjoyed for months. more often than not, he's fast asleep by 7 p.m. and usually awakens for a little food between midnight and 3 a.m., although in the past week, we've been surprised to find that he's slept until his normal waking time of 7 a.m.!

the occasional full night of sleep is a welcome relief after 324 days!

now, if i can just shake the feeling that i'll be forced to suffer the wrath of the gods of sleep by having the hubris to think that maybe, just maybe, we'll have months of sleep filled nights to come :-)

the eric update - day 323: a visit from an internet friend! or we're mostly harmless.

today was an extra special day because odin and us had the opportunity to meet lori, a long time reader and postcard sender from palm harbor, florida who was nice enough to let us know that she was going to be in our part of the world and invited us to meet for a cup of coffee and conversation.

we had a great time and we're happy to report that maybe, just maybe, there's another person in the world who can vouch for the fact that we're reasonably normal people and won't embarrass you too much in public if you take the initiative to invite us out for coffee :-)

all jesting aside, words are often inadquate to describe how much we appreciate the support we've received over the past year from "strangers" and if lori is any indication, you're an even nicer bunch than we ever could have imagined.

and i'm not just saying that because she surprised us with a new hat or odin!

thanks, lori!

the eric update - day 322: goofing with the grandparents!

anyday is a good day to visit grandparents! and since grandpa snowdeal has a new digital camera, whenever we get together the air is often filled with the sounds of camera shutters opening and closing.

obviously, odin knows exactly how to work the camera :-)

the eric update - day 321: not kissing cousins. yet.

can it really have already been three weeks since odin has had a chance to hang out with with his cousin evelyn? time flies, all the more so now that we've moved out of this sold house and he and she don't get a chance to see each other on a daily basis.

regular readers might remember that had he not been born 15 weeks early, odin and his cousin would have been born within days of each other, which makes her his age adjusted buddy.

although we're not supposed to compare them in terms of development, it's impossible to not and it's amazing to see them hit developmental milestones at almost the same time.

they certainly seem to enjoy each other's presence.

the eric update - day 320: beaker frantically tries to prevent odin from doing the unthinkable.

beaker , the long suffering assistent to dr. honeydew on the muppet show, apparently doesn't know that odin can, in fact, ignore the "do not remove under penalty of law" warning on the tag attached to his boppy.

as you can see, beaker is quite frantic about the prospect that odin might be hauled away by the federal authorities despite my repeated attempts to explain that he was terribly mistaken.

clearly beaker and odin could do a little better job of matching their plaid shirts.

hey, it's friday - whaddya expect :-)

the eric update - day 319: no more eggs for odin! or a food allergy?

some may remember that one of odin's very first foods was a soft egg yolk which we gave him since it's well known that they are a great source of iron and dha (docosahexalnoic acid). we continued the occasional egg for a few weeks until he had what was either a very coincidental bout of stomach flu or a reaction to the egg. we never really knew for sure what caused him to throw up nearly continuously for over an hour, but eventually concluded that it might have because the egg was too rich a food for someone not quite used to anything other than breastmilk.

since he's been doing so well with solid food lately we thought that we'd try an egg again. and unfortunately the result was quite similar. after a few hours, odin began vomiting for over an hour and didn't stop until his stomach was completely empty.

it's odd and a little worrysome that he didn't even eat that much egg yolk - we simply mashed up a bit of hardboiled yolk in some breastmilk and gave him a few small baby spoons of the mixture and topped of his meal with plain old milk. but despite the small amount, it seems too fantastic a coincidence for the egg to not be the cause his of stomach woes. could the little bit of diluted egg be "richer" than the straight yogurt and sweet potatoes that he's so increasingly fond of?

or are we perhaps witnessing the effects of a mild food allergy? although not common, it's not unknown for infants to develop an allergy to egg whites, but everything we've read indicates that it's far more unusual to see an allergy to egg yolks; who knows, maybe he's also allergic to egg whites and we just don't know it because we've never given him any. either way, hopefully there's another explanation because egg products are in everything and i've heard that it can be insanely difficult to keep infants and toddlers from accidently injesting something with egg as an ingredient.

the eric update - day 318: odin and the other guy. a self portrait.

today was a slow day - the perfect kind of day for hanging out on the back patio, wondering when it will be warm enough to "open" the pool. and i guess as good a day as any for a self portrait with odin.

which is not exactly the easiest thing to do when all you have is a 50mm lens on your camera and no tripod or remote shutter release; regardless, i love the fact that it looks like we're both wondering if i'm ever going to snap a picture that's in focus and doesn't cut one or the other of us out of the frame.

it appears that odin doubts that it'll ever happen before his bedtime.

and is it just me or does it appear as if we have identically furrowed brows with a slight squint to the eyes?

the eric update - day 317: really pretty much almost probably just about crawling!

i thought, for reasons that seem fairly silly in hindsight, that infants instantaneously discovered that they could crawl. that there'd be a discrete moment when all of a sudden they figured out that they had the ability to propel themselves across the floor.

but, at least with odin , it seems that things are so clearly defined and for the past day or so he's been really pretty much almost probably just about crawling!

every so often, when he's really motivated, he'll move his hands and feet together in a way that's more coordinated than even just two weeks ago and "crawl" a few inches towards whatever has captured his interest.

he's not overly confident in his new ability, but i think it's (almost) safe to say that he really has started a new era of personal mobility!

the eric update - day 317: yet another eye exam. or the unexpected, lingering effects of retinopathy of prematurity.

ironically, we were encouraged by the clinic staff to not book this eye exam considering how positive the results were from our unexpected exam less than two months ago, unless - of course - we suspected that something was wrong. and we almost did skip it, since neither of us has spent much time thinking about odin's eyes since our opthamalogic emergency that wasn't.

and while it's certainly not a dire emergency of the life threatening sort, today we learned that we might not have fully escaped the lingering effects of retinopathy of prematurity; it seems that in two months odin's eyesight has gone from slight farsightedness which is normal for an infant to slight nearsightedness which is not. for the numerically inclined, he's gone from a +2 on the farsighted scale to a -1.25 on the nearsighted index, which is obviously a shift of 3 units in a very short period of time.

will his sight shift another 3 units in the "wrong" direction, indicating legal blindness in another 60 days? statistics indicate that it's not highly likely, but it's not unlikely enough to be considered improbable. will his eyes spontaneously go back to "normal"? almost certainly not. unfortunately, most often it's a one way trip to progressively worsening nearsightedness in cases such as odin's.

in reality, all we can do is wait and, er, see what happens since nobody can predict how quickly, or even if, his eyesight will continue to deteriorate. and, in an almost amusing twist, we've been given the worse possible advice to give parents with our temperment - watch him closely for "abnormal" signs. if you watch any baby closely enough for long enough, you can convince yourself that everything is abnormal.

in any case, and in all seriousness, we're supposed to stay particularly attuned to whether or not he's crossing his eyes since that means that one eye is getting progressively worse at a faster rate than the other eye. and if one eye is worse than another, the brain can quickly decide to shut down the signals from the "bad" eye which is not something you want in a brain that's forming new neuronal connections. so, as long as both eyes are equally nearsighted then odin could measure an astonishing -8 or -9 before glasses or corrective measures would be considered because, well, it's almost impossible to keep glasses on a 10 month old. but, if the eyes are differentially affected, then we would probably need to start looking at different therapeutic options to help prevent the brain from shutting things down.

that's right. it's possible that we could have the pleasure of trying to figure out how to keep an eye patch on an infant. aaarrrrggggghh, matey!

but we'll cross that bridge, or plank, when we and if we get there. and for now, we'll be happy to simply watch odin investigate the plastic wrap on his exam chair and marvel at how quickly the chair appears to be shrinking between visits.

the eric update - day 316: fun with food! a series.

o.k. i realize that probably nobody is interested in a seeminly endless series of photos of odin eating. but it's a new thing for us which makes every feeding fun and exciting.

and beyond just the fact of the newness, i have to admit that he's so expressive that it just blows me away. this is another one of times where i catch myself remembering how different things were as a non-parent; sure, i'd seen pictures of food smeared from one end of an infant to another, but i never really thought beyond the "ha! look at the messy baby!" reaction.

little did i know that there was a whole lot more going on than just a mess being made.

so, today i decided to do my best to look beyond the smeared food to capture just a few of the many faces of odin.

the eric update - day 315: more new tooth enamel spotted! or the paper teether.

whoa! slow this train down! it's only been a week since our first sighting of tooth enamel and we can now already see a new incisor coming in on the top! he keeps clicking his teeth together as he attempts to figure out why there's something quite different where his gums used to be.

and let it never be doubted that regardless of whatever remedy we may try, odin's favorite teether is a piece of paper or cardboard. we try not to let him him eat the paper for too long since it's obviously fairly easy for him to choke on a small bit of it, but there's really no stopping him from shredding his children's magazines when he really decides that it's something he wants to do, which is pretty much anytime he has his hands on one.

the eric update - day 314: the awesome power of the fishes!

did you know that the sumerians were the first to keep fish as pets over 4,500 years ago? and fish owning students have higher grade point averages and math and verbal sat scores than their non-fish tending counterparts? and that tending and caring for fish is known to lower your blood pressure. well, at least according to a site supported in part by the florida tropical fish farms association, aquatic industry companies and the florida department of agriculture & consumer services. so it must be true!

but even if one were to doubt the ultimate veracity of the claims, there's no denying that little odin is quite fond of fishes. and if we're ever are on a field trip that brings us close to an aquarium, as was the case during an adventure to a local big box superstore, we can't not stop and say, "hallo! fishes!"

he's polite and doesn't bang on the tank as he's quite content to simply place his hands on the glass as he calmly watches the fish dart here and there.

of course, his fascination with fishes is in no small part due to the fact that he helps care for a pair of pet goldfish and not a day goes by where he doesn't spend a little time in the morning and evening with them.

we have a hankering to get another aquarium to put in his room so he can listen to the soothing sounds of the water bubbling and gurgling while watching the fishes as he winds down for naptime or bedtime or any ol' relaxing time.

so if you're fond of fishes, we'd love to hear your comments as we do our homework to find odin a few new aquatic friends.

the eric update - day 313: mister intentionality.

each day we get to see more and more obviously intentional behaviors from odin and more than a few of them are quite endearing.

what does sleeping on the floor have to do with intentionality? well, it makes sense when you realize that he's rolled, scooted and almost crawled off his big boy bed to a spot that's nearly 5 feet away from his original sleeping spot. it's a familiar scenario - a short while after putting him down for sleep we'll hear him grunting and groaning while struggling to get to whatever particular spot he's chosen to sleep. initially, we'd make the mistake of putting him back on the bed, but have quickly learned that we were just making it more difficult for him to get to his choice spot and delaying his falling fast asleep.

today mister intentionality apparently really wanted to take a morning nap on top of a clean bag of laundry next to his hamper. when he woke up, instead of asking us to come and pick him up, he played with the hamper for awhile, which makes me wonder if that was his plan all along.

and when he's not roaming around his bedroom, finding newer and more interesting places to sleep that aren't on his big boy bed, odin often likes to impress us with how much he'd like to play with his toys all by himself. it's certainly not that he doesn't like us to hang out with him, but we're also getting better at figuring out when he'd like to spend some time investigating his toy box without mamma or pops pestering him. he enjoys pulling each toy out and carefully inspecting it, before moving on the next one.

now if we could just teach him how to put them back in the box.

the eric update - day 312: yogurt! yum!

since our early study of solids, odin has been slowly, if a bit begrudgingly, trying out new foods. and while he may humor us by accepting a spoonful or two of carrots or oatmeal, other than bananas we haven't been very successful in stumbling upon a foodstuff that he enjoys without a nontrivial amount of cajoling.

that is, until we tried yogurt.

much to our surprise, after a spoonful of the good stuff, he clamors for more and can't get enough of it!

different than the recommendation for the introduction cow's milk which isn't encouranged before 12 months, the american academy of pediatrics suggests that you can try yogurt as early as eight months ( well, actually, various sites claim that the aap doesn't actually recommend yogurt until 9-12 months - maybe someone more knowledgeable than i will clear up the discrepancy ), so we thought we'd be in the clear considering he's ten months actual, but just shy of that recommendation in age adjusted terms.

you'll notice that we happened to only have stonyfield lowfat, organic yogurt on hand which isn't a perfect option since fat is important for developing baby brains. but we think he'll be just fine for now since he's only getting a small amount.

stonyfield also has a special line formulated for infants and toddlers which we'll probably try that unless someone has a better suggestion.

the eric update - day 311: guys and dolls.

it's funny how easily one can slip into the easy habit of subconsciously reinforcing gender stereotypes at a very early age, especially when it comes to toys. even though i'm relatively cognizant that savvy marketing is behind the perceived difference between a barbie doll and, say, g.i. joe, i'll admit that i had to pause when kris came home and pulled a doll out of a bag from a recent shopping trip. it's certainly not that i'm against boys playing with dolls; in fact, it's fascinating to me that my first, immediate reaction was surprise that she hadn't picked him up a dump truck precisely because i didn't really think i had any preconceived notions about what makes an appropriate toy for a boy. in theory, i didn't care, but there it was, the surprised reaction, proving that maybe i did. just a little at least.

of course, odin doesn't care one wit and quite likes his new doll. it looks a little like him ( and is a bit bigger than he himself was when he was born ) and he likes playing with the doll's face when he's not using its hands to sooth his teething pain.

so, maybe now i'll be a little more prepared if someday he asks for a barbie doll.

further reading:
toys for boys and girls
avoiding gender stereotypes
GUYS AND DOLLS: Breaking Out of the Gender Box
gender identity

the eric update - day 310: mister serioso tackles the stairs! almost.

nope, mister serioso is still not crawling, which doesn't really concern us in the slightest. but he's so close that it's hard to not anticipate each and every time that we put him on the floor that he's going to scoot himself quickly to the other side of the room.

while we patiently wait for that milestone, odin has been doing his best to impress us with how strong he his by pulling himself up and on to whatever might look like it could provide an interesting obstacle to overcome. which of course, leads one naturally to attempt the seemingly insurmountable stairs.

someday soon when we're continually admonishing him to not to attempt to climb the stairs all by himself, i'll remember today as the day that he he came very, very close to climbing his very first step.

the eric update - day 309: so, ahhh, what was in those teething pills anyways?

i don't want to turn this into all-teething-all-the-time, which of course means that i'm going to write about our continuing adventures with teething.

in my naivety, i thought that when teeth finally broke broke through the gums that we'd see the rapid disappearance of teething symptoms. yes, i can hear all you veteran parents quietly snickering from the peanut gallery. indeed that doesn't seem to be the case, so we ran drove to our local health food store to grab some hyland teething tablets which a few people recently recommended as a teething remedy ( not that we won't be trying the other ideas, this was just the first on our list for a variety of uninteresting reasons ).

i think the jury is still out on whether or not the tablets are going to work for us. we've given him two doses of three tablets about four hours apart and it's hard to say if it helped alleviate his symptoms. then again, maybe he'd be a lot more symptomatic if we had done nothing. then again, sometimes a placebo really does work wonders so maybe it's just a case of trial and error until you find something that works until it doesn't and you move on erroneously attributing the whims of statistics with cause and effect.

sometimes i think my life would be a little easier if i had taken fewer math classes. but i digress.

in any case, after we had given odin his first dose of teething tablets i decided to check the ingredients:

Active Ingredients: Calcarea Phosphorica (calcium phosphate) 3x, Chamomilla (chamomile) 3x HPUS, Coffea Cruda (coffee) 3x HPUS, Belladonna 3X HPUS 0.0003% Alkaloids

belladonna? i guess if it's the hallucinogenic nightshade that might explain odin's behavior after taking a few of the tabs!

in all seriousness, if you do decide to try the teething tablets, make sure you follow directions and dissolve them under the patient's tongue! if you just put them on top of the tongue, they're likely to gag as they try to swallow the tablet before it completely dissolves. trust me on this ;-(

for the humor impaired, i feel compelled to add that his appearence in the photo was not indicative of his general demeaner - it just happened to be one of the many "unflattering" photos that i would usually delete. and i'm mostly joking about the beladonna. mostly.

the eric update - day 308: happy mother's day! we have the first sighting of actual tooth enamel!

as you might be aware, today is mother's day! and it's a extra special mother's day for us since it's kris' first official mother's day as a mother since odin was born.

and what shall history record was the first gift given to kris as a mother for mother's day? i guess it's appropriate that she humbly requested a locket, so she could always have a picture of odin near to her heart ( well, she didn't really say the "near to my heart" part - i made that up for effect ).

i think we can find a picture or two to put in the locket :-)

mere days after wondering when odin's bottom incisors would break completely through his gums, i can verify that we have had the first sighting of actual tooth enamel!

they're not sticking out very far and it's impossible to photograph them, but they're there! when he decided that he wanted to sooth his gums by gnawing on a granny smith, you could hear his teeth squeaking against the apple skin, which of course, i thought was the coolest sound i'd ever heard.

the eric update - day 307: a future tar heel?

much to the chagrin of certain michigan state fans ( d'oh! ), kelliamanda was kind enough to send odin his latest collegiate t-shirt from the university of north carolina in chapel hill - home of the tar heels.

thanks, kelliamanda!

and who knows, perhaps years from now, this picture will get him interested in unc and your evil plan will be realized :-)

the eric update - day 306: beware the teething monster!

jeeez, louise. if odin's central incisors pop through this evening it'll be none too soon. frozen washcloths, teethers and gum massages are doing little at this point to alleviate his irritation.

and while he's relatively content while he's awake to maintain a steady-state of manageable irritibility, his naps and nightime sleeping have pretty much fallen apart. quickly.

perhaps benzocaine salves like anbesol or orajel are a short term solution? on the downside, more then one resource advices against oral anesthetics because they can numb the throat and cause choking.

then again, maybe it's time to rub a little whiskey on his gums. joking!

as always, anecdotes and advice are encouraged.

the eric update - day 305: down with the sippy cup industrial complex!

montessori schools discourage them in their classrooms and some speech pathologists and dentist advise against their use ( always a naysayer in the crowd though ); and yet despite the misgivings, you're still likely to see them everywhere - kids clamoring for their brightly colored sippy cups.

while we're not anti-sippy militants and we might change our tactic the first time he spills grape juice on a relative's carpet, we still thought it would be fun to get odin used to drinking from a "real" cup. or at least a very, very diminutive cup.

and no, smarty pants, it's not a shot glass. it's a mini measure, measuring cup which is just the perfect size for odin to mimic us while we're drinking from our cups. he's already quite adept at putting it up to his mouth, but what little liquid we put in the glass usually ends up running down his face, as he doesn't have all motions coordinated perfectly.

but soon enough, i suspect, he'll be banging his Real Cup on the table, yelling for, "more juice!"