Ouch! My first stiches.

Graydon slipped on the wet bathroom floor this morning and hit his eyebrow on the edge of the shower. We got him cleaned up and put a makeshift bandage over the cut to keep his little fingers from exploring too much, got ourselves dressed, and then headed into the weekend clinic at his pediatrician's office.

The cut had closed up well enough that the first pair of nurses looked at it and told us that it was a superficial scratch, but that the doctor would look at it anyway. The pediatrician came in to look at it and also declared it a scratch. I explained to her that when I was initially stopping the bleeding I could pretty clearly see into the cut several millimeters. She then gave it a good tug and it dutifully opened up to reveal a lice little laceration. The pediatrician then went to go get a different doctor who knew how to sew.

Graydon is all strapped in and ready to be put back together. I'm glad they didn't ask me to try and hold him. At this point, he didn't seem to mind the restraints. He just kind of lay there waiting patiently for the inevitable.

Graydon didn't like this part very much. Four little stitches and it was all over though. The next bit of fun is figuring out where to go to get the stitches removed next week while we're in Montreal.

After he was all put back together, Graydon passed out in his car seat and had a pretty respectable nap. He's been in a perfectly reasonable mood the rest of the day and hasn't even been messing with his bandage yet.

True Value Bucket

We found a use for the True Value bucket! Thank you Denise and Frank...

Fun with old friends

We ran into Fed and Daniele at a mutual friend's wedding and Graydon had a great time on the dance floor.

Looking out the Window...

.
There is little more fascinating than watching the world go by outside!


These two photos were taken just a few days apart - it's amazing how much stability Graydon has gained in that time. Today, he was able to turn around and look at me without even a wobble. The other day, it took all of his concentration just to hang on.

There were no baby swings

So Graydon had to swing with Daddy. I don't think he minded.

Election Day

Voter fraud is rampant in California.

Halloween Monster

Graydon's daycare had a Halloween parade on Friday, and Neal went to watch. Teresa took this picture there, thanks! We have some from Halloween night, too, and will post those once they're downloaded... :)

I'm stuck

Graydon was a bit fussy, rather cuddly, and very tired this evening. The result is what you see below. What you don't see is that I can't feel my right hand anymore. (at least I can read the nytimes left handed.). When eva finally got home from a field site, she took this picture and then went off to pump. I'm hoping she comes back soon so that we can get him to bed and I can get my arm back.

Oops...

This is what happens when your primary mode of locomotion is backwards.

Mami does it too.

Graydon loves knocking over stacks of blocks (and is willing to crawl to do it) regardless of who builds them.

The remains of a pancake

It is currently unclear how much of the pancake got eaten vs just crushed to small bits and hidden in crevices for us to discover later. But he started with a whole pancake and this is all that was left at the end (notice the left hand)...

Does this count as crawling?

After that success (?) Graydon and Daddy celebrated together on the floor.

So THAT's what that switch is for!!!

Graydon has been happy closing the hatches on this toy for several months now (and has gotten very good at it), but never really got anywhere trying to get them to pop open again. Then tonight, he suddenly got very deliberate with his opposable thumb:



Later, he also figured out the orange slider switch and the blue button. Tomorrow, we'll work on the rocker switch and perhaps, in a few months, we'll also get the green key.

My daddy went to Slovenia...

... and all I got was this stupid tshirt!

Where in the world is my daddy?

My daddy is traveling for work again, but I got to talk to him on skype this evening. He also sent me this clue. Can you help me find him?

Thank you Doris for reading me my bedtime story while Daddy is away.

Some of it went in

I've got a tooth and I'm willing to use it!

Attempting to eat corn on the cob with one tooth.

... and down.

We returned from the farmers market with lots of veggies, some delicious scones, and a passed out baby.

It still fits!

Kind-of... UT football may not be doing too well this year, but Graydon still looks studly in his (rather snug) track suit.

Neal is back from Slovenia and we are off to the farmer's market this morning.

A well-balanced diet

Five things were on the dinner menu tonight - can you identify them? Milk doesn't count (it's extra). :)

Fun at the Beach!

Today was a day full of adventures. Geneva, Teresa, Chris, Eva and Graydon (Neal's away on business) all piled into our Outback and headed out to pick apples at an orchard near Watsonville. The forecast high in Watsonville for the day was either 80F or 90F, depending on which web site you checked. By the time we were headed out of there, the car (which is generally quite accurate) was reading 102F. So we decided to head to the beach in Santa Cruz on our way home to eat lunch and cool off. At first, Graydon was a little nervous about the waves crashing into the beach (they were a foot tall, after all!) and he was also not thrilled with the chilly water temperature. But the air was 96F (in Santa Cruz!!!) so we decided to try him out just sitting right at the point where only the biggest of breakers might send an inch of water or so his way. The end result was a baby happily digging his way into the mud with feet! Good thing we had spare outfits for the kids - though not for the adults. And - for just about the first time ever - we regretted not bringing swimsuits to the beach.

Here's a short video to go with the photo:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ZDYXJBQojA

PS: The cursed onesie strikes (is struck?) again! ;)

All Art-and-Wine-Festivaled Out

Sesame Street Blocks

While we were visiting John, Susan, Henry, Alex, and Ryan in Ottawa we discovered that Graydon really liked some of the boys' old toys. Specifically, he was thrilled with these rubber sesame street blocks. So, after a quick search on eBay, Graydon now has a set of his very own.

Hook 'em!

I'm ready for some football!

Bathing Giggles

We discovered a fun new game during Graydon's bath last night. He normally enjoys bath time, but the reproducibility of the laughing was worth grabbing the camera.



After it was all said and done we had a very happy Mami and baby. (That is, until he refused to eat before being put down for bed and then screamed until nearly midnight... He's recovering from a cold right now and we are coming down with it, so we'll all be very happy once this all passes.)

Swimsuit modeling out-takes and runners-up

We've been back in California for a few days now and are still trying to work through the backlog of pictures from all of our travels and visitors this summer. This is a follow-up post to the swimsuit modeling post from last week. We'll start with an out-take from Graydon's swimsuit photo shoot. The red swimsuit was the last wardrobe change and we had the audacity to sit him down in the smaller creek which was ~ 18 deg C. This was well below his accustomed bath temperature and produced the rather unhappy reaction seen below.
Julius is one of Graydon's cousins from Germany and clearly has the hang of this whole modeling thing....
Benjamin is Julius's father and spent most of the week "beavering" as his wife Katharina put it. By blocking off the dam he was able to control the water level in the small creek which came in incredibly handy for some of our rock moving endeavors. (Pictures still to come in a future post.)
This is actually the picture that originally inspired the concept of the swimsuit modeling photo shoot. We were out skiing in Texas and Eva took this shot of Gramps posing on the bow of the ski boat.
A little while later Gramps was dragging himself back onto the boat after a ski run. This usually produces some pretty unflattering pictures because you are exhausted and dripping wet. However, this time Gramps responded particularly well to the call of "Smile!".
To finish things off, we have a shot of Gramps pulling Eva on the wakeboard while doing his best "Dirty Harry" impression. Clearly, he is a man on a mission.

Time warp

Here are some throw-back pictures from back around Easter. (~6 wks old?) We had a bit of a snafu with Grossmama's camera but were able to recover some of the pictures while we were in Montreal last week.

Graydon getting his first experience with snow! He was rather uncertain about it, but we suspect that by the time he sees snow again (Christmas?) he'll think it's pretty fun to play in.

Luckily, Graydon has outgrown his male pattern baldness since this picture was taken. He has also long since outgrown the frog suit! As an aside, the frog suit was left in Montreal due to a blow-out on the way to the airport and we recovered it this past week as well.

Graydon catching a nap in Granddad's very soft and fuzzy arms.

Sorting mail

We just got back to CA and I'm helping sort the mail!

Graydon Explores Canada's Capital

Guest blogger Auntie Susan writes:
Graydon arrived in Ottawa (with his personal assistants in tow) to an enthusiastic welcome. He spent time cheering on his cousins' "fussball" teams and enjoying a very large white dog who was happy to see him. Uncle John is a very amusing guy, and figured out that his feet are especially sensitive to beard stubble.

Quintessentially Canadian photo op. with 2 Royal Canadian Mounted Police and a fine steed with Graydon's cousins at Parliament Hill in front of Canada's Parliament Buildings.

Waiting for the Tour to Start

We had to wait for a while for our tour to start, but at least there were hot dogs, sodas, and benches in the shade to be had!


The cousins are holding a conference... wonder what trouble they're planning on getting into??

Graydon the swimsuit model

Maybe it's because babies are so cute in swimsuits. Maybe it's because everyone knows how much both parents like the water. Maybe it's because there is a global oversupply resulting in vast clearance sales. Whatever the cause, Graydon has been given four swimsuits thus far and decided to explore his options as a swimsuit model.

Graydon received this cute outfit from Ebo and Erika at the ripe old age of -4 months.

Denise gave Graydon theese cool trunks while we were in Texas. The hat was a gift from Cody and Michelle.

Ingrid arrived in California with a bona-fide swim diaper that Graydon made FULL use of at some point.

And to round things out, these red trunks from Grossmama were waiting for us when we arrived in Montreal. As you will see in another posting, these are the best match for the suits that Mami and Daddy always wear.

Trying to catch Graydon awake

Since all you can see of Graydon in most of the pictures in the previous post is his blue noggin, we thought that we would post a few photos from the same trips where you can actually see him. He is after all the supposed subject of this blog....

First off, this is the explanation of why you only ever saw the blue ball before.


Daddy and Graydon hiking at Pt. Lobos.


A little bit closer.


And closer still!


During our bike tour of the Stanford campus, we had to make an unscheduled stop near the cactus garden to repair a flat tire and a hungry baby.