Number two's number two, and number one's number one (tricycle)

I'm not one of those dads who likes to brag that "I've never changed a diaper."  As I've written before, I find there to be something of a communion -- and I mean that quite seriously-- when I change one of Alex's, and I've never tried to shunt off the poopy diapers to Jane.  So how is it possible that today was the first time I changed one of Ella-Anne's poopy diapers?  Almost a full month with her, and this was the first one?

Just call me "Mr. Lucky."

But my luck ran out today.  Just as Jane and Alex were about to swing by the house to pick the two of us up for a lunch out, I detected the "formulaic" scent of an infant poop.  So I got her onto the changing table, opened up the envelope, and announced, "And the Oscar goes to . . . ."

As it turned out, my luck wasn't the only thing that ran out today.  A whole lot of poop also ran out.  Out the top of the back of the diaper, and onto the back of the inside of her cute little outfit.  Apparently, Ella-Anne had saved up a really good one -- a wardrobe-changing one -- for Daddy's first poopy diaper change.

I had forgotten what sorts of poop infants who eat only formula have.  They're not human.  They're some sort of foreign green alien substance.  Soylent Green, I think I'll call it. 

It was a big day for Alex, too.  (No, not in the poop department.)  This morning, she and I went out to Toys 'R' Us and purchased her first tricycle.  A pink Disney Princess tricycle.  With a pink Disney Princess bicycle helmet.  Though we almost had a meltdown at the checkout when I wouldn't allow her to add a Tinker Bell umbrella to our purchase, we survived that and made it home.  Well, Alex had been waiting all of her life for a tricycle; she just didn't know it until today.  She rode that sucker up and down our driveway in the morning, and again in the afternoon when we returned from lunch.  She was so tired that when it was bedtime, she came into my home office, threw her arms around my neck, and said, "Thank you for the tricycle, Daddy."

I said, "You're welcome.  I love you, little bug."  And Alex gave her standard response:  "To the moon and back."  (In case you don't know the origin of that, it's here.)  Se went to bed without any audible fuss, and at 8:35, she is out like a light.

Finally, speaking of "out like a light," Ella-Anne has been a champion sleeper the last two nights.  Thursday night -- down at 9 p.m., and up for the first time at 5 a.m.  That's eight straight hours if you're scoring at home.  (Or even if you're alone.)  Last night -- down at 10:20 p.m. and not up until after 7 a.m.  And that's over eight and a half hours.  At nine weeks old.

Say it with me.  "w-w-w-dot-Miracle Blanket-dot-com."  Order it here.  We do not get kickbacks, but we should.

Three years ago

Compare this photo of Alex in her stroller at Wabash Homecoming 2006 to the one of Ella-Anne below.

"My legs are squiggly"

The blogging hiatus of almost a year means that I haven't captured some of my favorite Alex-isms.  The good news is that she is at the very highest end of verbal skills for a three-year-old.

The bad news is that she is at the very highest end of verbal skills for a three-year-old.  And that means that she's got an explanation or an excuse for everything, and sometimes she combines it with whining or wailing.  (Who am I kidding?  She almost always combines it with whining or wailing.)

Take mornings as an example.  I'm usually the first one up in the house, followed shortly thereafter by Alex.  That means that Alex awakens to Daddy sitting in the family room with a cup of coffee and the paper, with "Morning Joe" on television in the background.  As previous readers may know, Alex was a big fan of "Morning Joe," because "Mika looks like Mommy," and she liked that "Silly Willie."  (Apparently, though, the eponymous Joe Scarborough didn't even register with her.)

That was then, this is now.

Now, she'll see "Morning Joe" on the TV and cry, "I don't like the news any more."  (Sometimes that's coupled with an "I want to watch Mickey Mouse!")  Usually, I stand firm.  Usually, she gets distracted, either by something in her playroom or by a commercial -- a current favorite is the Walgreen's commercial with the various products falling on top of each other in Rube Goldberg style. 

But the "I don't like it any more" can get old.  "How about a cup of milk?"  "I don't like milk any more."  I call [balderdash] on that one.

I also call [balderdash] on the clearly fallacious claims, like when she is lying on the floor or the sofa and wants to be carried instead of walking on her own:  "I don't know how to walk!"  Or, my personal favorite, "I can't walk because my legs are too squiggly!"   This is a word she made up, meaning that she believes her legs are too squirmy and wiggly (squirmy + wiggly = squiggly) to effectively walk without assistance.

But today's Alex special suggests that we will be having a longer discussion.  "Mommy, when we leave Ella-Anne at Magda's house, can we get a little brother?" Uh, bug, we're not leaving Ella-Anne anywhere else -- she's here to stay.

Picture perfect

A nice picture of a sleeping Ella-Anne from the Wabash College website (and the article accompanying the picture):

Home again

I'm in only a slightly better mood this evening, so this won't be long.

The flight home wasn't terrible; Alex and I occupied a row of two by ourselves, while Mommy was in the window seat in the row directly in front of Alex's window seat.  Alex only kicked Mommy's seat back a few times, only shrieked a few times, and only engaged in sociopathic behavior a few times.  Most of the flight, however, she was engaged with a cup of ice water, a paper napkin, and a strange, spa-attendant-like fixation on mopping my cheeks, brow, ears, and fingernails with a wet napkin full of ice water.  Anything for a quiet hour and a half flight.

More vitals for Ella-Anne, now that I have the pediatrician report in front of me:  21 inches long (7th percentile); 8 lbs., 6.4 oz. (5th percentile); head circumference 14-1/8 inches (below 5th percentile).  She's a little behind where Alex was at this point, because the deep archives on the old blog tell me that Alex reached 8 lbs., 8 oz. on September 5 (when she was 48 days old); Ella-Anne is about 1.6 oz. behind that level at 57 days.  Yet it seems like Ella-Anne is a bigger eater (and has chubbier legs at this point) than I remember Alex being.

Congratulations to:  Our friends Doug Brunt and Megyn Kelly on the birth of their first child, a son named Edward Yates Brunt, who arrived last week at a strapping 7 lbs. and 10 ounces (decidedly above the 5th percentile) and will go by the name "Yates."

Another of my Jones Day colleagues who shares Ella-Anne's July 28 birthday:  My Chicago colleague Irene (Savanis) Fiorentinos, who wished us "NA SAS ZEESEE" -- and who (with her husband) is also an adoptive parent -- of Lia, who turns 3 in October.  (In case you want a translation, "NA SAS ZEESEE" means something along the lines of "May she have a long life.")

May she.