Uh oh

She can roll over now.
Time to be extra careful about using the strap on the changing table and the bouncy seat. Time to be sure to keep her on the middle of the bed, not at the sides.
But oh, it was so cool! I just put her down on her stomach for a second, and she rolled right over. I assumed it was just my weight on the bed next to her that was giving her a downward slope, so I got up, and she did it again! We managed to capture a bit on video, but we can't use video on this site so you'll just have to believe us.

We had a wonderful weekend here. Grandma came up from Brooklyn, and Ben and I got a night out. We managed to stay out 3 hours, our longest time away together. Mia cried all night while we were gone, but she (and Grandma) recovered nicely. We went on a picnic with Isabella and her parents and had great fun in the outdoors. Hopefully we'll be doing more of that soon.

In sleep news, Mia has been sleeping 10 hours at a time at night. At least, she was until last night. But still! We've been putting her to sleep around 8, and she'll go straight until 6 without needing to be fed or changed. It has meant a good few nights of sleep for us, and she seems to be very happy when she wakes. Still working on the naps, but we're getting there.

That's all the Mia news for today. More soon.

Friday morning update

All is well here at Casa BabyStoneJohnson. It's finally warm and dry outside, and Mia and I have been spending more time in the great outdoors. Hopefully we'll start to go on short hikes soon. She can now face forward in the Baby Bjorn, which means she is strong enough to hold her head up unsupported. Yesterday we took her for a walk with her facing forward and I can't remember ever seeing her smile so much.


She is now sleeping in her crib. This is a huge milestone, at least for me. She was probably ready weeks ago, but I really wasn't. Then, we tried to get her to nap in the crib, but she wanted no part of that. Now, we put her in at night, and she sleeps most of the night. It's been three nights now, and she seems well-rested and happy. We're working on getting the napping thing down. We've got two good ones, a morning and one afternoon, but we're still working on getting the third one in.

Let's see what else...yesterday she held on to a rattle and shook it for the first time. Previously, she would only grasp it but then drop it. Yesterday, her best friend Isabella was shaking the rattle, so Mia, ever her mother's daughter, competitively held and shook the rattle. She also held it to her mouth like a microphone. While it's doubtful she'll ever be a rock and roll singer, it was very cute.

That's about it here. Have a great weekend! Here's a cute picture to tide you over until next week.

At Bertucci's, nobody can hear you scream

We've been waiting for you

Of all the "firsts" that we'll be going through as new parents, last night proved to be an interesting one. Before I go too far, let me apologize for my latent New York snootiness. I grew up in a restaurant city, where people can be quite serious about the art of eating out. We never had a birthday at Chuck E' Cheese, and to this day I don't think I've been to an Olive Garden. Only later in life was I introduced to the concept of "Family Style Dining", and even then only as an option of last resort.

And there's nothing wrong with huge bowels of pasta, or chain restaurants in general. I'll gladly admit Bertucci's makes a quite respectable dinner roll. It's the concept of "family friendly" that I hadn't yet internalized. Until last night.

Friends were in town, so we arranged to meet up with them and 10 other people. There were three children, including Mia (3 months), Daniel (18 months) and Rose (3 years) that we had to plan for so the small, crowded dimly lit hole in the wall was out of the question. We needed highchairs, space and a team of waiters with the patience of a Buddha on spring break. Daniel stuck pasta on all his fingers, Rose licked cheese off of her pizza, and Mia for the most part watched the hilarity ensue. There were screams for ice cream, limp attempts at adult conversation, and more plates than the board of health could have been comfortable with on a table full of elbows, sippy cups and wine.

But this is what people do. Food made it's way into the right places eventually, and nobody got hurt. Corrie and I sucked down our dinner like a coke addict with a crazy straw, and got our daughter home in time for her late night (9:30) snack. Like most things I assume, the challenge is not in getting through the evening, so much as doing so with grace and dignity.

Ok, we'll settle for the grace.

Three months

Today was Mia's three month checkup. She's now 11 pounds 14 ounces, and 23 inches long. I thought for certain that she weighed closer to 13, but I suppose I guessed wrong. She almost rolled over on the doctor's table, much to my surprise. It was the first time she even seemed interested in getting onto her back from her stomach. She took her shots like a champ, but I, ever the coward, had to turn away. She doesn't feel well now, most likely in reaction to the shots.

It's amazing how quickly she is growing, even day by day. She has outgrown most of her newborn clothes and is now in the next size of diaper. We had to pack away her pajamas and onesies. She can now grab toys and jam them in her mouth. She is fascinated by her feet and the fact that they are attached to her and that she can move them. She babbles nonstop, day and night. Sadly, she has begun to "watch" tv, which means we'll need to get rid of it soon. She'll look at the colors and seems to be drawn to the Simpsons.

Before we know it she'll be eating solid foods and sitting up on her own. She might even grow some hair and get a chubby little belly. For now, though, she's just three months old. And just perfect.

It's just too easy

"gawsh, Baby-raisin' shur is complicated"

Making fun of Britney just aint what it used to be. It's like she isn't even trying anymore. The real crime however is poor Sean Preston has this for a role model.

#17 and climbing

We struggled for a while with naming our daughter. Of the many, many rules one should abide when faced with such an awesome responsibility, we tried to avoid names that were too popular*. We didn't want her to be saddled with a name that 5 other girls in her homeroom also had, forcing her to choose between being "Funny Mia", "Tall Mia” or just plain "MJ". All options that we'd be comfortable with if she decides to go that direction, only as long as she isn't painted into a corner.

So it is with not a small amount of foreboding that we see "Mia" has jumped quite a bit recently in popularity.

Honey, we tried our best.

*other rules in no particular order include:
- no names of people we're directly related to (don't want to send the wrong message)
- no names of people we hated in jr. high
... oh, and the list does go on.

Best Father Ever

Of course she’s going to learn how to throw a baseball, make pasta and a decent loaf of bread by hand, and the ability to disarm jerks with a rapier wit. That just comes with the basic father package. What we need here is that something special, something with a measurable Wow quotient.

We’re never going to be that family with the backyard pool that everybody uses. Nor will she look back 30 years from now on learning how to drive stick shift on our ’67 Corvette. What I might have to do to really stand out from the pack, to stake my claim to her affections years after she’s moved out, gotten pierced and tattooed, and has utilized her dual masters (modern dance and pre-reformation pottery) to write a best selling novel with thinly disguised parent figures providing comic relief…

...is to come out the gates in a BIG WAY. Think of it as the best birthday party every.


(Eat my dust Bill Cosby)

Posty post

Sometimes we post not for any reason, so much as for the pure joy of posting. It’s a Sunday morning, and the rest of the family is sleeping. Walter is playing his favorite game, hiding his pig ear somewhere in the house before whining at my feet for me to get up and find it. It’s finally warm enough in Boston to open the windows. NPR is of course on in the kitchen.

Corrie has been working up a list of “foods that are easy to eat over a baby’s head”. Chicken noodle soup, not so good (the noodles tend to slide off the spoon). What you need is a nice cohesive chili. Muslix, with just enough milk to congeal it, is also a crowd pleaser. Let me stress, this is all theoretical experimentation. Nothing has yet dripped onto her head that I know of.

I've been trying to read to her, just to get her used to the sound of my voice. Currently into a book outlining the history of radical militia groups in the pacific northwest, but if it's read in a sing-song voice, it sounds like a bedtime story. (there's some disagreement about that apparently)

Mia has been a ball and is having tremendous fun these days. She is hours away from finding her thumb, currently content to sticking her whole fist in her slobbering mouth. Once she makes this leap, it’s akin to having an indestructible binky that nobody can take away. Our hope is this will help her sleep better if her bink falls out in the night.

She’s also getting better about voicing her concerns, and not going straight to an all out wail. A few well placed grunts tends to get her what she wants, and anything we can do to teach her moderation is a step we want to take. She is becoming quite the benevolent queen of her own soft kingdom.

Happy Fun Day

Perhaps Dad isn't as stupid as he looks

Welcome to the inaugural, "Mia and Dad Happy Fun Day". For the next 6 months (at least) I'm working a 4-day week, taking a 20% pay cut, to play with my child and free Corrie up once a week to make progress on her dissertation.

Now let's be honest here, today began with a not insubstantial amount of trepidation. Not only has she spurned my love over the last few weeks, but she recently decided not to nurse from the bottle either. My boss relates her experience forcing her eldest daughter off breast-feeding, and it wasn't pretty. She had to go back to work, and with no other options apparent; their daughter went cold turkey. She left the house and stayed away until she took the bottle, leaving her husband home to try to force feed their screaming, beet-red-faced child every hour or so. Took her 30 hours before they broke her will. 30 hours I hoped never to have to see.

So far she's been great. She took about half a bottle at 10:00, fussed a bit, then after priming her palette with some vitamins, she agreed to finish off the bottle. We played on the floor with her colorful grabby toy; she showed off her neck strength on her belly, burped and is down for her mid-morning nap in her swing. (By the way, thank you Sara and Andy for that. It's amazing).

All leading to the indisputable conclusion that I'm not nearly the toxic presence I was looking to be just last week. We'll head out for lunch to meet up with Corrie at a local cafe, then see what kind of trouble we can get into without mom around.

Ten weeks

It has been so long since we have posted...our apologies. Ben is back at work, I'm trying to do some work from home, and somehow the time has just slipped by. So much and so little has happened. Our days blend now. But it's been amazing, to tell the truth. So many changes have happened, even since the last post.
Mia smiles now. If you smile at her, she'll give you a huge gummy grin back. Her eyes light up. I can't wait to hear her laugh. I think it's coming soon.
She can grip toys now. She has figured out that she can make her hands do things, so she grabs toys, hair, jewelry. She also puts her hands in her mouth, but she hasn't found her thumb just yet.

The biggest change is that she sleeps now. For long periods of time. Last week she began sleeping seven hours at a stretch, and last night she slept for eight and a half hours. It was blissful for all. We've started reading bed time stories to her--she doesn't quite get it, but it's fun for me.

As much as I don't want to, we may have to move her out of our room and into her crib now. She's ready, most likely. If she sleeps eight hours I won't have to get up in the night to feed her. But I'm not ready. I like her sleeping next to me. When she wakes up, she always has a huge smile on her face. It's priceless.
This weekend we had a special Hebrew naming ceremony for her. We had some family and a handful of friends come to our home, and the rabbi gave her her Hebrew name, Menucha Rachel. Menucha was my grandmother's Hebrew name and Rachel my great-grandmother's. Some day she'll ask about her name, and it will be amazing for her to learn about her family. The ceremony was very moving. As the rabbi pointed out, Mia's birth was a miracle. I couldn't agree more.