Almost a Year

It's almost been a year. Amazing. Sometimes it feels like Ian was born just a few months ago, other times, it seems like the longest year of my life. Things have been going really well and Ian is hitting milestones left and right. He just started getting his teeth. He is a little late on this one, but apparently I got teeth really late so it wasn't unexpected. Every time he has been fussy for the past six months we blamed it on him getting teeth. Our pediatrician told us at least 4 months ago that he is only a week or two away. Now they are finally here and we are learning the true meaning of teething, which involves Ian not wanting to eat and a lot of diarrhea. Isn't parenthood nice?

Ian also started walking. One day we were at a store and Ian saw a toy he wanted and just sort of took off. Betsy quickly pulled out her camera/video recorder thing from her purse (what a great mother's day gift) and got to recording. Check it out, but turn your volume down unless you want to hear Betsy celebrating at the end:




Generally, Ian is really happy and such a good kid. Once in a while he is bad and knows it. For example, almost daily he tries to go eat the dirt out of our one remaining potted plant that he has access to (notice the impressive home made netting device to help keep him out of the dirt ... it doesn't work, but Betsy will still sell you one for $8.99):
It's a little hard to be mad when he is smiling and laughing the whole time. I guess he has already figured out how to avoid getting into trouble. One big toothy (or in his case, toothless) grin and all is forgiven.

Ian's birthday is coming up and I am sure we will have a lot of new pictures and stories, so check back soon.

Still Here?

Every time I post I apologize for taking so long since the last time. Betsy typically gets mad at me for apologizing. Now I understand why. It was a little like the boy who cried wolf. I hadn't really taken that long between posts. Now is really the time to apologize. The best part is, I have absolutely no reason for not posting for so long. My guess is you all gave up on me by now, but if you are still here, sorry, I will try to do better, plus if no one is reading, I can pretty much write anything I want, so maybe these posts will get a little more interesting. I should probably start doing this late at night after a long summer associate dinner where I drank a little too much wine, that might increase my readership a little. Enough about me, what about the Ian?

Ian is doing great. He has all kinds of new tricks. He crawls, he pulls up on furniture, he stands up without holding onto things for a few seconds, and he falls and hits his head and cries a lot. That last one didn't take much practice. He got really good at it really fast. Betsy and I sort of half-assed the whole "baby proofing" thing. Mostly it consisted of putting caps on the outlets and moving our coffee table out of the living room. That metal and glass coffee table should come with special warnings when you buy it. It almost seemed like it was specifically designed to hurt kids learning to crawl/walk.

Ian says "Mama" once in a while. The other day Betsy walked out of the room and Ian started crying and said Mama and crawled out of the room as fast as possible. That always makes Dad feel great. He did say something that sounded a lot like "Dada" once. He never said it again. He was probably talking to a Cheerio and not me, but that's ok.

Anyway, the kid is super-cute. We are having a blast. It seems like there is a first of some sort every few days. I will try to keep you (whoever my one remaining reader may be) updated a little more often.

I have posted a link to the newest pictures of Ian over to the right. Enjoy!

Hey

Hey there. Been a long time. How's it going? The Goldstein house has been a busy place. I have been working way too much. Betsy has been busy with lots of baby things and trying to cook food she can eat three meals a day. Ian has been busy with play groups, music class, and generally learning about life. Oh what the hell, I know you are really only here to check out the pictures.
There. Happy now?

Ian has had some exciting times lately. He now knows how to sit up (and generally not fall over). He rolls around a lot. He gets up on all fours and gets real close to crawling. He went to his first rodeo. Really, he did. Ask him about the pig races. He spent his first night away from his mom. Actually, that was a probably a bigger deal for his mom, but we had a wedding to go to in Austin. Sorry Ian, you weren't invited. Well, you sort of were, but not really.

Ian also started eating real food. He now eats rice cereal and sweet potatoes. Tomorrow he starts on carrots. For those without kids, you have kids start eating one thing at a time so that you know if they are allergic to something. Ian is allergic to so much that this is especially important for us. The good news is, he hasn't had a negative reaction to any food he has directly eaten.

I wish there was more to report, but we are really just doing the every day stuff right now.

Thanks for checking in and I will get another quick update up soon.

Congratulations

Congratulations to Boris and Jennifer! They're having a baby. They are almost exactly one year behind us. If they have a boy, they will be set with hand me downs for life.

So, what's been going on with our house?

Ian experienced his first Super Bowl. Betsy and I usually have a party and we were trying to decide what to do this year with a new baby. The Super Bowl starts fairly late for a baby, but too early for a baby to be in bed. So this year, instead of our regular party, we did a Super Bowl baby party. We invited friends from Ian's play group and had 8 babies in the house all under 6 months.

It really wasn't nearly as bad as it sounds. At the beginning of the game all of the kids sat in their dad's laps and watched the game. One by one, they ended up in their mom's hands. All of a sudden, Ian was the last man -- well, baby -- standing. I was proud of him, of course. But, even he had to eventually head into the other room to hang out with his mom.

We had a great group and a great game, at least if you were a Giants' fan. The babies came back to watch the game once in a while, but were generally scared off by one particularly raucous Giants' fan in the house. Last year, I famously made the new baby from down the street cry when there was a big play. I think I was rooting for Chicago last year, but I don't really remember. It was announced quite clearly at the party that there were obviously going to be problems if I ever was a dad. What no one knew at that party was that Betsy was actually pregnant then.

Fast forward one year and this time I wasn't the one making the babies cry. Phew.

In other news, Ian has some crazy food allergies. We can't really pinpoint what it's all about, but the most significant result is that Betsy can't eat anything. And I mean anything. She is eating rice, chicken, and a few vegetables. Mmm mmm. Eventually we will get this all figured out, but right now it's a bit difficult. The good news is, Ian is perfectly happy. His allergies or food intolerances or whatever it is doesn't seem to affect him at all other than some unusual poops. There it is, a baby poop reference.

On another note, a friend of mine who was a little offended, but not really, about not being invited to the Super Bowl party was told that it was only people with new babies. His response was, oh, don't want th be there, you are probably going to have to talk a lot about your babies' poop . He had no idea how accurate that comment was.

Which is which?

Baby Ian, meet Baby Gregg

Ian Walks -- sort of.

Merry Christmas . . . and a Happy New Year

(New Pictures of Ian - click the link to the right) -->
Christmas
I never thought I would really like Christmas. If you know me well, you know it's not necessarily my favorite holiday. But all of that changed this year. Now, thanks to all of you Christmas celebrating types, I get to stay home from work and hang out with Ian and Betsy. What a great four days. To help get into the spirit, I even offered to make dinner on Christmas Eve for our family members who had nothing else to do. We did without the traditional Chinese food dinner and I cooked up a storm all day. We even pulled out our wedding China -- and I thought we would never use it.

We had a great Christmas, I really enjoyed spending four straight days at home with Ian and Betsy, and I didn't even work that much! Ian is a ton of fun these days. He is smiling a laughing a lot. He is interacting with people. He is holding things, kicking at things, and even standing up (with our help, of course). If you haven't seen Ian in a while (or ever), you should really try to come visit, because he is super-cool and your trip will be worth it.

New Year's Eve
Right now I am sitting in a hotel room in Marco Island, Florida. Actually, I am in my parents' room which is connected to my room. Betsy and Ian are sleeping in our room, so I decided to take a few minutes to get online and do some work. Blogging is more interesting than work, so right now, it's winning. I should have a little more time for this now, so hopefully the updates will come more frequently. The extra is mostly because fantasy football season is over. Usually on Sunday morning I would need to be checking websites and watching pregame trying to figure out who to start. There would be 2 or 3 calls to important fantasy football type people. Now, it's over and I can just relax and enjoy my Sunday football. By the way, not that you care, Travis and I got second in our league, which was a pretty serious feat considering we came back from the bottom half of the pack at mid-season. Go us!

Ok, back to Ian. Ian is doing great. He traveled like a champ on the plane. He slept the whole way and ate on the way down with only one little cry the entire time. We drove an hour plus from the airport to the hotel without a complaint. And, he is sleeping nicely in the crib that the hotel provided. Their crib is pretty nice. It is this very cool stainless steel thing that looks more like a prison than a crib. And it is smaller than a regular crib, so it fits really nicely in the room. Had this been an option for his nursery, it might have beaten out our current crib. I wonder where they get these things? Medical supply companies? Do the hotel chains have them made specifically for their hotels? Who knows.

Oh, I almost forgot, Ian went to the ocean for the first time yesterday. He stood (parent assisted, of course) with his feet at the edge of the water just watching the waves come in and out. His feet slowly sank into the wet sand. We are all very familiar with that feeling, but it must have been very strange for him. He didn't complain, but he also didn't really smile or get excited. He just sort of hung out and watched. I am going to assume he liked it. Today we are going to take him into the pool for the first time. There are two pools here and the one we were at yesterday was too cold, but we figured out the other one is to be heated. Ian has these absurd swim diapers that are WAY too big for him, but they are required for the pool. Little does the hotel know that his regular diapers would be more protective.

If I don't get back to the blog before then, have a happy new year! Betsy, Ian, and I will be long-asleep before midnight (I couldn't even wait up to see the end of the Pats Giants game last night . . . I am old), so celebrate for us!

Oh, I almost forgot, new Ian pictures in the three month link to the right.