ring!!!!!!!!!

if you ever want someone to call you, just put your sleeping baby in the crib. three minutes into her nap, you'll get that phone ringing and a screaming baby.

why can't people see through their phones to know when it's a bad time to dial me?

so sweet

once more the baby falls asleep on me while we're watching The Rocky Horror Picture Show.

I really should have named her Magenta.

Ahhhhhhh

one of the gifts the baby received that wasn't a gloworm was a set of barrels. They come apart and you can stack them. What I've found the child likes is when I carefully pile them up four high. She smiles and then slaps them down.

my child is now in her godzilla phase. I think this will last until she's 48.

after all the gifts are home, the baby still loves the wrapping paper most of all.

How to make it easy

Here's a great tip for parents of their first baby that's enjoying its first Christmas - Don't buy them too many gifts. In fact, if you have a lot of close relatives that you'll be visiting on Christmas day, you might consider not buying them anything. Cause odds are that no matter what you buy them, someone else is going to wrap it up for them.

Since the little baby has no real clue about Christmas, you can hit the after Christmas sales looking for stuff the baby didn't get.

This plan can only work for at least two Christmases. By the time the third year hits, they're clued in that Santa doesn't show up on the 27th.

Santa?

sure the baby wakes up at 4 a.m. and 7:30 a.m., but she doesn't care about coming downstairs to see her gifts. Nope. She just wants a bottle and a chance to talk away. This is the calm before a decade long's snowstorm of sneaking down the stairs.

she has a bit of it down

In the Christmas eve fun, we discovered she does know how to rip off wrapping paper. However she likes to eat it instead of knowing what's beneath. It's kinda like someone who just likes the taste of fried chicken skin over the meat.

Time for her to watch all 24 hours of A Christmas Story so later in life she swears she had an Uncle Ralphie who kept going on about wanting a Red Rider BB Gun ever holiday season.

My New Career

At almost seven months of age, I'm not so much a teacher to the baby, but a physical therapist. Every day it's about having her test her body's limits as far as strength, grip and balance. I'm not so much teaching her words as I'm just getting her to use her tongue in odd ways to make noises.

It all looks so much simpler in Baby Geniuses.

SAVVVVVEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!

We got one of those swing seats that you attach to the top of a doorway. It lets her bounce around and pretend walk with out having her fall over and bust her nose. I roll a mini-basketball towards her. She semi-kicks it back. I kick it back. after a couple minutes, I decide that this is goalie training. She's got rather good intercept instincts for a six month old. I refrain from seeing how she blocks shots coming straight at her noggin.

stretch armstrong

getting her dressed today I had to toss two outfits into the "outgrown" box. She's zipping up so fast she's yet to have time to round herself out like other Weeble babies we see at the stores.

I should keep her under the coffeetable during the day to keep her from getting taller than me in the next six months.

countdown to Christmas

now we're down to the final days before Christmas and the baby doesn't seem to care. There's no demand for a hot toy. there's no searching through my bedroom in hopes of exposing the surprises. She doesn't even ask what we're doing on Friday. This is my last relaxing Christmas.

no preschool blues

keep seeing these pieces on the amazing trouble parents in New York City go through to get their kids into the right pre-school. As if someone being able to paste macaroni to paper will determine the rest of your life. Is it wrong to want to home pre-school your kid? I ought to be able to get her to understand colors, numbers and the alphabet. And maybe she'll also pick up the cinema of Norman Taurog. she'll at least know all of her Godzilla films.

my promise

I would like any readers to know that when I am writing a blog entry or editing a baby video, my child is in a safe and secure position. There is no child jeopardy in order for me to share these snippets of my life.

Now when I'm not blogging and me and the baby are watching the Three Stooges, odds are I'm the one risking my life when she catches onto Moe's way of life.

less pain

the baby only cried for 30 minutes before she fell asleep. Now I just hope she doesn't burp herself awake

the bad seed

The baby just tried to kill me. it's true.

I'm stretched out on the sofa and holding her up so she can stand on my chest. she grabs a small pillow from the top of the sofa, drops it on my face and then plops down on the pillow. that's right, she tried to suffocate me. She was laughing while pushing the foam into my mouth.

if i turn up dead and only the baby is in the house - the police better name a "baby of interest."

Bedtime for Bonzo

we've decided at six months, it's time for the baby to understand the concept of being dumped in the crib while she's still awake. It took 45 minutes of screaming before she finally gave into the urge to konk out. I do feel bad, but it's not like she can do that much at night. She's not a good designated driver. And while she does make a handy wingman at bars, she seems to monopolize the attention. "I'm a baby...why do you want to talk to my daddy - talk to the baby!" To sleep she goes.

today I'm introducing her to involuntary naptime. I should try to find my copy of Godzilla vs. King Kong so their smashing Tokyo will drown out the baby's cries. I feel like a prison guard assigned to watch the hole. Someday I should write a book, "Everything I Know About Babycare, I Learned from Oz."

i hate it when the baby is napping on me when Jeopardy is on. I can't say the questions without fear it'll be "What is waking up the baby, alex?"

Teething Time?

A few months ago we thought the baby was teething. Her gums hurt her. We'd put painkiller on 'em along with giving her frozen chewtoys. But no teeth emerged. Now she's back to drooling hard and chewing on anything like a beaver catching up on last second work before a vacation.

I'll be tormenting her for the next few weeks by singing, "All I Want For Christmas Is Any Stinking Teeth!"

stranger danger

Now the baby is in the zone where she fears being around strange faces and hates me disappearing on her. This was completely put to the test when a friend dropped by and I had to go use the bathroom. He had to admit that my child had a vocal range that could peel wallpaper.

learning

we took Josie over to a friends' house for dinner. They have a baby 8 months older than her. we figured she could pick up tips on crawling. hard to tell if it worked. she's been hit with teething pain so there's no desire to roam. just scream high enough to loosen bolt on passing plane.

Happy Festivus!

State of Play

During the day there's basically three things that happen with Josie. She rolls on the floor. She rolls stuff on her little sit and spin toy. She fights off the desire to nap while attempting to roll of my lap. I'm fearful of the day she realizes how to pull herself up on stuff. She's shaping up to be a world's most diabolical tumbler.

the dream

Now that my daughter seems to be bound to be a good size, I've decided to have her become a women's field hockey superstar. Maybe it's from watching The Belles of St. Trinians. But I think she'll be imposing in a skirt while wielding a stick.

And later she can use her stick to beat off unwanted advances.

car doesn't work

just putting the baby in the car no longer puts her to sleep. i hate it when i lose a shortcut to silence.

Where is he?

As pointed out earlier, the Pampers we use on Josie feature Sesame Street characters on the front. For the Newborns through size two, they had like baby versions of the characters - Big Bird, Cookie monster, Elmo, Grover and Ernie. Now that she's in Size 3, they have them as their normal character sizes. No more muppet babies. But here's what gets me - Where's Bert? Where is the Yellow guy with the conehead? Why won't Pampers put Ernie and Bert together on the same diaper?

Is this their way of avoiding some whacko group claiming that having Ernie and Bert on the same diaper is pushing a homosexual marriage agenda on 6 month old babies? Or has the Bert Is Evil web campaign made them think that Bert really is evil and can't be trusted to capture your baby's poop?

Quit hiding Bert!

the queen

the baby is understand how her wrists work. she spend a lot of time doing a beauty queen wave. i might have to get her a tiara.

ouch my ears

Why do I insist on telling the baby "inside voice" when she whines at level that probably isn't safe outside either. Then again it's not like she's listening that well. I just hope she doesn't make any squirrels go deaf.