EHV: Elliott’s toddler blog

In early March, Fayette visited young Elliott.  Load that page to contrast him in her arms then with today's visit:

A little more active and animated.  Fay lost hair in this picture.

Apparently I failed to post her last visit from six weeks ago.  Here are two pictures, six weeks apart -- can you tell which is which?

Part of why she came over was to capture of picture of him playing with the dragon she knit.  Here are three.

On Saturday, Elliott met another of his female suitors -- Jane!  Her father, Jonathan (left in the first picture) and I helped rebuild our college robotics club.  Although the three of them now live a few hours away in Oregon, this is the first time we have successfully  met up on the west coast.  Elliott and Jane, five months older, are approximately the same size, although Elliott is a few pounds heavier.  They really seemed to like each other!  Watching Jane sit up, and crawl, makes us both nervous and excited for Elliott's next stage.

Today, Elliott and I ditched Mom and went off to breakfast with one of my former coworkers, Aaron.  Aaron fled Seattle for the less mild Minneapolis, and therefore returns frequently in the summer to tempt himself back.  After eating most of our breakfast, Elliott insisted on a walk around the neighborhood.  Here we see Aaron playing his roll, as a finger to hold, so that Elliott can slip off to sleep.  Mom assumed, when we arrived two and a half hour after departure, that her services for comforting a screaming baby.  She was shocked to be proved incorrect.

 

Last week, we discovered another way to bring Elliott to a happy place.

A year ago next week, Tessa was pregnant and I was on a flight to Tanzania, Africa, to climb Mount Kilimanjaro.  One of the memorable people I climbed with was Shahir and his children.  It was during the climb that I got a first text message that the baby within Tessa was likely a boy, and Shahir was one of the first to congratulate me.  Having caught the high altitude bug, Shahir came through town this week on his way to the summit of Mount Rainier.  We had a lovely dinner together at our local Ethiopean restaurant, and discovered that Shahir has a real talent with infants.  Elliott loved him.  These pictures show it.

Elliott has been grabbing his feet alot today! It was also nearly 90 degrees in our apt, making us take many walks to our local coffee shop!

Sent from my iPhone

Here are some things we learned while flying around the country with Elliott the first two weeks of June:

• Babies pick up ambient moods pretty quickly.  I title this picture "Layover delay at O'Hare":

  
• Travel requires equipment improvisation.  Bathing and comfortable sleeping are critical for long trips, but a bath tub and a bouncing chair are a drag to transport:
   

  

• Securing an extra seat -- either buying the extra ticket, or getting on an uncrowded flight or bus -- is crucial for long trips:

  

• Not to imply that to enjoy the trip, the baby remains seated much of the time:
  

  

   
• Also, in-seat in-flight entertainment can be a beautiful thing:
  

  
• But a Kindle has its place, too, if you can get the baby sleeping:
  

  
   
• Finally, lest you believe that Tessa did all the work (and to balance any embarrassment she might experience from these pictures), I did my part too:
  

  
   

After climbing Kilimanjaro last year, while Elliott gestated, I came back with a greater passion for the animals of the Seregetti -- especially giraffes.  They became something of a theme for the nursery walls, and that has carried over thus far.  While in Vermont, his grandparents gave him a stuffed giraffe that he adores.  It plays variant nature and white noises and has heft (as does he!).  At 4 months, he is now 18 pounds, but tall enough that he's less than 50th percentile for weight-vs-height.  A bit less than two months ago, Elliott very loosely fit in his MIT shirt.  Today is probably the last day he can wear it.