Pulling Up: The Sequel

Scott and I learned this weekend that not only can Lincoln pull himself up on bookshelves and couches, he can also pull himself up in his crib. We discovered this when we woke up Sunday morning and were greeted by Lincoln standing in his crib, staring at us. As a result, we have now lowered the mattress in the crib to the lowest setting. So now he can lay on his tummy and stare at us, sit up and stare at us, but (at least for now) he can not stand and stare at us on weekend morning.

With all of Lincoln's new developments, he has become a lot more fun to play with. Some of his favorite games include crawling through "obstacle courses" of pillows, large stuffed animals, tunnels, and (unfortunately for Cheetara) cats. He has also been known to crawl over Scott and myself, although he prefers to "attack" us by grabbing our faces or belts, strings, etc. I have a feeling that if we could read his mind, we would just hear the mantra "gogogogogogogo - must keep gooooooooing!"

Pulling Up

It seems that every day Lincoln is reaching a new milestone. Yesterday I set him in the living room to do some work in the kitchen. After a couple of minutes I came back to check on him, and saw this:

Yes, Lincoln is pulling up now. He's been standing up against furniture for a couple of weeks. Now it seems he's able to stand up by himself using a table, couch, or (his most popular choice) the bookshelf. Miss Lucy thinks he'll be walking early, and I'm inclined to think so, too. Unfortunately, his ability to stand up is not matched with an ability to sit back down. So for now, Scott or I need to be close by in case he needs to do a quick landing.

His reading choice in the photo is the "Journal of Post Keynesian Economics". Apparently "Fluffy Chick and Friends" was no longer stimulating enough for him.

A Sunday Drive...

Lincoln likes to spend leisurely Sunday mornings sipping a nice mug of milk before he heads out for a relaxing drive around the living room in his Fisher Price baby car (you can't see the steering wheel from this angle, but it's there). He does all of this, of course, wearing his monster-truck hat set at a jaunty angle to impress the ladies.

Scott and I realized this weekend that Lincoln's noggin has officially outgrown this hat. We thought we'd let Lincoln wear it around the house, though, since it has so much personality.

Some Family Updates

I've done an awful lot of "Lincoln" posts lately, so I thought it was time for a "Linda" update (poor Scott will have to wait for his update). First, though, I want to mention that to celebrate St. Patrick's Day, Lincoln wore his John Deere shorts outfit (courtesy of great-aunt Susan). For anyone familiar with farm machinery, you can guess the color of the outfit. No pinches for my boy!

As for me, I submitted a rough draft of my dissertation to my supervisor about two weeks ago. It clocks in at about 115 pages - much shorter than Eric's (my old officemate) dissertation - his was well over 500 pages!! I'm currently waiting for my supervisor to read it and give me feedback. There's a slim chance that I could graduate this semester, although that's looking less and less likely. I'll probably end up defending at the end of this semester and graduating at the end of the summer or fall semester. Meanwhile, I have a huge job of editing and proofreading to do. Scott has graciously agreed to help me proofread, and we've already had exciting debates about whether page numbers go before or after punctuation marks in quotes.

Some 8-Month Portraits!

This morning we got up early to go to Portrait Innovations and have some portraits taken. Lincoln's first portraits (at 4 months) were taken at JC Penney's, and we wanted to see what the differences would be like. First, here's two of the pictures. In the first one he's standing all by himself!!:
In this next one he looks incredibly cute. Unfotrunately, he wasn't incredibly smiley today. Anyone that's been around Lincoln for any length of time knows that he loves to smile and laugh...unless he's getting his picture taken by a professional.
Portrait Innovations did a great job. The photographer had a hand-held camera so she could get pics from lots of angles, and the photos were taken on the floor - so no worries about Lincoln falling off the "stage"! Other big plusses were that we got to keep a CD of all of the pictures taken (low-res), and they stay "on-time" (so no waiting 2 hours past our appointment time). We ended up paying a bit more, but we got tons of pictures and a change of clothes. So a definite thumbs-up.

Hot "Poo"tato (not for the squeamish)

I'll apologize in advance for this somewhat graphic post, but as a parent of a baby the topic of "poo" seems to come up pretty often...

As Lincoln gets older, his digestive system has been maturing and his previously semi-liquid mild-smelling poo is tranforming into a semi-solid horrifically-smelling assualt to the senses. He has also become "irregular", sometimes pooing every day, sometimes going for 3 or 4 days without a "delivery". As such, Scott and I (along with our unwitting daycare provider) are playing a constant game of hot pootato. No one wants to be home alone with Lincoln when he finally poos, but as days pass wihtout a dirty diaper, we each know that the odds of either of us being stuck with changing duty goes up exponentially. The risk is exacerbated by the fact that Lincoln can't sit still long enough to do a quick "wet only" diaper change, which means that when he poos we risk having him try to crawl away while diaper-less and dirty...

I've decided that when Lincoln turns 16 I'm going to show him and his buddies this post and then maybe...just maybe...that will make it all worthwhile...

A Visit from the Hauners - and babyproofing.

We had a very exciting weekend this past weekend - Grandma and Grandpa Hauner came to visit! Lincoln was very excited to see them, and recieved lots of extra-special attention all weekend. The (older) boys went to the car show, and Lincoln and I went with my mom and sister to the Plaze to enjoy the weather and do a little shopping. I got to see the cute bed linens Mary picked out for her baby's room, and I bought a couple of "bath buddies" for Lincoln. Unfortunately, we were having so much fun visiting with my parents, I didn't take any pictures :(. Lincoln impressed his grandparents by sitting in the "big boy" chair at restaurants (also known as the hgh chair) and using the "big boy" stroller (ie not using the baby carrier).

In other news, now that Lincoln is mobile the term "baby proofing" takes on a whole new meaning. As I've been typing this, I've had to stop several times to: 1) Move the power cord so Lincoln won't grab it, 2) Move Lincoln out from under the rocking chair, 3) Rescue Cheetara from Lincoln's "petting", and 4) Set up a "tunnel" for Lincoln to crawl through. And I thought babyproofing just meant covering up outlets and setting up a baby gate!

Kings of the Mountain 2007

In February, we spent a few days at Copper Mountian with my parents. It was a great trip, and here's the proof...the annual King-family skiing video. Check it out if you've got a few free minutes.



Also, if you're interested, here's a link to the video from last year.

Kings of the Mountain 2005

Lincoln really gets around

Now that Lincoln's moving faster, it seems that I've been moving slower...at least, I've been slow at getting his crawling video uploaded. Here it (finally!) is. He can really get around the house fast. He can go from the kitchen to the living room to the tv room in a blink of an eye. Visitors to our house may notice that furniture is slowly disappearing - first our ottoman, then one of our coffee tables...nothing is more fun to Lincoln than a table leg these days!

Two More Ski Photos

I couldn't resist posting a couple more ski pictures. The first one is Joni and Lincoln wrestling on the fabulous quilt that Joni made.	The other photo is proof that I really did ski on this trip.
This has been a milestone week - On Monday Lincoln started crawling for real - moving without his tummy on the floor. He is pretty fast doing his army crawl, so I can only imagine what sort of trouble he'll get into when he gets up to true crawling speed! He also had another "first" - he went from crawling to sitting all by himself! I have video of him crawling so I'll upload that soon.

We're Back!

Lincoln had a great time on his first ski trip! As you can see, he had the right clothes for a visit to Copper Mountain with Grandma King. Of course, the entire King clan was there - Grandma and Grandpa King, and Aunt and Uncle Tracy and Joni. Next is the view from the condo. Don't worry, we didn't take Lincoln up that big ski lift (at least, not this year...)! We had a great location, just steps away from the new Copper Mountain shops and the lifts. Skiing is *tough*, even for kiddos hangin' out in the condo. Here Lincoln is relaxing with Grandpa King and Scott after a tough morning. Lincoln had a great time with all of the family, and I think he misses all of the excitement today. Next year, we're going to get him his own set of skis - only for the bunny hill, of course - mommy's baby has to stay safe!

Doing some laundry...

So the other day I needed to get some clothes out of the dryer, and wondered what I should do with Lincoln while I ran to the basement. My solution, of course, was to have Lincoln "help" me with the clothes. He had a great time in the laundry basket, even though he wasn't able to get much folding done.

Say Hello to my Little Friends!

Here is proof that Lincoln now has teeth - two of them!! I've been trying to catch a picture of them ever since they made their first appearance, and finally today Lincoln cooperated. He loves to feel them with his tongue, and we've learned to be careful about sticking our fingers in his mouth now that he has chompers.

Happy Valentines Day!

Happy Valentine's Day!! Here's a picture of my two "Valentines". Who knew I'd have two great loves in my life?

I was remiss yesterday in not mentioning Scott's birthday. Lucky him, he was born on Friday the 13th in 19xx (I don't know if I'm allowed to say how old he is!) I didn't forget everything, though - I made him some yummy chocolate cupcakes.

Look who came to visit!

On Saturday we hosted a reunion with our Bradly class. Not only were our classmates able to come (Tanya, Mario, and Amari; and Tricia, Jason, and Jonas), but our instructors, Summer and Casey (with their sons Tevon and Luna) were also on hand for some food, and fun. The photo at left is of our little ones - Amari, Jonas, and Lincoln. We learned that is sometimes difficult to get three crawling, active kiddos to sit still long enough to snap some photos.

Lincoln was very polite and shared all of his toys. Here Amari is picking out her favorite while Jonas gives her the advice that "the best toys are at the very bottom of the basket!" Lincoln has already chosen his toy.


Here's all three kids hanging out. Looks like Amari is still picking out what toy she wants...I think Lincoln really liked having other kids to play with, and I really enjoyed chatting with the other parents. It's hard to believe, but we started our Bradley classes over a year ago. It won't be long before all of the kids are up and running around!

Guess what's coming to visit!

No pictures (yet), but Lincoln is definitely finally getting a tooth! You can feel it just below the surface, and it is sharp!! Scott is convinced that there are two, but I can't tell. I think it hurts Lincoln a bit, as he's been a little grumpy the past few days and drooling up a storm. I don't blame him - I would be grumpy too if I had a little spear stabbing through my gums!! So send good wishes his way that his little friend(s) will make an appearance soon!

Quality Control

Everyone knows that this blog is a group effort, and I would like to take a moment to thank my "QC" (Quality Control) team. Here you can see them watching Lincoln's crawling video to make sure it's up to blog standards.

Thanks for all of the great comments on the "choose your own caption". If you haven't read through them all, take a look!

Write you own caption...

This photo was taken during the last big snow in Kansas City. Lincoln loves to stand in our picture window and lick the glass (I think he likes the cold). Lest you think I'm a terrible mother, I would like to point out that I am only holding him beneath the arms so that he can balance - he is pressing his own face against the glass. Soooo...what caption would you put with this photo?

Here's Your Prize!

You all win!! Here's your prize - I "lured" Lincoln across the rug using Mr. Snail's hynoptic music. He can definitely get wherever he wants to go using a combination of rolling and scooting.

A Winner!!

Actually, there are many winners! The correct answer is sweet potatoes. More specifically, sweet potatoes mixed with oatmeal - this substance is not only healthy, but it creates a concrete-like orange substance that adheres to skin and clothing.

I'll post the video soon - I'll need assistance from my Senior Control Officer for Technnical Talent (S.C.O.T.T.) to help me get it uploaded. Please be patient (and don't ask how long it took me to think up that acronym!).

A Contest!!

I've decided to have a contest, and everybody can be a winner! The photo below was taken after Lincoln's lunch today. As many of you know, he's not been liking most solids. So today when he actually decided to eat something I was thrilled and didn't worry too much about the mess. So here's the contest: post a comment telling me what you think Lincoln had for lunch today. If anyone posts the correct answer, I'll reward you all with a video of Lincoln doing his new snake/scoot crawl technique. Good luck!!

Secret Pal is revealed!

You may be wondering who has been sending me all of the great knitting stuff (and so have I!), and this week my secret pal has revealed herself and sent one final awesome package. She is (drumroll)... Anne, and she has some pet ferrets, which explains why Dr. Zaius has *loved* all of her packages.

So, here are the goodies she sent me this month:




First, a wonderful book called "Kids: A Knitter's Dozen" - I've already picket out a sweater I'll make for Lincoln! She also sent two patterns: A lovely wrap with a star design from Knitpicks (which is on my list of "must-knit soon", and a pattern for a cardigan that uses every color of Knitpicks Palette they make! This one may have to be put aside for a while as I work up the nerve to try it! She also included a color card for Palette so I can see the colors in real life. Finally, she sent me a lovely simmer pot with tea lights and three different scents - cool water, sandlewood (my favorite!) and mulled wine. YUMMY!!

THANK YOU ANNE! She has been a wonderful secret pal and I will be reading her blog regularly to see what she's been knitting!

Lincoln really enjoys reading time with Mommy and Daddy, but since he's very independant he also enjoys doing some light reading on his own. To help him out, I've provided him with some old magazines to "explore":










Here he is reading an old Shape magazine. The article is about trimming your belly, but Lincoln seems to have misunderstood the directions - even though I told him that eating the magazine will *not* help reduce his belly.

Snow...

It snowed last night, so today was Lincoln's first encounter with the white stuff. His reaction was mixed. He wasn't thrilled, but he wasn't upset (remember the leaf incident from the Fall).

Do the Locomotion...

Since it's Friday, I thought I'd have a post about the different ways Lincoln gets around the house. He is a master of rolling from side to side, and can move very quickly by simply rolling. He has also developed a bit of forward movement. I won't call it crawling because that would require him to be on his hands and knees. Instead, he uses his feet to "shove" his upper body and head along the floor. He has to stop every couple of inches to lift his head off the ground to see how far he's moved. He's pretty good at it, too - I just watched him "shove" across the entire length of the living room! I think crawling is just around the corner...
I don't have video yet of Lincoln's shove maneuver, so here's a photo from a couple of weeks ago showing one of Lincoln's other favorite forms of locomotion - having mom and dad push him in a stroller!