4 Month Pictures

I haven't yet had a chance to do the comparison of his pictures each month, so for now I'm just sharing the 4 month pictures! Enjoy!

Pictures

Gavin's 4-month pictures will be posted shortly. In this case, "shortly" means some day between now and the next 365 days. Somehow, I don't seem to have time to even upload pictures lately! Everyone told me how I wouldn't have time for anything once "the baby" arrived. ...how my once glossy, fresh toe polish would become faded and chipped and would wear off on its own before I had a chance to soak in my lovely bubblebath, trimming and repainting my toes in a fresh shiny coat of perfect polish. ...how having shaved legs would become a luxury rather than a necessity. ...how I would wear a ponytail 6 days a week because I wouldn't have time for blowdrying or straightening my hair. ...how macaroni and cheese would become standard fare.

Well, last week, we had corn dogs and macaroni and cheese for dinner one night, I wore a ponytail 5 days of the week, I shaved my legs only twice, and I finally removed the last remaining tidbits of toe polish leftover from, ...get this, December! I do, however, still have the luxury of my bubblebath. Sometimes it's just 10 minutes to wash my hair after I hand freshly bathed Gavin to Cliff to be dried off and dressed, but a couple of nights a week, while Gavin is sleeping or hanging out with Cliff, I get into the tub and spend 20 or 30 minutes in there. It's not the three hours that I used to spend in the tub as recently as just a couple of years ago, but it's a relaxing bath.

I can't blame anyone else for my lack of free time though. It's not that I don't have it, it's how I choose to spend it. Cliff took Gavin to Menard's on Sunday morning and then to lunch at his parents' house so that I could get some of my pictures uploaded. So, they walked out the door, and what did I do? I sorted the laundry, got a couple of loads going, started cleaning out the fridge, cleared off the dining room table... and then kicked myself for not heading straight to the computer to upload pictures. I've been griping for weeks that I haven't had time to upload and print pictures (I'm going scrapbooking this weekend) and then I go ahead and take my one opportunity and instead do laundry? I can do laundry any time! It doesn't usually get folded until one of Gavin's Grandmas comes over, but at least it's clean. So, I did eventually get on the computer and worked with my pictures. I worked for three hours, staring at the computer screen, cropping, correcting red-eye, boosting color, recropping, saving, and finally... ordering some prints. You won't believe how far I got! I ordered prints of pictures taken from Nov 19, 2008 to Nov 30, 2008. That's only 11 days worth of pictures. Do you know how many pictures I took in those 11 days? How many times Gavin's angelic newborn face was captured in the viewfinder of my camera? How many MB of digital storage he takes up on our hard drive? For a short while, I had his photos on my work computer. I knew that if I kept that up, his photos were going to be the death of my computer, and how would I explain that one to the boss??? Not to mention one of the times that blue screen of death appeared, the computer would never come back again and the photos would be gone forever. Now they are safely stored on my hard drive. External hard drive. And backed up online just in case. But... only those through Nov 30th are backed up online. Remember when photos were stored under the bed in a cardboard box? Or better yet, in the damp, cobwebby basement? Or the moth-infested attic? Now they are backed up, stacked up, scrapped up, and shared. Speaking of sharing photos... Did I mention I will upload some pictures of Gavin soon? Maybe this weekend... no, I'll be out of town... scrapbooking! Maybe next week. I took his 4 month pictures on the chair and I think he may have even sort of smiled in one of them! I've always been a strong supporter of Proex for printing pictures. When the online photo sharing tools like shutterfly, flickr, snapfish, and picassa came out, I clung to Snapfish. It worked for me. I have hundreds and hundreds of pictures on Snapfish. Well, the other day, when I was uploading pictures, I decided to try out Wal-Mart's photo printing service. I had heard that people like it and it isn't as expensive as Proex. So I loaded all of these pictures on there and sent them to print. Great, right? I noticed that Wal-Mart's online photo sharing tool is EXACTLY like Snapfish's tool. It looks exactly the same. So, I thought, maybe they're run by the same... you know... people. I thought maybe I could just copy all of those albums that I have on Snapfish onto Wal-Mart and then they'd all be in one place. Do you think I could figure it out though? Nope! Why would they look exactly the same if they aren't? Why can't I copy albums from one site to the other? Ugh.

4 Month Well Baby Visit

We went to see Rita tonight for Gavin's 4 month check up and he's doing well! He is over his last little cold and is feeling good overall. He has grown an inch and a half in length and just a little over three lbs in weight in the last two months. His current measurements and percentiles on 3-19-09 are:

Height 25" (50%)

Weight 15 lbs, 5 oz (70%)

Head Circumference 42 cm (50%)

So it looks like even though we think he is really growing so fast and getting so big, he is very average on his height and head size and just a bit over average on his weight. She checked him out from head to toe and told us there were no worries. She took a look at his belly button because I was a little concerned about it. It has a hard bump inside it and is darker inside than the rest of his skin. She said that is completely normal and is called the Ligament of Treitz, which isn't actually a ligament at all. Apparently when the umbilical cord is cut, those veins inside that were carrying the nutrients through the baby begin to shrivel up and become the "ligament". She said it will likely get softer and lighter colored as he grows and I've already noticed that it isn't as hard or as dark as it was earlier.

Overall he is doing great. He is no longer sleeping for long 8-9 hour stretches at night, so we think it might be time to try to feed him a little baby cereal or even have a bottle of formula before bed. We'll have to try it and see. It's funny, but this seems like a huge transition to me and I almost feel like I need to take a few days off work to do it. I know that is silly, but we don't know how to do formula or cereal yet and I feel like it will take some trial and error. I'm just not sure I'm up for the trial while busy with work! I guess this is as good a time as any. Maybe we'll try it next week.

Developmentally, Gavin's come such a long way. I only vaguely remember the helpless little critter he was at just a few days old. He was just learning to nurse. He was all floppy and rag-doll like. His little body just curled into a ball when you tried to hold him upright. He couldn't control any of his movements and he seemed so fragile. Now he sits upright in his bebe pod seat and his walker and exersaucer. He tolerates tummy time and holds his chest up with his elbows and looks all around with his head. He laughs. He actually laughs when you blow raspberries on his belly or nibble on his toes. His smile is infectious! He's a little ham. He also arches his back and squeals when he's frustrated. When he realizes he is about to be fed, he can barely stand to wait the 5 seconds it takes to get everything situated. What was a little tiny, "Momma, I'm a little bit hungry" quickly becomes a "Feed me now, I'm starving, Can't you hear me? I'll say it louded. I'm so hungry I can't take it. Feed me now!!"

Yup, he's a growing boy! We love him to pieces! All 15 lbs and 5 oz of him!