Black Beard

Monday went by very quickly. I wasn't around much because it was a teaching day. At some point during the day, Jeff weighed Henry at 16 lbs 12 ozs, which is much heavier than the other day. Either the other day was a bad reading, or Monday's was. We did not weigh him today, so we'll have to wait and see. Perhaps we'll get a chance to weigh Henry tomorrow. Grammy came over in the afternoon. She fed Henry peas. He had fun making a huge mess. Grammy fed him in his high chair in the living room, because Jeff was working (his work area is near the kitchen). I think that's the last time we'll try food in the living room. He flung the top to the peas jar on the carpet. We got new carpet last March. Between the dogs, cats, and Henry, it has already taken quite a beating. Henry looked rather sleepy after our walk; it took us a long time to settle him down though. I don't think he went to bed until 10 or so.

Henry took several naps this morning on Veronica's watch. Grammy came over in the afternoon. Dorsett came for a PT appointment around 3PM. Although Dr. Tsai wants Henry to be seen by a PT once week, the insurance company is being a pain the "fill-in-the-blank." Dorsett's paperwork says that she is approved for sixteen visits, but the insurance company left her a telephone message that said they only approved four, then they want to see her notes, and then they'll decide whether or not she is needed. As if the insurance company penny pinchers are qualified to decide whether or not my son needs physical therapy. These are, of course, the "fill-in-the-blanks" who refused to pay for the pulse-ox study that was needed to get my son off oxygen (oxygen that they were paying for). Ruthless and stupid are a bad combination.








Dorsett worked with Henry on his sitting. He was doing a good job. He is sitting up by himself for several seconds. But if you touch his back and he knows you are there, he'll flop backwards and not bother trying to catch himself. Dorsett let him take a few tumbles, trying to get him to catch himself. She was impressed by the range of motion that Henry has when he is sitting upright. He has the ability to hold his toys up high, which I guess suggests that his balance is getting better. She said that holding toys up high is a more advanced skill than playing with them at lower angles. She got Henry into a crawl position and he did hold his stomach off the ground with his legs tucked under, all by himself. Although his knees magically find themselves in the tucked position with his caboose in the air when Henry sleeps, he rarely puts them in that position when he is awake. In any event, his arms are strong enough to hold up his body. Now, he just has to figure out how to coordinate all the pieces together. It was exciting to see. Of course, I wasn't expecting him to hold his stomach off the ground, so I didn't have the camera ready to catch it. I did get a few pictures of Dorsett lightly holding him in that position.

We went for a nice walk. The weather was great. Our dogs are getting a bit out of control. I think that we'll have to get back to the Caesar Milan basics. Roger has become "Off Road Rog." He insists on tromping through the desert, despite the fact that he always gets cactus in his feet, which wouldn't be a big deal if he'd let us get it out of his feet. But he doesn't let us touch them.

We decided to give Henry prunes today. It hadn't been a week since his last food introduction, but we figured that since he'd already had prune juice several times, it was unlikely that prunes were going to be a problem for him. He was a little perplexed at first, but he took to them faster than he did with the peas. He dribbled them down his chin, so Jeff called him Black Beard.








Grandpa came over tonight. He played with Henry on the floor. Henry started to get fussy, so I gave him a massage, which I hadn't done in a while. He had a bottle and fell asleep on me. He looked so peaceful lying on me.

Tomorrow is Jeff's and my anniversary of the day we first met. It's been 15 years since we were introduced on a blind date. It was at a sorority event called Tie-One-On. One of my sorority sisters was dating Jeff's roommate (his fraternity brother). So how are we going to celebrate? Jeff and I discussed exchanging gifts or just assuming that our love would be enough fulfillment for the day. We've decided to go with the latter. Neither of us has exactly had a lot of free time to get gifts. I'm still trying to get up to speed on my work. Still haven't made much progress on my backlog of email. And now that Henry is really coming along with his motor skills, we are feeling a bit pressed to get this house Henry-proofed as soon as possible. Our wedding anniversary is coming up in March, so perhaps we'll be wild and crazy then, and go out to dinner.

Alright. I'm signing off...