Tristan’s grandma Didi (my mom) came out to visit last week.  Sometime last month, she told us she had managed to get some time off of work and was able to come hang out for a bit and play with Tristan.  It’s fortunate for her, but unfortunate for the rest of the family, as she is the only one who lives within a decent driving distance of us.  We’d love to see some more of the family but we realize that the trip’s not easy.  Hell, if the trip weren’t longer than shit, we’d make it out to visit everyone more often!  And to be fair, we prefer to take the plane which makes visiting my mom actually the least convenient, because she lives about 100 miles from the nearest major airport and the subcompact cars I like to drive don’t do well driving through the Nevada/Arizona desert areas.  But still – family is invited to spend a little vacation with us!  Our sleeping accomodations sort of suck, especially if multiple family members are here simultaneously (my mom took up residence on our floor, next to Samurai), but we have a blow-up mattress, a couch of reclining goodness, and a chaise lounge.

Tristan adored all of the attention he received and the new toys he got to play with.  He was fussy after his grandma left, but we don’t know if it was because of a change in the Virgo’s routine, a growth spurt, teething, or random.  I think we suspect a growth spurt due to his weird eating habits these past few days, but thankfully, his fussiness is tapering off.  Hell, we couldn’t even calm him down with movement, which is almost failsafe.  It’s sort of amusing but very stressful to walk around an apartment complex with a screaming baby in a baby carrier/pack thingie.

We’ve started dressing Tristan in pants and socks in addition to his little onesies.  It’s finally getting cooler during the days here.  I could live without that in general, of course, but for some reason our apartment is usually sweltering.

Tristan really looks different from his newborn days.  Hell, he’s put on almost 50% of his birth weight already.  His hair is still dark but seems a bit more sparse.  You can tell when you look at his pictures but it doesn’t seem as obvious when we see him day after day.  It makes me glad that we’ve taken so many pictures, though.  I hope he appreciates this little album of sorts when he gets older and wonders about his babyhood.

I also hope Tristan will be amused to know that I currently have purple hair and his dad currently has blue-black but mostly black hair.  Both dyes will fade in time.  James looks good with black hair, though!  I am not so pleased with how the purple came out in mine.  But I suppose that when Tristan wants to do weird shit with his hair, we will not really be able to deny it on principle.  We’ll have some standards, though.. I’m sure!

Added 17 new pictures to 2-3 month gallery.

Added new 2 – 3 Month pictures.

Today, I set Tristan down on his stomach.  He pushed his chest up, looked around, and promptly rolled over.   I decided to grab the camera and take a picture.  So he promptly flipped me off. 

He’s a troublemaker, that one.

Tristan seems to be becoming more aware of his surroundings and abilities. He really tried to grab his bottle while being fed just a moment ago. He had the motions all correct – he just has to work on the strength and coordination to get it for sure!

He also seems to be trying very hard to communicate with us – it’s so cute how he babbles and looks at us intently, as if any time now we’d be able to make sense of it. And right now, he’s sitting in James’s lap trying to do sit-ups!

I’ve been trying to make an effort to go somewhere that’s outside the home and walk around with Tristan in his carrier.

On Thursday and Friday we managed to go to two separate malls. Each trip entailed 30-45 (didn’t count, really) minutes of walking around and having females gush over Tristan as if they’ve never seen a baby before. There was the girl in the Bare Escentuals store who was talking about how she’d adopt her sister’s kids if she could, and there was the older Asian lady outside of Target who was walking with a younger woman, perhaps her daughter, who looked very embarassed at the display. Tristan loved it, though.. after a moment or so of both women paying him such attention he began giggling and hiding his face in my chest.

He seemed to enjoy being carried in general; he was very fascinated by random scenery and kept his head turned to take it all in. I figure that wearing him is good exercise for me and good snuggling for him, so it’s something I plan to make an effort to do as often as possible. It does get tiring quickly – he’s over 14 lbs now, according to our home scale! My neck hurts just thinking about it. I expect that this will improve with time.

We received Tristan’s passport today. Damn.. nice timing! Also, he has a “what the hell?!” look on his face.

Tristan is pseudo-napping on the couch, while I sit on the floor next to him and pump. He’s sort of sleepy, but he’s not staying asleep. He wakes up and fusses if he drops the pacifier, which he rarely keeps in his mouth when he’s actually asleep. Normally he’d have woken up or passed out by now instead of going in and out of sleep. I’m anxiously awaiting the time when he can pick up his own damn pacifier!

Last night he managed to spit up on two of my shirts in a row. He’s sort of a cluster-spitter.. he’ll go for a while without any incidence of spitting up, and then about four feedings in a row will turn him into the human fountain. Not much we do seems to affect this – whether or not we burp him, feed him a certain amount or not, incline him or not, etc. However, he did get my hair straight out of the damn shower. Punk!

John McCain was giving his concession speech and Tristan busted out screaming for no apparent reason, other than he had to listen to McCain’s voice (since Tristan had no idea why the man was speaking, after all). We’re glad he agrees with us politically! We didn’t want to listen to McCain speak anymore, either.

What we’ve noticed about Tristan lately:
– he almost has the holding his head up thing mastered when in a sitting position
– he can lift his head so he’s staring straight ahead while on his tummy
– he’s started babbling a whole lot this past week or so
– he’s learning to burp himself by rocking himself back and forth
– he really likes being propped in a sitting position
– he really likes being changed unless it’s time for a feeding
– we can reliably make him giggle unless it’s time for a feeding