Babies Grow so Fast!

Dylan is approaching his 4-month birthday so I recently looked back at some photos from June. He doesn't even look like the same baby! I can't believe how fast he has grown and how much he has changed. Here are some comparisons.

Above: Dylan is about 1 day old. He's always been a peaceful sleeper.

Below: So glad they make large swaddles. Don't know what we're going to do when he grows out of it.

Above: Dylan is about 2 weeks old. He's just discovering the Monkey Gym.

Below: The Monkey Gym is still a favorite, only now he tackles, yanks, swats and kicks it.

Above: Dylan is about 1 week old. I think this was the first time we put him on his tummy. He can't lift his head at all. Bryan says he looks "Chinese."

Below: Dylan loves his tummy. He can lift up on his arms quite a bit.

Baby's First Cold

Last Sunday, Dylan started to snort quite often after we arrived home from church. At first we thought it sounded kind of cute, until it occurred to us that he was getting sick. The rest of the day his snorts, coughs and sneezes became more and more frequent. Our little guy was becoming sick for the first time.

As first time parents, we did what we always do when we have a parenting question: Google it. This time our search was, ‘what to do baby has a cold.’ The best search result told us to call the doctor immediately and get an appointment for Monday morning because he was under four months old. Other results told us to get a humidifier and saline drops for his clogged nose.

Dana went out to our friends Kevin and Gara’s house, who were having a Jaguar party for their game against the Indianapolis Colts. Other new mothers at the party stood in astonishment when Dana told them that her sick baby was being taken care of by her husband. Why is that? We hear mother after mother tell Dana how they can’t believe I can stay home with Dylan for more than two hours, let alone a sick baby. They tell her that they could never leave their children home with their husbands for any period of time. Come on new Dads! It’s not that difficult and, trust me, I am not the most qualified Dad in the world.

Dylan had a full on cold by Monday. I stayed home with him and worked from home during the day. We went to the doctor’s office in the afternoon. Boy did he put on a show for the nurses. Sick or not, he was all smiles as they all fawned over him. That’s my boy!

While the doctor was seeing Dylan, I showed my inexperience as a father. You know how we say, ‘there is no such thing as a stupid question.’ Well, I really pushed the envelope when I asked the doctor how to use the ‘nose sucker,’ referred to as a nasal aspirator by most educated people. You know you are asking a dumb question when you have to preface before you ask, “Now, you know I have an advanced degree, but….”
Squeeze in, put in nostril, un-squeeze so it’s sucks the snot out. Someone is getting paid hundreds of thousands of dollars per year to tell this to people like me.

Monday afternoon, after the doctor’s visit, was the peak of Dylan’s cold. He cried so much that he was hoarse the next morning. Meanwhile, I was trying to bang out some work from the laptop at the dining room table. Each wail pulled at my heart. By the time Dana came home around 6, I was fried. I was out the door to start our new Financial Peace University class. I couldn’t get out of the house fast enough.

Since then, Dylan is just about back to 100% (as of Friday morning.) Dana and I have our first child sickness under our belts (except now both of us are sick). We can only hope that our questions (and Google searches) get more intelligent with experience.

Post Labor Day Weekend Update

Dana is back to work as of last week Monday. We are still adjusting to life as DIK's, Dual Income with Kid (oh, that sounds bad.) We are getting the routine down, though we fight for Dylan's attention when we come at night.


Dylan is growing like a weed. He was in the 86th percentile in weight and height at his last checkup. I told Dana that I have never been 86th percentile in anything, especially physically. She laughed and thought for a moment (I could hear her mind grinding away) and then went silent. My point exactly.


We are having a lot of fun, though. Sleeping through the night = a lot of fun. Dylan is sleeping through the night now, which eliminates our 'passionate discussions' of who will do the overnight feedings. Mom and Dad like their sleep and are willing to fight for it!


Dana had a birthday a couple of Wednesday's ago. We went out to eat at an eerily quiet Italian restaurant. Maybe you only notice these things when you have a baby with you. Dylan was quiet, thank goodness. Her present was a shopping spree at DSW (Discount Shoe Warehouse.) Dylan and I people watched at Starbuck's while she spent 90 minutes there.


Work is going well. Dana and I are leading Financial Peace University through our church this fall on Mondays. Anyone in town should come.


That pretty much covers all of our updates. Here are some cute pictures of baby D.

Wear Leather Pants, Get Rid of Wife

So I was checking our Analytics report today for our blog (this shows me how many visitors have come to the site, where they are coming from, how long they stay - basically stops short of giving me your name and address) and saw that an awful lot of people were visiting from the blog jonalysis.wordpress.com. I had never heard of this site before and thought "Oh, it must be one of Bryan's friends who has added us to his blogroll."


I visited the site to find the subhead read "The World is Different Through the Eyes of a Fetishist" and realize that the site is dedicated to men in leather pants and a post about Bryan's Rock and Roll Weekend is leading things off!

The comments add to the hilarity. My favorite reads:

Perhaps Bryan does not have a particular desire to wear leather pants. Perhaps
the leather pants were just a part of a clever scheme for Bryan to have a night
out without his wife Dana and their infant Dylan. You see, Bryan’s outfit was one of the reasons why Dana was not going to the concert with
him. Perhaps the title of this post should have been “Wear leather pants, get
rid of wife”.

Hmmmm. This person has a good point. Perhaps Bryan knew that I did not want to be around him in his leathers and therefore wouldn't go to the concert with him? Perhaps he came up with an extravagant excuse to ditch Dylan and I for the weekend so he could get a full night of sleep in a hotel room instead of sharing the nighttime duties (Dylan was not sleeping through the night at that time). This has given me a lot to think about.

What are your thoughts? Please comment.

Lots to Smile About

Ok, now that Bryan has his late 20's quarter-life crisis out of his system (aka: Rock and Roll Weekend), we have lots to smile about.

First, Dylan has started to smile back at us more frequently and it is SO CUTE! I, of course, have my camera out and try to capture as many of those smiles as possible. There will be a Dylan smile montage at the end of this post.

Second, my sister Robyn came to visit for a few days and meet Dylan for the first time. She has some friends who have been completely stressed out parents, which leads to stressed out, fussy kids, so being around a baby for an extended period of time wasn't at the top of her list. We gave Dylan some pep talks before she arrived to be on his best behavior - "Son, if you want cousins some day you better behave while Aunty Robyn is here." We ended up having a fabulous time. Dylan was excellent - he did not poop in her lap or spit up on her one time (he left that for me), and she grew quite attached to her little nephew by the end of the weekend. Dare I say she even uttered "Let me know when Dylan is up tomorrow morning. I need some more Dylan time before I leave." Mission accomplished.

Third, and probably the biggest reason to smile, Dylan has started sleeping through the night! Praise the Lord! Hallelujah! We've gone about a week now where he's slept from 10:30/11:00pm to anywhere between 5:30/7:00am. What a difference sleep makes!

Smile Montage... Ready, Set, GO!