Baby Grab

Been a little while since the last post. Nicole and I have been busy. Us and baby Maddox have a whole flock of holiday visitors all set to get his first Christmas started off right. I'm really looking forward to it. Nicole and I both are. We've been trying to get our house ready for the holidays... painting, cleaning, organizing. We're not really sure what to expect because we haven't hosted anything, let alone an actual Christmas. So we're doing everything. I've even done some near tragic electrical work. My father and I installed a new chandelier and I re-did some electrical outlets. Changing them from the dingy off-white they were to the bright white they are now. And, when I say bright white, I really mean bright white in the same context of electrical sparks. Here's how it went down:

• Nicole: Are you going to change the outlets without turning off the power?
• Me: No response, just working.
• Nicole: Hey, don't you think you should turn off the power first?
• Me (annoyed at being questioned): I didn't have to on the first 2. I've done this before you know.
• Nicole (still questioning): ... mmm okay I guess.
• Me: No response, just working... and thinking about life and having doubters.
• Me (2 seconds later with the same face you get when being unexpectedly popped by a towel in the bathroom): "....." (as sparks engulf me from the wall)
• Me (next outlet, obviously too stubborn to turn off the power after the previous Hiroshima): (Same face as before, but with a hint of unbelieving). Damn.
• Me (2 minutes later, happy to inform everybody): Okay, the power is off now.

So, despite the troubles, things are good. I doubt anybody will notice the white outlets in the dining room, but if you do, now you know the rest of the story.

Life with baby is getting better by the second. Maddox is such a great son. Nicole and I really did get lucky. The only time he is not happy are when he encounters one or several of his new found dislikes. Here's his short list of dislikes, in no order: Hunger, Dirty diapers, Being sleepy, Having remote controls fall on his head while sleeping, and last but not least, not being held when he thinks he should be held. Other than these 5 things, Maddox is usually always happy. But when he's not happy, he's really not happy. It's almost funny how upset he can get. But we rarely see it, so life with him is good.

Lately he has learned 2 new tricks: grabbing things and making noises. All this really happened in the last few weeks. The noise he makes is really funny. He doesn't say any words yet, but he has noticed that he can control the noise somewhat. I say somewhat because he hasn't really mastered voice inflection yet. So he's really got one pitch to his voice. And it's eerily similar to a growling baby bear cub. Since he can't do the voice inflections yet, really all he can control is the length of the sound and when to do it. It's really funny. The length of the noise is almost always a full breaths worth (5 to 10 seconds). I guess his reasoning is why do less? And the when to do it is either while biting your face (his favorite past time lately) or letting us know that even though he is in his crib, he's still not asleep. Both are great. It's things like this that really make being a parent fun. I really love it.

Oh, and the grabbing, yes. How could I forget. Step one for him is grabbing anything within reach. He hasn't perfected it quite yet, so in all honesty, he swats at things about the same amount he grabs them. Mostly because his brain is just a half second behind at the moving objects at this point. It's still a little too new to him. So when he misses (or swats) it looks a lot like King Kong swatting at planes while climbing the Empire State Building. Oh, and should he actually catch hold of something, step 2 is "Put in mouth".