Feels Good to be a Dad

This is my favorite picture of Maddox to date. It makes me smile everytime I see it. What a pork chop he's turning out to be. He's been really fun lately. He's learning new tricks by the dozen. Here's a quick list of what we've taught him within the last week or 2:

1. He will give you a kiss on command. (Actually he learned this about 2 or 3 weeks ago, but it's his best trick). Granted, it's not really the traditional "puckered up" kiss, so much as the "open-mouth, cheek-licking" kiss. And, if you ask and aren't prepared for it, you may catch it on the mouth. He mixes it up, sometimes he makes you wait, sometimes he doesn't. Sometimes he doesn't even wait for you to ask.


2. He knows how to wave. He'll hold his hand out and move his fingers and smile with his mouth open. It's really funny.


3. He knows how to hug. It takes some convincing, but if you are holding him and ask for it repeatedly, you can guilt him into doing it. Hugs consist of him laying the side of his head on your shoulder. The length of his hugs are decided by him. Typically they only last a few seconds, but occasionally you'll get lucky and score one that lasts up to 10 seconds. It's kind of awkward, trying to determine if he's still hugging or just fell asleep. Oh, and the open mouth neck bite is complimentary on some hugs... depending on how he feels at the time the hug is requested.


4. He's learned that banging his maraca on the wall while you hold him is his favorite trick. Basically, you take him to a select, interesting stretch of wall or post or window (if you dare), tap on it lightly to let him know it's okay, and he will wail on it with his maraca. I asked, and Maddox said it's his favorite.

So these are the happenings. I haven't taken the pictures off the camera yet, so that will have to wait another week. Also, by this time next week, I hope to have the CD-Rom that will enable me to post videos on here. So I'll try to catch some of these tricks and post them.