Was it really that bad?

Today was Torin's first experience with a live violin. I picked two very nice pieces from our "sleep" play list, Massenet's "Meditation" and Brahms "Ave Maria," and downloaded the sheet music online. For some reason I thought Torin might find live music interesting.

Have I mentioned my G peg is seriously tight? Well it is and it's really hard to tune the G string. Torin seemed uncertain, but curious for a moment but in the wahwahwah moment of G string tunage he emitted a piercing WAHHHHH of his own several octaves higher than mine. Having never heard this particular cry before I'm still not sure what it meant ... fear? auditory pain? mortal offense? I immediately put down the violin and picked up the baby. He was quickly calmed and placed back in his spectators seat. Four bars into "Ave Maria" his little face screwed up in a wail preceding grimace. Once more I quickly abandoned the violin in favor of the baby.

C'mon! I'm rusty, but I'm not THAT bad



All right, I thought, lets change tactics. "Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star" plucked banjo style with backup vocals (mine, ugh) and constant eye contact? Acceptable. "Row Row Row Your Boat" played with the bow was acceptable until I missed a note at which point it became an offense. "Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star" played with the bow, constant eye contact and a ridiculous smile elicited tentative smiles. I put the instrument at away at this point to end the 5 minute introduction to live music on a happy note.

I suppose I'll just have to skip the tuning and start off with the circus clown method of violin playing for our next session.

Sickies

Torin came down with a nasty wet cough on Monday. I thought he was just aspirating milk and spit up, but when it was still around Tuesday I took him to the doc to make sure he didn't have fluid in his lungs. He didn't. Yesterday he woke up with a runny nose and last night I got a mild soar/scratchy throat and some minor congestion, so I'm pretty sure we picked up a virus. I was surprised that he beat me to it and hope this doesn't mean he got the Swenson tendency towards respiratory infections. This is Torin's first illness and so far he is handling it as gracefully as a snotty nose and cough can be handled. He's mostly himself, playing and smiling but he isn't sleeping very well (I don't sleep well when I'm coughing and congested either). I've let him nap in the sling on and off all day to keep him upright and it seems to be helping. I was up with him 5 times last night and hope that he will be able to sleep better tonight, but I'm not counting on it.

A Conversation with Chatter Mouse and Purple Hippo

Torin is telling Chatter Mouse that Mommy didn't bake him a cake for his three month "brithday" yesterday. If I can figure out how to edit the AVI I'll cut off the part at the end where he shows us what a pro he is at spitting up.

The Funniest Number

Torin has been slowly developing his laughter skills for weeks. He started with an uncertain, punctuated, and rather literal "Haha." It was so uncertain and literal that I wasn't sure I should actually quantify it as a laugh, but it's evolved into something much closer to the real thing. I heard his best laugh ever last night, full of genuine amusement and glee ... not in person, but over the baby monitor. Go figure that Dad would get the first laugh! Apparently "eight" is very funny when you're 10 weeks old. If I thought "eight" was funny at that age, I don't remember.

Over the weekend, The Scoot added counting to Torin's entertainment repertoire. I'd heard him counting for Torin earlier in the day, but apparently the hilarity of the number didn't hit our babe until his evening change (or perhaps I should say one of several evening changes?). The Scoot counted aloud as he re-snapped each of the snaps on the PJ's and as he got to the eighth and final snap Torin emitted a definite peal of laughter. Torin continued to laugh each time one of us said "eight" for several minutes. He only smiled at seven and nine, but EIGHT is the FUNNIEST number!

Say Cheese!

Torin has a beautiful vibrant smile and he's been using it for weeks, but I have yet to catch his full scale glee on camera. It's really hard to get a young baby to "pose" with a smile plastered on his face. This is his first on camera smile, not a huge smile, but a smile none the less. I think he may have been a little dazed by the repeated camera flashes.



Torin's current favorite things:

• "talking"
  
• ABCs
  
• bouncing on mommy or daddy's knee to the tune of the Lone Ranger theme song
  
• the chatter mouse toy hanging over his play mat
  

For this picture we were "talking" and going through the ABCs. Sometimes we sing it and sometimes we just say the letters slowly so he can see how our mouths move when we say the letters. He tries to mimic our mouth movements.

Yawn!

Torin falls asleep listening to Scott read Grimm's Märchen on the Kindle.


Torin had his 2 month vaccines today. It killed me to listen to him shriek while the nurse was giving him the shots. She gave him some Tylenol first, so he was himself for most of the afternoon, but around dinner time he started feeling really lousy and wouldn't let me put him down. I wanted to put him in the sling, but he got very upset if he even thought I was going to put him down so we just sat in the rocking chair instead. He took a nap on my chest while I rocked and read about babies sleep habits on the kindle. After an evening dose of Tylenol he was all smiles and chatter for a bit. I hope he'll be able to sleep it off tonight. He's a tiny bit cranky now, but that could just be because its almost bed time.

He measured 24" long and weighs 12.2lbs. No wonder most of his 0-3 month clothes don't fit anymore! I bet by the end of next week he will graduate to medium gdiapers and 3-6 month clothes exclusively. The Carter's brand 0-3 are the only ones that still fit. Gap seems to run much smaller. I've pulled all the Gap 3-6 month clothes out so he can get as much wear out of them as possible - they are just so darn cute!

Bear Feat and Pirates

Our little Wild Thing reached 8 weeks yesterday and today he is wearing his very first 3-6 month outfit. Oma sent it for Christmas and it's the CUTEST thing. I'm glad we decided to try it on or he would have outgrown it before we even pulled it out of the closet. If he gets much taller he will grow out of it before he fully fills it out. I was so sure it would be huge on him, and boy was I wrong. Is my baby a giant?


All cozy after a trip to the knit shop where Kristina sang to him in German and I got some new yarn.


Here is the sweet Jolly Rodger on the back. Did I happen to mention that this is the CUTEST outfit ever!