Golden Pig Tales

In the game of Ezra versus Gravity, I think gravity is winning more matches and games now, but Gravity will not always win the matches and games. Ezra will win and learn to win matches and games against Gravity in Gravity’s home field of Earth.

Ezra now has an ability and tolerance for sitting upright. After minutes of holding self steady and up, he will begin to fall left, right or forward. Forward is actually the position he will fall when sitting upright more often than not because of his big and heavy head being pulled down over the span of a few minutes. This leaves his head between his legs near the ground. When tipping left or right, his arms do balance Ezra and his big head. Or his arms soften the fall to the floor helping ease the defeat of the match with gravity.

When stand practicing with -v- and I or holding himself up to stand with the help of the coffee table, Ezra doesn’t seem to understand that when moving forward he needs to lead with the legs and body and not with hands and arms. He seems to believe that gravity will not play to win the match this one time while he reaches for something too far to be reached from his current standing position. Ezra is getting to know Gravity always wants to win any game with it. Ezra can shuffle feet to an objective if there is an objective to reach like a pacifier or a blanket to chew on, so Ezra is learning to play the game with gravity. But sometimes passions overwhelms perception and he tries to fly to the pacifier or the blanket (to chew on). His balance does lose, and he falls like a board to the floor, but never hits because while the match is a game between Ezra and Gravity it is not a death match, and I am on Ezra’s team and won’t let Gravity win all the matches while Ezra is still a very young child learning to play with gravity.

Ezra’s play with Gravity continues. Soon Ezra will begin to win more and more matches and games with Gravity while becoming more injured from losing an occasional match and falling. Soon I will not be there to catch him and there will be one less game Ezra plays with me.

Ezra has a high chair now. It’s a loaner, but Ezra doesn’t plan on using it for very long, so he is willing to give it back. However, the excitement sounds and happy talk expressed while he first sat in the high chair may mean he may want it forever.

Now he is as high as us when we sit to eat at the table, which is much better for -v- and I don’t need to look down to look and talk with Ezra, and Ezra doesn’t need to look up to look and talk with -v- and I. We only need stare across the table to have a conversation with Ezra or to find out who can smile the longest.

I only hope his enthusiasm and obvious joy at being high up in the high chair remains. He was never this happy while in any of his other chairs unless -v- and I were some how amusing him like in the video of this post: I Made Ezra Laugh.

Ever since I have been bottle feeding Ezra, I have been waiting for the day he is able to hold his own bottle. I am waiting for the day because bottle feeding is easy if you don’t have an itch or a scratch or want to click a mouse button to read a different news article. I am waiting for the day because there are times when I snooze off while feeding Ezra, and my arm and hand holding the bottle will lower, and the end of the bottle will lower causing Ezra to suck down a bunch of air and cause a bunch of burps. Or the arm holding Ezra’s head up will lower causing Ezra to gag and | or become disconnected with bottle.

Yesterday morning at 3:43 A.M. Ezra woke up. Ezra wanted a new diaper and some food. I had a bottle ready, and it was on the night stand, so it was not a difficult task to wake up and change Ezra’s diaper and then get the bottle and begin to feed Ezra. I was a little worried that I may nod off while feeding Ezra.

To my surprise, Ezra grabbed the end of the bottle with both hands, lifted the bottle end, and he began to feed. My big boy was holding his own bottle. This had never happened before. Sometimes he has put one hand on the bottle, but not the other. At the beginning of the feeding, both hands gripped the end of the bottle with a vise hold like an object he is trying to put in his mouth to teeth. I was tired and wanting sleep prior to the feeding, but I was wide awake during the feeding with wonder watching Ezra hold the bottle. Near the end of this feeding, Ezra lost all interest in holding the bottle, and I had to take over with smile and a feeling like a proud father.

I think Ezra may be good at playing a horn instrument the way he makes muffled talkie noise on occasion while breast feeding.

Ka Boom! It’s Ezra’s first tooth!

He’s been teething, supposedly, for the last month, so I’m always looking at his mouth trying to see a tooth. Usually I just see spit and maybe some regurgitated milk.

I was looking at his mouth today while he was lying on his blanket by the window, and talking to me in his special way. I could see something on the bottom right of his gumline - a little white bump. I thought I saw something there last night, but wasn’t willing to bet that it was a tooth. Having now looked at a bunch of tooth eruption charts today on the internet, I am almost positive that the little white bump is a tooth about ready to erupt!

It had been some time since Ezra peed on me. I actually have thought during these past couple weeks, <When was the last time Ezra peed on me?>

During the first two months, I feel Ezra peed on me often during diaper changes and baths. Before tonight, I feel it had been at least three months. Three months before tonight because during Ezra’s bath tonight Ezra peed on me while I was waiting to dry him off after -v- was done cleaning.

The pee was a quick short stream that shot from the tub in the sink and arched over the kitchen counter and down on to my pants making it look like I peed my pants.

Ezra’s crawling is getting better. He can some times move over the floor using his hands, arms, feet, legs, chest and stomach, but when he is moving across the floor with this method he doesn’t move far, and he looks like a sea turtle crawling on the beach to lay its eggs. Some times the inability to move with this method to reach an object will cause enough stress that one may think Ezra was laying eggs. The only thing Ezra lays is his face to the ground after a session of flailing arms and legs, which isn’t bad as long as he didn’t spit-up prior to head hitting ground and rise with a face covered with spit-up and saliva, but with a face covered with spit-up he is usually smiling.

The morning monologue of Ezra excerpts: huhe huhe he huhe huhe… And Errrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrraaaaaaaaaaaaaaawhaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa… And ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht-ppPtht… And the many sounds I will not attempt to write with letters.

Ezra is 5 months old today!

He must have celebrated really hard at daycare, because when we got home this evening, he had a snack and went straight to bed at 5pm. Party!

Yay! Yay! It is Ezra’s birthday today.

Yay! Yay! It is Ezra’s birthday today.

Yay! Yay! It is Ezra’s birthday today.

Yay! Yay! It is Ezra’s birthday today.

Yay! Yay! It is Ezra’s birthday today.

When I was growing up, I was taught to call natural swirls in the hair that causes the hair to stick-up Cow Licks. Cow Licks look like the tip of a tornado touched the head and made the hair swirl. They look like a cow licked your head and caused the hair swirl and flow the other way.

I had Cow Licks and tried for years to tame them with hairspray or hair gel. I even had my hair long partly to not have cow licks. I have grown up and realized there isn’t enough hair product or hair length to tame Cow Licks.

I hope to teach what I have learned from my Cow Licks to Ezra, so when Ezra gets the age when he cares about his hair I can tell him that his Cow Licks are cool as long as he finds the right style. And I will note to him how cool his Cow Licks are because they form an infinity sign on the back top of his head (as -v- noted the other).

I realize that thumb sucking is thought to be a replacement for sucking on mom’s nipple or the nipple of a bottle or the pacifier, but Ezra has already began to use his thumb to do something other than substituting a thumb for a nipple.

I have been noticing Ezra uses his thumb to press upon his upper gum. When he does this, he looks like he is sucking his thumb, but really he is focusing pressure upon one location of his gum.

When he is not using a thumb to press upon his gums, and there is no other object to put in his mouth, he tries to jam his fist into his mouth, so his knuckles rub against his lower and upper jaw. I believe this technique does cover more area and spreads the pleasure of dull pain with each bite numbing the sharp pain of teething, but this technique doesn’t seem to offer the same focused intense dull pain that a well place thumb can when the teething pain increases in a specific location.

He does put two fingers in his mouth like he is trying to catch his tongue. He puts the thumb and forefinger in mouth and chews. This two-finger method appears to be being replaced with the thumb-only method, which I have noticed as his thumb gets bigger and is able to better shove thumb in mouth and better guide the thumb to those teething intense areas.

Does Ezra have resolutions for this new year, 2008? I asked him yesterday, and he didn’t have much to say, because he was chewing on the thumb and forefinger of his left fist. Maybe he wants to resolve to make a greater effort to stick his whole fist in his mouth. Or perhaps he would like to challenge himself to only one change of clothes per day. Perhaps he is hoping to try some new foods. Whatever he might be thinking about New Year’s Resolutions, I hope that one of his resolutions isn’t “become completely unphotogenic and boring so people will stop taking pictures of me” because that would be bad news for me and the grandmas.

If one of your resolutions was to look at more pictures of babies, or you were hoping for a 2007 retrospective of Ezra in pictures, you’re in luck! I just uploaded 100 pictures featuring Ezra (there’s maybe another 5 that feature him only indirectly) to Picasa:

http://picasaweb.google.com/valeriester/EzraSBest2007?authkey=-DX7KT03vcI

Check back every few months for more pictures - I might just get around to uploading with more frequency because lots of people keep asking to see more pictures. Maybe they don’t really mean it, but just in case…

Despite the Western New Year, it is still the Year of the Pig until February 6, 2008.

There may be some dispute if it is the Year of the Golden Pig. Some claim it is. While others claim it is not. I suspect those who claim it is not the Year of the Golden Pig didn’t or won’t have a child during The Year of the Golden Pig thereby becoming very lucky.

Translations of the type of pig do conflict. Our translation of time defines this year to be the Year of the Golden Pig.

Ezra seen to me that he wold be up during Happy New Year at our New Year’s Eve Party. He was not. He slept right through Happy New Year. He therefore loses our bet.

I think he got too excited and thought he could stay up all night when really he could only make it until 8 P.M., which is later than his normal time for sleep, but not late enough to be awake during Happy New Year Time.

Happy New Year, Ezra!!!