Your passenger isn't all that thrilled.

I have more photos which I will post later but for now I just want to post my candidate for movie of the year. Your first “Free Fall”.

As you rode up it was clear to me that you didn’t quite grasp, while watching from the ground, what you had signed up for…on the initial drop I could see signs of the whole thing going very wrong very quickly but you quickly found your feet, so to speak, and had a blast…so much so that on the way out it wouldn’t do but you had to ride it one more time (luckily for me, we made it on line just before they shut it down!).


(The whole thing is great but my favorite bits are the little wave before you got going and your “bravery” at the very end).

Well Lilah after 3.5 years you are finally, sleeping in your own bed, sleeping in your own room and putting yourself to sleep!!

The recent development of you being able to put yourself to sleep has gotten me thinking about the evolution of your bedtime routine. So here it is, as complete as I can remember.

For the first few months it was really easy, hand you to your mom and you would nurse yourself to sleep. On the odd occasion that she would be unavailable I would typically stand up and rock or do deep knee bends until you fell asleep. The key during this period was for me to stand ,if I even tried to sit down you would snap to attention and start to cry, no matter that I kept rocking you.

At about 6-9 months things got a bit trickier as you would be dead tired yet refused to close your eyes and therefore would just stay awake and fuss about being awake. In this time I learned that once you reached a certain point I only needed, by any means necessary, to get you to close those peepers. For a while I could gently blow into your face causing you to blink and viola, you were gone. Eventually, however, you turned this into a game and started laughing and blowing back in my face, argh. I was able to counteract this for a short while by brushing my hand gently across your face, forehead to cheeks.

Thankfully it was around this time that you would let me sit or lie down. So I got in the habit of laying on the couch with you on my chest and gently rolling back and forth until you closed those perfect little eyes. You and I watched many a football game in this position, OK I watched and you snored.

Somewhere between a 18 and 24 months you got tired of me holding you in order to go to sleep and preferred to lay on your belly whilst I gently rocked you with a hand on your back or bottom. This approach continued well into your 3rd year.

One nice addition, once you started talking, was one could gauge exactly how tired and close to sleep you were by the frequency of “I love you”s that you would mutter periodically.

In the fall of 2008, while we were in an Apt. in Norwalk awaiting, our move to Spain, you slept in your own room and bed (at least you started the night there) for a short stint, but it didn’t last and every morning you were in our bed anyway, still we had to put you to sleep.

While we were in Spain you went back and forth between your room and bed and our bed, again you usually migrated to our bed during the course of the night anyway. All the while your mother or I had to spend 30 minutes or more reading/rocking/cajoling you to sleep.

In January of this year you started sleeping AND WAKING, consistently, in your own bed in our room, getting you to sleep was still a nightly chore.

Last week you were finally willing to relieve us of our bed time duties (or least reduce it down to a story) and put yourself to sleep in your own bed, in your own room. And so far there have been only a few mornings where you made your way into our bed during the night. Hooray!

At the time, I was not very happy with many aspects of the arrangement (some times more than others). However, looking back, I wouldn’t trade any one of those nights putting you to sleep for anything in this world (OK, OK there are a couple of them that I would gladly give up…but not many). It was truly a magic time and, don’t tell her, but I think your mom was right all along in her approach to bedtime.

Sleep tight buddy.

Lilah plays Fetch with Gidget

While she is very much a puppy she is mostly housebroken and doesn’t seem to be to scarred from the 4 months she spent in the shelter. She was picked up by Bridgeport Animal control in December and from there, thankfully, made her way to paws here in Norwalk.

You two have made fast friends and she has been, so far, very conscientious or how small you are and hasn’t pounced you, though I wish the same could be said of your mom and I. As your mom tells me that this afternoon you two spent the day playing fetch and you, of course, were beside yourself with joy.

While we are only 2 days into getting to know our new friend, we all agree that we seem to have made a good choice.

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According to your mom today you read your first word. The word in question? “mop”.

There was 8-10 inches of snow on the ground this morning when we woke up. Unfortunately the snow was very dry, to dry, in fact, to make good on our promise to have a day making snow people. Your disappointment on this matter, however, was short lived. After the always arduous task of getting your snow gear on you and Mom headed outside to meet the neighbors and play in the snow, I followed soon after. After getting the driveway dug out (thanks Anna) we moved to the front yard to make some snow angels and a “Snow Mound”. I piled all the snow from the sidewalk, and some from the yard, into a big pile at the front of the yard. You made some windows and dug around with your rosy read cheeks as I finished off the walkway and patio.

Before heading in for the day we dug out a snow cave, in classic form, however, you were more interested in destroying it than playing in it, though I did manage to snap a couple of pictures in said cave.

After destroying the snow cave your hands started getting cold and we decided to go inside and warm our toes by the fire. You mom had the brilliant idea to make some hot chocolate. So while she worked on getting dinner started and making ready for cookies, you helped me make the chocolate which was topped off with some “Fluff” in lieu of marshmallows.

As I write this you are about halfway through your cup and are already way out of control. For example you just jumped up and down on the couch for about 5 minutes exited about football being on and demanding to know where the gamecocks are, all the while pounding on my back. Following that display you suggested that we go tackle Mommy…then you took off and tackled her (though I don’t think you actually brought her down).

So back in October our friend John came to visit us in Spain. While there he tried to get you to tell us “what the fonz says”. However, you refused to say the iconic “Ayyy”, choosing instead to put up your thumb and say “Beeee”.

In the midst of all our travels we quickly pushed this to the back of our minds. Until last night at dinner when you started asking (with your thumbs up) “who says Beeee, daddy”. It took us about ten minutes before your mother correctly guessed the Fonz.

I am going to get Daddy some bacon… some soda…. some wine…. some football.  I want to get all that for Daddy and give it to him!

So on our visit to Granada and the La Alhambra we got to visit the Palacio de Carlos V. While in the great patio, which had amazing acoustics, so of course we talked Lilah into recording some Little Feat for us.

You have always enjoyed looking at our pictures as soon (and sometimes even sooner) as we take them. On our recent trip into the Andalucian region of Spain, you took it a step further and actually began taking your own pictures. And amidst the close-ups of your shoes, gravel, and blurry tourists you managed to take some very nice photographs. You were insistent enough to get your turn with the camera that we will be sure to get you your own sooner rather than later. Here are a few of our favorites.

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Lilah, you have finally come around on some of Daddy’s “moogis”. Last week you woke yourself up coughing and so you got to spend some insomniac hours with the old man. I happened to be watching some Little Feat videos on You Tube and you were interested enough to ask me who was singing. After thinking about the answer, Little Feat, for a bit you replied that “I like little feat, that’s my moogis daddy”; “they don’t have little feat, they have big feet.”
Which made me smile, both on the inside and the outside.

Ever since that night you have also been going around singing:
“der’s a fatman
in da tub
with the blues on” (Winnie).

While I appreciate the fact that you have been asking to hear “Fatman in the Bathtub” ever since, I can’t help but get the feeling that you are calling me fat.