Holiday Wrap-up

Santa's sleigh is long gone and the New Year's confetti has settled.  The tree is down and the leg lamp has made its way back to the man cave, and we here at Team Timmons have successfully navigated our first busy holiday season with our little man.  It will come as a surprise to no one that there was no shortage of love for Avett.  And gifts.  And Christmas outfits.  LOTS of Christmas outfits.

(see what I mean?)

Without a doubt, we were definitely more excited about Christmas than Avett this year, although I assume that won't be the case next year, right?  In any case, as I mentioned, the kid made out like a holly, jolly bandit.

No judgment on my Christmas morning look or well-worn and supremely comfortable pajama pants:

Perhaps the best gift I got was this.  Seems like nothing until you're a parent and it's your kid.  Avett figured out how to giggle, and is evidently pretty ticklish.  This was the end of Christmas day.  Pretty awesome, right?

When we weren't throwing down on one of our 5 Christmases (yes, you read that right), we ran Avett back to the doc for another checkup, and thankfully after our Batman vs. the Joker-like vigilance, he won't need to wear a helmet.  We may still end up doing some PT for torticollis, but we're over the big hurdle and if we focus on his neck exercises and stretches like we have keeping him off the left side of his head, we may avoid therapy as well.  Woot, woot!

Tomorrow is the dreaded Mommy-is-going-back-to-work-and-no-one-is-really-excited-about-it-aside-from-the-grandparents-who-will-be-watching-Avett-for-us.  Whew.  I've been off for just under two weeks and I'm already mad about the alarm, but Ruth Ann has been off since September.  And she's a new (and let me reiterate awesome) mom.  She obviously trumps me in the return to work category, but neither of us is all that excited as it's been really nice to be at home and spend some good, quality time as our family unit.  And with that being said, it's rapidly approaching my bed time, so I'll bid you adieu and leave you with some more pics.  Hope every single one of you 12 or so readers enjoyed the holidays as much as we did!

Hung with care (thanks to Mom for the glitterific Santa)

I finally manned up and started handling bath detail.  Still not sure why I had such a mental block about it.

Hey.

Tummy Time - Still not a favorite, but it's getting better

We start nerds early in this family.  And why yes, those are fake Chucks socks

Wizzzzzzzzzzzuuuuuuuuuupppppp?!?

Watch the Throne

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You're STILL not in the holiday spirit?

How about now?  9 shopping days until Christmas!

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That's my boy

Just a quick post here....Since Avett's arrival, my mom has uncovered some of my old clothes from when I was a small fry.  Funny enough, they fit someone else we know now.

Thankfully, I think Avett takes more after his mom.  No comments from the peanut gallery on the picture of me (it's NORMAL for young babies to be cross-eyed sometimes, you guys).

And here are some of my favorite pictures from the last month or so.  It's really amazing how your definition of entertainment changes when you family expands.  I'd rather carry on with this kid and try to squeeze out a smile than tear off an epic guitar solo on Rock Band.  MOST of the time.

Ready for his first 5K (RA and Avett took care of business while I ate doughnuts!)

Another recycled family item.  Bjorn, smjorn

So fresh and so clean

There's one of those smiles

Santa?!?  I know him!

(Sorta) Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree

And finally, here are the updated weekly photos.  At some point soon, we'll probably just snap these each month, but here's the latest batch.

Looking thoughtful

Looking tired

I'm pretty content over here

Those cheeks, am I right?

Loungin'

Laughing at an awesome joke, obviously

And finally, another side-by-side shot (gotta love a new iPhone app).  It's crazy to see how much this little fella has already grown up and changed.  Ruth Ann just finished her grad school semester (whew!) and I'm really looking forward to some time off around the holidays to enjoy some quality family time before everybody goes back to work.

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Hey kid, look THAT way...

From the previous posts around here, you'll know that we're pretty lucky so far with our little man.  He's agreeable (mostly), sleeps well, is content to chill, etc.  That's awesome, but there's just this one thing.  He likes to look to his right.  A lot.

(maybe he just wasn't into this book?)

Ruth Ann and I watch this kid like a hawk and had noticed that all that lookin' was starting to do a number on the back of his head.  We even called the nurse a month or so ago to ask what we should/could be doing to keep from flattening out his noggin and the answer we got was to just try to get him interested in looking the other way.  So, put things on his left side, prop his head, etc.  For not having a hard head yet, this dude is stubborn and always seems to find his way back to his favorite side.

Fast forward to last week and his 2 month checkup, and the doc mentioned two not-so-feely-good things.  Torticollis (maybe very slight) and....a helmet.  I'll preface this with the good parent in me by saying if the professionals say Avett absolutely has to sport a helmet for his well-being, then I'll be commissioning someone to make it look like App State's finest.  And of course there could be MUCH worse things than some headgear, I get that.  But....who really wants that for their kid?  I mean, I want to snuggle baby head, not hard plastic.  And it sure can't be all that comfortable for him, can it?  And is the thing even washable?  Anything that doesn't get washed for nine months is going to have some stank, right?

We go back in a month for another head check-up to see what we may need to do.  In the meantime, we are being extra vigilant on getting this small fry looking the other way and off that one side of the melon.  Lots of tummy time, stretches (thanks for the tips, Charlotte), belly naps (easy now, only if we are with him and watching closely), and various ways to prop/turn that head to keep him from always being on the same side (he is very crafty in still turning the other way).  We let him sleep his own way at night since we're not able to watch as closely, but wonder if there are safe things to do during that long stretch of night sleep too.

So, parents out there...What are your thoughts/experience with new baby heads and helmets?  From what I can tell in my research and talking to others, there seems to be some different approaches in different places (ie, there are helmets galore around here, but not so much in other places where our friends and family have kids).  Couple that with some articles that say unless the case is severe, repositioning is just as effective as helmet therapy, and the conspiracy theorist in me starts to get a little suspicious about all these helmet recommendations.  Those things are expensive and someone is getting PAID.  I'll update the world after our next appointment, but would love to see some comment feedback from you knowledgeable folks in the meantime....

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Thankful? Yep!

OK, so this post is late and well overdue.  I know, I know, but believe it or not it's been a bit harder to carve out time to keep the blog fresh and write posts when I'm somewhat clever, witty and coherent.  It's all for you, gentle readers, and I want to keep the quality at Team Timmons top notch.

'Tis the week after Thanksgiving and after the dust settled, the food digested and the power nap happened, I've got a little time to reflect on what was a really great long weekend.  My place of employment is pretty generous with holidays and so in addition to the holiday on Thursday and Friday, I took Wednesday and Monday off to make for six. days. off.  In a row.  That's a glorious thing, right there.  Some of my most favoritest family made the trip over from Kentucky to visit and we got some good time to catch up and my brother was in town and brought his new pup, Mac.  To quickly summarize, Thanksgiving this year included the recently expanded Team Timmons, an aunt, cousins, kids of cousins (4 and 6 years old), my bro, parents, their neighbors and close friends, and four pups.  And a partridge in a pear tree.  It was busy and wild and loud, and awesome.  Since a picture's worth a thousand words, I'll take the easy way out and give you a photo recap:

Avett was snuggled, here by Aunt Lynda

Here by Grandpa and Nana Nance

Here by Uncle Kev

Here by Oma (entertainment provided by Papa)

Cornhole was played

Naps were taken

By dogs too

Happy baby!

And a team picture

And after the official holiday dust settled, we sneaked our way up to Blowing Rock for a night a Chetola, a meal at the ever delicious Black Cat, and some Christmas tree shopping at our favorite choose and cut spot in Boone.

This is my concentrate-hard-so-I-don't-fall-down-the-mountain-with-our-child face

(they have cows there too!)

Obviously, this was our first big holiday with Avett and through all the hubbub and excitement, we did get a chance to take a few quiet minutes and reflect on parenthood so far.  Our thoughts?  Man, are we lucky.  Avett is such a good baby (insert knock on wood here).  He's making things as easy as he can on us first time parents, and for that we really are thankful.

And now, Christmas is right around the corner.  I'm generally a fan of Christmas music, but for some reason I am on a serious festive music kick this year.  I like the classics (duh), but I also really enjoy hearing the people I normally listen to make a pass at a holiday tune.  If you're on Spotify, and honestly why wouldn't you be, you should check out the Christmas Album from She & Him (think Jovie from Elf) and Scott Weiland (yes, the STP guy at his crooner-y, uh, best).

Thanks for checking in, I'll try to keep this puppy more up to date.  In the meantime, enjoy this crazy/busy/hectic/special holiday season!

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Progress Report

Ruth Ann's a teacher, see what I did there with the post title?  Aaaaanyway....

It's been a minute since a proper blog post, so I'll try to catch things up here.  On Monday, Avett was six weeks old and looked something like this:

Since the last baby post, this kid has done plenty of eatin', sleepin', and poopin'.  And thankfully, not too much cryin'.  This is one (mostly) happy baby, and I think we are probably taking that for granted since we don't really know any better.  I mean, rarely does this kid get cranky about much of anything.  He sleeps in pretty good runs at night (and an extra special thanks to RA for handling that early morning feeding like a pro), and we've been able to establish a pretty good eat, hang out, nap routine during the days.  We've made a couple successful adventures out of la casa, and Ruth Ann even managed to safely pack up and transport little man out solo.  Without breaking down.  Kudos, wifey!

This week was our six-week checkup and I'm happy to report that my better half has a clean bill of health, and that the doc was quite impressed with Avett. Well, mostly the size of the chunky cheeks, but hey! this boy is growing.  I took a rough weight this week and the little man tipped the electronic scale at 9.6 lbs.  Granted, laying him on a bathroom scale is not the most scientific weighing method, but I think that's pretty accurate.  I mean, just compare these two pics and I think you'll agree.

And without further adieu, here is approximately 2% of the pictures we've taken over the last 6 weeks!

Baby Feet!

A nap with Mom

Thanks for the swing, Ben

Tummy Time

Cooper on watch

Mountaineer in the making

Proud!

Dueling banjos babies

This ground and these pumpkins are COLD

Family reading before bed

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