Goin' Places

So, we're on the move. I don't think that I've posted much about Joseph's new-found ability to go places. He's only been crawling for a couple of weeks now, but he's got it down. Check him out:

Isn't he cute? I took that this morning, after his 10 month sitting with Mona:

That happy face came from him and his clothes being clean, 6 teeth still on their way in, a cold that's lingered for about a week and a half now, a short nap, a mom who wanted to take a picture of her sweet boy in such a cute outfit, a little boy who's figured out how to get to things that he wants, a little boy who wants mom's camera, and a mom determined to take the picture. Who wins? Not sure yet...we'll let you know.

Anyway, now that he's mobile, I've been finding him in all sorts of interesting places with all kinds of interesting things. I've got "Oh the places you'll go" looping in my head, but Dr. Seuss makes me feel like I'm shopping at Ikea (with ring-dinglers, tartufas, and flarks, or something like that), and that particular Dr. Seuss book is sooooooo over-used that I need a new mantra. "Travelin' Man" (that old song) makes an appearance sometimes, but I'm not crazy about the idea of him having an assortment of ladies all over the world. At any rate, I went to get a cup of coffee in the kitchen and came back to find him here:

He's seen the dog go in there hundreds of times and figured that he should check it out too. I had to capture that moment. That one will make it in his wedding slide show of embarassing and cute childhood pictures :) Then he just wedged himself here and played with the pet toys:

Then we just put this out, because who doesn't love a big old box? Sorry it's blurry...I need a new camera (have I mentioned that?).

And one picture of the two of us from the wedding that we went to last weekend in Cleveland (that would've come out better if I'd had a better camera). He was such a trouper! It was a marathon weekend of driving out, visiting family, going to the wedding, and driving home, and he did wonderfully. It was a beautiful wedding and he charmed everyone in his little Chinese boy outfit that my mom only told a few people came from an open market in Beijing.

Now, hopefully we'll be able to go to the Deerfield Fair tomorrow if it doesn't get washed away today and if his cough is better...we'll have to see how it all rolls. We'll let you all know, though!

Status

Kate has blogged briefly about this before, and I've found myself in this vein. Facebook asks you to update your status to those who may be interested in what you're doing. People come up with all kinds of stuff, and it seems that I often choose just one of many options. So, today we went with: Allison has the Back-to-School Cold. or something like that. Other options may have been:

Allison...
's head is full of snot and therefore making coherent thinking rather difficult.
is just plain ol' sick.
had a great time at a beautiful wedding this weekend.
is so impressed with her very pregnant cousin!
is moderately concerned about this chesty cough that Joseph's developed.
thinks that VapoRub is a fascinating invention.
is really tired.
has become a knitting fiend.
is trying to get caught up on the baby hats that are owed to about a dozen or so babies...and thus has become a knitting fiend.
is already bored with grading papers.
would love to take a nap...ever.
can't believe that her dog peed on the floor this morning.
is feeling a little guilty for not letting her dog out earlier so that she didn't have to pee on the floor this morning.
really hopes that her dog doesn't have fleas.
wants a new digital camera.
got a screaming kick out of David Sedaris this past weekend.
recommends anything David Sedaris to everyone.
much preferred listening to David Sedaris read his book than reading it herself.
should go to bed now.
is waiting up to see her husband that she hasn't seen since early Thursday morning.
is hoping that her husband brought her cool presents from Colorado and Chicago, but won't be upset if he didn't.
is hopeful for the future.
is wondering if we can afford a new (used) car/van.
needs to schedule Joseph's 9 month pictures now that he's almost 10 months old.
is looking forward to the Deerfield Fair this weekend and some good horse pullin' (pronounced "hass pullin'").
needs to schedule Joseph's 12 month well-baby checkup.
's head is full of what seems like a million random thoughts.
is really going to go to bed now...and read until Matt comes home.

Happy Birthday(s)!

Happy Birthday Max! 22 is sure to be a great year for you and we look forward to sharing it with you!

And, a Happy Birthday to a Miss Annika Lin also!

We're a travelin' band

Well, Matt is gone, again. He left this morning to visit his grandma and aunt in Denver with his dad. His grandma is quite sick and is dying. We decided that his time would be more productively spent visiting her while she was alive...so, he's in Denver this weekend. Conveniently, he'll also be able to catch the Bears game in Chicago on Sunday. Lucky dog.

And, Joseph and I are headed out tomorrow morning for Cleveland. A friend of the family is getting married this weekend, so we're wedding-bound. It's sure to be busy and exhausting for all of us. Joseph has managed sniffles this week to follow up last week's fever, so hopefully he'll sleep most of it off in the car on the way out there.

While I can get it

Joseph's asleep, Matt's gone racin' boys (boogity, boogity, boogity), the house is clean (enough), and I'm less than uninterested in the pile of papers that I have to grade. So, here I go:

Let's start with the photo update.

While Matt's folks were here over Labor Day weekend, we went through the butterfly exhibit at the Museum of Science in Boston. A beautifully huge monarch had gotten comfy on Joseph's head while I was talking nerdy stuff with a guide. I managed to capture this stunning image of the event. Please notice the adults behind him admiring the cute boy with the butterfly on his head while the boy seems to be wondering "what the hell is going on?".

I need a faster camera. Now, he's not quite crawling yet. But, he is managing to scoot around using his own hybrid form of movement...some flopping on his stomach, some reaching really far with his arms, some pushing himself backwards. A lot of pushing himself backwards, actually. And, a little bit of reaching for things above him. He managed to score a bag of Veggie Straws from the coffee table that wasn't quite closed. He was so proud of himself--notice him double-fisting the Veggie Straws. You can't see Staley hovering at the edges stealing one straw at a time...she controlled herself pretty well.

Since we're talking about his movement, this was just the other day. How did I get here, and more importantly, how can I get out?

Then, my mom, Joseph, and I met some of her friends from work at this little museum where some monks were creating a sand mandala. We didn't get to see them working on it (because I was slow), but we did get to see the mandala and the other neat stuff that the museum had. So, here's the mandala almost finished:

And here's Joseph dressed up like a little Nepal...ese...ian, er, kid from Nepal:

And, finally: when we went in for his 9 month checkup last week the doctor said that he's very close to cutting all 4 of his first teeth (two tops, and two bottoms). That, in conjunction with the low-grade fever that he picked up this week made for a rather unhappy little boy. He's still gaining weight (18 lbs 2 oz), and otherwise looks good, but he's been kind of serious these last few days.

Now, this has been rolling around in my head for a while now and I just kind of want to articulate this. I read a note that my cousin had written on "following the path of God." She seemed to think that following in the path of God meant a life full of suffering, pain, unhappiness, and general difficulty. So, I'm wondering if that is what it means to be a good Christian. I'm making the assumption that if you are a good Christian you are following in the path of God. So, what does that mean? Is it about your choices, your intentions, your silent beliefs, your ministering to others, your personal discipleship? Some of each? I'm bothered by her belief that this brings pain. Yes, Jesus suffered. But...I don't mean to sound crass, here...I'm not Jesus, and didn't He do that so that we could have eternal life? I go to church (a good chunk of the time, anyway), I treat others as I would like to be treated (most of the time, I think), I am using my powers for good (as my mom says): I am using my gifts to help others, I live an honest life (mostly, I think, although I did download some songs from Limewire and we do own some pirated DVDs), and I have given my son to be a child of God. Am I missing something? Really, I'm asking you all, please tell me. I put this out to my students the other day (minus the religiousness of it...more a "what does it mean to be a good person" type thing), and they came up with some interesting (although young, in my perspective) ideas. One said that if you believed that you were making the "right" choices throughout your life that you were automatically a good person. That seemed like a load to me. Another said that as long as your choices weren't taking away someone elses' choices, then you were making acceptable and therefore good choices. Another load, to me. Then we got into where society gets their views on what is right and wrong. We didn't quite get to the point where society has perhaps the most skewed (or un-Christian) perception of right and wrong...but it is a public school and I would like to keep my job.

So, ponder and please respond. I'm interested in others' perspectives. And, the crib is crying, so my time here must be done.

Sweet boy

So, this warms my heart: yesterday when I got home I called Matt (or he called, or something like that...we spoke) and he asked how Joseph was when I picked him up from daycare. He was fine--happily eating Cheerios. Apparently when Matt dropped him off yesterday morning, his buddy, E, was already there and having a lousy day. He's a little older than Joseph and is apparently cutting some painful teeth. So, E was upset and crying. Matt put Joseph down on the floor, Joseph looked at E who was crying, and burst into tears himself. I thought it was so sweet that he was concerned about his buddy and being an empathetic crier. I'm sure that the daycare ladies were thrilled to now have two crying babies instead of just one, but, hopefully it didn't last. E was napping off his sore mouth (and snuggling with one of the ladies--have I mentioned how happy I am with this place?! They are so nice!) when I got there to pick up Joseph.

Conversation with a younger me

Thank you to all of you who sent me birthday wishes yesterday--rest assured that they all made me smile :)

So, I've been thinking about this "30" thing for a while now and have found myself wondering what my 20-year-old self would have said to or about the 30-year-old that I've become. I think that one of the reasons that I've been thinking this is that my 20th birthday has been floating in my head since that is when Matt and I kind of officially declared our interest in each other (or something like that). I just recall a party in a box (that my mom would always send me), an assorted cheesecake, 517 Scheele, a green inflatable chair, fabulous girlfriends, and Matt and Adam showing up late because they had just driven back from a Van Halen concert in Milwaukee. How things have changed...the highlight of yesterday: buying dog food and a fish for my desk at school. Humf.

Anyway, this is what I've come up with for my conversation with my 20-year-old self:

I see we've put on some weight. Yeah, thanks for pointing that out...lets blame it on the baby. Wow, a baby. I guess that works. Yeah, he's pretty cool. And, you'll be happy to know that we managed to get to London and Rome before the whole baby thing. Well, that's good. So, I take it we're married. Yup, we keep this one. He's a good guy--he drives us freakin' crazy sometimes, but he's a good guy. We live in NH? Yeah, I know that wasn't the plan, but it's really not so bad this time around. We've got a nice little house and I've got a good job. So, the teaching thing is working out? Why, yes, I do rather love teaching. Where did we get our masters degree? We're not going to talk about that...it's on the list of things to do in our 30's. How's the fam? Great! Folks are wonderful and still working. Max is getting married. What?! I know, we all grow up so fast, huh? It's okay, though, Jackie is awesome and we love her. He wants to be a doctor, too. But, he's a Ghostbuster. Well, he's going to be Dr. Max. Oh, and the Grandmas died. Understandable. We miss them a lot. Yeah, they're pretty cool ladies. So, are these really the best years of our life? Well, they're easy living years: your bills are paid, your food gets cooked for you, and you live in a rarified world where everyone is very much like you. But, I don't know that I'd want to go back there now. These are pretty good years too: marriage has gotten functional (most days), we've figured out the job situation, and this kid is just about the greatest thing in the whole world. Good to know. Any advice? You will survive your engagement, be wary of Morgan, and watch the credit cards. But, otherwise we've got no regrets.

I wonder what the 40-year-old me will be like...