pre-vacation post

We're going to the mountains on Monday for a few days, but I'll leave you with some pictures before we go... this was our week.

Benjamin helped Frederic wash the car after it became a bug cemetery on our trip to and from northern France last weekend. Washing our car in our driveway is something we don't take for granted; we've only been able to do so since we moved to the house.

It was warm enough to play in the pool again.

Noah is a different baby these days - smiling, cooing, and laughing most of the day. We love it! He is sleeping great at night (goes down around 6:30 pm and wakes up around 5 am to eat, then sleeps some more) and is starting to take good naps.

A rare moment where the two were together - Benjamin's not terribly interested in Noah lately; I guess he doesn't seem like very much fun yet to him.

Noah having some "tummy time."

And Benjamin was having trouble with his soupy yogurt so Frederic told him just to drink it. Which he proceeded to do with gusto.

A few random updates

It's been busy here lately - what else is new? My computer is officially dead for the moment. The fan has completely stopped turning and I can't even turn it on long enough to do a complete backup before we send it off to the manufacturer to have them fix it, so we're waiting on a hard disk drive enclosure we can plug into the other computer's USB port to back it all up first. This is the part where I'm glad we still have 2 computers - Frederic has moved his computer into my office so I can continue to work while mine is unavailable - since it looks like mine will be out for quite some time.

The past two Saturdays we have attended weddings, one in Paris and the second in Lille, northern France. We had a good time and enjoyed seeing people we hadn't seen in quite some time. Benjamin was pretty tired at the first wedding - we left "early" at midnight! - so we left him with friends while we went to the second with Noah. Of course, he still didn't get a nap that day and got to bed late, so he's only now, three days later, starting to get over the effects of that long day.

Noah got to go see a physical therapist yesterday. He favors one side of his head when he is lying down, which is pretty much all the time since he can't sit up yet, so it's flattening out. The physical therapist said his eye was "stuck" and his diaphragm was "stuck," whatever that means, and he adjusted them and said we should see improvement. Frederic will take Noah there again Thursday, and four more times after that.

Frederic is on "paternity leave" now through the first week of July, so we are at home this week and I am trying to catch up on work, and he is trying to catch up on some things around the house. Then Monday we head up to the mountains for a few days to check on the condo and meet the Belgian lady who is going to take over managing rentals for us.

It turned warm and sunny again after a few more days of rain so Benjamin got to enjoy his swimming pool again yesterday. I'm surprised there was any water left when he was done, the way he splashed it all out!

no more starving baby in our house

Good news, we went to the doctor today for Noah's weight check and from 11 lbs, 8 oz last week, he is back up to 12 lbs, 12 oz today.

He's taking less formula at each feeding now, but I think we'll hold onto the scale we rented from the pharmacy for a bit longer for a little peace of mind. We don't go back to see the doctor until he is 4 months old now, so in about 3 weeks.

And Benjamin thinks he's found a good use for the electric pump's carrying case:


I don't think I mentioned it yet in the blog, but Frederic's request for regular hours has been accepted! Starting in early July, he will begin work every day at 7 am and be home between 3-4 pm. We are very happy about this and hope it will make our lives a little bit easier.

I'm also pushing for him to find a job in the US, but so far the airlines he's looked at are cheapskates ($10/hour in San Diego? You've GOT to be kidding me!) and/or want the applicant to have lived 5 years in the US already (probably a terrorist prevention thing, but pretty dumb all the same). So if you have any leads, let us know! Preferably ones not too far from St Louis.

Well, we've discovered at least part of the reason for Noah's fussiness. I've apparently been starving him. He had his 3-month checkup on Monday and instead of gaining close to 2 pounds like he should have, he lost 3 ounces. So I'm working to get my supply back up and we are also supplementing him with formula (wow that stuff is expensive! $31 a can!) so he doesn't waste away to nothing in the meantime. He goes back for a weight check on Tuesday.

We already washed and oiled the patio table and chairs some time back, but the plastic cover we wanted for them wasn't in stock, so we bought a different one, which turned out to be very thin plastic and didn't survive the first bout of wind it had to deal with. So the poor patio set has been dealing with the elements, and possibly more than the elements; Frederic thinks the greasy-looking spots all over them were not from rain but from an airplane de-fueling overhead. Yum. We found a tarp at the store recently so Benjamin and I washed the table and chairs again so now we can try once more to protect them from the rain.

Thankfully the sun has returned, so now Benjamin can bounce off of the hedges instead of the walls for a while.

Rain, rain, go away!

We have had rain all week long. Or possibly longer. I tend to lose track of the days between Frederic's crazy schedule, trying to squeeze my own work in, and all the gray, rainy days. In fact, I've been convinced all day that it's Sunday today. It's Saturday, but no sooner have I reminded myself of that fact than I forget again.

We don't go outside much when it rains, so Benjamin has been bouncing off the walls lately. The other day we decided he'd just have to go out anyway since it doesn't look like the rain is going to let up any time soon, and if he doesn't get some of that pent-up energy out, he's going to drive us completely crazy. Besides, you can only watch Cars, The Bee Movie (known here as "Bees"), and Finding Nemo (known here as "Fish") so many times. Well, if you're an adult, that is. Apparently a child can watch them ad infinitum.

I kept an eye on him from the dry patio.

He enjoyed splashing but it didn't take long for him to be soaked through. We bought him rain boots today since it looks like the summer isn't going to show up for a while. We also went looking for a raincoat - you'd think that wouldn't be hard to find in a place where it rains at least 70% of the time - but the only raincoats we saw today were for girls. So the search continues.

Noah seemed to calm down from his fussiness around 8 weeks old, but during the past week or so he's started up again. Here he is in a rare moment of non-fussiness. He says hello.

Noah can roll over from his tummy to his back now; he started at 2 months and 3 weeks old, which is a full 2 months earlier than Benjamin did. He will be 3 months old tomorrow!

We have a new niece!

This isn't exactly *our* news, but close enough. My little brother Jordan and his wife Kacey had their first child June 1st! Her name is Caitlyn Grace, and we are not happy to be living so far away right now! We will have to wait until November to meet her in person.