Six Months Old! and the Haps Here

Col the Hutt

"Shh. I'm busy."

These beautiful snapshots were taken a week before Col's actual six-month milestone, because the poor kid isn't in top form. He's been sick since last Thursday, when he came down with a nasty cold that is gunking him up so completely that green goo is coming out of his nose, mouth, eyes, and ears. It's the kind of thing where he wakes up with his eyes crusted shut. The doctor said it's just got to run its course, and prescribed alternating Tylenol and Ibuprofen to help him feel more comfortable. His fever's down now but he's still pretty unhappy.

Having two kids is easy!

I'm grateful that this is happening now rather than in two weeks, when I start work (yep--new job!) and Lars concurrently goes out of town for two weeks. But it still sucks. Col's never been a good sleeper, but now he wakes himself up every 15 minutes snorting or coughing. All. Night. Long. Lars has been sleeping with Tor. I keep reminding myself how lucky we are to live in a period when I don't need to worry that Col may actually die from this cold. This reminder improves my attitude maybe 70% of the time, which is something.

Just a bump on a log

Mouth breather

Usually, though, Col's got a great disposition (other than his refusal to sleep for reasonable stretches) and is getting more and more active. He can now log roll across the floor to get just about anywhere he wants to go, and often where he wants to go is under furniture. I've frequently plunked him down and gone to cook dinner or fold laundry only to find him under the couch, Tor's bed, the coffee table, the dining room table, or the TV.

Thank goodness the table is glass or we might never have found him

He thinks his big brother is the best thing ever:

He goes willingly to people at day care and the church nursery, and in stark contrast to his big brother at this age, he takes a bottle like a champ. Because six months is the conventional time to start babies on solids, we also tried letting him grab and eat some bananas. He was not particularly successful--I think he maybe swallowed one and sent four or five dribbling into the recesses of the high chair. The next question is whether to feed him with a spoon, as we did with Tor, or to do this "baby-led weaning" thing where you just set out food in front of him and he can eat whatever he wants--bananas, avocado, mushy pears, food with that sort of texture.

Sit-ups with DaDa

Aftermath of sit-ups

Hanging with our resident superhero

"For me, you say?"

"What's with the camera?"

Last man standing at the church nursery gets ALL THE TOYS

Bathtime!

Tor continues to be a cutup, although he also whines a fair bit when he doesn't get his way.

"I'm the billy goat gruff, so you be the troll
and go under the bridge."

Scene: At the pub.
Tor: Look what I found!
Uncle Niels: Whoa, a feather! Is that a crocodile feather?
Tor: No. It's not green.

Scene: Leaving day care.
Tor: Can I hold my umbrella?
Mom: Well, it's not raining. What would you want with an umbrella when it's not raining?
Tor: I'm going to use it as a walking stick because I've got a poorly foot.

That one is mainly funny for its Britishism. I didn't even know one could use "poorly" as an attributive adjective--I'd only heard it in the predicate, as in "He's a bit poorly today" or "I'm feeling poorly." Schooled by the three-year-old.

He's still pretending to be Ironman or Spiderman a lot, but Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles have gotten thrown into the mix. He's had a set of small Turtles action figures since December (courtesy of Ah-Bee and Pakka), but just recently he's been profoundly interested in watching Turtles cartoons, playing with the action figures, and pretending to be a Turtle. This led to the following conversation at day care:

Mom: So I saw in the newsletter that tomorrow there's an Easter egg hunt and the kids are supposed to dress up. That means like in their nice Easter clothes, right?

Day care staff member: Oh no, we don't want to get their nice clothes all messy. It means they can dress up in a costume--a bunny or a chick or anything; it doesn't even have to be related to Easter. They can dress up like superheroes if they want to.

Mom [nonplussed]: Oh, I totally misunderstood. I guess we'll have to make you a costume, huh, Tor?

Tor: I want to be a NINJA TURTLE!!

And that is how we spent a late night creating a turtle shell and mask out of the backs of cereal boxes. Lars took point on engineering the shell, which was held on by two army-issue belts. Tor wore the only green items of clothing he had--track pants (track trousers?) and a windbreaker--to complete the look. And, of course, gloves.

It emerged that he specifically wanted to be Donatello (the purple one)

When we picked him up at the end of the day, it turned out that he had won the prize for Best Costume: a mammoth chocolate egg wrapped in gold foil. It also turned out that no other parents had put their kids in costumes. Take that, Americans.

The haul

DaDa also took Tor to a nature outing at a local park with the English equivalent of granola-head parents. They made mud pies, brewed tea in a storm kettle, and cooked stick bread.

Great outdoors selfie

Watering the pile

Helping with some real cooking: pasties!