Perspectives

it's amazing how a head that looks so small from above.....



can look like such a potato from below.



It's amazing how much of a hand a 3 month old can get in his mouth without gagging.(but still managing to half way flip you off with the other)



It's amazing how someone who can't seem to get comfortable in his bed, can sleep soundly while awkwardly draped over mommy's shoulder.




and it's pretty amazing when you see someone developing a sense of humor through the basic building blocks of a funny face and a fart noise.

The Usual

Not too much interesting around here this week. (how can there be with this weather?)
He had a good outing to church this morning where he saw his 5 week old cousin, Eli, who outweighs him by a couple of pounds already.
Saturday night we attempted our first meal out since he's been around. Fortunately, we had a team of 4 grandparents with us for extra support. He actually did really well. If the restaurant's service would have also done well, we would have been in and out, free of trouble.
Unfortunately, the 30 minute seat quote turned into an hour, and the waitress would come in far behind cold tar in a race, so we had a fussy baby toward the very end of the meal.

Saturday morning we went for a walk around campus, and, again, he couldn't care less about the alligators.



So, to punish him for his indifference, I made it rain and cut his walk short. (but i guess it isn't really punishing him when i have to run a half mile back to the truck in the rain, while he waits, covered.)
We made up for it by letting him take in the wonderful smell of boudin and smoked meat at Johnson's Boucaniere, where they were playing his favorite cd, The Figs.

During the week he got in a good visit with Cousin Caroline, and they actually seemed aware of each other for the first time. It was pretty cool.



He even let her grasp at the crazy-arctic-goat-kangaroo-hairdresser on his mobile.



He's slowly getting more smiley and making more attempts at vocalizations, so we're encouraging him as much as possible.
Now that he's seemingly aware of sound and his ability to make it, I probably need to clean up my vocab. That's going to be a toughie.

He's also trying to reach for toys, but doesn't quite understand that reaching with your hands does not involve kicking with your legs. He'll get it straight some day.



Friday night we'll probably be going to the symphony followed by fireworks, which should be a good test for him.

and, to close, a little follow up from the Home Depot story, which seems to have universal appeal to all parents. I went back to HD today, and noticed that there are still black splotches on the floor in front of the bird seed.
Moral of the story- Colic Calm stains concrete.

The First Quarter

It was a good week around here.
That is something that makes me very happy.
Unfortunately, it doesn't leave much to write about here. That is compounded by our complete photographic neglect this week. Looks like my weekly update ambition may be running thin. May be going every two weeks soon.
Now for the content.

Riley came down with whatever funk Joan and I had, so he's been snotty all week. He's getting tired of having his nose suctioned, but it's really helping him breathe. A 12 week old shouldn't snore, but that's basically what hes been doing.

On the dietary front, on Friday Joan tried shellfish, and he did not seem to have any negative reaction.
Saturday night she tried spaghetti sauce from Carrabbas, and, again he hasn't reacted.
She came across this website, http://www.godairyfree.org/Table/Dining-Out/Fast-Food-Restaurants/ which has links to the allergen pages of many fast food, and dine in, restaurants. You'd be surprised what things have unsuspected dairy.
We both suspect that he's really only got a problem with dairy, but you still have to be slow in reintroducing everything else, just in case.

Friday night, Riley got a visit from Cousin Caroline, who is infinitely more vocal than he is. He's still trying to make sounds, but they are few and far between.

Saturday morning we took Riley and Jimmy for an "adventure" out at the nature station. Once we're far enough back in the woods, we let Jimmy get some off leash time. The kid seemed to enjoy the new sights and sounds. That is, until he fell asleep. Hopefully we can do it more often when it cools down. By the time we got off the trails at 9 am, it was almost too hot to be out. ( especially since I wear jeans in lieu of being eaten up by chiggers for the next 2 weeks.)

Just a little while ago, Jennifer and Ryan stopped by to visit Riley. Jennifer is one of the select handful of people that we like from law school. They're expecting a boy in November. They've chosen the name Connor Patrick O'Neal, because they hate all things Irish. :)

And now for the part where I make fun of my kid and myself.
They say you can take the boy out of the trailer park, but you can't take the trailer park out of the boy. I'm starting to believe the saying is true, and that my DNA was somehow altered in the first 9 years of my life. I still like pig skins, Barq's Red Cream Soda, Slim Jims, and old country music. Unfortunately, I think I've passed these traits on to my son, who, at just 12 weeks old, is starting to grow a fine feathery mullet.



He just has that one, super thick strip across the back, and everything else is thin. We'll have to run him over to see Maurice for a little trim soon. That'll mean Maurice will have cut 4 generations of my family's hair. Not bad for a guy that is 73 and still on his feet 8 hours a day.

And just to make this post a little longer, and show that we're trying to return to normalcy with food, we're not having chicken this week. Instead we're going back to an old favorite, Fajitas from HEB, grilled at 750 degrees on the Egg.




And here's the usual pics

Pouty Face




Startled





and Cheesy Smile

What's In A Name

I just realized, I never posted our reasons for choosing the names that we gave our son.
I suppose there is no real need to, but there is no real need for any of this, yet I do it anyway as a (semi) creative pressure valve.

So where does Riley Evans Wallace come from?
First, the last name was easy, so we'll skip that discussion.

Riley was picked out of a book. We came across it and liked it. We had no previous attraction to the name, it just had a ring to it when we heard it.
We were trying to avoid unisex names (which Riley can be) but since it is still used much more for boys than girls, we thought it would be ok.
The only other real first name option was Walker, but, given the popularity of those Chuck Norris jokes last year, it just had too much of a Texas Ranger connotation at the time we were picking a name.

The middle name actually has a little back story.
Joan got pregnant shortly before we took a 5th anniversary trip to see the Weary Boys in Colorado, for one of their last shows together (sad)



I wanted to try to work something from that trip into the name, but we weren't really big on Rocky, Denver, Zebulon, Snowcap or anything else we could think of.
Then we came across the name Evan. It wasn't one we were necessarily big on, in that form, but then we remembered going to Mt. Evans in Colorado (North America's Highest Paved Highway).



In fact, on Mt Evans we took our first "family pic" in which she was pregnant,though we didn't know it at the time.



It was also the first time either of us had been in the western mountains or been around real snow on the ground, and it is an incredibly beautiful setting, so it is a special memory place for us.




One of us suggested Evans as a name, and we both liked it.
It's going to get screwed up for his whole life by people leaving off the "S" (already did at his baptism) but we're fine with that.

The coincidence comes in that we later found out that both names have family connections.
Riley Wallace is my great-great-grandfather.
Evans is my dad's maternal grandmother's maiden name. (my great grandmother)
We really had no idea of these when we picked out the names, but it's kinda cool that things worked out that way.

So there's your history lesson, and a chance for me to post some of our pics from Colorado (alot more at Flickr)