Monday, March 31, 2008

Now that's a big baby!

Stian had his 4 month appointment today, and as suspected he's a big baby! He weighs 18 pounds 12 ounces, which puts him in the 97.7th percentile. He's 25 3/4 inches long, 70th percentile. And his head circumference was 45 cm, 97.7th percentile. So yep, big baby!

I asked the doctor if he was getting too chubby, and he said nope, it's totally normal. I guess it's pretty common for breastfed babies to be quite chunky early on, and as they get older they start slimming down. So we shall see. But I'm glad he's not concerned.

He did really well at his appointment. He has his next set of vaccinations and he did better this time. But the nurse was better this time too. The last nurse was nice and all, but this nurse was nice and super fast, and I think the helped. Stian still cried, but not for very long, and I didn't cry at all this time. ;)

He came home and took a long nap - almost 3 hours. And then when he woke up he was quite fussy. I don't know what's wrong, he seems sad. So maybe his legs hurt. So I've been carrying him around in his mai tai (I don't have a picture of him in it, but I got a Baby Hawk Mai Tai) for about 45 minutes trying to clean house. But man he's a big baby to be carrying around like that. He's too little to carry around on my back in the mai tai, unfortunately, because I think that'd be easier on my back! So I finally had to take him out of it. He seems a little happier now, but still fussy. Poor little guy. I think he'll be going to bed early tonight.

Thursday, March 27, 2008

Tummy Time!

Stian decided now that he's 4 months old it was time to stop messing around with this tummy time and get down to business. He hasn't been complaining as much about tummy time lately, but he just didn't seem to get it. He would just lay there and suck on his fist. Finally today he started to do what he was supposed to!



Cute onesies

I thought I'd take a moment and post some pics of Stian in some of the cute onesies that people have given us.

This one is from Sandi:



This one is from Mike:



This one is from Carla:



Thanks Sandi, Mike and Carla!

Four Months!

Stian is four months old today!



He sure has grown a lot in the last four months! His four month appointment is on Monday. So then we'll know how much he's grown.

Sunday, March 23, 2008

Happy Easter!



And just because it makes me laugh every time...

Saturday, March 22, 2008

Jumper

Okay, so apparently he needs a little more practice...

Friday, March 21, 2008

Standing and Music

Stian doesn't seem all that interested in standing. When you hold him up and try to get him to to put weight on his legs his legs just buckle under him. So Laura suggested putting him in a jumper - I guess that worked for Sunniva, she started having more interest in trying to stand once they started putting her in a jumper. So we pulled out the jumper that Wayne and Kelly loaned us (thanks Wayne and Kelly!). He didn't jump in it, but he was at least putting some weight on his legs.



Then this evening he started getting grumpy - he's actually been quite grumpy all day, I'm beginning to wonder if he isn't starting to teethe already - so Kris decided to play him some guitar. He seems to like it. He gets quiet and seems to listen. We had a little mini allsang (the music and singing time from camp) with Kris and I both singing him Norwegian children's songs we learned at camp. We're such dorks.

Monday, March 17, 2008

Vacation #8 - Two days at sea

The last two days of the cruise were at sea. We had formal night the first night. Unfortunately the pictures of Kris and I that night didn't really turn out, and we didn't get a picture of Stian in his cute outfit that Aunt Margaret and Uncle Bob gave him, but here are few pictures anyway.







The last day at sea was rather cool as we were getting pretty far north at that point. And the seas were quite rough. They were reporting waves at 12-18 feet. I was pretty darn nauseous there for awhile, it calmed down as the day went by though. We just spent the day mostly hanging out with family.





All in all it was a good vacation. It was good to get away from the cold weather for awhile and to go someplace warm and beautiful. Stian was really a remarkably good traveler. He seemed to enjoy all the hustle and bustle on the ship. He also got lots and lots of attention - from family, but also from strangers. He had a lot of fans on the ship.

The trip home again was uneventful. Toop and Morri seem to have been in very good hands with our dog sitters, which was good to see. It was so hard to leave Toop right now, so I'm glad she was well taken care of. She's still hanging in there. It's hard to know how she is really doing as she seems really tired, but so does Morri. So maybe after a few days of lots of sleep we'll get a better gauge on how she really is.

Vacation #7 - Labadee, Haiti

The next day we were in Labadee, Haiti. Labadee is sort of a fake place - it's a small peninsula owned by Royal Caribbean and gated to keep the Haitians out. Although they do hire Haitians to work there, and have a bunch come in to sell local goods in the marketplace. But still, it's not real Haiti. So while technically we have been to Haiti, I know nothing about what Haiti is really like. Although it was really beautiful at Labadee and the area around it.

This was a beach day, and it was lovely.

Here is me and Betsy and Karin out floating in the turquoise water.



Stian got some more time in the water. The first time Kris took him out he promptly fell asleep in Kris's arms. I guess the crashing of the waves put him right to sleep. But Kris took him out a couple of times and had him up to his armpits in the water. He didn't seem to mind.



We rigged up some shade for Stian so he could lounge on the beach in the shade.





Lounging at the beach is apparently hard work as Stian promptly fell asleep on the tender back to the boat.



Here's a picture of the area outside of Labadee - in other words, real Haiti. It was beautiful. Hard to imagine that the people there are so poor that they eat dirt. I hope at least that Royal Caribbean bringing their ships here brings some money into the area. But I'm not sure it does much as most everything is provided by the cruise line. At least the Haitians who work there and sell there can benefit from the tourists.

Vacation #6 - Dominican Republic

The next day we were in the Dominican Republic. We'd never been here before so we decided to take an excursion offered through the ship. We piled into a open air bus type thing and headed off into the countryside.



Stian loved the truck. It was noisy and jiggly and just perfect for napping. Our first stop was at a sugarcane plantation.





We tasted fresh sugarcane, and of course rum (also known as "Vitamin R") is made from sugarcane, so we tasted some of that too.

Our next stop was at a plant nursery where they were growing all sorts of neat plants and flowers.





After that we stopped at a place where they make cigars and watched how they were made. Apparently the Dominican Republic is one the major cigar producers in the world.



After that we stopped at a rather annoying shop to do some shopping. But we didn't buy much here aside from a t-shirt for Stian and some magnets. We weren't overly impressed with this stop on the tour. But overall it was a good tour and interesting, and allowed us to see a little bit of the Dominican countryside. The ship left this port rather early in the day, 2:00 if I remember right. So we went back up to the room after our tour and had a nap.

Vacation #5 - Beautiful St. Thomas

The next day we were in St. Thomas. I love St. Thomas. We've been here several times before, and it's absolutely beautiful. Everything I have seen of the U.S. Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands is so gorgeous. I'd love to go spend some time there and explore more.

Since we've been to St. Thomas a number of times and done the shopping and several beach and taken the ferry to St. Johns, this year we decided to take the gondola up the hill to look at the views.



It was beautiful up there.







There was a restaurant up there and some little shops. So we hung out for awhile and enjoyed the spectacular view.











That's our ship to the right.

After we were done there we went back down to the pier and did just a little bit of shopping. I bought a citrine pendant. Citrine is Stian's birth stone - apparently November is either citrine or yellow topaz, but citrine seems to be easier to find.

Vacation #4 - Meeting up with the ship and family

Monday arrived and it was the day we could meet up with the ship. But the ship wasn't scheduled to dock until 3:00 pm. So we had a leisurely morning. We went for a walk on the beach and through the neighborhood.



We had a nice lunch and finally headed to the pier. The cab driver dropped us off quite aways from the ship, so we had to haul all of our luggage pretty far, and we had to fights the hordes of people coming off the ship who would not make way for us going against the flow of people to get on to the ship. It was very exhausting and frusterating. But we finally made it on to the ship and got situated. We met up with Kris's family. It turns out that it was probably a good thing we had missed the ship as they had encountered a pretty nasty storm on their way down where they have 100 mile an hour winds and 30 foot swells. I think I would have been awfully ill had I been there.

We chatted with the family for awhile, got a little organized, and then headed back into Old San Juan to do some shopping.





We didn't buy much, but Old San Juan is pretty and it was nice to just walk around. They have beautiful old blue brick streets in part of Old San Juan.



After shopping we headed back to the ship for a late dinner and hanging out with the family.

Vacation #3 - The Rain Forest

The next day we picked up our rental car and drove to El Yunque rain forest. It was maybe a 45 minute drive. It was absolutely beautiful there.

There was lots to do in the park, trails to hike, things to look at, etc. Of course having a baby along slowed us down. If it had been the two of us we would have seen much more of the park. But that's okay, we still got to see it, and it was fun to go with Stian.

We stopped at a tower and climbed up it to get a great view.







And then we hiked a couple of trails. Unfortunately we forgot to bring the Snugli with us to the forest, so we had to carry Stian. It would have been much easier if we had remembered the Snugli!







Stian did well on the hikes. He did have a bit of a melt down at one point when we had pressed our luck and gone a little further than we should have. But all in all he did well. We spent most of the day in the rain forest, then did a little more driving around and looking around in the afternoon. Then headed back to our hotel for a stroll in the neighborhood and some dinner at a local restaurant.

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Vacation #2 - Let's try this again

So the next morning we get up, take the shuttle over to the airport to catch our flight to San Juan that was at about 8:30 am. Today we don't have any travel problems. No delays, no problems, Stian is an angel on the plane and falls asleep before we take off and stays asleep for 3 hours. He wakes up basically just as we start our descent, and nurses. What a good little traveler!

Ahh, It's warm in San Juan! We collect our luggage and take a cab to our hotel. This is not just any hotel. This is the Marriott Resort and Casino in the Condado district. It's right on the beach, it's lovely, it's insanely expensive. Thank goodness Kris's mom always buys travel insurance!

We get to the hotel, our room isn't ready yet. We chat with the guy at the front desk and ask him what we should do in Puerto Rico for two days. We've spent some time in Puerto Rico before and have done the beach, Old San Juan, the forts, so we're looking for something different. He recommends we rent a car and go to the rain forest. That sounds like a great idea!

We set off to get a late lunch/early dinner while we wait for our room. We got to Tijuana's, where we have eaten the other two times we've spent time in San Juan and have some yummy food and relax.



Finally the hotel calls us and tells us that our room is ready. We go up to our room and change into swimsuits and head for the beach. The beach right at the hotel is beautiful.



Look, all of our footprints in the sand! Cute!



Stian gets his first dip in the ocean - only his feet though.



After this we went back up the room and got changed and went for a walk in the neighborhood and then went to bed.