Start of November

Townes has definitely started becoming more vocal with his squeals and moans, I guess he's just experimenting with different sounds. He's also still gaining better coordination and can grab things and flip over easier. He's figured out that when he shakes his rattle that he is the reason it makes a sound, he'll shake the rattle and smile.

Townes also has started to notice Lilly more and sometimes tries to reach out to touch her. He seems really interested in Lilly, and Lilly seems really disinterested in him; their love is not reciprocal.

Townes got another around of vaccines the other week. It's a pretty sad thing to witness, one moment he's laying on the table all content and smiling at you, then WHAM, he's squealing like a stuck pig. He weighs 17 lbs 11 oz.

Townes gets a kick out of his Montgomery Biscuits stuffed animal. When he laughs it's one of those deep toned, huh-huh...huh-huh, laughs. Kind of like Butthead on "Beavis and Butthead".

As far as music we listen to Jazz and the "O Brother, Where Art Thou?" album in the mornings, Townes also really likes the rap version of Hickory Dickory Dock on his nursery rhyme album. I might need to play him some Tribe Called Quest to see if he likes it.

Townes really likes to fly now. Right before we put him in the bath I hold him over my head and fly him around the room while he's naked. Even though I feel like I'm risking a pee shot to the face every time I hold him up, he loves it and always has the biggest grin.

* For those of who who can't tell, Townes is dressed as a Peep (that horrible sugar coated marshmallow candy) in the third picture

First Weekend of October

The last time Townes went to the doctor, the doctor said that he could feel some teeth below Townes' gums. Although I'm sure he's several months away from actually having teeth, maybe this explains his increased drools and wanting to suck on things.

Townes is beginning to become evermore "squirmy". Alot of the time he doesn't want to be held, and would rather lay on the floor where he can kick his legs and wiggle around. He'll flip over on occasion, and one time while on his stomach he slid across his mat while moving his legs. He continues to improve on grabbing things. Townes is also laughing more noticably. Especially this moring when Emily was playing with him, he was chuckeling alot.

We started him on rice cereal a few weeks ago. It took him a while to get use to it, but now he kills it down. I now know why our Diaper Champ was such a valuable purchase, since Townes started eating rice cereal he's been dropping some horrific bombs as of late.

* Auburn- Not much to say here, I guess I just need to find something else to do with my Saturday's. I'm about as disenfranchised with Tuberville as Bama fans were with Shula. I feel that we need to blow the whole program up and start all over. The offense is beyond pathetic, our quarterbacks are terrible, and all the penalties on the offensive line are inexcusable. I don't know what the answer is, I just know that our players are not as bad as they've been performing.

Baptism

Townes was Baptized this Sunday. Emily's family came into town and after the Baptism everyone came over to our house and ate Jim & Nicks BBQ for lunch. Everything went very well. I was a little worried that Townes would pitch a fit during the Baptism, but everything went smoothly.

Townes is starting to grab at things and is gaining better neck control. He went to the doctor this past Tues. and he weighed 16.2 lbs. He has also started grabbing his feet, and is making laughing sounds periodically.

Townes has started eating rice cereal once a day at night. He actually takes it pretty well, although sometimes he does spit alot out. Townes has also started to sleep through the night. I'm not sure if this is because of the rice cereal; the down side to this is he now wakes up around 5 am instead of 6 am, but given the choice I'd rather him sleep through the night. He got his first cold last week, which was pretty pitiful to watch (he does not like having his nose suctioned). He's over it now and doing well.

* Movies- I went and saw "Burn After Reading" last week. The commercials make it out to seem a light hearted comedy, but it was actually pretty dark. I'd compare it to Fargo out of all the other Cohen Bro. movies. I also watched "Over Her Dead Body" with Emily last weekend. I'm not kidding when I say that it might be the worst movie ever produced. I also bought two episodes of MST-3K on DVD, I use to love that show in high school. I bet Emily can't wait to watch it.

* Auburn- We lost a game to LSU that I believe that we should have won (just like last year). If it wasn't for an awful punt with a few minutes left to go in the game, I think we would have come out on top. I still have faith in Tony Franklin, but he really made some bad calls last night that I also believe cost us the game. Why can't Auburn recruit a decent QB? We had to put up 3 years of Brandon Cox, and now Chris Todd. Auburn has no threat of throwing a deep ball, which I believe hurts us tremendously. Hopefully we can beat UT next week, if not our whole season will fall apart. I still think Les Miles is an idiot coach that has tremendous talent.

Labor Day Weekend

Townes now weighs a little over 14 pounds and he flipped over twice this past weekend. He can't flip over on a consistent basis, but it's fun to watch him because he really looks motivated when he tries. It's neat to watch Townes' personality develop he seems to be smiling and in a happy mood (most of the time). He's also gaining better control over his hand movements, he started rubbing his eyes when he gets tired.

We ordered Townes some Halloween outfits. Emily got him a Peeps chick outfit (Peeps= those awful sugar coated marshmallows that Emily loves), a penguin outfit, and I got him a monkey suit with a fez hat. The monkey suit I got him is for 18 months so he'll have to wear it next year, the costume was just too good to pass up so I had to go ahead and jump on it.

Townes is getting Baptized on Sept. 21st. We met with our preacher last Wed. to go over the process. Hopefully Townes will behave during the service. He's getting Baptized towards the end of the 11:00 service and he usually takes a nap around 11:45 or 12:00.

I had to write a paper for one of my classes this weekend. It's probably the first paper I've had to write in 6 years.

*Music- The Knopfler/Harris album was a disappointment, there are only about two good songs on the CD, however the Uncle Tupelo album is good.

*Auburn- Well, football season is here. It kind of snuck up on me this year with so much else going on, and to be honest I don't have as much excitement about this season as usually do. I'm sure that will all change a few weeks down the road. I'm somewhat uneasy with Tony Franklin's offense. I was expecting to see a more high powered offense than the one that played on Sat., to be honest I'm kind of worried about it. Hopefully things will improve over the next few games. Franklin needs to realize he's not in the Sun Belt anymore and step it up.

Well I guess Bama is the dark horse for the National Championship this year. Honestly the ACC should just give up football all together and focus on B-ball; they are an embarrassment to NCAA football. NC State, VA Tech, and Clemson all lost. Is Bama that good, is Clemson that bad, or is it both? Time will tell. I do think Clemson's O-Line is terrible and Coach Bowden is a known choke artist. $100 says the next Daniel Moore print is called "The Catch", depicting Julio Jones first touch down for Bama.

*- We're going to try to post every two weeks now. Trying to post every week was becoming a hassle.

Not Much Going On

Townes is starting to notice his reflection in the big mirror in our bed room. We also gave him a small hippopotamus blanket that he seems to really like. Townes is becoming more active kicking his feet up in the air (I think he's trying to turn over), he is getting better control of his hands, and is starting to like is play mat alot more. Townes also likes to talk himself to sleep.

Townes went to his first birthday party in Birmingham is weekend. He mainly slept the whole time, and fussed while wake. Even short trips up to Birmingham seem to throw off his schedule and as a result he becomes more difficult to handle. Townes also went to church the first time this Sunday, he did pretty well in spite of us dropping him off screaming and crying. Hopefully the more times we take him to church the more use it it he'll become.

I'm starting back my MBA program at AUM this week. I'm not really looking forward to going back to school at all. Having a full time job, a baby, and school work to do is probably going to be a little stressful at times.

*Music- I took off my Pandora Radio stations, and instead created a play list of music to the right. It's a little bit easier to use than the Pandora link, all you have to do is click on it.

Vacation

This past week was our first vacation with Townes. We went down to Seaside, FL. this past Tues. and got back on Sunday. I think what I use to consider a vacation is now a thing of the past. Gone are the vacations where Emily and I could spend alone time together doing what we wanted when we wanted. Townes now occupies most of our time, it's kind of like having the same daily routine only in a different setting. It's still nice to get away from work, and I think once Townes is old enough to interact with us our vacations will be more enjoyable.

The weather was great at Seaside. There was a good breeze and the water was clear for the most part. We only took Townes down to the beach one morning around 8:00 am when it was overcast. He was in a fussy mood once we got down to the beach so we quickly took our pictures and left.

Townes did very well with all the traveling we did (i.e. going to Emily's grandmother's house in PC, the beach at Seaside, and her father's in Dothan).

Townes is a real morning person, every time we wake him he always smiles back at us (almost to the point where it looks like he wants to laugh). He also smiles when I tickle under his bottom lip, for some reason he gets a kick out of it.

* Music- I ordered a CD by Mark Knopfler (of Dire Straits) and Emmylou Harris; and also Uncle Tupleo's "Anodyne". I have most of Uncle Tupelo's stuff but have always heard Anodyne was their best album, and the Mark Knopfler album is just something I ran across which sounded pretty good.

* The top picture is Townes before we went to the beach, the second picture is what happened when we got down to the beach.

Short Post

Townes is now starting to sleep a little bit better without being swaddled, although nap times are still somewhat a challenge. Two of his favorite things to do now are watch the giraffe mobile in his pack n' play and layout in our front yard around 7:00 PM and watch the trees.

Townes took his first dip in the pool on Saturday with mixed reviews. He seemed a little uneasy at first then after a few minutes started to fuss. I thought he'd like the pool because he loves his baths (the pool wasn't cold), I guess the two don't necessarily equate.

*Music- I found out how to link my Pandora radio stations off our blog. All the stations are self explanatory. Townes Radio was the first one I created; all I did was input all my favorite bands. Every now and then Townes Radio will play some junk like Queen or The Eagles, other than that it's pretty good.