We all have our little faults. Mine's in California.

So I said to Kelly, "Hey! I should start a blog for Zach...you know, to track his growth and make sure we remember his accomplishments and all that stuff."

"Yeah, Kelly said, that's a great idea...only you already did that...you haven't posted anything for three months."

"Oh......right" I said.

Well it wasn't my fault. It was my "unbreakable" Mac Mini, on which all of our pictures are kept, that unexpectedly broke. Well I called in the big guns (William) and he fixed it saving me money...and not just regular money...Mac money. (That's worth more than regular money apparently)

Anyway, now that the "unpleasantness" is out of the way, let's just forget all about it, pretend it never happened, and let us never speak of it again. On to the main subject:

Zach is doing well. It's pretty much been life as usual with him. Lots of sleeping, eating, grunting, pooping etc. Actually Kelly went back to work in March (technically the end of February) and this "term" goes until the end of April so it's a couple months of either bringing Zach into town to see the grandmas (or other much-appreciated designated babysitter) or the grandmas coming here to watch him at home. It's been pretty tough for us. Kelly misses him a lot during the day and I've been pretty busy at work with the election, so I usually don't get home until after he is asleep for the night. (Note that even though I didn't actually say that I miss him too, like I did for Kelly, I do, in fact, miss him) Zach enjoys it though. He loves seeing his grandmas and always smiles for them...sometimes it takes a while for him to smile as he usually sleeps in the car on the way to Burbank and sleepy Zachy is not smiley Zachy.

Developmentally-wise, he is pretty much following the "What to expect..." flow chart. He's eating mashed up veggies and fruit now three times a day along with his 3-4 six ounce bottles. He's loving his food still. He's also very recently started eating Krispy Rice (not Rice Krispies...we stick with Kirkland brand food, and for that matter, pretty much anything else that Kirkland sells) He still hasn't gotten the pincer grasp down, so the idea is for him to lick his hand and mash it down on a pile, seeing how many he can get to stick, then shove his entire hand into his mouth and...the rest is simple.

He loves his oatmeal and bananas, but he loves the bowl that they come in equally as much.

He's also started "scooting" around on the floor. I can't really call it "crawling" because to get from point A to point B he uses a complicated system of rolling over, swiveling, grunting, bobbing his head, and kicking needlessly into the air. However, it works. We can't leave him anywhere anymore without worrying about what lies within a 10-15 foot radius that he can get into. He's also standing while holding onto things pretty well. He can't get into the position himself, but he can stay there for ever. Also, I haven't seen him sit up by himself, but I did enter his room the other day to find him sitting....just chillin' waiting for me. That was kind of cool.

He's been really interactive with toys and people. His focus is much better and he smiles a lot. It takes a while to warm up to new people, but he's usually pretty good with them.

This is Zach shopping with mommy for mommy's birthday at Target.

Zach loves his toys. But clearly daddy also likes Zach's toys (as seen here in the background)

Sometimes, there's so much to do and so many buttons to press that it gets a little overwhelming.

Great, he likes the drums...this does not look good for mom and dad's future sanity.

Zach hasn't been to his music classes in a while and he doesn't have many friends (what a nerd) so he's entertained by mommy most of the time. He goes shopping with us, plays with toys in the house, plays outside on the grass with Token, and sometimes goes to the park.

Whazzzuuuuuuuuuup!

His best (and probably only) friend, is Molly. He loves her because she lets him play with her toys and she gives him kisses and hugs.

In this sequence, Molly teaches Zach that pink can be a guy color too, and that bangles are a fun toy to put on your wrist, and put into your mouth.

April's probably going to be another busy month. Zach has his baptism this month (so we won't have to worry about that purgatory thing anymore) and Kelly is working still so he'll be doing his daily road trips. There will be plenty of growing though (hopefully up, and not out) so I'll try to be better about more frequent posts, I promise!

Kelly wouldn't tell me how much this outfit cost her for fear of emotional and/or physical abuse so we'll just suffice it to say that it's super cute and "you can't put a price on that"

Fun Facts:

• Zach has sixth teeth now; two on the bottom still and four on top. It's making him a little extra cranky and giving him a runny nose.
• He totally has moved into life-size adult poops now that he's started on solids...totally gross.
  
• He puts out his arms to let you know he wants up

-pf

Buckle up bonehead, cause you're goin' for a ride!

Well since it's been SOOOoooo long (two weeks) since the last post and SOOOoooo many people (one person) complained that they don't know what's going on in Zach's life, here's a quick (long) update:

Zach has been a ramblin' man over the last couple weeks. He's been to visit the Grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles, friends, AND he had his first day of school last Friday!

While I was out of town on Tanner's bachelor party having a fun time, Zach and Kelly stayed at Nonie and Papa's for the weekend. We learned a few things:

1. 35 diapers is not enough for an extended Friday - Monday weekend.
2. Zach seems to be aware of his surroundings because he gets a little wired when we are not at home for extended periods of time.
3. Kelly is not allowed to eat Panda Express or Chipotle while breastfeeding any more...."if you eat Panda or Chipotle and breastfeed, you're gonna have a bad time."
   

Stephanie came over to meet Zach

Kathy (Stephanie's mom) also met Zach (she's known Kelly since Mommy-and-Me...Kelly's mommy-and-me)

Also, while I was out of town, mommy and baby went over to the Runyon's to watch USC beat Ohio State. (Zach was wearing Buckeyes colors so needless to say, he was disappointed for the rest of the weekend...however, while he was at the house Ohio State was up so he may have been their good-luck charm.)

Sue and Jeanette met Zach for the first time

Stephanie met Zach thought he was hot...as in temperature hot, so she handed him off to...

... Samantha, who had of course met Zach before, but he was happy to sleep on her shoulder for a while.

Tiffany posed with him in front of the banner to help make it clear which team he wanted to root for.

Later that weekend, Kel and Z-man went over to Grandpa's for a family barbecue. I was bummed that I wasn't there (mostly because at that exact moment I lost $30 to the Carnival casino, regardless of the fact that I had drawn a 20 off of a double down...it only got worse from there)

Trish-the-dish meeting Zach-Attack

Cousin Tricia, Aunt Patty, Son Zachary, Uncle Randy and Cousin Daniel

Auntie Robin, visiting from N.C., loving on Zachary in his super style Ralph Lauren outfit

The week was pretty standard-issue. Except for the big "first day of school" for Zachy....technically it was the first day of mommy-child music play time, but it's a type of school...

There aren't any pictures, so you will just have to imagine the cuteness that ensued. Kelly said he had a great time listening to music, playing with rattle drums and blowing bubbles...REAL bubbles too!, not just the standard spit kind that he's used to. Also, the ever alert Zachary was caught snoring during the "hello how are you?" song and the teacher had to stop in the middle because of the volume...although she didn't stop because she was mad, she "just wanted to listen because it was so cute." I wasn't there so I have no way of knowing whether or not that is true, but I'm going to go out on a limb and guess that it was, in fact, cute.

That same night was Rosh Hashanah so we got to go over to Scott and Hadar's to see all the aunts, uncles and cousins. Zach had his collar popped and was in "chillin" mode, so we had a great time.

Pop, lock and drop it

Saturday was a relaxing day and Zach and his dad stayed home and watch football and movies while mom went to Sarah's wedding shower.

Today's pretty much of the same but we got some visitors.

Christine, just back from her honeymoon, came over with...

...Victoria, who is one of two followers of this blog, and had lunch with us and...

...Katie...........who held Zach and smiled for the camera.

We also gave Zach a bath during their visit and afterwords he was happy and excited as usual;

Zach: Happy and Excited

Finally, here is some happy-smiley-laughy video of Zach in the morning:

He tends to be much more alert and happy in the morning....at least someone's getting enough sleep.

Fun Facts:

• We both think there's something wrong with the scale...is it possible that he weighs 16 lbs already? His two-month appointment is coming soon so we'll find out.
  
• He is just about 5 minutes away from officially growing out of his 3 month sized clothes...I think we have a big baby.

-pf

It's not my fault I'm the biggest and the strongest; I don't even exercise

Well little Zach is only 6 days old now and he can already lift up his head. No joke! This morning, I was lying with him in bed with him on my chest tummy-side down and he was lifting his head up and looking at me. Granted, the sheer will to do so was probably spurred on by him trying to find out if I had any milk to give him; but no matter what part of my shirt or face he tries to latch on, I'm sorry to say, I've got nothing for him...that's mommy's job. Speaking of, Kel is doing great with breastfeeding. She used the pump today for the first time. It reminded me of the Discovery channel special I saw one time on automated cow milking but she got enough out for a full bottle and we froze it. They last frozen for a good 5 months, so she is going to try to build up a stock.

We Skyped to Bethany the other morning in Japan. It was so awesome to be able to show Zach through video. She thinks he has Williams' freak chest (a little bump where the sternum is for those of you not aware with Will's "freak feature." Also, we got some more family visits and a few calls from people wanting to visit so we are excited about that. (Great) Grandpa Jack came to visit today and that was really special. Zach was so excited to meet his great grandpa that he pooped his diaper immediately.

Several people have commented on who they think Zachary looks more like; me or Kel. I think me, (mainly because that comment is usually followed by "he's SO cute!" but Kelly disagrees for some reason). Here's some evidence:
It's pretty much the same routine over here. He is getting more cute (to us) by the day and we are loving him more all the time. Here are some pictures to tide you over:

Cuuuuuuuute!

Suuuper Cuuuuuuute!!



Kirsten and Stephanie were over today and they taught him
how to say I love you in sign and suck his fingers at the same time.

Fun Facts:

• We now have a pack-n'-play downstairs (courtesy of Grandpa) and a Bassinet (courtesy of Uncle Michael and Aunt Patti) upstairs so I don't have to transfer the bassinet up and down stairs every day.
• Kelly's milk is in! (Is it weird that I'm excited about that?)
• I thought that my computer had broken today, hence the delay in post...I most likely lost 75% of my followers due to that down-time. (75% translates to 1.5 people)

-pf