I forgot to mention that on the way home
we stopped by Queens to visit my sister’s new apartment. She
has a very nice brickstone in a good neighborhood. She even has
windows that can see the sky :) And a little tree in front of
the house. Very cute. It’s nice to know where family
lives.

So Thursday morning I said to
Alan, “I have a half-baked idea for you…” and Friday
afternoon we found ourselves driving to Long Island. My grandma
is selling her house and my parents and sister were going to
help her do some packing. I was missing the family and thought
it would be fun to surprise them. Since it was our first
overnight trip, I had no idea how much to pack for Lex – so I
packed just about all of his clothes :) Somedays he wears the
same thing all day, but other days we go through lots of
clothes. It all depends. I figured better safe than sorry (or
doing laundry). The trip down was rainy but smooth. We stopped
a few times to feed Lex. We hit rust hour traffic at one point,
so we stopped at McD’s and had dinner. By the time we were on
the road again the traffic was flowing again.

Saturday my parents got there. We stayed inside as a
surprise. My sister walks in, sees us, smiles and waves “hi”,
then does a total double-take. It was beautiful. Then my mom
walks in, sees us, and yells for about 2 minutes. Heheh… it
was awesome. Then she walks over and takes Lex out of my arms.
After his hugs the rest of us got some hugs too. Its tough to
surprise my mom – which made the whole thing that much more fun
:)

Overall we had a really nice weekend.
We didn’t get much packing done for my grandma, but I think she
was ok with that. Visiting is always more fun than working :)
She was also happy to show her new great-grandbaby off to all
of her friends and neighbors.

The drive
home took just about forever. We ended up stopped on I95 for a
little over an hour due to an accident. Then we stopped to help
a guy jump start his car (there were lots of cars that couldn’t
start after that, probably from people running the AC and radio
without the car on). Spent about 20 minutes helping this guy,
but no luck. He think he had electrical problems ’cause the
battery seemed ok. So we moved on. Our quick dinner break ended
up taking an hour because Lex was sick and tired of his car
seat. He screamed every time we tried to put him back in it. So
we hung out in the parking lot for awhile
feeding/changing/soothing him. Finally back on the road in time
to hit construction in the next city. Overall the drive was a
long one – but well worth it!

Now we’re
home and I promised Lex a few car seat free days. I think he
appreciates that. He slept sooo much yesterday. I think he was
recovering from the weekend. I was hoping it would carry over
into last night, but no such luck. Oh well.

We got Lex’s 1 month
professional pictures back today. Although they took a bunch of
poses, we only got two of them. They were all a lot of fun
though. We tried to get a proof sheet of all of them (in case
anyone else wanted to order some), but they wouldn’t give them
to us. Something about people scanning them in and putting them
online ;) In addition to the free pictures we got with our
coupon, we (by “we”, I mean “I”) ended up buying an additional
pose too. Olan Mills printed all of the poses and it was weird
sending a bunch of them back. I’m sure that a lot of people end
up buying them just because they are there and ready to go. I
thought it was weird that this lady had a bunch of pictures of
our kid and we had to send them back. Probably instead of
“weird” I should be saying “good business”.

Also, upon special request,
we set up an email account for Lex. I’m not gonna post it
online though, so if anyone wants it let me know and I’ll send
it to you. Keep in mind that he can’t read yet though, so
anything that’s sent to him will be read by us :) No top secret
stuff until he’s a little older.

I think Lex thinks he has two mommies – a
daytime mommy with hair and no glasses, and a nighttime mommy
with no hair (all pulled back) and glasses. He always looks a
little confused to see me at night.

Anyway, we had a great 4th of July. We went down to Alan’s
parents house where they had a backyard picnic with all of
their neighbors, many of whom we’ve met before. I posted
pictures (as well as another week of random, around the house
pictures) at photos.datdec.com. Check them
out.

Happy 4th of July to all! We’re starting
the day here with a beautiful sunrise. Hope you all have a fun
day with lots of grillin’ and fireworks, or however you choose
to spend your day. We’ll be spending it with a block party down
at the in-laws. Should be a good time.

We went to the drive-in last night and saw
Star Wars and Mr & Mrs Smith. It was a lot of fun. Lex was
very well behaved – if you can use the word “behaved” for a 5wk
old baby. He slept almost the whole time, waking only for food
and a diaper change. I have to confess that I slept through
parts of both movies as well (hey, I’d been up since 6am!). It
ended up being a late night. We got home at 2:30am, nursed
again, and got to bed around 3:30am. Then up again at 6am for
the hungry baby. And on that note, he just fell asleep so I’m
going back to bed.

Lots of developmental changes
this week. Lex is starting to find his hands and feet lately.
He’s becoming a master at punching his little hands and kicking
his little feet. On the playmat he is able to bat at some of
the toys – though I’m not sure he really knows what he’s doing.
It’s cute to watch anyway :) He is also able to get his fist in
his mouth now (not the whole thing, but some of it) and he even
got a finger in there once, though I haven’t seen that again.
And he’s grabbing at stuff! Mainly my shirt, my hair, the burp
cloth on my shoulder, etc. When I put him up to burp he ends up
holding on to the burp cloth and/or my shirt and taking it with
him.

He also is smiling a lot
these days. Sometimes it seems very social (I smile at him, he
smiles back) and other times I think it’s still reflexive (big
smile followed by big burp, for example). Either way though,
it’s adorable!

He’s quite a strong baby
too. He pushes himself up with his legs and stands there for
almost a mintue (with a little help from us on the balancing
part). He’s getting more control over his head as well, though
he still has a ways to go with that.

Today we went out for a dessert run (after lunch!! gotta
kick this dessert habit!) and we sat on the beach by the lake
to eat. It was a beautiful day and Lex finally got a dose of
sunshine after the muggy, overcast, stormy week we’ve had.

On a down note, I fear we may be facing
a colic baby :( The past few days he has cried for several
hours, almost unconsolably, every evening. Tonight it was
almost exactly 5-9pm – what they call a “PM fusser”. It was
awful. We have this soothing CD (sort of melodic womb sounds)
that calms him down when we play it *really* loud, but as soon
as we turn the volume down he’s screaming again. Alan and I
broke out the ear plugs :) When we finally got him to sleep at
9pm we hit the sack as well – talk about an exhausted family.
However, right now he’s lying in my lap calm, peaceful, and
smiling away. That makes it all worth it!

PS – Happy July!