First tooth

Samuel's first tooth has broken through,

Pictures to follow.

Standard baby picture

Trip to Provin

Provin is a small village located to the southeast of Paris.  Its claim to fame is that it is a medieval city that has kept its medieval architecture.

It is a bank holiday(one of many throughout the year) here in France so most of the country had the Monday after Easter off.   As we were walking to the car there was plenty of evidence that there indeed was a bank holiday:  Our street which normally does not have a foot of pavement that is not used to park some type of motorized vehicle was at least 50% empty.

I have to admit that upon arrival I was disappointed.  I had expected a scene similar to a Renaissance festival in the states.  It was disconcerting when after buying our tickets and entering the city to see cars parked on the street. My expectations needed to be adjusted accordingly.  Our first step was the tithe house.  This was a mistake as it is the foremost example of tacky tourist exploitation in the village.  It is a medieval age building with still life dramas depicting aspects of medieval life.  The depictions themselves were not the issue:  the audio guide issued upon entrance was amateurish and laughable.  It featured the worst English & Italian accents as actors(?) attempted to portray medieval merchants selling their wares and explaining their crafts.

The rest of the day was quite enjoyable. We visited the tower of Provin which was a lot of climbing, difficult with Samuel in arms but the views(except for the industrial valley) were really quite nice. We capped the day with a legend of the knights show.  A 45 minute exhibition of jousting, sword fighting and horsemanship.  Very similar to what is provided at your standard renaissance festival or the Medieval times show that we have told many of you about. One aspect of the show we enjoyed is that the bad guys who tried to take over the village acted and looked like the orcs from the lord of the rings trilogy. They even played some of the music from the movie while the action was taking place.

We may have learned a valuable lesson today.  Samuel refused to eat during our visit.  Most likely because they was too much noise and confusion around him.  When we returned to the car he was willing to take a bottle of spinach.  Unfortunately, about 10 minutes before we pulled into our parking garage he spat up most of the spinach. We hope he is not getting sick and that it was just the movement of the car after eating immediately before leaving that caused this eruption.

Samuel and grass.

Julia, Samuel and I had dinner with a couple and their 4 year old son on Saturday.  They live in the suburb Chatou, about a 15 minute drive from our apartment.  They invited us over because the weather was supposed to be nice and we could sit outside in their garden and grill(yes!!!) dinner.  Upon our arrival we sat on the grass for a little get together conversation.  Samuel's reaction was one where we wish we had taken  the camcorder.  Samuel reacted as if the grass were on fire.  He would put his hand near the grass and quickly move it away.  If we put Samuel on a blanket he would crawl to the edge and very reluctantly reach out and touch the grass then pull his hand back and not leave the blanket until picked up.

We have started taking Samuel to the park where, if we can find a patch of grass that is not covered in dog poo(Parisians are so uncivilized), we put Samuel on the grass for a few minutes and he is slowly adjusting to the feel and texture of grass.

Samuel, the cats and child gates

As Samuel is becoming more and more mobile we have slowly been adapting by child proofing the apartment.  

Yesterday I installed a child gate to prevent Samuel from sneaking into the kitchen and drinking the cats water or eating their food.  Unfortunately our very spoiled cats sat on the hallway side of the gate and meowed and wailed as they were separated from their sustenance.  Samuel did =not like the gate when I was fixing my dinner as he was on his knees holding onto the bars looking at me with his big blue eyes asking why he was unable to play in the cats water.

When Julia returned home(she had dinner last night with a friend so that I could watch the Chelsea/Liverpool match in peace with my son) she felt sorry for the cats and propped the gate open with a box of tissues.

This morning while I was working in the office Samuel went on an excursion.  A minute after he left the office he started to cry.  I walked around the corner toward the kitchen and saw that he had removed the box of tissues and that the gate had closed behind him and that he was locked in the kitchen with no hope of escape.

From this day forward the cats will have to learn to jump the gate or we will have to move their food to another room.

-Dave

We are no longer the worst parents in the history of civilization...

As we have posted earlier Samuel has been refusing to take solids consistently since we first attempted in November. We have tried everything we can think of  and we have tried everything that other people could advise.

Our pediatrician has advised us that Samuel should be eating solids by now and that the only reason he was not is that we made his life easy by always offering bottles when he refused to eat solids.  He also told us that when Samuel was hungry enough he would eat solids. Following his advice many times in the last few months we have skipped bottles with Samuel in the hope that he would be hungry enough to eat solid foods.  Every time we tried this he still refused to eat his solids. Following doctor advice we went so far as to not feed Samuel for 18 hours last Friday.  He still refused to take any solids. Based on this we made an appointment to see a Pediatrician gastrointestinal specialist this morning. She re-assured us that we are doing nothing wrong, that Samuel will eat solids when he chooses to eat solids.  We should continue to feed him as we have been putting purees and rice cereal in his bottles.  Her advice was to continue to use the bottle but add other purees and meats to the bottle mix.

Samuel's vitals as of 6 April 2009.  Weight 8.9 Kg(19.6 Lbs.), Height 75.5 Cm(29.72 inches).

For height he is slightly above 50%, for weight he is at 10%. Still concerned about weight but considering the colds and gastro he has had the last few months plus the trans-atlantic flights where he slept rather than ate we are satisfied that his weight did not drop farther down the charts.

Samuel update-4 Avril

Samuel is changing every day.

He still does not have teeth.

He has learned how to sit up by himself from a lying position.

He has learned to sneak up behind us, grab onto the back of our pants and pull himself up.  He thinks this is funny as it is very difficult to pick him up a from this position without him letting go and falling down.

Samuel will pull himself up on almost anything in the apartment.  He is slowly learning how to let go and sit down but the higher up his hands are the less likely he is to attempt to sit down.

While Samuel was typing his update yesterday he turned on a voice that tells us what we are doing on the computer.  We have no idea how to turn it off.  Currently the voice is telling me that safari is open and that we have the window to post to our blog open.

Samuel is not talking much yet but we do expect him to talk later than usual as he is exposed to two languages and that must be confusing to him.  He babbles in his own language.

-Dave