HD’s Musings

I’ve gotten to the point where, even though I’m expecting it, I’m constantly amazed by Elliott and her progress.  Seeing this little person grow and develop - from day to day! - is an amazing thing. The latest is her discovery of her hands and how she can use them.  I’m not really sure when this is supposed to be happening, but over the past week or so she’s really been working her hands, specifically putting them into her mouth, extending her fingers and moving them independently of each other - things like that.  So I started forcing the issue and have been trying to get her to grab at her toys.  Our good friends Chris and Brea gave Elliott “Sophie the Giraffe” - it’s a latex squeaky toy that has this great long neck - perfect for little hands to grab.  Starting Friday, I would hold Sophie in front of Elle’s face and then take her fist and physically put her fingers around Sophie’s neck. She would sort of flop it around a few seconds and usually drop it.

Throughout the weekend, any time Elle was in her car seat or bouncy chair, we’d put Sophie in with her and do the same drill of putting it in front of her face and trying to get her to grab it.  She wouldn’t really grab it on her own, but she would use her hands and push it up her chest and would work some part of poor Sophie into her mouth.

Fast forward to Saturday afternoon.  Elliott was laying on her back on her activity mat with the usual kicks, punches, yells and general good times she usually has on her mat.  All of a sudden she stopped making noise and moving.  I looked over to check on her and I noticed she was completely still with her closed fist about three inches from her face and she was staring.  Hard.  She held that pose for about a minute and I could just she her little thought forming, “Whoa - this thing I’ve been swinging around and putting in my mouth is attached to me and I control it.”  It was amazing.  She eventually tiwtched and lost her concentration but since that point, it was like something clicked.

This weekend I also noticed that she’ll now look at and follow things you put in front of her, as opposed to the scattershot randomness of the first 10 weeks.  Wherever her bobbling head took her line of vision, that’s what would get her attention.  Now she’ll actually look at things and follow them with some semblance of thought or control.  A cool example was a book I was reading to her.  The book is a standard book until you get to the last page where it is a pop-up with three huge, colorful butterflies.  When I got to the last page, her little face little up with wonder, awe and a bit of fear when those butterflies were hovering in 3-dimensional glory.  She was actually able to react to something that was put in front of her.  That was a very big moment for me to witness.

So now we’re on to Sunday morning.  Elle woke up around 6:00 (after sleeping around eight hours!) and after Kari fed her, she brought Elle to visit Daddy in bed.  We generally sit up and smile at each other and she tries to ignore her Dad’s morning breath and I try to catch any milk she spits up before it hits our sheets.  So I grabbed Sophie and held her in front of Elliott to see what kind of progress we might be making.

I put Sophie in front of her and instantly I see concentration in her little blue eyes.  Both hands start sort of twitching and she starts to get a bit excited.  It was like she knew what to do, but her hands just wouldn’t quite cooperate.  I was totally mesmerized.  I’m convinced she’ll figure it out within the next week, but it could be another month for all I truly know.  What I do know is that it is completely thrilling to watch the development happen right before my eyes.  I imagine synapses lighting up and neurons firing across her young, wrinkled little brain.  The leaps and bounds in progress is just awe inspiring to witness first hand in something that I helped create!

Whoever knew that grabbing at a rubber giraffe could be so much fun?

We had a great time here in Milwaukee last weekend as we had a crew of our Minnesota friends in to visit and all three couples brought babies with them!  As some background, I still keep in close contact with a variety of people from high school, but there has been a gang of five of us who have been close since our days wandering the halls of Lakeville High School. Today, 12 years (!) after graduation two of us, myself and Josh Silva (married to Andrea), live here in Milwaukee while the other three, Chris Ellsworth (married to Brea), Josh Wilske (married to Grace) and Pete Feig (married to Emily, who was also a Panther), live in Minnesota.  We’re all happily married (each playing well above the rim) and four of us have children (the Silvas have a dog, Nike) 13 months and younger.

Both we and the Silvas have purchased homes recently and the arrival of Elliott spurred the visit.  They all got into town late Friday night and the first mass gathering of the babies happened in the Silva’s living room.  Ethan (Josh and Grace’s 13-month old son) and Zachary (Pete and Emily’s 9-month old son) were all wound up from sitting in the car for 5 ½ hours so they came out guns blazing.  Crawling everywhere, piling on top of each other and have a grand old time.  Piper (Chris and Brea’s 8-month old daughter) had been in town for a few extra days but wasn’t to be left out from the fun.  Elliott, at just nine weeks, was comfortably sleeping and couldn’t care less about the madness happening at carpet level.

Piper trying to figure out why her Mom is holding another baby...

Pete pointed out early on how now that we have kids, our gatherings will gravitate to the floor as we all watch, laugh and separate the kids as they roll around each other.  His observation would be confirmed a number of times throughout the weekend.  We didn’t stay too late Friday night but the festivities continued Saturday.

With Piper (she likes to stand)

Kari and Zachary

Pete and Elliott

The group met at our house for lunch and the kids were reunited.  We moved everything in our entertainment center above three feet to protect it from Zach - one of his favorite things to do is to crawl to furniture and pull himself up to stand and grab.  Ethan is able to go down stairs so him and his Dad took a trip (intentional) down our stairs as we have about twice the amount that the Wilske’s split level has.  His smile going down made me appreciate the wonder of stairs all over again.  Elliott got in the act by laying on her activity mat in the midst of it all.  Piper and Ethan both joined in on the fun by tugging on her mat’s various hanging sea creatures.

Elliott and Ethan playing on the activity mat!

Piper and Zachary getting in on the activity mat action

We then ventured back to the Silva’s house (after a few naps mixed in for good measure) for a BBQ and to enjoy the night.  The party moved from the carpet to the grass in the backyard.  We finally got a group photo of all the kids together (Nike even joined in!) and just had an all around great night of cornhole, good food, cold beer and great friends.

It was a weekend full of moments where you step back and really appreciate your life and how things have progressed.  It really is remarkable for this group to still be such good friends and still be so close after all these years and all the miles we’ve all traveled.  We spent countless hours in high school and college playing basketball, volleyball, video games and cards.  We didn’t let the fact that we were going to schools in Minnesota, Wisconsin, West Virginia and Massachusetts get in the way.  We all met wonderful women and they have all become friends along the way.  Now we’re starting our families and it was amazing to see our kids “playing” together now.

The Kids (from left): Nike, Piper, Elliott, Ethan, Zachary

We joked around that our kids don’t have a choice about being friends so we’re starting them young.  Two boys and two girls - Piper was happy to have Elliott join the gang so she was no longer outnumbered - now it’s up to the Silvas to break the tie.  Right now the developmental differences are pretty profound, but in reality they are all essentially the same age.  Elliott and Piper will be in the same grade (we’ll see which class Zachary ends up in with his August birthday) and Ethan will be the “old” one as he’s a whole 3-4 months older than Zach and Piper and ten months older than Elliott.

As a father, it was crazy to see the kids as they all seemed so big compared to Elliott, but I remembering holding all of them when they were her size.  To think about her being that big, or her crawling all over the place or even walking is almost too much to think about.  Right now, time with Elle is measured in days as she always seems to be reaching milestones or having a “first.”  Kari mentioned to me how proud she felt just to see our daughter amongst all these other wonderful kids - it really was a special weekend.

I feel so blessed and so lucky to have friends like these in my life.  To keep any friend for 10 - 15 years is remarkable, and to have a group this large manage to stay together is wonderful.  As our lives continue to get more complicated with marriages, houses and children, we’ve managed to stay close and include all the wonderful new parts of our lives in our friendship.  To my good friends - thanks so much for making the trip, can’t wait to see you again!