Life is a Highway

Subtitle: Splitting Heirs

We decided to split up after Alabama because Brett could go a whole lot faster than we can with Henry. With Henry a 6 hour drive is actually more like a 9 hour drive after factoring in all the breaks...so it made more sense for Brett to just keep driving, make it back to Portland sooner and then *hopefully* get a place all set for us before Henry and I arrive! Currently Brett is in Idaho and we are in Colorado. We stopped yesterday to see my cousin and her family in Denver and today we're heading to Vail to visit another cousin and then up to Craig, Colorado, to visit an aunt and uncle. Our goal is to make it to the land of Zion - SLC by tonight.
Speaking of the land of Zion, they don't call the middle of the country the bible belt for no reason. Wow. The most amusing/perplexing/angering sights we saw amongst field after field of corn were the full sized billboards stating "Jesus." Hmm. Now, I understand the periennial favorites of "Abortion Kills!" or "God Hates Fags!" because those are actually making some sort of statement, but "Jesus"? What's the point? A reminder? Do people in the midwest forget and need to be reminded? It made me wonder how "Christians" would react if there were billboards stating "Mohammed"? Or better yet some villified historical figure "Genghis Khan" or similar. After all, probably more people have been murdered, prosecuted, or colonized in the name of Jesus throughout history than any other ideology. I found it especially ironic that these Jesus signs were right near where the Trail of Tears took place - the slaughter of perhaps millions of native peoples right here in our own country by our predecessors all in the name of Manifest Destiny...
The road gives me lots of time to think.

And they're off!

We're leaving today (hopefully this morning) and heading to Montgomery, Alabama for our first stop tonight. The truck is nearly packed so we've just got to load up the rest, load the cars, go through the house and clean and we're outta here!

4 Month Progress Report

Henry went today to see his pediatrician for a final visit before moving back to Portland. Even though it's 6 days early for his four month check-up this visit counted as that check-up. His vital stats are: weight - 13 lbs, 5 oz; height - 24 inches (which is what it was last time so I'm suspicious that he wasn't measured correctly either this time or last). These numbers put him in the 25th percentile for both height and weight among other 4 month olds. However, when adjusted for his prematurity, these numbers put him in the 50th percentile. So he's right on target - and has a nice and even height/weight distribution. Now I just have to find a good pediatrician in Portland although I doubt that will be much of a problem...if anyone knows of any homeopathic/holistic pediatricians, let me know! (They must be accepting of a limited and delayed vaccine schedule.) No new picture as the USB cord was accidentally packed already but I'm hoping that mom's memory card reader will be able to upload pictures from my camera onto the computer, so stay tuned. In the meanwhile, here's one of the wonderful pictures that Geoff took

Brett and Pictures

Brett was unhappy that the blog doesn't feature his picture more often. As I explained to him, this is out of respect to him in that he has told me he "hates" to have his picture taken. The natural consequence of hating to have your picture taken is obviously that you hate to have pictures of yourself seen. Therefore, I try to keep the blog Henry-centric - with a liberal amount of myself sprinkled in since I have the opposite feeling about having my picture taken. So anyway, here's a picture of Brett at the MLK memorial in Atlanta. He's either deep in reflective thought about Dr. King's truism that "injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere" or he is expressing his displeasure at having his picture taken. You be the judge.

Little Man (part 2)

Once again, sometimes he just looks like a little man; albeit a two foot tall man without control of bodily functions. Regardless, here's a picture of him sitting in his "Bumbo" chair ready to be dealt into the next hand of poker.

16 Weeks Old

Hello all! Henry is 16 weeks old today; here is his weekly update picture. He is getting so big! Just in the last couple days he has started really enjoying being read books. He moves his eyes around the whole page, taking every picture in and really following along. We've got to get a video of it! Speaking of videos, the computer won't let me upload any videos on it so until we get that figured out (which likely won't happen until we get home), no new videos. We did take a video of the house, so when the video function is working again I'll post that. Oh, and yes, that is his "real" hair coming in and, yes, it is a little reddish!

In other news, mom left for Indianapolis today and will return next Tuesday to help us move home. Hooray! We're going to figure out the route to take home - choosing this time to take a southern route so as to pass through previously unseen states.

Moving Home

As most of you probably know, we'll be heading home soon. What you might not know is just how soon! We keep changing the date of the move to sooner and sooner. We will probably be leaving Savannah on July 24th to head west. The drive will undoubtably take longer than it did coming here since we have a baby in tow now, but we expect to be home sometime in the first couple days of August. I know we're both really excited to be back in Portland and cannot wait to see everyone and to introduce Henry to all his friends and family.

Even though it has nothing to do with this post, I can't help but put this picture of Henry on - it's from when he was a day old. I can't believe how small he was!!

15 Weeks Old!

I almost forgot that it is Thursday! Since we're not at home, I don't have the Boppy so this picture will have to suffice. This is Henry in an outfit that my cousin, Katie, gave him...it's a 6 month size!

Hotlanta

Pictures:
Me and Henry at the MLK memorial and museum
Henry at Six Flags
Me and Henry at the aquarium (he stared at all the exhibits just like you see here)
Me and Henry when we ran into Anderson Cooper at CNN


Atlanta has been a wonderful change of pace from Savannah for us. Plus it's been great to spend time with Mom, Dad, and Geoff (just wish Mike was here too). The first day we got here we went to the MLK memorial which was absolutely amazing. We saw all the artifacts as well as the church that he preached at here (and where his funeral was held) and his childhood home. The memorial has his grave along with his wife's. It was a truly astounding and impactful experience. It is hard to believe that it was only 40 years ago that the civil rights battles were being fought. Yesterday we went to Six Flags Over Georgia where in addition to sweating our brains out we also rode some really sweet rides. Henry had a pretty good time getting lots of attention from other park goers. Today we went to the aquarium and to the Coca-Cola museum and to CNN. The aquarium was crazy - Henry absolutely loved it. He just stared and stared at all the lights and displays. Not sure what we'll do tomorrow yet but Dad and Geoff leave at 7:30 pm and then we'll (Mom, me, Brett, and Henry) head back to Savannah.

Internet Issues

Hello all!

We are having some problems with our internet. Namely that our modem got blown out during the last lightening storm. We can pick up a random wireless connection every now and then, but nothing reliable. Thusly, our blog is suffering.

It's been great having everyone here but we miss Mike and wish he was here too. Charleston was a ton of fun - got to see an old plantation which was really interesting. We will be in Atlanta this week and plan to spend a day at Six Flags and then tour around the city seeing the aquarium, the MLK memorial and other sites.

Geoff has been taking some amazing pictures of Henry that are just as good as any professional would take....another reason I am bummed out that the internet isn't working...I can't get them from my computer onto the blog.

Hopefully we'll get something worked out and I can post some pictures soon.

14 Weeks Old!

For the last 3 days I have been trying to post some new videos without success. The process has frustrated me and I haven't posted anything else while I try to figure out what's going on - so sorry that there has been no activity!

Anyhow, here's his weekly picture sitting up and one of him standing with Brett since you can't really tell how tall he is in the sitting picture. His legs are so long that he has to wear 6 month size pjs and pants or else they are too short for him. Unfortunately the top half of his body is not a 6 month size yet, so his pjs are baggy at the top. It's not that much of a problem here since it's so hot - his little rompers (like what he's got on in this picture) just look like shorts...or short shorts if they're already shorts.

He is holding his head up constantly now and it's steady most of the time. He still goes a little Stevie Wonder on us sometimes with the swaying head though. He also really wants to sit up and strains forward all the time. If we help him balance he can sit for awhile - 5 minutes maybe - before getting tired. He also likes to stand, as you can see in the picture with Brett. He kind of stomps his feet and it looks like he's either marching or dancing.

Dad and Geoff get here tonight. Tomorrow we're going to go to Charleston, then Saturday spend the day in Savannah ending with another visit to Paula Deen's (yum!), not sure what we're going to do Sunday and Monday although at some point mom and Geoff are going kayaking again. Then on Tuesday we go to Atlanta where we're planning on a day at Six Flags (yikes! Did you see the story on the news about the decapitation last weekend there?! Hold on to your hats...literally), going to the MLK memorial, and a visit to the aquarium.