Busy week - and Matthew's crawling now!

Breaking news! Matthew has his first tooth and is now really crawling!! He started scooting himself around the room about 2 weeks ago, but just this weekend he can get on all fours and motor around. As Joe says in the video, we actually have to watch him now (especially since he fell off the bed last Thursday). He also likes to pull himself up on things, mama will have to go on meds if he starts walking too soon.

Here's a video of some of his first moves...

Here is a close up of the two teeth breaking through. Kinda hard to see.

Last week was a really busy one for me as I was out of the office attending the annual conference for the Society of Human Resource Management (SHRM), of which I am a member. It was a great conference, very positive and I really learned a lot. It was nice to be in a learning environment again. My boss also treated us to some great meals (I am still full!)

Here are some photos from the week.

View from the lounge at the Signature room, about 96 floors above Chicago.

The Heavens treated us to a beautiful rainbow. A few minutes later there were two rainbows, side-by-side. So cool.

There were spiders on the outside of the windows.

Yours truly with boss, Leslie. Can you see that I cut about 4 inches off my hair last week!

Braised Helix Snails in buttery herb sauce with black rice. There were a few garlic chips on top, yum!

Grilled Prosciutto and Buffalo Mozzarella. What can I say? Bacon and cheese, two of my favorite things.

Pan seared salmon with bok choy chai and fingerling potatoes. The sake brown butter sauce on this was out of this world good.

At Gibson's. 

Small (!) New  York strip with sauteed garlic spinach and mushrooms.  The steak was like butter, seriously tender and buttery.

Gibson's desserts are insanely big. This is a typical size serving of Haagen Das ice cream with macadamia nuts and chocolate fudge sauce. The steak knife takes the idea of "death by chocolate" to a whole new level. We ate every last bit of this, it took 7 of us!

On Friday, I attended a seminar by Edward Tufte a master of visual quantitative design. It was so hip and cool and I am really glad that I went.  This graphic depicting Napoleon's March is genius. And if you can find the graph of the development of rock/pop music, it is a fun one to checkout too.

I was wiped out Friday night.

Now you may return to reading the last entry of Father's Day Weekend (below). Joe did a great job didn't he!?

Father's Weekend: PART IV (finally!)

I thought since it's been more than two weeks, it's probably time to finally write my last Father's Day post about, well, Father's Day.

The day started with Dylan saying "Happy Father Day, daddy!" while we're all still in bed. Traditional parents will guffaw at our admission, but we'll do whatever will keep the kids -- and us -- asleep. When Matthew is in his crib against his will, his cries get gradually louder until Quyen or I -- ok, usually Quyen shakes off her sleep to fetch him. Sleeping our bed, Matthew and mommy and daddy get much more sleep. Everybody wins.

We've been working with Dylan to get him to sleep in his own bed, but he'll climb in our bed long after we're asleep. Dylan has two sleeping habits that kind of drive me nuts. First of all, he's not one to sleep under the covers. This kid can kick off the covers in his sleep. And when he does, the person next to him, usually me, will have his covers kicked off too. Any attempt to return the warm covers to their original position, which cannot be done unless Dylan is covered as well, is met with Dylan's kicking legs which move as he's riding an imaginary bicycle. His other bad bed behavior is that he likes to sleep perpendicular to the rest of us, but parallel and adjacent to the pillows. That usually means someone is going to have a face full of feet (usually me) and only one bun on the bed.

Sleep disorders aside, we got out of bed Father's Day morning. Quyen gave me a wonderful card, as did Dylan and Matthew. My new travel coffee mug has pictures of Dylan and Matthew emblazoned on the side. The kids' daycare ladies framed a xeroxed copy of Matthew's footprint and Dylan's teachers helped him make me a personalized pot holder perfect for the grill.

Later that day Quyen took me and the kids to dinner at Houlihan's, a new restaurant nearby. It's part of a chain but it's a new favorite for us because the food is good and the cocktails are tasty. We ordered tuna wontons for an appetizer, which were excellent (we ate them the last time we were there, too).

My main course: stuffed chicken breast with a side of mashed breast of potatoes.

For the main dish I had a stuffed chicken breast filled with a few cheeses, and a side of green beans. Quyen ordered the gigantic Chicken Asian Chop Chop salad.

Quyen's Chop Chop salad. (Isn't Quyen beautiful? She hates this pic. I love it.)

Quyen said it was quite good. We also got a free desert for Father's day that we all shared.

Matthew and daddy.

Dylan cleaned his plate.

We all had a great day, even Mr. Napkinhead.

Father's Weekend: PART III

Ok, pardon the delay. Back to the weekend festivities!

After Dylan's inaugural tee ball day of team selection and skills assessment wrapped up, we raced home, packed a few things for some lakeside R and R and headed to the shores of Lake Michigan to meet up with my former colleagues, and fellow family bloggers, Mikel and Fran LeFort We worked together at the Post-Tribune (Mikel helped hire me, actually) in Merrillville, Ind., for a few years. We haven't seen each other since Mikel took a job as executive editor at a paper in upstate New York in late 2003.
The LeFort Family

Their children, Anna and Alexander, are beautiful kids are so well-mannered. They and Dylan played together so nicely. They had a blast.

Dylan and Alex getting some practice before joining the AVP 2008 Pro Beach Volleyball tour.

Nice DIG, Alex!

Our trip to the beach was our first this year, and Matthew's first ever. Matthew had a blast playing in the sand. He kept digging in the sand with his hands. I'm surprised he didn't eat more sand than he did, as his mouth is where everything he picks up goes.

Mommy and Matthew getting a his fill of sand.

The weather was absolutely beautiful for a day at the lake.

I took this shot standing atop a huge sand dune. I am seriously out of shape. My legs were on fire and my lungs were inhaling/exhaling so fast I couldn't talk. But it was the view that really took my breath away. Wow. If you look closely at the above photo, you can just make out the Chicago skyline.

After I took a few pics and had time to catch my breath, I made the easy trek down, which involved long, almost leaping steps into the soft sand below. I enjoyed the descent so much I considered going back up just to come down again.

But I quickly came to my senses.

Dylan covered in sand coming to see what I'm doing.

Apparently, Dylan saw me come down the dune and wanted to see what I was doing. In the picture above, though he was walking in sand, he had a purposeful stride in his steps. I barely was able to snap a few frames of him walking toward me before he went on by in favor of tacking that hill. My first thought was, "You go, Dylan!" But that thought soon gave way to the realization that I may have to climb after him.


There goes Dylan, ever the adventurer, to the top of the dune.

Well, my realization was realized. Up he went. To the top. Nonstop. Not even resting once. And not paying attention to me yelling, "DYLAN! STOP! COME DOWN!" The kid didn't even turn around to see what I was huffing about. So up I went. Again. He stopped at the top and turned to look at me. I'm sure he heard my continuous yelling, but he turned again and disappeared, out of sight, over the ridge. I started to freak out and hurry to the top, but my legs weren't going any faster. He could have stepped on something with his bare feet ... he could have scampered down any number of trails ... God knows what. In a matter of moments, he reappeared on a trail head right where I was standing. I have no idea how he got there so fast, but I grabbed him and made the descent again. Yes, I had wanted to go down the hill one more time and I got my wish.

You'll have come back for Part IV of Father's Weekend.

Father's Weekend: PART II

Ok, back to Dylan's new baseball glove and his first day of tee ball

Walking to the baseball glove display case in the sporting good store took longer than expected because Dylan would get distracted because of all the cool sports equipment. ("Wow! Looky at dat bat!")

Even at the wall covered with hundreds of brown, black and, yes, pink leather gloves, Dylan was more interested in the baseballs wrapped in plastic.

"How 'bout this pink glove, Dylan?" I asked.

"No, daddy, dat's for gers (girls)," he responded matter-of-factly. Everything pink he says is for "gers." Neither Quyen nor I have ever suggested that pink is a feminine color, so we think he may have picked that up at daycare.

The hardest part of selecting a glove for Dylan was finding the smallest glove to fit his right had.

These photos show only a fraction of all the gloves available, slowing our decision. The glove we're looking at above is the one we bought. Dylan's first baseball mitt!

Running late, we ran home, made and ate quick lunch before heading over to the YMCA where his league is based. Unfortunately, there was no game today, only skills assessment and team selection. Seeing all those 3- and 4-year-old boys and girls was a sight. I don't want to sound too kumbaya, but it was cool to see dozens of parents and even more children of all races and social and economic backgrounds coming together so these tiny, innnocent, beautiful kids can pay baseball. I couldn't help but think that perhaps in this group of kids could be one of Dylan's future best friends. A friend he could have for years or decades or his whole life. A friend with whom he'll experience all those unforgettable moments of childhood like exploring a creek back in the woods or playing kick the can until his mom calls him inside for dinner. The kind of friend he'll share a seat with on the bus or double-date for a high school dance. Seeing Dylan with the other kids on Saturday in an instant made me think of my own childhood and the friends I had on my baseball teams each year from age 8 to 15. I still talk to some of them, maybe not as frequently as I'd like, but they're still friends that are burn into the memories of my own childhood that I'll never forget.

Wow, that was a trip down memory lane. Ok, here are some pics finally:


There's our future major leaguer in the center, surrounded by a group of future best friends prior to the skills assessment.

Dylan checks the binding of his glove before showing his mad fielding skills.

Dylan at right, his teammates and his coach (in the black shirt).


Uh, I think Dylan's trying to hit on the only female teammate. He's been taught that initiating the conversation is half the battle.

You can be sure that this blog will be filled with action shots of Dylan swinging the bat, running the bases and chasing the ball. Come back Saturday night for those. But in the meantime, come on back tomorrow for Father's Weekend: PART III where we head to the beach to hang with former colleagues of mine, Fran and Mikel LeFort, and their two beautiful children.

Father's Weekend: PART I

Quyen, the boys and I didn't celebrate Father's DAY, we celebrated Father's WEEKEND.

The weekend began on Friday evening when we met Theresa, Matthew's godmother, in Crown Point at the Corn Roast, which is for us is the festival to start the summer. We met Theresa there to discuss details of our end-of-summer "big chill" weekend, but we began eating (yes, we had corn on the cob) and chit-chatting about everything but what we had intended.

The weather cleared up to give us a perfect evening. Lots of food, live music, a couple beers and it's easy to see how we kept off topic. Theresa took this photo, one of only a handful taken Friday night.

We left the Corn Roast to visit my dad, who lives nearby. 
It was a complete coincidence that Dylan and Grandpa were wearing IU t-shirts. Who knows, maybe Grandpa will get lucky and have one or two of his grandkids attend his alma mater. It's a topic of conversation with many of his friends that all of his five children graduated from Purdue University.

We stayed at Grandpa's house for about an hour before we left to get the kids home and in bed.
Saturday morning we all went to a local sporting goods store to buy Dylans's first baseball glove. His first day of tee ball started at 12:30 p.m. that day. I hadn't bought a glove in at least 10 years, maybe more, so to see so many options was a bit mind-numbing. Even more frustrating was trying to find a right-hand glove for my son, who's a lefty -- a LEFTY!  We saw it coming at an early age when he picked up a crayon or a fork with the hand that isn't the right one. 

I've always been a righty, my two brothers are righties, as are my two sisters, both my parent, all of my cousins (18 including my siblings) and just about any other relative I knew.Not only is he a lefty, but he also has steel-blue eyes. That's a head-scratcher too because no one in my family or Quyen's immediate family has blue eyes.

So, I"ve been keeping a brown eye out for left-handed, blue-eyed mailmen who seem to linger longingly outside the front door. Hmm. (Quyen knows I'm kidding, so don't hate!)

Anyway, back to the glove. We found one he'll likely use for the next five years or so.

I'll continue this post later today when uploading photos won't take so long.

Peanuts!

My name is Quyen Greco and I am addicted to blogging. How do I know this?

Well last night Dylan finally did something that most pre-school children eventually do, he got a peanut stuck up one of his nostrils. He comes over to me oh so calmly, pointing up his nose “Mommy, help me. It’s stuck and I can’t get it out.” I had given him a small bowl of peanuts as a snack, so I knew instantly what was stuck up his nose.

What was my first instinct? Yell out to Joe for help. My second instinct? Get the tweezers you say, or maybe a tissue or maybe a flashlight? No, that is what a normal mother might do. But no, I instantly wanted to find my camera so that I could capture the moment for our Blog. Am I the worst!?

But then Dylan started gagging and choking a bit and the seriousness of the situation reality hit me and I snapped out of mommy blogger mode and into, mommy this is an emergency mode. In the time that it took me to run to the medicine cabinet to look for the tweezers, Dylan had already sneezed the peanut out of his nose. All harm diverted.

Dylan was so calm through it all and a little perplexed, not knowing he should have been scared or if it was cool and funny to projectile sneeze a peanut from his nose. Hopefully, he won’t want find out and try the stunt again.

Meanwhile, I might start thinking about getting some help with my blogging “addiction”.

Life in suburbia ...

When you live next door to two teen girls, you're bound to experience the residual effects of them getting "TPed." That's short for "toilet papered." No, the girls aren't targets of the popular clique. In fact, getting TPed is badge of honor in these Indiana parts as a sign of membership to said clique.

Last night, bandits (I assume young males, which is the typical sex of a TP perpetrator), under cover of night, entered the yard, armed with roll after roll of the white variety. The ammo of choice also is usually single-ply and unscented, of course, because why spend extra for the good stuff when it's going to end up in trees, right? The rolls are launched like a grenade and thrown high into trees for optimal streaming effect.

They must have been trained by ninjas because I didn't hear a thing and I was in the family room all night -- it's where I usually pass out, fully clothed, on the couch, watching TV, and is the part of our house that is closest to our neighbor's yard.





As you can see by the flags, part of a veterans monument a block from our house, the winds were whipping today. The high winds caused the paper to shrapnel into our direction sometime this morning. I spent about 10 minutes or so gathering fluttering strips of paper from our yard, front and back.

After cleanup I went inside to get back to work. A short time later I glanced outside the dining room window to see this:





The tree limb landed where I had been one hour earlier picking up paper debris.

Just goes to show ya that life in suburbia can be a treacherous lot.

Ok, that line is about as funny a I can get because I can't think of a joke that somehow incorporates "If a tree falls in the woods, does it make a noise?" or the ever-popular "Do bears s--t in the woods?" When you think of a funny anecdote, submit a comment!