Giving Thanks

As you know from watching the video we posted a couple of days ago, we just returned from a great trip to Ryan's home town of Syracuse, NY. We had a great time, and Arlo misses all the attention from his family members. Ryan's mom, Patty, took a lot of great photos of the week and here are a few of our favorites. If anyone else has photos from Thanksgiving dinner or other family events, please send them to us and we will add them to the slideshow.

Click on the word bubble in the lower left hand corner to see captions.

We clearly have a lot to be thankful for this year: a healthy baby, good jobs, and lots of loving family and friends. We hope all of you had a great holiday!

A Week of Firsts

This week Arlo enjoyed his first plane ride, his first celebrity sighting, his first Thanksgiving, and meeting a lot of family for the first time. Needless to say, he's a little excited about it.

Arlo's First Swimming Lesson

Today we took Arlo to his first swimming lesson. Why take such a little baby to swimming lessons? Well, young babies have not developed a fear of water in part because they resided in a watery home in utero. Now is the perfect time to teach Arlo how to swim and take advantage of his instincts.

We wanted to enroll Arlo in swim lessons because we love the water and want to enjoy activities like swimming, boating, etc. with him. Another important part of infant swimming lessons is safety. Arlo will learn not only how to swim, he will gain some basic skills that he can use if he has an accident like falling in a pool or out of a boat.

Australia commonly teaches infants how to swim. If you don't believe me, check out uSwim.com for videos and a do-it-yourself swim curriculum.

Arlo's first lesson went pretty well, but after an hour-and-a-half lecture before we got into the pool, he was exhausted and fell asleep in the middle of the lesson. Of course we took a few pictures:

Relaxing Before Getting in the Pool
Arlo is starting to suck on his hands. We are hoping he won't want the pacifier as much, but as you will see, he still needs the pacifier to soothe himself when he gets fussy.

Arlos' fancy new swim diaper.
Unfortunately, he's too skinny to fill it properly. At his two month pediatric appointment, he measured in the 95 percentile for height (25 inches) and in the 50 percentile for weight (11 pounds, 10 ounces). He's a long and lean boy!

Arlo is so lean, he needed a wetsuit to keep him warm in pool water even though it was about 95 degrees.

Arlo floating on his back all by himself!
Just for the record, I watched Arlo closely during the lesson. Don't be fooled by my apparent lack of attention in this photo!

Backfloat Close Up

A Walk in the Park

One benefit to being on parental leave is getting to enjoy great weather during the week. Arlo and I have been walking a lot and enjoying the sunshine, which we will miss greatly when the Seattle winter (i.e. rain and darkness) set in. Yesterday, I took Arlo off-roading in what I call his SUS (Sport Utility Stroller). Believe it or not, this trail is in the middle of the city. Pretty awesome, eh? This park also has a beautiful beach and a breathtaking view of the Olympic mountain range and Mt. Rainier.

This is the life!