Ho Ho Ho!

Now that Owen is 10 months old we figure it's about time to work on his vocabulary. In keeping with the holiday spirit, we've been working on "ho, ho, ho." To be honest it sounds a lot like "uh-oh," but we'll take it. Here are a few pictures from Owen's first Christmas.

The guys looking festive in plaid

Owen got a lot of books for his growing library and some cute clothes but what really stole the show were the toys. A new ball from his cousins and a flashy and loud remote control from Uncle David. Hmm, I wonder if it's payback for being an annoying little sister? Ho, ho, ho.

Cloud Baby

All I want for Christmas is my two top teeth...and a brand new wagon. Luckily for Owen, Christmas came early to Rhode Island. Grandma sent a walker wagon that Owen will love once he's fully on the hoof. For now he's content being wagon cargo, a useful skill for our road trip to Chicago.

The Linker clan, minus Sydney (the cat), survived our 16 hour car ride from Providence to Chicago. Owen should get an award for being such a trooper. I'm pretty sure that I whined more than he did. I'm not kidding. 

As a reward for being such a good baby, we paraded Owen all over the Loop to take in some holiday cheer. Now that we're officially tourists, I wanted to get the obligatory picture of Owen at Cloud Gate, aka the Bean. I was definitely more enthused about the photo-op than Owen. He just looks confused, a little annoyed and very, very tired.

The Holla Daze - Act 1, California

Opening Scene: Three weary travelers, a husband, wife and their infant son, arrive in Orange County, California. It's 12:30 pm, the parents have already been up for over twelve hours and the baby just lost his favorite teething toy, Sophie Giraffe. And so begins the Holla Daze.

I'm not clever enough to keep up my faux-playwriting but you get the point. Being in California for Thanksgiving was great. The travel, not so much. Owen was not interested in sitting calmly for two flights and a layover. I can't blame him but a four hour flight feels especially long when your kid is on a sleep-protest.

Once in California, a good time was had by all. Let me rephrase that, Owen had a blast. We stayed on the beach and Owen spent an entire week with his Bubbe and Aunt Amy.  Here's the crew snuggling up on the couch for story time.

We took advantage of the nice weather by getting outside as much as possible. Steve and Owen have been taking swimming lessons and were able to show off their new skills in the pool. I was a nervous wreck watching my baby "jump" into the pool but the guys had great fun.

Owen also came to cheer me on at the Dana Point Turkey Trot. He was very impressed with my finishers medal and I was just happy to have finished the race.  Here we are at a post-race Thanksgiving day brunch.

Seeing as this was Owen's first Thanksgiving we tried to teach him a lesson about gratitude. I told him that I was thankful for him and being able to spend time with our loving family. He looked at me with his big blue eyes and sucked on his pacifier. He didn't have to say a word but I knew exactly what he was thinking. Owen was grateful that he just learned to crawl...watch out world!

Act 1 of the Holla Daze ended with a whirlwind trip to New York and a Lehrman family reunion. Owen met the rest of his cousins including the littlest Lehrman, Mable.

 
After a quick intermission, we drive to Chicago for Act 2.

Nine Month Matzo Ball

It's almost impossible to believe that Owen is already nine months old.  This has literally been the fastest year of my life. Summer was a blur and it's almost time to gear up for the holidays. In fact, in preparation for the great schlep to California to visit Bubbe and Aunt Amy for Thanksgiving we took Owen to a Jewish deli in Brookline, Mass. Here is his first taste of matzo ball and pastrami goodness.

Owen takes his eating, and pretty much everything else, very seriously.  Unfortunately these pictures don't accurately portray how enthusiastically he gobbled up (no pun intended) these yummy morsels.

Boo!

This is Steve is in his Halloween costume. He was so scary that hurricane Sandy steered clear of Providence. I kid, I kid but in all seriousness we were very lucky. We didn't even lose power and Owen was able to fully get into the Halloween spirit. Well, as much as can be expected of an eight month old baby. 

The Halloween fun was slow going for our little dragon but eventually Owen was okay with his costume and stopped crying long enough for his photo shoot on the front porch.

ROAR!!!  And here's just a little more cuteness. Aww...

Frakenstorm

The state of Rhode Island has pretty much shut down. We're ready for you, Sandy! Bring it on.

New Englandy

It's feeling very New Englandy these days. Could be the crisp fall weather, the changing leaves or the fact that we live in a cute city that just happens to be in New England. Who can say.

We haven't been having enough fun lately so last weekend we three Linkers headed to Newport, a quintessential New England town, for some chowdah.  Here are a few photos...

Lobster traps. New Englandy, right?

Owen slept during our walk through Newport Harbor but here we are at brunch.

I know it's normal baby behavior but he literally puts everything in his mouth. Everything. Things made a little more sense later in the day when we noticed that Owen cut his second tooth. Wicked Pissah (aka, really awesome)!

Heeeyyyyy

Owen's a talker. That's not too surprising. Steve and I are his parents. He's been pretty vocal from the get-go and at six months or so he started saying, "Dada." He says "Mama" too, about one for every 100 Dada's. Not that I'm counting. The newest words in his repertoire are "Hi" and "Hey." It's hilarious, he really does sound like the Fonz. You'll have to take my word for it, we haven't been able to capture Owen Fonzarelli on video. Yet.

Unfortunately, we haven't had a chance to check out the famed fall colors of New England, but we did go to a local apple orchard and farm to enjoy the season. Here's Owen down on the farm. Not the photo-op I was hoping for but momentous, nonetheless. This was the first time that Owen had ever taken an entire bottle on his own.

Come to think of it, we've had a lot of firsts these past few weeks. First time sitting in a shopping cart. As you can see, Owen is taking this very seriously.

First introduction to Cookie Monster. It was love at first sight.

First time eating Cheerios and sitting in a high chair at a restaurant.

But with the good comes the bad. We are also suffering through Owen's first cold and his first tooth. This combo makes for a snotty, drooly and somewhat miserable baby.

Juanny Strikes Again

Here's Johnny relaxing in the backyard this summer. What a good dog. For those of who haven't followed the Johnny saga, things haven't always been easy. Johnny came into our lives in May, 2010 and it seems like we've known him for a lifetime, not just two short years.

We adopted Johnny on a whim from a shelter in Chicago.  All we were told about him was that he was a Shepherd/Chow mix and roughly a year old. What the shelter failed to mention was that Johnny was neutered late resulting in canine Napoleon complex, he wasn't socialized with other dogs and he had a bum knee. But after knee surgery and stint at doggy bootcamp, Johnny was good as new.

For better or worse, Johnny is our dog and we love him but we were a little nervous about how he'd act around Owen. Needless to say we're relieved that Johnny seems to have taken a liking to our little man. Sometimes they even nap together, Owen in his crib and Johnny under the bed.

The Three Amigos  

Johnny knows how to be a good dog but sometimes his Mr. Hyde alter-ego, Juanny, still rears its ugly head. Unfortunately Juanny struck while Steve was in Hong Kong. Blame the police officer blocking our street, the drunk college kids tailgating before the Brown football game (we live down the block from Brown's stadium) or that annoying Psy song playing on repeat, but here's the aftermath of Juanny's wrath.

Yes, Johnny scratched Owen's face. My poor baby! Thankfully, it was a surface scratch, it didn't scar and Owen was honestly upset for about a minute. I, on the other hand, was upset for days and the incident was a reminder not to let Johnny share the backseat of the car with Owen. We all survived Steve's first business trip and the scratch was nearly healed by the time he returned to Providence. Welcome home Daddy!

In other news, Steve's dream of Owen being a baby model has been realized. Check it out!

From the Archives

Owen turned 7 months old on September 9th. I think he's as shocked as we are, the look on his face says it all. To commemorate the occasion, here are some pictures from the archives (I use the term loosely). 

This is Owen and I last September in East Tawas, Michigan. I was about 20 weeks pregnant and had just started showing. Fast forward to February. A new job and a cross country move later, here we are at the hospital the day after Owen was born. Very tired. Very happy.

 Owen Instagram'ed, a new adjective.

Grandpa Stan, Steve and Owen. Three generations of Linker's together. So sweet.

And here are a couple of cute hat pictures thrown in for good measure. This is before Owen figured out how to take them off. Now it's a struggle to keep hats on his head.

Punk rock Owen. Doesn't he look hardcore? 

 

This photo is more recent. A happy Owen sitting-up in his crib after his morning nap.