Hayley and Kate Minter

After a month or so of watching her get more and more interested in our meals, we decided to start Hayley on solid foods this weekend.

Well, “solid” in the most technical sense. The little bit of rice cereal mixed with breastmilk that we fed her didn’t look much different than the milk itself. But we put it in a bowl and fed it to her with a spoon, so it counts.

She did really well with it. She didn’t push it out of her mouth with her tongue, and she was eagerly grabbing the spoon and jamming it into her mouth every time it came close to her.

So that gets marked down as a success. I’m not sure how quickly we should advance with things like quantity, consistency, and variety, but we’ll figure it out somehow.

A new video is up for your viewing pleasure. In it, Hayley shows off her ability to hold herself in a seated position without any help from us.

She can’t put herself in that position yet, but that’ll be her next trick.

It’s been a busy few days, so let’s get to the news.

On the growing-up front, Hayley can now sit up for minutes at a time. She can’t pull herself into a sitting position yet, but if we put her on the floor in the seated position, she can balance herself. As long as she doesn’t make too many sudden movements, she’s fine. She can look around and reach for things while maintaining her balance, but after she tires or swings around too quickly, she tips over.

We had a fun but busy weekend in Virginia. We all went to the Hudson Family Reunion (Holly’s folks on her dad’s side) in South Hill. Hayley was pretty good while we were there - being passed around from stranger to stranger got her a little fussy, though.

We spent the night with my dad, and Hayley slept pretty well. The next morning, we dropped Hayley off with the Grandparents Estes, and went fishing with my dad. Hayley was apparently a doll while she was being baby-sat.

We met my mom for dinner at the Kenbridge landmark, Mildred’s Meals, and Hayley was good for dinner, getting a little fussy at the end. We then polished off the busy weekend by watching my niece Ashley play T-ball. Hayley had been through about enough by that time, so she wasn’t really happy unless one of us was walking her.

So around 9:30pm, after feeding and changing the little princess, we set out for North Carolina. Almost as soon as she got into her car seat, Hayley started screaming her head off. It was her “I’m pissed off” scream. We drove for about 15 minutes, and stopped to take her out and hold her. She was happy as could be when we held her, but started screaming again when we put her back. Holly was in the back seat with her, but that didn’t help. We drove to the North Carolina rest area and stopped again, with the same results. As we pulled off again and she started screaming again, I turned on the dome light in the car. Things got quiet. After about five minutes, I whispered back to Holly “What’s she doing?” Holly replied “She’s asleep!” Sure enough, Hayley slept the rest of the trip, didn’t wake up when we put her in her crib at home, and we had to wake her up around 8am the next morning to eat. I don’t know if she was scared of the dark, just wanted to be able to see Mommy, or if it was all a coincidence, but I’ll have to remember that dome light trick.

Holly and Hayley made the trip through the rain into downtown Raleigh today. We met for lunch at that Raleigh institution, Big Ed’s - it was the first time Mommy and Baby have met me downtown for lunch.

Hayley was great during lunch - sitting in her carrier, playing with her toys, kicking her legs, and smiling at the passers-by. All of the wait staff who came by remarked as to what a good baby Hayley was.

We couldn’t agree more.

Preston and Trish have put up a website about Jacob. I highly recommend you check it out - it’s chock-full of pictures of cute babies.

I love playing with Photoshop.

We got our first laugh tonight!

I was downstairs playing with Hayley, in a pretty normal way. I’d have her stand on my stomach, then lift her up and drop her back down on my stomach, with appropriate crashing sound effects.

So she was having a grand old time, smiling and enjoying the fun, and after a while, she began laughing! Big old happy baby laughs. She kept it up for a good 5-10 minutes of playing before she began to get tired out.

You just want to grab that baby laugh and wrap it around you like an afghan. It was so wonderful to hear her so happy.

Let’s hope she keeps on laughing.

It’s been a fun first Father’s Day with Holly and Hayley today.

Hayley surprised us by sleeping nine hours straight last night. She went down around 11pm. We woke up around 8:30 this morning and realized that the baby hadn’t woken up yet! So Holly went and got her, and we were all thankful for the extra rest (especially Daddy, who spent the weekend moving furniture up in Virginia).

My present was a nice engraved picture frame that said “Happy Father’s Day / June 15, 2003″ on it. We took a picture of Hayley and I with the digital camera, printed it out, and it’s in the frame and headed for work with me tomorrow. Click the small version of the picture to your right to see it.

The day was fun - I alternated between geeking out (playing on the Mac, continuing my season with NHL 2003) and playing with Hayley. Holly cooked me some good food in honor of the occasion (sausage biscuits for breakfast, and steak, baked apples, fresh-from-the-garden stringbeans, and crab-stuffed mushrooms for dinner), and Hayley was a good little girl, aside from spitting up about 800 times tonight.

So my first Father’s Day is in the book, and I’m very glad to have such a wonderful wife and sweet daughter.

Surprise, surprise - a new video online. In this one, Hayley shows off how she can prop herself up in a semi-sitting position.

Enjoy!

The last in the series of new cousins arrived yesterday. Jacob Preston Warren was born in Richmond, 8 lbs, 3 oz, 20 1/4 inches long, and strawberry blond hair.

Congratulations to Preston and Trish!

Cousin Roll Call! Ashley, Ryan, Blake, Brenden, Kevin, Hayley, Lily, and Jacob!