official name change

isaac will no longer be called isaac alfred. he will now and forevermore be known as stinky gonzales. there are two key elements to his new name: 1) stinky. it has already been established that he has stinky man farts, and if he is anything like me that is never going to change. 2) gonzales. like my favorite looney tunes character, isaac has developed an incredible amount of speed lately. although he does not yell random spanish phrases like "andale, andale", he will make a mad dash at the drop of a sombrero. usually he goes for the things he is not supposed to have, like computer cords, digital cameras, and ninja stars. perhaps he is a little loco en la cabeza.



an aforementioned attempt to catch a video of him waving

a rude awakening

you know you are a dad when you wake up at 5:30am and within an hour you are dry heaving while cleaning up your son's poop from his baby einstein saucer. it had the consistency of lukewarm hot fudge, thick enough to ooze, but thin enough to run...right out the sides of his diaper. this is the second time in three days this has happened, and i am purchasing stock in diaper wipes this afternoon.

as an added bonus, a viral infection of unknown type and origin has assaulted him, bringing the twin blessings of a medium grade fever and overall discomfort. he tries really hard to be happy, but sometimes mid smile he breaks into this truly pathetic high pitched squealy whine as if to say, "i am sorry guys, i am just not making it." infant motrin helps keep the fever down, and running random errands keeps everyone a little more sane. yesterday we strolled around vons for a good 20 minutes while isaac explored the wonders of the frozen food section, loudly voicing his opinion and approval at random intervals.

he is learning to wave and to clap, and we are trying to capture video of both to post soon. in the mean time, i am going to try to scrub this smell off my hand.

keeping auntie up to date

isaac has been enjoying some new things...

isaac's new moves on his kickboard. it's become a favorite activity around the montgomery household.

he's not a real fan of 7up, but we loved that he kept going back for more.

E smalls

how do you know you were in high school during the mid 90's? when you take a picture of your son feeding himself and you think he looks like the late, great notorious b.i.g. i am not sure why, but this picture cracks me up, and totally makes me think that he is going to wave his hands in the air like he's a true player.

of course we will not raise him to be a true player, but a gentleman. he will hold doors open for the ladies, say please and thanks, and look people in the eye when he shakes their hand. oh, and he will challenge other dudes to a duel by slapping them in the face with his gloves.

apparently he is shaping up to be a gentleman of considerable size, as we learned today that he is currently in the 75th percentile for length, weight, and head size. he tipped the scales at just a couple ounces under 22 pounds, so he has more than tripled his birth weight by this the ninth month of his life. according to the pediatrician, he should be 6'2", 185 pounds when he is full grown, but we will give that one some time.


the teeth count is now up to at least two, and infant motrin has been a life saver here at the montgomery house. if you look hard in the above picture you can see two chompers on the bottom row. i know he has yogurt coming out of his nose and a filthy bib on, but it is the best teeth picture we got. while he is generally his happy self, he gets a little fussy at times, but night seems to be the worst. annie sits upstairs with him as i type, soothing him back to sleep.

his mobility is increasing all the time, by far the most entertaining part of this process is when he is on his hands and toes with his butt in the air, looking like he is assuming downward dog position. he can scoot pretty well, but he takes his sweet time getting there, dragging one leg underneath him like an anchor, often sitting back up just to look around.

he continues to charm people wherever he goes: grocery store, doctor's office, panera, etc. he is learning to wave goodbye, my new nickname for him is "stinky pete" cause of his stinky man farts, and he is so full of life and joy that sometimes i can't help but revel in how fun he is. now if i could just get him to call me big poppa.

auntie is going to be missed...big time

it's true, my auntie is on her way to nyc for the summer. mom and i were sad to let her go since we play with her almost everyday. mom promised auntie will be back in august and i can't wait.

auntie and i at chevy's.

auntie's last chevy's shift. now she's off to use that education she been paying for.

one last good bye bbq

my last day with auntie. see you in august!

a great mother's day

i am not a writer like my husband, but i had to take a moment to brag about what a fantastic man stew is. he spoiled me this past mother's day with a bbq lunch, a clean car, and my favorite... a clean house. does it get any better than that?

grauntie and isaac reading barbara's book.

the cards isaac picked out for grammy and grautie

grammy (my mom) and isaac

i've got the best mom in the whole world. she has always sacrificed for our family and made my sister and i feel like a top priority. it's been a real treat to watch her love my son the same way she has loved us. i am hoping one day i'll learn to be a mom like her.

treat your mother right

so isaac broke his first tooth today, and we were not even the ones to find out. some woman who annie knows ran into her at the forum which is a glorified strip mall here in carlsbad. while they were talking the woman innocently stuck her hand in his mouth (i still don't know why people think this is ok) and noticed he has a tooth on the lower jaw. it has caused isaac some overall discomfort and correlated fussiness lately, but he is a champ.

speaking of his champness, he did an amazing job at his hearing test on wednesday. his hearing aid mold will be ready in a couple weeks, and then we will test drive a couple different styles for a couple months each before purchasing our own. we are once again feeling inundated by support that we didn't ask for, like julie the nurse who moved us to the front of the line for this test so that isaac can hear more clearly as soon as possible.

tomorrow is mother's day, here is a good reminder from mr. t:

6 and a half hours and counting

staying hydrated for the marathon night

three words that should never be used in reference to a 9 month old child: intentional sleep deprivation. yet annie and i find ourselves in the midst of just that. isaac hasn't slept since 3pm, it is now 9:37, and bedtime isn't for nearly another hour. his wake up call comes at 4:30am, which means ours does as well.

you might wonder why we would subject ourselves to such treatment, and that would be a very legitimate question. tomorrow morning he goes in for his extended hearing test and hearing aid fitting. he must be sleep deprived and then sedated in order to be able to conduct the procedure. we are glad it is sooner rather than later, and we are also very glad that we got the 8:30 am appointment instead of the 11:30am one.

isaac is a freaking champ, still laughing and dancing along with annie as she does jazzercise in the kitchen to keep him entertained. if only she were wearing leg warmers and a leotard, but alas, those days are long gone.

funny developments

so lately isaac has been smiley as usual. no surprise there.

but he has also been doing some pretty unusual things in his sleep. the other night we checked in on him when we went to bed, and found him like this. he also has taken to sleeping on his side, holding on to the bars with his hand, always on his left.

he has also started to look like me a bit. no mustache, but the belly is there.

something has also been developing on his backside. the junk in his trunk makes getting out of the bumbo a little bit tougher these days.

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it is crazy, he seems to be doing new things almost every week now. when he is in his carseat, he will use his feet to bring something he has dropped back to his hands. when we go to take him out of his carseat, he hurriedly swims his arms out of the straps, so he can get on with the rest of his day. i am sure once he learns to crawl, we will have to be moving pretty quickly to keep up.

gray hair part two

i was joking around with my friend paul not to long ago about how i am going to start naming my gray hairs after stressful events in my life. one will be called "the time isaac nearly fell out of his swing b/c i turned my back for literally three seconds" (actually, truth be told, he did fall out, but annie caught him with her catlike reflexes), one will be called "the time i had a gun pointed at me by a peace officer b/c i tried to outrun him before pulling over" and a whole series of them will simply be entitled "third grade". wednesday another one was added to the list called "the day i found out isaac has permanent hearing loss".

it is a rather long story, all the details of which i probably couldn't get straight, but what it comes down to is that isaac is legally deaf in one ear. multiple hearing tests over the past several months have confirmed that hearing in both his ears is not quite what it should be, and this past week the doctors told us that they want to equip him with a hearing aid.

if you have ever seen him before, you might have noticed that both ears are pretty small, but that his right ear is even smaller than his left, like it never fully opened up. annie and i, in the tradition of finding nemo, have dubbed it his lucky ear. turns out this is more true than we initially realized.

normal hearing level is a 20, and hearing in his lucky ear is at a 35. essentially this means he cannot hear whispers, but he can hear regular voices. this is a much better prognosis than most people who have similar conditions. generally kids with microtia cannot hear anything, and many of them do not even have ear canals. the fact that isaac can hear out of that ear at all is amazing. his other ear is at an 85, and although the doctors are still unsure about exactly what he can hear in that ear, they know it is not much. within the next couple weeks they will do some extended testing and fit him for a hearing aid which he will probably wear in one form or another from here on out.

initially i was super frustrated with the news, actually i was just straight up pissed. i am pretty sure a few choice expletives were thrown the way of the technician who had told us that any hearing loss was partial and temporary, giving us what we now know is false hope about his condition. it was as though one of the few pieces of "good" news we have received about isaac's health had been snatched away from us before we really got to enjoy it.

but honestly, we still have more than enough good news. first of all we know that something is wrong with his hearing. it is quite conceivable that we could not have found out until much later, when it would have been of much greater detriment to his speech development. second, we have the resources to do something about it. the insurance company ain't much help b/c they don't have to be, but the technology that can help our son exists and is accessible to us. there are countless situations around the world in which this is not the case.

i am quickly realizing that part of me as a parent never wants my son to face difficulties. i want to protect him from harsh reality. i want him to remain like he was the morning of his cleft surgery: blissfully unaware of what was coming, smiling and thinking that the world was peaches and cream.

yet i know at some point in his life his ignorance will give way to awareness. some kid will make fun of his cleft, of his hearing aid, or of the fact that he has superman on his underpants. the burdens of discouragement and frustration that we as parents have been carrying for him will be placed squarely upon his shoulders. and my heart aches because of that.

but when i really think about it, who wants to raise a kid that never has anything bad happen to him? kids who get everything their way are absolute brats, just ask half the oc. trials can be transformative, they can be things that give you character, humility and compassion.

annie and i are trying to become the type of parents that help this happen for our son. in the process i often wonder: how do you balance legitimate grief and not letting your son feel too sorry for himself? i am not sure, but i am almost certain i will develop a few more gray hairs in looking for an answer to this question.