Bloggogriff

This is a picture of some of Owen's socks. Can you tell me what is odd about them? That's right. They all have little rubber bits on the soles. To keep him from, um, slipping and falling when he runs around. Uh-huh. Here's a nice photo of Eric and Owen together.

Owen is one month old today! We can hardly believe it. It has been a truly amazing thirty days. Alas, I don't have the energy to write much more than that, because I've come down with a cold. Let's hope Owen doesn't start his second month with his first bout of illness.

Owen had his first trip to the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market today. Now I think we can say he is a real San Franciscan. As you might guess from Owen's fetching fleece jacket (with bear ears!), it was cold today.

Everything looked great at the doctor's office today! Owen is now 22 1/2" long, 10 lbs 3 oz. That puts him at the 90th percentile for height and 75th for weight for one-month-olds. AND he won't actually be one month old until next Thursday.

Owen is getting too big for some of his newborn clothes already. Apparently "0-3 mos." should really be called "0-3 wks." In this picture you can see some of the things that are now too small for him. The blue Winnie-the-Pooh jammies at the left were his going-home outfit (cue mommy sniffing and wiping eyes). And the little white socks with the Emory University crest were too small on the day he was born. I had the opportunity to arrange the clothing for a photo shoot because Owen's Grammy has arrived. Here she is on rocking chair duty!

Owen can almost get his hands into his mouth. This evening he was doing quite a good job of getting my finger there if I put it in his grasp. He can just about get his own hand up to his lips, but he can't quite figure out how to hold onto it or get it inside his mouth once it's there. Helping hands...aren't here yet. We were under the impression that my MIL was arriving today. We found out this morning that actually we were mistaken and she won't be here until Monday. D'oh.

I am so proud to be a part of California today!!! News release from the Judicial Council of California: S an Francisco — The California Supreme Court today held that the California legislative and initiative measures limiting marriage to opposite-sex couples violate the state constitutional rights of same-sex couples and may not be used to preclude same-sex couples from marrying. (In re Marriage Cases, S147999.) The court concluded that permitting opposite-sex couples to marry while affording same-sex couples access only to the novel and less-recognized status of domestic partnership improperly infringes a same-sex couple’s constitutional rights to marry and to the equal protection of the laws as guaranteed by the California Constitution. The decision directs state officials who supervise the enforcement of the state’s marriage laws to ensure that local officials comply with the court’s ruling and permit same-sex couples to marry. The decision becomes final in 30 days unless th...

Today we took Owen to visit Eric's lab. He dazzled everyone with his total adorableness. He also had a poopsplosion on Eric, as you can see here. (More photos from the visit to the lab on Flickr.)

Owen has been here for two weeks already! So far his major talents are eating, sleeping, and pooping. 1. Eating - It takes Owen about 15-20 minutes to finish a meal. That doesn't include the time it takes to wake him up at least once in the middle (a diaper or clothing change to get him going again). So far he has managed breast, bottle, and pacifier with no sign of the dreaded "nipple confusion." He is getting pretty accomplished in spitting up afterwards as well. 2. Sleeping - I know I'm jinxing myself just by mentioning it, but so far Owen is a fantastic sleeper. His eat-wake-sleep cycles average about 4 hours during the day, and he's been doing a five or six hour stretch every night. At least half the time he just goes straight back to sleep after he eats. Eric and I both crave the "awake time" but it usually lasts ten minutes at the most, unless Owen gets the hiccups. 3. Pooping - The last two days, he has managed to produce gigantic poopsplosions ...

Yesterday we took Owen for his very first just-for-fun outing. It was a very short walk around the Mission Bay quad. He slept through most of it. I had a wonderful first Mother's Day! And now I am going to brag about all the great things my family did for me: What I got from Eric: 1. Bouquet of roses 2. Breakfast of bagels and lox, which I had been fantasizing about for months (smoked salmon is a preggo no-no, just like Brie). 3. Two cards, one from Eric and one "from Owen." 4. After our walk around the quad, he took Owen with him while he got a haircut so that I could sleep for an hour-plus with no baby in the apartment to subconsciously listen for. 5. Foot rub with salt scrub and peppermint oil lotion. 6. Appointment for a massage at the health club. What I got from Owen: He slept from 8:30 p.m. to 2:30 a.m. and from 3:30 a.m. until...well, it's 8:20 and he hasn't woken up yet this morning. (ETA - he woke up at 8:30.)

How Owen came into the world, from his mommy's perspective... Although my medical file used the date of May 2 that was predicted by the six-week ultrasound, my due date as calculated from my last period was April 29, 2008. Around 8 p.m. on April 28, I started having Braxton-Hicks contractions that were stronger and more frequent than any that I had had before. That’s not saying much, because they had always been very weak and never more than three in a day. Now they were occurring at intervals of about fifteen to forty minutes and felt like menstrual cramps. Eric and I had a very nice dinner of salmon, asparagus, and baked sweet potatoes and joked about the possibility that it was our “last meal.” I went to bed around 10:30 but couldn’t sleep; every time I was almost out, another little contraction would wake me up. I started my usual insomnia/illness routine (make up a bed on the couch, watch Lord of the Rings DVD extras on low volume), and spent the next few hours dozing very li...

Technically he's only 11 days old, but we had our two-week checkup with the pediatrician today. Owen is back up to 9 lbs 6.8 oz, nearly his birth weight and well above where he was expected to be by now, and he has been officially cleared from wake-to-feed scheduling. (And there was MUCH rejoicing.)

As you can see from the pictures below, Owen was incredibly chilled out during his bath and nail trimming. His daddy did both of those jobs and also gave him a moisturizer rubdown, and baby seemed quite happy through the whole process.

I know that almost everyone who reads this blog has gotten the news already via email or phone, but here's the official announcement! Owen Michael Griffis arrived exactly a week ago - April 29 at 2:12 p.m. He was 9 lbs 8 oz at birth and 21.5 inches long. I will be writing up the birth story sometime in the next week or so. In the meantime, enjoy some pictures from his first week. More of them are available on the Flickr link. Owen and his mom - April 29, 2008 Owen and his dad - May 6 Owen and his grandma!