The Fine Game of Nil

Liam’s hair has gotten quite long, and Alex and I have frequent discussions over when it will be time to cut it… It usually involves Alex saying, “he has a mullet, we have to get his hair cut” and me saying “he looks bald, we’re not cutting his hair”. (As a side note, we finally did cut his hair about two weeks ago. I cut it for him, because I couldn’t justify paying someone to snip just a little bit off. I’ll post pictures of that soon. also, I know he doesn’t look bald, but his hair is so blond and fine that it doesn’t really seem like he has that much). Here are a few pictures to demonstrate the hair situation.

Also, here I am about 7 months pregnant

The final two pictures are of Liam over two days when he was sick with a pretty high fever. He was quite lethargic, and just kind of passing out all over the place. He actually fell asleep on Alex about half an hour before his bedtime, which is very unusual for him. He had chosen his outfits (note the trucks and sharks), and they clearly don’t fit anymore

A few weeks back, we took the train out to Codman Farms in Lincoln, MA. It’s calving/lambing season, and we had heard that they had lots of baby animals to see (lambs, calves, piglets, kids (goats), etc). They are conveniently located less than half a mile from the train stop, so instead of renting a car, we got to ride the train. Liam is really turning into such a typical boy. He loves to see cars, trucks, buses, trains, etc. When he sees a bus, he moves his hands around in a circle, the motion for singing “the Wheels on the Bus”. There might not be anything cuter than a little boy waving his hand and saying “beep, beep, beep”.

So, we took the train out and walked over to the farm. There we were told to feel free to walk around and look at whatever we wanted.

Hard to see, but the piglets are in the background

He was afraid of the turkeys, which I can understand. They’re as big or bigger than he is, and just funny looking. Plus, there were a lot of them and they were clucking and carrying on

Cows? We’re much more comfortable with cows. We know they saw “mooooo”

Inside one of the barns was this old toy horse

Then we went to see the baby goats

Some action shots

Oh yeah, Liam also loves tractors

We had a great time, and it was nice to support a local farm.

Working slowly to get caught up, next in our traveling was a trip to Seattle to see Grandma and Grandpa and the Aunts. It is surprising to realize that his aunts Sara and Jenny have only met him once, and that was in February of 2008, so over a year ago. He was just figuring out rolling over then. He’s a completely different baby at this point. Aunt Anne had come out to Boston in June, 2008 to help watch Liam while Alex was in Crete and I had to work. Then we tried to meet up in St. Louis in November, but something came up and she wasn’t able to meet us there.

The most unusual thing about the trip was that it snowed almost every day we were in Seattle. Seattle doesn’t get a lot of snow as it is, and for it to snow so many days, especially in March, is not normal.

Our friend Shawna and her boyfriend Scott drove up from Portland, OR, to visit us over the weekend. Scott has family in Seattle as well, so they didn’t drive all that way just for us. It was really nice to spend a little time with them, even if it was just a few hours.

Liam and Aunt Jenny, and the cat, on the stairs. This is another cat that was less than interested in Liam. Our cats at home just tolerate him, although he seems to be slowly making friends with our black and white cat (Maus). The orange cat (Abby) still runs away immediately.

We met our friend Colin for lunch one day. He was busy studying for his midterms (his in his first year of medical school at University of Washington) so didn’t have a lot of free time. We had lunch, then went over to the Science Museum. We decided not to go in because it was actually sunny and a little warm, so we walked around near the space needle for a bit, then said our goodbyes.

Liam and Mama at lunch

Liam and Colin

Just hanging out on Grandpa’s lap

Sitting with Aunt Sara

A little out of focus, but sitting with Aunt Anne

We spent a lot of time playing the Wii Fit game, because we were fairly housebound due to weather…. Liam seemed to enjoy watching, and even tried to climb up on the fit board with me a few times

Here is a series of pictures of all the things a toddler can ride while shopping at the outlet mall

All too soon, it was time to say good night and good bye to everyone

a kiss for Jenny

and grandpa

and grandma

Working slowly to get caught up, next in our traveling was a trip to Seattle to see Grandma and Grandpa and the Aunts. It is surprising to realize that his aunts Sara and Jenny have only met him once, and that was in February of 2008, so over a year ago. He was just figuring out rolling over then. He’s a completely different baby at this point. Aunt Anne had come out to Boston in June, 2008 to help watch Liam while Alex was in Crete and I had to work. Then we tried to meet up in St. Louis in November, but something came up and she wasn’t able to meet us there.

The most unusual thing about the trip was that it snowed almost every day we were in Seattle. Seattle doesn’t get a lot of snow as it is, and for it to snow so many days, especially in March, is not normal.

Our friend Shawna and her boyfriend Scott drove up from Portland, OR, to visit us over the weekend. Scott has family in Seattle as well, so they didn’t drive all that way just for us. It was really nice to spend a little time with them, even if it was just a few hours.

Liam and Aunt Jenny, and the cat, on the stairs. This is another cat that was less than interested in Liam. Our cats at home just tolerate him, although he seems to be slowly making friends with our black and white cat (Maus). The orange cat (Abby) still runs away immediately.

We met our friend Colin for lunch one day. He was busy studying for his midterms (his in his first year of medical school at University of Washington) so didn’t have a lot of free time. We had lunch, then went over to the Science Museum. We decided not to go in because it was actually sunny and a little warm, so we walked around near the space needle for a bit, then said our goodbyes.

Liam and Mama at lunch

Liam and Colin

Just hanging out on Grandpa’s lap

Back at the end of January, we made a surprise trip to Nevada, MO, to see Alex’s dad for his birthday. He didn’t know we were coming, or that a surprise birthday party was being thrown for him at a friend’s house. It had been a few months since Bruce and Barb had seen Liam, and 9 months since they had been able to spend any appreciable amount of time with him. (We saw them for a few hours when we visited St. Louis in November 2008, but the last time they saw him for more than a few hours was April 2008.)

One of the nice things about the trip is that Cousin Rachel goes to school about half an hour away from the KC airport. She was nice enough to drive down to meet us for lunch before we drove to Nevada. This was Rachel’s first time meeting Liam, and my first time seeing Rachel in probably two years.

On the way to Nevada, we stopped to visit what Alex reports is (or was) the world’s biggest crane. Or maybe it was just MO’s biggest crane.

This is just a warm up:

Yeah, that’s pretty big

Liam was a big hit at the party, running around among various different people and making friends with all of them. He was his usual, personable self, which was nice because he had had a really long day with the flying and driving, and it would not have been surprising for him to be in a less social mood.

The candles read “lost count”

Back at the Nevada House, Liam learned to enjoy smoothies for breakfast

The one day that the weather accommodated us, we took Liam out to Radio Springs Park, which has a nice playground, and lots of room to run/walk around.

Liam tries to step onto the ice. Daddy is there to rescue him

Playing back at the house

There are some really cute videos of Liam playing the piano. I will have to have Alex post them, because I don’t know how to do that.

All I can say about this photo is, I was not involved in this project

Getting home to Boston with all our luggage was quite an adventure. We are definitely pros at using our strollers as work horses!

But we made it

Wow, we are behind on updating this blog! Liam continues to grow and develop every day. He is talking more and more, which is a relief to me, as I was worried he was a little behind in his speech. He can now say: mama, dada, me (pointing to himself), ball, dog, turtle (tur-tul), baby, eye, ear, nose, mouth, teeth, shoe, truck, choo choo, moo, woof, and roar like a lion. I’m sure I’m forgetting some things he can say, and he surprises us everyday with more things.(But, he is very well developed in his motor skills, jumping at a two year old level already!). Oh, I just remembered, he has started saying “baboo” which we think might be baboon, but we’re not sure. He also says thank you (than ou), good job (goo ja), and bye bye.

We have recently done a lot of traveling and visiting with people (trip to Missouri in January, trip to NH in February, trip to Seattle in March, and I went to LA in March for Naama’s babyshower), and over the next few days we will hopefully get lots of those pictures up for everyone to see.

But first, I think we never got around to making the official announcement on here, though most readers should know by now, Liam is due to be a BIG BROTHER in June! That’s right, we’re having another baby! This pregnancy has been flying by, probably because Liam keeps us so busy we don’t have much time to focus on it. Still, things have been going very well, and baby Holman #2 (we don’t know the gender) is doing well and is kicking up a storm in Mama’s belly. Liam doesn’t quite understand what it means, but he knows that there’s a baby in mama’s belly and he points to my belly button and kisses it. He also says “baby” which is very cute.

Okay, now, here are a some pictures from our trip to Loon Mountain in New Hampshire. Our friend Shelley flew in from North Carolina, and our other friend Emily B. drove up from Providence Rhode Island and we spent a weekend at Shelley’s family’s condo. I obviously couldn’t ski, but still had a great time.

Looking like a Gap ad!

Intently reading, even though it is upside down

Taking his doggie for a walk. Luckily the owners of the condo have children, so there were toys for Liam to play with.

Liam was a big fan of this Tube

Liam can beg food as well as, or better, than this dog!

Breakfast being made after a hard night!