I realized the day before his four month birthday that Jonah already had two teeth! I figured that if he was going to have teeth already, he may as well start eating solids. Plus, I had to figure out a way to punish him for biting me while he’s nursing…and forcing him to eat nasty rice cereal seems like my only option.
What a cutie he is.
My birthday fell on a Saturday this year, and it was a fantastic day! We took full advantage of the perfect weather and hit the beach for a surprise party for a co-worker of mine. Here’s our family photo!
The Drennan Boys
Before the beach, we washed my car in the driveway. I think it was probably the fourth time it had been washed in five years. Linus “helped” by wrestling the hose the whole time.
Linus took unraveling the hose very seriously.
Then we left the kids with Maria and walked down to Abbot Kinney Blvd for some dinner and drinks. It was the perfect day!
This is from a few months ago, but I thought it was worth sharing. Prepare to be dazzled! (click the link–you’ll need QuickTime to view it)
We had a great July 4th. The weather was perfect, so we headed to the beach (along with every other person in Southern California). It was our first trip to the beach as a foursome, and now that we live a little closer, we walked there. It’s 0.7 miles from our new house. Awesome!
After the beach and naps, we played in the house for a while before heading up to the rooftop for fireworks. We had a 360 degree view of fireworks going off everywhere. Very cool.
Linus and Jonah=BFF’s
For those of you who don’t know already, Ryan and I have moved to a new house in Venice. It’s actually only about five blocks from our old place. When we found out our previous landlord hadn’t been paying the mortgage (we received a notice that the house was going to the auction block just three weeks away–and did I mention I was 38 weeks pregnant?), we immediately started looking for other places that would accommodate two adults, two children, and two large, annoying dogs. Luckily, we found a house that we LOVE. The dogs are very happy with this change even though they have a smaller yard than before because now we (and when I say “we”, I mean “Ryan”) are taking them for lots more walks around the ‘hood. Sometimes, when Ryan feels like walking 0.2mph, he takes Linus with him. Linus is not what I would call a “fast walker”. But we try to take him whenever we can because it’s good for him to learn that there is more to being a dog owner than yelling at them to stop barking.
The new house has an open layout downstairs that leads to a small outside deck. To Ryan’s dismay, this has lead to a total disregard of the no shoes inside policy, because Linus is constantly running back and forth between inside and outside.
Plus you can just run around and eat and the same time. Note that Linus prefers to move at a snail’s pace when walking the dogs, but during mealtime he runs.
Linus LOVES his baby brother. He helps us by consoling Jonah when he cries: “Don’t cry, Baby Jonah. It’s okay.” He also informs me of the reason for Jonah’s crying: “I think he hungry,” or “He tired. He need to go to sleep.” Or today he told me, “He want his mommy.” And then he gave Jonah his Toy Story doll, Woody. Now THAT is true love.
Here are some more pics of Jonah. For his 10 week check up, Jonah is almost 14 pounds and is 70% weight, 50% height. He also is in the bottom 2% for best hair, poor thing. He has patches of it just hanging around, ruining his chances of an infant modeling career. I came home from work yesterday and he looked huge to me. It’s so weird how that happens. He’s smiling a lot and getting interested in studying objects and his hands. He also seems to be adjusting just fine to our nanny, Maria, who I also really like, not only because she takes fantastic care of Jonah but also does laundry, tidies the house, and yesterday she washed and changed our bed sheets. YES!
He’s not quite as Buddha-ish as he appears here, but I think this one’s funny.
Studying Daddy
Such a sweetie.
Jonah Mock Drennan was born March 22, 2011 amongst the stars at Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles. He was a big boy–8lb 130z–so I guess I’m not too upset that I ended up with another c-section. And I won’t go on and on about how horrible labor is, but can I just say that those women who claim to love labor and childbirth are clearly psychotic.
As so many second children before him, Jonah doesn’t stand a chance of competing with his older sibling in terms of the number of photos taken. If I had to estimate the ratio of infant Linus photos versus infant Jonah photos, I would put it at approximately 396:3, or for those of you who think you’re really smart (read: everyone in the Allen family, who unfortunately are the only people reading this), 132:1.
So, I will do my best to dig up some Jonah photos. They’re not great, but I guess they’re better than nothing (?):
Here’s our family portrait at the hospital. Tired, anyone?
Linus really loves his little brother, or “Baby Jonah,” as he calls him. I think this started from his cousin being called “Baby Judson” while we were visiting DC. He hasn’t paid him much attention, but when he does he is very sweet.
Here we are at the park when Jonah was a little over three weeks old. I would like for everyone to know that my roots are supposed to be showing. It’s called hombre style highlights and some very fashionable movie stars have similar ‘do’s. And, I have since been to the salon and I now look much better. So you can just save your snarky comments.
Baba came to stay with us for three whole weeks. It was kind of like…oh, I dunno…dying and going to heaven? Yes, that’s exactly what it was like. I’ve never been to heaven but I’m pretty sure that Baba lives there and takes care of your every need.
Just over a month old
Here is he is Charleston in Marie’s Moses basket. Jonah is happiest when completely engulfed in blankets or being held (or preferably both).
This is my attempt to distract you from the fact that I haven’t posted in almost a year. More to come…(sorry, this will be the only mustache photo)
We heard there was a marathon going past our house, so we decided to walk over there and cheer people on while we digested our Krispy Kremes donuts. Actually, I don’t remember if we went to Krispy Kreme that particular morning, but considering it was a Saturday and I was pregnant…I think the odds are pretty good.
I don’t have a lot (any) of experience with marathons, but apparently the race organizers set up various forms of entertainment for the runners. Of course, the path through Venice featured a bikini-clad fire juggler. I don’t know if it was planned or just ironic, but she happened to be performing steps from a fire station. Oh yes, and there was some very strange techno music blaring too. Anyway, Linus was smitten with this freakshow.
On a sidenote, despite Linus’s attire, it was actually in the 70′s. But hey, if he wants to wear a thick sweatshirt and wool hat, fine with me.
