Archive for the 'What We've Learned' Category

What We’ve Learned: Month 18

Tuesday, February 23rd, 2010

“Book! Book!”
“Okay, Henry. One more book, but then you have to go to bed.”
“Brown Bear! Brown Bear!”
What? That was new.
When did he learn that? When did he learn those words? When did he start putting nouns and adjectives together?
That happened this evening right before he went to sleep, but it’s not so unusual. Kristen wrote [...]

What We’ve Learned: Month 17

Friday, January 22nd, 2010

On Wednesday, I flew out to New Jersey — to my company’s home office — for a planning session.
Now a significant part of my job is traveling, and each year I have to go on around 12 business trips. The bad thing about these trips is that it takes me away from Kristen and Henry. [...]

What We’ve Learned: Month 16

Tuesday, December 22nd, 2009

While Henry has a pretty robust vocabulary, if push came to shove, he could go through his days saying only three different words: up, open, and apple.
Up is, of course, the signal for one of us to pick him up. But it also means put me down. Or carry me over there. Or let me [...]

What We’ve Learned: Month 15

Monday, November 23rd, 2009

When I was 12 years old, I first read about the San Diego Comicon. The largest comic book convention in the nation, it was the mecca of comic book collectors, and for the past 25 years, I’ve wanted to go. I’ve dreamed of going. On several occasions I even made tentative plans.
For whatever reason — [...]

What We’ve Learned: Month 14

Saturday, October 24th, 2009

Only writing these “What We’ve Learned” posts once a month has gotten me out of my rhythm a bit, so this may take a bit to get into.
This has been a month of illness, of trips, of walking, of talking. It’s been a month of bad nights (those 4 wake-up nights still happen on occasion), [...]

What We’ve Learned: Month 13

Thursday, September 17th, 2009

Last Sunday, we all went to the Renegade Craft Fair. What is that, you ask? Well, it’s a craft fair where urban hipsters go to buy ironic t-shirts for $25 (and other handmade stuff, although all equally overpriced and ironic).
It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining, it was in the mid-70s, and we [...]

What We’ve Learned: Week 55

Thursday, September 10th, 2009

Henry has a sunny disposition. We all know this. His smile is proof.
The only time that he ever complains or gets a bit ornery is when a) he hungry (and can you blame him?) and b) when he’s tired. Those few minutes after his bath can get a bit difficult, with the diapering and the [...]

What We’ve Learned: Week 54

Thursday, September 3rd, 2009

I’m not much of a video game player any more. Before buying a Wii a year-and-a-half ago, the last system I owned was a Sega Genesis that I bought my senior year of college (lo many years ago), although I only owned one game (an ice hockey game that my best friend and I played [...]

What We’ve Learned: Week 53

Thursday, August 27th, 2009

At one point in my life, I was skinny. Tall, gangly, uncoordinated, friends in college lovingly called me a big piece of spaghetti.
(These were some of my best friends, too.)
While I’ve filled out quite a bit since then, I’m still pretty uncoordinated and still tall.
So what does this have to do with Henry? Well, on [...]

What We’ve Learned: Year 1

Friday, August 21st, 2009

This is going to be a sappy one today. Just a warning.
One year (and 10 hours) ago, Henry arrived into this world with all the fanfare that would accompany a boy of his impeccable lineage. There were trumpets blaring. They dimmed the lights for 5 seconds in the city of Chicago. The Queen of England [...]