day of the dead with the newly living . . . really

hey oh!

oh, how life has changed . . . this weekend we had a halloween/day of the dead party with our new friends. really, they are new. newly made, newly met, barely used, untested, wonderful, perfect, and brand spanking new!

and their parents came too. here are some highlights - in addition to the teaser that brynn posted a bit earlier.

a bat, two pumpkins, a red pepper, a pea pod, and your neighborhood cat

what the heck is going on here? why is everyone flopping around? will you people look at the camera?

hey hey, watch your pumpkin stem there buddy! yo pepper, can you help a guy out?

proud poppas and a celebratory cigar!

love to you all!

jw

What is the deal with this holiday?

trick or treat

Happy Halloween!

and it's an innie

hey all,

big doings this week. micah man dropped his umbilical stub (technical term) - kind of looked like a raisin - and now has a big boy belly button. he is growing up so fast!

micah is a month old today and is still a fairly mellow fella. i think he knows his parents might be delicate and he is taking it easy on us. he is not taking it easy on "the girls" - he eats a ton! for the most part he doesn't fuss unless he is hungry and though this is quite often, the answer is never too far away.

with all this eating he sure is growing. i came home the other day to find Brynn looking at him with a bit of emotion in her eyes. i asked her what was up and she said, "he is just so big, he is growing so fast." before we know it our little fella will be a big fella.

we plan to celebrate and cherish every moment along the way.

lots of love!

jw

hey, what are you looking at?!?

Micah and some of his favorite things . . .

is it too early to start thinking college? Go U Bears!

i DO love my mom! she burps me, she feeds me, she wipes my butt, she loves me.

who wants a kiss?

ahhh, life is good!

hope everyone is terrific.

love from Maine.

jw, bw, and mw

Cousins!

Hey All -

Long time no nothing . . . sorry about that. This week has been my first full week back at work and I am negotiating a new balance. I am struck by how quickly the little guy has asserted himself. In a moment life is totally different. Now, you might be saying, duh! and you are right. This grand change isn't a surprise, but then at the same time it is.

It is fairly common to have someone tell you that you just don't know until you experience it, or you have to see for yourself, or some other variation of the same that suggests either you really do have to see for yourself or the person talking really doesn't feel like explaining it to you.

Well, having a kid is the most profound - you don't know until you know - experience I have ever had. My brother and sister in law have a wonderful and amazing linguist of a son named Will (see below) and several of our close friends have children, so naturally, in anticipation of Micah I thought, ya, sure, I know what it is going to be like. I have seen this.

Nope. I had no idea. Having a son is totally, unequivocally awesome. And, it is an absolute discovery of new riches, new balances, new questions, and new life management every day.

So, enough about me.

Last week Micah got to meet his cousin, William Edwin Wartman. Will is 20 months old and an amazing little boy who does a terrific impersonation of a parrot, plays a mean piano, and enjoys words like Monhegan.

Micah met Will and Will's parents, Dave and Katie, at Bowdoin Homecoming and then had them all over for a sleep over that night. Will took great care of Micah and will certainly lead him on terrific adventures and get him into all kinds of trouble - a great older cousin.

Thanks for checking in. I will try to step up my game and keep the posts coming a bit more frequently.

lots of love

jw

open air peeing

Micah had his two week check up on Friday and it went great!

Of course, the most important thing, and greatest highlight, is that he is perfectly healthy and doing everything he should be doing as a whopping two week old.

That said, the number two highlight was a real close second. As is the case with many medical appointments, Micah had to take his clothes and diaper off before things could begin. After we waited for a few minutes for Micah to do this he was still clothed so dad stepped in to assist. I took off his onesie - a cute plane, train, and automobile number (yes, "cute" is a much more frequent invader of my vocal patterns than ever before), removed his diaper, and announced him ready. The nurse stepped forward to measure him and do some other intake things. She proclaimed his cuteness and moved in for a closer look. Just as she leaned over his chiseled (envious) 21 inch body he started peeing all over the place. It was as if you could hear him exclaim, "Release the hounds!", and the hounds were his pee.

Rookie mistake . . .

The nurse was flustered. She recovered fine. Brynn chuckled. I was proud. I went for the fist bump, but Micah wasn't quite ready for the pound.

love to all.

jw

today

living with an infant is a constant lesson in perspective, privilege, love, appreciation and much more. today i find myself reflecting on the notion that in micah's world there isn't really day or night and there isn't a yesterday or a tomorrow. micah is in the present, and his present just flows.

what micah does so well that i think is hard for many of us is that he doesn't put his urges, needs, and wants off for a later date. there is no, "i will do that tomorrow" or " that can wait", instead there is "gimme that milk!" and there is "i'm pooping now" and there is no shame in taking a midday nap. i hope that as days turn to months, and months to years, micah will continue to go for what he wants and that we all might ask ourselves if our words and actions are truly reflective of what we want or if we are simply holding off for a day that may never come.

i hope your today is so full and wonderful that you haven't yet thought about tomorrow.

love you all.

jw

adventures . . .

sorry for the delay since my last post, Pop and Gigi came to visit this weekend, so I fell a bit behind on the blog.

hanging with Pop and Gigi!

it has been a gorgeous weekend here and the shining sun provided added motivation to get outside and introduce Micah to the world. we have gone on a few walks, cheered for our friend Paley at her homecoming soccer game, had brunch at Slates, and visited with our dog park friends. Micah's adventurous spirit is strong and his attention magnet is even stronger. he has met neighbors, fellow soccer enthusiasts, and curious passerbys - all without making a peep - his charm knows no limits.

hope you enjoy the photos and they hold you over until the next post.

as always thank you for reading and i hope you and yours are wonderful.

love - jw

bath time

(in the voice of Bruce Willis from Look Who's Talking)

bath, what's a bath? ahhh, i don't know what a bath is. in the water out of the water, soap here and there, can you really get soap THERE?!? What's the big fuss, last week I could breath in the water. Really, how many wash clothes do you need?

You people are making me nervous. Will someone hold my hand?

Ok, ok, let's get on with it. I'm ready now. No, no, no - you didn't tell me I had to get naked for this. HEY! Stop it with my diaper. I just made a huge mess in there and I am proud of it. Did you know I poop mustard seeds?

AHHHHH! Ok, well if that's how you are gonna play - take this . . .

Ya, that's right, I am peeing on you, HA! A little on you, a little on her, a little down there for Copley. That's what you call that weird looking squirrel, right?

Oh, oh, oh, now you are getting me wet. Will you hang on a minute? I do not know how I feel about this. Ahh, ooh, eee, that's nice, ooh more there, ya, I like the water in my hair . . . no not there, back to my hair, stop with the water down there, i said stop . . . it is COLD!

Are you done yet? You guys are slow, what are you nervous or something? Just get on with it.

Now hang on a minute, you didn't tell me it was going to end like this. I wasted a good pee back there. If I new it was going to end like this I would have been smiles the whole way. Will you just tell me what you want, I am tired of trying to interpret your sounds and smiles. Just tell me what's going on, will you? Cause, this is the good stuff. I mean I could do this all day.

Am I cute or what?

Yes, I know, my mom is awesome and beautiful, right, amazing too. Ok, ok , back to me. I mean look at me.

love,

micah (as interpreted and recorded by his dad)

Good Morning!

A great night last night. After a bit of a needy beginning (serious eating frenzy) to the night Micah finally fell asleep around midnight letting Mom sleep for about two hours while Dad flexed the quads up and down on the exercise ball over and over again. Good sleep for him and a good work out for me - it is clear that if I ever fall terribly out of shape Micah will make pay. He then woke for a feeding around 2 and then went back to sleep for three hours. . .yes!

Speaking of solid, Micah's poop is not solid, and nor should it be. No, it is "mustard seedy" - which, we are told, is exactly as it should be. One of the great wonders of this whole thing is the role of poop. It is fairly constant, roughly once every two hours, it is accompanied by terrifically explosive gas (one of our new parent friends likes to say that her babies - twins - tell great fart jokes - and they do), and most impressively they are the medical equivalent to a weeklong wellness check in the hospital. If the poop is doing what it should be doing then he is healthy, simple as that, no more questions needed. And this profound significance of a good poop is precisely why at roughly noon yesterday I ran up the stairs with great enthusiasm to exclaim to Brynn - "HE POOPED MUSTARD, HE POOPED MUSARD SEEDS!!!"

out little mustard maker (could be working one through in this photo)

love,

jw

I ran out to the grocery store today and this is what I found when I returned . . .

Grab your blanket and come on over. There is always room for one more. I think Copley is sniffing Micah's butt. That is an invitation to be friends in dog speak, right?

What a smile! Which one of us do you think is smiling because they are happy and which one is smiling because they just worked out a fart?

A terrific day today. We had our home visit from the hospital staff today and it went GREAT! Micah is in terrific health and is a serious eater. Brynn found a book that describes different infant eating styles and we are confident that Micah's approach fits the "Barricuda" style. . .ouch.

Every moment is a treasure.

love to all.

jw

home!

family outing! a short walk around the park (yes, he is in there). brynn is recovering really well. certain parts of her body are still trying to figure out what the heck just happened - while certain parts of my body are still screaming IMPOSSIBLE!

micah did great his first night at home. he is feeding really well. hard to turn that offer down. and, he slept in small waves most of last night culminating in a big finish of 3 hours of sleep in the baby burrito featured above. i think we did about 54 laps around the house while he slept and i stared intently and lovingly every step. he is just beautiful.

let us not forget that micah, as amazing as he is, is not the only bundle of cute and cuddly, in this house. for starters, i am here, and . . . there is copley too. copley is doing a great job of welcoming micah home. she likes to sniff around him, lick his head (we try to limit this one), and blame her farts on him (me too). she actually has a lot to gain by his being around. with micah here it is much more likely that someone is sitting on the couch ready for a dog to snuggle right in - and copley sure is a good snuggler. these two will be bust buds in no time.

we are absolutely loving our family - immediate and extended! thanks to everyone for the kind emails and notes. today we have had several of our neighbors come by with goodies and gifts. we feel very fortunate to have the support and love of so many.

love to you all!

jw

feet!

simply joyful

a day in the life of mr. micah is eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, eat, poop tar, sleep, make faces, eat, eat, eat, eat, . . .

a day in the life of micah's parents. did you see that? oh, look at that? what's he doing now? now? . . .

in the wake of a wildly complex and miraculous event such as the birth of a child we are reminded to celebrate, cherish, and rejoice in the simplest of things - life, each other, and love (and a good poop).

truly beautiful.

if you aren't sure of Micah's supporting cast. brynn's parents, Rand and Marcia - Grampie and Grammie, are in the photo with Brynn and my parents, Mike and Sue - Pop and Gigi, are admiring Micah in the other. And of course, there is the most beautiful pair of Brynn and Micah taking a little nap. What a gift!

love to all - jw

Micah Robin Wartman

WHOOO!

20 hours of love and little Micah is born. the woman's body is an absolutely amazing thing. how did this come from there?!? i am in total awe . . .

Brynn is amazing and is feeling great. Tired and sore, but the kind of tired and sore that you just can't beat.

Micah Robin is a celebration of Micah's two grandfathers. Micah is a variation of my dad's name, Mike, and Robin, is Brynn's dad's first name. Our little guy will carry on the tradition of amazing, kind, loving, caring, bald men.

Both sets of grandparents got to meet Micah today, which feels incredibly special. He has lots of fans and lots of love already.

thanks for reading - the real fun has begun!!!

love

jw (and bw and mw)