4 months old

Oscar had his 4 month birthday on December 11th, and we celebrated it with a trip to the doctor for a bunch of shots and some measurements.  The vaccinations went fine - he was definitely more scared than hurt by the shots.  As we suspected, Oscar's rocketing himself right along the growth chart and the stats back up everyone statement of "oh my, he's a big dude":

• weight: 16 lbs 11 oz (76th percentile)
• height: 26 1/4 inches (91st percentile)
• head circumference: 17.25 inches (97th percentile)

Oscar is a vocal little guy who loves to test the range of his voice.  His teachers at school often comment on his squeals of delight while playing with favorite toys.  He's also smacking his lips and starting to make consonant noises.  There's even been a couple incidents of "ma-ma", but I know he doesn't mean it yet.

He's starting to roll, too.  Twice I've seen him on his stomach and, with no warning, just push himself onto his back.  And then he's always doing this pretzel side-roll thing which I'm told is a precursor to back-to-front rolling.  Probably a few more weeks and I'll be all "um, where's Oscar? oh, he rolled himself to another room".  Time to buy a baby gate for the top of the stairs.

Oscar is also showing some genuine interest in books.  When we sit down to read, he starts grunting and throwing his arms about excitedly.  His favorites are "I Am a Bunny" and "Aliens Wear Underpants". Oscar even turns the pages so he can see what's next.  When asked "Where is Nicholas?", the main character in "I Am a Bunny", Oscar looks directly at the bunny on the page; it's fascinating to see what he already understands.

Finally, Oscar has begun the glorious journey of teething.  According to his teacher Priscilla (a woman with decades of childcare experience) he's got something like 6 teeth all coming in at once. Needless to say, this makes Oscar pretty cranky some days.  Sometimes he's so worked up he can't sleep unless he's being held.  Thank god for babywearing dealios like this one:

asleep while being rocked

We continue to drag Oscar around to all kinds of parties and political events ... holiday parties, birthday parties, political organization launch parties, dinner parties.  The kid is a party animal!  Jason finally got to show off his baby at his office holiday party, after 4 months they were probably starting to think Jason was making up this whole fatherhood thing.

Oscar helps launch Better Boulder,
a new political organization in town

We also try to make sure Oscar gets in at least one good adventure every weekend.  Two weeks ago we went skiing with Oscar in his trailer, on a short outing near the house on the Shanahan Ridge trails, so we could check out our equipment.  As expected, when you have 50# of kid and trailer attached to your back, the downhills feel like a freight train and the uphills are tiring. Thank you Oscar for getting us in shape this winter! Little O was a champ in his Patagonia snowsuit and blankets, slept on the uphills but woke up on the rocking downs.  We learned valuable lessons - always bring along snowshoes, so that you can walk the trailer out if needed... which I got to do at the end of the day.

The following weekend, we did a bicycle urban assault with Oscar in the bike trailer and us on townie bikes.  We hauled Oscar around on the paths and stopped by the Cruiser Boutique to see our friend Ryan and check out all the super amazing bikes one can buy to haul around kids and groceries. Jason's already picked out a bike seat for Oscar, for when he can wear a helmet and sit in front of his dad on the handlebars and go mountain biking.  :) Unfortunately we were having so much fun that we forgot to take pictures, oh well, better luck next time.