This is a cross-post from my other website, KurtisFranklin.com, where I detail my work on a 1950 Willys Jeep. A decidedly different project than this. 

Turns out having a kid not only takes a lot of the time I used to have, but also the money that would be necessary for me to continue working on Ike.

That’s not to say it’s been without Jeep-related fun. In fact, today marked the start of a new Jeep project. No, it won’t take the place of Ike, but it will let me have a little Jeep fun while also passing the torch to Hayden.

What could I possibly be going on and on about? Well, here’s the start of the new project:

Yeah, it’s a little …. different than my normal projects. It’s got a LONG way to go. First things first, I had to tear the whole thing down. Part of this felt very much like my tear down of Ike. I will say though that the screws were FAR less rusted and in need of brute force than the 1950’s version.

There was quite a bit of muck, grime, mud, grass, and what I can only hope was anything but animal poop. After disassembly, the first step was the initial wash. It looks better than it did, but there’s still a lot of work that needs to be done.

I’ve got some big plans for this little Jeep. It’s not quite the same as Ike, but it’ll do for now.

As we near the end of Hayden’s first year, I’ve started to have these little surreal moments with him. Little things have been making a big impact on me lately. I can’t tell if this is one of those instances where I’m longing for him to stay little forever, or if the little discoveries he makes every day are a promising look into the future that I will enjoy with him, but I can say I just can’t stop smiling just thinking about it. I’ve said before that his personality is beginning to take shape, and that certainly holds true this month.

One of the greatest little things he’s been doing lately is his insatiable need to be a little daredevil. Whether it’s crawling over his mom or I laying on the floor, going out of his way to crawl over the lower end-table supports, or attempting to climb any amounts of people, dogs, or toys to get to something just out of his reach, the more heart-stopping for his mother, the more inclined he is to attempt it. One of the most fun parts of this, at least for me, is the look he gets on his face right when he decides to attempt something daring. Usually it begins with him sizing up the obstacle, sitting back and catching the eye of myself or Kim, usually just out of the corner of his eye, and then a wry smile as he leaps into action. And when I say leap, I mean he really jumps from that sitting position as far forward as he can.

The other great thing he’s been doing lately is more in-depth problem solving and discovery. Watching him with water is especially entertaining. During the bath, which is one of his favorite activities, he’ll attempt to figure out what the soap bubbles are and attempt to pop all of them in the bath. While he’s never been successful at getting rid of all of them, he certainly gets me plenty wet in the process, which seems to make him just as happy if he were to be successful. Add to that the strange origin of the water (aka bathtub faucet) and his seeming inability to grab streams as they slip through his fingers, and you’ve got a good picture of what bath time looks like for us. I think I’m pretty excited about watching him continue to discover the world around him 🙂

Crazy Stats:

• Milk consumed: 5.5 gallons
• Diapers Changed: 244
• Food consumed: 34.1 cups

There have been very few moments over the course of the last 10 months where I’ve really been able to pause and have one of those “I guess I’m a father now” moments. There’s been little instances where I’ve been with other parents and the conversation turns to topics that include stool consistency, Bubble Guppies, sleep patterns, and milestones. All topics that I never would have thought I’d be earnestly participating in, but that sneak up on you as the kid gets older.

Recently though, and likely due to the holidays, it’s hit me just a little bit more that I have a little person that is completely dependent on me. Last year at Christmas we were still thinking about and preparing for a kid that was still months away. Instead of thinking about how little sleep we might be getting once he was here, I now have this little man that crawls and stands and walks and drools everywhere. While I still occasionally wish he wasn’t quite so mobile and that I could leave him in the center of the room without worrying about my laptop falling off the couch, I just love seeing the sense of amazement and accomplishment in his eyes.

His individuality is a bittersweet inevitability. All you have to do is look around our house at the growing collection of various gates, walls, and increasingly barren surfaces that are about three feet and below to see just what I mean. I’ve joked that you need an engineering degree to get around our house, and that’s not far from the truth. We even had to migrate our Christmas tree from its placement of the last 7 years (which has now been re-established as a play area for Hayden) to the living room. This means that in order to keep curious hands away from the lights, ornaments, and presents, a large fence has been erected around the Christmas tree. In a way, it looks a bit like the tree has been incarcerated rather than protected.

So between the Great Wall of Baby being installed around the house, the more barren lower surfaces, and the ever increasing splay of blocks and toys about the room, we’ve fully settled in to having a kid. A lot has changed since the days of putting finishing touches on the nursery and attending a baby care class. The terror of “are we even ready for a kid” has quickly turned into “what did we even do all day before we had a kid?” and I’m just fine with that.

There are a few things that everyone tells you shortly after telling people that you are having kids. They tell you about the sleepless nights, the early mornings, and the joys of baby proofing a house. Sometimes, as a parent, you get lucky on a few of these items. In our case, we’ve got a kid that loves to sleep at night, and given the chance will sleep in long enough some mornings that we wake up on our own and wait for him to come around. Baby proofing so far has been a very different experience for us. Don’t get me wrong, we knew that we had maintained a less than baby friendly environment, but I was at least expecting that baby proofing would have been more gradual.

For instance, we thought he’d start rolling around well before we ever got to a crawl. That would bring with it the job of containing the little bug to a safe-to-roll area. Next would be crawling attempts at the end of the rolls, and again we’d expand out our baby proofing to accommodate. Finally, more ernest crawling would take place, and overall containment and crawl-height items would be of concern such as power outlets. Later, hopefully much later, would be walking (and falling) that we’d have to contend with.

In our case, rolling was never his thing, and his early crawling was more of spinning on his stomach with very little horizontal movement. This meant that when he finally started crawling he went from not crawling on a Thursday, to crawling in short bursts on a Friday, and by that Sunday the dogs were running to keep away. It’s one thing to have a baby that goes from not crawling to crawling everywhere over a short period of time, but it’s a very different case when Amazon can’t get your items to you fast enough to contain the little speed demon. This also means that we didn’t get to slowly build up our defenses, and instead had to scramble to keep him out of trouble.

Even worse than that, he’s trying to get to the walking stages well before we could possibly be ready for that. I’m sure many kids would avoid certain large obstacles put in their paths, but instead Hayden uses them to pull himself up into a full stand. Add to that his insanely refined sense of balance and growing confidence, and you end up with a kid that causes us to be both simultaneously extremely proud and entirely terrified at the same time.

Crazy Stats:

• Milk consumed: 5.98 gallons
• Diapers Changed: 268
• Food consumed: 31.9 cups

What happens when you’ve got two parents that tend towards being a perfectionist before trying something new in a public way? You end up with a kid that will do all of the mechanical pieces of crawling in smaller bits without actually putting them together. This has pretty much described Hayden’s “attempts” at crawling up until this point. He would rock on all fours, he would drag his feet while attempting to “walk” his hands forward, he’d faceplant while pushing his legs in a crawling motion; all the bits and pieces required for crawling, just not all at once. Then, just recently, he decided it was time for all the parts to come together. He went from not crawling at all, to tormenting the dogs by always being right behind them.

On top of tormenting the dogs, this little guy just loves to laugh. If I were a stand-up comic, he’d be a great audience member. With a variety of physical and vocal cues, he finds me absolutely hilarious. On top of that, his laugh is so infectious that it’s nearly impossible not for me to laugh, which causes even more laughter to ensue. It seems every month I think that it would be great if he could stay this age forever, and then each additional month that passes I decided that now is the perfect age for him. I can’t believe that my little boy is growing up so quickly, and I just wish I could hit pause, at least for a little bit.

Crazy Stats:

• Milk consumed: 5.97 gallons
• Diapers Changed: 264
• Food consumed: 12 cups

Time sure has flown by. I remember sitting down with Human Resources at work when figuring out what my paternity leave was going to look like and figuring out that Hayden would be just about 7 months old when both his mother and I would be back to work. Now, we are both back to work, and we’ve got a rambunctious 7 month old that we just can’t seem to get enough of.

In the last few weeks, he’s becoming far more expressive. Being bored, tired, or frustrated are all starting to get slightly differentiated. Excitement and happiness also have different levels now; sometimes he gets so excited he can’t contain it and starts bouncing up and down with what can only be described as the biggest smile his little face can hold.

We are also continually surprised by how strong he is getting. There’s something about seeing a small baby, a small human being, that makes you initially think of fragility. But then, when he’s trying as hard as he can to resist a diaper change, you’re shocked that you’re not able to hold this little 18ish pound baby still.

That’s it for this month. We couldn’t be happier with our little man, and can’t wait to see what the next month holds.

Crazy Stats:

• Milk consumed: 6.16 gallons
• Diapers Changed: 267
• Food consumed: 17.67 cups

For all the major milestones and firsts in a child’s life, perhaps none of them are as big to a parent as the day of birth and the short time between then and the first birthday. But, between each of those two major milestones, are dozens of big milestones and for each of those dozens more minor events. For instance, the first night the kid sleeps through the night, or the shock of the parents’ when he suddenly can drink nearly twice the amount of milk in a bottle than he did the week before. And then there are the little things that are hardly milestones but make a parent proud.

Six months is a pretty major milestone. We’re just far enough past the newborn stages that much of the daily aspects of raising him no longer seem nearly as laborious. He’s far from independent, but at least a few times a day we’re able to give him a toy and he can keep himself occupied for a few minutes while we eat dinner or gather stuff for an outing. He’s also strong enough now that when you pick him up or are holding him, it’s far less of a chore since he’s able to assist in the process.

While most parents seem to wait until their child hits the 6 month mark to begin introducing food, we tend to be over achievers and decided to start trying food early. The little man was showing all the signs of being ready for solid foods early. His constant chomping while we were eating, not to mention his extreme interest in our food, were just a few of the initial signs that told us he was ready to start. Rather than start with sugary and processed “baby food” that is based on rice, we started on fruit, or more specifically the single greatest berry (at least to Californians): the avocado.

The first few attempts were real small amounts, only a few teaspoons, and I’m pretty sure more of it ended up on him then in him. His second food was pumpkin, and while I expected to have a bit of an uphill battle with the new food, it seemed the only thing that got him to eat pumpkin was if it was mixed with twice as much avocado as pumpkin. I’m sure we’ll have a few foods that require a little avocado comfort mixed in, but so far he’s taken to eating solid foods far better and faster than I anticipated. In fact, he is already to the point where he misses it if we aren’t able to give him some avocado because we are out. The next few foods we try and give him will hopefully lead us to some easier to carry with us foods, and we’ll begin ramping up how much food we give him.

It’s hard to believe that only 6 months ago we were in the hospital getting the news that he was coming early, and now all these months later, I couldn’t imagine what we did before he was here. I wouldn’t trade it for the world.

Crazy Stats:

• Milk consumed: 6.71 Gallons
• Diapers Changed: 265
• Solid food consumed: 1.7 cups