For he's a jolly good fellow ...

Today, the lad has reached the half-year mark. We reckon our main job is to keep the child alive and more or less intact ... so we take today as a notch in our belt. This is an amazing thing: Six more months and he won't even be a baby anymore. He'll be a toddler! As I (Gabe) thought about that today, I was a little surprised at the pang I felt. We just love him so much as he is this very minute, it's hard to imagine him as such a different person in 6 months or a year or 10 years. But, as I understand it, I don't have much say in the matter of his growing up ... so I am prepared to accept and enjoy it.

We celebrated his half-birthday with a grand excursion. We traveled up to Wisconsin to visit an old, dear friend of Ashley's and his phenomenal family. Pat and Sarah have two little boys: David (3) and Arthur (5). They are sweetness personified. And, they were really into Ezra. It's amazing to watch an adorable 3-year old look at your 6-month-old and say, "Ezwa's weawy cute!" That statement itself is a new category of cute. We had great fun eating, playing and Wii-ing.

Saturday Ash and I took Ezra out for his first cross-country ski, strapped to Daddy's back. He seemed to enjoy it thoroughly for a while, and then passed out. We had a great old time gliding around the woods. We had so much fun that we stopped in Madison on the way home today and skied some more.

In other news, we continue to make halting progress on sleep. On the positive side, putting him down at night has gotten so, so much easier. It is a blessing. And, he's finally starting to take naps at his nanny's, which is a huge relief. Babies are supposed to nap 3 - 3.5 hours a day. Most days at Najiba's, he wasn't napping at all, or maybe just a half-hour. That seems to be improving. On the not-so-positive side, we've had some difficult night wakings lately, and we're not seeing the kind of improvement there that we'd like. We're still slightly on-edge about the whole thing. But on the whole, it feels like progress.

We've also had some success with the rice cereal. Ezra is learning to swallow, and his, um, leavings have begun to reflect that. We haven't had him weighed in a while, but it feels like he's filling out.

Last weekend we spent a wonderful afternoon with the

Skokie cousins. Somehow, Ezra had not seen Cathy and Joe since his bris. We were pleased to imprint him with some more positive images of his cousins.

Oh, and Ezra watched part of his first Super Bowl tonight. I chose to flout the

recommendations of the American Academy of Pediatrics and allow the boy to take in a little boob tube. I don't think his mom approved. I think Ezra like the Bud Light commercials the best.

Gobs of love,

Gabe, Ash and Ez