Tigers fan

Living in Ann Arbor, Erin and I have become pretty big Detroit Tigers fans over the last few years. Admittedly, we're bandwagon fans, but you can't argue that it's a lot of fun to get wrapped up in a local sports team when they unexpectedly do well, as the Tigers have the last 2 seasons.

In fact, the week Will was born, the Tigers defeated the New York Yankees to advance to the ALCS (American League Championship Series) - this was a monumental win for them, as they were the wildcard team and significant underdog. It was cool because the Yankees won the first game in the series (on October 3rd, we were miserable in the hospital but I saw parts of the game), then Will was born on the morning of the 4th and the Tigers won 7 straight games to go to the World Series for the first time in some 20 years. I thought we had given birth to the ultimate sports good-luck charm, but then the Tigers promptly got whupped by the St. Louis Cardinals (Uncle Jeff's and Aunt Jenna's team) in the World Series. In fact, I specifically remember that this picture was taken while we were watching the whooping.

Anyway, Will seems to have taken to his forced-upon team as well as any infant who doesn't have any concept of what a sport is. We watch the 'Taaah-grs' (which Will pronounces 'dadas') whenever they have a night game (which start at 7) for the half hour before we start getting Will ready for bed. Erin got me a Detroit cap for my birthday which Will likes to play with so we took a few pictures here. We might be able to pull these out sometime in the future so Will can prove he was a Tigers fan 'since he was a baby'.

To be honest, if you were here for when these pictures were taken, you'd see that actually what's happening is I put the cap on his head and would try to get the picture before he pulled it off, which he would pretty much immediately do.

no ice cream for Will

This is more of a public service announcement than a fun blog post, but this is probably the best place to let lots of people know about things like this.

Erin took Will to the Allergist this morning to do 3 hours worth of allergen testing. The results aren't completely in - they're still doing tests on a blood sample - but we know this much for sure so far:

Will has a strong allergy to cow's milk. Strong to the point that they had us get EpiPens to keep around the house in case he gets exposed to it. We pretty much figured he had this allergy, as he would throw up and get a rash any time we gave him even the smallest amount of dairy - like a bite of macaroni & cheese or one small spoonful from a Dairy Queen blizzard. This could be particularly painful in the future since he can't eat any Wisconsin cheese curds when we go to visit grandma & grandpa or enjoy blue moon ice cream with his dad. Also, as Erin found out over the weekend, Will also can't eat butter, which in case anyone out there didn't know, is a dairy product made from cow's milk.

He also has mild/moderate allergies to eggs and wheat. So that means he can occasionally have foods which contain those ingredients (like pretty much almost all breads), but we shouldn't enter him in any hard-boiled egg eating contests.

Also the doctor thought there was a good chance that Will already has some kind of seasonal allergies but they couldn't be sure of that until he gets older for some reason.

tooth update: brushin' it

I decided we'll try to keep everyone updated with Will's tooth progress. I would say at this point it's probably sticking up a good couple millimeters. He still doesn't appear to have any obvious pain from it, and it hasn't changed his desire to put everything he can grab into his mouth.



So since he has teeth (tooth) now we brush them before bed each night. He usually likes it, just something else to stick in his mouth I guess. His little toothbrush is very cute. There's usually a song that goes with this that Erin sings ('brusha brusha brusha').

playing disc golf in the backyard

I am something of a disc golf nut, and I have taken Will with me to local courses many times. Will really seems to enjoy our trips and likes watching me make the sweet throws that I do. He also likes when the discs hit things and make noise, whether it's in the basket (where you're supposed to get the disc to, like the hole in regular golf) or a tree or other obstacle which I don't intend to hit. Last year Erin got me my own basket so I could practice throwing at it in the backyard, and I do fairly often. Since Will is now big enough to semi-entertain himself in the yard, sometimes he helps me practice. Usually this means he holds my discs until I throw them, but last weekend I taught him to throw the disc into the basket himself. Sort of. He got a kick out of it though so we got a quick video.

Will likes the dad-train

We go for a lot of walks, sometimes in the morning before I go to the lab. We usually have about 45 minutes between when Will has finished his breakfast and when he needs to go down for his morning nap, so that's our window of opportunity to walk with him. Usually toward the end of the walk, he starts getting sleepy and threatens to fall asleep in the stroller. This would be bad because then he would wake up from dozing in the stroller for just a few minutes, and think he had just taken his morning nap so he won't go back to sleep. This usually results in a grumpy boy, and deprives mom of her morning's 45 minutes of peace.

So one tactic to keep Will from falling asleep in the stroller is to pick him up and carry him and push the empty stroller. While he's pretty tolerant of being carried in the normal fashion, he REALLY likes it when I put him up on my shoulders like this. Or as I call it, 'riding the dad-train'. I can never see his face but Erin says he immediately gets a huge grin on his face and gets very excited.

We went for a morning walk a few days ago, and for whatever reason, it seemed like this was the first time that Will realized my face was on the other side of the back of my head. He is very familiar with the dad-train, but I'm not sure he ever entirely connected it to dad. Since making this new discovery, he tried very hard to lean over to see me, as you can see. Then he put his fingers in my mouth and nose like he always does, had a great time with it. When we got home he still was having fun on the train so we took a few quick pictures.

Will plays with his toys

We keep a basket full of Will's toys in the living room, and this is probably where we have Will spend the majority of his playing time. He knows where the basket is and will froggy-crawl to it and pull it out (often times onto his head, causing him to cry) if we put him down anywhere on the main floor of our house. His favorite toys are his piano and the ball-thing which is full of little plastic shapes. He likes to grab the shapes out of it and throw them, then cries for Erin or I to put them back in so he can do it again.


These pictures show the intense joy Will gets from playing with the ball-thing.


Look at these two lazy guys, layin' around after getting worn out from playing so hard.

A tooth!

Yesterday Erin discovered Will's first tooth is coming in! It's on the bottom in the front. You can't see it yet, but can definitely feel it, and his bottom gum is bruising so you can tell it's finally happening. He doesn't seem to be in any pain, nor is he any fussier or slobberier than normal, but he has been very slobbery for the last 6 months (his shirt always looks like this) so that's not saying much.