Tom and Sally

I’ve long thought (well, for at least the last 11 months) that Tom and Sally share the same profile. While not exactly the same, it is nice to look at. I think Tommy and Sally like each other.

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Tom Swims, reads, and more

On Friday, Sally and I packed up the dogs, the cat, and Tom and headed for Houston for a weekend with Katie and Dale. Tom does good in the car, rarely cries or moans… we think so anyways, as we wouldn’t really know given the volume of the radio. We usually listen to podcast versions of This American Life, it makes the time fly.

In Houston, we enjoyed a lovely weekend of relaxation and laziness. Drinks by the pool, followed by a dip in the pool. Tom squealed with delight as I spun him round and round in the pool. On Saturday evening we went to the Grand Lux Cafe to celebrate Katie’s birthday. Katie and I kept Tom happy by feeding him star shaped baby cereal. Dinner was great. Sunday was much like Saturday, but with an inching conclusion that we would need to go home at some point.

On Saturday, I spent some time making another video… while Katie did some photography. Here’s some of our work:

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Sally pulls a tommy face

Tonight, after hanging out with our family, Uncle Larry mentioned how sometimes Tom gives him a disdainful look that reminds him of the look Sally gives when she’s not amused. Katie and Dale sent us this photo and we think he may be right. 

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The Marine Crawl

Tom’s been working at this for sometime, but now he has finally gotten the hang of it and is moving fast towards crawling, walking and running. First thing we realized was that the most interesting thing he could find was the dog bowls. Oh, and if you have your speakers on, you can hear what has happened to this old marine as he has turned from a salty-leatherneck to a dorky-dad.

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The writer strike is over…at lepard.org

There is lots of Tommy news to share with you all since the last post. Here is a quick wrap up of his last 4 months…

• Holiday in sunny San Diego, California + bonus trip to the zoo!
• A total of 5 baby teeth
• Holiday in Las Vegas, Nevada
• Long weekend at Granddaddy Lepard’s in Scottsdale, Arizona
• First accident report from school ;-(
• Marine crawl across the living room
• 2 mullet trims
• 2 ear infections + 3 visits to the Doctor
• First Easter egg hunt
• Visit from Grandma & Grandpa Johnson
• Hanging out with Uncle Shawn
• Trip to Houston to see Katie & Dale
• Becoming a regular at the new local pub, Nomad
• Eating real, human food
• Drinking from a sippy cup & the dog bowl
• Told ‘No’ for the first time

Seems as thought we have enough to write a novel, but since I only pay my writer only a warm home cooked meal every now and then, I guess I get what I pay for. Well, it’s a new month and now that I have started to cook again I am hoping I can get the writer back at it! There are lots of pictures, videos, and funny stories to come. In a few weeks, my lovely cousins from Albuquerque are coming to Austin to pay a visit. Come May, us Partard’s are heading down to the beaches of Padre with Trominski crew. July it’s wedding time in Albuquerque for my little sister Brittany, and loads of birthday parties!

For now, all I can give you is this little rant, and few photos… until next time!

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Two front teeth

   The night before we took Tom on his first flight I discovered his first tooth. The next morning there were two of them. I’m excited to announce that they are growing in crooked-nothing wrong with wearing your British heritage with pride!!

For your enjoyment: British smug Tom and British Boarding School Tom:

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Rambling Update

Again, I’ve gone far too long without updating the site. So here is a quick recap of the past couple of months taken from notes that I jot down for when I finally get around to updating the site:He is eating everything put in front of him—apples, pears, bananas, sweet potato, carrots, green beans, peas, peaches. I’ve gotten over gagging when he gets it all over his face—no need to worry there will not be any photos of Tom with food smashed all over his fisog. He opens his mouth when he wants another bite and he likes to take the spoon away from us and do it himself. I started off saying please and thank you with every spoonful to try and indoctrinate him with some manners but that got old really fast. Sierra, Krystal, and Jennifer have somehow trained him to giggle like a maniac every time one of them says “meat”. After steering clear of McDonalds for over 20 years, I see Happy Meals in my future. Other things that make him laugh include: looking at himself in the middle, being bounced up and down, playing airplane, watching anything being thrown up and down, and Trish.
On the weekends, we set up the house like a mini-fitness training circuit. He sure does like to bounce and kick around a lot but he gets frustrated with crawling. He can spin like around like a cast-member of Breakin’ 2-Electric Boogaloo and is a master of scooting backward but the efficient forward crawl seems to be an effort.
He’s taking a lot more interest in the dogs lately—follows them around and if they are play-fighting, he’ll even stop eating to check them out. So I’m thinking he’ll be a vet or organize dog fights for a living.
On the rare occasion that he does get cranky, he still calms down to the tune of “My Bonnie” with the words changed to “My Tommy”. We’re a bit sick of it, but it works.

Here he is with his Christmas booty:

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OK, OK, I’m a bad parent…

…not because I laughed at how loud Tom cried this morning after getting four shots, or because I added to the misery by banging his head on the car door as we were leaving the doctors, or even because I proceeded to drop him off at day care so I could go shopping in peace. No, I’m a bad parent because I have not updated this website in almost two months–and a lot has happened in two months. My grandma visited from England and my Aunty visited from New Zealand. We had a brilliant Thanksgiving here at the house with US and UK representation. Grandpa Larry stopped by for a short, but fun visit, and we’re about to embark on our holiday travels to see family and friends in Dallas and Oklahoma before heading home for Christmas Day.

The latest “Question of the Week” is ’so, what’s Tom doing now?’ To which, the honest answer is ‘not a lot’. But, to new parents, every little thing is worthy of a News at Ten broadcast. We are lucky to have a son who sleeps from 8pm until we wake him up 7am. He entertains us around 6 am with a hearty round of cooing and babbling to himself before dozing off again. He goes to sleep smiling and wakes up grinning. This month he has started to laugh out loud and roll over. He’s soooo much more interesting than his first two months on earth.  During the day, he is looked after by Donna and Deanna at daycare. They spoil him but I’m also confident that they’ll take no messing if he was ever to be too naughty.

Here’s a collection of photos-I’ll get Chris to post more soon. Enjoy!

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Here comes Halloween

A mini-cold front hit Austin last week. This meant we were able to get Tom dressed up in some warm clothes that we thought he would grow out of before having a chance to wear. He’s massive. Here he is ready for school:

Last Wednesday, Trish and Sandy hosted a neighborhood pumpkin party. The local firemen showed up to entertain the kids. Tom didn’t seem too bothered, but Michael, a friend from work, was pushing youngsters out of the way so that he could get inside the truck:

Tonight, Trish and Sandy came over and I carved my first pumpkin. We had visions of taking photos of Tom surrounded by all of our carving efforts, but he got bored and went to bed before we’d carved a single one. No worries. We had a couple of glasses of limoncello and set to work. Tomorrow, we’ll have a photo shoot, but for now, here’s my first attempt at pumpkin-carving:

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Back to work

Trish took this photo of Tom–I think it is my new favourite.

This week was my first official week back at work. I had to attend a meeting in San Antonio. There was so much to catch up on and issues to gossip about and problems to solve that I was kept really busy-this helped with being away from Tom for the first time.

As soon as I got back to Austin, I picked him up from daycare and double-checked the squiggle I’d made on the small of his back with a magic marker–I’ve seen too many situation comedies where the goldfish (or the budgie, or the hamster) meets a tragic demise when the owner is out of town. To the amusement of the audience, the designated guardian frantically rushes around to find an exact copy before the owner’s return. Not that I don’t trust Chris or Uncle Larry or the Ginger Queen, but you can’t be too careful about these things.

We spent the afternoon hanging with Trish and Sandy on their back lawn before heading over to David and the Ginger Queen’s for a cook-out. As grandparents may be reading this entry, I won’t linger over the fact that Ollie, the French Bulldog, was desperate to get his jaws around Tom’s ears. Although I guess a one-eared baby would mean that I wouldn’t have to bother with the magic marker squiggle when I go to Corpus Christi next week. Surely there aren’t that many one-eared replacement babies available in Austin? Don’t worry grandparents! Ollie’s a fickle doggie and he soon got tired of sniffing around Tom and decided to get fresh with Chris Lepard’s hairy arm instead.

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