By the way, we reported early last week that Simon didn't have much of an interest in balls; over the weekend his new favorite game became rolling a ball and chasing after it.

On a side note, Ofoto, where we regularly upload our photos, has changed its ways recently so that you must sign in to see anything larger than a thumbnail image. Signing in is free; sorry about the change.

Kidding. Simon has many books. Other current favorites include: Tails, Goodnight Moon, Moo Ba La La La, Where is Baby's Belly Button?, Where is Clifford?, and, of course, the book that can get him out of any funk: Baby Faces. He tolerates about six others and the rest get nothing but complaints. You might even make him cry if you try reading "Guess How Much I Love You."

Simon now nurses for 15 - 20 minutes at a time every two hours. When he has solid foods (lunch and dinner at this point), he can last up to three hours without nursing.

He is drinking a lot less milk during Mom's work hours (down from 22 ounces to about 15) but he makes up for it when she gets home.

Simon has yet to urinate on anyone but himself while his diaper is being changed. In fact, he has only urinated twice during a changing ever, both occurrences were in the same week and that week was in his first month. (We mention this because people make such a big deal about little boys and peeing.)

Simon is no longer scared of loud noises. He spent a couple of weeks in his fifth month terrified of the blender, the hair drier, the vacuum, etc. but now he thinks the hair dryer is super fun (it makes wind!); he still prefers not to be left of the floor while it is being vacuumed but he thinks the vacuum is super interesting.

The "cry it out" method has worked once again; at least until the next set of teeth arrive ... (Hava only fed him once last night, after eight hours of sleep, and he went right back down.)

We thought he was really interested in balls. It turns out he is interested in the Wiggly Giggly ball because it makes noise and the blue sparkly ball because it is, well, sparkly; all other balls need not apply.

We reported once that he loved bananas. Bananas are the ONLY food he won't touch; Simon's food policy is this: bring on the green, yellow and orange vegetables, I love fruit, give me rice or barley but keep your bananas to yourself ...pulllease!

Simon has always used disposable diapers and we don't even dry him after using wipes anymore and you know what? He's never had diaper rash.

Simon only fills a diaper with number two once or twice a day at this point. It is really, obnoxiously, potent but two potent poops is better than ten merely disgusting poops so we're loving it.

Simon still swims every Saturday and squeals with delight as he holds onto Mom's fingers and walks himself into the water. Hava dunks him a couple of times at each class and he doesn't seem to mind.

The Prius is coming! The Prius is coming! (But not for another month or two; we're somewhere between 67 and 77 on the list and they get 35 cars a month.) Hava did manage to get the car seat out of Matthew's car and install it without much suffering into her car last week. Putting it back in Matthew's car took lots of time, physical pain, and swearing like a sailor who is trying to crawl into the back of a Toyota Celica around a large car seat in the dark attempting to stuff a seat belt that won't untwist through a tube that is half the size of his hand.

On the mushy front, Simon has been crawling over to give Mom and Dad a nice hug and a kiss; only he can't pucker up so it is more like a hug and a wide-mouthed slime. It is very sweet if slightly gross.

Maybe you'll just have to trust us that it was freaky. Guess what? Simon is paying attention.

In any case, we and our little talker got bundled up and went to the library. The class was an hour long and there were 21 other babies. At one point, the librarian asked everyone to lay their baby on their backs for a few songs and people did and their babies STAYED! We looked at each other in utter amazement. Apparently Simon is a little, uh, more rambunctious than the other 3 to 12 month olds. We literally have to pin the top half of his body down to change his diaper and it takes both of us to get his clothes on in the morning because he just ... won't ... sit ... still. He hasn't been still on his back since he learned to roll over. So instead of laying down and instead of calmly bouncing on Mama or Dada's knees like the librarian asked, Simon bounced on his feet through most of the song and story portion of the class and Dad threw him up in the air a few times for good measure.

When that part of the class was over and the librarian brought out a colorful sheet for the floor and lots of toys for the babies to play with, the adults laughed as Simon darted into the center of the room, plopped himself down in the center of the sheet and merrily started chewing on toys. He was joined by an 11 month old boy and then the less-eager babies started slowly to move forward. It was fascinating to see them all squished together chewing and grabbing seemingly oblivious that there were other babies nearby. OK so Simon did attempt to use one little girl's head to help him stand and that didn't go over so well.

Last night, during one of his awakenings (of which there were MANY - one every one-to-two hours), Simon put Dad's finger in his mouth (on his newest tooth), bit down, said "ahhhhh", and (quite literally) fell back asleep. It seems to take these teeth about two days to break through the gum so we figure we can expect at least another 37 nights of sleeplessness in the coming months.

Yesterday Simon started talking back; try to get him to say "mamama" or "papapa" or "dadada" and he says (in a very determined voice) "ah bababa!". He means: "that's not mamama! that's AH BABABA!" (only everything is ah bababa); Simon knows best (OK, not really but we'll humor him for the time being because he's cute and we're tired).

Last night the bumper in Simon's crib was removed permanently for the third time which may have contributed to his 10 pm, 11 pm, and 11:30 pm nightmares. Then again Mom had nightmares as well so maybe it was just something they ate.

Perhaps it is time to make a HUGE admission ... this may be difficult ... if you're one of Simon's grandparents you may want to sit down ... OK ... Simon is not perfect. (I think I just heard Grandma Wee gasp all the way from NY.) Yes, it is true. Simon's slight defect seems to be that he is not the best sleeper in the world. A few of you may have already picked up on this. We're working on it but admitting that he has a slight imperfection makes things easier on all of us. No?

Now, in his defense, it does seem that he is in the midst of changing schedules from three one-hour naps to two one-and-a-half hour naps and he is getting teeth. This new nap development is pretty darn exciting for those of us trying to get some TV watching, I mean important work, done while he is off in la la land.

By the way, want to make the little boy laugh? Look up to the sky and then startle him by saying "BOO" really loud in his face; it's hysterical. Dad giving Simon the evil eye is also funny as is hearing adults bark like a dog. We don't really get the jokes but, hey, whatever works.

1. He cried while standing in his crib last night but got down gracefully and fell asleep on his own.
2. He slept for nine hours straight, woke up for a snack, went back into the crib without any fuss and slept an additional two hours.
3. When he hears the bath running he often excitedly crawls from his room, through the hall, into the bathroom. Last night he pulled himself up on the tub and actually tried to scale the tub wall to get into the bath on his own. We snapped some shots of his naked backside attempting to figure out how to scale a tub wall.

Ferberization is already working (thank goodness). In the event that anyone ever searches for "standing in crib" "can't get down" "cry it out" and finds this page, those people should know that we have discovered that letting him cry for about 15 minutes before laying him back down, singing him a song and rubbing his back seems to do the trick. We were only letting him cry for 6 minutes at a time and that didn't work (made him angry and us frustrated). Of course, we had more than one 15 minute crying session on the first night ...

Tastes of a seven month old (aka Simon's favorites):

Favorite toy: "Susan" the plastic goldfish (given to him by the staff at the Hotel Monaco in Seattle)
Favorite food: peaches
Favorite song: "Funk Soul Brother" (by Fat Boy Slim)
Favorite activity: standing & "cruising"
Favorite part of anyone else's body: toes
Favorite part of his body: fingers
Favorite book: Baby Faces
Favorite movie: Microsoft 3-D flower box screen saver