Emory is six months old today. I can’t believe it’s been six months already! He’s such a big boy. He’s changed so much. Granted, we’ve changed as well, probably even more so than Emory.
Toby has definitely changed. When I married Toby, he couldn’t even mention the word poop let alone clean it off of another human being’s bare ass. It’s amazing what love can do.
If we had done things by the book, we’d celebrate today by giving Emory his first ever jar of solid food. But we started feeding him solids a little over a month ago. It was time. He was outgrowing the milk diet, not that we stopped giving him bottles we just added solid food to the menu to appease his already hearty appetite. We haven’t looked back.
The first time Emory ate baby food, he actually complained between every spoonful, which was really quite funny. If I had to guess what he was thinking it would have been, “DAMMIT WOMAN! WHY DO YOU KEEP REMOVING THIS ODDLY SHAPED, YET TASTY BOTTLE FROM MY MOUTH?!” The complaints have since stopped. Now he differentiates between spoon and bottle. He understands a lot more now, actually. It’s been a hard transition for me because I am used to raising cats who react more to smell and sound. You can hold up a can of tuna or cat food in front of our cats and usually they don’t lift a tail. But the moment you pull out the can opener and actually use it, all hell breaks lose.
Emory isn’t like that. He’s human and therefore understands what something is just by looking at it. I discovered this the hard way one night as I lifted the Bjorn from the floor (where it usually is) and put it in the closet (where it belongs). As soon as he saw it he began furiously kicking his feet and excitedly began yelling, “OOOOOOOH! AHHHHH! GAAAAAHHHH!! EEEKKKKK!” (Translated, that reads: “A WALK! WE’RE TAKING A WALK! I GET TO DANGLE! I WILL SEE LADIES AND HAIR!”) It’s kind of the way a dog acts whenever you grab their leash.
He now knows what a spoon is and that the spoon is going to come back to him holding more food. So instead of screaming between bites, he just waits for it with his mouth wide open much like a baby bird waits for its regurgitated worm.
At the time this post was written, he has eaten all of the following: carrots, pears, apples, bananas, sweet potatoes, peas, winter squash and whole grain rice cereal. He has loved every single last one of them. (For now.) He’s not freaked out by any of it. But we’re a little freaked out by the ever-changing poop.
The first time carrot poop made its grand entrance into the world Toby made a face like “Can we send this one back? It’s malfunctioning.” This happened recently. We were out at the Blackbird Parlor in Williamsburg having an early lunch. We sat right at the front of the restaurant, next to a great big picture window overlooking Bedford Avenue. I had just received a delectable grilled cheese sandwich. Right as I sunk my teeth into it, Emory decided to take a poop. There was no way anything was coming between the sandwich and me so I happily volunteered the car and nominated TobyJoe for diaper duty.
The car stood not 10 feet from the entrance to the Blackbird Parlor, in full site of me and my sandwich. It was like watching a really bizarre TV show on a high-definition flat screen television. This was the episode that Toby changed the baby’s diaper from the backseat of a Toyota while wrinkled-nosed hipsters walked by and I, the mother, sat safely behind a giant pane of glass and watched.
I hadn’t ever seen that many different expressions project from Toby’s face before. Each facial expression told me everything I needed to know. I didn’t need to smell the poop. I could tell from Toby’s face exactly what it smelled like. I didn’t need to see the poop. I could tell from Toby’s face it was shocking as far as poop goes. The passersby, mere extras in this episode, made faces as they stupidly looked over to see what my husband was doing to a baby in the back seat of a Toyota and I could tell by their expressions exactly what Toby was dealing with.
As I finished my sandwich and drained the rest of my cappuccino and my husband added the finishing touches to my baby’s bare butt, I had the overwhelming urge to cheer for him. Toby has come such a long way over the last 6 months and that is what we really should be celebrating today.
Mihow 
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