A late update (and a new theme)

So I cannot keep my word and write every week. But it is only because I had crazy few weeks. (Oh, yeah, I decided to go with a darker theme for my blog - just to keep it nice and black)

Work-wise I am back to work, back to experiments and science. And I finally got to present a group meeting. Some might say "big deal", but it is a big deal. In our group we get to give a group meeting about once every six months (and even then it is really flexible). I gave my first meeting after 8 months in the group. During the group meeting you present all you have done (and plan to do) to the boss and this is the only time he really hears about your project. Usually the boss, and some of his minions, try to find weak spots in the project and once a weak spot has been exposed then they sink their teeth and start tearing the raw flesh. Luckily for me - this group meeting was more of a material science and material/electrical engineering meeting, therefore no one is able to shake me and expose weak spots in my knowledge of these subjects. I gave a 1.5 hour presentation that was very satisfactory. Now I have six more months until the next time I need to report to the boss (unless I decide it's time to publish an article, and then I have to make sure the boss knows that).

But the main interest is, of course, on our personal life and not my professional life. CJ has been growing fast. We can see changes in him and his behavior almost every day. He finally stopped ignoring the world around him and he studies with great interest anything that appears in front of his eyes. He is loosing his hair fast (he was born with a head full of hair, but he prefers to look more like his dad, bold). Also, in the last couple of days he started smiling at me and the MRS, not a smile out of a deep sleep, like he has done before, but a genuine smile directed at that face in his field of vision.
The only thing is that he sleeps whenever HE wants and not when we want him to sleep. By now I know what 4AM looks like pretty well (that's my feeding shift) and we go to sleep at 10PM just to make sure we get our 6 hours of sleep.
But sleeping is not the only thing - I cannot understand why he cannot tell us what's wrong!! He cries when he is hungry, he cries when his stomach aches, he cries when he wants a pacifier, he cries when he wants to go to sleep, he cries when he needs to burp. Why can't he just tell us what the problem is? or, at least, have a different cry for each of the different cases!

Well, we found out that raising a child is a full time job. Now we are trying to juggle that and our previous life. Good luck to us.

A boy was born

So, for those of you who asked themselves 'where did he disappear to?' and couldn't put 1+1 together - the MRS. gave birth two weeks ago.

The story of CJ's birth (his real name will come up soon) is a long one. The MRS. got the first contractions right after SHAVUOT, and for the next 30 some hours she had contractions, however, they were not close enough and we were told not to come to the hospital.

After more than 30 hours (two full nights actually), we were told we can come and check in at the hospital, by then the MRS was in active labor and she was admitted. The contractions kept on going, and after more than 40 hours since the first contraction hit, the MRS finally cracked and asked for drugs to lessen the pain (I have to admit - she was much more enduring and powerful than I expected!!). The boy decided to wait until another day will change on the calendar, and right after midnight on the 22nd of May he came out.

We decided (or rather the MRS decided and I agreed) to call him Ely. Now, just to make sure you pronounce it correctly - ILAY or EE-lie, not Eli or Ellie or any other pronunciation!! For some reason non-americans have a problem with this spelling.

Anyway, we left the hospital 36 hour after Ely's birth and we started our home adventure with feeding, sleepless nights, diapers full of $#%@ and all the fun stuff of being a parent.

But actually it is a lot of fun. The boy grows every day, and becomes more responsive and demanding. He loves to eat, he hates to lay still, he has mixed feelings about baths and he is totally opposed for being nude (even for a very quick diaper change). When he gets mad or upset he waves his fists in the air and screams from the top of his lungs. He is really opinionated even at the early age of two weeks.

That's it for now, there are so many new things happening all at once, but (for me) the most interesting is my child. I will save other stories to when I return to a more orderly life, when I sleep better and when I can get my mind on anything else.

Oh, yes, we have decided not to share pictures of CJ (I think I'll keep this nickname for him) on the blog/facebook/the internet. So if you really know me and you want to see a picture of CJ, just send me an email and I'll send you some.

That's it, the boy is crying, which means "leave everything and tend to me, and only me". So I'm off...