Archive: 2006
December 5, 2006
At fourteen months you can really start to see Finn turn into a little boy. He's eating real food now, runs pretty well, is no longer afraid of all men, and is really enjoying the company of other kids: especially his 5 year old cousin Jay. But how long is Finn we hear you ask?
Well he's one Handsome Pantsome Unit long. HP is a name Tom uses sometimes to denote the fact that the Ladies Love Finn J. He often has nice pants too. Finn's been having a lot of fun of late and you can check out his adventures involving turtles here and then here.
NB. This whole getting a photo with him standing up is more elusive than we first guessed.
November 5, 2006
Thirteen months into our three year lease, the Finn B30iTurbo continues to perform well despite it's many non-routine visits back to the dealership for minor fixes. He seems to keep getting gunk in his eyes and visits to the specialists have not provided any more ammo than drops (fun fun fun) and decongestants. Finn has also had all his routine maintainence with several rounds of shots. But how long is Finn we hear you ask?
Well he's one Tough Nut Unit long. Tough Nut refers to a t-shirt he has from the famed Mambo Surf company of Sydney. It is a phrase that really has come to personify Finn as he continuously proves to his mother than he is a boy. If you look closely at this picture, you can see his snarl.
October 5, 2006
One year old! Birthday boy agrees that time has flown...but we are prepared with the Fall look website and lots of new content. And to celebrate the fact that Finn walks now we move to a portrait shot...no more lying the floor. So how long is Finn we hear you ask?
Well he's one Year Old unit long. Official calculations at the National Institute of National Institues show that such a unit is 30.25 inches long (he's only 2 foot 6 ya know), 25 pounds (he lost weight) and his head is 48 centimeters in circumference. The ridiculousness of switching measurement formats mid sentence is brought to you by the American Medical Association. Lightweights.
In all categories he is above average. Well we knew that already didn't we.
He's also now allowed to eat anything except peanuts. Which means it's on for Froot Loops, chocolate cake, Tim Tams, Jello, Sorbet, Ice Cream and of course his favorite, Starbucks Apple Fritter. Though Starbucks states on the website that an Apple Fritter is 500 calories (is that a lot??), Finn has actually lost weight through a cunning use of not eating much and running around like a crazy man.
September 5, 2006
Eleven months old today. Taken moments before Tom ran out the door to catch a flight to Australia, Finn is so keen to walk that we tricked him to stay still for a moment through a cunning use of switching sides. He rolled a moment later, and we recognize this may be the last one of these we do lying down. So how long is Finn we hear you ask??
Well he's one Bubs unit long. Jenny calls him Bubs a lot which may or may not be related to the Homestar character of the same name (check it out, check it out, check it out). He seems to like it...he responds at least, and he's definitely always checking it out.
Note that he is concentrating with all his might, but also note that the toy of the month is the orange starry thing™. This comes from a toy which has other colored starry things, but his favorite by far is the orange one. He has taken to crawling with it (when not walking) in one hand around the house creating a distinctive scraping sound. You can hear him on approach....scraaaapeee, bang (other hand and knees), scraaaapeee, bang, scraaaapeee, bang...great for the new floors. Video can be seen here at the end of his day two of walking clip (13MB). Finn also has a penchant for dropping his toys from great heights to see what happens (always the scientist) which has turned our family room floor (as shown above) into a surface not unlike the surface of a golf ball. Hundreds of little dents. We'll be needing some carpet in there at some point.
Hard core fashion victims will notice that Finn is wearing white pants on the day AFTER Labor day. A big no-no.
August 5, 2006
At 10 months Finn discovered ball sports. He has 5 or so small hard balls which have widgets inside them that make noise and such, but he also has a few big bouncy ones. They sometimes even take him away from playing with the empty water bottles (plastic gallons) which are clearly his favorites. Finn quickly realized that holding a small ball in each hand at the same time meant he could not crawl. He'd just slide nowhere like a cyborg. With one ball in hand (as shown below) he'd go in circles. Oh well. He's pretty adept at catching, throwing and can even juggle 4 or 5 at a time. Well that's not true but we could see him one day taking up cricket baseball. So how long is Finn we hear you ask?
Well he's one Little Man unit long. This is what Tom calls him sometimes, because indeed at this point he is not really a baby, but rather (especially when he dresses up and heads out to the office) he is a smaller than full size male of the species. A little man with a little plan.
July 23, 2006
On the day of Tom's birthday, we take a moment to ask what Tom looked like at Finn's age.
Well he looked like this. He was in black and white and obviously had just put his fingers in a live power socket. Imagine those eyes being blue, that hair being blond, and it's not too far from young Finn. We'll see if we can get you something in color shortly.
July 5, 2006
A lot has happened in the last month for this newly minted 9 month old. He can now crawl at Nascar speeds and is on the other side of the house before you can say "Where the hell did Finn go??" Guppie is great about becoming the target of constant taunting. Finn will chase Guppie all over the neighborhood with the goal of pulling out her hair in giant orange clumps. He often succeeds.
Finn also now can pull himself up to stand next to something while holding on, including people, and is hence technically 'cruising'. Walking will be in a month or two no doubt. So how long is he we hear you ask?
Well he's one Linebacker unit long (though the fancy leg trick shown above imparts more soccer player or ice dancer). A kind older gentleman in a store once called him a linebacker and others have noticed his footballer type proportions. Up close, his legs especially show some heft.
Following this bullyish theme, reports are coming in of Finn and his main buddy Jeremy terrorizing the day care employees. They attack at the same time; again Finn concentrates on pulling out the hair, while Jeremy concentrates on pulling out their boobs. Wonder how this will manifest in their later lives.
June 5, 2006
Eight short months have come and gone and Finn has turned from a baby into a little man. He is now just starting to figure out the crawling thing (not quite there...give it a week) with his most likely first crawling target being the cat (Guppie El Gato). He has somewhat got down the moving backwards slide which always seems to put him in a corner, under a couch or at daycare under a crib. Finn is also now able to stand up if he holds on to something with both hands. He can't get to that point himself, but once there can hold on for quite a while. So the big question we hear you ask...how long is he?
Well he's one Chompy unit long, which when not wriggling or trying to eat the Black and Decker motorized tape measure is almost 28 inches long (23 pounds wide). Chompy refers to an incident which our lawyers have informed us will not be described on this internationally public website. Rather let's reiterate that Finn has one tooth and tell you that a small leg may or may not have been involved. Enough said? I think so. Finn actually has a few other teeth on the horizon and we can see them about to cut through. Good times, though drooling times. Unless of course, you are a small leg.
May 29, 2006
With Finn back on the nebulizer and with another cold he can not seem to shake, we must sadly confirm that he will not be going to Australia this year to Sam's wedding and in fact has cancelled all his air travel plans indefinitely. He will try to spend some time at a summery beach though, most likely at Ocean City, New Jersey where he has a vacation home. He will of course not fly there, but travel on his trusty steed, the Finn Mobile™.
May 20, 2006
Hard core fans know that Jenny's birthday is May 20th. This year this date also happen to coincide (thanks in great part to some sloppy German dock workers and a studious car salesman) with the delivery of the much anticipated Finn Mobile™.
Jenny loves the new car smell and was quite surprised to be able to spend the day learning the intricacies of iDrive and wagon etiquette. You can learn more about the car here.
May 10, 2006
Few people know that Finn's site has been a beta test for another site which has been in development since Finn was born. That new site launched today and can be found here. Finn and the two sites share the same dad.
There is actually a third site which shares the same code base, but if we told you where it was, we would have to kill you. We think Finn's Great Aunt Posie might know which site that is.
May 5, 2006
At seven months Finn has totally mastered the rollover and is starting to use it as a method of pre-crawling propulsion. He can do forwards and backwards now with ease. He's also sitting up by himself, which means he 'graduates' from his current daycare class, gets a certificate and moves on up to the next class of hard core infants. The next graduation is the one we look forward to as we get a price reduction as well as a Comcast corporate discount. Who knew!?!? So how long is Finn we hear you ask?
Well he's one Finnsterino unit long (pronounced Finn-stirrr-EEEEEE-no). Finnsterino refers to Moterino, which is Italian for a scooter (ciao!) and a name we coined an elderly waiter we had in Rome one night who had an interesting mode of acceleration between tables. Yes, we are mean people...but we tip well. For more on Motorino's click here.
April 15, 2006
As part of spring, we have revamped Finn's website to reflect the new season's colors. The winter greys have been replaced with a plethora of colorful new hues. Look to have updates every season or so, as the mood strikes.
April 12, 2006
Regular viewers may recall that parents of small children are instructed by law to dress said children in odd costumes for certain religious events. With Easter upon us, we were in need of a good Finn image for a card to go with the bucketload of Easter candy we were giving to the day care crew and we did not want to have to buy a bunny outfit to have Finn hurl/cry/sweat all over. The solution...a virtual bunny suit thanks to Finn's 6 inch high bunny toy and some brazen photoshopping.
Note how the ears come out of his cranium as well as the cute fluffy little arms. If you think you'd like to try a little Finn photoshopping, we will now open a contest for the best photoshopped Finn. Plenty of Finn images to choose from on this site. Go to town. The winner will receive an autographed copy of Finn's latest book "A Babies Guide to Motorcycle Maintenance".
April 5, 2006
At six months Finn is really powering along. He was measured for the first time at over 20 pounds which means it's time to upgrade to his new car seat. He also fits much better in the Zippy stroller now. He is able to roll over and also can almost sit up by himself, falling over after about 30 seconds. He's eating vegetables now and has even started in on bananas. So how long is he we hear you ask???
Well he's one Bubbydoob unit long. Bubbydoob is a name Jenny uses, and at some point we may make t-shirts with it. If you would like to preorder your very own Doobalicious Tee, click here.
March 29, 2006
Today was an interesting day. First up the latest on the Finnmobile. Or should I say the Ex-Finnmobile. After having been carefully prepared to Finn's exacting specifications by a team of Bavarian engineers, some north German hacks managed to total the car while putting it on the ship to America. Yes, you read that correctly. They wrote off a brand new car.
So our fine friends at Munich Home Base HQ, have immediately set forth to produce a Finnmobile better, faster and stronger than the first...and such a mobile shall be called Finnmobile 2: Son of Finnmobile™. To the naked eye, Finnmobile 2 will be exactly the same as the original, with the exception that it won't be quite so smashed up. Or underwater. Our curiosity demands pictures.
The second news of the day, was that the results from Finn's fancy x-ray "digital fluoroscopy" extravaganza last week reveal he has a mild form of a condition that does in fact somewhat constrict his airway at times...making it somewhat hard to breathe. The condition for those medical among us is Mild Distal Tracheo Malacia. Good news is that most kids grow out of it between 6 and 12 months. So he'll be fine, just sometimes he sounds like a tiger purring.
More news on that after we go back to visit with the awkwardly named Dr. King next month. Apparently, she has her own holiday.
March 27, 2006
Finn is now over 19 pounds. Start warming up those new car seats everybody. it's a new ball game at 20 pounds.
March 15, 2006
Finn went to see the specialist yesterday an A.I. Dupont Hospital and they gave him the the 'probably all clear' but he will have an x-ray to make sure and a follow up visit in a month.
The visual representation of Finn's eating habits has been updated to show the latest trends. Non-statisticians beware, but hard core fans note that now he rarely eats after 9pm or before 5am. Those who think the 5am feeding is self-serve are mistaken. You'll also note he is down to 5 or 6 bottles a day, much less than the 9 or 10 feedings he was doing earlier.
March 12, 2006
Finn's Contact page has now been launched, so please drop Finn a line and tell him what you think of his website or maybe even his fancy new sneakers. Finn sends out a special thanks to Nate for coding the php! Finn always has trouble with the php code.
March 5, 2006
Young Finn Blaxland has settled into his fifth month with cold in hand and an appointment to see a specialist at the Dupont Hospital for Children who Snot a Lot. Like all things in the state of Delaware it was named after and/or paid for by one of the many Dupont Chemical heirs. If it was not for them, Delaware would be REALLY scary.
With all this talk of Finn being sick, we don't want you to imagine Finn as a poor lifeless skeleton of a fellow with little left to offer the world. Rather, think of him as you might a happy go lucky rugby player ready to down a case of Guinness as much as the next lad while singing odes to his ole sweet marm.
In fact this month, Finn picked up the nickname of Bam Bam after his eager exploits on the saucer ripped off one of the accoutrements.
One Bam Bam Unit will not buy you as much as it used to in old money. It seems to us that Finn's growth has slowed as he adjusts to less bottles. He started to eat a little rice cereal from a spoon, holding his own water bottle and soon might start on fruits.
February 28, 2006
One of Finn's biggest fans (and there are many) is Madeline. Not known to do things half way, Princess Madeline has her own castle (good). That is...she has a castle cake (better). That is...castle cake with ice-cream cones on top and little princesses around the side (best). Happy birthday Princess Madeline!!
Man does Finn want a piece of that cake. Or at least a flavor of baby formula called "Princess Cake with Ice-Cream Cones Surprise".
Madeline's favorite page on this site is the animal page...so check it out!
February 20, 2006
Finn is very excited to learn that he is going to visit Australia for his first birthday (and his uncle's wedding). Finn hears that there are many friendly animals and great beaches there, and wonders if it is unreasonable to expect some sort of marsupial as a birthday gift. He remembers hearing something about this last time he was in Australia when he travelled in mommy's pouch.
He'll also get to meet all the relatives on the other end of that video chat thingy. A great Blaxland October fest all round.
Finn will be also visiting San Francisco to check out the cable cars and the Googleplex, as well as Los Angeles to visit with his agent...or maybe just hang out in Santa Monica and the O.C. (don't call it that).
Which brings us to the fact that try as they might, Finn's parents just can't seem to stop travelling. Some research was required to deduce that since they have been together they have been to:
- 2000 Rome & Tuscany
- 2001 Sydney
- 2002 Venice
- 2003 Germany, Austria, Italy, Switzerland, Atlanta
- 2004 Hawaii, Cleveland, upstate NY, Seattle
- 2005 LA & Australia
- 2006 [planned] California & Australia
...and that is excluding nearby city trips (NYC & DC) of which there have been many and business trips (also many). Finn hopes that they settle down soon and get used to the fact that all the best vacations can be had at the Jersey shore.
February 5, 2006
Today Finn celebrates his 4 month anniversary with a brand new jumping apparartus, the Jumperoo Deluxe...
Finn has lately been enjoying some indepedence thanks to a cool device Kate brought over just in case Finn liked it. It's a spring loaded jumping seat which hangs in a door frame and allows Finn to jump up and down like he was playing on a trampoline while happening to be dressed in a legless high chair. When first placed in it, he did not seem to know exactly what to do, but after a little time he realized he had vertical control of his body and amused himself with a huge ear to ear grin on his face.
We love the bouncy seat (name unknown...shown above) but the only place we could set it up was the doorway to the office at the other end of the house from where we usually hang out. So a trip was planned through the wintery rain to Toys R Us to check out other bouncy devices and after thorough in store testing (and some drooling we must admit on someone's part) Finn gave his big grin seal of approval to the Fisher Price Jumperoo Deluxe (pat. pending). We knew it was the one when we saw the kangaroo on the front and of course that it had the word Deluxe in it. We'll buy any crap that is 'Deluxe'.
The Jumperoo Deluxe comes with all the mod cons including toys on board as well as songs and sound effects which are generated after motion sensors detect some serious Jumperooing has been had. Now he can jump AND watch TV at the same time as he is in the family room and not in Stinky Hell Hole Siberia. He's been watching The Office lately (UK version...though he thinks the US version is ok too).
[Update] A documentary has been prepared on Finn and the Jumperoo, and can be seen in LARGE Quicktime format (160MB) or smaller Quicktime format (35MB).
Recently, with his music tastes being quite advanced and his spinning abilities on the saucer and sidecar-baby-walkman really taking off, Finn developed the nickname DJ Vomit.
An unusual call sign indeed, but quite apt for one who is so willing to bring up some lunch while breakin' the beats (see above).
As you can see in this picture, Finn rather likes the name DJ Vomit. He'll be going in for a check up Friday, but we can assume that his unofficial height at 25 inches (thanks for the trusty motorized Black & Decker tape measure Andrew!) and a weight of 18 pounds clearly puts him in danger of needing a new car seat (limit = 20 pounds) about 8 months too soon.
February 3, 2006
We have had some good times of late. In the last week (let it be noted that I am now jinxing it) Finn has started to sleep through the night...that is from about 9pm to 6am. Occasionally he wakes up around 3, but the improvement in his cold, the new manouver of sleeping on his tummy and simply getting older all seem to have factored in this development. We expect it to all go to hell when he starts teething.
Daycare at The Learning Experience™ has been a great improvement over the last venue. Since the location of the new place (just across the street from the mighty Weinstein Plumbing Supplies) is quite close to where Jenny works, she spends every lunch time with Finn and that seems to both keep the employees in line, and make Jenny and Finn much happier about the whole concept of daycare. Of course Friday was an exception when during a firedrill in which four babies were placed in a crib, covered with a blanket and wheeled outside, Finn was clocked by a clipboard dropped by one of the day care employees. Ice was applied to his forehead (note to self: Finn really does not like ice applied to his forehead) and Jenny was called to make sure that everything was OK and to sign the 'incident report'. They have been very apologetic and professional about the whole fiasco. On the plus side, it took them a whole five weeks to cut open his head...the last place managed that in two!!
January 24, 2006
As the snow comes down tonight we are coming up for air from more sickness, Finn Blaxland is still a little under the weather but battles on happily. Mostly just an enduring cough. He's back on the nebulizer which it turns out is just a fragrant form of SPEED.
Frequent Dr. checkups allow us to closely monitor his weight though (now at 17 pounds). He went from 40th percentile to 90th percentile to just plain first in the weight category. We are now moving him over to the 6-12 month clothes even though he is not even four months old yet. He should be slowing down a bit as his need for night-time feeds seems to have stopped (he still wakes up, just is not hungry). Here he can be seen performing a sleepy Push-Me-Pull-You.
With a little help from family, we have been able to do some minor home improving...the first since Finn was born. You may recall that he got the nice room, we got the stinky hell hole. So per his instructions, demolition has begun on a slight kitchen revamp which included bombastic removal of ye olde fake ceiling pillars and putting in new floor to ceiling cabinets to extend the kitchen into the wide hallway. New cabinets are not quite yet installed (Ikea ran out of parts) but are already being used which allowed us to clean up the front room and pretend to use it as a dining room.
This photo is really only impressive who have seen the room before. The faux table shown here is to test the size of the real table to come and in fact will act as the real table until a miracle occurs, and the real table is built. The pictures on the table are set to go into Finn's room. Fancy chairs...no? We have no idea where they come from...they just keep turning up (last count = 15 matching pistachio chairs from DWR).
January 18, 2006
We could not stop Finn from going car shopping again. For some reason he thinks there is only one car brand and after cruising their lot for a hour or so he decided upon this one.
Well not this exact one, but a custom built one that looks like this and has all the options he wants (bluetooth, iDrive, iPod connectivity). He loves the color...if Sparkling Graphite can merely be called a 'color'. This AWD wagon will do 155MPH before the govenor kicks in though since ours will never see the light of an Autobahn (or in the case of the car it replaces the 2AM glow of the Coliseum in Verona) it will probably never live the dream. [sigh] They hope to have it built and delivered by mid-April. For those of you wondering what kind of car this is, it's a Buick.
[PS. Station wagons are BACK!]
January 13, 2006
Many have asked for more clarification on the specific tunes of Finn's iPod playlist. Keeping up with his musical tastes is tough, so Finn has posted what may be the first in a series: an iTunes iMix called Finn's Select™. Now you can listen to some of the same tunes [iTunes link] while your mom gives you a bath.
Make sure to buy some of these tunes and get down...down town (satisfaction guarenteed or your money back).
January 5, 2006
Breaking in the new year, today Finn started as his new day care The Learning Experience (as opposed to the other option which was The Jimi Hendrix Experience). Those of you following closely realize that this makes him an official Ex-Duckling™. Jenny and Finn both quite liked the new place which bodes well. Jenny spent her corporate enforced hour lunch break with Finn as the new day care is close to her office and they both enjoyed that greatly (see Finn's bright eyes below). Let's hope that this place is a keeper.
Finn would have started Tuesday the 3rd, but he was still sick. He had been diagnosed with a type of bronchial pneumonia. Though he had it for three weeks he seemed to get through it better than most. You can see him here using his nebulizer which gave him a medicated mist to breathe [awwww...]
He's getting back to normal though of course his parents are still under the weather. We hope the new place will not be such a cause for sickness, though in the end daycare leads to more illness the first few years. The doctor's office gave Finn an official 'allowed to go back to school' card for the daycare place...seems that a parents note will not cut it any more.
Jenny got Tom for Christmas the latest Homestar Runner DVD and as we watched it we realized than Finn absolutely loved it and spent most of the hour jumping up and down with glee at Homestar and his buddies. Since Finn is always bringing up his formula, he has garnered the nickname "Bernadetto" after a certain skit involving the line "Nice upchuck Bernadetto!" That toon can be seen here, by clicking on the "Puppet Stuff" button and then on the "Labor Dabor" link.
Bernadetto is in fact 3 months old today. So it's measuring time. We did not get an official length from the Institute of Institues this month, but we do know that Finn is over 16 pounds which means he has doubled his weight since birth.
One Bernadetto unit is in fact exactly equal to one Finn unit. Finn is still one Finn unit tall so no change there. Though one can now expect a Finn unit to be about 23 inches long. This is in fact a different photo from a month ago (below) but Jenny points out that Tom and Finn are wearing very similar outfits as last month.
January 2, 2006
Those who have been unfortunate enough to visit us at the Stinky Hell Hole™ know that we have had Finn's crib in pieces in the dining room for months now. Finally it was built and he is sleeping in it.
Special thanks to Jay and Lisa for letting us borrow it. Jay enjoyed it for his few years but now has the biggest bed this side of the Mississippi.
Archived News
With so much going on, we have archived older news:
Finn's 2005 news »
