Legos with Grandmom and Grandpop

Quinn is in a huge Lego / Duplo phase. Playing 'Legos' is his favorite game, and now that we have enough blocks, we can really build some cool stuff.
Both my Dad and I love Legos as well, so it was a natural fit, in a geeky engineering sort of way. Above is my Dad playing a Legos variation that he invented for Quinn: Colors.

I think this was a ship...or maybe it was a huge house...or maybe a church...

Blue Eyes and his Smile.

Quinn really likes building tall towers...and uses his chair to build higher and higher...

Of course, he has to pick up his work of art and show everyone...which makes it tough when the towers are really tall...

After Emily's Baptism, Dad and Kocka got sucked into playing Legos as well...

The result of Quinn playing with our camera...a pretty good self shot.

Football with Grandpop

My Dad did a great job playing with Quinn - whether Legos, reading, or playing football, both of them seemed to have a great time. Below a few pics of the game...
Tackle!

Who do you think got tired first?

Like every football game at our house, CU wins!

Pumpkin Carving

My Dad showed Quinn how to carve pumpkins. At first, Quinn was a bit skeptical about the whole event, and my Dad was a bit worried about having a knife so close to his grandson.
Quinn definitely did not want to help Grandpop pull out the pumpkin guts.

Quinn got more and more interested when the cutting began.

Typical Quinn: trying to analyze everything.

Success!

While Halloween isn't like it is in the States, pumpkins and pumpking carving just goes with the territory. The pumkin looked great when we put a candle in it!

Home Alone

After two wonderful weeks with my parents visiting us in Germany, Eva and I are now home alone with the kiddos again. The insanity at the Gould house continues without grandparental support...
I'll post more pics and stories soon, but I wanted to start with these of Quinn hamming it up for the camera. After I came back from work, he wanted to put my boots on...and I helped him with my hat.

He's definitely a Texan in training

Birth, Life, and Death

Als Gott sah, // As God saw

dass der Weg zu lang, // that the way was too long

der Hügel zu steil und // that the hill was too steep

das Atmen zu schwer wurde, // and breating became too difficult

legte er seinen Arm um mich // he laid his arm around me

und sprach: // and said

"Komm wir gehen heim." // "Come, we're going home."

Shortly after receiving and experiencing the glory and joy of birth, we got a
strong reminder of the absolute nature of our life on this earth as we found
out that Eva's grandmother passed away.

While words can never really cover the emotions tied with the passing of a loved one, these emotions became, for me, much stronger as I saw my newborn child, Emily - as the beginning of life as reflected with the absoluteness of death in the passing of Eva's grandmother.

One then starts reflecting on one's own age. My bones are getting older, my muscles are getting weaker, and I just don't move like I used to. Don't get me wrong, I'm still young and active, but still a bit older.

My folks came to visit for two weeks, and they arrived the day before the funeral. Seeing ones parents age as well, within the backdrop of a death of a loved one and a birth of a new child puts additional perspective on one's age and eventual death. I still 'see' my parents as they were when I was in High School...even though this was almost 20 years ago; their age when I was in Middle School was not far from my actual age now. While this is probably human nature, it still adds a finiteness and a reminder that we are all aging.

At the funeral, there was a very interesting dynamic: while the group of family and friends were morning the death of their wife, mother, grandmother, or friend, they were all celebrating the birth of Emily (who was with us). It was a very strange yet natural dynamic. Perhaps seeing a newborn helped ease the pain.

While I only new Oma Göttgens (Tick Tack Oma) for a few short years, the funeral was difficult, as I have many, many warm memories of her. She always made me feel a part of the family and she always made sure that my favorite chocolate truffles were in her house when we visited. Simple, but very heartwarming.

My favorite picture is below: of her and Quinn, looking at airplanes flying over their backyard.

Thank you for listening / reading.

Let it snow...

When Nina was on sabbatical in the deeper parts of Bavaria, she got Quinn a traditional shirt to go with Lederhosen...and now it finally fits!
Next year, Quinn and Papa are going to get matching Lederhosen and shirts!

Nina visited us last weekend. We definitely love it when Nina (and Frank) visit in and of itself, but it was nice to have some extra hands around the house.

Typical picture of Emily trying to sleep, and Quinn trying to help out. He really is trying to be nice to Emily and to softly stroke her face or hand, but when he does this when she's sleeping, he just wakes her up.

Massive crying tends to ensue. The only person that seems to not be bothered by Emily's crying is Quinn himself.

This morning, Emily's crying woke him up...and it was super cute how he races to her room in his PJ's...wanting to see what he could do to help.

My answer: go back to bed...it is 5am.

Quinn riding the couch like a horse. He only does this when we have the camera out ;-)

Quinn would touch and hold Emily all the time if we would let him.

Conversation today at the Gould house: Quinn, do you have to go potty? No, I've already pooped in my pants.

Oh, the joys of potty training.

As for Emily, she's doing just fine...it would be better if she would cry a bit less and sleep a bit more during sleeping hours. Thankfully, I get to go to work so that I can rest a bit. Coffee consumption has increased.

We're sure the amount of crying with Emily was the same with Quinn...but it just FEELS different. With Quinn being able to verbalize pretty well now what he wants, we are a bit out of practice with dealing with a baby that can only cry (and not tell us what is wrong).

This too, hopefully, will pass. In the meantime, we're trying to enjoy the time together...even if it is a bit more hectic than before. It is hard to believe that it has been almost 3 weeks already.

P.S. It snowed today...Ouch.

The Great Ironies of Life

When you think about it - whether you believe the Creation Theory or the Evolution Theory - the process of child creation is amazing.

From a fertilized egg to childbirth of a working human is too complex to even contemplate. It is amazing how it all seems so pefect, everything working in complete unison. For those of you that have children you understand.

You also understand the associated ironies of this amazingly complex and perfect process. Ironies that such a perfect creation and process should not even allow:

1. Why does gas create such pain for babies and makes them scream like a stuck pig?
2. Why can babies sleep perfectly...except from between the hours of 11pm to 3am...when 99.99% percent of the rest of the world sleeps.
3. Why do babies grab and pull chest hair, when Papa is trying to calm the babies? Perhaps to keep the tired Papa from falling asleep?

2 Children is not 2x the Work

Eva and I are trying to take parenting to the 'next level', and I definitely understand the statement from other parents that say that folks with only one child are not 'real' parents. Not to bash those with one child, but the 'work' curve can become exponential with 2 kiddos, not linear - especially when the newborn (and parents) are sick.

Unfortunately, we hit a milestone with Emily 2 years earlier than with Quinn: Emily was running a fever two days ago, and we had to start giving her antibiotics. Illnesses with newborns can be tricky and dangerous.

Fortunately, Emily is doing fine, but Eva is now full on sick...less sleep for the Gould family.
On the good news side, the weather has been nice, and I've spent the time off of work...outside with Quinn. The pic above is typical Quinn: the stick in his hand is one of my 'tools' and he is fixing the brakes on his trike. He uses his imagination a lot more these days, and then role-plays. A stick can be any number of my tools: weedeater, drill, wrenches...super sweet.

Emily bundled up on one of our walks.

Emily getting weighed...she's putting on weight well, and everything seems fine (outside of the recent fever, of course).

Eva's parents shortly before leaving a week ago.

Quinn loves grocery shopping. First of all, there are two rides for him: the tractor and a moped. I don't put any money in...and he is happy just sitting on them for a while. Oh, if he ever found out that they would move if you put money in them. Second of all, we usually get a pretzel from the bakery, and when we get fresh lunch meat, the butcher gives him a slice of lunch meat (Gelbwurst).

The odd thing is that he always has to ride them in the same order: first the tractor then the moped. If a kid is on the tractor, he patiently waits instead of going to the moped first. I don't know where he got this patience from (Eva) and I don't know where he got the ideosyncracy to always do things in the same order (probably from my dad ;-).

I think he looks super cute in his Timberland lumberjack jacket when he is on the tractor.

Quinn helping out with Emily. He is still very caring and mostly gentle with Emily. He mostly leaves her alone when she's sleeping...but when her eyes are open, he is all over petting her.

Last night was especially cute, touching, and funny for me: Emily was screaming (this was about midnight), which woke Quinn up. Quinn sat next to me in the chair, so I was sitting there with both my kids in my arms. Quinn started petting Emily to try to calm her down as well.

I later got up to try to walk / rock Emily to sleep - or at least to get her to quit screaming. Quinn followed me, but ran into the glass door with his head. Ouch. Now I had two screaming kids. This is what I mean by exponential work. When they play together, all is OK...but two screaming / hurt kids is definitely a challenge.

A few weeks ago, Quinn went to the dentist for the first time. He didn't like it, but the dentist left an impression, because now Quinn plays 'dentist' all the time. The thing on his face are a pair of plastic tongs from his 'kitchen'. When he plays dentist, he opens the tongs and puts them around his face. Strange (I guess he's imitating the dentist and his mask ?!?), but super cute.

At the playground.

It freaked me out when Quinn started climbing this ladder without my help, but he did just fine, and he's getting a better feel for these sorts of things - climbing, jumping, sliding, and of course, running.

Learning to Read Minds Again

Neither Eva nor I know what happens with the time. Eva came home from the hospital on Wednesday evening, her parents went home yesterday, and our Friday flew by.
This was the view I got when I came out of the hospital after Emily was born: my mother in law patiently waiting outside, basking in the last rays of the September sun, with my father in law and Quinn. This is so typical Göttgens: sitting outside, face in the sun, enjoying the rays. Makes me smile every time I see it.

With having a new addition to take care of, we're getting used to guessing again. With Quinn, he pretty much can tell us what he wants and why he's upset. Emily just cries when she needs something and sleeps when her world is OK. We have to guess again what the issues are: diaper, hungry, hot, cold, older brother pulling her arm...

I haven't received the editor's approval for this pic yet, but I like it...and since the editor is breastfeeding now, I get my way ;-)

Two pics of Emily and her Oma.

As I mentioned earlier, Eva's contractions allowed us to drop Quinn off at friends before we went to the hospital. They were going to an open house of the fire station (Feuerwehrfest) anyway (which we were planning to do as well with them). Quinn loves firetrucks, so he is especially stoked about his fireman's helmet. As a sidenote, after taking his tub, he ran around the house naked (like normal)...but this time grabbed his fireman's helmet. Imagine a naked 2 year old wearing only his fireman's helmet...

Emily seems to really like napping on my chest. It is a great feeling to feel her soft head on my chin...plus, I like to nap as well. We already have something in common...

Emily's welcome home. I'm still very grateful for Eva's parents for coming over after Emily's birth: it allowed me to clean up a few things at work and was a great help and relief as I tried to get things ready for Emily and Eva.

Since Eva's dad is also a great cook, I ate great every night...but, I'm not used to seeing fresh lard (Speck) in our fridge.

Family pic...

Eva's parents also took Quinn to day care every day and picked him up as well. They spoiled him by letting him take his trike each day. Quinn had a blast.

I love this jacket...I think it makes him look a lumberjack. Then I get the Monty Python Lumberjack song in my mind for the rest of the day...

Quinn has been a very proud brother so far. Outside of hitting Emily upside the head a few times, he has been very gentle and loving. His first word each day is Emily. He even gave Emily his favorite Lego Men (LegoMännchen) this morning. Those are his favorite toys.

Quinn and Opa cracking hazelnuts.

Since Quinn has been playing quite a bit with Legos (Duplos), Emily thought it would be good to get him a Lego Cement Mixer as a gift to celebrate her birth. Quinn has been playing with it ever since.

The Legos have been a blessing as Quinn has been playing with them more and more...even playing by himself in his own room! Legos were some of my favorite toys growing up, and I love to play with them too. Quinn doesn't mind if I help him build his houses, but I have to do it his way. And, he's rather adamant about his building codes.

Grandpa will have fun with the Legos with Quinn, but he'll have to leave his engineering knowledge at the door ;-)

@ Dad: you'll understand what I mean when you get here.