ISN'T IT GRAND?

James' GRAND Aunt Margie is here for a week of baby duty! She's here to meet her grand-nephew and take care of him during the day while Jay and I are at work, relieving Jean for trip home to check on her house and take care of some business. We picked Margie up from the airport Thursday evening, welcoming her with the much-remembered Mississippi heat and humidity (she had visited us once before back in early June of 2007, when conditions were even worse than they are now). Westerner's tend to have a low tolerance for our southern weather...

We headed straight for pizza, since it was time for James' 6pm feeding and we didn't want to make him wait the hour drive home from Jackson. It was our first public breastfeeding experience and it went really well. We got a corner booth at Mellow Mushroom and put the Peanut Shell nursing cover to good use. James and I had practiced with the cover the night before, with little success, because he was far too interested in the black-and-white pattern of the fabric to pay attention to his meal... Luckily, that wasn't a problem the second time around. He chowed down for his usual 10 minutes, then I passed him straight over to his Aunt. Here they are posing for their first photo, a pair of March 3rd babies, born 50 years apart:

After a little while, James got tired of being held (he has to have his "alone" time, just like we all do), so we laid him out on the table on his blanket, and he was satisfied to look around the restaurant, kick his legs and pump his arms:

James stayed on the table until halfway through the meal. When he got fussy at 7:15pm Jean and I knew he was ready for his evening catnap, so I scooped him up, held him on his side, and gave him his paci. He was out in about 2 minutes, and stayed asleep until we left the restaurant at 8pm. Then he slept all the way home (of course, since car rides are even more sleep-inducing for him than milk). Miraculously, even with the extra 2 hours of sleep that evening, the little man still kept to his night-time routine of 9pm bottle, 9:30pm bath, and 10:30pm-ish bedtime, only waking us once at 4am to nurse (we've had this once-per-night feeding thing going for over a week now, but we've been hesitant to blog about it, for fear of jinxing it).

Margie brought James some new books and a silly new toy, which James loves. It's actually the first toy he's really responded too. It makes him smile like crazy, and we can't blame him - the thing is hilarious! A goofy little puppy that has a silly laugh, pants like a dog, and says things like "Uh-oh" and "Wee"! The best part is that it goes off every time you so much as bump it, and sometimes even when you don't (maybe it's possessed?) Here is a photo of James enjoying his new toy:

In addition to the restaurant tabletop, James has had one other interesting resting place this week - the laundry basket! The washer beeped while I was walking around with James and the clothes needed to be moved over to the dryer. Rather than taking James into the living room to be laid down while I completed the task, I simply placed him in the laundry basket on top of the dryer, which happened to have the recently washed and dried blanket that Margie made him all folded and inviting:

And one more adorable blog-able thing... As I was cleaning up my pumping supplies and getting James' bath ready last night, I started hearing this cute little sighing coming from the living room. I listened for a while, then realized that James and Margie were having a "conversation". James had fallen asleep after his bottle and was snuggled in Margie's arms. She was making cute little sighing noises at him, and he started answering her with his own contented little sighs (without waking up). I couldn't resist getting some video, so here it is for your viewing pleasure: