TuttleTree.com

My computer was unexpectedly down for a few days (more info below), so although I was taking pictures, I didn't go out of my way to upload them nightly. Here are a few of the ones I missed, more tomorrow (or soon, at least).

Just me.

Still getting the hang of this whole black background thing. Not sure how to get my hair not to blend in without washing out my face. Welcome any tips.

Our power went out for somewhere around an hour this night. When it came back on, my computer's power supply started making unhappy noises.

Luckily I got Newegg to give me a credit to buy a replacement, since this one is only 2 months old.

Without my computer I was feeling very helpless. Not that I would have used it that much on a Friday night anyway, but not having the option can be devestating. Hence the black and white and frown.

Brett Myers will drive a man to drink.

I spent this evening down at a friends house watching the Phillies lose, miserably, to the Braves. Luckily, he had some Sam Adams Winter Lager on hand to ease the pain.

"How is he sleeping?"

This is, easily the 2nd most common question — after gender — I have to answer when I tell people I'm a (new) father. I always tell the truth, but never the whole truth.

The truth is that he sleeps very well. The whole truth is that — contrary to popular belief — you don't have to get lucky to get a good sleeper. Ok, so there's a little bit of luck involved: it would be incredibly difficult with a colicky baby. But aside from that… Like anything in life worth achieving, all it takes is a little knowledge, and a lot of willpower, determination, and hard work.

You see, we're BabyWise parents. We follow a routine that slightly deviates from what a baby will do naturally — eat, wake, sleep; rather than eat, sleep, wake — for many reasons, but high among them is that he's generally wide awake when we put him down for a nap. In doing so, we're giving him the opportunity to learn how to put himself to sleep without a sleep aid (stuffed animal, pacifier, etc). If he always fell asleep during or shortly after a meal, we would be conditioning him to need that meal in order to sleep, and potentially set him up for a lifetime of sleep problems.

I can speak from experience: It works wonders! Dylan has been sleeping through the night — 10pm until 6am — consistently, since he was about 11-12 weeks old; and inconsistently, since 9 weeks. Why even mention the 9 weeks part? Because after 9 straight weeks of getting up every 2-3.5 hours to feed and change diapers, every extra hour of sleep counts — let alone a single all-nighter in the middle of an otherwise wakeful week.

In addition to his great overnight sleeping ability, he calms himself down for naps in less than 5 minutes (if he fusses at all); and our day care provider tells us he's a joy to have around — happy when he's awake, easy to put down at nap time, and a good sleeper — unlike the other infant she watches.

I'm a strong believer that you can't argue with results. And those, my friends, are what I call results.

The problem, I think, is that the majority of parents do it wrong!

I've been toying with the idea of adding more video content, kind of inspired by my friend Mike who does an awesome series of video beer reviews for his blog. I'm not sure what I might do videos of other than show off Dylan's latest tricks. (He can do a backflip, now!) Do you like that idea? Or would you rather I stick to Ye Olde Texte?

I think part of the reason I like it might be that it will be something I'm comfortable talking about in more of a presentation setting. It wasn't on my nerdy goal list for 2009, but I have wanted to start thinking about presenting or writing magazine articles in the ColdFusion community for a while now, and part of the reason I haven't yet is that I haven't quite worked up the nerve.

Anyway, here's my latest dorky hobby. It's my first attempt at recording something like this, so hopefully my video skills will get better with time.