Flu shot (we are back in Gainesville!)

I took Nikolas for his first flu shot. It was quick and relatively painless. I took the opportunity to weigh him at the nurse's station and he weighed 18.5lbs. No idea how that translates into percentiles for the US.
The only reason I took him for a flu shot is to help get him protected during the trip planned for the Christmas break. I just that hope my baby is as good on those flights as he was during out flight back from California! I initially tried to change my ticket to be on the same flight as Robb from Atlanta to Jacksonville, where we are both changing planes (Robb arriving from Moscow and us from LA), but I wasn't allowed to make the change over the phone. Well, so we showed up at LAX bright and early in the morning for our 8:30am flight when, just as I was asking the person at the gate if I could have a seat with more leg space, it was announced that due to some mechanical problem all of us would be redirected to other flights. I asked again if I could be accommodated to catch Robb's flight in Atlanta (didn't matter when I left LA), and since I was first in line, the lady at the check-in was nice to arrange this for me. She even tried to let me sit next to Robb but there were no two seats next to each other. So this turned out just perfect! There was no way otherwise that Robb and I could fly together from Atlanta to Jacksonville, and who knows how long we would have had to wait for each other in Jacksonville to drive to Gainesville together.

After I was booked on a noon flight, I called mom and dad and they turned around and returned to LAX to keep us company. We had coffee and lunch together at the airport, took some more pictures, they played some more with Nikolas, it was great!

Then, on the plane, I held Nikolas in my lap with the table pulled down right in front of him, and I handed him some plastic cups and bottles with water to play with them. That was the latest discovery: I could hand him my keys or a water bottle with a little bit of water in it, and there was entertainment right there for at least half an hour, if not more. He is getting very good at hand motor skills (still good with his feet too). He holds objects, no matter how tiny they are, passes them from one hand to another, and always, when he encounters a new object, holds it in one hand and wiggles his wrist so the object waves around a few times, as if he is checking out how heavy or how elastic it is...! There is a special determined and absorbed look on his face as he does this. It's very funny.

He managed to fall asleep in my arms once and another time while I stood holding him. And not for a bit did he get fussy! I couldn't believe it.

In Atlanta we met daddy :) and flew together to Jacksonville. Nikolas provided entertainment for everyone around us. By this time he was getting tired which meant he got pretty loud with his happy, energetic shrieks. They could easily be misinterpreted by giddiness, which it probably was, but it's the kind that happens just before once passes out into deep sleep.

Back at home he slept in bed with mommy because he got terrified lying in the playpen under a large fan, I guess, in addition to the new smells and new surroundings. The playpen was in our bedroom until Robb moved Nikolas' furniture back to his freshly painted blue room! I didn't know what shade of blue to expect and I was nicely surprised to discover my favorite summer blue :) It gives the whole room such an interesting, deep and calming effect! I arranged the furniture in there a few times in the last couple of days, until I found the perfect arrangement! Now I really like it, and it seems like Nikolas does too. I let him crawl around the living room, kitchen and his room pretty freely (I still have to move the Nordic Track out of the way), but I think we've done a good job keeping the area child-safe.