The new photo album.

Apologies to all for not sending an udpate for a while. We know how the Oliver Solomonceo fan club yearns for news of Monkey's latest physical accomplishments. At the moment, Oliver has discovered that he can make *very* high-pitched shrieking noises for fun and pleasure. So fun. So pleasurable.

But that ain't nothing. The real fun part is that he's started to
teethe. And before that, he had a really nasty respiratory virus. So
he *had* been sleeping for a whole 9 hours straight, but he can't do that, and therefore neither can we, when he has a bad cough. Teething apparently produces a "drool cough", because they drool so much they're practically choking on their own spit. Mmmm.

Oliver probably caught the cold during a visit to his ENT for a
follow-up about his vocal cord. The doc says the cord is almost
entirely healed, so it was probably viral rather than congenital, and hopefully Oliver will never have to see a laryngoscope again, and shouldn't need any speech therapy. Yeah!

Oliver is sitting on his own now (not for very long, but he's really
cute when he falls over), and his favorite games are trying to stand up and sucking on our fingers, sometimes both at the same time. He loves music, and loves to sing along. He seems to dig visual art, like his Daddy. At least, he didn't complain when I took him to the Met yesterday (couldn't let him enter the New Year without seeing at least one Picasso.) He's obsessed with Outside, and needs to be walked a few times a day, like a dog. Luckily everyone in his life is willing to oblige him.

He is being cared for by me and Greg, but also by his really wonderful nanny Nell, and by my mother, as I'm back at work now three days a week. I didn't want to, but we find we've grown very attached to having health insurance. Although it was pretty nasty there at work when I left, it's actually been fine to go back. My new boss is nice and easygoing and very glad that I've returned. Apparently no one paid any bills while I was gone, including the rent, and eviction proceedings were started in my absence. So it's nice to feel needed.

As for Greg, he had a really great shoot in Puerto Rico and has put
together a fashion book that's truly stunning. He has an amazing
digital retoucher, Mark DeHaven, who has helped him create work that's nothing like he's done before, at least to my eye. It's quite Sexy. That said, the photo industry has been going through massive upheaval and we're struggling to figure out what to do about it. We're thinking a lot about more affordable places to live and are very confused about the whole thing. We love Park Slope, but our apartment has been colonized by baby paraphenalia. We're not sure what to do yet; we'll keep you posted.

In Baby Networking News, Oliver has recently made the acquaintance of Baby Pilar Ching Lee and Baby Rebecca Rose Oppenheimer, and is still hoping for introductions to Baby Quinn Anthony Kasdan-Grollo, Baby Ryan Bailie Plaza, Baby Vincent Moses Hellegers, and Baby Lauren Wood. (In other words, late 2006 has been a very big quarter for babies, and it seemed like a shout out was in order - congratulations everyone!)

That's about it for news. I don't know if I ever sent the end of the
breastfeeding saga. The final bit is that I pumped 'til Oliver was
about 4 months old, than weaned him off of it, and now he's totally on formula. He'll be starting solids pretty soon, but we're worried about allergies, since Greg and I both have 'em, so it may be a few weeks yet. We feel good that he got a lot of breastmilk, but the whole experience pretty much sucked. All sympathy to anyone having any difficulties breastfeeding, and we hope anyone attempting it can achieve it with greater ease and grace.

Happy New Year everyone,
Much love,
Michelle and Greg