In mid-July, Lisa's Mom and Dad drove out from Illionois to visit. They spent a number of days hanging out with us. On the night of July 17th - our anniversary - Lisa and I had our first dinner alone since Sasha's birth. The shots of Lisa in the nice black dress are from before we left. It was that evening that Sasha got his first bottle of expressed mother's milk, courtesy of Grandma Brown...

Lisa loves the next two shots, with Sasha and I sleeping under the covers....

I discovered that one way to keep Sasha entertained while he's waiting for a meal is to hold him and spin around in circles. The previous two photos look down on him, while spinning; hence the startled look in his eyes.

The next three see Sasha throwin' the horns for Michael Laird:

Sasha has developed his first hobby. He lays on his back in the bassinet, with head turned to his left looking at his mirror (with a black and white puffy border). He puts his left hand behind it, and moves it an inch out and back, while staring intently at it. We suspect he's watching the fuzzy objects reflected in the mirror moving.... He'll do this for 45 minutes, resulting in a big puddle of drool and one satisfied baby! As the days passed, his hobby got more developed, including bopping himself in the nose repeatedly with the mirror while swatting at the the yellow star on the other side of the bassinet and "talking" to himself...

At the end of July, we took Sasha in for his one month check-up. His doctor was very pleased that he was doing so well. His weight was up to 8 pounds 5 ounces, he was getting longer, and much more active and alert. Sasha made many trips to Manhattan during July, taking in two Bowie video exhibits, a number of relaxing feeding in big cumfy chairs at Starbucks (yes, boo! to corporate takeover, but those chairs are comfy and the mocha frappachino is a very nice snack!) and getting lots of compliments while riding around on the Subways in his Baby Bjorn carrier. He's a Manhattanite, all right!