Jack's half birthday celebration

We've had a great weekend, not the least of which was our celebration of Jack turning 6 months old on Saturday! To catch you up, Friday afternoon Stacy and Kaia (see the embarrassingly old pic of Jack and his best friend above) came over to drink tea (mommies), hold hands and chew on books (babies), and start learning baby sign language (presumably everyone, although Jack and Kaia probably won't be able to sign anything for a few more months).

Ben was able to come home at a decent time on Friday, so we had dinner together while Jack fought a valiant battle against the curtains and a blanket. A bit hard to describe, but very entertaining to watch, and Jack seemed to enjoy himself.

Saturday we slept in then walked Ben into work (he had to go in for a few hours), and Jack and I headed to the grocery store to pick up supplies for his half-birthday dinner. Ben and I celebrated with some lasagna (Pops' secret recipe) and a rainbow chip birthday cake, while Jack had a dinner of bananas and carrots, one of his new favorites. I think Mommy and Daddy got a slightly sweeter deal.

Oh, and for the record, Jack is pinching skin on my arm in the picture above, not just flab. I'm fortunately back to within about 5 pounds of my pre-pregnancy weight, but one of Jack's less desirable habits right now is holding onto just my skin rather than grabbing my whole arm. He does a similar thing with my hair, which is part of the reason I'm shedding like crazy and feel like I'm going bald.

Sunday afternoon we went to lunch in Fulham at the home of a new S&C associate. Cristoph is Swiss, his wife Alex is from a German-speaking part of France, and their 7 year old son Adrian is going to Fulham Prep, one of the best (and most expensive) schools in the world. It was really interesting to hear them effortlessly moving between speaking several different languages with one another.

Today Jack and I have washed and dried all the laundry in the world--no small feat when every (small) load takes about 4 hours. And although I'm not completely sure he understood what he was doing, I think Jack is starting to get the hang of playing patty-cake. We do three claps with his hands together (I'm moving them, of course), the three claps with our hands together, then three claps with my hands, then reverse. Today he started reaching out his hands to clap with mine at the right time!