breakfast

It's been in sunny and warm the last few days.  This is both wonderful, because it means my poor, damp Southern bones are starting to dry out a little, and horrible, because with the windows being open our hounds are hearing and smelling every bit of wildlife out in the forest.  In fact, as I type this the two little guys are standing on one of our end tables, staring intently out the window, no doubt waiting for the coming attack from numerous creatures that they have once again realized live on the other side of our walls.  The only thing that pulls Bentley away is the tiny clicking noise of one of J-man's puffs falling from his highchair tray to the floor.  He finds every single one of them, and often the ones stuck on the highchair, or in his pajamas, or the seventeen that inevitably end up in other rooms of the house, falling out of goodness knows what crack or crevice in his clothing.  We've been amazed at how quickly we go through these containers of cereal, but I've decided that a solid third of them end up in the dogs' mouth.

J-man watches the dogs' activity in between bites, and chats with me as we eat our breakfast.  We've been trying to teach him sign language, using the standard hands-closed, fingers-touching to indicate "more", but he seems to have decided to communicate "more" by staring at whatever it is that he wants, holding his arms out to the side, and tensing up to the point that he starts to vibrate.  This is often accompanied by grunting or crying.  I'm assuming he learned this form of signing from his father.

Little guy has been growing new teeth for the past few days, and it's been hard on all of us.  Really, he's been growing them since he was 4-months-old, but these most recent two, the top two, have been the worst.  I know this is pretty standard teething protocol, but I think his good temper during the first three spoiled me.  I've given up on feeding him any solids other than cereal and rice husks; the screaming that started after the first three bites of pureed food were starting to make our mealtimes less than relaxing.  He's spent the last two nights in our bed as he can't seem to relax enough to stay asleep, and being close to us seems to help.  He still wiggles and squirms, mind you.  He just has more room to do it as he utilizes my stomach and groin as a kick bag.  He looks a little less puffy and swollen today, and I can now feel the tip of at least one tooth, so maybe the worst is almost over.

Bentley has left the window and is back over by the highchair, waiting for whatever last few scraps may fall.  Jude has noticed him, and is looking from his cereal to the dog, as though contemplating whether or not he feels in the mood to share.  He's taken lately to hanging over the side of his chair in order to "share" his breakfast with Bentley.  Several times now I've found him stuck at a 90 degree angle while the hound greedily licks his outstretched fingers.  J-man is now just using wide strokes to sweep his remaining puffs into the floor, which marks the end of mealtime.