9 Months

Ever since Orin learned how to crawl on all fours,

he has been unstoppable.

He now easily cruises over to objects, pulls himself up,

and holds on bobbing, weaving and babbling until he 

a) loses interest and moves on, or

b) falls down

To help Orin enjoy his new skill set to the fullest,

Casey and I decided to get him a platform activity toy for his birthday.

The toy features a large array of brightly colored objects

all of which can be pressed with the result of some random 

song or factoid being sung by an overly enthusiastic woman.

As I write this she is singing "Green Circle! Green Circle!"

Orin adores it.

We also decided to get him a pair of leather slipper shoes

to help eliminate falls caused from his socks slipping

on the hardwood floors.

There were a large variety of patterns for the slipper shoes.

Casey made the final decision.

But today was not only made special because of Orin's birthday.

It is also the day that Uncle Alex sets out on the second,

and longest, segment of his Special Forces combat training. 

He will be out of contact for 5-7 weeks in some undisclosed part

of some undisclosed state doing some secret SF training operation.

This segment boasts a 70% attrition rate.

It is the last segment where soldiers can fail out of SF,

so today and tomorrow and all the days of the next month or so

try to remember to say some kind of 

manly sounding prayer for my brother.

He has certainly come a long way since 

his boot camp graduation 2 years ago...

And now, I am going to shamelessly post a large number of pictures 

of Orin without any descriptive tidbits

except to say that they were taken a few days ago when

the temperature reached 60 degrees and 

Orin and I decided to take in a little sun...

Goodnight.