Friday, June 19, 2009

Ask Julia...and Henry!


I let Julia handle most of the blogging this week but I wanted to check back in before the weekend (and before my one-month birthday on Monday!) to put out the call for questions for Ask Julia & Henry. On Julia's old baby blog, she got a ton of great questions for Ask Julia, and we're hoping for more of the same on our new blog. I know that many more people read the blog than send in questions, so I'm hoping that you "lurkers" will finally submit a few queries of your own. Here are a few, sent in by yours truly, to get the ball rolling:

Where did your name come from?
Henry means "ruler," and while I'm indeed ruling the roost (sorry Julia, but it's true!), that's not why they picked the name. The night Julia was born, Dad slept on a less-than-comfy chair in Mom's hospital room, and had all sorts of weird dreams. In one vivid dream, they had a baby named Henry, so he told Mom that if they ever had a boy, they should keep the name in mind. And no name came along that they liked more, so there you go. The middle name, Joseph, has meaning on both sides of the family (it's Dido's name, and the name of Grandma's father, among others), and we thought the two names went really well together.

What will you be called?
You mean will I be called Hank? No! In fact, Mom and Dad completely forgot that was a nickname for Henry until people started asking. But the plan is to call me Henry. The only person who might thwart that is Julia, who sometimes has trouble saying "Henry," especially when she's talking quickly, and ends up calling me "Harry," which has led Mom and Dad to slip and all refer to me as Harry on occasion. (I should mention that one relative, who shall go unnamed, is not a fan of my first name at all, so it remains to be see what this person will end up calling me.)

Are your Mom and Dad getting any sleep?
Some. I've been very good about sleeping from feeding to feeding at night, which is the most they could ask from me at this point. They should be extremely grateful! And Mom and Dad are now at the point where they are switching off feedings, so while I awake every 3-4 hours at night for a feeding, they are conceivably sleeping for longer periods of time than that. But I know they're both sleep deprived, and getting more tired with each passing day!

What's up with your Twitter feeds?
The feed "gadgets" on the blog's sidebar can be a fit wonky sometimes (blame the main Twitter site, which frequently gets overloaded, which is why sometimes the Twitter feed is blank when you pull up our blog), but since it can take a few days to get a post queued up, Julia and I wanted to give you quicker access to bigger news. So on my feed, I keep you updated on when big things happen, like I start sleeping with the lights off or I change diaper sizes. These are things that I might not devote a whole blog post to, but I still want you guys to know about. Meanwhile, Julia devotes her Twitter feed to funny and smart things she's actually said. If you ever need clarification of something in one of our Twitter feeds, send one of us a note!

How does your first month compare to what Julia's was like?
Mom hates comparing the two of us and what we were like as newborns, so I'm going to respect her wishes. But I will say that in general, we had similar experiences.

And finally, what are your email addresses again?
I'm so glad you asked. You can contact Julia here and me here, and if you have questions for both of us, just send to one address and it will get to both of us. So what are you waiting for? Start emailing!