Kiddie Crack...

This is completely addicting.

I swear, I think it might be better on acid, but it's still pretty entertaining....

Dancing!

I discovered a website that offers all sorts of neat children's music and they even have a few videos. When I played this for Louisa, she started bouncing up and down and got really excited. Unfortunately, I didn't have the camera going, so this is her second viewing:



She loves music, so I'm thinking these CDs might be nice alternatives to "The Wheels on the Bus...".

Let me do what I can do!

Louisa has developed an independent streak lately (gee, don't know *where* that came from!) which has extended into her eating habits. She's less and less content with being fed and wants to feed *herself*. I've been indulging that by allowing her to stuff the puffed corn kernels into her mouth as much as she wants, but I decided this weekend to see how she'd handle a banana instead. Here's what went down:

So far, so good...


She's figured out how it works...


Minimum of mess so far...


Banana remnants...


I have to say that she did a good job with the banana (and with another banana later that weekend). I'm trying to think what else might make good finger food and will have to do a little research. The one drawback to this independent streak is that it means her mealtimes are messier and baths are definitely a MUST!

Everything I need to know about being a Mother, I learned from the WWF...

1). In a pinch, a "scissor" hold with your legs is a good thing.

2). Your bark should be worse than your bite/always put on a good show.

3). Never underestimate the convenience of a tag team.

4). Sometimes costuming is everything.

Elisabeth

Elisabeth left us to fly home yesterday morning and we missed her before we even exited the airport terminal. Everyone (especially me) got a little teary to be losing a member of our family. This morning, our house feels quiet and kinda empty (I guess it's a preview of Empty Nest Syndrome for Walter and me). Louisa was looking for her last night while I was feeding her--she kept looking down the hallway where Elisabeth's bedroom is/was. It feels so strange to walk past her bedroom and see it so devoid of all her stuff.

Before she left though, we set up Walter's tripod and took some really good photos of everyone:




Walter and I are already discussing next summer's European trip so we can go visit her in Basel. See you soon, Elisabeth!

Bathtime

Louisa really enjoys her baths.



Baths are part of our bedtime routine--she has a good dinner of solids, a nice bath, and then it's time for nursing and bed. Daddy always likes to help give her a bath, I think in part because she's always so excited and happy:




She has several duck toys to play with (although her favorite toy right now is the cup) and a fish that squirts water at her. She loves to watch us fill the cup and then pour the water out in front of her while she tries to "catch" it.





She's actually holding the yellow cup in her hands in those pictures (get your minds out of the gutter, people!).

Riding in the car

Lulu had some fun on Sunday when her daddy rolled down the back windows!

Weekend Fun

We had some family fun this weekend in the backyard. I spread out an old tablecloth on the ground in the shade of our red plum tree on Saturday afternoon. Walter joined us in the backyard when he got through cutting the grass in the front. He even brought us some refreshments! Wow, what a guy!

I brought plenty of toys for Lulu to play with:



And Daddy even got in on the fun!



I think someone enjoyed having the full attention of two adults and enjoyed the late afternoon sunshine.



Daddy even helped Louisa put her toys away when we went inside.

Welcome, Jamison Timothy!

Lulu's future prom date, Jamison Timothy Beard, was born this afternoon at 2:18pm, weighing 8 pounds 7 ounces and was 20.5 inches long. I have no pictures (yet!), but both mother and baby are doing well and may even be home tomorrow if everyone keeps doing so well. Melissa was scheduled to be induced tomorrow morning (Monday), but Jamison decided he didn't want to wait anymore and came all on his own!

Louisa and I are excited to have a new playmate right down the street and I know that Lulu can't wait to teach him all sorts of cool games and show him all her toys. I told her that now she wasn't the Cutest Baby On The Block anymore--now, she could only be The Prettiest!

Playdate

Most Friday afternoons, Louisa heads off to a playdate with several other new moms. Louisa is the Old Lady of the group since she's the oldest. It's great to talk to other young, first-time moms and discover common problems, ask for advice, and just generally get out of the house and NOT be the sole source of entertainment for your little one. We typically get together at each other's homes, but as the weather has gotten warmer, we've started meeting outside at McKinley Park (great baby swings!) and we recently met at our house and walked over to the baby pool! This past Friday, we met at McKinley and enjoyed some unseasonably cool (i.e., not in the 90s), sunny weather:

10 Month Update

Louisa turned 10 months old today!
Weight: 20 lbs (hard to get her still on the scale!)
Height: just shy of 29"
Head circumference: 18"

Lulu is crawling around the house and follows us from room to room. She's crawling really fast (much faster than you expect). She's also pulling herself up and balancing with support from chairs, couches, low tables, walls, etc. which means that anything on those surfaces is also fair game now. (this morning she discovered the drink coasters on the coffee table) Her balance is getting pretty good, too. We're not sure when she'll start actually toddling around, but we expect it sooner rather than later.



The biggest challenge with her increasing mobility (and short attention span) has been keeping her safe. I think she's part rabbit with her fascination for electronic cables and outlets. She also loves to "read" books, catalogs, magazines, newspapers, etc. And by read, I mean completely tear them apart. She also loves banging on things--glass curio cabinets, metal bowls in the kitchen, the side of the bathtub, you name it. Her Daddy is currently trying to teach her John Bonham riffs from Led Zepplin songs, but time will tell (ha!).



Perhaps the biggest change for us/her since last month's update is that she's now sleeping in her crib in the nursery. The transition has been pretty easy for all of us--I think because we waited until she was ready and we were ready. Her bedtime routine is a good dinner of solids, then a bath around 7:30pm, followed by nursing and rocking until she's asleep. She sleeps from about 8pm until around 6:30am. Sometimes she wakes up at 5am, but I nurse her and then she's asleep until 8am. She's also taking naps in her crib during the day. I think her earlier bedtime is the result of her scaling back to two naps during the day--one around 10am and another sometime in the afternoon (she's less predictable with that one). Having our evenings back has been huge for Walter and me--it's been so nice to sit down to dinner and be able to converse with one another or to watch TV, etc. The hard part is remembering to go to bed early b/c Lulu's gonna be up earlier than we want to wake up!

Sidenote: I'm SO glad that we bought the black black-out window shade for the nursery. We pull it down and her room is *dark* no matter what time of day it is!

She's also feeding herself some snack food--bunny-shaped graham crackers and puffed corn cereal. This has expanded our ability to keep her entertained while we're out, too. She recently enjoyed black bean dip and spicy salsa at a mexican restaurant last week. The girl doesn't shy away from spicy foods!

Elisabeth took Lulu on her first trip to the zoo this afternoon, too. She reported that Louisa was most interested in the chimpanzees and the other babies who were there, too. She (Elisabeth) is returning home to Basel next week and we are really going to miss her, especially Lulu. It's been wonderful to have her here as a member of the family and I think we've learned a lot about Swiss culture that we didn't know or expect. Even though I returned to work this spring, I don't think Lulu (or I) viewed it as "daycare" per se, just that she was being taken care of by another family member while Mama was gone. So, next week will be a big change for us both.

I can haz cheesburger?

Lulu discovered the perils of eating with her daddy this evening at the Rubicon. Walter was holding her in his lap and attempting to eat his bacon-cheeseburger at the same time (foolish, I know!). It was all going (relatively) well until...he got about halfway through and then the grease that had accumulated in the wrapping paper started to pour on to poor Lulu's head! D'oh! We got her all cleaned-up and she sported an, um, interesting hair-do (very "There's Something About Mary") until we got her home and gave her a bath.

Man, did she smell good though!

Three Teeth...

...are apparently all coming in at once. Her front 2 incisors and the other outer incisor (to go with the outer incisor on the opposite side and the two bottom middle teeth).

No wonder she's been SO crabby and cranky for the past few days. Poor baby!

Don't worry--I'll fix your little red wagon...

Our friends, Trent and Aimee, gave Louisa a really cute onesie that she's now big enough to wear:



Apparently, someone is working on her gentleman's magazine poses?



And loves her daddy's turntable!




For those who are interested, she's learning how to pull herself up to standing, too:


And a random shot


Rowr! On to Tokyo!

Cute Crawling

Someone is really enjoying being mobile!

Yo como comida mexicana, tambien!

IMG_2300, originally uploaded by kace_chalmers.

Lulu enjoyed her first real visit to a Mexican restaurant. Sure, we've been to Chipotle (probably more times than I should admit!), but not an actual sit-down restaurant (at least not since she's been old enough to notice the world around her). Walter and I went to Zocalo on Weds and she sat in a high chair and enjoyed some black bean dip, guacamole, and some broken-up tortilla chips.

Nein!

Lulu is discovering the meaning of the word, "No." It was endearingly cute and simultaneously frustrating to tell her "Nein!" and have her grin at me. Elisabeth and I have discovered that she starts to tear up a little and get upset when we tell her "Nein!" now.

I don't want to chase her around the house saying, "Nein!" all the time though, so I think I need to figure out a method to re-direct her energy rather than chastising her for her natural curiosity. Any suggestions?

In other news, we also have her preschool situation all figured out. We want her at the Merryhill school over on Eastern Ave, but they don't accept children younger than 18 months old. So, we have her on their waiting list until February once she's old enough to enroll. Until then, we have her enrolled for 3 afternoons a week at the Mission Avenue Preschool for this summer, starting June 23rd after Elisabeth goes home to Switzerland. She'll be part-time for the remainder of the summer (T-R, 1-5pm) and then switch over to full-time this fall once I return to work. So, we'll be able to enjoy our mornings together before I head up to school.

The staff at Mission Ave have been very accommodating about using cloth diapers and wanting to use any German words that we use with her at home, to re-enforce her vocabulary.

Eavesdropping.

I've heard stories from one of my co-workers about how their baby monitor picked up a drug deal happening down the block and of course, there's the story that made national news about the family whose monitor was picking up NASA communications with an orbiting space shuttle. But, last night our baby monitor picked up something less ominous (drugs) or incredible (shuttle). As we were lying in bed, our monitor picked up the ham radio operator down the street (and around the corner) talking with someone in Morse Code. Walter and I have made jokes about how this particular individual is my father's SoulMate because his house is absolutely covered in ham radio antennae, but otherwise, we haven't had any TV reception interference or any of the usual problems of living nearby a serious ham radio operator.

I'd like to think that a) the fact it was in Morse code that was slow enough to be hand-pecked the old-fashioned way and b) only the old-timers really know Morse code anymore (I don't think you even have to learn it to get your ham radio license nowadays) means that we were hearing communication that was more than just the guy down the street. One of my sincere regrets is that my grandfather never got to meet Louisa before he died this past February. But perhaps W5CIV was letting me know that it's okay, that he can see her anyway (and a lot more than if he were here in person).

Miss you, Grandaddy.

New Car Seat

Someone has officially outgrown her infant car seat. We've been limping along with it for a few weeks now, mostly because of its convenience. Elisabeth and I both have bases for it in our cars, so it's been easy to take Louisa along with us.

Now that I'm home on summer vacation, Louisa will be travelling more in my car, so we installed the new convertible (i.e., it will do rear-facing and forward-facing) car seat we bought about a month ago. It's a Combi and is specially designed to fit in smaller cars, like our VW Jetta. Louisa seems pretty happy with her test-run of the new seat.




We also like that it allows the front seats to be pushed back farther, giving us more leg-room. But, it does mean that if she falls asleep in the car, there's no more just sliding the infant seat on to the ol' stroller and going. Now, we will have to get her out of the seat and put her in the stroller (which has now been outfitted with its seat, sun shade, and basket underneath the seat).