Family fun in the sun

We just got from a wonderful week vacation with the extended family in Florida. We've been to the Alden Beach Resort at St. Pete Beach twice before with one side of the family. This time we went there with the other side of the family. Last Saturday, we arrived and met the grandparents at the Tampa airport. Late that night, Aunt Sonja and "the cousins" arrived. We had six days of fun and relaxation.

Poor Elaine wasn't used to walking in the outdoors without boots. She refused to walk on the sand, regardless of whether she wore sandals or went barefoot. I had to carry her on the beach and she would only sit down on a blanket. Once there, she loved spooning out sand and sorting sea shells for hours.

Meredith loved building castles, finding shells, and jumping in the ocean--especially with Zach. Meredith spent countless hours in the pool too. Both girls never wanted to leave the pool. Every time Elaine caught sight of the pool she desperately wanted to get in it.

We saw a dolphin. We saw pelicans and fishing hawks and storks and egrets and lizards--all within 100 yards of our room. The week also featured a trip to the zoo in Tampa and a eco-boat ride and an eco-safari adventure involving ziplines. Jen was interviewed by a local television station on the latter one. Meredith fed a giraffe at the zoo (it had a blue tongue!) and allowed a parrot to sit on her head for a bit.

While enjoying the sunset on the beach one evening, we turned around to see the space shuttle taking off on the other side of Florida. Meredith thought that was pretty cool.

The girls were excellent travelers and we dealt with minimal tantrums from kids and adults alike!

All an all, a great, relaxing time. Pictures to be posted soon.

Pumpkin goodness

When I was in my youth, we'd frequently have waffles on the weekends. Sometimes we'd get a special treat, particularly in fall, and have pumpkin waffles. As the days got shorter and colder and it was even more difficult to get out of a warm bed on Saturday morning, the smell of pumpkin, cinnamon, and nutmeg would eventually pull me out of bed. It was a method I much preferred to forcing me up for the day than the one favored in December: Blasting of a Bing Crosby or Ann Murray Christmas album over and over and over again.

*****

We had a full weekend that featured among other things, perfect fall weather. On Saturday, we went to the Augsburg homecoming football game and watched the Auggies (yes, they are really called that) handedly defeat the Oles (from St. Olaf, yes, they are really called that). Meredith and Elaine liked watching the action on the field. Elaine would clap along with the crowd to be part of the excitement. During the fourth quarter the girls got a little antsy and starting playing around with a little ball. Meredith took a swift kick at it and landed it in some poor woman's face 15 feet away. (Apologies were quickly offered.)

From the football game came the ArtiCulture opening. ArtiCulture is a local visual arts education nonprofit. Meredith has taken a couple classes there and celebrated her fourth birthday there. I've been volunteering with them a bit in recent weeks. They have an awesome new space on Franklin Ave which we got to tour.

On Saturday night, Jen went out to party and sing karaoke and eat some fabulous homemade Indian food. She didn't have a drip of alcohol to drink because she had to drive back in forth to Maplewood, but had so much fun she was a little loopy afterwards.

Sunday morning featured pumpkin waffles. Both Meredith and Elaine ate them up quickly; though Elaine seemed to prefer the whip cream topping to the waffle itself. Since I had leftover purred pumpkin I made some pumpkin cookies that I now need to get rid of lest I gain back some weight. After waffles, we packed up and went apple picking in near Jordan with friends. Meredith got a pony ride in too!

In the afternoon, Jen and I drove back to Minneapolis to see a play at the Jungle Theater. It was a Mamet piece, A Life In the Theater. I definitely recommend it for some excellent acting. Afterwards we drove back to the 'burbs to procure the kids. We returned to Minneapolis to have dinner with the neighbors. The only problem was that both Elaine and Meredith had fallen asleep before dinner. Despite multiple sincere efforts, neither one stirred. I eventually gave up and let them sleep. Apparently they both had an active weekend. The two girls proceeded to sleep a full 13 hours! They arose Monday morning no worse for the wear and ready to face the week.

Pigtails!

Elaine's hair is just getting long enough for pigtails. She had some in her hair over the weekend. We thought she looked super cute.

Mid-summer pictures

Below are some highlights from this past month. We traveled to Missouri to visit grandparents. We hosted the other grandparents in Minneapolis. We've had a lot of swimming fun. Meredith did a week of "art camp" in the mornings and Elaine told her first knock-knock joke, sorta.

Swing time!

Elaine shows her stuff

Elaine is a quick mover, but she's been in no hurry to walk. She has been crawling, cruising, and "scooting" for many many months now, but hasn't been all that interested in walking. She seems to get where she wants just fine through her other methods.

But each day she does give us indications she is moving towards walking. Her favorite activity this past week is to do an unassisted stand from the sitting or crouching position. She'll stand for a bit and then plop back down. We captured one of the brief instances on video.



Oh, yes. She does like to clap for herself just about every time.

More milestones

Elaine had her first-month checkup yesterday. (Derek brought her, since I am (always) at work, so this is hearsay, but I think we can believe him.) She was only about 25th percentile for height and weight - a proportional little peanut - and the doctor thought her development was right in line. Good news! We think she's pretty great, but doing things in a different order and timing from Meredith. Good to have input from someone who thinks of it as a sample larger than 2.

A snapshot of Elaine at one:

Elaine's favorite things:

• pulling up on EVERYTHING - the bed, Daddy's pant leg, even the dog.
• babbling constantly. She's rarely quiet. It's good we don't go to concerts or live in an apartment.
• including real words in her babbling: fish! dog! all done! ooh! (Pooh, as in Winnie the.) meow! (when she sees a picture fo a cat.) She's saying more than that, but that's all we have gleaned so far. Derek thinks maybe she's speaking French.
• finding and following her sister and the dog, around and around.
• grinning at you, hiding her face, then quickly looking back and grinning even wider. It's the cutest thing in the whole world. (And no, I'm not biased at all.)
• looking at books. Each new page is exciting. She loves both being read to and crawling over, knocking books off the shelf, and crowing with delight to sit and look at them by herself.

Elaine is working on:

• cruising. She hasn't quite got the idea that she can pull up and then move - we'll see when this happens!
• more teeth. She has the front four, plus significant bumps on her gums.
• feeding herself. She doesn't quite have the chewing part and is just not that interested. But she eats a wide variety of pureed foods.
• making herself understood.

-JRR

Bunnies and Eggs

Meredith has been looking forward to Easter the previous week. She was counting down the days. We had talked about the Easter egg hunting a little bit and the Easter Bunny's role in it, but it hasn't been a big focus around here. Nevertheless, Meredith has been talking to someone because the day before Easter she gave both us parents a long speech about all the things she knows about the Easter Bunny. Among many tidbits was that the Easter Bunny can't talk.

We found ourselves the day before at the Midtown Global Market. We ended up staying longer than planned with the unplanned, good fortune of seeing the Easter Bunny come in to take pictures with kids. Well, amend that. Meredith told us afterwards that it wasn't the real Easter Bunny, but a grown-up dressed up. She knows because the fake Easter Bunny had gloves on. Meredith still enjoyed having her picture taken with the pretend bunny and Elaine didn't freak out for a couple of seconds of picture taking.

On Easter we spent much time with the neighbors and connected friends and families. Six kids went about an excited egg hunt through one house and two snow-covered yards. My hope is that next year, due to a later in the year Easter and a warmer early spring, that we'll be able to conduct an egg hunt without snow and cold. I think it was March 26 of last year when we were able to walk at Minnehaha Falls in shorts with the thermometer passing 80! We got ice cream that melted faster than we could eat it!


PICTURES!

Elaine explores the slide. Meredith tries to help.

Spring break in Green Bay

Last week was Meredith's school's spring break. There was nothing spring about it except for some melting of snow that revealed our long lost friend: grass. Jen's law firm does not have a corresponding spring break, so I took Elaine and Meredith to the exotic locale of Green Bay, Wisconsin.

We spent some time with Grandma Cathy and Grandpa Dave, and got to see Aunt Sonja and Uncle Chris and the cousins, Kayla, Natalya, and Zach. Meredith enjoys being around her cousins! They are nice, friendly, fun, interesting kids. Even better, Meredith likes playing with Zach. He's a big kid, but he also lets her boss him around. What could be better? In all seriousness, Zach is simply a good sport who plays very nicely with a sometimes pushy four year-old. (She just knows what she wants I guess.)

In Green Bay, Meredith got to go to her first basketball game with her grandparents. They saw the UWGB Fighting Phoenix Women win their first conference tournament game. Apparently she had lots of questions to pepper at her grandparents throughout the game. We went to the Wildlife Sanctuary and saw a bunch of animals. We saw eagles, owls, snakes, giant fruit bats, and an eagle nest; but Meredith's favorite part by far was feeding corn to the geese and ducks.

All in all, it was a fun trip to Wisconsin. The five hours of driving both ways went relatively smoothly, with the girls sleeping most of the way back. It would have been perfect had Meredith not struggled with nightmares every twenty minutes in the car.

For your viewing pleasure, some video and pictures from the last week!


We won't have Elaine babysit anyone anytime soon:


Meredith had a bit of sugar on this day:


PICTURES (More pictures from Wisconsin will be added in the coming days)

Mid-winter pics

Here are some pictures from the last few weeks. They include shots from the visit from Grandma Gail and Grandpa Kerry, the art show at Meredith's school, and last weekend's trip to the Minnesota Children's Museum. We also have evidence of Elaine pulling up. She's doing it a lot these days, with ever-increasing confidence and stability.

First, a clip of Elaine's new trick: clapping.

Traveling girl

I've been delaying a post in the hopes to get a couple of corresponding pictures and/or videos. But no luck thus far! They will have to come later.

Elaine has pulled out a few new tricks this week. First, kids her age like pulling things out of other things. So Elaine likes to pull books from the bookshelf, pull papers out of the printer, grab anything out of a drawer (she'll spend 10 minutes trying to get a drawer open for this purpose), and pulling toys out of a bin. In the last week, on several occasions, she has started to place items in containers. Very soon, I know, we'll have her cleaning up after herself!

Elaine also began clapping. It's a little on the later end developmentally for clapping. She's done other sophisticated stuff with her hands for a while (waving, pointing, wagging her finger, etc); but the clapping hands are brand new. She uses it to celebrate, to get attention, and I think as a modified sign for "more." When she wants more food she seems to clap. It appears she also used it to request being picked up.

Incidentally, Meredith has been practicing snapping her fingers. It's a difficult and frustrating task for a preschooler. Meredith is doing pretty well at it! She has the movement right and often makes a good "snap" noise with her right hand. I try to encourage her, in part, by telling her I don't snap very well with my left hand either. Every once in a while she practices winking too.

Lastly, Elaine is "traveling." She's been able to pull up on parents' hands and other things for a while now; though, she hasn't been all that excited by it. This week, she has pulled up on the bottom stair and a couple other objects, and "traveled" a few steps over, unassisted. Today, she did this a couple times, as a means to trying to figure out how to go up the stairs when a parent or the cat went up. It won't take her long to realize that walking (and climbing the stairs) are necessary for keeping up with her big sister.

Reflections are

Elaine loves looking in the mirror. I'll hold her in front of the mirror and she'll smile and wave and try to hit it. One wonders at times what she thinks of this reflection. Does she think it's another baby? Perhaps one very clever at copying her actions?

It's become clear over the past weeks that she recognizes my image as a reflection. She'll look back and forth between me and my reflection and treat us the same way. She easily makes eye contact with my reflection and does silly things.

Today, I lifted a hand-held mirror of Meredith's to Elaine's face. She did something interesting. She saw her reflection in the mirror, then deliberately looked behind her to see who was there. After a momentary search, she gazed back at the mirror and waved. She then smiled and then started to try to hit the mirror. It seemed quite clear to me that she recognized that the mirror reflected people in front of it, but was unsure at least on this occasion if the reflection was herself or another baby in the vicinity. Sometimes it's difficult to figure out how these kids think. They have so much to learn and put together on a daily basis. Good thing they are so curious.

Rock and roll

We have a couple of girls who appreciate some good rock and roll dance moves.

Elaine often hits the keyboard until it plays this song she can dance to. Sometimes she looks like she's going to fall right over, but she'll stop herself with her hands.



One wonders where Elaine learned her dance moves...

Winter pictures

Some pictures from the last couple of weeks as we deal with the continuing winter cold.

Catching up to Elaine

Elaine is an active 10 month old. Not only does she continue to crawl quickly around the house as if she owns it, Elaine is learning new skills. She is pulling up on all sorts of things. Recently, she spent about 10 minutes trying to figure out how to get her whole body up a step. She made excellent progress, bringing most of her body up, but eventually gave up. Elaine was trying to get to Meredith, who wisely surmised the way to get some space from her clingy little sister was to go half way up the stairs.

This morning, I entered Elaine's bedroom to see her standing up in her crib for the first time. I don't know how long she had been standing there. She's still learning on how to get down from a stand. This was the first time she pulled up all the way by herself. In the past weeks she often has grabbed our hands to pull up into a standing position. It's a whole new chapter here. I'm going to have to get the baby gate on the stairs pretty soon!

Elaine's two bottom teeth are sticking well into her mouth and the top ones are imminent. Yet, she still doesn't want to try to chew anything or feed herself. We give her cut up cheerios. But despite our demonstrations, she prefers to push them around and hold them instead of placing them in her mouth. Her favorite food continues to be yogurt.

On the verbal front, Elaine is starting to say "mama" more often than chance in reference to her mom. I swear that I thought I heard her say something like "bah!" to a ball a couple times last weekend, but it's hard to say for sure.

Drool and Birthdays

It's begun. With Elaine's second bottom tooth poking through, the girl has begun to drool. Each morning I greet her in her crib and she has a big "drool goatee" hanging down. It's precious. The new teeth also mean that food is getting more messy for now. She spits out her formula and dribbles out her pureed baby food. Glorious.

On Saturday, we had a little celebration to mark my 30th birthday. It feels like a milestone. We had a wine and cheese theme and friends generously brought great wine and cheese selections. The party included a fair amount of crazy four year-olds loudly chasing each other through the house. Eventually, they were largely relegated to the upstairs, where a suspicious spot appeared in the carpet. Meredith, after cleverly covering it up with a piece of paper, admitted its cause to be "moon sand" and water that "accidentally" spilled on it. "Moon sand" is this particularly treacherous substance. It's like sandy, foamy play-do--but messier.

Several days into my 30th year, I do feel older. Still, the moments I truly feel old is when I awake to crying at 5-something AM to deal with a messy diaper. Birthdays or no, I'm hunched over and stumbling as a I drag my aching body around the house, eyes open just enough to navigate around physical hazards. I don't, however, feel wiser quite yet. It's hard to feel wise when a four year-old is beginning to out-clever you.

Stuck inside

With the cold outside and the cold viruses in our bodies, we've spent a lot of time inside in the last week. In between getting healthy and watching the Packers miss their chance to go to the Super Bowl, we've had to find some entertainment.

The girls and I decided to do a dance concert. A clip of the performance is below for your viewing pleasure.

VIDEO: Meredith is a dancing queen



PICTURES

We got teeth!

January 16 will hereafter be known as the day Elaine got her first tooth. After months of slowly working on them, today her bottom, center right tooth popped through. She has a sharp edge to contend with now. It appears that the tooth's center partners on the left and top won't be that far behind. She'll be chewing before we know it!

Video: Elaine sounds

Here is the promised video of Elaine's newest sound. She liked having me pat her mouth while she did this. In the days since, she prefers to run her fist or the back of her hand over her mouth herself.

aw-aw-aw-aw-aw

We're back to the old grindstone. This has been an up and down week. It's hard to go back to old routines after the holidays and traveling. Jen went back to work, Meredith back to school, and Elaine and I were just the two of us in the mornings. We're kind of tired, but at least healthier (so far) than we were last month.

Elaine has taken off this week. All of a sudden she is doing real crawling, instead of her "comando scooting." Elaine can pull up to standing position. She can stand with minimal balance support for a long time, even going one-handed already. She can kind-of do an assisted walk--but the walking thing is still a little bit in the future.

Elaine's favorite sounds she learned while we were in Florida. She takes her fist or back of her open hand and runs it over her mouth while she makes a long vowel sound. We hope to get one of these frequent incidents on video soon. She gets a kick out of it every time she does it.

Pictures: Christmas with family

Despite the hurdles of illness and weather-related traveling woes, we've been able to have a fun holiday so far with family. My parents, Meredith's and Elaine's Grandma Cathy and Grandpa Dave, have come to Minneapolis to spend the holidays with us. Uncle Jesse rode out with them after flying into Green Bay from Arizona. We were also pleased to host the Jensen family. Meredith enjoys playing with her cousins Kayla, Natalya, and especially Zach. Zach is apparently a really cool guy according to Meredith. (I'd concur.) Their mom, Aunt Sonja, drove the five hours each way during questionable road conditions to spend the weekend with us.

Last week, Elaine was sick and Meredith was very sick. I got sick in time for everyone to come and was bedridden for much of the past 4 or 5 days. It's not been fun, but our main hope is to be well by the time we fly to Florida on Jan 1.

Below are some pictures from the past week. It appears upon viewing that Jen probably took a lot of these since she doesn't appear in them. Grandpa Dave escaped the camera this time too. So we'll have to rectify that.

PICTURES

VIDEO

Also, last Friday Meredith's school presented a whole program of holiday songs from the preschool, pre-kindergarten and kindergarten classes. The below video is one sampling. Apologies for the low production values. The brief moment of darkness in the middle is my attempt to record Elaine's reaction to the singing. Meredith is sitting in the front, middle with a red Nordic sweater.