pictures!

These are from our visit to David's parents' house in mid-August, so E is 9 months old in the pictures.

4 am

The cat, the husband, the baby all conspired to wake me up around 4 am and I never went back to sleep. I guess it's a good thing, because I was dreaming about my to-do list! There's something I wrote on it at work, two letters "HB", and I can't remember what that means.

the girl in the mirror has more teeth

This weekend E and I visited Aunt Helen and family, as well as Granny Annie, who made E laugh more than anyone. At her apartment E visited the cute little girl in the full-length mirror, patted and kissed her, tried to head-butt her, grinned endlessly at her, and looked around the corner of the wall to try to find her.

I've been thinking for months that E was teething but I had stopped checking regularly because nothing was happening. Well, at Helen's house I happened to glance at my baby's mouth while she had it wide open and I saw new white teeth poking through -- FIVE of them! Four on top and one of the lower laterals (next to the two she already had). Suddenly the child goes from two little teeth to a mouthful. I don't know when they came through. It must have been in the last few days.

So I decided she is now ready for Zwieback toast, and she loved it. The smell had a memory for me - I remember eating these things, I guess when my sister was a baby. I recalled a vague image of my grandmother's kitchen and looking up while someone got me one of these snacks out of a box on a high shelf.

Sorry there's no new photos. I have two rolls of film from the last 2-3 months and they're going to the developer today.

time and food

Last night David fed and bathed E (tasks which I normally do because I enjoy them) and I was able to capitalize on my rare evening burst of energy. I vacuumed and mopped the kitchen and bathroom! Wow. I had to read a little Harry Potter to settle down afterward, but that's always risky -- sometimes the story is too riveting to let me go to sleep. I stayed up too late.

E is doing well. She is taking after her mother when it comes to eating. The sitter says she will eat as long as you keep spooning it in! She doesn't seem to lose interest. I can tell when she's getting full because she will start slapping the food on the high chair tray, but if you slow down and give her a few breaks, it seems as if she'd keep eating all night. She recognizes cheese now and her face lights up. She never gets tired of toast. She tried ramen noodles this week - that was fun. She figured out how to slurp a noodle into her mouth. And, as we all know, right, anything she can feed herself tastes better than whatever I put on a spoon!

learning

On Sunday when I picked up the remote that works the radio in E's room, she saw it in my hand and immediately looked across the room at the radio.

Another day, when she sat down with a just-filled diaper, she raised herself up and turned back to look at the floor, to see what she sat on.

misc

E is sleeping better the last couple of weeks, so I am too, and I should be able to get back to regular blogging. I haven't been taking as many pictures though, so you're getting a steady stream of left-brain input. This morning there's no special theme, just a general update. As I type the sweetie-pie is relaxing in her "exer-saucer" (what is the generic name for such things?), slapping a book, saying "ba" (with no special meaning that I can discern), and starting to yawn a bit. She woke up at 5:45, an hour ago, can't stay awake very long this early. Oh, now she's turning the pages of the board book and touching the pictures - every now and then she appreciates a book as something more than a thing to chew on.

... (put her back to bed) ...

E was 10 months old on Sept. 10th. She and I went to Victor's birthday party last week, enjoyed the "baby cakes" that his mom made, which were less sweet than the regular cake but just as much fun to smear in your hair. Her favorite food lately is cheese toast. She's starting to prefer carbs over vegetables, so I feed her the vegetables first.

We put the baby swing in the attic (saving for Kristie if she wants it). E would just get in it and grab the poles so that the swing stopped. She plays with her toys less now. She'd rather have a piece of string, keys, a telephone, a spoon, or a piece of cardboard (which she eats). When she gets hold of a cord or rope or ribbon she gets all intense and flings it furiously up and down, passes it through her hands, holds it up in the air, talks to it. Maybe in a previous life she did cowboy rope tricks or was a snake charmer!

I'm keeping the nursery at church this morning, taking E along of course. This weekend David is working on a computer model of a World War II airplane - and it's for work. Yesterday the three of us took a walk to the drug store at David's suggestion. I need reminding to enjoy the outdoors.

Well I guess I should get a move on, get my shower before she wakes again. Bye for now.

milk memories

Purging expired frozen breastmilk from my freezer, I encountered another surprising pang of nostalgia. I was throwing out bags from January, which was before I gave up writing the time of milk production on the bag alongside the date. Reading "1/11/06 2 am" gave me a flashback to a dark winter night with a lamp always left on, the smell of the heating, a pink bathrobe and t-shirt spotted and damp with milk, "sleeping" on the couch between a hated breast pump and a soothing/glowing fish tank, and a bassinet in the middle of the living room, an enviably sleeping bundle gently breathing inside.

I love my husband, continued

Reflecting on September 11th, I remember how much I missed David that week when it happened, and he was in Fayetteville painting a set. I slept on the couch with the radio on (tuned to public radio) all night, all week. And it was the "live your life now" wake up call of those terrorist acts that made me realize I wanted to marry him. Three months later we were on our Florida honeymoon!

We're thinking of going to Florida this December, taking Emma, of course. The logistics worry me a little (including 12 hour drives), but I look forward to it.

peek-a-boo!

Last night E played "peekaboo", for real. The gist of how it went was this.

The 3 of us were on the couch and David tossed the edge of the blanket over E's face. I said "Where's Emma...?" in that playful tone of voice, and she pulled down the blanket and grinned. I said, "There she is!" Then she raised both arms over her head, holding the blanket, covering her face. And it was up, down, up, down, over and over again, often so fast I couldn't get the sentences out. It was "Where-" "There!" and then "Wh-" "Th-"!

We had sort of played the game sometime before, recently, but very briefly and with E's actions being more haphazard. Whenever she would be thrashing around with a blanket or towel or piece of clothing (as she does) and happen to cover her face, I would say "Where's Emma...?" And then "There she is!" (or "peekaboo" or the Southern "peep-eye!"). Earlier in the day yesterday, or the day before, when I was dressing her, that had happened and she had responded to my next peekaboo prompt by raising both arms over her head, but whatever cloth she was holding didn't cover her face. Apparently the first association she made with the game was holding her arms over her head. But I covered her face for her and did it one more time. Then she lost interest. So last night on the couch was the first time she truly "got it" and did all the actions deliberately.

when do you count it as "first word"?

This morning Emma has been saying "mama, mom" in a more deliberate way than ever, but it was directed at Kaylee the cat (twice), and then at the yardstick. She liked playing with the hot pink yardstick from Wilbourne Furniture in Dunn, NC. Later it was the whisk: "mama, mom".

Since it wasn't directed at me, I don't think I'll count it.

most fun ever

The day I let E play in the cats' water bowl was probably a highlight of her life so far! She pulled the dish towel down from the oven door. She splashed and splashed. When she couldn't lift the bowl to drink from it she bent down to it (but that was too awkward and she stopped trying).

These were taken sometime in July, I think. So she's around 8 and a half months old.

I love my husband

David had an idea for moving my computer off the floor and he got around to putting it back together before I did - so you can thank him for getting me back to my early morning blogging! Of course, two of my dedicated readers are now off galavanting westward in their RV, without Internet access for a month, but I'll carry on for the rest of you. My in-laws take their cats with them in the RV - isn't that cool?

It's almost 6 am and I need to stop now and get these dishes done or else I'll be in a really pissy mood when I come home tonight and see them again. I've also got to put the clothes in the dryer so that I'll have something to wear to work today.

Here's a link to the CCL blog (where I work), if you want more serious reading....
http://leadthis.org/ Several of us contribute to this.

ambivalence

You can tell by my last two posts I've got mixed feelings about my cat (Ellie May -- Kaylee is David's cat.) She starts a new anti-depressant today that may help.

Emma news: Third tooth impending. Can stand up from a squatting position without holding on. Spits out baby food in a slow, proud way. Favorite things to play with: keys, scrub brush, leather coin purse, hair, paper. Favorite game: crumb patrol.