Crawling Along :-)

She's always a blur of motion right now!

Eating rocks and flowers in the garden. Delicious!Yes, Addie is officially mobile. Look out, world. Videos below!

This is a quick post, and that's really the big news. Posting about once a week or a week and a half is the rate of posting that I'm happy with right now. It gives me enough time to record the "memorable moments" in Addie's life without feeling like a burden. Normally I'd like to write more, but I'm in a hurry today, so without further ado...

We went to our first Twins game last weekend. Well, it was mine and Addie's first game. It was a beautiful day, but very very long...about 11 Am to 10:oo PM in all. Addie was such a trooper. She eventually fell asleep in Tim's arms after literally hours of being awake and wonderful.

Before the game, waiting for the light rail.


The view from our seats.



The guy who was kind enough to take this said "Oh, what a nice picture!" ....not sure what he was seeing. LOL. My eyes are closed, Tim hasn't quite gotten a smile out yet, and Addie looks like someone just told her the world's supply of breast milk was endangered. But it's an obligatory family photo from the event.

Little sleeper. Love that tiny little fist and those cheeks.

Adelaide is a very busy baby right about now, with lots of corners to explore and things on the carpet to taste. It's an adventure. She's pleased as punch with her newfound ability to move herself around and she's making up for all those looong months of dependency. There is a lot of rolling, bouncing, cruisin', n crawlin' to do.

Some other quick favorite things of hers:

Mac and cheese
White peaches ( a girl after Mommy's own heart)
Anything sweet (ditto above)
Kung Fu Panda (the movie)
Mamma Mia (the movie...no I'm not kidding, I wish I was...she likes the singing)
Her Kermy Bear

And in grown up life, I made a chilled melon soup and salad nicoise that were so pretty that I just had to take a picture.


And dinner out with friends. Delicious Mexican on the deck.




The multimedia portion

The first attempt to capture crawling on video...let's say it didn't quite work out. The second attempt was much more successful.



Standing up in her crib is a new pastime that is fun for the WHOLE family. Or not. As soon as she wakes up now, she is eager to try standing. At ALL hours of the day and night. Problem is, she can't figure out how to sit down yet so she gets upset and is "stuck".

Eight Months, Minneapolis, and Aunties

Here's how most of our pictures with Addie turn out these days. A picture of us smiling while trying to contain a blur of energy. And then you end up with a still picture but your kid looks a lot like Popeye the Sailor Baby. But you settle for it, because really, what else can you do?







Addie is eight months old. I'm so tempted to do my usual cliche about time flying or how I can't believe it...but I'm abstaining. Kind of. I guess not really. Oh well, cliches become cliches for a reason.

If I had to choose one word to describe Addie at eight months, I'd probably choose "wonderful". If I had a choose a slightly more descriptive word, I'd go with "active". As demonstrated by the pictures above, Baby Girl is never still and never quiet. She is always on the go, always chatting/shouting, and always funny. She is vigorous in her wants and her affections. If she wants something, she wants it immediately. If she loves you, you'll know it. Her particular marks of affection are grabbing your face with both fists and squeezing with all her might and/or embedding six sharp teeth into any convenient body part that comes her way. Right now I have a scabbed over slash mark on my cheek (darn baby fingernails grow so fast) and teeth marks in an unmentionable place. She is still nursing, let's put it that way. Weaning never looked so good.

Despite the teeth marks, I am glad that Addie is still nursing because that's the only time I see the last remaining vestige of her infant self. She has long, sleepy, dreamy cuddle sessions when she wakes up (7:30 every day, like clockwork) and before bed (this varies a lot, usually around 8). Otherwise, she probably nurses around four times a time, at random times, though almost always before her two naps. She has dropped her third nap and is now sleeping fairly reliably in the morning and afternoon. Morning nap is usually around 10 AM and afternoon nap is around 2 or 3, depending on our activities.

Otherwise, she isn't incredibly scheduled. That's mostly because I don't want to be on a schedule. If I was working outside the home, or if I had a smaller child to tend as well, I'd probably need more scheduling in my life, but since I'm not and I don't, I'm content to enjoy this relaxed lifestyle with Addiecakes. It's nice on the weekends too, because we can switch gears easily into "family fun time."

Speaking of, we spent the last weekend in Minneapolis with Tim and some of our good friends. We had the BEST time. Tim was there for five days for a conference and we joined him for the weekend. The guys were able to spend some time with us, but otherwise my friends and I enjoyed some wonderful dinners, relaxing hotel time, and the city life.

I had forgotten what a charge of energy I get from the city lifestyle. I love living in Rochester, but there is no doubt that I miss the city. Just walking out of the hotel was invigorating. We were right in the heart of Minneapolis, on Nicollett Mall, which is a great area filled with shops, restaurants, theaters, museums, sports stadiums...you name it, it's there. I'd never spent much time in Minneapolis and I found it far more to my liking than Saint Paul (the city, not the apostle).

We had a great "mom and kids" dinner at the News Room on Friday night, while the guys went to a Twins game.


This was followed by a night out on the town at a tequila bar and a dance club. Needless to say, children were with babysitters. At first, I found it very difficult to relax. I was worried about Addie going to sleep properly, I was worried about being out at all while being a mother, etc. Eventually I was able to relax and realized that it is possible to have a good night out without guilt. There is nothing wrong with trading in your flips for some high heels and your diaper cream for some lipstick. In fact, I think it's probably healthy and I know it did my soul some good to shake out the kinks.

The next night everyone spent time with their individual families. Tim and I went on a long walk through the Loring Greenway with Addie. The Greenway is a public trail that winds through parks and lakes and is decorated with art installations and sculptures. We then decided to go for a late dinner and had some divine Thai food. Adelaide had fallen asleep on our walk and she actually stayed asleep for most of the meal. Tim and I were thrilled to have 1) exotic foreign food we can't get in the Roch and 2) an adult conversation while 3) being able to see our beautiful daughter sleeping peacefully in her stroller.

A family pic from our walk, in front of the "Dandelion" Fountain.



The next morning we went to Tim's dad's house for Sunday lunch. We weren't able to see Grandpa Randy at all, but we did have a nice time with Abuela Terri and Aunt Sylvia. We feel like Sylvia is practically a roommate now (in a good way!) because we'd gotten to spend time with her and Bonnie earlier in the week. They came to Rochester for a few days and we had a blast with them.

Fun with Aunt Bon


Here's a picture of our meal of appetizers followed by a chick flick. We had hummus with carrots and celery, vegetarian sushi, chips with guac, bruschetta, and a cheese platter with crackers and grapes. And wine. Of course.

Sylvia and Bonnie also bought Adelaide a baby pool. She loved it. Video below of her in it. For now, here's a snap of her in Sam's sunglasses


Then it was off to see Fellows United in the championship game. Sadly, Fellows (or FU, as I like to call them) went down in a blaze of glory to a team of mostly African guys (mainly Somalian, I think?) that were extremely quick and skilled with the ball.

Some randomness: Addie loves riding on Dad's shoulders. Tim may go prematurely bald from this, because she holds on for her dear life to his scalp.


This is kind of funny. It's Addie, eating a copy of The Gospel of John, in a translation entitled "The Message." Personally, I loathe The Message translation of anything, and it's especially cruel to the G of J...but I wanted to take this pic solely so I could say "Look, Addie is hungry for the Word!" Christians will get it.

And now for the multimedia portion. Here is Addie, playing with her toys. I love this because it shows the little flashes of temper that she shows when her toys just fail to cooperate. It cracks me up. For now.





This is a video of Addie in her baby pool. It's a bit longer than usual, but she kept doing cute things right when I wanted to cut it off. The voice in the background are me, Sylvia, Bonnie, Bonnie's boyfriend Sam, and their friend Will

Quite the Week

I have to admit, this one of her on the toilet is probably my favorite picture from the week. Don't worry, the stains aren't potty related. It was some really good baby food that was so yummy, Addie just wanted to bathe in it. There's a picture of more mess with that below. Also, background on the potty training further below.

Yes, we had quite the week around here. It was busy and summery and wonderful. There were soccer playoffs in the awful heat, victory celebrations, pool parties with friends and our first family swim (!) and lots of good food and good times.

And best of all, Addie has all of a sudden taken off in terms of her abilities. She's learned to pull herself up to standing, to sign for "milk", and she's THIS close to learning how to crawl. She's eating everything in sight, whether it's meant for her or not, in the literal sense, and also in the figurative sense...by which I mean that she is lovin' life and livin' hard.

Using the potty is not one of the new abilities. For those that don't know, we've pretty much always put Adelaide on the potty...since she was about 2 months old, I'd say. This is all in the theory that potty training consists of two parts. First, getting your child to use the toilet. Second, getting them to use ONLY the toilet. The first part has been really easy. Addie loves sitting on her potty and uses it on a fairly regular basis...probably at least once out of every three times that she sits on it. And she sits on it at every diaper change. We haven't really attempted the second part yet because we don't think she's ready for that ...but it probably won't be too much longer. The official theory is called Elimination Communication, or just EC for short. It's essentially the idea that your child can use the bathroom in a toilet from infancy. Trust me when I say that this is much easier than waiting until 2 years of age. I've done both, and I much prefer this method. And anything that gets us out of diapers early is a good thing, in my book.

The latest pictures are a true reflection of Addie's exuberance, potty pic included! Her mouth is open ALL THE TIME lately, especially when's excited. If she's not making noise, she's asleep. She's usually shrieking, "singing", panting, or growling. I blame myself for the growling because we do a lot of animal noises together and she's always liked the growly ones (bears, tigers, and the like). It's funny but kind of odd to hear a little baby girl with such a sweet face growling like a wild animal when she's worked up.






And in another newfound ability, Addie made her first "unauthorized" mess. By which I mean that I've given her lots of things to play with, assuming she would tear them apart. This was her first mess that she made totally on her own and without my permission. I was in the shower and I peeked out to check on a suspiciously quiet child and saw that she was very absorbed in the nail polish supplies. I had to take a picture once I got out. And no, it's not ideal to shower while your child wanders around the bathroom, but if your husband is a resident, you get this picture. It's our lives!

Another mess! I think it's safe to say that she enjoyed the banana cherry baby food that I made for her. It was in her ears and nose afterward. Little sweet cheeks, captured in a rare quiet moment.
Last but not least, Tim and Addie together before his playoff game on Sunday. Fellows United won, 4-2. On to the championships!


And in grown up life, I had to take a picture of this chicken pot pie that I made. It was the nicest crust I've ever created, mostly because I didn't try to roll it out as one whole piece, I just did a lot of flower cutouts. It was yummy, if I do say so myself.

This is a picture of an epic Scrabble game that Tim and I played on Friday night. We were sick of movies, so we got out the board games. This game used every single tile and was extremely close. I won...but only by two points. We agreed it was an achievement worth documenting.


And now for the multimedia section.


My sweet little bunny in her swing. I can't tell if this terrifies or delights her. Maybe both.


This was hilarious to me, as you'll see in the video. It's very real, in that Tim had no idea I was recording at the time. I thought our "discussion" was over and clearly he was NOT done with the topic. And it's very real in that it's one of those "discussions" that all married people have that for make absolutely no sense, and yet for some reason, matter intensely at the moment. Tim was quite unhappy that I sent him downstairs when the wrinkle releaser was UPstairs. I'm so glad that I captured this on video because he almost never goes off into an irritated rant ...and of course, the one time that he does, I document the whole thing. Now no one will EVER forget this...(*Rubs hands together in glee)
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This is the "cookie thief" video that I accidentally left off the blog last time. Tim asked me to put it on because "it's my favorite". So of course I did.

Discovery and Rediscovery

Lately I've been rediscovering things. The way the world looks at floor level, the way a laundry basket worn on the head creates weird echoes when you talk, the way light filters through a tent made of bedsheets. Everyone knew exactly how those things looked and felt at one point, but somewhere along the way we became much too cool and grown up to see world though a laundry basket's plastic mesh sides.

I suppose that's inevitable, but I, for one, am pleased that my baby has given me a valid excuse to play again. It's only a matter of time before I'm tossing doll clothes onto the ceiling fan. (My sisters will understand immediately, but for all others, we used to throw Barbie clothes onto the blades of the ceiling fan and shriek like crazy when we turned the fan on and the clothes came flying off. Fun for the whole family right there.)

Addie loves all of this. Her delight in being under things has led to many minutes of hanging out with her under various materials and objects. She is ecstatic when someone drapes her head with a towel or a sheet. I tossed my black silk bathrobe over her head while making the bed one day, and she was in heaven. She looked exactly like a baby Darth Vader and appropriately enough, she started doing her signature "growl" while covered entirely in shiny black silk. I giggled quite a bit over that one.

If her number one pleasure is "having things placed over her head", a close second is "gobbling down big people food" and a close third is "reading...but only three Addie approved books." Addie is still eating the purees that I make, but she also loves macaroni and cheese, applesauce, and chocolate chip cookies. Now, I'm pretty sure that cookies are not on a seven month old's approved diet list, but she took it upon herself to try it out (see video) and that was all she wrote. Now there is a fat chance that I can eat a cookie alone during her waking hours.

And woe to the person who attempts to read any book other than the ones she likes. That book will very soon meet the wrath of an angry baby's pudgy little limbs until it is closed and "Moo, Ba, LaLala" or "Mommy, Carry Me Please" or "Each Peach Pear Plum" is substituted. "Goodnight Moon" is especially hated and the mere sight of the classic orange cover sends her into shouts of protest. And to be honest, I kind of sympathize because why IS that book a classic? "There was a comb and a brush and a bowl full of mush and a quiet old lady whispering 'hush'" ????? If you ask me, having an old lady in a ruffled mobcap in the corner of your room as you're trying to go to sleep is the stuff of nightmares NOT sweet dreams.

In other news, we're still dealing with teething around Chez Ewald. She has six needle sharp pearly whites and believe me, we are ready for teething to be done. Our baby is a robust and vigorous kid, and when she is unhappy, she lets us know. Us, and everyone else in the radius of, let's say, a football field. Below are some videos that demonstrate this perfectly.

In the first, she is squalling before her nap. I decided to film the miraculous power of the Itsy Bitsy Spider. I.B.S. can calm even the most extreme crying...for at least ten seconds. Apologies for my singing.





In the second, you can just see the crazy energy coursing through her ....she's a handful in these moods. Funny, though.