01-31-07
Okay, today's actually Feb 1, but I just wanted to let you know that I posted a few more videos on YouTube, but they'll probably only interest you if you're a Grandma or an Auntie.

01-30-07

Sean's ankle one week later

Sean's ankle in all it's glory - it's keeping him from working for two weeks (at least - he still can't even put a shoe on) although I must admit I LOVE having him here at home. Ever's getting a lot of floor time and attention and interaction since she & Sean spend so much time on the floor or on the bed. She isn't totally crawling yet, but can maneuver across the bed and floor quite well. She sat up on her own today and loves it. You can see how hard she works just to stay upright. No teeth yet - still lots of toothless smiles. She claps all the time now - especially if we sing the "We Like to Clap" song that we made up. I am currently working on her saying Hello and Bye-Bye (waving). For those of you who have expressed concern for Sean's ankle - thank you. It's sprained and probably some tendons torn. It's not broken. He can't use a "walking cast" because he can't put any pressure on his heel. It's iced a lot and raised most of the time. There's really not much he can do but wait for it to heal. And, sadly, he won't be playing volleyball anymore. We can't afford any more injuries.

Celebrating Ever & Geneva's half-birthdays

Mama & Ever

Ever

Geneva loved her birthday gift!

Ready to crawl

Lastly, I leave you with another video of Ever - clapping!

(As before, a few more new videos here.)
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01-24-07

Sean has been banished to the second bedroom because he has to sleep on his back, so he can elevate his ankle. When he sleeps on his back, he snores. Normally I can jab him in the night and he'll roll over, but he can't roll over now, so off he went into the second bedroom to sleep with his foot propped up on pillows and he could saw wood all night. I slept poorly. I could hear him in the other room and it just didn't seem right that he had to be away. (He kept us up the night before - he did have to be away.) When Ever & I woke up at 9:00 I was still very tired from not falling asleep until 3:00 and nursing a couple times after that, so I got her up and changed her and gave her to Sean to play around in "his" bed, knowing he'd holler when she was ready to do something else. He woke me up at 11:30 by doing this bunny hop/drag walk while bringing Ever to me. "She needs to nurse," he said. "I made you a cup of tea - it's in the kitchen." And then he CRAWLED - got on his hands and knees and CRAWLED AWAY.

No no I'm not done yet. As he's crawling across the floor he goes "OW" and then I hear him rummaging around in his tool box in the hallway closet. "What are you doing?" I ask. "I found a carpet staple!" he replies, "We missed one! And I... found it" and he begins to yank out the little pieces with pliers.
Rainbows and unicorns, this guy. Eighteen years of rainbows and unicorns.
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01-23-07
(New video)

Jessica and Nicole help her with the candle

Eating solids now

Ever turned 6 months old Saturday and turned a new leaf. The newest chapter in her life has her morphing into a monkey baby. Seriously. Last week she was soft and cuddly and quiet, and then this week it's "Ma! Listen to THIS! AIEEEGAGAGAGAGIEEEEEEEEE! What do you think?! How `bout BLAAAAAAAAGGGGAAAA!" and "What happens if I head-butt you in your forehead? Did that hurt? `Kay now how `bout if I head-butt you in your teeth? That hurt too? COOL!" and "Why are we just sitting here when I can climb your torso/head/leg/the cat?" and "WHY CAN'T I eat the cat?" and "Clapping! Clapping is so fun! But it's MORE fun if I clap your face! Neck! Eye! Boob! Mouth! Cat! and OOOoooooh what was that I just did? A back-hand? LOVE IT! AIEEEEEEEE!"
I know this is how a baby becomes a toddler and it's supposed to happen, but at six months? My Mom called tonight and Ever was shrieking and Mom said "WHAT is she DOING?!?" then Sean's Mom Margeret called like two hours later and said "WHAT is she DOING?!?" THIS IS WHAT SHE DOES NOW.
Just as this change was occurring, Sean rolled his ankle Monday night playing volleyball, rendering him about 20% helpful, which is a huge difference to me because usually when he's home, he's 100% Daddy. Ever loves the time she can climb all over him in bed but he can't work and he's in quite a bit of pain. But his body makes excellent monkey bars, I'll give him that much.
Why can't Tomoka be here NOW?
Other Mommies? Six months? Is that right?
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01-22-07
Introducing.... VIDEO!

More here.
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01-17-07

Today I took Ever in to the clinic to have her second set of baby shots, which is about 2 months past the recommended date, but it's okay since she's still breastfeeding. Anyway. She's 14 pounds and something ounces, I dunno, it's metric here. She's also 27" long which puts her in the 90th percentile for height! Because her weight is normal and her height is high, the doctor had some concerns about her being too skinny. Ever gets some "people food" for fun once in a while, but I go to the school of "breast is best" and was very surprised when the doctor told me that she should be eating solid foods three times A DAY. She said if I was opposed to rice cereal, then I should try oatmeal. Where do they FIND these doctors?!? I had to come right home and re-verify that I'm doing the right thing, but it still caused some stress and Sean had to talk me down a little. After some more research we decided to do what we had planned all along - give Ever bit of what we're eating and let her decide when and what she wants to eat. The doctor actually said "If you don't train her on solids now, she won't learn how to eat."

Now, maybe this is because I went to public school all my life, but... I never met a kid who had to go home for lunch because they never learned to eat. What a bunch of Old Wives Tale hogwash.
Ever is now sleeping peacefully after her shots and hopefully she'll continue sleeping, which started at 7 p.m. If she gets up in the night then I'll just get up with her. I still can't imagine how I'd be able to do all this if I was working again.
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01-16-07

I just found out tonight that some friends of mine (real friends, mind you) broke up, and I had to read BOTH of their blogs to see that it happened over a month ago. We've received cards from Matt & Fernanda like three times now, along with multiple e-mails, and I've not even responded via e-mail. Ditto for Heather and the Germans and so many others. I don't think I've spoken to Estella since she was here. Remember when I was doing something social every night? It's amazing how one little baby changes your entire world. We had Dave over for dinner tonight, and I did pretty well getting the table cleared off and the shopping done, but Ever decided to go for a record to see how long she could go without sleeping. Besides her 1/2 hour nap in the stroller on Hastings, it was 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. And BOY WAS SHE TIRED. Like, loopy crazy tired. Sean said at one point she looked at him and her EYES WERE ASKEW. She wants to practice crawling AT ALL TIMES including while nursing or falling asleep, which makes her pretty dang wiped out and makes Sean and I want to build prison bars around EVERYTHING. She is just so, so close to getting there - she has even accidentally crawled a couple times.

Do you all remember Tomoka? We met her in sign language class in Seattle in 2001 when she was a nanny, she stayed with us to visit in 2002 (when Chad died), and she lives in Osaka, Japan. It's a long story, but anyway to make the story short, we love her and she's going to come live with us and be our nanny.
No, I'm serious.
No, I'm serious.
The immigration paperwork is already filed. We got her plane ticket to Indiana for Todd's wedding this June. For reals. We've had quite a few excited e-mails going back and forth for the past couple weeks, as you can imagine. She'll arrive June 5 and stay either six months or one year, depending on Canadian Immigration. A live-in nanny! Ever is going to love her! It will definitely be a change for us but there were just so many positives we couldn't refuse. And you know me - I love having people around. So, I know it's not for a while, but I just wanted you all to know.
When you've eaten way too much dinner it actually does not digest better with coffee and an éclair on top. Future reference for myself there.
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(Maggie Simpson)

Previous January 2007 entries