A budding photographer

Recently, it occurred to me to let Mia take pictures with our little portable video camera. It doesn't take great photos but it is the only thing we have besides the huge camera she can hardly hold. Below are some pictures Mia recently took. I first culled the blurry one's out and then chose my favorites and out of these, I had Mia choose her 5 favorites. Here they are not in random order but in the order she chose them. Maybe this reflects something deeper maybe not. I hope not because the pictures of mommy and daddy didn't make the cut :) Oh well. Here they are:

"my purse"

"my Dora wallet"

"strawberries"

"Kitty"

"Gavin"

Weekend Playdates (and stew)

This weekend Gavin had his first playdate with a boy named Luke. . .same age though 6 weeks premature. That and Gavin's (ahem) stature and you get this size difference. . . behold:

This mom just moved into our area from NYC though she is from the UK and her husband is from Holland. She emailed a neighborhood listserve I am on to introduce herself and I emailed her back about how I also had a 9 month old boy and we got the kids together soon thereafter. We arranged the date during Mia's nap so I could focus on Gavin. Here they are with Mojo making a cameo in the background. Gavin was so impressed by his friend's crawling that he did more tummy time (and sliding backwards) than he usually will do for Dave or I. We should have him over again soon!

This weekend I had the rare pleasure of making a meal all on my own without having to stop to nurse Gavin. During the week Dave has dinner ready so we can eat right when I get back from work so I don't have a lot of time to cook anymore. Furthermore, my cooking usually entails a recipe for something new or else it comes out awful. But this time, I was creative and decided what to make on what we had (a ton of root veggies) and was only with a general outline of a recipe and it came out great. I made a root veggie stew featuring beets, celery, onions, fingerling potatoes, sweet potatoes, parsnips and carrots. It was great, in my opinion at least though Dave doesn't like 3 of those ingredients and Mia only had the fake sausage I put in to appease him with so needless to say I get all the leftovers to myself :)

Finally, we were excited to host my friend Polly (we met and would run together in Binghamton) and her 3 yr old boy Alex. We had so much fun and so much to catch up on that I nearly forgot to take a picture of the kiddos. Here are the kids riding bikes to the park (a warmish day in February), our last activity before Mia's nap and Polly's departure:

Thanks for coming guys, we had a blast! Can't wait to see you all in MD.

Siblings play together

Coming up with fun things to do engaging both kids has been a challenge to say the least. Gavin is so easy it is tempting to just give him a toy and focus on Mia who DEMANDS our constant attention. Although this does need to happen occasionally, since I am a 2nd child I am super sensitive to making sure Gavin gets his fair share of me as well. Since painting continues to be one of Mia's favorite activities but Gavin will eat paint we have tried 2 things: 1) food-colored yogurt painting (edible. . . yum!) and 2) this bag painting you see above.

We were also lucky enough to inherit Randall's old tunnel, which we bought him for his first Christmas. This was something the kids were enjoying together too: looking at each other through the ends of the tunnel and having Mia crawl towards/away from Gavin.

Finally, here you see Mia and Gavin on a typical evening. Mia likes to get in the crib while I am lotioning, diapering and dressing Gavin. Although I appreciate when she doesn't request this because then Gavin and I get some alone time, they really are super cute together. Oftentimes when Gavin is fussy and tired Mia will kick really fast (see above), which makes them both crack up.

Happy Valentines Day!

Dave and I generally take an active stand against celebrating Valentine's day and prefer to express our love throughout the year without making obligatory chocolate/flower purchases. But with 2 kids 3 and under it gets pretty tough to make time for ourselves. In addition to a nice date night (in honor of the holiday, though a week late) Dave and the kids made me these red velvet cupcakes. I made some pink milk (strawberries pureed with milk and a pinch of sugar) to go along with the theme. We also encouraged Mia to make cards for and call some of the people she loves. She decided to make her Aunt Libby and friend Simon each a Valentine's day card and called her friend Leah and her cousins Randall, Mattie, and Jeremy to tell them she loves them. Gavin enjoyed getting his hand painted to contribute his hand prints on some Valentine day cards for his grandparents.

Gavin is 0.75 yrs old!

A little bit about Gavin during his 9th month

Sleep: Since the beginning of this month, January, he has been shifting from taking 3 naps a day to taking only 2 but it is still about a 50/50 split right now. We started letting Gavin cry for 5 mins at night time (before soothing him and doing it again) because he figured out that we would run to him immediately when he cried. Luckily for us it only took the one 5 minute period. Since then we have only had to do it again less than 5 nights and it never amounted to anything longer than 15 mins. He has occasionally this month even slept all the way through his 11-12 hr night without waking up once (7pm - 6:30am) though he usually still wakes up once somewhere between 3-5am for a quick feed then back to bed (15 mins total).

Motor skills: This month he started being able to stand at his little table unassisted, he started turning pages in his board books. He can now roll a ball back and forth between 2 people, which makes it easier to play with him and Mia at the same time. Gavin also started raising both arms as if he wants to be picked up but we also had just taught him "so big" and 'all done' in sign language both of which entail raising one's arms above their head so it isn't so easy to know what he means when he raises his arms.

Language skills: We became certain this month that Gavin actually knows what "mama" and "dada" mean since he consistently says "dada" when Dave enters a room and didn't mention "mama" the whole time I was in Boston for a job interview but said "mama" during the night feeding after I returned (did he smell it was me?). Gavin has known how to sign "milkie" for awhile now.

New foods this month: cheese (Fontina), bread (sourdough crust), bean (cannelini), spaghetti, corn, mango, tortellini (spinach filling), tomato. Also introduced: nutmeg, cinnamon (on sweet potato and/or applesauce) and salt, pepper, garlic, basil (in bruschetta we gave him). He also had his first complex food: broccoli cheese nuggets (cheese, whole wheat matzo meal, eggs, broccoli, spices). Gavin is a big eater and loves all these new foods!

Miscellaneous: This month he started playing with whisps of my hair when I hold him (almost like twirling it) and sticking his fingers in my mouth when I nurse him (or whenever actually). The hair twirling is so sweet that I purposely put my hair down when I'm singing him to sleep. Gavin started imitating (shook his rattle book, gave it to him, he shook it) and also making funny noises by moving his tongue around in his mouth while vocalizing. He is interacting with Mia more (trying to elicit her attention) but oftentimes by trying to pinch her or grab her hair. Gavin's 3rd tooth came in! But it wasn't the top middle ones like you'd think. It was a top lateral incisor so the one to the right of what will be the two top middle teeth that aren't there yet. Finally, this month Gavin is no longer okay with you taking a toy away from him. He gets angry and doesn't always do okay with a replacement toy.

Stats: on his 9 month appt today Gavin was 24 lbs, 11.6 oz (93rd %) and 2'4.5" (50th %) and I can't remember his head circumference but I remember her saying it was in the 95% So despite the high percentile for weight Gavin's growth chart is actually leveling off (it was inches above the curve and has since made a 90 degree turn and is heading back towards the lines. Just to give you perspective, Mia (a large baby!) was 25 lbs at her 1 yr visit. I can't fathom how big our 3rd child would be if we had one. My wrist would break! Walking can't come soon enough to aid my aching arms. Gavin didn't need shots at this appointment but he did need a blood draw to look at his lead levels and complete blood count. Poor guy! The phlebotomist said he was too pudgy for him to feel his veins so we were switched to his supervisor who also couldn't find his veins (both people checked both elbows and wrists) and finally went with the first arm she checked. Afterwards she said it would be a big bruise but he was such a trooper. Oh yes, but as usual we were scolded for not doing enough tummy time even though we tried to convey to her how much he hates it. She seems to think you can just entertain him and it'll be fine. I asked her if she'd prefer more tummy time with screaming and crying or less tummy time and she didn't come out and say it but I got the sense she didn't think letting your baby scream and cry was a big deal. Hence the picture above (my guilt tummy time/airing his tushy out combination treatment), which in my opinion shows he is not lacking in upper body strength thank you! (She was a bit concerned that he isn't more mobile: not doing hands/knees, can stand if you prop him with a table but can't pull up etc. I bet I wouldn't be able to pull myself up if I weighed proportionally as much as he does at my height---that conjures up funny images).