Need I say anything?

My precious Luthien,
Oh, how you are growing up! Dad did some much-needed winter clothes shopping and had a little photo shoot with you last week and surprised me at work with this picture. The first thing I thought (after I stressed out wondering how much everything cost) was how old you look! I can't believe my little baby is getting so big! I am so grateful for you and the many wonderful ways you have changed and enriched my life. You and I had an excellent day together yesterday. All this week, rather than walking up to me and hitting me you've been coming up and giving me gentle caresses on my face. A mentor I had in graduate school once told me I was "a quick study"- I think about that from time to time and usually disagree with the observation. Well, I'm trying to be more positive lately, so maybe I am, because most definitely you are!

I am also grateful for a husband who is one of the best stay at home mom's I've ever known (not that I've known many), and who has excellent taste. There are not many women who can trust their husbands to go clothes shopping for the family, and in our case, I prefer that he does it all. The only downside to that is that there are not many moms who have to discuss haircuts, clothing choices, etc. with their husbands, but that's another story.... :)

I love you!
Mom

Quick Update

Hi Luthien,
Well, I don't have too much to share and we haven't taken the greatest pictures lately (forgot our camera on Thanksgiving and for other events), but I'll start with the pictures we do have.

Toward the middle of November we took a quick trip out to California for your Aunt Trisha's baby shower. I know, I know- I said I wouldn't do anymore of these trips with a baby/toddler in tow, but we really wanted to support Trisha and it was pretty much a free trip. Believe me, during the trip back I was second guessing my decision! Overall though, it was a lot of fun and you were a good girl. You had fun at the shower because there were lots of kids to play with and they even gave gifts out to all the little ones!

Here is a picture of you walking on the beach with dad. It was pretty cold, so instead of playing in the water or anywhere near wet sand (still not a texture you a enjoy), you wanted to chase the seagulls.

I don't know if you can see your expression very well in this one, but it looks as though you're courteously laughing at one of Grandad's jokes. I also just love the way you're sitting at the table- so grown up and relaxed.

This is a cool picture with your Aunt Stefanie's sister, Jenny. No photoshop used, just the sunset in all its' glory. It was a fun treat to be able to meet up with Jenny and drive her back to Arizona. She happened to be visiting California at the time, all the way from Switzerland. For the entire length of her trip (she stayed in AZ for a few weeks after that) you were totally confused by her, always thinking she was Stefanie.

Another note is that you now LOVE cars and trucks. You can say "car" and make the "vroom vroom" sound. I'm so glad we have stuck to our goal of presenting you with mostly non gender-biased toys. This actually is harder to do than one would think. I would still say that you like stuffed animals more, but at least the cars were given an equal chance!

Thanksgiving was nice- very relaxed because everyone brought a dish to share. It was much too hot, but has started cooling down since then, thank goodness! The best part was that mom started working part-time that week (down from full-time)! The extra days with you are priceless, but I am still learning the ropes. It's especially hard for me to let go of my desire for perfectionism as a mom, but more on that later...

The day after Thanksgiving we went to pick out a tree! You must know that in our 4 1/2 years of marriage we have never had a tree, so this was a big deal. The day went by all too quickly so we ended up actually putting up the tree after you went to sleep that night. I think that was actually best to do anyhow, since you are still so young. It was fun to see your reaction in the morning.

You have always been an early riser (around 6-6:30), much to your night owl parents' dismay, so it was actually still very dark when I captured this picture. You were so excited about all the lights:

We are very particular about the ornaments on the tree. Luckily, most are made of cloth and are therefore childproof. This was not done on purpose, we just have an obsession with the Anthropologie sweater ornaments and others similar in style. Please note Max, from Where the Wild Things Are....

We don't have a ton of ornaments because these Anthropologie ornaments don't come cheap. We wait until after Christmas to buy them, and we have decided to make this a family tradition from now on.

Mom is rather meticulous about how/where the ornaments are placed on the tree. So it has been an interesting learning curve for both of us- you learning not to pull off all the ornaments, and me trying not to care. Luckily being a mom in general doesn't allow for my natural tendency to freak out about this sort of thing- I've just got more important things to worry about!

Luthien, Mama loves you and is so proud of how much you're learning and growing every day. You learned many words at a young age, so you've only added a few new ones recently- such as car, apple, bubble, yeah, bear, owl, bed, light, star, popcorn, tree, happy, elbow, Bobba, Poppa, and a few more animal sounds. I'm trying to encourage you to put two words together but not pushing too much yet. I think right now you are learning a lot about your emotions, which has been hard on mom especially. This means lots of tears, along with a lot of laughter of course, as well as learning not to hit, bite, or steal. Mom thought she knew how she would discipline her children but it is proving much more difficult than she thought. I know this burst in your emotional development is a lot to handle, but we can get through it, especially with lots of love.

Until next time little one,

Mom

Halloween etc.

Hi Luthien,
Well I have lots to report since it's been a month since my last entry! You are becoming such a little girl. I still refer to you as "my baby" but you are a true toddler at this point. You are signing and saying lots of new words. Dad's grandparents, Bobba and Poppa have been here the past few weeks, and after just a couple days you got their names down- you even distinguish between the /b/ and /p/ phonemes!! You finally have down two more animal sounds- "baaa" for lamb, and "neigh" for horse, although you prefer to do the clickety-clack sound for horse. You now recognize and can match different colors, and you have started attempting to sing, which is so cute! You don't do it for very long because I think you get embarrased/frustrated when it doesn't come out sounding the way we sing it. You are a such a perfectionist (like me) and also very stubborn (like dad)- this is showing in your personality more and more every day. Dad took you to the pediatrician today and at 16 months you are still not quite 18 pounds! Yikes! I am trying not to worry about it anymore- you seem to be doing so well from a cognitive/developmental standpoint and you really are a good eater now. Of course mom has high expectations so she still gets frustrated at times, but truly you eat more things than most 1 year olds, such as cod liver oil, peas, and broccoli (okay only sometimes for that last one)! I am feeding you tablespoons full of coconut oil to fatten you up, and you are welcome as much butter (grass-fed/organic) as you please! Per the pediatrician's request I will be keeping a journal of everything you eat each day (I've done this before and it is pretty difficult, but I will give it another go). The calorie goal is 950/day.

At the begining of October we took you to a local farm/pumpkin patch. It was definitely still a little too hot for this kind of activity, but we made the best of it. We had you skip your morning nap so we could get there right when it opened at nine, but it was still too hot, and you were pretty tired. Here you are playing with the goats and cows, looking cheery as ever:




There was a maze that we put you in to see if you could find your way out. You would get about half-way and then run back to the beginning, but I was proud at how courageous you were since dad and I didn't go with you!


Okay I guess this is a bad picture but one of your favorite parts of the farm was surprisingly not the animals; it was playing in a toy house with all the other children. You still LOVE other kids, especially when they are a bit older than you are.



In the pumpkin patch:



And another with your cousin Amelie...you've gotten so good at saying her name- "Ami"



This is actually a picture of the farm animals at the Phoenix Zoo. By this time you were loving the goats. Mom was sad because she misses out on going to the zoo with you, but dad loves taking you during the week when it's not so busy. This particular day the temperature was actually pretty cool, yet the sun was still blaring!! I have to mention that since you are wearing a sweatshirt in the bright sun! When will it ever go away?!


And another, separate day at the zoo, with Beckam. Apparently all you wanted to do was sit in his stroller with him, which I guess you ended up doing!



The other day Roofus started to grab some of your stuffed animals that were on the floor. Mom quickly said "no Roofus," which you echoed. After about a minute I look over and see you diving head first into the floor, picking up your stuffed animals with your mouth. It took me a minute, but then I realized you were imitating Roofus!! You even started doing a little growl like her. You love to imitate others, something I don't think I've mentioned before, but this definitely was the best yet! We can see already that you are blossoming into such a little actress (I suppose like your mother)...




The Scottsdale Farmer's Market just opened back up for the fall, and we had so much fun there this past Saturday! Lucky for you but unfortunate for my bank account, they have an adorable little store set up with locally made, organic baby/toddler clothes and toys! I just had to get you this hat, it's so adorable. Now, you may have heard your dad and I speak with disgust about putting enormous flowers on babies' heads (no offense to those who do that sort of thing), so I have three things to say in my defense! 1) This is a hat, not a headband, and the flower is not quite as big. 2) The colors are very muted, which hopefully tones down the outrageousness of the flower a bit. 3) I would have preferred the hat without the flower, but it's sewn on really well and the hat looks so good on you I couldn't pass it up....



And...drumroll please! Halloween...



The day didn't turn out quite as I had planned, but that seems to happen often so I am starting to adjust. I just plan way too much to do in one day since I only have the weekends with you :(
Also, dad got really sick again with his Crohn's, so he wasn't able to do much. The plan was to carve our pumpkin and make popcorn balls during the day, then do two activities in the evening. We ended up just going to farmer's market in the morning while daddy slept. I don't know what happened the rest of the day but before I knew it, it was getting dark. We were supposed to help out with the activity at church but since dad wouldn't have been able to help and I would be watching you the whole time, we ended up going straight to your Aunt Shannon's house to go trick-or-treating with your cousins Jack and Ryan. Here is a picture of the group that went around:



After a couple of houses you got really into the whole thing. Just look at the wonder and determination in your eyes:


Getting candy (that won't be eaten) at a house with Nana:
I wish I got some better pictures from the back- for some reason the back of your giraffe costume was the cutest part!


One week before, dad and the band he's been playing in- "The Olympic Whites"- played a show at a "Family Spooktacular" Halloween party. It was actually a lot of fun, and since you had been requesting to put on your costume daily, it was nice to have another event for you to wear it to! There was a photographer set up who took some nice shots (sorry for the small size). Unfortunately we waited until the end of the night, after dad played, so he was pretty sweaty and we were all pretty tired, but I still think the pictures turned out great. I love the naturalness of the second one. Dad's smile is perfect and you're ripping off your costume...




Love,
Mom

Language

Since the last post was fairly lengthy, I wanted to write separately about your current language skills. I have been taking an inventory of all the words you can say, so I will list them here. Keep in mind these are the intended words, yours don't always sound exactly this way- for now you typically shorten multi-syllabic words, and you definitely substitute a few phonemes for others. But here is the list in no particular order other than they are somewhat categorically grouped:

mama, daddy, nana, grandad, amelie, hi, bye, no, up, down, go, more, kiss, beep, dog, cat, fish, bunny, elmo, eye, nose, mouth, ear, knee, toes, tummy, baby, ball, balloon, button, airplane, key, moon, spoon, cracker, milk, banana, water, yogurt

I may be forgetting a few, so I will add to the list as I remember more, or as you add more words to your vocabulary. Once it gets to about 50 I will stop, as this is *generally* when children get a word "spurt," so I expect that you'll take off with your vocabulary from there. Also, I only included words you consistently say on this list- there are others you have said on and off but I'm not totally sure you have them yet.

You have plenty more signs that I could add to the list, and I think these are very important, but no time now. Except I will say that you just started signing "frog" and "elephant" (with sound effects) and it is SO cute!

Love,
Mama

Updates

Hi Luthien,
I wanted to give a quick re-cap of some recent happenings, and as always an update on your development.

I mentioned that you started walking on August 14th. You were very excited about it that day, but then took about a week long break from walking altogether, unless we persuaded you to do so. However, about a week later you figured out that this was the best/fastest mode of transport, and since then you have not been able to get enough! You LOVE your independence. You want to walk everywhere, and you also love being outside. One of your favorite activites is to walk all around the neighborhood- this will be more fun for mom/dad once it gets a little cooler, but you don't mind the heat a bit.

I always said I wasn't going to post videos on this blog since it is intended as a journal for you, but I feel I have to post this video of your first steps on the 14th. I'll just have to take it out later, when I print these writings/pictures to a book. Try to ignore the extreme high-pitched voices coming from mom and dad. We were very excited...





Here is a picture taken a couple of weeks ago when we were in Tucson very briefly. Previously you had been afraid of snakes, like your mama. However, this was a very friendly snake and you totally adored him...



Also, we bought you your first potty! You love to sit on it whenever we're in the bathroom, and you've even gone actual potty in it one time! I am determined to potty train you early, but since I'm not home as often as I'd like this is going to be a difficult task. We will see...




A cute bathtime picture with your cousin Amelie. As always the water is your favorite place to be (a very close second to walking outside).


This picture cracks me up- it is so very you. You almost always have to be holding something in one or both of your hands. At breakfast the other day you were holding your bagel/almond butter in one hand and my license/credit card in the other (your favorite). All of the sudden you saw a pill bottle and just had to have it, so you quickly stuffed the bagel in your mouth and attempted to eat it that way, just so you could hold all the objects you wanted. This isn't the first time you've done this...


I felt like I needed to include a family shot because we have so very few of these. We're not as fond of the posed family shots as we are the candid types, and those are somewhat hard to come by. Also, dad would prefer that he looked closer to the way he did when he was 18, even though we try to tell him we love him no matter what. So he typically resists family photos for this reason as well.
The picture was taken by cousin Chelsea on our Portland trip.


She also captured these adorable shots:



In other news, I've been looking at your baby pictures a lot lately, in an effort to become more excited about a new development in all of our lives. When you were born you were the most beautiful baby I had ever seen. I think you were 3 days old in this picture- you were amazingly tan and you were my little duckie. Something about your lips always reminded me of a duckling, while dad called them "kitten lips." Oh how perfect your father and I are for eachother- I never thought anyone would understand or share my idiosyncrasy of seeing animals in people (and we wonder where you get your quirks).
Oh, and in case you didn't catch the "hint" above, I am happy (now) to report that you will be meeting a new brother/sister sometime around May 4th of next year! I have been explaining this concept to you, and one day you actually pointed to my tummy and said/signed "baby" which was so very cute. You will be an excellent big sister, I am sure of it. You are such a little helper these days.


How much you've grown since then...


Happy Fall!


Love,
Mama

Haircut

Dear Luthien,

This past weekend you got your first haircut. Not a big change considering there's not a lot of hair to work with, but those bangs and that mullet needed some serious trimming. Dad fought me on this one- he thinks messy hair on girls = cute/beautiful. While I don't require perfection (as noted by the absence of bows, flowers, headbands, and barrettes in your hair), I felt a little polishing of your look was warranted. Our friend Lisa did the job for both of us that evening. The best part is we go to her house for our cuts, so we left that night not only looking prettier, but with full bellies and having had excellent conversation and many laughs.

Other than not wanting to wear the "cape," you were totally calm throughout the experience. It was almost as if you were mesmerized by it, because you're typically not that calm :) I'm sure the comfortable setting and the fact that you got to sit on my lap and eat your cracker the entire time helped!

Somehow I can't even style the little hair that you have as good as it looked that night (hair is definitely NOT one of my talents), but it still looks much better than before. Lisa cut the back into an angled little bob, and did a cute little side-swept bang in the front. Even Dad loved it...

Thank you for being such a good girl for your haircut, and thank you Angela for the fantastic pictures!

Love,

Mom

Portland

Oh Luthien, this time I actually have an excuse for not writing sooner. I've been wanting to tell you all about our Portland trip for awhile now, but both of our computers have been dysfunctional. After some serious blessings at the Apple store, we finally have one computer back, and are expecting the laptop back very soon, free of charge (thank you Jeffrey!)


Portland was all I had hoped for and more in many ways. There were only a few things we missed out on considering you are only 1 and can only last for so long doing 'touristy' things and eating out all the time, but that was to be expected. We definitely hope to (and will!) move there in the near future. We're pretty sure you loved it as much as we did. We stayed with Rome's cousin Chelsea/husband Mike in their beautiful home.


Here is a picture that doesn't quite capture my sheer delight (and suprise) upon taking a glimpse at little Oliver when we first arrived. He is 4 months old in this picture, and bigger than you! He has the most amazing baby personality I have ever seen: calm and content ALL the time (very different from you)!


One of your favorite pastimes: climing their two sets of stairs! The other favorite activity which I do not have pictured here was pushing around their walker toy- it's a step above ours because it is a dog and barks when you push it. You kept stopping to sign and say 'dog' every time you would hear the toy bark!



One day we took the "Portland Aerial Tram" up 3,300 feet- at the top is OHSU. If the clouds weren't so thick that day we would have had a great view of all the mountains, but nevertheless the city view was spectacular (and don't worry, the weather issue does not deter us from wanting to move there)!


We also toured the Lewis & Clark college campus. It was a beautiful, old, heavily wooded campus. Dad fell in love. Here are a few pictures of you sitting with Henry while Dad looked around. I love this one because Henry looks very studious- totally appropriate for the setting! By the way, you are signing "dad."



Also love this gem of Henry- he's quite the ham!



And I just had to include this one to show just how much fun you had with the boys (your second cousins I suppose?) You adored both Henry and Oliver and got excited each time you got to see them. By the way, the mismatched outfit was not intended- your first outfit got too hot so I put you in a onesie we bought that day. Yeah, the temperature actually changes in Portland throughout the day/night, something we're not accustomed to here in Phoenix!

On Sunday we went hiking at Multnomah Falls (part of the Columbia River Gorge). I don't have any pictures from the bottom but I will say that Dad's sweatiness and your confused look are appropriate- it was only about a mile and a half hike, but it was VERY steep. You loved the whole experience- especially when dogs passed by. I think you thought it was funny that you were so much taller then them!

Enjoying part of the falls:

You and I relaxing by the rushing river- of course you wanted to jump right in...

So we let you!

After the hike we sat down for a bit and talked with a long-time Southeast Portland resident. You LOVED his little pup. This picture cracks me up because the dog looks as though he's attacking you, yet you're laughing- so typical for you!

One day we met up with a friend of mine from graduate school, Elissa. She also lives on the southeast side of town, and was kind enough to give us a tour. This would be the perfect place for us to live- very charming, lots of locally owned businesses and restaurants, tons of antique and book stores, and young families galore. She took us to this little kid friendly cafe. Kids can run around and play with toys/musical instruments, the whole time while being serenaded by an indie-pop type kid music artist. Only in Portland! She played her own songs but also played some classics that you loved.

After our lunch outing and tour, with Elissa:

This next sequence of pictures is the 'goodbye' with Chelsea, Henry, and Oliver. I love how you and Oliver interacted:

The friendly hug...

...followed by a passionate kiss

And then the classic half embarassed/half proud expressions. "Okay, that was kind of weird and

gross..."

Another classic: Henry's 'chokehold' kiss. He did this multiple times a day, it was so cute.

One last shot of the adoreable threesome:

We left Portland on a Tuesday in the late afternoon, so beforehand we ate some yummy local organic food and then made a stop at the Rose Garden- miles of beautiful flowers.

Again, what a fabulous trip, and much needed retreat!

Things we failed to capture on camera:

1) Powell's Bookstore (largest used/new bookstore in the world!)

2) The BEST farmers' market in the posh nearby town of Lake Oswego (puts my favorite downtown Phoenix market to shame)

3) The delicious meal created by Chelsea and Rome following our trip to the market

4) Right next to the farmer's market: the most amazing French bakery ever. What more could I ask for?!

5) More of Chelsea/Mike's fabulous house (not to mention the baby deer that came right up to their back deck!)

There you have it Luthien, more recent updates to come!