Wednesday, August 24, 2011

Wednesday, August 24th (day 56/365)

Here is a picture of Phoebe eating (whole wheat, low sugar) pancakes this morning.


From reading the blog it must seem like we feed the baby nothing but pancakes.  They are really only the occasional treat - and these ones really are whole wheat.  We'll give them to her occasionally after she's eaten at least a few spoonfuls of fruit and yogurt (a more typical breakfast).  We're not actually sure Phoebe likes the taste of pancake because she doesn't end up eating very much of it.  We think she mostly likes the process of tearing each pancake into tiny bits and then slobbering them into oblivion.  It is messy, but she enjoys it, so we invested in a giant pack of sponges from Costco.

The other thing this picture shows is how Phoebe sits in her high chair.  She almost always immediately swings one leg up and sits side-ways. 

Before my mom came to visit, she shipped a giant box of clothes and toys.  One of the toys was a set of trucks.  At first Phoebe was like "meh, trucks, not sure I'm interested" and didn't pay much attention.  Then she found out that the boys next door have the same trucks and all of a sudden she thought trucks were the BEST THING EVER!!! 




Tuesday, August 23rd (day 55/365)

Phoebe is definitely in the middle of a bad bout of teething and it has been pretty rough on all three of us.  She is still working on those two bottom middle teeth.  While my mom was here, the one on the left started to poke through but it still looks about the same - A WEEK LATER.  The one on the right is just a swollen, red mess.  The poor munchkin is clearly pretty uncomfortable.  We're doing everything we can to make her feel better (well, not everything, but apparently you aren't supposed to give kids whiskey anymore).  Stop me if I have told this story before (I am too tired to know and/or check) but my dad used to say that whiskey was the perfect cure for teething, here is his magic formula:
1) Pour a double whiskey
2) Dip your finger in the whiskey and rub finger on baby's gums
3) Drink the rest of the whiskey
His punch line was always "I'm not sure what it does for the baby, but you feel a lot better about the teething situation" (paraphrased). 
Anyway, we refer to Phoebe's current state as "tragic".  We can temporarily cheer her up, but she always ends up being grumpy and frustrated.

Oh, you are amusing me!  I am temporarily pleased.

I am done being amused.  Get your freaking camera out of my face.  I am not here for your amusement.

I am in pain and you give me a ridiculous rubber giraffe??  Thanks a lot.

Monday, August 22nd (day 54/365)

Baby versus PENGUIN!

We got this silly penguin toy for $1 at a consignment sale and it turns out Phoebe really likes to play with it.  Mostly, I think she likes the music that it plays when you hit it.  She'll go to town on the poor guy and then stop mid-tackle to dance to the music.  The noise you hear in the background is daddy watching preseason football.  We're ordering the munchkin her baby Bears gear this weekend so that she'll be all set for fall!

Sunday, August 21st (day 53/365)

Sunday I had to work most of the day getting ready for class.  I did get a little break though and Jeremy treated me to a back-to-school trip to Office Depot!  I do love an office supply shopping trip!!  Sunday was also the day of the welcome back BBQ at school.  I talked it up, so Jeremy and Phoebe met me for lunch.  It turned out to be ... less than stellar.  There wasn't enough food, and Jeremy is pretty sure he got food poisoning from the chicken he ate (and we all know how Jeremy stoically suffers in silence).  He also got swarmed by bees (I may have also heard about that incident multiple times - "I'm allergic you know.  I could have died.  You would be a single parent because you made me come to this stupid BBQ").  So, not our best family outing.  There were both a bounce house and cotton candy though so I think Phoebe will really like it when she gets older.  What is better than consuming ridiculous amounts of sugar and then flinging yourself around a giant inflatable cube?  I am guessing not much, if you are 8 years old. 

When we all got home and were just relaxing in the living room (Jeremy was recovering from his brush with death), Phoebe crawled over to the box of diapers we had just purchased to send to daycare and ...

Oh this? No big deal.  You should see what I do when you're not looking.
 She just climbed right up like it was no big deal.  Not even letting go of the toy she was chewing on.  Jeremy and I just looked at each other and said "well, crap".  Phoebe has clearly mastered climbing up onto stuff now.  She spent a few minutes trying to figure out how to climb from the box of diapers onto the tray of the jumperoo before we finally did the responsible parent thing and removed her from the cardboard box.

Speaking of our awesome parenting skills, here are some pictures and a video of Phoebe chewing on dirty socks.  I think we will title our forthcoming parenting book What? It's not like we'd let her EAT it.


So many socks, so little time.




PS. In case you were worried, Jeremy did survive ... although it was touch and go there for a minute what with the fact that a bee almost touched him and all.  Also, he wanted me to point out that he dressed the baby in the outfit she is wearing in these pictures and he was very proud that it MATCHED. 

PPS After all the build up, the Jumperoo is a total dud!  I cleaned it all up, put it together, and Phoebe was completely unimpressed.  I don't know if she is over the Jumperoo already, or if she just finds this one unacceptable. Luckily, she has discovered the dishwasher which she finds fascinating so I guess we're off the hook for baby toys for a while.

Saturday, August 20th (day 52/365)

Did you notice we passed 50 days on our project 365??   I am pretty excited, because I don't think either Jeremy or I actually thought we'd make it this far.  Of course, I am trying not to be too self-congratulatory because classes started for me on the 22nd and I am significantly busier than I was before.  Here's hoping we can keep up the momentum into the fall.

Saturday after swimming and naps, we went downtown Monterey to part of the fancy car show.  The part where they let the rif-raf near the cars.  There were some pretty fancy cars

Please Dad??  I promise I'll drive it really safely!!!

They even had one of the cars from Back to the Future 3

She is so young and yet it is already 100% obvious that she thinks her parents are giant nerds.

After the car excitement we went for a little walk along the ocean front path. 



Friday, August 19, 2011

Friday, August 19th (day 51/365)

Baby versus teething biscuit


Thursday, August 18th (day 50/365)


Wednesday, August 17th (day 49/365)

Somebody takes after mommy and daddy - she already seems to be interested in Frisbee :)




P.S. Happy birthday Gramma Joyce!!!

Tuesday, August 16th (day 48/365)

First, Daddy and Phoebe eat pancakes for breakfast.  She looks a little nonplussed that Daddy has helped himself to baby breakfast.



It seems like I am always talking about laundry doesn't it?  I think my mom thought I was exaggerating until she saw the munchkin's handiwork in person.  One day, while I had to go to work, my mom stayed home and did our laundry (THANK YOU MOMMY!!!).  When I got home she had moved the pile of baby clothes outside to stain treat.  She was set up at the patio table surrounded by piles of Phoebe clothes and bottles of spray-n-wash.  All she could say was "wow".  In this picture you can sort of see the array of stains on Phoebe's shirt.  Also, she is in her THIRD pair of pants for the day. 


Monday, August 15th (day 47/365)

Typically I get blamed for all of the Zulily packages that show up in our mailbox, but lately both Grandmas have sent Pheobe adorable presents!  When the package from Jeremy's mom showed up, he didn't even open it because in his words "I just assumed you had ordered something else ... SIGH".  Anyway, we set out to get some pictures to send Grandma Linda and the munchkin was very uncooperative.  First, she smeared pears all over her robot jammies before we could get a picture.  Then we put her in a cute dress for school and she wouldn't hold still long enough to get a good shot.  This is seriously the best shot we got out of at least 20 attempts.  Thanks for all the great presents grandmas!! We'll keep trying to get those pictures ...


Sunday, August 14th (day 46/365)

My mom really wanted to see the ocean while she was here so on Sunday, we got some sandwiches to go from a great deli in Monterey and headed down to the beach.  It was a beautiful day, so we all dipped our toes in the water (the FREEZING COLD water).  Phoebe really loved both the sand and the water.  She wasn't bothered at all by the chilly surf and she really only got upset when we stopped her from eating sand.  We all had a lot of fun introducing Phoebe to the ocean!






Saturday, August 13th (day 45/365) + video bonus

Baby food served in the high chair is some how much less appealing than the exact same food served from a cat dish on the floor. 



Video of munchkin making music


Friday, August 12th (day 44/365)

So, these "parents", I am not so sure they know what they are doing.


Thursday, August 11th (day 43/365)

Grandma is coming!!!  Grandma Joyce gets here tonight.  Phoebe is excitedly checking out the Toys R Us flyer in preparation for major baby-spoiling. 


Wednesday, August 10, 2011

Wednesday, August 10th (day 42/365)

Today Phoebe was a little out of sorts.  She has had a cold for two weeks now and I think there's some teething going on on top of that.  Usually she gets all worked up if she even sees the box of Cheerios (actually Joe's Os, but same difference).  Today, she just didn't seem interested ... at first.  I am a little confused about her love of the Cheerios at this point given that she has no teeth.  Eating each individual Cheerio requires a ton of effort and the production of a ridiculous amount of drool. 

Cheerios AND bananas??  What are you trying to do to me?!?!

You can lead a Phoebe to the Cheerios ...

Wow, there are these delicious circles of oaty-cereal goodness stuck to my high chair.  Why don't you ever feed me?

Tuesday, August 9th (day 41/365)

Today, Phoebe was really hungry when we got home and I needed to buy a few minutes to get her dinner ready.  I hastily grabbed a little tupperware of baby puffs and handed it to her thinking that she could have a quick snack while I fixed something more nutritious.  Actually, it turns out I wasn't thinking at all, because this is what happens when you give a seven month old a tupperware full of ... I am guessing anything ....

"Eat them out of the cup you say".  Well, they are out of the cup and I am eating them so I fail to see your problem.

Yum!  The shoe gives it a little extra something.



Is my dinner ready yet?

Monday, August 8th (day 40/365)

Phoebe loves to pull up on the benches in the kitchen (really she loves to pull up on pretty much anything).  Today we were hanging out getting dinner ready and she decided to put on a show for the camera.

Hey Mom, are you getting this?  I am about to be super-adorable.






My god woman - isn't that enough???  It isn't easy to be this cute you know.

Sunday, August 7th (day 39/365)

On Saturday before we left for Palo Alto, we stopped by the post-wide yard sale here.  We were in a hurry to hit the road, so we didn't shop for long, but we did find a few things for Phoebe.  Probably our favorite find was a Halloween costume.  Jeremy has wanted Phoebe to dress as Godzilla for Halloween since she is so destructive and we found an adorable dragon costume that I think will fit the bill nicely (with a few planned modifications).  We tried it on just to see and we think that we have a pretty cute Phoebe-zilla (if we do say so ourselves!).

Phoebezilla takes a play break.

Phoebezilla is off to find her next victim! (I think the puppy slippers make the outfit so much more menacing)

Saturday, August 6th (day 38/365)

We had a great Saturday!  Our friends from Palo Alto had an appointment, so we drove up to hang out and babysit their almost-two-year old K.  K is an awesome little kid - we joke that it is his fault we had a baby because he was such a cool, easy-going baby - he made the whole parenting thing look easy :)  After we all hung out for a little bit, Jeremy and I were on our own with both kids.  K is actually a HUGE fan of Jeremy, and they had a lot of fun playing.  Of course, Phoebe did her best to interject herself and K was for the most part really sweet and understanding.  He did have to remind Phoebe of the rules occasionally, I think he thought the whole "baby" excuse wasn't exactly a valid reason for not following the rules better.  Despite Phoebe's cavalier disregard for rules, K was very sweet to her - he was always giving her toys or trying to show her how to do stuff.  One of the cutest things he did was to get down and crawl around so Phoebe could chase him.  Sadly, Phoebe does not have a great attention span, so she was always quitting the game in the middle.  We had a really great time babysitting and getting to see our friends.  It is fun to get a little preview of what is in store for us as Phoebe gets older (well, a rough idea anyway).  This experience did really reinforce the notion that Phoebe will DEFINITELY be maintaining her only child status for a LONG LONG time.  We are NOT ready for two kids!!!

Oooo, book, here let me help

Excuse me, baby coming through

Another book, it looks like you need more baby help!

What tunnel?  I don't see a tunnel.  Oh, you mean those blocks I just crawled through.  I guess those could have been a tunnel ...