Naomi

more Chinese New Year photos

Adam and Uncle Peter

As requested, a photo with a better view of Naomi's outfit. Here she is with PoPo, Adam, and Aunt Maria.

Adam has always had a special affinity for Aunt Leela. Adam made a special point of asking her to come play with him. They worked on identifying Mahjong tiles, I think.

Thanks Laws, for the photos. I'm not sure whether it was Kat or Uncle Peter who took this one. I'm sorry I didn't bring my own camera but sometimes it's that *one more thing* that'll drive you nuts trying to go anywhere with both kids.

Psst. Don't tell Adam.

There's a love triangle in this house: Adam, Naomi, and Olga. Olga is Adam's lovey, or "transitional object," and formerly known as "The Seal."

Adam and Olga in November

Whenever Naomi can get her hands on The Seal, she treats her exactly the same way as Adam did at this age. She clutches her, carries her around with her, and pauses frequently to lay herself down on her, as if she were a pillow. Of course, this treachery is discouraged and Olga is the one thing that Adam is never obliged to share. We've also had some success introducing a different lovey to Naomi. The faceless organic cotton doll that Kevin and Susanna brought Naomi from California is de rigueur at bedtime. We're calling hir, "The Jester." I think ze'll stand up to the washer/dryer a lot better than Olga does. Pictures of The Jester to come soon. or someday. y'know. eventually.

UPDATE, May 10th: Naomi and Olga caught on film:

Chinese New Year

Unfortunately, Adam had shed his hat by the time this was taken. It was completely adorable. Thanks for shopping for the outfits, Poh-Poh.

6 months old!

Naomi is six months old now and, wow, have there been some changes.

Naomi got to try some cereal in mid-December. We had explained to Adam that Naomi would start to eat cereal, "in December, when it's cold outside and snow is on the ground." So the day of the first real snow, she got her first solids. She hasn't exactly taken a liking to them. She tolerates rice cereal the most and abides a few tastes of barley or oatmeal cereal. We just tried apple sauce yesterday and today. not a big hit. However, she did kind of enjoy sipping milk from a cup and from a bottle tonight. That was encouraging for me. To date, she has wanted nothing to do with a bottle, no matter its shape or size. She took a bottle ONCE, from my Aunt Joan, way back in August.

The day Naomi turned six months old, December 19th, is also the day that we arrived in Ottawa for the holidays (more on that in a separate post) and the day that she learned to sit up - free sitting, that is. Before then, she could get mostly upright but she kept bearing some weight on one hand on the ground and she tipped to one side.

By the 27th (27 weeks old), she was fully crawling. Until then, she was certainly getting around with a mix of creeping and crawling. It had seemed for a couple of months that she'd crawl any day but then she had some setbacks when she experimented with her technique. She started getting up on her hands and toes, with her butt pretty high in the air. So she'd tip over. A lot. Cute, but pretty frustrating for her. Adam is not a fan of her crawling. She's much to good at getting into his stuff now. In fact, for a month or so, Adam has regularly been requesting I'm A Big Brother (Thanks, Tsangs!) for his bedtime story. However, we have been forbidden from reading (or looking at) the page where the baby touches the little boy's trains.

[editting to add: Some time between the 27th and the 30th, she was pulling up to standing in her crib.]

On December 30th, Naomi had her check up. All good. Happy, healthy baby.

age	WEIGHT			HEIGHT
mos	lb,oz	%ile		in	%ile*
0	7,1	34		20.0	72
1	9,12	47
2	12,10	77		22.5	34
4**	15,0	68		24.5	45
6	16,8	52		27	82

* Using CDC data.
** I don't remember the 4-month measurements well. I'm pretty confident about the weight but the length - not so much. Does anyone remember hearing it?

A week or two ago, all on one day, peek-a-boo became Naomi's favourite thing in the world, she started looking for dropped objects, and she was no longer happy to go into her crib alone to put herself to sleep. Sigh. It was good while it lasted. Also, we had prepared Adam that come January, he and Naomi would both be sleeping in the kids' room. We'd always made a point of calling it the kids' room, rather than his room. And now they are in the same room but the transition has not been seamless. Naomi's crib may be in that room, but we've put the playpen in ours as a backup for when either is keeping the other up. Naomi often spends the last stretch of the night in our bed if Dion brings her to me, since I fall asleep while feeding her.

Photos will have to wait. G'night!

Uncooperative Subjects

I tried to get a picture of the kids together for sending out with holiday cards. fail. I had to splice two headshots together.



Here are some out-takes and runners up.

Adam!

I love this shot of Adam trying to grab my camera!

Happy 35th Anniversary!

For PoPo and GungGung's 35th Anniversary,

we went AAAAAAAAAALLLLLLL the way up

to the CN Tower to eat.

Here's Adam playing peekaboo with Uncle Norman

and Naomi playing with Uncle Norman's ear.

We checked out the observation deck and glass floor after lunch.

It was a big hit all around. Good times.

In a Flash

I was photographing Naomi today because it's been a little while and I was just using some automatic settings and natural light:

But the natural light was fading on me:

really fading:

So I grabbed a white blanket for a better background and tried out the flash. Not bad and I do like how her lip colour stands out here but a little too stark, I think:

So I tried partially blocking the flash with my fingers. Much better:

Also, kinda interesting that the background is overexposed.
Oops. covered the flash too much:

Best Hallowe'en EVER!

I've never had so much fun trick-or-treating. Or maybe I did when I was a kid and I just can't remember it but tonight was AWESOME. I'm still a little giddy 5 hours later. Adam has been really excited about Hallowe'en all week and the night did not disappoint. All day, he was like a kid at Christmas, so to speak, starting from the moment he got out of bed and saw his costume, which I'd laid out for him.

I had been a little nervous about how the night was going to go because Adam was being unco-operative and unpleasant when it was time to eat dinner and it looked like everything was going to be NO all night long. This despite a four-hour nap. We let him settle into playing with trains for a few minutes, which helped. I think he was just nervous. While he was distracted with the trains, I whipped his costume onto him and all of a sudden he was excited again.

For the rest of the night, Adam was at his most charming, delightful, and polite best. Which is saying something because, really, despite being 2 years old and having developed his mother's stubbornness (yes, I take full credit, er, blame) he really is a great little kid. Not only was Adam well-behaved but he was just so sweetly wide-eyed about everything. He was just as eager to talk about the jack'o'lanterns at every house as he was to collect the goodies. Perhaps the jack'o'lanterns were even better than the candy harvest. He liked to interpret the expression on each face. The vast majority were supposedly "happy," but a few were funny, and even fewer were scary. Luckily, he never caught on to any of the spookiness of Hallowe'en other than some minor trepidation when people's faces were hidden behind any kind of mask.

Naomi was her usual doll-like self. Only toward the very end of trick-or-treating did she get a little squirmy because it was time to eat. Adam was happy to call it a night because we finished at Rob and Becky's house, where he got to hang out with Clare, play with her fabulous toy collection, and munch on candy, of course.

Unfortunately, we never got a shot with the full effect. This snap is missing the conductor's hat, the orange pumpkin bucket, and the green rainboots. Ah well. Needless to say, Adam was a HUGE hit with the neighbours. His manner was adorable and OMG the JOY that spread across everyone's face upon seeing this costume. I had deliberately been avoiding any gender-connotated language but we did get a lot of compliments on the Princess Thomas costume. I had been sticking to "your costume is wonderful," and avoiding princess, beautiful, and pretty.

My theory for why Adam wanted the pink dress is sibling rivalry. I don't think Adam has even clued into pink for girls/blue for boys. But he does think that all pink clothes (even mine) belong to Naomi. And he had been asking why Naomi's shirts were called dresses. So, I speculate that he thinks she's been getting special treatment with the dresses and all manner of pink clothing. But really, who knows what's going on inside the head of a two-year-old, even if said two-year-old almost never stops talking.

Kudos to Dion for being a good sport. Thanks to Rob and Becky for hosting. Thanks to Po-Po and Gung-Gung for the Thomas costume. Thanks to Katie for lending her dress and thanks to Shana for delivering it. Thanks Naomi and Adam for the Best Hallowe'en EVER!

Pumpkin Patch

How cute are Adam and Clare? Don't you love her sweater?

Rob tells me that Adam was actually able to move the wheelbarrow a little bit. Also: thanks to Rob and Becky for bringing their camera and posting these photos on their picasaweb album.

I started explaining Hallowe'en and trick-or-treating to Adam. He's pretty psyched, always hoping that the next time he wakes up it's going to be Hallowe'en. I'm trying to play down the scary part and play up the fun parts. I tried to explain costumes: "You wear FUNNY clothes - a funny hat, a funny shirt, maybe marker on your face. What type of costume would you like to wear, Adam?"

Without hesitation, Adam replied: "A pink dress." I guess he'd think that would be "funny." This answer has remained consistent in future discussions, even after the arrival of the Thomas the Tank Engine costume from PoPo and GungGung and some Google image searches of trick-or-treating and Hallowe'en costumes.

I guess I'll ask around to borrow a pink dress to go under the train costume. The sleeves and skirt would still show. Or maybe I'll look for the size 4T pink princess costume that Naomi is bound to request in a few years and buy it now.

Niagara Falls

Tiffany took this photo. She wrote:
"Adam talks almost non-stop. He and I share our birthday. Coincidence? "

Here we go-oh!

Naomi is creeping and rolling around all over the place and thinking about crawling, I think. Sigh.

And some more headshot, just cuz.

Our little raggamuffin ...

... playing peekaboo in the pantry.

One in, one out.

In the past few weeks, Adam has given up his highchair/booster with straps at home. We still need it for some restaurants and parties. His main motivation, I think, was to be able to see the kitchen clock. His view was blocked where the highchair was.

So, Naomi has graduated from the rocking chair beside the table to the highchair at the table. She still lists; so, we stuff some blanket beneath her elbows but I think a Bumbo would be better. I haven't gotten around to scouring Craigslist. Anyway, I think she likes it.

This picture makes me stare.

This one makes me yawn.

This one makes me sigh.

This one makes me smile.

And this one makes me laugh.

Happy Birthday, Dion!

Dion got two cakes this year because I'd already bought the stuff for making/decorating a cake with Adam when I learned that Dion's parents had ordered ice cream cake. Yay! When baking with a toddler, it's not really about the baked goods so much as the activity. So we just made cake from a mix and used icing from a tub. I think it's been a LONG time since I've done that. If it's been a long time for you, too, you may forget just how intensely sweet that stuff is. Really, really sweet. Maybe it's just the flavour. I'll try short cake or something next time.

What's that behind the candles, you ask? Yes. more candles! Adam found them in a drawer and insisted that they belong on the cake. So he added them. Here's a better look:

Don't worry. We didn't light those.

laughing

One of the best times to be a parent is when you're lying face-to-face with your smiling baby and then you do something to make her laugh. So you laugh. Then you hear your own laugh again as she copies it, nearly exactly. Then you laugh. Then she belly laughs and you do too.

Those two minutes completely make up for the entire previous night of nearly no sleep.