six months

We are having a very hard time understanding how our resident small person has gone from this:

To this:

Our adorable but boring little lump has turned into a person who laughs, sings to herself, eats vegetables, pets the cats, insists on talking on the phone, and has recently invented a game that consists of simultaneously sucking down a bottle, kicking both legs, and smacking Mama in the face. I am not making any of this up.

And she has a tooth.
Also, there's a slim possibility that she's begun speaking Swedish.
We are out of our league here, people.

M could care less that today is her half-birthday, but we're pretty excited for her. Also, it kind of feels like we've accomplished something, keeping a tiny person alive for half a year. I think we're entitled to a small celebration. Of course, I'm hoping for something involving a cupcake. But I'd also settle for a stiff drink. Parenthood, as it turns out, is a study in contradictions.

Thank you, everyone, for helping us keep it together for the past six months. We owe you.

halloween

We didn't go trick or treating on Halloween. For one thing, it was rainy. For another, the only person in our house even remotely the right size for trick or treating isn't going to taste candy anytime soon.* Unless she gets left alone for too long with her dad and a bag of miniature Reese's cups. 

I guess we could have done the neighborhood circuit and pocketed M's candy for grown-up consumption. In fact, now that I think about it, that's probably exactly what we'll do next year.

If we had gone out last night, we would have come to your house because you probably would have had lots of the good candy, which is to say that you wouldn't have bothered stocking up on anything that wasn't a thoughtful combination of chocolate and peanut butter.

You also would have said absolutely sweet and flattering things about M's "costume," and then I would have had to own up to the fact that not only did I not knit the little bear suit, I only remembered that we had it after listening to a group of other parents discussing the costumes they'd gotten for their significantly-younger-than-M babies. Because until about ten o'clock yesterday morning I was of the very strong opinion that babies did not need Halloween costumes until they were old enough to say "Butterfinger."

Then you and I would have looked at each other for a minute and I would have started shuffling my feet just a little bit, trying to think of something else to say, until suddenly--bless that child!--M would have done something incredibly cute, and we all would have started laughing at her, and I would have stopped worrying about the awkward silence and started wondering whether it would be rude to ask you for an extra bag of Reese's Pieces for the cats who, sadly, had to stay in for the night.

Then M would have grinned her goodbyes to everyone lingering on the doorstep, and her dad and I would have whisked her away home just in time for her to have a bottle and roll into bed before she had a chance to start her exhausted banshee routine. Which is how bedtime always goes at our house.

Hey, this is my fantasy. I can end it however I want to.

*Although she has started taste-testing solid foods. More on that another time...

grandpa

We were entertaining again this week.

The last time Grandpa Ohio visited, little Miss M was just a month old. Sure, she was cute and all, but, holy cow, was she tiny! And also a little boring. Her primary daytime activity was sleeping.

How quickly things change. 

For better or for worse, there was very little daytime sleeping this time around. In spite of a debilitating nap strike, M adapted very quickly to having three grownups to boss around. She and Grandpa had lots of together time, both inside and out--in spite of some cruddy Seattle weather. For some reason, though, every picture I have of the two of them seems to include our ratty red couch.

There was reading on the couch,

--with and without cats--

Skyping with Grandma,

and lot of just sitting around, being chummy.

We were all sad to say goodbye at the end of the week, except for M, who didn't realize until the next day that she was missing one of the grownups that she used to have wrapped around her little finger. Then she turned extra-clingy, trying to figure out what had happened to the sweet guy with the mustache.

Don't be too sad, though, everybody.
We're already gearing up for an exciting Ohio trip at Christmastime!

crazypants

It's been over a month. I am sorry. To say that we've been busy around here might suggest more achievement and productivity than we can really claim. Instead, I'll just say that it's been nutty at our house.

Exhibit A:

That's bossy Miss Eleanor on the left and extra-curious Miss Finch on the right. I know that it's wrong to pick favorites, so I won't tell you that one or the other is my favorite. I'll just mention that Miss Eleanor is A Very Bad Cat.

For those of you rolling your eyes right now, wondering what we were thinking, let me say that we were thinking we wanted kittens. A pair of them. It's been part of our plan for years, and we were waiting for the right time and the right cats. We had assumed we'd find our feline friends before Miss M arrived in our lives, but it didn't work out that way. So now, we're just making things up as we go along.

Introducing the small creatures to each other went well enough. Out of the fifty bazillion pictures I took to preserve the moment for posterity, though, I don't think there's a single one in which at least one of my three subjects isn't a blur of activity.

The cats were pretty quick to get comfortable around the baby.

Then they started getting a little too comfortable for this nervous mama, who is constantly waiting for a cuddle session to end in blood and tears.

It hasn't happened yet.

We'd like to think that M is learning to be gentle with the cats, but honestly, it's a little too early to expect much in that department.

Sometimes, M tries to eat the cats.

Usually, though, it's the cats snacking on her.

And just when you think everyone is going to sit quietly and keep their distance...

...something exciting happens!

So now we have some extra messes, some extra noise, more than a little extra laundry, and lots of extra chaos. Really, though, it's a small price to pay for M to have her own private circus. I briefly entertained the idea of making her a lion tamer's costume for Halloween. Not that she's, like, in control or anything.

But the cats are happy. And when we're not cleaning up kitten pee or wondering who ran off with the kitchen sponge again, we're pretty happy. We can't claim to know exactly how M feels about the new additions, but she looks pretty happy from here.

action-packed

Boy howdy, has it been a busy few weeks for us! Visitors, traveling, and lots of walking in the August sun. It added up to something like this:

Two brand-new aunties!

Four ferry rides!

One sunflower!

Dancing on tables at various restaurants! (If you're curious, we were here and here.)

A trip to the top of Seattle's tallest building! (Thanks again, Uncle D!)

 And a visit to the zoo!

Whew. We were exhausted. You're probably exhausted just looking at the photos. Believe it or not, this wasn't enough excitement for M. In her spare time, she's also been rolling over, learning to nap in her crib, yelling a lot, and playing several recently-invented games with Dad.

This one is called "Queen of the Laundry."

This is either "Diaper Hat" or "Diaper Head." I can't remember which, but the rules of the game are pretty obvious.

And that, my friends, is how we spent the last two weeks of August. Here's to the cooler, calmer days of fall...