cindy's world

One quick anecdote before I get into the zoo stuff: this morning as I was pouring milk for Allie’s breakfast, Allie pointed at the milk carton from her high chair and said, “Baby!”
“Milk,” I corrected her, still pouring.
“Baby.”
“No baby here, mil–” And then I saw it. On the side of the milk carton facing Allie was a photo of a toddler as the milk manufacturer explained why the added DHA is good for developing bodies. “Oh, you’re right. There IS a baby here.”
“Baby.” You’d think I would’ve learned after all the “bbbbloon”s, “bow-wow”s and “mau-mau”s she points out way before I see or hear them.
~ * ~
Yesterday, because the weather’s so beautiful (high 80s!), Mr. W and I took Allie to Irvine Park with intention of going to the zoo inside. The zoo isn’t grandiose with exotic animals the way San Diego Zoo is, but it’s got local animals and a petting zoo. Not bad for $5 parking and $2 per adult zoo entry. We parked in a general area and walked past picnic spots and a pony ride area to the zoo section, Mr. W holding Allie and handing me the DSLR camera. Turns out he’d only brought the 2 new portrait lenses (my xmas present), which was a bit of a pain because I had to be far away to fit what I needed into the frame. But you do get nice focused shots in an otherwise too-busy background.
On the way to the zoo part of the giant park, Mr. W saw a hollow tree and inserted the baby.

I don’t actually know what she was standing on, because she was in there alone, and I’m not tall enough to look in. I didn’t have time to check it out anyway as Mr. W said there’s a big black spider in there so to hurry and take the shots so we can get Allie out.

She didn’t get bitten and she rather enjoyed the view from there.
Having just entered the zoo, Mr. W placed her in front of the sign so we’ll know for future reference where we are. However, the lens did not zoom out at all so I couldn’t fit the sign in the frame.

I ran across the walkway, backed up against an opposing building, waited for all the people walking between us to pass, and managed to get this shot. Unfortunately, I was too far away for her to hear me call her to try to get her attention.

Mr. W said I complained too much about the lenses. I guess I was verbalizing all the difficulty I was having getting the shots in the frame. But the lens was good for stuff like this:

It’s not often we could get a nice clear shot of her eyes since she’s always running around and she has such dark eyes. But the problem with trying to photograph in a busy outdoors area is that one parent has to always be very close to Allie while the other parent runs 20 feet away to get a shot, and it wouldn’t be possible if I were by myself. As it was, an entire boy scout troop and some goats were running my kid over.

It was easier when Mr. W picked her up. For both me to photograph and for the goats to not nibble at her hat.

Allie likes kids (human kids) more than she likes strange animals. This turkey didn’t hold her attention as much as the little girl next to her did. (I say “strange animals” as distinguished from familiar animals, such as Dodo, whom Allie runs to joyously every chance she gets and then squats down in front of to give him a kiss.)

BTW, turkeys make soft, rather pretty and soothing cooing noises. It’s nothing like the “gobble gobble” we were told in school that they make.
Mr. W introduces Allie to a sleeping bear. It must be nothing like what she expected, because she didn’t recognize it and say, “Bay!” like she does when she sees teddy bears.

More father-daughter animal-gazing. I don’t remember what they were looking at because I couldn’t back up far enough to fit it into the frame. =P

Along the pathway, Daddy pointed out some interesting stuff…

…and Baby pointed out some interesting stuff.

Yeah, Allie ran up to and petted more than a few trash cans that trip.
We had lunch at the park’s picnic area, and altho Allie ate homemade organic carrot-kale-celery-fennel greens-ground beef-bell peppers-and-brown rice porridge and freshly homemade granny smith applesauce, Mr. W and I tried the snack bar’s burrito, hamburger and fries. They were surprisingly good, albeit slow to arrive. Soon, it was time to go home.
I don’t know what was said between the two during the walk since I had to run 60 yards away to take the photo, but I imagine it went something like this…
Allie: Thank you for taking me on my first trip to the zoo, Daddy.
Mr. W: Thank you for coming into my life, Allie.

One last quicky photo op before getting in the car:

Now that Allie has had a wet cough for the 3rd day, and now has a runny nose, she LOVES the nasal suction tool. She used to cry and squirm and bat my hand away when I would try to suction out a booger, but I think she now realizes she NEEDs suction and that it makes her itchy wet nose feel dryer and less itchy, she now asks for it by pointing and saying, “Mmm?”, she lays back voluntarily and watches the bulb or aspirator expectantly, and if we’re too slow for her, she’ll grab it and put it in her nose herself. She stays very still when we’re suctioning and smiles when we’re done. Sometimes when we’re done, she insists on Round 2, pointing and asking us to do it again, being upset when we tell her we’re done. This is true for the nasal aspirator bulbs, the 2-piece bulb with a straw that Mr. W jimmied (my favorite one), and the BabyComfyNose. So now we can switch off so that when one is drying after being used and washed, we can use another one. And I don’t think I’ve ever pulled so much slime out of Allie’s nose before, even the last and only time she’d been sick almost exactly a year ago. (But she was smaller then, so she produced less boogers per square inch.)

Aside from the occasional wet coughs (that would sometimes wake her up when she’s napping or starting fall asleep at night) and even less occasional sneezes, Allie’s still the same old happy-go-lucky goofball. She now knows how to open a closed door, and is tall enough to reach the L-shaped handle by simply going on her tiptoes, too. She opens doors, and she closes them when she knows it’s time for you to go. Every morning, Jayne holds her by the open garage door so we could wave goodbye to Allie as we leave for work. “Bye,” Allie would tell us matter-of-factly as she walks to the door, often before we’re even ready to leave. “Bye,” she’d say as we picked up our stuff and exited, and “Bye,” she’d say as she struggles to close the door on me while I’m still putting on my shoes in the garage. Jayne has to keep the door open with her foot and the last thing I see of Allie each morning before leaving for work is her struggling to push the door closed in Jayne’s arms.
Same thing when we come home from work. She’d walk to the gate in the living room and tell Jayne “bye,” even before Jayne has gathered all her things. Jayne would laugh and translate, “Okay, you can leave now, mommy and daddy are home.”
“At least she doesn’t cry when people leave,” Mr. W comforted himself saying yesterday.

We never received our studio photos in time to include the prints in Christmas presents to Allie’s grandparents (and great-grandma). I emailed the photo studio Christmas evening to inquire about it. A few days ago, I received an emailed response from them indicating that they had thought we were okay with getting the prints after the studio re-opens after the holidays. Well, we were, but when we left, we’d agreed that it wouldn’t be a problem for them to get the prints done before the holidays, so that was what I’d expected. I thought if they couldn’t do it, they could’ve contacted me. The studio apologized for the confusion and said they would throw in a couple of extra prints for free, which was very nice of them. Last night, I got the share-able “unprintable web digitals” via email. The photos ARE small, but not as small as I’d expected, altho Mr. W was unimpressed with their size. Here are the two poses we’d purchased from the photo studio, the top being 300K and bottom 425K:

I also heard from Kari, the photographer who came to us for a separate outdoor photoshoot. She emailed me that a CD with her edited digitals (presumably full-size resolution) along with two large prints will be mailed to us. It should’ve gone in the mail yesterday. I can’t wait to get those; I made our Christmas cards this year from Kari’s photos (she emailed me about 15 fairly quickly after the photoshoot so that I could do holiday mailings) and people LOVED them. Mr. W will want to use Kari again for any of our future photography needs.

I was nervous about Stage 3/4 foods for Allie when she’s ready to move beyond the purees, because I wasn’t sure how to prepare finger foods and “real foods” fresh every day when I’m at work all day except for the 1.5 hours or so I get with her after work until her bedtime. But what I’ve been doing is making a one-pot meal en masse that usually has some sort of grain (typically brown rice and/or quinoa, or tiny semolina pasta) made into a porridge with fresh veggies (carrots, peas, edamame, green beans, corn, tomato puree) and a meat (beef, fish). Then I freeze them into 1.5 to 2 oz portions in silicon ice cube trays and she’s good for about a week. I try to give her a different one-pot dish for lunch from her dinner, and I add to each frozen dish some extra veggies as I get them (freshly cut, steamed, frozen), chopped bell peppers, broccoli, carrots, asparagus, zucchini. Sometimes she gets the extra veggies on the side as finger food. Jayne has never had a problem feeding her. She gets fresh seasonal fruit after each meal that Mr. W cuts up for her in the morning as I select and place her frozen foods in serving bowls to thaw out for the day’s feedings. All the day’s food prep is done before we get her from her crib each weekday morning. Snacks are kind of left up to Jayne’s pleasure, with some suggestions from me. Allie sometimes gets tiny baby waffles that are frozen like Eggos, heated in the toaster oven, which would be dipped in Greek yogurt, hummus, or eaten with a scrambled egg that Jayne would make. Sometimes it’s half a slice of sprouted whole wheat bread with Colby cheese bits. Sometimes it’s veggies and fruit. She drinks her cow’s milk from a straw and water from a sippy cup, still gets 3 servings of breast milk daily (nursing morning and bedtime, plus a bottle after the first nap or nursing when I’m home). Nutrition must be adequate; Allie’s pooping regularly, 2-3 times a day, and I think she shot up a couple more inches in the past month as her head is now well above the tops of our living room baby gates/blockades. The seats on our couches come up to her waist. She’s now attempting to climb, getting a knee up on the couch, but unsure of how to get her other leg up from there. She uses her underfoot toys as stepstools but hasn’t realized she could move a toy to where she wants to go and use that as a step, yet. *keeping fingers crossed that she doesn’t figure this out anytime soon*

Brain development is fascinating. Based on what I’ve learned in reading The Wonder Weeks, Allie is now at the development of “programs.” She understands a whole series of events and can put them together and control the outcome. Something as simple as, “Allie, where’s your sock? Get your sock and I’ll put it on for you” is pretty complicated when you think about the process. The above is what I said to her when I happened to see that she’d taken a sock off at some point in her play and had left it by some toys in the living room. So her response was to put her hands palm up like a shrug, as if to say she doesn’t know where her sock is, then walk around leaning forward so that her face is closer to the ground, as if to say, “I’m looking for it.” She walked around for a bit with her hands raised up, then spotted the sock. The hands went down, she ran to it, picked it up, brought it back to me, and then waited for me to pick her up and place her in my lap to put the sock on. In order to get to this point, she has to first understand what a sock is, that it is separate from her, understand distances, that she can bridge the distance, she has to stick out her hand toward it and move her fingers in a gripping fashion to pick it up, and then she has to remember to bring that sock to me and have me help her put it on. All of that were learned in bits and pieces in her development for the past year. Her being able to understand “programs” is handy in that we can now just say, “Ready for your nap?” “Ready to go night-night?” and she’d stop her playing, run around to the gate at the stairs, and pull on it, waiting for us to open it so she could step through and make her way upstairs to her room.

Her memory development is a cool thing to observe, too. Last night, for example, she was having her bath using an organic home-milled chamomile baby soap I’d purchased from a friend’s wife who handmakes all her organic products (Moxie Organix, if any of you are interested). Allie pointed to the soap bar and said, “Baya!”
Mr. W corrected her, “Soap. Not banana. Soap.”
“Bayaya,” she insisted.
Looking at the bar, the translucent cream color does bear an uncanny resemblance to banana flesh, albeit shaped differently.
“No, soap.”
“Baya.”
“Soap.”
“Baya.”
After she was taken out of her bath, dried off, diaper put on, she ran back into the bathroom where Mr. W still was, and pointed at the bar.
“Bayaya!”
“Soap.”
“Baya.”
“Soap.”
An application of lotion later, she was put in her fleece footsie jammies, said her goodnights to Mr. W, nursed, and as I started to move her off the Boppy to place her in her crib, she pointed at the bathroom door and said with all seriousness, “Baya.”
“You’re still on that?”
She went in her crib, played for the usual 20 minutes or so until she went to sleep. 11 hours go by. We go in her room to pick up a standing, smiling Allie from her crib. “Good MORning, sweetheart!”
*point* “Baya.” The way she smiles mischievously when she says “baya” tells us she’s deliberately telling us it’s a banana even thought she knows it’s not, so it’s a game to her.

“One” rhymes with “fun.” And she is lots of it.

I’m deeee-lighted to announce that Mr. W’s vacation-at-home with Allie has concluded and they both did EXTREMELY well! Unless Mr. W lied on his entries on the app, it looks like Allie took great naps on time and had all her meals and snacks on time. He took her out to an organic lunch at Mother’s Market on Monday and she ate Swiss chard and tempeh off his plate. Reportedly, the other restaurant patrons smiled at her for being “so cute.” Allie may newly be going through her adjustment to get down to one long nap, started this weekend, but she’s healthy. No diaper rashes or any issues. Yay!

New Year’s Day, my parents came over and we did a Chinese hot pot dinner. Allie joined us at the table and had turnips, tofu, whitefish, napa cabbage, taro root. And then my parents played with Allie so that I could explore a new Bejeweled game on the computer. That was nice.

Allie even joined in on the computer fun.

All photos here courtesy of my parents.

If I don’t get around to posting about Xmas, I’ll just say that Allie was opening gifts for a week leading up to Christmas Day. She got tons of toys and clothes from our friends, coworkers, and family. It was a nice, quiet holiday week (the stepkidlet has been in Germany for the past month visiting her boyfriend’s family, which I think beats last year’s Christmas trip of Haiti).

Allie turned 13 months old on Sunday. The above photo was taken day-of. That day, she met my childhood friend Sandy for the first time (since Sandy moved to Texas for work)! Sandy and her boyfriend were very impressed with what a “good baby” Allie is…and she really is. She rarely cries, rarely fusses, and expresses her needs by pointing and babbling. (She’s babbling a LOT.) She’s happy in crowds and happy on her own. We don’t even know when she’s up from her nap without checking the monitor, because she doesn’t cry then, either. I keep a close eye on the babycam and try to catch her immediately upon her waking and give her 15 minutes to hang out on her own and poop. She plays in her crib, hums, practices her babbling, rolls around on and with her fuzzy blanket, walks around and peers over the railing, pulls off a sock and drops it out of the crib to watch it fall. Sandy was especially impressed by how well she eats her chopped foods, and WHAT she happily eats. “What’s that?”
“Quinoa and brown rice with edamame, spinach, bell peppers, carrots, peas, and green beans.”
“What’s she eating now?”
“Chopped papaya.”
“What, did she run out of broccoli?”
“Yeah, yesterday.”
“I was just kidding. She eats broccoli?”
They were also impressed with her durum wheat semolina pasta in organic tomato soup with steamed tilapia and veggies (i.e., lunch). Oh, and her snack of sprouted whole grain wheat bread with artichoke hummus and Colby cheese. Allie now eats and enjoys avocado. Yay! So that’s everything she’s tried, as avocado was our sole “failed” food early on.

As for her physical stuff, she’s running, walking backwards, spinning in circles, and squat-walking (taking staggering steps forward while maintaining a plie’). She’s still forbidden to touch the Christmas tree and the boxes underneath, so she’s come up with new ways to make contact now. Aside from placing her toy on the boxes, she’ll now back up into the tree and boxes, never turning around. When she feels the tree or boxes, she’ll sit down on a box, still never turning around to look. “I’m not doing it on purpose if I don’t see where I am,” she seems to claim. Sometimes she backs up into it leaning forward, so that her butt sticks out and she’ll booty-bump the tree and ornaments repeatedly, still never looking back. “No, don’t touch it with your butt, either,” I’d say, and she’d straighten up and run off.

She also started kissing in the last month or so. She does it at will without being prompted, which makes the sign of affection that much cuter. She makes the kissy sound when she gives an air-kiss, but she’ll often run up to me to plant a silent open-mouthed kiss on my cheek, knee, or turn when I’m holding her and place a wet one on my cheek and then smile playfully at me. Most often, though, she kisses her favorite stuffed animals. Those are noisy smacks.

It’s also now apparent that she pays attention. I’d been rubbing an antiseptic lotion from a little bottle onto the dry patches on her ankles for months. Now she’d ask for the bottle (“bah!” while pointing), and then she’ll shake it up like I do, touch her fingers to the tip of the bottle cap (cuz I don’t hand it to her uncapped), touch those fingers to her knees and ankles and rub the areas, and then turn the bottle upside down and touch the tip to her ankles, like she’s pouring the lotion onto the right spots. Today during her bath, she took the washcloth and rubbed it on her feet, and then also scrubbed Mr. W’s knee with the washcloth, like she’d seen it done on her body parts. And then she dipped the washcloth in the water, took it out, and squeezed (some of) the water out.

Her words are still mostly the “B” stuff, though. “Bow-wow,” “ball,” “bir(d),” and the like. What she says most often, though, is “hi.” She added a fake laugh, a “heh heh heh,” into her spoken repertoire. It basically means, “I find that amusing.” She uses it when she sees a photo of a dog, gets a new toy that she’s examining, generally when she likes what she sees and wants to acknowledge that.

Naps are easy on us. She still has a very long latency period, usually 20-40 minutes before she falls asleep. But we basically leave her in her crib and exit her room and that’s it. She’ll take the time she needs to play on her own and soothe herself into her nap. Once down, she sleeps pretty well, being a lot less noise-sensitive than she’d been when she was younger, for at least an hour. At bedtime, she still nurses but not very long, usually less than 10 minutes a side. Then she’ll flip over onto her stomach on the Boppy and try to crawl to the armrest, babbling. At this point I pick her up, carry her to her crib, lay her down on her fuzzy bear while she giggles and smiles up at me, turn off her light, and leave. She plays for 30 minutes or so until she decides she’s now going to go to sleep, then she lays down, closes her eyes, and is asleep. She only sleeps about 10.5 hours overnight, though, waking up on her own around 6:30 every morning. I’m just happy she’s not waking at 5:15a anymore like she’d been doing for almost 2 months.

Mr. W finds it hilarious that she empties her toys out of her containers now and places the containers on her head, then giggles and tries to walk around blind.

My parents bought her a training potty for Christmas (my mom thinks I should’ve potty-trained her already), and this is what Allie did with the potty when she opened the gift:

Mostly, she’s a little clown and loves to make people laugh. This is her “mock shock” face, used when something drops or she walks into something and wants to express, “Ooh, did you see that?!”

She realized on Christmas Day, when we had my parents and grandma over, that when she stops, arches her back and sticks out her belly, we laugh. That made her stick out her belly more and more so that she’d grunt and strain trying to stay upright. We’d laugh harder. So then she started just exaggerating and faking the strain, grunting away, for our reactions. I think my mom has a video of it, but here are some stills.

Quite the little ham, isn’t she?

Oh, yes. In brushing her teeth tonight, I decided to do an additional count and inspection. Upper teeth, all 8 are out. The full bottom surface of her left upper molar is out, the incisor is out most of the way. Half of her right upper molar is out and the tip of her upper right incisor is out. Bottom teeth, nothing new is out, just the central 4. So that makes 12 teeth this month.

As if we need another sign of her quick growing up, I noticed that she often sleeps with her legs straight now. She doesn’t do the infant knees-tucked-up dissected-frog position anymore. I’d be okay if she slows down a TEENY bit now, but Mr. W can’t wait until she loses her morning nap and can have actual conversations with him.

The hubby took this holiday week off of work to stay home with Allie by himself. (I don’t have enough seniority at work to get high-demand days off.) I was nervous because on weekends and holidays when we’re both at home together, he usually isn’t aware of what time it is so he’s always surprised (and dismayed) when I say that we have to head home because Allie’s late for her nap or for lunch or whatever. I’d joked that I hoped Allie doesn’t miss all her meals and her naps this week, but Mr. W knew I was at least half-serious. Monday, Christmas Eve, was his first full day alone with her (he’d had half-days when Jayne would still come by at some point). The day went perfectly. He’d even had his friend over much of the day to do computer stuff, and even then, Allie had all her meals and naps on time. Today is the second day they’re home alone together.

I got this email from Mr. W at about 8:30am, with the subject line “Allie and I are fine,” and the content of the email:

We just went on a little bike ride. We love you. Come home early.

I thought, “That’s nice,” and then I got to the attachment:

I’m not sure how to respond.

I think when you love children, it shows in your photography. Our outdoor photographer Kari, with whom we just did Allie’s 1-year outdoor shoot on Tuesday, told me soon after she arrived at our house, “I love kids. They’re my favorite subjects to photograph.” I love Allie, but I’m not really a kid-person. My attempts at photography this past month have been all right, but nothing to write home about. When I take an action shot of Allie it looks like this when it’s acceptable:

Cute subject, photo makes you smile, but it’s not artistic or anything. It’s Allie frolicking in a holiday wonderland.
When it’s just short of acceptable, it’s usually because composition is a little off, or the focus is mis-aimed. Allie moves fast; it’s not easy. For example, here’s an action shot of Allie in which I somehow managed to only have her knuckles in focus.

Leave it to me that the smallest body part is what I get the camera to focus on. =P
And then when I (attempt to) do a portrait shot, it’s not stunning. It’s just sort of “there.” Like this:

Again, cute subject, but without post-production cropping and other work, it’s not something that would even make me stop and go, “Ooh, I like that one.” So I’m glad I’d called in the professionals for Allie’s one-year photoshoots. We haven’t seen the studio shots done last week by inGrace Photography, yet, but we already got some digital proofs from Kari. Here are some of my favorites.
You saw my “portrait” of Allie, above. Now see Kari’s Portrait (with a capital “P”).

Stunning. I realize she did post-production work and played with oversaturation of hues, but still. This makes me stop in my tracks and gawk a little.
Here’s something with a little more personality showing. Allie walked around tickling herself with this fuzzy reed (?), and wouldn’t let it go.

Somehow it just conveys adoration. It’s almost as if a mother took the photo, but Kari doesn’t have kids (yet).
And here’s yet more personality, which Kari brought out herself by reaching in to tease and tickle Allie’s tummy, then swinging back very quickly to take the shot, then reaching up for a tickle and a tease as Allie giggles and plays back, then leaning quickly back for another snap.

Allie clearly really liked Kari. 🙂
When I do a portrait of Daddy with Baby, it’s “fine.” It may even be “cute.” It’s like this:

But good golly, when Kari photographs Daddy with Baby, the two look cohesive and vibrant together.

Here’s a couple of the three of us together.

Words fail me. I don’t think photography’s even Kari’s day job! This photoshoot wasn’t easy; Allie kept taking off and almost deliberately always turned her back to the camera and/or ran away from it. In Kari’s own words, tho, “…but you would never be able to tell the way that bright smile screams ‘take my picture’…” The experience even inspired Mr. W to buy me a very nice portrait lens for my DSLR camera. I barely remember how to turn on my DSLR so I certainly was too intimidated to look into expensive, semi-professional accessories. However, unbeknownst to me, Mr. W was researching on my behalf. When we got home from work today, a box had arrived, which Mr. W handed me and told me to open right away — it was my Christmas present. The moment I touched the box, I said, a bit confused, “You got me a camera lens?” Why would he do that? I don’t know what I’m doing with the camera to justify a purchase like this.
Mr. W looked blank. “How did you know that?” I looked down at the plain box. “Does it say that on the box?” He took the box from me and looked at it, then handed it back.
“So it IS a camera lens?” I asked, still befuddled.
Now he looked a little crestfallen. I’d ruined my own surprise somehow. I opened the box. Mr. W installed it on my camera and played with it while I fed Allie dinner. Then he handed it to me as he took Allie’s bowl out of my hands. I was still unconvinced this was something necessary, especially given the expense, but a few minutes later, I realized this lens is exactly what I’d always wanted but didn’t know I was looking for. The effects created brought many creative visions I had to fruition. Now I really need to re-learn how to use my camera and take full advantage.

But, you know what? Kari’s probably 8-9 times cheaper than this lens. I’m definitely still going to keep her around. 🙂

Our Christmas tree went up December 1 during Allie’s first nap period. My only contribution to it was a joking affirmative response when Mr. W asked if Allie’s giant Hello Kitty balloon, which the stepdaughter and her boyfriend bought for Allie’s birthday, would make a good tree-topper. And next thing I knew, there it was.

It’s fun to watch Allie test her boundaries, just a little bit. Mr. W figured we’d just “teach her” not to touch the tree, ornaments, decorations, boxes, etc. I thought, “Fat chance.” Tree, little bright lights, shiny balls, ribbons.

When I brought Allie down from her nap, she saw the tree on her way down the stairs and her eyes lit up. She pointed, delighted. “Ehh?”
“Tree!” I said.
“Bbbbbloon bbbbloon!” She pointed higher.
“Yeah, that’s your balloon!”
I put her down in front of the tree in the living room and let her have a closer look. At her height, she saw all the big boxes and pointed excitedly. “BAH!” she pointed to our prop presents. I hadn’t even known she knew the word for “box” (minus the last consonant sound, as usual).
“That’s right, box! Lots of boxes!”
“BAH!” She walked up to the boxes and picked one up. I let her play with it as I took some photos with the DSLR. And that was the last time she was allowed to touch anything Christmas tree-related.

So she’ll walk up to it once in awhile, and point. We let her do that. And then her finger would draw closer to an ornament, slowly. When she makes contact, we say, “No. Don’t touch.” She pulls away, clasps her little hands behind her back, never turning around. She leans forward, which we let her do. And then she sniffs the tree. That’s okay, so we don’t say anything. She plops down and looks at the box. “Baw?” She reaches out and points. That’s okay. She reaches farther, touches with her hands.
“No, don’t touch the box.” She ignores us. “Allie,” in a stern warning tone. She freezes. She pulls her hand back, standing, staring at the box. And then slowly, tentatively, a foot will reach out toward the box, hanging in the air. “Don’t touch with your foot either.” She pulls her foot back. And then she’ll proceed to forget all about the tree, the boxes, the ornaments, until someone new comes over. Then she’ll point to the tree as if to show them the newest addition to our living room, and sometimes she’ll go through the testing of limits again, gingerly.
Overall, though, she’s a surprisingly obedient kid. Hoping we just skip the terrible two cliche personality altogether. 🙂

Mr. W’s putting up our Christmas tree instead of playing Diablo (or some other PC game[s]), so I finally get to use the computer! Woohoo! Let’s see, where did we leave off about last weekend, when my baby became a whole year old? *scrolling* Oh yes, Saturday, the day after her birthday.

Late morning on Saturday, I frosted Allie’s cake as she napped. If anyone is interested in making sugar-free frosting for their desserts, I used 4 ounces of whipped cream cheese (you can use regular softened cream cheese) and stirred 1/4 teaspoon of vanilla extract and 2.5 tablespoons of apple juice concentrate (it comes frozen, so just thaw it) into it, whipping with the spoon. Then I added undiluted beet juice for coloring with a dropper. You can see a photo of the finished cake on Part 1.
Then Allie’s paternal grandparents came by to hang out with The Birthday Girl while we (okay, Mr. W) prepped her birthday food for our family gathering.

As you can see, Allie decided to wear a shirt that labels who she is, in case of confusion.
When my parents got there, we had a feast of prime rib, mashed potatoes, string beans, cornbread stuffing, and all sorts of stuff that we set up in the backyard to take advantage of the beautiful weather.

There was a ton of leftovers, since my grandma backed out last minute for a church event, and both of Mr. W’s older kids decided not to come until the evening. It’s nice to have ready-made food in the fridge.
First, we toasted to the birthday girl.

Allie didn’t get her own cup of champagne, but my mom wanted her to have a taste of the sweet Asti Spumante. I dabbed a spoon in my flute and touched it to her lips. She licked her lips…and then pointed at the glass, requesting, “Mmm?” I didn’t give her more.

Allie enjoyed her lunch outside, too!

And she got to listen to Gong-Gong (maternal grandpa) tell stories.

Allie’s favorite part about being outside is, as usual, playing with treasures she finds on the ground.

While Allie took her afternoon nap, we (okay, Mr. W) decorated the living room for her specially. I got her after her nap, changed and fed her upstairs, and as she came downstairs, she found the house transformed.

Look, Allie! Balloons and presents! And now big brother and big sister are here, too!

Yay, she’s actually allowed to rip paper! She wasn’t sure what to do, since she was always being told “no” and having paper taken away from her when she starts ripping.

Allie got her first piece of furniture from Gong-Gong (grandpa) and Po-Po (grandma): a beanbag chair! I don’t know how she carried something that heavy and awkward without falling, but she gets lots of practice.

Gift bags were easier for her than gift wrapping, since she still didn’t trust that she was allowed to rip paper without being chided.

Next, it was time for her smash cake. Mr. W pulled her high chair into the living room, lined the floor, put a big “1” bib on her, and put the cake down. She touched the frosting tentatively. “Yeah! Eat it!” everyone encouraged. She gave a little taste with a finger, and it was good! So she offered it to her grandparents.

Since there were no takers (no one likes organic healthy cakes except for me, the baby, and Mr. W), she decided to eat it herself.

She stayed daintily clean and neat until…

Oh, well. This is why I loaded on the frosting.

Allie later had her first taste of ice cream, too. Organic vanilla bean, thanks to her Gong-Gong and Po-Po’s willingness to share. She only got a little bite and didn’t ask for more.

And then, she just played the rest of the night away. With two grandmas and two grandpas…

…two older siblings…

…supervising the photography…

…it was enough to tire a girl out!

“Thanks for my beanbag chair, Po-po. I’m ready for bed now.”

On Monday, the three of us went to Mr. W’s parents’ hotel for a visit before they left. Allie had breakfast with us at the hotel, and she had scrambled eggs, bits of home potatoes, and cow’s milk for the first time! She ate so well and so eagerly that we’re not letting her have a lot more table food. It’s all going well, if a little too quickly at this point. 🙂
Thanks for the first year, my little sunshine and rainbows!