December so far

We’ve kept pretty busy but not that crazy busy that, well, drives me crazy. We’ve been careful not to over do it. I hate to say no to activities that come up but I think leaving some open time leaves us all a little happier. We started off the month with our annual family pictures. We usually have our photos done around the end of October but the photographer was back East visiting her new baby granddaughter. We tried in November but Zaeda was really sick and with her staying up most of the night, three out of four of us looked really bad the day we were scheduled to shoot. So we rescheduled. We finally made it in to see the photographer when we were all feeling better. Here are a few pictures from our session. Sorry, grandparents, you’ll have to wait to see your photos; they are not shown here.

We went to Zoo Lights at the Oregon Zoo with Karri and Michael on one of the coldest evenings that we’ve had in Portland. It was 24 degrees but you wouldn’t have known it by watching Oliver. He was so excited. Both kiddies were bundled up and so cozy that Zaeda fell asleep.

Oliver’s new quips:

“No way, Jose!”
“Fantastic”

He continues to be very sweet with Zaeda. He recently asked me to put her on the floor but have her standing so that he could dance with her. If my hands hadn’t been so full I would have taken a picture.

We were getting ready for work and Zaeda was on the bed just hanging out. Oliver climbed up and grabbed a pacifier to give to her. Zaeda hasn’t really taken to a pacifier so I was interested to see what was going to happen. Instead I heard Oliver saying, “Here comes the train, Zaeda. Time to open the tunnel.” I suspect he heard this from his Nana. It was so cute!

Zaeda still continues to surprise us with how much and how often she can eat. She can put away a 2.5 oz container of baby food and then want to nurse minutes later. She's a solid little girl. So far we haven’t found a food she doesn’t like. So far she's had bananas, squash, green beans, peas, sweet potatoes, peaches, pears and applesauce. Next on the menu will be prunes.

At the beginning of the month I picked Oliver up from daycare and he handed me this picture. He drew it all with the exception of the Christmas tree. I’ve had it at my desk for the last couple of weeks but decided I should share.

The picture is of me decorating our tree. The little things that look like they are leaping off the tree are the lights and he said the marks on the tree were seeds. He pointed out that he drew my curly hair. The long lines to the left of the picture are our stockings. I think he captured our tree trimming moment perfectly.

Oliver attended his first friend’s birthday party this month. It was held at a gymnastics and dance studio in Tigard. We all had a great time. Here are the kids in the foam block pit. Oliver is the one in the orange and navy shirt (right in the center at the start of the video).

Zaeda met up with the birthday girl’s little brother. They are all in the same classes. As you can see, he is really smitten with her.

We also made the customary visit to Santa. Oliver could barely keep his pants on he was so excited. But as soon as he got to Santa he clammed up. Zaeda wanted nothing to do with the big guy.

Zaeda at 6 months, solid food and Oliver’s antics

Zaeda turned 6 months old on Thanksgiving. We celebrated by giving her mashed bananas. She wasn’t too sure about it and after a few bites it all came back up. We tried again the next day but no luck. We finally resorted to rice cereal and all is well. She gets very excited when we hold the spoon in front of her; sometimes she gets so worked up that her whole body shakes.

We went to the pediatrician and her stats are-

Height- 2’3” (89%)
Weight- 16 lb 3.5 oz (54%)
Head Circumference- 16.73” (51%)
She loves to talk, growl and squeal. Her range is varied and fun to listen too. She's sitting up completely unassisted. Being pulled to standing is still her favorite activity but we just located Oliver’s old baby toys and she has been playing with a variety of them. If she sees something she wants, she just reaches for it. The other day she almost toppled over face first in an effort to grab some keys. Great-Grandma Zaeda gave her her first baby doll and Zaeda spends a lot of time with the baby’s foot, shirt or hand in her mouth.

Oliver continues to amuse us as well. His toilet training is going pretty well—some days are better than others. Tonight I found him in his usual corner doing his “business.” When I asked him what he was doing, he admitted the obvious and then added, “and talking to myself.”
He has also learned that items put on higher shelves are not necessarily out of reach if you use a chair or toy crates stacked upon each other.

He is stubborn at times and recently told both me and Keith on separate occassions that he didn’t want us telling him what to do. I had hoped that we wouldn’t reach that stage for about 10 more years.

He's very curious about reading and sounds out the letters on signs and in books. He often tells Keith during storytime, “No, I want to do it (read) myself.”

Recent Oliver quips:

• "Yes sir!"


• "Poopy!" ( repeated, sung aloud, or as the primary topic of any conversation -- all we had to say was that it was sometimes not a good word to use, and it shot to the front of his vocabulary)


• "Vacaroom" -- the noisy thing we use to clean the carpet.


• Tofu ="toe-food"


• "Why?" and "what?" -- Why is it dark? Why is the moon coming up? What is a prince? What is a king? Which led to a discussion about Robin Hood where Oliver said it was bad to take money from people. This doesn’t seem to apply to Oliver as he is always taking coinsoff of Keith’s nightstand.
  

Our weekends in December are already looking busy (How can that be!) so we decided to get our tree this past weekend. I usually consider it a bit sacriligious to put up a tree before December but we just didn’t know when we could get it done. Oliver LOVED decorating the tree this year. When Keith was putting on the lights, Oliver remarked how handsome the tree looked. He did a good job decorating the tree—most of the ornaments were in one section about 2 ½ feet off the floor in about a space 3 feet wide. When we were finished, he looked up at the tree and told me that our tree was beautiful. After so many years of tree decorating, you forgot how beautiful a Christmas tree can look. Just another reason to slow down and enjoy these few evenings before Christmas.