By Popular Demand

Another Adrie Post

Are you tired of hearing about her yet? My life consists of work, snow, sleep, photography & photoshopping, and Adrie. Oh how I love her.She's started saying "nigh-nigh" and scrunching up her hand in a wave whenever we're on our way to bed or naps. Lo and behold, at 7:15 tonight she came over to me and voluntarily started saying "Nigh-nigh-nigh-nigh" and waving - so I raced her to her bed! Life will get so easy if she starts asking to go to bed!

I am a little embarassed to admit this part, but her hair changed color when I washed it. She's back to screaming her lungs out in the bathtub, so I can't even remember the last time I made her lay down in the tub for a hair washing. Needless to say, her hair went from a medium brown to strawberry light-brown with her bath today. She was hoarse afterwards, but mmm mmm she smelled so nice and I couldn't stop touching her hair.

You wouldn't believe the mess this tiny thing can make in no time at all. She is a wonder at entertaining herself, but there's hell to pay after. Her newest favorite thing is my old jewelry box. She holds up earrings, necklackes, and rings to her ears or puts them on her toes and says "Ooooo!" When an item loses her interest she tosses it to the side and finds the next. I've decided to leave my bedroom and bathroom floor in disarray until my work week is done, as this cycle just repeats itself every morning while I get ready for work.

Try #2 in the snow: She still cries when it touches her.

PROOF that we were forced into child labor

1994 - Weymouth, MA

Mallory Jan

age - 1 year, 9 months

One Evening with Adrie

I just can't resist. Here are the cute things that happened in the space of two hours with her:

She did a decent job of using a baby fork to feed herself alfredo macaroni noodles, though she gave up and used her hands for the last third of dinner. She also begged and begged for a taste of my salsa, which I gave her. What a face! She didn't ask for any more. I let her have a tortilla chip toward the end of dinner, and after watching me intently she insisted on dipping her chip into my dip repeatedly.

She figured out that green beans are long and thin, just like her sippy cup straw, so she'd put a bean in her straw and then put the straw to her mouth to eat them, one by one.

She also thought it was hilarious to pick up her cup with her teeth by that silicone straw, and shake her head back and forth to hit her shoulders with the cup. She laughed over and over at that one!

She treats the dining room table like a fort, and her new game is that when I 'chase' her she wriggles under the table where I can't get her. The six dining chairs form a cage around her, and she paces up and down in the 3-foot by 1-foot aisle, 'teasing' me by popping her head out where I can see. When she's bored of that, she pushes chairs out of the way in a hilarious effort to stop me from getting her (they are heavy and it takes monumental effort on her part!). By the end of the evening the chairs were scattered all over the kitchen.

She decided the pedestal sink in the bathroom looks an awful lot like the drinking fountains at church, and it took a great deal of persuading to convince her that going "Ahhhhh" with her mouth open wide was NOT going to get her a drink out of that fountain.

In the two minutes I let her diaper rash dry out, she managed to pee on her bathroom floor and slip and slide and fall in it at least twice. I picked her up and she began crying LOUDLY, shaking her head and sobbing "No no no no" because she knew I'd make her take a bath. She cried through the whole bath.

While lotioning/powdering after her bath, I let her play with my ring. She put it on each of her fingers, admiring it by saying "Ooooh!" I had to laugh when she then tried it on each of her big toes!

Of course there were other little cute things, but I thought I'd give you a small taste of some of the best! I absolutely love her and can't believe how entertaining she is becoming.

The Faces of Adrie

Just wanted to document a few of my favorites out of the Snow Shoot we did yesterday - see my Digital Darkroom blog for the final shots!







WIDE SMILE is the name of this one. NOT a real smile.

This is a genuine happy/funny face.

Crying face.

Mad/unsure face.

Laughing!














Licking her lips. She does this all the time! I love it.

Eight weeks until nursery!

Oh my gosh she is becoming more fun at the same time as more annoying. I'll start with the annoying behaviors first:

• She says "Nya, nya, nya" (no, no, no) to EVERYTHING! She usually shakes her head back and forth vigorously in accompaniment. "Do you want a bite?" "Nya" "Do you want a drink?" "Nya". "Are you ready to go?" "Nya."
• She is testing me already. She'll purposely hover over something she knows she's not supposed to, and watch me to see what I'll do. For example, last night she walked right up to the space heater and put her hands two inches above it, imitating me saying "No" and shaking her head. She sat there about to touch it through a round of "Adrie, don't" and "Adrie, uh-uh" until finally I physically moved to stop her, while she ran away laughing.
• When there's something she wants, it takes monumental effort to distract her. She will lean her whole body out of my arms toward the object she wants - and she's heavy! She is also very vocal about what she wants (Eh! Eh-eh-eh!). I repeatedly say "Please" and tell her the name of what she wants... oh I'm so sick of the "Eh!" whining
  

On the other hand, the cuteness is growing exponentially and making all of the annoyances worth it. Some examples:

• Right after getting in trouble she'll come up to me with the hugest grin and happily say/shout "Hi!", Like she's trying to get herself out of trouble. (It works).
• Anytime I sit down on the floor she ends up in my lap. Sometimes with a book, sometimes with her baby, but always backs her booty up until she plops in my lap. She usually won't stay very long, but she always comes back.
• If I lay on the floor she'll come sit on my upper torso or neck or head. It's hilarious.
• She LOVES to be chased. All I have to say is "I'm coming to get you!" or get down on all fours and she's off and wigging in excitement. Squealing, too.
• Her dancing gets bigger and better. Add in head tilting this month - especially in her car seat she rocks out by tilting her head from one side to the other in time to a beat. She really laughs when I mimic her.
• She laughs a LOT. Easily. When I copy her dancing, when I copy her movements in the high chair (she'll lean waaaayy to one side, then the other), when I say "Ouch" in a high pitch as she makes a loud noise, and on and on. Her laugh is magical.
• She loves to look at other kids. She points out every baby we see and is fascinated by all children under the age of 6.
• She's started playing pretend - she'll feed her baby bites of whatever she's eating, she'll pour pretend from one cup to another, etc.
• She understands SO much of what I say. "Can you put that back?" and she will! "Bring me your jammies" and she does! It's amazing. She doesn't talk a whole lot but she really understands most of what I say to her.
• She blows kisses but has forgotten that you're supposed to blow them, not just kiss your hand. To the right is a picture of her 'blowing a kiss' - except her hand never leaves her mouth ;)
• She likes tv now - she absolutely wriggles in excitement over Baby McDonald (Baby Einstein video), Super Why, and a few other PBS cartoons that are on while I get ready in the mornings. Luckily they can keep her busy for 10-15 minutes while I hurry to get ready for the day.

• She has just started inventing games. Last night she hid behind the ottoman and kept popping up to "scare" us, then she'd disappear again, looking at us from under the ottoman... it's hard to describe (and come on, they were rules she was making up as she went along!) but it was amazing to see her imagination and creativity! -->

Some more of my life!

I don't really think the pediatrician meant that goldfish were an acceptable staple for dinner when he said "this age is picky - just get her to eat something" - but that's what Adrie took it to mean and there is no arguing with her. No joke, dinner tonight was 1 cup goldfish, 4 oz. water.

I tossed my cookies three times last night. It was the most disgusting thing I have ever experienced as my guts dug up 9:00=my dinner, 10:30=my lunch, 1:30=my breakfast. I pled a sick day today and took Adrie to the sitter - it was nice to lay in bed all day long. No book, no movies, not even much sleeping - just the privelege of laying and thinking. I did sneak out for a Cafe Rio beef quesadilla about 2:30 and managed to keep it down. Praises!

I taught the Joseph Smith lesson #1 in Relief Society this week and I felt honored and blessed for doing so. Of course preparation is the greatest time as I learned a lot, but giving the lesson and keeping a room full of amazing women in rapt attention while feeling the Spirit together was a priceless experience. If anyone wants my outline just let me know.

The prayer at the end of Relief Society was given in Spanish. I had to resist applauding afterwards as this is what happened at the dinnertime prayer each of our nights in Mexico :)

I had the privelege of photographing newborn (well... 1 month-old) twins this weekend and was so excited over the shoot I had the entire thing processed and ready to go five hours after shoot time. I think this is my favorite picture:

Well... or else maybe this one. As always, one of the last-minute unplanned photos wound up one of the very bests (this happens about 80% of the time. Sort of like icing on the cake.)

Life is Good!

My Other Baby

Something you probably don't know about me...

I take pride and joy in the plants in my office. I have two of these plants - I don't even know what they're called! - that's I've kept in my office at Heritage since my first month as a therapist. Back when I kept waiting for someone to come tell me 'just kidding', this dream job wasn't real.

Plant #1 (pictured above) I've nurtured from a 4-5 leaf sprout. And... um... I'll confess that "nurtured" is pushing it. Basically, I water it when it wilts. End of story. Sometimes I even wait a week after it starts wilting to water it out of sheer laziness. And three years later, voila. Plant #2 is even longer, because it started out a little bigger from G&G Williams home. Last year sometime I added Plant #3 of the same variety, as I could tell that #1 and #2 were approaching old-cat-lady status.

After stringing up the vines from plant #1 across two entire walls of my office, I have decided to retire it home and see what I can make of it. Sadly, it lost a 10-foot section in the process: RIP.

Fighting those January Blahs

became
turned into

Thank you IKEA and Christmas money from G&G. I love sitting in my front room now!

Boring little update

Adrie now clasps her hands together for prayers - even when we don't ask. We opened our eyes from the Erica birthday dinner prayer yesterday to find her sitting quietly as could be, hands clasped tightly! Today I asked her to fold her arms while I broke my fast and prayed over lunch. I was shocked that she kept them folded the whole time! Now I guess we'll just work on the whole eyes-closed thing.

In fantastic news, I had my first dentist's checkup since 2001 with NO CAVITIES. The hygenist said "I give you permission to eat more Christmas candy and brush your teeth every other day." SCORE! Flossing in the shower has saved my teeth.

I have been thinking about how amazing water is. One simple thing I remember from high school chemistry is how H2O is polar - positive on one end and negative on the other. Which makes it the perfect dissolver. This week as I sit dishes in the sink to "soak" (my favorite way of feeling like I'm doing dishes without having to get my hands dirty) I say a silent prayer of thanks for the polar properties of H2O.

I purchased the game "Catch Phrase" with my Target Christmas money. Tonight I played it with my inlaws and it was so much fun! I am not really an organized game-type person, but this is such an easy, outgoing one with easy rules and laid-back format. I'm excited to play it more (be warned, those of you coming to visit me in the future.)

I am SO EXCITED about the new Joseph Smith manual for 2008 and 2009. In fact, I have decided that part (maybe all?) of my scripture study for this year will be reading the lessons for Sunday school and Relief Society the week before. In the months since October Conference my scripture reading has largely consisted of reading the conference Ensign and it has been a breath of fresh air to my spirituality. I'm excited to let this become a good chunk of my bedtime routine.

Other New Year's Resolutions:
* Exercise EVERY DAY even if it's really small, like 20 calf raises. Just do something. Except Sunday.
* Visit teach and attend the temple every month
* Run in the Rex Lee on March 29
* Be in shape enough to not embarass myself in above-mentioned Rex Lee
* Stop saying mean things, uneccesary comments, and "should" statements as guilt trips.
* Learn my camera enough to quit relying on automatic modes
* Shoot a wedding

Happy Sunday!

Return to Real Life

Today's theme song: Battle by Colbie Caillat. I love love love love LOVE music. Amazing how a song can have lyrics that are like poetry for life. Right up there with scriptures that perfectly fit what we need. Yesterday's song: Let this Go by Paramore.

Communicating with Adrie lately is in dolphin language. Observe:

"Ah, ah, ah-ah" (gesturing toward the tutu across the room)
"Do you want this?" as I pick it up and hand it to her.
"Tah-too" (thank you.)

"Ah, eh-eh-eh-ah ah" (gesturing to the fridge)
"Do you want a drink?"
"Ah ah ah ah ah"
"Oh, do you want a bite?"
"Eh eh ah ah ah"
"Cheese? You want cheese?"
"Tah-too."

It's actually really fun. But not as easy to hold her because instead of just sitting complacently on my hip, she's reaching all over the place for things.

The other game we play is "What's that?"

"Wha tat?" pointing at something
"That's a window"
"Wah tat?" pointing at the counter
"That's a sink."
"That's a washcloth"
"That's the fridge"
"Wha tat?" frantically looking around... then pointing at the first thing that catches her interest.

Life is so much fun with her around :)

The Mexico Extravaganza

Happy New Year!

I'm warding off January-'return-to-reality-it's-14-degrees-outside-depression' by processing the 1000+ photos I took of the glorious ten days I just spent in 65-degree Tempe and Rocky Point. It. Was. Heaven. And the photos are almost as good as the real thing. I love it. All of the professional looking ones are here on my business blog. Here is a smattering of all the rest:

I got more pictures of myself with Adrie than the total that are in existence. So I'm going to post my favorites, in big format, for history's sake. I was very pleased. And dang it, it's MY blog. There should be pictures of me ;)

Just about everyone aged 6 to 36 got their "jumping" picture taken. It was SO MUCH FUN. Obviously.