Month: November 2009
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guestbook: mike and mina
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guestbook -
guestbook: sarah (& kurt)
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guestbook -
first christmas tree
turns out, we might have been a little too eager to get a christmas tree this year.we started thinking through how we were going to fit one in the house back in October, and rearraged the furnature by mid-November. and then, come the first day after Thanksgiving, the lady spakler, baby sparklet and immediately jumped in the car and roared off in search of something tall, skinny and green.
finding a tree lot in DC is about like finding a gas station … they are around, everybody has their favorite, but you never can seem to find one when you are looking.
we started off looking in glover park, and the lot over there that we usually use still hadn’t opened for the season. we then drove out connecticut avenue to a stand i had last used in 2005 … only to find that the whole area had been plowed over and turned into a gas station.
by the time we crossed into maryland, we were feeling pretty good … because soon after we passed an SUV going in the opposite direction with a tree strapped to its roof like road kill.
and sure enough, after 15 minutes and trying two more “known” lot locations (from when i lived in bethesda, circa 1999) we finally found a lot that was open.
we bought the lot’s third tree of the season.
and, given how hard it was to find a christmas tree that was open, i’m guessing we bought the city’s third tree of the season as well. now we just have to dig out the hot chocolate maker, and we’re all set for the winter.
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Christmas Tree 2009 -
photos: thanksgiving 2009
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photos: thanksgiving 2009, washington, dc -
guestbook: poppa
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guestbook: grant “poppa” roberts -
firsts
photo of the week // week sixanother string of small celebrations over the weekend:- first “take your daughter to work day” — we stopped by the Conservancy on Friday afternoon (i had the day off) and made a quick round. i love the fact that i am the only boy in a department of 29 women for just this type of occasion.
- first television — i caught little miss kate actually *watching* television this weekend. sunday night, i put her down in front of the tv to get her a new bottle, and when i came back here eyes were transfixed on the screen. of course, it was the tottenham match, and they went on to win 9-1 (which is kind of a lot for a soccer match) so she’s now allowed to watch tottenham whenever she wants.
- first dress — baby momma has been just itching to get sparklet into a little dress she had picked out, and we had a couple good reasons (guests, work) to break out the nice stuff. monumental, because it’s the first time she’s broken out of the usual onesies/pants routine.
in other news, we had out latest pediatrician’s appointment on Friday. sparklet clocked in a a whopping 9 pounds, 1 1/2 ounces, which brings her up to about the 25th percentile for weight. if you couple that with 22 inches long (75th percentile) and 14 inches around (25th) she’s either going to be a bean pole, or a supermodel, or both.
and lastly … i’ve got to find a new time to blog. way back when, i used to blog on my two hour round-trip, public-transit commute, but with the baby i have started driving (i know, i know) which not only takes less time (18 minutes each way) but isn’t a very good environment for multitasking.
more recently, i’ve been blogging during the downtime between the 6:00 pm feeding and the 10:00 pm feeding. the lady sparkler is asleep, and sparklet *used* to be either (a) asleep or (b) blessedly docile. however, since the onset of the six hour rolling dinner feedings last week, there has been precious little time (or free hands) to write anything down.
maybe they make thought-to-screen, telepathy-based dictation software for the mac …
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sparklet’s first dress -
more?
we used to have a problem getting sparklet up, awake and moving enough to eat. we also used to have a problem with her being so mello, that she never gave much of an indication if she was hungry.
looking back, those were the golden days.
sparklet has finally started becoming the little diva/drama queen we’ve been waiting for. she just never stops eating in the evenings — and is not afraid to flex those golden pipes if the feeding pauses for more than a second or two.
and, unfortunately, the super-amped/aggressive feeding phase is not the normal “witching hour” you hear tell of, because that implies it dies down after an hour or two. our 6:00 pm feeding now starts at 4:45 pm, and lasts until 11:15 pm. it’s like a labor day marathon of very special “witching hour” episodes.
but, baby momma keeps saying she’s excited, because this “attentive eating” shows that she is an energetic and engaged child. all i can say is never get between my baby and dinner.
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meridian hill
we’re officially one month past birth, which means baby sparklet is officially allowed (by the pediatrician, who was concerned about germs/fevers/black plague) to show her face out in public.and no one had to tell us twice.
last night we went out to dinner (at the heights) for the first time in nearly six weeks, with the mighty baby boigs providing guidance, advice, and cover … which must have worked, because sparklet slept through the whole thing.
this afternoon, walked down to meridian hill park and played around in the last of the foliage. we keep forcing ourselves outside, thinking “this will be the last good day before spring” … but we’ve been saying that for a month now, and we don’t seem to be any closer to winter.
not that we are complaining — with a November due date, we honestly didn’t think sparklet would see the light of day until her aunt’s wedding in Austin next February — so, we’ll take whatever we can get.
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photos: meridian hill park, washington, dc -
guestbook: the boigs!
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guestbook: the boigs! -
sensible mommy cut
last time i cut my hair, the guy gave me a mullet. after a quick repair job, i went the next 22 months without giving anyone the opportunity to do it again.lately, i’ve been thinking its about time to let go of my anger … thinking that has speed up the first time that baby sparklet got grabby, and made urgent the other day when i was mistaken for a woman.
thus, the sensible mommy cut … even though it’s for daddy.
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quilt
we’ve gotten so many incredible gifts over the last couple of months, and today we received yet another … a quilt that my godmother had (unannounced) been hand quilting since August.she apologized for not getting it done on time — she thought she had an extra three weeks, as we all did. neither the lady sparkler nor i do anything original, creative, artistic merit and we were both just blown away by the handiwork.
beautiful.
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oh, poo.
someone just poo’ed in someone else’s hair. i’m not going to name names here, but it wasn’t me.here’s the story.
our heroic protagonist, let’s call her aby-bay arklet-spay, was minding her own business … hanging out on the changing table, wondering what life would look like on the “other” side of yet another diaper.
our incredibly omniscient narrator was assisting aby-bay with her diaper transition when he discovered that she (aby-bay) wasn’t quite done “negotiating” with the old diaper.
the third character in our little drama is the (mostly) innocent bystander, let’s call her ady-lay arkler-spay, was wandering around the room, looking to be useful, trying to distract from the fact that the only time aby-bay poops is when the incredibly omniscient narrator is on diaper duty.
before long, ady-lay arkler-spay bent down at the end of the changing table, rummaging through some bags of diapers on the floor, when … the incredibly omniscient narrator covered up aby-bay’s rear just in time to stop something really, very bad from happening.
ady-lay arkler-spay then started chatting with the incredibly omniscient narrator, while he stood there, releaved that he had just save her noggin’ from an inexplicably grotesque catastrophe.
after a few minutes of wanton distraction, the soon-to-be-no-longer-very-omniscient narrator decided aby-bay was finally done, and took his hand off her bum in order to bend over to get a new diaper.
at this exact moment, two things happened in perfect unison.
first, ady-lay arkler-spay decided she hadn’t fully rummaged through those bags of diapers on the floor and, second, aby-bay arklet-spay decided she wasn’t quite finished “negotiating” and decided to took advantage of the fact that her old diaper was no longer held in place by the now-not-really-omniscient-at-all narrator’s hand.
suffice it to say that badness ensued or, more specifically, long distance badness ensued with startling accuracy.
half an hour later, everyone was in great spirits. aby-bay arklet-spay was done negotiating so that she could happily start another two hour feeding, and ady-lay arkler-spay had just taken a nice, warm, satisfying, if unexpected, shower.
and the incredibly-omniscient-though-obviously-not-omnipotent narrator? he’s just happy to have a story to tell aby-bay’s first serious boyfriend when the time comes.
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first trip to the zoo
photo of the week // week fourwe’re in a strange bit of indian summer that is reaching deep into november, but nobody in the sparkler family is arguing.we figured when baby sparklet arrived it would be waaay to cold to spend any serious amount of time outside, and frankly i didn’t think that baby mommy would be up for the hike down there and back.
we didn’t spend much time in the zoo — baby sparklet is just starting to look and focus, mommy still isn’t 100% — but we did find a hidden little statue that we’re going to try and swing by for photos each visit.
i’m really excited that we’re up and moving around. i feel like i’ve been waiting eight years to take my daughter to zoo …
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photos: first trip to the zoo -
dejected sox fan in denial of series result
tough week to be a red sox fan. baby sparklet slept through game 6, and then pooped in protest … somewhere, my godmother (and brother, and father) are proud.Explore the Photo Set:
photos: the rest of week four -
birth weight
i think we’ve totally become some of “those” people — the kind of people who do nothing but talk about their kids, and (worse yet) their kids bodily functions.i think this puts us right along side senior citizens who only talk about their latest surgeries (which is probably exactly what people like us become in 30 years) or New York Yankee’s fans who only talk about their
2627 world serieses (decidedly not what we’ll become, unfortunately).with this realization, however, comes expectancy — and news about sparklet’s bodily functions.
we had our fourth pediatrician appointment today, and sparklet has packed on nearly a whole pound (15 ounces) since the last visit two weeks ago. this is a huge relief because she had lost a ton of weight by the time we left the hospital (~8%) and she’s now back above her birth weight finally … albeit by only three ounces.
the driving force (obviously) is that she is downing milk like it’s going out of style. she’s doing about six one-hour feedings a day (6am, 10am, 2pm, 6pm, 10pm, 2am) and is up to about four ounces at each. this is *ALOT* of milk, and we’re still having to supplement with some formula to cover the massive and sudden jump in sparklet’s intake.
the (mostly) great side effect of all this is that her energy is through the roof, which means that she is regularly staying up for an hour or two after feedings … and is particularly active after the ones where we want her to go to bed straightaway (eg. the 10pm/2am feedings).
soooo, the lady sparkler and i have rotated our schedules around a bit to manage. she goes to sleep now at 7pm, i cover the 10pm, we swap places midnight, she covers the 2 am, she grabs whatever sleep she can, we both handle the 6am, after which I go to work, and sparklet/mommy get a couple more hours of sleep before the 10am.
before this weekend, we had been doing a lot of joint feedings (mommy is the starting pitcher, goes deep in the game, i’m the closer for those last essential outs) but the added “awake” time has forced us to rethink exactly how important it is for us to bond over babies, bottles, and … well, you know.
i hear all this settles down at month three, or maybe four. of course, i’m pretty sure that’s in 2010 … so, thank god she’s so damn cute.
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camera dump: november