Going mobile

Spring crawled across the living room floor this evening! She got up on her hands and knees, and I started to tell Gerry how yesterday she had taken a couple of crawling "steps" when she proceeded to demonstrate just how far she could actually go!! And what was so worthy of crawling all that way? Brother's ball of course! Reed was not thrilled with Spring playing with it, but we convinced him that we should let her keep it since she had crawled for the first time ever, just to get it! The thing that made me laugh is that some college friends of ours keep a blog about their kids who are about the same ages and Reed and Spring and they recently made a post about their kids' difficulty in sharing the exact same type of ball!

And in other Spring development news, she can also get herself from lying down to sitting up. And she wants to pull herself up to standing whenever she can. And Reed development, he's finally getting mine and yours figured out as well as me and you, though the word "I" still seems to be problematic. He usually says "my" instead of "I".

And now, photo highlights from the last few weeks.

Reed tried to bring me a flower, but shook it a bit too much. I actually got a picture as the flower was falling.
Fortunately, Daddy went and cut another flower for Reed to bring to me!

Long time blog readers will remember that last summer, I ruined one of the great joys of childhood for Reed, running through the sprinkler. If you did not read that particular post, it's pretty funny and worth a read if I do say so myself. Anyway, you'll all be happy to know, that this year, we got the sprinkler set up, free of incident and Reed loved it!

Spring was happy to hang out with her Daddy and I and observe Reed going through the sprinkler.

Reed needed to walk around with his bear (the bear's name is Cheesy Grilled Bear, so named because he often likes to make a dish of the same name with the bear). We put it in his mei tai and we carried his bear around wearing nothing else but his diaper. Part of what I love about this picture is the look on Spring's face. She always watches Reed so intently!

Best Mother's Day ever!

I've had a wonderful weekend and a fantastic Mother's Day!!

Yesterday, we spent the morning deep cleaning the house, then after Spring's morning nap, we went to an arts and crafts fair nearby. We saw lots of moms and kids we know, and it was a gorgeous day! Gerry said I should pick out a Mother's Day present for myself, so I happily bought myself a beautiful new sling.

Our friend Kathryn was there and snapped a couple of pictures of Reed and Spring.

I baked some oatmeal raspberry muffins last night so I got to have delicious muffins for breakfast, then Gerry took Reed to Starbucks to get mommy a soy latte. Not as tasty as a cow's milk latte, but I'm going dairy-free for Spring and it seems to be agreeing with her. On a side note, Reed calls Starbucks, the "chocolate milk house" because when we take him there, we let him get chocolate milk. It cracks me up! Anyway, when they returned from Starbucks, Gerry asked Reed if he has something to say to me. Reed said, "Happy Mother's Day mommy!" Talk about melting a mommy's heart. I scooped him up and gave him a bunch of kisses and hugs and he laughed. When I put him back down, he said it again, and we went through the routine a couple more times. It was so sweet I almost cried!

Mid-day, we had a bbq with some families from a parenting forum I'm part of. It was a really fun way to celebrate Mother's Day and once again, the weather was gorgeous! Then this evening, we went out to a great vegetarian restaurant that's fairly new here in town. We came home and gave Spring a nice relaxing bath in the sink while Reed splashed in the other half of the sink beside me. And to top off the day, Gerry made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. Seriously, I don't think life gets much better than this!!!

Six month photos

We had a six month photo session for Spring last week with our photographer friend, Kathryn. She gave us a few pictures as a sneak peak. I'll post more when we get the rest!









And of course, we couldn't let Spring have all the modeling fun!

Dada

Today, for the first time, Spring said, Dada(dadada)!! Oddly enough, I'd been just a touch concerned about her verbal development. At four months, she should have been blowing raspberries, at five months she should have been make vowel-consanent combinations (like ah-goo) and at six months, she should have started repetitive syllables (like da da da). But it wasn't till about two weeks ago that she started blowing raspberries, and then two days ago, she started saying ya ya ya ya. It's been my experience with Reed and talking to other moms, that babies seem like they can only learn one thing at a time. Spring was focused for a long time on learning to crawl, or at least get up on her hands and knees. Now that she seems to have the hands and knees thing mastered, she's playing catch up on the last two months of verbal development!

Last summer, Reed started pretending when he was playing. He'd "feed" his stuffed animalsl, put them down for naps, etc. We've had a new development in the realm of pretend where now, he pretends to be somebody or something else and he'll also tell Gerry and I that we are being something else. Okay, so this doesn't seem so cool while I'm typing it, but you'll have to believe me that it's a fun new development!

Lots of pictures

I've been a bit delinquent in posting this month, so I'm going to play catch up a bit!

Spring listens in rapt wonder as Reed tells her a story. There are actually several books that he has memorized that he likes to "read" to her!

Spring really likes to get on her hands and knees now. Not much forward motion yet, but soon I think.

It's hard to get a picture of your baby on the floor...

...when you've got a helper on your back!

Reed using his bubble mower. Every time he plays with his bubble mower, he asks me to take a picture of him. Seriously, I must have 100 pictures of Reed running with his bubble mower.

I try to be good about taking pictures of Spring when I take pictures of Reed, even if she's just hanging out watching brother, like we were doing here.

Photo evidence of Spring's very first bite of solid food! Mmmm.... mashed bananas...

All done!

Another Spring milestone occurred last week when she pulled herself up to standing!

Mini-me? I suspect that Spring will look a lot like me, and I feel like our resemblance is especially striking in this picture (which I made Gerry take because I love the jammies she's wearing and she's about to outgrow them).

When the weather was so nice, we went for a picnic to Belfair State Park.

I think Spring might need some cool shades too!

And after our picnic dinner, we went oyster hunting. It all started out fine.

But it wasn't long before Reed got stuck in the mud. In fact, the only person that didn't get really muddy was Spring!

Reed playing at our favorite local park. Check out the view!

Outdoor snack time at home, enjoying the nice weather.

Reed lounging.

What a difference a week makes!

You wouldn't know it by the wonderful weather this weekend, but Monday we had fresh snow. (ok, it was actually hail, but it stuck around until mid-day tuesday).

Here's Spring in front of the bulbs that grandma Lisa planted last fall right after she was born!

This weekend, it's been great, and we've been outside a lot working in the yard. Got the onions and lettuce planted, and Gerry's started attacking all the hedges with his new high powered trimmer. It's not quite as cool as the weed dragon, but is a close second.

Just pics today

I have lots to say, but no energy for writing anything, so tonight, just a few pictures! In case I don't get around to updating the blog for a while, I suppose I should add for posterity, that Spring is now mobile. She gets up on her hands and knees, the scoots herself backwards and back on to her belly (though tonight she managed to scoot forward to get a toy)!

Giddyup!

At the Pike Place Market on Saturday.

Spring's first food

Well, I was going to wait until she was six months old to introduce foods to Spring, but it just so happens, that she got her first taste of solid food today. Was it mashed bananas as I had planned? No. Was it what I gave Reed when he first had solid food, rice cereal? No. It was a sunbutter and raspberry jam sandwich on whole wheat bread... It was supposed to be for Reed!

We went to a playdate today and I had packed a sandwich for Reed. It was a VERY busy playdate. I had Spring in my lap, the sandwich in my hand, and Reed was in Grandma's lap right next to me. Spring started to wiggle and leaned to try to bite the sandwich and without thinking, I put it in her mouth!! My mom pointed out what I was doing and I immediately took it away, but as long as she could see the sandwich, she had her eyes locked on it. I just lost track of which child I had in my lap for a moment and thought I was feeding Reed a bite. Oops! Thank goodness she hasn't had any allergy issues so far!! In a couple more weeks, we'll give the mashed bananas a try! :-)

Reed has really been getting into is role as a big brother lately. He plays with Spring as he's doing here, he gives toys to her and even helps with her evening massage. Spring absolutely LOVES watching him and laughs at him all the time!

Firsts

We've had a lot of firsts these last few weeks! It's hard to know which one to post about first!

Tonight, Spring got up on her hands and knees for the first time. Initially I put her on her hands and knees and she rocked back and forth for a few seconds. Then, she decided that she liked hands and knees so much, she worked hard to get off her belly and do it herself!

Spring has been sitting up on her own for the last few weeks. She can't do it for very long and often supports herself with one hand, but it seems like everyday, she can sit for a little longer.

Spring had her four month check up a few weeks ago. She was right around the 75th percentile for height and weight and somewhere between the 75th to 90th for head circumference. It's quite a change for me to have a baby who is not on the bottom of the growth curve!

Reed had a big first over this past weekend. Gerry took him to Lake Chelan for two nights. This was his first overnight trip without Mommy!! It was a little lonely around the house without Gerry and Reed, though it was also nice to have some one on one time with Spring. Reed had a good time at Lake Chelan. We talked to him about it for a few weeks before he left so he was really excited to go!

And it only took one of our snowiest winters ever, but Reed finally played in the snow for the first time!

Cutting a rug

I took this picture to send ot Gerry's aunt Nancy to say thank you for the lovely rug that Reed and Spring are sitting on, but the picture turned out so good, that I thought I'd post it here too!

In other news, Reed has refused to nap for the last three days.I lay him down, then he just babbles for the next few hours. I fear he's going to stop napping and I'm not ready for that!!

I can't believe

I forgot to share about my two favorite plane moments from our trip to Florida!

We flew down there on Valentine's Day. We were well into our second flight, Spring asleep in my lap, and Reed asleep in Gerry's lap, when I nudged Gerry and said quietly, "Happy Valentine's Day". Gerry started laughing! In all the stress of traveling with the kiddos, Valentine's Day had been the last thing on our minds! I lamented that we had not left our mp3 players out since neither Gerry nor I could get into our bags to get them. So Gerry began to sing to me :-) I joined in and it was way better than listening to mp3s. Honestly, I think it has to be one of my sweetest Valentine's Day memories ever!!

My other favorite moment occured on our trip home. We were about to begin the second flight of our journey. I had just changed Spring's diaper and returned to our seats to find Reed at the plane window yelling something with a lot of excitement. I couldn't quite understand what Reed was saying so I gave Gerry a questioning look. Gerry said, "holy crab." As we had been landing in Dallas, Gerry had spotted a huge mega-church with a seven story parking garage out the plane window and had exclaimed "holy crap!" Now, Reed was giving us his best imitation of Gerry, only Reed, fortunately, saying the more polite, "holy crab!" LOL!

West Sound Sailing race #1

This was a picture I had to share (Gerry Here). It's from last saturday's WSSA sailling race. The course took us about 16 miles from the North end of Bainbridge island, up to Jefferson Head, then across to Magnolia, back over to Eagle Harbor at the south end of bainbridge, and back to the start. It's a pretty fun course, because it takes us into an area that we normally don't sail much. It also passes though a major shipping lane.

The sailboat is "Carpe Diem", who I've had the pleasure of crewing on a couple of times over the past year. It's a pretty nice IOR 32', and Rob has done some awesome interior work on it. I can't imagine what the view was like, from where they were. There were well clear of it, but... 'yikes'...

BTW, photo credit goes to Jason, our other crew, who was smart enough to have a camera.

We've done this race twice in the past, and both times it was pretty miserable. Being the first race of the season, there are always plenty of bugs to shake out. This year turned out to be a great race. Winds were good, the tide was slack, and the sun even came out for a bit.

Also different this year, is Cody has a new boat, "Aldebaran" a Catalina 30 that he bought from another guy, Ole, who I also sail with when I can. In case you were wondering, 'Aldebaran' is the star that makes up the eye of the constellation Taurus.

The Bull. (insert sailing joke here)

We've taken her out a couple of times over the winter to check her out, but this was her first race, as well as our first time trying to flying the spinnaker on this boat. Luckly, there were no major disasters, and we had a great race.

Literally?

I love how literal kids are. Reed had the hiccups yesterday. Grandpa, joking around, asked Reed, "Where did you get the hiccups?" Without skipping a beat, Reed replied, "In my mouth!" LOL!!

More Feb pics

I've got to figure out how to turn off the red eye reduction on my camera. All the flashing lights leave Spring looking startled in most pictures, even when just moments before, she was smiling. This is about the least startled I can get!

Cutie pie!

Spring's at the age where, if she can get ahold of something, she puts it in her mouth. It's fun to watch how hard she works at playing with toys!

Would you like some cheesy grilled bear? I don't know how this game got started, but for several days, Reed ran around with his stuffed bear and a spatula saying, "Reed makes cheesy grilled bear!"

Dueling ukuleles!

Shoot, somebody might see me drinking Starbucks! Okay, you might know I'm a coffee snob. I have long boycotted Starbucks, not only because they are a giant corporation, but also because their coffee wasn't good. They intentionally burned their beans to give them a "distinct flavor", then in order to compensate for having nasty beans, their baristas would put enough syrup in your latte to put you in a diabetic coma. But a few years ago, Starbuck's changed owners, and they made some changes. They shut down all the braches for a few days and retrained all their baristas and their beans are better now too. It's taken me this long to give them another try, and I'm not saying I've become a faithful Starbuck's drinker, I'd rather support a local business if I can, but I will say that it's nice to be able to get a consistently good drink if I do go there.