...and a spare moment presents itself

Rob started traveling for his job last week. He'd gone out of town before, just for a day, I think, to Reno. But last week was the first Big Trip, which we'd all said we'd be OK about. And we were OK. But, damn, it's hard to split up like that. We take for granted the rhythm we develop when we know there's someone else helping keep it together every day. Sure, we have the fabled Routines, and the stuff that we know gets done at a certain time each day. But now we're dealing with a full-on hardcore toddler (srsly) and the routine sometimes falls prey to the whims of someone who cannot yet Use Her Words. Ack.

But we (all of us) survived last week. Rob was gone Sunday night through Friday night. God bless Southwest Airlines, which allows for the easy switching of flights, from, say, one from Portland with a layover in Sacramento that ultimately gets delayed to the point where the connection would be a moo point (anyone watch Friends? you know what I'm saying there...) to a nonstop PDX-LAS that leaves in 45 minutes that you can justbarelymake but it's OK because you bought Business Select (best spent twenty bucks in the travel industry).

He's on his way back to Portland tonight (delayed, actually, but it says it's boarding rightthisminute so that's good) and will be back Tuesday. We'll survive.

So to catch up....

Easter looked like this:


...and it was perfect.

Ava had her FIFTEEN MONTH OMG SHE'S FIFTEEN MONTHS checkup on Friday. She's 30-1/4 inches tall, 23.1 pounds. If childhood physical development had a bell curve (which it totally does...) she would be right smackdab in the middle, at the highest point, where Average resides. Awesome.

She knows so many words. Tonight, she helped me pick up her toys before bedtime. She smiles and giggles and waves and dances and oh, oh how she glares at you when she is displeased. Yikes. The condemnation she can conjure up is quite alarming (no idea where she gets that...).

Things are good. We're scrambling to maintain some semblance of sanity, and I think we succeed most of the time.

Go Go Bye

This is one of those times where my failure to adequately maintain a baby book past February 2009 is blatantly obvious, because where else would I possibly document such a milestone? Right.

This morning, Ava made a sentence. And she was very definitive about it. She meant what she said. I knew she meant it, because she was pointing at the time, and pointing means that she is totally serious.

So, we're gathering up to leave this morning. She has had her first breakfast (she's our little Hobbit: First Breakfast, Second Breakfast, Elevensies (snack, for the rest of us), Lunch, Second Snack, First Dinner, and Second Dinner) and she's out of her booster chair. We're both kind roaming around, picking stuff up that we're taking with us. I grab my purse and my go-cup of coffee. She grabs her jacket and her go-cup of water. She looks at me, points (so I know she is serious) and she says, "Go go bye" and then her pointing finger becomes a waving hand.

"Why yes," I say, "We are indeed leaving now. I'm glad you are ready." and we walk together to the car.

Such a big girl.

If Ava had an iPod...

... this would be her playlist.

1. The theme from Elmo's World
2. She's A Rainbow, by the Rolling Stones (Rob's ringtone on my phone)
3. The Darth Vader theme (my dad's ringtone on my phone)
4. The Rainbow Connection (still my default lullaby when bedtime is hard)
5. The theme from Two and a Half Men (♪♫Men men men men manly men men men ooooooooooooooo♪♫
6. Enter Sandman by Metallica (it comes on the radio, I turn it up, we headbang, and it's awesome)
7. Mysterious Ways by U2 (it kind of bounces and she likes music that kind of bounces)
8. Isn't She Lovely by Stevie Wonder (on at least once a day on 105.7, and it's about the moment when Mr. Wonder laid eyes {um... you know what I mean} on his newborn daughter)
9. The theme from Bonanza (ideal for when she's sitting on my knee and bouncing anyway)
10. The Trolley Song from Meet Me In St. Louis, club mix (see above RE: bouncy)
11. My Favorite Things (as long as it's not the version I sing at the top of my lungs when Sound of Music comes on, because she hates my version of it and cries just as loud as I sing)
12. You Are My Sunshine by Ray Charles. Nuff Said.
13. Intergalactic by the Beastie Boys (won't let the beat nnnnnnnnnnnndrop!)

These are the songs that Ava is starting to know. We're in the car together a lot, and since she no longer naps on the ride home, I have 45 minutes (more on a bad traffic day...) twice a day in which to entertain her. And then we get home and watch Sesame Street so there's more music there. Ava loves to dance. When a song that she knows comes on, she'll STOP IN HER TRACKS and look around and then she'll put her arms out and bounce up and down. I'll catch it on video as soon as I can.

Seriously, Two and a Half Men. Best theme song ever.

I can tell you how to get, how to get to Sesame Street.

We are not those parents who boycott television. We're just not. We will never be those parents, either (unless TV programming is completely taken over by the people who brought us Jersey Shore and even then there will be a movie in the Blu-Ray [yes we've gone to Blu-Ray and it is AWESOME] 24/7/365). We like to think that we're selective about what we watch when Ava's in the room (although some movies, like Animal House or Airplane! or Caddyshack seem to be always on somewhere and we inevitably watch them). With Ava, we have re-discovered Discovery, National Geographic, and Animal Planet. She likes watching them, and we like watching her when she watches them. So everybody wins.

Recently we procured a couple of Sesame Street DVDs--the classic stuff, like counting with Herry Monster and JohnJohn and Rubber Duckie and that one episode that was so early on that Oscar the Grouch was orange. Yeah. So Sesame is on every day (yeah, I know, duh). We DVR it (we are SLAVES to the DVR, see above IN RE: 24/7/365) and watch it with Ava every night during and after dinner.

She loves it. I'd forgotten how much fun Sesame Street is. I like that they still show the old stuff (Super Grover KILLS me) and they have new stuff (Abby Cadabby is so cute!) that we like quite a bit. They teach manners. They teach basic skills. They teach that cookies are good but so are vegetables and they have cool celebrity guest stars (Jason Mraz!).

Ava dances during the songs.



Yeah, that's some kind of cute. Oh and Auntie Beth? That's my favorite outfit on her--thanks for sending pretty clothes for our girl :).

Her other new thing is carrying her purse. I got it free from re-subscribing to Vogue (I have big plans for being able to read magazines someday...). It's too small for me but she carries it around like she's Carrie Bradshaw on the red carpet and it's a Birkin bag.


Such a little girlie-girl! Love it :). Someday, she and I will go shopping together and Nordstrom will proclaim a holiday and name it after us. Can't. Wait.

Our cups runneth over.

We're blessed. We know we are. We have jobs (although the terms of mine are currently the subject of discussion at a special session of the legislature), our bills are paid, our house is warm (insulated, I imagine, by the stuff on all of the counters and tables...) and we are healthy (unless you count colds). At the end of each crazy day, Rob and I look at each other and say it out loud, how lucky we are.

Ava is a little girl. Not a baby, not even a little bit, anymore. She knows more words than she says and her personality is really coming through. This morning I went in to wake her up, and she looked at me like "WHA?", handed me her monkey, and pulled the blanket over her head. That's my kid all right ;). We're working with Daycare to transition her to the Toddler Room. She is down to one bottle a day (right before bed) and she's losing interest in that pretty quickly. She can walk all the way from the car to her classroom. In the Toddler Room she will eat her meals at a table, instead of in a high chair. She'll nap on a cot instead of a crib. They have two hours a day of outside play (weather permitting...) which she is going to LOVE.

She's so big. I look at her on the rare occasions that she falls asleep in my arms, and I can only see glimpses of the baby she used to be. She's stretching out, so the rolls of little chub on her legs are going away (booooooo...). She is going to be a handful, I think. Already, she makes it clear when her world isn't what she wishes it to be. She doesn't like too many people, so we're watching her carefully as she moves from the familiar team of Daycare Ladies to a new group. She'll be OK, I know. But we will need to help her learn how to be OK and stay OK.

Right now, I have 3 close friends (you know who you are, ladies) in various stages of pregnancy. It's so cool to be on this side of it, like I'm in on a secret. It's such a big deal. One will have her baby next week (!!!! so excited!!!) and we can't wait to meet him. Seeing my friends go through this after having done it myself makes me realize that no, we're not ready to do it again. I'll say that again in case you missed it: no, we're not ready to do it again. Not yet. It's too big. We're good with where we are right now.

Ch-ch-ch-changes

I like to think that we've gotten pretty good at adapting to new stuff in the last year. There's been no rule book, and since everyone has survived, I'd call it a success. We spend a lot of time talking about how we can do stuff better, how we can help Ava become safer, stronger, happier, quieter (eh, we're realists, but we're hopeful). Work, for both of us, has been pretty static, and while we kind of got bored with the same-old same-old, it was easy to coast through most days after even the roughest nights.

Rob recently scored a promotion, and my job is about to undergo a major upheaval. Our days of phoning it in during business hours are O-V-E-R.

Rob will be traveling for his new gig. There is a training session that will be in any one of a dozen cities, depending on when he goes, and then after that he expects to be out of town 10 days a month or more. Adding that on top of his 2 classes at the university, and Rob's going to be one busy guy. He's gone from low man on the totem pole to "Guy With Company Laptop and Blackberry and Credit Card" with three days' notice, and we're kind of reeling from all of that.

My job hasn't changed in 2 years, and before that it hadn't changed for 4. Now, suddenly, of the 3 systems I use at work, one is being replaced (long overdue--the old one was implemented in 1990 and is written in freaking COBOL, which is the IT equivalent of carving runes in the wall of a cave), the process behind another is being redesigned by the Department of Homeland Security (seriously, and can you imagine my delight at their involvement...) and the third, which links the two others, is going to need some serious upgrades, both to hardware and software. My role in all this? Evidently my boss thinks I'm good at seeing what needs to be the end result and then working backwards to find the process that will be the solution. The cherry on top of the cake that is all of this, is that one more database is being tossed into the mix (just for kicks, I assume, because God is funny like that) and I'm not even sure where that one even is applicable.

All of a sudden, we have no constants. Ava is changing every day. She went from taking 5 hesitant steps from me to Rob on Monday to charging across the living room with a handful of toys and a big hyperventilating smile on her face. Rob's job is going to be full of new stuff every day for months to come. My job? My job description now consists of words like "development" and "implementation processes" and it all sounds like a big load of bureaucratic BS that is going to keep me jumping.

The changes to both of our jobs are good in so many ways. Suddenly we're both in careers with clear trajectories (if we choose) that will lead to even better opportunities. We will have control in what our jobs look like, and how they're done (to an extent). It's exhilarating!

I'm afraid of getting swept away by all of this and missing important stuff. I'm so relieved that all of it didn't hit six months ago, when we were still flying by the seats of our pants as parents (well, we still kind of are, but we bounce back faster when we fall). But now, Ava's becoming this little girl who points to herself when you say "Where's Ava?" and discovers a dozen new things every day. Shutting the door at the end of the day on the lunacy that our jobs are about to become is going to be so important. We'll need to not only set aside time that is just for family, but we'll need to remember that merely being present in the room is not the same as being present in the moment.

"So, is Ava walking yet?"

Watch volume--there's a bit of squealing and "Oh my God!"-ing on this one.



Why yes, yes she is walking.

A Video Thank You

Dear Auntie Beth, Uncle Mike, Molly, Calleigh and Justin,



Love,
Ava.

364 Days

Tomorrow is Ava's first birthday.

Later this week, I'll post pictures from her party this weekend and talk about how much fun we had and how wonderful it was to celebrate with our friends and family.

Right now, it's about where this last year has taken us. At 11:00PM on January 11, 2009, Ava decided that it was time for things to happen and things have been happening every moment since that moment. I recently came across the little outfit that she wore home from the hospital, the one with the strawberry pattern and the little hat, the one that was so big on her. It's so small; I remember thinking as we put it on her, how will she ever grow to fit into this great big suit?

I remember wrapping her in a blanket that was doubled up because otherwise there was too much blanket and not enough baby, and then laying her down in the crib, and there was so much crib around her. And she was this little soft pink burrito in this great big crib.

I remember how long a 2-ounce bottle used to take at 4 in the morning, and how we wrote down every feeding for three months in the pink journal that I will keep for my entire life.

I remember how long 3 months of maternity seemed to be as it loomed ahead of me as I left work on that last day, and wondering how I would pass the time and thinking that maybe I'd get really good at Guitar Hero before I had to go back to work.

I remember watching Ava sleep, and knowing that I should try to sleep too, but how can I put her down when she's making all these cute little faces and she's so snuggly and I can sleep later.

I write this down because I won't remember all of it forever, and I want to make sure it doesn't disappear, because it's so precious.

We have spent 364 days getting to know this amazing little girl, and watching her figure out the world around her. We laugh because she laughs, we cry because she cries, we wake up because she wakes up, we love because she loves. It's amazing. It's exhausting, sure, but it's amazing. We're better people because we have someone watching us and learning from us.

Happy birthday, Ava. It's been the best year ever, and it's only the beginning. Let's go look at the world and see what we can see.

This Was The Year That Was

Holy crap, what a ride 2009 has been. I find that when I look back each New Year's Eve, there tends to be a theme to the year that may or may not have been apparent while it was happening. This year's theme? 2009: The Quest For Sleep.

When it began, I was sleeping for none and Rob was sleeping for 3. Two weeks later we were both sleeping on eggshells. In the subsequent months, we came to realize that at some point we would need to sleep more than 3 hours at a time (or total) in the night. So we consulted our team of experts and learned how to Train Our Child How To Sleep. It involved a really awful week of being awakened around 1AM, checking to make sure there was Nothing Actually Wrong, and letting her learn how to get herself back to sleep, all the while checking on her in 2 minutes, then 5 minutes, then 10, then 20, then 40, then (one awful, exhausting night) another 40. The theory is that the baby will figure out that it's OK to go back to sleep. And after a few days, it worked.

So now we gauge how we're all doing by whether or not Ava sleeps through the night. Whenever something is up, she evidently needs our undivided attention, which is most easily accessible between the hours of 1 and 4:30AM. This is when we learn about teeth, fevers, rashes, and various other potential unpleasantries. We find that the helplessness we feel at not knowing what to do about whatever is going on is compounded nicely by not being able to call anyone for help because it's the middle of the night.

Sleep begets sleep, we've found. When she has a good nap during the day, there's better sleep at night for all of us. And that's our year.

Happy New Year from Las Vegas. We won't make it to midnight--Ava's down by 9:00, and we'll wear out long before the tape-delayed ball drops on the west coast. But that's OK. Because a good night's sleep beats the crap out of Ryan Seacrest and the Black-Eyed Peas.

Whoever invents these toys is my hero.

Watch, as Ava amuses herself for six entire minutes.




Awesome.

Earlier tonight, we watched Cinderella together. She danced to the Bibbidi-Bobbidi-Boo song and clapped when it was over.

Oh hey look, on Christmas Eve at my dad's house? She climbed the steps.




Such a big girl!

Christmas Wrap-up (Get it? Christmas? Wrap? That's a joke, son)

So it wasn't too crazy.  I think she's still too young to really lose her mind over Christmas.  We're still at the point where everything is still so we can get pictures of her doing stuff rather than her being aware of what's happening.  But it was awesome.  There was no wistful wishing for what comes next, no drama, nothing that took the focus away from Ava's First Christmas.  It was magical.

We had Christmas Eve with Grams&Gramps, and Ava got her first baby doll (awww...).

And then Christmas Day we were at home.  And we had the perfect Christmas morning.  Seriously.  I was sitting there, watching her surrounded by her new toys...

...in her monkey pajamas, thinking that this? is perfect.

We did learn a few things for next year:

1. Take the stupid presents out of the stupid packaging before you wrap them.  This was OK for her this year, but next year when she KNOWS that it's HER PRESENT, I doubt she'll be very patient about waiting for Mama and Daddy to untwist 17 twisties so as to release each component of a 43 piece set.
2. There is no drive too long to go see a cool Christmas Lights display.  Sometimes the search for a house we've heard about that has amazing lights and music is part of the fun, and it's always worth it.  
   
3. Grams's loaner Christmas tree is pre-lit, and fits perfectly on the table.  Festive?  Check.  Lovely?  Check.  Entirely out of reach from small grabby hands?  CHECK.

So it was wonderful.  And our friends had wonderful Christmases too.  There's a lot of joy in this world right now, and we're very thankful to be a part of it.

Baby's First Christmas

Merry Christmas from Rob, Kristie and Ava!

She had quite a haul, pictures and film will be up shortly.  We're watching Christmas movies and dinner is already in the oven (ribs YUM).  Best. Christmas. Ever.

We have words!

There is much rejoicing, as Ava's first words were not related in any way to the 90 minutes a day we spend in the car together and the morons with whom we share the roads!

Ball.  She said ball.  Actually, she said "baw", but she was pointing at a ball when she said it, so it counts.  Because it's close enough, and she meant what she said.  She was talking about that ball, right there.  So, as you can plainly and unmistakeably see (because you just said "baw" out loud to test weather it qualifies as "ball"), a word was spoken.

We also hear Mama and Dada a lot.  And they're not just random sounds anymore.  When she says them, she looks for us.  When she hears Rob talk from the other room, she says "Dada" and squeals. And it's adorable.

Smartest. baby. ever.

We? Are in trouble.

So today about 10:30, Daycare Lady calls me at work.  It seems Ava got a bit tangled up in a toy bin while she was reaching for The Toy That Was Furthest From Her.  When they attempted to extricate her she kind of, well, lost her mind.  We hadn't seen Hulk Baby for a while.   Things have been pretty uneventful.  We're back on a fairly regular sleep schedule that actually involves everybody getting some sleep.  We were lulled into a false sense of security.  We got cocky.

So today, when the batphone rang, it kind of caught me off guard.

She's OK.  Daycare lady called just to let me know that Something had happened, but there didn't seem to be any lingering effects.  She calmed down after maybe 10 minutes (with the help of a bottle and some Cheerios).  She had her normal nap and lunch and snack.  She was a little edgy for the rest of the day, though.  At pick-up, I picked my first battle: Ava doesn't want the coat? Ava does not have to wear the coat.  All righty then.

In the past 11 months (precisely 11 months, in fact...) I have worried about many things where Ava is concerned.  Today, I worry that my kid is going to handle anger and frustration in much the same way as I do.  That is, she's going to explode like a grenade as her first reaction, and when that passes, and it will pass quickly, she'll be over it, she'll be fine, and everyone around her will be like "what the hell was that?!".  I want to make sure she learns how to handle stuff like that in a way that doesn't alienate everyone and perhaps trigger a semi-negative component to a performance review at her job (don't ask.). 

Or, maybe, she's just a toddler and we just have to suck it up for a few years.  It could also be that.

So 11 months ago, to the minute, I had a contraction.  I didn't know it was a contraction.  I thought it was my dinner settling.  Dinner on January 11, 2009, was In & Out Burger, which I am convinced is what put me into labor.  So at 9:30 PM that night, I stood up and stretched and felt something ODD.  Like I was being stabbed by my burger (double-double with onions).  And then nothing happened for probably an hour.  And then everything happened all at once.

It's been 11 months of astonishment.  We know Ava pretty well now.  But she's changing so quickly that sometimes we don't keep up like we should.  I looked at her the other day, and she's not a chubby little baby anymore.  She's a (still somewhat chubby but less so) little girl.  She's about to take off walking (OMG we are doomed) and one day soon the babbling is going to pause and she's going to say a word and mean what that word means (hopefully it's not something she picked up whilst riding with me...).