Happy Birthday Aunt Betty

Saturday morning, we took Hadley on her first plane ride down to beautiful San Antonio, Texas to go to a surprise party for my mother's sister Betty who was turning the big Seven-Oh. My mother is the baby, Betty is the oldest with 13 years separating her and my mother, and Susan is directly in the middle.

My Aunt Susan is no stranger to swooping in and suprising people, having done it many times over the years. So when she wanted to plan this wonderfully extravagant week-end, complete with surprise guests, including ourselves and my parents, we knew we definitely had to go. Especially since Aunt Betty has been such a big part of our lives over the past several years, coming up for the wedding shower, baby shower, and wedding. And remind me to tell you sometime about the road trip that we took one year from Denver to Muncie, Indiana because I didn't feel like flying home for Christmas.

Here's to you Aunt Betty, aka, Miss Apple Stuckey. I hope you had a wonderful week-end. Love and kisses, yours truly, Miss Chocolate Pop Tart.

Grody to the Max, Like Totally

My brother and his wifey, Yoon Mi recently had a fun day of going out and having little fish eat dead skin off of their toes. Ok, I'm also supposed to say that this is not a real South Korean 'thing' as Yoon Mi was completely disturbed and a little bit disgusted by it. But notice how the fish want nothing to do with her foot, but my brother is a veritable buffet of dead skin for them to feast on. He's like the Bonanza of Daegu for these fish.
I should mention that you had to pay for the pleasure of having fish nibble at your feet, but only after you got coffee and ate breakfast at the cafe/fish nibbler location. I wonder if Starbucks has ever considered starting these at test locations in the US? NOT!

I will stick to my pumice stone thanks.

Li'l Squirt Baby Pool

I couldn't resist, I had to get this. Even though she will probably not enjoy it until next summer, I am enjoying it now. Imagine my excitement when in 2 years I will be able to get her a slip n slide?!?

I ordered this squirting pool from One Step Ahead and we tried it out this week-end. I posted video to YouTube of her hestitant try with it. She was unsure of how chilly the water was.

I would really love to take a Mommy and Me swim class at the local rec center, but am having trouble getting the times to work with our schedule. I want her to learn how not to be afraid of the water and how to roll over if she falls into the water.

Peaches? Not so much.

In case you were wondering whether or not Hadley is 100% angel baby, here's some proof of her being little miss finicky. We've been experimenting with lots of different homeade foods. When she loves something, she opens her mouth and gobbles down the whole portion. However, when she does not like something, (take for instance these peaches) upon the first mouthful she gags, acting as if I was trying to feed her liver and onions. Then she will purse her little lips together and clamp them shut. Not even the chuga chuga choo choo train will get her to open up.

GOBBLES DOWN: sweet potato, peas, rice cereal, pears
GAGS: avocado, banana, peaches, prunes

This week we are moving on to super porridge (oatmeal) and squash. She's got to love oatmeal, I ate it almost every day when I was pregnant.

Proud Papa

The first time I went up to DGs new cube, it was littered with pics of the dogs and his family, but none of me. Get married and your wife becomes day old mexican food. But here is DG outside of his cube at work, where he has surrounded himself with a wall of Hadley for people to see as they walk by. Olin Mills eat your heart out. I personally would want to stare at it all day. I would never be able to get work done.

I didn't do a Father's Day post because DG already took care of it, but I would like to take the time to wax on poetic about what a great Dad DG is, and not just because he prints out pictures and plasters them on his cube. 1) He loves her so much it hurts. 2) Listening to him play and read to her is enough to make me want to have 10 more of his children. 3) He has a special touch feeding her that no one else has. and 4) He is completely excited about parenting. I love me some DG.

Square Foot Gardening

Guess what dad? We are going to plant vegetables.

Gibson and I are going to help a lot, providing moral support.

Last year, with the move, we were unable to get it together to plant our garden. Though DG did make these boxes for me so that we could try to square foot garden. He prepped them this week-end filling them with our fresh compost, manure, soil, and vermiculite. Though we are bit late in the game, we are still hoping to get a good crop of cucumbers, yellow peppers, cherry tomatoes, yellow squash, lettuce, and carrots.

Sitting Pretty

In the past couple of weeks, Hadley has learned to sit up on her own. She loves to sit and play with her toys or watch the dogs. When you tell her to press the flowers to play music, she understands and will reach out and grab them. This is good for at least 30 minutes of fun.

During our physical therapy assessment last week, I was hoping to WOW them with her feats of strength. And though they were impressed, we still have a few milestones to hit. So we are trying to train her to bear weight on her hands so that she can begin to catch herself when she tips over and we are also giving her more tummy time trying to get her to roll from her tummy to her back. (She can already roll from her back to her tummy.) It is so fun to play with her and watch her progress.

And in other news, her first tooth has broken through! I was on video Skype with my parents this week-end and when Hadley started chewing on my finger, I felt something sharp. I got so excited, I threw the camera down and started digging around in her mouth. I am now on tooth watch 2008 and monitoring the progress. My baby girl is growing up so fast. ::sniff::

Mama Needs a Beer

Today marks the first day in a year and a half that I had the desire to have an alcoholic beverage. Well, if you can call Michelob Ultra Lite alcohol. Maybe it was the 97 degree day we had, or the BBQ atmosphere, but it was pretty tasty.

As you can see, Hadley was in the spirit too, as she was two fisting Erin's and my beer. I had to tell her NO BEER, until you are 21 and I take you to Vegas to celebrate your birthday. And YES, she will want to go to Vegas with her mom, because even though I'll be 57 ::sob::, I'm still going to drink bloody mary's at 8:30 in the morning like they were juice, get up on the bar and dance (cougar alert), and slip her $1's for the thunder from down under male australian strippers (that I've hired to come to our room). Ok, maybe it's excessive and she would rather stay at home with a good book, until I enforce my next tactic of mocking her relentlessly and guilting her into coming to Vegas with me.

Week-end in Review

Last week-end was a whirlwind of fun times, including all of my favorite summer activities. First, while DG was off building fences, Hadley and I met Lora and Liv at the Cherry Creek Farmer's market. Slathered in sun screen and a hat, we walked through and got some amazing tomatoes, cucumbers and a loaf of Udi's ciabatta bread. On Sunday, we met Lora and Liv again at the Market in Larimer Square for lunch and Piazza del Arte, otherwise known as the yearly chalk art festival. Here are future BFFs Liv and Hadley getting to know eachother. Here is the little snippet of their conversation: "Hadley...Hadley... cute." :giggle blush: "Liv, so pretty. Wanna play dress up?" They are 13 months apart.

Here is one particularly good piece that caught DG's eye.

Here is a close up of the detail. Less than 4 hours after we left, all the hoses came out to wash all of these away!

And finally on Sunday night, we packed up the picnic back pack and headed up to our old hood to watch a free jazz concert in City Park. This is a weekly event in the summers. We met Kurt, Marie, and Luke who were in our Baby Class. We feasted on grilled chicken, potato salad, snap peas, red pepper, cherries and special Tiramisu from Sushi Den.

Happy Wedding Day!

Congratulations to my baby brother who has officially married his fiance, Yoon Mi. I've mentioned my brother many times on the blog, usually having to do with maggots and poop slippers, or wearing weiner bachelorette tshirts. He moved to Korea in 2001 to teach English to 5-6 year olds. All the moms demand their kids are in his class. He is so good at it, and he loves it so much that he has never come back. Well that and he met the love of his life.

Here is a video of his graduating class singing Yellow Submarine.

Doggie Day Care

While my BFF Holly is out of town on vacation, we are babysitting her australian cattle shepherd/blue healer mix Ali. For some reason, Ali and Gibson love eachother. LOVE. Well Gibson loves to try and hump her and Ali loves to smell his wiener and try to get him to play. Tica and Ali do alright, but we've learned they can't chase the ball together because eager Tica gets sacked like a high school quarterback.

Here is an example of how high Ali can jump while trying to catch a frisbee. This shot would be better if she actually had the frisbee in her mouth. She must have been having an off day.

Ali is a great dog and has taken to sitting at my feet under my desk while I work, until I kick her out because her rancid breath is about to make me vomit a little in my mouth.

2, 4, 6

From left: Oslo is two months, Braxton is 4 months, Hadley is 6 months. We were just missing Sailor who is 8 months. Babies are us.

Kim, my friend from Seattle, and Oslo's mom was in town this week-end visiting family with her new baby. So sweet and precious and looking like a spitting image of both his mother and his father, Kevin. Right before she took the shot, Lisa said "VH1 Behind the Music is going to be so happy we took this picture", as all these babies come from musical families.

And just because I can't resist, here is Kevin circa 1998 in a digitally enhanced photo that he created as a joke. I don't even think my chest was that big when my milk came in.

Daily Dose of Baby

Hadley just ate carrots, is in a new hand-me-down outfit she has not yet worn, can sit up on her own without support for a few minutes at a time, and when you tell her to "push the flowers" to play music, she does it. She can also go from her back to her tummy and her tummy to her back, but only if I've turned my head for 2 seconds.

I have to type fast so that I post this picture before DG realizes what I've done. Finally I'm the first to post about something new!