Our Day Off

Monday morning Lane and I were both happy to have an extra day to spend with the SB Grovers. Claire woke up early and was playing with Gabriela in the bed. Natalie woke up, stretching, and before she even OPENED HER EYES she was asking for a turn to hold Gabriela.

Uncle Lane made fresh coffee, homemade banana flaxseed pancakes and bacon for the girls. And then we headed up to DC where we saw some beautiful cherry blossoms.
Spring time is so beautiful with the THOUSANDS of cherry trees in bloom all over our nation's capital. If only yesterday hadn't been so windy!!! We enjoyed a peek at the Cherry Blossoms and took a trip to the top of the Washington Monument. You see those itty bitty windows up there? They are 500 feet up in the air and we could see the entire city and more from those windows.

Afterwards, we headed over to the American History Museum where we saw the american flag from 1814. While everyone else checked out the flag exhibit, I nursed Gabriela in the family restroom at the museum. Another mom was nursing HER eight month old daughter. They just looked at each other when they were done nursing. The first little girl finally broke the awkward baby silence by saying the only word she knew: DADA. Gabriela actually responded to her. She said MAMA. It was cute seeing their little baby conversation.

We then checked out an exhibit on the first ladies, including some of their fancy gowns and accessories, a large Abraham Lincoln exhibit, and some of the girls' favorites: Dorothy's REAL ruby slippers, Kermit the Frog and Oscar the Grouch. We also checked out a hands on science area before we went back home and feasted on Afghan food from Kabob Palace. mmmmm.

The Big Kid Pizza

So dinner was a little late. We thought it would be a good idea to feed the girls first. This led to us waiting even longer, which resulted in us "sampling" the kid pizzas as we anxiously awaited our own.

The result - half fresh tomatoes and basil with goat cheese. The other half - fresh spinach with mushrooms sauteed in garlic, olive oil and red pepper flakes with grated parmesan cheese. it was heavenly.

Oh, and those little crumbs you see there are actually bits of pizza. Gabriela had her first taste and she seemed to enjoy it :-D

Pizza Night

Last night the girls each made their own pizzas. They started out by each making a batch of fresh pizza dough. (I helped out and made the sauce). Claire and Natalie each had SEVERAL slices of their masterpiece pizzas. They had so much fun. Claire made a smiley face out of pepperoni on hers and Natalie made a flower.

The Zoo

Sunday was a gorgeous day. Lane actually got a little sunburn on the back of his neck, it was so sunny!

We had an awesome trip to the zoo. We saw the momma and baby gorillas, saw the orangutan climbing outside, the pandas, arrived at the tigers and lions just in time for their afternoon feedings, and we even saw the hippo playing.

Gabriela's favorite were the little swimming turtles. She had her hands up against the glass and talked and talked (or yelled) her little head off to them. The girls, on the other hand, were still enthralled with Gabriela. I think she was their favorite exhibit at the zoo.

Banana Surprise!

Yesterday after dinner, the boys went out to run some errands. Claire & Natalie thought we should surprise them with a dessert. We came up with BANANA SURPRISE. We cooked little phyllo dough rounds, and when the cooled, put in chocolate pudding, then whipped cream, and a dusting of cocoa powder. We topped them off with a little baby banana slice.

It was a surprise, so we didn't tell them bananas were at the bottom. And we didn't mention dessert either. Instead, Natalie got everyone's attention: "Everyone, I have an announcement to make. Please go sit at the table - and someone bring Gabriela" Once we all obeyed and sat around the table, she decided to have us all stand. I think she just got a kick out of four adults listening to her.

Claire presented everyone with their Banana Surprise and it was a hit.

More Tamale Madness

Claire is working hard to make the masa

Natalie Approves

Putting Tamales in the Pot

Natalie's First Tamale

Claire's First Tamale

Claire and Natalie LOVED making Tamales. They each gobbled down THREE! Gabriela had her first taste of tamales also - just the masa, and she seemed to approve as well.

Here is Claire's tamale making lesson, complete with her own special tip!

SB Grovers

Showing off our hard work! Tamales!!!

Snuggle bugs

We are having a blast! Today we just took it easy... that is, until we made TAMALES. They are cooking right now and I can't wait to eat them. We also decided that we need a timer so we know whose turn it is to hold Gabriela. She is getting so much love and attention from everyone!!! We're so lucky to spend a whole week with the SB Grovers!!!

Daddy Time

Making Her Mama Proud

We found a fun finger food for Gabriela - israeli cous cous - the big fat round pasta. Gabriela scarfed it down. It was just the right size for her! The best part was that it was cooked with chicken stock, sauteed onions, saffron, white wine and black pepper and she LOVED it. What a sophisticated palate our little baby girl is developing :-D

She also chomped down on a free sample at the grocery store the other day - rosemary olive oil bread. It had a very strong, yet delicious rosemary flavor and Gabriela couldn't get enough!

We Miss You Already, Nana!

My mom came for a short visit after spending the week in New York with David & Christianne. We had a lovely quick visit.

She arrived Saturday afternoon and immediately started a photo session and fun Nana time with Gabriela. Then she kicked our asses in Scrabble.... TWO times!!!

Sunday we lazed around until Gabriela woke up from her nap when we decided to take a quick trip to the newly reopened American History Museum. We saw a huge exhibit on Julia Child's kitchen and the original United States flag from 1814 that inspired Francis Scott Key to write The Star Spangled Banner, in addition to a couple other exhibits. We feasted on Thai food afterwards, where Gabriela was on her bestest behavior.

Nana watched Gabriela all day on Monday and gave our little angel a stellar report for the day. They read stories, laughed and played peek a boo, and had some quality bonding time. When I got home, I opened my newly sparkling refrigerator to start making dinner and was told to rest, that my mom wanted to make us dinner!

Remember last time when she visited and I cried my eyes out when she left??? She told me she never cried all the times HER mom came to visit her from across the country. Well guess who had tears in her eyes at this goodbye?!? I think our little sweetpea charmed her nana or something cos it was hard to say goodbye.

After all the baby watching, dinner cooking, refrigerator cleaning, and house cleaning, my mom actually thanked ME for everything (and Lane threatened to cancel her flight so she wouldn't be able to go home).

We miss you already, Nana!

Gabriela Is Starting To Crawl

. . . and here are the videos to prove it! She's been doing the army crawl thing for a long time now, but just this weekend started to move around on all fours. Here's a time progression of Saturday morning's crawling practice. In just a few hours she had already improved a lot!

She used to just rock back and forth. Now, she's got some forward movement.



Look at her go!



Getting better.


Just super cute!


Enjoy :D

Visitors Left and Right

Today my mom arrives for a quick visit on her way back from a week in New York with my brother and his daughter. We are so excited to see her! The last time my mom saw Gabriela was in Peru when she was not even three months old yet. I can't wait for her to see how much Gabriela has changed. I know we're going to have a great visit.

Tuesday my mom leaves and Thursday, Uncle Ian, Auntie Adrienne and Claire & Natalie arrive for a week-long slumber party in the middle of the Cherry Blossom Festival. You're going to see lots of pictures of that visit coming soon!

Not wanting to be left out of the Cherry Blossom festivities, David arrives April 3rd, the day after the Santa Barbara Grovers leave, to spend the weekend with us.

It's going to be crazy busy and even a little hectic, but I wouldn't have it any other way! We love spending time with the fam!

Strike a Pose, Gabriela!

Gabriela does this new thing where she pauses from her crawling adventures, turns over, points one of her feet up in the air, and rests her hand on her hip, or even funnier, her little bum. She does it ALL the time! I've been trying to catch photos but only managed to get a couple.

Eight Months Old!

Ready for the rain
Hold on tight!

p.s. can you see my two teeth?

Seriously, where is the time going!? And how did my baby get so big?

Gabriela’s latest new thing is standing up all the time. She sticks out her hands so we will grab onto them and she immediately goes from laying down to standing. And when she holds on, it’s mostly just for a little help with balance. She hasn’t figured out yet that she can pull herself up onto furniture, and we haven’t told her.

I have given this baby all super hippie food so far. Until last night, that is. I was picking up a package at the front desk of our apartment and they had a delicious looking pile of warm freshly baked cookies. As I was eating my white chocolate macadamia nut cookie, Gabriela started going crazy. She was grabbing for it like there was no tomorrow. It was like she KNEW she wasn’t supposed to have it. I really, truly tried to resist giving her a taste. But she was just too cute. I gave her the teeniest tiniest littlest bittiest crumb of cookie. Luckily by the time she finished sampling it, I had gobbled the rest of it down and there was no more left to share.

She is enjoying eating more and more by the day. And while I pride myself on being a generally easy breezy mom, I have discovered that I am absolutely paranoid that she will choke on her food. One of Gabriela’s newest meals is black beans mixed with avocado and mango. Gabriela is also mastering picking things up with her index finger and thumb and putting them into her mouth – and not just food.

Gabriela talks and talks. She’s been practicing with different volumes of her voice. Bath time splashing is fabulous to her. Last night she had her first bath without the little baby bath tub. I never saw so much broccoli in our tub! Gabriela was fascinated to see me filling up containers with water and dumping them back into the tub.

She hasn’t graduated to full on crawling, and I’m not sure she needs to. That girl gets around fast to anywhere her heart desires! She has started rocking back and forth on all fours, which usually results in her sprawled out on the floor before she resumes her army scoot.

Gabriela continues her interest in strange “toys”, the latest and greatest being a stack of coasters and chewing on CDs. Mmm. She is extremely observant. Sometimes we stop by at the park on our way home from daycare and she seems to love watching the bigger kids, dogs and even the guys playing basketball nearby. She still isn’t quite sure what to think of the swings.

We are so lucky to have such a delightful baby. She just makes us so happy!! Gabriela only cries really if she gets hurt or if she’s tired and hungry (at the same time). She still loves to be “worn”. We are getting tons of use out of all our baby carriers still.

Weekend update

Friday night we hung out at Alex & Matt's with Sean & Jessica. True to form, Gabriela stayed awake the whole time and was quite the social butterfly. We were a little nervous that she didn't fall asleep until around 11 pm because we had to get up early the next morning to go to the zoo!

Bill & Julie invited us to the zoo's annual member appreciation event, while it was closed to the regular public. It was awesome!! There were way fewer people than usual. We got to see the panda up close chomping away on tons of bamboo. We watched the oldest elephant in captivity get hosed down for a morning bath, the cheetahs, zebras, tigers, lions, the small mammals (Gabriela loved the Golden Lion Tamarins), the reptile house, and our usual favorite, the orangutans and gorillas.

However, this time was THE BEST! The gorillas were more active than we've ever seen them at any zoo. Two of the brothers were running around chasing each other. One was a little stinker and even threw a pile of hay at another one. They were climbing and coming right up close to the observation wall. We could have stayed for hours watching all this. As if this weren't mesmerizing enough, there is an itty bitty teeny tiny BABY GORILLA!!! She is so sweet! The baby girl gorilla was born in January and she was tinier at three months than Gabriela was at birth. The momma gorilla just walked around like normal with the baby clutching her tummy fur. She'd cradle the baby and sometimes just pat her back like we do with our little people babies. She knew just what to do and how to be a good mama without even reading any parenting books. Check out pictures of the zoo's new addition here. Warning: Your heart just may melt.

After a shorter than normal evening slumber and walking around all morning at the zoo, we ate a late breakfast with Bill & Julie. On our way home, we debated whether or not to walk above or underground to go home. At the last second I voted underground. We were just around the corner from our apartment when we saw all this BABY STUFF for sale! The Junior League was having a sale of JUST baby stuff before their annual Tossed & Found sale, which I am totally attending this year. I was like a crazy woman. I had no idea this was happening, got in late in the game, made Lane relinquish all his cash to me and had him take our sleeping baby upstairs with instructions that I would call him if I needed him to bring me the checkbook.

They charged $10 admission and I bought $25 worth of stuff, including a brand spankin' new shopping cart cover/activity center for $5 that would have cost at least $20 anywhere else. PLUS I won a raffle prize which was a $25 Baby Gap gift card. Totally worth going! We got some board books, some toys, our shopping cart thingy, a book for me, a little outfit and a bunch of long sleeved cutie tees.

Exhausted from this last minute shopping extravaganza, I joined my already sleeping family for FOUR hours of delightful napping. Gabriela seriously napped for at least five hours. I thought for sure she'd go to bed super late that night or wake up ready to play wide eyed and bushy tailed in the middle of the night, but she went to sleep at 9:30 and didn't wake up until 7:30. I guess she just needed some catch up.

Man, so did I. I think Daylight Savings Time kicked my ass. Every night this week I've felt overwhelmed, tired, have been so busy and still felt like I didn't get much done. Maybe this week will be better. The weekend is almost over and we still have lots of cleaning, cooking, and laundry to do. Wish us luck!!!

Here are some pics from the zoo. I wish we had taken more, but we forgot to charge the battery

Checking out the alligators at the reptile house. Gabriela had just woken up from her nap here. She really enjoyed seeing the fishies and turtles swim around.

At the subway station on our way there. It was a little chilly in the morning so we just bundled up extra.

Adventures in Baby Food

I think I've already mentioned how much fun I'm having concocting baby food for Gabriela. I have been inspired by an article to include spices in Gabriela's food. Lately she's had sweet potatoes and lentils with cinnamon, broccoli and GARLIC, and oatmeal with fresh mango and nutmeg with ground flaxseed. And she's loved every biteful.

Our pediatrician said meat is an excellent source of iron and zinc, especially for breastfed babies. So last night, we introduced Gabriela to meat. I ground up some barley in our totally awesome spice grinder in just a few seconds and cooked it in water, kind of like oatmeal. But then I added the most mexican of Mexican spices: CUMIN or cominos, as the real Mexicans say. I added this delightful cereal concoction to the blender along with some trusty breast milk and cooked chicken and pureed it all up. For the finishing touch, I mashed up some avocado and mixed it all together. Gabriela gobbled it right down.

It was kind of like baby burrito filling... oooh, maybe next time we should add some beans!! See how excited I get about this stuff???

I'm just not sure about the whole finger food stuff. I want to give her little pieces of food to practice picking up and putting in her mouth. But I'm also super paranoid about her choking on something. I got her some Joe's O's from our beloved Trader Joes. Maybe some cut up banana or avocado since it's soft and mushy?? Should I break down and buy some commercial baby food? Gerber snacky snacks? Still trying to figure this one out.

Milk?

I'm pretty sure Gabriela meant it when she did the sign for milk. She's done it several more times over the past few days. Today she even said MAMA and then did the sign for milk. Genius, I tell you. ;)

Gabriela's Doctor Visit Today

Last week Gabriela was supposed to go to the doctor for a booster flu shot. We went to the doctor alright, but only because she had a fever the night before. So her booster shot appointment was rescheduled for today.

It was a good thing that we had the appointment because Lane noticed some little white splotches in Gabriela's mouth yesterday and we had to go get them checked out. Gabriela was on her best behavior while we waited one hour for our appointment.

It turns out she has thrush which is a very common yeast-like infection for babies. Gabriela got a prescription for that. As part of the routine check up, the doctor checked her ears to find, not one, but TWO ear infections. I had no idea! I guess I should be grateful that Gabriela doesn't have any symptoms, but it's a little scary not knowing my baby is sick. She's been mostly her happy, playful self. We got a prescription for that too, but the doctor said to wait to fill it, since ear infections can heal by themselves.

We had a nice talk about feeding. I'm actually excited about all of Gabriela's eating. The other night she had basmati rice with dried apricots and tonight I made her oatmeal with fresh mango and nutmeg and flaxseed.

Gabriela had her one shot, and as the nurse was getting prepped, I reminded myself that she would pick up on my anxiety. So I tried to act calm and okay instead of nervous about my baby being caught completely off guard with a huge needle in her leg. Maybe it worked, or maybe Gabriela is just super-baby because she cried for like half a second and was over it.

But the MOST surprising part of the doctor visit adventure was when Gabriela extended her arm and stuck her thumb up and started closing her fist over and over again. I thought she was just conducting another one of her experiments, and did it with her for grins, when it suddenly hit me! This is the sign for milk! We've been doing signs with her - only a few basic ones: milk, eat, more, and up. I don't know if it was just a coincidence, but I immediately fed her, said "milk" and did the sign back.

What an exciting couple of days!

Gabriela Pics

In her cutie-patootie skirt

Our Little Mexican conducting experiments with her tortillas.
"MMM, I like putting tortillas in my mouth and then spitting them right out!"

Gabriela's Newest Developments

Gabriela gives us five and has started to wave.

She also loves to stand up and is so bold as to try to let go. Here are some action photos.

Look how proud she is!!

One handed! That little daredevil!

Concentrating
Uh-Oh!


Gabriela just melted my heart today when she said MAMA to me. She did it several times today. I'd like to think that she actually meant Mama, and wasn't just practicing her "m" sounds. But when she said it, she said it TO me, right before I'd pick her up. It was just darling. We caught some mamamama on video just for you.

When I called my mom to tell her Gabriela said Mama, she thought Gabriela actually said Nana. Gabriela will have lots of practice saying Nana in two weeks when her Nana comes to visit. We can't wait.