Florida 2009 Slideshow

We've been ridiculously lax with the posting recently, but it's been a busy month. Here's a quick one from our recent adventure with the larger Butler family--including Grammy, Poppy, Uncle Chris, Aunt Wendy, and cousins Josie and Nick--to the Gulf Coast of Florida.

Mom, Dad, and Dahlia were lucky enough to stay with Grammy and Poppy in a beachfront condo for a week, replete with a patio for watching the sunset or watching the cousins in the pool as well as the absolutely essential AC and crib that helped us help Dahlia get a decent amount of sleep.

Chris, Wendy, Josie, and Nick stayed in a similar condo two floors down, and the kids had a plenty of fun getting spoiled by playing with the grandparents and, of course, lots of swimming in the pool. Here's a quick montage we threw together with some great photos from Amy and Aunt Wendy.

Videos of the motorboat mouth

Here are two videos to illustrate Peter's post below.


Motorboat mouth


Dahlia with Sophie the giraffe

And a bonus picture of Dahlia rocking tummy time. She's getting so good at it!

Bronx Cheer Bandit, or L'il Miss Motorboat Mouth

Little Ms. D takes a rest from her mouth farting.

So what's Dahlia been up to for the past month and a half?

Well, all sorts of stuff like learning how to roll over from her front to her back (the lazy baby's solution for getting around tummy time), going on fun trips around town and down to Southern California, getting two sets of vaccinations, celebrating her 3-month birthday, and grabbing stuff with her hands. We're also pretty sure that her teeth have started coming in, 'cause she drools like nobody's business.

One of the more amusing recent developments is Dahlia's habit of ending words or sentences by blowing bubbles with her lips, which makes a sound like a motorboat, or actually, more like a bronx cheer. (Some call them raspberries?)

Anyway, it's pretty funny to hear Dahlia respond to some of our questions with a grunt, gurgle, or squeak, followed by a fake fart sound and bubbles. A sample conversation:

"Hi, cutie. Aren't you a good girl?"

"Urgle blerg pbbbbbbbbbbbt."

"Do you want to see what mommy's doing?"

"Erra hoo pbbbbbbbbbt."

Maybe you have to be there. ;) We'll try to get it on video and post. I don't think it will last long.

Thank goodness for a daughter who likes to make fart sounds with her mouth. Hooray!

Videos of Dahlia making baby talk

Here are a couple of videos where I've tried to capture Dahlia talking. She sometimes really talks up a storm, in sentences, and with sounds like "oww", "ooh" and squeals.

Sorry we've been so lax about posting. We'll post more soon!

This first one is on the changing table. See how Dahlia loves holding onto those fish curtains.



This was taken later the same day, when Sarah and Lisa from Adobe came to visit, bearing a scrumptious dinner.

Dahlia talks ... on video

We're working on broadcasting our Webcam so that anyone can watch, but until then, Amy has been recording some videos for Facebook and YouTube. This one's not the greatest, but she's talking a little bit.

Play time

Dad and Dahlia in Dolores Park enjoying the sun

Today we met up with Craig and Gerald, got food from Bi-Rite and sat in Dolores Park for a couple hours enjoying the sunny January day. Dahlia was such a good girl, really enjoying the fresh air and people watching.

So yeah, after all this time I'm finally finding time to write a post. For some reason, I thought that being home all the time, you know, "not working," I would have time to do housewifey things like cook, clean, and write blog posts (and thank you notes, and Christmas cards, etc.). However, as any parent could have told me (and probably tried to), it seems that all I have time to do every day is feed Dahlia, change her diapers, play with her, and try to get her to sleep.

Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love it. Playing with Dahlia, even feeding her, changing her diapers, and rocking her to sleep are all amazingly fun and rewarding. And now that she's sleeping for a little while, I will attempt to write a blog post.

Some of the things we do to play during the day are: read books like the new Mother Goose nursery rhymes book from Aunt Molly, compare Dahlia's hands to Mommy's hands, play jump-up and airplane, peekaboo (though she's still too young to see what's funny about it), dance to the new jazz CD from Aunt Wendy and Uncle Chris (or was it officially from Nick and Josie?), and sometimes, when she's starting to fuss, I take her to see the view from our back porch.



Playing peekaboo with Daddy

Tummy time with the chicken rattle

Tummy time has to be Dahlia's least-favorite of our play-time activities. It's like she doesn't even realize how good she is at it! She's always had a strong neck -- she was holding her head up and looking around in the delivery room, truly. But that might have had more to do with adrenaline than anything else. I think tummy time for her is like doing push-ups for me. In fact, I figure it's only fair if I do push-ups while she is on her tummy and the longer she goes, the longer I have to go.

Dahlia loves watching the safari animals spin in circles over her head

In the mornings is when Dahlia is at her best. After her breakfast, and after I've eaten my cereal, I change her diaper and put her in her crib to watch the mobile while I take a very quick shower. They really should make the music and spinning last longer -- 10 minutes would be perfect so I can shower and get dressed before it stops and she gets bored looking at the unmoving animals. It is a life-saver, however. She gets this super cute look of excitement when I reach up to turn it on and she sees the animals start moving.

Looking at her favorite fishes on the curtains over the changing table

Another great call are the curtains that my mom and I made -- I chose the fabric and she made them. Dahlia loves them! She stares at the fish during diaper changes. The way the light comes through them, giving them a glow, really attracts her gaze.

She likes all windows in daylight and particularly likes going outside. She's fascinated by all the things to see, especially when they're lit up with sunlight. I take her out in the Moby wrap (like a sling but she's upright, held tightly against me with her head peeking out the top) and she stares intently, so alert and so curious. After about 2 minutes of walking and taking it all in, however, the vibrations get the best of her and she falls asleep.

Fortunately for me, she's happily asleep for awhile and I can either walk for exercise (wearing my new pedometer; thanks Chris and Wendy!) or get a quick meal. Since Peter returned to work, he's been coming home for lunch or occasionally meeting me out for lunch at a restaurant. We ate at Weird Fish on Friday and Dahlia was so good and asleep the whole time and I was able to enjoy my favorite sandwich, the Black Cat (blackened catfish with mango salsa and shredded cabbage on French roll).

Ah, there's my call -- I'll post again soon. Working on making videos so will include some next time. Until then...

Childbirth class reunion / baby lineup

Left to right: Dahlia, Lia, Russell, Annika, Muriel, and Ari

This past Saturday, Amy and I attended a reunion of our childbirth preparation class. We took it this summer at Natural Resources on Valencia, and it was taught by Tracy Dillen Massillon, who is now about 34 weeks pregnant herself.

The class was 3 hours every week for 6 weeks, and we got to know everyone pretty well, so it was great to see everyone again and especially to meet all the new tiny people! Jim and Martha Sue hosted at their wonderful apartment on Oak St., and everyone brought plenty of food. All the moms nursed; all the babies slept at some point, and almost nobody fussed. What a wonderful day!

It also offered the invaluable chance for the most excellent baby lineup picture above. You can see little Dahlia asleep on the left. As the photo session went on, she slowly and surely slumped over onto poor little Lia, who didn't seem to like it one bit. Poor baby!

Here's a shot of the entire crew, Tracy excepted (she's taking the picture).

Back row: Peter, Amy, Dahlia, Russell, Hiroko, Annika, Stacey, Lia, Martha Sue (hiding), Muriel, Denise, Jessica, and Ari. Front row: Aaron, Micah, Jim, Eric, and Matt