Baby Boy Meets The Family

Dear Baby Boy,

You wouldn't believe how many people ALREADY love you! On the day we brought you home from the hospital, Grandma Linda arrived for a visit from Washington. She took wonderful care of you and whispered lots of encouragement for strength and a wonderful life in your ear.

A few days later, your aunt and uncle, Katie and Leo, came to visit from Las Vegas. All of us went to the beach -- you went to the beach a total of four times in your first 9 days of life. Not bad! Everyone enjoyed holding you and was very impressed about what a calm baby you are. You don't like to have your diaper changed, but other than that you're pretty chill. Oh, another thing people always notice about you is your big feet. I wonder if that means you're going to be really tall.

Your grandma Denise and granddaddy Hal really wanted to see you, but they were going out of town and decided they had to wait until they got back. But then they couldn't stand it anymore and so they drove 2 hours to meet us at the beach and hold you for two hours -- and then they had to turn around and drive back home. I promised them I would tell you about that and you'd appreciate it some day.

Here's a nice photo with you and Grandma Linda. She left this morning and I'm sure she already misses you. I don't know if you can tell, but Zadie is lovingly patting you in this photo. She likes you and thinks you're quite the curiosity! I wish I had a photo of your other grandparents visiting with you at the beach, but we'll make up for it later.

A Baby Boy!

Everybody keeps acting like this foster-adopt process is emotionally brutal and wondering how we can do it. It's definitely an emotional roller-coaster, but I also find some comfort in these kinds of situations where things are completely beyond your control. It's like you just let go and try to have faith that the right thing will happen -- there's really no ability to try and control the outcome.

Case in point: we felt a great deal of sadness about losing Deshon, but we also understood why it happened. Then today we received a call about a 4-day-old baby boy. We heard a few basics and we had five minutes to call the social worker back with an answer. It only took me two minutes to track Tori down and call the guy back with a big "yes." Then we drove to Pasadena and picked him up, which was really fun. He still doesn't have a name yet, but we're working on it!

This time we feel pretty confident that we'll get to keep him. Of course, being a foster parent means you never know until you work your way to the point of adoption, but we hope and think this is going to work out.

Baby Boy Kuykendall, we are very happy to have you in our home. We have been holding you non-stop since we got you and at this very moment Tori is holding you and you are doing some cute little half-asleep grins. I know everyone says babies don't smile until six weeks and it's just gas, but it sure seems like smiles. You have a big shock full of black hair, rosy cheeks, and perfect little red lips. You also have enormous feet! Best of all, you have a great temperament and have only cried when you really needed to tell us something (thank you for that!). But check back with me after our first night together -- we'll find out what kind of sleeper you are!

We feel very privileged to have you here and, in a stroke of good fortune, it just so happens that Grandma Linda was arriving tonight. She totally hogged you all night and loved holding you and talking to you.

Here's a video from when we went to pick you up at the hospital. Tori was actually the first person to hold you and rock you, but my camerawork on that video was pretty bad so I'm going to post this one. The nurse kept wanting us to handle paperwork and all we wanted to do was snuggle with you.

Deshon Is Gone

The judge ordered Deshon to return to his previous foster mom today. I stayed home today and got the call at about noon and had about 30 minutes to pack all of his things up and drive him to our adoption agency. I swung by the office so that Tori could say goodbye.

We are so sad and a bit blindsided since we expected this all to take around six months to a year to be resolved. You know when you sign up to be a foster parent that you're signing yourself up for an emotional roller coaster, but this was our first experience with that. When we first told about Deshon, his circumstances led us to believe that we were really going to get to keep him, but in the last week or so we saw a few signs that the judge might be going in a different direction.

As heartbreaking as it was to say goodbye to him today, I feel good about the home he's going back to and that's the most important thing. His previous foster mom was overjoyed and I could see that there is obviously a lot of love there. Deshon was smiling and giggling when he saw her, so that made me really happy. Also, I'm thankful that everything was resolved quickly. As hard as it was to say goodbye today, it would have been WAY harder to say goodbye after a year.

Those are all the logical reasons why I'm okay with Deshon leaving today, but the more emotional side is that he really is an incredibly good and sweet baby. Everyone who got to meet him really fell in love with him. Good things will come his way.

Today was really strange because for the last five days we were also babysitting two additional foster children -- an 8-month-old and a 4-year-old -- for a total of four kids. We were really wiped out last night when their parents came to get them at about 10pm. So it was weird today to go from a small house that was literally bursting with children all over the place back down to just one.

We loved every minute of Deshon and we will miss his adorable little smiles and screams!

Welcome, Deshon!

Yesterday our adoption agency called to ask us whether we would be interested in taking Deshon. We didn't have to learn too much about him before we said YES! Without getting too much into the nitty gritty of details, Deshon arrived at our home last night at 9:15pm. Tori and I were so excited for him to arrive that we had to play cards to pass the time and calm our nerves (we had already done all the cleaning we could do).

Deshon has big bright eyes and is full of smiles and funny babbles. He didn't seem to have any trouble adjusting to our home, although as it got later and later we were unsure of how to get him to sleep. But once Tori got him to sleep, he slept for 9 hours straight!

We are thrilled to have Deshon here and hope that we get to keep him forever and ever. But, part of the reality of being a foster parent is that we really don't know what will happen. So we're just trying to take deep breaths and hope that Deshon ends up in the best place possible.

Here's a video of Zadie and Deshon together. Zadie is very curious about him, but also likes to stake out her territory with regards to the attention she gets from her moms. She always wants to be held by the person holding Deshon.

Size 23s

Here's Zadie wearing Shaquille O'Neal's size 23 basketball shoes. Our friends Richard and Allard got these shoes years ago and were kind enough to let Zadie take them for a spin. Zadie's donor had a size 16 shoe, so hopefully this is not going to be a sign of things to come! When I was pregnant, Tori used to dream about me giving birth to an enormous foot. It will be interesting to see how big Zadie's feet will be.

Speaking of genetics, I think that Zadie looks a lot like me, but she also has some personality traits that are definitely not from me. For example, she is extremely mechanical. I can barely change a light bulb. She loves to put things together and one of her favorite toys is a set of keys because she tries to unlock everything imaginable (we have locks on one of our cabinets). Tori is also very mechanical, so it's a nice little fit. I, on the other hand, am very verbal -- thus far Zadie has not followed in that path. She is now 16 and a half months and she's only comfortable with a few words: wawa, ball, woofwoof, up, and mama (only when she's crying or really upset).

Despite the fact that Zadie has not made huge developmental strides in the verbal department -- and despite the fact that this weekend one of our family friends told us about a kid who knew all his letters by the age of one -- I am not worried. I just always remind myself about my dad. He didn't go to kindergarten and showed up to first grade not knowing any letters or numbers. As he says, "he was pure as the driven snow" (does that saying even make sense?). Anyway, he turned out to be quite successful, so I'm not going to worry about all this.

This isn't necessarily the best photo of Zadie, but I think it's really cute. Part of why I like it because she has this silly red bead necklace on, which she's been wearing for about two months straight. Normally she has two or three of these necklaces around her neck and I'm always afraid she's going to get so tangled up that she'll end up choking, but so far so good. We took her to a Peace Corps event where all the former volunteers had to wear these red bead necklaces and by the end of the night she had ripped them off quite a few people.

We just returned from a nice weekend in San Diego celebrating Nick's graduation. We're very proud of you, Nick! Nick and Austin are both very good cousins to Zadie and she finds Austin particularly amusing.

It's nice in some ways to be home, but in other ways our place doesn't quite measure up to being at the parents house. We had a great time in the pool all weekend and we should have taken a video of how excited Zadie gets in the water. Shoot!

Zadie Is Part Fish

So I got the new computer and I still haven't been posting. Instead of blaming my old computer this time I'll blame my dear mother because it took me a while to get all the great photos she took while Zadie was staying with them. It's been a few weeks now, but we left Zadie for three days and I think everyone involved had a ball (including Kate and Tori!).

Zadie got lots of time to play in the pool, which she loved. She would start wiggling and flopping around in your arms when she saw the pool -- "wawa" is one of her few words. She's a very good sport about being dunked, but she definitely doesn't get the concept of holding her breath. Her favorite thing to do is just to thrash around with no direction.

So enjoy the pool shots! Shoot, Mom, I wanted to post the pool shots with you and Nick, but somehow that didn't come across in the photos you emailed me. I think I got the first and third set, but not the middle set. Also missing the one of Zadie playing with her sink.

Zacation

Tori and I are on a zacation: a vacation from Zadie! We went to San Diego this weekend and had to come back a little early for a friend's wedding, but we left Zadie with her grandparents. They'll bring her back on Wednesday, but that means we have approximately 80 hours that will be Zadie-free. Last night we stayed out late at our friend's wedding and this morning we SLEPT IN! It was pretty nice, I must say.

But, of course, we do miss our little Zadie Zoo and we'll be very excited to see her again on Wednesday. I know that she's having a great time with her grandparents and she is totally obssessed with their swimming pool. Zadie calmly waved goodbye to us as we drove away -- she was in her grandma's arms and couldn't care less to see us go!

I included this photo because it's evidence of a very strange phenomenon. Zadie is a typical 15-month-old in that she is extremely busy and she doesn't like to stop and cuddle very much. Unless she hurts herself, it's very rare for her to want to be held very long at all. But this is all out the window with Grandma Denise. She holds onto my mom and rests her head on our chest for literally 45 minutes at a time. It's the weirdest thing! She does it when she first sees her, but she also does it when my mom goes to get her from a nap and at several points throughout the day. Of course, my mom eats it up and feels no guilt whatsoever about parading this affection in front of us!

Hopefully Zadie will be willing to return home to us. Between Grandma Denise and Granddaddy Hal, we're in trouble. Granddaddy Hal takes her swimming and sings her songs and lets her pretend to drive his car (when it's parked, of course!).

Zadie in Grandma Linda's Garden

We like to give Linda projects when she comes to visit us. I'm not really sure how much she appreciates this since she'd really like to spend all her time biking and rollerskating along the ocean. Still, she's a very good sport and she always comes through -- even if it's usually crammed at the end of her trip when she's finally got all her play time in.

During her January visit, Tori gave her mom the mission of re-doing the garden in our front yard. I'm the kind of person who just accepts things as they are and doesn't really see the need to change them (especially when it comes to household matters); Tori is the exact opposite and is always looking to revamp a room or, in this case, a garden.

Anyway, this is far too much background on these photos -- the point is that we'd like to thank Linda for creating a beautiful garden for us! Now that it's spring and the flowers are blooming even I can definitely notice a huge improvement. Zadie was really excited about these photos because usually we don't let her go into the garden (she likes to try and pull stuff up or trample flowers).

p.s. Thank you to Sidney for the adorable dress (even though she happens to be wearing jeans under it this time).

15 month checkup

Zadie had her 15-month checkup last week and she’s defying the odds. It amazes me how much she continues to grow despite very stubbornly refusing to eat much of anything besides fruit. This child goes bonkers for all fruits, but particularly loves apples and berries. It’s very challenging to convince her to eat anything else and we do worry about her getting any protein. Tori tries every trick in the book to sneak some protein in (berries mixed w/chicken?), but Zadie always outsmarts us. The doctor said to just let it be and not to fight her too much. I guess it could be worse and she could refuse to eat anything but junk food.

Anyway, Zadie leapt up on all the growth charts. She weighed 23 lbs and 13 oz, which is the 70th percentile (up from the 50th percentile last time around). She measured 32 inches, which is the 90th percentile, and her head circumference was 19 inches (that must be centimeters, not inches, right?). Her head circumference is now in the 100th percentile, so the poor child definitely has my genes in that department.

Finally a video!

My sister told me that Zadie's cousins have been anxiously waiting for us to post a video, so here's one I have from about a month ago. Zadie is walking really well now (better than in this video) and you'll also notice that her hair is really growing. Tori is really good at putting it in pigtails that actually stay, but since I don't do it as well Zadie always manages to pull the rubber bands out when I do her hair.

So I finally got my new laptop! And my mom gave me her old webcam so tonight we Skyped with Kim's family and my mom (she's up there visiting). Zadie is a bit confused about the people on the computer screen, but she enjoys it.

Reinforcements on the way

I haven't been very good about blogging lately. I'd like to blame my computer, which is very old and very prone to shutdowns. Recently a new friend who is also an IT professional tried to diagnose the problem and he informed me that my lack of anti-virus vigilance was allowing hackers to do horrible things and that I was an irresponsible global citizen. He feels very passionately about these issues and I must admit that I was completely unaware of any of this -- I just thought my computer was slow and annoying.

So I've finally broken down and bought a new laptop. I've been agonizing over this decision for the past year since I'm trying to be cheap and of course I don't NEED a new laptop. But I found a decent deal and it should be here shortly. Which gets back to the subject line of this post -- hopefully I'll be blogging more often (and interestingly) once I my new laptop arrives!

But isn't that always how it is with materials possessions? You think, "Well, if I had x item then I would definitely do blah blah blah." So you readers (all three of you) can keep to this promise!

Stages

Literally ever since Zadie was born, I have told Tori that her particular age at that moment was definitely my favorite age. She always laughs at how I keep changing what my favorite age is based upon whatever age Zadie is at the time. I think it's because I didn't previously have much experience with babies and so everything has been new and exciting -- and I really have loved every stage.

Except this new stage. Zadie is 14 months old now and she really, really wants to talk. She does actually do a lot of talking, but none of us know what she's saying. It's kind of a nasally alien language and she is very persistent in her attempts to communicate. This isn't the part that I don't like -- I find her little alien language very adorable. The part I don't like is what happens when we either don't understand what she wants or we understand but decide not to let her have her way. She yells and cries. It's not like any of the tantrums that I know some kids have (and maybe that's in store for us down the road), but it's very unpleasant.

It's only been 14 months, but I think I can identify what one of my major parenting challenges is going to be and I'm really trying to work on it. I think I get very easily drawn into standoffs and battles of will and determination...like I'm always trying to prove a point or something. I don't want Zadie to think she can yell and then she'll get what she wants, so my natural instinct is to battle her and show her that I'm in charge. But then I see how Tori so naturally avoids major conflict and instead offers different solutions or finds some way of convincing Zadie that her way is definitely the most fun way. So I'm trying to work on not engaging in a battle of wills with my 14-month-old daughter. I better start working on this now so that I'll be ready when she becomes a teenager! As my own parents can attest, I was a very stubborn child so hopefully Zadie will not inherit that. I remember watching "Bridge on the River Kwai" (sp?) when I was in elementary school and then deciding to go on a hunger strike over something I was mad at my mom about. Wisely, she ignored the whole thing and the hunger strike kind of lost its appeal.

This is my very favorite photo of Zadie (hooray, Kim!). Kim also took the family photo, which I really like, but I think I'm going to get a snarky comment from my mom about my terrible posture. Mom, this is not an issue of my posture -- it's just that Zadie was being squirmy and everything got discombobulated.

Happy Birthday, Mom!

Today is my mom's birthday and we were lucky enough to have her for one night. We wanted to make her a special breakfast, but all she wanted was oatmeal, so we put a candle in her bowl of oatmeal and had a great breakfast (except for Zadie's grumpiness). Our nephew Nick also came up and he's always a great guest.

In honor of my mom's birthday, here's a photo Kim snapped on one of their morning walks in Hawaii. Everyone knows how kind and loving my mom is, but some people don't know what a quick sense of humor she has. She is one of my favorite people to spend time with -- and not just because she takes me out to nice dinners!

I'm also including a group photo from Hawaii, although it is sadly missing Eric, who had to go home early to start his new set of classes. And, finally, I love this photo of my dad about to blow out the candles on his 60th birthday. This was in Hawaii and we all sang "Happy Birthday." As you can see, he was quite emotional about it all -- I think he may be the first person to ever start crying during "Happy Birthday." Not normally a tear-jerker, but my dad is a pretty sensitive guy!

Beach Zadie

We just returned from a wonderful week-long vacation in Kauai with our whole famdamily. There were 13 of us who traveled there to celebrate my parents' 35th wedding anniversary and my dad's 60th birthday. What kind of parents take their whole family to Hawaii to celebrate their anniversary? Those are some good-hearted people!

I could blog about bajillions of memories from the trip, but it's late and I still have a lot of things I need to do tonight, so I'm going to just break this up into chunks. The first thing I want to blog about is Zadie and how much she loved the beach. It's a good thing, too, because Tori might disown her if she didn't like that beach! My dad said she was like a little sand crab. I'll try to find a video to post of her splashing around and rolling around in the sand like a little maniac, but for now these photos will have to suffice.

Thank you to Kim for taking AMAZING photos throughout the whole vacation and then posting them all so quickly. I'm going to post a bunch more of her great photos (and not just of my child) later.

She Walks!

Well, it's taken 13 and a half months, but Zadie finally took her very first steps last Thursday. Hank dropped her off at our office and, in front of several co-workers, she took three steps in a row. Everyone cheered and she got freaked out and started bawling.
She hasn't done much walking since then, but last night we tried to lure her to walk by holding the pacifier out for here. Here's a little video clip of her showing off her new talent.

Catching Up

It's been a while since I've posted, but it's not because I haven't tried. I tried uploading a video the other day and it took forever and finally froze. So then I was too irritated to approach the blog again, even though it wasn't the blog's fault -- it's really the fault of our 4-year-old computer. Maybe we should stimulate the economy and buy a laptop.

My sister has been putting me to shame and blogging her heart out with great posts and great photos. She gets all deep on her blog, whereas I'm just thankful if I make an entry and post a photo or video.

My mom came to visit last week and it was great to have her here, of course. But there's starting to be a downside to her visits. Zadie has become slightly obsessed with her and only wants to go to her. And then she makes these little whiny cry sounds if she doesn't get to. I've seen this behavior before because Zadie's cousin is highly obsessed with my mom and after she leaves Izzy takes a few days to recover. So I told my mom to stop spoiling her with so much attention, but of course my mom acts so innocent. Ha!

Our Little Road Warrior

One of the things I love about Zadie is that she's really good at rolling with the punches and being dragged around all over the place. Tori, of course, likes to hit the road and we take Zadie on all kinds of adventures. These photos are a case in point. Tori and I are rode our bikes and Grandma Linda rollerskated to Venice. Zadie fell asleep along the way and Tori tied this scarf around her head so that it wouldn't keep falling forward and waking her up. Oh, and respect to Grandma Linda for rollerskating that far -- I couldn't rollerskate more than a block!

This photo was taken in the rec area in Venice, which is one of my very favorite spots. Can't beat the people-watching there! Most people are into people-watching all the weirdos in Venice, but I personally like watching the pickup basketball games, handball, and the guys who do the high rings. I especially like observing how the basketball players mediate their arguments -- I don't fully understand the system, but they do seem to work their disagreements out.

The other reason I like Venice is because I get to eat at Mao's Kitchen. Yum!

Big Family Weekend

Kim's family drove down to stay with us for the weekend and my parents came up from San Diego. It was a great way to spend the three-day weekend and we even got to celebrate my parents' 35th wedding anniversary with a fancy dinner out (Uncle Hank babysat). We had a great time playing with all the younguns and we also had a great time ditching them with Uncle Hank two nights in a row while we went out to eat, played dominoes, went for ice cream, etc. We had some good bouts of the giggles, too. I'm sure nothing would seem funny if I tried to re-tell the stories now, but one thing that was really funny was when I was talking about how Grandma Linda had introduced Zadie to Jamba Juice and taught her how to drink out of a straw. My dad turned to me and said, "Who's John Batusse?" I'm totally laughing just thinking about it. And our other favorite joke revolved around the International Rectifier building we passed by a few times a day. I won't bore you with all the musings we had about that company, but it was pretty funny. Oh, and Tori had one glass of red wine and she was drunk as a skunk! Okay, one last anecdote: while we were playing dominoes and Tori was demolishing us, my mom said, "Don't help her out -- she's WIPING our butts!" Haha. We all wondered why more people don't accidentally say that instead of whipping.

Thanks again to Kimmy for taking such great photos.

Zadie's Birth Story

It's just about time to have this blog printed and turned into Zadie's baby book, so I want to be sure and chronicle her birth story. Here goes.

Dear Zadie,

On January 31st at 2am, I woke up to go to the bathroom. When I got to the bathroom I realized that my water had broken and I took a moment to gather myself and then went and gently woke Tori up. When she opened her eyes and I told her the news, she had a big smile on her face and hopped out of bed. Next we went to the guest room and woke up my mom, who happened to be staying with us that night. We weren't all running around in chaos like you see in the movies. We were all very calm and Tori packed my bag for the hospital while I lay in bed. My mom, in typical Denise fashion, applied her make-up and got her things together.

We headed out of the house at 3am and arrived at Little Company of Mary hospital in Torrance. We had done all of our prenatal care with midwives and had been planning on having you at home until the very end of our pregnancy, when I developed hypertension or preenclampsia or something. At that point, the midwives decided it would be best for me to give birth in a hospital. Tori and I were SO disappointed that we cried and cried -- we had your home birth all planned out and it was going to be so special. But obviously the important thing was that you arrived safely and, as you're about to read, it was still a very special experience!

Anyway, I was in labor for a while when one of our midwives arrived just as a friend to help us along and guide us. Her name was Amber and she was amazing. She did reiki on me (along with your grandma Linda), gave me little herbal remedies to speed things up, and generally helped me focus. Tori and I had taken a course and had been practicing a birthing technique called Hypnobabies that is basically a way to self-hypnotize during childbirth as a pain management technique. Actually, they don't even let you use the "p" word because they believe you can deliver a child pain-free. So when I would have a contraction, I would be standing up and I would put all my weight on Tori and I would think of turning off a little light switch and go into another zone. Tori was amazing and completely exhausted by the end of all this.

Our room at the hospital was very un-hospitallike because we had all the lights off and just used battery operated candles to create a relaxing atmosphere. We also had a stereo that played the Hypnobabies CDs (some were music and some were meditations). Everything worked really well and progressed nicely. I can honestly say that I experienced zero pain until the last 45 minutes, at which point I lost my concentration and became a little anxious for you to come out!

It had been important to us to try and have you naturally, without using any drugs. One of the little chants you learn to say through the Hypnobabies program is "anesthesia" because you're basically willing an anasthetic to reach the area where you're feeling discomfort. So, sometime towards the end, Tori couldn't wait any longer and had to leave my side to go to the bathroom. My mom came next to me to take her place and heard me chanting "anesthesia" over and over (softly). So when Tori got back from the bathroom, my mom said, "Tori, Tori, she says she wants anesthesia!!" It was very funny!

The doctor arrived in the nick of time and you were born at 6:50pm. Your grandmas were so excited to find out that you were a girl that they gave each other a high five. My mom had been taking lots of in-depth photos and had become so nauseous that she almost fainted and the nurses had to get her some orange juice and tell her to put her head between her knees. But by the time you came out she was with us again and everyone was so excited to see you!

When your little head popped out, your Mama T left my side to move down and check you out and, when she saw your face, she said "Why is she beautiful?" And your Mama T *never* thinks newborns are beautiful. It's also interesting because at that point we didn't even know you were a girl!

The nurses immediately put you on my chest and I was amazed that you looked right up into my eyes. I thought you were going to be all squinty and out of it, but you were very calm and aware. I put you to my breast and, although I was completely clueless, you knew exactly what to do and nursed away -- it was very sweet. Your Mama T cut your umbilical cord and helped the nurse clean you up and swaddle you while I took a moment to recover.

Although we were both exhausted that night, your mamas didn't sleep at all because we were proudly staring at you and also obsessively checking whether you were still breathing. You slept like a rock and seemed completely content.

So this is your birth story. Your birth was very calm and peaceful and low in drama -- much like you! I admit that I've edited a few elements out of this story, but I'll be happy to share them with you when you get older!

Hi Zadie! It's your Ma T here. It has been so amazing to watch you smile, grab, laugh, army crawl, crawl, eat, drink, clap... We have been able to brag about how good you are from the minute you came into our life. We are so lucky to be your parents. Although your Ma K is the writer, blogger, reader and journaler in the family, I've loved having you as my new best friend and am so glad Ma K has captured it here! I am excited about all the laughs (and fights and tears) to come!

One-Year Check-up

We took Zadie to her one-year check-up today and she got very positive reviews from the doctor. Despite the fact that she is not yet walking, she is very active and inquisitive and has a great personality (that's what the doctor said).

I'm nursing Zadie once a day (at night) and she has started whole milk for the rest of the time. She's generally a very good eater, but while she was sick the past two weeks she became very picky. We're hoping this will change as she begins to feel better. Her appetite is definitely back. Her favorite food BY FAR is any and all kinds of fruit. But I think bananas take the cake. She likes them so much that we hate to feed them to her because she goes a bit, well, bananas. Haha.

Zadie weighed 20 lbs and 2 oz, which is in the 46th percentile. She was 30" inches long, which is in the 76th percentile. And her head remains enormous at 18.5 inches in circumference -- a whopping 93rd percentile.

Zadie's First Birthday Party

Zadie got a birthday cupcake and loved everyone singing "Happy Birthday" to her.

All was well until she tried to play with the flame on the candle. Ouch!

But it was nothing that couldn't be healed with a yummy cupcake with chocolate frosting. This was really Zadie's first ever time to eat sweets and everyone cheered her on. She ate with relish and got the chocolate frosting over everything, including her pink tutu.

Grandma Linda really felt adamantly that Zadie needed a first birthday party. She helped us arrange the whole shebang and here she is with Zadie before we pummeled the pinata.

Surprise! My parents surprised us all by driving up from San Diego to catch the very end of your first birthday party. Guess they decided they couldn't miss out on the fun.
About 25 people joined us at the park today to celebrate Zadie's birth exactly one year ago. Of course, it's hard to imagine it was that long ago. Whew. Zadie wore the pink tutu that my mom made her and then, after she got chocolate frosting all over that, she slipped into this pretty dress that cousin Cheryl made for her. Everyone had fun and we played croquet, smashball, and bashed in a pinata. Thank you to everyone for attending and for Grandma Linda for putting this together.

Ode to the Rogers/Wilson Side

As we approach the one-year mark and I will soon be printing this blog out so that it can become Zadie's first year baby book, I've been teasing Grandma Linda that she needs to take more photos of her and Zadie. Despite the fact that she lives in Washington, Grandma Linda comes for long visits of about a month or so and spends her days taking Zadie on bike rides along the beach, checking out all the finds at the swap meet, getting a Jamba Juice in Manhattan Beach, and teaching her new songs and tricks. But, through all of this, we somehow have very little to document that all this happened. Maybe it's because Linda moves so fast that we can't slow her down for a photo. In any case, we definitely want Zadie to look at this book and know that her Grandma Linda was an important part of her first year of life. And the same goes for Aunt Susie and Uncle Hank. Uncle Hank, in fact, has taken wonderful care of Zadie and is her personal "manny."

Here's some photos from their trip to the Santa Monica farmer's market today.

The Croup

Zadie is sick again. This time she's got the croup. Not sure if you're supposed to say croup or THE croup. I told Tori that it sounds like some affliction you'd catch in East Texas in the 1950s. She said she thought it sounded like an STD. It started with wheezing, a dry cough, and a little bark that sounded kind of like a seal. Now it's kind of more like a cold with a runny nose and the whole nine yards. The rubber snot sucker thingie has been hard at work. I generally avoid snot sucking and leave it to Tori, but even I have gotten into the act this time around.

Zadie is asleep now and Tori is in our bedroom reading a Shel Silverstein book. I can hear her chuckling every once in a while. Zadie, I hope you'll enjoy his books as much as I did when I was a kid. "The Giving Tree" is still one of the saddest books I've ever read.

Photos By Kimmy

Kim took some wonderful photos this weekend and I thought I would just post these two of Granddaddy Hal and Grandma Denise. But there are so many other great ones and you can view them all here. Thank you, Kim, for taking these. We want to hire you!!

San Francisco Photos

Here's the three cousins in matching piggy pajamas. Zadie stayed at Kim's house for two nights while we were in SF and had a great time playing with her cousins.

And here's me and Tori headed out for a night on the town while my parents babysat. We went dancing and had a great time!

Charlotte (Nika's daughter) graciously allowed Zadie to take a bath in her bathtub. She wasn't so gracious about sharing those bath toys, though! How cute are these two?

Tori made us walk all the way up Lombard Street (the curviest street in the world). It's like climbing up a mountain or something. Did I mention I was carrying Zadie and it was a really hot day?

This was an amazingly beautiful day. We walked from the Powell station, through Chinatown, and into the park in North Beach. This is at Columbus Park in North Beach.

Weekend in SF

Tomorrow is Tori's birthday, so she wanted to come to San Francisco for the weekend and do all of her favorite San Francisco activities. We're staying at Nika's place right now and my parents are staying with Kim and watching Zadie for us for two nights. We really do miss her, but it's also been great to sleep in.

We had a little brunch party yesterday and Kim and Eric, the twins, and my parents came into the city. Kim took some great photos and posted them on her blog. Thanks for taking these special photos, Kim!

When I get home I'll post some photos of Zadie and Charlotte, Nika's daughter. It's been so fun to see them play together!

Memory Lane

Zadie's first birthday is quickly approaching and I'm feeling a bit reflective about how much she has changed in this last year. I started this blog when Zadie was about three and a half months old, so I never really posted any early baby photos. I plan on turning the first year of this blog into a baby book for Zadie through a service Kim told me about called Blog2Print, so I want to add a few photos from the early days.

The top photo is one that I really like because it's great of Tori and I love that Zadie is just completely asleep throughout the photo shoot. It's funny to think of how newborns can just sleep under any conditions.

The next photo is one with Grandma Linda when Zadie was only one week old. You can get a glimpse of her very calm nature in this photo (Zadie's, not Grandma Linda's!).

The next photo was taken at about two months, so you can really see much more of Zadie in this one. I think she looks beautiful. Her eyes look blue here -- I think this is right about when they started to change color. They were hazel for a few months, but right now they are light brown and I think that's what it is going to be for life. I love her brown eyes!

The final photo isn't very flattering of me, but I like the scene. This was taken when Zadie was three months old and when she was still sleeping in her co-sleeper (like a playpen that raises up to the level of our bed so that we can reach over and grab her from bed). We loved our co-sleeper because we got to sleep "with" Zadie, but we never had to worry about smushing her. Zadie is wrapped up in one of Tori's famous swaddles. I could do a decent swaddle, but Tori's were always works of art and Zadie couldn't get out of them. I also like this photo because it shows us taking a nap in the middle of the day and it reminds me of how exhausted I was during this period of being in grad school, having a newborn, and working full-time. It's so odd that I was sleeping on my back and with my hands like that -- I never sleep on my back and I must have been really zonked to be able to sleep like that. I'm really glad those days are over!

Drive-by (the good kind)

Last Saturday my parents decided to come for a drive-by, or at least that's what they called it. They had been on vacation in Texas for the past two weeks and weren't able to spend the night, but they missed Zadie and wanted to see her. So they arrived at noon and left at about 5pm.

Zadie was in a good mood and happy to see both of them. We walked over to the park and took these photos. We're really lucky to live in a neighborhood with lots of parks, schools, shops, and a library. Zadie's Uncle Hank often takes her to this playground to play with the other kids (we don't want her to become a spoiled only child!).

Grandma Linda has been in town since Christmastime and I need to get some photos of her and Zadie. It's hard though because she is frequently riding her bike or rollerskating -- Zadie gets to go, too -- so it's just harder to slow down and get the camera out.

Sick

Zadie is almost one year old and she has never really been sick. We've been so fortunate. But a few days ago she caught a stomach virus and started vomiting. It was so awful. She vomited every 30 minutes or so from about 5:30pm to 11pm. Even after she fell asleep, she would wake up and dry heave in bed and I would put my hand on her back and her whole little body would be retching.

I know how much I hate being sick, so I can't imagine what it would be like to be that sick for the first time. When she was vomiting she would just look at us with this pathetic, confused look and of course there was nothing we could do to help. Thankfully she ended up sleeping through the night and was fine the next morning, but I hope she doesn't get that sick again for a very long time.

I just read Anne Lamott's book "Operating Instructions" and I highly recommend it. It's about her first year as a mother and it's hilarious and brutally honest. Thank you to Ms. Sobel for giving it to me.

Rogers Sing-a-long

Zadie spent her first Christmas with the Rogers family at my parents' house in Julian (thank you, Mom and Dad, for letting us use your home!). We had 23 people crammed into their house and we had a great time. Well, I think maybe Zadie had a bit of culture shock because this was her first full-on Rogers family experience and she wasn't quite prepared for the noise level. She's used to being an only child and living in a quiet, peaceful environment, but over Christmas there were tons of kids screaming and lots of cousins and other relatives who wanted to hold her. She's always been good about going to other people, but she must have gotten too frazzled and she didn't do so hot. But towards the end she got better and she's just going to have to get used to it -- she'll be having another sibling sometime soonish!

After Julian, Zach's family (5 kids worth) came to Manhattan Beach for the week and stayed with Aunt Susie. They came over for dinner last night (minus nephew Aaron, who had just gone home to San Diego). Here's a video clip of Zadie hanging out with the Zach Rogers family and loving their singing. One of my favorite things about spending time with the Rogers family is getting to sing so many fun camp songs. "I Am A Conductor" is my personal favorite, although sadly that one is not featured in this clip. Check out Zadie laughing -- I wanted to zoom in on her, but thought that would be too Zadie-absorbed!