Archives for “Parenting”
In the last week: Annie’s grandmother died Zoe spent her first period of time apart from Annie (3 days) Burrito (our cat) is not eating, which is how her sister started deteriorating before we had to put her down. I worked a 66-hour work week Our friend Eric was in a motorcycle accident (he’s got [...]
Over the holidays, Zoe spent a lot of time with her cousins. Since she’s an only child and the only girl in the group, it’s pretty interesting to watch how differently she reacts to situations. In general, she’s delighted to see the boys’ high energy and rough-housing, and she likes to join in. Unfortunately, she [...]
“Her name is Pot-Lock Robot. She’s an acro-bat. She’s only four months old! You see her? She’s being so crazy! She’s got an owie.” – Zoe, telling me about her baby doll
Annie: Okay, I’m going to count to five, and then we’re going to be all done with this. Zoe: Mommy, stop talking! I’m going to count to six. Annie: And then we’ll be done? Zoe: No, I’m just counting to six.
I was taking photos of Zoe in the backyard, and when she noticed, she ran over to the chair and struck this little pose. She held it long enough for me to snap a single shot, and then ran over, demanding to see the photo. Her reaction was “I so pretty!”
This is old news by now, because I’m a lazy parent-blogger, but Zoe has (long-since) given up her crib and moved into a toddler bed. We bought her a very nice bed for her second birthday, and she loves sleeping in it. Most nights, bedtime involves one parent (usually Annie) handling bath, teeth, and reading [...]
These are the details that she’ll kill me for sharing when she grows up, but I don’t want to forget them, so apologies to future Zoe (and future me!) Zoe is totally potty-trained now, and it was suspiciously easy. To the point where I’m half convinced that we’ll wake up one morning to discover it [...]
Since Zoe was very little, it’s been my job to clip her nails. The funny thing is, you would expect a small child to resist this, but Zoe has always been fascinated with the whole process. She sits calmly in my lap, and holds out her hands and feet. Once she got big enough, we [...]
The very first thing anyone ever said about our daughter was that “she’s got a mind of her own!” That was the ultrasound technician, back when Zoe was still in the womb, but it’s just as true today. No matter what we’re doing, she’ll find a way to put her own spin on it. Here [...]
Zoe was a little young for the beach last year, but we’ve managed to take her a few times this year, and she’s always very excited. She loves playing in the sand and even (with a bit of coaxing) splashing in the creek — though she refuses to touch the actual ocean, and when it [...]
If we take Zoe to the park for a half-hour, she will spend 20 minutes of that time watching what all the other kids are doing. It’s not that she’s shy, really. She loves other kids, and will happily play with them — once she’s watched them for a bit. This particular photo was taken [...]
Don’t worry about the fact that you can’t see anything in the video – it was taken in Zoe’s room with the lights out, while Annie tried to put Zoe to bed one night. For several nights in a row, I had been laughing while listening to Annie try to put Zoe to bed. She [...]
Dear Zoe, You are two years old, and it is absolutely crazy how much you have changed and grown lately. You’ve recently started going to Co-Op daycare, started jumping and doing somersaults, become fascinated with reading and writing, and singing and talking. You are always busy and high energy, and everyone thinks you’re adorable.
I just realized I haven’t been posting about Zoe much lately. I’ll try to make up for that with a few photo posts, but let me kick-start the process by sharing a few things:
The controversy about the possible connection between vaccines and autism has been in the news again lately. Portland is a sort of alternative-parenting Mecca, and I know people who fall all over the map on the vaccination issue. The only constant seems to be very strong feelings on all sides. We talked to people who [...]
It wasn’t too long ago that Zoe used to be completely uninterested in food. While her cousins and friends would gleefully eat anything and everything on their parents’ plates, Zoe would pick uninterestedly at her food and then tell us that she was “all done.” We weren’t really worried about it, because we knew that [...]
Vanessa: “There is no fun in my life!” Dr. Huxtable “As you get older, it gets worse.” – The Cosby Show
Zoe started walking a few weeks ago. She’d been building up to it for quite awhile, and it’s suprising how quickly it’s become her primary method of getting around. For the first week or so, walking was a novelty — a game she would play with us, or something to make people clap — but [...]
The other day, Annie and I noticed that Zoe has just enough hair to put it into little tiny pigtails. As you can see, I was greatly amused by the results.
Zoe has been sick off and on for about two weeks now. It started with an ear infection, which got bad enough that her doctor put her on antibiotics. Then she got a bit of a cold, threw up a couple of times, and then diarrhea for about a week. Plus she’s been teething. Yesterday, [...]
Distraction seems to be our current favorite parenting tool. “Can you imagine,” my friend Kathy, also a mother of a two-year-old, once asked me, “if you and Michael were fighting and you were furious and in tears, but he was just like, ‘Mmm. I know. That’s too bad. Hey, honey, look at the blue jay! [...]
Birth: I was called home from work because your mom went into suprise labor 3 weeks early. After just a couple hours of pushing, you were born in the bathroom at 3:30 in the afternoon. You weighed 5 pounds, 5 ounces, and were 19½ inches long. Oh, and your mother nearly divorced me for trying [...]
