Photo Update

In the playhouse at the public health centre (waiting to get immunized)

Opening and closing the patio doors: a favourite past-time.

 

 

 

Listening to Daddy's "muh" (music)

Getting so tall. How do you feel about walking, kiddo?

A good part of every day is spent bombing around our place with her bee.

August

I really need to post more regularly because when I sit down to post after more than a month I feel like there's so much to catch you up on. There have been some big events around here over the past few weeks, so I'll do my best for now, and I promise to post more frequently from now on.

On August 9, James was called to the Bar. It was the culmination of three years of law school plus one demanding year of articling (combined with an intense first year of parenting) - definitely an achievement worth celebrating, if you ask me! We were so happy to have James' parents, Granma, brother Sam and his wife Anne here for the occasion, close family friends Ken and Georgia, and my parents too. It was a lovely ceremony at the courthouse, followed by a reception at the firm and a nice family dinner to cap off the day. Charlotte was at the bar call too - or most of it, anyway: she got tired of sitting and not being able to explore the courtroom, and my Mom kindly offered to take her out and kept her happy in the foyer for the last few minutes. In the evening a friend put Charlotte to bed and stayed with her for the evening so we could enjoy a leisurely late dinner. In addition to celebrating James' accomplishment we just really enjoyed the chance to visit with family. Charlotte seemed to enjoy it too. No surprise there - apart from the half hour bar admission ceremony she was generally the centre of attention!

 The other big event of late has been my return (turn, more like) to work and Charlotte's start at daycare. I'm teaching a course this semester at the smaller local university, conveniently located just a fifteen minute walk from our place, and also working on finishing my dissertation. In order for this to happen, we placed Charlotte in daycare at the start of September. I'm not going to lie - we're still in the adjustment phase, and it's been tough. The first day was pretty good, the second day a little less so. Then there was the long weekend, followed by a bad teething day (the only really bad one she's ever had) - it was a non-teaching day so I stayed home with her. The first day back after four days away was so rough that the staff were concerned that Charlotte might be getting sick and called James to pick her up at 2:30. They hadn't been able to get her to sleep, eat or drink. But when she got home she was happy as a clam and put food away like usual, so we knew it was difficulty adjusting rather than sickness. The upside of this is that we've been really impressed with how the staff have handled it and the care they've given Charlotte. She's in a daycare at an elementary school just up the street. She's in the youngest room, for 12 to 24 month olds, and there are three staff for ten children (in theory -I've never actually seen more than eight there at any one time). All three are so calm and gentle and because Charlotte's been having a tough time they've been giving her a lot of one-on-one attention. The last two days of the week went better than Wednesday. She has a blanket from home there now for nap time, along with a couple of familiar books, and most importantly, she brings her Rabbit with her now. It's an adorable fat rabbit that Uncle Dan and Aunt Sarah gave her for Christmas. Charlotte is really into stuffed animals and blankets these days (anything soft), and the Rabbit is her favourite (with the pink bear her great-grandma gave her a close second). She's been clutching it so tightly at daycare that she's made permanent little handprints. Kind of heartbreaking, but it's definitely helped! Because my schedule is flexible she's only going for about six hours a day, with a 1 1/2 to 2 hour nap in the middle, and I feel really fortunate for that. I'm expecting tomorrow to be a rougher go again, but hopefully by the end of the week she'll be starting to feel a bit more settled and secure there.

I'll save an update on Charlotte's emerging abilities and personality for next time, except to say that she's becoming more and more affectionate which has been really gratifying for us. It's so sweet and affirming when she crawls over and puts her head on our legs, or snuggles her head into our shoulders, or ever so often, plants us with a full on kiss!

Last week the weather was the hottest week of the summer, hitting 30 degrees.

One

Last Monday Charlotte turned ONE. It's hard to believe that a year has past since we brought that little 7 pound, 9 ounce bundle with the skinny legs and the fuzzy hair home from the hospital and started our life together as a family of three.

Charlotte still has the same bright eyes, but she's changed in so many other ways. I took her for her 12 month immunizations this week and she weighed in at 23 pounds, 12 ounces with a length of 30 1/4 inches (maintaining her place somewhere in the 80-90th percentile for height and weight). Our chubby pumpkin has been slow to move, but in the past couple of weeks she has begun to crawl more proficiently and pull herself up to sitting and standing. It's so much fun to see her little head peaking around the corner as she comes to find us in another room. And it's such a change to see her sitting or standing up in her crib when we go in to get her in the morning or after her nap. She's still furniture-surfing, but now uses walls too, and can stand unsupported for short periods.

Charlotte's verbal abilities are also improving. She often pronounces the first consonant of an object correctly, ie. "buh" for ball, "duh" for duck, "muh" for milk, etc. She can say "ma ma" and "da da"  - exactly that way, with a gap between the syllables - but more often it's "mamamama!" or "dadadada!" She has her own versions of animal noises that we find pretty entertaining. Charlotte talks to herself when she's playing, and when she's caught up in playing she has a funny habit of using her legs to spin herself around in a circle while seated, usually with a stuffed animal or small toy clutched in each hand.

Since Charlotte's birthday was on a weekday and we don't have any family in Edmonton I decided to invite a few girlfriends with babies to join us at a neighbourhood park in the morning for a little celebration. It was a beautiful sunny day and I think Charlotte enjoyed it. Going with a bug theme, I used caterpillar invitations, we gave Charlotte a large helium bee balloon on the morning of her birthday and then brought it along to the park, and I decorated bug cupcakes (recipe courtesy of Martha Stewart). Needless to say it was a more involved dessert than I usually go for but then I've never had a child turn one before! It was kind of fun - and James helped. Despite the theme, the mosquitoes actually stayed away for the most part - an improvement over the previous weeks. James was able to skip out of work and drop by the park for a short while (and deliver coffee for the adults), so we gave Charlotte her cupcake and sang to her while he was there.

I wish I had more photos of the actual party, but it all went by so quickly. Fortunately a friend captured a short video of Charlotte receiving her birthday cupcake (Thanks Lana!) as well as a couple of photos of the moment. I hope these give you a taste (sorry, cupcakes are all gone!) of the occasion.

Catching up with her friend Madi

Swinging with Jake

 

  

Summer

Wow, the days and weeks fly by and suddenly I realize it's been six weeks since a blog post. In the interim we enjoyed a wonderful long weekend visit from James' Mom (and Charlotte's Granny)  in June and spent the first week of July in the B.C. Shuswap with my family. Since I have a backlog of photos on the camera (but mainly since it's been a busy day of cleaning and errands) I'm going to go light on the writing and let the pictures do most of the talking. Unfortunately it seems that when we're around extended family we almost completely neglect to take photos - too busy savouring their company. So the photos I'm going to share document what Charlotte's been up to around the house lately... I promise I'll be back again soon with a more substantial post.

This child loves the bath...

...and loves teeth "brushing" almost as much.

Snuggles

Looking out at our patio. She's getting pretty good at spotting "buh" (bugs).

Charlotte's favourite activity at the moment: pushing chairs around. This one's not light!

She's pretty pleased about the whole standing/furniture surfing thing.

I'm never sure if she has a destination in mind...

What's a baby blog without a bare bum shot?

If you're happy and you know it

The first year of a baby's life is a constant process of change, but we're struck by the way Charlotte's development seems to happen in clusters. In the past month or so Charlotte's ability to communicate with us has improved significantly. Some of her new abilities include clapping, waving, and pointing. And it's now clear that Charlotte understands a lot of what we say to her. We estimate that she recognizes at least fifty words. These include: Mommy and Daddy;  "outside", "tree", "park", "bubbles", "ball", "book", "clap", "wave"; names of animals; body parts such as "hair", "hands", "feet", and "nose"; "cup" and many of the foods that she eats.

Charlotte is also better able to communicate her likes and dislikes. At the moment some of her favourite things to do include: standing up in her crib (and standing in general), going on the swing at the park, playing with the laundry basket, and "brushing" her teeth (ie. sucking on her toothbrush). It follows that her biggest dislikes are being interrupted from doing any of those activities! Fortunately she's easily distracted from her displeasure at this stage.

Follow our blog

I just wanted to let you all know that I've now added a new "Follow" gadget to the sidebar on the right. If you sign up, you will be notified by email when we've added a new blog post. Or, if you prefer the suspense, you can just keep checking back on your own every so often...the good ol' fashioned way!

Spring

The Victoria Day weekend couldn't have come at a better time - James has been really busy at work lately (it seems like we're always saying that) and we're loving the change of pace this long weekend. Charlotte, our normally fantastic little sleeper, is also in the midst of a transition that has put a bit of a wrinkle in things - she's now moving around like crazy in her sleep. That's not a problem per say, but she's been rolling onto her tummy, which is not her favourite position, and if she rouses and finds herself that way she gets upset. It's not that she can't roll herself back, but she doesn't yet know that she can, so in the meantime we find ourselves going in to roll her back so she can settle back to sleep. I imagine this will resolve itself soon enough, but last night I was up an unprecedented three times to re-position Charlotte. So today James and I are taking shifts looking after Charlotte and resting, and the fact that I am now catching up on email and blogging in bed at 11:30 a.m. feels very luxurious!

This past week we enjoyed gorgeous, 20 plus degree Celsius weather, which has meant trips to the park, windows and patio door wide open all day, and lots of barbequing. Charlotte loves going to the park, which provides new places to stand supported and other children to watch. She has fair skin, though, so even with a hat, sunscreen, and keeping in the shade as much as possible we've had to limit her sun exposure.

The arrival of spring has breathed new life into Edmonton. Every year that we've been here I've been amazed at how green and lush the city becomes - at the end of a long, bleak winter it is easy to forget. In contrast to Calgary, which is quite arid, Edmonton is a woodland environment, and it is evident now not only when we walk in the river valley nearby but even on our tree-lined street. Although our neighbourhood is primarily made up of apartment buildings, it is an older area of the city and well treed. On Wednesday I took Charlotte to the downtown library for a baby program we like - it's a comfortable half hour walk from our place, and she had her morning nap on the way. Afterwards we enjoyed our lunch outdoors at Winston Churchill Square (by city hall) with our friends Megan and Noah. Many downtown workers were also enjoying their lunches in the square (including the Mayor - our minor celebrity sighting) to the sounds of live music. The downtown farmer's market opened on Saturday, and the three of us walked there for a quick browse and some hotdogs (though none for Charlotte yet). It was a beautiful day and packed with people. To me this is city living at its best, and it's been fun to start sharing it with Charlotte.

Grass!

A Jack Layton rally in Edmonton. We didn't quite get close enough for a kiss for Charlotte

"Reading", a new favourite pasttime.

Happy baby