Dinner with Dad

Since Mom has been late getting home the last two days, we've had dinner with Dad. Dad would really rather watch G'town play basketball than feed the kid, so Margaret has spent a fair amount of time in her highchair messing around with Cheerios. It turns out that we've discovered a few things in the process.

First, food can be fun! In particular, when lots of Cheerios are plopped on our tray, they don't have to go into our mouth. Instead, we can throw them all over the place! Such entertainment! Especially when Dad admonishes us: "NO!" gets a pause and a perplexed look in response followed by more tossing of Cheerios. Dad has learned to limit the number of items put on the tray at one time since a rapid movement of the arm can quickly clear away a few dozen Cheerios. However, Maddie sure seems to enjoy that game.

Second, the highchair itself can be a source of entertainment. Especially when Dad pops up and down from underneath the tray going "BOO!" Such shenanigans lead to peals of laughter as does tickling of the feet underneath the tray. Of course, it's all probably exacerbated by extreme fatigue (which Dad also doesn't worry about too much during a good basketball game.)

Here comes trouble

Videos!!!!

It's so exciting to be able to use YouTube......

So the sound isn't well tied to the video, but it's free so who can complain?

Margaret in the command post on 12/28



Margaret in her high chair on 12/30



And best of all, Margaret playing with Maddie on 1/28

Daddy-daughter day

Margaret and I spent a day puttering around the suburbs of DC out near where Abby works. Since we had to get the car serviced at a dealer out there anyway, we figured that we'd spend the day going to the outlets (to buy baby clothes) and, gasp, Walmart (to buy cheap diapers and wipes.)

After the oil and front headlight were changed, we stopped at a Petco to get food for Maddie. Although Margaret fell asleep in her captain's seat in the car (Abby likens it to a Barcalounger since it's so plush) and I managed to transition her from the car to the Baby Bjorn without waking her up, I just had to wake her in Petco to see the ferrets and other animals. The fish got a giggle as did the birds, but the big hit was the hamsters, especially those running on their wheels and the ones messing around on the glass to check us out. We also met Samson, a very frisky golden retriever puppy whose owner kept trying to reign him in as Margaret giggled uncontrollably while he sniffed her.

Our trip to the outlets was uneventful with a few purchases of baby wear and some minor fussing, the latter of which probably stemmed from Dad's hesitance to bother with the changing room. Given that it's so cold and Margaret's bundled up, it's difficult to justify a full scale visit to the "family bathroom" without a really pressing concern (i.e. a stinky diaper.) A diaper change in these conditions involves 5 minutes of clothes removal which inevitably makes everyone involved unhappy. The result of this inattention on Dad's part led to a wet diaper that weighed about 2 pounds by the time that we got around to changing it. But I don't think that Margaret was too uncomfortable since the technology behind diapers is amazing at this point (something that I never appreciated before her arrival.)

Beyond appreciation for the advanced technology of baby hygiene, another new development is the type of stores that we visit when we go shopping. There appears to be an entire genre of stores that I never ever ever frequented before Margaret's appearance, but that now comprises our primary destinations and serves as the site of our little shopping triumphs - we got a Osh Kosh B'gosh winter coat for next season for $9.99? Whooo hooo. There's a Little Me outlet? Carters? Baby Gap?!?! I start hyperventilating when I think about how much money we can save compared to the outrageous mark-ups that are charged on baby clothes at retail. Funny how priorities change, although as befits the genes that I inherited from my maternal grandfather, I've always been, ahem, frugal.

While waiting for Abby to get off work, we did another exciting first: a car wash! Margaret wasn't pleased to be in her car seat at that time of the day and the line for the car wash was long, so to keep things from getting really unpleasant, I reclined my seat and kept inserting Cheerios into her mouth to keep her happy. When we got into the car wash, there was an initial moment of apprehension after which she seemed to be trying to figure out what the heck was going on. She wasn't really entertained (or scared) so much as she was perplexed. But she was engaged as she kept looking back at forth while the big mats when swish-swish over and around the car. Before getting Mom, we then stopped to eat some kiddie food in a Burger King parking lot at which point, as I was talking with a friend on the phone, Margaret, with a full mouth of mixed-up raspberries, pears and cereal, looked at me, grinned and gave me a big bronx cheer.

Margaret at day care

Although it's now a few months old, this is Margaret's first "class picture" from day care in the GSA building (you can click on the picture to enlarge it.) Kids transition into the toddler room on a regular enough basis that the class list is pretty fluid, but on the front row (from left to right), you've got Yuta, Ms. Kiran, Erin, our little Margaret, Ms. Jakki, Brooke, some kid I can't remember, Ms. Krystal, and sleepy little Sean. The back row has goofy Kevin, Ms. Claire, Katie, Big Ben, Ms. Dominique, Mickey, Katherine, Ms. LaDonya, and Wyatt. It's funny, but I know almost all of the kids by name (and they recognize me too based on the big grins I get when I come to visit or pick up Margaret), but I know none of their parents. This seems to be the case for other parents too since while we recognize each other and exchange pleasantries, they all know Margaret by name. Frankly, some of the kids can be pills, crying and fussing a lot. But all of the caretakers seem to really like Margaret. She's a "busy girl!" they say, always messing around with stuff, especially stealing toys from other kids. She doesn't nap very well (never has) and fusses when she's hungry, but I think that they view her as a pretty happy, good humored kid. My Jakki likes to "dance" with her, while Ms. LaDonya says that they have "serious conversations." And Ms. Kiran likes to sing standard kiddie songs, albeit in a droning sort of style reminiscent of south Asian music. Lately, I think that they've given up on getting her to nap more than once during the day, so she has been zonking out while bundled up in the Baby Bjorn during the walk home.

Turns out that Ms. Jakki is pregnant, so I told her "You know, Ms. Jakki, kids can be difficult." As Wyatt was precariously climbing on top of a toybox, Sebastian was having a meltdown, and Sean was putting some unidentified thing in his mouth. She just gave me a beatific smile while Ms. LaDonya giggled.