Holiday happenings: Part II.

Lest all of you faithful readers out there

actually, you - the person reading this - might be the only faithful reader, but just say for the sake of argument that there are others like you

who have been hanging on the edge of a cliff for the last 10 days and are starting to think that your hopes for a Part II will remain eternally unfulfilled, well, this post was written to provide that catharsis which is so hard to find these days.

Clara was lucky enough to be able to kick it with both sides of the family this Christmas, and she was kind enough to demonstrate her various skills over the course of the morning that they were able to visit.  She moves so quickly, though, that we were only capture a small number of these moments.  But just close your eyes and picture a spazzy little gal who likes squeaking and classifies everything as either "need to chew" or "need to chew again", and you'll have the right idea.

Calm before the storm of excitement.

Reprising her role as le pièce de résistance.

 

Looking earnest.  (I might also note that this was the first day in a loooong time that all of her hair could be found within half an inch of her head.)

Since Christmas, we've also been beginning the long journey of introducing Clara to the concept of solid food.  You know the one - it begins with rice cereal and ends 19 years later with mushrooms. Not being one to turn down an opportunity to stick something new in her mouth, she's exuberantly embarked on this quest.  See, for example, the following pictures of her taking to water like a fish to, um, well, yeah.

  

 

Katie and I often watch the Simpsons while eating dinner, but something about Clara's impersonation of Barney Gumbel tells me that we should perhaps wait until after she's gone to bed...

 

Our house apparently has a problem with static electricity in the wintertime.

 Keep it comin', Mom.

Excerpt from a conversation heard this afternoon.

Me: "Mike was telling me that he really likes the movie 'The Sting.'  Have you seen it?"

Katie: "You mean the one with Sylvester Stallone?"

Me:  "Um, I don't think so.  Robert Redford and Paul Newman were in it."

Katie: "Oh, right - that's what I meant."

...

Although, on second thought, I would probably pay a lot of money to see a remake of The Sting with Rambo playing a major role.

Holiday happenings: Part I.

While it is not a widely known fact, it turns out that, during the month of December, this author has a very difficult time focusing on any task for longer than 5 minutes, due to the tremendous and nearly incapacitating sense of anticipation regarding Santa's visit.  Not surprisingly, this has resulted in some extremely slackful behavior as of late, one consequence of which has been the unfortunate neglect of his duty of downloading pictures from our little friend, Mr. Powershot.  But in an effort make amends for these past misdeeds (or nondeeds), here is a brief voyage through our recent travels through living rooms on both sides of the border that we share with our friendly neighbors to the north.

As you can see, Clara had a number of new experiences in her first holiday season, including the following:

Being alternatively taunted and enticed by a series of large, fake, well-lit shrubberies,

discovering the joy of Christmas morning and the simultaneous wearing of all presents that one receives (this picture taken early in the day), as well as the subsequent discovery of the thrilling multiplicity of experiences that are collectively known as ribbon,

becoming acquainted with her inner Buddha nature,

 

enjoying the documentation of her official holiday role as the "Center Of Attention,"

 

 learning how to karaoke into a carrot stick, and

 

watching humongous flakes of snow accumulate on the front lawn and being secretly glad that she is wholly invulnerable from the threat of snow shoveling.

The snowflakes looked as though they would be delicious to the taste, as they say, but since we're still working on the distinctions of inside/outside and the ramifications thereof, she contented herself with licking the window instead.

Gimme a . . .

So, like, my parents keep trying to push books and, like, reading and, you know, stuff. But what I really wanna do, you know, is, like, wear skirts and, like, waive my arms in the air. SAN DIMAS HIGH SCHOOL FOOTBALL RULES!!!!!!

Sigh. My parents are, like, so lame.

Hey Mom, look at me!!

Clara is amassing new skills on what seems to be a daily basis; however, it is hard to capture these moments on video due to her rapt fascination with the video camera and her tendency to stare blankly at the flashing light whenever it appears. Luckily, we managed to catch her off guard on several occasions and documented some of the major developments of the past month.

This first video documents three of Clara's loves: (1) munching on anything with a strap; (2) viciously attacking the wipes on her changing table; and (3) sucking on her toes.

I'm beginning to fear that Clara has a little bit too much of her Mama's serious nature and not enough of her Dad's fun-loving humor. This rare display of the giggles hopefully proves otherwise.

Clara's new found mobility is still somewhat of a shock to her -- especially when she realizes that she is the victim of self-imposed "tummy time."

An autumnal post.

Lest you think that our little family has been exclusively focused on helping Clara perfect the art of blowing raspberries, Katie and I wanted to assure you that we've been at least as busy as bees (especially considering their sluggish nature in such chilly temperatures as we've had recently).  Here are a few of the other activities that we've been engaged in over the last two weeks:

Ah, good ol' New England exercise.  Strangely enough, we found all of these leaves (and more, since the pile heads around the corner) in restful repose upon our lawn on the weekend before the vacuuming truck came by.  I am presently harboring a sneaking suspicion that our neighbors conspired against us in the dead of night and stealthily moved hundreds of pounds of crinkly leaves into our backyard right under our proverbial noses.  As additional words will undoubtedly fail to accurately express my possibly irrational sentiments, allow me to conclude the description of this picture thus: if it were possible to perish from the condition of sore leaf-raking muscles, I would not be writing this post right now.

It is indeed fortunate that the sense of satisfaction that accompanies a well-groomed backyard invigorates and enlivens the constitution, and my muscles were "back on their feet" (as it were) in no time.

(now, back to more baby)

After such an endeavor, what better way to recuperate than by gorging oneself on turkey, stuffing, cranberry super-yum, and other assorted treats?  Thankfully, Thanksgiving was just around the corner, and we were able to soothe what ailed us by eating large quantities of delectable delicacies.  Which consequently caused a series of different ailments, but that's a story for a different day...

Seeing as Clara hadn't yet really gotten on the solid food bandwagon, my mom decided to prep her for the meal by introducing her first solid food: tree bark.

Clara thought it was pretty freakin' delicious.

Afterwards, we had a little rest.

Katie and Clara peacefully preparing for the gluttony which will shortly ensue.

(pictures of eating excised for the

purposes of good taste and decorum)

After the feast, we had to hose Clara down, as we do every night, and my mom was kind enough to fluff up the towels in the dryer before they were used.  Clara thereby discovered the joys of warm towels, and rolled around in them for about ten minutes before the excitement (and heat) dissipated.

 

 

(the little cutie.)

Katie and I were fortunate enough to have our friends Joe and Marcia visit us over the holiday as well - they moved back to Minnesota a few years ago, but are kind enough to constitute the (adopted) Midwestern segment of our family, and so they came out to meet little Clara and hang out while enjoying the beautiful weather that we had in Boston over Thanksgiving.

 

Clara winds up for a full-body attack on Mel the Squeaking Moose.

Joe tried teach Clara how to do a Charlie McCarthy bit, but every time he tried to do the ventriloquism thing, it just sounded like a baby crying.  Maybe a little more practice will do it next time.

Finally, Clara's been practicing her up-sitting in the boppy.  Here she is looking skeptical after being told that it's a useful skill - will anything be as comfortable as being carried around?  She may have a point...

Is your Mama a Llama?

Perhaps we've read that book too many times, because Clara clearly thinks her Mama is a llama. It's the only explanation for why she repeatedly tries to communicate with us in llamaese.