Family
Heartfelt updates about family milestones and everyday moments. From taking Mazie to college and annual visits to the Renaissance Festival to Swedish‑pancake breakfasts and VR outings with the kids, this category celebrates togetherness.
Best Kiss Ever
Mazie is growing up so fast. She’s such an amazing kid. For the last couple of months if I asked she would come over and give me a kiss on the cheek. Well this weekend she decided all on her own she was going to give her dad a kiss! Man was that awesome. I was holding her and she comes around and gives me a smack on the cheek. I’m still beaming!
She’s doing really great. I can tell that she’s trying to learn how to deal with stairs which has her, at times, over-protective dad freaking out. I’m constantly lurching to grab her as she approaches anything resembling a stair. She’s doing a lot better walking along with me – she stays with me well for as long as a block only wandering off a little bit.
She is also starting to talk more and more. She’s figured out “help”. If she gets into a tough spot walking around, or wants something off of a counter, she will ask mom or I for “help”. She’s got “dog” or “cat” down well, including a very convincing “meow”.
She just gets better and better, and being Mazie’s dad is the best job I have. 🙂
Celebrity Spotting: Doug Savant
We are all in Iowa City this weekend to see our friends Lisa & Eric and particularly their new baby girl Rachel. She’s as cute as can be and so tiny! I know Mazie was that tiny, but I have no real recollection of it.
We are staying at the Hotel Vetro, which is an overly hip hotel for Iowa City and while going to the elevator today Tammy saw someone in the hallway she was positive she knew. She stopped the guy while telling me “Isn’t that someone we know?” I looked at it wasn’t, but it was one of the actors from Desperate Housewives, Doug Savant.
I checked online and his wife is from Iowa City so I would guess they were here visiting.
Nintendo DS Lite
Yesterday we were at Best Buy on my occassional visit to wonder around the store and just check stuff out. Tammy finds these trips annoying since I rarely buy anything, and after 5 minutes decide to leave. Yesterday though I decided to check out the gaming aisles and stumbled on the Nintendo DS. I had read about these “brain games” for the DS in Scientific American Mind magazine and was intrigued. They had one of these on the demo unit so we played it, and it was pretty fun. 10 minutes later we walked out of the store with a DS Lite and three games.
I decided that my ban on ever buying a gaming console again (at least until Mazie is old enough to find it fun) was not applicable since this is a portable unit. So far, it’s a lot of fun and the portability makes a great for flights. The initial set of games we got were Brain Age, Big Brain Academy and Super Mario Bros. Now it’s time to start looking up information on hacking the DS! 🙂
Looking for Land
Tammy and I have been talking for a couple years now about getting some land that we could eventually (10+ years) build a house on and maybe live on when Mazie (and any other potential, future kids – settle down Grandma’s, no news here) have moved out, etc. I’ve been thinking that we shouldn’t bother waiting to get the land until then – prices are likely to be higher and we could use it right now as a getaway on weekends.
This Friday we did our first road trip to tour some options and looked at 6 properties in the Red Wing, Zumbrota area of Minnesota and in Wisconsin on the other side of the river. Mazie was with her grandparents so driving 240 miles in the country was actually pretty fun. We are looking at property between 15 and 25 acres. We want something within one to two hours from the Twin Cities. We want something fairly wooded, with a good building site. Electric service is not needed.
It was really good to look at these properties because it helped clarify how we would use the land and what qualities are important for us. There is a lot that we want to do.
First, a small living option is necessary right away. Tammy did a bunch of research and found this great option for us called the miniHome. As soon as you own the land, you need a place to stay on it and the idea of camping every time you visit wasn’t that appealing to either of us.
The miniHome is a near ideal solution for this. It’s rated as a mobile home so it can be brought to a site without any special police escort. It’s designed to be ecologically friendly and self-contained. They have an option that puts solar electric and a wind turbine with it for complete off-grid usage. It has reservoirs for water and waste. In short, this is a one-stop solution to having 350 square feet of comfortable, heated space with all the conveniences you would expect. The only thing lacking is air conditioning, which you could add if you wanted. (Note: it even has an ethernet network!) We would plan on leaving this on the land to be used as a guest option as well.
The other structure that we would need right away would be some sort of utility building. This essentially would be a 2-car garage. This would be where the solar array and wind turbines would come together with a battery bank to store electricity. The utility building would house all of this and also provide storage for a car and other tools. I would probably need an ATV with a trailer that could be parked in there as well.
Obviously we need to identify a good spot for an eventual home. There are a lot of structural issues to consider for this. However, we would add other issues as well since we want it to be efficient and integrated with the location. Correct sun alignment would be important for passive solar heat, for example.
All of these locations would require access by large machinery. Everything else would be fine just being accessible by ATV.
I would want to have a nice, big firepit on the property. Ideally this would allow 10-15 people to enjoy a fire, and include an option for open pit cooking as well. Preferably this would be in an area with a lot of trees.
For the evenings, and since we’d have the dark sky for it, I would want to put up a dome for my telescope with a permanent mount. This would be wonderful and make it so much easier to take in the night sky. This would ideally be in a fairly open area, on the highest point possible to get the best view to the horizon. Electricity is necessary but can be easily provided by a small solar PV module and an isolated battery. I would need to extend the network to it as well, most likely using some sort of wireless option.
It would be a shame to have a bunch of land without a good spot for a garden. Tammy and I are far from green thumbs, but we definitely want this option. And last but not least we want to have a cool walking path that would snake through the land and connect everything up. This would allow for nice, evening strolls or just serve the utility of getting to various places.
We also learned that the approach to the land was important for us. We didn’t like land that was right next to a busy road. We liked it much more when you left the highway, then took a smaller road with may eventually meander to a gravel road for access. Also of importance is what is around you. We really liked one property but didn’t like that there was a big campground a couple of miles down the same road.
There is much more research to do, much to learn about this, and we aren’t in a rush. However, it is pretty exciting to think about the potential!
Wordplay
Last night Mazie’s aunt came over and babysat while Tammy and I went out for a “classic” date – dinner and a movie. We went to Wordplay at the Edina Theater. It was a fun movie all about the world of crossword puzzles. Sound like a topic that doesn’t really deserve a movie? Well, that just means you aren’t aware of the annual crossword puzzle tournament and the ridiculous speed at which some people solve a crossword puzzle (just over 2 minutes!).
The movie was great, and particularly fun for me since I have so many geeky hobbies: rc helicopter? rc cars? telescopes? home network? solar power? Watching Wordplay is like getting a 90 minute pass into this world of crossword puzzles. To an extent, you could envision a movie about one of your geeky hobbies with you in the hotel convention center talking to the guy about how amazing your telescope, helicopter, car is.
Fun, lighthearted movie.
PAX
Tammy and I decided that we wanted to make sure to raise Mazie understanding the value of charitable giving and in general “doing good” in the world. One of the things we are doing to that end is making a donation to a charity of her choice (or our choice on her behalf until she is old enough) on her birthday. This year we decided to support PAX, an organization that is working to reduce gun violence amongst children and teenagers. I attended an event of theirs a few weeks ago and the numbers were shocking. Eight children or teenagers die everyday as a result of gun violence. Even more shocking is the fact that more houses have guns than Xbox’s.
PAX has two main programs. The first is called “ask.” and is aimed at parents. The simple goal is for parents to ask if there is a gun in the house before their children go to play somewhere. Awareness is key, and many accidents happen while children are playing and some of the parents have no idea a gun was even there. The second is “speak up!” which is a toll-free hotline for students to report gun related concerns in school. The hotline receives over 15 calls a day of reported gun issues in schools, and coordinates with the school administration to respond.
They are an impressive, national organization with low overhead and a passion for working on this issue. Hat’s off to them and all the great work they are doing!
Happy (Delayed) Fathers Day
Being a dad rocks.
That pretty much sums it up. I could just end this comment now and be done. Dad’s that are reading it would understand. In fact, the openness of the statement is ideal as you can consider all that individual greatness of being a dad with your kids.
This year was my 2nd fathers day. It’s fun that Mazie’s birthday is right before fathers day. It makes for a better day as you are already celebrating how awesome it is that your child has grown more and more.
Mazie is so cool. She’s a pro walker now, rarely falling or getting tripped up. She even does pretty well on uneven surfaces with actual shoes on. She’s really verbal. She ranges from her version of dog, banana, gypsie, logan, mom, dad to her tendency to be, as Tammy and I put it, squaky.
She is a strong willed kid. She knows exactly what she wants to eat, in what order, and will clearly communicate it to you. She has started to play games with me. She’ll pretend like she’s going to come to me and turns away at the last minute giggling. Simply put, it’s pretty awesome to watch this little girl growing up.
Being a dad is a pretty great thing. I realize that it’s so much easier than the mom side of the fence. No being pregnant. No delivery. No breastfeeding. Even the things that are shared, this dad gets the easy route on. I change a tenth of the diapers Tammy does. The hardest thing I do is going away on business trips, but I credit that away time with making me truly appreciate the wonder that is my kid.
I love my kid. I love my wife. I love being a dad.
Safety Stairs
I’m a super-excited Dad! I’ve been on the search for a long time for a gate that we could put on the stairs in our house and was having no luck. And now that Mazie is mobile, the lack of a child gate was elevating my blood pressure significantly. The problem? One of the sides that the gate must connect to is relatively short.
The left side in this picture is only 30.5" high. This turns out to be a major problem with most child gates. I was lucky to find this one at USA Baby that turned out to be a perfect fit for the space. If you have a challenging spot this is a wonderful gate.
I can now relax a bit while Mazie runs all over the top level of the house.
Mazie Walking!
Two weekends ago Mazie really started to walk. She’d been able to take a step or two for a while, but while we were in Lanesboro on the Olson Family trip she “took off” and decided she was mobile. In the last two weeks she’s gotten pretty good at it and now pretty much demands on walking on her own. Here is a video of her walking at the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum. (Excuse the video quality, it was taken with my Canon S500 camera in movie mode, with a shaky hand.)
Add Video.
Mazie at 9 Months
It seems amazing that in only 3 more months Mazie will turn 1! She is doing great. She has recovered from her 2nd real cold with lots of coughing and sneezing, and most notably plenty of running nose. An almost never-ending amount actually. She’s decided she likes baby food and we think she has her 2nd set of teeth coming in since she’s been eating her hand pretty much constantly lately.
She’s turning into such a little kid now. She likes to babble at you for a while and will share some stories with you. They are pretty short still, but it’s just amazing to hear her voice and particularly to hear her giggle.
We had a trip to Ikea this weekend and Mazie and I had a great time while Tammy shopped with our friends Lisa and Eric who were in town for the weekend. All sorts of fun to be had at Ikea.
Mazie has chosen to stay fairly immobile thus far. She’s not crawling, and from the looks of things she is likely to just skip that whole process. She doesn’t like being on her belly at all. She does love it though if you hold her hands and let her walk around the house or around stores. She finds that to be a great old time. She can scoot around pretty well and can make it all over her play area.
I’m itching for spring to come and for us to be able to spend more time outside. We ordered a bike carrier/jogging stroller (Chariot Cougar 2 if you are interested, I’ll post impressions of it after we get it).
I put up a whole bunch of pictures from January and February. Don’t miss the pictures of her in the bowl.
Mazie Graduates to Bigger Car Seat
We got Mazie’s next car seat today, a Britax Marathon. They had a sporting pink one with flowers all over it, but we went for the more neutral and car appropriate (oh, and washable) version.
Mazie tried it out at the store and she loved it, or at least she didn’t yell at us right away. She is big enough now that she can use the bigger car seats but not too big for her infant seat, so we’ve still been using that. I’ve been thinking that she finds it annoying and wants to move up to the real car seat and stroller combination. That way she can sit up and see more things. She’s always craning her head around trying to look at things. I’d find it annoying at least.
Mazie is finally over her cold. Just some minor sniffles at this point. Tammy and I were able to catch it before she fought it off. Luckily we are able to blow our nose and have cough drops.
Mazie's Sick
So yesterday when I got home from work Mazie was having dinner and she was really sick. She didn’t seem nearly as sick when I went to work. She had a full-blown cold. She woke up this morning not feeling any better.
She has had a cold before, when she was very small. It wasn’t that big of a deal – runny nose and some mild coughing. This one is different though. This is her first, real cold. Nose is going crazy. She’s super-congested. Coughing stuff up. And I’ll tell you it’s killing me!
This morning I gave her a bath while Tammy was at the gym and after the bath, which I think she sort of liked with the cold and all, she would cough and then wimper. I could tell her chest was hurting when she was coughing. And what could I do? Zip. I just held her and she hung out with me a lot less excitable than she usually was. To prove the point, when Tammy got back from the gym Mazie just hung out with me and didn’t feel a need to jump into Tammy’s arms as fast as she possibly could (as is typical).
I sure hope she gets better soon. I don’t know how much of this I can take!
Quick Mazie update – she has teeth! Her bottom two teeth have come through and boy are they sharp. I know since I was feeling them this morning and she decided to take a bite on my finger.
Mazie Sleeps Through Night!
For the first time in the 196 days since she was born, Mazie slept through the night last night. She enjoyed restfulness, with minimal disturbances, from 7:00 pm to 6:10 am. Her mother was extremely excited but realistic that this is not a pattern yet. Her father was proud but thought she did this all the time. News at 11!
Mazie at 6 Months
Mazie turned 6 months old on Dec. 14th, and she had her 6-month Doctor appointment on Monday. She’s doing just great. She’s just growing faster and faster. She’s essentially 75th percentile for weight, height and head circumference. She’s mastered sitting up now and loves to sit on the couch or on the floor with tons of toys all around her banging things and having a blast. She’s also started real food now. She only had rice cereal, aside from milk of course, until she was over the 6-month mark. She’s started oatmeal now and really likes it. We’ve tried carrots which she was a bit suspect of, and at this point she’s decided that bananas are not for her. Whenever she gets a mouthful of bananas she gets a really funny look on her face.
I can tell she’s super excited about Christmas, or perhaps I’m just more excited about Christmas because of her. She’s going to love digging into all her toys. 🙂
Celebrity Spotting: Al Franken
Okay,so maybe this is the Minnesota version of a celebrity spotting. It’s not Madonna, or Bono, or any other single-named person (really, how pompous do you have to be to only have one name?).
Today when Tammy, Mazie and I were going into the Galleria for some shopping, we were passing in front of the entrance of Barnes & Noble and there is Al Franken getting out of a black Lincoln town car. Apparently he was in town for a book signing event so a lot of people had this “Celebrity Spotting”.
Anyway, we didn’t gawk or anything. Didn’t want to make Al feel awkward. 🙂
Home Vacation
I’m taking this week off, using up some of my remaining vacation time before it vanishes. Tammy and I are not feeling adventurous enough to go on a big trip with Mazie, so we are staying home for the week. I’ve picked a couple of projects to work on (like I need more of them!) and spending time relaxing and hanging out with Tammy and Mazie. We have some babysitting arranged so we can head out and have some outside fun as well.
I’m feeling really pumped about what I’m working on at the office lately (read: change the world), and it’s hard to disconnect. But, I know it’s healthy and I will come back after a week with even more focus and clearer vision.
'tis the Season
The holiday season is now officially upon us. We were at Southdale today and Mazie got her first picture with Santa! She didn’t have a lot of things on her list, but I clearly heard Santa mentioning something about the Teletubbies.
She had a great time today going around to different places and getting carried around by Mom and Dad. Such a cutie!
Santa’s little stand there had several print options, along with the option of getting a CD with the “Hi-Res Digital Photo” on it. I asked what resolution it was and none of Santa’s little helpers knew. They were shooting with a Canon Digital Rebel, so I asked if it was just native resolution of the Rebel. They figured yes. $26 later I have a CD with a 3.15 megapixel image on it. Now, that may be “Hi-Res” to some, but it’s practically a camera-phone in my book. Grrr…