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.
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…