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.
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Changing tables? Waste of time and money. First of all, changing a baby that is sideways in front of you is stupid. Second, you never take the baby to one of these changing things, you just change them. I insist on Mazie having her feet toward me to change the diaper.
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The crib in the baby’s room? Try the crib in your room. Today we moved the crib up into our room. The family bed is great, but going from that to a crib in her room, in another room, is too much. Crib goes to our room for a few months, then into her room. (Or so we think…)
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Mazie currently doesn’t dig anyone but Mom holding her after around 7pm. Nothing to learn here, just that this stuff happens, it will change in a while.
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Stuff is everywhere, almost, and she’s still not mobile yet! The Intellitainer has taken over the fireplace. And the great thing is, I don’t really care.
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This swing is the most important thing in the world.
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Function over form. Who cares how it looks, it works.
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When the baby is melting down, and you know Mom can make it better, but you really want to try, don’t. The continued meltdown results in frustration for baby, you and Mom. Know when to fold ’em.
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Honda Odyssey. ’nuff said.
'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…
Music Everywhere!
A few months ago I bought the Roku M1000 MP3 player for Mazie’s room. I really liked it, even wrote on here about how great it was. Well, I liked it so much I decided to buy two more. Not the M1000, but the cheaper M500. Roku was running a sale, I think moving them out to make room for new models. I picked up two to put the whole music collection in the bedroom and a yet-to-be-determined location.
Install was easy as can be. Hardest part was finding a power outlet for it. (Note to self, need to redo power in bedroom!) Still like these units, even though I’m ultimately left a little frustrated with UPnP servers.
Mazie Moves... To Her Bedroom
Newsflash! Mazie has moved to her bedroom! This seems like a pretty giant step to me. I took her crib apart and moved it out of our room into her bedroom on Sunday night. Last night was her first night in there. She was a brave little girl, sleeping all by herself in that big room. It was a little shocking to have our bedroom back. Seems like there is all this room now, but it’s nice for us and I think she was ready as well. She seems to sleep a bit better in her room, it’s a bit more quiet.
She also figured out last night how to kick the music toy in her crib. After a few hours we started hearing music on the baby monitor and it finally dawned on us what she was doing.
I still miss taking naps with her though – she won’t do that, at least not easily, anymore.
2005 Olson Family Weekend
Last weekend was the 2nd annual Olson Family weekend. This is a fairly new tradition on Tammy’s side of the family where everyone does a mini-vacation together for a weekend once a year. Each year someone different plans it. Tammy is excited for the 3rd one next year already because she is planning it. 🙂 This year started off well by being much warmer than our trip last year up past Duluth.
Corinne did a great job picking this years trip to the Wisconsin Dells, or as those in the know call it, “The Dells”. We stayed at the Wilderness Resort cabins, which were very nice. The Wilderness is a little crazy, it’s a giant resort, waterpark, golf, spa location and I think it has some locals unhappy – but they seem to be doing a very good job. Tammy and I went to Sundara a while ago and loved it, which is also a Wilderness property.
It was a nice weekend with days outside hiking, geocaching and exploring the Dells, and nights goofing around and playing Xbox. I put up a number of pictures from the weekend. It was also Mazie’s first trip to Wisconsin, and she had a nice time hanging out with all her aunts and uncles (grandma and granpda too!).
Mazie's First Concert
On Saturday Mazie went to her first concert, and it was rocking! Our neighbor suggested that we go to see Ralph’s World with their family. Mazie had a great time!
When I first walked into the concert I was a bit surprised. It was loud! Not as loud as a show I would have went to at 1st Avenue, but a far, far cry from a guy with a guitar. Ralph’s World looked like a real band. Dudes in t-shirts and jeans, guitars, bass and drums. The three things that were a tip that this was a kids concert were the hundreds of kids having a blast, the song titles like “We Are Ants”, oh and the predominance of minivans in the parking lot.
I really thought Mazie would be screaming mad due to the volume, but she was digging it. She had a great time but had to cut it short because she got tired out.
If you have kids (you know who you are, see the minivan comment above), you should definitely haul the kids to a Ralph’s World concert. You will have some fun too!
Just Typing
Sometimes I just feel like typing something on this here website. I guess that’s the advantage of being the site operator, author, editor, publisher and everything else.
This has been a busy week. I’ve been completely absorbed with this project at work. We finally got it launched today and I really think it’s one of the, if not the, most amazing thing we’ve done. If you are curious, go to MarketWatch when the market is open (M-F 9:30a to 4:00p ET) and look at news stories, quotes, etc. You’ll see the quotes are streaming at you. We did this ourselves, and it was a massively challenging and fun project. I was literally unable to sleep, waking at 4:00a most days, my mind whirring with ideas. I’ve gotta take some time this weekend and decompress a bit. I put some especially peaceful music on my iPod so when I wake up in the middle of the night I can try to listen to that to help me sleep.
I sort of took today off, even though Mazie and I went into the office for a couple of hours and I was email for a couple more hours at home. We had furnace contractors, roofing contractors and our landscaper over today to discuss projects. I pulled the trigger on the furnace one so that is going forward. I need to decide on the roofing project soon so that I can let the solar guys (we are also looking at solar heat and electric) know what is going on.
We are starting phase 3 of our landscaping project. First phase was the front yard, 2nd was some hardscaping in the back yard, and this final phase is the conversion back to native plantings for the undeveloped area in our backlot. It was completely filled with invasive plants, and we are now getting ready to transform it. It will be perhaps the most challenging and interesting of the projects, but the least visible, at least from the curb as it were.
I’m debating the whole solar thing. I’m not sure what I think about having 4’x6’ black panels sticking up off the top of the house for heat. The solar electric stuff is much less obtrusive, but has a lot higher cost.
We are heading to Wisconsin for a family weekend with Tammy’s side of the family. I expect it to be a blast. May pack up the telescope since we’ll be in darker skies. I feel a little bad that I haven’t given that the time it deserves. I really do have too many hobbies. It’s just that everything is so interesting! 🙂
Mazie Mazie Mazie
Little Maze is getting less little by the day it seems. Along with getting bigger she’s really developing a lot more of a personality. She’s got her “I want mom” cry, her “I’m hungry cry”, and her “I want mom” cry. Did I mention that one already? We went through a few days a while back where she decided her dad simply would not do. If I tried to hold her she just threw a fit. She’s gotten a lot better at that too, throwing fits that is. She can get her legs and arms shaking, and just wail. If this gets beyond a certain point there is nothing you can do but give her to mom.
She’s also having a lot more fun cooing and blabbing to herself in the middle of the night. She particularly likes it when her dad tickles her and blows on her belly. She giggles away for a good long time. This ends up being endlessly fun for her dad and fills his heart with big amounts of pride and happiness. If you can make your kid giggle you can do anything.
We have her four month appointment next week. That seems to have arrived quickly. I think Tammy may disagree with that assessment though. That means another round of shots, no fun. We are looking forward to getting an okay to start giving her some food. We acquired a high chair already continuing our pattern of getting baby stuff well ahead of the need for it.
Maze loves her new mini-van. She thinks it’s just great. She particularly likes the navigation system. :-)
Tammy and her sisters threw a surprise birthday party for their mom recently and she did a little photo shoot with Maze and the birthday stuff. Some great pictures, check them out. My friend Dan and his wife Melanie are about to have start this parenthood thing any day now! With these 4 months under my belt I get to give advice to someone like I actually have a clue what’s going on. That’s fun too.
Honda Odyssey
Ever since Mazie arrived we have been learning that taking a car seat in and out of a station wagon is not a terribly comfortable thing to do. We’ve also been planning on getting a new car for Tammy. We started looking at minivans a few weeks ago and today we pulled the trigger!
We bought a 2006 Honda Odyssey. I got completely “shiny pebbled” (shi-ny peb-bled, v. 1. to get obsessed with bright and shiny gadgets and forget all practicality) as we were exploring our minivan options and went all out on the Touring edition with DVD and navigation system. I worked a good deal (thanks Internet!) and got a reasonable price relative to dealer invoice at Richfield Bloomington Honda. Their Internet sales guy was quick with emails, only took a couple of back and forths to get to a good price and we had a deal done. Walked into the store the next day and did the paperwork. We got the silver pearl metallic color, pictured above.
A year ago I would have told you you were crazy if you told me that I would be all hyper about a minivan, but this thing is so cool! It has every gadget, bell & whistle you could ever want. It’s too much to even go through here, and I haven’t figured out what they all are yet. The side and rear doors are all motorized. I’ve vowed to go as long as possible without actually touching one of those. 🙂 It also has a backup camera, all kinds of different sensors and of course twice as many cup holders as passengers. There is even a 110 outlet in the back with AV ports to plug in your camcorder or game system.
On top of the gadgets, it drives very well with some very notable braking power. I also like the “ECO” mode that shuts down three of the six cylinders to get better gas mileage. It has the run flat tires with the mandatory tire pressure sensors. If you get a flat it just lets you know and you need to get to a shop relatively soon.
Can’t wait for a road trip!
Dad Tips
I’m no expert on this matter. In fact, I’d say I’m far from it. But clearly I’m doing an adequate, or even above adequate job. Some wisdom to share:
Feel free to add your own!
Mazie 3-month Update
I think both Tammy and I are stunned at the thought that little Mazie is only going to be 3 months old this week. The 14th is the big day! She is very excited, I can tell. We are stunned because it seems like forever since she came into our lives. That should not be read as a good or bad thing, but that the period of time before she arrived seems very, very far away. It’s easy to sit back and think of things that happened, say a year ago, and feel like you are reminiscing about a previous decade! Anyway, time goes on for all of us and I’m sure that these first 3-months have seemed even longer for her.
Mazie continues to grow and amaze us both. Since the last update here, she’s developed a lot. She tracks you as you speak, or walk around. She giggles a lot and at least has convinced me that she likes to play little games with me. Mostly this involves me tickling her belly or cuddling her up and rocking her around. Then she giggles, I feel amazed, and we repeat until she’s had enough of it and gets ready to blow a gasket.
Speaking of blowing gaskets, she has started to do that. The last few nights she’s discovered her full-bore cry. We have started to wonder if babies can just get colic at 3 months!? This is when she’s supposed to be settling into more of a pattern and relaxing. We’ve started to put her to bed earlier, partly as a result of the crying. She’s getting more sleep but it’s not necessarily doing anything about the crying.
Mazie went to visit her great-grandparents last weekend and did great. She went through 10 hours in her car seat each way without too much fussing, and delighted us both by keeping a fairly stable nighttime sleep pattern, however she was way too excited to take any naps during the day which lead to some cranky behavior.