Evelyn's first Easter egg hunt

This morning we went to an Easter egg hunt at the Piney Branch Elementary School in Takoma Park. Evelyn's FIRST Easter egg hunt! We staked out a spot on the field with four plastic Easter eggs and Evelyn surveyed the area, sat down, mouthed the eggs, put some eggs in her basket, took some out and was delighted at the new experience. She wore her bunny ears we found at the store yesterday and got her photo taken for the newspaper--hopefully it will make it into the article and I'll be posting a link to the photo! In the meantime, I've posted an album at Picasa for you to see Evelyn bunny at the egg hunt.

Directly after the egg hunt we headed over to Rockville for Ben Cavanaugh's first birthday party. Evelyn loved the pumpkin muffin/cake, asking for more, moRE, MORE! Luckily we got two muffins to take home with us and the recipe. She also got into the present process, playing with Ben's toys right alongside him, smiling, waving and truly enjoying it all. She took 4 steps in a row on her own, a new personal record, toward one of Ben's relatives. I stood by in awe as my baby took steps so confidently and quickly that she was really walking. The past 3 weeks I've been considering her steps as cute antics not entirely connected to walking, but seeing her today made me realize that walking is not so far off for her. And what a whole new world it will be for Evelyn when she can walk--or should I say run? We had such fun at Ben's party and seeing Evelyn play with Ben's presents gave me some ideas for her birthday. Bongo drums, for instance, were a big hit today and I like the sound they make. The fisher price Barn was another hit, although I prefer the old school ones that say, "Moo!" when the doors open (the doors don't even open on the new one!).

What an exciting day! Of course, there are photos of Ben's party in the Picasa album with the Easter egg hunt photos.

Photos from our January trip to Kansas

Back in January when we were visiting the Lerners in Lawrence, Kansas, they hosted a very nice party. I took some photos and have finally posted them at Picasa HERE with a few other photos fro our trip to Kansas, including photos of Rachel and Dean with Evelyn.

At the party, Evelyn wore a lovely dress in which she looked like a snowflake (to me), little tights and black patent leather shoes. Many of you may be astounded at my attention to Evelyn's clothes, especially those of you who are familiar with my own style in clothing (or lack thereof). Dressing a beautiful baby girl is just so incredibly fun. I love it. One of my favorite things each morning is picking out an outfit for Evelyn. And on the weekends I love to go shopping for baby clothes. erm...toddler clothes...?

Kerplunk!

Evelyn's latest game is called Kerplunk! She sits up, catches your eye and then slowly lets herself fall over while you say "Kerplunk!" Then she rolls over, sits up and does it again. Usually she does this on the bed, which is where she developed the game with Nana while skyping with Grandpa. But lately she has also decided to Kerplunk in the bathtub. She has no fear. She doesn't mind the water washing over her, she just rolls herself over and sits up, albeit sometimes spluttering. I, on the other hand, feel my pulse racing and tremble while I try to keep that happy fun smile on my face. This is so scary, but so great that she likes the bath and doesn't mind going under water! Swimming lessons this summer would be fantastic!

Baby steps

For about two weeks Evelyn has been taking single steps to get to me, Michael or Nana or to go from the footstool to the window ledge. The past two days she has taken 2 steps in a row. She is still wobbly, but making progress. The moms at the play group last week were calling her a toddler. My breath caught in my throat at that. My baby could be a toddler soon?! How can nearly a year have gone by so quickly?

Dairy update #3: major progress

We have made incredible strides on the dairy front. I am afraid to talk about the amazing strides for fear that I will jinx the whole thing. I am regularly eating yogurt and cheese and I have eaten 1.5 pieces of Pops's cheesecake. YUM! and some banana bread with butter in it. I can't bring myself to put butter on my food or drink a glass of milk yet, but maybe soon...I don't even know what to cook these days, everything tastes SO GOOD with cheese on it. Tonight I ate some leftover black beans with CHEESE and avocado. A random meal, but SO GOOD. Almost anything could be a meal when you add cheese!

But the best part: Evelyn has been eating yogurt every day this week. She bangs her hands together to tell me the sign for MORE! MORE! MORE! when I get the yogurt out. And she has had cheese twice without incident. And, some banana bread made with butter (more enthusiastic banging of her hands!). A whole new world is opening up before her. In less than 3 weeks Pops will be here and I believe cheesecake will be on little Evie's menu:)

Baby sign break-through

This week Evelyn started using some new baby signs and really focusing on signs in general. It's like she suddenly fully realized the importance of using her baby sign language and is gung-ho to move it to the next level. She's been doing milk, water and potty on occasion for the last three months or so, but not necessarily when she wanted any of those things and always with a look of silliness on her face like she didn't quite believe what she was doing. But now, she has a whole new relationship with those signs. She is visibly thoughtful before she does one of the signs and she is using them in situations when she is frustrated because she wants something and isn't getting it.

She picked up the sign for "more" this week and is so thrilled to use it. Our most difficult times of the day (Althea is laughing hysterically thinking of the differences in scale we have between Evelyn's and Sylvia's difficult times...) are when Evelyn is eating. At nearly every meal she gets fussy (maybe frustrated? with us?) at least briefy and we distract her by using the sign for water (and giving her water from a cup) or by putting her food in a dish of brewer's yeast for her to fish out. We often wonder if she has to use the potty since she almost invariably pees during her meals. But really, who wants to take off the tray, wipe the baby down, take off the bibs, remove the clothes, hustle over to the potty and wait to see if pottying was the source of the fuss?!

Now that Evelyn has learned that she can tell us she wants more of something, she has used that sign at every meal. it doesn't hurt that most of her meals have involved blueberries or mangoes in the past three days:) And she does it with such character. She'll do the more sign and then clap, as if to say, "I'm amazing! I just said 'more!'" Just tonight she started fussing when she ran out of blueberries and when I asked her if she wanted more she became very thoughtful for a few moments, did the sign for more a few times and then clapped. It was so adorable...all 10 or 15 times she did it.

A mom who was nursing her second child told me last fall that it wasn't worth teaching a baby signs since they only really use them for a few months before they start to speak anyway...I was so disapointed in my heart to think that moms in-the-know think signs are a waste of time, but I decided we should do signs anyway. And, I'm so glad I did. Just the past three days have been amazing. The pleasure Evelyn gets from communicating, the break-through in understanding her fussiness at dinner, both of these things are so worth the absolutely minor effort we've exerted in teaching her signs!

Now we have to get that signing book and DVD out (thanks, Ben!) to refresh ourselves on the signs while Evie is so receptive!

skipping work and dairy update #2

Yesterday I took the afternoon off of work because it was absolutely beautiful, 60 degrees and sunny and my office doesn't have a window so I was feeling trapped and yucky. I left work around 2:30 p.m., picked Evelyn up, picked Pippin up and drove to the Rachel Carson Greenway. We hiked for about 1.5 hours in the warm sun stopping to throw the ball for Pippin and watch him swim across the creek to get it. We saw trees gnawed down by beavers, we got very intimate with some moss on a rock and some old leaves, we touched tree bark and baby budding leaves, we sang songs, we talked about the rooster (Cock! says Evie) and the turkey (Gobba! says Evie) and we threw the ball some more for Pippin. It was a wonderful afternoon.

We then messed it all up by my trying some food at Trader Joe's that unbeknown to me had whey in it. Poor Evie had a very rough day today, lots of crying, refusing to eat or drink or be happy unless Mommy was holding her. Poor dear, I thought maybe the dairy problems were over. Maybe tomorrow will be better.