adventures at home and abroad

Michaela and I have been spending a lot of time at home lately, considering the weather and Adam's super busy work schedule. Michaela recently has been enjoying the aprons Grammy made her. She prefers wearing them both at once. And she also demands that I wear my apron the same time she has hers on. Unfortunately, I do not look as cute as she does.

On the one sunny day we had on "spring break" week - which really means nothing to us at this point - Michaela and I went to the Sherwood wildlife refuge and went for a walk. She probably walked 3/4 of a mile all under her own power (and at a very slow speed for me!) As much fun as the walk was, and looking at the birds and playing in the gravel, the most fun by far was weaving in and out of the bicycle rack at the head of the trail. Who knew we didn't even need to leave the parking lot?!

safety first?

Grab the camera, take a photo, all the while saying, "Michaela, I don't think that's too safe."

freezin' in central oregon

At the end of February (yes, I'm still a month behind in blogging cool things that we have done, perhaps that's because we're so bogged down with the uncool things we're doing... staying inside because everything is constantly rainy, gray and muddy) we took a break from the mundane and went to Black Butte with my parents. Poor Adam, unfortunately, had to work, but Michaela and I took off on a great adventure. Michaela hadn't really seen snow before, and there was plenty of it. It was also the coldest I have ever been - the last morning there the thermometer read 10 below zero when I got up in the morning. But the snow was a nice change from the rain - at least I thought so, don't think Michaela was so sure. These are the only pictures we got of her in the snow because this was the only time she allowed us to take her outside and play in the snow.

 



But she did enjoy looking at the snow on the deck through the window.


We really didn't do much of anything while we were there, besides snowshoe a little, and venture into Sisters (which is really dead midweek in February) and have a yummy yummy donut at the famed Sisters Bakery. We took this picture for Adam to show him what he was missing.

And oh yes! The purpose for our entire trip was to go to my cousin Janae's baby shower. We got to spend time with her the day before, and then go over again for the shower on Saturday morning. I am so excited to find out whether Janae and Mark are going to be having a little guy or a little gal as an addition to their family. Michaela had fun with Nana but wasn't sure about the other 25 people who were at the shower. She did eat her weight in blueberry muffins, though, and slept much of the trip home, completely exhausted from her big day.



Checking out Aunt Karen's pantry, Bella in tow



Children's Museum

In the drizzly days of January, Sarah and I decided to fight off the post-Christmas blues and take our girls to the Children's Museum for the day. Even for such little girls, it was great fun! It was hard to get pictures of Lily and Michaela together, since they (especially Michaela) were constantly moving on to check out something else. And since we used a free pass from the public library and it cost us nothing but gas money to go, we'll definitely go again! It certainly wore out the kids, possibly us moms as well. Enjoy the photos!

Lily - a fisherwoman

Going in? Coming out!

All the attractions with water were the best, as far as these girls were concerned.

Looking sharp in her full-body smock

We probably should have spent the entire day in the water room, because nothing else was quite as interesting.

18 months, 13 days

That's how long it's been since Michaela joined the family. Here's some info about what our little toddler is up to these days. At her 18-month medical appointment, Michaela was declared to be a healthy little gal. She weighs 21.5 pounds (10th percentile for her age) and is 32.75 inches tall (75th percentile). She got one vaccination, but luckily doesn't have to get another one until her 2-year appointment! That will be the longest stint she will have gone without an immunization. The doctor expects Michaela's verbal development to skyrocket over the next few months and encouraged us to try to get her to say words out loud which she currently uses hand signs for (like "please," "thank you," and "more"). Words she does have in her vocabulary right now: Mama, Dada, blanket, milk, more, up (pronounced "bup"), doggie, book, bye-bye, and a very mangled attempt at banana. She understands nearly everything we say, though, and I find it incredible on a daily basis. I had to ask the pediatrician about the 3 'P's at this appointment - peanut butter? potty training? and pillow? The answer was yes to the peanut butter, since we don't have any peanut allergies in the family that we know of. As of now, Michaela doesn't seem to like peanut butter, a great disappointment to her mother. Potty training... the doctor says Michaela is still really young and just said to do all the things I have been doing - sitting her on her potty chair, both clothed and without a diaper on, and waiting for her to do her thing. And Michaela is way past the risk of SIDS now so when I find a small pillow that I like, we'll put it in her crib. Lately I've noticed she's been wadding up one of her blankets and laying her head on it. Hmm.




Using a spoon to feed herself Malt-O-Meal... a work in progress




With cousin Genevieve at Playdate PDX - a fun indoor park!



Unfortunately her 18-month check-up was bookended by ear infections. One at the end of January, and one on the mend now. It was a scary time for Adam and I as we tried to figure out why Michaela was running a fever, was so lethargic and yet cranky, and wasn't sleeping for any length of time at night. The first time I took her to the doctor, she just had fluid in her ears, but it wasn't infected, however after the course of a weekend (during which poor Abbey, Dave and Greyson were visiting) Michaela had developed a double ear infection. Conveniently she loves the pink color and bubble gum flavor of the antibiotic. Then about a week or so after her last one cleared up we awoke to her crying and running a fever in the middle of the night... again. So I gave her a day and when it didn't seem to get better, off we went to the Children's Clinic and it was confirmed - yup, an icky ear infection.  So we're 4 days into this next run of antibiotics, and she's getting close to feeling better again, for which I am very grateful. We have, however, gone through an entire bottle of children's ibuprofen.

But back to happier things... here are some other funny things Michaela's been up to lately:

-- coloring in her coloring book, just a little scribble on each page

-- closing doors (say on me while I'm in the laundry room) and then knocking on them. She also likes to close herself in a room (i.e., the bathroom) and then knock

-- she's into talking on the phone - but only fake phones. Just today she was talking into the calculator.

-- diapering her baby dolls. Actually, I do the diapering, and she does the undiapering. Multiple times per day.

-- climbing backwards down our staircase all by herself. However, it's so much more entertaining if she's also carrying one or two items in her hands.

-- dancing with her index finger pointed up to "This Little Light of Mine"

-- going down slides; the small one in the church nursery she goes down on her bottom, but the big one at the park she can go down feet first on her tummy

-- and of course... READING! We read and read and read and read and read...



Michaela, Isaiah and Lily at Lily's first birthday!!



Family Photos

At the end of the year, Adam's friend Kyle was in town with his wife to visit family, and they kindly stopped by to see us and to take some family photos. We enjoyed catching up with Kyle and Haley, and also enjoyed sharing a meal with them at Chipotle.

Is it 2011 already?

As the approximately 3 of you who read this blog may have noticed, it has been an embarrassingly long time since I last posted the doings of Team Puckett.  I'm not really sure what has happened, except that I started using naptime for something other than writing a blog post. I started out reading the Lord of the Rings trilogy, as cultural enrichment, and it turns out that I am really enjoying them. I only have about 100 pages left to go in the entire story, so please no one ruin it for me! So yes, naptime for Michaela has been decadent reading time for me.  Hopefully in days to come you will get to see some of the exciting things we have been up to in these cold and rainy first weeks of the year.

O Christmas Tree...

Several Saturdays ago, our family went to get a tree from a Christmas tree farm connected to one of Adam's co-workers. We are so thankful for their generosity!! Since we didn't get a tree last year, this really was Michaela's first Christmas tree outing experience. She loved it. I realized how come I love the Christmas tree cutting day so much - I experience all of the reward, and all of the hard work is done by Adam! He just smiled when I observed this - apparently he had already noticed that fact.

Posing with our selected Christmas tree - notice their matching boots!

The face of pure excitement

More excitement as it appears the tree is coming home with us!

"My first Christmas" bootie ornaments from Grammy (we received them last year, but they are unappreciated by a 4-month-old)

Ta da!

From Baby's Point of View

Now, when I say "baby" I actually mean Michaela's baby doll, who, for lack of creativity and effort on the part of her parents, is largely called "baby doll." It's 9:00 am, and where is baby doll currently spending her time? In between being carted around in the arms of her loving, if not gentle, mommy Michaela, she is tucked into the green tupperware lettuce crisper that has been in Michaela's play drawer for months. Every morning (and sometimes several times during the day) the lettuce crisper is dumped upside down to empty it of unwelcome toy contents and carried to baby doll. Baby doll is placed in (right side up, thankfully) and then carried around. This morning, however, there is an extra special touch. Baby doll has been wrapped up cozily in my kitchen dishtowel (surreptitiously stolen from the oven door where it hangs) and then placed in the crisper. Of course, by the time I finish this post, Michaela's moved on to other things and I didn't get a photo to prove it, but just enjoy the mental picture. Happy Friday, all!

Giving Thanks for Family... and Heat

A bit about Thanksgiving...


Michaela is happy to be eating her 2nd, or 3rd, bite of chocolate!!



Our little family had planned to travel up to Adam's parents for a couple of days prior to Thanksgiving. Then, be prepared, everyone-- the warnings for Arctic Storm 2010 appeared on the news! As many of us predicted, nothing too wild and woolly actually materialized, and so we continued north, where things got considerably colder and snowier. Adam's parents told us that they didn't have power, which happens a lot to them so we didn't think it through. The difficulty specific to this storm, however, was that the tree across the street had actually fallen on their power lines out front. So when we arrived for family fun times, the temperature in their house was 56 degrees. By the time the power company had taken down the tree, fixed the power lines,  and the heat kicked on (24 hours later) the house was 50 degrees. Not terrible, but enough for Adam to walk around shrouded in a blanket the whole time. I still maintain the memories will not soon be forgotten: eating dinner by candlelight, sitting talking around the fire, drinking mugs of warm hot chocolate and cider to stay cozy, playing board games by daylight, and analyzing the tree on the power lines outside.



Michaela and super-cute cousin Greyson

 We tried not to ponder what prepping Thanksgiving dinner was going to be like if we only had the gas stovetop. It was the closest I've been to camping all year, and I savored nearly every minute (the toilet seats were pretty cold).


 

 Luckily, the power came on just in time to prepare desserts for the extended family dinner. As you can see, Michaela was loving the pumpkin pie. She tried and seemed to like most everything on my plate, but I'm pretty sure she ate almost an adult-size serving of dessert. Her mother's child! We had fun with the three second cousins being together: Cousin Sally's daughter is 2 1/2, Michaela at 15.5 months, and Greyson at 4.5 months. Greyson slept through Thanksgiving dinner, as apparently we weren't exciting enough for him. He'll take it all in next year, though, I'm sure.

So very much to be thankful for.