For a while now, I have done this thing when I wake up in the night and have trouble getting back to sleep: I lie in the dark and imagine what my friends are doing in various time zones around the world. Somehow I find it reassuring and relaxing. When Adriana was a newborn, things changed, though. As I groggily nursed the baby and then rocked her back to sleep after she ate, I imagined all the other mothers who were awake with their little ones. It made the middle of the night feedings less lonely.
For the past few nights, Adriana has had a fever and last night she couldn't keep down any medicine that would help. In the wee hours of the morning, I lay in bed with they hot little baby on my chest--it was the only way she would sleep. I worried about when she would start to feel better and about how I would function today with so little sleep. And then I thought of all the other mothers who were up with their feverish children, kissing the hot foreheads, stroking the damp hair back from the little face, worrying about when it would all be okay, and I started to relax.
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Peek-a-boo
On our trip to Tilden a couple of weeks ago, Adriana had a great time playing peek-a-boo around a tree with my friend Jeff.
It seems like they are having much more fun than when she first met him a year ago:
It seems like they are having much more fun than when she first met him a year ago:
I'm guessing any future babies will be super-colicky to make up for this easy one
I don't know how parents of colicky infants manage. Last night, about an hour after I put Adriana to bed, she woke up crying, which is totally normal. I normally snuggle and nurse her for a few minutes and she goes right back to sleep. I don't know what it is about that one-hour mark, but this has been going on for probably six months now--it's probably the most predictable thing about her sleep. But she's had a little bit of a cold since the end of last week, and last night she couldn't nurse for more than a second or two because she was too congested to breathe through her nose. I tried keeping her upright for a while, hoping that would help the congestion so she would get to where she could breathe well enough to nurse, but, angry that she was awake and that I wasn't nursing her, she cried and screamed, making the congestion worse. Brian and I contemplated whether something else could be wrong, came up with nothing, and I finally just sat in the armchair, held her close and waited.
Thirty minutes after she had originally woken up, she was asleep again. Thirty minutes of inconsolable crying left me feeling so helpless. How do parents whose babies cry for hours every night ever manage?
Thirty minutes after she had originally woken up, she was asleep again. Thirty minutes of inconsolable crying left me feeling so helpless. How do parents whose babies cry for hours every night ever manage?
Friday, April 25, 2008
Nature walk: Tilden Regional Park
Who knew there was more to Tilden than the merry-go-round and steam train? On Saturday, Brian, Adriana and I headed up to Berkeley for a walk with Jeff, and did a six-mile loop through Tilden, that didn't take us by either one. Not that I have any objections to the merry-go-round or the train--in fact, I'll be quite happy when Adriana is old enough to appreciate them--but last month we went with friends to Vasona Park, where she was underwhelmed by the train and frightened by the bell that rang at the start of the carousel ride (and thus spent the entire ride nursing), so I was more than happy to let those things wait. We did stop in at the Little Farm. I'm not sure Adriana really appreciated it, but the rest of us did.
We did pretty much exactly the hike suggested by Bay Area Hiker. It was a nice walk, with pretty views of the canyons and then, at the end, wonderful path with a view of the Golden Gate in one direction and Mt. Diablo in the other.
We did pretty much exactly the hike suggested by Bay Area Hiker. It was a nice walk, with pretty views of the canyons and then, at the end, wonderful path with a view of the Golden Gate in one direction and Mt. Diablo in the other.
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Nature walk: Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve
Last month when Brian's family was in town, we took them to the Russian Ridge Open Space Preserve for a nature walk and picnic. It was a beautiful, perfect day.
Brian studied the map a bit afterwards and was interested in exploring one of the other trails, so we decided to go back two weeks later. And though dark, drizzly days have their own kind of beauty, Adriana is not a fan of wind in her face, a fact of which she chose to remind us every time there was a gust of wind by screaming and bursting into tears. Half a mile into the walk we opted to turn back.
But this past weekend it was spectacularly sunny and 80 degrees (and not humid!), so we decided to try once more. We did a six-mile walk this time, taking the Ancient Oaks trail to the Mindego trail. The Mindego trail eventually comes out on a fire road, and we opted not to do that last mile as it was not shaded and we were nearly out of water, but Brian's curiosity about the trail was satisfied.
Brian studied the map a bit afterwards and was interested in exploring one of the other trails, so we decided to go back two weeks later. And though dark, drizzly days have their own kind of beauty, Adriana is not a fan of wind in her face, a fact of which she chose to remind us every time there was a gust of wind by screaming and bursting into tears. Half a mile into the walk we opted to turn back.
But this past weekend it was spectacularly sunny and 80 degrees (and not humid!), so we decided to try once more. We did a six-mile walk this time, taking the Ancient Oaks trail to the Mindego trail. The Mindego trail eventually comes out on a fire road, and we opted not to do that last mile as it was not shaded and we were nearly out of water, but Brian's curiosity about the trail was satisfied.
Saturday, April 12, 2008
15 months
Last Saturday, Adriana said her first word, declaring "dog" in a loud, staccato voice as she looked at a photo of a dog in a book. We stared at her and glanced at one another. Then she did it again and grinned at us. Now we spend all of our free time trying to get her to say it again. Or to say dad or mama.
"Da da da da da," Adriana babbled on Thursday night, smiling at us.
"Aw, are you saying 'dad?'" Brian asked.
"Um, I think she's just making noises right now, love," I told him. Did I really believe that, or was I just offended that she was saying "dad" instead of "mama?"
"Doesn't matter, I just melted."
"Psssst, kid, now's the time to ask for a pony," I stage whispered to the baby, who started to giggle maniacally, as if she understood.
We're honestly just happy to hear her babbling, as she's never done a great deal of that. Even if she's not talking, she certainly understands a lot. When I say that it's time to feed the cat, she goes into the kitchen and points to the container where the cat's food is kept. She pulls open my dresser drawers and looks to me, waiting for me to ask her to close them, which she then does. If I ask her if she wants to go outside, she runs to the door. A few days ago I misplaced my glasses, and wandered around the house searching for them, repeatedly signing "glasses" and asking Adriana if she knew where mama's glasses were (I was worried that I'd left them within her reach and she'd taken them--not that she would give them back because I was asking). Now whenever she sees me without my glasses (which had fallen behind my dresser), she makes the sign, and then goes to my dresser to point to where they are. I was interested that she learned the sign when I wasn't actually showing her the glasses, since I wasn't sure she would know what I was talking about, but I guess all the times I've requested "Please don't grab mama's glasses" have made an impression. And she manages to communicate fairly well with her sign language. We know when she wants to eat or nurse or get out of her sweater or listen to music. Our favorite new sign is the one she makes now to request a diaper change. Sometimes she doesn't really need a diaper change: she just sees the cat through the baby gate that is on the door to the room where the changing table is and is trying to get us to take her in there. Other times she signs just before she actually needs the change, which we keep thinking holds some sort of promise, although she seems young to be thinking about potty training.
Adriana's favorite thing is to be read to. I am careful not to leave picture books on our nightstands. That's important if I want to eat breakfast and get ready in the morning without constantly reading to her, because as soon as she sees one of her favorite books (these days those are Where the Wild Things Are, The Paper Bag Princess, Pat the Bunny, and some animal books I picked up at the zoo just before she was born) we must sit and read them over and over. And I'm fine with that...after 8 AM. The weather has been beautiful lately, so we've been sitting out on our balcony to read while while we share a sandwich for lunch most days. Any neighbors who are home during the day are probably getting tired of those same books over and over, but I can't think of a nicer way to eat lunch.
She's usually a little shy around strangers, but she can be an incredible ham when she's in a place where she's comfortable. We were doing some dancing around at our yoga class yesterday, and Adriana didn't want to be held as the younger babies were, so she joined in the dancing on her own. She knew everyone was looking at her and laughing, so she danced more, grinning and waving her arms.
She still isn't eating a huge range of foods, but she is eating a fair amount and it's all healthy (well, with the exception of garlic fries at baseball games), so I can't really complain. Most nights she sleeps pretty well. She always wakes up at least once, but I don't mind that--I kind of like bringing her into our bed to nurse and snuggle. Sometimes I expect her to already be in her bed and there is a moment of groggy panic when I hear her cry and can't find her in our bed. The other night I reached for her to my right, found she wasn't there, and turned over to move her from between Brian and me, and discovered she wasn't there, either. I was lifting up the blankets, terrified she was smothering somewhere before I realized that she had just slept for five hours in her own bed and was now standing up in it, looking at me frantically searching for her while she cried to be picked up. And then I lifted her out of her bed and and she rested her head on my shoulder and stopped crying, just like that.
A few months ago, a friend whose baby is less than two months older said of her little girl, "She's not really a baby anymore; she's such a little girl now." And I was surprised by that, because Abigail and Adriana are nearly the same age, and of course Adriana is still a baby. But now as I look at her studying the rosemary on the balcony or looking at a book by herself, I know exactly what Becca meant. It makes me appreciate the time that we spend curled up nursing in the armchair or playing in the bathtub, when Adriana seems very much the baby, even more.
At the ballgame
Picnicking on Russian Ridge
Hiking with dad
Ready for lunch and stories on the balcony
Making the windchimes make music
"Da da da da da," Adriana babbled on Thursday night, smiling at us.
"Aw, are you saying 'dad?'" Brian asked.
"Um, I think she's just making noises right now, love," I told him. Did I really believe that, or was I just offended that she was saying "dad" instead of "mama?"
"Doesn't matter, I just melted."
"Psssst, kid, now's the time to ask for a pony," I stage whispered to the baby, who started to giggle maniacally, as if she understood.
We're honestly just happy to hear her babbling, as she's never done a great deal of that. Even if she's not talking, she certainly understands a lot. When I say that it's time to feed the cat, she goes into the kitchen and points to the container where the cat's food is kept. She pulls open my dresser drawers and looks to me, waiting for me to ask her to close them, which she then does. If I ask her if she wants to go outside, she runs to the door. A few days ago I misplaced my glasses, and wandered around the house searching for them, repeatedly signing "glasses" and asking Adriana if she knew where mama's glasses were (I was worried that I'd left them within her reach and she'd taken them--not that she would give them back because I was asking). Now whenever she sees me without my glasses (which had fallen behind my dresser), she makes the sign, and then goes to my dresser to point to where they are. I was interested that she learned the sign when I wasn't actually showing her the glasses, since I wasn't sure she would know what I was talking about, but I guess all the times I've requested "Please don't grab mama's glasses" have made an impression. And she manages to communicate fairly well with her sign language. We know when she wants to eat or nurse or get out of her sweater or listen to music. Our favorite new sign is the one she makes now to request a diaper change. Sometimes she doesn't really need a diaper change: she just sees the cat through the baby gate that is on the door to the room where the changing table is and is trying to get us to take her in there. Other times she signs just before she actually needs the change, which we keep thinking holds some sort of promise, although she seems young to be thinking about potty training.
Adriana's favorite thing is to be read to. I am careful not to leave picture books on our nightstands. That's important if I want to eat breakfast and get ready in the morning without constantly reading to her, because as soon as she sees one of her favorite books (these days those are Where the Wild Things Are, The Paper Bag Princess, Pat the Bunny, and some animal books I picked up at the zoo just before she was born) we must sit and read them over and over. And I'm fine with that...after 8 AM. The weather has been beautiful lately, so we've been sitting out on our balcony to read while while we share a sandwich for lunch most days. Any neighbors who are home during the day are probably getting tired of those same books over and over, but I can't think of a nicer way to eat lunch.
She's usually a little shy around strangers, but she can be an incredible ham when she's in a place where she's comfortable. We were doing some dancing around at our yoga class yesterday, and Adriana didn't want to be held as the younger babies were, so she joined in the dancing on her own. She knew everyone was looking at her and laughing, so she danced more, grinning and waving her arms.
She still isn't eating a huge range of foods, but she is eating a fair amount and it's all healthy (well, with the exception of garlic fries at baseball games), so I can't really complain. Most nights she sleeps pretty well. She always wakes up at least once, but I don't mind that--I kind of like bringing her into our bed to nurse and snuggle. Sometimes I expect her to already be in her bed and there is a moment of groggy panic when I hear her cry and can't find her in our bed. The other night I reached for her to my right, found she wasn't there, and turned over to move her from between Brian and me, and discovered she wasn't there, either. I was lifting up the blankets, terrified she was smothering somewhere before I realized that she had just slept for five hours in her own bed and was now standing up in it, looking at me frantically searching for her while she cried to be picked up. And then I lifted her out of her bed and and she rested her head on my shoulder and stopped crying, just like that.
A few months ago, a friend whose baby is less than two months older said of her little girl, "She's not really a baby anymore; she's such a little girl now." And I was surprised by that, because Abigail and Adriana are nearly the same age, and of course Adriana is still a baby. But now as I look at her studying the rosemary on the balcony or looking at a book by herself, I know exactly what Becca meant. It makes me appreciate the time that we spend curled up nursing in the armchair or playing in the bathtub, when Adriana seems very much the baby, even more.
At the ballgame
Picnicking on Russian Ridge
Hiking with dad
Ready for lunch and stories on the balcony
Making the windchimes make music
Saturday, April 05, 2008
Recent conversations with Brian
While we listen to the music on this post from Rachel's blog:
Me: I actually like organ music. One time Cyndi and I were at Temple Square, and--
Brian: Let me guess. You didn't get drunk and have sex with anybody?
Out of nowhere as he is doing dishes:
Brian: You know, I really love proof by induction.
Me:
As I read his cousin's Facebook profile:
Me: Rachael likes your music and my music. She likes Jack Johnson and Simon and Garfunkel, and she likes Jurassic 5 and Ozomatli. Okay, basically she likes everything except country.
Brian: Oh, I'm sure if you asked her, she'd say all kinds of nice things about Shania Twain. California Jews love Shania Twain.
Me: (giggles)
Brian: I should feed you pizza and wine more often. You laugh at more of my jokes.
Me: Feed me pizza and wine? I made the pizza and opened the bottle of wine. And did the dishes afterward.
Brian: Wanna make out?
Me: I actually like organ music. One time Cyndi and I were at Temple Square, and--
Brian: Let me guess. You didn't get drunk and have sex with anybody?
***
Out of nowhere as he is doing dishes:
Brian: You know, I really love proof by induction.
Me:
***
As I read his cousin's Facebook profile:
Me: Rachael likes your music and my music. She likes Jack Johnson and Simon and Garfunkel, and she likes Jurassic 5 and Ozomatli. Okay, basically she likes everything except country.
Brian: Oh, I'm sure if you asked her, she'd say all kinds of nice things about Shania Twain. California Jews love Shania Twain.
Me: (giggles)
Brian: I should feed you pizza and wine more often. You laugh at more of my jokes.
Me: Feed me pizza and wine? I made the pizza and opened the bottle of wine. And did the dishes afterward.
Brian: Wanna make out?
Monday, March 31, 2008
Travel journal: San Francisco
As we headed out of the city yesterday, I lamented to Brian, "I don't know about today. I mean, the Giants lost and I got peed on."
He pointed out that it had been an awesome day of doing touristy things in San Francisco: after the baseball game (which, yes, the Giants lost, but it was preseason, so it doesn't count, and we got to lounge around in the sun and look out at the bay)(oh, and I shouldn't forget to mention that it's good to be back at a ballpark that understands the importance of garlic fries) (also: baby's first ball game! baby's first garlic fries!), we walked up to Coit Tower (and actually went to the top of the tower, which I'd never done), then climbed up Lombard Street (I cannot believe I'm actually talking about doing a marathon in San Francisco; nice, flat San Diego was totally the way to go before), and then went for a trolley ride. And (and!) we did it all with my friend Mark who I hadn't seen in years. Which, all in all, comes out to more positives than negatives, even if being peed on (at least it was by my own kid) does get count extra on the negative side.
He pointed out that it had been an awesome day of doing touristy things in San Francisco: after the baseball game (which, yes, the Giants lost, but it was preseason, so it doesn't count, and we got to lounge around in the sun and look out at the bay)(oh, and I shouldn't forget to mention that it's good to be back at a ballpark that understands the importance of garlic fries) (also: baby's first ball game! baby's first garlic fries!), we walked up to Coit Tower (and actually went to the top of the tower, which I'd never done), then climbed up Lombard Street (I cannot believe I'm actually talking about doing a marathon in San Francisco; nice, flat San Diego was totally the way to go before), and then went for a trolley ride. And (and!) we did it all with my friend Mark who I hadn't seen in years. Which, all in all, comes out to more positives than negatives, even if being peed on (at least it was by my own kid) does get count extra on the negative side.
Quiet
I started to write something last Tuesday, but I realized quickly that it was basically going to say, "GAHHHH. THE NOISE. MAKE. IT. STOP." Because the noise of the gigantic fan that had been running in my apartment since Sunday afternoon was making me a little bit insane.
On Sunday, Brian seemed to be taking the flooding in our apartment more seriously than I was. I mean, after we'd discovered it and called maintenance and whatnot. I was stressed out when it was happening, too, but once someone had come to pull up the carpet pad, set a gigantic fan going, and promise to return to check on my washer the next day, I felt that I was doing okay. I contemplated leaving that night with the baby, but with my sister using my dad's spare room and Adriana's "Jewish grandparents" out of town, I decided to just stay put until morning. We left the fan running overnight, and I joked about people who spend a lot of money on white noise machines when we'd gotten this one for free. But even with being out of the house all day on Monday and for a good chunk of Tuesday, by Tuesday afternoon all the "white noise" was giving me a headache. Now I was the one strung up and cranky and Brian seemed relaxed. He turned off the fan when he got home on Tuesday night, and it was amazing what the relative quiet did for my mental health.
My mental health was improved even more on Thursday, when the floor was totally dried out and a man came to put down new a new pad and re-lay the carpet. And Friday when the maintenance guys finally fixed my washer and I no longer was going to have people in and out of the apartment checking on things. And Saturday, when we finally caught up with the laundry (I was wondering how three people could wear so many clothes in one week, and seriously considering a nudist colony), it was good to feel like things were finally back in order.
Now the refrigerator is humming, the washer is spinning, and the baby is dancing to the Dixie Chicks while playing with a beeping kitchen timer. And the house seems quiet.
On Sunday, Brian seemed to be taking the flooding in our apartment more seriously than I was. I mean, after we'd discovered it and called maintenance and whatnot. I was stressed out when it was happening, too, but once someone had come to pull up the carpet pad, set a gigantic fan going, and promise to return to check on my washer the next day, I felt that I was doing okay. I contemplated leaving that night with the baby, but with my sister using my dad's spare room and Adriana's "Jewish grandparents" out of town, I decided to just stay put until morning. We left the fan running overnight, and I joked about people who spend a lot of money on white noise machines when we'd gotten this one for free. But even with being out of the house all day on Monday and for a good chunk of Tuesday, by Tuesday afternoon all the "white noise" was giving me a headache. Now I was the one strung up and cranky and Brian seemed relaxed. He turned off the fan when he got home on Tuesday night, and it was amazing what the relative quiet did for my mental health.
My mental health was improved even more on Thursday, when the floor was totally dried out and a man came to put down new a new pad and re-lay the carpet. And Friday when the maintenance guys finally fixed my washer and I no longer was going to have people in and out of the apartment checking on things. And Saturday, when we finally caught up with the laundry (I was wondering how three people could wear so many clothes in one week, and seriously considering a nudist colony), it was good to feel like things were finally back in order.
Now the refrigerator is humming, the washer is spinning, and the baby is dancing to the Dixie Chicks while playing with a beeping kitchen timer. And the house seems quiet.
Monday, March 24, 2008
Am totally psychic
Yesterday I correctly predicted who was at my front door, just moments after I heard knock. Of course, this may have been mostly because on my way to answer it, I saw the huge puddle of water in front of my washer and when you are in an upstairs apartment and your hallway is flooded, the knock on your front door is pretty much certain to be your downstairs neighbor coming to inform you that her ceiling is dripping.
Sometimes I really want to buy a house. But then something like this happens, and it is quite nice to have an emergency maintenance number to call, so that someone else will come pull up the carpet, dispose of the pad underneath, and set a giant fan going. "Nice" because someone else is dealing with it, I mean. Having my hallway and bedroom carpet all pulled up isn't nice. Toddlers and exposed nails? Not a great combo. Adriana was good about staying away last night, but we're abandoning ship today. Grandpa probably needed a baby fix anyhow.
Sometimes I really want to buy a house. But then something like this happens, and it is quite nice to have an emergency maintenance number to call, so that someone else will come pull up the carpet, dispose of the pad underneath, and set a giant fan going. "Nice" because someone else is dealing with it, I mean. Having my hallway and bedroom carpet all pulled up isn't nice. Toddlers and exposed nails? Not a great combo. Adriana was good about staying away last night, but we're abandoning ship today. Grandpa probably needed a baby fix anyhow.
Wednesday, March 12, 2008
Nursing nursling
Today at yoga, as we mamas began our sun salutations, Adriana picked out a baby doll from the toy box. It was naked, but she found a little t-shirt for it, and, unable to coordinate actually dressing the doll, wrapped the shirt around the doll and carried it around for a while. Finally she sat down next to me, lifted her shirt, and pushed the doll's head against her chest. My little nursling pretending to nurse! She nodded seriously and made the noises she does when she's imitating adult conversation, while we all laughed.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
14 months
I just have to say that 14 months is SO MUCH BETTER than 12 or 13 months. I mean, I survived those months. I am here to tell the tale. But I am so much happier now. Of course, I'm not sure that what's changed is Adriana. I think a lot of it is that I really needed to adjust from babyhood to toddlerhood, and I don't adjust very quickly to change. But with some time, I can manage it, and I have. So I am handling my toddler better and because of this, or because Adriana is getting better at expressing herself, or perhaps because of the alignment of the planets, life is seeming pretty good these days. This is not to say that it's all sunshines and rainbows and unicorns around here. But now our daily routine is something along the line of sunshine-tantrum-rainbow-tantrum-unicorn-tantrum-tantrum-chocolate- tantrum, rather than just tantrum-tantrum-tantrum-tantrum-tantrum-tantrum-hey- I-know-what-let's-have-another-tantrum-tantrum-tantrum. See how that's an improvement?
Adriana loves to read books. I had been afraid for a while that she just wasn't going to enjoy reading (because a child's behavior at one year old is surely an exact predictor of her behavior for the rest of her life, right?), but now it seems that it's all we do. Her favorites from last month, Good Dog, Carl and Doggies: A Counting and Barking Book are still at the top of her list, but we also spend a fair amount of time reading The Little Engine That Could and The Paper-Bag Princess. A lot of the time we read only a page or so before Adriana goes wandering off, but other times she will sit quietly through the entire story--and then sit through it two more times in a row. Sometimes I think she could sit here and read books all day, but we're also spending a lot of time at the park. She loves to watch older kids play, and she'll try to hug the other toddlers who are close to her size. She climbs up the play structures and sometimes will climb down carefully, although usually she wants to hold my hand or go down the slide on my lap.
Another favorite thing is music. It was one of Adriana's first signs, and almost whenever the house is quiet she will go to stand by the stereo and request that I put on music. She claps with the audience on life CDs and dances to bouncier songs. She seems to be a big fan of the Dixie Chicks, Erin Mckeown, and the Clash, in particular, but she'll dance to pretty much anything peppy. sometimes when we're reading her a book she'll take a "dance break" when a song catches her attention, and will stand up to bounce to the music for a few seconds before returning to the story.
She still doesn't have any words, although she is babbling a bit more, but she is continuing to sign. She signs "dad" when she hears someone coming up the steps in the evening (and will pitch a mighty fit when she realizes that it was our neighbor and Brian isn't actually home yet), and "mom" when she hears me in another room or sees any female figure in a book. She signs "dog" when she sees a dog in the park (unless it's a really small one, in which case she signs "cat") or when she hears one bark outside. She's starting to put together series of signs, such as "eat" and "ball" when she wants a grape, and she recently threw her sippy cup to the floor, telling me "all done water" with signs before raising her arms to be picked up and signing "milk."
Her sleeping and eating have improved a great deal in the past couple of weeks. One night, after a visit from her grandparents, we sat down to dinner, and Adriana devoured her food. We kept bringing her more because she kept eating. She woke up once that night, and I thought I was in heaven. The next night she repeated her eating and sleeping, and I thought I was living some sort of charmed life. On the third night, Adriana refused to eat much and I didn't worry about it, until that night when she woke up every two hours and I discovered that even after a year and a half of interrupted sleep my body had quickly become enamored of more solid sleep--I could hardly function the next day. So our evenings are now rather tedious as we spend several hours trying to get the baby to eat. I don't do too much coaxing, I hope, and I try not to let myself get too emotional about it (you may think I'm kidding, but this is my ability to sleep we're talking about here), but I do follow the baby around and give her bites of food every time she gives me the chance. I do worry about the habit of not feeding her only at the table, and not making her sit down with us, but putting her in the highchair when she doesn't want to be doesn't seem to make matters any better. Plus, I figure any habits she has this week, good or bad, are likely to change within two weeks, so I just go with whatever works.
She is more willing to eat a variety of foods these days, and she doesn't make horrible faces whenever she tastes something new, but it must be food she can feed herself. She eats a lot of beans, asparagus, carrots, grapes, rice cakes, and cheese. It may not be the best or most varied diet, but at least it's relatively healthy. I haven't noticed her nursing much less, except at night of course, but losing those night nursings did seem to affect even my daytime supply, making nursing painful for a few days last week. The problem seemed to be solved with some fenugreek. So now I smell a bit like pancakes, but there are worse things to smell like, and now nursing Adriana doesn't leave me in pain and her frustrated.
Best of all right now is the way she seeks out cuddles. She leans her face in for a kiss, gives hugs and pats, tugs on my jeans when I'm standing, so I will sit down and make a lap for her to sit in. After her nap, she likes to sit in the armchair with me and snuggle for a bit while she wakes up. We don't read or listen to music or anything. It's one of my favorite times of day.
Adriana loves to read books. I had been afraid for a while that she just wasn't going to enjoy reading (because a child's behavior at one year old is surely an exact predictor of her behavior for the rest of her life, right?), but now it seems that it's all we do. Her favorites from last month, Good Dog, Carl and Doggies: A Counting and Barking Book are still at the top of her list, but we also spend a fair amount of time reading The Little Engine That Could and The Paper-Bag Princess. A lot of the time we read only a page or so before Adriana goes wandering off, but other times she will sit quietly through the entire story--and then sit through it two more times in a row. Sometimes I think she could sit here and read books all day, but we're also spending a lot of time at the park. She loves to watch older kids play, and she'll try to hug the other toddlers who are close to her size. She climbs up the play structures and sometimes will climb down carefully, although usually she wants to hold my hand or go down the slide on my lap.
Another favorite thing is music. It was one of Adriana's first signs, and almost whenever the house is quiet she will go to stand by the stereo and request that I put on music. She claps with the audience on life CDs and dances to bouncier songs. She seems to be a big fan of the Dixie Chicks, Erin Mckeown, and the Clash, in particular, but she'll dance to pretty much anything peppy. sometimes when we're reading her a book she'll take a "dance break" when a song catches her attention, and will stand up to bounce to the music for a few seconds before returning to the story.
She still doesn't have any words, although she is babbling a bit more, but she is continuing to sign. She signs "dad" when she hears someone coming up the steps in the evening (and will pitch a mighty fit when she realizes that it was our neighbor and Brian isn't actually home yet), and "mom" when she hears me in another room or sees any female figure in a book. She signs "dog" when she sees a dog in the park (unless it's a really small one, in which case she signs "cat") or when she hears one bark outside. She's starting to put together series of signs, such as "eat" and "ball" when she wants a grape, and she recently threw her sippy cup to the floor, telling me "all done water" with signs before raising her arms to be picked up and signing "milk."
Her sleeping and eating have improved a great deal in the past couple of weeks. One night, after a visit from her grandparents, we sat down to dinner, and Adriana devoured her food. We kept bringing her more because she kept eating. She woke up once that night, and I thought I was in heaven. The next night she repeated her eating and sleeping, and I thought I was living some sort of charmed life. On the third night, Adriana refused to eat much and I didn't worry about it, until that night when she woke up every two hours and I discovered that even after a year and a half of interrupted sleep my body had quickly become enamored of more solid sleep--I could hardly function the next day. So our evenings are now rather tedious as we spend several hours trying to get the baby to eat. I don't do too much coaxing, I hope, and I try not to let myself get too emotional about it (you may think I'm kidding, but this is my ability to sleep we're talking about here), but I do follow the baby around and give her bites of food every time she gives me the chance. I do worry about the habit of not feeding her only at the table, and not making her sit down with us, but putting her in the highchair when she doesn't want to be doesn't seem to make matters any better. Plus, I figure any habits she has this week, good or bad, are likely to change within two weeks, so I just go with whatever works.
She is more willing to eat a variety of foods these days, and she doesn't make horrible faces whenever she tastes something new, but it must be food she can feed herself. She eats a lot of beans, asparagus, carrots, grapes, rice cakes, and cheese. It may not be the best or most varied diet, but at least it's relatively healthy. I haven't noticed her nursing much less, except at night of course, but losing those night nursings did seem to affect even my daytime supply, making nursing painful for a few days last week. The problem seemed to be solved with some fenugreek. So now I smell a bit like pancakes, but there are worse things to smell like, and now nursing Adriana doesn't leave me in pain and her frustrated.
Best of all right now is the way she seeks out cuddles. She leans her face in for a kiss, gives hugs and pats, tugs on my jeans when I'm standing, so I will sit down and make a lap for her to sit in. After her nap, she likes to sit in the armchair with me and snuggle for a bit while she wakes up. We don't read or listen to music or anything. It's one of my favorite times of day.
Sunday, March 09, 2008
Nature walk: Monte Bello Open Space Preserve
All week long, Brian talked about wanting to get out for a hike on Saturday. On Friday night we discarded plans for Big Basin in favor of staying a little closer to home, when we read about the Monte Bello Open Space Preserve on Bay Area Hiker. We ended up not following the walk from the website, instead doing a loop comprised of the Canyon, Bella Vista, and Indian Creek trails--which came to about 5.5 miles. It was a perfect, sunny spring day, a perfect day for a hike.
Friday, March 07, 2008
Gloaming
Reading in the car while the baby slept (bringing her into the house usually wakes her up, so I just carry a book around in the diaper bag) recently, I paused when I saw the word "gloaming." Another one for my list, I thought, and my mind began to wander. "Sunset" had made my list, and when I saw "dusk" on Eleeza's, I realized that "twilight" should have been on mine. Considering how so many words for the same thing make me happy, I decided that it must be something about that time of day, some kind of magic to the sinking of the sun, the ending of the day. And I think that magic seems stronger this time of year as it becomes apparent that we are on the other side of Solstice at last. In the winter it becomes dark before I've had much of a chance to notice, but as the days begin to lengthen, I can appreciate sunset, dusk, twilight, the gloaming. I can indulge nostalgia for other times when I've noticed that particular time of day.
I remember drawing with chalk on the back patio and playing on the swingset and picking plums off the tree and eating them in the evenings--a whole series of memories I can't quite place in time, all mashed together in my mind.
I remember playing outside after dinner with our new puppy when I was ten years old, my brother and sister and me, all chasing and being chased.
I remember walking home from the house of a friend who lived up the hill from me, my clothing damp and leaving me just a little too cold because the sprinklers had come on while we were sitting outside and we thought it would be a good idea to run through them, even though we were old enough to be too cool for that kind of thing.
I remember coming up the slope from McHenry, probably sometime in spring of my junior year of college. I was alone and it was quiet, and as I passed the (hardly used) student center I felt light and happy. The sun had mostly set, but color still streaked the sky and the bay.
I remember sitting on my front step in Alexandria, watching neighbors climb off the bus and take their dogs for a walk before dinner, while I read poetry.
I remember holding hands with Brian, while he wore Adriana on his chest and we took a walk when he was returned home after work last spring.
I remember drawing with chalk on the back patio and playing on the swingset and picking plums off the tree and eating them in the evenings--a whole series of memories I can't quite place in time, all mashed together in my mind.
I remember playing outside after dinner with our new puppy when I was ten years old, my brother and sister and me, all chasing and being chased.
I remember walking home from the house of a friend who lived up the hill from me, my clothing damp and leaving me just a little too cold because the sprinklers had come on while we were sitting outside and we thought it would be a good idea to run through them, even though we were old enough to be too cool for that kind of thing.
I remember coming up the slope from McHenry, probably sometime in spring of my junior year of college. I was alone and it was quiet, and as I passed the (hardly used) student center I felt light and happy. The sun had mostly set, but color still streaked the sky and the bay.
I remember sitting on my front step in Alexandria, watching neighbors climb off the bus and take their dogs for a walk before dinner, while I read poetry.
I remember holding hands with Brian, while he wore Adriana on his chest and we took a walk when he was returned home after work last spring.
Validation
Sometimes I get frustrated when I'm upset because I just want Brian to listen to what I'm saying and agree with me that whatever it is just sucks. Instead, he listens and then starts coming up with solutions. I thought it was just in his nature to fix things, and didn't necessarily understand his impulse.
But yesterday I got a phone call from a friend. She was angry and upset, to the point that she was unable to sleep and could only lie in the dark fretting. I listened to her talk, and wracked my brain for any relevant advice, some sort of solution to her problem. I came up with very little of any use, and finally I just said, with complete honesty, "That's awful. I don't blame you for being bothered by that. I'd be furious."
There was a pause on the other end of the phone and a deep breath from all those thousands of miles away. Then: "Thank you." I didn't laugh out loud, but I was amused at how just hearing someone say that it was okay to be upset about this problem could help my friend calm down that quickly, as well as my own "fix it" mentality.
But yesterday I got a phone call from a friend. She was angry and upset, to the point that she was unable to sleep and could only lie in the dark fretting. I listened to her talk, and wracked my brain for any relevant advice, some sort of solution to her problem. I came up with very little of any use, and finally I just said, with complete honesty, "That's awful. I don't blame you for being bothered by that. I'd be furious."
There was a pause on the other end of the phone and a deep breath from all those thousands of miles away. Then: "Thank you." I didn't laugh out loud, but I was amused at how just hearing someone say that it was okay to be upset about this problem could help my friend calm down that quickly, as well as my own "fix it" mentality.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
Travel journal: San Francisco
A few weeks ago, Brian came home from work saying that he wanted to take a vacation. With a three-day weekend coming up, we decided that we should leave town for the weekend but not go too far--it would be the perfect chance to test out traveling with a toddler without spending a fortune on plane tickets and dealing with the hassles of flying with a toddler. We went back and forth, trying to decide between a city trip and a trip that would be more hiking, and finally decided on the city trip, because we've missed wandering around cities, we knew we needed to experiment with that kind of travel with Adriana, and we haven't spent any where near enough time in San Francisco since we moved back to California. Also, it's easier to find a last-minute affordable hotel in the city than up in Point Reyes.
On Saturday we ate an early lunch at home and then drove up to San Francisco. We parked at the de Young museum, and headed inside, only to realize that it was a beautiful day and we would rather spend it outside. We spent the afternoon wandering around Golden Gate Park, loosely following a couple of walks from our deck of City Walks cards: we circled Stow Lake and wandered onto Strawberry Hill, strolled through the botanical gardens, and then ventured into the Sunset district where we grabbed a couple of wraps and returned to the garden, so we could eat and Adriana could get out of her stroller and play on the lawn. I was worried because Adriana hadn't nursed since nine that morning, but she had been nibbling on Cheerios from her snack trap while we walked (we began calling her Gretel over the course of the weekend, because she was leaving a trail of the things all over the city) and was very interested in what I was eating, so I shared my falafel with her and realized that I should be happy that she can go longer between feedings from me.
Turtle in Stow Lake
Chinese Pavilion
Freedom!
Eventually we headed back to the car and went to our hotel (the Westin Market Street--I found a great deal through hotels.com) to check in. We let Adriana wreak havoc in the room for a bit, before I realized that being trapped in a hotel room with a baby who was getting into everything was certainly not my idea of a good time. Even if we weren't yet hungry, it was time to get OUT. We put the baby into the Beco and headed over toward Union Square. Adriana fell asleep on my back as we wandered around the square and surrounding streets. We finally decided to stop and get a bit of dinner, which was fine until I decided I needed to get the baby off of my back. I tried lowering her gently onto the bench of our booth, but she woke anyhow. And she wanted nothing to do with the high chair, so we took turns holding her and eating dinner. And in spite of the late nap, she still went to bed at a respectable hour that night.
We got a fairly early start on Sunday. I wanted to have a big yummy breakfast somewhere but hadn't planned on any place in particular, so we walked down to the Ferry Building, thinking that one of the restaurants there would serve the kind of Sunday brunch I was hoping for. Alas, all the restaurants were closed, so we got pastries at Peet's and let the baby run around outside, patting friendly dogs and chasing pigeons. I studied my walk cards, and we went from the Ferry Building to Chinatown. It wasn't yet ten o'clock, and the streets were fairly quiet when we got there. We peeked inside the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Company, and the people there motioned us inside. I stood and watched for a while as the machines turned out perfect circles and people folded them into fortune cookie shapes. One man said something to me, and pointed to a basket of crisp circles that hadn't been folded into cookies yet. I didn't understand him, and he said something again. When I still didn't get it, he pointed to me, then the basket and said, "You. Take." So I did.
At St. Mary's Square, we released Adriana onto the playground. She spent a fair amount of time just playing with the gate, but eventually discovered the play structure--the one that wasn't in a sandbox, as she refuses to walk on or touch sand. She finally even asked to nurse, which surprised me, as I had been expecting a repeat of the previous day. We spent a little more time after our play break wandering Chinatown while Adriana napped in her stroller, and then we tried to get ourselves some lunch.
Lunch was a fiasco. We found the place where my friend Melanie and I ate last fall, which had been recommended by her copy of Lonely Planet. They didn't have high chairs, but back in September when Adriana and Eliza were eight and six months old, that wasn't too much of a problem. At first we weren't concerned, because Adriana was asleep in her stroller, and they let us squeeze the stroller in by our table. But then the baby woke up and wanted out, and the restaurant was getting more and more packed with other tourists, and we ate quickly and left. The food wasn't even that great.
We made another playground stop, but Adriana was obviously still tired and didn't want to play, so we decided to go back to the hotel to see if she would take another nap. She didn't sleep then, but she did nurse well, and we sorted through the deck of walks, and picked out a couple that would take us through the Mission. I had planned on doing the Cole Valley and Haight Street walks, but somehow these other ones sounded more interesting--plus we figured we would end up near some good Mexican food in time for an early dinner--so we hopped on BART up to 24th Street.
I'd never done much walking around the Mission, and it was interesting to take the time to see the neighborhood. It reminded me of DC's Columbia Heights or Logan Circle, with the transition to hipster gentrification in process, but with more murals and more signs in Spanish. There was a beautiful playground with murals and a mosaic dragon, but Adriana had conked out in the stroller again. Starting to get hungry, we headed toward Valencia--it was early, but we thought if we ate something light, we could have a second, later dinner. We just knew that we needed to get food before we got cranky--a valuable lesson we learned when we first traveled together back in 2001. We stumbled upon Dosa, and I immediately remembered that on a trip to California when we lived on the east coast, but the only night we were going to be in the city on that trip it had been closed. I gave up on the idea of Mexican food (or even on the idea of one of Jeff's pizzerias, since I'd left the list at home). They weren't serving dinner yet, so we settled into a coffeeshop for a snack. Adriana woke up while we were there, but we were able to keep her happy with Cheerios and repeated readings of Good Dog, Carl.
After the disaster that was our lunch, I was a little intimidated by going into another restaurant with a rambunctious toddler, but the staff at Dosa handled it great. We stashed the stroller by the coat rack, and they had a high chair ready for us. I was also relieved to see two other groups with babies--it made me feel much more comfortable. Adriana loved the pappadam that they brought to our table, and our dosas arrived quickly and were delicious. We live near some excellent Indian restaurants, but I had missed South Indian food. Still, we didn't linger over the meal, and we wrestled the baby, our daypack, the carrier, and the stroller out through the crowded restaurant fairly quickly.
The busy day had left Adriana tired once again, and after dancing around the hotel room to the radio (she was quite pleased that she could turn on the clock radio herself by just pushing on the sleep button), she was asleep by 8:30.
We were determined that on Monday I would get my brunch, although we decided that we might grab something light beforehand to make that possible. But our dinner the night before had been early, so I woke up starving at 6:30. I showered quickly and ran across the street to pick up something at Starbucks. After juice, croissants, and hot chocolate, second breakfast seemed unnecessary, so we decided to pack up our things and head out to Land's End for our final walk before heading home.
The City Walks routes all begin at a spot along a bus route, but because we were driving we began just above Ocean Beach. We loaded the baby into the backpack, stopped to look out at the water, and were pleased to see dolphins porpoising just out beyond all the surfers. Realizing that we had taken a long enough time getting out of the hotel that we could eat again, we decided to grab second breakfast at Louis' before heading out on our walk. Adriana and I shared a big plate of pancakes that were fantastic.
Those little specks are dolphins, I swear.
The views along the Coastal Trail were fantastic. We marveled at the wide open ocean and speculated about the container ships we saw making their way toward the bay. We had intended to walk to the Palace of the Legion of Honor and then back to our car, but when we came around the corner at Land's End and saw the Golden Gate in the distance, we started talking about walking all the way there. I am a bad judge of distance but it looked like it could be done. And Brian had never walked across the bridge. We went back and forth as we walked, wondering if we could do it. As the trail emerged out onto the road, there was a sign that included distances: 2.7 miles to the bridge, 1.7 miles back to the Cliff House. Adriana was tolerating being in the backpack fairly well. Some of the time she babbled and giggled to herself, and when she started with her "Eh? Eh?" noises, we knew to check to see what she was signing for--usually she just wanted her water bottle, sometimes she was requesting a snack, and once she had asked for milk. So long as we met those needs promptly, she was fine. We decided to do it.
Things did get a bit confusing once we'd emerged from the Coastal Trail near Eagle Point. We could see the bridge, and we could see the beaches below us, but walking through Seacliff, we were unsure if we were on the right track. We stopped at China Beach, hoping that there would be a ranger or someone there (I don't know, it seemed reasonable at the time) who could help us. Instead we used the restrooms there and gazed back up at the huge houses above us. While we were there I thought I heard a cat meowing, but decided I was probably crazy. But, as we were leaving, I heard it again, and noticed a large, grey-striped cat sitting there looking at us. I approached it, in spite of Brian's warnings that it was probably mean. I scratched his head and noticed he had a tag on his collar: I PLAY BEACH I KNOW WAY HOME KTHX. I laughed, remembering our neighbor in Alexandria who had been stuck with vet bills a couple of times when her cat had been picked up by well-meaning strangers who had noticed his limp. He was a former barn cat who liked to be outside and had had the limp as long as Karen had had him. He died last year, but I thought that if he were still alive I would have had a similar tag made for him.
Back on the road, confused about whether we were actually going to find a trail to follow, I dug through our deck of cards and found a walk from the Golden Gate to Baker Beach. That didn't quite connect us back to the Coastal Trail, but we were able to tell from the map on the back of the card that we were on the right track. As we walked down toward Baker Beach, we started wondering if we would feel up to the walk back--after all, between the baby and the backpack itself, Brian was carrying an extra 30 pounds on him ("Hey, I lugged around an extra 30 pounds when I was pregnant with her," I told him). Once we were past the beach, the signs telling us how far to our destination were more frequent, giving us the encouragement we needed. There were several artillery batteries along the coast, and we stopped at the first one we came to, Chamberlin, but I refused to walk down the steep steps to the other ones, determined to just make it to the Golden Gate.
And then we were there, just like that. First it was right ahead of us and we could see the cars heading onto it, and then we went through an underpass, and suddenly we were on the other side. We stopped on the grass for a drink and a snack and a diaper change. As we sat there on the grass, Brian asked me, "Do you want to walk to the other side?" I considered it for a moment, thinking that it wasn't a very long bridge and that I was feeling pretty good, before realizing that he was joking. Instead, we picked up our things and headed back the way we'd come. We laughed noticing the little three-wheeled yellow cars we'd been seeing around since Saturday, because this time we could hear the computer talking to the passengers, reminding them to look to the left at the stop sign before continuing on to the right. "In case you don't have your wife with you to nag at you," I told Brian.
The other side!
The walk back seemed shorter than the way there. The sun, which had come out sometime between our pancakes and when we'd reached the beach, was starting to disappear into the clouds again, so we kept up a good pace to stay warm. Adriana was starting to lose patience with the whole endeavor (she had napped a little bit on the way to the bridge, but the backpack isn't ideal for sleeping), so I walked along putting Cheerios and pieces of freeze-dried apples into her mouth, since she'd given up on feeding herself.
Looking back the way we came.
We made one last detour, up to the Palace of the Legion of Honor. We watched a couple having wedding portraits taken while we stretched out our legs and backs. Adriana asked to nurse, so I fed her and then took a couple of pictures of Rodin's Thinker. We circled the parking lot, studying the Holocaust Memorial and admiring the views of the city before looping back down to the path.
It was a relief to see the Cliff House in front of us at last. We passed by it back to our car ("Look at that view!" a Go Car computer exclaimed to its passengers as they came around the bend and passed us). We wondered about heading back into the Mission to find a good taqueria, but instead opted to head back down the peninsula, giving the baby a chance to rest. We saw hang gliders and parachuters as we drove down the Great Highway, which seemed somehow like the perfect end to the weekend.
Finished!
And it would have been the perfect end. We would have come home triumphant, pleased that we had managed a successful trip with the baby, having figured out how to travel in a city and do a decent length hike (10 miles!) with a toddler, but we pushed things a little too far by deciding to grab a bite of dinner in Palo Alto on our way home. Adriana woke up as we got her out of the car, and proceeded to let her discontent to be well known. Brian drank his margarita while I took her outside, then I went back in to drink mine and eat my enchiladas while he occupied her looking into storefronts, and then we switched again so he could eat. Finally we went home, where Adriana delighted in seeing all her toys again, and fell fast asleep by eight o'clock. And we weren't too far behind her.
So now we feel pretty confident about traveling with a toddler, although I am a little terrified of taking her on a plane. We know how to meet her needs while we're out and about, and if we do so promptly, we don't have to move at a much slower pace than we used to. Last fall we declined a trip with some of Brian's colleagues for a hike near Stinson Beach, but now I think we could handle it. I'm looking forward to doing more hiking, and to doing more walking around the city. The City Walks deck of cards was a good investment, I think. I wish the cards included a bit more detail, both on distances, and on some of the things you come across, but they gave us good starting points. The walks are pretty short and easy, but they can also be combined with nearby walks for a longer outing. We did the walks from eight cards over the weekend, so we only have 42 more to go.
On Saturday we ate an early lunch at home and then drove up to San Francisco. We parked at the de Young museum, and headed inside, only to realize that it was a beautiful day and we would rather spend it outside. We spent the afternoon wandering around Golden Gate Park, loosely following a couple of walks from our deck of City Walks cards: we circled Stow Lake and wandered onto Strawberry Hill, strolled through the botanical gardens, and then ventured into the Sunset district where we grabbed a couple of wraps and returned to the garden, so we could eat and Adriana could get out of her stroller and play on the lawn. I was worried because Adriana hadn't nursed since nine that morning, but she had been nibbling on Cheerios from her snack trap while we walked (we began calling her Gretel over the course of the weekend, because she was leaving a trail of the things all over the city) and was very interested in what I was eating, so I shared my falafel with her and realized that I should be happy that she can go longer between feedings from me.
Turtle in Stow Lake
Chinese Pavilion
Freedom!
Eventually we headed back to the car and went to our hotel (the Westin Market Street--I found a great deal through hotels.com) to check in. We let Adriana wreak havoc in the room for a bit, before I realized that being trapped in a hotel room with a baby who was getting into everything was certainly not my idea of a good time. Even if we weren't yet hungry, it was time to get OUT. We put the baby into the Beco and headed over toward Union Square. Adriana fell asleep on my back as we wandered around the square and surrounding streets. We finally decided to stop and get a bit of dinner, which was fine until I decided I needed to get the baby off of my back. I tried lowering her gently onto the bench of our booth, but she woke anyhow. And she wanted nothing to do with the high chair, so we took turns holding her and eating dinner. And in spite of the late nap, she still went to bed at a respectable hour that night.
We got a fairly early start on Sunday. I wanted to have a big yummy breakfast somewhere but hadn't planned on any place in particular, so we walked down to the Ferry Building, thinking that one of the restaurants there would serve the kind of Sunday brunch I was hoping for. Alas, all the restaurants were closed, so we got pastries at Peet's and let the baby run around outside, patting friendly dogs and chasing pigeons. I studied my walk cards, and we went from the Ferry Building to Chinatown. It wasn't yet ten o'clock, and the streets were fairly quiet when we got there. We peeked inside the Golden Gate Fortune Cookie Company, and the people there motioned us inside. I stood and watched for a while as the machines turned out perfect circles and people folded them into fortune cookie shapes. One man said something to me, and pointed to a basket of crisp circles that hadn't been folded into cookies yet. I didn't understand him, and he said something again. When I still didn't get it, he pointed to me, then the basket and said, "You. Take." So I did.
At St. Mary's Square, we released Adriana onto the playground. She spent a fair amount of time just playing with the gate, but eventually discovered the play structure--the one that wasn't in a sandbox, as she refuses to walk on or touch sand. She finally even asked to nurse, which surprised me, as I had been expecting a repeat of the previous day. We spent a little more time after our play break wandering Chinatown while Adriana napped in her stroller, and then we tried to get ourselves some lunch.
Lunch was a fiasco. We found the place where my friend Melanie and I ate last fall, which had been recommended by her copy of Lonely Planet. They didn't have high chairs, but back in September when Adriana and Eliza were eight and six months old, that wasn't too much of a problem. At first we weren't concerned, because Adriana was asleep in her stroller, and they let us squeeze the stroller in by our table. But then the baby woke up and wanted out, and the restaurant was getting more and more packed with other tourists, and we ate quickly and left. The food wasn't even that great.
We made another playground stop, but Adriana was obviously still tired and didn't want to play, so we decided to go back to the hotel to see if she would take another nap. She didn't sleep then, but she did nurse well, and we sorted through the deck of walks, and picked out a couple that would take us through the Mission. I had planned on doing the Cole Valley and Haight Street walks, but somehow these other ones sounded more interesting--plus we figured we would end up near some good Mexican food in time for an early dinner--so we hopped on BART up to 24th Street.
I'd never done much walking around the Mission, and it was interesting to take the time to see the neighborhood. It reminded me of DC's Columbia Heights or Logan Circle, with the transition to hipster gentrification in process, but with more murals and more signs in Spanish. There was a beautiful playground with murals and a mosaic dragon, but Adriana had conked out in the stroller again. Starting to get hungry, we headed toward Valencia--it was early, but we thought if we ate something light, we could have a second, later dinner. We just knew that we needed to get food before we got cranky--a valuable lesson we learned when we first traveled together back in 2001. We stumbled upon Dosa, and I immediately remembered that on a trip to California when we lived on the east coast, but the only night we were going to be in the city on that trip it had been closed. I gave up on the idea of Mexican food (or even on the idea of one of Jeff's pizzerias, since I'd left the list at home). They weren't serving dinner yet, so we settled into a coffeeshop for a snack. Adriana woke up while we were there, but we were able to keep her happy with Cheerios and repeated readings of Good Dog, Carl.
After the disaster that was our lunch, I was a little intimidated by going into another restaurant with a rambunctious toddler, but the staff at Dosa handled it great. We stashed the stroller by the coat rack, and they had a high chair ready for us. I was also relieved to see two other groups with babies--it made me feel much more comfortable. Adriana loved the pappadam that they brought to our table, and our dosas arrived quickly and were delicious. We live near some excellent Indian restaurants, but I had missed South Indian food. Still, we didn't linger over the meal, and we wrestled the baby, our daypack, the carrier, and the stroller out through the crowded restaurant fairly quickly.
The busy day had left Adriana tired once again, and after dancing around the hotel room to the radio (she was quite pleased that she could turn on the clock radio herself by just pushing on the sleep button), she was asleep by 8:30.
We were determined that on Monday I would get my brunch, although we decided that we might grab something light beforehand to make that possible. But our dinner the night before had been early, so I woke up starving at 6:30. I showered quickly and ran across the street to pick up something at Starbucks. After juice, croissants, and hot chocolate, second breakfast seemed unnecessary, so we decided to pack up our things and head out to Land's End for our final walk before heading home.
The City Walks routes all begin at a spot along a bus route, but because we were driving we began just above Ocean Beach. We loaded the baby into the backpack, stopped to look out at the water, and were pleased to see dolphins porpoising just out beyond all the surfers. Realizing that we had taken a long enough time getting out of the hotel that we could eat again, we decided to grab second breakfast at Louis' before heading out on our walk. Adriana and I shared a big plate of pancakes that were fantastic.
Those little specks are dolphins, I swear.
The views along the Coastal Trail were fantastic. We marveled at the wide open ocean and speculated about the container ships we saw making their way toward the bay. We had intended to walk to the Palace of the Legion of Honor and then back to our car, but when we came around the corner at Land's End and saw the Golden Gate in the distance, we started talking about walking all the way there. I am a bad judge of distance but it looked like it could be done. And Brian had never walked across the bridge. We went back and forth as we walked, wondering if we could do it. As the trail emerged out onto the road, there was a sign that included distances: 2.7 miles to the bridge, 1.7 miles back to the Cliff House. Adriana was tolerating being in the backpack fairly well. Some of the time she babbled and giggled to herself, and when she started with her "Eh? Eh?" noises, we knew to check to see what she was signing for--usually she just wanted her water bottle, sometimes she was requesting a snack, and once she had asked for milk. So long as we met those needs promptly, she was fine. We decided to do it.
Things did get a bit confusing once we'd emerged from the Coastal Trail near Eagle Point. We could see the bridge, and we could see the beaches below us, but walking through Seacliff, we were unsure if we were on the right track. We stopped at China Beach, hoping that there would be a ranger or someone there (I don't know, it seemed reasonable at the time) who could help us. Instead we used the restrooms there and gazed back up at the huge houses above us. While we were there I thought I heard a cat meowing, but decided I was probably crazy. But, as we were leaving, I heard it again, and noticed a large, grey-striped cat sitting there looking at us. I approached it, in spite of Brian's warnings that it was probably mean. I scratched his head and noticed he had a tag on his collar: I PLAY BEACH I KNOW WAY HOME KTHX. I laughed, remembering our neighbor in Alexandria who had been stuck with vet bills a couple of times when her cat had been picked up by well-meaning strangers who had noticed his limp. He was a former barn cat who liked to be outside and had had the limp as long as Karen had had him. He died last year, but I thought that if he were still alive I would have had a similar tag made for him.
Back on the road, confused about whether we were actually going to find a trail to follow, I dug through our deck of cards and found a walk from the Golden Gate to Baker Beach. That didn't quite connect us back to the Coastal Trail, but we were able to tell from the map on the back of the card that we were on the right track. As we walked down toward Baker Beach, we started wondering if we would feel up to the walk back--after all, between the baby and the backpack itself, Brian was carrying an extra 30 pounds on him ("Hey, I lugged around an extra 30 pounds when I was pregnant with her," I told him). Once we were past the beach, the signs telling us how far to our destination were more frequent, giving us the encouragement we needed. There were several artillery batteries along the coast, and we stopped at the first one we came to, Chamberlin, but I refused to walk down the steep steps to the other ones, determined to just make it to the Golden Gate.
And then we were there, just like that. First it was right ahead of us and we could see the cars heading onto it, and then we went through an underpass, and suddenly we were on the other side. We stopped on the grass for a drink and a snack and a diaper change. As we sat there on the grass, Brian asked me, "Do you want to walk to the other side?" I considered it for a moment, thinking that it wasn't a very long bridge and that I was feeling pretty good, before realizing that he was joking. Instead, we picked up our things and headed back the way we'd come. We laughed noticing the little three-wheeled yellow cars we'd been seeing around since Saturday, because this time we could hear the computer talking to the passengers, reminding them to look to the left at the stop sign before continuing on to the right. "In case you don't have your wife with you to nag at you," I told Brian.
The other side!
The walk back seemed shorter than the way there. The sun, which had come out sometime between our pancakes and when we'd reached the beach, was starting to disappear into the clouds again, so we kept up a good pace to stay warm. Adriana was starting to lose patience with the whole endeavor (she had napped a little bit on the way to the bridge, but the backpack isn't ideal for sleeping), so I walked along putting Cheerios and pieces of freeze-dried apples into her mouth, since she'd given up on feeding herself.
Looking back the way we came.
We made one last detour, up to the Palace of the Legion of Honor. We watched a couple having wedding portraits taken while we stretched out our legs and backs. Adriana asked to nurse, so I fed her and then took a couple of pictures of Rodin's Thinker. We circled the parking lot, studying the Holocaust Memorial and admiring the views of the city before looping back down to the path.
It was a relief to see the Cliff House in front of us at last. We passed by it back to our car ("Look at that view!" a Go Car computer exclaimed to its passengers as they came around the bend and passed us). We wondered about heading back into the Mission to find a good taqueria, but instead opted to head back down the peninsula, giving the baby a chance to rest. We saw hang gliders and parachuters as we drove down the Great Highway, which seemed somehow like the perfect end to the weekend.
Finished!
And it would have been the perfect end. We would have come home triumphant, pleased that we had managed a successful trip with the baby, having figured out how to travel in a city and do a decent length hike (10 miles!) with a toddler, but we pushed things a little too far by deciding to grab a bite of dinner in Palo Alto on our way home. Adriana woke up as we got her out of the car, and proceeded to let her discontent to be well known. Brian drank his margarita while I took her outside, then I went back in to drink mine and eat my enchiladas while he occupied her looking into storefronts, and then we switched again so he could eat. Finally we went home, where Adriana delighted in seeing all her toys again, and fell fast asleep by eight o'clock. And we weren't too far behind her.
So now we feel pretty confident about traveling with a toddler, although I am a little terrified of taking her on a plane. We know how to meet her needs while we're out and about, and if we do so promptly, we don't have to move at a much slower pace than we used to. Last fall we declined a trip with some of Brian's colleagues for a hike near Stinson Beach, but now I think we could handle it. I'm looking forward to doing more hiking, and to doing more walking around the city. The City Walks deck of cards was a good investment, I think. I wish the cards included a bit more detail, both on distances, and on some of the things you come across, but they gave us good starting points. The walks are pretty short and easy, but they can also be combined with nearby walks for a longer outing. We did the walks from eight cards over the weekend, so we only have 42 more to go.
Thursday, February 14, 2008
Wednesday, February 13, 2008
13 months
I was going to post this on the eleventh, but then fate intervened. And by fate I mean a gigantic tantrum that lasted seemingly forever,* and left me shell-shocked and exhausted. Adriana didn't want me to sit at the computer and type. She didn't want me to play with her toys with her. She didn't want to be held or snuggled or nursed. She didn't want me to put her down. She didn't want to play peek-a-boo. She didn't want her sippy cup, but she also didn't want me to take it away. She also didn't seem to really want to arch her back, hurl herself to the floor, and scream, but she did plenty of it anyhow. It was a warm day and the windows were open and I started to wonder what the neighbors were thinking, as the baby was screaming and sobbing as if in pain. After about an hour of her screaming and my attempts to comfort her, I asked her if she wanted to read Good Dog, Carl, Adriana's book of the week. Still crying, she went and found it in the other room, and brought it back to me. She sat on my lap, shuddering with residual sobs, and I read her the book over and over. Whenever I started to set the book down to reach for another one, she protested, so we looked at the same picture book for about 40 minutes. Then everything was fine. Adriana toddled off to play by herself, and I sat and stared, wondering how on earth I would ever deal with a two-year-old, if this is what a one-year-old is like.
But then, awhile later when she was playing by herself, I sat down in the armchair, hoping to finish my book, and Adriana brought me over another book that she loves these days and asked to be picked up. We read that book over and over too. Adriana would look back and forth between my face and the book with a big smile, as I counted dogs and made barking noises. Sometimes she would take the book from me, and then turn the pages and babble. And then she leaned back against me, sighing and stroking my face, and we snuggled there in the armchair.
In spite of the tantrums, things are more positive than negative these days. Adriana is so loving right now. She gives her monkey and her doll hugs and kisses, and carries the monkey around the house. She come to me with her arms open for a hug, and pushes her open mouth against my cheek for a slobbery kiss. She loves other babies, and will crouch down in front of a baby in a carseat at yoga, so she can wave and smile, or gently pet the hair of a baby having tummy time on a blanket near his mama.
While she can go longer between feedings now, there are still days when she hardly eats any real food. But there are days when she eats well, and I actually notice a decline in how much she nurses. She loves to eat Cheerios, beans, bananas, little pieces of tofu and cooked carrots and sweet potato and chard. She doesn't object to strong flavors, often sharing our curry with us, although sweet things, such as toast with peach jam, are also big hits.
She walks relatively steadily now, getting where she wants to go (and is frustrated sometimes when we insist on putting her in a stroller or backpack). She climbs the play structure at the park (with me hovering right behind her), and easily climbed onto the hearth and the couch at my sister's house last weekend. Sometimes she crawls after a ball, and I love to see her do that--babies look so funny when they crawl. But whereas a month ago she would drop down to crawl when she wanted to get somewhere quickly, she usually realizes quickly that now she can get there more quickly on two feet.
I've struggled some with adjusting to toddler-hood. I think some women have difficulty adjusting to life with a baby, but I feel that I was able to get into that routine fairly quickly (or perhaps it just seems that way in hindsight) and instead am hitting a sort of wall as I try to deal with a determined toddler. Some of it is that I miss having a little baby. Some is that I am simply learning to deal with these new challenges. After my yoga class on Sunday, Brian and Adriana were waiting for me on a nearby plaza. It was wonderful to see Brian kneeling down, playing with Adriana, and even better to see the little girl in striped leggings and a navy blue windbreaker turn to see me and toddle over with an excited grin on her face.
*And then I didn't post yesterday because fate intervened in the form of a sunny day that totally required a trip to the beach.
But then, awhile later when she was playing by herself, I sat down in the armchair, hoping to finish my book, and Adriana brought me over another book that she loves these days and asked to be picked up. We read that book over and over too. Adriana would look back and forth between my face and the book with a big smile, as I counted dogs and made barking noises. Sometimes she would take the book from me, and then turn the pages and babble. And then she leaned back against me, sighing and stroking my face, and we snuggled there in the armchair.
In spite of the tantrums, things are more positive than negative these days. Adriana is so loving right now. She gives her monkey and her doll hugs and kisses, and carries the monkey around the house. She come to me with her arms open for a hug, and pushes her open mouth against my cheek for a slobbery kiss. She loves other babies, and will crouch down in front of a baby in a carseat at yoga, so she can wave and smile, or gently pet the hair of a baby having tummy time on a blanket near his mama.
While she can go longer between feedings now, there are still days when she hardly eats any real food. But there are days when she eats well, and I actually notice a decline in how much she nurses. She loves to eat Cheerios, beans, bananas, little pieces of tofu and cooked carrots and sweet potato and chard. She doesn't object to strong flavors, often sharing our curry with us, although sweet things, such as toast with peach jam, are also big hits.
She walks relatively steadily now, getting where she wants to go (and is frustrated sometimes when we insist on putting her in a stroller or backpack). She climbs the play structure at the park (with me hovering right behind her), and easily climbed onto the hearth and the couch at my sister's house last weekend. Sometimes she crawls after a ball, and I love to see her do that--babies look so funny when they crawl. But whereas a month ago she would drop down to crawl when she wanted to get somewhere quickly, she usually realizes quickly that now she can get there more quickly on two feet.
I've struggled some with adjusting to toddler-hood. I think some women have difficulty adjusting to life with a baby, but I feel that I was able to get into that routine fairly quickly (or perhaps it just seems that way in hindsight) and instead am hitting a sort of wall as I try to deal with a determined toddler. Some of it is that I miss having a little baby. Some is that I am simply learning to deal with these new challenges. After my yoga class on Sunday, Brian and Adriana were waiting for me on a nearby plaza. It was wonderful to see Brian kneeling down, playing with Adriana, and even better to see the little girl in striped leggings and a navy blue windbreaker turn to see me and toddle over with an excited grin on her face.
*And then I didn't post yesterday because fate intervened in the form of a sunny day that totally required a trip to the beach.
Thursday, February 07, 2008
Parkfairfax
Sometimes I am surprised by what it is I miss about our time living in DC. I wasn't surprised to miss my friends or even some of our favorite restaurants, but I wasn't expecting to miss my old neighborhood. When we "lived in DC," we weren't actually in DC--we were in the Northern Virginia suburbs. I went out a month before we moved to find a place for us to live, with visions of a cute basement apartment in Georgetown or a row house in Adams-Morgan, or maybe some sort of apartment in Dupont Circle. But the reality of all those things wasn't exactly what I'd pictured--the Georgetown basements I looked at were dim and cramped, Adams-Morgan was out of our price range, and the one Dupont high rise I checked out was...a high rise. I was soon calling about listings in Arlington and Alexandria, and on the morning of the second day of my househunt, I took a bus from the metro to a development in Alexandria which had cute, colonial brick condos, plenty of trees, and even parking. I called Brian afterwards to tell him I thought I'd found us our place, excitedly telling him that it was large, full of light, and not a bad commute for either of us, although it wasn't on the metro. I'd lived my whole life in the suburbs, and, in spite of romantic ideas of city life, apparently that wasn't going to change any time soon.
We lived in that neighborhood, Parkfairfax, for all of our five years. After three years, when we wanted to move to a place with an extra room and a washer/dryer (and when our landlord wanted to sell the unit we were living in), we moved just down the street from the place I originally picked out. Parkfairfax was built during the 1940s, just a little south of the Pentagon. There were some things about the apartments that let you know that the place had been built that long ago--weird wiring for the light switches, and original wood countertops in some kitchens. There was a condo association that kept everything looking rather Camazotz, I suppose--they had an azalea sale every May and a bulb sale every fall, so that most people's gardens were similar, and there were rules about what you could have out on your patio--but it did seem sweet and even sort of quaint. As a Californian, I was amazed that the large lawns weren't watered--they just stayed green most of the year--and by the brick buildings, which I was pretty sure meant we were all doomed in the event of an earthquake.
Mostly I miss Parkfairfax in the evenings when I close the blinds in my bedroom so that the people in the next building five yards away can't peer directly into our windows. I miss my Parkfairfax bedroooms. In our first apartment there, our windows were at ground level, but they were partially hidden by large azaleas. I could lie in bed and peer through the bushes at our little patio. Our second place in Parkfairfax lacked a patio, but the bedroom window was perfect: nearly right up against it was a dogwood tree, and an oak towered over the open space below us. In the winter the trees were bare, and we could sort of see across to other apartments, but they were far enough away that we couldn't see much. In the spring the dogwood bloomed, and then it and the oak leafed out, keeping our room relatively cool and shaded--in fact, I hadn't realized how much darker our room was in the summer until I stood there just before we moved and remembered how bright our room had been as I'd laid in bed in labor with Adriana back in January.
But what started me thinking about this was something that completely took me by surprise. When I went to vote on Tuesday, I missed voting in Parkfairfax. I loved getting ready for work a little earlier than usual and then walking over to the nearby synagogue to stand in line with my neighbors while we waited our turn. Even if I didn't know many of them by name, we recognized each other from our bus rides (I think half the neighborhood rode the bus to the Pentagon Metro every day) and walks, and we would all nod and smile politely. The last time we voted, when I was quite pregnant, we waited with a man who lived across the street from us and rode the bus at the same time most mornings, and as he stood with his two-year-old in his arms, he joked with Brian about doing curls to get ready for our baby. When I was sent to wait in another line because when we'd moved the previous year I hadn't changed my address but the registrar somehow knew about it, I wasn't the only one in that line who had to change my registration right there because I had moved within the precinct. Maybe I'll feel differently when we've lived here a bit longer, and perhaps the fact that not working means I was able to vote after lunch, when there wasn't any line, rather than before heading in to the office. But I definitely missed my old community this week.
We lived in that neighborhood, Parkfairfax, for all of our five years. After three years, when we wanted to move to a place with an extra room and a washer/dryer (and when our landlord wanted to sell the unit we were living in), we moved just down the street from the place I originally picked out. Parkfairfax was built during the 1940s, just a little south of the Pentagon. There were some things about the apartments that let you know that the place had been built that long ago--weird wiring for the light switches, and original wood countertops in some kitchens. There was a condo association that kept everything looking rather Camazotz, I suppose--they had an azalea sale every May and a bulb sale every fall, so that most people's gardens were similar, and there were rules about what you could have out on your patio--but it did seem sweet and even sort of quaint. As a Californian, I was amazed that the large lawns weren't watered--they just stayed green most of the year--and by the brick buildings, which I was pretty sure meant we were all doomed in the event of an earthquake.
Mostly I miss Parkfairfax in the evenings when I close the blinds in my bedroom so that the people in the next building five yards away can't peer directly into our windows. I miss my Parkfairfax bedroooms. In our first apartment there, our windows were at ground level, but they were partially hidden by large azaleas. I could lie in bed and peer through the bushes at our little patio. Our second place in Parkfairfax lacked a patio, but the bedroom window was perfect: nearly right up against it was a dogwood tree, and an oak towered over the open space below us. In the winter the trees were bare, and we could sort of see across to other apartments, but they were far enough away that we couldn't see much. In the spring the dogwood bloomed, and then it and the oak leafed out, keeping our room relatively cool and shaded--in fact, I hadn't realized how much darker our room was in the summer until I stood there just before we moved and remembered how bright our room had been as I'd laid in bed in labor with Adriana back in January.
But what started me thinking about this was something that completely took me by surprise. When I went to vote on Tuesday, I missed voting in Parkfairfax. I loved getting ready for work a little earlier than usual and then walking over to the nearby synagogue to stand in line with my neighbors while we waited our turn. Even if I didn't know many of them by name, we recognized each other from our bus rides (I think half the neighborhood rode the bus to the Pentagon Metro every day) and walks, and we would all nod and smile politely. The last time we voted, when I was quite pregnant, we waited with a man who lived across the street from us and rode the bus at the same time most mornings, and as he stood with his two-year-old in his arms, he joked with Brian about doing curls to get ready for our baby. When I was sent to wait in another line because when we'd moved the previous year I hadn't changed my address but the registrar somehow knew about it, I wasn't the only one in that line who had to change my registration right there because I had moved within the precinct. Maybe I'll feel differently when we've lived here a bit longer, and perhaps the fact that not working means I was able to vote after lunch, when there wasn't any line, rather than before heading in to the office. But I definitely missed my old community this week.
Monday, February 04, 2008
Signs
One of my professors from Santa Cruz started encouraging Brian and me to do sign language with Adriana last summer. His granddaughter is only a few months older than Adriana and, by nine months old, was already able to communicate a bit with it. Brian and I thought it sounded like a great idea, and in fact, I'd been occasionally signing "milk" to her before nursing since she was a few months old, but we hadn't been really dedicated about it. Eventually, though, I checked out Sign With Your Baby from the library. We read a chapter here and there, looked up a couple of signs, and then when back to just signing milk occasionally. I knew she recognized the word when I said it, but
So a week or so before Christmas, when Adriana signed milk for the first time, we were surprised and immensely pleased. After enjoying this new ability she had to communicate we started adding more signs. Soon she was pointing at the stereo and signing for music when she wanted me to turn some on, or signing when she noticed music coming on during the news in the evening. Brian is better at it than I am, pointing at something and making the sign for it over and over as they play: he is the one responsible for teaching her "ball" and "monkey," her two favorite toys.
It's fun watching her catch onto a sign, and she is learning a couple of new ones every week. Early last week I put her in her highchair and gave her a slice of cheese to snack on while I cut up some vegetables for soup. She started to fuss and I went to get her out of the chair, but then seemed to sign "eat," so I gave her another piece of cheese, which she ate happily. On Friday as I was folding laundry, Adriana kept dropping her sippy cup into the hamper, and then whining for me to get it out. Each time I went to retrieve it for her, I would ask, "Do you need me to get your water out?" putting a ridiculous amount of emphasis on "water" and "out" as I signed them. Finally, I heard the cup hit the bottom of the hamper and looked over at the baby, who was patting her mouth with an open hand. Not quite the sign for water, but close enough. And she's done it over and over since then, both when she sees her cup and when it's not there but she wants a drink.
I heard somewhere that babies that sign often talk late, probably because they can communicate without speaking. I'm not sure if there are scientific data to back that up, and I think I've also heard that it doesn't affect when babies talk and that babies who sign talk earlier. But at eleven months old Adriana didn't have any words at all, and now, at nearly thirteen months she still doesn't (according to my baby book, I started at nine months), but I am finding it doesn't matter. She is going to be a late talker, so it relieves us all to have Adriana able to communicate with us beyond just fussing. Normally when we are at my dad's for a visit, I have trouble knowing when to feed her, because even when she seems to be fussy and a little hungry, she is so busy playing with Grandpa and getting into cupboards, that she won't eat. Last week when we were there, I didn't worry about nursing her until she asked, which she eventually did, and she really ate, too, not just nursing for a second before pulling away to see what she was missing.
This morning, I was awake but still exhausted, so when Adriana began to stir, I closed my eyes and pretended to sleep, hoping she would go back to sleep. Instead I felt her sit up and then touch my face. I opened my eyes, and there, so close I couldn't even focus, was a little fist signing for milk.
So a week or so before Christmas, when Adriana signed milk for the first time, we were surprised and immensely pleased. After enjoying this new ability she had to communicate we started adding more signs. Soon she was pointing at the stereo and signing for music when she wanted me to turn some on, or signing when she noticed music coming on during the news in the evening. Brian is better at it than I am, pointing at something and making the sign for it over and over as they play: he is the one responsible for teaching her "ball" and "monkey," her two favorite toys.
It's fun watching her catch onto a sign, and she is learning a couple of new ones every week. Early last week I put her in her highchair and gave her a slice of cheese to snack on while I cut up some vegetables for soup. She started to fuss and I went to get her out of the chair, but then seemed to sign "eat," so I gave her another piece of cheese, which she ate happily. On Friday as I was folding laundry, Adriana kept dropping her sippy cup into the hamper, and then whining for me to get it out. Each time I went to retrieve it for her, I would ask, "Do you need me to get your water out?" putting a ridiculous amount of emphasis on "water" and "out" as I signed them. Finally, I heard the cup hit the bottom of the hamper and looked over at the baby, who was patting her mouth with an open hand. Not quite the sign for water, but close enough. And she's done it over and over since then, both when she sees her cup and when it's not there but she wants a drink.
I heard somewhere that babies that sign often talk late, probably because they can communicate without speaking. I'm not sure if there are scientific data to back that up, and I think I've also heard that it doesn't affect when babies talk and that babies who sign talk earlier. But at eleven months old Adriana didn't have any words at all, and now, at nearly thirteen months she still doesn't (according to my baby book, I started at nine months), but I am finding it doesn't matter. She is going to be a late talker, so it relieves us all to have Adriana able to communicate with us beyond just fussing. Normally when we are at my dad's for a visit, I have trouble knowing when to feed her, because even when she seems to be fussy and a little hungry, she is so busy playing with Grandpa and getting into cupboards, that she won't eat. Last week when we were there, I didn't worry about nursing her until she asked, which she eventually did, and she really ate, too, not just nursing for a second before pulling away to see what she was missing.
This morning, I was awake but still exhausted, so when Adriana began to stir, I closed my eyes and pretended to sleep, hoping she would go back to sleep. Instead I felt her sit up and then touch my face. I opened my eyes, and there, so close I couldn't even focus, was a little fist signing for milk.
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