Food update

Alice continues to have new foods every day, and we are introducing them at an increasing rate. Recently we've added peas, watermelon, bread, pasta, cheese, flax seeds, Pork By-Products, Water, Pork Liver, Chicken, Rice, Corn Starch, Oat Fiber, Chicken Fat (preserved with mixed tocopherols and citric acid), Fish Meal, Corn Gluten Meal, Chicken Liver Flavor, Calcium Sulfate, Guar Gum, Fish Oil, Brewers Dried Yeast, Glucose, DL-Methionine, Choline Chloride, Potassium Chloride, Taurine, Cysteine, Calcium Carbonate, Dried Egg Yolk, Glycine, Vitamin E Supplement, Iodized Salt, Potassium Citrate, Thiamine Mononitrate, Zinc Oxide, Ferrous Sulfate, Niacin, Pyridoxine Hydrochloride, Beta-Carotene, Manganous Oxide, Calcium Pantothenate, Vitamin B12 Supplement, Riboflavin, Biotin, Vitamin D3 Supplement, Folic Acid, Calcium Iodate.

Mobility 3.0

Lots of exciting news for Alice in the past month: mobility, teething, new foods, and delightful new interactions with us and with Lizzie.

Since I last checked in about a month ago, Alice has gone from barrel rolls to a commando crawl to full fledged all-fours crawling. For a while we wondered if she would ever bother with a real crawl -- she was so good at the commando crawl, she seemed to find little need for the real thing. But about a week ago she started to try, and by a few days ago it was clear she'd be making the switch. As of today there's almost no belly scootching at all. And she's FAST. Dangerously so. Developed concurrently with the switch to all fours crawling is Alice's "knee-up" maneuver, by which she pops up onto her knees to reach things on chairs, table tops, etc. The magazines are no longer safe on end tables; I've lost 2 issues of the Economist in as many days..

Next up in the news, and this just in today -- the first sign of a tooth! Bottom right-center, just barely poking through. She has yet to bite me, but I sense it's coming. I remember Lizzie's first forays into toothyness, and I must say I'm not looking forward to a repeat... But we celebrate the tooth nonetheless. Our little baby Alice is growing up!

New on the list of foods are: wheat (pasta, well cooked and cut up as finger food, as well as a soft roll yesterday); cheese (soft, in little pieces); whole black beans; diced avocado; and a host of other fruits and veggies in soft baby-food type preparations.

Last but not least, Alice and Lizzie are having more and more interaction with each other. THIS, people, is what it's all about. SO wonderful. So cute. And I am so very proud of both of them: Lizzie is gentle and kind (mostly), and Alice is enthusiastic and patient. Tonight they took their very first bath together. A few pics from then, and also earlier in the evening, to give a sense of how they behave together. (Mostly Alice glowing from Lizzie's attention, and Lizzie loving the limelight she gets as the exalted big sis.)

cheerio fiend

Alice is full fledged Cheerio addict. Once she sees them, she howls and bangs on her tray until she gets them. Then she shoves them in her mouth as fast as she can and "asks" for more. Other than that, feeding goes well, and she is agreeable with most new foods. Hard to say what her favorite is, except Cheerios.

She's turned into a very regular sleeper, and we've finally managed to eliminate night-time feeding. Her first real sleep-through-the-night was just a few days after her 7 month birthday. Basically Mom and Dad had been slackers and just didn't have the energy to deal with getting her out of the habit of eating during the night. She adapted very quickly and without much protestation. She is a good napper, with a morning nap lasting about 1-2 hours, and an afternoon nap of 2-3 hours. Sometimes the naps are a little too short, but she can usually deal pretty well with a short nap. Again, she's a very mellow and agreeable baby.

She's mobile now. For a couple months she's been rolling places intentionally. then she added the pivot, and a few weeks ago a very deliberate commando crawl. She doesn't do a classic crawl yet, and I think that it might be delayed a bit, because she is so good at the commando crawl. Liz never did a commando crawl and the first way she figured out to get around was the actual crawl. Alice could move faster with a real crawl, but it seems the commando crawl meets her needs for now.

She has been sitting for a few weeks and can now sit herself up off the ground. Its funny: sometimes, I can put her in the center of the rug sitting up, and she gets frustrated. I think she gets frustrated because when she is sitting she can't move around - like she hasn't figured out that she can flop down, crawl around, and sit up again. This happens most often in two places: in the living room and outside. These places house her two favorite obsession other than Cheerios: the fireplace screen and grass. Usually she can crawl to either of them from where she is. But if I plop her up sitting on her butt, its like she gets stuck. I'm sure it won't last.

Bye for now.

Just a quickie post

Hi there,

Alice has put a few more notches in her belt recently:

1. rolling back to front, about February 15th,
2. solid food, about March 10th,
3. sleeping on her tummy, about March 10th.

So, she's officially a big girl now. Other than that, she is a delight. Very personable and social, and she continues to be very mellow. She loves hanging out on the floor with her toys, rolling around.

The big news for the family is that we are moving the NH, so Alice and Lizzie are gong to be New England girls! East coast!

Food, glorious food!

Alice had her first taste of rice cereal on Sunday, March 6th, at just under 5 and a half months. We had been planning to wait until her 6 month birthday, as we did with Lizzie, but it just wasn't meant to be. Both Alice and I have been ravenous lately -- and when I think of it, it's no small wonder: she's pushing 17 pounds or so. No wonder I can't keep up!


Alice took to rice cereal with gusto! As the spoon approached her mouth for the first time, she grabbed it and shoved it in her mouth with alarming speed. (She's been watching us at dinner for months, so maybe I shouldn't be surprised that she knew what to do. Still, it makes me question our table manners!) She had at least 2 tablespoons that first meal (though admittedly, a good bit ended up on her bib (and face, hands, tray, etc.). Yesterday she had a quieter meal. The first 10 minutes were relatively unsuccessful -- she kept spitting out the cereal, though it sure seemed like she wanted to eat it. After that she really got the hang of it, and ate another few tablespoons with relatively little leakage.

Yikes: Old post I forgot to publish!

(From February Second)

Yes, yes, we know. We're very slow in updating the blogs these days. But we have a good excuse: we're overrun! By children, colds, students, new projects and research, and the rest of life... it's a zoo around here. The girls are thriving despite the chaos.

Alice is growing like a weed, both physically and developmentally. Her four month checkup with Dr. Wong confirmed what we already knew: Alice is a happy, robust, and right on track developmentally. She's in roughly the 72nd percentile for height and the 80th for weight, so no concernes about feeding and growth.

Her sleep is regularizing nicely, with a short morning nap (30-45 minutes around 9am), a long (2-4 hour) midday nap, and a sporadic late afternoon nap on those days when she needs to recharge to make it to bedtime. On a typical day, Alice goes to bed a little before Lizzie -- usually around 6pm -- then sleeps until 2 or 3am, wakes to nurse, and then goes back to sleep until morning (6:30-7:30am). It's not perfect, but it's getting better!

All around Alice is a happy, mellow, drooly (oh so drooly) baby. What a treat!

Looking forward and remembering back.

Amazing how time flies. 2010 is out the door, the Christmas tree came down yesterday, Lizzie's back at school, and the season's cookies, gifts, and excesses are long gone. So ends another incredible -- and incredibly busy -- cycle around the calendar.

Alice's first year (including gestation) was a blur. It's hard to believe that this time last year, she was little more than a blastocyst -- if even that -- and now we have a living, feeling, usually joyful but always spirited little person on our hands! The past month has brought big changes in little Alice. Alice achieved a major milestone which, alas, I have yet to see: she rolled over, from front to back, on Wednesday 10/22, just shy of her 3 month birthday. She repeated the feat three times -- for Eric and for O'Mama and O'Pa. And then... nothing. Hasn't done it again. It's a bit uncouth, really, to share the moment with everyone but me... she leaves my sight quite rarely still... and yet. Harumph. (But of course, I am very proud.) She's also very very close to rolling back to front. We were sort of expecting that first, truth be told.

Alice has also become very talkative. She coos and gurgles quite a bit, but she also, well, talks. I can't think of how else to put it. Harranging, perhaps. It can be very loud. She discusses the wrongdoings of her nemesis Mr. Brown Owl, and she'll sometimes beckon the ceiling fan to please come closer so she can get a better look. And of course she demands attention from me -- from us -- when we are insufficiently engaged in her cuteness on the playmat. (This said, she's still remarkably more independent and self-entertaining than Lizzie was at this age.)

Somewhat less charming are Alice's new sleep habits. First the backstory: Shortly before Christmas, Eric and I shared some takeout szechuan eggplant, a dish we both love in large part for the numbing szechuan peppercorns that signify the dish. Turns out, those same peppercorns flavored my milk, and Alice didn't like it. At all. She was inconsolable for about 36 hours. Didn't want to eat, then got too hungry, then didn't take much, got hungrier.... in short, a disaster that led to some bad habits like waking several times a night and very poor napping. The peppercorns are long past, but the residual effects linger on. Alice has been waking 2 and 3 times a night (and typically failing to settle back to sleep at least once) for nearly 3 weeks now. BOO! (Before this she'd been sleeping from roughly 6:30pm -2am, then again from 2:15am-7am.) I'll start dream-feeding tonight to see how that goes. Fingers crossed.

Sleeping woes notwithstanding, we're all doing well and looking forward to an exciting 2011. I'll leave you with a little baby-zen. Happy New Year!