A year already??

Yeah, it is really hard to believe!  The little bundle of joy we first saw 1 year ago is now a sturdy, happy, almost-toddler!  As you can see in the above video, she enjoyed her birthday quite a bit.

Although it is a little sad not to have this little single armful of baby any more, she is so much more fun now than a newborn, I have to say.  Smiling and giggling (funny mouth noises are great fun right now!), motoring around, paying a bit more attention to certain toys...  I'm sure I have many more deep thoughts I could share here about my feelings on this whole issue, but to be honest, it's all I can do to even put posts on her blog at all...don't have it in me right now to go digging deeper.

Lyra says:  Thanks to all the friends and relatives for the birthday presents...I really did not have enough toys before this (Mommy says, that's not true!).  Thank you Grandma and Akong for cleaning me up after the smash cake!

Skillz and other things:

Motor: Still crawling all over the place and cruising where there are handholds.  Also standing unsupported more often and for longer periods of time.  Not quite able to walk yet, though she can walk if you stand next to her and hold her hand.  Daddy claims she took a couple steps towards him, and today while standing drinking her milk (i.e., distracted), she definitely took ONE step.  It is definitely harder to hang out with her as she must be pretty much constantly watched.  Everything must be picked up, examined, tasted and/or bitten.  Sometimes the bitten includes Mommy or Daddy's leg.

Language: Doesn't seem to (consistently) have actual words yet, or maybe we just don't recognize the Lyra dialect of English.  Sometimes she seems to say "da"! when she sees Daddy.  Also, I think sometimes "mamamama" during meals is "more."  Today at dinner, I swear, I thought I heard her say "more."  Sadly, she does hear that word more frequently than "Mama", I think.

Foods:  Still loving her ability to eat dairy, has liked sharp cheddar, Monterey Jack, and swiss cheeses.  Today for dinner had tofu with sweet potato.  Tried quinoa and mushrooms for the first time (along with peas, not new) yesterday and today, wouldn't really eat it until other flavoring was added.  Also today had her first peanut butter (on toast)!!

Sleep: Still sleeping the sleep of the righteous (or something) from about 6:30ish to 6:30ish.  Man, are we lucky!  Still taking 2 naps a day (today's experiment to let her go longer before she napped - in an attempt to move her to one longer nap - failed utterly).

Stats: 24 lbs. 13 oz, 32.25 inches (average height of a 20-month old!)

Good job!

This is Lyra at the Weathervane restaurant near our house, for her (early) birthday celebration dinner with my parents. Here she is showing off the skill she developed fully in the past few days (or else she developed the desire to actually use it!) once Grandma used some hard love and just put the sippy cup on the tray in front of her and didn't hold it up for her to suck. I don't know why this particular thing she is doing makes me so happy. Literally, every time yesterday and today she picked up her cup yet again and not only put it to her mouth (which she did very occasionally before), but properly tipped it back enough that the milk actually went into her mouth (which she didn't seem to get before), I felt so, so happy and proud. She even completely emptied 4 oz of milk tonight! Maybe it especially thrills me because it is so obviously purposeful, unlike her standing unassisted for several seconds, which just seems accidental.

Oh dear

Now that Lyra is mobile, crawling (very fast sometimes!) and cruising, we have stay much sharper than before...otherwise things happen....like coffee mugs getting knocked over, slippers and shoes getting mouthed.  She is starting to stand sometimes for a few seconds at a time.  Walking independently can't be far behind...then we will really be in trouble!

Very Cute Things She Started Doing Lately: She is babbling even more than before, but some of the noises are completely new, little "uh" and "oh" and "wo" and "oooh" sounds when she is pulling herself up, crawling, etc.  It's very, very cute as she sounds like she's making tremendous efforts to do these things.  Not sure, but I think sometimes (especially when eating) the "mamama" sounds may mean "more."  Flailing her hands toward the bottle or bowl also means "more."  Flapping, slapping, and pushing at incoming bottles or spoons, very clearly means "no more!!"  These actions also lead to lots of various food products on the floor, Lyra's hands, the highchair, and mommy.  Recently she started frequently doing this kicking motion back and forth with her legs straight - while lying flat on the changing table, or being held up in the air...it's very cute, and I think when I start saying "kicky-kicky-kicky" it makes her do it again.

Unfortunate New Things:  She used to love "brushing" her teeth.  Now, she very firmly closes her mouth, shakes her head, and even sticks out her tongue in her efforts to avoid the dreaded toothbrush.

Exciting New Things: Lyra can now deal with dairy!!  No more "milk protein intolerance."  She loves cheese (sharp cheddar cubes - yummy snack), whole milk (completely off her pricey formula - though we were getting it free through health insurance anyway), yogurt.  Thank goodness...it seriously expands the range of  "real" food we can feed her.  Also, she has been off the Dr. Brown bottles for the last month or so.  SO happy about that...those bottle parts were such a pain to wash.

Newest Foods Tried: Besides dairy products, curried fish, Indian food (Tandoori chicken, chapati bread, aloo gobi - too spicy!, saag paneer), pasta, whole peas, corn (of course, the kernels came out whole in ...her you-know-what).

In less than a week she turns 1 year old.  It is almost unbelievable to me that an entire year has passed...so much has happened and we have so loved watching her change and grow...

First Christmas!

Finally getting around to putting up some pictures of Lyra's first Christmas!  This week was spent in Florida, half on the east coast (West Palm Beach, at the Chuang condo family compound) and half on the west coast (Sarasota at Grandma and Grandpa Plerhoples's home).  The best part was having everyone from both sides of the family together, even if briefly.  It was so great to have all 6 kids there with the 3 grandchildren.  Alex (Joe and Kim's son) got to meet Cora (Tim and Alicia's daughter) and Lyra for the first time, and Lyra got to see cousin Cora for the second time.  They are all basically the same age - or at least we will think of them that way eventually, since 1-2 months, which has seemed like this gigantic difference for the past year, will mean nothing later on.  So here it is:  Lyra was born February 15, Alex March 27, and Cora April 2...bam bam bam!

Lyra also got to meet certain Plerhoples family members for the first time - Great-Aunt Stella and Great-Aunt Jim.  She also of course had fun and flirted with various other new friends.  This was also the first time Lyra ever flew on an airplane, and she did great!  Well, on the way back up she was a bit whiny but when you've missed your morning nap...you're going to be cranky!  And how could I forget...first time in a pool.  Loved it, of course...

She did not really get the concept of opening gifts and so they were all opened for her.  She got lots of cool presents and currently most of them are strewn around our family room floor, or tucked away in her little Radio Flyer wagon.  Can't wait until next Christmas, when she will actually be cognizant of what is going on, and very excited!

Just a few words, again

Well, it's been a really busy couple months for our family....Xmas week with family, the St. Lucia vacation...busy parents working...I will post a more detailed post later regarding the recent vacations, but for now, before I forget, I just wanted to mention a couple of really endearing things Lyra has been doing: turning the book pages at bedtime (as long as you let the flap loose only when you're done reading the page, you don't have premature page-turning), and swaying in time to various "musical pieces", including off-key singing, drumming on the table, etc.  She is really enjoying the music in the morning and at bedtime from Scout, her green stuffed dog who says things like "Hi Lyra!" and sings a Lyra song that spells out her name (nifty Xmas present from Grandma and Grandpa P!).

Oh, and above - cute (tiny) (first) ponytails!

A quick word from St. Lucia

We are here in the Caribbean - my first trip to another country!  The slog here kind of sucked - we had to get up at 3 am and get to Logan Airport for the 5:45 am flight, and then run through the Atlanta airport 20 minutes before the connecting flight was scheduled to take off.  But we made it, and are enjoying the vacation.  I am loving seeing new people, and also the refreshing breeze off the ocean.  Haven't gone swimming yet, but looking forward to it!  This picture is in Rodney Bay at the end of a long day of eating, napping, and walking around the town of Gros Islet in the hot, hot weather.  Right after this we had dinner and I had my first real meal that was totally table food: curried fish with potatos and carrots, plus plantains, and I LOVED it!  Bring on the ethnic food!

More (and more pictures) later!

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year from our little vampire (can you see the 2 little fangs coming in up there?)!

           It's been quite a year...time to reflect back on 2009.  Lots of changes in our lives, but obviously, the biggest and best was the arrival of little Lyra and, eventually, her smiles.  Before we had her, I feared how our lives would be altered - how we wouldn't be able to just pick up and go wherever we wanted, for example.  Well, a lot of the things I thought might happen did happen (we in fact can't just pick up and go wherever we want, whenever we want!), but it's really and truly ok because the tradeoff is having this amazing and totally lovable creature in our lives...

I started thinking a couple months back (Lyra's now 10 1/2 months) that oh, she won't change as quickly any more.  Not true!  It has been really fun and so incredible to watch her develop - a nascent skill will go from first hints of her doing it, to fumbling intermittent attempts, to refining, then to advanced placement level, all within a short time span, sometimes within a couple weeks.  For example, watching her "pincer grasp" utilizing index finger and thumb to grasp items was initially sort of painful to watch...within TWO WEEKS she was conveying small crumbs into her mouth and having a nearly 100% success rate at actually getting everything into her mouth.

Some updates on what she's doing these days:

Food: Eating pretty much anything you give her.  Cheerios are a favorite.  She loves bread, too.  She now eats peas and green beans quite happily.

Motor skills: Besides mastering the pincer grasp, she is finally crawling forwards, though still somewhat jerkily.  Just this week she started pulling/pushing herself up to stand, and is cruising around.

Not-so-fun new developments:

• Hating diaper changes or clothing changes that require her to stay on her back; she now usually screams because she is trying to roll onto her tummy, while the diaper-changer continually tries to roll her back over and hopes no pee decides to come out at that moment.  This morning there was no crying due to mommy entertaining her with silly noises and faces...doubt that will hold up for long, though!  
• Wanting to get into the kitty food and water dishes...will be moving those behind the baby gate!
• Needing to childproof.  Two of three gates are up so far (didn't order enough extensions for the third) in order to be able to confine her to one area.  Mommy bought these "nice" magnetic cabinet locks that don't show from the outside...but are a royal PAIN to install, as Daddy can attest to, in part due to our slightly funky cabinet door design in the kitchen.  There are some holes in the cabinets now, oops....

Hmmm, still not done with this post and it's getting out of date over a week later.  For one thing, Lyra now has all 8 of the front teeth (4 top and 4 bottom) coming in.  Better post it now!