7/28/06 - Heat Wave

The weather has been continually sweltering, breaking 50-year (and in some cases, 100-year) records. Even at night, the humidity has kept the temperature around the mid 80's. The state's power grids have been overloaded all week, causing power outages and forcing rolling blackouts all over California. Officials have asked people not to run major appliances before 7pm, which means no loads of dishes or laundry. Just as your house it starting to cool down, you have to run an appliance and heat the place up again. It makes it harder to cook, too. The last place I want to be after a hot day is hovered over a hot stove. Thankfully our power hasn't been affected, because if it were we'd be forced to retreat to the closest store or mall for the air conditioning. I've tried letting Eva crawl around in just a diaper, but she has a tendency to pull on the tabs and take them off, so I have to make her at least wear shorts or the diaper covers that go with her dresses.

Picky Eating

Almost overnight, Eva has decided to exercise her power in making food choices. She's lost interest in the fresh fruits I cut up for her, and tends to pick the meat, bread or favorite veggies from her tray and leave the rest. Sometimes the novelty of using a toddler spoon or fork will engross her attention enough that she will eat whatever she manages to get onto it regardless, but not always. To be fair, she doesn't have much of an appetite for more than couple bites of anything right now. The heat probably has something to do with that. But if she ever catches us eating, she instantly wants a bite of whatever we're having, even if she turned her nose at the exact same thing on her plate not moments before. And it has to be from our plate; no fair serving her separately in the highchair.

Nursing has been reduced to a bedtime or naptime indulgence, although in the case of a boo-boo or unsettling event (such as a doctor's visit), mommy's breast is considered a soothing retreat from all evils. When she wants to nurse she uses the sign for “milk”, pumping her little hand so earnestly at me it’s hard to say no. With a reduction in breastfeeding, I'm realizing it is probably time for me to start returning to pre-pregnancy eating habits. I've always been more of a grazer, anyway, but I need to cut back on my portions and sweet tooth indulgences I previously would have been able to get away with. Since interrupting my day to make a sandwich or sit down and eat is such a hassle, I frequently catch myself snacking on whatever is available, which usually isn't much healthier than a cookie. I'm going to have to start stocking up on healthier finger foods. Dinner is a different story, because I always like to have a healthy meal waiting for Dave when he gets home, that I can chop up for baby food the next day.

New Habits

While Daddy’s girl has got the “dada” call down pat, Mommy’s summons continues to be a much more simple “eh, eh!” sound (which I think is baby talk for “hey, you!”), followed by a gesture or baby sign to indicate what she wants. I’m going to flatter myself that she usually wants Mommy, though she still has the audacity to put off saying my name. Eva is once again pulling off her glasses every chance she gets, which makes me nervous when we go out that we might lose them again. I'm paranoid now because I also lost my own glasses, and after two days of looking finally ordered a replacement. Two days after that...you guessed it...I found them at the bottom of the diaper bag. And I had looked there four times! Oh, well. Now I have back up. Besides throwing her glasses and becoming a picky eater, Eva has started a new habit of pulling her hair out. She does it when she's tired, particularly while she's nursing. She's always been fidgety while trying to fall asleep, but lately she's literally been pulling out fistfuls of hair, which makes me uneasy. Doesn't that hurt? She's also started waking almost every hour during the night, and after a few days I realized she was in pain from trying to cut her first molar. First she got her two bottom teeth, then her top four, and recently her 7th down in the lower front. Now she's getting #8, her first molar on her upper left side, and it's making her cranky and miserable. Nothing Baby Motrin and cold teethers can't fix.

Baby Praise

Whenever we go to church, Eva likes to grab one of the shimmery flags provided for the kids during worship and wave it around like her older counterparts. A lot of the parents have begun sitting in the front rows so their toddlers can have plenty of space to dance, twirl and wave colorful flags in front of the worship band. Some people might consider that a distraction, but I think it's sweet to watch the little ones join the praises in their delightfully unabashed way. Jesus said we should come to Him with the faith of little children, and their innocent example is uplifting, not to mention adorable.

Looking Forward

Two women at my church are expecting their second child, and since the joke is that babies always come in threes in our group, everyone is good-naturedly eyeing the next candidate. Apparently I’m one of them, but I don’t mind being part of the joke. Eva is at the age now where we feel it would be fine to get pregnant again. We're simply not avoiding it anymore. I don't like the term "trying", because that to me turns baby making into a kind of science experiment. Charting cycles, taking temperatures, and scheduling sex like some kind of strategic operation. We're not doing any of that, we're just leaving it in God's hands. Last time the timing was perfect: I was pregnant within five months of going off birth control, the nausea left me just before Thanksgiving, my energy returned just in time for me to work the Christmas rush, and she was born in early summer, before the heat really kicked in. Right now my only fear is that next time I'll end up nine months pregnant in the heat of summer. I hate the summer heat anyway, but being hugely pregnant would be even more miserable. It makes no sense to think about it though, because it's out of my control anyway.

7/22/06 - Playtime

Eva is now 13 months old. She has a new favorite activity: toddling around by pushing her Fisher Price Corn Popper ride-on around the house. She's gotten so tall, her hair is getting long and curly, and she changes so much every day I'm afraid to blink. She's also revealing how smart she is, learning so much so quickly I often catch myself asking "when did she learn to do that?" Eva recently learned to make "fish lips", and can frequently be found puckering up to show off her new skill. She's also learned to play with her lips like an insane asylum inmate, sticking them out and flicking them with her fingers to make a "bwub, bwub" sound. It's become her universal sign for "mouth". She loves to point to my nose, then play with my ear, then flap her lips with her fingers, all while I name the different parts for her. Then we repeat the game over and over. I showed her how the little balls go down the rainspout of her Fisher Price playhouse, and she mastered it within three tries. Now she's trying to see how many other toys can fit down the chute.

Water Baby

Eva loves water, and will sometimes try to climb into the tub or wading pool while fully clothed. Once in the pool, she'll keep climbing in and out until the clean water is clouded with dirt, grass, and doomed ants. She loves to play with the hose as well, splashing herself and everything around her. Dave likes put her in the wading pool with a few toys on our back patio, and then rest in a chair with his feet in the water while she plays. Eva also got her first experience in a big pool at our Mommy and Me group last week. At first she clung to me apprehensively, but after seeing her little friends enjoying the water, she soon started splashing and playing like an old pro in my arms.

Baby Talk

Eva is becoming quite a Daddy's girl. Whenever she hears the door creak at the top of the stairs, she thinks it's Daddy coming home and excitedly crawls over to greet him, clapping and calling "dada!" until he picks her up. It's enough to make your heart melt. I hate to disappoint her when she often discovers that it's just me coming back from emptying the trash or throwing in a load of laundry. She is increasingly making an effort to communicate, often using baby signs and gestures she makes up on her own. While watching her "My Baby Can Talk" DVD, I noticed that Eva would use the sign "more" to imitate every sign they introduced. She uses it constantly now, including when she wants to be fed or picked up. I don't think that she quite understands yet that it means "more", but uses it whenever she wants something because it has elicited reactions in the past. She gets frustrated when we don't understand her.

Mischief and Mayhem

Ah, the nuisance of a toddler's growing abilities! She's so quick, she'll get into trouble before we even realize it. At the mall this week Eva took off her glasses and dropped them out of the stroller while I wasn't looking. After spending an hour and a half retracing our steps and asking every shop along our route if anyone had turned them in, I was forced to go home empty-handed. A few hours and phone calls later, I was told the girls at JC Penney had found them under a display rack. Whew! Just in time, because I had ordered new lenses for her frames to replace her old, scratched ones. These ones are Transitions, so she doesn't have to squint in the sun anymore, and I don't have to buy separate sunglasses. She also likes to get into the trash so she can dump, shred and play with the contents. Once we even caught Eva playing with soggy toilet paper in our master bathroom toilet when someone forgot to flush and put the lid down. I get the shudders just thinking about it! I can't load the dishwasher when Eva is around because she always goes after the dirty silverware. You always gotta stay one step ahead of her.

Beat The Heat

I've been sick with a bad head and chest cold this week, made even more miserable by a record heat wave that's sweeping the nation. We've got window A/C units running full blast, with strategically placed fans to try and recirculate the cooler air. I've discovered it can be difficult to buy certain cold medicines these days because they're apparently popular to use for cooking meth. So you have to take a card of your pick to the counter, where they'll limit how much of the real thing you can buy. What a drag. If there's anything I've learned about being a Mommy, it's that you can't call in sick. The work goes on. Diapers still have to be changed, laundry and dishes still have to be done, the trash won't empty itself, the family still has to be fed, and baby still needs to be dressed, bathed, put down for naps and supervised while they tear the house apart in the name of discovery. Dave took some vacation days for the last week of my parent's visit, so he was able to help me some. Eva really enjoyed having Grandma and Grandma, Uncle Caleb and Aunt Barocha to play with. Now my family is now back home in Oregon, and Dave is back at work, so I'm on my own again.

7/3/06 - Summer Insanity

This has been a crazy past few weeks, and there are no signs of it letting up. For one thing, it's been hot and unseasonably humid, with even some thunderstorms. I've had to frequently retreat to the mall or other locale to escape the heat, since our house only has a couple of small A/C window units. Dave has spent the past few months preparing for a community health fair to be hosted at his building, and was working overtime the last couple weeks leading up to it, so I barely saw him.

My parents have come down from Oregon for a month-long visit, and have been driving back and forth between my house and Grandma's house to help take care of her, who is still weak and poorly. In some ways that's worked out better for Eva, since it gives her a day or two in between visits to get back on schedule, with plenty of sleep and down time. She gets so excited when my family is here it makes it hard for her to go down for naps. Having them here has been a good excuse to visit local attractions to keep my sister Barocha (14) and brother Caleb (12) entertained. So far we've been to the Lavender Fields, Mission San Luis Rey and the Reuben H. Fleet Science Center.

Practice Makes Perfect

Eva has always been observant, studying new people and things with amazing intensity. It's finally starting to pay off. She recognizes objects and their purposes, and loves to try out using them. She knows a hat goes on your head, shoes go on your feet, a comb goes in your hair, and a spoon in your mouth. She points the remote at the TV, tries to drink from a toy cup, bangs on the bongo drums, and holds the phone to her ear while chattering away. She knows the signs for "eat", "more", and "all done". She's also started waving "bye, bye".

I've started teaching her to recognize body parts, and she will eagerly point to your nose when asked, as well as your ears and mouth, with a little coaching. The question everyone wants to know now is, "is she walking yet"? She's taking her sweet time on this one, preferring to crawl because she can do that so much faster. She'll walk if you hold her hands, but drops onto the floor the minute you let go. Though the other babies I know who are Eva's age have been walking for weeks, I know she's still well within normal range. She's just taking her time, content that she can get where she wants to go by crawling. It doesn't bother me as much as it did when she was months behind her little friends in crawling. She did it when she felt good and ready, and right away was a skillful as if she'd been doing it all along.

You begin to realize that every child has their own time frame for everything, and it has nothing to do with how smart or advanced they are. Actually, it's got more to do with temperament. High energy babies tend to hit milestones like walking sooner because they are always eagerly in motion, though using these skills before they're completely ready can result in a lot more bumps, bruises and falls. More laid back personalities like Eva will be more content to wait before attempting these skills, but once they do, they usually master them pretty quickly. It also has a lot to do with whether or not they have older siblings who motivate them to try and keep up so they're not left out. We just have to remember that by the time they get to school age, nobody's gonna care when they first walked, potty trained or drank from a cup. They're all gonna end up on about the same plane anyway.

Road Trip

My friend Kate flew in from Wisconsin and wanted to meet up with friends at the YWAM base in Los Angeles where we used to live and work together, since there was a good-bye party there for old friends of ours. At first I said no because a 250-mile round trip is tough with a baby in a car seat with no one to help entertain her. But Eva had so much trouble sleeping the night before, I knew she'd be down most of the morning, and decided to risk it. I figured we could stop at Grandma's house along the way if she got too antsy. Eva was still asleep when we passed Grandma's, so I decided to gamble and drive straight on up. It was a 2 1/2 hour trip, and she did great up until the last 20 minutes, when she finally started throwing a fit.

When we got to the YWAM base I let her stretch, climb and crawl wherever she wanted, so she got pretty dirty, but burned off enough energy to be able to handle the drive back. I got to see all my old missionary friends I used to be on staff with, some of whom I hadn't seen in years, and most of whom had never met Eva. Dave Gustaveson was there, surprised to see "the leprechauns" out in force again and meet the babies ("Big" Eva, Kate and I used to run around as a trio of the shortest staff on the base, and were good-naturedly dubbed "the leprechauns" because of our petite size). I also got to see Dave Smith (Smitty), Ylva, J.D., Megan & Nigel, Bonnie & Conrad, and Wayne & Karen. Kate and Nicola and baby Raphael came to visit, too, so it was like a mini reunion.

I could see the light of recognition come on whenever someone first heard Eva's name; they immediately knew whom she was named after. I thought that was sweet. (I joke that the only opportunity her 5-foot namesake would ever have to being called "big Eva" was my naming my little girl after her.) It was nice to spend some time in a place where people had those mutual friendships and understood how much they meant to me. It was a lot of fun. My visits there are always few and far between, and with a baby, they get even more difficult to manage. (Boy, did I feel like an old fart with all these young DTS students swirling around, and me married with a kid! I still can't believe my DTS was 10 years ago! Ouch!)

On the way back, little Eva started fussing just before we got to Grandma's, so we stayed there for the next few hours while I gave her a bath and let her crawl around some more. We left around Eva's bedtime, hoping she go to sleep, but she was so over-tired and wound up that she cried the whole drive home. Then it took her an hour at home to finally settle down enough to fall asleep. Needless to say, as fun as it was to see old friends at my old stomping grounds, I won't be going back anytime soon.

Cuddle Bug

Eva loves to cuddle. When she's playing throughout the day, she stops every few minutes to crawl over for a hug. If I'm ignoring her while occupied with something, like writing an e-mail, she'll get really fussy until I pick her up. Then I shower her with kisses, talk to her, give her lots of eye contact, and try to finish what I was doing. Sometimes that's OK with her, sometimes it's not. If she wants my undivided attention, she wants it NOW, and won't let up until she gets it. Toddlers can be very demanding that way.

People talk about "getting through the first year" as if everything gets easier after that. The truth is, with every stage of development, you simply trade one set of challenges for another. True, she's good at entertaining herself now, but it's usually by getting into things she shouldn't. When, as an infant, she was spitting up all the time and going through three outfits a day, I couldn't wait until she outgrew that phase. But now I've simply traded the daily load of laundry for mopping the floor under the highchair after each and every meal. And though she rarely spits up anymore, it's much worse when she does. (Like a few days ago, when she baptized me, herself, and the living room recliner in chunky guacamole.)  Lesson learned: be grateful for what you have this moment. The grass may look greener on the horizon, but it's often an optical illusion.