Monday, September 27, 2010

And so it begins...


Beatrice gave me my first real scare today. We were looking to escape the heat (today in L.A. it was 113F downtown and even hotter in the Valley, the hottest record temperature in L.A. ever - that is, not just for September 27, but for any day in any year since they started recording temperatures in 1877 - but I digress). I took Beatrice to a well air-conditioned indoor shopping mall with a carousel, a little ride-on train, and an enclosed children's play area.

Beatrice was playing in the play area while I sat beside her on a bench. I saw her crawl into a tunnel and immediately I stood up and walked over to her - there were a lot of much older kids near the tunnel and I was afraid she'd get trampled. I walked four steps to the tunnel, peered inside - and the tunnel was empty. I stood up, scanned the children's play area, and Beatrice wasn't anywhere.

Just as I was starting to panic, I caught a glimpse of dark hair streak past out of the corner of my eye. I turned to see Beatrice running at full speed through the gate, out of the enclosure, and through the shopping mall, headed for the jewelry store Claire's. I chased after her but she got there ahead of me. By the time I caught up with her she was sitting happily on the floor of Claire's pulling shiny plastic necklaces off the lowest display shelves.

So if anyone wants to buy her a leash for Christmas...

Thursday, September 23, 2010

The County Fair (and the Wages of Fun)





Beatrice in the petting pen

Yesterday we took Beatrice to the Los Angeles County Fair, where I used to go every autumn as a child. She had a wonderful time, from the petting zoo to the pig racing, from the corn on the cob to the lemonade, from the cow milking demonstration to the carnival rides she loved watching even though she was too young to ride on them.

The highlight of the day, naturally, was the Extreme Canines Stunt Dog Show. Every time a dog caught a Frisbee or jumped through a hoop she shrieked "Doggy! Doggy!" in joy and amazement. At one point she was so excited she actually vomited into the "performance arena."

Giddy about dogs

Waiting patiently for the dog show to start

Beatrice stands riveted to attention at the dog show moments before throwing up with excitement







We stayed for five hours and she was on her best behavior the whole time, finally falling asleep in the car covered in bits of corn and hay. Sadly, when she woke up back at home again and saw she was no longer at the fair, she didn't take it very well. After about fifteen minutes of sobbing we managed to bathe her and give her a sandwich for dinner before she went to bed to dream about stunt dogs.

This morning I heard her on the monitor talking about "doggies" in her crib and throughout the day today she would occasionally shout "doggies!" and then start laughing and squealing.

There are more fair photos on Facebook.

(The post title is a reference to this old article of mine.)

Monday, September 20, 2010

Stack of Pancakes

Beatrice's Halloween costume from last year was featured today on Apartment Therapy. Stay tuned to see what her 2010 costume will be...

Wednesday, September 15, 2010

Literary Los Angeles and The Nervous Breakdown

I just wanted to point your attention to my weekly column at PANK magazine, Literary Los Angeles. Check it out! It's a fun, short weekly look at some issue related (however tangentially) to culture and the arts in Los Angeles. This week I complain about our gorgeous Southern California weather and mourn the missing autumns of my youth. Next week I interview one of my favorite writers and fellow L.A. natives, Aimee Bender.

I also just started a humor column every other week in The Nervous Breakdown. In
my second installment, I discussed choking to death on a gummy bear. I am writing my third essay today, one of a series on working in retail.

Beatrice Goes to Pre-Preschool



The play kitchen area

The library

This is the third week of Beatrice's "pre-preschool" class, as I call it. Every Wednesday Pasadena City College (PCC) hosts a class for babies 13-17 months that runs more or less like a preschool, only the mothers stay with their babies the whole time. The class runs from 9-11:30am and features free play time with a rotating array of toys both inside and out, songs, dancing, puppets, story time, crafts, and snack time.


This week Lynley and Alexis joined the class, too



Working on sharing



Craft table

Sensory table - Beatrice mostly likes to sit in/on it



The baby doll corner


Beatrice spent most of the morning free play time pushing a doll back and forth in a toy stroller, playing in the little kitchen area, and trying (and still failing) to color with crayons. She has a hard time with sitting in a circle and singing, however - she gets up, wanders outside, or goes around hugging the other mothers. After snack, though, she settled down and enjoyed carrying around small plastic horses and stacking blocks or looking at books in the library. The day ended with a dancing session and that's where Beatrice really shone - she's not that good at sitting still and listening to music, but she is really, really good at dancing.

Sadly I forgot to photograph snack time, which is by far Beatrice's favorite time, but I'll do so next week.

Thursday, September 09, 2010

Daily Schedule


Eating breakfast this morning: no more high chairs!

Recently I've started working on a baby scrapbook for Beatrice, something I've been meaning to do since she was born fifteen months ago. I've been using this blog to look up photos and dates (when was it she first smiled? At four weeks? five?), using it as a sort of digital baby book.

But most of these blog entries are dedicated to holidays, milestones achieved, or special events like family visits and vacations. Since this blog is now officially being used for record keeping, I thought I'd add her daily schedule on a regular, non-special weekday like today.

9:30am Wake Up.*
Diaper change, get dressed. She loves helping get herself dressed and undressed. The first thing she does every morning is greet the dogs: "Hi dogs!"

9:45am Breakfast.
Some of her favorite breakfast foods include fruit, scrambled eggs, string cheese, Joe's O's, quiches from Trader Joes, yogurt, cottage cheese, and vanilla mini waffles from Whole Foods. Breakfast tends to be her biggest meal of the day (probably because she spent the last fifteen hours beforehand asleep).

10am-12:30pm Morning outing.
Every day we try to go somewhere fun. On Tuesdays and Thursdays, we go to the baby gym with Miller and Jack. On Wednesdays we've just started going to a "pre-preschool" class hosted by Pasadena City College. Other days we might go to a music class or concert, to the park, to the zoo, to an indoor playground or children's museum, or to the Americana shopping mall.

12:30pm Lunch.
Some of her favorite lunch foods include soup; cheese toast; pasta; fish sticks, soy meatballs, edamame hummus, chicken shu mai, and chicken nuggets, all from Trader Joe's; quesadillas; turkey sandwiches; pizza; and tacos. But really she'll eat anything. Occasionally we'll eat lunch out on the go - either I'll pack something for her or we'll eat at a restaurant (like Sharky's Woodfired Mexican Grill, where kids eat for $1).

1/1:30pm Nap time. Diaper change.
Sometimes she'll sleep two hours, sometimes three, occasionally four. I spend this time writing, cleaning the house, starting dinner, checking email, etc.

3:30/4pm Wake up. Diaper change. Small snack - milk, water, or juice, with fruits or vegetables, crackers, cheese, pita chips, etc.

4-5:30pm. Afternoon outing.
Usually these outings are just errands to places like Target and Trader Joe's, but sometimes we'll try to incorporate something fun, too. Today we're going to Costco to pick up some photos I printed and then to a hardware store to get a key made - FUN!

5:30-6pm. Quiet play at home.
By this time she's winding down and getting tired and/or winding up and getting fussy. We play in her room or outside in the yard. Activities might include the water table and the sand box outside, or puppets, puzzles, books, or coloring inside (though we're still working on the whole "not eating the crayons" thing).

6pm. Dinner.
Her dinner foods are pretty much the same as her lunch ones but she eats much less at night. Sometimes Dev will be home early and then we can all eat the same meal together. Usually, though, I make her a separate dinner to eat now and make dinner for me and Dev when he gets home around 8pm.

6:30pm. Bath time. Brushing teeth, combing hair, changing diapers, putting on pajamas.

7/7:30pm. Story time. Bed time.
Bed time can be as early as 6pm, though, if Beatrice has been sick, is in a particularly fussy mood, or missed her afternoon nap.

BUT, I used to read sample baby schedules on websites like Babycenter when I had a new infant and they always seemed so regimented. What if you were traveling, or had visitors? What if there was something really fun going on in the middle of nap time? Dev and I are big believers in flexibilty, so none of these things are set in stone. For example, we might decide to take her to the Americana's Bhangra Night and let her stay up until 9pm dancing to Indian music and eating french fries and cupcake icing. Because you're only young once.

*I know, I almost didn't add this one because I knew other mothers would hate me. She's a good sleeper, what can I say? She makes up for it by being very, very high-energy when she's awake. Specifically, she used to have two naps, one in the morning and one in the afternoon. Then in January of this year, she just started combining her night sleep with her first nap, so now she usually doesn't wake up until 9am at the earliest - she's been known to sleep past 11am, or more than sixteen consecutive hours. But before feeling too jealous of me, check out what she's like when she's awake.
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