Eight is Great!

Happy eight-months old to Rachel!

The drool-goatee is pretty much a permanent feature right now. Today, there was some hint of upper teeth, but they didn't materialize.

Rachel loves to stand - whether supported by a finger or two, or leaning up against her little activity table. Today, she pulled up to standing from sitting next to the table and was proud as punch - until she lost her balance.


Crawling forward remains a challenging activity, but she can get just about anywhere she wants to be by scootching, rolling, lunging and rotating herself around. She's so close.

She's pretty much off of breastmilk at this point, and has chunked up quite a bit in the last couple of months. We have a feeling her weigh-in in a couple of weeks will be an eye-opener.

As for Daniel, he's doing well. He appears to be going through a little bit of a growth spurt - or at least an eating spurt. It hasn't been a battle to get him to eat for the last week, which is a change. He ate a whole, big bowl of popcorn shrimp the other day. Every day when you ask him what he's going to do that day he says "Playschool".

Daniel is a typical 2-year-old in that he's testing his limits a little bit. Unfortunately, one of the limits he's testing these days is "how much hitting of Rachel can I get away with?" - so there have been timeouts, and toys going away. That got his attention - for a whole day we had to hear "lightening McQueen...." in a sad/whiny voice. He hasn't hit her for a couple of days now, so that's a good thing.

And that's about it from here for now. Hope all are well.

Love, D, R, E, A.

Why?

Hey there everyone

Rachel is probably the one with the most updates for this last week, though it's been busy for both of the kids. The first two teeth are definitely here now, they popped out of the bottom gums about a week and a half ago. The drool hasn't slowed one bit, and we suspect that the next set isn't far behind. She's moving away from breastmilk, and doesn't actually seem to care/mind.



The tongue thing is new, and she does it a lot. In the last week or so, there's been a mobility breakthrough. She'll pop right up onto her hands and knees, and then - crawl backwards. The thing that changed is that she started realizing that she could "get places" by crawling - even if it means a combination of going backwards and rotating around now and then. She's VERY proud about this. She's also starting to walk her way up to objects and showing a little bit of willingness to move her feet to almost "cruise", but that's honestly a few weeks out. Oh, and she babbles up a storm. No distinct first word, but endless "dada", "vava" and other consonant-vowel combos. Theres' still nothing that will make her as happy as when Daniel shows her how to sing or dance.

Daniel's been going to playschool on Mondays and Fridays for the last couple of weeks. Here's the obligatory "first day of school" picture. We've noticed a few things that he's picked up - songs we didn't teach him (sticky-sticky-sticky-sticky-bubblegum) and some sharing behavior that we're very happy to see.



Eric was out of town all last week for work, and D did get a little stressed out by that. Even once Eric was home, D was very reluctant to go to sleep, take a nap or tolerate that Papa goes to work/leaves the room. At the same time, he was "punishing" Eric by insisting that Anida do some of the bedtime routines/bedtime stories that Eric normally does. We're getting back to a routine, but he was clearly affected and confused and isn't quite over it yet.



The blog title? Oh yes, Daniel has discovered "Why?". Why are we driving? (to go get groceries) Why are we getting groceries? (so we have something to eat). Why are we eating? (so that our bodies get strong). Why? And so on. it has no end.


(At the Walk for PKD weekend before last)


Which reminds me (because of the burley in the background) that we got a bike trailer for the kids. Daniel loves getting pulled around, and it puts Rachel to sleep, so it's a win-win-win solution.

Grandma Babe was visiting last week, which everyone enjoyed. On Sunday, we all went to the Colorado Railroad museum for the annual "Day out with Thomas". D was somewhat overwhelmed by the whole thing, and tired to boot, so it wasn't a bad day -it just wasn't an amazingly fun one either.



And that's about it from here.



Love, Rachel and Daniel

No, I didn't...

Friends

Sorry about the delay - wrote this a week ago, but neglected to promote from draft to final.

Most of the time, Daniel just amazes us with how he has picked up language or phrases and uses them in the correct context. It's just plain old fun to watch him string ideas and phrases together.

Though for the last couple of days, he's been in a mode where he'll deny something repeatedly, and no amount of logic, proof or argument will change his mind. "Daniel, did you poop?" "No, I didn't" (you can smell him 8 feet away). "Daniel, did you hit Rachel?" "No, I didn't" (she's bawling). I'm sure this ability to deny the patently obvious is completely normal and will pass.

Daniel started playschool on Friday, and he seemed to enjoy it, but we really haven't heard too much about his day. He made "an art", but he doesn't talk about the other kids or his teachers much. Still, he seemed to enjoy his day, and I'm sure we'll hear more as time goes on. Something in our PC caught fire the other day in the middle of videoconferencing with Farmor and Grandpa, and D was quite shaken and worried that the PC had crashed while Farmor was "inside" it. It must have just been some dust, because it was smoky, but everything is working fine now.

Rachel may have finally crossed a barrier to crawling -> she's been pushing herself backwards, but in the last couple of days, she has pulled her legs under her and "lounged" forward to get where she wants to be. It's not smooth, but it seems to work. There's also a hint of a first tooth.

Anida has been helping our friends Harrison and Gretchen at the Palissades wine festival this weekend, so Eric's been getting a taste of parenting 24/7. It's gone reasonably well, though it certainly is a full-time job juggling the two of them, and they've missed mama a lot. Sunday, Grandma Babe comes to visit for the week, and it's also the annual PKD walk, so Eric and the kids will have walked in it by the time this is posted.

And that's about it for now. Hope everyone is well.

Love, Daniel, Rachel, Eric and Anida

Welcome to our new blog

Friends, Family

We're glad you chose to follow us over here to our new blog. The name obviously refers to the age difference between the kids.

All of the posts from the "old'" blogs are here, and there is still some tweaking to do, but if we wait to be "done", we'll never launch the site. I'll eventually add back the photo albums, and my goal is to introduce "tags" to classify the posts.

What? The editor speaks in first-person on this blog? Yeah, the whole writing as Rachel or Daniel is done for now. That was cute at first, but got kind of strained after a while. Other "new" rules involve not using our last name or those of our friends.

But enough rules. On with the updates.

Daniel is starting playschool these days. It's a drawn out process of getting started. Because he's going on both Fridays and Mondays, there have been two open sessions and two orientation sessions, but this coming Friday we finally start "for real". He seems to really enjoy school so far - with no separation anxiety, and a big smile on his face at the end. We introduced potty training for real in the last couple of weeks, and there have been some victories where he's voluntarily told us in advance, but also a number of missed chances. So it's a work in progress.

Rachel is in the process of realizing the permanence of things - particularly mama. Until recently, she'd get upset if mama left her sight, but she's starting to realize that things that disappear from her vision come back. This has allowed Anida to start going to the gym, because Rachel can now stay in the daycare there. The goal of crawling is tantalizingly close - Rachel will push up on her arms, thereby sliding backwards, but just in the last week or so, she's started pulling her legs under her like she's going to crawl. Right now, nothing makes her happier than pulling up to standing with a little help. She gets this big "look what I can do" grin on her face.

And that'll have to do for an initial post. Please do check back - there will be regular updates here at 21monthsapart.

Love Daniel, Rachel, Anida and Eric.