Hand-holding

Daphne is perfect.

Here are a couple things that demonstrate this:

-Hand holding
Whenever you place your hand in her vicinity, especially if giving her a pacifier, she reaches out and clings to your hand. In the middle of the night when she fusses, I'll reach over to replace to her pacifier and she just grabs my hand and draws it to her.

-Squealing hour
Starting at about three months, Daphne had been sleeping pretty well through the night. But she liked to get up very early. Probably because the sun started coming up at nearly five in the morning. So after a quick snack between four and five, she would get placed back in her bassinet and then spend the next hour squealing. She was rarely fussy, she was just practicing using her voice. But it was consistent for at least a month. Pleasant squealing, cooing, and talking for nearly an hour.

-Toe eating
She loves to engage her core and lift her feet high in the air. She stretches and extends them well above the side of her bassinet. And she will occasionally lower her toes right into her little hands and direct them into her mouth.

Catching up

Well we've got a lot to catch up on. I see that the last post was from over 8 months ago. In those 8 months we've:

- celebrated Adaline's 3rd birthday
- passed an incredible holiday season in Chicago
- bought a condo in Lincoln Park
and
- had a baby

Let's talk about that last one.

Daphne Bluth was born February 11, 2019 and, like her sister (the first of I'm sure many comparisons to her sister) she took the bumpy road to this world.

Mrs. Bluth's water broke late Sunday night and she labored all night. By mid-day she had fully progressed and she began pushing. But Daphne never made it down the canal too far and they started prepping for a Caesarean section. As they were prepping, Daphne's heart-rate plummeted and so they started an emergency Caesarean section. She was pulled out with the umbilical cord wrapped twice around her neck. Fortunately she started crying and there were no signs of damage.

In my short life I don't think I've ever felt fear like I felt for the few seconds after: "During the prep work, the baby's heart-rate plummeted and we had to do an emergency Caesarean section." We were so incredibly lucky this time.

Because they had to put Mrs. Bluth under general anesthesia, it took her awhile to awaken from the procedure. Even after she woke up, she was unsure of what had happened and what was going on. Instead of a memory of her snuggling her newborn after birth, she groggily remembers me holding the baby and the thoughts of nervousness as they put her under the anesthesia as the nurses and doctors began running around and yelling for emergency equipment.

Once everything calmed down and we were back in our hospital room, we began to bond with this perfect baby.

The naming process was a little less certain this time around and we even looked at each other a couple weeks later and asked if we had given her the correct name.

Adaline was delighted to meet her (and we have some fantastic friends that took care of Adaline for the few days that we were in the hospital) and was immediately a helpful sister.

Once again, the same day that we brought home (to our new condo!) the baby from the hospital, my mother-in-law showed up to help us with the transition. And we've now had four delightful months with her (the baby, I mean).

Some highlights:
-She is an incredible sleeper. At six weeks she was sleeping through the night. She would take long naps during the day all the time.

-She was born with some hair. Adaline said that her hair looked like mine. A little patchy, but nothing to be ashamed of. She's starting to get a little curl to it now.

-Her demeanor is incredibly calm and thoughtful. She can handle lots of attention (from her sister, mostly) and doesn't seem to mind. The only thing that really gets to her is loud noises.

-Lately she has been waking up at five in morning and squealing for delight. She'll squeal and jabber and talk for about an hour. In fact, after every nap she wakes up in a good mood. But she really is in a talkative good mood in the early mornings.

-She tends to have blowouts during church.

-She is very long. She was 21 inches long when born (two inches longer than Adaline) and 8 pounds 9 ounces. She is still 1.5 inches than Adaline was at her age. She will outgrow her bassinet soon because she is so long. She will also soon outgrow clothes for 3-6 months old children.

-She doesn't love her little rocker chair, but she will tolerate it for short durations.

I'll cover some of those other life events mentioned above in some other posts. For now, enjoy some pictures:

Why??

The dreaded day has come. We've reached a new parenting level and we're realizing how unprepared we are. Adaline has learned a word that I can't figure out how to respond to. She has started asking "why?"

Whenver anything doesn't go her way, she asks why?

"Adaline, por favor ayudame a levantar y organizar to ropa."

"Why?'

"Por que es tu ropa."

"Why?"

"Por que tu la sacaste de la caja."

"Why?"

"I don't know why! Why don't you tell me why!"

She's only two and is just developing language, but so far, I have not been able to satisfactorily answer any of her inquisitions. I have completely failed at communicating with her and is frustrating for both of us.

I'm sure the next 16 years will be a blast.

Language is fascinating to watch her pick up. Right now she insists that I say always say "por favor" and that Mrs. Bluth always say "please". And she will even occasionally hold herself to that same rule (saying "por favor" to me and "please" to Mrs. Bluth). She has noticed a pattern and has implemented a rule in the little piece of the universe that she controls.

She has a several other favorite sayings like:

"You don't listen to me!" (when she wants to do something that we've told her not to do)

"I'm tired" (when she wants to do something that we've told her not to do)

"That makes me sad." (when she wants to do something that we've told her not to do)

Traveling Toddler

In the words of Charles Dickens, traveling with toddlers is the "best of times and the worst of times". We have been fortunate enough to be able to travel with Adaline a handful of times and have had mostly good experiences. We've also had some negative experiences, but by and large we enjoy traveling just as much now as we did pre-child.

On Adaline's first flight, she started off like a trooper. She made it nearly 3 hours into the flight and then she just lost control. For the last 45 minutes of the flight, right until we touched down, she dialed her cry up to a ten. Fortunately we were surrounded my nice people that mostly ignored her and didn't shoot us any nasty looks. The guy on the end of the row even pretended to be asleep the entire session. Mrs. Bluth is still scarred from that flight.

Our most recent flight couldn't have gone any differently. We were planning on leaving for the airport at 5:30am and so the last thing we did was wake up Adaline. She sat right up and said "We're going on the airplane today?" She didn't even need to rub the sleep out of her eyes because she was so excited. She loves flying, but mainly because she gets lots of screen time.

The plane this time had individual screens and so she got buckled in and asked for her backpack. She reached in and pulled out her special headphones and asked for help plugging them in. Once she was settled in and watching whatever kid show was on, she didn't acknowledge us for the next four hours (except to start the next episode every time the prior had finished). She didn't need food, water, or the washroom. She just vegged the entire flight.

In some ways, toddlers are incredibly adaptable and resilient. In other ways, not so much. With this trip she immediately warmed up to our hosts and had a blast being herself. She was a pretty darn good houseguest. There was the occasional meltdown because we were certainly asking a lot of her (abbreviated naps, new food, strange sleeping arrangements). 

Random Memories

Mr. Bluth walks out of his room with a bright green shirt on. He had just changed. Adaline looks up from TV show she is watching.

ADALINE: Cute! (goes back to watching her show)

---

Baby-sitter is telling Mr. Bluth about how well-behaved Adaline was. Tells him that Adaline showed all of her toys. Adaline pulled almost all of them out one-by-one. Eventually she found a blue bell.

BABY-SITTER: Que es esto? (What is that?)

ADALINE: Go Mommy go! GO MOMMY GO!

(Mr. Bluth realizes that this was the bell that he and Adaline carried with them and used to cheer on Mrs. Bluth for her marathon 8 months earlier!)

---

Adaline gets in trouble at the pool for trying to bite two different friends (including her best friend!). Because this is new, and severe, behavior, Mr. Bluth talks to her the whole bike-ride home about not biting. They get home to tell Mrs. Bluth what happened.

MRS. BLUTH: What happened at the pool?

ADALINE: I comiendo los dedos de Viola. (I was eating Viola's fingers.)

---

Walking home with the neighbor boy after his baseball game. Adaline is in the stroller and he is walking beside her and holding her hand. He is telling everyone about the time that he saw a garden snake. He knew that it was not venomous because venomous snakes have wide mouths and heads because the poison is stored in little pouches on the side of the head. But this snake had a narrow head...

ADALINE (Interrupting him and with a tone of "ah, this explains everything"): Ah, narrow!

Everyone laughs.

---

Just after waking up this morning, we're all three laying in bed. Adaline is playing with a headband and Mr. Bluth puts in on his head.

MR. BLUTH: Oh es para mi pelo? (Is this for my hair?)

ADALINE: Papi no tiene pelo. (Papi doesn't have hair.)

---

Mrs. Bluth takes a couple of Tylenol and walks out of the kitchen. Adaline walks in.

ADALINE: Papi, necessito medicina. (Papi, I need medicine.)

PAPI: Mami no se siente bien, por eso toma medicina. (Mami doesn't feel well, that's why she's taking medicine.)

ADALINE: (unintelligible babbling that sounds like "mermo")

MR. BLUTH: Huh?

ADALINE: (mimes vomiting and makes vomiting noises)

MR. BLUTH: Oh! Estas inferma! (Oh! You're sick!)

ADALINE: Si, y necessito medicina. (Yes, and I need medicine.)

She wasn't really sick.

Things that Adaline loves

Things that Adaline loves:

Friends - Adaline recognizes and loves to be with her friends. If we're trying to motivate her to get going somewhere, it helps to mention that "so-and-so" will be there. In fact that is how we get her to go just about anywhere that she is resisting. She runs and chases and loves to drag friends around by the hand. If the friend is equally assertive, then there are clashes but the hurt feelings never last more than a minute. If the friend is a little less assertive, then s/he will be dragged around to whatever Adaline wants to do. Friends are what make her world go round.

Babies - She always notices the babies. Sometimes she just hovers around them waiting to be useful or to steal a pat. She makes herself useful and will make sure the baby is covered adequately. But this is always a means to an end. And that end is to hold the baby. She doesn't usually come out and ask to hold the baby at first. But after a few minutes of shadowing and assisting, she wants to hold the baby and she has the biggest smile while doing so.

Swimming - Sometimes on Saturdays we go to the local Park District Pool (Home of the Orcas) during family swim time. In just the last couple of months her confidence has grown tremendously. She will splash around until her lips are blue from the cold. She doesn't love to jump in by herself, but will jump in if anyone is holding her hand. We might be close to her jumping in sola.

Soccer - Last week she had her first organized soccer practice. When I got home from work, she promptly showed me the four kicks she has learned. Inner-foot kick, toe kick, side kick, and back kick. Her side kick consists of her carefully lining up next to the ball and pushing the ball with the side of her foot.

Pictures - She loves to look at pictures on our phones (Although she uses this as a ploy to get access to our phones and then switch to another app). But she also loves posing for pictures and taking pictures of what she considers to be photogenic moments. Sometimes she demands that we stop whatever we are doing so that we can document whatever she has found to be important enough to photograph.

 

 

Mexico City

In our most recent travels, we only had two goals: eat fantastic food and explore beautiful (and warmer) neighborhoods. Mexico City proved to be the perfect place to accomplish both.

We had known that we wanted to visit Mexico City for a little while (same time zone, short flight, great food!) and all of the sudden tickets were on sale so two weeks later we were taking off.

This did not leave the Mrs. very much time to prepare for our trip. She hastily filled out some spreadsheets but we were lacking some of the careful preparations that she normally does for our excursions.

After a long but mostly uneventful flight, we arrived to our charming hotel at 1AM in the La Condesa/Roma Norte neighborhood. This neighborhood was a little south of the financial sector of the city and between the downtown historic center and the largest urban green-space in Latin America. The architecture was charming and colonial and we came to realize there was a sizable population of ex-pats around.

Sunday morning we slept in before venturing out and realizing that the main boulevard near us was closed on Sunday mornings. Instead of cars zipping up and down the street, there were hundreds of cyclists, skate-boarders, runners, and walkers. We hopped right in so that we could admire some of the neighborhood.

From there we decided to make the short journey to the south suburbs of Mexico City. Xochimilco is famous for its Skittles-colored rafts. We purchased some horchata and hopped on for a ride up around the canal. Mariachis serenaded us as vendors tried to sell us their wares from their own little rafts. Even Adaline learned to say "no gracias" after we were approached far more often than we could possibly purchase.

Adaline loved the patos (ducks) and sitting right on the edge of the raft. 

Afterward, we headed back to the hotel for a nap.

That evening we had the good fortune of meeting up with a mission friend and a Provo friend that are now married! They were kind enough to explore the city with us, take us out to eat, and to show off the Basilica de Guadalupe. Some of the nicest people in Mexico City, no doubt.

Monday was dedicated to a children's museum called El Papolote. It had everything: a water feature, a kitchenette, a mini-supermercado, an aquarium, a firetruck, other children running around, and a food court. We could have spent multiple days exploring this place.

During nap time, I snuck out and found an incredibly delicious, blue-corn gordita with nopales and pork. Brilliant. That evening we found a park, some flautas for dinner, and ice cream.

The next day we headed to Coyoacan to visit the legendary home of Frida Kahlo. This was a fascinating glimpse into the life of a stunning artist. We did not have enough time to see and absorb all of the intricacies of the home, but it was still probably the favorite stop of Mrs. Bluth's.

After a couple hours, we found a small indoor mercado where we ate some lunch (molote and enchiladas) and bought a yellow dress for Adaline. The neighborhood of Coyoacan felt a little like San Diego.

After nap time, we explored the neighborhood of Condesa (saw mansions!) and found another park to play in. We had a fantastic steak dinner at an Argentine steakhouse. They even had a kid's room where Adaline could watch TV and color while we enjoyed a great dinner together.

On Wednesday morning we did some more exploring of Chapultepec Park. We found some park toys meant for children, but there were sure a lot of dogs running around. Then we found a pretty neat bookstore where we picked up a few books and even slid down the in-store slide. We said goodbye to our quaint hotel since we were going to another hotel in another part of town to explore.

Soon we were exploring an enormous park (another one!) closer to the historic downtown. The next stop was 43 floors up in the Torre Latinoamericana. Although we had already driven all over the city, it was a pretty astounding sight to see it spread it in all directions.

We kept walking through the colonial downtown until we reached the famous historic Zocalo. The weather was pretty rainy so we only stayed for a few minutes before heading back. Fortunately, we found some ice cream on the way home. Then I stepped out that evening and had a fantastic pambazo and some rolled tacos.

The following morning we got up early and went straight to the bus terminal. A little over an hour later we were arriving at the architectural remains of an ancient civilization: Teotihuacan.

By the time we reached the top of the Pyramid of the Sun, we were tired again. I loved that you could feel how this was once a bustling city. The Avenue of the Dead that runs right down the middle of the ruins, feels like it is only a few years removed from heavy use. Absolutely a fascinating city.

You want to know a good way to relax after spending the morning climbing ancient pyramids? Go swimming. Strangely, our hotel required that we wear swim caps. Which was fine, but they had to lend us a couple. And they were still a tad wet from the previous wearers. But, oh well, we took a dip. Somehow we managed to squeeze all of this in before nap time.

 

After nap we headed back to the main plaza of Mexico City. Turns out it was the International Day of the Woman, and so we able to listen to a concert right in the heart of the city. Following that we took a peek at the Templo Mayor and then the massive cathedral right on the square. Today the weather was quite a bit better and we were able to spend more time exploring the plaza, especially the massive cathedral (real name: Catedral Metropolitana de la Asunción de la Santísima Virgen María a los cielos).

Soon we were just walking around this central colony looking at plazas, drinking horchata, and observing water fountains. We stopped for some more fantastic rolled tacos on our way to the hotel and that was that.

Before the city woke the next morning, we were in the airport headed home. Our only excitement was that I left my phone at the security checkpoint. Except they said they didn't have it so it was just missing. I boarded the flight thinking it was gone (and very glad that Google Photos just automatically upload!). And then two hours into the flight, a passenger woke me and told me he had seen me leave my phone and grabbed it to return it, but he hadn't seen me again until he walked to the back to use the washroom. Very odd.