Tue - June 17, 2008

Wed - March 12, 2008

Two!

Nina is two years old.

My good friend Alicia came to visit for the weekend and we had a fantastic time talking, hanging out with Nina and each other. We took Nina to the Seattle Aquarium and to a couple of parks. Nina had fun calling her "Nina's Alicia" and "Ginna's Mommy". My Dad came to town on a layover in a flight to Asia, just enough time for a nap, birthday dinner, and some games before getting back onto his airplane. Nina loved seeing her GRRRRandpa along with Nana, Bopbop, her Aunt, and Cousin Lissette for dinner. She and Lizzie had great fun running around the house with noisy popper toys and eating at the "pretty blue table" I set up for them. Nina had an aquarium themed lemon cake and I couldn't resist making it a Nitrogen cake as well.

Nina and Mom enjoying the sun and sand



A common Nina look when she wants up, up, up


Nina does a fantastic job opening presents!


The nitrogen/aquarium cake


Happy, smiling girls

Posted at 12:05 PM    

Wed - February 20, 2008

Tue - January 15, 2008

Thu - January 10, 2008

Nina pictures

A few newer pictures of Nina.

Here are Nina's first "class" photos taken at her day care this year:


Playing in the first snow in Seattle


And Nina Claus versus Nina on Claus


Playing with presents


At the aquarium, New Years' day

Posted at 03:41 PM    

Nina update

I am overdue on Nina entries!

Yes, I am way overdue on Nina entries. I promise more pictures in the next week or so.

Nina pretty much talks in sentences all the time now. If she doesn't know words, she makes them up or fills space with some nonsense sounds. I think this is a habit picked up from some classmates at daycare. Most of the time she is really talking though, and most of it is of her own making, no longer dominated by parroting other people. It is pretty amazing.

She is working on having conversations. About a month ago, she would randomly say "Hi!" in a totally cheerful, bright, engaging way, but then have no idea what to do afterwards, except bye-bye. She would use it to interject, change the subject, or get your attention. It was totally cute, which made it work for all of those things. Now she can almost talk to the phone to Grrrrrandma or Grrrrrandpa. She says "Hi!" and then can respond to "How are you?" with "Good" and she can answer simple questions about her day. It is really fun to see how interested she is in this form of talking, and how talking on the phone helps to develop it. Nina was given her own cell phone for Christmas. It rings if it is closed and left alone for a few minutes. Nina will turn and say "uh oh" and answer it. When asked who is calling it is usually Daddy or Grandma. Sometimes she'll pick it up and say, "I call Grandma" and then sometimes we'll really call Grandma to help her get the hang of it. She is loving the phone.

My favorite recent comment from Nina:
"Mommy needs chocolate!"

Nina is also starting her more terrible twos. She has toyed with tantrums for over a year now, but they have developed into some really loud and long events. She has transitioned to a big bed from her crib, and mostly that process has gone well (although the first week it was taking over 90 minutes for her to settle down). However, lately she is working on stall mechanisms, "Mommy, soooooo hungry", or "Mommy, big hug and kiss", or "Cover up!". When Arne was out playing pool this week and I got to do the bedtime ritual all by myself she decided that a nice big tantrum when I left the room was in order. Talking to her in this state is useless because she is making so much noise she can't listen. She can holler! When I left the room and told her she wouldn't get another hug until she was in bed she stopped. Last night it was a tantrum at the end of dinner when I told her she couldn't get down until she asked. A couple weeks ago it was when she couldn't ride the teeter-totter at the park exactly when she wanted to. It has begun.



Nina and her Christmas dolly and crib. Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!

More photos coming soon (where is that other camera???!)

Posted at 01:02 PM    

Tue - September 25, 2007

Fri - March 9, 2007

Birthday!

Stories and some portraits taken on her birthday.

So, today was the big day. For the last two days I've been remembering the waiting, the labor (and more labor) and finally the wonder of seeing this tiny (ok, not so tiny) human in my arms. It was challenging, frustrating, seemingly endless, and then wonderful beyond anything I could really imagine. It was a very tender and awesome moment. How can a whole year have gone by since then? How can Nina be so big, weaned, and ready to take on the world so soon?

Nina had a very nice birthday cake made by her Nana Karen. It was a banan cake with chocolate frosting, quite a nice combination, and a gentle introduction of chocolate for Nina. She had a BLAST with her cake, licking, biting, patting, waving, and finally spreading it on her head. She giggled like a mad girl about being able to make such a beautiful mess. We have lots of pictures but I don't have time to post them because I leave tomorrow morning for a conference and my poster is neither finished nor printed. So, here are a few photos that are easy to post from Nina's first portrait session. I was underwhelmed with the experience, but it is nice to have some cute dressed up Nina pictures. I think we need to dress her up for ourselves to photograph more often, I think that will be more satisfying in the long run.

Ok - the cheesy "Look I'm 1!" picture. I'm not a fan of the backdrop, but Nina has a great expression on her face, and this was her first and last successfully posed shot. The rest were lucky captures of Nina when she wasn't streaking toward the camera or us. It helped that she wasn't sure about how to walk in those fancy shoes, but that didn't slow her down for long.



I like this one a lot. The setting is cute, but not so cheesy. Nina doesn't have the cutest smile but it is a fairly common Nina expression.

And the obligatory close-up


And a few showing what Nina was doing for the rest of the photo-shoot, after she got over the novelty (which lasted all of about a minute) of the setting and the strange lady photographer making strange noises at her.




She really wanted to just play with the bears or get the duck that the photographer kept squeaking at her. In a strange way I'm kind of proud that she was only distracted for a short period of time. Nina is just a bold, curious, active little girl, and nothing as boring as a photo-shoot is going to slow her down for long.

Thank you to Grandma Carol and Great-Aunt Kelly for the incredibly cute little dress. It is such a pretty green (my favorite color) and it was a big hit with everyone.

Posted at 08:48 PM    

Sun - March 4, 2007

Nina ventures out

A sunset in the vacant lot

After several weeks where the temperatures were so cold I wouldn't even bundle Nina up to go around the block with me and Tikka, we finally has some really nice days last week. In the warm temperatures we finally ventured out and Nina had a great time walking in her boots. She has realized that falling down outside isn't so fun (she fell in the snow and it was very cold on her hands when she got up) and so she walks pretty carefully. She is fascinated by everything, of course, so we didn't get very far, but she learned about trees and sticks, grass and dirt. It was fabulous.

Posted at 07:04 PM    

Mon - February 26, 2007

Mon - February 19, 2007

Fri - February 16, 2007

Tue - January 30, 2007