After Bath Dance Party

Most evenings we have a dance party before putting Lena to bed.  She loves music and always dances when we put certain songs on.  It's a good way to get out any extra energy before bedtime.  The other night she had her dance party in her bathrobe because she had just gotten out of the bath and for some reason she loves being clothes-less.  She would love to dance around naked, but it's still a bit chilly and I couldn't post pics of that, so the robe is kind of a compromise!  Too bad I can't take video at night, because it's hard to capture her actually dancing on still photos.  

Time for jammies! 

Also, I have posted our March pics on my Picasa page for your viewing/downloading pleasure.  Here's the link: http://picasaweb.google.com/aseleener/March2009

We have had a death in our congregation this week, so with that and extra Lenten services, it's pretty busy around here.  That means Jim has already had his last day off until after Easter. 

We are hoping that April brings with it some warmer weather.  We are so ready for spring!  But the weatherman says it will be a couple of weeks yet. :(

 

Getting into trouble. . . .

So our precious little Lena is always trying to climb up stuff.  She is just not content to stay at floor level!  Well, yesterday I was cleaning the kitchen when I heard her start to cry from the living room.  I went in to check on her and this is what I found:

She was trying to climb up her walker (which we just use as a barrier to the front door now that she is too big for it) and got her foot stuck in the little rainbow.  I had to laugh when I saw this.  And luckily the camera was right next to me, so I decided to snap a quick pic before freeing her! :)  (She wasn't screaming in pain or anything, just annoyed that she couldn't move.)  What a goof!

This is a pic I took of her in the waiting room at the surgery facility in Holland last Friday.  There wasn't anyone else in there, and we had just had a long car trip, so I let her walk around the waiting room and get some energy out while Daddy was doing his thing with the patient.  See her trying to play with the electrical outlet?  I'm not kidding when I say she gets into everything lately!  

We've had a rough morning here today.  Somebody woke up on the wrong side of the crib!  Hopefully the nap she's taking now will help.

Pickle Face

We had a really fun day today!  Jim took the day off school because one of our members was having surgery and he wanted to be there for that.  The surgery was taking place in Holland, so after Jim was done being all pastorly with the patient, we decided to spend the rest of the day there.  First we stopped by Hobby Lobby so I could get fabric to make Lena some bibs.  Then we hit an 88₵ store (and we thought the dollar store was cheap!) and a local resale shop that had cats walking around in it!  Apparently the store doubles as a pet adoption center.  So Lena got to pet some kitties as we shopped.  Then we hit Salvation Army (not as good as Goodwill.)  After that we headed downtown and spent the rest of our time there.  We had lunch at a place called the Windmill Restaurant.  The food wasn't that great, but we enjoyed our time there anyway.  Jim gave Lena his pickle spear and we had lots of fun watching her reaction.  She made the funniest faces when she tasted the sourness of the pickle, but she always wanted more!  It was so funny I decided to take some video of it with my cell phone.

I think it's so funny how she laughed afterwards!  What a goof!  Something else funny happened while we were there.  When we were finishing up our meals, the waitress walked by and asked, "How are you guys doing?"  She was wanting to know if we needed anything else.  Well Jim was not really paying attention and replied, "Good. How are you?"  Ha ha ha!  He didn't even realize what he had done until I started laughing uncontrollably!  What a dork!  

After I recovered, we paid for our meal and headed out to explore a little bit more of downtown.  We went in a neat little shop that had all kinds of unique gifts and jewelry.  I almost bought a bracelet made out of polished palm tree nuts from South America.  They had some really neat stuff.  Then we went into a bookstore that had a love bird, a chinchilla, and an aquarium with clownfish and a starfish.  The starfish was so cool!  It was dark orange and black, like a tiger but without the stripes.  One of his "legs" was up on the side of the aquarium so we could see his little suction cup things he uses to move around.  

After that we hit Cold Stone and enjoyed some ice cream.  I ordered a kiddie cup of strawberry ice cream for Lena and as I was feeding it to her, I realized that it was the first time we have ever ordered food especially for her.  We have just been feeding her food from our plates.  But she's getting big enough now that I've been noticing that she eats a substantial amount of my food when we are out!  I guess it's time to start asking for kiddie menus!

Lena was exhausted by the time we got back in the car to come home.  She was so tired that her pacifier fell out of her mouth and she didn't even notice.

We really enjoyed our time in Holland today.  We decided that when school is out for summer and Jim has Fridays off again, we will spend every other one exploring a town we haven't been to before. 

And, in case you were wondering, the surgery went well!

Happy First Day of Spring!

Lena's First Walk of the Season

Yesterday it was warm enough that Daddy took Lena for a walk.  It was the first time she's been out like that since last fall.  

Breaking out the stroller.  Jim actually got her out of it and let her walk along the trail for a little ways.  She liked it except for the fact that she had to hold Daddy's hand.  She wanted to just take off on her own!

"I'm all ready to go, Daddy!"

I took some pics of her onesie today because I think it's so cute.  It was with the stuff that Chrysts gave us (hand-me-downs from their girls.)  I thought the front was cute when I put it in her drawer and I didn't see the back until I put it on her today.  Cute!

Oh, and Jim just noticed last night that Lena has a new tooth coming in! And it's on the bottom so those two won't be so lonely! She hasn't had a new one since around Christmas so we had been wondering when another one would appear. I hope it won't bother her too much as it comes in.

Happy St. Patrick's Day, everyone!

Spoon Feeding Video

Yesterday I got some video of Lena feeding herself with a spoon.  She didn't do it as readily when the camera was pointed at her (of course!), but she did do it for a little while.  I think she would have used it longer had it been facing the right way.  She had the bowl part of the spoon upside down.  So she goes back to using her fingers.  And it was much more messy this time than the first time I "caught" her using the spoon.  But I had taken precautions by taking her jammies off before I sat her down to eat.

Jim Preaches at Historic Trinity

Today Jim preached at Historic Trinity in downtown Detroit for a midweek Lenten service.  One member of our church, Kerry, wanted to go also so we carpooled.  

I sat in the back with Lena while Jim drove and Kerry navigated.  (I was glad to be relieved of my navigating duties today.  There were tons of detours and closures when we got into town, but Kerry did a great job getting us there.  He was very helpful!)  Lena took a nice nap in the car on the way there, clutching the string to my Cardinals jacket the whole time.

They had a sign with Jim's name on it.  Neat!

We had some time before the service to walk around and get some energy out before sitting for a while.  

Lena saw a really cute little girl there!

Daddy took Lena to introduce her to the other pastors.

Historic Trinity is a beautiful old church. 

 

This one's kind of grainy; my camera doesn't seem to do very well in low light situations like this.

Standing at the pulpit.  I think those figures are supposed to be John and Mary, but why they are there is a mystery to us.

Lena did pretty well during the service considering she had been stuck in the car all morning.  I thought she was being a little bit distracting and fussy and I kept noticing the lady in front of us turning around to look at her every so often.  I thought that she was bothering the lady and I tried to keep her a little quieter.  Then after the service she turned around and said "She was so good during the service for someone her age!"  I was really surprised!  

After that we ate a lunch that the church provided.  Then we hit the road to go back home.

Lena slept again on the way home.  We got back in Middleville at 4:45, just in time to go home and come back again for our dinner and service at Good Shepherd!  

It was a long day, but a good day.  Jim really enjoyed preaching there and the pastors seemed to really like him.  Lena had fun looking out the window when we were driving through Detroit.  It was her first time in a city that size; there was so much to see!  I am really proud of how well she did yesterday.  She never got very fussy in the car even though she was really bored and wanted to run around.  It's so nice knowing we can pretty much take her anywhere with us and she handles it well.  Such a good girl.

Grandpa Lee and Denny's Grape Jelly

We had a great day today!  Grandpa Lee came up today to install the new garage door opener that he and Grandma Sheryl got us for Christmas.  Our old garage door opener worked, but it had no remote and you had to hold the button down to close it.  (Our house inspector said it looked like it was homemade.)  Since there was no remote, after driving out of the garage, one of us would have to get out of the car, close the garage door, and leave through the side door.  It is really bad in winter when the driveway is icy and the snow is piled up outside the side door.  As a result, we often left it open while we were gone, which isn't convenient either as a neighborhood stray cat has seized the opportunity to take up residence in our basement!  So needless to say, we have been super excited to get a new garage door opener. 

I took a few pics today.

Lena playing in the living room before Grandpa Lee got here.  She did a nice job of entertaining herself while Mama did laundry and picked up around the house.  

The garage door installation seemed to go pretty smoothly.  We told Grandpa Lee that we would take him out to Denny's to eat when he was done.  He loves Denny's and all of the ones in Fort Wayne closed.  But we still have them here in the Grand Rapids area, so we treated him to that as a thank you for the garage door and installation.

Lena made quite a mess of herself at dinner.  She kept dropping food down the front of her shirt, which was kind of funny when it was cracker crumbs, but got pretty gross when it was grape jelly!  Daddy gave her a cracker with grape jelly and it ended up everywhere.

"Mmm, grape jelly!"

The funniest part was when Jim first gave her the cracker, she looked at it for a second, then proceeded to lick the jelly off before eating the cracker.  I love how she's looking at me sideways in this pic, like she knows she's being mischievous!  If you look closely, you can see the jelly squirting through the holes on the other side of the cracker.  What a mess!

We had a fun visit with Grandpa Lee.  Lena loves it when people come to visit her.  She really likes to play with Grandpa's beard too!

Thanks so much, Dad, for the garage door opener and for installing it for us.  We really appreciate it!  It was nice seeing you today.

Tomorrow we are off to Historic Trinity in downtown Detroit.  Jim will be preaching at the midday Lenten service there.  I'll try to take some pics to post later.

Lena fed herself with a spoon!

So, I didn't get a picture of it, but I just had to share what Lena did today.  As I was preparing the rest of her lunch, I had a small bowl of oatmeal and yogurt sitting on the dining room table with the spoon in it.  I sat Lena next to the table in her high chair and gave her some raisins to occupy her.  After a while I realized that she must be out of raisins by now, and usually she starts to fuss if she doesn't have anything to eat on her tray.  So I was suspicious of how quiet she was being.  I peeked my head around the doorway and found her feeding herself with the spoon!  She had grabbed the bowl off the table and was holding it in her left hand while she was shoveling yogurt into her mouth with the spoon in her right hand.  I was so shocked!  I have never let her feed herself with a spoon before and I just assumed that given the opportunity, she would stick her hand in the bowl and feed herself that way.  But here she was, using that spoon like a pro.  And it didn't turn out quite as messy as I originally thought it was going to be.  She had the bowl by the edge, so some of the yogurt had spilled out, but luckily it hit the floor instead of the high chair.  And she had yogurt all over her spoon hand and the spoon, but that was easily cleaned up.  There was hardly any on her shirt.  Wow!  

I'm so proud of my big girl.  I guess now I should start letting her feed herself with the spoon on a regular basis.  Maybe we'll try it again right before her bath time. :)

Birthday Cake Video

So there hasn't been much to blog about going on here.  Pretty boring.  Just waiting for the warm weather to stick.  So I thought I would post a video that Hilary took at Lena's birthday party.  It's of her eating her birthday cake.  You have to watch it all the way through; at the end she starts licking her fingers one by one to get the icing off.  Too cute!

12 Month Check-Up and Silliness

Lena went to the pediatrician today for her 12 month check-up.  It went really well.  Lena is now 21 lbs. 2 oz., which is good because she has gained back the weight she lost while she was sick and then some.  She is 30 3/4 inches tall, which isn't much taller than her 10 month visit.  She was either 30 or 30 1/2 then.  Still, she's in the 92nd percentile for height and 50th for weight, so she's still quite tall for her age.  Her head circumference was in the 50th percentile as well.  

Everything else was pretty routine.  She got two shots and only cried for like 30 seconds.  She is so great about getting shots.  She's one tough cookie.  

The best news we received at this appointment is that she doesn't require formula anymore.  Her doctor said we can switch to regular cow's milk now.  That is such a relief, considering that she has been on the most expensive formula on the market (Nutramigen) since she was three weeks old and it has been costing us about $170 a month.  Yippee!! She had some regular milk with her lunch today and seemed to like it okay, as long as I warmed it up.  

This afternoon I took some pictures of her playing in her room.  I took a lot because I was trying to get one specific shot, but of course, Lena had other ideas.  I never did get my shot, but I did get some cute ones that are worth sharing.

Walking around like a monkey.

She kept coming too close to me when I was trying to take her picture.  She doesn't quite get the concept yet.

She had fun playing with the box that some of her birthday gifts came in.

Being silly. 

 

"What's under this book?"

The photo shoot really wore her out.  Time for a nap!