Smiles and Shakespeare

Guess what! Annie smiles! And not just because of gas!

Yesterday, Annie met her Aunt Clare Marie and saw her Aunt Dode again. Then she slept while her grandma and I got lunch at an interesting little cafe in Snyder called O3.

We also went to Shakespeare in Delaware Park in the evening, and brought salads and a DiPaulo's pizza. (DiPaulo's makes the world's best pizza. Really. We haven't found anything like it anywhere else). The Tempest was showing, but because we were too far back, we couldn't see anything. Plus, there wasn't a whole lot of action - it was mostly just dialog. So we cut out at intermission and went for a walk in the park instead. There was a wedding at the Delaware Park Casino, where Jim and I had our wedding reception. Very pretty. I can't believe our wedding was almost 10 years ago.

Today I'm hoping to do some family visiting. Then tomorrow, I'm off to Barker for a couple of days at the lake!

Reclaiming Baby Status

Now that Annie and I are out of the house, Solomon has reclaimed his rightful position as baby of the house:
In this photo, he is sleeping on the changing table, right where Annie's head usually is when we change her. It is the highest perch in the room, and I'm told that the cats often defend their territory by sitting in the highest place in their territory. So there you go.

I told Jim that he should try putting a diaper on Solomon, since anyone who leaves the changing table must have a diaper on. Jim said that he'd probably lose one of his arms if he tried to do that.

Nieces, aunts, grandmothers, friends and a grand old city

I'm in Buffalo til July 6. We drove in on Wednesday and it took 9 hours. Ack. The drive is usually 7 hours, but stopping for bottle feedings will tack on the time.

After some sleep (and feedings), we went to Alex's. Click on the link below to read more about that:

http://afuss.blogspot.com/2009/06/family-time.html

Today would've been my parents' 38th wedding anniversary. For lunch, Mom, Gretchen, Annie and I went to Merge, a new restaurant with a lot of vegetarian options. It had really great food (including an interesting kale salad that we're going to try to replicate tonight). It's located in downtown Buffalo on Delaware Avenue, somewhat near Spot Coffee. It's nice to see new businesses opening in downtown. After lunch, we went to the cemetery and then back home, where I took a short power nap. After several rather spectacular thunderstorms over the last 24 hours, the weather is sunny and hot. Hopefully it'll cool down enough so we can eat dinner on my mom's back porch, and then take a walk at Niawanda Park.

Annie and friends

I just can't resist posting this adorable photo of Annie with all her new buddies from my new moms' group at Isis:
Annie is the one who looks like she's in her underwear :) (this was the spare onesie in my diaper bag because she leaked formula around the collar of her outfit). She's to the left of the little girl in the yellow shirt and blue pants. Today was "graduation" day - the end of our 6 weeks. After I get back from Buffalo, I start a new group, called "Next Step," for kids who are 3-4 months. All the kids in this photo are the same age as Annie, plus or minus 2 weeks. The little boy to the left of Annie was born on the same day as she was!

Clothes sizing, or, why Jeannie needs to return to work

Annie is 10 weeks old today. I guess I should start referring to her age in months now? Otherwise, I'll start sounding like one of those moms that says that her 3-year-old child is 36 months old. :) So, Annie is also 2 months old.

I also tried on my pre-pregnancy jeans this morning and they fit!! (a little tight, but comfortable enough to wear). This is a very good sign, because my jeans were the first to go when I was pregnant. Of course, this happens just as I had given up on them, broke down and bought a new pair of jeans in a larger size. But that's OK.

And speaking of clothes and sizing, I figured out why it seems that babies don't fit into any of the clothes that their moms get as shower presents. I was at BRU last night and noticed the sizing chart for Carter's clothes. Size "NB" (newborn) is for 5 to 8 lbs. The next size is 3 months! Yeah, that's kind of a large jump, right? Except that the "3 months" size is for babies who weigh 8 to 12 pounds. This seems a little off, in my opinion. Annie is in the 25th percentile of 2 month old babies, and the smallest baby in my new moms' group, yet she weighs over 10 pounds. Several babies that I know (including my niece) were 8 pounds or larger when they were born. Annie will almost definitely be larger than 12 pounds by the time she turns 3 months. I think Carter's would be more accurate to say that these clothes are for "0-3 months" like other clothing manufacturers ... in fact, I think on some Carter's clothes that I got as hand-me-downs, the sizing is listed as 0-3.

After reading this post over, I realize why I need to go back to work. I need to be worried about things besides the meaning of the 3 months size by Carter's. Well, maybe it's a good break. It's much easier to worry about baby clothes sizing than most of the things that go on at my job.

Father's Day Part 2

Well, we got back from Townsend, Mass., which is where the clock store was. It was fun, except we left our picnic back home on the kitchen floor. We realized this after we had parked in the state park in Townsend and were quite hungry. We looked at each other and said, "Who brought the lunch?" On the good side, we did manage to remember the baby and her diaper bag. Annie got her normal formula for lunch, and we ate a diner in Groton, Mass.

Annie gave her dad "The Little Engine That Could" for father's day. How did she know that he liked trains? Amazing. Later, we had story hour:

Annie seemed more interested in what was going on outside, but we still had fun.

Father's Day!

Happy father's day to all the dads out there!

And a smile to remember those dads that aren't here anymore.

I wanted to do a picnic at Houghton's Pond today, but it's raining (again). So we are probably going to go for a drive up to Leominster (near the NH border), where there is a shop that sells antique grandfather clocks. Some of the people that work at this shop appear on Antiques Roadshow on a regular basis. Jim loves looking at the old clocks and wants to build one someday. It's a beautiful drive and we'll do a car picnic if the weather doesn't clear up.