My trip to Whistler

OK, so I went to Whistler a few weeks ago and haven't told you all about it yet. Sorry about that, but I've been busy getting ready for Santa to bring me tons of toys. The plan was for Grandma, Grandpa, Mama and I to drive up to Whistler to visit Auntie Sue and play all day in the snow. That's not how it happened though. First of all, Auntie Sue was down on Vancouver in the hospital, so we only got to stop by to see her for a few minutes. That made me really sad that she wasn't on vacation with us. After we visited her we went up to the condo all by ourselves. It was really pretty, and I was really excited to be out of the car. All the snow I was supposed to play in was actually rain though. That part was also sad. We all ended up having a lot of fun though. I even got to go in the hot tub because it wasn't really very warm and Mama thought it would be OK. It was fun and the bubbles were really interesting. We did a lot of shopping (for me!) and walking around. We also went on what was supposed to be a sleigh ride, but ended up being a wagon ride because there wasn't much snow. I really liked the horses and even got to ride up front with the people who were driving for us. It was so exciting. I think that my favorite part of the whole trip was the fireplace though. It was so pretty and I loved looking at the flames dancing around. Overall it was a really fun trip, but we were all really worried about Auntie Sue. Luckily, after a bunch of time in the hospital and a bunch of work by her doctors, she's back home now. I got to go visit her at her house last weekend. It was really fun and I liked watching it start to snow from her balcony. Between then and now it has been so cold it's driving me crazy. Mama and I haven't really been doing very much because she doesn't want to drive anywhere. We've been going on walks around our apartment though and I think the snow is really weird. It's cold and wet and I don't really like it. The only place we have really been going has been to swimming lessons. I was the only one there for the last two weeks, and I really liked that. I started kicking really hard and moving my hands around in the water like I'm really swimming. Mama won't let go of me to swim on my own though. I guess she doesn't trust me. Maybe it's because I kept trying to put my face under the water and getting it up my nose. The best part of swimming was flirting with the lifeguards. They're pretty cute and I like to make them smile. Don't tell my Daddy though or he'll be mad at me.

As far as learning new stuff, I'm still working on getting better at standing on my own. I haven't taken any steps yet, but I'm working on it. I'm not really crawling yet, but I am flailing around to get myself where I'm going. I'm pretty efficient about it even if it's not very graceful. I've started talking a lot more, but I mostly just say "Da Da Da" over and over again. Daddy thinks I'm saying DaDa, but I'm not sure if I am or not. I like that it makes him happy though.

Be sure to check out my new pictures on my picture website athenaluccio.myphotoalbum.com

November Update

Hi everyone. I know it's only been a few weeks since I posted last, but a whole bunch of new things are going on with me and I wanted to fill you in. I have officially decided that crawling is for suckers. My new plan is to roll onto my belly and cry until someone (usually Daddy) either picks me up to move me or brings me what I want. If you think about it, crawling is rather stupid anyhow. It's a slow and inefficient way of getting around the world. Who wants to coordinate all four limbs to move anyhow? That's why walking is the way to go. Sadly, I can't do it quite yet though. I found out that the first step to learning how to walk is to learn how to stand up all by myself. I've been holding myself up at a footstool for quite some time now, but recently I started pushing myself back off of it and balancing on my teeny-tiny feet for a few seconds before crashing down either back onto the footstool or onto my butt (Did you know that if you stick it out while you're falling you don't hit your head on the floor? Pretty cool huh?). I'm getting really good at it. Today Mama was helping me to get balanced, then letting go of me to see how long I could stand. I did it for 10 whole seconds before I fell. She was very excited and proud of me. I'm also working on pulling myself from sitting to standing on a footstool or the side of the bathtub while I'm waiting for Mama to fill the bathtub. I've only done it a few times because usually my feet get all tangled up underneath my butt and I can't quite get them set up right.

I still don't have any teeth yet, but my mouth has been hurting a lot lately so I'm hoping they come in soon. I can't take much more of this. I think it's driving my Mama and Daddy crazy too. They don't seem to enjoy me waking them up every two or three hours to cry about how much it hurts, but I really need to them to help me so they'll just have to deal with it. l

A few days ago I got to meet a new family member because Daddy's Grandma Pat came to visit for Thanksgiving. She's really nice and bought me this awesome hat that glows in the dark. She didn't know that it did that, but I think that it is absolutely fantastic. Mama and Daddy like it too because if we go on nighttime walks they can see my head bobbing around in the stroller even if it's dark. I'll get to see her again on Thanksgiving, which apparently consists of everyone eating a lot of food together. I'm hoping that Mama will give me some mashed potatoes, and maybe even a little bit of pumpkin pie. They're just about the right consistency for me, and they're delicious. I'll let you know how it turns out.

After that Mama, Grandma Diane, Grandpa Dean and I are going on a vacation. Daddy has to work so he won't be able to come with us, which makes me really sad. We're going to go up to Whistler to stay at Great-Auntie Sue's place up there. From what I hear it's going to be cold and snowy outside, but we'll have a nice warm place to sleep. I've never been out of the country so I am really excited about that. I really wanted to get a passport, but Mama says she'll just bring my birth certificate with us so I don't need one. We might even get to go on a sleigh ride while we're up there which I think sounds really fun. I might sleep through it though. We'll have to wait and see. I'll make sure to have Mama take a lot of pictures so I can put them up here for you all to see.

More new stuff I can do

First of all I will tell you all about my visit from Auntie Jenn last week. She (like Mama) is currently not working (stupid economy), so she decided to come visit me for five whole days. The day that she was coming in on the train I went to a playdate with some other kids my Mama met through some group. None of us are crawling yet, so we didn't do very much together, but our Mama's got to spend time talking to each other. Then Mama and I went to pick up Auntie Jenn way down in Seattle. We did lots of stuff together over the next few days and I smiled at Auntie Jenn every time I saw her. I really like her. We went to wander around stores a lot while she was here and it looked like her and Mama had a great time. I even got to try on her glasses and high heel shoes. I was pretty fancy. On Halloween we waited patiently for Daddy to get home from work, then we went out to show off my pea pod costume. We only got to go to one house because I was really crabby and all of Mama and Daddy's friends were out doing fun grown-up stuff. I had fun though. I saw lots of other kids out in their costumes and can't wait until next year when I can walk around in my costume and wear something really cool like a zombie princess costume.

After Halloween Auntie Jenn had to leave and I was really sad that she couldn't stay here forever. I still look for her every morning when Mama and Daddy come in to wake me up. Speaking of waking up, I am really proud of myself that I have been sleeping all night (11 hours!) by myself in my crib with only fussing once (but when Mama or Daddy comes in to show me they're still here I go right back to sleep). I've also been taking all of my naps in my crib just like a big girl. Aren't you all proud of me? I've also been working more on learning how to crawl. So far I can get up on my hands and knees, then move my legs forward like real crawling, but then I fall on my face and do it again. I move forward like this, but it's really slow. I'm much faster at crawling backwards. Plus I can wedge myself under various things and it makes Mama laugh. I've started trying to pull myself up to stand on my legs, but I'm not very good at it yet. This morning at story time Mama helped me put my legs in the right place so I could pull myself up on the basket of books. It's really low though so I just stood there with my butt stuck up in the air and Mama supporting me so I didn't fall. It was really exciting, but Mama says I cheated because she helped me so much. I'll do it on my own soon I'm sure. I think I might just skip right over crawling and go straight to walking and/or running. I still don't have any teeth, but they still hurt my mouth. Mama and Daddy are starting to think that I have invisible teeth, but I think they're crazy. We'll just have to wait and see what happens.

Next week I'm going to go down to Grandma and Grandpa's to stay for two days to see my cousin Henry and my friend Ruby June. It should prove to be quite exciting.

What an exciting month!

Yet again, I'm sorry I took so long to write more on here, but I'm awfully busy for a little girl and it's hard to find time to tell you all what's going on. I have already done so much stuff in October so far, and it's not even over. Just a few weeks ago my Mama and Daddy took me up to the Pumpkin Patch to pick my very first Halloween pumpkin. It was dirty, chaotic, and fantastic. I had a great time looking at all of the pumpkins and even sitting on one of them. When we had all chosen our pumpkins I got to ride in wheelbarrow with all of them....OK, so I didn't ride in there, but I got to sit in there. It was weird, and I couldn't figure out why the stems were all prickly. The next week we all went over to my Mimi's house (that's grandma Michelle, for those of you who aren't paying attention) to carve them. Mama and Daddy carved theirs out, but they decided that it wouldn't be safe for me to use a knife, so I got to paint mine. I hated it. I really wanted to carve it out to look like a ghost, but they wouldn't let me. To make matters worse they stripped me down to my diaper in front of my uncle Jared and made me sit on the table to paint it. Then they gave me a bath and I cried during that too. It was very traumatic. I'm going to call my therapist tomorrow. A few days after that my Grandma came to visit Mama and me, and we got to go to storytime at the library for the very first time. It was amazing. There were all these other babies there who looked a lot like me, but most of them were more mobile and talkative. We got to sing a lot of fun songs and dance around in the library, so I loved it. Mama said that she'd take me twice each week to do storytime at two libraries close to my house. I'm super excited. We also went to see the YMCA to see where Mama and I are going to do our swimming lessons in a few weeks. It sound like Mama's also going to let me go play with some other babies in a big play room while she works out or sits in a sauna. I'm kinda glad she's doing it. I need some time away from my Mama to play with other kids. It's pretty darn exciting.

The most exciting thing so far this month just happened yesterday though. I was over at my Mimi's house for dinner (after a disasterous lunch at my Aunt Emily and Uncle Chad's house) and I was playing on the floor with the doggies and Uncle Jared. Now I should tell you that at home we have nice cushy carpet on our floors, but Mimi has pretty wood on her floors. I got a little bit too excited and tried to reach forward for something and fell on my face. I hurt my lip and started bleeding everywhere. Daddy freaked out, and Mama tried really hard to stay calm but I wouldn't let them see in my mouth because it hurt and I was scared so they were really worried about me. My mouth bled for a long time, but then it stopped. Mama and Daddy looked in my mouth and they think I just cut my lip so I will be just fine. The only bad thing is that now my lip is all swollen up and puffy. I look pretty weird. It was really scary, but I'm just fine now so don't worry about me. Halloween's coming up pretty soon and my Auntie Jenn is coming to visit me on Wednesday so my exciting month isn't even over yet. I can't wait!

You missed me didn't you?

I know it's been a really long time since I posted anything on here, so I thought I'd fill you all in on what's been going on with me. The day after my fantastic boat ride I woke up with a pretty high fever and Mama and Daddy ended up taking me in to the Doctor. She checked me out and told them to give me some tylenol so I wasn't uncomfortable, and to come back in two days if I was still sick. I laid around for two days and didn't feel any better (except from the tylenol). Mama and Daddy were all pretty scared, and Daddy even called my Doctor one night because my fever was 103.7 (which is extremely high for such a little baby). Mama and I went in to see the Doctor again on Tuesday, and she did a few tests on me and told us that I had some sort of infection, but she wasn't sure what kind. She told Mama to take me down to Children's Hospital for them to check me out. Daddy joined us at the hospital, since he was working down in Tacoma that day. They checked me out and discovered that I had a really bad bladder infection (they found this out using something called a catheter, which I never ever want to see again in my life). They gave me some antibiotics and sent Mama and Daddy on their way. It took a few days for me to feel all the way better (mostly because I got an infection from the antibiotics so I had to get some special cream to put on twice a day). The worst part of this whole ordeal? I was supposed to go to a concert on Tuesday with Mama, Daddy, Mimi, and Grandpa Dean, but I had to miss it because I was at the hospital. I was really really bummed, but everybody says they'll take me to a concert soon enough.

I'm all done with the antibiotics (two whole weeks of taking it!), and I'm feeling so much better now. I'm back to laughing and smiling at Mama and Daddy, which makes them really happy. Although I've started this new thing where I only smile a little bit and stick my tongue out. It makes everybody laugh so I really like it. I'm still working on figuring out how to crawl, but I'm getting pretty close. I can get up onto my knees and move backwards a few inches, but not forwards. I just like to be different. I have gotten a lot of new toys lately, and I'm having fun figuring them all out. I really like the squirty bath toys I got yesterday and the obnoxious (that's Mama's word) radio that Grandma and Grandpa brought me. It makes me laugh. Mama and Daddy also had to go buy me a whole bunch of new clothes the other day because I don't have anything that fits and will keep me warm in cold weather. They were pretty excited because they haven't really bought me much stuff yet because my friend Presley gave me all of her old clothes. Overall my life has been pretty exciting lately and Mama, Daddy and I can't believe that I am officially six months old today. They say that's a whole half of a year old already. Wow, that was fast.