sunglasses at night

As part of the gift bags at Ada's birthday party we included these cute foam sunglasses for all of the kids. They were a steal at Michaels and I thought they might provide a good chew toy for the little ones. Well, Ada actually really likes to wear hers. More accurately she likes to have us put them on her face. When she finds her glasses among her toys, she will carry them over to one of us, put the glasses in our hands, and then scrunch up her shoulders and squint. This rivals her tickle and dog licking anticipation on the cuteness meter - and I think she knows it...

definitely not in charge

Ada has been waking up at least once a night to feed. She is so small and obviously hungry at these wake ups that I don't want to take them away from her, but I'd rather the feed happen before I go to bed than in the middle of the night. I have heard about "dream feeds" where you nurse your child while they are still sleeping and then put them back to bed with a full tummy. What a perfect solution, I thought. So last night I went into Ada's room around midnight, lifted her out of her crib, and sat down in our nursing chair. She didn't even notice. When I tried to feed her, her mouth was clamped shut. She wasn't hungry at that moment and there was nothing I could do to get more milk in her tummy. Giving up I stood up from the chair and she arched her back until she felt herself being put back down, reached behind her head, grabbed her binky, and managed to open the jaws of death long enough to get the binky in. Basically saying - I could have opened my mouth if I wanted to, but I obviously didn't want to, if I had I would have cried out and THEN you should have come in to try to feed me.

bed time giggles

Most nights are a bit of a struggle when it comes to getting Ada to bed. We have a bit of a routine, but lately she pops awake and starts to cry the second she senses the crispness of her crib mattress underneath her precious little head, even though she is dead weight in our arms. Tonight seemed like another one of those crazy nights but when I layed her down in the crib she stayed down, so I stroked her back, eventually moving to a little baby back rub, thinking she was almost asleep. Little did I know she was setting me up. As I started to move my fingers in little tiny circles I hear a noise coming from the crib mattress - I listened a little more carefully and realized my cute little monkey was giggling. Wide awake but not wanting to miss out on any tickles. I have no idea where she gets that from. ;)

4 years ago...

Elliot and I were enjoying the open outdoors in Yosemite - our first married vacation. The official wedding anniversary was this past Saturday and in a grand romantic gesture, Elliot planned out a full day of fun activities, all without our little munchkin (as much as we love her). It was a nice break and I think Ada probably had as much fun as we did as she got to spend the whole day hanging out with dogs - possibly her favorite creation other than the whole nursing concept. I won't go into details of the adult day except to say that I am really really bad at golf - but Ada's day deserves some second hand story telling.

Ada spent the day hanging out with her Auntie Katie and after a whole day of Katie whispering "Auntie Katie" into her ear, Ada has started saying "Aunnn TTTT". As I mentioned Ada got to spend her day with dogs. First with her favorite dog of all time, Katie's lab mix, Thea. Thea and Ada have this great deal - Ada will spread food around her face and Thea will lick it off. Thea will also lick Ada's fingers and toes if Ada asks nicely - but for the most part she sticks to Ada's face. And Ada greets these licking fests with giggles of pure joy. She has taken to giving me a fake laugh when I'm tickling her - but the face licking laughs - those are totally real. Katie also took Ada to hang out with Melissa and two other, new dogs that Ada had never met. This amounts to just about heaven in the Ada ranking of unexpected events.

They also did some shopping and dancing and other general fun girl stuff. But most importantly - they napped. Ada has never been a good weekend napper. I can't blame her - she gets to spend the whole day with almost instant access to mommy mookie and that alone is enough to keep her up for hours on end. She will usually crash for about 40 minutes at some point during a weekend day but never more than an hour. However, playing with Thea must have been much more exhausting than playing with mom and dad because she took a 2 HOUR NAP!!!

So while Elliot and I were relaxing and remembering what it was like to eat a meal and have an adult conversation AT THE SAME TIME - Ada was enjoying her break from mom and dad with just as much abandon.