That's right... she's a lobster!  Here's the story told as I imagine it unfolded in Sophia's mind:

 

"Mama?  What are you gonna do with those?"

 

"NOOOOOOOOO!  Don't pinch the lobster!!!!"

 

"Holy Crap!  This crazy woman is going to cook me!!"

 

"Seriously!  Do you people see what is happening here?  Is there water in this pot!?  Call Child Protective Services!!"

 

"OK, OK... it's just for pictures?"

 

"I can probably pose for a few pictures..."

 

"WAHHHHHH!!!  I'm not enjoying the joke anymore!!!  She's really going to cook me!!  Someone save me!!!!"

 

"Oh thank goodness... yes, walk away from the stove mama!"

 

"You think that was funny!??!  Take that!  Lobsters like to pinch, dumbass.  Now who's laughing?"

 

 

OK, no more posts with Sophia "speaking" until she really does speak.  I just couldn't resist this time.

 

Have a Happy Halloween everyone.  We'll be taking Sophia out for Michief Night tonight to egg cars and toliet paper houses.  :)

 

We shot some videos today that do a pretty good job of showing you just what this Baby-in-Motion is capable of!

  

 

This next video also shows you why I finally broke down and wrote in her baby book that Sophia's first word is "Baba".  Damn.

  

 

Here's a picture for you:  Saturday evening, I head to the grocery store for a few "essentials".  The store is full of people in Halloween costumes, picking up that last case of beer or 9 bottles of vodka... young people with edgy little costumes and fun parties to attend.  I'm in line (1) in sweats, (2) with my glasses on, (3) with a cart full of diapers, baby food, and toliet paper.  And to top it all off, I had coupons.  COUPONS!  Seriously, is there any clearer image of a loser?  It could have only been worse if I also had some Depends, Ex-Lax, and a National Inquirer in the cart.  I cracked open a beer when I got home and tried to forget that it even happened.

 

The rest of the day was substantially better, although not necessarily more exciting.  I finally got around to taking Sophia's 8-month picture with the pink pig.  There are some pretty cute shots:

It's really difficult to get her to just sit still *next* to the pig.  Pink pig gets grabbed and man-handled pretty quickly these days.  He got wrestled to the floor shortly afterwards:

 

OK, tomorrow I might try to get some Halloween pictures.  Sophia doesn't tolerate her costume very well just yet, so it might take a few different photo shoots to get some good ones.  Stay tuned!

 

Here's something that I don't get about the United States.  Why is it that we view people who cannot read in this day and age as social outcasts who must not be very bright, BUT it's totally acceptable for someone to make a statement like, "Oh, I'm just not good at math" (where *math* is often defined as dividing 45 by 3 or taking 10 percent of 60) and not label that person a moron?

 

Seriously... this is a legitimate parenting question.  If your kid is learning to read and struggling, most parents realize (I think... I hope!?!) that it's not really an option to allow the kid to *NOT* learn to read.  Yet, when a kid is learning to do basic math, parents (and teachers?) are willing to just let it slide.  Am I missing something?  Can a person really get through life without basic math?  If not, why are there so many of those people out there?  I had a student come to the board yesterday with a calculator to "compute" 27/3 and 21/3.  Did she not have to stand up in her third grade class and recite her "3" times tables like I did? 

 

It's not like this in other places, right?

I know you've been dying to see our jack-o-lanterns all lit up.  Well... your wait is over!

Did you all notice that most of these are Sophia-lanterns?  All (except Esen's on the far left) have just two lower teeth.  I guess her baba thinks that that the next teeth to come in are her upper canines?!

 

We took a few rare family shots, including one with my Suzy-Q:

Those laser beams of Suzy's are pretty impressive.  Wonder what super powers come with those things?

 

We also had some 8-month pictures of Sophia taken.  The best shot by far is this little purple number (this is just a picture of the picture):

I'll try to get some of these in the mail to folks.  We got some wallets and some pictures of Esen and I with Sophia that are reasonably cute, so I'll share those, too.

 

Here's a picture of grandma trying to keep Sophia entertained while we waited for our turn with The Picture People. 

That damn green spoon (unfortunately) made it into some of the pictures... it was the only way to get her to stop screaming!

 

And finally, there are a few pictures from last week that I forgot to share in all the hub-bub.  I was a little late getting home from work one night and this is the sight that greeted me.  They were so snuggly and cute!  I just wanted to squish Sophia's lips!

And this butt-in-the-air style is her new preferred manner of sleeping.  I've been dying to get a picture of it!  Finally I just took my chances with the flash... she didn't even budge!  That's our little cupcake-butt... sleeps great while we're still awake and then wakes up after we go to sleep!

 

 

 

 

 

Grandpa and Grandma Griffith are here from New Jersey this weekend and, in my effort to clean the house and get groceries and otherwise prepare, I have neglected Sophia's blog.  I figured I would just upload a few pictures to show you what we're up to over here.  Grandparent activities so far have included:

Swing time at the park...

 

Pumpkin Carving (Esen's first time)...

Sophia gave us plenty of encouragement during our pumpkin carving (particular her baba who had never carved before!), but we decided *against* giving her a knife and let her try.

 

Here's a video of some of the pumpkin "action"...

  

 

 

The finished products... (I'll post a picture of them lit up later tonight!)

 

Crawling time...

 

Oh, yeah... and a little beer drinking! 

No, she didn't get any, but she was holding on to that bottle for dear life!  I had to pry it out of her tiny little alcoholic hands!

 

I'll try to be better about updating, but it might be a few days until you get more!

Wondering how I get any work done with Sophia around?  Well, I've found that this little trick (see pictures below) works for hauling laundry (at least the clean and dry kind... not so much for the wet clothes). 

For those who haven't visited our house, the washer is inside the house but the clothes dryer is located outside in the garage, so fetching laundry is more complicated than just running into the other room.  Navigating through the back door with a baby *AND* a basket of clothes is no easy task, especially because there are usually several cats lurking by the back door attempting to sneak into the house!  It won't be long and this little trick won't work, however,... she'll be able to crawl out of the basket soon!!

Friday night:  at home with the fam, delightful and relaxing, watched a (dumb) movie.  Will someone tell Will Farrell that he is funny, but not so funny that the script can totally suck?

 

Saturday:  departmental picnic on campus, beautiful day, good cookies, later we walked to the park (with Suzy-Q) to throw the frisbee around while Sophia sucked on toys in her stroller and Suzy stalked squirrels, made new recipes for dinner, graded some of the worst exams I've seen in my life, ended the evening with Bon Jovi on Saturday Night Live.

 

Sunday:  brunch with Turkish friends in Davis, evening dessert with more friends at our house, snuck in some domestic work in between, but didn't ever make it back to my horrific grading.

 

Some video highlights of the weekend include:

 

Eating Kix cereal (now that there are TWO teeth with which to crunch!  Still trying to capture photographic evidence for y'all...):

     

Most of them wind up mashed in her tight little fists or on the floor (and, hence, in Suzy's tummy).  Oh well, they keep her pretty entertained anyway. 

 

Eating banana (second time went a lot better than the first):

     

The real problem is that she only eats about 1/10 of a banana and I don't really need to add 9/10 of a banana to my diet.

 

Commando crawl (*with* obstacle course):

      

We predict real crawling with butt in the air by the end of the week.  Watch out Suzy... she's comin' for ya! 

 

Sorry it took me all weekend to get the blog up to date... I had good intentions when I posted the pre-weekend teaser and didn't mean to tease so long!  Can't believe another weekend just flew by.  Guess all those people weren't lying when they said that life with a kid seems to move by with lightening speed...

1.  Two teeth are better than one.

2.  Crawling?  Sophia says, "Puh-leez... Give me a real challenge."

3.  Sleeping through the night is for sissies.

 

More later... I'm going to go enjoy a frequently interrupted night of quasi-sleep.

In posting the Oktoberfest pictures, I completely overlooked our Saturday afternoon trip to the cute little park near our house.  We were hoping that some fresh air and sunshine would help Sophia feel better (and us too, I suppose).  She was pretty droopy and tired from lack of good sleep, but it was still fun.  :) 

 

Swinging: (Permanent link: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4806304902184771763&hl=en)

     

 

Sliding: (Permanent link: http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-4974993602460173625&hl=en)

     

 

A couple of still shots are posted below.  My favorite is the one where she is looking at a little girl on the swings next to us and clearly thinking, "Yo! Get off my swing set biatch."  :)

Oktoberfest!  Beer, dancing, sausages!  Awesome!!  We met our friends Kace and Walter there.  Walter, being a good German, owns and WORE his lederhosen for the occasion (see pictures of the dressy black deer leather below).  Double Awesome!  Despite being sick with yet another cold (I hate this aspect of daycare so much I could scream), Sophia was really quite charming and fun.  While waiting in line for bratwurst, she befriended all the ladies within grasping distance, including a sweet woman in a black and white print blouse that endured Sophia's fairly vigorous groping for about 15 minutes.  Kace did a better job of capturing the overall Oktoberfest experience... check out her blog for more (http://kacecorner.blogspot.com/2007/10/oktoberfest.html), including a video of some dancing that occurred after Sophia's bedtime.  Speaking of which, it's nearly time to start bedtime preparations, so Auf Wiedersehen!

Reliable, delicious, rejuvinating...  Where have you gone, good SLEEP!?  I have been a good sleeper (nearly) all my life.  I can drop off easily in a car, I can take naps during the day and still sleep at night, I fall asleep easily, stay asleep easily, and generally fall back asleep if I wake.  All that has gone out the window thanks to Sophia.  I did pretty well when she was really little because she was fairly predictable... up every 3-4 hours.  It sucked, but my body could get used to it.  Now, she might sleep well one night and then be up randomly the next.  Could be because of variation in her naps at daycare, or because of teeth, or because Suzy barks, or because of something she ate making her all farty.  No way to predict or to settle into a routine with all these variables at work. 

 

Last night is already a bad memory... can't remember how many times I was up.  I think it was twice, but then that's not counting the 6am time.  At 6am I was delirious and just decided to bring her into bed, give her some milk, and hope that she would drift off again.  But, like Popeye and a can of spinach, the milk just pumped into her extremeties and supercharged her kicking and crawling such that there was *obviously* no sleep in our future.  Thankfully, Esen took one for the team and got up with her.  I don't think I had it in me.  We had both been up with her around 3am, but he somehow managed to drag himself out of bed again at 6am.  The good news is that she fell asleep in his arms a little while later (something she rarely does with him these days, I suspect because he's not lactating).  The better news is that I got a few more hours of sleep and might actually make it through the day as a result. 

 

I have an observation about parents and sleep deprivation.  Esen has always been a really bad sleeper.  He has tons of trouble falling asleep and also struggles to fall back asleep if woken up.  As a result, he has accepted the feeling of exhaustion in the morning a long, long time ago as just part of his lot in life.  He copes; he rarely complains; he makes coffee and gets on with things.  So, for him, this baby-related interruption to sleep is just not that much of a shock to the system.  For me, on the other hand, it is a rude, rude awakening.  His body is used to unreliability when it comes to sleep.  But it is almost more than just what the body is *used to*... it is that, mentally, he accepts the volatility in sleeping patterns and doesn't yearn for things to return to "normal."  This just isn't that far off from his normal.  For what it's worth, I think Suzy takes after her mommy and is yearning for a nice, predictable, delicious night's sleep as well.

I never wanted Sophia's blog to be one more item on my to-do list, but sometimes it feels that way.  I'm generally pretty good about getting pictures and videos off the camera and uploaded with some witty text to accompany them, but lately it feels hard.  I'm recovering from what I think is a little bit of food poisoning this week (no more Chinese food for me!), so maybe that nasty experience is bringing down my enthusiasm for everything.  I went to bed before 8pm tonight after dragging myself through my day's classes and now I'm wide awake at 1am.  Ironically, Sophia is fast asleep.  Figures.

 

While I'm awake, I guess I should take the time to download pictures and videos... at least that way I can alleviate some of my blogging guilt.  In this little video, I've captured some of Sophia's "talking."  She's getting more and more vocal every day and I even feel like she recognizes some words.  I wished that I had let the camera run for just a few minutes longer... as soon as I stopped the video she let out the funniest screaming, babbling extravaganza.  (permanent link:  http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-346404901248734080&hl=en)

   

 

I also took a few bath photos tonight.  A couple of things come to mind when I look at these pictures.  First, one of my favorite parts of her bath has yet to be captured on film.  When I'm taking her out of the bath tub and she is sort of standing in the water drip-drying, she has the cutest little expression on her face, likely made cuter by the fact that she is slippery and wet and happy.  I'll have to get Esen to take this shot.  Second, in the pictures where she's wrapped in her towel, you can see the calming effects of the pacifier.  She gets a little fussy as I'm drying her off because she's tired and ready for some milk.  When that pacifier gets popped in her mouth, her eyes close a little bit and she gets this look that drug addicts must get when they finally get their fix.  Her face says, "Oh THANK GOD!  I really needed that... mum-num-num-mmmm...."  Makes me wonder how hard it will be to finally get her to give up that pacifier...

 

OK, back to bed for me.  Sophia will probably wake up as soon as I drift off to sleep.