Yeah, I check on her regularly when she's sleeping.  Mostly it's because she's so darn cute though!  Not only does she sleep in silly positions (see picture below), but it's so nice to catch her when she's just waking up.  This morning she took a really long nap (it was going on 2 hours!), so I decided to wake her up and catch it on film.

  

Eventually I'll get a video (or even just audio) of how sweet she is when she lays in her crib and talks to herself and sings and so on.  When you hear that on the baby monitor, there's just no better alarm clock in my opinion.

 

After this morning's mega-nap, I decided to drag her around on a couple of errands.  First we hit Target for some bigger diapers and a booster seat.  The booster seat is our answer to the high chair.  I don't think our little kitchen really *NEEDS* a huge high chair (and they are all quite huge) and this little guy can go with us to restaurants and friends' houses.  Although it's designed to be tethered to a kitchen chair, it is quite stable just sitting on the floor, so I suppose it's also something she can use on the floor too.  Sophia's not able to sit up on her own yet, but the harness on this booster chair is good enough that it keeps her upright pretty well (even better once you put the tray on).  Another bonus that I see in the future... this being small enough that it can easily be dumped into the bath tub for a good scrub.  And at $24.99 at Target, who can beat the price?  While at Target I also picked up a few other things to start getting her "in the mood" for eating solid foods, which are right around the corner.  I think it's a good sign that the spoon went right into her mouth without any prompting from me!

 

After that we hit the car wash.  Sophia slept through it, although I'm not sure how... it was one of super noisy ones where enormous whirling plastic fingers are slapping up against every inch of the car.  I thought she might be frightened, but apparently not.

It was an interesting weekend in our house.  OK, OK, not really *interesting* in the way that normal people would say something was interesting.... more like challenging.  Esen left Saturday afternoon and then I had the baby (and the puppy) all to myself.  Saturday evening was like a dream... Sophia went to bed at 7pm, I ate a nice dinner (thanks to leftovers supplied by my thoughtful husband), cracked open a Guinness and the new Harry Potter book, and proceeded to enjoy a nice, quiet, relaxing evening.   

 

Then it hit me.  As I prepared for bed (taking Suzy out to pee, tucking the kitties into their garage, closing the windows big enough for a person to crawl through), I realized that I was the only adult in the house.  I felt this immediate pressure to keep watch against predators from outside and to more carefully monitor Sophia from inside.  It sounds silly, doesn't it?  But every other night since she came into this world, I've had at least one other person by my side at the end of the day to make me feel like I'm not alone in protecting her.  It's an incredible amount of pressure really.  I mean, I know I've been largely responsible for keeping her alive for 5+ months, but never completely on my own.  In the short time that she's been sleeping in her crib, it's never been *just* my ears listening for any sign of trouble.  Since she's been able to get anything and everything into her mouth, it's never been *just* my eyes that have watched to make sure she doesn't try that with something that could choke her.  It's never been *just* my judgment used to determine if she was ok or required medical attention.  At the height of my neurotic thoughts, I was going over my infant CPR and choking training in my head and making sure that my cell phone was with me at all times ("just in case").  Last night I started having different yet more morbid thoughts... what if something happened to me while Esen was away.  Would anyone know something was wrong?  Probably not for quite a while... OK, I need to stop... this is getting me all freaked out again (in the light of day, no less!) and I have another night to face tonight.

 

Two nights have passed without incident and I am pretty sure that the third night will pass similarly.  Still, this experience has really made me think a little.  Now I think I understand why people with kids actually shell out for life insurance and drive safer cars and generally play things a little safer.  The most precious cargo has been bestowed on us and we don't want to do anything to put it at risk.  I don't want to take this risk-averse approach to extremes, of course, but that is a whole lot easier to do when you've got another sentinel by your side.  In the last few days, Suzy has sure helped in this regard.  She notifies us when there's someone (or something) near the house, she sleeps in the baby's room to help keep watch, and she prevents me from ever feeling truly alone.  I might not have slept at all these last two nights without Suzy by my side.  Note to self: buy better dog treats.  :)

 

Esen, if you're reading this from Virginia... come home safely to us... we miss you!

Maybe it's just because I'm short and so I expected to have a pint-sized kid, but I am just constantly shocked at how long this crazy baby is!!  Let me give you an example.  Now that she is sleeping in her crib (quite well... knock on wood!), she needs to be dressed a little more warmly, so footie pajamas are the preferred sleeping attire.  I'm also just a total sucker for a kid in footie pajamas... so cute!  Anyway, Sophia only had a couple of these, so I knew I needed a few more unless I wanted to be doing laundry all the time.  The ones she has are 6-9 month or 9 month size, so when I looked online, I decided to buy a few 12-month size so that she had a little room to grow.  Please see attached pictures of her in the 12-month size... note how well she already fills these suckers out!  These are high quality ones from the Children's Place, not some Wal-Mart cotton that would shrink up a ton.  In fact, after washing, these still looked like they were going to be really long on her... until I put them on her long baby body!  These pictures also highlight the fact that she is already soooo long relative to my torso.  I'm telling you, I think we have a Katie on our hands.

 

In other news, Sophia is really pressing up tall on her hands when she's on her tummy (see picture below).  She's practically got her whole stomach off the ground!  She hasn't showed any signs, however, of using her lower half for moving... so I still think we're quite a ways from crawling.  Still, I've started thinking about things that we'll have to do to baby-proof this house against a moving baby.  Think we'll start with the 40,000 cords behind the TV and move quickly on to the lower cabinets in the kitchen and bathroom (which are currently stocked with cleaning products and plenty of breakable stuff).  I suppose I'll also have to break down and *really* clean the floor.  I mean, it's clean enough for me, but probably not clean enough for a mobile Sophia given how everything goes into her mouth.

 

In still other news, some of you know that I've been dealing with an extremely painful tendon in my right wrist since the end of May.  This "new mom tendonitis" is from lifting the baby and (moreso) from cradling her to breastfeed.  I've been wearing a brace since June that immobilizes this area (not particularly baby-friendly, but necessary) and got a shot of cortisone into the tendon about 5 weeks ago that didn't do much.  Continuous use of pain killers is not really an option because of the breastfeeding.  Yesterday I got a second shot of cortisone and was not all that hopeful since the first didn't do much to relieve the pain.  Surprisingly, it feels pretty good... hell, I'll even say good!  I'm still wearing the brace to keep from over-using the area, but perhaps it will actually heal well enough this time that I can handle my dear Sophia without pain. 

 

Finally, my better half is on his way to the east coast as I type.  He's visiting some friends in DC and Charlottesville and I'm officially a single mom for the next four days.  I am hopeful that I survive.  I've never done this alone for 24 hours, much less 92!  I have a borrowed copy of the new Harry Potter book and plan to crawl into bed early with some wine tonight (and every night until I finish it!)... hopefully Sophia will cooperate. 

Who can be cranky when you see this?

   

Seriously... I live with her and I just never get tired of hearing this laugh.  If nothing else, it's a heck of a lot better than crying!

We had our interview this morning for Esen's green card.  After all the paperwork and correspondence leading up to this point, I thought for sure this last step would be a pain in the ass, too.  Nope.  Easy as pie.  Apparently, having a baby is the key.  Not too many faux couples bother to take the chirade quite that far, I guess.  It's kind of a shame really... I was sort of looking forward to the questions they might ask.  Last night we were making sure we knew each others' favorite movies and colors and foods, talking about the most recent restaurant meal and argument, etc.  I was kind of looking forward to being able to demonstrate that I knew my man so well that they couldn't stump me (and vice versa for him).  Nothing.  No questions.  Well, she asked where we met and for a copy of our latest tax return (which wasn't yet completed when we started this process) and then said that the application was approved.  So anticlimatic.

 

Still, Esen now has his green card (well, to be truthful, he's got a stamp in his passport (see picture below)... the card arrives by mail in a few weeks and is not, in fact, green at all).  Additionally, we went by the DMV with this new proof of his right to be here and he's now legal in the driving world as well.  Surprisingly, both appointments took less than an hour.  When was the last time you heard of someone going through *TWO* government agencies that quickly!?  So, now he can come and go as he pleases... whether it's just down to the grocery store or around the world.  I'm hoping that he chooses to go to the grocery store first.  :)

She was doing so well... adjusting to her crib, sleeping (with a few brief interruptions) for 10 hours or so at night, taking good naps during the day.  Last night was a total nightmare.  Although she went down without any problem, she was up and crying from 1am throughout the rest of the night off and on.  I think it would be an overestimate to say that we got 3 hours of sleep.  In hindsight, the current sleeping problem is likely related to her teeth coming in.  We can't see any teeth, but she's certainly the right age and is doing plenty of drooling and chewing on hard things.  Tonight, she went to sleep around 7pm, but was awake and crying an hour later.  We gave her some infant Tylenol and hope that does the trick... I don't think either of us can take another night like last night.

 

In other (good) news, Esen's visa through UC-Davis came in yesterday and we picked it up today.  All I have to do now is drive him over to the DMV to get his driver's license renewed.  I didn't think that it was a good idea to tackle the idiots at the DMV on less than 3 hours of sleep, so that will have to wait until tomorrow.

 

I'm tempted to go to sleep now... only 8:30.  This is how it starts isn't it?  I'll be wearing "mom jeans" and driving a mini-van before I know it.  :(

Five Months!  Wow... people are right when they say the time flies.  I figured out yesterday that Sophia is already 1/3 of my total height.  The picture below definitely captures her increasing size (especially when viewed as part of the album that documents her growth).  She's sleeping sweetly now... ahh...

We bought him on a whim, but he has won all of our hearts.  He is Jacques the Peacock.  It's hard to predict what a kid will like, but Sophia sure likes this guy.  Esen named him and we both utilize him daily to get Sophia to squeal with delight.  See video for an example.

  

This is a topic that I've been meaning to blog about for a few weeks, but kind of forgot about briefly.  We saw something on the Colbert Report several weeks ago that I thought was really interesting.  Apparently, researchers (of what discipline, I'm not really sure) have identified a correlation between the direction your hair swirls when viewed from behind and the probability that you're gay.  The hair "swirl" (think of a guy with a crew cut) is actually officially called a "whorl", which is a term that can also be applied to plants, finger prints, and sea shells apparently.  Here's the statistic that I found interesting.  Among gay men, 23 percent had hair that swirled in a counter clockwise direction.  In the general public, only 8 percent had a counter clockwise whorl.  Check out http://nymag.com/news/features/33520/ for a picture of what I'm talking about as well as an article on this issue.  Although the article is quick to point out that a counter clockwise whorl shouldn't be viewed as a predictor that someone is or will be a homosexual, both Esen and I couldn't help but check out the direction of Sophia's swirl the next morning.  Hers is clockwise, but I'd like to clarify that I don't really care much about her future sexual preferences.  Because women's hairstyles aren't amenable to checking hair swirl direction (except perhaps among the butchest of lesbians), the study findings are only applicable to men anyway.

 

I find this issue interesting for a couple of reasons.  First, as more physical attributes are identified as being homosexual and heterosexual (and the article talks about others), will we start to hear about crazy right-wing Christians changing their stance on abortion because they suddenly have more information about whether their unborn babies are gay?  It's an interesting dilemma that might soften their stance on one of those hot-button issues.  Second, if you had a son with a counter clockwise whorl, would you buy him more gun and truck toys and dress him only in blue and green?  Sort of an attempt to make nurture counteract nature.  Third, the article also posits the idea that sexual preference is related to hormone balance while babies are still in the womb.  My reaction to this point:  Great... why not let mothers-to-be feel like they are responsible for EVERYTHING.  It's hard enough being responsible for eating healthy enough and taking the right prenatal vitamins and exercising just the right amount and not stressing out too much.  I can see some redneck idiot beating up on his wife because their son is gay and the doctors inform them that it's likely because she ate some bad ham while she was pregnant.  And that leads me to my last point.  Now that I'm a parent, I don't understand how some parents "disown" their children for being gay.  I've tried to think what Sophia could do to make me turn my back on her, and I come up pretty short in this thought experiment.  I mean, I'm not even sure I could disown her if she committed some heinous crime.  So, relatively speaking, being gay is a non-issue for me as a parent.  I'm quite certain that's *NOT* the case for everyone in this world, however, so studies like this hair whorl research that seek to identify outward signs of homosexuality are just a little troubling to me.  Interesting, but troubling.

 

OK, this was a heavier post than I thought it might be when I started.  I'm attaching a few pictures of our girl to soften the final message.  Ironically, the pictures we took of her today show her dressed in a pink quasi-tutu.  This is not our attempt at forcing Sophia into some female ballerina mindset... the outfit was a gift (a really cute one, too!) like nearly everything else in her closet.

1.  At my La Leche League meeting today, Sophia was "standing" next to a 9-month-old boy, Ira.  Ira, who really was standing nearly on his own, is an average sized baby with a mother the same height as me.  Sophia was taller than him.  Jeez... guess that explains why she's wearing 9-month sized clothes.

2.  Even though I mocked the idea of making one's own baby food, I bought a book on the subject and am seriously considering it.  I know, I know... it sounds a little insane, but it just doesn't look that hard given how much and the way we already cook.  I will, however, have to buy a blender and/or food processor of some sort.  Hmmm....

3.  If you happen to hear an unidentifiable "click-click-click" noise coming out of your baby monitor, you might just have a dog sitting in the baby's room and biting her nails.  ("her", as in Suzy... I don't want you thinking Suzy was biting Sophie's nails...)

4.  A Dairy Queen Cookie-Dough Blizzard and an afternoon nap ROCK... especially on a Thursday.  :)

 

A list of four things seems short, but that's all I got...

Laid her down at 7:30, asleep by 8:30, and she slept until nearly 7am.  Esen went in to give her the pacifier at 6:30 when she first cried and, when I went in 20 minutes later to get her up, she was on her stomach!  Little bugger rolled over (first time in that direction... must be able to push off the sides of the crib) and was just talking and giggling.  She must have been mighty pleased with her new trick! 

I laid her down at 7:30pm, she fell asleep around 8:30pm, and woke up around 6:30am.  What a dream!

We're looking for something positive about not being able to go to Istanbul... the proverbial "silver lining" amidst the storm clouds.  Well, here's something:  sleep.  No, not for us silly... for Sophia.  She's been having some sleep issues in recent weeks, namely, getting back to waking up several times each night.  Not good for a nearly-5-month-old (or for the parents of a nearly-5-month-old).  We had been hesitant to make some necessary changes to her sleeping arrangement, which still consisted of a basinett (pack-n-play) in our room, because we knew that the trip to Turkey would involve (1) two 16 hour plane trips, (2) 10-hour time changes... twice, and (3) sleeping in a pack-n-play while we were there.  It seemed silly to try to get her into her crib (and out of our room) prior to this trip because we'd only have to (potentially) struggle to re-establish this new sleeping arrangement when we returned to Sacramento. 

 

So, last night we decided there were no more excuses for not moving her into her room and the crib.  Now, she's been taking naps in her crib for probably nearly a month, so it was already pretty familiar to her.  Still, I was worried that she would wake up and wonder where the heck she was and scream bloody murder.  In fact, Sophia did just great in her crib.  She did do some waking, but was easily soothed back to sleep with her binky.  I, on the other hand, feel like I didn't sleep a wink.  Perhaps it was the baby monitor sitting on my nightstand.  I felt like I should be listening for little signs that she wasn't ok.  I'm sure that I had it turned up WAY too loud because I could still hear her movements, but really... would I have it any other way for the first night?  The thing that put my mind at ease happened about 1am (and several times after that when I checked on her in person)... Suzy slept on the chair in her room the whole night.  She was like Sophia's own personal guard dog!  :)  You know, Suzy often comes into the room when Sophia is eating and just lays on the floor next to us.  I always thought it was to be near me.  HA!  Looks like maybe I've been replaced as the object of doggie desire. 

 

I definitely made a rookie mistake with the switch to the crib.  In our room, Sophia has always slept in a onesie and swaddled in a light-weight blanket.  She often wriggles out of the swaddle and we remove the blanket entirely.  Our room is warm enough to do that.  Her room, while it starts out the same temperature as ours, gets chillier at night apparently.  By 6am when Esen got her so that I could feed her, her little legs were like popsicle sticks!  :(  Guess it's time to break out the footie pajamas. 

 

Below are a few pictures of what she's doing right now during her morning play time.  Looks like good, clean, farm-themed fun, no?  She's also reading up on her Turkish.  And Suzy?  She continues to stay close... periodically checking in on us.  :)

I know this blog is supposed to be about Sophia and cute, happy baby things, but I really need to rant just a little bit.  Unfortunately we won't be able to go to Turkey this week as we had planned.  :(  :(  :(   The past few weeks, most of you know, we've been waiting for Esen's visa through UC-Davis to arrive (recall earlier post about his lack of a driver's license).  The International Office at UC-Davis is in charge of these things and they didn't send out the paperwork until June 27th.  This is not so bad (even though his current visa expired on June 30th) because they were supposed to request the "expedited service" to get it to him in two weeks.  They did request the expedited service, but did they do it on June 27th when they first submitted the paperwork?  No... they did it on July 12th.  Did they tell Esen this?  No.  Did he ask repeatedly about the status of the visa and inform them of our impending travel plans.  Yes.  Did they bother to speak up about this little detail until today?  No.  Do we hate the people who work in the International Office at UC-Davis.  Yes, most certainly.  Did I mention that the expedited service cost Esen $1000 (it came out of his research budget for next year, so it's not the same as cash out of his pocket, but still!)?  The woman who is responsible is conveniently on vacation, but I strongly suspect that she will return to some harsh words.  It was her assistant that finally told Esen the whole story this morning.  Grrrr....  She better hope that Esen doesn't call in the Turkish mafia.  :)

 

So now our little Sophia Lale will have to wait to use her cute little baby passport.  Her daddy will continue to be stuck in the house without his driving privileges.  We're hopeful that he'll be able to remedy the driver's license issue after our Green Card interview next Thursday.  I suppose I should be grateful that at least all of our clothes are clean and that we hadn't actually begun packing for the trip.  I think I had better plan on going to the grocery store to get some good beer and food for dinner tonight... I've got a disappointed Turk on my hands.

 

Ooops... there's a hungry baby waking up in the other room... better go get the milk buffet open!

A month ago, I posted here that Sophia had rolled over (from front to back).  She hasn't exactly been consistent about that trick.  In fact, I'm sure we didn't see her do it again for almost 3 weeks.  The last few days, she's been pretty sly about it.  I'd set her down on a blanket on her stomach, look away to grab a toy or something, and she'd be on her back when I'd look back.  This morning her daddy finally got the evidence on camera.  I was out walking Suzy, but apparently Sophia rolled over 3 times in a row... the third time was captured on film (see below).

It's not all that exciting I suppose, but it is an important milestone, so let's just check that box off.

 

I was a little too slow at getting the camera the other day when Sophia was doing some SERIOUS singing (with Esen's assistance).  I caught the tail end of her performance on video, but she was getting hungry and cranky, so things deteriorated rather quickly.  :)

 

In other news, Esen really seems to be doing quite well in his new house bound status.  I think it has taken him a few days to get used to being without the license, but now he's really embracing it.  He made some delicious dolmas for us recently, grilled chicken and pineapple, too.  All I do is show up with groceries.  Truthfully, I think we're both looking forward to getting back to some sort of "normal" where we divide up the tasks more evenly on a day-to-day basis.  Neither of us is really house wife material in the long run.

Not only does she need a bigger car seat, but she's also really starting to fill up her crib and spill out! 

 

I ran over to buy Sophia's new car seat this morning and have it installed.  We went with the Britax Roundabout... it's what all the cool kids are using.... rear-facing until 30 pounds, forward-facing until 45 pounds.  It just looked so puuuurty and had that new car seat smell, so we had to find an excuse to get her into it.  During her nap, we found the perfect excuse... we needed something to keep her limbs in her crib (evidence in the pictures below!).  So, her crib set came with a bumper, of course, but now that she is more mobile, I worry about her getting her little face mashed up against the bumper and not being able to breath.  So, I did what the doctor recommended and just removed the bumper completely.  That action quickly revealed a new problem... arms and legs that manage to escape the confines of the crib.  Fortunately they make something called a breathable bumper that is basically a mesh-like bumper that keeps limbs (and binkies!) in the crib without posing a smothering risk.  So we drove over to Target to pick one of these up (only to find that they didn't have any in stock forcing us to order online anyway) and Sophia got to try out her new ride.  After supervising her daddy's skills at getting her strapped in, she enjoyed a nice ride that ended in a nap.  Must be comfortable enough to offset my cursing at all the bad drivers we encountered.

 

The big downside of this new carseat is that you can't just snap it into a stroller frame.  This is going to be particularly problematic when traveling with it.  I mean, imagine us in San Francisco.  This last time we were there, we could install the infant car seat in a cab and bring the snap-n-go stroller.  Upon arriving at our destination, the car seat locked into the stroller and we were on our way.  Now, we will still have to install a car seat in the cab for safety reasons, but when we arrive at our destination, we are stuck with this big, bulky car seat... this one can't be converted into something portable by snapping it into a stroller frame because of its size.  What the hell do you do now?  Carry around a car seat?  Risk her life by not using a car seat in the cab?  Why don't they make snap-n-go's that the bigger car seats fit into? 

 

We're headed to Turkey in a week and will face this dilemma.  My solution will just be to use the old car seat and bring the snap-n-go stroller frame.  Sure, she's close to an too inch long for the infant car seat, but I figure a little fudging is ok to get us through this one last big trip.  I sure would like some suggestions about what to do in the future though.

 

We'll face our first test tonight.  We're headed out for some sushi, which I have totally been craving all day.  In the past, we'd just bring the infant car seat in with us and she'd have a place to sit/nap.  That doesn't work with the new car seat.  Guess we'll be balancing a baby on our laps while we eat, which could be pretty rough given my mediocre chop stick skills! 

Well, Sophia has outgrown her infant car seat, which means (1) we need a new, bigger car seat, and (2) we need to move her into a big girl stroller.  The stroller we've been using is basically just a frame that the infant seat snaps into.  We finally broke out the big girl stroller that the Sautners got us a few months back and set it up.  The instructions say that she should be six months old before she'll fit, but she's so darn big that I thought I would try it out.  She does look pretty small in it (especially because we see this particular stroller EVERYWHERE, usually with toddlers in it), but we got her strapped in well enough that we were racing around the house.  This stroller is so popular because it's extremely light weight and has great maneuverability (did I spell that right?).  We were "poppin' wheelies" all over the house and she had a great time.  :)  Perhaps we'll take it out on a quick trip to the coffee shop to see how she likes it.

 

I've also included a picture of her with her favorite froggy.  This little guy is constantly in her mouth.  Right before these pictures were taken, she was sucking on his back leg as if it was a pacifier.  Our little girl likes frog's legs!

Today was Sophie's first day at the pool.  She tolerated it, but I wouldn't say that she really "enjoyed" it.  That's mostly because of the circumstances... no morning nap and arriving at her lunch time.  Initially, she wouldn't eat with all those crazy, screaming pool kiddies running around, so we put on her swim diaper, her bathing suit, some SPF 50 sunscreen, and got her in the water.  The water in the really shallow kiddie-pool was too cold for her (ironic, no?), so we just dipped her toes in and sat on the edge for a bit.  The main pool was quite a bit warmer, so I sat in the shallow end with her (see pictures below).  There were a TON of kids in there on a warm Saturday afternoon, so there was a little too much splashing going on for our tired and hungry babe.  We eventually just found a spot in the shade so that she could eat and then she fell asleep.  After she woke up, we tried again, but she was cranky after a too-short nap, so we just called it a day.  We'll try again on a weekday and when she's more rested.  I suspect she'd be happy to splash around a bit herself if she wasn't sleepy and hungry!  At least we got some cute pictures.  Esen thinks that she looks like Elton John in the sunglasses... :)

Some of you are probably familiar enough with work visas to know that an employer sponsors an employee for a specific period of time and, after that, the visa expires.  Because UC-Davis essentially hired Esen for a one-year post-doc position, his visa expired on June 30th.  When they decided to hire him on for another year, they implicitly agreed to extend his work visa for another year.  They're doing this, but they're not doing it very quickly.  The paperwork was mailed by UC-Davis to the appropriate authorities last week and so it will be a few weeks from that point before the documents arrive in our mailbox.  We have to wait on this paperwork before we can go to Turkey, but that's not even the real kicker.  The current source of angst is the California DMV, which insisted on issuing Esen a driver's license last summer that expired when his work visa expired... June 30, 2007 (other states, like Virginia, don't have this rule).  And so here we are at day #6 of his "house arrest."  He hasn't driven since before we went to Seattle and, until today, he hadn't been out of the house since we returned from Seattle.

 

Now, I'd like to share a couple of points about this situation that I think are a tad bit humorous (though, admittedly, he probably doesn't find it quite as funny).

1.  I was looking forward to getting back to the office.  Now that he really can't come up with a good reason for *NOT* being the primary childcare provider during the day, I get to!

2.  It has been over 100 degrees every day since we got back from Seattle.  It's really better inside the confines of our 900-square-foot house anyway.  If you're going to pick a time to be stranded in the house, it might as well be when it is ungodly hot outside.

3.  He wanted to go for a run yesterday because he was starting to go so stir crazy.  It was 106 degrees.  Apparently RUNNING in 106 DEGREE WEATHER is preferable to sitting in a cool house.

4.  He's in the process of buying a new car.  Even though he pretty much has one picked out, he really can't do anything about it now.  Sort of frustrating given how long he has waited and looked.  I tried to convince him to buy one in June, but I think he quickly realized that *I* would be the only one allowed to drive for the first two weeks of July and figured he'd just wait.

 

The running talk resurfaced again today, so we went on a little field trip this afternoon to look at car seats and high chairs and such.  I've also offered to take him to the local microbrew for dinner if he promises not to try running in this heat.  I seriously think he would wind up dead of heat exhaustion before he hit J Street because of the lack of a delta breeze in Sacramento right now.  I mean, even Suzy drags us home when we try to walk her around the block.  It's tough to be a black dog in Sacramento in July.

 

So, I'm sharing this story with all of you so that you will give my sweet Turk a little sympathy.  He's dying over here and could use some words of encouragement.  :)

 

UPDATE FROM A FEW HOURS LATER:  We did, in fact, make it to the microbrewery for dinner.  After a nice appetizer and a round of brews, I took Sophia to the bathroom to change her diaper.  That was a big mistake... we both came away covered in baby poo.  Tonight's lesson:  always get Esen to change Sophia's diaper.  No seriously, the lesson is this:  if your daughter normally poops several times per day and she hasn't yet generated a poopy diaper by 7pm, don't go out to dinner without a change of clothes for everyone in your party.  Thankfully we were only about a mile from home and this is not a fancy restaurant, so walking out with poop on my shirt was not as horrible as it would have been if I had looked nicer to begin with (translation: poop looks better on a t-shirt than a blouse).  Needless to say, we got our dinner to go and the poopy babe is going into the bath as soon as I finish typing.  I guess there's also a load of laundry in my near future.  :)

Here's a little video for y'all... not exactly overly patriotic, but it is pretty cute.  Her "talking" often sounds like cat meowing to us.  Maybe that's what happens when you have Lucy and Ethel lurking around outside the windows meowing all the time.  The Jumparoo time has only gotten more violent since I shot this video... she really gets going some times.  I think it might be time to remove the pillow from beneath her feet, although that might just allow her to jump even higher!