Lois goes swimming!

Yesterday we took Lois to her first swim lesson. We missed the first two weeks after Lois was sick and then we were out of town. But Lois caught up just fine and had a blast. Some videos below:

 

 

Lois is taking a few steps

I'm not sure it's fair to call it full on walking, but Lois took her first unassisted steps on Sunday, March 16. And she's repeated the feat a few times since. We capture a hint of it in this video (which is also full of our regular color commentary on Lois's daily activities):

Catching Up On Lois!

Time just raced by us for a while. Here are some new updates!

Lois is now ten and a half months old. She was crawling but now she seems over crawling. She is desperately trying to walk. She can cruise along holding furniture. And yesterday she pulled off this impressive feat:

Lois is also a great eater. She will try just about anything, even though she doesn't always like it. (Not a huge fan of green olives.) Her favorite foods are string cheese, avocado, and anything in the berry family. Her constant demand? That she feed herself! She does not tolerate mom or dad trying to feed her with a spoon. No way.

Lois is quite a curious kiddo. She loves grabbing new things and then flipping them over and over and over and over in her hands. Everything gets a full inspection. She is getting more patient with books. She started off just trying to eat books. Then she loved flipping pages. But now she likes exploring the pages a bit more. She especially loves books with things you can touch on each page.

Lois knows peek-a-boo. If she's holding something big enough and you ask her to do peek-a-boo, she'll hide her face behind the object and then drop the object really fast and then laugh as soon as you say peek-a-boo. She loves it when her stuffed animals play peek-a-boo behind the couch cushions too.

Lois loves music. She had a maraca she basically shook to death after her hours and hours on end of continuous shaking. Now she has a couple new maracas/shaking toys. She loves shaking them along to music, and loves it even more if you shake along with your own instrument. She also has some adorable dance moves if she's in the right mood.

We can't believe we're just weeks away from Lois turning one year old!!

Holidays galore

The holiday season has come and gone in a flash, and we're very behind with our updates. It seems like Lois is changing every day. She remains adorable:

Thank you Aunt Kyle for the new hat!

Lois started crawling on Saturday, December 28, after some valiant efforts during the week of Christmas while we visited relatives. Her ultimate inspiration was a toy truck. It took a while to get a video, but this is one of her early successes.

Lois also ended 2013 with four teeth (that we know of). She's had her bottom two for a little while, but two top teeth popped out the last week of December. Thankfully without too much trauma.

Over Christmas, Lois got to meet her two oldest cousins. So now she has officially met all her cousins. Here is Lois with cousins Daniel and Lauren. They were very sweet to her:

 

 

 

Lois has had a bunch of visitors. Aunt Roxanna and Uncle Pavlos stopped by:

 

Cousin Leo was here for Thanksgiving:

 

 

Grandpa Pete was here just after Thanksgiving:

Uncle Mark came through Chicago in December:

 

 

So all in all, 2013 ended on a fantastic note. We'll post a couple more pics from New Year's soon. But here are a few last 2013 shots we love!

Ready for Thanksgiving with Dad:

Music class with Mom:



 

Snuggliness:



 

And lest you think it's all about Lois, here's a video of Rob and Taber's holiday tradition:

 

 

 

Happy 2014!

Karate chops of happiness

When Lois is happy, she will raise one or both arms in the air and bring them swiftly down to her sides in a karate-like chop. It's a karate chop of happiness that always means "More of that!"

This is not to be confused with the karate chop that says "I make my own decision!" or "I'll do it myself!" Sometimes Lois is hungry but she wants to put that bottle in her mouth by herself, so she will karate chop that bottle away from her mouth if you try to do it for her.

Here are a few recent pictures. I'll try to upload a karate chop of happiness video soon.

 

Perfect Lois grin.

 

 

Lois loves her new stackable cups.

 

 

Lois thinks her feet are amazing. She's constantly grabbing them.

 

 

I hear selfies are all the rage. So here's a family selfie. The black fur in the front is Dunkel.

 

Lois is figuring out how to turn pages in books. And then she shoves the pages into her mouth.

Little Miss Lois

On Friday morning, I noticed a tiny little tooth in Lois's mouth. No more toothless grins. Our little girl is teething, but so far hasn't been anything but her normal, happy self. Fingers crossed that the rest of her teeth come in so easily!

Here's quick shot of Little Miss Lois from this weekend. She's wearing a gray sweater and black pants -- definitely her mom's daughter.

A night out for the adults

This fall marks the 20th anniversary of my law firm. So Rob and I had a fancy night out at the firm party. Just because we're parents doesn't mean we can't still get a little posh every now and then!

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween! The strawberry was just a pre-Halloween outfit. Lois was officially a pea in the pod in celebration of her Pez heritage. Dunkel also joined in on the fun.

Oh, the cuteness!

Lois is eating multiple solid food meals a day now with some interesting preferences. She loves sweet potatoes, squash, and green beans. She likes bananas and sometimes pears. She does not like peas or carrots. And she hates PEACHES. What??? Who doesn't like peaches? Doesn't she realize that Grandma's peach cobbler might be one of the greatest dishes on the planet? Such a strange girl.

Despite not loving fruit, the first of Lois's two Halloween costumes is a strawberry. Lois also had her first day of "school" recently -- a Wiggleworms class just a couple blocks away. So here are some pictures of a costumed Lois and Lois enjoying class.

Lois is six months old!

Lois is a couple days past half a year old!! Lois's six month birthday was Tuesday, the 22nd. And yesterday, Lois had her six month check up. She's still rockin' the pudge at 92nd percentile for weight. She's 93rd percentile for head size. And she's dropped a wee bit down to 72nd percentile for height. The doctor said that "at her size" she should be sleeping for 10-12 hours straight at night. I laughed. But last night she did sleep almost nine hours... waking up at 4am. Fortunately, she went back down for a couple more hours after eating.

So here are a few recent pics of our little bajoe in all her chubby glory.

 

 

Lois loves eating her feet.

 

 

Lois resembling some of her Pezold cousins!

 

 

Lois cruising in our 'hood.

 

As season ticketholders, we got to get our picture taken with the Stanley Cup. It took a few seconds for Lois to notice the big shiny thing in our midst. But once she did, she was impressed!

 

Oh, and please take a moment to admire my new sneakers -- the same sneakers Wendy Davis wears while filibustering! 

 

Cruisin'

Lois is out enjoying a gorgeous fall day and sitting up in her stroller.

Lois and Dunkel

From this morning.

Lois: What is this black furry thing sitting next to me?

Dunkel: What is this pudgy round thing pulling my hair?

Lois discovers swinging

Lois is on the move, so to speak. She is rolling over onto her belly and (sometimes) rolling back over onto her back. This is giving me anxiety when we put her down to sleep because she rolls onto her stomach quickly and falls asleep. Meanwhile every doctor/article/person-in-the-know says NEVER LET YOUR BABY SLEEP ON THEIR STOMACH. Of course the asterisk to that is that once your baby rolls over, you have to give up on NEVER LETTING YOUR BABY SLEEP ON THEIR STOMACH, and every doctor/article/person-in-the-know says it's probably now fine even though no one can explain why it's now probably fine while previously it was the worst thing in the world.

I suppose this is just the path we're stuck on now... permanent anxiety!

Anyway. We don't spend all our waking minutes worrying. In addition to rolling over, Lois has also discovered swinging... and there's pretty much nothing cuter than these pictures:

She was also rockin' a little scar on her forward. Kindof like Harry Potter if, instead of an evil wizard trying to smite him, Harry Potter had instead just scratched his own foreheard with his fingernails.

Some overdue updates

I went back to work on August 19, but I haven't posted for a while longer than that. So I can't even just blame my lack of posting on the whole work-life balance thing. Ah well. Some updates:

Lois is more than 4 months old! She smiles and laughs all the time, especially when she's with Rob. She can sit up on her own most of the time... until she falls over. She rolled over onto her belly for the first time a couple days ago. She started eating (very watered down) oatmeal a couple weeks ago. And even though she's still waking up twice a night, she's sleeping in longer stretches.

So all in all, she's doing great.

Now for what you really care about -- new pictures!

Yes, she's a little chubster. This picture is called, "Hey Dad. Mom said, 'you're it,' and then left me here."

 

 

After a round of oatmeal. Still skeptical.

 

 

At my cousin Erin's wedding! Lois is wearing the finest dress money can buy... from Target.

 

 

Holding hands. Have I posted this before? I dunno, but I love this.

Blog-apalooza!

Three posts in one day, surely we jest??

Well, Ali to the rescue. She just sent me her pictures from our NH weekend -- the annual Penn Law Wives Club gathering. So here are a few cute ones, including one with all four kids together! Hurrah!

PS

Lots of pictures in the post below. But since some of you asked, I'll also say that yes, I had a great birthday on Sunday. Lois slept reasonably well on my birthday eve. Then my sister Resa babysat for Lois while Rob and I went out to dinner. Highly recommend Bavette's in Chicago. Delicious!

Yep. A little extra sleep and some yummy food. That, my friends, is what we call an AMAZING birthday when you have a three-month-old.

Oh, and I continue to miss marking L's milestones on this blog. Lois turned officially three month's old yesterday, July 22. Woot!

Hello again!

We've had a busy couple weeks! But if Princess Kate can get herself together just 24 hours after having a baby, I suppose I can get myself together to do a blog post, right? (As an aside, seriously Kate, is there no end to making the rest of the world look terrible? I didn't even shower for two days after having Lois and I definitely have never held my baby while walking in heels. You are such an enigma to me. But I digress....)

After the 4th of July, we went to NH to visit with Ali, Eddie & Naomi, and Sophia, Fritz, Abe & Ray. Given all the little ones, we obviously didn't take any group pictures. Damn! But we did get some cute pics of Lois:

Lois taking a nap amidst the craziness.

 

Lois giving Dad some smiles.

Lois and Dad at the lake. (Check out her teensy feet!)

We came back to a house full of visitors, including Great Grandma Lois:

So glad Lois and Lois finally got to meet each other!

 

Meanwhile, Lois is getting bigger and cuter every day:

Look people, I can almost sit up on my own... if I'm leaning against pillows.

Cheeks make a great pillow for napping.

One of Lois's many, many looks of skepticism.