A little more advanced

... after a week or so days of ambling.Still a bit hesitant, but not for long...

Madeleine has made remarkable progress regarding her bipedal movement in the last week or so. This is one of the first videos we took, about 9 days ago, in which 'Pants first begins exploring this new form of forward movement.

Happy Birthday MaddiePants!

The evening began with super healthy birthday pizza!
And now for birthday cake and a party hat!

That is my favorite picture. But, enough with the evil party hat! We took it off and let her enjoy the cupcake! I dont think she ate much of it, but seemed to have fun playing with it.

The cupcake is cleaned up, so what do we do now?

Presents! Presents! Presents!
She wasn't quite sure what to think at first. But, after we got them unwrapped , she started to see the fun.






And finally, a birthday bath.

Who Needs Toys?

Last week I was getting ready for work, Paul was already out the door, and I was not exactly running late, but I was getting close. So, I am in the kitchen chopping up fruits and veggies into ridiculously small pieces for Madeleine's lunch and racking my brain for ideas of what else I can send with her to eat. Normally (i.e. most mornings I have a similar "oh crap, what is MaddyPants going to take for lunch" moment), she is in the high chair or playing with pots and pans at my feet. On this particular morning, she was in the living room happily babbling and coo-ing. I could see the top of her head, so I knew she was not near the normal danger zones--power outlets, power cords, other electronics, choking hazards, breakable items....you know, the things she likes most. At first I was just thrilled she was happy and I could continue chopping and labeling random food items with her name and the date and tossing them into her lunch bag. But after a bit my curiosity got the best of me--what was making her so happy? how dangerous is it? So I popped into the living room and this is what I found:
The box was pretty much empty by the time I found her and she was loving it. I couldn't believe how fast she could pull them out--two hands, one right after the other. It was hilarious! Sorry for the bad picture with her eyes closed, but as I said, I was getting close to running late.

Playground Videos

We have a park about a 5 minute walk from our apartment, and Madeleine has just begun to appreciate it. Needless to say, so have Sarah and I. Here she enjoys the slide and confounding dad's attempts to coax her down.

Fun with Dad

We found out Madeleine likes corn pancakes this morning. Pea also does, but that was sort of a given.

Madeleine Basketball! We enjoyed a day in Napa last week, visiting six wineries with Uncle Mark and Aunt Tukta. The corks from the wine bottles made all those hours in the carseat worth it.

CRAWLING

Finally! After months and months of the very efficient army crawl, miss M is now pulling up by herself and seems to want to walk (assisted heavily by us) everywhere. So, we started to lose hope that she would ever actually crawl. However, this evening she proved us wrong!

Happy Birthday Paul!

For Paul's 30th birthday we took a little road trip down the coast to monterey, carmel, big sur, and on the way back we stopped in santa cruz for dinner. It was a lot of fun and Madeleine made almost all the way home before she decided that she no longer wished to be in the car. Her screaming was quickly silenced by paul getting in the backseat with her and letting her lick our left over ice cream spoon. Ice cream has that effect on me too.

Monterey Bay
Flying Baby at Starbucks

Big Sur = Beautiful! we have to go back!Last but not least, Paul's birthday custard fruit pie--yum yum yum yum

Determination

Few things keep Maddie's focus as much as the dog bowls...

Madeleine the Mimick

MaddieFish

Last week Madeleine began taking swim classes, or better yet, splash-around-while-mom-holds-you classes. She loves splashing in the water! And, it is something fun and different to do with an almost 8 month old.

Anxiously awaiting to get in...

Water Baby!
Madeleine's daycare/swim buddy Lauren and her mom.

Swimming is very tiring....

How ya like me now?

SOCK MONKEY! Our very talented friend Krista made Madeleine a sock monkey...for real. She made it. How crazy is that? Madeleine loves it. Thanks Krista!

Sausalito, a hike, and other random pics

The first weekend in May we drove up to Sausalito for brunch and a stroll along the water. It is a pretty cute town, but we don't have any pictures of that. We do, however, have pictures of Madeleine and Paul at brunch!
We found a place not too far from us (Pulgas Ridge) where you can let dogs off leash. So we loaded up the baby and sweetpea, swung by starbucks, and went for a little hike. SweetPea was in heaven! Maddie was in her blue cubs outfit and looked like a little boy, so we called her Matty all day.

Just a few of the cute new outfits from Aunt Pat and Nana Jane...





Oh, and Maddie sleeping happily with her bum up in her crib! (thanks to Cindy and Jason for the blowout onesie!)