Mama or Papa?

Hannah is experimenting with sounds, especially consonants: Mamamamamama ...... babababababa.... and such. Dadadadada, at this point, may be too great a leap so I'm focusing on Papapapapapapa.
I'm doing my bit to see if I can't be the first one H calls by name but, let's be honest, Mama has done a little more than I to earn that distinction.

She's growing up

Life has been keeping us busy of late. When this is this case, important things like The Blawg go neglected. Let there be no mistake - this blog is here to keep our far-flung friends up to date on our daughter's progress. Without further ado, here's what she's up to these days.

She can focus, she can ponder...

and she is very close to pushing back and crawling.

She spends time at the office

She unwittingly plays with "her brother." H's blanket has some loose ends...

much to Keeper's great delight.

Everyone wins.

And after a long day, she takes a bath before bed.

Life at the 646...
not bad.

Solid Food

I know, right? Already?
Yup, Hannah turned 6 months old last Friday, and as such it's time to begin expanding th'littlun's culinary horizons. We began with bananas. I took a small chunk of b'nana- unimaginably minuscule - mooshed it up and put a barely perceptible amount of pulverized mash on her tiny spoon.  It was too much. But Daddy's a quick learner. We resized the dose and tried again. The first bite was a success. The second bite became a fashion accessory, and the third bite became a game. In the end I had to use 2 spoons so that she could play with one while I tried to feed her with the other.

Incoming bananas via disembodied hand. Hannah seems game.

The prize! Hannah meets spoon, her newest friend.

Next we tried reconstituted rice cereal. MMMMmmmm gooood! Here's how it went.

"More Bananas?"

"Oh. Rice cereal."

I once heard of a French doctor who told a new mother that the first solid food should be Roquefort cheese, "to develop the palette." Perhaps we'll try that next.

-r

No Small Triumph! . . . and other updates

She's In the Crib!!

For any of you with children, I need not tell you 

how wonderful it is to have your child - not only move into the crib - but sleep well. For the past two nights, little Hannah has slept the proverbial sleep of a baby- 8 hours each time. She woke up happy, if ravenous, each time. Daddy's fingers are crossed for continued solid sleep.

For some, it's the flowers, for others, it's the break in the weather. While these are nice, my favorite thing about spring is FRESH BASIL! Here I have three plants in an Earth Box (courtesy of Meg & Tim Campbell). These plants should see me through the season, though I'll have to get more if I hope to make pesto - sans pine nuts, of course.

 The warm weather has freed our winter baby to shed some layers. It has also allowed us to become acquainted with each point of her 75th percentile.
Look at those rolls!

 Last Sunday, the three of us took in a show. Not just any show, either. We braved the five-minute walk over to Canopy Studio and saw their production of Aerial Circus. Outstanding, as always. It was amazing enough to hold the attention our little 5.5 month old for over an hour. Who do you think was among the performers? Yeah, unicycle guy (see Lazy Sunday).

 In other news, Daddy was pleased to no end to find Hannah dressed in some racing bib shorts. She's just 10 years away from winning her first nation cyclocross championship.

As for H, she seems to have found an app niche that has not yet been filled. Get on it, Jobs!

More soon.

-r

Lazy Sunday

Daddy and daughter, muggin' for the camera

 This past Sunday was great! No agenda other than to take things as they came. Well, I say that. The first priority of the day was to watch the 109th edition of Paris-Roubaix, arguably the most important one-day bike race of the year. It's a beautiful, bone-rattling, 140 mile race that takes riders over the hardest cobbled roads in the north of France. In the end, a dark horse from one of my favorite teams took the honors (and immediately proposed marriage to his girlfriend- seriously! That's a good day!).

Man, what a feeling...

Once it was over, my patient wife and daughter and I talked about what to do with a beautiful, warm Sunday morning. Hannah suggested we get something to eat.

Giraffe- not on Mommy and Daddy's menu.

So we bundled the baby into the stroller and headed off to a nice little brunch place, Ike & Jane, just a 10 minute walk from the house in Normaltown.* Nature was putting on a show. It seems everything was blooming: dogwoods pink & white, azaleas, irises, cameleas, flox, verbena, roses, tulips, everywhere was washed with color.

This is why we put up with the summers. There's no more beautiful place on earth.

  

Our new toy. Finally, daddy can run with Little Miss.

A good day for sweet tea... and some egg & cheese biscuits.

A shot through the mesh of the stroller. One pic, two Simpson girls.

  

We ran into all kinds of people on our walk. Athens is a small town. Have you heard it said that we are all separated by 6 degrees? Well, in Athens you can narrow that down to two... simply because everybody knows this guy!

Handlebar mustache and a unicycle- yup, Athens.

The azaleas offer their swatch.

 It was then home to wind down towards nap time.

Counting toes or reading? I dunno. It's just a cute shot.

More soon.
-r

*Normaltown was originally the next stop on the rails up from Athens. It takes its name from the State Normal school there. Many of the original buildings are still there and have been under the protection of the US Navy Supply Corps for the last 57 years. They just vacated the premises last week, though, to make room for Athens' new Med School. We truly have it all now.

Away for the Weekend!

Do you see Grandfather's profile?

Not sure what brought it on- I'm just glad it happened. Jason Harwell (the husband of my wife's dear friend, with whom I have struck up a profound friendship) felt the need to clear out of town for a weekend. So Daniel, his brother, and I joined him in a jaunt up to Grandfather Mountain where his family has a place... and not just any place. The photo above was taken off the back deck!

After catching a quick bit at Taqueria del Sol (where else?) we drove up to Blowing Rock, NC in beautiful weather. By that night, though, we heard thunder approaching and saw lightning flashing. Seriously, we saw...

 Thunder Snow!

Jason called this "Snizzle." I call it SNOW, dog!

Inside the chateau

The snow held us back not at all, though. We had movies (Trading Places yes, that one and Kurusawa's Seven Samurai) and it was NCAA Final Four. If you're gonna watch basketball, those are the games to catch. Ah, Butler.....sigh... We had plenty of popcorn and brownies to make it through. 

We also did some hiking and some "driveway" maintenance. The road washes out pretty seriously. I couldn't help but think of the CCC workers who built the Blue Ridge Parkway. Sure, roadwork isn't much fun but if you got to see this every time you looked up? Good work if you can get it. Jason tells me that the BRP construction crews, North and South, joined not far from le chateau.
 

Outside the chateau.

On the Blue Ridge Pkwy, 20 yards from le chateau.

 The main goal of the weekend was to decompress. No internet, no rules. Just three fathers without their email. The conversation flowed nicely.
Since all the snow melted by midday Saturday, we were able to make a dream come true on Sunday.

A dream comes to fruition- the boys sip morning coffee on the porch.

Thanks, Harwells (and Dalelios). It was a great weekend.
-r

Yup, she's cute.

Some new pics for y'all.

Mommy and Hannah, enjoying eachother's company*

Straight chillin' with a bunny luvvy and a ladybug footy.

It has been said that she looks like either Sarah or myself at different times? What do you think?

 

 

*Here, I continue my quiet revolution to make "eachother" one, not two separate, words. Feel free to join in.
-r