Baby Play

Daddies do love to play with their babies!

Pointer

I think the photo says it all.

Mom and Babe

I do love my baby!

Cloisters

Central Park Zoo

We had quite the little adventure at the zoo. Here are our family zoo vacation photos!

Central Park Carousel

My grandmother loves carousel animals. In fact, the house I grew up on has at least 5 of them. I have a natural love for them, and I always jump on a carousel when given an opportunity.

While we were strolling through central park, we happened upon a carousel. Though I did not know about the carousel, I quickly fell in love with it considering that it is the #1 in the US. Here is some information about it from the website. http://www.centralparkcarousel.com/

"A carousel had been in operation at Central Park since 1871. The original carousel was powered by a blind horse and mule. The current carousel was manufactured by the Stein & Goldstien Company of Brookyln, for a trolley terminal outside Coney Island.

The carousel was moved to its present location when a fire destroyed the previous one in the in the fall of 1950. This carousel features the largest hand carved figures ever constructed.

The outside horses are 3/4 the size of an actual horse, A Ruth Sohn band organ playing Wurlitzer 150 music roUs provides the music and is original to the carousel. To this day the carousel and its figures are hand painted."

We got to ride it, and here is my proof.

Daphne and George

George, though not related at all, seems to be a grandpa. In fact, while we were there, we kept getting comments about how much they looked alike from strangers that didn't know that they were not related. Truth be told, they get along famously.

George and Daphne went to look at the ducks while mama was betting on the horses (and winning).

Patti Girl

While I was visiting in New York in December, one of George's friends gave Daphne a doll to play with. Though she was interested in it at the time, I left it there for lack of suit case room. When we went back, she managed to find it, and Patti became her best friend. We named the doll Patti after the lady that gave the doll to Daphne.

This is Daphne and George playing with Patti in her stroller.

Chicken Watcher

Did I mention that Daphne likes to sit and watch the chickens?

Big Baby

One of the benefits to having a bigger baby is that she can now play out on big kid toys. On this day, she loved the slide, and we had to take turns letting her go down it for at least an hour. What fun!

No Diaper

I am big on letting the baby run around with no diaper on. When we were visiting in California, I had taken her diaper off for some reason, and for whatever reason, I had a pair of underwear to put on her. They were a little big, and she had some problems getting around with them.

What a cute butt!

Grandpas are Good to Play With

Isn't is good to have a grandpa to play with?

Shoe Bronzing

In recent conversation, someone mentioned to me that it would be a cool idea to have Daphne's shoes bronzed. I really, really like the idea, and I have chosen the shoes, we are going to bronze the roobies that are in this photos.

We got them second hand, and now that Daphne has used them to the point of growing out of them, they have holes in the toes. We are going to bronze them up. I think it would be a lot of fun. I actually plan to do it myself, I think it could be a really fun project to do one day. Until then, the shoes are sitting on my desk.

These are one of my favorite pairs of shoes, so it is only fair that we would immortalize them.

Sippy Cups

Though I am not a huge fan of sippy cups, we do own a few, and Daphne knows how to use them. It is a good way to give a kid something to drink and let them drink it at will. We filled this cup up with apple juice and let her suck away at it. She had never had apple juice before, and she just could not stop drinking it. It was pretty funny to watch.

On the Floor

I really like when Daphne lays on the floor and just sits there and plays. She kicks her feet and smiles. It is a rare thing, but it makes me stop and smile every time, and I can never resist kneeling down and playing with her!

Daphne and Papa Bob

This photo doesn't show how cute this actually was, but Daphne was standing there talking to and looking at Papa Bob. It was like the two generations admiring each other. What a precious moment.

Do We Look Alike?

People always tell me that we look just alike. I tend to disagree mostly, except for the cheeks. Look at those cheeks. Between the two of us, we could supply our whole town with cheeks and there would be some to spare.

Cute When She Sleeps

Occassionally, Daphne will fall asleep on my lap while I am working. I think she looks like a little angel, and I like to have her sleep on me when she does.

Playing With the Car Seat

We have Daphne's infant car seat in the closet, and for whatever reason, when she spots it, she points to it and intensely wants to play with it. I have left it down, now, at times after we use it so that she can play with it, but I have got to keep the closet doors closed or we have a problem on her hand.

This is Daphne trying to convince her daddy to not put her to bed, but to let her play with her car seat instead.

Working With Daddy

One of Daphne's favorite activities is to sit with her daddy and pound on the keyboard at his desk. We both have special software on our computer that makes sounds and noise when you let the baby pound on it now because she loves it so much.

Doesn't her daddy look so happy to have her with him?

The Three Munchkins

When Julie's kids come over, they really like to play around with our animals.

You can look out at the chickens if you stick your head out the window of the living room. Daphne loves to stand on the window sill and gaze out. She got Julie's kids to be curious about the animals, and I caught this candid shot just in time. It is one of my favorite photos for sure.

Pepper Mess

This is what happens when you leave a baby at the table with the pepper shaker for too long.

In Daddy's Ergo

Occassionally, the baby can be found in the Ergo on her daddy's back. Here is one such instance.

Playing Around

As a photographer, I have the time and the knowhow to edit photos to make them really cute. In fact, the reason I put photos up in spurts is because I save them all on my camera and then I process them all at once. It helps me be creative and see what kind of cute photos that I do have.

When I do edit them, I really enjoy making some of them old-school sepia. Something about it really grabs my attention, and I really like them. These are some simple photos of Daphne playing around that I really like high-key sepia. Wouldn't you agree?

And Now She Climbs

The baby exploring stages go from crawling to walking to climbing. Though the first two are very obvious to a parent, there is no definitive "she is now climbing" action. They do a little here and a little there until you suddenly realize that you can't keep the baby off your desk (more on that later). This particular photos is a photo of Daphne climbing on our kneeling chair. It is usually parked under Jared's desk along one side, and she climbs up onto it and just lays there. It truly is adorable.

So, in case I have not announced it yet, we have a climber!

And Then There Was Cute

These photos were taken the same day as "The Fit" photos.

Once she calms down from a fit and starts to play around, she is back to her cute and adorable self. I like these particular photos because they are a series one after the other of things that she does that are totally adorable. She does like to do cute things just when I push the shutter button.

The Fit

I almost always take cute photos of Daphne. This particular day, she was throwing a fit while I was trying to take photos, and rather than stop, I documented the fit. Not all babies are happy all the time.

We have had a particularly bad month because Daphne is getting 6 teeth at the same time, and it makes her miserable off and on. Often, she is inconsolable. Though this series is kind of sad, it documents the fits she throws sometimes.

Dirty Feet

Daphne is always outside with me doing something. She likes to have her shoes on sometimes and at other times she likes to have them off. It is difficult to guess which is which. On this particular day, she hated having her shoes on, and she kept taking them off throwing them around. After we spent some time outside, I realized that she had actually gotten grass stains on her feet. What a dirty little baby!

Early Birthday Party

These are some photos that were taken at the surprise birthday party that Jared threw for me back in April (months before my actual birthday). We look so happy in the first photo! I did truly have a good time.

The second photo has the home-made strawberry shortcake in it. Jared's mom made everything from scratch, and it was so incredibly good. I love strawberry shortcake on my birthday.

New Baby--Baby Noah

I disappeared for a while there at the end of May as I was trying to wrap things up for school before heading off to New York for a week!

In the hub bub, I became an aunt!

My sister, Melissa gave birth to a healthy baby boy.

Noah Ward was born on memorial day. He is happy and healthy and I am heading over to visit them on Wednesday! I can't wait!

More Golfing

Jared, Daphne and I headed out to the driving range here in Mcminnville to brush up on our golf game.

It only cost $3 for a bucket of balls, and it was so much fun. We hit just enough balls to get some practice but not too many to get frustrated. I still need more practice, but it is actually becoming a lot of fun!

Goat Show

Scott had told me about a goat show that was happening on the 7th that he wanted to know if I wanted to go to. I had been planning to go and enter my goat in it, but it became clear that after getting stuck in San Diego one day longer than we expected that it was just going to be an awful lot of extra work to try to fit everything in. I decided not to take her, but Scott and I decided to go and watch.

It was a lot of fun to see the different breeds of goats. I fell in love with the Nigerian Dwarf goats. They are amazingly wonderful animals, and if I had a ton of land I would consider having a herd of them over other standard size goats.

After seeing how it is all done, I am planning to take my goat to the county fair in July here in Yamhill County. You will be hearing more about this soon!

Happy Birthday to ME!

I turn 24 today! Happy Birthday to me!

It wasn't the best birthday ever. We got stuck in the airport and then Daphne was a little cranky about being home and returned to her normal routine. Birthdays past 21 don't make much difference anyway, but I am a sprightly 24!

Big Day in the City

Jared, Daphne and I all decided to take off into the big city for another adventure.

We hopped onto the morning commuter ferry that goes from Rockaway straight to Wall St. in Manhattan. Daphne likes boats and water, but the day was really rainy, so we did not get to see as much on the way in as we would have liked to. Daphne was more interested in eating the bagel sandwich I had gotten for breakfast.

When we got into the pier, we walked off with the rest of the people going to work, and we walked along Wall St. looking at all the crazy people rushing off to work grabbing their morning coffee and bagel as they went. It truly is a rat race in New York.

We got to see a lot of cool things in historic downtown Manhattan. It is hard to believe that that is the place that dutch immigrants landed when they were coming to the US for the first time. It is one of the most historic areas in America, and it felt like it.

We got to see the building that houses the Stock Exchange, and we even walked down to the building where the Merchant Exchange was.

After that, we hopped the subway up to Chelsea Market. Chelsea Market is a market in Chelsea that the Food Network has their headquarters at. There were a lot of little novelty food shops to look around in, and we had fun looking at the fish and the Thai food and the Italian food and the cooking stores and everything else that there was to look at.

We escaped with nothing bought, which was a miracle because God knows I am sucker for kitchen things.

We then hopped on the metro again and headed straight for the Museum of Natural History. We were running a little short on time, so after spending some time in the Earth Section we headed on up to the dinosaur exhibit. I didn't expect it to be as large as it was, and Daphne had a great time running around pointing at all of the different dinosaurs.

We ran back downtown in time to catch the commuter ferry home.

It was a great day, and it was incredibly exhausting. Our time in the city is over for now.

Kayaking

George and I have been talking about kayaking off and on. Every time we went out around water there were people out in their kayaks moving along. I have only ever been in a kayak one time when I was much younger, and I barely remember it.

George was telling me that there is this new type of kayak that you use foot pedals on, and it is just like riding a bike. I was excited to try it out, so we headed down to the docks and rented one.

I can honestly say that we had a blast out there. The pedals were easy to use, and the boat even had a rudder. I could get it going really fast, and I could even get it to turn in a circle with very little effort on my part.

One funny note is that we were trying to change kayaks midstream, and though I managed to stay dry, George did not, and we had a funny experience with him being stuck in the mud trying to get back into the boat!

I saw lots and lots of clams and mussels along the edges of the shore. I was eying them, but George told me the EPA would come get me if I even thought about it. How sad.

I am actually thinking about trying to find a place to kayak in Oregon. It is such a fun little sport.

Golf Game

George loves to golf, and we were talking about it recently while we were out there. He said that he would be out on the course every day if he could because practice is key, and he really enjoys playing.

I challenged him to teach me how to play. After working on my grip for a few days, we headed out to the driving range. Jared and I split 108 balls between the two of us, and we took turns playing with the baby. I tried putting her in the Ergo on my back while I was playing. It was pretty successful, but it restrained my arm, so I kept hitting balls really oddly.

I must say that I at least was able to hit the ball, which is more than I can say for my previous golfing experience. I hit quite a few of them up and straight and they went about 100 yards!

I think we will be doing more golfing in the future.

The European in Me

We got to go to the Cloisters. This was something that was recommended to me by a friend that had spent some time in New York. He said I would like it, and he was right.

The Cloisters are unique because they are parts of important European building that have been moved to the US stone by stone so that we can have a part of them. They are well cared for, and they really help to give an understanding of some of the art. A lot of the art would be disregarded in Europe, but it is important over here. I felt like I was right back in Italy and France learning about the culture, and I annoucned to Jared that we were going to move to France and make cheese. He thought we should stay here.

I loved the gardens at the Cloisters as well because they had some important Mideavel plants in them that are not so common now. We spent a lot of time running around appreciating what there was to see.

After that, it started to rain on us, so we got out of there and took a drive in Manhattan. As we headed by a beautiful Church, we ran in, and I got to take a look at a beautiful Gothic churh. I am amazed that this wonderful city has so many churches in it that were built with such great care. I am so glad we stopped because the church was an important stepping stone in my art education.

We then continued to head down to the village. I had found a cheese shop online that I wanted to go check out, so after driving for a while, we found the perfect parking spot. We jumped out and headed for the cheese.

I am intereted in cheese because of my cheese making endeavours lately, so I wanted to taste some goat cheese. I ran into the most wonderful man in the shop, and despite the fact that it was busy as heck, he sat and talked to me about cheese and gave me samples of anything I wanted. I selected some of the best ones to take home with me, but the experience of being around so many different cheeses and getting to taste and talk about them made me realize that I am so lucky to be following this path, and that this is a wonderful game for me to play. I loved the shop.

After the cheese shop, we at at John's pizza, which I am convinced has some of the best pizza in the world. It was so much fun to enjoy.

We then walked around the Village. I loved the space because it was like being in Europe. It was sleek and hip, and we enjoyed just being a part of New York. I saw so many wonderful custom shops that were European in spirit. No Walmarts around, that is for sure. I was inspired and rejuivinated.

We got lost on the way out and realized that we had parked the car next to the building that was used in Friends. That was pretty cool!

All in all, I feel really oriented to the city, and I am loving being a part of so many things that I felt like an outsider to just a few short months ago.

We got stuck in traffic on the way out, which helped us to see so much of the city without having to even move. We saw SoHo and Little Italy. We also got to see China town. They were all wonderful to look at.

Boating Day and More

We did so much today that it was really like three days.

I never thought that I would have so much fun running around being a tourist.

We got up early this morning to go out and check out what was going on down by the Boardwalk. There were quite a few people out there surfing in their wet suits. I can't believe they were out there because the water was very cold, but it was sure fun to watch them try to jump up and catch the waves.

I was forced to think of the meaning of the phrase, "Surf's Up."

After the surfing, we went to the local bagel shop to get some bagels to eat. New York bagels are the best, and it was so much fun to sit and eat the best egg bagel available with cheese, sausage and egg on it. We ate overlooking the water.

After that, we headed down to the docks and hopped on George's boat. He is the caretaker of the USS Guam, which is an old Navy boat. We fixed up a problem with the battery, and then we headed out. We got a prviate tour of New York. We saw the Statue of Liberty up close and then we headed out toward Ellis Island. We then went up the channel between New York and New Jersey. It was cool to see the financial district and to peek in on what everyone else was doing.

It was the perfect day to be out on the water, and there were lots of other people out on their sail boats looking wonderful. We saw some yachts as well.

We then headed back around the island, and I drove the boat under the Brooklyn Bridge. It is one of my favorite sites in the world, and it was such an honor to get such a close moment with it.

We continued our tour heading back to the docks in Brooklyn.

All this was before lunch. After sitting down to a New York sandwich with a cannoli for dessert, we headed out to Rockaway for a walk. We met up with some of Georges friends before we took a mile walk down the beach collecting shells we liked while throwing the duds into the ocean like boomerangs.

It was such a plesant and memorable day, and I feel like I am starting to really get to know the city well.

A Day in Manhattan

Jared, Daphne and I headed in to Manhattan for the day to have an adventure.

We went in on the bus with all the commuters, and we were stuck in traffic. Apparently, a crane fell over in the city, and we got stuck right behind it. It is all over the news.

When we got in the city, we went to visit some friends that work at our church. We have not seen them in ages, and it was so much fun to introduce them to Daphne and to see the lives that they have built for themselves.

After that, we headed out and found a deli to get food at. We made a trek across the city to central park where the plan was to sit and eat some lunch. Daphne got a huge kick out of the park because she was able to run around wherever she wanted to, and she came back to us to get food.

We decided to let her have the day she wanted, so we took several hours walking with her in the park.

We happened upon the Carousel in Central Park, and true to my grandmother, we stopped to get on. All of the horses are orginonal carved art, and the carousel is supposed to be one of the best in the country. Daphne and I got our tickets to go on, and Jared spent the whole ride getting photos of us riding around. Daphne did not love it so much, but we did have a good time going up and down!

After we walked some more, we ran into the zoo, so we decided to go in. We went to the children's zoo where there were goats and lambs and pigs and llamas and cows. Daphne had fun playing with them. She was used to them and very comfortable with them. We headed on over to the main part of the zoo and checked out the penguins. They were so fantastic, and Daphne just loved watching them dive down and play around.

We also got to see the Polar Bears in the park. They were playing around rolling around in the water, it sure was a lot of fun to watch. The zoo was not as big as I thought it would be, but we had a lot of fun anway.

After hopping on the subway, we ended up at the Met. I wanted to get a gander at some more works of art I had missed before. We hit up the painting area where I got to see another Boticelli and some Filpo Lippi paintings. I also got to see the Vermeer, Degas, Van Gough, Manet and Monet collection. Daphne and Jared loved the Japanese art. I am so glad that I have gotten the chance to look at some more wonderful works of art. This is a hobby of mine, and I love to do it.

We headed home and got home just in time to go out to eat. We went to the best clam bar where we got steamed clam and calamari. The steamed clams are to die for, and I think I could eat them for dinner every day of the year for the rest of my life with no complaints!

I am for sure a New England girl in the sense that I LOVE sea food!

Better Than Art

We went to the Metropolitan Museum of Fine Art today in New York. As we were walking around with Daphne, one of the security guards mentioned that Daphne was more beautiful than all the art in the museum.

I tend to agree. That was one of the best compliments that a mother, especially one that loves art, could ever get.

Betting the Ponies

It has always been a lifelong dream for me to go see the race tracks where the triple crown races are run. Jesse and I headed out to see Pimlico almost a decade ago, and I realized that being in New York, we are right there where the Belmont is. The Belmont is almost always run on my birthday, and, that being next week, I was wanting to head up and see the action.

We arrived for the 1:00 post time, and we stayed for 8 races. After a slow start, I was able to start calling the races, and I won about $100 with my new betting style. Jared is convinced I should start betting online because I can pick them with a little knowledge and a little luck.

The track is so beautiful, and we were able to play with the ducks in the duck pond while I watched my last two horses win their races. It is so much fun to be in the grandstand and to be a part of such an old and wonderful ledgend.

I am so lucky that I got this chance to see the ponies and be a part of racing history.

Oh... and Daphne liked it too. She was fascinated by the horses, but she had a better resposne to the geese in the duck pond. She liked jumping up and down with me yelling for the winner of the race, and she really liked how excited I got when I won!

Worst Fear

A mother's worst fear is finding the cap to a permanent marker with the body no where in sight.

I have been searching the house for ages trying to find the damage.

Woof, Woof; Mooooooo

Daphne is very, very fond of our dog, and she cannot resist saying hello to him.

Somewhere along the line, she learned his name, and now all dogs are called "Bwaff", though she does know the word dog.

Apparently, while she was hanging out with her Grandma this weekend, Daphne learned that the dog says, "woof, woof." When Jared was telling me about it, I asked her where the "woof, woof" was, and she turned to where the dog was supposed to be, and looked greatly distressed that he was not there.

Later in the evening, we were doing a puzzle, and there was a dog in it. I asked her where the dog was, and she pointed to it and said, "Woof woof." I then showed her the cow and went, "mooooooooooo". She mimicked me perfectly.

My little girl makes animal noises. How fun is that?

Wading Pool

It has been mega hot here lately. It is hard to believe that we had the latest snow on record here in Yamhill county just a few weeks ago in April, and now we have record breaking heat 3 days in a row.

The change from heat to cold has not been gradual at all, so it has been hard on all of us, including the animals.

Daphne and I decided one of the best ways to stay cool was to get a little wading pool set up. I blew it up and put it on our back porch. It worked out really well. There was a point yesterday when our neighbors were over here sitting in it with Daphne. Jared and I were standing in it to keep our feet cool.

Daphne really likes it, but her favorite thing is to get in and out of it. Since it is an inflatable pool, when she straddles the side of the pool, a bunch of water spills out, and the reaction she has when the water leaks out is just precious.

Potty Training

I have been working back and forth with Daphne about using the toilet. Ironically, she will poop on the toilet, but she will not pee (I hear it is the opposite with most kids).

She has been running around with out a diaper on mostly because we have been outside a lot. In fact, I only have 3 diapers in my diaper pail and I haven't washed in 4 days or so.

We made a big fuss and gave her a big congratulations when she made a poop in the potty yesterday. I am hoping that she will start to tell us when she needs to go, since very often when she has to poop she just goes and stands in the bathroom to do it.

It is a little early, but the sooner the better, I say.

Bird Brain

There is a reason why calling someone a bird brain is not a complement.

You see, the birds have a little tub that I use to fill with water. Two of the chickens decided to stand on it at the same time, and it managed to flip over on top of them. They were stuck under there for hours before I managed to find them and flip it back over (this was at night).

Silly, dumb birds.

8 More Days

Only 8 more days until the chicken and duck butcher.

I think that I will appreciate it, and I also think that my neighbors will appreciate it. The ducks have taken to "talking" to the neighbors. Though it is cute, it is a little more high-key than I wanted my farming to be.

And so, they have a butchering appointment on the 25th at 9am. Things will be a little calmer and I a little more quiet without the ducks. The living conditions will be a little crowded until I butcher the next set of chickens in 2-3 more months.

Sizzle

Today was hot, Hot, HOT!

Daphne and I spend the majority of the day outside despite the fact that it make it up to 101 degrees here!

I realized that our back yard gets shade later in the day, so even though it is very hot, we are in the shade and can be outside and play without too much of a problem.

I have been working very hard in the yard trying to get it all up to snuff. Yesterday, I moved my apple tree because it turned out that I had planted it originally in the only spot in our back yard that we can fit the trampoline. Our neighbor had a trampoline they were wanting to get rid of, so they gave it to use for next to nothing. It is in great shape, and I really like them, so it will be a fun addition.

Because of the heat, we also got a little blow-up kids pool, and I put it on our back deck. Daphne and I played in it, and she really, really had a lot of fun, which was nice!

I also finished planting all of my plants except for my herbs. It was nice to be out there getting that all done (oh wait, I still have to plant some garlic). I will be producing quite a bit of food, which is nice. I already have quite a few sprouts,so it will not be long at all before I have radishes at least!

It was all hard work, and I was definitely sweating, but it was totally worth it.

Towel Cape

Daphne got a hold of a dish towel this morning and put it around her shoulders.

She was trying to convince me that she was using it as a coat so that she could go outside--at least that is what I assume. The cape stayed on her all the way outside and didn't come off until she saw some bunnies to play with.

Hairbands

Last night, Daphne and I went outside to enjoy the beautiful weather just before bed. Actually, it was way past her bedtime, but I was letting her stay up late because she generally sleeps better that way.

I was laying on our porch outside, and she was sitting on me. She wanted me to take my hair down, but I didn't know why. I almost never take it down.

It turned out that Daphne wanted to get my hair bands out of my hair so that they could go in hers.

She sat there putting the band on top of her head and waiting for it to fall down. She just doesn't understand why she doesn't have any hair.

Another Use for Thank You

Daphne is quickly learning about "thank you" and manners.

However, she did learn another use for saying, "thank you" and being cute.

When she wants something that I am holding, she points to it and says, "thank you." She does it as a preemptive way to keep me from saying no, and she assumes that she will get it anyway, so why not get the matter over with.

This worked today when she wanted the marker I was marking my garden with. A nice polite, preemptive, "thank you" got her exactly what she wanted.

School Woes

This semester is not going as well for me as I would like. I am just hoping to survive the next two weeks and be done with it!

I have two research papers to write and some other things to do as well. I am working on a project for one of my classes that is a "green" or "eco" website. It is kind of a lot of fun. I have done the majority of the work for that class at this point, so I just need to do a little coasting to the end.

For my Native American Studies class, things are not going well. I got a D on a paper, which is completely unlike me, and when I inquired with the professor, she did not get back to me for 2 weeks, and when she did, she told me that she had changed the grade to a C. There is no explanation for the reason that that grade was increased or the reason that the grade was so low.

My only hope with that class is that I get by with a C in the class so that I can walk away from it and find a class where the professor is actually interested in teaching.

In all of this chaos for school, I was not looking very far into the future, and it turns out that I have a few hurdles to jump to make it to graduation.

1.) I got a phone call from the adviser at the school that said that they had decided not to accept 20 of the credits from Greece. The school is not accredited, so they would not accept the credits.

The good news about this is that there is a petitioning process, and the even better news is that I have gone through the process with my other credits from Greece, and they were approved. That gives me a great deal of hope that I will be able to gain the 20 credits back. I just hope that it does not take a long time to do it because I only have 2 semester of school left if these credits are accepted, and I want to make sure that I am taking the right classes (if I take the wrong type of classes, I just have to do them over).

2.) PSU does not give grand money during the summer. The truth is that I have been using my grant money to go to school, and it has worked nicely. However, they do not give grant money during the summer, which means that if I want to take summer classes that I need to pay for them on my own. This is less than thrilling for me, and it means that I will most likely skip the summer to go to school because our financial situation does not allow for me to shell out 2-5 thousand dollars for a semester.

3.) With the decision to not do summer school comes the devastating realization that I will not graduate for another year from now if that is the case. I was planning to finish up Christmas of 2008, but with the summer school not happening, it is more likely going to be June of 2009. It is a devastating blow to me.

4.) And so, I again need to muster the courage to continue on in the face of adversity with school. It would be a very dumb thing indeed to quit now when I have done my senior capstone and fulfilled the requirements for the degree and now all I have to do is just match a "number of credits needed". In truth, no matter how much I don't want to finish, 24 credits away from a 180 credit degree is a really dumb place to stop. I will persevere. I was sure that I would get a college degree, and I promised myself that I would trek on, but a lot of times, I feel like I would rather be investing my time into something else. My future self will thank me, I am sure.

So my To-Do list looks kind of like this

• Don't fail my current classes
• Take the summer off
• Get 24 more credits
• Have a college diploma!
• TOUGH IT OUT
  

Facing Forward

Car seats... car seats

These are things that have to be dealt with when you have a child. We had an infant car seat that Daphne used for about 9 months, and we recently switched to using the Britax car seat she is in now.

The government regulates heavily what you do with your child in the car. Though I think it is funny that they find it necessary to keep a child in a booster seat until they are 8 years old (or even longer if they do not meet the weight limit). I DO appreciate that there is a safely tested option for my baby when she is in the car.

I seem to be obsessed with putting the car seat in the car correctly and making sure that each time Daphne gets into the car seat that the straps are all perfect. I was yelling at Jared for some half-hearted attempt to put her into the car seat because "my two most precious possessions are in the car, and if we were to wreck...." He gets it, but it is still kind of an obsessive thing for me.

The safest thing for a baby in the car is to stay rear facing. Technically, when a baby is 1 year old and weighs at least 20 pounds, they can turn around and face forward (at least in Oregon). However, the safest thing to do is to leave them rear facing as long as possible. I know moms that have done it for almost 3 years leaving their kid in the seat until there just nowhere else to put the legs of the kid.

Though I don't want to go that long, I do want to keep her rear facing as long as possible. She doesn't seem to mind.

When we were driving home from California, I decided to put her forward facing. The amount of stuff we had crammed into the car made it clear that I would not be able to sit next to her like we had done on the way down so the only way to have access to her was to face her forward. We also thought that it would be an amusing new thing for a baby we planned to cram into the car for 8 hours.

To tell you the truth, it was not as exciting as we had thought. She liked to be forward facing, but the tilt of the car seat was not quite right, so when she fell asleep, there was a lot of head flopping. I think she can see better back facing, actually.

Alas, I will turn the car seat around and try to get another year out of her facing backwards, but I suppose some time she won't be a tiny baby anymore either.

California Here We Are

We decided to take a long weekend trip to California to visit Jared's dad down there.

Jared's dad's name has officially become Papa Bob for all intents and purposes.

Jared and I have been married for almost 5 years now, and we have been together for almost 7. In all that time, we haven't done a lot of family visiting together. He has come to Burns with me 3 times total and I had never gone down to California.

He talked about taking me over and over and over again, and so we decided to head on down. It would be good to get to visit with his dad and see the sites of where he grew up.

Man O man did I get the grand tour. We went everywhere. Most importantly, we went and took some photos with a big, giant tree, which is really cool. I had always wanted to play around in a Redwood forest, and we did for a little while.

I saw the house Jared grew up in and the town he grew up in and many of the towns around as well. They even took me by the hospital he was born in!

We had an awful lot of fun, and we got to hang out with Papa Bob for a while, what a treat!

Papa

We are now calling Jared's dad "Papa Bob."

We decided to take him out to eat while we were visiting for a little birthday celebration. As we were walking away from the restaurant, I was coaxing Daphne to say, "Papa" over and over again.

She was working on it, and she eventually, just blurted out a nice little Daphne, "Papa." It was very sweet. I think that is the best birthday present that a tiny baby can give to her Papa for his birthday.