First day of school

Monday was Lily's first day of daycare, or school, as we are referring to it. Lily goes to a Little Red School House nearby, which is very convenient. I am not sure how excited any of us were to the idea of leaving her with people, who as of yesterday, will still sort of strangers. Carrie and I had done our due diligence and visited them on open house days, as well as unannounced. We toured the facilities, and spoke to parents of kids who go there, and everyone has been happy.

The night before we went through a familiar process of packing up everything she would need for her first day. Carrie had already dropped some of the bigger stuff (diapers, wipies, mobile) off at the location in the last two weeks. This was just her daily needs (blankets, backup clothes, binks, etc.). We also tried to pick out some clothes that made her look cute, but not too cute, for her first day.

Carrie and I went together to drop her off and meet the people one more time. When we got there other parents were dropping their kids off as well, and very clearly had a routine they would follow. The three of us tried to blend in and follow the others a little so as not to look like newbies.

Lily handled the day pretty well, seemed to play well with the teachers assigned to her room.

Now, towards the middle of the afternoon, she had some GI activity (we refer to that as working on some pants). Apparently it was a big deal and required a change of wardrobe. Now unless Lily has taken on the defense mechanisms of a sea cucumber (by jettisoning her inside bits), I am going to chalk this one up eating a lot the day before. So far, we can call the whole experience a success. Now, for day two!

In other news, I put a poll on blog to the right. I stole the idea from a friends blog, and something snapped the other day when Carrie and I saw a commercial for Frisch's. I thought that it would make a good survey question. Does Lily look more like her parents or the Frisch's Big Boy? ( I really mean that in the best possible way, big cheeks, big eyes, poofy hair...).

I have also posted some new pics here.

Well, isn't that a new sensation !?!

Whenever Lily picks up a new skill, be it spit bubbles or rolling over from back to front, I find myself amazed at her problem solving skills. Not just her's, of course, but babies in generally (really, mostly her's). I am not sure about the the rest of humanity, but when I think to myself, I do it in English, with words, that have meaning. I would assume that the rest of humanity does the same, except in their own native tongues.

But, babies don't have tongues. I mean they have tongues, but not mental tongues...linguistic tongues. When they encounter a problem, such as a backwards facing pacifier, how do they problem solve? How do they itemize their steps? Or when a family member is singing the somewhat graphic words of Rocky Racoon, how do they decide that they like it? (BTW, 5 points awarded to whoever can name provide the name of the girl of his fancy.).

This question reminds me of a very specific piece of text from Douglas Adams Hitchikers Guide to the Galaxy. I've pasted the substance of the passage below, but in order for it to make sense you'll need a little background.

-WARNING-this is some really nerdy stuff!

Basically, a spaceship was being targeted by 2 missiles. This spaceship was, however equipped with an "improbability drive", which, when activated, put the ship into the most improbable situation, basically as an escape mechanism. In the story, the drive was activated and the missiles turned into a bowl of petunias, and a sperm whale. Enjoy! (For those of you who really want to wear their geek-pants today, I highly recommend this description.)

Another thing that got forgotten was the fact that against all probability a sperm whale had suddenly been called into existence several miles above the surface of an alien planet.

And since this is not a naturally tenable position for a whale, this poor innocent creature had very little time to come to terms with its identity as a whale before it then had to come to terms with not being a whale any more.

This is a complete record of its thoughts from the moment it began its life till the moment it ended it.

Ah ... ! What's happening? it thought.

Er, excuse me, who am I?

Hello?

Why am I here? What's my purpose in life?

What do I mean by who am I?

Calm down, get a grip now ... oh! this is an interesting sensation, what is it? It's a sort of ... yawning, tingling sensation in my ... my ... well I suppose I'd better start finding names for things if I want to make any headway in what for the sake of what I shall call an argument I shall call the world, so let's call it my stomach.

Good. Ooooh, it's getting quite strong. And hey, what's about this whistling roaring sound going past what I'm suddenly going to call my head? Perhaps I can call that ... wind! Is that a good name? It'll do ... perhaps I can find a better name for it later when I've found out what it's for. It must be something very important because there certainly seems to be a hell of a lot of it. Hey! What's this thing? This ... let's call it a tail — yeah, tail. Hey! I can can really thrash it about pretty good can't I? Wow! Wow! That feels great! Doesn't seem to achieve very much but I'll probably find out what it's for later on. Now - have I built up any coherent picture of things yet?

No.

Never mind, hey, this is really exciting, so much to find out about, so much to look forward to, I'm quite dizzy with anticipation ...

Or is it the wind?

There really is a lot of that now isn't it?

And wow! Hey! What's this thing suddenly coming towards me very fast? Very very fast. So big and flat and round, it needs a big wide sounding name like ... ow ... ound ... round ... ground! That's it! That's a good name — ground!

I wonder if it will be friends with me?

And the rest, after a sudden wet thud, was silence.

Curiously enough, the only thing that went through the mind of the bowl of petunias as it fell was Oh no, not again. Many people have speculated that if we knew exactly why the bowl of petunias had thought that we would know a lot more about the nature of the universe than we do now.

I wonder if this is the sort of thing that goes through Lily's head when I start immitating a howler monkey for her, or she puts a new toy in her mouth, or a new food for that matter? Without the benefit of language to help her comprehend the world around her, she just reacts viscerally, with pure feeling, to every experience, old and new. I guess, I am trying to say that my daughter is a raging ball of uncontrolled emotion...but in a good way.

Here are some new pics, as well as some good new video.

I DRINK YOUR MILKSHAKE!

I previously wrote about an ill-fated trip to Sonic on a trip back from Louisville. For those of you who are not aware, Sonic has created quite possibly the greatest milkshake known to man. Although I would never admit it, one of the highlights of each trip to Louisville is the opportunity to hit up the Sonic in Oldham County along the way. I say this because I was lead to believe that the only Sonic in town was on the North Side of Cincinnati, and thus amazingly inconvenient, turning a freeway-Sonic into a bigger deal than it should be. A few weeks ago, my sister-in-law pointed out that there was, in fact, a closer Sonic just 9 miles away. I was able to convince the family that this was a good trip one night. And there was much rejoicing.

As we were coming in to the house that night, I had my arms full of milkshakes and Lily (in her carseat) and was fumbling to get the keys into the door. I hastily sat my milkshake in the seat with Lily, gained entrance, set the Lily-Milkshake seat down, and looked for a light switch, as it was quite dark in the house. When the lights came on, I saw Lily with a death-grip on my straw desperately looking for whatever was inside, as you can see.

I don't think she actually got anything. To date, she has only had breastmilk and formula. My feeling is that if she did manage to suck any out, the bottle feedings would stop, and we'd be making more frequent runs to the local Sonic, to pacify a milkshake obsessed baby.

In other news, I think this serves as documentation that Lily has discovered her voice...and it's many powers....baby powers. Maybe this is how she asks for milkshakes?




Note: she really isn't upset in this video...she screaming cause it's fun.

Coming full circle

Lily has just turned Five months, which means a LOT of changes in the recent weeks. Besides the normal behavioral advancements, we've also started putting her on a big girl path by letting her sleep in her own bed, in her own room, away from us. I think she was happy for the change, because her her new digs came with her own entertainment (mobile and light projector courtesy of Grandma Robin). Plus she has a ton more room to wiggle/rotate/roll around in.

We've also started to go through her clothes and box-up things that are too small, things that 5 months ago we never thought she'd be able to wear. We've even been able to put together a few "Before and After" shots. I guess this is what you call growth?!


She's not just getting bigger on the outside, though. One of my favorite things is watching her try to mimic us. Of course this forces me to do ridiculous things just to see if she'll do it. Perhaps I am testing not only her mental development, but also her better judgement. We started with a simple popping noise, like when you pucker your lips. it took about a week or so, but she got the hang of it, and at bath time started to look like a goldfish, constantly articulating her lips. Below is some video of the goldfish in action.

Nowadays we are working on tongue wiggling and spit bubbles mostly.