Standing Room Only

I've found that the best way to feed Cate is with her standing up. The fact is, she can't stand up on her own and so if she's standing and eating her hands are tied up holding on to something. Which means she can't grab the pureed whatever with her hands and smear it all over us.

I know all babies are messy eaters at first, but I am telling you: you have not seen a messy eater until you have seen Catherine Lee Major with some pureed spinach. It is really amazing. Imagine one quarter teaspoon in her belly and one half cup spread between her hair, my hair, the inside of her nose, the inside of my ear, her arpits, my shirt, her knees and my elbow. Feeding her standing up doesn't prevent the smearing altogether, but it does improve the ratio of food in her belly to food on us significantly.

Of course, you might be thinking what I would have thought had I not been feeding this child for just over eight months. If you don't let her feed herself, how will she learn? Seriously? Think about that for a minute.

Yeah, that's why I've decided not to worry about it.

So while standing, Cate's absolute favorite thing to eat is Ella's baby food. I started off making all Cate's food myself, but that lasted for about three weeks. Then I found Ella's. It's all natural (no preservatives, no sugar, not even water added). It comes in crazy combinations, including C's two favorites: carrots, apples and parsnips and sweet potatoes, pumpkin, apples, and blueberries. The best thing about Ella's is that it comes in packages like Capri Sun with a handy screw off top and a little nozzle. Meaning you can just squeeze the Ella's right in to the little one's mouth. When I mentioned this technique to one friend she said it had never occurred to her do do that. Clearly, she is more refined than I am. Her baby eats with a spoon. Or his fingers. So sophisticated, you'd think he's the one whose dad is a chef at a fancy pants restaurant.

But the fact is, while our Cate is on the verge of walking she still has never held her own bottle, much less fed herself. (I imagine the experts would diagnose her with "delayed self-feeding disorder") Every now and then she manages to get a piece of food into her own pie hole, but for the most part she'd really just as soon have her people do it for her.

Oh, and did I mention: she refuses to wear a bib. Ever. She can get any kind of bib off faster than Houdini could get out of a straight jacket. Velcro, snaps, t-shirt neck, whatever. She can get it off.

Which means I typically feed her standing up, straight from the nozzle on the baby food container ... whilst she wears nothing but a diaper.

What can I say? She's a classy girl.

Rookie

Tonight I made dinner for a couple we know from church who just had a baby girl. Because Sam was working and Cate and I had no other plans, I made a fairly elaborate dinner. Nothing fancy--but it required a lot of chopping and a sizable collection of pots and pans. My sous chef is still not much for slicing and dicing and as a result I typically pull the Pack n Play in to the kitchen where she hangs out while I prepare dinner.

The immobile Cate of old actually seemed to like spending a few minutes in the Pack n Play each day. The turbo-mobile Cate of today does not. Never has that been more apparent than tonight.

For better or worse, the third prong of my very sophisticated parenting strategy (see previous post about first two prongs: speak to her like she understands English and give her lots of kisses) is: Do not respond to hysteria by caving. Never has that been tested like tonight.

Cate cried her little head off for longer than I'd like to admit while I prepared dinner. In my head, I imagined myself giving her a pep talk: "I know you don't like it in there. Sometimes we have to do things we don't like to do. You have your favorite toys and I am right here. You can choose to be miserable or you can choose to manage how you feel about this hard thing. I love you." But there was no pep talk. I just continued preparing dinner.

I finished dinner. We both survived. I swear she was glaring at me for an hour. We delivered our dinner and admired the new baby and the new baby's nursery. We stopped by the store, which is basically Cate's favorite thing in life, so I think I earned some points back there. We came home. And it was time to do the dishes.

To clarify, once she's in the Pack n Play I am all about her toughing it out. But I have a brain (and a heart). When we got home, I put her down on the floor in the room adjacent to the kitchen and got to the dishes. Within about 10 seconds she and a toy she had managed to lug along were in the kitchen at my feet.

And you know what? She crawled around in there checking stuff out the whole time I was doing the dishes.

And she's still alive.

She didn't open the door of the fridge, crawl in, and close the door on herself.

She didn't climb into the dishwasher, grab a knife, and cut herself.

She didn't find some quarter-sized piece of something on the floor, put it in her mouth, and choke on it.

She didn't claw her way on to the counter top, turn on the stove, and burn herself.

She didn't open the cupboard, unscrew the Windex, and drink it.

Shocker.

What a rookie I am.

Happy Anniversary!

It's been two years!

Us, newly minted as Mr. and Mrs.

We still remember the big day like it was yesterday. Apparently our photographer didn't realize how long it's been either, because we just got our wedding album this week.

Anyway, hoorah for marriage! Hooray for love! Sam's my favorite! I'm his! (He told me.)

I wondered a long time ago (before Sam and definitely before Cate) what I would say when my future children would inevitably ask me who my favorite was. I decided on my answer long before I met Sam: "Daddy's my favorite," I would tell them. Of course, I've thought a lot about this since Miss Cate came along. I love her oodles. Feeding her and changing her and bathing her and reading to her and snuggling her and playing with her and clapping for her is an unparalleled blessing and privilege. She is the cutest thing I've ever seen.

But even now I am so aware that Sam and I have each other forever and her only for now--that some day she will grow up and she will leave us. I think of her as a future grown up, I imagine her going to kindergarten and then to junior high and off to high school and college, and I believe my friends who tell me it will happen in the blink of an eye. I get a lump in my throat and tears in my eyes when I think about it (I know, she can't even walk yet), but the fact is she will grow up, and get married, and it will all start again, as it always has. And it seems to me that there are only a few things I can really give her along the way. And one of them--the confidence and certainty and security that will come with knowing she and her future siblings are decidedly tied for my second favorite--seems like the one to think about on the occasion of our anniversary.

How, you might ask, can Sam compete with this little bundle of cuteness:

It's not easy, but he does it. Day after day after day, he does it.

For our anniversary, Cate and I went on a tour of six Houston bakeries. We picked up a few treats from each of them, brought them home, and made this display to welcome Sam home from work:

Here are some close-ups:

Let me assure you that none of these treats came close to comparing to my Sam's treats. But we ate them anyway.

Sam gave me this Norman Rockwell print I've had my eye on for a while:

Don't you think that, in another era, this is how Sam and I could have met?

I love you, Sam. You mean the world to me. And Cate, you mean at least 9 billion planets to us both.

Going Back a Few Weeks

We're in Houston safe and sound ... posts about that to come in a bit, but I thought I should go back to our little family vacation to Albuquerque on the way here.

Notice I plan to skip any discussion of the absolute nightmare of packing, cleaning, loading, and hauling our stuff out of our third floor apartment, into the on-site garage we rented, from the garage into the moving truck, and out of our moving truck into our darling home in Houston. You don't want to read about that, and blogs are only for good news, right? At least we didn't drive the truck.

Ok, so back to Albuquerque. We decided that would be a good stopping point on our journey to Houston and since we ended up cancelling our scheduled family vacation for the fall because of our move we decided to make a trip out of it.

First, a plug for hotels.com: We found a totally great 4-star boutique hotel in Albuquerque that had a real crib for Cate. Boy is the real crib a game changer! So many hotels have switched to Pack-n-Plays, but from now on the real crib is an official Major Family Requirement for travel. We should have taken a picture of it, but we didn't. Here, however, is a picture of one of the darling alcoves that dotted the lobby:

Well, shoot. That didn't work and we didn't take any photos ourselves. If you're headed to Albuquerque, check it out: www.hotelandaluz.com.

So it took about 12 hours to get to Albuquerque from Salt Lake and Cate was such a trooper in the car. She was her usual mellow self, spent a lot of time sleeping, and basically only fussed when she was hungry or needed a change. Once we got to Albuquerque we did all sorts of fun things:

The Hot Air Balloon Museum

Albuquerque is the undisputed hot air balloon capitol of the world, and being from a world capitol myself, I appreciate this. About 800,000 people go to Albuquerque each year in October to see more than 500 balloons participate in the Balloon Fiesta. I just love hot air balloons and hope we can go back some October, but for now the museum was great fun. We're faking hot air ballooning in the above photo. (Does anyone else think hot air balloons are kind of like sea horses and dragonflies--almost too whimsical and fantastic to be real?)

The Zoo
You, Reader, know that animals are really not my thing, but something about having a baby makes you feel like you should go to the zoo (NB: the Houston Zoo is free the first Tuesday of every month an in effort to be a Good Mom I've already got it on the calendar through the end of the year). Here are a few photos from the zoo, but to get the full effect you really need to imagine the 100+ degree weather and the smell. Don't forget to imagine that while you look at these:

The baby elephant is smaller than Zuri, the baby elephant at Hogle Zoo in SLC, so seeing it was a bonus. When I saw Zuri earlier this summer I sort of wished I hadn't been so lazy and had gone to see her when she was first born. It's not like elephants are born in captivity every day, ya know? Or out of captivity for that matter, I guess. Did you know elephants are pregnant for two years? Sheesh.

The Aquarium

This was attached to the zoo and we spent about 5 minutes there. Not to be an aquarium snob, but something about being from the Monterey Bay makes all other aquariums seem totally not worth the time. Half our time there was spent taking this less than mediocre photo of Miss C:

Let's be honest: could she look more ridiculous? You can tell I'm not a real blogger because real bloggers only post great pictures of their kids.

The Botanical Garden

Also attached to the zoo and the aquarium. Highlight was the butterfly exhibit, but to be honest there weren't quite enough butterflies to enchant Cate as we'd hoped (good news: there is a butterfly exhibit here in Houston that is apparently packed with 'em so we'll have another shot at butterfly induced enchantment).

Spa Day/Daddy-Daughter Date

I spent one glorious morning at the spa while Sam and Cate had a Daddy-Daughter date at the hotel. I'm pretty sure they watched X-Men or Star Trek. Meanwhile, I was being pampered at Betty's Blissful Day Spa. Perfect!

Santa Fe

We took the train to Santa Fe for a day and wandered the shops, checked out the street vendors (bedazzled portraits of Michael Jackson for $400, anyone? How about Princess Di for $550?), and ate Mexican food. The highlights of Santa Fe were the Georgia O’Keefe museum and the Chuck Jones gallery. The Chuck Jones gallery also had some cool Dr. Seuss originals. Bugs Bunny and The Cat in the Hat in the same day as that big orange poppy: what more could you want?!

From Albuquerque, it was on to Dallas for one night and then we made the final four-hour drive from Dallas to Houston. Just like that, we were here in the Bayou City! Cate started crawling the day we got here and hasn't stopped since.

Because this post is sorely lacking in photos of Cate, which I know is what you, Reader, came for, here's a video of her. I can't figure out how to flip this so that it's going the right way so if you, Reader, know how please let me know. Shockingly, Microsoft Help was no help. Anyway, here she is:

Our New Family Motto: "You Don't Have to Shovel the Heat"

Y'all heard it here first: We are moving to Houston, Texas!

Our departure date is July 28!

Here is Cate in her new Texas outfit:

Cate and I picked out this cowgirl onesie while Sam was at his audition--yes, audition--to become the Executive Pastry Chef at Mark's American Cuisine. We decided right then and there that if Sam got the job we would purchase this get up from the hotel gift shop.

After I found this job posted online we worked together to get Sam's resume, cover letter, and portfolio together. We sent it off in the middle of June and within a day the Executive Chef owner of Mark's had called Sam and offered to fly him out to audition in the kitchen. Thus began a feverish few weeks of at-home preparation. Sam practiced four plated desserts that he would make when he got there. Here are photos of two of them (these are the rough draft practice versions he made at home--they were even better for the real thing!):

First, bread pudding made with chocolate donuts. This is topped with an almond toile (uh, that might not be how you spell that) cookie and served with a pistachio macaroon and tart cherry sauce.

Next, a lemon tart served with mint granita in a meringue basket and raspberry puree. Those are Pop Rocks on the end of the lemon tart:

The other desserts were a peanut butter banana s'mores and a goat cheese Bavarian with strawberry watermelon salad, basil, and a balsamic syrup.

Getting to Houston meant that Cate took her first airplane ride. Don't you love how skeptical she looks in this photo:

But she got the hang of it pretty quickly. Here she is on the plane:

While Sam was at his audition Cate and I mostly just hung out nervously in the hotel room. At one point we took a nap together in the giant hotel bed and when we woke up I found myself thinking, "Please let it be 11:00" but it was only 10:04. Sam's audition was six hours, from 8 until 2. I put off going to the pool until about 1:15 so that we'd have something to look forward to during the nerve wracking part. Here is Cate just before we headed out:

This girl is a fish! She loves swimming lessons so much and now she really gets the hang of getting in her bathing suit. As soon as I get it out she wiggles her whole body and squeals in delight. We had a great time at the pool! (It was the 4th of July, and so of course she wore her red, white, and blue suit from Grandma!)

While we were at the pool I was checking my phone every two seconds and Sam finally called. He had been offered the job! The next day we checked out neighborhoods and found a place to live. Within a week all the details of the package had been finalized, Sam had given his notice at work, and we had started to pack.

We are sad to be leaving our friends in Salt Lake, but we are so excited for our new adventure! I can't wait for warm Christmas. I'm already thinking about how we can have an outdoor element to Cate's first birthday party in December.

On our third date, Sam told me that when his kids turned one he wanted to make them cakes bigger than they were. Thus began our love story.

Clearly, a cake bigger than she is is a possibility--Sam made this wedding cake this week and Cate and I went to check it out:

Here is a better shot of it:

Not sure if I'll get to another post before we head out, but I'll get back on the blogging once we get settled in our new home.

See y'all later.

A Family Getaway

On Memorial Day we had a fun family getaway to Park City, which was a welcome respite after a couple of crazy weeks of work for Sam. Monday evening we took Cate in the pool, then hung out in our room eating pizza and watching TV (I know it seems totally un-American, but we don't watch TV at home. A whole evening of The Food Network and trash like The Bachelorette felt like a real indulgence!) It was perfectly blissful until … the 2AM family meltdown.

Cate had taken an extraordinarily long nap Monday morning, which was no big deal until we were all up and exhausted at 2 AM. We were all a little crazy, and two out of three of us were crying. A different two out of three of us were considering packing up and going home. We ended up staying and three out of three of us slept in until almost 10. On Tuesday morning when we woke up Sam jumped out of bed and addressed Cate and me, both still in bed: “Family,” he said, “I think we’ve regrouped after a good night’s rest! Good job, Family! Now let’s go have a fun day!” And we did: Off to Utah Olympic Park for the morning (Aerial ski jumping! Luge! Bobsled! Making of the medals video!) and lunch (and dessert by Sam's former boss, Raymond) at the new Montage Resort.

Bliss indeed.

Here are my two favorites in the pool (before the family meltdown):

Here we are all together at Utah Olympic Park (after the family meltdown):

You'll have to just imagine the family meltdown part, which included (among other things) brief but wanton disobedience to the government warnings regarding modifications to Cate's Pack-n-Play.

Here is Cate enjoying her first luxury hotel experience at the Montage Tuesday afternoon:

I think she's a natural on the chaise.

She Sits!

Cate is getting bigger and more fun every day! Her personality is coming alive and she—she, who for so long wouldn’t smile outside of our house—has become the biggest ham. She will smile, laugh for, and generally charm anyone who will look her direction. It turns out she might not be so much of an introvert after all.

On more than one occasion recently Sam has gotten her laughing so hard she can’t catch her breath, and she cannot contain her laughter and giggles when she is sitting in either of our laps listening to us talk to her or each other.

She has mastered so many new things lately … the most exciting of which is … sitting up! For a few days I wasn’t sure whether what she was doing officially counted as sitting up, but on June 3 it was official. She is a sitter-upper. She has not figured out how to get herself from a sitting to lying position on her own, so much like when she gets on her tummy and refuses to roll on to her back, she simply squawks, cries, or moans until her people (that’s Sam and me) come do the hard part for her. I know, I know, if I didn’t roll her over she would eventually figure it out for herself. But honestly, who suffers during that process? All of us. And I’ve never met a grown up who squeals to be rolled over from her tummy to her back or to get from sitting to lying down. So whatever, we do it for her.

Here she is with some toys on the first day I would officially count as a sitting up independently day: