hamming it up...

and a kiss! not the greatest pictures but fun. the girls were hamming it up with each other after esther's nap today and couldn't stop giggling while they stuck their tongues out and made silly noises. it's really cool to see a fun relationship already developing between the two of them. sisters!

Esther at 9 months

esther is officially 9 months old and we honestly can't believe it! people told us it would go fast with the second baby but we didn't realize just how fast it would be. it's really crazy that in less than 3 months, she will already be 1. things started out a little rocky with some extreme fussiness but she has ended up being an incredibly easy and delightful baby! she is easy on the go and will hang out in her stroller with a toy and does the same at home with a blanket and a bunch of toys. she is happiest when she is able to watch anything and everything dottie is doing (and dottie loves it too!) and she has the most adorable little laugh that is contagious and sometimes has us all laughing together just hearing it.

9 MONTH CHECK UP
weight: 16 pounds (10th percentile)
head: 44.7 cm (75th percentile)
height: 26.5" (25th percentile)

esther is a bit of a pipsqueak! at nine months, she is still in 6 month clothing which is wild for us after having dottie who started off so big. of course, taking after her mom and dad (and big sister), she has a pretty big head in comparison to everything else.

COMMUNICATION
from birth, esther has loved babbling and talking to herself. she makes all kinds of cute (and mostly loud) noises that sound like she is really testing the waters on language. she can say "mama" very clearly and says words that sound like and we interpret to be "bye bye", "dot", "dada", and "hi". when she gets excited, she coos or screams with excitement and waves her arms and legs all over the place. she waves, claps, and just recently started pointing at things.

PHYSICAL
esther can pull herself up on her knees easily while holding onto something and just today managed to pull herself up to a standing position. she is still not crawling but manages to get from one place to another without any issues by scooting or pivoting on her bum or army crawling on her belly. very fun to watch...

FOOD
esther never took to pureed foods. in fact, it was down right painful feeding her when she started at 6 months because she just didn't want to be fed from a spoon no matter what she was given. she just closed her mouth and wouldn't allow anything in. we decided to just start giving her finger foods which totally worked and now she pretty much self feeds herself everything (except yogurt!). she loves cheese, spaghetti and meatballs, noodles, avocado, black beans, pretty much any fruit, cheerios of course ... we just cut every thing into pretty small pieces and she picks it up and pops it into her mouth. when she is done, she is done and won't eat anything more. a very stubborn and decisive girl and has been from the get go! because of self feeding herself, her pincher skills have gotten really good and she is able to pick up even the tiniest pieces of food on her tray and pop them right into her mouth.

SLEEP
she goes to sleep at around 7:30 every night, wakes at 3:45 almost to the minute to eat, then wakes for the morning at around 7:30 to 8:00. we are still okay with the 3:45 wake up right now because she is such a pipsqueak that an extra feeding is welcome! she transitioned from 3 naps a day to 2 naps a day about 2 months ago. both of her naps last about 1.5 to 2.5 hours each, just depends on the day. as i wrote before, we worked with a sleep trainer when she was about 14 weeks old and has gone down very easily since then. she eats, gets a big hug, and then is put into her crib while she is still awake. usually she babbles for about 5 minutes and then falls asleep. for the past 2 weeks or so, has preferred being put down by me at night sometimes cries for about 30 seconds when i walk out of the room. we have chalked this up to her getting a little more social and wanting to perhaps stay up and see the action! she still sleeps with her two fingers in her mouth and mainly sleeps on her side or her belly.

NICKNAMES
the only nickname that has stuck is "pants". it started with "fussypants" when she was such a fuss bucket and i dropped the "fussy" when she turned the sweet corner. (seems a little like "blanket" jackson i know...:-) we are assuming this name will not stay with her!

TEETH
still still only has 1 on the bottom!

FOUND!!!

dottie and piggy were reunited at lowe's this morning! he was found halfway under a pillow on the outdoor furniture that we sat down on to test and he hadn't moved since. we were thinking the worst after a call to lowe's this morning turned up nothing but got the best! phew...

poor piggy

today on a visit to lowe's, dottie's dear sweet piggy went missing. she went to bed with a temporary piggy this evening only on the condition that she is going to wake up and go to lowe's with her daddy at 7:00 a.m. sharp tomorrow morning. if piggy is lost forever, this is going to be a very long and sad week! he has been with her for 3 years and she honestly hasn't taken a nap or slept a night without him. piggy, if you are out there, we are coming to get you and bring you home...

4th of july

in golden gate park

for more pictures, click HERE









dottie was so pooped after the picnic that this is how she fell asleep on the couch...

the leonards

luke, laura, and leif (2) came to sf for a visit from minneapolis a couple of weeks ago and dottie is still talking about the fun she had with leif and chuck is still talking about the pain he is feeling from skateboarding with luke. we had a great time seeing them all and even got a babysitter one night while we all went out without kids to enjoy a night in the mission. sadly for some reason or another we didn't get too many great pictures.

how cute it little leif? and odis and b's new puppy walter....

the lone tooth

you can actually see it now! still no sign of a second one.

music class

for about the last 10 weeks, dottie (with esther in tow of course!) has been taking a music class after school with dottie's buddies maisie and boone. it is something all three of them grew to look forward to asking every day i dropped her off, "is it music class today?". the music studio is a block away from dottie's school so we all walked down together at the end of each thursday and they danced and sang for 45 very fun minutes. they also got to learn some kind of new instrument every week! the teachers at little music makers, irena and josh, are amazingly talented and write all of their own music and play just about every instrument know to man. we are skipping classes this summer because of busy schedules but we will for sure be back in the fall.

it was also pretty fun watching esther participate every week. the music really captivated her for the whole 45 minutes and from the beginning, she wanted to shake a tambourine, hit a drum, or just bounce to the music!

another party trick for esther...

CLAPPING!

she is so thrilled with herself that she is clapping that she honestly does it all day long. when she wakes, when she sees people she loves, when she has no toys to play with...

jack and katie's wedding

over memorial day weekend, we headed to kansas city for jack (my cousin) and katie's wedding. it was a super fun weekend... tom and ellis came from connecticut, my parents came from pittsburgh, of course we got to see my aunt marsha, claire & scott, katie & jack, and lots of family on the o'connor side who it was nice to catch up with.

esther went swimming for the first time ever and many hours were clocked in the hotel pool by ellis and dottie. we also had a fun time checking out kansas city (while the girls took much needed car naps). The wedding and other festivities were perfectly put together and we all had a great time eating, talking and of course, getting crazy on the dance floor!

i will note that time difference worked in the best way possible for us. the girls stayed up quite late while we were there but then unbelievably slept in until 10:30 every morning. chuck and i haven't felt that well rested since dottie was born. yay for hotel black out curtains and time changes!!!

to see more pictures of the wedding, click HERE

problem solved

esther isn't too interested in crawling yet and has figured out other methods of getting things we try to lure her across the room with.

first tooth!

if you look really hard (and i mean REALLY hard) on the bottom left, you can see the beginnings of esther's new tooth that popped through last friday. amazingly enough she has not fussed even one bit about it!

ella and erna

dottie is over the moon to have 2 new friends next door, ella (4) and erna (3...just 1 month older than dottie)!

san mateo county fair

all i can say is, YES!!!!, it is county fair season again.

today we headed 20 minutes south of the city to san mateo for warmer temperatures (72 instead of 62) and the san mateo county fair.

we enjoyed...
the world's biggest pig, chickens, cows, tractor rides, corn dogs, kettle corn, ice cream cones with rainbow sprinkles, cotton candy, pulled pork sandwiches, fresh lemonade, a fun house, the scrambler, roller coaster rides, fishing for frogs (and the silly mustache glasses prize we won), and of course our friends penny, jason, wyatt, malcolm, jon, kim, frannie and jane!

sadly we did not get to enoy the "zillerator" because the kids were too short!

it was a good day! so good that dottie and esther zonked out within 5 minutes of driving away from the fair.

to see more pictures, click HERE

catalog shopping

kiki and grandpa come for a visit

my parents were invited to a wedding in the napa valley in may so we were lucky to get a visit from them in san francisco before and after the wedding. the girls had a ball with them and were sad to see them go but excited that we would meet up again in kansas city for my cousin jack's wedding 2 weeks later...

to see more pictures, of their visit click HERE





longtime friends from sewickley also invited to the wedding so we had a little pre-dinner wine and cheese at our house one evening...

esther's newest trick

face drawings

as it turns out, dottie is a bit of a perfectionist. when we suggest to her drawing something, she isn't usually happy with how things turn out because they don't actually look like what she is trying to draw. she then gets frustrated and asks for a little help. lately she has been a little more daring and has started drawing faces. here are a few of her first attempts...

esther meets elle

i have been doing some serious slacking lately in keeping up with events on the blog! i have a handful of things i need to catch up with and this is one of them. at the end of april, esther and i drove up to santa rosa to see my dear childhood friend jenn festa (now giordano) and meet her new baby girl elle. elle was as darling as darling gets and esther loved meeting another new friend who's hand she could try to suck on. i can't wait to see them again sometime soon and know that elle and esther will become sweet friends as they get a little bigger.

to see fun pictures of us as kids, etc... click here and here