Chickadees at the Garden

Aaron was lucky to be the parent teacher the last day that Juniper's class visited the Oakhurst Community Garden.



Juniper pretends to be a chicken, under some plants that provide shade to the birds in the chicken coop.



Anyone who knows the chickadees would say, "Of course Juniper and Sam have the watering cans..."



"...Thomas is the workman pulling his friends along for a ride..."



...and Claudia is holding a book."

We're so used to seeing Juniper in her Human Torch costume that we sometimes forget just what a sight she is. Seeing her on the swing with her jeans-wearing classmates really points out what a sideshow character our girl is. I say that with infinite affection and no small amount of pride. I love that Juniper is so completely and unselfconsciously exactly who she wants to be.

She eats!

(Click on the vimeo logo to watch a better quality version of the video on the vimeo website.)


This weekend we gave Hazel her second introduction to solid foods, and she was decidedly a fan. She probably ate about a tablespoon of her banana/breast milk slurry.

She had a rough day for naps, which is why she's rubbing her eyes so much. Hazel is not her older sister. At this age, Juniper would no more have eaten a tablespoon of banana than her own elbow. And if Juniper had been this tired, she would have simply fallen asleep at the table.

My Jennifer

Peep kiss!

Our friend Jennifer is one of Juniper's very favorite people. Whenever Jennifer comes over, Juniper wants to sit next to (or on) her, play with her, tell her stories, and generally be as close to her as possible. We know several people named Jennifer, and Juniper calls her "my Jennifer" when she needs to distinguish her from the other Jennifers.



Unfortunately, Jennifer usually sees Hazel in the evenings, shortly before bedtime, when Hazel is at her grumpiest and is least interested in hanging out with anyone other than Mom and Dad. There have been several occasions where Hazel looks suspiciously at Jennifer and then starts crying (or when Jennifer picks her up, and Hazel then looks stricken).



But last Sunday evening, Hazel and Jennifer had a delightful time together! Jennifer played the very fun game of tickling Hazel with her hair and was treated to the smiles and giggles that those of us who hang out with Hazel when she isn't tired take for granted. It's fun to watch Hazel just starting to learn who are the important people in her life.



No connection to Jennifer, but since this post has the Peeps kiss, it seems appropriate to include this shot of Juniper discovering the sugar at the bottom of the Peeps box.

Fat and Fatter

There are moments when we admire Hazel's copious fat...




...and then we remind ourselves what a truly fat baby looks like.

Hazel does have some nice chub and tops the percentile growth charts for her age, but she's got nothing on Violet's Michelin Man arms. For the record, here are Hazel's stats from her 6 month checkup: 20 lbs 7 oz and 27.5 inches long.

Bozo the Clown

Swing!

Apparently, there's been a lot of swinging going on in our family recently. Here's a collection of swinging pictures from three different park trips.



To our great delight, Hazel takes great delight in swinging. She reminds us of Baby Violet on the swings.



Juniper has only recently decided that she likes to go fast and high on the swings. Up until pretty recently, she liked her swinging slow and sedate. Now she wants us to push her as high as we can.



Speaking of pushing, Juniper takes a turn helping out her friend Claudia.






Octopus swing!

Not sure about the food, but I love the spoon

This weekend, Juniper helped introduce Hazel to her first solid food. Hazel clearly still has the reflex to push out anything that comes in her mouth, and I don't think that any food actually made it past her tongue. But she seemed mildly curious and entertained by the process, which we'll count as a positive first step.



She was more than mildly entertained by the spoon!

Alondra & Hazel

In case I haven't said it often enough, the girls are really, really lucky to have so many cousins nearby!

Aaron at work

Ever curious about the insanity involved in getting a halfway decent preschool class picture?

Hello, cupcake

Gramma recently came over to make spring cupcakes with Juniper. Juniper took her mixing responsibilities seriously.



She was a little messy at helping to pour the batter into the cupcake tins. (I think Gramma eventually took over on this job.)



Her favorite part of the project was decorating the cupcakes (and snicking more candy than she would normally eat in a month). Juniper is slowly learning that candy does in fact exist outside of Halloween. On a recent trip to the Yogurt Tap, her friend Thomas opened up a whole new world for her when he got candy on his frozen yogurt; she hadn't realized that there were toppings other than fruit. For the time being, however, she still accepts "Don't be silly; it's not Halloween" as a response to any request for candy.

Peek-a-Boo Kitty

(If you watch the video on the vimeo site, the quality will be much better than watching it embedded in the blog. Just click on the vimeo logo at the bottom right corner of the video above.)

According to a really interesting book we recently read, the quality of sibling relationships at six months is predictive of what the relationship will look like till one of the kids leaves the house. If that's true, we hope to be in for a pretty nice ride these next 15ish years.

This video is a few months old, but if anything, Juniper and Hazel's relationship has just gotten better. Juniper is a loving and engaged big sister, and Hazel adores her. I recently had the glorious experience of talking with two friends about their trip to Italy while Juniper and Hazel entertained each other! Juniper was being silly, and Hazel was being a great audience, and we grown-ups got at least 7 uninterrupted minutes to talk about boring grown-up things.

Legos

Those of you who know Aaron well know that he is obsessive about his hobbies. For much of his childhood, Legos were his passion, to which he devoted his free time and his allowance. Amazingly, his Lego collection survived younger siblings, multiple moves, and numerous yard sales, and is currently in several large bins in our barn. He recently pulled out a small selection of "big girl blocks" for Juniper. Those of you who know Juniper well will not be surprised to hear that she was delighted.



We often find Juniper curled up asleep with a book. For a few days after the Legos came out, they trumped books as her post-bedtime activity of choice.

Half a year

Hazel is 6 months old today!

Juniper's first school photos

Juniper's got her very first set of official school photos (with her dad as the photographer, no less). You can check out the photos here.

Queen Ellen Holds Court with the Children

Apparently we need some new space books

This afternoon, Juniper informed Aaron, "I haven't learned anything about moons in a long time." Wikipedia to the rescue. In lieu of a bedtime story, we read up on Europa.

Good morning, Juniper

Juniper's internal alarm clock is clearly set to about 7:30. On work/school mornings when we wake her up around 7:00, she whines and grumbles about how she is still sleeping and doesn't want to get up. But on weekend mornings, when Hazel's internal clock sometimes allows us to sleep in till around 8:00, we often wake to find Juniper hanging out in bed, reading and amusing herself. Hello, glorious independence!

Her book collection in this photo is pretty typical. She's reading a graphic novel about a space adventuring girl named Zita, has her encyclopedia open to the entry on spiders, and has a collection of Fantastic Four comics off to the side. Yep, that's our girl.