Ah man it's December!

So the wife claims I haven't posted on the blog since November and that was only pictures at that. Whatever. I think she's delirious. It's cold and she doesn't handle the cold very well and makes crazy claims. So maybe she's right on this one. (Please reference an earlier post about me not trying anymore. I blame the Internet.)

Quick hits of things Lea has done in the past month.

She's opened a child proof bottle. (A feat that I've been encouraging but has yet to be repeated.)

She's accomplished forward motion. Now she can attack from all 360 degrees.

She's still bald. My students have begun asking me if I shave her head. (I need to start telling them that indeed I do shave her head. For religious purposes.)

She just received her first dradle. I see a gambling problem in the future.

She's sitting herself up. Very ninja like though. We have not seen the act. She goes from laying to sitting in a split unseen moment. We think she maybe a mutant, or a superhero. Like the Flash. (Is "the" capitalized in the Flash?)

We are doing interblog promotion with the Castleofvandewalle blog. The paterfamilias (Kelly) of the Vandewalle clan is staying with us for a few weeks. I'm testing out to see if Lea like Kelly better. If so, then I've got a replacement in case I need to disappear for any extended period of time.

We spent Thanksgiving with Grandma and Grandpa Sand, as well as Uncle Greg, Aunt Sue, and cousins Ben, Sam, and Jake. It was good times, except for sleeping (Lea thought she needed Katy to sleep. Weird baby. I thought we should have let her sleep outside.) Unfortunately we forgot our camera battery. Instead we drew stick figure portraits of everyone there and taped it to Lea's forehead. I think this is a good way to make the memory stick. (Kate would like to point out that only half of this paragraph is true. You can decide which half you believe is fictitious)

I turned 30.

She loves playing with remotes and pop cans. She's very fond of smacking things with empty pop cans. Kids are cool.

Here is a link to a video of me trying to teach her to fist bump. Not sure if she quiet got the concept.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1fQZsld034I

Fun pictures!

Pictures

Lea discussing the philosophy of social dadadadnymics

Couple of things for tonight gang. First of all the kid is an Internet genius. Lea is a fan of the computer. Kate and I are pretty sure the laptop has become her favorite toy. I've posted past pictures of her smacking the keys to hear the noise. Well apparently Lea has had a purpose pounding on the lapper this entire time. This evening Kate was doing some intensive reading about the affairs of the world on People.com. Lea rolled over to the computer and started pounding away. When Kate returned Lea had cruised the information super highway and landed on ms.com (MS Magazine, not a magazine a movement). She was able to both use Google and click on the fifth website that popped up. Brilliant and a feminist!!! WOOT! We couldn't be prouder. (granted our little ball of political savviness is playing with a cheese stick wrapper while kicking the fire place, hey a girl needs time to unwind)

Second thing. I'm posting some links to videos I've posted on youtube. (The video format my phone uses does not work with blogspot. I'm forced to use youtube.)

Talking:

First link is the best. Talking up a storm with a fantastic serious face at the end.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HBLN3-Zrlrg

Next two are similar with the first--with the exception that my ridiculous voice ends up on the video as well. I sound dumb in real life. That makes me sad.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I-FkJ92CCGA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ry-IVB_Y0z4

Peace out

Pumpkins Pumpkins Pumpkins

Here are some more pumpkin pictures. By the way, I'd like to state that while backing up Lea's pictures I noticed that we have over 600 pictures of her. To put that into perspective, there are two baby pictures of me in existence. 600 to 2. Think about that. (And no I will not listen to a digital picture vs. film argument)

I swear we could give this kid a bail of hay and she'd be entertained for a month.

Lea ignoring her first boy. My job is done.

This is when people stop being polite and start getting real.

Lea vs. the Gourd. A struggle the likes which man has never see.

Lea in a basket. Pleased with me.

The Great Pumpkin Lea Brown

Don't you love that movie. The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown. Fantastic! My only problem was that when you expected to see the Great Pumpkin rise from the pumpkin patch, trust me I was always just as excited as Linus every time I watched that film, it turned out to be Snoopy. I always hoped that just one time, ONE TIME (I feel that caps are warranted), the real Great Pumpkin would rise out of that pumpkin patch. Alas, I feel that the late great Charles Shulz was trying to tell us something there. Not sure what. "Give up on our dreams" "DO stop believin'" I'm sure it was something important. And yes, I did watch too much TV when I was a kid.

Last weekend Kate, Lea and I join our buddies Nate, Bri and Trevin Laughlin (http://nblaughlin.blogspot.com/2010/10/great-start-sort-of-to-october.html) in visiting a pumpkin patch. It was a wonderful place to take photos. I've got lots of good ones here. Enough for another post. The pumpkin patch had all sorts of good stuff for kids, unfortunately our little ones were too little to care about the petting zoo and all the other animals.

Single best thing I saw there was a giant inflatable caterpillar. They type you'd see at a carnival, or fair. One that kids play inside. Here's the kicker, the kids exited the caterpillar by coming out the rear end. Not much funnier than seeing a kid randomly crawl out the backside of a giant caterpillar. Good times.

Lea holding my leg down. Kate trying to steal money out of my pocket.

Lea thinking about how she broke the lamp light.

More concerned with the hay than the camera.

Lea with Trevin. Working hard at being cute.

Lea laughing at kids crawling out of the caterpillar. She has my sense of humor.

Broken Lights and Shattered Diapers

Dearest Public (I mean my 11 loyal readers),

Ti's been too long for whence I last addressed thee with a new declaration. I've been meaning to post my pontifications for nary a fortnight.

Okay, that was dumb. Not sure why I try. (remember last post, I'm done trying. HA!) Lots of things to discuss--which means tonight I'll be crafting a super-post. Okay, really it's just like a normal post--TIMES TWO!!!!

We shall start our adventure of light and magic two weeks ago (I told you, a fortnight!). Crap, it was actually three weeks ago. Where does the time go. Really, someone tell me. Where was I, oh yes, three weeks ago...

Lea's daycare provider was off on her own adventure. (Disneyland/world. Something like that. Happiest place on Earth my foot...don't get me started on Disney. Okay I'm already started. Not a fan. Granted, I've never been there, but I'm assuming if I've never graced the place with my presence it must not be worth going. We'll be taking Lea to Civil War battlefield's for every vacation. What's better than a wide open field for her to play. She can use her real imagination, rather than being frightened by that scary rat...mouse and his dog. Whenever I go on these rants Kate tells me I'm dumb. I don't believe her. Neither should you.) Rather than letting Lea fend for herself at home (which was my plan--how else is she supposed learn survival skills, I mean she's eight months now. Time to take the training wheels. It's the 21st century for heaven sakes) Lea's Grandma Evans, or Su as we'll be referring to her the rest of the story, came to babysit. Su reported that the weekend went along without incident. Lea kept to her schedule while attempted to get Grandma to buy her anything and everything. Lots of fun, and it was great to have an extra set of hands around Lea for a week. Amazing how much a person can get done when it's 3 on 1 (adults to baby's).

Last week at some point Lea starting breaking things-which is as cool as it sounds. She has a fun game she plays when we her change diaper. She now rolls over and grabs stuff. It's fine when she grabs tissue, butt cream, or wipes. It's not so cool when she grabs the lamp sitting on the changing table--which is her favorite of course. Apparently, she is now strong enough to pull the lap down, which is what she did. This lead me to reach out and stop the falling lamp from crushing her, which lead to a light within the lamp to pop. Lea's reaction? A whole lotta nothin'. Kid wasn't remorseful (doesn't bode we'll for the future--there is a section I was going to type here that would compare Lea to something but this was edited out by Kate, thought I'd let you know). She also didn't thank me for saving her life. Just stared at me. Ungrateful little bald munchkin.

Okay I have another story but it'll come with the next post. Enjoy the pictures!!!!!!

Lea attempting to grab Grandma Evans' glasses.

Lea is the pretty dress given to her from her Uncle Chris and Aunt Joy. (From Hawaii. They brought us a Hawaiian pineapple. Anyone who like pineapple but has never had a Hawaiian pineapple, don't ever eat one. They ruin all other pineapples. No Joke, they are that good. Would I lie? Okay that's probably a yes, but seriously I'm telling the truth)

Grandma Evans and Lea.

Happy Munchkin.

Picture her Rollin'

I cannot remember if I've posted about this or not. Granted I can't remember much of what I've said or done since school started. Regardless, Lea is mobile now.



Not walking mobile, or crawling mobile, she's actually rolly polly mobile. She rolls. Everywhere and on everything. Her new game is rolling on her changing pad. Whole lotta fun when her diaper is off. Makes diaper changing time so much more enjoyable. Kate loves it.



She also now rolls in the crib. She's become a sneaky stomach sleeper. Pretty easy to tell when she has a red mark on her face and there's a giant drool spot on her sheet.



Now for some visual evidence. (Notice how I'm trying less on my blogging since school started. No, you didn't notice? I'm ashamed of you. Go back and read my back catalogue and return to this point. I'll wait........humm....... back? Now, see. I'm trying less. Just throwing that out there. Personally, I think the kid is just getting boring. I mean really, it's not me, it's her.)



Picture time!

Lea started in the bottom right hand corner of the picture. If you cannot find her, she's in the upper left and corner. I believe she's playing with diaper boxes. We're attempting to teacher her how to change her own diapers. We've had mixed results.

Ignore my dumb look.


Lea before the roll.

She rolls and she's into grabbing things. This kinda reminds me of the last scene in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. You know, Indy is reaching for the Holy Grail, and James Bond tells him to let it go. You don't know? Really? You apparently are spending too much time reading or getting out of the house. I suggest you starting renting more movies and spending some quality time in front of the T.V.

Round 1. FIGHT!

30 seconds of video. The first 5-10 are nothing special. Then it gets awesome. Thing to note, Kate was trying to sleep. Also, when Kate talks to Lea pretend a deep voice shouts, "FINISH HER!"

I call this Lea's Heels of Death. (Okay, it was much funnier in person than when I watched it. Kate's look at the camera is priceless)

Visiting the Van de Walles

A few weeks ago Lea, Kate and I visited Castle Van de Walle (http://castleofvandewalle.blogspot.com/) in the glorious land of Cherokee, IA. The visit was fantastic! Lea got to see her future BFF sleep as she attempted to scream (happy screams, dog calling type screams) Sloane awake.

It was happy fun times had by all. I wish I could add more about the visit, but my memory is awful this time of year. School started and I only seem to remember what I did the previous day. Regardless, we had loads of fun with Kelly, Jess and Sloane. Although, now that we both have kid-lets out bed times have bumped up a wee bit. So much for being up past 8:30. Getting old is as awesome as having kids.

Lea and Sloane. Notice Lea's increasing jealousy of any other baby that has hair.

Lea trying to figure out how to steal Sloane's hair without waking her up.

This looks like the same picture three times, but really they are three different pictures.

2 AM

Good Morning Everyone,

So it's been a few weeks since I've posted last. No excuses for laziness, but work started again (kids, they always show up in the fall. not sure how they keep finding school.) Anyways, here I am awake at 2 am wide awake, granted that's not too much of a surprise, watching the Warriors. (I love netflix. The Warriors just took out the Baseball Furies).

Lea is doing fantastic. She has entered a great stage of development. Lots of smiles and giggles and a whole lot less crabbing. I swear that I can't remember the old crabbing kid from months one and two. Really, I'm pretty sure I repressed those memories. That, and I've found that I've become a cliche. I smile like a moron when I see other little ones and the only topic I seem to talk about with other people is my child. What happen to me? I used to have movies, Nebraska, nerdness, and video games (not an extensive list to talk about I know, but really I live in the Midwest, not a lot to do here) to talk about--now just the kid. At least I'm a self actualized cliche.

Speaking of the little one, she has become a very adept roller. She figured out this week that she can use her rolling skills to get to places. Typically this means that she rolls across the room to the coach or love seat, gets stuck, screams, we move her to the middle of the room and the process starts all over again. This also means that she's rolling in her crib now, which is as awesome as it sounds.

As for the crib she has invented a new sport when waking up. It's called "Let's see how hard I can kick the wall and or the bars of the crib." Also fantastic.

I would post some new pictures but the lights are off and I'm not sure where the camera is. Not up for making a lot of noise at the moment--others frown on being awake this time of day.

Peace out

Awful

Sooooooo I went back to work today. Lea went back to daycare full time.

It was rough on everyone. I showed my distress by running around school like a chicken with its head cut off. Lea showed her anger by being a super baby in daycare. (not even being sarcastic)

Here we are. Working and daycaring. (sigh)

New wonderful happy fun things to report. Lea had her 6 month check up. She weighed in at 14 pounds 3 ounces (she is in the 0.06 percentile of humans in this house according to weight, her mother is in the 50%. I'm in the 100%. Who ever comes up with the answer of how much Kate and I weigh wins a cookie. You can post your answers below. Or email me. Or facebook me. I'll send the cookie myself. Winners choice.) She, being Lea, was 26 inches long. (If science has taught us anything, it's that no one cares about height percentile rank. It's a fact. Look it up. Stupid tall people)

Lea also had some more visitors this past weekend. Grandma and Grandpa Sand came and visited her. (Oh sure it was also Kate's birthday [29 again!], but really it's all about the baby at this point.) Lea did a fantastic job with her grandparents. Lots of smiles and giggles. Lea became best buds with her Grandpa Sand. They were inseparable most of Saturday...okay all of Saturday. (BTW, I ate two pounds of St. Louie style ribs at the Machine Shed, suffering only a minor case of the meat sweats)

Because I'm dumb, I didn't get any pictures with Grandma and Grandpa. Which means random bonus picture time!

Stanford BABY!!!

Okay, maybe she just likes the clicky sounds of the keys. Interestingly enough she refuses to play with the computer unless it's on and I or Kate are on it.

Lea is only smiling as a means to mock her dad's cartoon grin. And her mother wants another one.


6 months. Cute.

Who needs a professional when you can turn the camera on yourself. This trick always earned a laugh in college. At least for me. I loved when people trusted me with their cameras. I was cool.

Lea's New Talent

Lea has learned a new skill. Please turn the volume up on your computers before you click on the videos. Personally, I believe she's going to get far in life with this new found talent. (sorry, none of these videos include me making a fool of myself.)

One more thing...

You may have noticed there's a background and what have you now at the blog site. The wife figured that out. I would change it but I'm too lazy. It looks like a creamsicle now.

Odds ad Ends

Hello again everyone. I just have some odds and ends to pick up this afternoon.

First off Lea, Kate and I would like to congratulate Jess (girl) and Kelly (boy) Vandewalle on the birth of their first child, Sloane Rae Vandewalle. (I was pushing for them to name her Zelda, fell on deaf ears. Can't believe it.) The Sand'ses are very happy for Kelly and Jess and we can't wait to visit the new arrival. (Lea has another BFF, so exciting. At least of us) If you would like to read about the new Vandewalle, or if you would like to read a blog that is infinitely better written and funnier) than this one, or if you just like cute babies, please stop by and check it out at http://castleofvandewalle.blogspot.com/

On to the pictures!

Lea got the chance to go swimming with Mila (child of Amy and Jens, located at http://blessingtonfamily.blogspot.com/ Loads of cross promotion today) Lea was not overly impressed with the pool. She seem to tolerate being there, kinda like bath time. She (Lea) was constantly trying to grab the water, and fail. I sat her down and explained the three stages of matter (solid, liquid, gas, come on people that's elementary! I should not have to explain that to you) After the lesson she continued to try to grab the water. So much for Stanford.

Mila (cute baby on the left) LOVED the water. Slashed everyone. Lea was not so impressed with getting splashed. Granted she couldn't do anything about it.

This was Lea's reaction to finding out that Sloane Vandewalle was born. Or she was trying to grab my cell phone. She's into grabbing things now. Everything. Walking through Target is much more interesting that it used to be.

Lea and I went over to help Nate Laughlin (http://nblaughlin.blogspot.com/) piece together his basement after a flood scare. Lea sent her afternoon making cute noises at her buddy Trevin (cute guy in the blue). She was trying to grab his hair, prolly to steal it considering she's still bald as Fred Mertz. Regardless, it was cute.

Balloons and Wallaces

Like the rest of the summer I've let a few things I need to post on pass for weeks without posting. God blesses procrastinators. Betcha you didn't know that.

We'll start things off last weekend.

Lea's Grandma and Grandpa Evans and Aunt Rachael were in town to peddle some antiques at the traveling Antique Road Show, which airs on PBS. They may get on TV. While they were in town we (everyone including Lea) took in the Henry(s) Wallace house. (Quick history lesson. Henry Wallace was Sec. of Ag under FDR. Granted there were four Henry Wallace(s), including Henry's dad, Henry, who was Sec. of Ag. for Harding. President Harding is often believed to be our worst president--so that should be that Henry's dad, Henry, was the worst Sec. of Ag. ever? Now FDR is oft believe to be one of the greatest presidents ever--thus making Henry one of the greatest Sec. of Ag's ever. I wonder if Henry's intense rivalry with his father, Henry, helped him be successful. I believe there was a picture of Henry dancing on his father, Henry's, grave. Okay, I made half of that paragraph up. I'll let you guess which half.)

We also took in the Hot Air Balloon festival in Indianola. (BTW, I just picked the kid up out of her napping bed and she yakked on me. Kids are awesome.) The balloons were neat, but the pictures of Lea watching the balloons are far better.

Lea watching the balloons. Or laughing at Grandma Evans.

Lea playing with Grandma Evans' necklace.

Lea laughing at Grandma again.

Lea with Grandparents Evans and Aunt Rachael.

The Godchild

Shifting gears from teething unfunness. Lea recently recieved her baptism gift from her Godparents (Chris and Joy). I believe the pictures will speak for themselves.

Teething Update

Good Morning. The teething is still going on. Process is less fun that a when we were on vacation (that's when they broke through). Poor Lea has been having rough nights. Her days have been fine, but once bed time rolls around the pain seems to set in and she get quiet fussy. Kate and I have had a couple of later nights with the little one, starting to remind me of when she was a new born. Here are some cute pictures.

Cuttin' Teeth

Kid's got teeth now.

That's great.

Two little sharp suckers on the bottom. I'm told there are two more coming in on top.

The best part is when she rams my finger into her mouth. Used to be cute. Not so much anymore.

Random Pic. Lea is attempting to grab the camera. Oh yeah, she grabs stuff now too. That's also a lot of fun.

This is my attempt to get a picture of her teeth buds. You have to use your imagination.