(yesterday, but whatever - I did
take the picture yesterday, so I think it counts)
I'm not one of those people who go around saying "time flies" or "it feels like just yesterday," or any other cliche. And, truthfully, I don't feel that way about the last six months. It
is amazing to me that we've had Natalie for six months, that she's our six month-old baby and we're her six month-old parents. But I remember all of those difficult first feedings and challenging nights and screaming car trips and baths full of yelling. Those were loooong, dude. But I also remember the first smile and the first laugh and the first peaceful bath and all the morning snuggles. So six months feels about right, I guess.
And it is so right.
Natalie is really developing into a little person. An adorable little person, of course. This month brought rolling over. It also brought food beyond baby cereal: delicata squash and zucchini. Surprisingly, Natalie liked both of those; I tasted the steamed, pureed zucchini, and I did not think we'd have success there.
Natalie is also starting to express preferences in other areas. She'll cry/fuss if she's bored, wants a new activity, or wants something she can't reach. So I guess this will only last for the next 18 years. Or something. Along with our growing understanding of Natalie's preferences comes, perhaps, some projection on our part about what is her "favorite" rattle/song/book/etc. I don't know that the rattle below is her true favorite (whatever that means for a six month-old, anyway) but she does enjoy kitten-tonguing it. And if you hold it out to her she really just shoots her arm right out and takes it from you, just like a real, coordinated person!
Another major innovation is this month is that Natalie has started spending nights and naps in her own room! This took some
work - and some support from our good
friends - but we're really making progress in this area. I don't have a picture to illustrate this (dear readers, I love you, but not that much!). However, one thing that has really, really made this process easier on us has been the
video baby monitor. I understand there was a time before video baby monitors, and even before baby monitors at all, but, heck, I don't want to live in that time! It is so reassuring it is to be able to see her when she cries in order to determine if something is a sleep noise or the start of a problem noise. The first night she slept in her room, she slept fine, but I spent the night squinting at the little TV screen every 25 minutes. That behavior on my part has since passed.
(reading a story in the rocking chair in her room)
Natalie's other big milestone this month has been her teeth. She's getting her two front bottom teeth. And they are SHARP! They haven't seemed to bother her that much, although they are definitely bothering me during nursing. I spent a few days wondering if she was a vampire, a wolverine, or a
chupacabra. One tearful call to the hospital lactation consultant later, I now have a few new strategies and things are going a bit better.
(you'll have to imagine the fangs. I tried to get a picture, but the model was uncooperative. You know how tempermental the talent can be)
Last, this month marked the end of Mike's lovely, long paternity leave (coincidentally, and thankfully, also the near-total recovery of my arm). On the two days he doesn't teach, he usually stays until Natalie goes down for her first nap (around 8:15am, after a wake-up at 6am); and on the days he does teach, he's usually home by 4pm. So we're still getting plenty of Daddy time!
(yesterday, but whatever - I did take the picture yesterday, so I think it counts)
And it is so right.
Natalie is really developing into a little person. An adorable little person, of course. This month brought rolling over. It also brought food beyond baby cereal: delicata squash and zucchini. Surprisingly, Natalie liked both of those; I tasted the steamed, pureed zucchini, and I did not think we'd have success there.
Natalie is also starting to express preferences in other areas. She'll cry/fuss if she's bored, wants a new activity, or wants something she can't reach. So I guess this will only last for the next 18 years. Or something. Along with our growing understanding of Natalie's preferences comes, perhaps, some projection on our part about what is her "favorite" rattle/song/book/etc. I don't know that the rattle below is her true favorite (whatever that means for a six month-old, anyway) but she does enjoy kitten-tonguing it. And if you hold it out to her she really just shoots her arm right out and takes it from you, just like a real, coordinated person!
Another major innovation is this month is that Natalie has started spending nights and naps in her own room! This took some work - and some support from our good friends - but we're really making progress in this area. I don't have a picture to illustrate this (dear readers, I love you, but not that much!). However, one thing that has really, really made this process easier on us has been the video baby monitor. I understand there was a time before video baby monitors, and even before baby monitors at all, but, heck, I don't want to live in that time! It is so reassuring it is to be able to see her when she cries in order to determine if something is a sleep noise or the start of a problem noise. The first night she slept in her room, she slept fine, but I spent the night squinting at the little TV screen every 25 minutes. That behavior on my part has since passed.
(reading a story in the rocking chair in her room)
(you'll have to imagine the fangs. I tried to get a picture, but the model was uncooperative. You know how tempermental the talent can be)
This particular frame came to my grandmother pre-loaded with pictures that our family all contributed. For those who care (and that may not be much of our readership!), the entire 331 photos on the frame can also be found in the following album:
Rolling from her back to her stomach was the harder one. It seemed like her arm was always getting in the way of developing good momentum. However, this week she managed to get enough strength to sort of push through and over.
Here's a video of a full-on roll!
As you can see, Natalie's really progressed with the smiles! She'll often give a broad smile and kick her legs and wave her arms excitedly if one us enters the room and comes over to her.
We also feel that this month Natalie developed some arm-waving-based communication. This, for example, means "pick me up!"
On the eating front, Natalie is still mostly on a liquid diet. In San Diego, she tried a little yam, but she wasn't especially fond of it, making a face somewhere between quizzical and disgusted. 
(this isn't the face - this is just a thematic high chair picture)
Milestones not pictured include Natalie's first plane flight (okay) and her first cold (we managed!). Here's a picture from just before Natalie's third flight (to San Diego):
We went to visit my aunt Polly, who's had a rough time of it lately. We thought The Natalie Cure was in order.
Polly also received some lovely hand-knit socks. Since I am, like, the slowest knitter on the planet, Miso and I had planned to each knit one of these socks, thereby insuring that they'd be ready by the holidays. Miso had finished hers by early November. I had knit about 1/4 of mine, and had planned to finish it over Thanksgiving. One broken arm later, Miso was left to knit the second sock. And she did, in what seemed like record time to me! Guess we'll have to take up our team sock-knitting on another project.
Our short visit didn't allow for us to do much beyond hanging out, eating, and taking a lovely walk. For our walk, we walked along the ocean with Jake, the superdog. It was a cold, blustery day. Poor Natalie managed to fill her diaper (and then some!) just as we arrived at the park; the poor girl had to have a total outfit change on the back deck of my aunt and uncle's Subaru. I think she was pretty cold, but we worked quickly and soon had her bundled up inside Emilia's jacket.
After the walk, we all had cups of warm tea followed by Chinese food and some hanging out in front of the Christmas tree. Then it was back on the plane to San Diego!
Of course, Natalie also met other new people. My friend Jen Em came down from Seattle for a short visit.
We took advantage of Jen's visit to do some touristy things. First, we attended the holiday lights parade downtown - we "attended" in that we went to a nice restaurant on the water and ate lobster as the decorated boats sailed by.
Later during Jen's visit, we continued our holiday lights experience with a trip to the San Diego Botanical Garden to see their holiday lights. This was a totally fun event, complete with a bonfire for roasting marshmallows and a Celtic band singing holiday songs in Spanish.
Before we hit the holiday lights, we were joined by some good friends at my new favorite San Diego restaurant, Kaito Sushi. (I must confess to eating there again during my visit since SYL and I also went there to celebrate her birthday)
Jen and I also took Natalie to the aquarium. 
Natalie also got to meet our good family friends:
(for some dumb reason, I didn't get pictures of everyone, so we'll have to let the food pictures stand in for the missing folks!)
Here's Natalie with SYL:
And here's Natalie with her first kitty cat:
She wasn't that interested in the cat, but later in the trip she saw a dog and laughed and laughed. A girl after her mother's heart!
And here are some cookies I baked:
(not pictured: the delicious chocolate cake made mostly by Eric on Christmas Eve)
Also, after many years of talk and just under one year of knitting, I finally finished Eric's sweater vest:
Here are just some random cute pictures from the visit:
Okay, this post is already long enough, so I'm going to stop now. Look for posts coming soon about our trip to San Francisco as well as Natalie's five-months-old post.
