day care

elizabeth, the a.m. "teacher", at marianne's day care sent us this photo. elizabeth said marianne was intently watching felix as he played with one of the toys. she was just laying there like this for at least five minutes. so cute...i think she's plotting how to scoot over and steal the toy!

bedtime

marianne loves her bedtime - unless we don't get it started early enough! we usually start bedtime at 7:30pm, depending on when she gets sleepy.

1st: bathtime. she has a ball in her wash pod and loves, loves, loves her bath duckies...especially when momma or daddy "quack" them at her. she's not a fan of getting water poured over her head, she stands up against the back of the pod because it startles her so much.

2nd: towel-dried. daddy dries her off with her chicken towel (not shown here). she's rubbing her eyes...the warm bath always makes her super sleepy.

3rd: massage. momma lotions her up and gives her a nice rub-down from toes to head (in that order). marianne's favorite part is having her footsies rubbed.

4th: story time. daddy reads to her and marianne follows along, so long as her eyes stay open.

5th: bedtime snack. usually she nurses but occasionally daddy gets to give her a bottle. or, since she's already taught herself to hold it, she gives herself a bottle.

last: lullaby + swaddle. finally, momma sings twinkle twinkle little star and then either momma or daddy swaddles her up, gives her a rock and puts her down for bed.

she's sleeping at least a 7-hour stretch...and a couple of weeks ago she started sleeping 8 or 9 hours at a time, on occasion. momma can't wait for this to become permanent...maybe! even though i have to get up around 3 or 4 am when she doesn't sleep that long, i still like having the extra nursing session. i feel like i miss out on so much since she takes 3-4 bottles at daycare.

some recent faves

party animals

we were quite the party animals this past weekend. our neighbors throw some seriously fun yard parties...which we usually miss out on because inevitably we are always traveling when they have them. luckily, we were in town for their black + white affair on saturday. it was a great party - they were honoring their son's marriage and new baby girl, who was due the same day as marianne and born one day later! they really go all out...everyone was in black + white (even marianne), they catered and even had a "frank sinatra" entertainer. my first night to imbibe for over a year...and it ONLY took three bevvies to do the job. wow have i lost some serious endurance.

"frank" is back by the corner of the garage, in the hat

marianne didn't last more than half an hour...she slept all cuddled up in her stroller for the rest of the evening until we strolled home (across the alley)

every sunday in the summer, there are jazz concerts in city park. we joined our friends - robin, gavin + desmond - and a couple of their friends for a picnic in the park. there were tons of people there. it was a beautiful evening - warm sun, cool air, plenty of shade - and the jazz was a perfect backdrop for our picnic and conversation.

there's marianne's boyfriend, des, with his mommy + daddy!

marianne got a shoulder-ride on our walk back to the car...she's big stuff.

so patriotic

i love fourth of july! it's given me my best childhood holiday memories and i'm just such a sucker for fireworks. this year, for marianne's first 4th, we were in a parade! it was the second annual fourth of july highland parade. the highlands is a darling denver neighborhood with an overwhelming sense of community. for the parade, all of the neighbors (and other denverites, like ourselves) bring their kids/family/friends/loved ones out and decorate their bikes/strollers/wagons/selves in red, white & blue and parade a few blocks together to a local park where they bbq weiners and have a huge potluck style lunch. everyone spreads their blankets out for the picnic. our friends chad + kristin (and their dog, karma) joined us for the fun!

i guess marianne didn't rest enough during the parade because she snoozed when we got home that afternoon in her swing. i love the folded hands she has going on...she naps just like her daddy.

later that night, we went over to chad + kristin's for grilling and fireworks...we saw a few from a park near their house. luckily, as we were driving home through downtown we saw the coors field finale - AMAZING!!!!!

after her bath on sunday, drying off with one of her hooded towels from aunt penny:

we had such a wonderful weekend, spending family time together!

back in time

i had meant to post photos from memorial day weekend and fathers day weekend but didn't do it immediately following those dates. i just figured out how to post-date a posting tonight, so i went back and added some photos from each of those weekends. check my may and june archives to find them.

onto my tummy

here is the amazing footage of marianne rolling from back to tummy. never mind my obnoxious rattling of the linking rings...it was merely to keep her focused on the task at hand. otherwise, as soon as she spots the camera she freezes. she's also started grabbing her feet, which she kind of does in this video for a split-second.

she still rolls tummy to back but not as often. almost every time we go into the nursery when she wakes up in the morning or after a nap, she is on her tummy. she's usually fussing because, for some reason, she's either too exhausted to roll back over or she just forgets that she's able to turn herself back over.

a laugh

last night when i was playing airplane and other such floor games with marianne, she laughed! i was making some silly noise at her and she just thought it was a riot, i suppose. it was the sweetest dern thing i've ever heard. i think i say something to that effect every time she does something new but seriously, it was the sweetest thing. i can't wait to get a video of it for you all to hear soon.

on that note, i did get video of her rolling over last night during our floor session. it's in the middle of a 10+ minute video so i have to edit out the section where she actually rolls over so that it's short enough to post to the blog. i'll try to get it up tonight.