9.25.2011

Jargon o' the Seas (or, "HD Talking")

We have video!  Here's a tidbit of showing off some of her verbal skills, as well as her keen fashion sense:


Our kid is a complete chatterbox.  Like lots of little kids, she'll have entire one-sided conversations of gobble-degook with occasional real words thrown in.  I'd say it's been more fun than frustrating trying to decipher her meaning.  Especially when she cracks herself up learning a new word:




A small sampling of words to date:

puppy
Daddy
Mama
"mommy" = edamame (HD gets really confused when people refer to me as "mommy" -- to her, that means "tasty little soy bean" not "lady who provides for me")
dirt
"nana" = banana
apple
"butta-bye" = butterfly and/or peanut butter (unless my kid keeps requesting moths spread on crackers...hm)
"ca-kah" = cracker or bread
vegetable (this one actually sounds like the real word, which slays me)
turtle
"fee"  = fish
"bea" = bear
"Happy" = Harper

9.19.2011

Avast! It Be International Talk Like a Pirate Day!

All abandon hope; ye who enter here.  Me first mate will celebrate by shooting daggers with her eyes. Now dance the hornpipe smartly, me beauties!  OR ELSE.

9.15.2011

Fire on Deck (or, "Coolest Toy Ever")

My super duper aunt and uncle got HD the coolest gift ever last Christmas.  A full-on vintage style metal fire truck for her to ride around, complete with bicycle pedals, clanging bell with pulley, and detachable mini wooden ladders.  Seriously amazing -- it's the kind of thing you see in photos of little kids in the 1940s.  Only problem was that, at age 6 months, it was a tad beyond her capabilities at the time (despite the fact that HD is devastatingly advanced and mature for her age, naturally).

It's so very shiny.
But this past weekend to celebrate her 15 month birthaversary, we busted it out.




And it was GLORIOUS.  My girl is so on board with tools and rescue missions.  Make-a me proud!

HD got a lesson in wrench-handling from Daddy
Kid is totally ready to save the day

9.14.2011

Piratical Nonsense (or, "Grateful")

Ah, the eyelashes
I think everyone has moments of wishing that you lived somewhere else, even for a bit.  We all fantasize about visiting a particular place and (definitely) glamorize said place.  Don't you have places or times or situations that you love to inhabit again and again in books, movies, or just your imagination?  [Me?  Pirating and Caribbean port towns aside, I am totally into Regency period England, modern-day New Orleans, and NYC circa 1980 when punk was on the way out and new wave was on the rise.  And that's just a drop in the bucket.]

And then it occurs to you -- wow, the people of New Orleans have no idea that I find their world so compelling.  I don't think any average citizen of NOLA (still dealing with Katrina and oil spill aftermath) is currently wondering if some random woman out in California is slowly becoming entranced by his city's history/music/food and planning a future visit.  The everyday culture of his world is simply a given, along with the problems that go with it.  Nothing enviable about that.  Why would someone removed from that reality fantasize about it?

Enraptured by Yo Gabba Gabba
So of course it's even more surreal when you realize that there's a flip side to that coin.  What if I'm the one inhabiting a world that someone fantisizes about?  What if someone is thinking longingly, "Man, I wish I was married to my dead sexy best friend; had a crazy, brilliant, HEALTHY, funny little girl; worked a steady job; lived in a safe, (relatively) clean home; and was still able to occasionally see awesome friends and family...".  When I think of it in that context, I realize that the mortgage, the commute, the bouts of teething and 1000 other little stresses are not as all-consuming as I sometimes make them out to be.  That I am one insanely lucky pirate.  


Enjoying one of the last bottles before we give 'em up for good!

Thoughts like that are also what motivate me to start saying nightly prayers with HD.  I hope that Hubs and I are able to instill in her a sense of gratitude for all we're given, as well as a good work ethic to try and keep it.   




Eating "cack-ahs" (crackers) and "butta-butta bye" (peanut butter, but it also means butterfly?)

Unfolded laundry aside, I heart this pic.  HD sorta looks like a Beatle
Blocks and Rowdy, HD's partner-in-crime