Thanksgiving

 We had a lovely (and warm!) Thanksgiving.  Lots of just hanging out as a family o' four in the morning, a great little walk around a park and, of course, fabulous dinner with my family in the afternoon.  The girls were dressed in matching type outfits but of course I didn't manage to actually get a picture taken of the two of them together.... oh well maybe next time the planets align and I convince Genevieve to wear what I want her to and not what she wants to wear :)

Smiley

Isadora's favorite two things: nightly massage time and her yellow blankie...

Patrick just doesn't buy it...

but I think Izzy and Evie are still dead ringers for one another... they even both have that drool problem :)

 

What you cannot see in these pictures is that Izzy's eyes are now decidedly hazel.   And don't think this means that I think they are similar in any way other than their babyish good looks because they are decidedly not!

Isadora at 4 months!

Wow has four months really gone by already? (For that matter has 4.5 years really gone by already?!)  Izzy has become decidedly more opinionated in the past month and is not content to just hang out and let the world go by all the time.  One of her favorite things to do is to face out toward the world in the moby or baby bjorn.  In fact the past few nights I have found that this is the only solution to her rather colicy self between the hours of 5 and 7.

Isadora has discovered the power of her lungs and exercises this power with large bursting screams, either of delight or frustration.  The frustration usually comes from being left on her tummy, a state that she is not a fan of and has not quite figured out how to escape yet.  She is still just about the smileiest (I am sure that isn't a word) kid I've met and that smile just melts her other Lacroix household member's hearts.  Isadora appears to be a tooth prodigy and seems to be on the verge of her first teeth... or at least I hope that is why she was uncharacteristically waking me up so much this week.

She moved into her big baby crib this month, so she went from seeming gargantuan in the bassinet to itty-bitty in the crib.  Her daytime sleep is still spotty and her nighttime sleep is not as fabulous as it once was (I think she is getting so big she needs to eat at night just to maintain her weight :)  but she is at least doing a minimum 5 hours at a stretch which is good by me.  Izzy is definitely the kid who likes to sleep in, even now at 8 am she is still asleep while Genevieve decided that she would get up at 5:45 this morning.....  She is a definite fan of her thumb and/or first two fingers and loves to put them in her mouth and suck on them all the time.  My favorite thing that Isadora does these days is what I call her naked baby dance:  Every night I give her a little baby massage as part of her bedtime routine and this makes her just about as happy and cooey as I have ever seen her.  But more than anything being totally naked makes her dance!  She uses her strong little legs to push her body up and down and squiggles all around all the while laughing and talking.  I am not sure what it is about being totally naked that makes her so happy but I really should film it for posterity because it is hilarious. 

Halloween (the real deal)

Halloween was hectic but fun.  Genevieve was a witch (for whom we could not find a hat... that I of course finally found last night on the floor in her bedroom) and Isadora was a tiger.  We carved our pumpkin at the nth hour because the pumpkin carved the weekend before was rotted by the beginning of last week... I wish I had taken a picture of it, by far the best I have ever done, thanks to last years splurge on Williams and Sonoma pumpkin carving tools, which I didn't even get to use last year because we never carved a pumpkin... so there you have it, progress in the work/life balance... this year we managed to carve a pumpkin!  Well to be honest I started the second one and Patrick had to finish it because friends started arriving at our house and Izzy was preforming her usual 6ish I act like I am hungry but by god don't you try to feed me (aka colic) meltdown.  Oh and the pumpkin didn't end up lighted because we didn't have a candle in the house...

 Anyway Evie had a great time trick or treating with her friends, including her best friend, who went out trick or treating for the first time this year and definitely got a kick out of the festivities.  Most of the adult crew held down the fort with beer on the front porch and I took Izzy around in the pack with me.  I made the mistake of wearing high heeled boots, good thing Genevieve only wanted to go around the block.  I think this "family" picture (Evie insisted her friend be in the picture) pretty much sums it all up... 

Halloween Take 1

Halloween, much like Christmas, seems to be a multiphased event when you have a child.  In Evie's world first comes the Halloween at school (usually a week or so before the real deal because of their fall break), then comes the neighborhood Halloween in the park and then the real night o' sugary spooky fun.  (With generally a trip (or two) to Valley of the Moon peppered in between.)  Well the Halloween season has officially begun with yesterday's Halloween parade, trunk or treat and party at IST.  Evie is reusing the princess costume my mom made last year and repurposing it as a witch.  It was perfect because I already had the hat and so all we had to do was go buy tights (one size fits most... aka fits no one) and a broom.  I decorated the Subaru and was a trunk for treating... it was a little bit of a strange thing to stand at the back of my car and hand out candy but the kids got a kick out of it for sure!  I brought a costume for Izzy but it was just too darn hot for it, they just don't make costumes for kids who live in the desert, so she just hung out either in the ergo or in her car seat for the trunk or treating.  Hopefully it will be a bit chillier for the actual event so she can go as a tiger.  What a great start to the 2 weeks of Halloween :)

Mommy and Daddy

Genevieve decided to brave our closet and dress as Daddy:

 

And as Mommy:

Theories (or rather hypotheses) of Elevation

The girls are asleep and Patrick is out of town so really I should be working/studying, but instead of such productive activities I find myself contemplating a new theory (well really a hypothesis).  This hypothesis is not a great unifier of the world nor a fabulous contributor to science as we know it, but make no mistake, it is critical to me.  About a month ago elevation became very important to Izzy.  Now I am not talking about the sort of elevation she achieved in a trip to the cabin or a jaunt to Brazil.  This elevation comes from the simple fact of a parental figure standing up.  Patrick and I have found that Isadora greatly prefers her lot in life (when she is upset) when it occurs at oh at least five feet above the ground.  In other words, when she is fussy we must be standing up.  When I discuss this with others they offer me all sorts of opinions to the origins of said phenomenon: "you must rock her more when your standing" "you hold her more securely when your upright" or the converse "you must be giving her more freedom when you're standing."  All of these alternative (and somewhat contradictory) theories have caused me, as has happened in the past, to borrow from my other job (in this case that of the student who is taking a methods in research class) to try to ascertain an answer.  So... like any good scientist... over the past few days I have conducted a series of experiments.  The first involved holding Izzy more tightly to my chest, like I might when standing, when she was fussy.  That having no noticeable effect, I tried holding her more loosely, and in both cases she howled until I stood up.  The problems with small (albeit random) samples aside, there seemed to be no correlation between the tenacity of my hold on her, because by god did she continue to scream. I then tried rocking her (in a rocking chair nonetheless) like I would standing and .... nope still screaming.  I will continue to search for alternative hypotheses because, as of this evening, Izzy has decided that not only does she prefer I stand when she is fussy (aka tired) she also would like a vertical mom when she is breastfeeding, and while I might be able to accommodate this request now, I most certainly will not be able to do so when she is 20 some odd pounds!

The 3 Month Old Izzy

The 3 month old Izzy is a bundle of happiness.  She is constantly smiling and cooing at just about everyone she meets.  She doesn't seem to be perturbed by much, except for when she is extra tired and cannot fall asleep.  Then the only thing that makes her happy is for you to be standing up and carrying her with her head on your shoulder.  You must be standing up, sitting just will not do.  (This was a bit problematic on our nearly 60 hour journey to and from Brazil... as you might imagine.)  She is all about her newly discovered hands and loves to bring them up to her little mouth and try to suck on them.  The result is a large and loud slurping sound that can be heard across the house.  It is one of the best ways to figure out that she has woken up because otherwise she will frequently just hang out in her bassinet for a bit staring at the ceiling.   She is a one in a million baby for many reasons but perhaps the biggest outlier is her sleep.  She goes to bed at about 8 pm most nights and wakes up at 6:30 am... and trust me this has nothing to do with me.  She is not, however, a good napper and will only nap for more than 45 minutes if she is in a carrier or being held and sometimes even then she is not too keen to sleep for more than a short stretch.  She clearly loves her big sister because she has more than once stopped fussing and started smiling and cooing when Genevieve comes over to talk to her and play with her. 

6 things

6 things (3 each) about our girls that give me joy right now:

Isadora: the happy, intoxicated way she looks at me when she is breastfeeding; her big toothless smile and cute little giggle; and her warm head that is so nice to nuzzle.

Genevieve: the cute and creative songs she sings; her genuine kindness for others; the way she is learning so much about the world and how she loves to share that love with Patrick and I.

OK and two bonus things that I love mostly because they make my life that much easier :)  Evie gets herself dressed every morning for school (sometimes without us asking!) and Isadora sleeps for between 8 to 10 hours a night... one is a welcome permanent addition to the way our house operates the other I have no hope for maintaining in the long term....but that is OK too.

Dora the explora

It has been awhile since we've updated on the Lacroix happenings... and for good reason because the happenings have been many.  I've been away from home for more or less two weeks now and little Izzy has been along for the ride.  Her first adventure was up to Flagstaff because I went to the AZ Hydrological Society meeting to present a paper and accept an award.  My Mom came along with me that time to help watch Izzy while I was at the conference.  (I brought up my camera but didn't manage to take even a single photo...)  Then we were home for two days and off again... this time on the big adventure that has been almost a year in the making.... Potro de Galinhas, Brazil for the World Water Congress!  I did bring the camera for this adventure but really didn't take too many photos because I was at the Congress for a good part of it and then also just spent too much time enjoying the scenery :)

Isadora was an awesome traveler!  It took us almost 30 hours door to door to get there and about the same to get home and she really just rolled with it.  Most importantly she continued to sleep about 8 hours a night the whole time.  This was a miracle for Patrick and I because man were we exhausted when we got there and poor Patrick had a cold for the first few days of the Brazilian babysitting adventure.

Of course all of this adventuring has put me way behind on my work so I'll leave it with just the photos of the trip for now... perhaps to elaborate later because as you can imagine there are some stories behind these photos!

Isadora at 2 months

I cannot believe it has been two months since Izzy was born!  The past month has been less eventful in terms of travel but much more exciting in the personality development department.  Isadora is showing herself to be a mellow, quiet observer of the world.  Very little disturbs her, although she has started to cry some when she gets tired just before she passes out and falls asleep.  More often than not, when she is awake, she is just sitting there staring out with her big still undecipherable color eyes.  She doesn't sleep very well during the day but will sleep anywhere from 6 to 8 hours in one stretch at night.  She loves to smile at people, or at seemingly nothing at all and is totally utterly fascinated by lights and ceiling fans.  She has a pretty good repertoire of noises that she uses to get her point across, my favorite being the coo that almost sounds like a laugh.  Her hair is getting lighter, especially in the front where her hair whorl is.  We took her into her two month appointment a week early so she is probably a bit bigger than this now but at almost 2 months Izzy weighed 11 lbs 2 oz and was 23.5 inches long.  Finally and perhaps most importantly Izzy and Evie are a great pair.  Evie likes to cuddle and entertain Izzy and Isadora is just utterly fascinated by her big sister and smiles her biggest toothless grin whenever Evie "plays" with her.

Labor Day Weekend

I am afraid that my time to post is severely diminished of late.  Every time I have a "free" moment I feel the overwhelming urge to try to get ahead on a reading or two for school or to sit and watch 30 Rock... one productive, one highly entertaining, but neither good for furthering the online story of the family.  Well regardless here I am now at almost 9 pm on a Friday night, both girls are asleep (or mostly asleep... I hear Izzy making little noises in the other room) and Patrick is still at a conference (so no potential distraction via 30 Rock) and I have finally found the time to put up some pictures from last weekend.

Our long labor day weekend was pretty chill.  Isadora went to her first football game last Saturday night and she was a champ.  Evie did a great job of staying up late (it was a 7 pm game) and not straying too far from our assigned seats in the bleachers.  We now have season tickets in the stands, and although I think we all missed the half time cookies from the skybox, overall it was a lot more fun to be out and amongst the crowd watching the game. 

Izzy also made her first, albeit very brief, visit to the zoo.  We pretty much went there, let Evie run around in the little splash park part of the zoo and then came home again because it was just too darn hot.

At some point in the weekend we went shopping for clothes and Patrick just "had" to buy a video game that he could "play" with Genevieve.  (Really it was a matter of him wanting to play a video game and us not owning any that would be OK for a 4 year old to sit and watch)  He chose a fancy new (?) Mario Brothers game and he and Evie had a lot of fun playing it "together" on Sunday night.  At one point I was running around doing something (some chore I am sure) and set Izzy down in the baby chair thing near where they were playing.  As I walked back into the room I realized how ridiculous that looked and just had to take a picture....

Isadora's Party

 

A few weeks ago we decided that Isadora's arrival was a great excuse reason to have a big party with our friends... particularly those friends who don't generally get invited to four year old's birthday parties because they don't have a four (or any other year) old.  The party was concieved as a humble little gathering with margaritas and slip and slides in our back yard.  We invited just about everyone we know and when the yes guest list topped 60 we became concerned that we wouldn't have enough space for everyone in our house/backyard so of course early Saturday morning Patrick thought he'd look into a rentable, more substantial slip and slide...  I left it up to him and we ended up with this:

 

I can't even show you a picture of the whole thing because it was just that big and my yard that small by comparison.   Needless to say the 30 foot long, 15 feet wide and 15 feet tall slide was a big hit with all the party goers.  I am happy to report that there were no injuries and a good time was had by all.... including my brother and I.

Of course the honoree of the party did not get to experience the slide or the margaritas.  She did however get the chance to be held by at least a dozen eager visitors and cooed at by at least 3 dozen more.  I think we may just have found our "annual" party!

Rain rides, dresses! and more

I can"t believe it has been more than a week since I last post.  In one way it seems like an eon ago and in another it feels like just yesterday... ahh life with a baby in the house.  The lack of posting is not because of a deficit in goings on though.  We've played in the rain, reorganized almost every room in the house, listened to great stories and played dress up with some great new duds.  On top of all that I started classes this week and Izzy went to her nanny share for the first time.

One of the best of those have been the couple of decent rains these past few weeks.  Well decent by Evie's standards, not nearly enough to help the drought.  Actually Evie even commented on the fact that it wasn't raining enough to make good puddles... until it did and overflowed our rain swales and made the most tempting, muddy puddles to date.  Evie really wanted to jump in them so I told her what the heck, go ahead.  She proceeded to "get dressed" to jump, which involved her putting on a pink dress and pink snow boots.   The call of squishy mud between toes was great and so she managed to convince me to do a little jumping too.  During another rain she got out her favorite new umbrella and took it for a tricycle spin around the driveway.  For yet another, yesterday, it was sunny while it rained, which is my personal favorite.  Evie called it a sun rain, simple yet descriptive.

The other fun happening was receiving fancy new dresses, which just happen to match, for the girls from Nicole, aka Mimi.  I got both of the girls dressed up and we did a very brief little photo shoot because they were too cute.  I can see that one of the great joys of being a parent to two girls is going to be matching dresses...

Isadora at One Month

One month of Isadora. From right to left and top to bottom a photo for almost every day of her life so far (I missed one day...)

As first months go I think Isadora has had a pretty darn good one.  She has traveled to the cabin at Blue, up to Mt. Lemmon, over to the pool, across town to live at my parent's house for a week and even had a chicken coop pool party to celebrate her arrival. 

Overall she seems to be a mellow baby.  She doesn't like sleeping much during the day and will rarely sleep for more than 2 hours at a time, but (thankfully), she is a pretty darn good night sleeper and always does at least 3 hours at a time and as much as 7 hours at a stretch at night.  Her eyes are still light gray/blue and do not yet show signs of turning to brown (Genevieve's were already brown at this point).  She likes to make funny little noises, including a coo here and there, and makes them a lot.  This may be a bit too much information but bear with me here, she is only a month old and there isn't much to use to characterize her....  Isadora is the most explosive and powerful pooper I have ever encountered.  You can hear her across the house!  The other night I had the misfortune of of changing her diaper just as she went poo and, I kid you not, there was BM not just all over me but also a full 6 feet away from where she was lying on the couch (and this would happen to me when I am half awake at 3 am). Here is to hoping that she eventually has a bit more to put on her resume than that.

Advanced Parenting

So you have one child.  You know the ropes (more or less) when it comes to tackling number 2.   When the pediatrician tells you that your baby has lost a pound and if she can't get going on the whole eating thing you'll have to supplement, you don't freak out, hey you've been there before and it all worked out OK.  Getting the kiddo into the car seat isn't a nerve wracking 20 minute ordeal, its a 2 minute exercise.  The experience of successfully getting one child from baby to toddler qualifies you for the next level... Advanced Parenting.

In Beginning Parenting you learn the basics.  Feed, Diaper, Transport and Sleep (or attempt to sleep).  In Advanced Parenting you gain the skills to take your game up a notch. I have just begun my education in Advanced Parenting, but here is what I have learned so far:

Beginning Feeding Skills

• Get the baby to latch on and eat
• Figure out how to position the baby just right on the boppy pillow for maximum comfort
• Learn how to have just enough entertainment and sustenance for the 20-30 minutes you are stuck in one place feeding

Advanced Feeding Skills

• Swallow your pride and accept the fact that even though you thought you knew how to feed a baby that you must relearn how to get the baby to latch on and eat.  This is a bit like taking a class that uses calculus after a four year hiatus from calculus.  You thought you remembered what an integral was, but then you realize all you remember is that it is a cool little symbol, and not what the heck it really does.  Once you figure out how exactly it functions though the rest comes back to you pretty quickly.
• Forget the boppy, it is never where you are when the baby is hungry, learn to use other props instead.  This can include but is not limited to: regular old pillows, dirty laundry piled near you, piles of stuffed animals and the cat.
• Learn the fine art of walking while breastfeeding and holding the baby with one arm while doing so, because there is no way you would actually be allowed to sit in one place for a whole 30 minutes.

Beginning Transport Skills

• Master getting baby in and out of car in less than 20 minutes.  
• Determine how to install a car seat
• Garner the fortitude to not worry incessantly about the baby you cannot see in the backseat

Advanced Transport Skills

• Determine proper sequencing. Learn that it is better to secure the bigger child before the little one.  Reverse order when unloading.  This prevents runaways and frustration. Ideally older child buckles herself in, but, this is not a common occurrence and cannot be depended upon.
• Determine how to install a car seat
• Communication is key. Harness the power of the verbal child to check on status of non-verbal one.  "Is the baby asleep?"  "Does she look distressed?"  "Are you cold back there (to determine if that could be why little one is crying)?"  etc.  This enables one to more efficiently assuage any concerns and minimizes unnecessary car-pull-overs.

Beginning Sleep Skills

• Lower your expectations for mental function.  
• Read all sorts of advice on why your baby isn't sleeping they way she "should"
• Feel a tremendous inadequacy as a parent because your child is a "bad" sleeper.

Advanced Sleep Skills

• Realize that less sleep is no longer a problem because you never regained mental function after the first child.
• Celebrate when your new baby sleeps for two three hour stretches a night (and even one 5 hour stretch)
• Feel a sense of relief knowing that the previous child's "bad" sleep and the current child's "good" sleep have NOTHING to do with how you parent.
• Burn all sleep training books in your home... my that felt cathartic.

Mountain Escape

All last week I took care of both the girls during the day.  It is too hot outside to do anything fun here so I decided last Tuesday to pack both of them into the car and drive up Mt. Lemmon so we could have some fun outside for the day.  It was a great trip.  Evie had tons of fun playing in the stream both where we did a little hike and at a picnic area.  Izzy just hung out in the sling for the whole day, occasionally protesting when she wanted to eat.  I had a chance to just sit around outside and enjoy the day.  I am also proud to report that I remembered almost everything we needed for the day.  The only lapse was the bag full of snacks for Evie and I, which wasn't too big of a deal because we could stop in Summerhaven and get a pizza for lunch.  All in all we all thoroughly enjoyed the time... Evie asked me if we could go back the next day...  I was tempted to I'll admit but really a 3 hour drive (there and back) is only tolerable once a week.

Stats

Those of you who are familiar with my other day job (the one that doesn't involve diapers and pretending to be a unicorn or a princess or a cat) will know that I have a bit of an obsession with the graphical display of data.  In fact I would go so far as to say that it is one of my passions... how better to convey complicated information!  Well imagine my surprise and delight when I discovered an ipad app that allowed me to bring my passion for graphs into my world of mommy.  Oh yes great excitement ensued, and because I know you just must be equally thrilled at this development I hereby present to you Izzy's stats for the first almost two weeks.  Fascinating isn't it?

Now of course the rub in any great data display is that some poor soul must undertake to the tedious data collection in order to have the meat behind the pretty graph.  I will admit for about 14 days there I was happy to be that sucker (so to speak) because I wanted to make sure little Isadora was eating and eliminating enough.   By four days old she had lost a full pound (down two 6 lbs 12 oz) and so I was very determined to have stats to show the pediatrician for "analysis", should she not be gaining enough weight at her 2 week appointment.  Data gathering involved a commitment to record the time and duration of each feeding (including which breast was currently in use) and the contents of each diaper (you could even get so descriptive as to the type and quantity of BM, but really, at some point we have just gone too far).  This proved to be a bit time consuming, not to mention difficult to remember given my new found sleep patterns. So it should come as no real surprise that when last Friday rolled around and Izzy was back to birth weight even before two weeks I decided to break the chains of ipad bondage and stopped recording her stats.  I felt so very liberated... but hmm I wonder what her sleep patterns are now and how they will change in the coming weeks...

Doppelganger

One of the things I pondered a lot when I was pregnant was if Lacroix number two would look like Genevieve.  Many of my friends have sibblings that bear an uncanny resemblance to each other and I thought it would be cool if my two kids did too.  Well I am here to tell you that at least so far the two Lacroix girls are virtually dead ringers for each other.  They have the same lips, eyes, ears, eyebrows, nose and toes...  Izzy though has my fingers where Evie has Patrick's.  I don't have two pictures with the same expression, but you get the idea:

Their personalities, however, are already seemingly night and day.  Evie was a bit of a rough newborn, not sleeping in longer than 1.5 hour segments, awake all night and sleeping all day, pretty easily perturbed... etc.  Isadora is already a pretty good night sleeper and super easy going when she is awake. It will be interesting to see just how much their looks converge and their personalities diverge.