Happy Thanksgiving!

Margaret loves to help cook . . .


Well, Family, you were all very much missed this year. We haven't made it to any home for Thanksgiving since we got married. The last time we made the trip back to DC it took us fifteen hours and we haven't been too anxious to try it again. Once we added in kids and college students holiday travel really became impossible. We thought about coming this year, at the last minute, but it just really wasn't possible. But we really wanted to be in New England this year and everyone was very missed.

So, in lieu of an actual visit, I thought I'd share a bit of our Thanksgiving meal with you. We started the day with Mass at our parish and then attempted a visit to the National Gallery. A favorite artist of ours has an exhibit right now and we went to the Gallery last year. The kids weren't really up for it this time, so I played with them in the lobby while Eric browsed the exhibit for a bit. We stopped for Starbucks for some festive treats and then came home for naps.

Eric and I love to cook together, though we rarely do it. Today we started dinner prep at 4:00 and ate just after 7:00. Not too bad considering that we were trying several new recipes including the main dish: Rabbit. We'd never had rabbit before but a turkey is too much for the four of us and we wanted to eat something authentic and seasonal. Rabbits are easy to come by around here--Eric just set up a couple snares on the Mall and . . .

Fixing the bunny sauce.

Just kidding! We got the rabbit at the wholesale market up the street. It was really good and, actually, tasted pretty much exactly like turkey. We also had oyster dressing, real cranberry sauce, brussels sprouts and roasted root veggies. I didn't make pie but my dad left some chocolate here a few days ago, so I think we'll eat that as soon as the kids are asleep!


Joseph waiting anxiously to eat the "bunny."


All in all it was a wonderful feast and wonderful day. Our family certainly has much to be thankful for this year. Eric is trying his darndest to get a job closer to home so we can all see each other next year, but it's a lot of luck.


Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

You didn't miss anything!

I posted a few weeks ago that Margaret had started walking but our camera wasn't working. I was so sad that the blog would have no record of her first steps. But, then, Margaret didn't take any more steps. Here and there she'd toddle a few steps to get from one piece of furniture to the next but mostly she refused to really learn to walk.

We go to Daily Mass a few days a week at the Basilica at CUA. Margaret is almost always too noisy to stay in the church so we hang out in the hall where there are stairs and ramps and wide open spaces. Margaret mostly climbs up and down and up and down. The last couple of days she's insisted on my taking her hand so she can walk around. Today she forgot and let go and took about twenty steps towards me (while I held my hands just inches from hers). This afternoon at home I coaxed her into crossing the room a few times. Then Margaret was hanging onto my legs while I was busy peeling potatoes. I felt her let go and looked over my shoulder to see her toddling across the kitchen. That was the first time she'd ever walked without me begging her to do it, so I think it's official now. She's pretty much toddling all over the place and I got a minute of it on video. Hopefully our slow connection will upload it before I go to bed tonight!

Update: Well, now it's the next night and I still can't get this very cute video to upload. If our computer situation improves in the next few days, I will post it!

The climber . . .

. . . has reached new heights.

Advice? The high chair is now sitting on top of the table.

Baby Signs

There's a big trend among parents these days to teach sign language to infants. I got interested in this idea when Joseph was a baby and we made a few attempts here and there during his first year. He learned his first sign (ceiling fan) just before his first birthday. He learned "more" Thanksgiving Day. By New Year's he was learning signs about as fast as we could teach them. By the time he began talking the next summer he knew about eighty signs.

Some people worry that teaching sign language to babies harms their verbal ability. There is no real evidence for this as long as the parents speak to their kids as well (not a problem at our house). Most researchers agree that learning signs strengthens a child's overall linguistic ability. Joseph's verbal ability continues to impress many people we meet. It's hard to believe this is the same kid who was recommended for speech therapy at ten months of age (we declined the therapy).

Our success teaching Joseph to sign has made me an enthusiastic advocate of this mode of infant communication. It's a lot of fun and reduces frustration all around. It was amazing to sign with Joseph. He was always watching the world around him and always thinking. He would notice tiny things we'd missed and sign to us. Sometimes we had to look really hard but we always found that he was communicating real things. This has continued to hold true with Joseph's verbal communication. He always has a reason for saying what he's saying even if that reason isn't immediately apparent to his busy, scatter-brained parents.

We've started signing with Margaret. In some ways she's picking it up even faster than Joseph did but sometimes we wonder if she gets it. Sign language acquisition works the same way as verbal language acquisition. Signs are often imprecise or will all look the same for awhile. Margaret does a pretty clear "more" (food is such a good incentive!). She also has lots of opportunity for "doggie" as we have a pair of frequent barkers next door. The ability to sign "doggie" has completely eased her fear of the dogs. The same thing happened with Joseph when we taught him the sign for "siren". Margaret claps when we say "good job" and she usually manages "all done" when she doesn't want more to eat. She will sometimes do a loose approximation of the "nurse" sign.

This week I tried to branch out a little. We'd tried to teach her "hat" before (tapping the top of your head). She just hit herself in the face. We were reading a book about a zoo and I showed her "lion" (running hands through hair): she hit herself in the face. I tried "giraffe" (open hand along neck): she hit herself in the face. I tried "hot" (blowing) when the oven was on: she hit herself in the face. I guess we have a little work to do on subtlety.

I had an interesting insight into her personality when I tried to teach her "book" (opening palms in the shape of a book). I showed her and she immediately saw that I was trying to show her a sign and she tried to do it. She couldn't do it, so I took her hands in mine and did the motion for her. She tried to do it herself and couldn't. She made a frustrated sound and held her hands out to me so that I would do it for her again. Joseph probably would have just made up his own sign if he couldn't do the one we showed him. Margaret is a perfectionist. If she sees how book should be and can't do it, she won't sign book at all.

After all that . . . Margaret loves the camera so much that I can never capture her on film. As soon as she sees the camera she stops whatever cute thing she was doing and runs for the camera. Instead of illustrating this post with pictures of her signing I've shown her new favorite skill: climbing. We left the room before church Sunday and found that she'd climbed into the stroller all by herself. She was quite pleased and this activity kept her very busy and quiet during Mass later in the morning.

Happy Birthday, Joseph!

One week late but we all had a great time celebrating Joseph's birthday last weekend. Joseph has known his birthday is "October 27th" for several months. He put in his request for chocolate cake in August. His therapist asked him last Friday where the chocolate cake would come from (wondering if I was going to make it or buy it) and Joseph answered, very solemnly, "From Heaven."

I don't know if the cake was quite that good, but Joseph was pleased. Our favorite coffee shop in the neighborhood loves Joseph and told us to stop by on his birthday. They put a candle in a huge chocolate muffin for him, so he got cake for breakfast, too!

Grandma Marga decided just a few weeks ago to come to town for the festivities. She helped put together a birthday feast of lamb and stuffed squash and we had a couple other friends over to help us eat it. Joseph got lots of books and is loving all of them.

Grandma too pity on Joseph, Son of the Craftless Mother, and carved a jack-o-lantern with him. I was very impressed. "Jack" kept us company at the dinner table for a few nights.


The kids continue to get along and mutually enjoy each other's toys. Margaret, in fact, was much more excited about Joseph's birthday than for her own.

Family Vacation

Someone recently suggested to Eric that he needed to take a vacation. Probably good advice. He's been working hard this fall and with the move and everything this last summer there wasn't as much time to get away as usual. We'd been meaning to visit our friend, Fr. Mike. Since we didn't actually get any pictures of him this week, here is one from Margaret's baptism to jog your memory.

We got to know Fr. Mike well when he was in seminary at CUA and was assigned to our parish for two years. He's just recently been made a pastor of not one but four parishes in Portsmouth, Virginia. Portsmouth is in the same part of the state as Norfolk, and Virginia Beach. Fr. Mike was an incredible host and took a lot of time out of his busy schedule to entertain us. Here is Joseph enjoying his morning coffee while watching the boats from our hotel window:


Rotten photographer that I am, I didn't manage to take any pictures of any of the really cool boats we saw. Our room was overlooking the Elizabeth River which separates Portsmouth and Norfolk. It's a working harbor full of sailboats, Navy and Coastguard boats, ferries, and all kinds of other stuff. We saw some BIG boats. The first day we woke to a cruise ship coming in to harbor (from Bermuda) and watched it turn around and leave that evening. The ferry landing was just below our window and we rode it over to Norfolk one day for lunch and Joseph and Eric just rode it round trip one night after dark while I got Margaret to sleep. It was only one dollar a ride--pretty cheap entertainment for a three-year-old!

We had beautiful weather and enjoyed walking around historic Portsmouth but we also drove over to Virginia Beach one day. We thought we'd dabble our fingers in the water and go for a nice walk. But the water was still wonderfully warm thanks to the hot weather we've had. It was over eighty degrees outside so Joseph and Eric went for a swim! Joseph was scared of ocean waves back in June but he couldn't get enough this time. He laughed like crazy every time a wave crashed over his head. Eric took him out and held him in deep water and then brought him back on shore for a rest. He warmed up for a minute and then took off crawling down the beach again. He crawled head first into the water and went in deeper with every wave. He got knocked flat on his back once and still loved it. He was pretty sad to leave. We took our little beach bum for a walk on the boardwalk.


We had so much fun that we thought we'd go back Wednesday before leaving town. Unfortunately it began raining just as we left Portsmouth. We took the scenic (and very slow) route home using the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel. Our photography skills really can't do justice to this incredible bridge. It is eighteen miles long and you can only barely see land on either side when you get to the middle.


It goes under water twice so that big boats can get through. The bay is to one side and the Atlantic Ocean to the other. It was pretty awesome. There were folks fishing off the pier at the rest stop and one guy let Joseph reel in his bait. He talked about it all the way home.

Our little trip was a very relaxing few days.

Our internet has been down more than up for several weeks so blogging has really suffered. We're working on a fix and I hope to post a bit more this week!

The Walking Fashionista

Margaret is really into fashion. She adores her shoes and carries them around with her everywhere. She empties the entire dresser looking for something to wear. She can turn anything into a snazzy shawl: shirts, pants, tights, diapers. Just now she pulled out Joseph's hooded cardigan and wanted to put it on. The sweater is a little too big for Joseph, so you can imagine how it looked on Margaret. I grabbed the camera to take a picture for the blog and found that the batteries are dead even though I JUST charged them. Maybe it's time for new batteries.

Then, as if she knew I wouldn't be able to capture the moment on film, Margaret started walking! She's been SO CLOSE for the last couple weeks. She took one real step on her birthday and she's done two or three pivot steps here and there--usually when she gets a book in each hand and wants to get from the bookcase to the futon with them. But today she took several real steps. I think the secret was the too-big cardigan. Since her hands were covered up, I could hold her but she couldn't hold me. I got her started walking and let go and she came the rest of the way. We did it several times and then called for Daddy. Of course she refused to walk for him. As soon as he left I pulled her back to her feet and she took several more excursions without any help at all getting started.

But I can't prove it. The camera is dead. We'll try to get that fixed, but, for now, somebody else believe me!