Maggnificent Monday

Future geek alert! Maggie has been having fun unpacking the four boxes we have in our temporary home. It’s mostly Bill’s books and things that will be transferred to his office soon. But the graphing calculator and the lab goggles have become favorite toys and we may have to broker a deal with Daddy to keep them at home.
Maggie has developed some new skills since we’ve “moved in” here. She can count from 2 to 4 and from 6 to 10. She doesn’t like to start at 1 and she always skips 5, but she doesn’t necessarily think we’re wrong when we go all the way from 1 to 10. She can do a step all by herself with no railing support. There are a couple of steps in the house: one at the back to go out to the yard and one in the front to go down to the mudroom. She barrels on through from one end of the house to the other, going up one and down the other and up and down again with no supervision required anymore. And she’s started to correct some of her initial close-enough-to-understand-what-she-means words. For instance, “buck” is now decidedly “truck.” It used to be she would switch the inflection on uh-oh, so that she’d say uh-oh with the oh a higher pitch than the uh. Now it’s uh-oh, the way most of us say it. And a frog no longer says “(bite your lower lip and hum)-buh” but is much closer to “ribbit.” There are lots of other words too, but I’m having a brain freeze.
Another new habit is sticking her hands down her pants. It started out as down the back of her diaper, like she was aiming for back pockets and missed. Which is all fine and good and easily laughed off in public with a “She just discovered her butt. Ha ha ha.” (Unless there’s a dirty diaper, of course. Then it’s a little more trouble.) She recently began going down the front of the pants, though. Not as funny around strangers. We figure it’s like nose-picking and teeth-grinding? Don’t give it any reinforcement, positive or negative, and it will go away? Any advice, parents out there?

Maggnificent Monday

A girl and her rat; can there be anything sweeter? We have taken to letting Maggie have a friend for naps and at night. We let her choose a stuffed animal or doll, and she seems to really like having someone to snuggle with and talk to. Since this picture, we have moved into our “new house” where we’ll be for the month of July and got her real crib put together again. I think she likes it better than the portable one (even though she was an absolute champ when it came to sleeping in it for a couple of weeks), and it’s certainly easier to get her in and out of the taller one.
Since we’ve gotten to this “new house” a couple blocks from downtown, we’ve ditched the car and have taken to our bicycles. Maggie just loves to ride bike-a-cycles. She sits in her seat on my handlebars and points at things and talks and dings the bell to let people know a bike-a-cycle approaches. We’re so happy to have a biker for a girl!
Mountains don’t seem to have made much of an impression on her yet, but she does like to see the river. She’s learned “water” and “river” and she can point out “boats.” We went for a hike this morning next to a creek and heard for many step a little voice: “water. water. water. water.” Yesterday our bike ride took us to a boulder field and for many a pedal stroke a little voice: “rock. rock. rock.” She seems well suited to Durango, don’t you think?

Maggnificent Monday

Well, they say Durango is one of the least fashion-conscious cities in the country. Good thing, if Mags is going to walk around town looking like that. The change in altitude doesn’t seem to have affected her much (we’re trying to push the fluids so it won’t), but the dry air and blazing sun have left their mark. Her skin is rougher and her hair is starting to get tangles, thanks to the low humidity. And she’s much pinker than she was in the East, even though we slather the sunscreen on and try to keep her hat firmly in place. All in all, she’s adjusting great out here.
We’ve been staying in the mountains above town until we move into Bill’s colleague’s house while he’s out of town in July. We have a pretty sweet schedule we’ve fallen into: Get up and have oatmeal. Walk Eliza in the mountains. Go to town and see Baka Sue and Baka Scott. Bump around town. Drive back up the mountain for a nap. Go swimming at the hotel’s indoor pool, which is almost always empty. Have a simple dinner from our efficiency kitchen. Go to bed and read until we fall asleep. Pretty great.
Maggie seems fairly unimpressed with the mountains, but she does like all the different kinds of flowers she can find, all the rocks everywhere to pick up, and the chipmunks that live under the stairs. She’s into details, I guess. That’s cool. There’s lots of things to be curious about out here.