Magrilless

Two new teeth and a three syllable word — that was this week. The teething part is not so fun, although she’s more patient than she was in the past. Growing up has benefits. But we forget how it feels to have semi-sleepless nights. It’s not as fun as other things! Like listening to her learn new words. Her new summer pajamas have dinosaurs on them, which inspired her to utter those three syllables over and over. “Dinosaur. Bike. Dinosaur. Flower. Dinosaur. Dinosaur.”

Oh, and a doctor’s appointment. We went for her last check-up with her doctor here. Maggie’s not a fan of visits there. Everyone pokes and prods and manhandles and she’s not in charge of anything. But she’s entirely healthy and growing well. Height in the 19th percentile (up from 9th); weight in the 68th percentile (bit of a discrepancy there…); head circumference in the 98th percentile! She’s her daddy’s girl — look at all those brains!

We went to the beach this weekend, for the first time in Maggie’s memory. We taught her the word ocean which she repeated as often as she does Eliza. She waved hi and bye and generally thought it was an alright place, as long as she wasn’t too close alone. We threw and skipped rocks, and she thought that was pretty fun. She would pick up a rock and hand it to me and ask me to throw it in. “Momma. Rock.” Then point to the water. Actually she was more interested in the rocks that form the wave break than in the actual ocean. But it was nice to see her with that great expanse of water before we move to the great expanse of dirt and rocks.

And she’s smiling even though her hair looks that way because she’s gotten to eat this.

Why, you ask, are you eating a “Happy 1st Birthday” cake for Maggie? Clearly that date has already past. Well, we went shopping at a new store this week, one where the rumor is that your kid gets a free cake on their first birthday. So when we were going past the bakery, we casually asked if it was true. They said “Yes, pick out one of these.” They never asked when her birthday was or questioned why I have such a large and precocious infant. They just asked her name, gave us a coupon for the register, and off we went to have our cake and eat it too! (It’s not cheating the system if we didn’t get one when she actually turned one. We just got behind schedule, is all, for our justly deserved free cake. That’s our story and we’re sticking to it.)

This week Maggie practiced pulling something backwards (push it forward til it stops, pull it backward til it stops, push it forward til it stops, pull it backward til it stops). I guess I must have made “beep beep beep” noises a couple times for reverse, because now every time she goes that direction, she also beeps. We also worked on the “When I say ___, you say ___” chant. She’ll now do “When I say drink, you say juice. Drink. Juice. Drink. Juice.” And “When I say wicked, you say awesome. Wicked. Awesome. Wicked. Awesome.” And it is awesome to hear this little teeny voice go “awesome!” right in rhythm. What else? She learned a new body part, wrist, and a new word for dog, puppy. She learned that chile is wonderful even though it’s painful: A bite of red pepper-laced cheese was followed straight away with an actual scream. And then with the sign for more. It was really funny, actually. She’s helped me pack a few boxes and has played castanets in her stroller along with me on a couple of runs.

Hey, it’s been a good week. There was a I’m-trying-to-make-dinner-so-you-won’t-be-so-hungry-and-cranky-but-I-can’t-make-spaghetti-with-you-in-my-arms moment. But no one got burned or went to time-out or anything. So it must have been a good week.

A couple of recipe experiments later, here is my favorite variation:

Healthy Cookies

1/2 c butter, softened
1/2 c white bean puree**
3/4 c white sugar
3/4 c brown sugar
2 egg whites or 1/2 c egg substitute
2 c whole wheat flour
1/2 c oatmeal
1/2 c shredded coconut
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1+ c chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350. Cream the butter, beans, and sugar. Beat in eggs and vanilla extract. Mix in flour, oatmeal, soda, salt, and cinnamon. Stir in chocolate chips. Drop by spoonfuls onto baking sheets. Bake for 10 min (cookies will still be soft); let sit for 1 min (but not much more) on pan before removing to cooling racks. Freeze additional spoonfuls on a baking sheet until hard; put in freezer container until ready to bake again. Add 1-2 min of baking time for frozen dough.

**15 oz can of beans pureed with 1 Tbsp water. Use leftover beans not used in cookies for half the butter in other recipes, or stir in some lemon juice, garlic powder, salt and herbs as a veggie dip.

This week was all about Eliza. Maggie has discovered she can pronounce her name quite closely to the real thing (as opposed to when the dog was kind of LiLi). So all week, all we heard was “Lisha!” yelled at the top of 18-month-old lungs. “Lisha!” at helpful times like calling her to go for a walk or to have dinner. “Lisha!” when Mags was looking out the window for trucks and wanted a second set of eyes. “Lisha!” when she got out her books and wanted someone else to be interested in them too. “Lisha!” when she wanted to chase someone. “Lisha!” for showing her jacket. “Lisha!” for playing ball. “Lisha!” for saying hi. “Lisha!” for sharing her bottle. “Lisha! Lisha! Lisha! Lisha!” And Eliza for her part is mostly obliging. I think she’s coming around to Maggie, now that she’s more like a real person and not just a poking kicking machine. And treats don’t hurt; the other day I turned around from the sink to see Maggie had opened the bag of dog treats and was handing them out generously. We now keep those on top of the refrigerator.

Below is a Mother’s Day treat for all you moms out there. Hope yesterday was special and restful for you as it was for me!