Friday, October 20, 2006

Baby No More

Hard to believe that over a year has passed since we last posted here. Obviously, our little girl has changed nearly as much as our lives have. Little Ella left Ohio still an infant, just learning how to eat baby food and mashed bananas. Eleven months later, she returned to Ohio a full-blown toddler.

As you can see at right, she is now simply a little girl. Ella loves to color with her crayons and Color Wonder markers, to play kitchen and pretend to cook. She's fairly adept at feeding herself with a fork, and can work a spoon surprisingly well (provided whatever she's eating is thick, like yogurt!). With both Mom and Dad back to work at the same time for the first time in her life, Ella began going to her babysitter in August. Thankfully, she transitioned to this new experience extremely well.

Recently, Ella got to go with Mommy and Daddy to a local pumpkin farm to get some pumpkins. She had a blast! There were animals to see and lots of pumpkins to try to pick up. Of course, Ella struggled to handle pumpkins larger than her. Eventually, she found a pumpkin just her size.

Tuesday, August 30, 2005

2nd Term for Dad Administration

Boy, it's been awhile since we've updated this space. Sorry to those friends and family who have been fruitlessly visiting these last two months. Obviously, a lot's happened. Who knew that when the Dad Administration left office back in early June, a second term was right around the corner?? As it stands right now, I've spent more time at home this year than working for a living. Amazing to think about.



Anyway, there's lots to update ya'll regarding our sweet Ella. She was a real trooper during our drive from Ohio to our new home. Amazingly flexible, Ella found herself eating baby food in all sorts of new and strange places -- a curb in a McDonalds' parking lot, off the back of my vehicle in a dying mall parking lot, outside a Cracker Barrell, and at a desolate gas station just 20 yards from a massive corn field.

Apart from just geography, a lot has changed about Ella as well. If you'll examine the above photo closely, you may just be able to see the two tiny teeth that have revealed themselves in the last month. Ella has progressed to stage 2 foods, and as of this past week, has started eating mashed bananas.

After looking like she'd never quite get crawling and might just skip to walking, Ella got it figured out. Just two days ago, she finally figured out that if she moved her feet and legs less and her hands and arms more, she'd actually get somewhere. Sure enough, this moment of locomotion evolution occured when neither Mom nor Dad was watching. Imagine the surprise when we turned our attention to Ella and saw her six feet away from where she had just been. After two days of practice, she's still not fluid yet, but she's definitely over the hump.

Friday, July 08, 2005

Video Archives Shut Down

At first I thought the only problem storing Ella's videos was the amount of storage space needed to house them, which is why I took to deleting older ones from the server. While the storage issue can be managed by continually deleting the oldest videos when new ones are uploaded, the same can't be said for the bandwidth issues. My hosting service that I pay for allows for 2 GB of traffic in a month. I just received an email saying that I had already passed the 3 GB mark on traffic with still 11 days in my billing cycle. Increasing my bandwidth allocation is cost-prohibitive at this time, given our current situation. So, sadly, "Ella: The Video Collection" will be temporarily shut down until further notice.

Sunday, July 03, 2005

Thank God for Ella

With all that has been going on in the last few days, Ella has been an amazing source of constant joy. She has been even more happy and bubbly than usual (hard to believe). It's as if her spirit senses what her Daddy and Mommy are dealing with and she's doing her part to bring some relief.

Last night Ella was getting her diaper changed after something that was nothing short than breathtaking had taken place in it. Let's just say: solid foods have made diaper changing a whole new ballgame. Anyway, after cleaning her up, Mommy was playing with Ella when Ella let out the most unbelievable sound: a giggle. It completely caught Mommy off guard, making her gasp, call out my name, and then laugh uncontrollably. I got into the room and Ella did it again . . . and again . . . and again. That sound emanating from my precious daughter was, hands down, the most beautiful and rapturing sound my ears have ever heard. Of course, when I got the camera to record this melodious sound, Ella stopped. Here's the video of what that looked like.

Here also are two more videos:

As with the other videos, these files are large, so downloading will take awhile. They will be added to Ella's video library.

Monday, June 20, 2005

New videos uploaded!

Ella's video library has been updated once more with 8 new videos to watch and enjoy. These include two videos of Ella eating rice cereal (she absolutely loves the stuff!), on the verge of sitting up on her own, and playing in her exer-saucer. My favorite, though, is watching her feet: Ella has this wonderfully cute subconsious habit of twirling her feet at the ankles. Wherever she is, whatever she's doing, more often than not, Ella twirls her feet like other little girls play with their hair. Now you can experience it for yourself. Enjoy!

[NOTE: due to the enormous size of these video files + limited server space on which to host them, I've had to delete the older videos. They will still be listed, but not available for download. If you'd like to view one of these deleted videos, email me and let me know.]

Friday, June 03, 2005

My Last Day

Hard as it is to believe, my 10 weeks of paternity leave have finally been reduced to a single day - today. Unlike like time off from work due to vacation or holiday, my time at home hasn't "flown by" in that time-warp, "Boy, it's already Friday? It feels like only Wednesday" sense. As I look back, it does, indeed, feel like I've been off for a long time. Nevertheless, I wish it were longer.

In the time leading up to my going on leave, I wondered how I would handle being at home. I thought that I might suffer a small identity crisis because of how so much of how I see myself revolved around my job as a prosecutor. And even though it still does, no such identity crisis ever materialized. I wondered how my brain would handle the absence of the work-related stimulus. Turned out that my brain actually worked harder during my time off than before it, largely due to doing a lot of thinking and writing on a wide variety of issues on my blog. By comparison, my job can be quite mundane when I'm not in trial. (Which is where I'll be almost immediately upon going back to work: I start back Monday, and have a jury trial beginning Tuesday. No easing back into it. Reminds me of how I started my leave: no easing into it there, either, as Day Two was Ella's first ever Shot Day.) It's not that I dread going back to work - I don't. I'm just not excited or anxious at all at the prospect, and that surprises me a great deal. I didn't think I'd feel this way about going back to work when I last was at work.

I wanted to capture Ella waking up this morning, but I can't find the camera (it's likely with Amber at school documenting her last day with her current classes). Ella awoke just like she always does - with the biggest of smiles that cause her to whole body to fold up. When I come into her room and say "Good morning, Punkin!" her face scrunches into a full-face smile, her arms come up to her head, and her legs go up in the air. She is the happiest human being I've ever seen at the prospect of waking up. How do I preserve this sunny morning disposition for later enjoyment during her teen years?

It's amazing to think about how Ella has changed during the Dad Administration. Dressing her was a real effort that was a lot like trying to properly affix clothing to a slumping, sagging, sack of water. Now, she can sit and stand as needed; she knows to push her arms through the sleeves (although she sometimes gets her hands stuck when she grabs the inside of the sleeve); and she even has figured out how to push her feet into her tiny socks, making that task much easier. She recognizes what I'm doing when I am thawing her milk and getting her bottle ready - she is now so much more able and willing to patiently wait while sucking on her hands than before, when she would just howl to world wondering why she must suffer hunger so.

Going to sleep has been the biggest change. I used to have to cradle her and rock her to sleep, and then struggle to lay her down without waking her. Now, Ella goes to sleep like a "big girl," by simply laying down on our bed (the morning light in her room is unbelievably bright due to the uncovered arch window), sucking her thumb, and heading off to Sleepy Time. I lie down next to her, but now I think that's really for my enjoyment (snuggling next to Ella is such a treat, and a mid-morning nap is a nice treat as well!) rather than out of necessity.

Though Ella will never remember these past 10 weeks, I will never forget them. The bonding that I had hoped would happen indeed has: Ella definitely knows who I am now, and reacts to me and my voice as surely as she reacts to her Mommy's. I am so very thankful to God that I was allowed to have this time. I know that most fathers do not or can not do the same. I am so very thankful to God that I was able to be paid during this time. I wouldn't trade this time with Ella for all the money in the world, but fortunately, I didn't have to prove it.

I would like to "savor" this last week, and especially this last day, but I don't really know what that means. I spent inordinate amounts of time on Tuesday just quietly looking at Ella while she did whatever she did. Don't know if that was "savoring." I think savoring the moment must mean this: enjoying the experience as it happens without anxiously focusing on what lies ahead, while focusing yourself towards a spirit of deep gratitude. Wishing for it to "last forever" I think just spoils the experience by focusing on what can't be. Imagine taking a wonderfully juicy bite of the most flavorful piece of steak. (For you vegans/vegetarians out there, imagine something else. I have no idea what that might be . . .) To "savor" it by simply holding onto the bite longer ruins the experience, as the tasty meat turns into a bland, disgusting ball o' mush in your mouth. No, time waits for no one, and trying to stay in the present just leads to a soured future.

So, with that in mind, I'm not going to wish for more time, yearn for today to never end, and dread returning to work on Monday. I must move forward, as it is fast approaching the time for me to return to my life of fighting crime (sans the cape and tights, though I do sport a cowboy hat). But I will always cherish my ten weeks home with Ella, which clearly rate as one of the highest of highpoints in my life. But, before I can get to cherishing and crime fighting, there's dishes to be done.

[cross-posted at Ragged Edges]

Monday, May 23, 2005

Revenge of the Shots

Two weeks left in the Dad Administration, and we've come full circle to that first week. That's right: today was Shot Day, the Sequel. Today's trip to the Doctor was, surprisingly enough, not as hard as that first one. After seeing how tough Ella was the first time, I was less apprehensive about taking her to get pin-cushioned this time around.

Of course, before we could get to the business of fighting off a gaggle of childhood diseases, there was the matter of the weigh-in. Here's Ella's 4-month Tale of the Tape:

Weight: 14 lbs, 12 oz (75th percentile)
Length: 26.25 inches (97th percentile)

This confirmed what Amber and I thought: that Ella's increasing girth has started to level off, even as she continues to grow taller. She's started the process of filling out some of that excess flesh. Ella's now 6 inches longer than when she was born 4 short months ago. As I type this, Amber just got out the tape measure from her sewing kit to see what that means in real terms. Put it this way: the distance from her knees to her feet is all new.

After the weigh-in came the Long Wait for the Doc, which, in pediatrics, is surprisingly not that long a wait at all. Our Doctor has some mystical quality about him, because as soon as he comes in, Ella lights up and smiles profusely at everything her Doctor does. With Ella's eyes, ears, and other faculties checked and questions asnwered, Doc left and the Longer Wait for the Nurse Bearing Needles began. Last time, Ella slept through this part. This time, she expressed her displeasure at not being asleep (her appointment was right when she is usually enjoying her morning nap). Amazing how the sound of loud screaming reverberates and amplifies in a tiny, carpet-less examination room. I'm sure everyone outside thought the wailing was by some kid who had just gotten her shots. Little did they know . . .

As soon as Ella finally calmed down, the Nurse came in. She verified that yeah, they all had heard her. Then it was Shot Time. I've now seen this procedure done twice, and still can't quite believe how quickly it's done and over with. I think this Nurse went even faster than the first one. When the first shot went in, Ella was already crying again about being awake. Even so, there was a definite elevation in intensity in her cry. But, before Ella took that first deep breath after that initial cry, shots #2 and #3 were already over and both bandaids were already in place! Carnival magicians have nothing on this sleight of hand routine. It was like watching a surveillance camera video at work, where everything is in fast forward. Unbelievable.

Once again, Ella impressed her Dad with what a tough little girl she is. Her intense wailing was over almost as soon as it started, and she quickly settled back down into the cry that merely says "I should be asleep right now!" She clearly has her Mom's high tolerance for pain . . . and not her Dad's. And no, there were no photos this time around. I caught more than a little flak from that, from multiple sources.


Ella's first trip to the park . . . and her first experience with grass.


Ella studies her new friend.