Let's play a game

If you were 9 months old, which would you rather play with?

A. This pop-up toy?

B. Or a box of dishwashing detergent?

A. All these fun toys?

B. Or the t.v. cable cord?
A. This whole trunk full of toys?

B. Or the endtable (with accompanying magazines)?

If you answered "B" to all of the above, you are correct!!

Why is it that children are so attracted to the things you do not want them to play with? Not that she doesn't like her toys...she does...she just likes random/dangerous objects more. Which

means I have to be very, very attentive.

Our own little beaver

This is Livia's crib. Those are teeth marks. I'm not quite sure what to do about this.

Monday

On Monday we went to Alcatraz with our friends John and Erin. It's such a cool tour, and I discovered that I would not have survived as an inmate, as I started feeling claustrophobic after just our hour and a half long tour inside the prison! A woman named Joleen (I think) was there that day. She had lived on the island as a girl when her father worked at the prison, and she was there during one of the more famous escapes. I didn't buy her book, but I did go up to her and talk with her for awhile. What an interesting childhood!

The prison

Our little jailbird

On the island

San Francisco

Livia was surprisingly good during the entire trip. You can see a bruise on her cheek in this picture--she fell over and hit her face on our ottoman over a week ago, and the bruise will not go away!

Chase, John, and Erin are all locked up behind this door. I stayed out with Livia, but this was the solitary confinement cell, and apparently they keep it pitch black.


It was a gorgeous day.

On the ferry over to Alcatraz.

Livia was exhausted when we got home, but was refusing to admit it to herself. So when I put her down in her crib she started crying. Finally, after about 20 minutes she stopped, and when I peeked in this is what I found. It's hard to tell in this picture, but she had apparently been sitting up, crying, and was so tired that she finally just fell over, completely asleep.

Hooray for 3-day weekends!

Saturday

On Saturday we went to The Tech museum in San Jose, where they had this awesome exhibit about Leonardo Da Vinci. I have always admired his work, but I was absolutely floored by the sheer genius and expanse of his studies. I can't even begin to list all his inventions, so I won't. But here's a picture of his flying machine.

This is a ginormous horse that he designed and came up with a way to have it created in a single casting.

Here's Livvy eating peachesAnd here's Chase

Da Vinci studied everything from the human body to pulleys and levers, whirlpools to art, how birds fly to how to make screws. Afterwards, Chase and I both looked at each other and said, "So, what the heck are you doing with your life?!" Seriously, he's amazing.

9 months old

Livia turned 9 months old this week. It's hard to believe she's getting so big! Here are her stats...

Height: 27.5 inches -- 50th percentile

Weight: 18 lbs. 2 oz. -- 40th percentile

Head Circ: 44.5 cm -- 60th percentile

She used to be 75th percentile in height and weight, so maybe her petite genes are kicking in.

Here's a quick reminder of how chubby and bald she used to be...

And here she is now!

Since learning to crawl, her physical development has really taken off. She can now pull herself up to stand, cruise, and stand all by herself for a full 2 seconds before falling down. Wow! She has also started babbling a TON, which makes me think that there really might be a connection between language and motor development.

And now I'm just going to post a bunch of pictures of her.

She has the bluest eyes...

Laughing...

Enjoying her squishy blocks. She discovered that she can carry things in her mouth...

"Helping" me fold the laundry... I just thought this was a cute profile shot...

Crawling?

On Monday night, Livia began crawling! Or at least, her own version of it...on one knee and one foot. But hey, I think she should get brownie points for creativity.

The funniest thing I think I've ever seen is when she tried to crawl on linoleum flooring. It was reminiscint of a person trying to walk on ice in tennis shoes. She was slipping all over the place, and couldn't move more than a couple inches forward. SO wish that I had a video of that one!

Christmas Cheer (warning: ridiculously long post ahead!)

This being a "Self" Christmas year, Chase and I packed Livia up in the car and headed down to Apple Valley. We had planned on driving down on Christmas Eve, but at the last minute decided to leave Tuesday night instead, and drive through the night. Lest you forget, let me remind you that I once got in a major car accident when on the spur of the moment I decided to drive all night long to Arizona. Needless to say, I was a little nervous about our decision, but if we hadn't gone then we would have missed ALL the Christmas Eve festivities! So I went to the library, which is luckily open pretty late, and checked out a book on cd. Those things are magical. Chase and I were so engrossed in the story that neither one of us fell asleep even though our journey began at midnight and ended at 6:00 in the morning.

Now I need to brag a little about what an awesome husband I have. Chase had a conference call scheduled that morning, and we were both anxious to get in a couple hours of sleep. We brought in our bags and finally got into bed. Naturally, Livia chose that moment to wake up. Really wake up. She was wide awake and ready for the day. Chase immediately offered to watch her while I slept, and I gratefully accepted. I only slept for about 2 hours, because then he had to get on that conference call and couldn't watch Livvy anymore, but those were some much needed 2 hours! I don't think I've ever felt so loved in all my life! Poor Chase didn't sleep at all until about 3:00 in the afternoon. He ended up having to work a lot during this vacation (including on Christmas day!) which was a major bummer for both of us. But overall we had a ton of fun, and loved spending time with my family.

Growing up, we never had a fireplace (not much need for those in L.A.) and so always laid our stockings out on the couch on Christmas Eve. We have fireplaces now, but the tradition has continued. So here are all our stockings laid out from youngest to oldest. Chase enjoys making the weirdest faces possible in pictures.

This is a much more normal face. Notice Livia's little stocking at the very end.

Most of my family's Christmas traditions take place on Christmas Eve. So we read the Christmas story from Luke, did a little secret santa-ing, and drove around to see Christmas lights. There are a couple amazing houses in Apple Valley! One man has santa's workshop set up in his garage every year, another had a huge tv and recliners set up in his front yard with Christmas movies playing (very trusting, I thought), and another house had a sign in front of it that said "Tune to 107.1" and had set up their own little radio station of Christmas songs to which their flashing Christmas lights were choreographed. So cool.

We had a little musical program, as usual. Austin's rendition of Once in Royal David's City on the guitar was by far the best, but I thought the duets on trumpet and violin turned out pretty well, considering how rarely we play. Then we sang carols around the piano and hurried off to bed so Santa could come!

This picture was taken Christmas morning, right before we ran down to the living room to see all the presents. Emily and David look pretty excited! Livia...not so much. But then again, she didn't know what was coming!

Livia with her haul. I think she had more than anyone else! A big thanks to everyone who was so nice to give her presents!

I made a random little thing with buttons and a zipper (her favorite things in the entire world) and she seemed to really like it! She got really excited about the doll from Whitnie and Richie.
She loved all her presents, but like a typical baby, her all-time favorite part of Christmas morning was....the wrapping paper!!!

And the bows!!!Here is our little family on Christmas. (Please excuse the Ute socks. They were the only socks she had that matched her outfit)Here is our big family on Christmas.The rest of our vacation was spent chatting, eating, playing the wii, and enjoying each other's company. It was SO nice to have so many people around who wanted to play with Livia! Chase and I were able to go out to dinner for our anniversary (2 years, baby!), go to the temple, play tennis, and go shopping without having to worry about her at all!

Here we are on our anniversary. I thought about trying on my wedding dress, since it's at my parent's house and I am offically back to my pre-baby weight (woo-hoo!), but then I forgot.

Me and my sister, Laura.

Livia, enjoying all the toys at Grandma's house.

It was time to return home all too soon. Livia was an angel on the way home and slept almost the entire way. I was convinced that since she slept all day she was going to be up all night long. But she slept all the way until 8:00 in the morning! What a blessing. She spent the next morning entertaining herself by unpacking for us.

And now we wait in anxious anticipation for our next trip to Apple Valley, as well as next Christmas, which will be spent in Guatemala with Chase's parents!