Why I Love This Book

An excerpt from "I'm a Manatee" by John Lithgow:

With my wit, sophistication, and urbanity,
I dignify my watery domain.
No one near will ever hear me use profanity,
Because a manatee has his image to maintain.

I'm a manatee,
I'm a manatee.
I keep my reputation spick and span-atee.

No difference between my face and fann-atee
A stately manatee,
That's me.

My How You've Grown

Roxi turned .5 on December 5. Even though she's technically still a wee babe, she seems closer and closer to being all grown up to us. Her personality shines through more every day. She's getting so big. And, well, she's a bruiser.

She bounces in her exersaucer. Screams like a banshee when she gets excited. Grabs hair with wild abandon. Smacks tables. Rolls all over the place. Wedges herself into amazing positions in her crib. Chomps on anything in a 2-foot radius. Gets bored with toys, locations and activities. In short, Roxi is keeping us on our toes. We love it.

In celebration of her half birthday, Roxi had sweet potatoes for the first time (which she seemed to like as well as anything else) and went to the doctor the next day for shots and a check-up. We were pleasantly surprised to find that there were flu shots left, so the girl got a bonus prick in addition to the normal immunizations. She was a total trooper about it, crying only for a few seconds after her 3 shots and then giving her nurse a big hug.

Not surprisingly, Roxi zipped through her check-up with flying colors. Dr. P told us she was doing great and we were doing a great job raising her. I felt like we'd won a Nobel Prize.

So, without further ado, here are the latest stats:

• 16.2 pounds - in the 50th percentile
• 17.5-inch head circumference - in the 90th percentile (plenty of brain room)
• 27.5 inches long/tall - off the charts ... she's as tall as the average 9-month-old

Good thing we're already fans of basketball.

We got our first big snow last weekend - 10 inches or so. Naturally, Roxi needed to explore. As far as Rob and I could tell, her only reaction was BRRRRR. Look out for snowball fights and sleds ... next year.

Snow bunny!

Gobble de Gobble

Roxi spent her first Thanksgiving in Indianapolis surrounded by family: Grandpa and Grandma Wessel; Uncles Tom and Randy; Great Aunt Glenna; Great Uncle Charlie; [here's where my knowledge of proper geneological terms runs out] great cousins/second cousins Kim, Dale, Eric and Diana, and third cousins/some flavor of cousins Brittany, Ryan, Krista and Kyle. With the exception of Grandpa and Grandma, these were all new people to the sweet girl. She drooled on, pulled the hair of, laughed with, sat on and had more fun than should be allowed with everyone.

Though all Roxi got was her usual diet of formula, rice cereal and peas, the rest of us chowed down on the biggest spread I have ever seen. Capital deliciousness.

Roxi also had the chance to spend a couple hours with Rob's long-time friend Asit and his two boys Seren (4) and Kieren (1.5). We had a hard time believing that Roxi would ever be that big, mobile, talkative or hysterical, but Asit assured us it was true. Oh, and Roxi got her first kiss from a "boyfriend" - as we were preparing to leave, Seren asked, "Could I kiss your baby?" (How cute is that?) To which we replied, "Of course!" And so the girl got a smackeroo on the top of the head.

Every Tuesday afternoon, Roxi and I head over to a friend's house for playgroup, which consists of rolling around on the floor (for the little ones) and swapping stories (for the big ones). The best part for the half-pints, it would seem, is getting to slobber all over somebody else's toys. Way fun. The moms try to keep their slobbering to a minimum. This picture is from 2 weeks ago. From left to right are sweet girls Josie, Ryland and Roxi (who was feeling warm that day and had to ditch her overalls).

Dig my cool friends.

Sunday, November 21: Hello carrots!

Sunday, November 14: Welcome to peas (mixed in with a little rice cereal for extra yums).

You said a mouthful.