A Real Page Turner

We read to Roxi three times a day - before both her naps and before bedtime. She surprised us recently by turning the pages for us. You have to "prep" the next page by flipping it open a bit; Roxi does the rest by herself. Sometimes she gets so excited about seeing the next page that she reaches for it before you can finish reading the current one.

Page turning! Can full-fledged literacy be far behind? OK, probably. Still though, all signs point to an appreciation for books ... and not just chewing on them.

Roxi enters in a healthy debate (i.e., giggle fit) with Chomper the puppet dog. Needless to say, Chomper lives with us now.

Roxi's current favorite: the Peek A Block activity cube from her Nanna. It plays music, talks, lights up, rotates and - best of all - provides an excellent platform for pulling up to standing. Rob and I already know all the tunes by heart.

Roxi LOVES her new, big girl tub.

View from the top.

It's All a Blur

The days are flying by, each one with a new adventure for Miss Roxi. Please allow me to hit the highlights:

Today

• Whole food: Roxi ate little pieces of banana along with her regular breakfast of smushy rice cereal mixed with pureed fruit (pears in this instance). I put the wee squares on her tray for her to feed to herself, but she much preferred squishing them between her fingers and pushing them around the tray. So I put the pieces in her mouth for her. She ate 4 of them and spit 2 out; we consider that a success story.
• Weighty subject: According to our bathroom scale, Roxi weighs 17.5 pounds. And according to the clothes she is rapidly outgrowing, Roxi is getting longer/taller all the time. We won't have official numbers until her 9-month checkup on March 5.
• Big tub: Roxi will be taking her first bath in her new, fancy tub this afternoon. Look for pictures soon ...
• Dad rules: The sweet girl is looking forward to Daddy Daughter Night this evening, when she will be learning the finer points of airplane flying on daddy's knees, arms and everything else - and possibly the finer points of basketball cheering as well.

This Week

• Moo: Dairy products made their first debut in Roxi's diet yesterday in the form of yogurt. Prognosis is good.
• Boo: Tofu made its debut earlier in the week to mixed reviews.
• Happy hands: Roxi has learned how to wave. She treated her Nanna to big waves and smiles while shopping on Monday. It was the first time I'd ever seen such a thing. And now it seems like she waves at everything ... though, naturally, never on command. The waving consists of rapidly opening and closing her hands, fingers just a-flapping. Roxi's hands are usually facing away from the person (or object or imagined entity) she's waving at, which makes it all the more entertaining.
• Diaper bombs: Roxi's Nanna visited over the weekend, and a very sweet check-in agent at Frontier gave us special passes so we could go to the gate when she left. The part we didn't know ahead of time was that those with special passes get special treatment at security. Nanna looked on as Roxi and I got the full pat-down and metal detecting wand treatment. The security agents couldn't have been nicer though. They all put on new latex gloves before touching Roxi and took turns trying to make her laugh. Well worth the extra effort to hang out with Nanna at the gate.
• New ride: Our big girl has been too long/tall for her infant carseat since before Christmas. It took Rob and I a couple of weeks to decide which seat to purchase. Then we ordered it online. A week later it arrived ... damaged. So we had it picked up and its replacement arrived a week later. Which is my long-winded way of saying that Roxi has been enjoying her plush new seat for the past few days.

This Month

• On the move: Roxi can't crawl in the traditional sense of the action. However, she has mastered the soldier-style belly crawl and can get pretty much wherever she wants. In fact, she can go pretty darn fast if she's motivated. I learned this after I looked away for a moment the other day and then looked back to find Roxi halfway across the room attempting to chew on Teton (our large, black cat). Luckily, Teton seems either amused or ambivalent about Roxi's love offerings. He just sits there and takes it - the chewing, the pulling, the excited screaming. That cat will put up with anything for a little attention. Anyway, Roxi's forward locomotion is a lovely development. She will play on the floor for almost an hour at a time, happy to scoot toys around as well as herself. Time to truly babyproof the house.
• Up!: The Roxster has learned how to pull up from sitting. Her favorite activity is to use our fingers to propel herself to standing, followed closely by pulling up on her new Peek A Block activity cube. She will also pull up on one of her crib toys if properly positioned. Roxi hasn't learned how to pull up from lying down though, so we don't find her clinging to the sides of her crib or anything. Yet.
• Plenty to say: Roxi is known as "the conversation starter" at our Mommy & Me Pilates class. The girl has a lot to say. Especially if there are other children around. It generally goes a little something like this: "Da dee da da, NA NA, mo boo boo boo."
• Just add water: When held facing outward, Roxi will rhythmically thrash when she gets excited. To me, it looks like she's riding a bucking bronco. Rob calls it air swimming.

Roxi's first swim ... she's a splashing queen.

Big laughs in the hot tub!

Happy Snappy Holidays

Roxi had an incredible first Christmas. She got bunches of groovy, shiny wrapping paper, crinkly tissue paper, chompy ribbon and bangable boxes. Hours of flailing and tossing! Hours of happy chewing! Oh, and there was stuff inside all the wrapping that was pretty cool too, though she didn't really get around to all that until several days later.

Really though, Rob and I were amazed at the outpouring of gifts for the wee girl. Toys, stuffed animals, outfits and accessories from around the world ... Roxi is a lucky peanut indeed.

The best part of our Christmas celebrations, by far, was getting to see family and friends. Aunt Christa flew in on Dec. 21, and the 4 of us joined several pals for an Indian feast that evening. The next morning, Rob diagnosed and fixed the furnace, which had pooped out in the middle of the night (Roxi will hopefully inherit her dad's mechanical intellect and aptitude). Then Rob and Christa went to pick up Gamma Rose at the airport.

Roxi had several wacky, fun-filled days with Aunt Christa and Gammage, which included her first ever swim in their hotel pool. Dressed in just a swim diaper and a smile, Roxi splashed and splashed and splashed. She kicked, thrashed, dipped her head in the water and moved her arms in a remarkably swim-like fashion ... all in Rob's arms. The rest of us stood on the edge and took gobs of pictures.

Uncle Lee flew in late Christmas Eve, and Roxi had her FIRST first Christmas the next day. It took us so long to open all our presents that the sweet girl had to take 2 nap breaks.

On the 26th, Gammage, Aunt Christa and Uncle Lee headed to the airport. Gamma and Christa were homeward bound. Lee picked up G-Daddy, Mimi and Uncle Tyler and drove to Steamboat Springs. We Tusselwuppers spent the day packing and the evening driving to Steamboat. Roxi was a dreamboat throughout.

Then ... a week of skiing for most of us (except for Rob, who suffered an unfortunate shoulder injury on the first day), and a week of big time playing for Roxi and Mimi. The sweet girl enjoyed showing her family how to use pureed carrots as finger paint among other things. So, her SECOND first Christmas was at altitude.

Roxi's THIRD first Christmas was spent with her unofficial Colorado aunts and uncles - Ren, Scott, Jen and Mike - on Jan. 1.

Phew. We couldn't possibly have had better holidays. Roxi couldn't possibly have a cooler extended family. 2005 is going to be an outstanding year.

Roxi sporting her new Christmas hat and scarf, lovingly knitted by her bestest Aunt Christa.

Giddyup Daddy! We'd always heard that having kids would make us lose our hair, but we didn't know it would be THIS way.

Ye old Tusselwupper holiday family portrait.