Hard to Believe

It's hard to tell but what you are looking at in these pictures is rain.  A good steady rain that lasted about 2 minutes if I round up.  You know what that means....  Even more hot and humid now that it has stopped.  Chris says I am a rain pessimist.  But what I am is a rain realist.  Try working outside in a Dallas summer year after year with plants dying of thirst, ground cracking, skin burning, begging for some rain and never getting it. You would be pessimistic too.  But that's my Texas and I love her anyway- droughts, heat, humidity and all. 

What Now?

Well folks, my camera is dead.  It won't take a single picture.  I actually hope it will stay dead when I take it to get fixed this time so they don't think I'm crazy.  Then I get home and it doesn't work again.  I swear it's taunting me.  Chris and I went to Loveland, Colorado for a friend's wedding this weekend but I don't have any pictures to prove it.  We also hiked Bear Lake in the Rocky Mountain National Park but, again, no pictures.  Chris did take a couple with his phone of me looking very fat so I won't be uploading those onto the blog.  Until I get my camera fixed for good I probably won't be posting much.  Until then.....

Blooming Today at SMU

Silphium.

'Lord Baltimore' Hibiscus is a good perennial hibiscus for our area.

Lamb's ear.

Blackeyed Susans.

Althea.

Caesalpinia pulcherrima or Pride of Barbados.

Pride of Barbados.

Daylilies.

Scaevola or Blue Fan Flower.

Silphium.

Silphium.

Weekend Update

The camera is working again. Chris took it to Cooters last Friday. They messed around with the settings, said they couldn't find anything wrong with it, charged us nothing, and now it works. I love a free repair! So back to taking thousands of Edie pictures that all look a lot alike.  Edie is crawling, pulling up, trying to stand up from a crawl position, eating yogurt, cottage cheese, and much of what we are eating cut into tiny pieces. She begs at our plates like a hungry dog.  Since we eat on the floor it is easy for her to quickly get a hand into our plate of food. 

We took Edie to our local Knights of Columbus pool on Saturday evening.  I loved it!  Chris though isn't sold yet because it requires that you pay annually.  He would rather travel the city going from free pool to free pool forever.  We need to get on the waiting list which is supposed to be about 2 years long.  I spent every summer day of my childhood at the original KofC pool and I want Edie and Peanut to do the same. Plus once they can be in the pool by themselves, the parents just sit on the side and hang out.  And now they serve margaritas!

This is Edie's squat that she has learned to lower herself from a standing position to a seated position.  Before she would just fall over when she was ready to sit back down.

Like one of our cats she is immediately attracted to packing materials.

Helping me cook.

We now own a baby trailer for our bikes.  We took Edie out Friday evening.  She didn't seem too impressed but we enjoyed it.

Edie ate her first mashed potatoes last night.

Poor Edie

She really does look like a little boy sometimes but she acts like a tornado/bull/diva/sweetheart/curious George. Chris and I think she would make a wonderful child monarch. She would have no problem telling all the adults around her what to do or sentencing people to death.

Swimming Frog

Edie loves, loves, loves the water.  We try to take her swimming as much as possible.  We alternate between our friend Jeremiah's apartment pool at the Village and Nancy and Steve's home pool.  Every Tuesday evening she goes to her tadpole swim class.  She has learned not to stick her legs straight up in the air when she is floating on her back.  She can grab the side of the pool and we hope she'll learn to stop drinking the pool water soon.

Crawling Frog

Here is the crawling Frog yesterday afternoon.  She's loud and fast.

Weekend Update--Constant Motion

We went to a dinner party on Saturday night.  One of the other couples brought their 7 month old daughter.  The girl was a little angel.  She sat still in her mother's lap for at least 45 minutes.  Then she sat still in my lap for about 20 minutes.  Then she sat still on the floor for over an hour.  She quietly took her bottle and never got fussy even though it was getting late and was way past her bedtime.  We didn't bring Edie because she had a cold.  If we had brought her here's how it would of gone down.  Edie would of sat in my lap for .5 seconds, squirming immediately to get down.  I would have put her on the floor and proceeded to follow her around the entire house as she crawled from room to room.  I would also help her pull up on every piece of furniture in the house.  That would have gone on for about 1 hour.  Then she would start fussing because she was hungry so we would have fed here.  .0002 seconds after she took her last bite of food she would have insisted she get back down on the floor.  If she felt like being passed around the room from person to person (which she doesn't always agree to) she would have climbed all over that person until they couldn't take it anymore.  They would then have passed her to someone else or put her on the floor, at which time Chris and I would begin following her around again as she crawled throughout the house, again.  Around 7:00 she would have started to get fussy which would have escalated into a full on cry and Chris and I would have had to leave.  I'm not saying Edie isn't an angel because of course she is.  I'm just saying Edie has an agenda.  She's got stuff to do, constantly.  She needs to crawl over here, crawl over there, pull up on this, pull up on that, check out the dog water/dog food, crawl into the bedroom and try to chew on dad's shoes, crawl into the bathroom and pull up on the bathtub, it goes on and on.  Chris said that the very instant she takes her last sip of milk from a bottle she throws the bottle aside and pushes away from you, as if to say, "Get you hands off of me buddy.  I've got stuff to do that doesn't involve you."   Even before Edie could crawl she had an agenda.  She has NEVER been one to sit or lay around idly watching the world go by.  I wouldn't mind if she would for just one day but that's not her style.  Edie is go, go, go all the time.

Edie is recovering from her first cold.  Saturday morning she woke up with hardened mucus clogging up her little nose.  Poor thing!!  All that remains now is a cough.  It didn't slow her down, not one bit!

Here are some playtime pics from yesterday.

She always rubs the sides of chest like this when she is topless.

Frog in a Pretty Dress

Camera Probs

I will look into getting my camera fixed this weekend.  I hope the blog will be full of Edie pictures in the near future.

Sleeping Froggy

When Edie sleeps she sucks on her little comfort blanket.  Sweet Frog.  TGIF!!!!!!

No More Perdido Key for a While

The white sand beach at Perdido Key.

Chris and I and two other couples were planning on going to Perdido Key, Florida next month.  Chris and I have been there two other times and we consider it our summer spot.  Yesterday Chris found this on the internet.  The Eden condominiums mentioned are where we would be staying.  We canceled yesterday.  I know our canceled vacation is the very least of the problems the oil spill has created.  I cry every morning in the car as I listen to Morning Edition's reporting on the spill from Louisiana.  It's devastating and it's still pouring out of the well.  Florida... we'll be back eventually and I hope you'll be healthy and beautiful again.  Did yall hear that Kevin Costner testified on Capital Hill yesterday to pimp his machine that seperates oil from sea water?  Hey if it works, get it out there.

Perdido Key from above.

Swimming Frog

With a name like Frog it should come as no surprise that Edie loves the water.  Last night she attended her second tadpoles swimming class.  She is the youngest and the most enthused.  She is not the least bid scared of the water unlike some of the other, older kids.  She can barely concentrate on the task at hand though because he is staring hard at the other kids.  She is sooo happy after being in the pool. 

Here's a grainy picture from my mom's cell phone.

I think Edie and Chris are lower left.

Weekend Update

Sorry about this late post.  I know it was difficult to get through Monday and start your week without knowing what we did this past weekend.  I didn't go to work yesterday which means I wasn't at a computer.  I don't know why but I'm pretty paranoid about this pregnancy.  I keep thinking something is going to go wrong.  So yesterday morning when I woke and my pajama pants were wet I panicked and scheduled a doctor's appointment.  Turns out everything is okay.  The baby was moving around while we watched on the sonogram machine.  My appointment wasn't until 2:50 so I took advantage of a day off and slept almost all day at my parent's house while Pastora took care of Edie at our house.  Let me tell you this, this pregnancy is making me a zombie.  I haven't even brushed my teeth the last two nights because I couldn't get out of the bed and walk to the bathroom.  The worst part is that I was supposed to go the see Neil Young last night.  I bought the tickets several months ago before I knew I was pregnant.  The opening act started at 8:00 p.m.  My mom went in my place because I couldn't stay awake that late.  Apparently it was the most moving show ever.  I know I'm lame but I was sound asleep by 7:30 last night.

Here's the weekend.

Splashing in the tub.

See the Milo lookalike, Lord Gibbons.

In swim class they call the side of the pool the safe place.

Amy and Frog.

Steve teaching Edie some ballet positions.

Playing with knives is fun.

My first wagon.

Standing up in crib.