The Good, the Bad and the Ugly – Emma Style

Before I get into the heart of this post, I want to commend Michele for making every single post. Nearly a year ago I decided that it would be really great to have a blog. I thought I would write, at a minimum, every single week and more likely twice a week. I am sure you have noticed that Michele has done every single one. More than that, in the beginning, Michele was not so keen on the idea of blogging – which of course lead to my suggestion that I would do it and she wouldn’t have to worry about it. Now, Michele likes blogging and she was the one who had to convince me to write this one. Without further delay, here goes THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE UGLY:

THE GOOD:

Father’s Day weekend was absolutely incredible. First, Emma hung out with her cousins Kate and Jake at the Exploratorium. In reality, Emma slept while Michele chased me around the museum. (Although there is an incredible video of Michele playing with wind, available upon request.)  Afterwards, we, along with the Wangs (Ted, Michele, Kate, and Jake) and more Wangs (Tom and Buffy) went to lunch, where finally Emma woke up. Of course she demanded to be fed at the exact moment our food arrived. Needless to say, the day was so tiring that when we got home, Emma and I each took a nap. That evening, we headed over to Ryan and Kelly’s place for a BBQ with Emma’s friend Louden and his parents Michael and Stephanie. Emma dominated her performance until about 8:00pm when she suddenly and not unexpectedly turned into screaming Emma. It was a good day.

Father’s Day was one of the simplest and most enjoyable days ever. I got a rare treat – sleeping past 6:00am. Followed by alone time with Emma the Magnificent. She showed me many of her skills: rolling over, eating books, screaming, and laughing. We followed that up with a family breakfast and nap time for Emma. My favorite part of the day came when Emma and I took a walk to get some Mitchell’s ice cream. Emma was excited before we left and was talking throughout the walk. One of her new things is reaching for and grabbing plants and flowers. She succeeded many times on the walk. Michele knocked the day out of park by baking a Denver Chocolate Pudding Pie that was so chocolately that Michele could not even finish her piece. (Thanks to Chris and Carissa for helping us finish it off the next day.) Above all, I loved being with my family. After being apart the previous week, being together was the best gift.

I should also mention that Emma is now more than six-months old. She weighs 15 pounds and is 25.5 inches long. She is a smiling and laughing machine, who is pretty good at sitting up on her own. She has also started a fitness routine, doing stomach crunches. The whole thing is quite funny because she only gets her head and shoulders up a few inches and after trying for a few seconds her face turns read and she falls back to try the whole thing again.

THE BAD:

It is hard to find a Bad, but not impossible. A quick summary: First, the week preceding Fathers’ Day, Emma and Michele were out of town for a few days. Second, I cleaned up the most disgusting dog poop ever. In order to explain number two (no pun intended, honest), I need to explain number one. For the week proceeding Father’s Day, the three of us ventured to Los Angeles so Michele could work at E3 (a big gaming conference in which Nintendo is an active participant). We flew down to LA on Saturday and Debra picked us up and brought us to Bob and Marcia’s, who were out of town until Sunday. We spent part of Saturday with Emma’s great-grandparents who enjoyed every moment of Emma-time.

Everything was going smoothly until Sunday morning. As normal, Emma woke up around 6:00 am. I took her down stairs to let Gracie (the dog) upstairs. Upon opening the door, I was hit by one of the most pungent and putrid odors of all time – massive amounts of dog poop. Gracie defecated all over the entire kitchen floor. There appeared to be numerous trails throughout the kitchen. My description, does not do it just justice. (Photo available upon request.) I informed Michele, who grabbed Emma and then informed me she was taking care of Emma. I spent the next two hours cleaning dog poop off the floor.

Anyway, after Marcia returned and had two days to recuperate, I returned to SF and spent the next three nights without Emma and Michele. So sad.



THE UGLY:

Emma’s nanny quit. Obviously, we are disheartened because she was so fond of Emma, Emma really liked her, and we had liked her too. But I guess all good things must end and I have no doubt that we can find somebody else to replace her. Her last day with us will be no later than August 1. So we bid her au revoir et bonne chance.

The last few weeks...

It’s been a long time since my last post. Work was quite busy with E3 approaching but now it’s over.

Things have been really good with the Wyman clan. Emma is developing wonderfully and is even ahead of the gang in some aspects. She loves to roll over – she can roll onto either side when placed on tummy time. The second we put her on her tummy she rolls over – we think it is really cute but we know that she hates tummy time so much that she does whatever she can to get off her tummy.

Emma is also sitting up on her own. She stays upright for a little bit but eventually she falls over. She is getting really good at it and loves to sit up. She tries to pull herself up when she is laying down – it is incredible to see how strong she is.

Emma hasn't really taken to eating solids. We have tried so many types of food - applesauce, carrots, sweet potatoes, sweet peas, and zucchini - and she really dislikes them all. She also doesn't like the taste of water. We don't understand that one since she drinks milk and most of it is water anyhow. We are continuing to try but it is a bit frustrating. We just guess that maybe she isn't ready for them.
Emma has started to go to sleep between 7:30/8 at night. It’s nice because Jamey and I get to spend some time together before we go to sleep. She is also getting more sleep a night which is good for her. She is waking up around 6/6:15.

We think Emma is teething but we aren’t sure. She might have been going through a growth spurt but we go to the doctor tomorrow and we will see what she has to say. She was fussy and didn’t want to eat so much for a few days. She is back to her normal self but she is putting everything and anything in her mouth. We have to watch her so closely because if she can grab it then it will go in her mouth.
Something Emma did the other week really surprised us. We never knew this was possible but she proved us wrong. She was sleeping with her legs in the air! She was sleeping and we passed by her room... when we looked in we saw that she had her legs in the air - we thought she was awake but quickly realized that she was fast asleep. We are fully aware that Emma likes playing with her feet but sleeping with them in the air - that never crossed our minds. We got a picture of it but it didn't come out so great. But you can be the judge.

A couple of weeks ago, my Uncle Jeff was visiting Danny and he came over to see us. It was nice to see him and Danny. Uncle Jeff gave her a toy and she loves it.
Work is going well for me. As I said, it has been really busy but hopefully things will calm down a bit now that E3 is over. (E3 is the biggest video game industry conference of the year) I had to be in LA all last week so Emma came with me. She was fantastic on the plane. She is a great travel companion. She stayed with my parents and it was really nice that they were able to spend quality time with her. Jamey came down for the first few days too to help with the transition since my parents just came back from Europe. Emma and my parents loved spending time with one another. Emma was an angel and I think she will be welcome back there anytime.

Emma also spent some quality time with her Great Grandma and Grandpa, as well as her Aunt Deb, Uncle Ryan and Emily. Everyone seemed to enjoy her and we can't wait to see everyone again soon.

Emma's hair is getting so long. It is growing like wild fire - I wish my hair grew like that. Also she has the longest eyelashes - they are so pretty. I am so jealous!!! She takes after her dad in that respect.

I am now working from home on Wednesdays which I am so happy about. I will get to spend some time with Emma during the day… lunch. I also won’t have to deal with the commute to the office so that will give me more time with her in the morning and in the evening.

We had a great weekend. Jamey is going to write a post about his first Father’s Day and what we did.

Stay tuned for that…

The last few weeks...

Before, during and after Memorial Day

Before, during and after Memorial Day

Emma is the best baby. She is really the cutest thing and is amazing us every day. She continues to do really well with Laetitia and that makes going to work that much easier. Emma got her first boo boo – she got a little bruise on her noise and it looked like a carpet burn. She was a trooper though – she only cried for a second and had two little dots of blood.

She also tried a couple new foods this week. We made zucchini and carrots for her. We first gave her zucchini for three days and she didn’t really love it. She would make the funniest faces and while she pushed most of it out of her mouth, she did eat some. We then moved on to carrots and she didn’t care for those so much either. We got some really cute pictures of her trying these foods but we think we need to give her something sweeter next time. We will soon give her some fruit and hopefully she will eat it J We did buy a sweet potato and sugar snap peas at the farmer’s market this weekend so we will probably make those first and then give her fruit. We will see. She does love sitting in her highchair so we put her in it when we make dinner or just need a place to put her. It has taken the place of her bouncy chair.

Emma has really gotten the hang of her long afternoon nap, which is great and maddening at the same time. We have never been able to get her to sleep that long with us and don’t understand how Laetitia does it!!! So going into the weekend, our goal was to get her do a long nap with us. We decided that we were going to be very active in the morning and be back at the house in the afternoon so she could take her long nap in her crib. And guess what… we got her to take a long nap with us. We were so thrilled! She is so much happier when she takes this nap and we are elated that we were able to get her to do it.

Emma continued to roll over this weekend too. We weren’t sure if it was a fluke last weekend because she didn’t do it all week but she was rolling all over this weekend. It is so much fun to watch her do it. She was rolling over from each side and that was new.

One thing that was new is she was moving all over her crib on Sunday. She used to stay in one place but we found her head where her feet were – she rotated 180 degrees. We thought it was going to be a onetime occurrence but we found her rotated 180 degrees or 90 degrees a few different times.

We had a fun-filled holiday weekend with lots and lots of visitors. Emma was very excited to see everyone and greeted everyone who came through our door with a smile. She is so personable, friendly and social – it is really wonderful to see.

The weather was absolutely beautiful this weekend so we spent as much time outside as possible. Emma sported her sunglasses and sunhat with style!! (see picture with Chris) We can’t wait till we go to Palm Desert so she can wear her swimsuit too! She will be the cutest girl in the world.

Grandma Barbara came on Sunday and we all went to the Zoo. Emma really enjoyed seeing the flamingos but that was it. She didn’t seem interested in the other animals – but we liked that we got out of the house and did something. We don’t think we will be going back to the Zoo anytime soon.

Then on Monday Randi and Brian and Meredith and Jason came over. We were so excited to see Randi and Brian because I haven’t seen them since they got married. I couldn’t go to their wedding because I couldn’t travel (I was 9 months pregnant) and it was the first time they got to see Emma. Brian was scared at first to hold Emma but I just threw her in his arms. He did great! Emma also really liked pulling his hair. He didn’t like it so much but we all were getting a kick out of it.

It was also so great to see Meredith and Jason. We all got a chance to celebrate their engagement. Mer and Jason are so happy and they want Emma to be a flower girl in their wedding. We know it is a ways away but Emma is going to look so cute all dressed up and walking down the aisle!

I loved spending so much time with Emma this weekend. I never tire of it!! I just kept looking at her, playing with her toys, sitting up almost all on her own, eating food and growing up so fast. Time is going by so fast and it needs to slow down. She is such a big girl already! I love her so much – it’s an incredible feeling! Jamey and I love being parents and feel so fulfilled.