Toddler excursions into taxidermy and photography

Shirley's teddy bear, photo taken by Shirley

On Saturday, we went to Cat's house to celebrate the arrival of BTK ("Broken Toothed Killer") from the taxidermist. I was slightly nervous about taking Shirley to the open house, but decided to anyway. For the last eight months or so, our Saturday morning routine has been that she and  I go to the farmer's market for a few hours. Now that the market is closed for the winter (because really, who wants to go shopping at an out door market when it's windy and rainy and 35 degrees?) Shirley has been having difficulty adjusting to the new (marketless) routine.

Every Saturday, she wakes up and asks "Me go market?" and then has a meltdown when I try to explain the concept of "closed." (Techno-baby that she is, we've settled on telling her "it's buffering, just like Netflix does. It just takes a lot longer to buffer.") So I thought an open house gathering with friends would be a great Saturday event--as long as she didn't get freaked out by the large dead cougar that was the guest of honor.

[stuffed] cougar, photo taken by Shirley

Shirley and the cougar

She thought it was great! As soon as she saw that people were posing for pictures with it, she wanted her picture taken with it. Then, she wanted to take pictures of it and everything else in the house. Like the picture of "Teddy," her bear that she carries with her everywhere. She's got a good eye! 

First words

Shirley has hit that developmental stage where she's started babbling. She talks to us, the radio, her hands, her toys--anything that strikes her fancy. She spent most of the time I was watching her before work Saturday talking to our bookshelves!

But it's always "ah-goo gaba gaba" sort of stuff. Nothing remotely recognizeable as any form of English, even babytalk.

Except for yesterday. Yesterday as she was in mid-fussing to be picked up, she said "me me me!"
Brian and I were shocked and wondering if we'd really heard what we thought we'd heard. Sure enough, thirty seconds later, it came again: "Mimi!"

Good thing we didn't commemorate her personality by nicknaming her something profane!

"Breast is Best!"

Although all the infant development books swear she's at least a month early, it looks as though Shirley has started teething. Suddenly, I feel no urge to breastfeed her.

Why? Because even at the best of times this whole breastfeeding thing has been as though Society is pressuring me to allow a small rabid woverine to bite my nipples off several times daily. And when I've expressed reservations about this practice, Society has begun lecturing me on how vitally important it is that I do what's best for the wolverine.

Thank God for my breastpump. It allows me to give Shirley most of the benefits of breastfeeding while avoiding the puncture wounds.

Roadtrips and Relatives

It's been a bit since my last post, for a variety of reasons. (One of them has been fussing nonstop for the last hour.)

Also, visitors who came to admire both the city and the baby.

This is Kara and Caitlin, who are from Nome. Kara and her two other sisters visited us at the Bed and Breakfast last year during their spring break. This year, Caitlin was able to come, but Meghan and Hayley weren't. They'd been planning to visit us March 22-29th since before we knew we were expecting Shirley. And once we knew we were moving here to San Francisco, that just meant that they'd be coming here rather than to Overland Park.

So we took them to Golden Gate Park, etc. (Here's a picture of them in front of the DeYoung museum.)

Then Mom came to visit the next week. She spent most of the time cuddling with Shirley, which meant that I was able to get caught up on laundry for the first time in a decade or so.


And the obligatory stalking the baby for pictures photo.

And my latest pair of socks (finished last night!) and the offspring. Brian says I'm "forcing my hobbies" on our daughter, but I just think the sock wanted its picture taken with the most beautiful thing in the house.


Wednesday, we went on "Baby's First Road Trip" to Big Basin Redwoods State Park.

California might not be so bad after all.

The "Song of Roland" and other lullabies

I am not a "lullaby person." Frankly, I find them inane. (Go ponder the words to "Rock a Bye Baby." Think about what they actually mean, and then tell me that's something that's appropriate to fill small children's heads with.) I think singing them is insulting to the intelligence of the child you're trying to get to sleep. I didn't sing them when I watched other people's children, and I can't bring myself to sing them to Shirley.

But when she's fussy, Shirley likes to have someone talking to her. And as the sleep deprivation that life with a newborn entails makes me feel very brain-damaged, I have a hard time coming up with things to say to her that aren't as puerile as your average lullaby.

Enter the "Song of Roland." In a constant attempt to overcome my lingering insecurities about growing up redneck, I keep thinking I need to read more "great works of literature." So since I have a book with the complete text of several medieval epics, I've been reading it aloud to her.

I'm about halfway into it, and I've come to a conclusion: Roland is a punk. And even after reading this far, I'm still not sure why they named the song after him. Although you may not like your stepfather, it's just tacky to volunteer him as the French hostage to the Saracens. This being a medieval epic, I'm sure his stepfather Ganelon's treacherous plotting with the Saracens to have Roland and the rest of Charlemagne's rearguard killed off will result in a very messy death for Ganelon, but all the same, I'm still hoping that Roland bites it as well.

"Great literature" or not, I'm still not convinced that "Roland" is any more appropriate for small children than "Rock a Bye Baby." While less people die than in the Old Testament, their ends are recounted in far more graphic detail. Of the demise of one Saracen lord, who gets multiple spear wounds and keeps on fighting, the poet writes (John O'Haggan translation) "Were he Christian, what a baron he!"

Oh well, it'll still probably require less counseling to set her straight than if I start singing lullabies.