For the baby book

Sorry there was no Monday Morning Mia. We were away for the weekend and just haven't had time to catch up.

Mia had her 15 month appointment on Friday.
Vital stats: 20 lbs 11 oz, almost 30 inches long. She's in the 10-15th percentile for both height and weight. The doctor always tells us that Mia is perfectly proportional. Her head is another story--it weighs in in the 70th percentile. While she may look just like Ben, she seems to have gotten my big head.

Sadly, Mia's a little under the weather right now. She began to feel sick yesterday at babysitting and is still fighting something off. She's been napping on and off today. Hopefully she'll feel better soon and be up and running again.

More soon.

My generation

It's come to this.

I've been doing a lot of reading for my dissertation. My original topic was focused on how teachers in middle career are affected by mandated change (like No Child Left Behind). When I dug into the data, however, I found that there are really significant differences between how teachers from different generations feel about their teaching and their careers. So, I've been delving into a lot of sociological literature about generations, specifically Boomer, Gen X and Gen Y.

These readings are fascinating. First of all, I learned that my brother and I are technically in different generations. I suppose there are shades of gray in these areas, but it was worth noting.

A lot of what I've been reading talks about parenting. We (Gen X/Y) have been raised to think we can do everything we want, especially those of us who are women. We were never told that we couldn't be President or a professional baseball player or a firefighter. We were also never told that we had to stay home and keep the home fires burning. Among my women friends with children, there are people making all kinds of choices: part-time work, full-time work, flex-time work, stay at home. There are fathers who stay home while the wife works, and grandparents who travel great distances to watch children while both parents work or study. We can thank our Boomer parents for the freedom of these choices. Many of them didn't have the same options we do, but many also fought hard to secure hard-won victories in the work place to ensure that women could work equally alongside their male counterparts.

The other side of this, though, is the fact that we can't really have it all. I don't think anyone is completely happy with their "choices." Those who work often love their work but wish they could spend more time at home with their children. Those at home often wish they could be back in the workplace using the skills they worked so long and hard for prior to having children. Those working part-time often wish they had the economic luxuries that two full incomes provide.

All of this is to say that there are huge generational differences relating to parenting and working that are so interesting to read about. Unlike the Boomers and prior generations, we gen xers were raised to put ourselves above just about everything. We were praised for our good work even if it was sometimes mediocre. We're now doing the same for our children, teaching them that their interests come first, their needs are urgent. It's not a good or bad thing, it's just a thing.

In terms of my dissertation, these generational differences matter when it comes to career commitment. Boomers stayed in careers for 35 years; it wasn't assumed there were options. For my generation, though, we hop and bop around jobs, most never staying anywhere longer than five or seven years. This difference has major implications for teachers. If there is such constant turnover, there will never be a long-term workforce to teach our children. I want to look at what this means, and what, if anything, can be done.

In the meantime, however, I'm still reading all of this generational stuff. I was listening to NPR today and they were playing a piece about the 40th anniversary of St. Pepper's by the Beatles. For the people calling in, this album was a huge turning point. The crazy 60s, drugs, freedom, you name it. For me, the songs they were playing reminded me of The Wonder Years on tv. Talk about generational differences!

So, if Sgt. Peppers and songs like this are significant to the previous generation, what's our anthem? Loyal readers, please comment! I need to include this in my dissertation. What song defines our generation?

Monday Morning Mia

The rain has finally stopped here. We had a very wet weekend, leaving us to mostly indoor activities. Ben took Mia to the MFA to see the Hopper exhibit, and we did a little home shopping at Home Depot.

This Friday is Mia's 15 month appointment. I'm actually looking forward to seeing the doctor, just so she can see how much Mia has grown. I think she's put on a little weight since she's been eating so well and drinking so much milk, and she's definitely hit a little growth spurt. She has also turned into a virtual dance machine. If you so much as mention that she shake her booty she will oblige with glee. She continues to say more and more words. Her new favorite is "Up!" which she uses both to ask to be picked up and to tell us she's going up the stairs. She knows almost all of her body parts and loves to sing Head, shoulders, knees & toes. She points to her knees and toes during the song--it's just too fast for her to do all the other parts. Her other favorite word is ball. We got her a big purple ball over the weekend, which she petted the whole way home in the car, singing "Ball, ball, ball, ball..."

Toddlerhood is so much more fun than I thought it would be. Each day she wakes up and I wonder what new thing she'll learn. She loves to pretend in her kitchen and sing songs to her dolls in her crib. She loves to pick new books and read them, repeating the new words over and over. She is desperately trying to eat with a spoon and drink from a cup without help, and she's pretty much there if you don't mind a little mess. The skills just keep coming, each day a new one to add to the repertoire.

Someone asked me the other day if Mia is a social kid. In many ways, she really is. She does very well in her babysitting group and one-on-one with other kids. She loves to play with older kids, and seems to enjoy getting lots of attention from adults. On the other hand, she's not one for groups. If I take her to the playground, she kind of stays on the fringe or goes to the slide by herself instead of running over to other groups of kids. I suppose in most ways she's a true product of her parents--neither of us is particularly gregarious. We prefer small groups, which explains why we're more likely to host a small dinner party instead of a huge blowout. It's amazing to see the whole nature vs. nurture theory in action with Mia. She'll of course be her own person, and an incredible one at that, but in many ways she's also an extension of us and how we live our lives. It will be interesting to see how much of us we see in her as she continues to grow, and how much she'll differentiate herself from us along the way.

Rainy Saturday

Lazy day here at the house. Cold spring rainy day, nothing to do but lots and lots of laundry, and play with our girl. She's got some new toys, notably a large plastic kitchen to work with. There'll be more on Monday, but for those of you stuck inside, this is how we have fun.

Monday Morning Mia

This time it's really me, not Ben typing as me.
It's finally quiet here. We did babysitting coop at our house today and four toddlers, even while two are sleeping, make a whole lot of noise. Add in a dog who desperately wants to play and you get a very loud house.

We had a lovely mother's day here. We had friends over for brunch, and the day was absolutely glorious. Ben and Mia got me the kitchen apron I had been asking for, so now I can bake and cook to my heart's content without so much as a crumb on my pants. I've actually been cooking much more in this kitchen, and with more success than usual. Yesterday I made a frittata that was one of my better dishes, and it got more compliments than almost anything I've ever made before. I also made a lemon cake on Thursday that Ben said was a 9 out of 10, which I think is pretty good.

Mia is talking up a storm these days. She has real words now--ball, shoe, hat, more, bottle, milk. It's incredible how much she can learn in a single day. It's no wonder she needs so much sleep--that brain has to do a lot of processing!

We are also fully weaned. Last Tuesday was Mia's last time nursing. It wasn't as traumatic for either of us as I had thought. Mia happily gulps down nearly 20 oz of milk per day now, and I'm happy to be a little more free than I felt before. She still lets me snuggle with her as she drinks her bottle, so really it's about the same as before.

Our house is coming together, too. We bought some flowers for the back yard, and finally got some chairs for the table. Please come visit!

ABC Dance

Everybody has that one song that transports us back to our youth. Maybe it's "Deperado", or "Summer of '69. It's that one song that, when played on the radio, makes us stop what we're doing and reflect on who we once were. That distant look comes over us, and nostalgia takes hold, if only for a few seconds.

Well now that Mia has almost 15 moths to boast of, she's got her own song that reminds her of when she was younger.

(Or maybe she just loves slow dancing with her bear)

Mother's Day

We'll do a quick video soon of Mia and her dancing bear, but I can't let Mother's day slide without some pictures. Before we get to the festivities however, Mia has taken to sharing a bottle with her doll



In an attempt to get her to eat her eggs, Corrie found special Japanese molds for making your hard boiled eggs that much more fun to eat



and last but not least, we were lucky enought to have a number of friends and their kids come by this morning for an extended brunch, play date.



Ok, now get back to work, and stop reading blogs on the company's time.

Monday Morning Mia

Sorry for the late post--time just gets away from us sometimes.
It's a cool night here in Beantown. The windows are open in our living room and the back door is open for the dog, giving us a nice cross-breeze. The house smells of spring air and freshly ground coffee. Walter is out in his yard barking at the imaginary nuisances out there, and Mia just went down for the night. We're catching up on yesterday's Times and listening to the radio in the background.

We took Mia for Indian food for dinner, and she ate good amounts of everything. The waiters there are all madly in love with her and went out of their way to bring her a cup with a straw, extra napkins, and even extra papadum.

We're all pretty beat around here. Mia's grandparents visited this weekend while Ben went to New York to help Matt set up his new place. She really seemed to enjoy seeing them and having extra people to show off all of her new funny things. Over the weekend, she learned how to sing new songs, scrub the tub, and rock in a rocking chair.

Mia has been changing at such a rapid pace it's hard to even begin to describe the changes, let alone keep up. She really seems to understand a lot of words, even if she can't say them. For example, I asked her to bring her doll into the living room, and she went into her room and brought her doll out. I bought her a doll stroller to play with, which she seems to like. At least, she seems to like it to push around puzzle parts and her stuffed basset hound.

Right now, the biggest change is that Mia is almost fully weaned. I have been pretty ready to make that change for a while, but Mia wasn't on board with the plan. Over the last week or so, though, she has begun to gulp down huge amounts of cow milk. We're down to half a nursing a day, right before bed, and at this point it's really just for my own sake, not hers. I think she's pretty much fully done. I'm happy that it's on her terms and that she's making this jump, but even though I have been wanting to get to this point it's of course bittersweet. She's really not a baby anymore, and I'll miss the cuddling that went along with the nursing. I know she'll need us for so many things for a good long time, but nursing was the last thing that she truly needed that only I could give her. I'll miss the special time with her each day, but I'm so happy to see her off and running on her own, literally.

This picture is just a little reminder of Mia while she's still young. We should probably wash it (it's sunflower butter on the dishwasher, if you can't discern) but it's just too cute.