Impromptu Zoo Trip

Yesterday, we were about to leave to go to the grocery store when Brittany, noting how beautiful the day was, declared, "Let's Go to the zoo!" This was Hana's first trip to the zoo and she saw real-life animals that she'd only seen depicted as toys or as drawings in children's books.

Hana was particularly taken with the Meerkats. We saw them as they were just finishing feeding time and they were really active. Brittany commented that they looked smaller than they do on TVs "Meerkat Manor."

There was a boa constrictor and a monitor lizard.

We saw giraffes, elephants and zebras.

The lions were really putting on a show.

But the tigers were too busy laying on their backs and loafing around to be bothered with posing for pictures.

The sun bear was out and we saw the flamingos being fed.

We had lunch at the cafe there. Hana didn't much care for the chicken nuggets (I took a bite - can't say I blame her) but Brittany and I were pleased with our burgers. Hana was actually much more enthusiastic about the box her meal came in than the meal itself.

This picture is just before she ripped the box to shreds.

Brittany (who in general has a distaste for zoos) was so taken with the place that she bought a zoo membership for the family. Since the zoo is so close, it makes a nice outing.

Hana also went on her first carousel ride at the little amusement park at the zoo. The rides there remind me of the ones they used to have at Perris Hill park in San Bernardino when I was little.

Merry Christmas one and all

Look what we did for Christmas...
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1841151515

Our little pirate...

Here are a few pics of our little pirate hamming it up for the camera.

Fun loving pirate

Menacing stare

Stalking Plunder

Aaarrr!

Rainy Winter in Oregon

We just got back from Oregon, where we visited friends & family. First, we flew to Portland and visited with Abbigail & John and their daughter, Alice. Abigail had done a lot of building up of the visit for Alice, showing her the blog and building the expectation of the arrival of "Baby Hana." So by the time we got there, Alice could hardly wait to meet Hana. The two girls really hit it off! Save for a bit of competition over who got to play with a particular toy at a given time (Hana hasn't learned "share" yet), they loved hanging out together.




Britt and I enjoyed hanging out with John and Abigail as well. We took the kids to the park and Hana loved the swings. She's quite the little daredevil and was swinging fairly high. She's like that in general, totally oblivious to any type of danger from her various acrobatics and such. On the one hand, it'll be less nerve-wracking for me when she starts to develop some awareness of the concept of "safety," but on the other hand, part of me hopes she never grows out of feeling like she can do anything.



I fear Hana may have been a bit of a bad influence on Alice. Anytime Hana threw herself down on the floor and started to throw a fit, Alice would copy her. Anytime Hana would start to get into the plants around the house, Alice had to follow suit.


But the nice thing was that they enjoyed playing together. I think the moms really got a kick out of it too.

After a brief stay in Portland, we took the train down to Eugene. We've found that its much less expensie to fly into Portland than to fly into Eugene and the train is a nice. low key way to get around. Alice wasn't prepared for Hana to be leaving and cried when she and her folks dropped us off at the train station.



Hana got to spend some time at her Grandpa Al & Grandma Peggy's house. They love having grandkids around and Hana, being the baby in the family, was a big hit.


We went to lunch with Peggy one day. She showed us around her job and we met her co-workers.

Hana ate up the attention from her Grandma Peggy and the rest of the family.

She also ate up lots of food. She had salmon for the first time at Grampa's house.

We took the train back up to Portland and Hana and Alice got to spend one last day together before we flew back to Oakland.

Meeting Santa

Merry Christmas!

Here's Hana during her visit with Santa. I hope Santa didn't feel too upstaged. In that fur suit, the Claus is usually the stand-out style connoisseur, but Hana is the little fashion maven herself in that little leather dress!

Happy (almost) Birthday, Hana!

jon and i decided to try and beat the holiday rush and throw hana's birthday party a couple of weeks early. we hosted it at gymboree, and when i say hosted, i mean, i paid them the money and they did everything. it was AWESOME!!!!!

hana had a blast as you can see from the pictures. in fact, she was so excited she peed right through her diaper and soiled her cute little birthday outfit within minutes of her arrival. she's generally squirmy during a diaper change but this one was war... sheesh! the bow on her head (a first for us) was the last vestige of the birthday outfit and even i have to admit, it was pretty cute. she got her own little cupcake to eat... it's the first real sugary thing she's eaten (besides a gelato we shared with her over the summer). it was a white cupcake with buttercream frosting and sugar sprinkles. she picked up the whole thing and shoved it in her face and took a couple of bites of frosting. but then she chucked it to the side and crawled through it. she was more interested in making cakey handprints on mommy's dark rinse jeans then actually eating it. fun for her. not so much for me.

hana got so many great gifts for her birthday. from mommy

and daddy, she got her first rocking horse. she seems to like it and i think that poor horse will see many, many more rides.

nana and granddad (in atlanta) got her her very own chair. she likes to kick back and take a bottle in her chair. but bailey, her little cat buddy, thinks that the chair is his, and that once, again, some new thing has come in the house for his benefit, but he will graciously share with the baby. she is highly incensed when she is shood from the chair even though he was perfectly comfortable. i know, we've got some nerve...

nevertheless, it was a good time for us and the kids and hana would like thank all the friends and family who came to play!

Thanksgiving in Wisconsin: 11 months old

the walker pettigrew family packed up our parkas and headed to the dairy state for Thanksgiving this year. this was hana's first trip to wisconsin and the first time Grandpa Jim and Grammy Manzy will have seen her since she was 3.5 weeks old. while they are faithful readers of the blog, it really doesn't compare to the real thing, obviously, so it was fun for them to get reacquainted.





while there, they were treated to witnessing hana's first steps!!!!! when she walks, she usually screams and carries on because she's so excited. i had to teach her to walk with her hands up though because she kept trying to look at her feet when she walked which caused many face plants. as a result, she looks like franken-baby when she walks, which is amusing.

grammy manzy is an avid collecter of dishes, glass ware and antiques. while in wisconsin, hana got to use a 100 year old high chair, which converted to a jr. seat, which converted to a stroller sort of thing which converted to a rocking chair. and of course, as with many 100 year old items, it lacked the safety features of today's baby equipment. this proved to be hours of entertainment for hana. she quckly learned that since the tray on the high chair does not slide in like the one at home, but rather lifts overhead like a swing arm or something, that she could send her cheerios flying... this meant that mommy and daddy always had one hand on the tray while we ate with the other.

















while we were there, hana got the worst diaper rash of her LIFE. we were mortified by it's swift onset. it accompanied a bad bout of diarrhea and forced us to come to the realization that she no longer fits a size 4 diaper anymore. yes, that's right. my ll month old baby wears a size 5 diaper (larger than her 3 year old cousin) and size 2T clothes. we can hardly keep up, i tell you. well, eventually, she recovered from her horrific rash attack and through it all, she remained in good spirits.

overall, wisconsin was a relaxing time. grandpa and grammy live in a very small town surrounded by farms and dairies. we arrived for the start of the deer hunting season so we expected it to sound like our old neighborhood in L.A. (that's how my dad described it the first time he experienced it... gunshots, but without the ubiquitous "ghetto birds", aka helicopters) but wouldn't you know it, we slept right through it. we did see hunter decked in head to toe orange ducking into every available wooden patch, and piles of dead deer in the backs of pick ups... cheery. never the less, a good time was had by all, and the time flew by.