11 months: Seattle and walking, walking, walking!

The second half of our winter vacations brought us out to Seattle, where we enjoyed introducing Fiona to Charlotte's home turf. Our first stop was with Auntie Gail and Uncle Fred, where we were treated (as always) with fine wine, fine food, and wonderful hospitality. We celebrated New Year's Eve with four generations of Boettiger/Cooneys, and had a great time even though we didn't quite make it until midnight. (I later found out that my 97 year old grandmother had beaten us all, and had managed to stay up to ring in the New Year!)

Charlotte's family also hosted a wonderful reception for us later that week, which gave us a chance to catch up with many friends and family in the area. In addition to meeting many new people, Fiona also had the chance to see some of Seattle's many attractions, including Pike Place Market and the Space Needle. She was a great traveler as always, and we're hoping that her love for new foods such as seafood bisque (as evidenced by her wide open mouth in the photo below) suggests that she won't become a picky eater!

Highlights from the rest of the week included staying with Sara and John, where Fiona got to play with Katy and Jack (and their dog Boone!), then staying with Michele and Andy, where Fiona enjoyed playing with Linus and Ramona. Her walking skills were improving steadily the whole time, and although she was only taking a few tentative steps when we left North Carolina, by the time we were ready to head home she could walk around the airport with us. There are far to many photos to post on this blog, so be sure to check out the whole album at this link.

Finally, here is Fiona posing for her 11 month photo. We probably took 60 photos before we got a decent shot, since Fiona decided that getting out of the chair as fast as possible was a great game to play with Dad, but as always we're happy to have such an energetic and sun-shiny baby!

first steps, first Christmas, sledding & snowshoeing in Colorado: Fiona at 10 months

After recovering from her bout with H1N1 flu this fall, Fiona is now back on her feet, and took her first steps on December 14th! Since then she's been getting better at walking by the day, and enjoys careening from one object to another, where she can steady herself and head back to where she started. Winter brought Fiona her first experience of the Christmas season, and she has been enthusiastically pointing at Christmas trees and lights while exclaiming "buh!" and "tah!". We decided to celebrate my last year of lengthy winter vacations by taking a two and a half week trip out to Colorado and Seattle, so after finishing up an AI in internal medicine and an interview with the Duke neurology program, we packed an unreasonable amount of luggage into the car and headed off for Fiona's 4th round of air travel. The photo above shows Fiona getting ready to head to the airport, and the one below is her posing for her 10 month photo in Fort Collins, after arriving at Grandma and Grampa Cooney's house.

In Colorado we were all treated to a white Christmas with 6 inches of fresh snow, which allowed us to introduce Fiona to "real" winter. After some mild protest about being so bundled up, she soon discovered that snow allows for sledding, and after that I think that she was won over.

We hadn't known if Fiona would still be too young to really enjoy Christmas, but with the room full of four generations of family (ages 10 months to 1171 months), colored lights, and crinkly wrapping paper, she had tons of fun. My parents' cats continued to keep their distance for the most part, although Sam did warm up a bit to Fiona, and even consented to some petting (and some fur-pulling). The rest of the week included trips to Lory State Park, the Odell and New Belgium Breweries, and a visit to Rocky Mountain National Park, where we repeated the hike to Dream Lake, where Fiona first reached 10,000 feet in May, at less than 3 months old. We had perfect weather, and it was a great trip! Finally, after finishing up our week in Colorado we boarded our next flight to Seattle, and we'll have photos from that trip posted soon. In the meantime, more photos from our recent adventures are posted here.

9 months: road trip, influenza, ER, relatives

Lots of news and events for Fiona in the past month. First, to start things off, we had my lab over for a pumpkin carving fest & Fiona had a chance to show off her Halloween costume (a giraffe!). Dad not only carved a fine pumpkin, but he tried mightily to ride a unicycle...

Jeff took his board exam later that week, followed by our next family adventure: a road trip to D.C. I was there to serve on a grant review panel for NIAAA, and Fiona & Jeff came along for the ride. We met up with Dad's high school friend Mark Yarnell for dinner one night, and with Grandpa Cooney the next night. He was coincidentally in town for a meeting and was even in a hotel not too far away. After my work was done, we spent a couple of hours checking out the National Zoo with Grandpa before piling back in the car to drive home.

Back at home, Jeff interviewed for the UNC Neurology Residency program (very successfully!), and one by one, we fell to what was most likely H1N1 flu. Fiona went first, and her duration was shortest, likely because she was the most immunized. She did unfortunately end up with pneumonia though, so we spent a not very fun Sunday in the ER, where Fiona "enjoyed" her first chest x-ray. She responded quickly to the antibiotics and we're all pretty much well now. Jeff's folks came out from Colorado to the Hampshire Ct. infirmary, and then Auntie Kim and her beau Juta came down from Boston to spend Thanksgiving. In addition to having to make the usual efforts to avoiding a 5 pound weight gain over the holidays, they also had to evade swine flu!

Here is Fiona at 9 months. Her big new skills these days are pointing at things that catch her attention, standing independently, waving bye-bye, and fishing snacks out of her "snack trap" cup. She even says "buh-buh" when she waves bye-bye, which we think is intentional. She can also climb up whole flights of stairs, but we're trying to avoid letting her do that... More photos of this month's adventures are here.

Baby games

This is one of our favorite recent videos, which I think of as "fun with object permanence." Fiona loves it when objects (or people) disappear and reappear, as shown here!

The great 8: a picnic, camping, hiking the AT, a tractor pull, a ferris wheel, and a pony ride!

 We enjoyed one of the last summery days by heading out to Duke Gardens for a picnic, where Fiona proved that she was our offspring by immediately liking fresh Guglhupf bread with aged goat cheese. Mmmm!

Our next family adventure was much bolder: we drove out to the mountains to hike a segment of the Appalachian Trail.The impetus was a cool event to commemorate the Dartmouth Outing Club's 100th anniversary, in which the DOC organized 900 hikers to hike the entire trail in one day. We picked a segment in Tennessee not too far from the N.C. border. I was happy because it meant we would fulfill my goal of camping before Fiona turned 1. Jeff was happy because it gave him a reason to hit REI and get that sweet frame baby backpack that he's been dreaming about since we knew we were having a baby!



We found a great little campsite on Watuga Lake in Cherokee National forest. We all managed to sleep reasonably well, although Jeff was forced to confront the harsh truth that our baby girl is too large to sleep in a laundry basket... Here she is crashing for the night in the tent (with Swingsley!) and waking up the next morning.

Our next family adventure was a trip to the North Carolina State Fair in Raleigh. In the picture to the left, we are shown attending a tractor pull. We actually paid money to enjoy this spectacle due to my poor negotiation of the online ticket website. While we were there, we told Fiona that if she ever expresses a desire for a temporary tattoo of the confederate flag on the small of her back, she's going to boarding school in Vermont....

Fiona enjoyed seeing lots of animals at the fair, including a barn full of bunnies, and teams of racing pigs, goats, and ducks. Plus, she got to go on her first pony ride!

We also introduced her to the pleasures of the midway: carnival rides and food on a stick! We ate a month's worth of fried food - our favorite were the fried pickles (although the free hush puppies weren't bad). Here's one of my latest favorite photos showing Fiona on her first ride: the ferris wheel.

Here's Fiona attacking her first caramel apple. As far as we can tell, she thought this was the best thing she'd ever eaten. You can see more photos from our month's adventures, including videos of her pony ride and caramel apple eating posted here.

And finally, here is Fiona at 8 months, clad all in velour and clapping, as she does these days when she's pleased. She had official "school pictures" taken the previous day, so we may have those to post eventually too.

Biting, bonking, babbling, and baby gates: Fiona at 7 months

A lot has been going on for Fiona since our last post. For instance, all that biting finally paid off, and she cut her first teeth, as she shows off here. The first top tooth broke through yesterday, so you can expect to see those top teeth in next month's post.

She has also abandoned the army crawl and is now a crawling pro as she shows off on the left, where she is playing "Find Mama". Her avid crawling has stimulated a flurry of baby gate installation, as Jeff demonstrates to the right.

Fiona is loathe to sit still these days, so it was tricky to get her to sit still for her 7 month old portrait. Here was one pretty reasonable shot. We had to prevent her from climbing off the chair head-first several times, which relates to the other theme of the month: bonking. She's been doing a lot of head and face bonking as she learns to keep her balance while navigating her world. Just this morning she raised our hair by climbing up the two stairs out of the living room. Yikes!

She's compelled to pull up to stand on whatever is available: chairs, tables, Mom or Dad, laundry baskets, and her favorite: her little stool, as shown here. She makes a beeline for it every morning. The sharp corners make us nervous, given her "bonking" tendency, so we're trying to teach her the phrase "be careful".

Grandpa Cooney was in town for a quick visit & we all went out to a farm nearby to pick pumpkins. Turns out that it was the first pumpkin patch visit for all of us! Fiona was pretty tired, but she seemed to enjoy the visit. Here she is hanging out with some pumpkins. Although it's not pictured here, Jeff found the very biggest pumpkin in the patch to take home...

Finally, Fiona has been babbling up a storm, which you can see in a video posted here.The first thing she started saying was actually "Blah, blah, blah", which cracked up us. Here's photo where she's babbling  AND standing, two of her favorite things to do.

6 months: sitting, seeing family, going mobile

Fiona is no longer really interested in lying back and letting the world come to her, she wants to sit or stand up and reach out and grab what's out there. Here she is enjoying the novelty of going for her first ride sitting up in her stroller like a big girl.





She's eating for more than recreation these days, with a diet that now includes: rice cereal, oatmeal cereal, sweet potatoes, avocado, peaches, pears, bananas, and yogurt. As I write, Dad is getting ready to introduce papaya. She gave two thumbs down to plums (actually pluots...), but we thought they were delicious! Here she practices walking with a little help from Dad.





Grandma & Auntie Kim came for a visit a couple of weeks ago. Auntie Kim hadn't seen Fiona since she was 5 weeks old, and as you can see here, they were a little slow to warm up to each other (ha ha)...





Auntie Kim brought Fiona some stylish baby clothes from her recent trip to Paris, which she models here with help from Grandma. Fiona gave Grandma a warm welcome at the airport & followed up with a wave bye-bye when we dropped Grandma off to fly home.




Fiona enjoyed another milestone while Grandma & Auntie Kim were here: sitting in a restaurant high chair for the first time. As you can see here, she thought it was awesome! She chewed on straws, tried to choke on a sweet potato fry, and practiced her bird calls, much to the delight (I'm sure) of the other patrons. If only it had been basketball season, she would have fit right in at the Top of the Hill...


At 6 months, Fiona posed more cooperatively than usual for her monthly portrait. She seems to have come to recognize that we want her to look at the little silver box and smile. I am beginning to think that she looks like Jeff when she's smiling and like me when she's serious faced.



Although she posed cooperatively for a while, she soon wanted to climb over the side of the chair - See ya mama!

This week Fiona did her first "army crawl" and is now officially a mobile creature. She can't crawl with her belly up yet, but she is very, very close. Here's a photo of her in action yesterday morning. She seems most motivated to get to things that aren't toys (like this Roomba beacon). All the outlets are covered, and the cupboard under the kitchen sink is latched, now for the stair gates and all the glassware cupboards...


You can see more recent photos here.