Entries from January 2010 ↓

It’s hard to believe Ezri will soon have her first birthday.
Today she turns 11 months old on the 11th of the month.
Eric reckons that makes today a special day.

While we love Ezri’s name, we do call her by other monikers.
When we chose Ezri, we liked that it was hard to shorten into a nickname.

However, this has not stopped us from calling her other names.  Many of them are rather embarrassing.  So, we should definitely list them lest we forget.

1. Ezri B. Burrito – This one is from when she was very small and swaddled up burrito-style in a receiving blanket.
2. Bina – This one is yiddish for bee and from her Aunt Amy.  There’s a character named Bina in The Yiddish Policeman’s Union which is where I’d heard it.
3. Moopster – A very tiny Charlotte Q. pointed at Ezri’s face and said an emphatic “moop” which meant mouth. And I thought, yep, she’s my moopster.
4. The Moop – shortened Moopster
5. Ezzeroni Pizza – There was a joke that Ezri was made of pizza and ice cream while in utero.
6. Ezri Bean – We’ve known her since she was just bean sized.
7. Rootin’ Tootin’ Ezri – She used to root for a nipple and she tooted sometimes too.
8. Scootin’ Tootin’ Ezri – She stopped rooting and started scooting. She still tooted.
9. Ezri Bee
10. The Baby Girl – in conversation to each other Eric and I will talk about the baby girl. She gets called “baby girl” or “the baby girl” often enough for it to count as a nickname.
11. Lil’ Miss Rumble Pants – I picked up “rumbling pants” as a phrase from the Quigleys add Lil’ Miss and it becomes a nickname.
12. Little e – Eric is the Big E in our family and Ezri is the little e. They share the same initials E.B.B. and e.b.b. respectively.
13. My Sunshine – I sing her you are my sunshine a lot.

And in the photo here I think I would call her Carrot Top.

Ezri now has the complete indestructible book collection.
Thanks, Aunt Coral, for the surprise package.
She likes the firefly page especially and her mom’s owl hooting while looking at the owl page is also appreciated.

Ezri has been practicing walking behind the wheels of the Radio Flyer walker and the alligator walker.
We also do laps hanging from a parent’s hands around the loop of our house through the kitchen, dining room and living room.
Ezri has taken one or two steps unsupported. She is really loving walking with help and we figure it’s only a matter of time before she’s up on her own.

Babies love paper. It crumples and it’s fun to turn pages, but paper is flimsy. When moistened paper turns into mushy yuck.  Even a nice cardboard board book can be turned to pulp by a dedicated baby with just a tooth or two.  This leads not only to book destruction, but possible choking hazard and ingestion of ink dyes and paper whitening chemicals.

So, books for babies are mostly board books and reading them is mostly an activity shared with an adult, rather than an opportunity for solo exploring.

But, Ezri is so happy when she gets ahold of a magazine or catalog.  She loves looking through books on her own.  Enter Indestructibles which seem expensive at $5 for a seemingly flimsy magazine like pamphlet book.  However, Ezri has flipped through hers multiple times, she has put them in her mouth and pulled a full mug of cold coffee down from a bookshelf onto one and they are still standing.  They are a little rumpled, but still together with nary a tear or soggy page.

Indestructibles look flimsy and feel like a high quality paper, but they are not.
They are made of Tyvek – a material developed by Dupont and used for maps that are to be taken into the wilderness(rain doesn’t phase it), medical packaging (it’s hard to tear), and housewrap (it’s just that tough).

We own two of these Indestructibles. There are only 3 currently available.  All three feature brightly colored paintings of animals by Kaaren Pixton with no text.  Wiggle! March! features barnyard creatures and offers the opportunity to make animal noises.  Ezri likes my chicken and cow noises especially. Creep! Crawl! features the same style of paintings of bugs and slugs.  While some might consider the lack of text to be a cope out(yes, Eric I am talking to you), it is nice opportunity to just talk to Ezri about what’s in the pictures and point at things together.  We may have to pick up Flutter! Fly! which presumably features birds and has a hummingbird on the cover soon.

Here’s Ezri with that pinnacle of children’s book characters, Walter the Farting Dog. Oh, she loves the noises he makes!

Ezri does not build with her megabloks, but she does enjoy destroying the towers built by others.

Megabloks are also good for banging and rattling.

Cheers, Ezri.

Ezri has learned how to climb up into our IKEA Poang chairs.
She is very proud of her accomplishments.