The Christmas Boxes

We opened our Christmas boxes this morning!

Shiloh is still wearing his horse hat and shows no indications of taking it off. Ella keeps experimenting with her "pintheth shoes". I'm sure she'll get the hang of them before long. She also loves her Curious George monkey, and insisted on sharing naptime with him. Max and Ruby and Veggie Tales have already been on today. And Ella is trying to read all of her books at once.

Julie and I are thrilled with our goodie box [I've already got the coffee on], and Julie has already transferred everything into her new purse.

Thanks to everyone!! :D

Thanks to everyone.

Thanks. To everyone.

The Printheth

I'm really not sure where she came up with "Princess", but we've been talking about them ALL DAY today.

The Sous Chef‎

We just made enchiladas for our Mexican version of Thanksgiving. I used:

2 1/2 chicken breasts, cooked and pulled

3 tomatoes, chopped and with the mushy bits removed

2 small onions from the garden

A leftover third of a jalapeno pepper

Just enough enchilada sauce to moisten

A handful of mozzarella cheese

Salt and pepper

We then wrapped the filling in large tortillas cut in half. Ella will show you how on this installment of Cooking Wifus Ella:

Which made two casserole dishes. Pour over this two cans of enchilada sauce [minus whatever was used in the filling], cover with more mozzarella cheese, and pop in the oven until bubbly.

The Whistler

Ella blowing a whistle on 2/18/11. Bonus: At the three minute mark, she blows out of the other end.

And Now For Something Completely Different

Take a walk with me in the blistering cold. Except without the cold. Or the walking.

I also made this one for Thomas:

That Was Supposed to Happen

Even before babies learn to talk, they begin imitating their parents' speech. There may not be any words, but the stream of gibberish is richly imbued with emotional meaning. They also learn to imitate the nuance of pauses and intonation found in adult speech patterns. Add in extra "communication channels" like gestures, body language, and facial expression, and Baby is actually conveying an astonishing amount of incredibly meaningful information. Of course, all of this potent communication ability is eventually augmented one step further with the addition of a linguistic punch, the use of words and language, to add yet another layer of meaning. (Here's a funny example of what this looks like in an advanced stage.)

Over the last year or so, Shiloh and I have been working on developing these communication channels (also called "modes" in development jargon), and Shiloh's gotten very good with body language and facial expression. He's even fairly good at simple gestures, and can communicate very strong emotions in his inflection. But so far we haven't witnessed an attempt to mimic the nuance of adult speech patterns -- until last Friday.

I was getting Shiloh to practice making very specific sounds by asking him to tell me what kind of animal we should look up by imitating their sounds. After going down a short list, I threw in the catchphrase of a character on his favorite TV show (Widget from Wubbzy). At around the 37-second mark, he responds to my prompt by imitating her phrase exactly. He doesn't say the words, of course, but he does imitate the tone and intonation exactly. Which means that the imitation of adult speech patterns is finally beginning to emerge. We don't expect him to be hosting his own talk show by tomorrow morning, of course, but we're one definite step closer to the goal.

The Onion Man

This happens every time I chop onions. Shiloh, eager to help by scooping the freshly chopped vegetables into a bowl, leans in close and is surprised when his eyes start to burn and water. He usually reacts with a surprised squeal, but after wiping his eyes he heads right back into the action. We think this is more hilarious every time it happens.

The Wild Child

Here's a video of Ella squealing and laughing while playing peekaboo with Daddy.

The Vidnappers

That image above this sentence is a link to some spanking fresh videos of Ella which I'd really like to share with you. But, thanks to the Snapfish marketing team, I can't.

I thought I'd upload a video to Snapfish for a change, since the software tends to upload photos in a fraction of the time it takes to upload them to Photobucket. I was hoping that it would work the same way for videos, too (turns out it took about three quarters of forever, which is about the same upload speed as the other site).

After waiting so long for the process to complete, I was ready to create a post here and link to it, instantly sharing cute videos of a certain little puddle making wobbly tracks across the living room, a sight sure to strike feelings of awe, joy, and other warm and fuzzy feelings in the hearts of millions of people. Unfortunately, it was at this point that I learned that while the site will let you upload videos, it will not allow you to watch them -- or share them -- without first purchasing a paid account. You also don't learn about this until after you've already put in a good portion of your evening uploading the files.

So if you're wondering why there aren't any sparkling new videos of your beloved granddaughter [or cousin, or friend's brother's kid, or fellow homeschooling mom's son's daughter, or offspring of a complete stranger] cued up and ready for you to watch at your leisure today, well, you can thank the fine folks over at Snapfish for choosing to hold my home videos hostage.

[Edit:] I'm holding Ella while writing this post. Tuckered out after a long day of playin', crawlin' and jabberin', she fell asleep in my lap and is now laying strewn across the desk in a very comfortable and half-hazard fashion. This effectively increases her cuteness quotient by a factor of four.

The Speed Walker

Crouching Shiloh, Hidden Baby

See the munchkin, hear the goober.

Things That Go Bump in the Night

We were startled around midnight last night to hear some very eerie screeches and cries coming from a thick knot of trees and branches out back of the garage. We later identified the sounds as the calls of a female fox. She was out hanging around by the barn this morning, too, and we're beginning to suspect that she might have kits in the area.

Of course, foxes aren't the only things running around at night. We recently found the steaming fresh calling card of a black bear by the garden, noticed a suspected beaver dam in the creek, discovered that the raccoons are apparently still inhabiting the chicken house attic, startled a falcon that was picking at something in the grass by the road, saw a flock of whooping cranes that have begun hanging out in a nearby cow pasture, and -- while the family was visiting -- spied a lone bald eagle sitting quietly in the middle of a field. Marty Stouffer hasn't shown up yet, but we're expecting him any day now. I guess I should get some fishing line ready, just in case.

The Quiet Man... er, Woman

Even more playing-on-the-bed video goodness.

Just Lookin'

Ella was laying on the bed and talking away sweetly to herself until I grabbed the camera and hit the "Record" button. Then she clammed up and was just lookin'.

The Chicken Dance

Here's a video of Ella smiling at the annoying robotic singing Elmo chicken... thing. Babies are easy to impress, eh?

The Sliding Hill, Round 2

Shiloh and I took on the sliding hill again on Tuesday.


About to take on the hill.


Holding on tight.


Trying not to die.


Doing something stupid.

The Happy Baby

When I was little, I thought I'd open up a daycare one day called "The Happy Baby". I don't have the daycare yet, but I do have the happy baby. Here's a video of Ella playing in her chair this morning.

The Sliding Hill

Shiloh and I went sliding this afternoon at the golf course. The snow was perfectly packed, and Shiloh got to try out the new innertube that he got for Christmas. Here's Shiloh sliding down the hill:

The Italian Christmas Donkey

This is one of Julie's favorite Christmas songs. It can also be one of the most annoying, depending on how many times you've heard it. Enjoy.

Don't Lie

This is one of Shiloh's favorite "Wubbzy" songs.



[I was able to rip the flash video from YouTube using a Firefox add-on (DownloadHelper), and then converted it into an .mp3 file using FVD Suite. Then I burned the audio file onto a CD for him to listen to on his player. Geekiness quotient achieved.]