Weekend Catch-up

A holiday weekend is essentially upon us, and it made me realize that I better blog about the last few weekends so that my next post can be devoted to this holiday weekend, if I so desire. Let's see, where to begin... there has been WAY too much excitement in the Bashaw house as of late.

First of all, Jason and I are under contract for a house! We found this house on our first time out looking and while we loved it, we thought we'd go out and look at a few more places before deciding whether or not to put it on an offer. But then another offer was put in a day later, so we decided to just throw our hats in the ring with 1 solid offer and see what happened. And it was accepted! It has happened so fast that it really honestly doesn't even seem real to me yet at this point! Our closing is planned for August 12th, and then the fun of being homeowners begins! Here's a picture:


Next, a quick father's day recap. We enjoyed a nice laid-back Father's Day at home, featuring chocolate and butterscotch chip pancakes made with love by Miri's mommy for Miri's daddy. We gave Jason his gifts, including the T-shirt that Miri made for Jason at school and which he wore with great pride all day, despite the fact that it was about 4 sizes too big. Later in the day, we went over to my parents, and I got to spend father's day with my own dad too. We had a delicious dinner and lots of fun just being together.


Last weekend, Miri and I took J on a belated Father's Day surprise outing. Jason has been really excited about it finally being summertime, aka "Farmer's Market season," so we surprised him with a visit to Madison for the Dane Co. Farmer's Market, which is the largest producer-only farmer's market in the U.S. of A. It is pretty awesome. We picked up our typical must-haves (spicy cheese bread, cheese curds) and also got some fresh sugar-snap peas and homemade whole wheat tortillas. Yummo! We hung out on the Capitol lawn, walked around downtown Madison, and finished up the day with lunch at one of our favorite Madison restaurants, the Great Dane.

After the trip to Madison on Saturday, Jason and I took Miriam to her first Strawberry Festival in Cedarburg on Sunday. It was an absolutely gorgeous day, and we had a great time eating good food, listening to a band, and basking in the probably 10 million compliments that Miri got. Sometimes it is hard not to have a big head about the fact that my daughter is the cutest baby girl in the world.

I'm looking forward to this holiday weekend because although I have to work all day on the 4th (BOO!), the rest of the weekend should be a blast. Aunt Mary is in town from Ohio, Adam, Rochelle, and Kaden are in from Minnesota, and the weather is supposed to be beautiful. Yay! Happy birthday America!

Mobile Baby = Tired Parents

Well, well, well. Since my last posting, Miriam has become much more mobile. On June 13th, she finally realized that crawling on her hands and knees is a faster (and cooler-looking) way to get around. It was slow and halting at first, but she is now a speed demon. Especially when crawling to something she's not supposed to have or somewhere she's not supposed to be, such as Prescott's water bowl or to the wine rack to try to pull out bottles of wine. The other day, I turned my back to her for just a few seconds to put a plate in the diswasher, and when I turned back around, she was sitting very proudly in front of the wine rack waving around a tag from a bottle of Beaujolais. I tried to explain to her that it's really a better time of year for a chilled Sauvignon Blanc or a nice unoaked Chardonnay, but she didn't seem too interested in my explanation, just annoyed that I took away her tag. Then on Monday June 20th, she reportedly pulled herself to stand for the first time while Mommy and Daddy were gone and Gammy and Grandpa were babysitting. Well, as a working mother, I have adopted a rule that nothing new happens until I (or at least Jason) witnesses it first-hand. Unfortunately Miri didn't a chance to show us before she went to bed that evening, but she definitely demonstrated her new skill numerous times and with various pieces of furniture the next day! This baby can get upright all on her own, people! Watch out world... Miriam is a mover and a shaker!



It's awesome to see her accomplishing these new milestones, but it's very tiring keeping up with her! All she wants to do is move, move, move! It's like her energy level has multiplied by 5 in the past week and a half, but sadly mine has not! Also, I can't believe my tiny baby is turning more and more into a little girl every day. Sigh. All this growing is such a double-edged sword for me-- I'm proud yet wistful for her babyhood days, excited for new skills yet exhausted by keeping up! No matter what, I ALWAYS feel so blessed for this beautiful little girl. I thank God every day for this most wonderful of gifts, our amazing Miriam Aislinn.

9 month check-in and a few new firsts

Miri had her 9 month check-up with Dr. Esser this week. It was a really nice appointment in that she didn't get any shots! Yay! Miri is now 26.75 inches long(not sure of percentile, but somewhere between 25th and 50th) and weighs 14 lbs 11.5 oz (5th percentile). So she's still a lightweight (no surprise there!) but she's sticking to her own growth curve, and the doctor has no concerns with her weight or growth. She gained 1.5 inches and 1.5 lbs exactly since her last appointment! The developmental survey we filled out indicated she either advanced or right on track in all areas, so she's doing great there. She's in perfect health with no concerns. We got the all-clear to start introduce lumpier purees(Stage 3) and table foods cut into small finger food sized pieces. The only foods we have to steer clear of are honey (because of botulism risk) and the highly allergenic foods (shellfish, nuts and nut butters, egg whites).

Miri's had a few new firsts within the last few days. On Friday, she started pointing at things. The speech pathologist in me gets all excited about this new stage of establishing joint reference! On Friday when I picked her up from daycare, Miri patted me on the face to get my attention, and then pointed directly to one of the new sun decorations hanging from the ceiling in her classroom. And then on the way into the house, she pointed at a bird on the lawn! She is pointing to all sorts of stuff around the house, especially things that are up high that I'm not sure she ever really noticed before-- the pictures on the walls, the clock, the thermostat, etc. This provides her speech pathologist mommy with ample opportunities for auditory bombardment and labeling! :) After being given the all clear for table food at the doctor's, Miri tried a few table foods on Saturday. She had part of a banana for breakfast-- sliced into "coins" and then quartered. She did GREAT! No gagging or retching, and she loved it. We went to lunch at a gourmet pizza bar with my parents Saturday afternoon, and Miri got to try 3 new foods there-- little tiny pieces of sweet potato fries, teeny pieces of soft pizza crust, and a few little shell macaroni noodles (from our uber-delicious mac-and-cheese pizza). All of those foods were huge hits! Miri continues to work on new oral motor skills too. SHe's been really into sticking her tongue out lately, and now today she's been practicing lip rounding and blowing/whistling. It is so much fun to see her growing and constantly learning. She is like a little sponge!

Lastly, a quick note that the Bashaw family has officially started our home search! We had a home buying 101 meeting w/ our dear friend Jennifer's mom, Kathy. It was so gracious of Kathy to take over 2 hours of her time on a Monday night to share her knowledge with us. We talked finances, avoiding frequent home buyer mistakes, building vs buying options, etc. It was so informative and made us feel much more knowledgeable when we went into our next meeting, which was with our realtor (recommended to us by Kathy) on Friday. Our realtor seems like a good match for us and she knows the area quite well. She has set us up with an MLS search account, so Jason and I spent several hours last night going through the MLS listings in our target price range for Germantown and Menomonee Falls. We are eager to get looking with Mary (the realtor). On Saturday we met with the loan officer and initiated our mortgage pre-approval. He was impressed with our "financial report card" so to speak and said he wished all potential buyers were in our shoes. Yay us! Our hard work of savings and being responsible seems to be paying off. So hopefully we'll be in our first home by fall! Keep your fingers crossed, and we'll keep y'all in the loop!

Lions and Tigers and Bears... oh my!

This past weekend, we took Miri on her first of what we're sure will be many, many trips to the fabulous Milwaukee County Zoo. For those of you not from the area, I have to brag that Milwaukee has a truly awesome zoo. As an animal lover, there were few things I loved more than going to this zoo when I was growing up. So it was a wonderful Mother's Day gift (and early Father's Day gift for Jason) when my parents gifted us with a Zoo Pass for unlimited visits (and free parking!) for the 3 of us! Yay! Thanks again to Mom and Dad! I can tell our little girl is going to be as big of fan of the zoo as I am! Here are some pictures from our outing:
Meeting goats with Daddy and Mommy--


Seeing Petunia and Peony, the Guinea hogs (Not to be confused with guinea pigs! These porkers weigh in at 150-200 lbs each!)

Here's Giuseppi, the mini Mediterranean donkey. Miri LOVED him! We wanted to get her a stuffed animal in the zoo gift shop to commemmorate her first trip to the zoo and wanted to get a donkey since he was her favorite. Of course, she had to love one of the few creatures that the zoo doesn't have a stuffed animal of! So if anyone finds a cute stuffed donkey... let us know!

Miri also loved the elephants. In general, the "wild" animals that were in enclosures separated from the viewing area by a moat were less interesting for her. I think the increased physical distance made it harder for her to notice that there were in fact living animals over there. But not the big old elephants! She happily watched the zoo's pair of elephants, Brittany and Ruth. They were pretty active-- walking around, flapping their big ears, and picking up sticks with their trunks to munch on.

We thought Miri would love the giraffes because she is a huge fan of Sophie, her squeaky giraffe teething toy. But for whatever reason, she kept whining when we were near the giraffes until we walked away! Maybe she was frustrated that she couldn't get to them to chew on their ears, horns, and legs. :)

Miri and Mommy at Lake Evinrude at the zoo

And finally... I am including a picture of a bear. Otherwise the title of this post is a complete sham.

There you have it... Miriam's first trip to the zoo, in a nutshell!

The start of summer

A delayed recap of Memorial Day weekend (aka the unofficial start of summer)

Miri went on her first picnic!

"Hiked" at Pike Lake State Park!

Went to a birthday party for the first time and got all dressed up!

Had special bonding time with Uncle Adam!

Brunched outside!

Spent time playing outside at Gammy and Grandpa's!

Miri seems to LOVE the outdoors! We can't wait for to experience all the fun places we can take her in the warm weather and fun activities we can do as a family. Oh, and I should mention that Miri is well-slathered in sunblock in all outdoors photos, and we always keep a hat on her if she's not in a well-shaded area. You can rest assured that no babies were sunburned in the making of this blog. ;)