Beach Bum Baby

This weekend Zara got to go to the beach for the first time. We had a good time even if she didn't get to wear her new surf skirt and top because it was too chilly with a strong wind. We'll save those for later this spring/summer. John got a beach house from a contractor for the weekend, yup, yet another perk. It was a really nice place right on India Beach, just west of Jamaica Beach if you know the island. The Todd (link to the right) family joined us and we had a great time hanging out and playing with the kids. And, frankly, it was about time we all got to meet. The Johns work together and Liz and I have just heard about the other forever without getting to meet. Let's hope it doesn't take this long again to all hang out together.

Space Sightings

Monday morning Discovery launched on a mission to the space station. A scant 15 minutes before that, the space station flew in front of the moon. Coincidence? No, not really, it's just physics and something about a dude named Newton that cause the stars to align from time to time. Just a cool picture to post here for everyone. In case you can't figure it out, the bright spot on the lower right is the ISS.

Banana in Pajamas

We had previously decided to start introducing Zara to solid foods when she appeared to want them. For several weeks now we've been learning just how long her little arms are as we've had small hands landing in our dinner plates and wide eyes staring at us eating. We decided to try small sampling of foods to see how it would do and without jumping into actual meals and there would be plenty of time to adjust.

Supposedly everyone says rice cereal is the best first food, maybe but not for Zara as even a tiny bit gave her BIG TIME gas, like crying for an hour gas. We laid off solids again for more than a week and tried a tiny bit of oatmeal. Again, no chance big time gas. Google to the rescue, she isn't the first baby to not tolerate grains well right off the bat so we aren't going to revisit those for a long time now.

Last night, I tried a little mashed banana and holy cow do we have a winner. She loved it and ate it up like no tomorrow! We had no gas and, if wonders don't cease to amaze, we suddenly slept 7 hrs straight again without needing Mommy for one of the 2-4 night time feedings that started after a growth spurt a month and a half ago. HOLY COW! I think we just stumbled across an invisible line of awesomeness last night. I was so excited that I could sleep, I wasn't and didn't care at all. Here's hoping for a repeat performance!

Lawn M-overhaul

A couple weeks ago John broke out the lawnmower for the start of spring yard work. Since the grass doesn't really grow in the winter, it doesn't get any tending from us for awhile. During the course of his mowing, mower sounded pretty awful with a bad surging going on. So he started doing maintenance on the thing trying to figure out what it was. We bought just about the cheapest lawnmower Lowes had (house brand Bolens, push mower, but at least it has a Briggs and Straton engine) seven years ago when we were still on one income, John was in school, and having just bought a house with all those fun costs that come with that (washer, dryer, etc.). We have gotten a lot of use out of it and in Houston that means massively thick grass and mud sometimes.

John put on a new air filter, spark plug, oil, blade (not that it helps the engine), opened it up and the carburetor was clean and checked just about everything and still had a surge. Yesterday we priced new mowers, but before we bought we had one last thing to try. We drained the gas and put some fresh-hasn't-been-sitting-there-for-5-months gas in it and, voila, runs like a champ. Once we fired it up, we actually both thought the engine sounded better than it has in years with all that stuff fixed up on it. Good news, bad news though. Good, save a few hundred bucks and don't need a new mower. Bad, still have the bonus "exercise" mower without the self-propelling wheels.

Health-care Shmealth-care

John has a partially torn rotator cuff and myriad other damage in his left shoulder. Don't really have any good explanation for it happening, but its there and we have to do something about it before it just up and completely tears at the most inopportune time.

We have health insurance, of course, employer provided like all engineers and this really isn't about that political hot potato. But he has called THREE times to ask how much this little do-dad operation is going to cost us out of pocket and we still don't know. THAT is what is so ridiculous. Since the insurance only picks up 80% of this, 100% of that, or 60% of something else all based on the hospitals coding and which doctor/nurse/anesthesiologist/janitor is working that day, we can't just get a x amount of money for which insurance covers y. It is really frustrating. We are still trying to get them to give us a break down before the surgery, seems like its something any customer should have and even your neighborhood plumber can do.

You want to know how bad our medical system is, just try using it.

Ma'am-my Weekend

Zara's school had an international festival today and, since we got guilt-ed into contributing, I figured we should at least drop by and see it. So Zara and Mommy (John is still in Vegas for a bachelor party) went for lunch at the fair. All of the ladies in the infant room are of Indian heritage, so that meant there was some awesome homemade chicken biryani and samosas. Yummy, that's what I call an international fair.

The weird thing is all of her teachers continue to address me as "ma'am". Um... I'm not old enough to be a ma'am especially since they all outrank me in that regard. And secondly, I'm not their boss. But it is clear they are all very concerned with this children in their care and have done a great job taking care of her the last few months.

Since I've been a tad remiss though on th eblog, 5 month pictures for Zara. She has been getting over another cold and we've had to do antibiotics for the first time since she has a persistent cough we can't shake.

Baby Stats

We had another set of vaccines this morning for Zara, which means updated stats. 12 pounds 7 ounces, 24.75in and 40cm head circumference. So that is 10-50-10th percentile as we've always been trending.

Also, Zara rolled over on the quilt on the floor last night, so even for John, she has now rolled over on a surface which meets the International Standard for Infant Mobility (ISIM).

Large-sagna

For the PW girls, I tried out PW's lasagna recipe the other day and... umm... be warned. I mostly followed the recipe, but subbed out the beef for ground turkey and the breakfast sausage for zucchini and spinach. The second sub is because I'm not sure why all recipes are either meat OR veggie lasagna. Why discriminate when you can put the sides right in the main dish? I digress.

PW's recipe has a couple kinks that I'll be able to work out better on the second try I think. First, when I think large rectangular dish, I think normal 9x13 pyrex lasagna size. NO! I got halfway through construction and had filled the pan. So I had to slide/scrape/mangle the bottom into an even larger pyrex so I could fit more in. At least once I put the second layer on it looked normalish and all cooks together in the oven anyway. But the second problem, where do all the noodles go? I only used one box of lasagna noodles but PW's recipe if you follow her directions only uses 12, 12! noodles. I ended up throwing more in with an extra layer and 5 noodle layers instead of 4, but still had 7 noodles sitting on the counter. I don't get it.

All things I can deal with better when I make it the second time now that I know and oh yes, it turned out tasting awesome still so we will be making it again.

Side note: Helga the audi is FINALLY home but will have to go back since one wheel wasn't un-rashed and the alignment is totally off. :(

Repeatability

From the National Institute for Standards and Technology, the definition of repeatability is "closeness of the agreement between the results of successive measurements of the same measurand carried out under the same conditions of measurement." This is a concept we deal with a lot as engineers and basically means your results are true when you can make it do the same thing over and over again.

Well, yesterday, to demonstrate to Daddy that I'm not crazy. I had Zara in the pack 'n play and got her to roll over from tummy to back 5 consecutive times. So she is rolling over and easily, but it is a location dependent event. I think it has to do with being on her tummy in the pack n play where she can't see anything. John alleges that since the pack 'n play is 'softer' (not really its just a thin pad in there, not a trampoline), she isn't really rolling over. I'd like him to break out the durometer and determine which surfaces qualify for the rolling over test then.

This concludes my geeked out baby analysis today.

My Way or the Highway Milestone

This morning I was getting Zara dressed for school and, along with her aweseme pink flame baby legs, I put her in a brown shirt that has a button on the back of the neck. When I flipped her over to her tummy to close that button, little miss lifted her head back and pushed off to stop me. Apparently, we can and are capable of rolling over, but will only do so to stop mommy from buttoning her shirt. So that's how its going to be is it, little girl? I didn't get a repeat performance on the second try, but I'm calling it official, she rolled over.