The End...

I am typing this from home in Berkeley; this morning, Fiona and I arrived back in the Bay Area. It has been an epic day of travel and getting settled back in. Fiona is passed out after expending HUGE amounts of energy on the plane. I am exhausted from trying to contain her on the plane. Suffice it to say that she chose today to begin babbling incessantly.

I can't go on for much longer, so I am posting the above photo of Fiona back at Great Falls Park this past weekend. Hopefully this will tide you over until I have a chance for more substantial updating. Phew!

Butterflies....

We are down to our last few days in the D.C. area, so yesterday we did what we haven't done much of this visit, and actually took the Metro into D.C. proper. Our destination was the Natural History Museum. One of the feature exhibits at this museum is the Butterfly Pavilion. This is a huge room (in the shape of a chrysalis, natch) filled with butterfly-friendly flora and a huge variety of butterflies. The butterflies fly around free, and occasionally land on visitors.

When we entered the Butterfly Pavilion, we were greeted by a huge blast of heat and humidity, which the butterflies apparently like but which is more difficult for us humans. Fiona seemed untroubled, however -- perhaps she has finally adjusted to East Coast climes. She LOVED the butterflies, and seemingly could have looked at them forever. Apparently Butterfly Trauma is not in the cards.
While Fiona enjoyed the butterflies, she was downright ecstatic when we visited the prehistoric fossils. Ecstatic, I tell you! This was surprising; why would our baby be so excited about huge, immobile bones? Still trying to figure this one out.
In any event, it was a successful trip.

Fiona and Laurel

On Monday, Fiona had a playdate with Laurel. A year Fiona's senior, Laurel is the daughter of Susie, who has been my friend (and playmate) basically since birth.

Generally, playdates between an 8-month-old and a 19-month-old involve lots of what developmental psychologists term "parallel play" (I knew I'd put that developmental psych degree to use at some point!). This was certainly true of Fiona and Laurel, who more or less ignored each other as they banged toys together on the carpet and in the baby pool. However, at the end of our time together, the following exchange occurred. Luckily, I was on hand to capture the sequence of events. Judge for yourselves whether Laurel is a sweet little girl who has learned the art of sharing, or whether Fiona is using her Jedi mind tricks to manipulate Laurel into handing over her sippy cup. The truth probably lies somewhere in between.

Return to the Zoo!

Yesterday, we took Fiona back to the zoo. (The National Zoo, not the scary goat zoo).
There were many joy convulsions during our visit. However, since Fiona had previously visited the zoo, she took some more time in serious contemplation of the animals. These included some old favorites: elephants.....
And pandas.....But her favorite activity by far was watching people. She finds other people endlessly fascinating.
Of course, people tend to find Fiona fascinating as well. Her grandfather suggested we put up a fence around her and charge admission. It's a thought.

A Little Morning Music...

Fiona's personality continued to assert itself yesterday morning, when Fiona's Nana decided to sit with her at the piano. From the other room, I heard laughter; upon inquiry, Nana said, "Fiona's bossing me around in here." See for yourself in the photos above. Fiona was insistent on turning the pages of the sheet music herself, and seemed very focused on her playing. Later, she demanded (nonverbally) to get off of Nana's lap and sit by herself on the bench. I am torn between delight at Fiona's burgeoning musical career, and a sense of dread at what this indicates she'll be like at 16!

Feeding Frenzy

In case there was any doubt about it, over the past few days Fiona has definitely been manifesting a stong mind of her own. In particular, she has decided to declare her independence in the realm of eating. Now, up until earlier this week, I would have said that Fiona had demonstrated a profound giftedness in eating. Despite being a bit of a peanut, she was pounding down entire bananas, avocados, and two jars of baby food at each feeding. Imagine my surprise, then, when on Monday she began boycotting everything I offered her.

I'll spare you all the details, but a little trial and error proved the following:
1. Fiona wanted to feed herself. While in theory this is a great thing, the reality is that Fiona's fine motor skills do not yet make it possible for her to feed herself -- short of grabbing the spoon and flinging food around, or grabbing the bowl and flinging more food around.
2. If forced to accept food off of a spoon, it had better be some sort of fruit.

Needless to say, mealtimes have become interesting. I try to divert Fiona with finger foods while alternately attempting to shovel spoonfulls of food into her mouth -- all the while smiling broadly and keeping upbeat so that I don't give her a food complex. See above for a photo of Fiona eating Cheerios (a non-fruit favorite) with her grandfather.

Mother and Child Reunion

Yesterday, we attended a "Generational Social" -- a gathering of my childhood friends Jenny and Julie, their 5 children, and all of our mothers. It was wonderful to see everyone, although I'm always surprised by how difficult it is to catch up when 6 children under the age of 6 are involved!

This reunion also reunited Fiona with Gabe (Jenny's youngest child), who is 1 month younger than Fiona but already looks like a 3-year-old. Despite Gabe's superior size, though, notice who has all the toys.For those of you who have read this blog daily for the past few weeks hoping for news of Erick, I'm pleased to pass along that he's doing well. It sounds like he's having a great learning experience in Ifakara, Tanzania. "Learning experience" is one of those euphemisms (like "Opportunity to Succeed"), so in other words, he's enjoying his time there, but some things, such as trying to get any research done with any degree of speed, are challenging. We'll look forward to reuniting with Erick in the Bay Area on August 16! We miss him; whenever Fiona sees his photo, she reaches for it and smiles broadly. (Then again, she does the same thing when she sees Cheerios...)