Snowbound Herpetologist

News flash: Yes, it's true!  Being a scientist is easier than being a mom.  This week has been equal parts decadent (standing in a long, slow line without having to distract a baby from nuclear meltdown, drinking coffee whenever I feel like it, eating lunch out with husband, talking science with adults!) and heartbreaking (I miss her soooo much!).  I am so, so excited each day for the work day to end so that I can run home to my beautiful little baby :) The transition to full-time day care is going better that I expected in some ways and worse in others.  Her naps are fine, they have no problems getting her to sleep twice a day, and she's sleeping for about an hour each time.  I had expected sleep to be the hard part, but I was wrong - it's easy.  However, it's a struggle to get her to drink any milk - although I'm sending her with at least 10-12 ounces per day, it's a good day when they get 3 into her.  Totally unsustainable from the perspective of ...

Happy eight month birthday, Maya!  We are so proud to see how far you’ve come!  Husband marvels daily how he can’t believe Maya was an “uncoordinated lump” just a few short months ago :)  Oh, and how cute she is :) This is again going to be a fast post because a) the baby is fussy and b) I have a mountain of unanswered email that needs to be attended to NOW.  But here’s a quick synopsis of Maya at eight months! My favorite new observation is that she’s starting to get her “little girl” hair, which is growing in much thicker and longer.  I just love it, it’s so beautiful!  Husband was super white blonde from a really early age, but her hair color looks almost exactly like mine when I was her age.  My guess is that she’s going to end up with dark (and curly!) hair like me.  I can’t wait to do braids! Temperament-wise, she’s still bubbly, fun, and outgoing.  She’s also still very particular about things and easily frustrated.  She’...

While I mostly take a practical approach to clothing my baby, the one area in which I splurge is when I find cute owl stuff. This adorable shirt was like $6 on Amazon, and I just couldn't resist! It shipped direct from Seoul and I couldn't wait to see it on her. We woke to a cold and rainy morning, so today was the day! I did, in fact, recognize before ordering that my baby is not built like a cute Asian baby, so I ordered in a 24 month size for my fat 8 month old. Husband, who dresses her in the mornings, complained the whole time that he couldn't even get it over her head. I made it happen, but...well, see for yourself. Somehow the belly makes it even more adorable - she's my little Buddha! It is still *such* a cute shirt, though!

Preface: When I started this blog, I promised myself that I wouldn’t do too much censoring - that was the point of making it (semi-) anonymous.  This means you get the good along with the bad, embarrassing, and petty.   I wanted a reasonably accurate record of the fact that babies aren’t always sunshine and roses so that other women could feel a little less alone when their babies aren’t doing what they’re *supposed* to do. That said, Maya starts daycare full-time in a little over a week, and boy, am I going to miss her.  I had planned on writing a long post about how I’m savoring every second of my last days as a stay-at-home mom, but then the biting started, and this is what came out instead.  Still, I want you all to know that I am indeed savoring every moment and am still sort of at a loss about what I’ll do without her most of every weekday!  So, my little lovebug, if you’re reading this many years from now, know that this was but a small blip in our ot...

This won't be a long post, but I wanted to do a very quick update.  In the last week, Maya's eating skills have exploded.  I think she ate an entire salmon by herself the other day.  She suddenly mastered her pincer grasp, so now she shovels food into her mouth faster than she can actually chew it.  Her solid food consumption probably doubled without us doing anything differently than we already had been. Watching her hunt and peck at food on her tray is endlessly fascinating.  As a biologist, I've been unable to stop myself from setting up little experiments for her to test how she chooses her food.  In ecology, there's a famous hypothesis for how animals choose prey items called optimal foraging theory, which basically says that the choice is a function of 1) the value of the food item in terms of how energy rich it is, and 2) how long it takes to catch and eat the food item.  So I've been setting up little two item tests for her of different foods...