Getting Sassy

Hannah's starting to show a little more personality lately, mostly when she's not getting what she wants (the mouse, while I'm trying to use the computer, for example). Fortunately, we're still smarter than she is, and she can be fooled into thinking she wants something else (say, a scrap of paper that I "accidentally" drop on the floor so she thinks she's not supposed to have it).




We were going through her "too big" clothes again, looking for ones she could now fit into, and found the rodeo bowling outfit above.




At least this one is supposed to look goofy. It's a duck outfit. That's the beak and eyes on the top of her head. I suppose it's more of a duck-with-baby-emerging-from-hole-in-throat costume, but I guess they weren't trying for a realistic depiction of duck anatomy.




Hannah's up to 9 steps at a time now. When Mom got this outfit up in Iron River (bear country) last year, Hannah weighed about 5 pounds and it seemed like she'd never fit into it. Now it's the perfect sleeper for cool winter nights (in case we ever have one of those again in Texas).








Tomorrow we head to Grandma's house, where Hannah will stay while we fly up to Ohio for a friend's wedding. It will be the first time Carla's been away from Hannah for more than a few hours, but we're sorta looking forward to a couple days free of baby talk and protecting the environment from Hurricane Hannah. Really, it's just an excuse to loan Hannah to my mom and sister, but I think it will be great fun for everyone.

Stagger . . . Stagger . . . Stagger

I'm sure that someday Hannah will be in charge of dressing us funny, so we might as well take advantage of her defenselessness while we can. I thought this was a cow costume when I grabbed it at the store. It was only $8, so I didn't examine it closely or check for an udder. When I got it home I noticed it's a dog outfit. It even has a velcro-attached tail so we can play pin-the-tail-on-the-doggie while Hannah is scooting around trying to get to the next exciting new toy (by "new toy" I mean anything within three feet of the floor that we'd rather she not play with).



Speaking of scooting . . . that will not be her preferred method of mayhem for long. Just a few minutes ago, Hannah took 6 steps toward me, holding a fascinating Supercuts coupon that she had found. Her previous record was 3. She tends to walk (stagger is more accurate) more when she's holding something, probably because it's harder to crawl with something in your hand.




We took out our glass shower doors and put up a shower curtain to make it easier to bathe Hannah in the tub. The shower curtain drew her in like a magnet, then the toilet paper dispenser beckoned. If I hadn't been following her around, I'm sure we would have found a pile of two-ply on the floor with a baby in the middle. I seem to recall that Carla did exactly that when she was in the larval stages.



I've considered packing away the coffee table and just installing a little jungle gym in the living room for Hannah. We can't actually put anything other than toys on or under the coffee table, and it is only used these days as a fort, handrail, or drum anyway.

Hannoween!

We hardly noticed Halloween last year, because it fell three days after we brought Hannah home from the hospital on oxygen, heart and lung monitors, five medications, and two breathing treatments. We were a little preoccupied, to say the least. Hannah had a Halloween hat and binkie, but both too big for her (they fit perfectly now).

This year, we're a little more relaxed. I've even had time to carve a pumpkin.



Since someone always asks "How'd you do that?" (usually while thinking " . . . and why would you do that?"), here's the general approach:

First, I convert a photo of the subject into a black-and-white, high-contrast image using a photo editing program, then reduce it down to just 3 or 4 shades of gray. For amateurs like me, you have three shades to work with; bright where you cut all the way through, medium where you only scrape away the skin, and dark where you leave the skin intact.



Usually, I print this gray-shaded image, tack it on the pumpkin, and poke holes along the outlines so I can see where to cut after I remove the paper (same way Michelangelo transferred his fresco outlines to the ceiling of the Sistine chapel, I kid you not). This year I went all space-age and projected the image onto the pumpkin with my Texas Instruments DLP digital projector (a charming intersection of the low-tech organic artsy world, and the high-tech geeky electronics world) and traced the outlines with a sharpie marker.



From there, it's just a matter of carving all the way through for the bright spots, scraping the skin for the gray spots, and leaving the dark spots alone. All while trying to keep Hannah from eating the pumpkin, which she immediately identified as a potential food source and proceeded to gnaw upon. You can see some of my past pumpkin carvings, and other Halloween shenanigans by clicking here.

Speaking of Hannah and food, I put together this seasonal video clip, which Carla and my mother will hate but that Aunt Cat will love. Click here for a movie preview you probably won't see anywhere else.

For a few cuter videos, in case that one left you spooked, click here, here, and here.

We went into Louisiana last weekend for a visit, and so Hannah could get a little attention for a change. In case you thought I was the only weirdo in the Minor family, it was my sister Rena, not me, who noticed the adhesive properties of Hannah's rice puffs (see below). I hope for her sake that Hannah doesn't turn out to be the vengeful type.





In other news, our friend Carter is doing amazingly well after a bad spell back in ICU. He's now out of ICU and in a regular room, laughing and smiling and getting ready to get out of the hospital, hopefully for good this time. You can check out Carter's blog to get all the latest news and pics, but I couldn't resist stealing this picture and posting it here:

Carter