Corinne

This past Sunday afternoon we went on a field trip to the Philadelphia art museum. Instead of taking the handicapped ramp like most stroller pushing papas would, we carried the stroller all the way up the steps while I whistled the Rocky theme song. We even stopped and waited on a line to take our picture with the Rocky statue. Corinne wasn’t all that interested in the art but she took advantage of the acoustics in the galleries to practice her vowel sounds rather loudly.

It was a really nice day so after the museum we went for a walk and met up with Ben Franklin. He was even nice enough to read to Corinne for a bit.

Corinne turned 5 months old yesterday so I wanted to give a little update on what’s new. Corinne has been grasping objects and holding on to fingers for months but in the last week or so she has become downright grabby. I used to have to encourage her to hold on to things but now if you put anything within her reach it ends up in her mouth in seconds. She has also become a lot more interested in her toys. Especially the ones with moving parts and those that play music. Sometimes to keep her entertained in her high chair I give her rubber blocks that, once she is done chewing on, she likes to throw on the ground to play fetch with me. I think one of her happiest times of day is when we go for walks in the evening. She loves to be outside and look around at all the stuff going on. Some of Corinne’s other favorite things right now are being lifted up in the air, splashing around in the bathtub, sucking on her thumb, and when I make fart noises on her tummy.

For the last 4 weeks we have been feeding Corinne solid food once a day in the evening. At this point it is really more for her to learn how to eat from a spoon than it is to get the nutrition from the food so we have only given her rice cereal. Lately she seems to be getting the hang of things fairly well so today we tried organic peas. From what I could tell she seemed to like it but I guess after 29 days of rice cereal anything different was probably a welcome change. I don’t know if I am going to be as welcome to the change of the contents of her diapers but I guess we will find out in about a day or so.

Father’s Day wasn’t until Sunday but Cynde and Corinne turned it into a weekend long event. When I got home on Friday they surprised me with homemade cookies that they baked while I was at work. Cynde got me a GPS navigation system which was probably a great gift since this particular father gets pretty frustrated when he gets lost. I also have a bad habit of waiting until the car is running on fumes before I start looking around for the nearest gas station so this should help me locate one faster. Corinne also got me a gift, the shirt that I am wearing in the picture below. Saturday we headed to Jersey and we spent the weekend with Cynde’s dad and the rest of her family.  

Corinne was never really attached to her pacifier but lately she is even less interested. Her new friends are her right and left thumbs, she doesn’t really care which one. She has been sucking on her fingers and sometimes putting her whole fist in her mouth for months but it was just a few weeks ago that she figured out how to put just her thumb in her mouth. Her technique is still a little unorthodox though. Instead of the traditional closed fist / thumb in mouth method she puts her whole open hand in front of her face. It’s hard to describe but this picture should give you a pretty good idea of what I’m talking about.

With the oppressive heat this past weekend we decided that the best thing to do was go for a swim. We weren’t sure how Corinne would react to the water since it was a little on the cool side at 71 degrees but she really didn’t seem to mind. I’m a little heliophobic so we kind of went nuts with the sun protection gear as you can see in the second picture below. We got Corinne sun glasses with UV protection, her swim shirt and hat are 50 SPF, and we got her a floatation device with a sun shade.

It seems that there is usually varying opinions of which parent a baby looks more like. People break it down by individual features like “oh she has her mother’s eyes” or even based on certain facial expressions like “when she smiles she looks like her father”. In Corinne’s case it is pretty much unanimously agreed upon that she looks like Cynde. There was one woman that stopped us on the street and she was saying how much Corinne looked like her mom. I of course agreed but I added that some people have suggested that her profile looks a little like me. We turned Corinne to the side so she could compare and the woman just laughed and said “oh they’re just being nice”.

A couple of weeks ago Cynde’s parents brought out the family photo albums so we could look at pictures of Cynde when she was a baby. While we were flipping through the albums we came across one of Cynde’s dad’s baby pictures which I think bares a strong resemblance to Corinne. See for yourself.

This is Cynde’s dad

This is a picture of Corinne that we took last week  

I also included one of Cynde’s kid pictures as a sneak preview of what Corinne might look like in a few years. Cynde’s love of travel must have started at a young age because in this picture she is in the North Pole of all places.

Since we moved to this neighborhood we have always noticed the inordinately large number of helicopters that fly over the house. In the morning and evening I think they are news helicopters checking the traffic conditions on the nearby highways and at night I think they must be police helicopters chasing the bad guys. Whatever the heck they are doing they sound like they are going to land on the roof of the house sometimes and they cause Corinne to stir in her sleep. She sleeps pretty soundly and most noises don’t startle her but those helicopters have come dangerously close to waking her up. I can’t say for sure but I think they give her flashbacks of ‘Nam. I could be wrong though.

On Saturday it was raining off and on so we went to Reading Terminal Market which is indoors so we could walk around without getting soaked. Corinne really likes to go for walks and look around and there is plenty to see at the market. For Cynde and me it was a chance to buy some produce and sample some of the yummy food, such as the amish style soft pretzels. Sunday we went to the Art Star Craft Bazaar which is an outdoor event with about 150 artsy craftsy types selling their work. There was lots of great stuff and quite a bit of stuff for kids. We let Corinne pick out a couple of onesies and the unique stuffed friend that she has with her in the picture below. We haven’t decided on a name yet but I was thinking “Douglas” seemed fitting.