A zoo trip, and self-directed OT

Miss Maya had the day off today, so we packed ourselves up and headed to the zoo.  While she's always loved the zoo, it's funny to think back on how her favorite animals have shifted.   She delights in holding her nose near the penguins and sea lions to tell me that they're "stinky" (really, they are---the fishy smell is overwhelming), she doesn't care much about looking at them.  The gorillas, who like to hang out right at the other side of the glass, have never held her interest for more than a second.  The current favorites:  alligators, tigers, and rhinocerous.  Why?  Who knows.  But she was in love. 

Fake rhinocerous, I love you almost as much as the real thing :)

Mommy, a tiger.  A real tiger!

The cover of the zoo map (which she clutches the entire time we're at the zoo) is a photo of the tiger.  She kept looking at it, then showing it to the tiger. 

Hey tiger, this is you!  Check it out!

This might be my favorite picture of the day:

Tiger: Wow---I can't believe what I'm seeing through these bushes.

Maya: Wow---I can't believe what I'm seeing through this window.

In other zoo news, she simultaneously desperately-wanted-to-ride and was-terrified-of the bug carousel.

She was exhausted when we got home.  She had a snack and then was having some sort of tantrum-y fit, whining and pointing and trying to throw herself out of the booster seat.  I took her out and carried her around the kitchen, muttering "what, what, what is it that you want?  I don't understand" and my mind wandered, again, to our quest for a communication solution.  As it turns out, she wanted the white board & dry erase marker (she lunged as we passed it on the counter).

She sat on the floor and drew (and I sat at the table and checked my email)  and suddenly I heard "Done!"

Done with what?

As it turned out, she was giving herself some fine motor practice with the marker cap.  I don't know if she's done this at school or what, but it was seriously cute to watch her practicing her to cap a marker, and triumphantly yelling "Done!" when she had it, well, done.


That's one focused girl  :)

3 ducklings, 2 pigeon chicks, and 1 unsuspecting little girl

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Maya's special instructor, Virginia, brought over some ducklings today!  (She's a teacher by day, special instructor by night, and the eggs were hatched in her classroom.)  Maya and I were equally excited:

(gasp) Are those . . .

Mommy, ducks!!!!

They are only 5 days old and super cute.  We let them waddle around, drink and splash, eat some food.  When I walked and did a birdy whistle they followed me like I was their mama duck!  Maya was enthralled.  Check out my future ornithologist:

Hmmm.  You duckies are verrry interesting.

Then one of the ducklings started pecking at her foot, which was hilarious:



And did you notice that right at the end of that video the striped duck was checking out Maggie (one of the Little People.  Yes, we know their names.)?  Well, Maya thought it was ridiculous that the ducks wanted to play with Maggie:

Virginia!  That duck's kissing Maggie?!

Oh, Mommy, this is just too much fun.

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The second egg hatched this morning, and MP is now the proud mama to 2 very ugly baby pigeons :)

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Miss Maya went to sleep tonight blissfully unaware that tomorrow morning we're heading to the hospital for her ABR.  She's scheduled to start at 7:30, and we need to arrive at the hospital by 6, so it's going to be an early morning.

I can't help but feel like I'm betraying her when we head in for this kind of stuff.  She has no idea what's going on, or why she can't eat or drink anything, and then is scared, and then feels miserable.  I feel like I should have started my apologies tonight . . .

I'm sorry for misleading you into thinking this is just a normal night, little girl.  Truth be told, early tomorrow we're going to whisk you out of here with no food or water and pass you over to a team in the hospital.

 . . . and continue them straight through tomorrow afternoon . . .

I'm sorry that you're groggy and cranky and don't understand why.
I'm sorry that we have to keep waking you up to get you to drink when you just want to sleep it off.
I'm sorry because we chose this for you and you didn't even get a vote.

 . . . ending with the grand finale of either . . .

I'm so sorry that we put you through this whole stupid test only to find out that your hearing was perfectly fine all along. 

 . . . or . . .

I'm so sorry that it took so long for us to figure out that you couldn't hear perfectly. 

(sigh)

I will try to update the Facebook page when she is out and ok, but I'm not sure if I'll be able to do it from my phone.  Thanks for the good thoughts and prayers.  Although she's been sedated (3) other times, this is by far the longest procedure, and I can't help but be anxious (and apologetic).

(Re)united and it feels so good . . .*

We had an awesome weekend. 

Our first ever weekend road trip since Maya was born, and Maya's first hotel stay.  On Friday night we drove to my sister's place, where Maya ran (and fell) in the yard with her cousins nonstop for 4 hours straight.   I would have taken pictures, but I don't think it would have been physically possible to get all of the kids in the same frame anyway . . . and I was too busy stuffing myself with lobster rolls and homemade desserts to try :)  The running may have overtired her a bit, as she cried hysterically for most of the remaining drive to the hotel. 

We were a little nervous about her sleeping abilities in hotel room port-a-crib (pack n play), but she was super psyched to see a "special crib":

My own room?!?  And a special crib?!?  This is fantastic!

Saturday morning we went over to an old friend's house for a brunch playdate . . . which sounds normal enough.  Except for the fact that we've never met before.  Or spoken on the phone.  She's a friend that I "met" online---a few years back, and have since traded email, chatted online, etc. 

I'm betting that half of the people reading this are thinking "Cool!  I wish I could meet up with some of my online friends!" and the other half are thinking "Isn't talking to strangers on the internet an activity reserved for homicidal maniacs and pedophiles?"  

But really, I'm lucky enough to have "met" a bunch of amazing online friends (remember those awesome cardboard party animals?  They came from one.  And when we needed extra scrabble tiles to add Parker's name to Dave's scrabble plaque another internet buddy sent some over.).  And besides just mailing me stuff (lol), these are people who celebrate each other's victories and lend a lot of support in times of struggles.  So don't knock "imaginary" friends until you've tested the waters.

Hello, friend.  (See, we don't look that weird.  No homicidial maniacs here.)

And Maya loved playing with some new friends, too.  Every time that we're around other kids I feel some inner part of me holding my breath for Maya.  A little voice that thinks "Will they think it's weird that she doesn't talk to them?  Or that she walks a little bit differently than they do?" But her two (adorable) girls were oh-so-ready to play with Maya . . . they ran, played with chalk, jumped (or bounced, in Maya's case) on a trampoline :) They had even learned some signs to do with her . . . how sweet is that?

Ok, ladies, we've got the chalk.  What's the game plan here?  A landscape scene?  Animals?  Scribbles, perhaps?

After brunch, it was on to my 10 year college reunion.  An afternoon of running on the green and catching up with friends, followed by an evening of dinner, drinks and on-campus fun.  My dad came up to babysit Maya at the hotel so we could have a child-free evening (and Dave's parents babysat Parker for the weekend, so we were dog-free as well).

We returned this morning and I went out to check the pigeon (I had a feeling the hatching would be soon, because some other pigeon was visiting last Thurs & Friday---I had never seen him/her before, and I thought it might be a sign that something was changing).  Sure enough, one of the eggs had hatched---apparently just before we got in---the chick was still wet and wiggly.

Baby pigeon butt sticking out from under mom, with the other (unhatched) egg in the foreground

I left the video camera running for a while, with the hopes of catching footage of the other egg hatching.  No dice, but I did get to see Mama Pigeon (MP) pushing the egg back under her, which was pretty cool:




I think I mentioned before that baby pigeons are seriously the weirdest looking animals ever---bright yellow, gangly, awkward.  You may have nightmares.  You've been warned.

I had to refill Parker's dog food container tonight, which really bugs MP (you may remember that this refilling procedure was what first outed her prescence to us).  Anyway, sure enough, she flew onto the terrace railing while I refilled . . . and of course, I had my camera and video camera ready just in case she decided to leave.  I slipped off my rings and put them next to the baby for a size comparison---it's tiny and so weird looking:

Here it is wiggling:

(Don't worry, MP was back on the nest as soon as I walked away.  She picked an unfortunately high traffic area for her nest, but she seems to have quickly gotten used to Dave and I puttering around.)

We're waiting to see if the other egg hatches too.  I feel like I don't have time to do any cool animal behavior stuff anymore, so the universe has brought me my own little case study, right onto my terrace :)

A fantastic trip from start to finish :)

In other news, Maya's ABR is on Tuesday.  I'm nervous, and I feel bad for her poor little unsuspecting self.  But I'm going to not think too much about it until tomorrow night.

Show and tell

Maya wants to show you . . . . . . .that she is not to be underestimated :)

She was eating a waffle and looking at a zoo book.  I randomly started asking her to point to animals and was floored to see how many she knows.  When did she learn these things?




Ironically, her psych evaluation says that her receptive language---words she understands---  is actually less than her expressive language---words she can say.  She can only kind of say 1 word (bye bye- "ba ba") . . . so we can infer what they're implying about her receptive abilities.  Take that, psychologist-who-was-late-and-not-engaging-at-all.  (Oh, and her special instructor knows all of the names of the Little People---the only one that I know is Maggie)

Parker wants to show you . . . his new shoes.

(How embarrassing)

They're for function, not fashion. He was so psyched to have his stitches out (post-neuter) and be free to run, but quickly cut open 2 of his paw pads on ice :( So now he has rubber booties to protect his feet.

And, just for fun, here's some video of Parker running at the dog park this morning :)
(If you watch closely, at 0:05 and 0:21 you can see my boot pop into the screen as I kick the ball. I am a master high-kicker.)



(As always, if you don't see the videos, just click the play buttons and they will appear)

We're celebrities, until January 31

Maya loves Stew Leonard's. 

What is Stew Leonard's, you ask? 

It's a mini chain of grocery stores in CT/NY that sells very little processed foods, but lots of fresh dairy, meats and produce.  But that's not all.  It's set up kind of like a maze---there's only one way to go through, and as you wind through the store (which is painted like a barn) you go through bunches of decorations---the produce sections has fake trees lining the ailes, the banana stand has a giant singing and dancing mechanical banana, etc.  There are dancing mechanical cows and chickens. 

I think that Maya might think it's a theme park.

Back in the day, when she was born (May 2008), it was HOT.  After 2 weeks spent primarily hanging around the house, we were desperate to spend more time out, and the air conditioned Stew Leonard's provided a chance to shop, have ice cream (they serve food, too) and relieve our stir craziness.  So "Uncle Stew's" (as we affectionately call it) was one of Maya's first outings:

See the little tippy top of her baby head?

And once she had a taste, she couldn't get enough.  We can't go shopping anywhere near Stew's without stopping in, or we are guaranteeing a meltdown.

 Guys, look, it's right up there!  We're in the wrong place!  I need to get up that big hill to Uncle Stew's!  Right now!   Waaaaaaahhhhhhhh.  (Taken in the Costco parking lot)

Oh, and in the summer, they have animals.  REAL animals.  They even have . . .

wait for it . . .

COWS!  (well, calves,  but whatever)

I'm talkin' to a baby cow and it's lickin' my cow sticker.  It doesn't get better than this :)

I love it here!



So, when we were at "Uncle Stew's" a few days before New Year's Eve, I couldn't stifle a laugh when a bubbly customer service worker came over and said "Hi, do you guys shop here often?"  Ha! (the service is really friendly, by the way, they give stickers to Maya everytime we go . . . and although she's super cute, I suspect they might give stickers to all of the little kids).  We said yes, and she asked if we'd like to be the "customers of the month".  And that's how we became celebrities :)

They gave us the worst flowers ever and a $20 gift card:

Ok, the flowers were actually alive when we got them, but then Maya got sick and I forgot to take a picture until it was too late.

And our picture/bio is on the plaque-----if you're local you should totally head to Stew's to check it out!

I think you can click this and it will appear larger if you wan to check out the text.

It's hanging behind the desk in the customer service barn:

Maya was so excited to have this award bestowed upon her.  You can tell that she's just overwhelmed by the honor: