The girl petered out around 7 tonight. She became extremely irritable and "cried" for a good 20 minutes as I prevented her from harming herself by eating extension cords. She went to sleep with little fuss around 7:30. We hope she doesn't get up at 5:45 again tomorrow...we're so very sleepy today.

Yesterday Caroline woke up after 8 am. She had shorter naps and plenty of exercise at the park and the museum. So, of course we figured she'd sleep late again. She woke up about 5:45 am today and has been tearing everything apart, and I'm too tired to do much to stop the destruction.

Caroline and I joined Aaron and Emma (and their moms) at the Old Salem Children's Museum. Despite the children-hating staff, we had a good time.

Another rainy day, at least according to the local radar (it appeared to be raining on the weather site a lot more than it actually rained). Whatever. We stayed inside most of the day. Took her on some more unnecessary errands, but found a decent sale on zone bars at Target. This is Caroline's reaction when I explained the savings.

The weather improved; Caroline had some outside time; and it was a pretty fun day.

It's raining, and we have no legitimate errands to run, so it's going to be a long day. Caroline is dying to go outside.

The Cs went swimming again today. Next time, I will accompany them with the camera. This picture was taken shortly before bedtime, when the girl was pulling everything down within reach and trying to eat it.

Now that she's outgrown the fox overalls, my new favorite outfit is most definitely this awesome strawberry-themed dress.
Edit - I'm serious. I'm not being sarcastic. Caroline seems to like it too.

Cheryl came home today from an overnight business trip, and not a moment too soon. Caroline was tearing the place apart with abandon, and I was spent. She was pretty happy most of the time, but last night's bath drove me to medicate. Caroline definitely prefers mom's soothing baths to dad's prison camp style ones.

On our trip to the grocers this morning, I bought Caroline a second ball. Trying to pick up both at once should keep her busy for 20 or so minutes.

After a good morning nap and a delicious banana, Caroline is getting her daily dose of acrylamide.

She was the happiest ever today - nothing got her down from the moment she woke up babbling to her animals in her crib until going to bed with none of the usual fuss tonight. Caroline can now climb up on the couch (as long as she uses clothes or a blanket to get her started), she responds to the daily routine cues (she runs over to the refrigerator for her yogurt, points at the bananas when it's her morning snack, and goes and pats the bed for her afternoon nap), and gets very excited when Cheryl comes home (either runs to the car or eagerly waves at the window). Unfortunately, she can't talk yet. Unrelated note - when we checked on her last night before our bedtime, she had made a pile of her stuffed animals in her crib and was sprawled out on top of them.

Caroline woke up well after 7 this morning, then took over 4 hours of naps today. She must have had quite an exhausting time in NJ.

Caroline is sleeping peacefully after a busy day. Both nextdoor neighbors of the Grandparents Zukowski have dogs...which meant a lot of running to fences and sweetly saying, "Woof". Tomorrow we're going to visit the Saddle Brook relatives before we head to the airport. We're looking forward to spending the morning with Grandpa Z. on his birthday and Fathers' Day and then seeing Daddy around 3:15 at the Greensboro airport.

Cheryl again. Caroline spent the morning buying kitsch items on eBay with her zany Uncle Matt. She told me she can't wait to get her Batman tea set and her vintage Bettie Page pinups.

Caroline spent a great deal of time today playing with Grandma's excellent selection of new and vintage baby toys. She really enjoyed interacting with the neighbor children when they stopped in after an afternoon swim.

Cheryl, here. Caroline again proved herself quite a flexible and well-behaved traveler when yesterday's quick trip from NC to NYC turned into quite an odyssey. Despite a 3+ hour flight diversion in Richmond, and a total of a 6.5 hours on our puddle jumper with about 15 of my co-workers and twice as many nervous strangers, Caroline remained calm and friendly. She became quite the celebrity. Countless folks came up to us at baggage claim commending Caroline on being the best passenger on our flight. She never cried, in spite of missing her afternoon nap and her dinner (she had pretzels). Our flight attendant, Rebecca, said that Caroline was the best-behaved baby she's ever seen on a plane. She even charmed my boss's boss (my "grandboss") as pictured here.

Caroline has the car keys and is eager to hit the road - she's heading north for a few days.

Despite the 90 degree heat, Caroline had a great time running all over the front yard and at the park today. I am a bit sick with a cold, so chasing her around was not so wonderful for me. Fortunately she's started amusing herself for 10 or 15 minutes at a time with her toys in our living room - she had been needing constant interaction and supervision.

Today is Cheryl's favorite holiday. Caroline is dressed to celebrate. Last night our girl woke up shrieking around 11pm; we could find nothing wrong with her and eventually Cheryl was able to rock her back to sleep. I found her playing with her stuffed animals in her crib this morning about 7:30, as happy as can be - very unusual behavior for our little one.

Sometimes Caroline just doesn't want her picture taken. Or perhaps she wants our readers to know about student loan interest rates.
For the past few days she had been waking up later and later, so that today I pushed back the start time on the coffee maker and intended to sleep until at least 7:15. Of course she woke up at 5:45.
She made up for it though by behaving perfectly at dinner out tonight.

Cheryl and Caroline went to the nearby public pool this morning for a program that introduces babies to water. After some reservations, Caroline really enjoyed herself.

After a hard day of running around outside, 4 miles of walks, eating grass, and a trip to Target, Caroline went from 0 to cranky almost instantaneously around 7:15. Cheryl came home from a work happy hour about 7:30, and it was none too soon for our girl's bath and bed.

Caroline involuntarily wishes Aunt Kim a happy 30th birthday.

Caroline has one chore - maintaining the lawn. She's barely gnawed through a few feet of weeds, and the front yard is surely going to get us in trouble with the neighbors.

Caroline was a darling most of the day, but then came the storms and the fatigue and the dinner time fight over how much food she had to eat and once again, Cheryl and I were driven to medicate.

Caroline has started spitting her water out onto her shirt after she pulls it from her straw cup. She thinks it's really funny. We think it's really irritating and take the cup away from her - this evening she had a little tantrum when we wouldn't give it back. Luckily I think her tantrum crying is cute, so it doesn't bother me, although that may change in public places. In other news, it broke 90 degrees here today, and the cameraman doesn't work in that type of heat.

Just like her mom, Caroline will accept only the best. Of all of her birthday gifts, she likes this box the best. She spent about 40 minutes climbing in and out of it and dragging it around the floor, giggling all the while. Maybe we can get her a giant paper bag for Christmas. It will be the best day ever!
Edit by Jay - this was posted by Cheryl.

(Cheryl again, here.) Anyone for golf? Actually, I snapped this shot (and since I'm not the usual photographer, I mistakenly missed Caroline's head) to show off my girl's fashion sense. About a half hour before the game, she brought me a sandal after she spent a while trying to put it on her own foot. I took it as a sign that she knew she'd be out in public, and therefore needed to be shod.

Caroline was a joy throughout the Warthogs game. She spent most of it reclining against Camille and making friends with people in the crowd. She clapped along with the crowd when things were going well for the home team. She also made her mom proud with some solid fist-shaking at the crazies wearing BoSox hats. When we got home at 9:15, she showered and went to sleep with little to no fussing. Quite the happy wee one.

This is Cheryl. Caroline and I are having another glorious day. She woke once last night around 2:30am and went back to sleep by about 3:15. We got up this morning around 6:30 and napped from 10 until 11:15. We've been to the grocery store today and we've done some laundry. I'm trying to stretch Caroline's nap time until about 3 this afternoon; we're going to a Winston-Salem Warthogs AA Baseball game tonight with my friend Camille, and I'm hoping that Caroline will be able to stay up until around 9pm. We shall see....

So far, Caroline and I have had a lovely day. We played and read and shopped and ate. She did put up a little bit of a fight at naptime and bedtime. At bedtime she would only stop crying when we'd wander around the house. I think she may have been looking for her dad.

It's been raining for the better part of three days, so we're going a bit crazy. Caroline's been playing on my phone for the last half hour - good thing she hasn't figured out how to unlock it. I'm going away until Sunday as soon as Cheryl gets home this afternoon - wish her luck...

We went to the grocery store this afternoon - some old woman with bad breath decided she would give me 15 minutes of unsolicited advice on the benefits of blendered foods for our boy instead of the dangerous nutrition-free jars of food that were in my cart. Caroline isn't dressed particularly much like a boy today - her pants are covered with flowers. Not that I was going to change my purchasing decision anyway, but I refuse to listen to anyone that calls her a boy. Later, during lunchtime back home, a bird flew in the kitchen through the vent over the stove - though I heard it coming it still startled the heck out of me. Caroline was too busy playing with the scrambled eggs that she refused to eat to notice or care.

Caroline also loves the June issue of California Lawyer.

Caroline loves the 'naners.