Chasing ducks.

These are some photos from today's outing to the duck pond. I wish that all of you could experience Quinn's joy when we come here - girlfriend goes crazy! She loves the ducks. She runs after them with her arms outstretched, like she really believes she will be able to catch one and give him a big hug! I wish I could get better pictures of it, but she has no interest in accommodating the camera; by the time I am able to sprint in front of her (no small feat in and of itself) crouch down, and focus, she is running off at breakneck speed in another direction.

An update:

We are having another girl!

On December 18th, we went in for our 20-week ultrasound and found out that we are having another girl! And we could not possibly be more excited about that, for a number of reasons. This time around, Spenser's instincts were right - he thought we were having another girl. I thought we were having a boy, reason being that this pregnancy has been a lot different from the first one. It's been easier! I am currently 26 weeks along, and by this point with Quinn my legs and feet were completely swollen and I was on Tums three times a day for the worst heartburn ever...but with this baby, nope! My only real complaints are back pain (stretching, oh the stretching) and restless legs syndrome, which always kicks in at night. Sometimes Spenser has to sit on my legs to keep me from going completely insane! But most importantly, the baby appears to be completely healthy, and the pregnancy is progressing as well as can be expected...and we are very happy about all of that.

The holidays were a great time.

Well, a great AND a busy time! Life was pretty insane for Spenser. In addition to taking a class, he experienced for the first time what having a career in shipping means during the holidays...it means loads of overtime and absolute insanity! But he survived. We absolutely loved having my siblings and their spouses come up to Portland for Thanksgiving, and then we made the trek over to Hermiston for Christmas, which was equally awesome.

We found a new place to live...

...and this is pretty life-changing news for me, because our apartment has a washer and dryer in the unit. Hallelujiah! I have arrived! Haha. We waffled on whether or not we wanted to stay put and make a go of having two kiddos in the one-bedroom we currently occupy, which we thought might be workable and more affordable, or find a two-bedroom. Well, a letter from our current landlord raising the rent on this unit made it silly not to look for more space so we are headed out to Tualitan, very close to Spenser's work. That will be happening in the middle of February. Thanks in advance to everyone who is giving up their Saturday morning to help us haul our junk out there. :)

I hope to post a few more updates soon, particularly about Miss Quinn who is evolving everyday and becoming quite a little person!

A nice moment.

Quinn has a new trick! The video speaks for itself:

A family date.

The last couple of weeks have been a bit rough. Last week Quinn had a major teething episode, made obvious by the inhuman amounts of drool she started to produce (seriously, she could soak through her shirt in minutes). She was not her happy easygoing self at all; if I put her down, she wanted to be picked up, and when I picked her up she needed to be put back down again RIGHT NOW. She wanted a bottle, but then immediately wanted nothing to do with it. And she was up every hour and a half or so at night, sobbing and screaming. Poor kiddo! It was pretty miserable for all parties. Sure enough, this week when she would let us near her mouth we saw three or four new teeth poking through in there.

Just when I thought we were going to catch a break, I came down with a nasty cold (ok, well...maybe it hasn't been that nasty but I'm a pretty big wimp when I get sick so I didn't cope*). And then a few days later...poor Quinners' nose started running like a fountain. I don't know what to say about Spenser - he has freakish immunities and seems to have escaped it. But it has meant more sleepless nights and comfortless days this week.

So when Spenser got home from work this morning and everyone seemed to be in a pretty good state, I wanted to have a family date. We ran downtown for dumplings at Frank's Noodle House and then over to Salt & Straw for ice cream!! I was kind of bummed that we missed all of the autumn flavors but they have a special Thanksgiving menu right now...apple cranberry stuffing, mincemeat, caramel turkey (yes folks, these are flavors of ice cream). I was tempted by pumpkin custard w/spiced chevre but opted for sweet potato w/candied pecans. It was delicious, as you can see from the first picture above of Quinn shoving her face into it as soon as it was handed to me :) I also love that she is licking her lips in the second picture...she's a little woman after my own heart! She also loved people watching from the window. Ice cream was followed by a long family nap. Best Saturday ever; I sure love these two.

*Thank you, Mom and Vince, for helping out so much this week.

An autumn update.

This is Quinn enjoying one of our last dry autumn days on the swings! By way of update, here is where Quinn stands on the three things people always ask when they find out you have a fourteen-month-old:

- Walking? Yep! All over the place. In fact, I think her two favorite places to be are the church and the high school, where there are long wide stretches of hallways for her to cruise.
- Favorite foods? Wish I knew...she's going through a phase where she seems to dislike just about anything that is put in front of her, unless it is derived from a potato and comes from the golden arches (don't judge me). I guess she also likes scrambled eggs. I lie awake at night scheming up ways to feed her fruits and vegetables but it's pretty hit and miss.
- Words? Quinn says a lot of things and mimics a lot of the sounds we make, but I'm not too sure how discriminate she is with her vocabulary. For example, she will look right at Spenser and say "dada" but then toddle off to the cat and start calling it "dada" as well. There is one word she seems to understand: "uh-oh", which she pretty clearly associates with things falling. Usually food that she is throwing off her high chair tray. Unless it is a french fry.

It's a fun age! I think most people who read this blog already know this old, albeit big, news...but I haven't documented it here, so for the sake of posterity: Quinn will be a big sister on or around May 5th!

I have had the usual host of first trimester complaints, but overall I am feeling well! We are going in for the 20-week ultrasound (at which point we will know the gender) on December 18th. We can't wait to add another little one to our family!

Winco crisis.

Quinn and I experienced a minor crisis this morning at Winco. Here I was, so proud of myself for getting us going early...but after an hour or so of grocery shopping, I loaded the groceries into the car, went to take Quinn out of the cart and discovered that her foot was totally wedged between the tiny metal slats! Folks, it was stuck. I could see that it wasn't going to be good but I tried to jiggle it a little bit anyway - at which point she erupted into screams of pain and big crocodile tears started pouring down her cheeks :( Her little ankle was really inflamed and any time I tried to work with it she would start screaming. I'm not sure how she even got it in there! I hadn't noticed it until I went to get her out! At this point I was having visions of firetrucks and the jaws of life and getting progressively more worked up myself. I finally wheeled the cart back into Winco for some help. I probably looked like a crazy person because I was bawling my eyes out and moving at top speed (although Quinn was relatively calm, as long as I wasn't touching her leg). It took a few tries, but the lady at customer service was finally able to understand that my child's foot was stuck. She assured me that it happens sometimes and we would free her, then got on the intercom: "Would an associate please bring a tub of butter to the customer service desk, thank you." Unfortunately that took about five minutes because the associate wasn't sure if we needed butter, margarine, unsalted, salted, low sodium, or organic butter and what size. Finally the customer service lady helping us just said "Any kind of butter is fine! It's an EMERGENCY!" So up came the butter, which we massaged around Quinn's ankle and pop! her leg came right out! It was all rather traumatizing but thanks to the nice Winco employees for helping us out!

Quinn's summer.

Oh, what does Quinn do in the summertime?

Sooooooooo many fun things! Yes, I realize summer isn't technically over yet...but it always feels like it is to me when August ends and everyone goes back to school. Thanks, everyone, for a fun summer!

Exciting airplanes.

This video teaches us two things: First, that Quinn is now a willful acting agent and no longer an agent to be acted upon. What do I mean by that? Well, if you try to hold her down and smooch her face a billion times she may use her sharp little fingernails to resist you, as Spenser learned the hard way. Second, she finds airplanes very exciting.