We have a singer in the family

 

Penny likes her new toy

 

Aries-Ox girl

Penelope has started a new phase in the past week or so. She is becoming more independent and assertive. When she is in a familiar environment, she uses her loud voice now. As her daycare provider noticed today, "she has found her voice!". She wants to do things her way (aka the messy or dangerous way), like feeding herself, climbing on things, and taking stuff out of drawers (safety alert!) and she gets mad if you restrict her. I try to let her experiment, while I supervise, but it is a constant game of hazard control as she comes close to falling from high places or smashing her fingers in drawers. I guess letting her learn from her mistakes starts now? I'm afraid that when she starts walking (and from then on) we will be in trouble...

Tahoe

We decided to take advantage of the daycare holiday on Friday and celebrate dad's birthday in Tahoe. This was Penny's first time to Tahoe and her first time in the snow. She wasn't all that impressed with the snow, but she was a good sport anyway. Saturday was spent hanging out at the lodge at Heavenly, checking out doggies and other kids. Unfortunately, the travel crib (which she used a little bit in Japan) didn't work for her this trip, so we co-slept in a king bed, which took a night to adapt to. We also got to hang out with some friends that met us in Tahoe and we visited grandpa in Sacramento.

Penny's 1st Birthday!

Thank you to grandma, auntie, and uncle for helping to make Penny's 1st birthday party a success! Penny is a very lucky girl (not a baby anymore) to have lots of friends and family to celebrate with. She also has lots of new toys, clothes, and books!

Flickr update

See the past 9 months of Penny photos
3-6 months
6-12 months

Tuckered out

We went to the city, ate pho, shopped for party supplies and visited the doggies and fishies at the pet store. All the excitement today made Penny tired...

Sour orange

Penny was excited about the oranges today. She was pointing and saying "ba-ba-ba" (she calls all round things balls) at the store. She carried the orange on our walk home and when she got to eat it, she made funny faces, but she kept going back for more.

My kitty

somebody got face paint at daycare

"no no no"

Penny knows how to shake her head "no". She probably knows because she is told "no" often. Some parenting philosophies say that you should never tell your child, "no":
Never saying "no" means focusing on good behavior and finding a way to accentuate a child's direct or indirect control over everything he wants."
We take that philosophy into consideration, but I don't think that we could realistically follow that style (there I go, being negative again). Today, I caught her playing and exploring by herself. She shook her head "no" while she started playing with the game controller, which she knows that she is not supposed to play with. So, it seems like she knows what she is not supposed to do, but she doesn't necessarily follow the request...

Penny's sleep update

Penny still wakes up once in the night. I (mom) had been waking up with her and feeding her thinking that she needed to eat to make up for not eating enough (milk) during the day. Dad has taken my place a few nights now and has gone in to comfort her when her crying doesn't seem like it will subside. It turns out that she doesn't really need to eat, but now he has started a new unsustainable habit. He checks on her, lays her back down and reassures her. Then, he stays in her room for a while because if he leaves, she starts crying again. Today I found his pillow and blanket on the floor in her room... how long will this last?

Penny's salon haircut

We went on our monthly trip to the city for Minkz's haircut in our old neighborhood. His stylist noticed how poorly cut Penny's bangs were and she fixed them for her!! As you would expect, It took some distracting by another friendly stylist to get her to stay still.

Birthday party fun

We went to Syona's 1st birthday party on Saturday at the Spaghetti Factory. It was fun and got us thinking about Penny's birthday party, coming up soon...

Penny showing off

Penny has been learning so many new things, it's hard to remember to get the camera out to record them. The other day at grandma's, she was in a fun mood and decided to show off a few of them at once. This time, camera was actually nearby.

 

Penny @ 10 months

Penny is babbling a lot and cruising along the furniture now. She keeps doing the open-close hand sign as if she wants something, but we haven't figured out what she is trying to say... Her food preferences seem to be constantly changing and I can barely cook enough to keep up with her appetite.

photo taken by auntie Laura

Mama and Bap

For a while, Penny would say, "ba-ba-ba" a lot and Minkz would say, "Hi ba" when he greeted her. Well, somehow this has caught on with her and when she sees dada, she says "bap!". So, it seems like Bap is her name for him at the moment...

She's back

It took about a week, but Penny seems to be adjusted back to California time and routine now.
We had the funniest experience going out to eat the other day. It was the first time in a while that we ate out and I actually got to eat as much as I wanted to at a relaxed pace. The reason was because Penny was occupied observing the table next to us as they conversed in Mandarin. She seemed really fascinated by the different sound and she just stared at them the entire time we were there! We were happy that it kept her entertained while we ate.

Japan trip 09-10

International travel with a baby was a whole new experience for us. We really didn't know what to expect. Some of things that I was worried about were, how she would behave on the flight, how she would handle the time zone difference, breastfeeding acceptability there, and eating out with the baby. The flights were okay - the way back was a little harder than expected because she could not sleep well even though it was time for her to sleep. The time change took about a week to adjust - she was usually asleep by around 6 pm and awake around 5 am. So, one of the challenges for us was getting dinner before she was passed out. Breastfeeding was not a problem. Since she nurses less frequently I rarely had to feed her while we were out. I did find a couple of nice nursing rooms. Eating out was a challenge because of the lack of secure highchairs.. Another difficulty is that we didn't bring a stroller so we carried her the entire time and she gets heavy (especially when she is asleep). We didn't get to do everything that we wanted to this trip, partly because it was brief and partly because of the baby. But, overall, it was worth it for us to go. We really wanted my grandmother in Japan to meet the baby and vice versa. Although Penny will not remember it, she will know that she has been there and I hope she realizes that it is important to us that she has ties to our relatives there.

おばあちゃんとペニー

Here's a short video of Penelope with her great grandmother (おばあちゃん) in Japan.

 

Time change

We are experiencing a lot of changes with Penny on this trip, so far. She has not been able to get a stretch of sleep longer than 5 hours. Usually, she sleeps 11 hours at night with one or two brief wakings. With the new sleeping arrangement plus the time difference, when she has woken up (around 1 am), she has had a hard time going back to sleep, meaning that she is in a bad mood, nothing consoles her, and she cries herself back to sleep. We brought a travel crib, but it is difficult to use since she would need to cry-it-out in order to fall asleep in it and we likely have neighbors that would not appreciate that. We had her fall asleep in it once for a daytime nap after about 15 minutes of crying, but as we were about to confirm that she had in fact fallen asleep on her own, the house cleaner walked in and woke her up! :(
Another concern of mine was regarding eating out with the baby and the availability of high chairs (and kid-friendly dining). So far, we haven't seen a high chair that has been safe enough for her to use. There have been boosters and chairs, but they have no safety belts. So, we have been eating while holding the baby - quickly and taking turns. Another odd thing, Penny has been on a hunger strike of sorts, refusing to eat much solid food... maybe because of the jetlag? she is nursing fine so we are not worried.
one thing she loves is the Japanese style bath. We have been taking a bath together in the morning to kill some time (since there is nothing to do at 4 am) and she seems to feel very relaxed, submerged in the water up to her neck.