Oct/19/2008 05:58 PM
September 2008 - This month was dominated by three things: Family reunion trip to Park City, Utah, combination Business/Vacation trip to Newport News, Va, and Hurricane Ike.
Hurricane Ike came thru and Megan fared better than most, She slept through all of the hurricane, and enjoyed playing in the puddles. We "evacuated" to Newport News/Hampton Virginia (Dad had a Business trip to Langley Research Center), and saw Uncle Joe's and Aunt Kat's new house. She also got to visit the Virginia Living Museum which Mom highly recommends.
Megan's manual dexterity continues to improve, and she can now turn the knob on her play radio. Megan also is babbling quite a lot, and will Say "BaBa" while pointing to Daddy. She also hand signs hurt, drink and milk.
She enjoys playing with car and frogs. Aug/26/2008 01:18 AM
August 2008 - Megan continues to be her cute, curious self and increasing her self-reliance. Her manual dexterity is improving and can do some corse threading, as well as spoon her own food, she’s signing more now, gesturing “friend”, “help”, “milk”, “bath”. She enjoys pushing items around like chairs, and boxes and her toys. She really likes playing with cars and pushing them around on the floor. She now also knows the letters D, F, M. And can identify shapes like triangle, diamond, star, circle, oval, square. Megan like finding the on/off buttons on things and is very curious about the effects of pressing buttons.
Megan and Mommy will act out animal behaviours with the stuffed animals, especially with the frog and duck
We went to the Zoo and Megan really enjoyed seeing all the animals especially the frogs and lizards in the Reptiles and Amphibians house.
Megan will help put on her own clothes, especially shoes, socks, and shorts.
On July 28th, Megan weighed 17lb 12oz, also within this last month, Megan’s cut her 4 lateral incisors.
Aug/05/2008 10:55 AM
July 2008 - Megan's walking everywhere, and she's carrying stuff as she goes. She likes to stack things, especially blocks. She’s getting pretty good at it. And a cute thing she does is clap her hands while looking to us for approval. Knobbed puzzles she’s just about figured out to rotate the piece to fit.
Megan’s also been playing alot with her frog and spider toys pretending to hop and eat insects. She really likes frogs and gets excited when she sees one in a book. She’ll get up and find her stuffed frog and bring them to the book. She’s even learned to recognize frog in Chinese. During sing-a-longs she’s working on the hand gestures that go with “Itsy Bitsy Spider”, “Head, Shoulder, Knees and Toes” and “Wheels on the Bus”
Megan does tend to babble when she gets tired but hasn’t said anything new. However her level of cognitive recognition is increasing. She knows the letters A, B, C and T. She can cough on command, and she will match her toys to items in books. (Fireman, animals and objects). She likes to go draw with sidewalk chalk with Mommy and then go for a ride in the wagon.
Megan’s feeding herself with a fork and spoon now and is eating chicken, carrots, applesauce, watermelon, and various toddler meals.
In the garden Megan’s picking and eating tomatoes and blueberries. She also likes watching daddy mow the lawn, and will wave everytime he circles the yard. Domestically she’s taken with helping Mommy clean the house, she’s got a paintbrush that serves as a baby broom, and will point out pieces of dirt that she wants Mommy to get rid of, she’ll also bring dirty clothes to the laundry room. Jul/15/2008 12:52 AM
We’re trying her out on a lot more foods, salmon, turkey, and the various flowers in our garden.
We start with a high school graduation party for our neighboor Dale. We made a Pig faced strawberry cake made with the "Animal Crackers" Wilton cake pan. That required practice with frosting tips.
She had a "Barnyard Babies" themed Birthday Party and received from guests many wonderful gifts, which she enjoys playing with.
She watched the STS-124 Shuttle launch in her NASA jumper. She tried her hand at finger painting, and went to the community pool for the first time. She enjoyed visiting the neighborhood parks and the playgrounds as well as Book Babies at the Library.
We bought her first pair of strudy shoes at Stride Rite.
On June 2nd, Megan was 17lbs 4 oz and on June 13th Megan was 17 lbs 8 oz, 28” in height and 18” head diameter
She finished the month with four teeth total, 2 upper and 2 lower. May/20/2008 04:25 AM
This has been a pretty busy month. Weather in Texas is creeping towards the hot side, so we've been scrambling to do outdoor activities while it's still possible to do so without melting. We made trips to the Frankie Carter Park, Bay Area Park, Mercer Arboretum, and Houston Zoo. We also visited Aylin's house and the pediatrician.
On April 21st, 2008 Megan weighed 16lb 6 oz., 27" length, 17.75 Head circumference.
Megan's starting getting her two top teeth in, they're big compared to the bottom two teeth, and there seems to be a gap between them. She's standing up a lot longer now, and can take a step or two or three before plopping back down. She can also walk assisted. (Be sure to see the previously posted Proto-walking Video Clips. She can climb up stairs, and crawl really fast.
Megan loves to play with her Little tykes people, and her blocks, and light switches. She love container play, and taking and putting things in holes and boxes.
Megan hasn't been saying much other than the ubiquitous "eh”, her all-purpose syllable, to get attention. On walks she likes us to pick up pine cones for her collection, clover flowers to eat, light poles and fire hydrants to touch, and small trees to explore. She’s amused by Hunter and the cats running around.
She loves to eat chicken, papaya, mangos, cheerios and carrots. She’s okay with peas, asparagus and sweet potatoes. She also likes canned tomatoes but the acidity will cause redness on her skin wherever it comes in direct contact.
Megan loves go outside and play in her sandbox, keeping the sand in the sandbox and out of the bed has been our challenge.
Julie celebrated her first Mother's Day. And we took some photos in front of our fruit bushes.
Apr/13/2008 10:14 AM
In the activities area we visited the Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo for the petting zoo, the Bayou Wildlife Park (which is only 15 minutes from home), and had a couple of picnics at the Bay Area Park (Harris County Parks). We posted photos of all the animals in the previous entry.
Megan is starting to stand a lot more, and is able to stand unsupported for short periods of time. We first observed it last month and now we finally caught it on (digital) film on April 10th. She's demonstrating comprehension across a wide variety of words as evidenced in the video clip we posted previously. Around March 21st Megan we heard Megan say "Hi" at first we weren't sure she was really saying it, but then at Breakfast, she looked at Daddy, waved and said "Hi". Later she said "Hi" to Basil. She's also said "Neigh" as the response to "what sound does a horse make?"
When playing, Megan is really into "putting and taking" and investigating the interaction between all her different toys. Especially sizes and shapes.
Megan's expanded her palette to include butternut squash, asparagus tomatoes, eggplant, green peppers, mangos, and pineapple. Mommy's been making her home made applesauce which she really enjoys.
We took some portraits when she turned ten months old, and also on St. Patrick's Day since Megan is one-quarter Irish.
On March 31st, we measured her length to be 28" and weight at 17 lbs.
Mar/17/2008 02:48 AM
Out in the back yard we filled in our raised bed with new dirt, and bought Megan a sand box which she enjoys playing in.
One of her favorite new toys is a stuffed Dr. Suess Yertle the Turtle we bought from Kohls.
There were two trips to the Pediatrician for the first trip: on 2-25-08 she weighed 15lb 15oz, 26" height, 17" head circumference. She was scheduled to get her 9 month immunizations but she had some congestion so we opted to wait 3 weeks, so on the 3-12-08 : she weighed 16 lb 5 oz, 26.625" height and her 17.5" head circumference.
Megan will now play ball with us. She's often giving us items instead of just taking them.
Megan has started standing unsupported for a few seconds (5-6) at a time. (When this occurs we're way too astounded to get the camera and capture the moment on digital film).
She's started eating Cheerios, broccoli, dill, chicken, and egg yolks.
Mar/04/2008 12:54 AM
Winston finally got to go to Book Babies at the local public library and brought a camera. Book Babies is a half hour program where the librarians lead an interactive sing-a-long and bring out lots of books and toys for the babies to play with. Julie and Megan try to go 2 times a week for this free program.
Megan has learned to climb up stairs and has been known to do it on her own initiative. She's also quite speedy over flat terrain, she likes to stand up on everything, and is quite sure of herself. She still needs support when she's standing. On Feb 10th, we watched her work her way around a coffee table at IFS.
Her second tooth has broken though (another bottom one, and you can see that in some of the photos.
Megan made a trip to the pediatrician on Feb 11th, because she'd been scratching behind her ears and also being very congested. She weighted 16.0 lbs and was 26.5" in length and 17" head diameter. The doctor recommended we give her decongestant and use a humidifier in the room.
Megan's friend Aylin turned one this month too, and Megan went over to help celebrate.
On Feb. 7th, there was the launch of STS-122, and this is the first time Megan has actively noticed the event.
Megan laughs and smiles a lot, and will smile when asked for the most part. She actively plays peek-a-boo, and thoughly enjoys it. She's started waving hello and good-bye. And we believe she's made her first sign "Enough" when she's done eating in her high-chair. When she's playing she's gotten very good at plucking things off of stacks and piles without knocking everything else over. and when we went to the Hong Kong Market, our local oriental grocery, and Megan grabbed herself a cucumber pickle, and refused to let it go.
We end this gallery on Valentine's Day where Mommy celebrated her birthday and our 6th wedding anniversary.
Jan/03/2008 02:36 AM
The two pages of photos here have a 100 photos each, the first page covers the site-seeing part of the trip, and the second page covers Family, and Christmas.
Megan handled her first few airplane rides quite well, sleeping and looking out the window when she was awake, she didn't cry very much, but was shriekly happy at points. I don't think she disturbed our fellow travelers too much.
Upon arriving in California, Winston got sick with fever and chills, and had to take it easy while Julie and Megan explored the town of Seal Beach.
Megan got to play in the sand inSeal Beach and see the Pacific Ocean for the first time. And met some of Winston's co-workers (Feng and Lie-Mine) for lunch one day.
Megan got to try peas for the first time, and she happily smeared it all over the place, and did not dislike them as much as the carrots.
For the weekend we stayed at the Joshua Tree Inn and it was pretty cold at night and mild during the day. On our way to Joshua Tree, we stopped off in Palm Springs, and had lunch downtown, followed by a ranger led two mile hike in the Tahquitz Canyon to the Waterfall. It was very pretty, but cool, as the canyon walls made the trail mostly in shadow.
We spent all day driving around Joshua Tree National Park stopped at quite a few of the nature trails and exhibits in the park. We ended the day watching the sun and temperature set at Keys View overlooking Palms Spring and the Salton Sea. We spent the next morning on a 3 mile hike in the forty-nine Palms Canyon, and the nature trail at the Oasis of Mara.
On Christmas Eve we drove back to the Los Angeles area and met Family from Winston's mother's side for dinner, and stayed with family from Winston's Father's side. Everyone was really happy to have met Megan, and though she was tried from a whole day's traveling and activity, many photos were taken.
Megan's first Christmas was quite fun she got to watch her Second Cousins once-removed open tear open christmas presents, while she went thru her gift box. That afternoon we all walked to the neighboorhood park, and looked at all the waterfowl then. Megan was very entertained by all of this.
The flight home was uneventful except for fact that Julie was now suffering the same symptoms that Winston was a week earlier, and we missied our connecting in Dallas. American Airlines put us up for the night at the local hotel and paid for both dinner and breakfast.
After we got home, Megan went in for her Flu shot booster. Her measurements didn't change as she remained 15 lbs 5 oz, and 25.5" in length, and a head diameter of 16.5". The lack of change we're attributing to it being warmer, so Megan wore less and so didn't weigh as mch as last time.
