There IS some Norwegian in the boy!

It's official. See this stuff to the left? Yep, everyone in my (maternal) family likes it. I can eat it by the bagful, my sister loves it, my mom loves it and her sister loves it. The dichotomous candy that you can buy in dozens and dozens of varieties in Scandinavia: black licorice. Brett hates it. In fact, he hates it so much that it's officially banned from small spaces that we might both occupy - like cars. I bought a big bag of it in bulk at the grocery store yesterday and decided to offer it to Larson today just to see how much Norwegian is in him. Not to worry, he LOVED the stuff and immediately asked for more, as the brown-black drool dripped down his chin. Little buddy, you have no idea, but you just made your mommy really proud! Now I know that I have to hide it along with the chocolate, way back in the pantry. (Chocolate loving, by the way, is a trait he gets from his daddy's family, so we've got most of the candy categories covered :)

Relaxing weekend

These are some photos from a couple of weeks ago which I meant to post earlier, but got a little sidetracked. Spent a lovely weekend laying low and hanging out with the family. Tended the garden, soaked up a little bit of sun, took photos of cooperative children :)

It's hard to believe that summer is almost over! Apples & pears are appearing to replace the berries and cherries. School is starting soon. It's getting chilly with the window open at night.

On an unrelated note, I read an interesting book last week: Parenting, Inc.: How We Are Sold on $800 Strollers, Fetal Education, Baby Sign Language, Sleeping Coaches, Toddler Couture and Diaper Wipe Warmers -- and What It Means for Our Children. It's basically an analysis of the big business that parenting has become and how we, as American parents, all too often are sucked right into it. The author doesn't profess to be immune to it all, but her interviews with the people who own companies that market goods and services to parents and consumers are pretty eye-opening to the ridiculousness of it all. You can't help but think as you read through this: "but I didn't go to 500 different music, language & art classes before I was 3; or have a fraction of the toys (not to mention Baby Einstein, but don't get me started on that one) that are available today and I turned out fine...maybe it's not so bad for my kids to engage in a little unstructured play or - gasp! - to actually help mom and dad around the house for an afternoon instead of attending the how-to-get-your-toddler-into-an-ivy-league-college-class-du-jour.

Anyway, I recommend the book for a quick read. Who knows if the statistics are sound (the only part of the book I know anything about is the chapter on the effects of TV/media on kids because one of the researchers quoted is someone I've worked with...plus I don't think the AAP would recommend no TV under age 3 without some data to back it up...), but it provides some nice food for thought for anyone with kids (or who just shops for kids :)

Hot weekend

Whew! Getting through a stretch of 87 degree days with no AC and just two fans was a bit of a challenge. Fortunately, Monday brought with it a return to our more temperate summer weather, which I am very grateful for. It was especially hard now that Cora has taken to the baby wrap and I couldn't have her in it for more than 5 minutes before we were both drenched in sweat. Yuck! The picture to the left is a dahlia from one of the planters on our bedroom balcony. I decided to try out our new camera for some close-up shots just as the sun was going down and the lighting was nice. When I planted them this spring, I was hoping to be able to cut them for use inside the house, but the plants haven't yielded that many blooms thus far. Probably need more Miracle-Gro, as I learned from my mom, the expert gardener, when she was here visiting. I'll work on that.

Here's Cora all stretched out in the summer heat...I think this pretty much sums up what we all were feeling! It's funny how moving out here has completely reset my thermostat for what kind of heat I can tolerate. In the Midwest, it's not uncommon to have weeks and weeks of weather like this, with close to 100% humidity to boot! Now if it gets above 80 degrees, I'm feeling it. We bought the shirt she's wearing on our trip to Kauai in March; Larson has a matching one and they both wore theirs yesterday.

This was Larson's fun Saturday afternoon activity with dad: washing the truck! As you can see, he is all grown up and can spray down the sides all by himself.

The open water swim went well and Larson had a great time with his friend, Malia. No pictures, though, because Brett didn't want to bring the camera. Despite the heat, Brett said the water in Lake Washington was still pretty chilly. The highlight for Larson was getting to see both an ambulance and a firetruck when they were called to the race location to tend to a participant. Lights, sirens and everything!

That's all for today. Here's Cora sleeping peacefully. She's still doing a great job sleeping at night, with pretty long stretches for me to sleep as well. During the day, it's a little harder; there's a lot of holding involved...I've forgotten that 1-2 hours awake is about all that a newborn can handle before they get overtired. Unlike Larson, she likes to be held and rocked and then put down, whereas all he needed was motion (swing, carseat, etc) but didn't seem to care a bit about being held. I guess this is just an example of their different personalities and temperaments showing themselves! So much to learn about my little one...

New name

Yes, I changed the name of our blog. It just doesn't seem fitting to have Larson get all the spotlight. We'll try this one out for a bit and see how it goes...

...and now we are four!

Well, it's been a week since Cora joined our family and things seem to be following the "it's easier the second time around" pattern so far. Is this because second (and third, etc) babies are inherently more laid back or perhaps that parents are less freaked out and anxious about every little thing? I'm guessing maybe a combination of both, but speaking for myself, I'm definitely less anxious about things this time. We had our first checkup at 5 days old and Cora had gained almost half a pound...could be just a different scale, but I think at least some of it is real. She is already too big for the smallest size diapers, good thing I only bought one pack!

Larson & Nana meeting Cora

Yesterday we had a lovely day at home for my birthday. Brett, Cora & I went to Trophy Cupcakes for a treat and brought some more home for the whole family at dinner. Larson probably would have eaten all of them if we let him. He tried really, really hard to be patient until it was time to eat his cupcake, but couldn't control himself to ask for one about every 20-30 seconds. For dinner, I got to eat something I've been craving for months: sushi! It was yummy. Larson kept asking to see it, but was not interested in trying any. Maybe next time.

All ready to go home!

The heat that we've been escaping this summer is here for a few days: today the high is going to be 90! That is really hot for this un-air-conditioned neck of the woods. We have our fans working overtime to keep the house cool until it passes, which will hopefully be in the next few days. I was a little nervous last night because I've been swaddling Cora for sleeping and it was just too hot to do it...would she sleep anyway? Fortunately last night she did, so we'll just have to see how it goes.

So, yes, our lives are definitely different now that our family is bigger and even simple things, like trying to have dinner together, have their new challenges. Despite all this, I couldn't be happier. Larson is really excited to show Cora all his toys and wants to help out with just about everything. He follows me around the house and alerts me when Cora cries that she "needs to eat, Mama!" Some of our happiest moments are spent playing on our bed or on the couch, en famille, laughing, etc and now we will just make room for another body to jump on the cushions and get buried in the pillows. Life is good.

Tomorrow, Brett and our friend Stephen are going to swim in an open water event at Seward Park. Hopefully we'll get some fun pictures from that, even though I'll be home with Cora. In the meantime, here's a couple of photos of Larson: first, watching Olympic swimming with dad and second, enjoying his own swim class (and despite a rocky start, he loves it now and gets into all the activities...last week he even did the "submarine" on his own - that's toddler speak for putting your head under the water :)

Announcing Cora Irene Buchholz!

Our new arrival is finally here! This will just be a quickie post with the essentials while we adjust to life at home with a new little one...

Cora made her way into the world at 1:07 am on the lucky date of 8/8/08 weighing in at 7 pounds 8.5 ounces. She is named after my maternal grandmother who passed away while I was in college. We're all doing well and happy as can be (though a little sleep-deprived!). Larson is handling the adjustment of having a baby sister as well as can be expected for any toddler. He's full of questions about what she's doing ("Why is she crying?" "I want to see that thing on her belly button again...") but definitely has apprehensions about having to share the spotlight. Fortunately his Nana is here to shower him with attention and help a little with getting things in our house going again. Here are some of Cora's first photos:

Weighing in

Dad and Cora

Getting her first shampoo - where did all that dark hair come from? Definitely different from Larson's bald newborn head but equally precious.

I will try to publish more details and photos soon but for now it's time to catch a little sleep...

Summer days

It's mid-July and summer is definitely underway. Larson comes home from school nearly every day with his clothes soaked after playing in the hose outside in the afternoon to keep cool. Like any toddler, he doesn't seem to mind :)

We've enrolled in swim lessons, round two, but this time our guy has been a little less cooperative. Comfort level in the water = improved; willingness to participate in what the rest of the class is doing = needs improvement. Oh, well, it's still a fun time for Larson & Brett.

For the second summer, our CSA has been providing us with a weekly box full of fresh, organic and tasty produce which we really enjoy. Larson loves to look and see what's in the box each week, although his interest stops at actually eating any of said food (we're still working on that...). Our cool spring helped produce the most delicious strawberries I can remember eating in a while and we've also enjoyed snap peas, beets, carrots & last night I made pasta with carmelized fennel. (I think it smelled and tasted wonderful, but I'm a little impaired right now with a stuffy nose, unfortunately). It's fun to take the list of what's in the box and create a week's worth of healthy, fresh food -- our grocery store needs definitely go down a lot during the 20 weeks of our CSA! I love that we're supporting a local farm and getting great food all at the same time. I used to be a farmer's market junkie, but parenthood has put a damper on the amount of time I have free to browse and pick every week, so the CSA has been a great solution. If you want to find one near where you live, try googling CSA and your state or region...that's how I found ours!

Other fun tidbits:

* Thanks to Miss Alexis & Miss Lindsey, Larson now asks to be excused when he is finished eating and wants to leave the table.

* Larson can now sing the entire ABCs by himself (and SOOOO into letters -- "Look! There's an S on that sign!")

* Favorite color is still green, but he admits that he likes red lollipops the best (he took 3 days to finish a Tootsie Pop last week...we just asked him if he was done and wrapped it up in foil until the next day like it was no big deal)

* LJ loves to help mom make pancakes on Saturday morning -- knows almost all the ingredients!

We still have a few preparations for the new baby, but feel like we're getting as ready as we'll ever be. I passed 37 weeks this week, so hopefully it won't be too much longer before we have some exciting news and photos to share. I hope everyone living in hotter climates than we do is staying cool!