Model Baby

I promise I will not become a stage mom, but I must admit I had Claire model some baby clothes in the name of her cuteness. A local baby clothing and blanket company was looking for babies to model for its Fall 2011 catalog so I suggested Claire.

We spent half an our one afternoon at the photo shoot, dressing up in a few different outfits. Claire's payment was an adorable outfit and another lovey to add to her collection.


They let me join her for a souvenir (not the catalog!)
Some more babies (and Claire) can be seen on their blog as well.

Vocabulary

Claire's vocabulary has expanded. The day after she exclaimed "Kitty" she started saying "agua." Now she will say "hi" and "dada," which is accompanied by a forehead tap - the sign for Dad.

Claire will occasionally wave hi or bye and her signing collection also includes the first half of "dog" - a thigh slap.

I love it!

Kitty!

Announcing Claire's official first word: "kitty".

At home and at day care, Claire is exposed to her feline friends with adults saying and signing "kitty". For the past couple of days, Claire has been mimicking us and says "kitty" back to us.

Yay, Claire!

10 Months

The elephant appears again and again we had some trouble capturing a still shot. Here's the bug at 10 months!

Excellent posture, as you can see!

Making her escape

Family Photos

I finally cashed in Matt's 3rd anniversary gift to me: professional photos. Our wedding photographer was a mousy amateur and we never did any engagement pictures. And, naturally, we wanted to get some great shots with Claire and the photogenic Sunapee. So, we set up a session with a local photographer who recently memorialized our friends' wedding.

Sunday morning we met up with the photographers, conveniently named Matt and Suzanne, brought Becca & Kevin to help schlep stuff and wrangle the dog and frolicked in the grass. Claire and the dog did great. Claire's hair was sticking up the whole time, but isn't that more fun?

Here's a preview of the session.

Peekaboo Claire

I took this video of Claire playing peekaboo with me behind the coffee table. I'm so very behind in posting, so I hope to catch up slowly!

9 Months

As expected, Claire is at an in-between stage for taking her monthly portrait. She is too old and mobile to get a good still shot, but too young to understand "stay still!" So, here is her 9 month elephant portrait in a series.

This is all I could get of her sitting still. This was immediately followed by...

I thought I'd try a standing shot.

The elephant didn't fare very well.

At her 9 month doctor appointment on 11/3, Claire weighed in at 16.5 lbs, 27". She has 3 teeth - I'm not sure why only one top tooth has appeared but hopefully the second will follow soon.

Little Houdini

Claire worked her magic again to wiggle out of her sleeve after (during?) her nap. Now she has more incentive - to chew on said sleeve!

Happy Halloween!

The babies dressed in their costumes for an extended Halloween party today. We brought out Claire's back up costume (dinosaur) which is a tad snug (it's a 6mo size hand-me-down but too cute to leave it in the closet). It was nice of Nas to lend his antenna to entertain Claire!

Playgroup Halloween Party

On Sunday, our February Baby Playgroup had a Halloween party. All the babies came in costume to play while the adults chatted and discussed how adorable all the costumed babies were.

Claire, dressed as an elephant, was joined by Curran (the party's petite hostess) the dinosaur.
Here we have, l to r, Claire the Elephant, Hailey the Cow, Jackson the Shark, Pumpkin Auggie and Dinosaur Curran.
As the afternoon went on, some more friends arrived as others departed. The later line up included, l to r, Dylan the Bear, Monkey Erica, Curran the Dinosaur, Dragon Dylan, Hailey the Cow, Tessa sporting Asian Silk and Kitty Cat Claire (the elephant ensemble was toasty, so Claire showed off her all black cat outfit).

Sunday Morning Chat

Claire video chats with Mana and Papa

Baby's First Curly Fry

Matt's Arby's lunch was not safe from tiny hands. She had her first taste of curly fry.

Preparing for Bath-time

Claire checks out the water before getting in

Eight Months

The lighting is strange in Claire's room in the morning, so the strange glow is from the iPhone flash. Below is another photo from the same "photo shoot" as it's getting harder to have Claire stay in one place. She wants to move!

She's always on the run, unless strapped into a seat of some kind. The purpose of the crawling is usually to get to higher ground, i.e. climb to a stand. She is not a fan of diaper or clothing changes - again because those activities take away from exploring.

Beach naps, with varying success

In NH, we tried a few methods to accomplish naps at Colby Point. My mom had a pack & play and a tent for the task. Neither does much in the way of soundproofing, oddly enough.

Day one, take one: no luck.

Day one, take two: short term success.

Day two: lots of crying, from afar.

We changed tacks and had most naps at the Farm.

Cousins

Jack and Aileen had a great time playing with Claire. They were very helpful at bath time and helped me pick out clothes for her. The favorite activities included holding her (many games of pass the baby) and watching her sit in the pink chair (bumbo), at Jack's request. They were bummed to learn how much babies sleep during the day!

Woodard Family Reunion

We kicked off our East Coast summer vacation with a big gathering of Woodards at Matt's uncle Tom's and aunt Deb's home in New Canaan, CT. Great Grandma Bernice met her newest great grandchildren, Claire and Ian. Ian (5 months) came with parents Jason and Jana from Singapore. One year old Ani came with her parents, Duncan and Liz from Seattle. Four year old Aileen and two year old Jack joined Claire to round out the generation. Together with Simone, Matt, Mike, Nick, Steve, Tom and Vicki, Bernice had all her family around her.

Matt demanded a head scritch from CAV (Crazy Aunt Vicki)

Ian and Claire square off. Claire eventually screeched her pterodactyl screech and reduced Ian to tears.

I'll take that

Having eaten all of her own animal crackers, Claire reaches over to steal one of Finn's.

Reflection

Claire crawled over to the big mirror yesterday morning and pulled up on the frame. She proceeded to entertain herself for several minutes playing with her new friend.

All Dressed Up

Now that Claire is on the move, it's hard to catch her in a rare moment of stillness. Here, she's in a good mood, after a nap, hanging out in cousin Lauren's room. She's all dressed up for Lauren's first birthday party.

7 Months

Claire poses with her elephant at 7 months (& 1 week, I kept forgetting). She is a crawling, climbing, standing, 2-toothed*, happy baby.

*Two bottom teeth have poked through as of 9/11/10

Crawling!

After a few weeks of rocking on her hands and knees, reverse motion and army crawling, Claire has figured out the real deal. She started crawling today.

After I saw it once, I had to grab a camera and lure her into moving a few more times (not that hard). The bait? A sock, naturally. Here she is going for her sock, with an interruption mid-way, followed by a graceful face plant.

Now I suppose we should baby-proof or at least vacuum a bit more often.

Lunch at Daycare

Daycare reports that Claire eats more than the "big boys".

Six Months!

A few days late, here is Claire with her elephant at six months. She is sitting up on her own and gets on her hands and knees and rocks. She is starting to nosh on solid foods and appears to have two bottom teeth ready to break through.

Unky Boo

Hanging out with Great Uncle Bruce

Doubly Great

Claire met her Great Great Aunt Nancy this week in New Hampshire

Hooray for Aunt Simone

The pro helps calm Claire on this perfect beach day on the Jersey Shore.

Mmm, Spoon!

Claire stole my oatmeal spoon this morning. Looking forward to starting solid foods!

Physics Baby

Lazy Sunday

Hanging out on the couch after a walk to the farmers market

June Summary