Zoe's First (and prayerfully, last) Car Accident

Yesterday was one of my most frightening days as Zoe's mommy. She was in her first car accident. Poor thing! Trevor, Zoe and my mom came downtown to have lunch with me. As they were dropping me off after lunch, I had a strange feeling come over. I can't explain it, but I had a moment of fear that something could happen to my family. The feeling was so strong that I made a point to stress to Trevor to be careful driving home. In response to that admonishment, my mom said a quick prayer for "travel grace and mercy." I said "amen", kissed my family and went back to work. Not more than 15 minutes later my mom called and told me they were just in an accident. My heart sank. The background was eerily quiet, so that scared me. My first question was if Zoe was okay!? My mom assured me that she was. Next I asked if Trevor was okay. Thankfully, he was. And finally I asked my mom if she was okay. Thankfully, she was also okay.

The accident was on the highway and it was a 5 car pile-up; my family was car #4 in said pile-up. Thankfully, traffic was starting to slow down, so no one was traveling as fast as they could have otherwise. Shortly after the accident, Trevor started having a bad headache and pain in the middle of his neck; my mom recently had major abdominal surgery, so she was in pain from the pressure of the seat belt around her waist and she was having neck, shoulder and back pain. Both Trevor and my mom ended up in the ER; both were released with a clean bill of health. Thank God! We took Zoe to get checked out by her pediatrician; she, too, got a clean bill of health. Again, thank God! As a safety precaution, we bought Zoe a new car seat today. We'll worry about getting the car fixed next week.

I'm so thankful my family is okay. It scares me to think of a car, or a truck in this case, ramming the back of our car where precious little Zoe was sitting, completely defenseless. But I'm so thankful that a sovereign God protected me family in their time of need. Thank you, Jesus!

Pumpkins!

We took our little pumpkin to her first pumpkin farm on October 17. It was a first for Trevor, my mom and me as well. I was disappointed that there wasn't an actual pumpkin "patch" at the farm, but it was a fun outing nonetheless. The funny thing is that Zoe was not impressed with the pumpkins in the least. I thought she'd like seeing something new. Nope!

The farm smelled, well, like a farm. There's no way I could live on a farm! The pumpkin farm had a petting zoo; Zoe actually wanted to feed the goats. She kept trying to touch one of the goats that my mom (Nana) was feeding; it was cute. There were some longhorns on the farm, which was apropos since we went on the day the Longhorns beat the So.oners. Trevor accompanied Zoe on a tractor ride, which was so sweet. We look forward to future visits to the pumpkin farm as Zoe gets older.

Feeding the Goats

The Family

"Look, Zoe, a pumpkin!" (Zoe: "wow, look at the grass!")

"Look, Zoe, two pumpkins!" (Zoe: "wow, more grass!")

Farmer Zoe, Playing on a Tractor

Tractor Ride with Daddy (I don't know who had more fun?!) Trevpr gets daddy of the year for cramming into this TINY cab!

I Love This Picture (Zoe is so affectionate)

Multitasking? (LOL...actually, this happens sometimes when Zoe tries to suck on her fingers...she's not really picking her nose (yet!))

The View From My Office

I've been working from home this week because my mom is at our home recovering from a recent surgery. Today, while preparing for a conference call, I heard a tap at the office door. Below is what I saw. This is far better than the view from my 42nd floor downtown office.









On the topic of me working from home, it's amazing how much harder it is to work from home when Zoe is in the next room. When I go to my office downtown I feel guilty being away from Zoe, and I miss her like crazy, but being home is more difficult because it seems cruel to separate myself from my baby girl. Sure I take short breaks to nurse her, play with her or just snuggle with her, but some days, like today, I have to cut all of this pretty short when I have a lot of work to do. Today I just felt like Zoe must have been thinking "don't you want to play with me, Mommy?" And I DID want to play with her! I missed her so much when my day was complete. It's amazing how much you can miss your baby even when you're under the same roof. So very sad. It sure is tough being a working mommy, but I'm thankful that I have the flexibility to work from home occasionally. Although it's not the same as spending an uninterrupted day with Zoe, it sure beats the alternative.

Too Busy to Sleep

In the last week Zoe learned how to do two very exciting things: sit up on her own and pull up to the standing position against objects (she used to do this frequently while holding our hands). The result: a baby that is too busy to sleep. Once upon a time when I laid Zoe in her crib after her bedtime routine she'd roll to her side or stomach and continue sleeping. That is no longer the case. Now when I lay Zoe down she immediately rolls to her stomach and something goes off in her head that says "hey, stomach equals crawling and then sitting", and that's exactly what she does. And then she comes to herself and remembers "hey, I also know how to stand up now, so there's no better time than the present to practice my new skill." A few seconds later she remembers she was actually sleeping before all of this activity started and then she gets upset, so an abbreviated bedtime routine follows. Getting Zoe to sleep takes extra long these days. I look forward to the days of putting her to bed easily. For now I'll stop and enjoy the season we're in because I know it'll be gone before I know it, and in a strange way I'll actually miss it.

G.I. Zoe

Zoe's on the move! Zoe started combat crawling on September 26 and she had it mastered by the next day. Now she's trying to figure out how to crawl on all fours. This is exciting and sad at the same time. Our baby girl is growing up so fast! :(


The Combat Crawl

All Fours? You decide....

Michael Who?

Zoe started swim lessons at the end of August. She's in a Water Babies class for infants 6 months of age and up. Her instructor is Ms. Sarah. Trevor and I want Zoe to enjoy the water, but more importantly, we want her to begin learning important life-saving skills at an early age. Zoe got off to a slow start because the pool seemed a bit overwhelming to her. She's doing really well in the water now. She's even gone under water for two seconds without a single tear...just lots of fun, splashing, and smiles. 6 weeks down, 13 weeks to go.

Watch out 2028 Olympics, here comes Zoe Alexis!! She's sure to blow Michael What's His Name?'s 2008 record out of the water! (No pun intended...)

Isn't she lovely?

Look, Mommy....I'm floating!

Taking a break

Whew, what a workout!

Balloon Festival

The city we live in has an annual hot air balloon festival. Trevor and I have never attended, but this year we had a special reason to check it out. The balloons were inflated and launched twice a day for an entire weekend, so we took a blanket out to the festival grounds and enjoyed a Sunday evening launch. The weather was perfect. Zoe enjoyed watching the balloons momentarily, but she especially enjoyed the fresh air, rolling and crawling around on the blanket and playing with her two favorite people in the whole wide world, Mommy and Daddy.

8 months!

Dear Zoe,

You're 8 months old! What a fun 8 months it has been.

Guess what you're doing now?! You're CRAWLING baby girl! And you've also figured out how to pull yourself up to the sitting position from your belly or from the crawling position. Back to crawling...initially you started out with a cute combat crawl and one day you figured out how to support your body weight on your hands and knees (well, one knee). Your crawl is absolutely darling. Instead of crawling on "all fours", you're crawling more like on 3 1/2's because you drag yourself forward on your left knee and right foot. It's so cute! You're so cute! In addition to crawling, you're pulling up on every thing! You really love standing. Daddy is convinced you'll soon be walking; I'm not ready for that.

You love blowing raspberries, Zoe. And you especially love to blow them with a mouth full of sweet potatoes, peas, oatmeal, you name it. I try not to laugh when you do this because I don't want to encourage bad behavior while eating, but it's hard not to laugh. Even when I have peas speckled all over my face. Speaking of food, this month we added butternut squash, sweet potatoes, prunes and peaches to your menu, all of which you love. Daddy and I really enjoy making your food. It's wonderful knowing that you are getting healthy, organic food without the preservatives found in jarred food. And it's homemade especially for you with lots of love.

You're still taking your swimming lessons and you're doing well at it. You continue to go under water without any trouble and you've even started to kick your legs a bit when "swimming" toward Daddy.

Your personality is starting to come through more and more. You've become somewhat tempermental and you seem to yell at us sometimes when we're not moving fast enough for you or when we don't pick you up on demand. I hope this is just your frustration at not being able to talk to us to tell us what you want as opposed to something that will remain.

You give the sweetest kisses, Zoe. Mostly you kiss Daddy and me when asked, but you often will surprise us with spontaneous kisses. Mommy likes to jokingly say you give "french kisses" because you like to kiss mommy by sucking on my bottom lip. It's pretty funny and oh so sweet. I could kiss you forever. In fact, I will kiss you forever, even when you all grown up and think it's embarassing. :-) Okay, maybe not...

Zoe, you're developing object permanence. When we hide objects under things like throw pillows, you will start looking for the object we hid. Mommy and Daddy recently played a game with you where Mommy was hiding behind Daddy. You were trying to look over Daddy's shoulder to find Mommy. Although it sounds simple, that really warmed our hearts.

This month Daddy and you went on your first playdate together. You met up with one of the Gy.bore.e mommies and her daughter, Sasha. The four of you went to the Dallas Ar.bor.etum. Daddy reports that you all had a great time. Hopefully this will be the first of many playdates for Daddy and you.

Zoe, your two favorite people in the world continue to be Mommy and Daddy. That works for us because you're our favorite little girl! You also still enjoy being held a lot. While some parents would find it burdensome, we love cuddling you because we know that one day you'll outgrow it and we'll miss these special moments. You've developed stranger anxiety in the last month, so you cling onto Mommy and Daddy extra tight when unfamiliar people are nearby. Although we want you to have a healthy awareness of strangers, we hope you'll soon outgrow some of this.

Zoe, we love you so much! Not only are you adorable, but you are lovingly adored. You make every day special and better. We love you!

My love always,

Mommy

8 month photo

(these pictures are getting more difficult to take now that Zoe's so active)

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