Halloween Ladybug

We had thought that seven months was too young for Halloween, and that Aria's first Halloween would be next year. But just in time, my friend Beth came by with this ultra-cute ladybug outfit. Here's Aria all dressed up and ready to go trick-or-treating. She didn't collect any candy, because she really is too young for that, but she brought joy to several of our neighbors. Photo taken October 31, 2008.

Aria Enjoying Fall Harvest

In addition to enjoying Aria's new vocabulary today (make sure to listen to Aria babbling below), we also enjoyed a lovely sunny late fall day by hanging out on the deck. Aria really enjoys animals and plants, especially if she gets to feel them. In this photo she was on the deck discovering freshly picked squash from our garden. Photo taken October 26, 2008.

Babbling away!

Aria's always made plenty of interesting sounds, but today it really felt like she started "talking" to us. No, there are no real words yet, but today she started to say syllables like "ba" and "da" quite a lot amidst the usual coos, gurgles, and squeals. Click on the link below to listen to a recording I made tonight as we sat at the dinner table. (Just so you know, I did edit out a lot of the blank space between her vocalizations.)

Aria babbling

Recorded on October 26, 2008.

Look at me now!

This photo was taken the very first time Aria pulled all the way up to standing by herself! She's still pretty new at it, and, so far, once she's up her feet stay firmly planted in one place. But we're holding our breath for the next stage -- cruising. Oh, and by the way, Aria turned seven months old yesterday. Photo taken October 14, 2008.

Nature girl

Last weekend we visited the North Cascades. We spent Saturday night at a quaint little resort in Marblemount where I gave a piano concert. The next day we explored the area around Baker Lake. I just love this photo Ted took of Aria so at home in the woods. She also got her first chance to play in the sand by the river that flows into the lake. The third photo shows Mommy posing with Aria under snow-covered Mount Baker. Photos taken October 12, 2008.

Budding musician

In case you haven't figured it out already, we are a musical family. Ted and Karen met through music, and Aria's birth parents, Amber and Charlie are also musical. Music drew the four of us together, and we chose a musical name for our daughter (Aria means song or melody in Italian.) Aria gets to listen to and play music, in one form or another, every day. Here she is playing Daddy's guitar. Photo taken October 7, 2008.

Sitting pretty!

It kind of seems like an afterthought, what with all the excitement of crawling, but Aria crawled before she learned to sit up unassisted. Ted took this photo on the first day she actually sat by herself. Don't you love her beguiling expression? Photo taken October 2, 2008.

Omigod... STAIRS!

Aria has just expanded her new found mobility into climbing stairs. YIKES! We knew we were a bit behind in babyproofing the house, but this takes the issue to new levels (pun intended ;-) I'm so excited to see her expanding her skills and want to encourage her in everything, but this really can't work without very close supervision, because she doesn't know how to keep from falling backwards and tumbling down. She's already tumbled from step 1 back down to the bottom a couple times. Fortunately our house is carpeted, so that doesn't hurt too much. But if she gets up more than one step, it's definitely not safe. Now I get the need for baby gates at the bottom as well as the top of stairs. Weekend project here we come!

More photos coming tonight -- haven't decided of what yet.

Open wide!

Now that I've done the concert I was practicing for, I'll catch up on posting more of the great pictures of Aria that have gone by.

This photo is from Aria's six month birthday when she got her first feeding of "solid" food -- baby rice cereal. Since then she's also added bananas and pears to her repertoire. As you can see, she had no trouble knowing what to do! Photo taken September 17, 2008.

Don't you love my sweater?

Aria looks cuter than ever modeling this beautiful sweater, hand-knit by Betsy Senff. Betsy is a member of the Bellingham Chamber Chorale, of which I am a member also. Betsy gave Aria this sweater on her birthday back in March on behalf of the Chorale. It was too big for Aria in the Spring, but now that she's bigger and the cool weather has returned, I suspect we'll be seeing her in it a lot. Thank you Betsy and BCC! Photo taken September 20, 2008.

Crawling & Drumming

Sorry I took so long to get a video posted of Aria crawling. I usually post to the blog at night after she's gone to bed, but the last couple weeks I've been practicing piano at that time because I have a performance coming up.

Anyway, please enjoy this video showing two of Aria's newest skills: crawling and drumming. In the background you can see the baby fence I recently put up. I didn't want to fence her in, so instead I fenced in my office area so she can crawl around freely in the downstairs play area, but be safe from my computer and my electronic piano keyboard and all the attached cords and things. Video taken September 25, 2008.