over a year

Tilda is over a year now, fourteen months.  Life became so hectic for this gradparent.  Dissertation defense, conference meeting, pack up the place and move across the country and begin a new postdoc in the midst of one of the hardest snowiest winters in recent history.  But Tilda came through great.  Her mom is still a gradparent, but her dad is now a postdoc-parent.  It can happen.  You can have a kid in graduate school, finish, succeed even, and move on to the next step.  Tilda walks now, she is on the verge of speaking full on, she has plenty of teeth, still wears cloth diapers, still is breast-fed, though she supplements it with whatever we're eating.  Tilda dances and loves music, she plays with other kids, and has now finally met most of her immediate family.  Should I shut down the blog?  No longer a grad-parent.

Tilda seven months, last semester, hula hoops wiggles

I am a horrible blogger.  The last post announces Tilda as six months old.  She is now seven months old.  Her bottom two teeth are in, and there was not much trouble there.  But, the top two middle teeth are on their way in.  They are not kind to my little girl and it is brutal to see her struggle so much.  Well, this is her mom and her dads last semester as graduate students.  Tilda still comes to university with us every day, she likes it a good deal actually.  At now over seven months, Tilda does not sleep all day or even for hours as she used to, has not for a while now.  So work when you can and do what is conducive to getting things done.  Rest, and do things for yourself, small things because there is not time for big things.  I love being Tilda's dad, it is awesome and those little teeth make her smile even cuter.  She is still in cloth diapers and has been eating things along the way such as avocado and banana.  She can stand while holding my fingers and hold her self up, while the mid-section wiggles around as if she's got a hula hoop circling her.  She's had a couple of booboos and they're heartbreaking.  She's also had her immunization shots, first three sets, 2, 4, and 6 months.

Tilda is six months

Tilda will be six months in less than a week.  Six months.  She has at least two teeth and we suspect more teeth on their way is what currently drives her mad.  She rolls and can sit up.  She has a variety of squeaks and squeals and chirps and murmurs at her disposal.  She wears cloth diapers always and is a breastfed baby.  She recently tries an occasional banana or avocado.  She has a huge smile and dark eyes, she grabs your whole head for a hug and a kiss.  She's working really hard to get herself up from lying on her back to sitting up.  I should do as many stomach crunches.  She kicks, does with her feet and legs whatever she can.  Her grip is very strong, particularly if you are trying to remove something from her clutches.  She has bonked her head, rolled off a couch, scraped her leg, and had a couple of immunization appointments.  She is tough, she is sweet.

grabber/chewer, avocado is a fruit, post-docs

Tilda is a grabber and chewer these days.  The drooling calmed down a bit for a while there while the bottom front two teeth emerged.  So cute and little and whitish clear, but sharp, ow, and what force.  But the drooling has resumed now and we suspect a couple more teeth are breaking through.  We have been experimenting with occasional exposure to limited fruits.  Banana and avocado (a fruit apparently), and others.  We'll stick with banana and avocado until further notice I think.  We tried apricot because they grew on our tree out back but she didn't have much interest.  I have secured a post-doctoral positional for the spring of next year, which means I need to become a doctor this fall.  I had planned on completing my dissertation this summer but I had my laptop stolen over the summer and that is really bad for a PhD student.  Tilda will next year then be the child of post-docs, which is good for her because it means her parents can afford to buy her shoes when she'll be transitioning into the walking phase.

I'm not sure I believe the BP solution will work.  We'll see.

Disturbing satellite image of the oil at the Mississippi River delta

Disturbing satellite image of the oil at the Mississippi River delta (http://www.nasa.gov/images/content/458667main_oil20100526-full_full.jpg)