Things Penelope is Into Lately

Here is a photo log of some of the things Penelope is into in her 18 month glory.

She really likes puzzles (but mostly taking the pieces out and eating them.)  But what she really likes is eating ice chips from a bowl at her kid-size table:

 Penelope also likes to use our "travel" high chair as her own personal chair in the front room.  She sits in it and watches tv, plays with the buckles, or just chills:

 She models the clothes I make for her (working the apron):

 She reads up on the election; VA is a battleground state, after all:

 And sometimes she just relaxes by watching the Disney channel, but first she has to get in her chair.  Which she does the same way every time.  She scoots into it feet first, then starts to slowly turn around:

 Once turned all the way around and seated squarely she surveys her kingdom:

 Then she relaxes and watches a little Lion King before her nap:

 Penelope also loves to color right now.  We color at least once a day.  Here she is playing with the container of crayons, and sometimes that's enough.  She doesn't always want to color, she just wants to sort the crayons into and out of the tin:

 Last but not least she likes to do whatever Mom and Dad do, including assemble IKEA furniture:

My Toddler is Walking

Penelope turned 18 months last week (more on that later).  The last few weeks she has started to walk more and more. At this point she walks more than she scoots.  She only scoots when she wants to get somewhere really quickly.  I was telling Caitlin all of this and she requested a video, so here you go!  She's just walking down the hall of our apartment.  Put her in the gym at church and she's in heaven!  It's fun to see, and also kind of weird because we can really see how tall she really is!  She can reach up and pull anything off of any counter in the house, causing a whole new level of baby-proofing.  We are proud of our little walker!

Autopsy Report

We finally have the autopsy report two months later! For those of you who are in the medical profession, or may have taken medical terminology, here is the diagnosis from Marshall's autopsy report:

• skin sloughage consistent with intrauterine fetal death
• nuchal cord reported at delivery
• bilateral subcapsular renal hemorrhage
• hepatic infarction
• enlarged spleen with decreased white pulp and distention of the sinusoids
• bilateral pleural effusion, moderate
• moderate ascites

For those of you who don't understand that "language", the results tell us that Marshall had a blood clot in his kidney that ruptured, causing his death.  It is nice to have answers, and now I will go to a high risk OB to see if this can be prevented in the future and what steps need to be taken before we have another baby.  I had blood work done to see if I am somehow a carrier for this clotting. Other findings are because of the kidneys:  fluid in his stomach and lungs (I think that's what the OB said), something with his liver, and he had an enlarged spleen that wouldn't have necessarily caused any problems.

My Toddler is Toddling

I am not ready to deem Penelope a walker quite yet, but she is more readily taking steps.  Whenever Dave and I aren't looking she takes a few steps.  She's even starting to walk to us when we want her to, as evidenced in this video.  But, the situation has to be just right: she has to want to, she can't be grumpy, she's got to feel steady on her feet, etc.  We're proud of our little girl for having the courage to start taking little steps (she's kind of a scaredy cat, so it's a big deal)!  Frankly, it's amazing we've caught this on video.  We've been trying to catch her animal noises and other cute things she does to no avail!

Thoughts

Things I think when I look at recent pictures of myself:

1. Get your jacked up haircut fixed (long story, it looks good from a distance, but it's a really bad haircut)!
2. Having two babies sure made me put on weight...dieting is on the to-do list
3. Man, I need a tan!
4. Penelope likes me so much she's always looking at me and not the camera...smile.

Luray Caverns for Labor Day

 We went to Luray Caverns for Labor Day (well, technically on Saturday).  It's a series of caves that were discovered near the Shenandoah Mountains in 1878.  If you're familiar with Mammoth Caves in KY, it's very similar.  I went to Mammoth Caves back in grad school, but my computer crashed and I lost all the pictures, so I guess this was a redo...but this time with a husband and toddler.

 Group shot with some stalactites

 A reflection of the stalactites onto an underground lake...which is only 18-20 inches at its deepest point.

 P was glad to get out of the stroller.

 Some guy had the idea to build an pipe organ down there using the stalactites as pipes.  They apparently tapped on stalactites to find the correct notes, then set up a system of hammers to lightly tap on them when the organ is played.

Here is the wishing well

This is the rigging that is used to play the pipe organ.  The black piece at the end of the tube extends out and taps on the stalactite.  The organ played "A Mighty Fortress is our God."  We have tons of pictures of the stalactites and stalagmites, but I won't bore you with posting any more of them.

Natural History Museum

 Last Thursday Dave had the day off so we drove into DC and went to the National Museum of Natural History

 We knew the elephant (I think he's named Harry) would be a hit with Penelope.  She's really into elephants lately.  Don't let the picture fool you.  The second she saw him she started doing her elephant sound over and over.

 We didn't go see every exhibit.  That's the joy of a free museum; you only see what you want to and stay for your allotted two hour parking meter time.  Penelope enjoyed the mammal exhibit.  She pointed like this at almost every animal, except for the ones that scared her.

 She especially liked the gem section.  After ooing and aaahing over the shiny jewels she liked the "touch me" portion of the exhibit.  She loved the amethyst geode so much that she didn't want to go, and tried to lick them as well.

This one was also fun, but not as cool as the amethyst (or so thought P, she headed back towards the amethyst after this).  I think it's quartz, but I'm not a geologist, and I never took rocks for jocks, so it's just a guess.