Birthday, Part 2 (Spaghetti Dinner)

In my family, it was always a tradition that the child whose birthday it was got to pick the meals for the day.*  In August of 1994, my nephew Josh had his first birthday, and we ate a dinner of macaroni and cheese and grapes.  This was my fault, since I had reminded people of the tradition, and set them guessing what Josh’s favorite foods were.  The real flaw in this scheme for one-year-olds is that they haven’t actually tasted most of the foods that sensible people have for their favorites.

Bearing in mind that most people wouldn’t want to eat a dinner of blueberries followed by a second course of blueberries with blueberries for dessert, I made spaghetti, a meal that Margaret has enjoyed in the past, and also one which made for good pictures (see?  I’m always thinking of you people).

She could tell something was coming, though she didn’t know what yet.

She started off slowly,

But she soon got into it.

One of the skills that she developed during the course of the meal was slurping, which proved an efficient noodle-delivery system, but had the slight problem that it meant that she had a few more duck-face pictures than she probably wanted.

Like this one:

Or this one:

Or this one:

Still, she thought her spaghetti was good to the last drop.

Here, have a close-up or two:

And then we cleaned her up to await the cake.

Look how excited she is for it.  You should be too!

*Some people might argue that our devotion to this tradition sprang from the fact that the food in our house was horrible very healthy;** I remember at 4 or 5 wanting sandwiches on store-bought bread for lunch, as a high treat.

**There was a cookbook called “No Salt, No Sugar, No Fat” which was lovingly nicknamed “No Salt, No Sugar, No Fat, No Good” by the children.

Birthday, Part 1 (Presents)

I’ve decided that there are too many pictures of Margaret’s birthday to put in one post, so I’m going to divide them up thematically.  And at the moment, she’s having a nap, so she may wake up and interrupt me between posts.  But don’t worry; they’re coming.  And both Leo and my mother are at my house right now nagging me to post more, so we should see some progress.

Anyway, Margaret seemed quite happy with her presents.  She got a drum filled with musical toys, which she took to right away.

Her favorite part of it is two rattly little eggs, which she plays with all the time.

Also, you can see the corner of the quilt her Nana and cousin Hannah made for her.  I don’t have a good picture of it, but I will strive to get one.  Her other present is visible on the other side of her in this picture; it’s a cart filled with blocks that she can wheel around.  It allows her to walk Very Fast and she likes it a good deal.

This walking thing is, you understand, Very Serious Business, and so she gets a somewhat determined look on her little face.  Also somewhat gleeful.  Very cute.

Anyway, it seemed to be successful.

Next up: Birthday Dinner (Spaghetti).

Nana’s Birthday Tea

Margaret was meant to share her birthday with her Nana, but a certain stubbornness prevented that (which means that she also doesn’t have to go through life with me making groundhog jokes, so there is that benefit to it).

And it meant that I didn’t have to make two cakes on one day, so that’s good.

Anyway, I made tea for my mother’s birthday, and Margaret joined in, since finger sandwiches without crusts are more or less right up her alley.

As, indeed, they were, though she took a moment to inspect them.

And then noticed that some of us over at the table were having scones and jam and clotted cream, and nice as the finger sandwiches were, she could be trying some of that too, couldn’t she?

Her looks are frequently quite eloquent.

Walking On A Walk

Last weekend, Margaret’s Nana and Grandpa and Aunt Andy were visiting, so we went to the Botanical Garden to take in the Orchid Show and go for a walk.*

We got her bundled up for the walk in to the Garden.

Of course, we then had to unbundle her to walk around and look at the orchids, but she didn’t seem to mind too much.  After another bout of bundling, we ventured forth into the garden proper.

But one of the things that her discovery of walking has done for Margaret is suggest to her that she need not waste her time sitting in strollers when there is the possibility of going on her own two feet.  And I had promised to let her do some walking on her own, and I hate to lie to children.  So we sprung her.

She seemed to appreciate it.

Though she clearly realizes that walking is serious business and needs concentration.

Also, though she looks sweet and angelic and demure and like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth,**

she made an unholy fuss when we tried to put her back in her stroller because She Was Walking, Obviously, And Couldn’t We See That?

*Margaret seemed unimpressed by the orchids. 

**That is a stupid idiom, because if butter won’t melt in your mouth, you’re dead.

Should I Worry?

The other night, we dressed Margaret in some monkey pajamas, and because it was sitting right next to us, and it matched, we stuck a monkey hat on her.

I thought it was cute.

But she seemed to think that someone needed strangling.

I’m just going to assume that it isn’t me that she wants to do away with.

Not The Video You’re Looking For

I really am going to publish video of Margaret walking sometime soon.  I promise.  The tricky thing is that I’m often trying to be ready to catch her when she takes a header (if at all possible while she’s approaching something VERY CORNERY INDEED), so I’m not always (or ever) recording her steps.

I do have, however, very cute video of her swinging, complete with her favorite phoneme (“dadadadadadada!”).

So that’s something.

Punk Kids

This post chronicles Margaret’s encounter with a roast chicken dinner.    It was, I would like to stress, a very nice dinner, with roast potatoes and Brussels sprouts and a chicken.  And she ate a good deal of it, including the Brussels sprouts (which put her a good bit out ahead of her uncle and grandfather, who were eschewing them).

There was, however, a moment at the end of her meal, when she decided that she was done, scraped up the chicken and potato and sprout that she still had left on her tray, and piled it on top of her head.

This left her hair somewhat greasy.

So I styled it.

 

I’m thinking of using olive oil and schmaltz on her hair from here on out.  It seems to work.