Evie's 49th Week

Being in Oregon with family members seems to have done Evie plenty of good. She has developed several new sounds, including d, g, ng, and almost sh.  She has gotten lots of practice walking while holding onto someone's fingers too.  I think being around so many different people has done her a lot of good.

It amazes me how friendly she is.  When someone first approaches her and says something to her, she will turn her head, but she is smiling and turns back moments later to check them out again.  Even with Seth's great-aunt Jerry whose mannerisms and speech are a cross between Sophie Petrillo from "The Golden Girls" and Rhoda's mom from "Rhoda" (i.e., somewhat loud and boisterous), she didn't get scared.  Just turned her head and then turned back for more.

She also would willingly go to family without getting upset.  Someone commented how secure she must be to be willing to do that.   That made me feel good.

I'll have to share pictures later since we are still not at home for me to load them, but this week, Evie met quite a few relatives for the first time: Gram's sister Jerry and Jerry's daughter Cathy; Gram's brother Mike, his wife Lois, and their daughter Debbie; Gram's sister Donna and her husband Roger, and Seth's uncle Ira and Ira's wife, Brenda.  We had a full house because everyone stayed with Gram, and Evie was quite often the center of attention.  She loved it, too!

The memorial service for Grampa was on Sunday, as I mentioned earlier, and then Monday was the military burial.  I thought Evie might cry when they shot off the guns, but no.  She jumped and then looked to see where the sound was coming from.  I seriously have the best, most easy-going child.

Immediately after the service we had to leave since we had originally planned to be in California from May 11-18.  We decided that in the amount of time it would take us to drive up to Portland from Gram's check in for our flight an hour early, change plans in Denver, fly to Orange County, get our luggage and our rental car and drive up to Oxnard, we could just drive the whole way ourselves.  So we did that instead.  We left the cemetery and drove straight to Oxnard.

Evie slept the first leg after a bit of fussiness.  We stopped in Medford to gas up and get some food and I sat in the back with Evie to feed her her lunch.  She napped through most of the next bit, as we passed Mt. Shasta and Redding.  We stopped again in the middle of nowhere for a stretch and a diaper change.  Then she was awake and played for a bit before catching another nap.  She didn't fuss at all until our last stop for the night, when it was pretty clear that she was ready for a bed and not a car seat to sleep in.  But to be in the car for almost 13 hours and not fuss more than maybe half an hour total...  man, do we have an awesome traveler!

So, here we are in California.  We are staying with our friend Matt, and this is Evie's first time meeting him.  We got in to Matt's house around 1 a.m. on Tuesday, caught some z's, and then Tuesday morning met our friend Wolfie for breakfast.  We just relaxed Tuesday morning and afternoon until we went to meet Grammy and Aunt Madi for dinner.  Evie enjoyed sitting with Grammy and being held my Aunt Madi.  She was a little fussy since it was relatively close to her bedtime by the time we left and since she hadn't napped too well that day, but it was still a good time.

Today, we have took her to her first California beach.  I do have one picture I can share now (will have to upload the rest when we get home).

When we first set her down on this beach towel, she started taking off and I was afraid she'd be all over the place, getting into seashells, and kelp, and whatever other flotsam and jetsam was left on the beach.  But the second her hand touched sand, she recoiled and sat back down.  She sat there examining her left hand, moving the sand on it around with her right hand.  She wasn't exactly unhappy about it, more that she just wasn't sure about what it might be.

We had another beach towel laid out about 3 inches from this one and my cell phone was on it.  She wanted to get it, but wasn't willing to cross that 3 inches of sand to make it happen.  She did tolerate standing in the sand and being put down on the sand, but she just wouldn't crawl over it.

Tonight, we met up with Seth's friend Dan Smith, creator of the Battle of the Bands card game that we are such big fans of, and Dan's wife Tisha and their son Dante.  Dante is 9 years old and loved entertaining Evie.  He brought out all kinds of stuffed animals and puppets and would make them move and interact with her.  He loved to share his belongings and was so sweet to her.  They hugged and she babbled at him and he would babble right back.  It was so fun to watch them interact.  Dan and Tisha enjoyed playing with Evie too, and we all had a great time.

I'm pretty sure Evie said her first word tonight.  Dante had quite a collection of stuffed rabbits as well as a large stuffed carrot.  He was pretending to eat the carrot and Evie reached for it and he asked her if she wanted the carrot.  She said, "carrot".  I mean, maybe it was a coincidence, but she definitely said "kaiwat".  Tisha and Dante both agree that she said it, and Matt, Seth, and Dan were talking during it, so they are my only witnesses.  So, it's been quite an exciting trip so far!