a woman of words...

people don't believe me when i tell them that amelia likes to read. i'm aware that she's not actually reading anything, but it's true that she really does like books. simple bright pictures are the key... we've got a solid four-book rotation going on over here. thankfully she can't understand what i'm saying just yet... my story-telling skills are definitely lacking. really, how much can be said about a goldfish?

happy birthday grandpa!

grandpa willy turned sixty last week. the celebration was perfectly "him": a trip to the bathhouse with his boys and a big spread of jewish food from max & benny's deli. lots of happy grandkids on a beautiful chicago night...  

picture perfect... which is pretty impressive

 the troops are getting restless...

... one got away. the great escape. cassius? clay?

puppy love.

i've previously written about how much bako and jake love millie (and vice-versa), but bako took it to an entirely new level a few days ago. i staged an intervention and it won't happen again. i'm putting some necessary distance between the two of them. see for yourself...

within a couple hours of this little make out session, i caught bako literally trying to eat a pair of her poopy pajamas AND an ant trap! the experts claim that a dogs mouth is cleaner than a human mouth, but even so, i'm going to make a concerted effort to keep his little tongue away from her face...

dr. grandma

there is great debate in our household over whether or not babies are born with extraordinary abilities already in place... or if excellence can be nurtured in a person. jason and i have talked about it a lot, without ever really coming to much of a conclusion. our current consensus is that it's a combination of the two. natural ability + loads of practice (malcolm gladwell suggests 10,000 hours is the magic number) = greatness.

so we've determined that genetics don't tell the entire story, but they're worth at least a little bit of our attention (even if for nothing more than the pure enjoyment of speculation!) for instance, i'm certain that she has the appetite of her dad. she inhales her bottle and starts to cry... every. single. time.

i'm banking on millie inheriting some of her grandma carol's proclivity for math. we were able to celebrate her earning her doctorate last weekend... in math education. especially for a girl who doesn't exactly excel where numbers are concerned - i am super impressed and proud of her. we missed hearing all of the lovely things that her colleagues said about her at the ceremony, but i have no doubt that they were singing her praises.

(she really liked the tassle on grandma's cap)

we celebrated our brand new doctor grandma with yummy chocolate cake and ALL of her grandkids... it was the first time that all of the caref kids were together. i think it's a pretty good looking bunch of kids - must be in their genes. :)

i love justin bieber...

i really do. i know that i'm joining the ranks of eleven year old girls by admitting it... but it's true. let's hope that this little clip of millie isn't a taste of things to come... it's funny and horrifying at the same time. i couldn't resist comparing these two...

a birthday... kind-of

jason says that you only get one birthday a year... i disagree, especially if you haven't turned a year old yet.  millie and i decided to celebrate without him... a big day out on the town. it seems like i always end up running errands on friday afternoons, along with EVERY other person in the city. thankfully, millie doesn't currently hate her carseat... so at least we're peacefully stuck in traffic.

forest used to talk about giving 'reality tours' to the tourists coming to chicago for the weekend...  he wanted to take people down a back alley or two, away from the hustle and bustle of skyscrapers and michigan avenue. chicago isn't always as pretty as it looks on the postcards...

which brings me to the point of this lovely post... 

i was going to take a few shots of the birthday girl this afternoon when she woke up from her nap. i bent down to pick her up and thought that her back felt really sweaty (she'd been sleeping in her carseat), but quickly discovered that it was not actually sweaty at all... it was poopy. millie didn't seem bothered in the least to be literally sitting in a puddle of poo... quite a gigantic mess from somebody so small. unfortunately we weren't at home with a closet full of clean clothes. we had to make do with what we had...

so this is a true-to-life picture of miss millie on her four month birthday. a little bit of puke on her shirt and a little frown on her face (she still stops smiling as soon as the camera comes out...).

i promise that i don't usually take her out in public dressed like this! 

you can see that she's getting so big  - her jeans are too short, her socks are too small, and her tummy's hanging out of her t-shirt. quite the classy little lady... i couldn't love her more.

there will be no cocktail parties or fancy dinners for this girl tonight.... i'll be taking apart a carseat and trying to figure out how to wash all of the parts. ahhhh....reality.  

mother's day

a lazy sunday at home... lots of spring sunshine. it was a beautiful day to be a mom!

the leader of the pack

jason and i took jake and bako to doggy school a few years ago... we were kindly asked to leave after about twenty minutes into the first class. we love them, but their lacking a little bit in their social skills. we were a little bit worried (or at least i was!) about bringing home a baby with these two in the house. if they didn't like her... we were going to have our hands full.

well, it turns out that i was worrying for nothing. they love her... and she loves them right back. millie doesn't even flinch when jake slobbers all over her face. bako runs over to me and whines whenever he hears her making noises in the baby monitor - making sure that i know she's awake. they nap next to her crib and lick up her drool... best friends in the making.

our bright eyed girl

i think that they're going to stay blue...