2009: From Little to Big

Sadly, we've let this blog slide off the map this year, with only a few posts over the last six months. This hasn't been because nothing has happened: quite the opposite, we've undergone some dramatic changes at home in 2009, both with Mather's development and the unfolding of our educational and professional aspirations. Life's just been too busy to blog about it, particularly as I was busy writing my e-Portfolio in order to complete my Master's program. That was the biggest writing project I've ever undertaken, and it was hard to muster the energy to write some more.
Co-operation
Perhaps the most dramatic change in our lives, essentially uncovered on this blog, was Mather's switch from a traditional teacher-driven preschool to a parent co-op. We first discussed our interest in co-op's in this post last year, and the most relevant line in that post is the last, in tiny text: "My own preschool is upcoming on the tour itinerary". That's where we ended up.

Built facing a spectacular cliffside from our favorite urban mountain, Rocky Mountain Participation Nursery School became Mather's new daytime home Monday through Friday back in September. It hasn't changed much since I was a student there in the early 80's; the school is still dedicated to an active, play-based curriculum in which the kids determine their own schedule, spend a lot of time playing outdoors, climbing and hiking and clambering around on the full-size playground.

As it is a co-op, switching Mather to Rocky Mountain has changed our lives pretty drastically. Unlike our previous preschool, we are intimately involved in the operation of the school, from (my) serving as a parent-teacher one day a week, our participation in weekly all-parent meetings, big school parties for Halloween, Winter Solstice, etc., as well as fundraisers and other activities.

Personally, working at Rocky Mountain as a parent has been an eye-opening experience. While I had gotten used to my own daughter's idiosyncrasies, getting to intimately know 19 other children aged 3-5 has taught me a lot about children, human behavior and parenting. Getting to witness Mather develop friendships and connections personally has also been a revelation, and her development has taken off in leaps and bounds in the challenging, boisterous Rocky Mountain environment.

One of the best elements of being in a co-op is the strong connections you make with other families. We've already become very close to some of Mather's friends and their parents. This was brought home to me at my parent's Christmas Eve party, which was attended by one of my original Rocky Mountain "classmates", still a very dear friend of mine, and three Rocky Mountain parents from circa 1981 (and the attendant stories of my youthful trouble-making)...

Mather also turned three in November, which she considered her big girl moment: don't let her hear you call her a little girl! She'll get in your face about it. So in 2009 we really feel like we went from little to big, and we've got a fun, loud kid with a ton of opinions and personality.

Showing off the hat she sewed herself. The school's cliff is visible in the background.

Graduation
Mather's world isn't the only one undergoing change: this month I graduated from San Jose State's School of Library and Information Science with a Master's Degree, and as of last week I started a temporary paid position in the archives department of the California Academy of Sciences Research Library. It will run until mid-April and get me up to speed on a suite of skills I didn't get to work on at SLIS, particularly digital and photographic archiving. I'm very excited.

After that position ends its term, I'll be looking to secure a permanent position in a library or research institution. While the downturned economy makes jobhunting difficult, I'm confident in my skills and professional abilities. I continue to blog about my thoughts on the profession and a variety of other thoughts on my "other" blog, The Pinakes. Please check it out.

Meanwhile, Emily is closing in on finishing her certification as a massage therapist, having already started on her practicums (I got to be her first "client"; it was wonderful!).

2009 has been a dramatic year. With so much of our lives in flux, 2010 might be even more so.

Happy Third Birthday Mather!!!

Yesterday, Mather turned 3!!!

Mather had been looking forward to her third birthday for quite some time. She's been boasting for months about being two-and-a-half. She never quite caught on to being two-and-three-quarters but she certainly knew that her birthday was the day after Halloween and that it was coming up fast.

A few weeks ago, she helped me pick out her birthday cake design. On Saturday, she went with us to pick up the cake, snacks and drinks for her party. The excitement was building as she readied herself for Halloween festivities, all the while letting us know that she was about to be three. When we put her to bed after Halloween night we said, "you're going to bed a two-year-old and when you wake up, you'll be three!" She was grinning from ear to ear when we chose "Happy Birthday" as her extra bedtime song.

Then came the big day! We hosted her party at Children's Fairyland in Oakland.

We reserved a picnic area for a few hours and invited some friends to join us for brunch and cake. After that, Mather went exploring around the park. Some of her favorite spots were the kid-sized ferris wheel...

There she is in the upper right. I think she rode it 5 times!

She also spent a lot of time in the reading room...

I remembered late into the day that I had brought her birthday hat. Yes, she's wearing her Halloween costume again... who can argue with a Birthday Girl's sense of style?

We rode a few times on the Jolly Trolly...

Mather and her buddy Charlotte were having a grand ole time licking lollipops and making funny faces..

And we stayed until the park closed! At which point Mather had gone a little loopy...

As if the funny faces weren't goofy enough... she started taking off her clothes... now THAT is a good party!

The festivities continued back at Nanna and Grandfather's house where we had spaghetti and meatballs for dinner, opened presents and had another cake!

Happy Birthday to my big girl Mather!

Halloween

The Purple Princess began her trick-or-treating journey at Nanna's house...


Then we trekked over to Belvedere Street for the main festivities...


Papasan even dressed up as a Buccaneer to accompany the Purple Princess on her door-to-door adventures...

She means serious business with those TWO goodie bags...

She snacked the whole way...


And ended the night a happy girl with candy-stained teeth...

Halloween Preview

The purple princess made an appearance at her preschool's Halloween potluck party last night!

Summer recap

We've had quite the exciting and busy summer, hence the lack of blog posts. So, here we go with another big catch-up post...

4th of July - GrandMather and Grandpa Tom get married!!

Fireworks cake!

Lots of birthday parties...

A summer luau with my mom's group...

A playdate at the Bay Area Discovery Museum...

Harvesting carrots from our backyard...

A big Ransom family trip to The Berkshires in Massachusetts...

Cousins
Mather (34 months) and Cora (13 months)

Nanna, Auntie Elsa, Momily, Papasan, Magoo, Anne, Baby Cora and Uncle Freedom
(not pictured, GrandFather)

The picture above was taken at the Cummington County Fair. At the fair, we also..

Rode the carousel

Rode the ferris wheel

And, rode a pony!

Other Mather highlights from our trip were:

A marionette performance of Rumpelstiltskin

Mather's first salt water taffy

Riding a seahorse at the local Stockbridge playground

Beating Uncle Freedom in a foot race

Beating Daddy in a foot race

And, barbecuing in the rain!

And for those of you keeping an eye on my kniting over at MomilyKnits:

Here is Cora modeling the sweater that I made for her first birthday!

Other summer highlights include:

Lots of stylish playground adventures

Rolling in the grass

Playing on the cable car at PacBell Park, home of the SF Giants

Practicing for the big leagues

And, Mather's first dandelion wish!

Safely Home

We've made it home, safe and sound, from our weeklong trip to New England. We've seen Hamlet, been to the County Fair, and barbecued in a hurricane. It was a fun frolic and we'll post some of the details in the coming days.

Mather was a sturdy little traveler who didn't mind the long flights. She caught up on her Assyriology on the flight East.

Life Saver?

Mather has never seen any iteration of Star Wars, yet she knew to say that she was practicing with her "life saver". The geek is strong with this one (well, that, and she goes to pre-school with four-year-old boys).

(Click on collage to expand).

Painted Faces

(Top: Talia, left and Mather)
(Middle: Charlotte)
(Bottom: Mather)

From Charlotte's 3rd Birthday Party.

I'm running away, and you can't stop me!

Photo series updates

Sometimes the best way to get caught up with Little Miss Magoo is photographic evidence! Click on each photo to link to an album.

Here is more from our Memorial Day camping trip...

(Click on jumpy bed photo for album)

A few weeks later we celebrated Maddox's second birthday...

(Click on the three-wheeled adventurer photo for album)

Just last weekend I got to join Papasan and Mather at gymnastics school...

(Click on the daredevil jumper photo for album)

This is what happens

When Raleigh comes to town.

le Resistance

When Mather decides to resist taking a nap, it's not unusual for her to toss something out of her crib -- usually either a binky, her sleepy bear, or one of her myriad stuffed animal "friends". She'll then usually shout and holler for us to get it for her. When we come in, she then demands to get up from her crib.

Today at naptime Mather upped her usual ante. Once we were finally convinced that she wasn't going to fall asleep and entered her room, we discovered that not only had she tossed out her binky, she had also tossed her sleepy bear. And all of her "friends". And her pajamas, which she had taken off. And the sheet off her mattress.

All that was left in the crib was 1) Mather and 2) her diaper (still on her). If we had waited any longer, she probably wouldn't have had that, either.

Rainbow Hands

Mather came home from preschool yesterday with a rainbow sticker. Before dinnertime, she asked me to throw it away because it got dirty. She then woke up this morning adamantly requesting the sticker. With no sticker to offer, I asked if she wanted me to draw a rainbow on her hand. Yes!, she proclaimed.

She moved a few times while I was drawing, hence the lines through her rainbow. Then she offered to draw a rainbow on my hand, which then became hands.

Enjoy.

Memorial Day Camping Trip

Mather has been really excited about going camping. We'd talked about it, a lot, in the nine months since we last went camping, and Magoo would build "tents" out of blankets on a fairly regular basis. It almost became too big a deal -- a few nights before the Memorial Day Weekend, I brought up how we'd be camping soon and she almost had a tantrum because she wanted to go camping right now.

What was one of the first things she said when we finally got there? "I want to go to new house*. I don't wanna go camping!!!" Ah, two-year-olds.

*We moved six months ago, but to her it's still "new house".

However, she got over it pretty quickly, especially as she saw tents being put together and air mattresses inflated. And her buddy Maddox.

Mather and Maddox enjoy a bubble gun.

The highlight of the weekend was the Sunday hike to "Tiptoe Falls". It hardly qualifies as a waterfall, but it made a lovely lunch destination.

Hiking's easy when someone else carries you.

Mather enjoyed throwing pine cones at the waterfall.

On the way back from Tiptoe Falls, we had to decide whether we wanted to hike back the way we came or take a shortcut that involved fording a river. While Momily and I debated how and whether we wanted to cross, the Goober chimed in: "You can do it Daddy. I want to cross the river. You can do it."

So we did it. I waded through the water carefully, with Magoo, while Momily "shimmied" across the log bridge, Meghan close behind. The water was neither fast nor deep, so the worst danger we were in was damp socks.

Momily's technique on display.

Back at camp, we all had fun around the campfire. Momily & Magoo invented a new game, called "Kissy Corn". That, or they're competing for the last bite off the cob.

We go on this annual excursion with (mostly) the same crew who go on the President's Day Trip. However, there was a notable absence this time around: Bob and Tina were busy elsewhere. Having their baby! Serena Aurora was born that Friday night, and the camping crew huddled around iPhones to see the new baby photos. We're looking forward to introducing her to her big "cousin" Mather!

Sunday at Sadiedey's

On Sunday we headed out to Oakland to visit Sadiedey's Cafe, a family friendly establishment with a wonderful play area for kiddo's. Magoo had been in a whiny mood all morning (unfortunately, this is an increasing trend right now) but she snapped out of it the moment she saw the large Brio set, the play-kitchen, the back room filled with books, and the climbing structure complete with a slide...

While there we hung out with my friend Miss Grace, her friend VDog, and our former neighbor Heather, who now lives over in the East Bay, generally sitting back munching on food while the kids entertained themselves -- quite the treat. It was a nice way to spend a hot day -- definitely recommended for all the overworked Bay Area parents out there!

I did have to endure a tag-team cushion assault from Magoo and Gabey.

What do you got?

This is Mather's favorite phrase at the moment. I think I ask her "whatcha got?" a lot, and now she asks it herself. She asked me the other day and I had no idea what she was referring to. Then she said, "you got green toes?" Aha! "Yes, I painted my toenails green. Do you want to paint your toenails?"... "no (giggle)." She's conversational, to say the least.

It's been a busy month, so we've got a lot...

We had three full weekends of Easter activities. We started with the Golden Gate Mother's Group annual egg hunt at the San Francisco Zoo. I had to work (tax season) but Nanna and Daddy chaperoned Mather as she hunted for eggs...


Went wild in the bounce houses...


Rode a horse on the carousel (her first solo ride)...


And got her first face paint...


All that fun, but no real time for zoo exploration. So, Mather and Daddy went back to the zoo the next week! The real focus was on the children's zoo, where Mather could get her first up-close experience with barn animals...


And she could pretend to be a meerkat...


And hop in the saddle...


The other big highlight (aside from a fascinating gate which Mather stood guard at like a troll, and the hand washing station) was seeing all the bugs. And the super-cool play structure inspired by the itsy-bitsy spider...

The SUPER stripey arachna-mather!

The following weekend, we hosted our own Easter egg dying and cookie decorating party! We invited lots of kids over and had a blast. Before the party, Mather and I rolled out some sugar cookies that we would later decorate...

(note the bottle in this picture... more on that later in the post)

Once the kids arrived, it was time to get messy! We did all the dying outside on our patio so that the kids could really get into it...


After that, it was time for some lunch and cookie decorating. This was Mather's idea of decorating a cookie...

A giant pile of colored sugar and sprinkles with a goldfish on top!

A fun time was had by all. And the fun times continued the following weekend (which was finally Easter weekend). Our friends Maurice and Shannon and their daughter Maia invited a bunch of kids over for an egg hunt. Mather was a professional egg hunter by this point...


And she was patient enough for another round of face paint...


With all that practice, it was no surprise that Easter morning was filled with chocolate gorging!

Daddy's childhood Easter basket is now Mather's Easter basket!

There was some very serious chocolate consumption.

April continued with some springtime traditions. Momily and Papasan enjoyed a Friday night Giants baseball game...


Our efforts at home turned towards our garden. We started with our little patio. We planted some herbs and a few poppy and catnip seeds...


Which then lead into a GIANT backyard clean up effort. Nanna and Papasan spent hours digging up weeds, pruning wiley bushes and trees, and removing any Mather-hazards. We had eleven 33 gallon compost bags of yard debris! Once that was completed (just in the last few days) the real gardening began. Mather even helped get the flower beds ready...


We'll have an update soon with pictures of our new vegetable and flower garden. Speaking of vegetables... guess who loves broccoli?

Chopstick Master!

And smoothies...

"I have a smoothie mustache!"

And train adventures to faraway places...


Where you can get bagels!


And bicycle adventures, to places where you can get a hot dog...


Then, at the end of the bike ride on a very hot day, one must indulge in an ice cream sandwich. Mather's first and she only left a tiny bit for Daddy!


The one thing that Mather is not indulging in anymore are her bottles. The bottle fairy came to our house last week. Just as we put out carrots for the Easter Bunny and he left a basket of chocolate eggs, we put out a basket of bottles for the Bottle Fairy and she left four new no-spill cups! Mather has had some trouble adjusting (a few tears here and there) but she understands that the babies needed her bottles and she can drink from a cup instead.

Mather is still enjoying her days at preschool. She tells us about what she and her friends do each day and what she eats for lunch and snacks. Daddy and Mather still hit the pool one day a week. Mather's jumping-into-the-pool skills have advanced tremendously. She also practices at home, by flopping over and jumping off of a leather armchair...


She's also graduated (somewhat) to the big-kid swings at the playground.


While the talking, eating and playing are all going well, we're struggling a bit with her naps. Although it seems to be getting better. Towards the beginning of the month she was rarely napping at home, even though she'd nap at school. So we started a chocolate-chip incentive program. Eight or nine chocolate-chips for every nap. She's getting back into the swing of it.


We also had a short-lived pillow experiment. She loved "play-napping" with pillows on her rug and requested one in her crib. We tried for two nights, but even though she fell asleep just fine, it seemed like she couldn't get comfortable in the early morning hours with the pillow in the way. Maybe a smaller pillow, or it will wait until she's in a big-girl bed.

Once again, we apologize for the long drought of posts. Tax season. Master's program. Not napping kid. Thanks for sticking with us!

Welcome to the Jungle

While we were hanging out at Owen's birthday party this weekend, Mather and her friend Charlotte decided to run off and have a little fun. They climbed under a chain into an area with heavy foliage which quickly got dubbed "The Jungle". The sight of their two little heads bobbing in and around ferns and bushes as tall or taller than they were is about the cutest thing I've ever seen. They hunted for flowers and sticks and good rocks to jump from. Fortunately I was there with a camera.

Partytime Preschool Style

On Saturday Mather was invited to a birthday for Owen, one of her chums at Preschool who was turning four. The party was in San Mateo's Central Park, a heretofore undiscovered (by us) gem just a few minutes from the City.

The cake, of course, was a big hit, with Mather digging in all by herself.

One of the premier attractions was the miniature train that ran around a little loop in one corner of the park -- Mather has always loved trains and this one fit her perfectly. Plus she got to ride it will all her friends.

That's Mather sitting behind her friend Zach on the first time around, and below, Mather sitting with Charlotte on her second circuit. Mather didn't want to leave. She's still talking about going back to keep riding "the train in the park", even though she doesn't know which park in what city.

It's a real throw-back to a bygone era -- no seatbelts, no harnesses, just a lurching little train where the kids better learn to hold on. On the first ride Zach, a four year old, was quite the gentleman, asking both Charlotte and Mather if they were ready before the train got going.

One of the real treats of going to this party, aside from getting to really meet some of the other preschool parents, was the chance to see Mather interact with other kids she knows. We have playdates with our friends sometimes, but she'll only see those kids once every few months at most -- these kids she sees three times a week. We've always wanted to be a fly-on-the-wall at daycare and now preschool, and this was the closest chance we've gotten -- we got to really see her interact and talk with kids she's comfortable around. And seeing how much she liked Zach, Charlotte, Adam and Owen was really heartwarming.

Call Me

A Lot Can Happen in 832 Days

Not to mention Lil' Chimpy has a brother. We met back up with Isabel while celebrating Liana's first birthday -- more on that here!

The Itsy Bitsy Spider

This time, it's Momily's turn to sing along.

Run time- 0:31.

Frère Jacques

Forgive me my poor singing. Not to mention my French.

Run time- 0:41.

Snow Day

Ah, we've once again fallen so far behind in our blogging. We've got videos of Mather singing, we've got trips here and there to report on, pre-school updates, new activities and games, not to mention some updates on what Momily and Papasan are up to (tax season and thesis, primarily). First we'll travel back in time about a month to our annual President's Day Weekend "No-Ski Trip*", and hopefully we'll add a couple more posts in the next day or two.

This was Mather's third President's Day (wow), and here are the past chronicles (2007 and 2008). Remarkebly, she has remembered sledding and snow all year (aided, no doubt, by her fondness for looking at pictures of herself). So we were able to whip her up into an enthusiastic frenzy about this year's trip. The car ride was amazingly stress-free, in part because Mather obliged us by sleeping for a substantial portion of the drive. She woke up, however, when we were on the side of Highway 108, trying to figure out how to affix our instruction-less chains to our wheels. Fortunately, even in the remote California foothills with a snow flurry all around us, my iPhone came through and provided us with step-by-step chain instructions. In the meantime, Mather didn't fuss because she was entranced by all the falling flakes.

There was a nice, thick snowfall this year and we were able to carve out numerous sledding runs within a few steps of the cabin we rented. Mather had a hoot sledding in my lap and learning to throw snowballs.

Head-to-head racing against Mountain Mike

Smiles at the bottom.

*People skiied the first year, maybe two of this annual tradition, but now we don't bother...we're too busy drinking beer, sledding, drinking wine, etc. to get up early and get to a ski resort. Not to mention our once rowdy group of college friends is now a pile of married people, with a couple kids and another one on the way...

Her Han Solo Moment

A verbatim conversation from earlier tonight:

Papasan: I love you, Mather.
Magoo: I know. I love me too.

At least she doesn't suffer from low self esteem!

Back to the Pool!

It's been a long time since Mather's formal swimming classes ended, and we finally signed her up for a new set. She's been in a few pools and lakes since then, but those have only been occasional opportunities for her to get wet. Now we're back for another run of classes at the Janet Pomeroy Center. Magoo was excited all week as we talked up our trip to the pool, and aside from the mandatory pre-pool shower, she enjoyed everything.

At first, she clutched to the toys on offer, but as the class went on, she got more excited about learning to kick, holding on to the side by herself, and hanging from the ladder that crosses the pool. It just took a little while for her to work up her courage. Once we were home, she couldn't stop talking about it all (even the shower!), and was excited to hear that we'll be going back next week.

Extra special thanks to Nanna for driving us there and taking the photo!

I Want Help Cooking!

Mather, in general, takes great interest in the domestic chores around the house. After all, it's what she sees us doing all the time. Diapering, laundry, loading and unloading the dishwasher, watering the plants, and so on. She always wants to help. Of all of these, cooking is the thing she's most excited about. She'll "play" cook at any toy stove (or, as is the case at home, a stool improvised into being a stove).

But she also likes to help for real. She gets really excited and puts on her apron (thanks Heather!) and makes sure you put on your apron, too. She helps me make our weekly pancakes -- scooping flour, turning the sifter, stirring the wet and dry ingredients together. On a lark this morning I looked up a recipe for blueberry muffins and made a batch (note: I have never made muffins before). Turns out they're easy! And Mather liked watching them rise in the oven.

Ready to enjoy!

Changing of the Guard

We've moved Mather from her old daycare to a preschool close to our house. We have not, however, given up on our co-op preschool search.

Mather started attending daycare when she was about 4 months old. We took a little break after Papasan decided to start his Master's program. Since then she's been going on a mostly two-day per week schedule for the past year-and-a-half.

With our move in late October to the Outer Sunset, the commute back to our old neighborhood for daycare was starting to get a bit burdensome. We did recently add bicycle commuting to the repertoire, which did make it a little easier, but that's only weather-permitting.

We also recognized that Mather didn't seem to be bringing home new skills anymore. In the past, we'd often felt like she was learning from the behavior and abilities of the older kids at daycare. Once the official school year began in the fall, Mather had actually become one of the older kids.

We did have some reservations about changing her routine. She was really building friendships and talking about her playmates. She would certainly have a learning curve at preschool and would once again be the youngest kid on the block. Also, this is only a temporary move because we still hope to switch to a co-op preschool this fall.

Part of the decision was lead by Mather's immediate comfort at the preschool, as evidenced by her playing, just a few minutes after we arrived for our tour:


There are two playrooms (plus a castle cubby) and an outdoor play space:


The programs offered by the preschool are also impressive - dance and movement instruction, a weekly bookmobile visit, puppet shows, lots of arts and crafts, visits from student teachers in child development studies - so much more than daycare can offer. And, at a better price. We are only paying $4 more per week to have her at preschool for three days per week, instead of two days at daycare. This is especially important because I am now back to work full-time (I was only working 4 days per week from May-December) and Papasan is underway on his thesis.

Mather started at her new school on January 2nd. She seems to be adjusting well - eating, playing, napping, all the important toddler stuff.

On her first day, she came home with a beautiful finger paint drawing of a snowman. Every day she comes home with some cute art project. Our fridge is going to get full fast!

Happy Birthday, Momily!

On Sunday morning, I heard the following conversation on the baby monitor, as Em had gone to get Mather out of her crib:

Magoo: "I want get up!"
Momily: "Okay, good morning!"
rustling sounds
Momily: "Did you know it's my birthday today, Mather?"
Magoo: "No. It's MY birthday!"
Momily: "Your birthday was last month. Today is my birthday..."
Magoo: "It's MY birthday TOO!"
Momily: "Alright, then, how old are you today?"
Magoo: "Three!"

It was in fact, Emily's birthday. And Mather will have to wait until November to be three. On Sunday, we gathered at the Ransom House on Downey and my mom put together a thanksgiving-esque feast of turkey, cranberries and stuffing. Elsa, Uncle Freedom and Cora were still in town so Em got to hold an armload of babies!

After dinner, we sang the customary song (which Mather was mildly surprised was not intended for her) and Emily opened some gifts. But the birthday celebration has not yet ended -- today friends Anastasia and Adina are taking Emily out for a morning at the spa!

Cora's already convinced only-childdom is the way to go.

Mather helped whip the cream for the pecan pie.

Wii Play Games on Christmas

My dad and Chris take to the lanes...

Taking a break from the usual Mathery goodness, I just wanted to post some photos to prove that my parents took part in - gasp! - playing a video game. This was the first time in their lives. They gave me a Nintendo Wii for Christmas, the revolutionary game console system predicated on movements over button-mashing. The Wii comes with a game disc with miniature versions of various sports, including golf, bowling and tennis. The game controllers, called "wiimotes", are motion sensitive and you hold them in your hand and move as if you were playing the real sport - swinging a tennis racket or a golf club, throwing a bowling ball, etc.

...and the court.

My father has spent his life as an intensely competitive person, and it didn't take long for that intense look to come across his face as he found one more avenue with which to best his children. And best us he did, at least in the bowling (my brother-in-law posted the best score, but dad beat both Elsa and me). He also scored a couple wins over me in tennis (though I've come back strong). My mother was even induced to pick up a controller long enough to channel her father through three holes of golf. She even admitted to liking it afterward.

Mom lining up her shot.

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas ransomedoff fans!

Today was the big day, Mather's third Christmas but the first one where she really participated. She was delighted to see all the stuffed stockings this morning.

And all those presents under the tree!

It was a full Ransom house for Christmas this year. Elsa, Chris and Cora came to join us from New York. Cora is now five months old and super-dooper cute. Here she is, posing with the Christmas stocking that I knit for her!

And here she is again, with GrandFather and Uncle Daniel...

And here she is opening her first Christmas gift, with only a tiny bit of help from her Dad.

Whereas all the help that Mather needed was her new chopsticks to help her bust into the big gifts under the tree!

Perhaps it would have been a little quicker with my new poultry shears - watch out!

Ah, the sweet sound of success... or is that the clunking of the horse and rider? (check out the cool new socks - not knit by me) This kept her occupied for quite some time while we continued opening gifts.

These are pretty cool too. Chris drew caricatures of the family to hang from a mobile above Cora's crib. Here are the three of us:

Another big winner was a tiny picnic set that Nanna picked out for Mather. And she got new gloves - she opened 4 or 5 presents all while still wearing them. Her first inclination was to look around for her bicycle helmet because Dan wears gloves when he rides his bike.

Cup of tea anyone?

Bicycling with Mather

I've always joked that I was born into a bicycle the way a Mongolian child of the steppe is born into the saddle -- riding from birth. My father is an ardent cyclist and used to carry toddler-aged me around on a rear-mounted bike seat, even in snowy Boston. Learning to ride was one of the pillars of my childhood, and I was very proud as a child to have never needed training wheels. To follow up on the analogy, when I'm on a bike, it feels like a natural extension of myself, supposedly the same way a Mongolian horseman feels about his steed.

With our move out to the Sunset, it became a much longer trek back and forth to Mather's daycare, which was still in the Haight. She and I would take the train together in the morning, but Mather would often lack patience on the train ride back home, when it was getting dark and she was tired (ie, she would throw a fit in front of all the other train passengers. Not fun.) So we were thinking about alternatives...and a bike seat seemed like the way to go. After all, I can ride nearly the entire distance between our house and Mather's daycare in Golden Gate Park, which is pleasant, and the girl certainly loves to go fast.

I bought a rear mounting bike seat and had the bike shop install it (I certainly didn't trust myself to the task!). While I was there, another dad with his daughter -- about four -- was buying her a new bike helmet because she had outgrown her old one. He heard me talking to the mechanic about children's helmets and offered me her old one -- for free! It fits Mather perfectly, and she's very enthusiastic about wearing it (sample dialog: "Daddy has helmet, Mather has helmet!").

Riding with a passenger does take a little getting used to. I don't typically talk while riding, but Mather talks the entire time ("bumpy!" or "I see stars!" when we're riding at night). She also kicks me in the posterior from time to time. I guess she wants me to go faster. I also ride much more carefully than usual. I don't take big risks when I'm riding by myself, but I do cut corners and I go pretty fast. Not when I've got Mather. It's a leisurely ride. But it's fun, and she loves it. And it sure beats a temper tantrum on a crowded N Judah.

Momily Knits

Momily's knitting circle friend Jenny commented on Mather's knit hat in the last set of photos. Since Momily is too gracious to toot her own horn, I thought I'd quietly jump in here with photos of three of her creations.

This is the first hat she knit for Mather, when she was still learning how.

This is Mather's custom-made Raggedy Ann "wig" -- a knit cap with yarn woven in and out to make "hair".

Mather's favorite, her "stripey hat". She's got a serious interest in all things striped, and all things purple, so making this hat was the obvious thing to do!

Thanksgiving in Las Vegas

The three of us took off to Las Vegas/Henderson, NV for Thanksgiving with Grandpa Cary and Sheryl. Cary made a fantastic turkey, and Sheryl mastered a vast array of sides for a great Thanksgiving meal. Em and I found a little time to sneak out at night and hit the blackjack tables -- unfortunately, the tables hit back -- and we also found a great Henderson playground for Mather to show off her new "apple shirt" (she's been asking to wear it seemingly every day since we got it).

"This way!"

Yes, she did try to go down the "bumpy slide" as well.