Ok, I need a little info from some of you "knowledgeable" types out there. Let me preface.

Awhile back my Dad bought me a "Princess Wand." It's pretty cool - it lights up, and has this sort of orb thing on the top that spins and glows. I had heard from some of the other kids at the park that princesses get whatever they want. So naturally, I put two and two together and was pretty excited. Come bedtime, I waved the wand at Dad and looked adorable (I think Mom is immune to magic). And then I still had to go to bed.

I figured I was doing something wrong, and kept trying. ...Nothing worked. Totally false advertising.

Anyway, I did a little research on "magical objects that get you whatever you want." (I googled it.) I'm hearing a lot about a little rectangular piece of plastic with a black stripe on the back. Apparently, if you can get one of these with your name on it, you're pretty much golden. Obviously, I'm in the market, so can anyone with experience with these things tell me how to get ahold of one?

Adeia, being advanced, knows many homonyms. For instance:

"Pa" means "fan,"

while "Pa" on the other hand, means "to pat,"

and of course, "Pa" means "five" (as in "high-five")

All of these words can also alternately be pronounced "ba," in which case they become homonyms with:

"ba," meaning "drink"

"ba," meaning "book"

"ba (sometimes "bat") meaning "bath"

and sometimes "ba," the word for "ball"

But this isn't the end of homonyms. No, it's only the beginning:

djous (juice) and djoues (shoe)

"no" (no!) and "no" (nose)

mayi (more) and "my" (I want that)

"ga goo" (thank you) and "ga go" (gotta go)

"da" (dad) and "dah" (done)

"tchssse" (cheese) and jshche (this)

All this excitement is too much for me. I think I'll go watch some School House Rock. Next time, I'll tell you about my bonsai tree. He's not as cute as the baby, but he also doesn't poop. (At least not that I've noticed)

About an hour later, I decided to do a little cleaning. My child decided to pull everything off the shelves. I put her in front of a video. She tore up some paper. I gave up on cleaning and read her a book. She threw the book. I began to wonder if someone had replaced my nice, happy, well-behaved baby with one of those "other" ones that you see at the mall. Anyway, She then tried to pull some videos down on her head. I though this might hurt, so I said something like "ADDIE! STOP!" Right then the tornado sirens went off, and scared the crap out of her, and she started to cry hysterically until they stopped. I felt bad. Stupid sirens, making me look all mean. I noticed she felt kind of warm, but she was throwing a fit, and that can be hard work.

Adeia then decided that the only thing that would make her happy was to go RIGHT THEN to the park. To communicate this, she stood in front of the door crying "BYE!!! BYE!!!" for five minutes. I eventually gave up explaining the various reasons it was unwise to go to the park (the rain) and picked her up and tried to , distract her by reading her FAVORITE book, which I try to avoid picking because if she sees it you have to read it five times. She threw it. Then she threw up on my pants. Mmmm....oatmeal. But backwards.

Luckily, I was able to piece the evidence together. In case you're worried, no one kidnapped Adeia and replaced her....she's just under the weather.

(Sorry Refe....I had borrowed your pajama pants....)

The past 11 months or so have been a roller coaster - lots of highs, a few lows - and in talking with a few of my friends, it seems that this is the common experience. I found myself asking, quite often, "What should I expect," or "What's the right approach?" Perhaps you've felt the same way. Now that I have the first year under my belt, I'd like to offer some tips to some of you newbies out there. Feel free to disregard them - "there's more than one way to throw a fit," if you know what I mean. These are just some of the more common problems I've run into, and my most successful approaches to them.

Tip #1 (What to do with a Fussy Parent):

Let's face it. Even the best parent gets a little fussy sometimes. And it's hard to tell what they want - communication isn't their forte. My first approach was to ask Mom or Dad to verbalize what they needed. This attempt failed miserably. My theory is that parent's have basic needs, which, if they are not met, result in fussiness. The problem is, sometimes parents don't even know why they're fussing - so it's up to us to find out. So I began to approach them in "problem solving mode." This was very effective - I even have a basic list I run through now. This list isn't comprehensive - I just picked a few things here or there to give you a general idea.

1. Hunger: Most probable issue. Try offering the parent a graham cracker or two off your tray. They seem to think this is funny, so it's also helpful if they're just bored or cranky. A word of caution though: be sure to only give them a taste of the cracker, and then take it back. You don't want them to get into the bad habit of eating off your tray.

2. Stress (emergency only): This tactic is primarily effective with moms. If you've tried all your regular tricks and you mom still seems stressed, try and get her to take a bath/shower. This is tricky - you can't just suggest it to them. I had to do this the other day, and I used a combo poop/messy eating method. It wasn't enough to just get it all over myself, so I kicked a little on the changing table and then smeared some banana on her face. End result? Double Bath! (The initial irritation might stress mom out further, so be prepared. But after that, they often seem more relaxed. )

3. Alone time: Parent's are very social creatures, but sometimes they just need a break. If you think you parent might be fussy because of over-stimulation, try letting them be for a bit. Go tear up a magazine, or unroll some toilet paper - any sort of solitary activity will do. I often use that time to catch up on the laundry - it seems I never have enough time in the day to pull it out of the basket and onto the floor.

4. Distraction - the "look over here" method: I can never say enough about distraction. Throw something, smile winningly, take your first step, crow loudly, say something witty - it all works wonderfully with a fussy parent.

That's all for this installment, kids. I'll try to be back soon with another installment and a few more tips, if I can steal some time with the computer. Right now I've got to go - it looks like Mom needs a nap.

In case you're wondering if we ran into Charles Shulz, we didn't. But if you remember my last few posts, we've been doing some culinary exploration...

Adeia's been enjoying the variety of produce on her little tray. (just don't ask about the grape/diaper fiasco....*shudder*) And what with her first birthday under her belt, the doctor tells me she can try just about anything. (Actually, the doctor literally told me that today, at Addie's one year check-up, so I'm not exaggerating.) Strawberries, chocolate, milk, shellfish - the world is her oyster. (sorry) The timing is nice - so today we had more fun with food. Addie tried peanutbutter. She loved it.

And immediately broke out into hives.

She even rubbed it in her eye, so that it swelled half shut. It wasn't really as frightening as it was pathetic. Poor baby! So we headed back to the doctor.... again. Luckily, we had a welcoming commitee - my mom, sister, and brother were all there - their doctor is in the same office. Addie cheered right up, and forgave the doctor for the four (FOUR!!!) shots she had given her a few hours earlier. Then the doctor measured me because I didn't know how tall I was, and we found out that I am 5'5" and 3/4.

After that I sent to the drugstore and got some benadryl for Addie, mascara for me, and bubbles for both of us. (Adeia approved of the bubbles immensely, and really wanted to drink the whole bottle of benadryl, because she heard from the doctor that Will Smith did that in "Hitch." I said no.)

So remember, just say "No!" to Peanuts if you are lunching with Adeia. (Although we will try again at 18 months. How fun!)

Adeia is walking like a pro, though it's the kind of pro that falls butt first a few times an hour. Nevertheless, she's toddling all over the place. And climbing. Yesterday, while Refe and I sat and watched, she climbed right up onto the coffee table and did a little dance. The best part was seeing her try to get down. You see, it's a little high for her. It also has a big open space between the legs, like a regular kitchen table. So when she tried to slide off, her feet didn't quite touch the ground. She hung there, suspended, kicking her legs back and forth a little frantically until we let her down. It was pretty cute.

Anyway, I'm off to pay the bills!

After a few days of what I call "re-bonding," Addie and I are now back in the swing of things. She's getting very adventurous - like yesterday, for instance. Adeia tried her first chicken nuggets. Granted, at first she thought I'd handed her a grease sponge to suck on, and was very excited. She said to me, "Yay, transfat! Who doesn't love chicken pulverized and reshaped into patties of questionable color, texture, and content?"

In Refe's defense, the box did say "no fillers."

Ok, so that wasn't that exciting. But here's a list of some of her other recent adventures, all within the last two days:

-"Creative Dismount off a Couch" (falling backwards)

- Constipation

- Crying (because of constipation)

- Turning purple (constipation)

- Eating an ant

- Finger painting with yogurt

- Watching American Idol (she voted for David Archuletto)

Oh, and she also took her first steps yesterday... February 26, 2007.

Woo hoo, Adeia!

I worked from five a.m. to one-thirty this morning, picked up a few supplies at Wal-mart, and came straight home. Since then I have done little else but pack box after box of stuff. Remember what I said about packing light? Well, Susan and I don't have that much stuff, but it is still plenty of hassle trying to move all of it. I am almost done packing our bedroom, which contains about seventy-five percent of our belongings, but I got in a rut so I switched to kitchen stuff. I have probably packed about a third of that stuff, and will try to get the other two-thirds packed after I finish with this post.

Of course, the only reason I am writing this post in the first place is to postpone that very thing.

Susan didn't say anything about it in her post earlier today, but I have to boast a bit about my daughter. Little eight-month old Addie was apparently pretty incredible for her mother on their three hour flight from Albuquerque to Chicago. The plane was only two-thirds full, so they let Susan put the car seat in the chair next to her. Addie spent the first forty-five minutes of the flight playing quietly with her toys. The next hour or so she napped. Once she woke up, Susan fed her and the little angel went back to playing. She hardly made a peep except for her happy babbling. That girl knows how to make her daddy proud.

Well... I guess I can't stall anymore, or I'll never get all this done by Thursday night. Back to packing - see some of you soon!

This said, Adeia is having fun adjusting to her new suite - the guestroom in my parent's basement. After checking out the acoustics with some prolonged lung-busting screaming, she posed a few provoking questions to me as I put her in her crib last night:

What if there's a cave in? Do all midwestern babies live underground?
Where are the windows? How do I know when to wake up? -all valid thoughts for an 8 month old in new surroundings..

Basement living is old news for me - I'm actually spending Christmas in my highschool bedroom. Of course, it's now in a glorified state. It has nice things like walls and carpet in leiu of cement and exposed electrical wiring. Woo hoo! ( I also hear that my Grandpa has installed some sort of sump pump so that we won't wake up in 3 feet of water, which may have happened once to my entire bedroom while I was on vacation in the Carolinas during my Senior year. It was really fun to see my senior prom dress floating by, covered in scum.) So it's rather updated nowadays, which is good for Refe and I. Whenever we come to visit my parents, we stay in the basement. It's gotten progressivly nicer since I moved out, going from hole-in-the-ground to finished suite. Not a bad temporary living situation. Although, to quote my cousin Theo, "It's not my favorite choice."

Ready for some family living, Refe?

I always enjoy when Adeia and Kayle are able to play together. They are only just starting to figure out that the other exists, and may perhaps be a separate entity after all. It will usually begin with both being placed in relatively close proximity to one another. After staring at one another for a bit, one of them (usually Adeia, being the female and therefore more social of the two) will then crawl up to the other and start smiling and hitting them. That's my favorite part, unless of course the hitter is Kayle, in which case I as her father must step in. Once they are separated the screeching begins. I think it's how they communicate. One screeches and the other responds in kind - it's beautiful really. Louder and louder, rising higher and higher pitch and timbre...

The night ended when the little ones had to go to bed. The little ones themselves are usually pretty good at letting us know when that time has come. We put them to bed, and then after a (very) short period of time, go to bed ourselves. I don't know what we did before we had a baby.

Apparently the seventh month is the one where babies decide that the only thing they are interested in doing is pulling themselves up on things and falling down. Even as I write this, I am having to leap away from the computer at frequent intervals and rescue Adeia from some new peril. The couch, the bed, dining room chairs, the bookshelf (a note from Susan: This morning Adeia fell down so many times in succession that Kristin, who was downstairs, thought I was doing Tae Bo.) Now, before you go and call DCFS, we are doing our best to make sure that our daughter doesn't injure herself. But she's just so darn cute! You should see the way she smiles and giggles when she succeeds in pulling herself up on some new piece of furniture. How could we deprive her of such joy and accomplishment?

At the moment, she is only able to pull herself up to a standing position. That doesn't alarm me - there's only so far you can fall when you measure a whopping foot and some change. What concerns me is when I see her straining to pull herself up further. When I came home this afternoon, Susan had Addie gated into a hallway with some toys while she caught up on some cleaning. I had only been watching her for a few minutes when she grabbed onto the gate and used it to stand up. After turning back and smiling - she had to make sure I was watching her - she stuck one of her toes into a gap in the gate's plastic netting and grabbed the wooden crossbar at the top with all ten tiny fingers. I watched in amusement as the just-now-developing muscles in her soft little arms began to twitch and shake as she strained to lift herself off the ground. Of course I had to call Susan over to watch before I took her down. So cute. Yet I couldn't help but have a nagging feeling that this might be a sign of things to come...

For the time being, I think that this is the cutest new development since giggling. What's next, walking?

Another fun surprise: I came to get Adeia from her nap, and it had gone unusually quiet. I walked in to find her standing at the edge of her crib, leaning over the side just enougth to make me nervous. And she was incredible thrilled with herself.

Oh, and Refe got a haircut. A LOT of a haircut. But we'll save that for another post.

Today, Adeia Madeline Tuma is officially six months old. It seems like only yesterday when I gave my new daughter her first bath at the hospital. She seemed so fragile and small. Now I have to hustle to catch her as she tries to crawl into the laundry room, or down a flight of stairs. I remember the first time she smiled. Now, she's so friendly that every stranger that walks by thinks they must have some special gift with babies, because Addie's grinning like a pumpkin. And with her two new little teeth, she's cute enough to bring peace to the Middle East (and sharp enough that she might even be able to survive in the Middle East.)

Happy Half Birthday, Adeia! We love you so much.

I'd like to give a little update on Adeia's most recent work.

As you know, Addie's a pretty ambitious little baby. She's known to tackle more than one project at once, and still finish all of them in record time. You remember, for instance, her "Scooting" project, which she was tackling on the side during her impressive "Rollover" project.

She's recently wrapped up "Highchair Feedings," "Screech," and her pet project, "Self Pacifier Retrieval" (SPR). SPR was really Adeia's four month opus, indicative of her true genius. I think it's the kind of work we'll be seeing a lot more of in the future.

Right now she's got a total of three new ventures on the table: "Crawling," "Space Exploration," and an almost unnoticed little project we like to call "Teeth." It's her fifth month, and there were rumors circulating that she'd really been feeling pressure to continue the exponential growth trend that has set her apart in her field.

Today found her working on "Teeth" with an almost feverish intensity. I think she'd really reached a point of frustration with the whole thing. I remember reviewing it with her this morning and seeing a lot that was still under the surface with the project - potential that was hidden under some layers still. I told her to keep working, and we'd review again this evening if she hadn't made any progress.

Around noon I heard sort of a ruckus coming from her office. I went to check and bam! - there was "Teeth!" What a breakthrough! She'd even doubled profitability by cutting not one, but two at once. I thought, how does she do it?

*Scottish Underachievers Unite!

Since I didn't really feel up to much else, Susan and I began working on our illustrated children's story 'The Wilzened Farctic Ox.' It is the tale of an aloof Farctic Ox with a beautiful coat of fur, who learns the value of humility and friendship when he is suddenly shipped across the world to the New Mexican desert. Susan is doing the illustrations and they are fantastic - we'll post some when we get a chance.

I wish we had a sound byte of Adeia in the tub today, it was hysterical. She loves bubble baths, and was chattering away like a teenager - albeit a teenager who only knows the consonant 'ga.' I love to see her having so much fun. Unfortunately, I couldn't really touch her much today. Whatever it is I have, or had, she doesn't need. A baby with a sore throat and sinus pressure sounds like about as much fun as actually having a sore throat and sinus pressure. No, actually, it sounds a whole lot worse.

I love my days off. Five days a week, my alarm goes off at four o'clock in the morning and I wander groggily through our house showering, brushing my teeth, force-feeding myself oatmeal or a bagel, before getting into the car and yawning my way to work. There I pump myself full of coffee and do what I've got to do.

When your daughter wakes up every morning at around seven a.m. you never get a chance to really sleep in on those remaining two days. And I have to admit that sometimes I wish I could just wake up when I wake up. But honestly, those early mornings are my favorite times with my daughter. When she first wakes up she is so excited to see Susan and I, (and to get out of her crib) that I can't help but love her. Those times, like this morning, are when she is at her happiest, smiling and screeching and jabbering away. We let her roll around in our bed, playing with the sheets and pillows - and in the case of this morning, my hair. Sometimes she will even lay her head down on my chest and snuggle. Adorable. I wouldn't trade these mornings for the world.

Since then, Susan has carried a baby to term, and given birth to the lovely Adeia Madeline Tuma. Addie has doubled in size, begun crawling, eating pureed solids, and possibly teething. The Tumas packed up and left Kansas City early this past July, and now share a ginormous house with the Shaffer clan - Ben, Kristin, Paige and Jaime. I have started my first novel, and our house has begun a cool little Bible study with a few other families in the area. God has been very good to us, cramming more blessings into a shorter amount of time than we ever could have imagined. All the glory belongs to Him, and we are thankful to Him every day.

That is my brief recap of Year Two of the Tuma family adventure, we can't wait to see what the Lord has in store for Year Three. Thank you to everyone who has supported and encouraged us these past two years.

Now I'm going to get off the computer and enjoy our anniversary. Be blessed everybody!

Adeia Madeline Tuma ~ 4.5 Months

Gaming, biking, refreshing Canada Dry, some cartoons, and a little sun... Sounds better than Jeff's vacation, doesn't it?

"Don't worry guys, I can totally split my baby's bottle into several 3oz containers. Luckily, she prefers being fed from an eyedropper."

Well, Addie got her first pair of shoes. Pretty sweet, huh? I'll post a picture of her little feet in them later.

Who needs rattles? Today a fussy Adeia met something overstimulating enough to hold her developing gaze for more than a few seconds. Actually, a lot more than that. A half hour.

Once again, Addie is ahead of the curve.

Addie, you are a daddy's dream.