Curious Critters

Over the long turkey-day weekend, Anika continued developing her zoological brilliance.  Even at less than two months shy of a year old, Alicia's television ban is in full force.  Even the most educational programs, like Life or Planet Earth are strictly prohibited.  Luckily, I have acceptable teaching alternatives.  Who needs a zoo, or the television, when you have Curious Critters, by David FitzSimmons?

The inside is as striking as the cover.  Curious Critters was a wonderful gift from Mrs. Hansen, "the Judge's" wife.  The photos are breathtaking.  In light of Alicia's gift at making animal sounds, we could probably charge admission for the other neighborhood kids.

The giant goldfish is one of Anika's favorites.  It's about 50 times a goldfish's actual size!  I doubt Anika will tolerate Mom's trips to the fish store ever again.

When Anika's eyes get really big, I tell her that it'd taste like chicken.  I don't think she is convinced.

Sometimes Anika gets over-anxious, and we tell her to stand still politely until she is called on.

I will take lizards for $500, Alex.

The different kinds of frogs are also a big hit.  Probably because Anika is so adept at moving around on all fours and sticking out her tongue.  I'd guess her tongue is three times the length of a normal human tongue, but I'm sure it's just right for a frog.

We are working on smile correction--with no real success and no promising methods.  Nose scrunching and eye-squinting are endearing when you're one.  Twenty one . . . not so much.

Curiosity and mischief are in full swing at the Freeman household.

Movember and The Beard Project

November, also known as "Movember", is now the one month of the year in which men can shamelessly let their facial hair grow regardless of whether it can be sported well or poorly--even in professional settings.  (Because I'm not convinced a mustache can ever be pulled off in a professional setting by anyone born after 1960, I'm opting for the beard.)  What boss or client can fault you for supporting prostate cancer?  Thus, I have joined the Movember facial-hair growing movement this month.  While I'm all in favor of whipping prostate cancer, I confess that I have ulterior motives.

Ever since Anika has been old enough to observe her environment, she's been scared of Grandpa Kim.  Alicia and I are at a loss for this phenomenon.  We finally decided that it must be Grandpa Kim's (extremely impressive and sporty) beard.  Thus, when Movember rolled around, I thought perhaps my growing of a (not as impressive and sporty) beard would help Anika overcome her fears.

This is before the days of Anika's keen observational skills.  (That or she was simply immobile and unable to express her fear of the beard.)

This is Saturday morning.  I've been hard at work growing my beard for twelve days or so.  You will note that Anika is all smiles notwithstanding the dark, and intimidating scruffiness of my face.

Needless to say, Anika is a lot more excited about this new development than Alicia.

This weekend, after almost two full weeks of the beard project, it was time to test my hypothesis.  Grandma and Grandpa Kim came to South Minneapolis for a first-time trip to Marla's Caribbean Cuisine--a hot spot that has been featured on Food Network's Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.  Anika doesn't like to mess around when she eats out.  It's only high-profile, international fare for her.  

This is Anika a month or so ago at Victor's 1959 Cafe--also a Minneapolis favorite, which was featured on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives.  The Cuban food is wonderful.  Anika got in the mood by doing her best Fidel Castro impression.  Or maybe she's expressing her agreement with the UN's condemnation of the embargo?  Hard to tell.

After enjoying Victor's so much, Anika wanted to stick with the Caribbean theme.  As you can see, both Anika and Grandma were quite happy about Marla's colorful red sign. 

Anika got right down to business when she arrived.  Marla's has the tastiest menus around!  We had to teach her that the Caribbean vibe involves being relaxed and, thus, voraciously eating the menu wasn't scoring us any points with the waitress.

Anika was outraged when we told her she couldn't order the ox tail, and we started feeding Anika her standard-issue pureed chicken and mashed up vegetables instead.  You'd have thought we were feeding her MREs.     

Luckily, this was not a problem that a bit of play time with her rattling ball wouldn't solve.  Few are.

So far so good.  She was quite happy sitting next to Grandpa Kim, beard and all.  But long-distance proximity is really no indicator of success when it comes to Anika.  We were cautiously optimistic.

Alicia and I give Marla's two thumbs up.  My chicken jerk was fantastic (just make sure you have plenty of napkins to wipe the sweat off of your forehead). Alicia's meal was also scrumptious.  We'll be going back for sure!

At home, it was time for the true test. 

In the midst of a spirited family game of Rook (the men won), Anika finally settled in happy and comfortable next to Grandpa Kim.  Mission accomplished.  Physics 101 starts next week.   

Moving and Shaking at Nine Months

Anika is getting older all the time.  She is constantly moving now--wanting to stand up, grab things, see things, eat things, smile at things, yell at things, and crawl all over the place.  I use the word "crawl" liberally.  From a functional perspective, I think the word crawl is accurate.  But a more accurate description of what Anika does is probably "worm."  She has not yet figured out that using her knees will increase her mph about 100% (and we are not in a hurry to provide her with any extra horsepower).  Instead, Anika uses her arms to pull herself across the floor.  It's like she hits warp speed when she transitions from the carpet to the hardwood floor.  Alicia and I think her worming bodes well for her back and shoulder muscles, and thus her swimming, weight lifting, or rowing career.  This video is not quite Anika's inaugural voyage--but close.  Apologies for the poor video quality.

In other news, Anika continues to push the limits of the growth charts--the downward limits.  She saw the doctor for her nine-month appointment and weighed a whopping fifteen-point-something pounds, which put her in the third--yes third--percentile for weight.  But even that's beat by her height percentile, which is even lower--the second.  Nevertheless, we are assured that she is perfectly proportionate and there is nothing to worry about for now.

True to her development in the womb, Anika's belly size continues to run ahead of all of her other measurements.  The upside is that this helps out in the modesty department and makes for easy bath-time photography.

This is Anika in her big-girl jacket (fit for a nine-month-old), though Anika may be able to wear it next fall at this rate.

Anika learning to eat bread crumbs with her hands.  This is her new favorite activity.  And it encourages finger dexterity to boot!  She'll be playing Operation before we know it.  

 

Anika the Owl and Other Halloween Fun

Anika really got into Halloween this year.  For many months we have been telling Anika to start thinking about what she wanted to dress up as.  Being that her exposure to the world is somewhat limited, she had no grandiose ideas of going as super-heroes, ghouls, goblins or zombies.  Instead, her ideas consisted of: (1) Mom; (2) her ring set; and (3) her play-mat owl.  We'll have to work on thinking outside of the box.

Wise Ms. Owl was an easy pick, despite how flattered Alicia was that she was in the running.

She's watching you!  Quite impressive handiwork by Alicia (with a tiny bit of help from the wonderful costume pro, Amy Lee Harrington).  Not quite sure what Alicia would have done had Anika picked her ring set instead.

Eventually, Anika started to get used to the idea of being in costume. 

Dressing up wasn't all Anika wanted to do though.  She promised to clean her room once a week for a month if we'd take her to the orchard.  It's hard to turn down such industry in a nine month old.  You can tell Anika thought it was a fair trade.

Anika made the most of her trip, making friends with various farm animals, including this gentle goat.  She's already asking for one for Christmas.  She was told to ask her Grandparents.  I'm pretty sure Minneapolis lots are not zoned for goats.

She also wanted to sit in sea of pumpkins (ala "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown"). She liked this a lot, but was not visited by The Great Pumpkin.

She was one happy kiddo . . .

. . . until we reminded her about her end of the bargain.

But she thought it was really funny when she gave us an I.O.U. and told us it wasn't redeemable until she starts walking.