Elder abuse?

Not really. They're not old enough. At least not by the way they work.

We put granddad and granny to work while they visited last weekend. And they liked it. At least they said so.

The first project: Paint the floor of the back porch. We needed to do this to survive another wet Oregon winter without massive wood splits not seen since ... well ... actually ... logging companies still clear cut Oregon forests, so they're seen all the time pretty clearly from a distance.



Anyway, Brad got on his hands and knees and painted the porch Daublin???. Brent watched.



A pretty great job:



We also tore out most of the landscaping in the back yard. This is part of an effort to start over with our landscaping around the house.



We also moved this storage shed out of its pictured location and into the parking space. You'll see what I mean in an upcoming post.



Meanwhile, Bettie did more than her part watching Claire each day. She taught her new words, including "up" and "down" and reinforced her sign language.



Here, they devise their own landscaping design and watch the squirrels romp in the cedar above.



Granny taught Claire how to screw the cap back on the bubbles bottle. Claire has since translated that talent to other containers, including an empty Gatoraid jug. Why drive to a museum when you can have this much fun on your own front lawn?!?!



Yep, it was a good visit from our standpoint. Lots of yard work done. Lots of free babysitting. We hope granny and granddad return real soon.

Hugs to granny, granddad

Claire enjoyed another visit with Brad and Bettie. This "vacation" was anything but, in some ways. In others, we enjoyed ourselves thoroughly and got a lot of satisfaction, babysitting and yard work out of the visit.

In short, we welcome them back anytime.

Granny walked in the door bearing Claire's first Raggedy Ann. Claire now hugs on command, by the way. She was not shy with this red head.





Claire is rapidly becoming a little book worm. Her attention span for the written word (or is it the printed picture?) has about doubled. She can now nearly get through a book without squirming her way out of a lap. Here, she actually teaches granddad a new word: "Bayh."



And no, she's not talking about the Indiana politico.

Later, she listened to granny mimic the sounds of a "Noisy Barn," moos, oinks and all.



Yes, I can see it now. Claire Hunsberger. BA, English Lit, Oxford. Class of 2028.


Class of 2028?!?!?

More new twicks

There's more!



Though she prefers crawling, Claire is quickly moving along the house on her own two feet. We can thank Mary for this. Mary works with Claire on this feat every day that the two are together. We sometimes barely give her practice time. Nonetheless, Claire has made amazing progress since our trip to New Mexico, when she could barely keep her legs beneath her long enough to stand upright. Now she's heading down the hallway with a big, knowing smile on her face.



She also knows what to do with a toothbrush. Sarah taught her. She let Claire watch as she brushed her own teeth. In minutes, Claire was doing the same. She does it on cue, both verbal and visual. "Brush, brush?" will do the trick. So will getting in vicinity of our tooth brush holder. We consider this a major breakthrough. If her memory and interest holds, we hope this helps us avoid Civil-Rights-era-like protests against teeth-brushing during the Terrible Twos. At least, that's our strategy. What do we know?



Yep, Claire keeps getting bigger and bigger, if not in weight, then in our own minds. Look out neighborhood. Look out CeeCee and Moppet.

Siwwy wabbit. Twicks are for kids.

OK, Claire has officially entered a new phase. One that eclipses her parents' ability to keep up with her. One that is both exciting and demanding and intimidating. One that has kind of turned a tree on its head.



Claire 's memory and learning capacity has grown fourfold in the past two weeks. She has started signing words with earnest. Besides "light," "done," "fan," "ball," "hat" and "bye-bye," she's begun signing "banana." She flashes this two-handed sign anytime she sees us bring the fruit to the table. Even when we utter the word. This week, Sarah was walking through Trade Joe's when Claire let out a "BLAAGHH!" She started making the banana sign. Sure enough, Sarah realized they were in the produce section, next to a pile of monkey business.

Claire actually said "da-da" a couple times on Wednesday night. She was looking up from mom's lap where she was nursing, trying to get my attention, when she did it. She signs "mom" and "dad," too, though she uses the same sign for both of us. ...We think.

We're working with her on "ma-ma." She knows what the word means. She just can't get the "m" sound out quite yet. Heck, I have trouble with it too, sometimes.



More evidence? Last weekend, she picked up the remote control. That, in itself isn't unusual. She considers it a toy. But she's never pointed it at the TV before. This time, she pointed it at the TV. Then, she looked at me. It was as if she was saying, "See, dad, what I can do?" or, worse, "Isn't this how you turn it on?"

We don't watch that much TV. How did she learn to do that? Wasn't from our babysitter, I'm pretty sure.



Our babysitter did capture this array of images. Claire tried a toy tree on for size, a gift from Matt's parents, and promptly forgot about it. She went along playing on the futon with her babysitter's cellphone, tree firmly planted atop her head.

And, last weekend she hung out, upside down, with Daniel. Glad he and his parents could stop by.

Land of Enchantment IV

We worked in quite a number of outings while we were in the great state.

It was Indian Markup weekend at the Plaza in Fanta Se, so we took Claire to show her what exquisite yet high-priced jewelry and pottery looked like. We ate Indian Bread and red chile. She heard her first Native American drumming. She was mystified.



And worn out.



All before the clouds broke.

We also made it to the Santa Fe Farmer's Market. The produce at this market is every bit as good and as varied as the items you'll find at Portland's market, which is amazing considering the items sold in Santa Fe are grown in the desert with help from much less rain. I could not believe the size of carrots we saw at one stand with produce from a farm in Las Trampas. Below, Claire helps mom and nana pick out apples. Yes, that's green chile roasting in the background. Mmmmmm.



Dad and I went for a hike in the foothills near their home. Try to ignore the golf course in the background of the last photo.





We pakced a lot in. We bought green chile. We shopped for toys. Sarah got a massage (We don't have pictures of that). We picked up some Christmas gifts. We ate out. We ate out again. And again. La Cocina. Tomasita's (and its famous blue corn green chile chicken enchiladas with sopaipilla pictured below). El Paragua. The Shed.



Man. When are we going back?!?!

Land of Enchantment III

It's hard to see friends anymore when we go home. But on this trip, we squeezed a few introductions in here and there.


Michelle purposely spurned her 10th high school reunion a week or so earlier to visit when we were in town. She came over with her niece and sister Rachel. We all watched a DVD of Michelle falling out of the Arizona sky with some guy and a parachute strapped to her back. Claire couldn't watch.

Aunt Tricia and Uncle Frank scheduled their trip to the Rockies while we were in N. Mex.



Claire got to meet her great aunt and listen to her play some excellent piano. It was the first time Claire's heard live piano.



The whole night turned quite rolicking.