A Round Up of Recent Adventures: Newport, Rhode Island

Today, Charlotte is 6 years and 365 days old. Because it's a leap year she has to wait one more day for her birthday. She can barely contain herself! I can hardly believe that seven years have passed since she changed our world forever. More on that tomorrow...

We've had a lot of excellent adventures lately, starting in April when we hosted Marlène, a French student teacher who was doing an internship (stage) at Charlotte's school. Hosting Marlène forced us all to speak more French (though she wanted to be practicing her English!) and to eat our family meals in more leisurely manner.  We learned a lot about Charlotte's school from a teacher's perspective, too. In all it was a wonderful experience which we hope to repeat.

At the end of the internship, we took Marlène and two other interns (Solenne and Fatou) to Newport, Rhode Island for the weekend.

After strolling on the pier and having an excellent lunch, we toured The Breakers. Philippe, Marlène, Solenne, Fatou, and I enjoyed the self-guided audio tour. Charlotte busied herself sketching each room.  She was fascinated, but wanted to see it her way, not understand the history or fabrication of the building. Her drawings are evocative if not representative, especially the bubbly way she captured the crystal and gold chandeliers in the dining room.  I was pretty sure she didn't hear the few details I mentioned to her or that she read, until she commented last week about the Vanderbilts and the leather-covered walls in their library!

Charlotte in front of The Breakers, Newport RI

The next day was a golden summery day so we went for a wonderful breakfast at The Hungry Monkey in Newport and then walked part of the Cliff Walk, with mansions (historic and otherwise) on one side and the sea on the other.

Solenne, Fatou, and Marlène on the Cliffwalk, Newport RI

At the end of the walk, Philippe hoists Charlotte like a sack of potatoes. I try not to notice her head pointing at the concrete.

 Thanks to Marlène we also made it to The Top of The Hub, the restaurant and lounge at the top of the Prudential Tower in downtown Boston. I'm ashamed to say that after more than a year in Boston, I'd not ever heard of this wonder. We met Solenne and her host family for a farewell cocktail and dinner.

The three little girls were fascinated with the view...there was a game on that night! Once again, I got a kick out of seeing Charlotte reject (Kobe beef) hot dogs (on a brioche) in favor of New England clam chowder and spicy calamari.

Charlotte and I have a list of things we want to do in Boston before we move next month. Going to Salem and the Peabody Essex Museum was on the list. We knocked that off the second weekend of Spring break. You can read about that trip in my previous post, Charlotte and Poetry in Motion.

Charlotte (and little bear) at The Top of the Hub

Sunday at our House

Believe it or not, Charlotte slept until 8:20 a.m. Did I use this time to get cracking on my enormous to do list? Did I prep a lecture, write a query about copy editing, or even do some laundry? Er...no. I set the alarm for 6 a.m. It awoke me from a disturbing dream (seriously, if I could do Julia Cameron's morning pages, I'd have some amazing screenplays. I even had the privilege of taking a screenwriting with her in a previous iteration of my life. Geesh.) and I decided to let Charlotte be my alarm.

Oh well.

We had a quiet Sunday. We met our friends Esther, Dave, and Sarah at a street fair to watch Chicago's Trinity Dancers. Charlotte was asked to step away from the stage as she attempted to join the show. Sarah stood at a respectable distance (though she is the one in focus in the picture--can you pick her out, Esther?).

My pals Sheri and Beth came for brunch. Charlotte was, I think, so excited about this that she didn't fall asleep until nearly 1 p.m. and then managed to sleep through most of their visit.

I was hoping to report a great-eating, no vomit day, but, alas, we had a big vomit at dinner. (Charlotte did to her credit, finish an entire baby yogurt for breakfast and a quarter cup of pizza puree for lunch.)

On the vomiting front: I don't blog about this often any more, but it's gotten worse again. We're seeing at least one significant vomit a day as well as many gags and mini-vomits. I've written a log of blog entries about this in my mind, but I loath writing about it. I am at my wits' end and end every meal close to tears. Part of our CHOW strategy is to firmly tell her "no" when she gags. I have to yell at her when she's in pain and unhappy because we can't tell when it is reflux or behavior. So, in other words, I have to scare my baby and make her cry. It's breaking my heart.

And what does she do? When I burp (yeah, I do occasionally burp), she pets my chest, looks concerned, and says "Mommy okay." She thinks it hurts me to burp like it hurts her. She is the sweetest child I have ever known. And while I would do anything to change her medical circumstances, I would not do a thing if it would alter her personality.

Gotta go before the tears soak my keyboard.

Fattening, er, Feeding Charlotte

Now that it's summertime, you may have noticed that Charlotte has a double chin, some little tiny fat rings on her neck and on her thighs. I forgot to mention in the feeding update that she weighed in at 28.6 lbs--a near 2 lb. weight gain in 3 weeks. She also grew 2 cms.

If you've eaten at our home, I hope you're thinking that it is my home-cooking that is doing the trick. You know, the healthy, as-natural-as-I can-make-it, varied food that I love to cook. Of course I'm not feeding my daughter high fructose corn syrup, processed sugar and flour, boxed foods or chemicals. I'm not the totally organic type (cannot fathom the $6+/gallon for milk), but I strive for hormone-free meats, local veggies, etc.

Yeah right.

Her favorite food right now is pizza (puree). I make it for her from scratch. Here are the ingredients (I am seriously cringing as I post this).:


And here's a picture of the finished product. In case you're wondering, it smells and tastes quite good.

You don't want to know what's in Charlotte's peanut butter and jelly puree!

How do I feel about this? Check out my LiveJournal essay from August 2006. I feel the same way today.