Just give me the WHOLE ear of corn

Tonight for dinner I did the usual take whatever we were having for dinner, cut it up into small, non-choking size pieces and place onto Isabel's tray. Let's just say that worked for a little bit. She ate her peas, her chicken sausage and bread no problem, but was not at all impressed with the small kernels of corn on her tray. I was able to distract her for a while but she kept pointing to the ear on my plate. So I figured what the heck, I'll let her try, but certainly didn't think she'd actually get any corn off of the cob. If anyone should have known the power of her sharp little chompers it should ahve been me. I'm not sure what was more fun, actually seeing her get corn off the cob, or just trying to the different methods until she found one that worked. The uncles were over for dinner as well and really had a good laugh. I think I'm onto something here though. If ever we need to keep Isabel occupied (and quiet), give her an ear of corn. Unfortunately I don't think that method will help us out in church at all...

So, before I ramble on any longer, here is Isabel and her first corn on the cob.


Going for it...



Perhaps the underhand grip would work a bit better...
(FYI, the "flat" looking portion is where I had cut some corn off for Isabel)

What, you've never seen a baby eating an ear of corn?

Perhaps Mommy was onto something and I should remove the kernels before eat them...

Nope, she was wrong. Eating it straight from the source is waaay better.

See all the progress I made! Mmm, corn.

A Pea, her pugs and a spatula

Most of you probably know by now that Isabel has the nickname of "Pea" which came about after I calling her sweet pea a while, which then got shortened to Pea. Lucky girl, we know :). Anyways, I got a call at work yesterday from Geoffrey who said "your little girl is chasing the pugs around with a spatula." Unfortunately he was unable to get a video as the camera was upstairs, but this morning during breakfast on the sun porch, she once again grabbed her spatula and went to town. As you'll see in the first video, General was not so enthused by this new game...but that didn't stop Isabel!

Random May Photos

Not a whole lot going on at the Buescher household, just the usual chasing after Isabel :). She has really perfected her walking and cannot be stopped. She loves to walk in the house and in the backyard and of course to chase after the pugs.

I've been itching to put Isabel in this dress since she got it for her birthday and a couple Fridays ago the weather warranted a sundress...though I should have thought twice before taking her outside to play in the dress. Things were fine while she spun the blocks on her miniature playground...

But then she decided to make a beeline to the teeter totter. Which would have been fine except we'd had a bunch of rain earlier in the week and I didn't think that there might be water in the foot wells. Oops. Isabel was certainly pleased to find the puddles to play in.

Just another day of Isabel head butting the pugs. She finds it really funny to ram her head into the pugs and thankfully they don't seem to mind.

My new favorite shirt. A co-worker of mine brought Isabel this shirt back from Wallops Flight Facility...check out what it says :).

Isabel is really into doors and the baby gates, of which we have 4 of. 2 at the playroom entrances, one at the top of the stairs and one at the bottom. She loves to go through the gate and then shut it. If she gets too far from the gate and realizes it is not shut, she immediately heads back to the gate to shut it before continuing on her next adventure.

A bowl of lettuce. How's that for random? Well, this is pretty special lettuce, as it is the first from our garden. The spinach isn't so happy and is already going to seed, but our romaine and butter lettuce is doing GREAT. I was thrilled when I could harvest enough leaves last week for a side salad. It will be even better later this season when we can have big salads where all the veggies come from the garden.

On Friday I snagged a sweet deal on this like new Burley D'Lite bicycle trailer from Craigslist. I took it for a short spin on Saturday to make sure I could handle it (let me tell you, hills are quite the workout with this thing). Isabel wasn't too sure to make of it at first, but seemed to enjoy it.

Monday we went to the W&OD trail and took an 8 mile ride to Anne & Jon's and back. It was so nice to be out as a family on our bikes. Eric took this picture for us upon our return. We then rewarded our cycling efforts with a yummy Memorial Day BBQ.

In other non-photo news, Isabel has been talking/verbalizing herself a lot more. Some of her words are more clear than others, but it is obvious that she recognizes many different things around her and is picking up words quickly. A prime example was yesterday while I was getting things ready for the BBQ and Uncle Eric was sitting with Isabel while she ate her lunch. He had brought a bag of goldfish over and kept pointing the the fish on the bag saying "fish." All of a sudden I heard a cute little "fish" come from Isabel. It was fun because tonight she could then say "fish" after I showed her one of her bath toys, also a fish.

And finally, a video from Saturday. Apparently Isabel had been going non stop (I was at a class) and was so tired that she started falling asleep during lunch. Geoffrey couldn't help himself and took this short video. Reminds me of being in college when you'd see students trying to stay awake during long boring lectures...

We hope that everyone has a wonderful holiday weekend! I can't believe that summer is almost here.

Walking the Halls

I'm going to assume that Isabel was inspired by our long run this morning to do a bit of her own "training." Isabel has been walking more and more each day, but tonight she took it to a whole new level and was intent on walking from one end of the house to the other, which she did over and over and over...complete with her duck in tow.

Be sure to have the sound on, as she makes some pretty silly noises while walking...and her little feet slapping the floor are also pretty funny to listen to. You can also see that she is um very graceful..."about as graceful as a drunk elephant" as Uncle Eric would say.

Here she is leaving her bedroom heading down the hall to our bedroom...well really to the gate to hopefully catch a glimpse of her beloved pugs.

And now here she is leaving the bedroom making a beeline for the craft room. (Time to start keeping this door shut until we reorganize so that all of dad's dangerous model building stuff can be kept behind closed and locked doors.

Mother's Day, Coffee Yogurt and "NO"

How’s that for random activities and thoughts.

Where does time go? I feel like it hasn’t been that long since I blogged, but its been almost 2 weeks.

Although I don’t have a picture, Isabel survived her first night away from mom, or rather, Mom survived her first night away from Isabel. 2 weekends ago Coelle and I headed down to Blacksburg for a quick visit with Katie before her baby arrives in a few weeks. We had a nice time and I did better than I thought and didn’t even shed a tear. Isabel did great and called to give me lots of updates (with the help of Dad), which was nice.

We had a lovely Mother’s Day weekend, which started out with a visit from Megan, Sam and their kids. There was a lot of action between Ben (4), Nathan (23 mos), Isabel and Nicholas (5 mos), but I did manage to snap a few pictures of Isabel and Nicholas. She was fascinated by him and would talk to him, point at him and “pet” him. Too cute.


Late on in the afternoon she took a walk around the backyard with Dad and picked some herbs, which she carried with her on the excursion.

Sunday I woke up to blue skies and a mother’s day card from Isabel, with a picture of a camera lens that is on its way to the house. She sure is setting the bar high, as last year she got me a GPS. After attending mass Geoffrey made me a delicious Mexican bagel (his own creation) and we just enjoyed a relaxing day around the house. Uncles Kevin and Eric joined us for dinner and even brought a Mother’s Day cake. Life is good.

Uncle Kevin and Isabel reading one of her "touchy feely books." Here they are feeling the dog's shiny collar.

Uncle Eric hugging Isabel who is hugging her penguin.

Helping mommy stir the oatmeal pancake batter.

And now for a few funnies. Isabel is becoming increasingly interested in everything that we eat…especially the stuff she knows she isn’t getting. I am a big fan of Dannon Natural Coffee yogurt and every time I pull out the yellow cup she points and expects to get some. Yesterday I decided to give her a taste, figuring she wouldn’t like the coffee flavor and that would be that. Well, as you can see, I was wrong. She liked the taste I gave her, and then tried to lick my empty cup clean!

And last but not least, a little story. Isabel has developed a bad habit (no idea where from, as she doesn’t do it at school), that goes something like this.

1. Isabel decides she is done with dinner (only in her head though, we have no warning sign).
2. Takes a sip of milk
3. A great big grin spreads across her face
4. Mouth opens and the milk begins to dribble out
5. Once the milk starts dribbling, she makes a sputtering noise with her lips so that milk sprays everyone (even landing on her head) and shakes her head from side to side with delight.

It is so hard not to laugh, so we usually tell her no, look away, hide our face behind a napkin. Monday night, Geoffrey was on his game and pointed his finger at her accompanied by a very stern “Isabel NO.” I was afraid she might start crying, as it’s the tone of voice we usually use on the pugs when they have been bad. Instead, Isabel broke out into a hysterical, almost mocking laugh. It was too funny and I couldn’t contain myself. Guess we gotta practice a little more on keeping a straight face.

Well, Isabel is napping which means I should be getting back to some chores. We are enjoying some beautiful weather and even went on an hour run this morning (Mommy was a little overzealous and should have turned around a bit sooner though...oh well!).