santa & ms. elf

Makayla met Santa at a community health fair last Saturday. She was surprisingly not afraid of the big hairy Santa...maybe she knew he was daddy's friend who dressed up as giant penguin on Halloween?! And of course, how can we have Santa without his super helpers! Makayla was happy to see this pretty elf that looked a lot like Auntie Jada! :)

little lady

Our little girl is growing up so fast! At 10 months going on 11, Makayla has learned to respond to certain words and started to copy what grown-ups are doing. She is super sensitive to sound...doesn't matter if it's loud from the TV or a random sound from somewhere, she would turn to the source and check it out. As soon as she hears music or even a drum beat, she would start swaying/dancing. It's really fun to watch :)

Some things she started to do lately: wave goodbye, high-five, nod when she hears 'yes', shake her head when you say 'no'...when the phone rings or when she hears someone say 'hello', she would put whatever she's holding in her hand up to her ear, whether it be a broccoli, piece of chicken, the ipod or an actual phone. But I think what made her daddy most proud was her ability to say 'hi dad' on demand. She probably doesn't know what it means yet but that doesn't matter. Daddy's heart melts every time she says it.

Mak got her first holiday dress last week from tai po (great grandma) and was asked to wear it on Sunday for church (thanksgiving service). Finally...no one asked if she was a boy today! Here're some pics of our little lady...

stair master

Makayla is now 10 months-old, and she has achieved an amazing feat that no other baby that we know has done before in our house - climbing our full set of stairs! The video shows her third time doing it today, but the very first time she did it, we weren't even trying to get her to do it. She just crawled to the stairs herself and zoomed up. Heidi yelled for me so that I'd get behind Mak to catch her in case she fell backwards, but she only slipped a couple times because she looked back to see me. Otherwise, the proud look on her face when she accomplished her inaugural climb was priceless. I wish my eyes could take digital photos to capture moments like this.



Next step, learning how to go down the stairs not headfirst.

food art

Today was a typical cold, rainy November day...perfect for a hot bowl of PHO! We took Makayla to 'I Love Pho' and let her try pho for the first time. Yup, you guessed right, she loved it! I guess that's no surprise since she loves rice and pho noodles is just another form of the same thing. But then again, what doesn't she eat?! (she did try something and didn't want more...lemon pulp...hehe...'no thanks mommy!')

So we went to the restaurant half hour before it closed. Mommy and daddy finished their dinner while Mak slowly but ever so diligently shoved and savored pho noodle pieces into her tiny mouth. Mommy was worried that the restaurant owner would kick us out (as we were the last customers there and even the waiter had his dinner and finished) so she started helping Mak finish her noodles. Due to the urgency to finish and leave, noodles were fed rapidly into the direction of Mak's mouth but didn't always end up in there. Instead, they were stuck around her mouth. This gave Mommy an idea...'hey, a sticky baby face makes a great medium for food art!'

Now the urgency to leave was not so urgent anymore. Instead, the following 'living art' was created and appreciated by a little laughter for the next few minutes. We packed up and left shortly after (while Mak was still trying to grab food that was caught in her plastic bib).

Untitled
Mix Media: basil leaves, slightly moistened baby face, hungry baby
2010

first halloween

We had so much fun making this costume. We didn't want to spend a fortune buying something already-made that she's only going to wear once...instead, we wanted to come up with something cute and somewhat original. The result...nacho libre! okay, this was probably not the bestest idea given that Makayla has been mistaken for a boy since birth until now (even if she's wearing all pink with flowers everywhere). But if we don't do it now, we may never be able to do it in the future - making her into a cute Mexican wrestler after Jack Black's character, Nacho Libre.

She's even cuter without a shirt like the character in the movie...but we won't embarrass her any further :)

she said it!!!

Makayla said it! she finally said 'daddy'. Well, it was more like "da" "tsi". She said it this morning when we were playing in our bedroom. Unfortunately, daddy was in the bathroom and didn't hear it. We've been trying to get her to say it again but have not be successful. Will keep trying!

Daddy & Makayla (8.5 months) We couldn't find a good recent picture of daddy and Mak so we borrowed one from Auntie Kristie.

eating monster

This girl never gets tired of eating...I wonder where she got that from. Maybe it's from my liberal (as in variety of food) eating habits while I was pregnant...despite the many well-meaning but often contradicting food advice I got from everyone...and their mother...and their mother's mother. I pretty much took every advice with a grain of salt, pun intended, and ate everything in moderation. Yup, even watermelon! ooo...

first time eating chopped up angel hair and bits of ground turkey. yummmmm!

One thing that we noticed is that when she's feeding herself, Mak would start by grabbing a piece of food and hold it in her left hand (notice the clenched left fist in the pic above). Then she would use her right hand to feed herself the rest of the food on her tray, all while holding the initial piece of food in her left hand until the food was all eaten. Lastly, she'd finish off what was in her left hand...before demanding more...