Birthdays, an Anniversary, and Indy... Oh My!

Thanks to another new camera that Kori got for Mother’s Day (this being a “real” camera), we’ll have some better quality pictures to post here. Remember - you can click on the pictures to see bigger versions.


Puma is reluctant to let Keelie go.

Keelie is over 11 months old now and is getting smarter by the day. Since I was still days away from turning five when my youngest sibling was born, I didn’t remember how fast kids grow and develop new skills. Wow! She’s learning new climbing techniques; she has learned to point to things that are out of her reach, which is effective – as long as it is something we want to give to her. She's also started doing the sign for "more" when I'm feeding her, and developed a habit of sticking her fingers far enough back in her throat to gag herself (girls learn so early, don't they?).

My two ladies!

Keelie has figured out how to get around the gate we use to keep her in the living room. When Keelie does manage to get around the gate and I pick her up, she is okay until I take her back across the gate, thus thwarting her progress. Then she'll let me know she isn't happy. Her sulk mode includes sitting on the floor with her legs apart, leaning forward so that her face is nearly on the floor, and crying. She seems to be able to do simple counting, too.

One of the best feelings in the world!

She likes it when I'm home when she wakes up for the day, and she knows based on Kori's routine whether or not I am home and in the other room when they wake up.

There she is, no doubt plotting a way around that gate.

We bought some new clothes for Keelie since she's finally outgrowing most of the clothes she received as gifts. While we were in the store, we picked up a toy she likes because of the music, sounds, and lights. Stuff that lights up – like cell phones or buttons on a remote – capture her attention.

I wish they could stay this peaceful.


Adorable!

Who knows what she is plotting here? Look at her tummy peeking through.

Since our last photo update, we celebrated a belated Mother’s Day at Puma & Granddaddy’s, and we went to Nanny’s place to jointly mark my birthday and my brother’s. I spent a little time in the pool. Keelie didn't mind the water. She wasn't thrilled about it... probably didn't know what to think about it.

There she is with her Aunt Binky.

I took a couple of days off from work for my birthday/our engagement anniversary and so we could see a midnight screening of the Indiana Jones film with the usual suspects at the Big Newport in Newport Beach, as I wrote elsehwhere.

Oh, the places we go!

I like this shot below because Keelie is laughing, she's playing with her new toy, and the dog is in the frame, too. Me? I needed to shave.

Thanks for stopping by. Let us know how you are doing. You can submit a comment to this blog or write us at KEPellman [at] yahoo [dot] com. Thanks!

Ken's Indiana Jones Film Review Online

My film review (and a little bit of what we did yesterday) can be found over at my individual blog by clicking here.

Happy Mother's Day

It's Kori and Keelie's first Mother's Day since the umbilical cord was cut. Woo-hoo! Kori has been such a great mother to Keelie. She takes to it like a duck to water, or like a nerd to Apple products.

We've been keeping things simple around here. Hopefully, we'll be looking for a house before too long. If the prices continue to go lower, perhaps there will be someplace around here under the seven figure mark.

Now for a round of the game "Where's Keelie?"

Keelie has become very familiar and comfortable with the family room, and can navigate around it quite well. If we don't put the gate up, she'll make a beeline for kitchen. If we get the gate up before she make it there, she let's us know how disappointed she is in our protectionist ways. She's at the point where walking is becoming preferable to crawling, but if she elects to crawl, off she'll go! She also climbs into her little rocker, though she' s more apt to slide and wiggle off of furniture, or out of someone's grasp.

Shelby and Keelie seem to have arrived at a new level in their interaction. Shelby is still not always happy with Keelie, but is more open to playing with her. That's probably because Keelie slips so much of her food to her.

Below we can see Keelie inviting Shelby to join her in waiting for me to come home.


"Nope, that's not Daddy. He's coming. Mommie says so."

"There's Daddy!"

I like how both Keelie and Shelby express excitement at my return. The topper, though, is getting the welcome home from Kori!

We like these pictures below, because if Keelie ever wanders away, we'll have good "mug shots" of her.

"Look to this side, Keelie."

"Okay, now look to this side."

She's our little blue-eyed cutie.

I wanted to slip in some more photos of Keelie and Shelby waiting for me on a different day. Can you blame me?

"Hey, Daddy's almost here."

"Open...open....open..."

We decided to go to see my mother a day early and spend some time with her, Kim, and Kim's family. Here Auntie Kim is helping as Keelie learns "Patty Cake".

Keelie loves to play with lids. She'll bang two together to make noises. She's got rhythm.

Here's a short video clip of her playing in Nanny's kitchen.

Thanks for stopping by. You can leave a comment here, or e-mail us at KEPellman [at] yahoo [dot] com. Let us know how you are doing.

This Story Has Teeth, and It Has Legs

In the past two weeks, there's hasn't been a lot of excitement, except Keelie is finally teething, and she's starting to walk unaided.

I think I finally captured proof that Keelie is a cyborg. Check out her right eye in that shot.

Actually, I kind of expect an outfit like this to come with a light saber.

"Use The Force, Keelie."

Or, you can just make a funny face.

That's our little blue-eyed gal. We almost caught her smiling on camera.

Probably because she is teething, she has also taken to sticking her tongue out. Here's a short video clip taken right after we put Oragel on her gums.

See? Not much going on around here.

Keelie Feeds Shelby

Okay, here's the short clip of Keelie feeding Shelby.

Taxed For Time

Finally, the moment you have been waiting for is here!

Keelie loves playing with red plastic lids.

Greetings from record-hot Anaheim. Certainly no flooding or snow problems here.

It’s been almost a month since the last update on what we’ve been up to. Mostly, we’ve been watching Keelie grow and develop. I’ve been working, but Kori has been doing the really tough job of holding down the fort. Keelie is very blessed to have the Mommie she does. One of the things Kori does is make Keelie’s food from scratch from fresh fruits and vegetables, instead of using jars of store-bought baby food. What a dedicated Mommie.

Kori did our taxes already, thankfully, so we’re not running around trying to get those done this weekend.

Keelie dives for the floor in an escape attempt. It's okay, Keelie. We file our taxes honestly.

Getting back to Keelie...she’s now almost ten months and has progressed quite a bit since our last update. When we go shopping, she loves sitting in the cart and trying to make eye contact with everyone. She’s become quite the quick and determined crawler, much to the dismay of the dog. But she’s also good at standing and walking, as long as there is something nearby to hold as security. Keelie does brief stints of standing without support - she doesn't even realize she's doing it, really. For some reason, she loves tearing up paper napkins and trying to eat them. She gets a little upset when we remove the pieces from her mouth to keep her from gagging.

When she is on the couch standing next to me, she’ll sometimes start jumping from a squatting position, over and over again. Her legs must be getting strong. If she’s not doing that, she’ll the glasses from our heads with the speed of Bruce Lee. But mostly, she isn’t content to stay on the couch anymore. She'll start climbing up the back of the couch, or slide off head first down to the floor so she can stand up at the coffee table and grab stuff, or move on to other parts of the room. I just want to hold her and play with her, but she has better things to do! At the coffee table or television, she’ll “slap” the surface like she’s a drummer. She’ll also do this when she crawls over to me when I’m in bed... standing there and slapping my shoulder and arm like she’s giving me a massage.

Keelie with Grampa Pellman on Easter Sunday. She was tired.

She gets thrilled when she's in the playpen, and standing at the side and looking out, and we'll play a game where we are face to face, then we both duck down and are looking at each other through the mesh of the play pen, then we straighten back up to look at each other over the top... she finds that hilarious.

The other night, she was having a good time dropping food over the side of her feeding chair and laughing at Shelby, who would franticly it up. Shelby loves to act as though we don’t have a bowl of food available for her at all times.

Keelie still hates going to sleep, hates changing clothes, and has now developed an aversion to the car seat. The moment we get to the car seat, she’ll arch her back and then, when she feels something, she will flip over, preventing us from snapping her in. It’s quite the effort to finally get her in, now, and she protests.

Speaking of protests, Keelie has picked up clapping, but doesn't quite know the uses for it yet. For example, she will clap in the middle of a crying session. Perhaps she is being sarcastic?

Awwwww!

Easter Sunday, we fell behind schedule because Keelie wouldn’t go to sleep the night before. We stopped by to see Grampa Pellman, Grandma Kathleen, her niece, and everyone else at her niece's place. We couldn't stay long, but we did take some pictures, as you saw. From there, it was on to my mother's, where the rest of my family was getting together. My youngest maternal cousin, Jennifer, was there from out of state on Spring Break from college.

Keelie was really tired because she hadn't taken her usual naps, so she ended up falling asleep in Kori's arms for about two hours (above). We waited for her to wake up before we left my mother's.

We’ve returned to my mother’s place on a weekly basis since, so that my mother, sisters, brother, brother-in-law, and nephews can see Keelie. We’ve also been over to Kori’s parents’ place, but not as often because Puma left town on a trip.

I took Shelby into PetsMart for grooming, as she was getting stinky and her fur was getting bad, and the weather is getting hot. Shelby now looks like a different dog and Keelie probably thinks she is.

Last weekend, we were able to slip in a short visit to the Disneyland Resort. Keelie really enjoyed the tram ride. Heck, we could have turned around and gone right back home and she would have had a great time.

We walked around Disneyland Park a bit and took Keelie on Peter Pan’s Flight for the first time. She didn't like it, because we had to hold her to make her face forward with that lap bar in her face. We ran into the same problem we’ve been running into lately with placing her in her car seat. We slipped into California Adventure to check out some of the recent construction there.

So, as you can see, nothing too exciting going on these days, and that can be a good thing.


Thanks for stopping by. Leave a comment here or write us at KEPellman [at] yahoo [dot] com.

Granddaddy's Pictures of Keelie

It's been way too long since an update - thanks for acting as though life goes on as normal even though we know you're suffering "Pellman Update Withdrawl Syndrome". (Actually, thanks for indulging us as first time parents.) We're going to reward your patience and effective coping skills with some "new" pictures from the last several months. One of our regular updates will be coming soon.

Keelie's Granddaddy is an excellent photographer. Recently, we were able to take home some copies of his pictures. All eight pictures in this entry are from his files. Thanks, Granddaddy!

Remember - if you click on the picture, you can get a bigger version.

This one is from around Thanksgiving.

Here is the man himself with his granddaughter. Check out that expression on her face.

That picture was from around the first of the year as is this one below - we were celebrating Uncle Steve's birthday. There's Aunt Kendra, Uncle Steve, Kori, and... some lucky guy holding Keelie.

From mid-January, Keelie celebrates her mom's birthday...


There's Keelie snuggling up to the birthday girl. A beautiful lady and a cute little girl.

These next two pictures are from late January. Puma is getting her granddaughter to laugh and smile, and Keelie is returning the favor.

Too cute.

Finally, from the start of March, here I am enjoying being Daddy.

Thanks for stopping by. As I wrote above, we hope to update you on what we've been up to over the last few weeks. You can leave a comment here, or write us at KEPellman [at] yahoo [dot] com.

We Survived the Ides of March

Happy Palm Sunday! And Happy BIRTHday to a certain special little girl who couldn't wait for her due date to get closer, and a huge congrats to Bob, Julie, and their families.

Wanted to check in with a few pictures and a short video clip. Since a high school classmate of mine checked in with a comment, I wanted to remind you that if you want to drop us a line, that’s great. If we don’t have your e-mail address, it is probably a good idea to write us at KEPellman [at] yahoo [dot] com so that we can write back.



Keelie continues to gain mobility, much to the dismay of Shelby. We’ll all be on the king sized bed Kori and I have, and Keelie will crawl around, trying to get to the poor dog. Fortunately, Kendra has been over a few times helping Kori to babyproof while I’m out fishing. Uh… I mean… working. Keelie doesn’t know about Daylight Savings Time, as it turns out, which means she was staying up and hour later than usual, at least by the clock. She now makes a clapping motion, and has figured out how to make clicking noises with her tongue, since her teeth aren't poking through yet.

Check out Elmo in the background. This Elmo is the one who talks, laughs, falls over, doubles over, stands back up, asks to be tickled, begs you to stop tickling, ice skates, solves quadratic equations on the walls with permanent marker, and tries to set the house on fire. He’s probably spying for the Children’s Television Workshop and siphoning funds from our accounts to PBS.

Keelie is so active, and if she is fussing and climbing up the back of the sofa, we alternate between sitting on the floor with her, putting her in the playpen, putting her in her Winnie the Pooh plaything where she can stand up and be ringed by toys, or in the doorframe jumper. She enjoys jumping more on the Pooh plaything than the actual jumper.

Here she is jumpin' a bit.

Recently, we went to a little fruit and vegetable market we have nearby where Kori picks up fresh fruit and vegetables, many of which she turns into food for Keelie. I don't think we've bought any jarred baby food. Kori is very dedicated to making fresh baby food. We then went across the street to Stater Brothers to pick up some stuff, parking near this camper/RV. The people in the RV, by their stares, seemed a little too interested in us, making me wonder if our van would have something stolen out of it. There was liquid on the ground... and after we stepped in it, went shopping in the supermarket, and came back to the minivan and stepped in it some more, I realized what was going on. The people in the camper were dumping their sewage into the parking lot... and we were walking through it.

I pulled our minivan up to a security guard in the parking lot and told him what was going on, but he didn't care. Apparently, even though he usually faces out towards the parking lot, he was there to work for Stater Brothers, presumably to keep someone from running of the store with some shoplifted cheese. He told me to talk to the parking lot security... which drives around in a little cart. It would have been easier for HIM to contact them. We didn't see them as we drove out. It is rare to catch illegal dumpers red-handed... and very frustrating that this guard didn't do anything about it.

Dave & Jenn were sweet enough to have us over for dinner recently. They even sent us home with some lemons after I drank up a lot of homemade lemonade. Mmmm.

We’ve been over to Puma & Granddaddy’s for a couple of family dinners since the last update, the most recent one being last night. We went over early to hang out and enjoy some time in the hot tub. Keelie currently hates taking baths, but doesn’t mind a dip in the hot tub. Go figure.

Work wise, I recently talked on-location with a reporter from KFWB AM 980 about some work state crews were doing that my coworkers were monitoring, and so clips of me were being played on the radio throughout that day.



Thanks for stopping by. You can leave a comment here or e-mail us. Let us know how you are doing! -Ken

Bonus: Keelie's 8-Month Pics

Because you have been so good (not because we can't stop bragging about our little girl... no), here are Keelie's official 8-month photos. The portrait studio asked Kori to sign a waiver allowing them to use the images for promotion, because they came out so well.

Remember - you can click on a picture to get the largest image.