Child Labor Laws?

Before going on a trip, it's always nice to get some housekeeping duties done so that you can come home to a [semi] clean house. Today we are headed up to Brisbane and the Gold Coast to accompany Chris on a business trip up there. While he's busy visiting Americans in jail and issuing visas, Maya and I hope to do some urban exploring in Brisbane, and some beach time at Surfer's Paradise over the weekend. (Yes, there really is a town called Surfer's Paradise. Let's see if it lives up to its name!) In the meantime, Riley's owners will housesit/dogsit and keep an eye on the pack in Sydney.

Dog Daze

On Sunday, we added another player to the daily circus, as we took on the job of dog sitting for Riley, an incredibly friendly yellow lab. His owners, Christine & Scott are fellow FS officers, and have just moved here to join the Sydney Consulate. Christine and Chris were in the same A-100 (Foreign Service introduction class) class back in 2007, so we remember them fondly from our DC days. Anyway, their house here wasn't ready yet, and Riley finished up his 30 day quarantine sentence on Sunday, so we agreed to take care of him until they move into their place. Maya is in heaven, and she acts like a fearless kamikaze pilot as she squeals and crawls headlong into the pack of dogs. While Lola still feels the need to lick Maya anytime she is within 2 feet of her, Riley acts more like a speed bump, who patiently allows Maya to crawl up and over him, stick her fingers up his nose, and play with his water dish, without so much as a head lift. I see now why labs are "family" dogs. I'm not sure who is going to get more water on the floor....Maya with her water dish antics, or Riley with his big, sloppy tongue.

Supereater

Maya's personality is beginning to show itself, particularly at mealtimes. When we started solids at 6 months, she was an enthusiastic participant, eagerly gulping down spoonful after spoonful of whatever we fed her. My friend, Karin, gave me a great book called, "First Meals" full of recipes for babies and toddlers that foster an adventuresome palate, so I dutifully cooked up everything from pears to parsnips, even though I personally had never eaten a parsnip in my life. (Chris, incidentally, asked me what I was doing with the albino carrots). I felt so proud of my "good eater", and also took her behaviour as a compliment, since, after all, I must have been cooking some delicious meals (fish in orange sauce, cheesy brocoli, pumpkin & chicken....) to make her want to eat so well.

Fast forward to last week, when we got our first glimpse of Maya the teenager, as she simultaneously rolled her eyes, turned her head and double karate-chopped the incoming spoon away from her mouth. This continued for a week: I defrosted the frozen baby food cubes that I had painstakingly prepared, she refused her food with her signature Ralph Macchio moves, and *splat* goes the food on the floor. No one was happy, except for Lola, who quickly took up position directly below the highchair and scrambled to lick up the rejected food before I could wipe it up. From Lola's perspective, Maya became an flailing piñata.

I did a bit of reading to figure out my next move, lest I set ourselves up for a lifetime of eating issues, and learned that this is part of the "exerting independence" stage, and that the best response is to turn over the feeding reins, no matter how messy it becomes. So, despite the freezer stocked full of nutritiously balanced, pureed, homemade baby food, Maya got toast fingers, pear chunks and boiled potatos for lunch (yes, today's meal was brought to you by the color beige). She smashed them into her tray, wiped them in her hair, and even managed to get some in her mouth, much to my delight. Granted, I found half of her lunch stuck to the underside of her pants as I lifted her out of her highchair, but, gosh darnit, she did it HERSELF. Lord help me when she turns 12...

Sydney Triathalon

Now, now....don't get too excited reading the title. We didn't run, bike and swim. In fact, the hardest thing we did today was find parking in the CBD (Central Business District). We did, however, spend a lovely Fall day (odd to say in April) downtown watching some high caliber athletes from all over the world competing in the Sydney Triathalon. It was quite a sight to behold watching all the chiseled, 2% body fat, athletes swimming, biking and running with the iconic Opera House and Harbour Bridge looming in the background. Maya got in the spirit of things and took off crawling into the wide expanses of the Opera House terrace creating obstacles for casual bikers and eliciting squeals of delight from the many young Japanese women tourists walking around.

We worked up an appetite with all that crawling and spectating, so we headed off with our friends to a huge breakfast at the popular, "Pancakes on the Rocks" restaurant. The place is named for the location on which it stands ("The Rocks"), not for serving alcoholic pancakes. Not to fear, the mimosas we ordered fit that bill, and went quite nicely with our gooey stacks of pancakes! Yummy!

The Petri Dish Outing

Oops...it's been a few days since I've posted to this blog. Time flies when you're trying to entertain a little one at home. The goal of most days is a) to tire out Maya, b) tire out Lola, c) not tire out myself. Maya (and Lola) manage to entertain themselves for a little while at home, but it seems that the familiar surroundings don't have quite the same draw that they used to. After Maya finished eating the bark out of the house plants, pulling on the power cords to the iPod, and climbing on the drying rack, it was obvious that the girl needed to get out. Luckily, a friend of mine here with a 14 month old finds herself in the same daily predicament, so she suggested that we go to an indoor child entertainment center called Lollipops. (Think Chuck-ee-Cheese). We arrived to find the place a chaotic zoo, as the kids are all home for the Easter School Holidays, and obviously all the parents had the same idea (ie get out of the house, lest the kids destroy their place). I'd like to say that I'm not usually a germ-o-phobe, but something about the kids licking the plastic balls and throwing them back into the ball pit was a little off-putting. Between the floor with half-eaten sandwiches stuck to it, the saliva ball pit, and the runny noses on 50% of the kids, you could say it was one giant petri dish. I went home and washed my hands as soon as I could :). Nonetheless, the kids seemed to really enjoy themselves, particularly the older ones, who could jump in the bouncy castle and run around the multi-level maze. For the under-1 crowd, it was more like a test of the immune system. But hey, we gave it a try, and both my friend and I came to the same conclusion: we'll stick to the outdoor playgrounds for now!

Royal National Park Coastal Walk

On Saturday, keeping with the theme of Coastal walks for the holiday weekend, we headed down to Royal National Park (about 1.5 hours drive from Sydney) to hike part of the 29 km Royal Coast Trail near the town of Bundeena. Though the imposingly dark clouds threatened to pour down rain on us the whole time, we managed our 11km loop from Bundeena to Little Marley Beach with only a sprinkle or two. Maya, true to form, sat contently in her backpack, singing or sleeping most of the way, and even weathered her on-the-fly diaper change and feeding with a smile. Good baby. The scenery was fantastic, with half the walk passing through scrubby bushland, and the second (and better) half skirting the coast overlooking the Tasman Sea. The wind was strong, but we stayed away from the cliff edges, lest we be swept into the sea below.

Happy Easter 2010!

The Easter Bunny managed to find Maya all the way on this side of the world, so she had a fun time opening gifts from all the Grandparents. What a lucky gal. Thanks for all of the Easter goodies....lots of cute outfits, sweets, and fun things to share with mom and dad too. She seemed to be most interested in the jelly beans and the chocolate. Smart girl!

A Very Good Friday

Aussies really know how to celebrate their holidays! For Easter, both the Friday before and the Monday after are public holidays, so automatically everyone gets a 4-day weekend. Hooray! To celebrate, we went on a short walk this morning with some friends, and hiked a section of the Coastal Walkway from North Bondi up to Watson's Bay. The blue waves crashing against the limestone cliffs were gorgeous, and we had a perfect Fall day -- blue skies, bright sunshine and mid-70 temperatures. Maya (and mama) enjoyed having Chris home from work to play all day!

April Fool?

Though I didn't plan to launch this blog on April Fool's Day, it does now seem to be an appropriate date, since that's what I feel like as I fumble along, trying to decipher the "foreign language" of Blogger. Having never written a blog before, I didn't realize how many decisions and choices one is required to make regarding fonts, layouts, gadgets, etc., so forgive me if this blog begins as an absolute mess. I imagine that there will be a steep learning curve to this, so it should be exciting (or painful) for you, the reader, to watch as this blog unfolds. Nonetheless, forward we go....

The main reason I've started this blog for Maya is so that our beloved friends and family members on the other side of the globe can partake in her daily adventures. Whether she's tackling a new milestone or trekking up a new mountain, you'll be there with her in [almost] real time. By now you've also probably realized that there are WAY too many cute pictures and videos of Maya, and it seems unfair to make you wait for a monthly picture dump. Not to mention, I'm sure that by the time you're done looking at said month's worth of pictures and videos, you're either asleep on your keyboard, or your vision has glazed over. Hopefully this blog should ease the eyestrain and provide more moderate and current Maya doses.

Feel free to send comments, advise for content or format, or questions. ENJOY!