Belatedly, the beach

Dear Reader,

These photos are a little overdue... oh well. Sometimes I feel completely overwhelmed by my busy schedule of opening up every cabinet in the house and pulling everything out. But then I think, If I don't do these things, who will? And that re-energizes me.

Right, anyway... the beach. It will make one feel small and insignificant...


...I hate that feeling. So I tried to figure out how to dominate the ocean. Mostly this involved running around in the surf...


...and jumping in the waves as much as my overprotective parents would allow.


Dad pulled me out of the way of so many incoming waves that he threw his back out for the first time in his life. I am going to have to put him on a workout regimen so we don't continue to experience these sorts of letdowns.

I am not going to claim to that I succeeded in conquering the sea. We'll call it a draw for now. One day I will have a boat... those seem to help:


In any case, I looked fabulous while I was at the beach, thanks to the chic babykini that Aunt Abby sent me:


It was a great week, all in all, thanks largely to Gram and the Cheeky Cheeks (Sue, Ali, Char and Tim) who doted most appropriately on me. In this photo from Shackleford Island, I believe they were simultaneously feeding me and applying sunscreen, as I proclaimed my Noo Yawk roots:


Ciao for now,

Maddie

Madzilla

(click to enlarge)

What's all this about? It's sixteen months later, and I'm still big. How big?

... so big that an acquaintance said to my dad this week, "I didn't know you had two kids -- where's the baby?" And he wasn't kidding.

... so big that I tower over the older boys in the nabe.

... so big that I am entering the "terrible twos" a bit early.

... so big that I am calling nurses' competence into question. I went to the doctor last week and lay very still while they measured me on the piece of paper. They marked at my feet and my head and measured the length: 34 inches. When the doctor came in he looked at the number, shook his head, and made a mark on the growth chart, far above the shaded parts of the graph.

Dad said: "Does this mean she's going to be six feet tall?" Mom rolled her eyes.

The doctor laughed and said: "No, probably not. You can get a better idea just by averaging your two heights." (Um, that would be 5'10", by the way.)

Dad said: "But isn't there supposed to be some age -- 18 months or two years or something -- where you can double the kid's height and get their adult height?"

The doctor frowned and said: "Well, yes, but I think this number is perhaps a little inflated. Maybe it was the way they measured it. The head measurement seems too large, too. That would have to have been an unbelievable growth spurt."

I smiled at the nice doctor, who is significantly shorter than 5'10". Have you ever seen me pack away corn, little man? I am going to play volleyball for Stanford, and rule the world.

OK, first I am going to learn how to spoon yogurt into my mouth rather than onto my chest. But after that, I am going to rule the world.

I am Madster, hear me roar.

--Maddie

p.s. I am a slim and ladylike 90th percentile in weight.

p.p.s. I'm not paying any royalties, but in case you were wondering, click here.

Summer in Hardtown

My scribe is back from his selfishly indulgent trip to Israel, and we are living it up despite the heat and humidity in Dur-ham (that means "Hard-town," unless my Latin fails me--and maybe it does).

The scribe attempted to ingratiate himself to me with gifts from the (Near) Orient, but it wasn't exactly gold, frankincense or myrrh. He did bring me a fabu new robe, though, with faux gold embroidery...


...and he also brought me lotions and therapeutic mud from the Dead Sea. The mud was horrible! Stinky and stinging. You can see that I was not amused:


What does a baby need skincare products for, anyway? Isn't baby-soft skin what all you old people want? To make up for the mud fiasco, Dada took me to a baseball game. I tried to stay up for the fireworks afterward, but my entourage took me home to bed...


Mostly in hot, humid Hardtown we hung out at the pool. Here's a typical vignette:



Note, if you can, what the sign says at the start of the video. Sixteen months old, and already breaking the law. Well, Mom's been predicting a life of crime for me for quite some time... Thankfully, the lifeguards thought I was cute and didn't bust me. Neither the first nor the last time!

More soon -- we have some catching up to do, you and I.

--Maddie