Oden Adventures

These first pictures are from Vianne's weekly (normally Mondays) Nature Walks with Grandpa, in which they explore the neighborhood and get to know things like trees and leaves and grass. This week's exploration led them to the high school track across the street...pretty cute!!

On Tuesday, Vianne sported this shirt which once belonged to her cousin Miriam.

She was delighted to receive a package in the mail from Grandma Gustafson!

Here she is, "reading" the card and checking out the loot: two Christmas outfits, warm footie pajamas, a Baby's First Christmas Precious Moments ornament that Grandma got on a recent trip, and a Care Bear that used to be mine!

Later that day came the biggest surprise of the week: Vianne began pulling herself up on the couch! (The Oden house will never be the same...)

Here she is, hanging out in her go-pod, which  we procured a couple of weeks ago, and largely attribute her increasing leg strength/ability to stand to. She kinda has a love/hate relationship with the go-pod, as some days she is content to amuse herself in it for 20-30 minutes, allowing me to work in the office or craft room, and other days she cries the minute I set her in it.  She did seem to like it better, I joked to Patrick the other day, once she discovered it serves her well as a podium (go-podium!).  She has for many weeks been exploring a potential preaching gift and quite often delivers a very passionate multi-point sermon, consisting mostly of the word "Ba", and most often to an audience of one (her Mama, that is).  Apparently, she feels that my particular soul is frequently in need of a fiery message...and she's probably right ;-).

Trying to get a handle on what's to come in the next four months...

So, this is probably somehow bad parenting, but Vianne is intensely curious whenever Patrick or I are using the laptop, and she is always wanting to "help" us type and is fascinated with whatever's on the screen (especially if it's a photo or video of her).  Sadly, my laptop broke several months ago...so I pulled it out and let her play with it.  She loves "typing" on the keyboard and was quite pleased to see a baby staring back at her in the (blank) screen.

Daddy's face also makes a nice toy!

Pulling herself up in her pack n' play

Friday was Patrick's last day of teaching for the semester at APU, so we tagged along and hung out in the sunshine while he taught (see below), so that when he was done, we could all go out to lunch to celebrate!

While we sat there, we were approached by an art student who just so happened to be needing a mom for her final project photo shoot that she was shooting that night at 9:00 pm.  It seemed serendipitous, so I agreed to come back & help. My first modeling gig:  I was the frumpy, out-of-shape Mama pushing the stroller and being lapped by the skinny, fit, track team girls on the APU track. :-D

On Saturday, Vianne & I went to our first Christmas party, at Hope House, so I dressed her up in the outfit she got from Grandma - so cute!  She is very wiggly these days and would not sit still for a photo...so these are action shots!