Just like that, summer's gone

Its funny how while Allie is still a few years away from school, it really felt like it was time for school to start. Maybe it was the weather cooling right at Labor Day weekend or perhaps the preparations Bridget's kids were making to start school. But it feels like all of the sudden, summer's gone and we're well into fall.

I wore long sleeves on a couple of my morning runs last week. Twice now we've had to scramble to find some long pants for Allie to wear. Its harder than it seems because she's grown since the last time she wore pants. A lot of them, while they still fit her waist, are short! The jeans she wore today are passable, but others have been funny to try on. I have a bag of bigger fall clothes in the basement that I need to bring up so that Allie can wear some clothes that fit! It was warm over the weekend and warm yesterday. Today was that in between day where it was chilly in the morning and pleasant after work. But soon we'll have to get the winter coats out!

One of the things I really love about the fall is the lighting. With the sun lower in the sky in the evening, I just love how the sun shines through the trees and the shadows. I love the pictures I take outside in the fall.

We have lots of fun stuff going on this fall. No breaks for us. We're looking forward to all the new adventures we can find this fall with Allie a year older. When we go to the pumpkin patch in October, we may try the kids' corn maze! And when it snows, we're thinking we'll go to one of the smaller hills and try sledding. I wonder what Allie will think of that?

So grown up

We're slowly becoming aware that our itty bitty baby isn't so itty bitty anymore as Allie approaches her second birthday. She is one amazing little girl. She's growing up and we are constantly on our toes. A few weeks ago we had to move her art table up into her bedroom because she discovered that she could climb on it!

She already knows what she wants: The keys and the phone! And the toy versions just don't do. Oh my.

She tries to fill some big shoes. She loves playing with shoes and she especially loves flip flops as well as untying our shoes as we are putting them on.

I'm not really sure what she was doing here, but her expression was really intense and priceless.

Our neighbor feeds the ducks from his balcony so we see the ducks a lot. Dada showed them to her and she was mesmerized. She looks for them now whenever we go down to the garage.

One of our favorite things Allie does these days is sing. We especially like singing at bedtime. I wish I could take a picture. We recently gave her a blanket. She doesn't usually keep it on, but we cover her up with it (its one of Mama's baby blankets!) and give her Hippo and Penny. Then Dada and Mama sing "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star," in all our out-of-tune glory. It doesn't sound pretty, but Allie loves it. She sometimes sings along in her gibberish language. And when we're done she claps, sometimes so enthusiastically that she tosses Hippo and Penny. We give them back to her and pat her on the tummy and say good night.

Eating is still hit or miss. I suspect it will be like that for a long time to come. But we recently discovered that she likes plums, in fact, she loves them. She has her old favorites, peanut butter and jelly, macaroni & cheese, spaghetti, pizza. But some days she won't even eat those. What she eats one day most certainly isn't what she'll eat the next.

There's almost nothing she won't repeat after us. I had her saying "Durso" today. She says "Allie," but doesn't put together "Allie Durso."

She plays games with Mama and Dada or by herself. She got a play picnic basket from Grandma and Grandpa and spends a lot of time taking things out and putting them back in, drinking out of the cups and eating from the plates. There's a little red and white checkered napkin that she uses to "cleeeeen up." Or she'll set the picnic on it like a table cloth. She plays with her blocks, building tall towers. Capitalizing on how she likes to "cleeeeen up," we make an effort to pick up the toys together before bed. 

She's growing up though. Over the last few weeks she seems to have discovered fear or at least more separation anxiety. She cries when one of us leaves the room. She's also started the tantrum habit. Sometimes there's a tantrum over every little thing. We've definitely learned to ignore this weekend! Naps are getting shorter, I'm afraid she might be moving toward giving them up entirely. Compounding this she hasn't been sleeping well. We hear her crying in her sleep and saying "no no," like maybe she's having a bad dream. I don't want my baby to be afraid!  

Its been such an adventure. I love seeing her learn. I love her quizzical looks as she studies a person or thing. She still springs up the moment we come into her room in the morning and gives us a smile and then promptly lays her head on a shoulder to try and go back to sleep. Her face lights up whenever we mention Baby Einstein or when we turn her music on in the car. What else will she learn in the coming year?

Ten years ago

Ten years ago this morning I was a junior at EIU and getting ready for my 8 a.m. class. It was my first semester working at The Daily Eastern News and I walked through my dorm's lobby to grab a copy of the paper to see how it turned out. I remember thinking how weird it was that there was a TV in the vacant front desk area tuned to what I thought in passing was old footage of the Oklahoma City bombing. I know how silly that was now becuase while I don't remember specifics of Oklahoma City, I know that building looked nothing like the twin towers! I walked across the quad to my class in Coleman Hall, Intro to Mass Communication. It was a class that I took because I was a PR minor for a semester. As I walked across the quad I was oblivious to what was going on. I hadn't turned on the TV while getting ready for class.

Only once I got to my class did I start to realize what had happened, though I'm not sure anyone realized at that moment the true enormity of it. The teacher was really upset and we discussed it a bit. We were dismissed just after the first tower fell and I got back to my room just in time to watch my TV horrified as the second tower fell. I was crying in my room wondering what the heck was going on and suddenly realized I needed to get to work. There was tons of work to do for the paper!

I don't remember too much afterward. It's faded over 10 years. I remember all the panic of the skies and that our editor in chief and a photographer had gone to the little airport in Champaign an hour away after we'd heard that planes had been diverted there. I remember the school administrators arriving at the newsroom to meet with the editorial board, which I was not yet a part of.

That evening I covered a prayer vigil that was held at the union. I wasn't the most aggressive reporter and thats the story that I ended up with. It was such a powerful service though. I don't remember much about the service, but I remember the picture on a photopage in the paper of a campus minister kneeling and sobbing.

In my short journalism career, this was the most surreal, the most significant day. I'm not sure what could surpass it if I was still working at the newspaper. I certainly don't want to find out because that would mean it would likely be something even more horrific than 9/11.

I didn't know anyone who was in New York or Washington D.C. or on flight 93 that day. I know a few people now who were closer to the action. But even though I wasn't closely affected, I know we were all affected. We were affected when those terrorists stole our security out from under us. The thought that no one could touch us on our soil was no longer. In its place came security alerts and difficulty traveling, particularly flying. The country got sucked into a war that I'm not sure is any closer to being won 10 years later.

One of my facebook friends posted this link a few days ago. Someone, I have no idea who, posted The Daily Eastern News from 9/12/01 (for some reason dated 9/12/08). I still get chills looking at that photo on the front page. We did our best to never use wire stories on the front page in those days and I don't even think we normally had access to wire photos. But thats what it was on Sept. 12, 2001, the first day of our alternate reality.

I write this because I think its important to remember. And I think everyone has their own interesting stories from that day. But I also write this because above all, I hope beyond hope that Allie, any future children of mine and everyone's kids never have to experience this horror. I hope we can end this war soon and show those terrorists that when they mess with the United States, they lose.

Relaxing

Note: I uploaded Thursday's video via YouTube and didn't realize I had it set to private. I think I've fixed that, so check out the video and someone let me know if you still can't watch it?

Its been a week here in the Durso house. Allie was a little off all the week before last, even that weekend before. Then last weekend we went to see Grandma and Grandpa with little sleeping (for all of us) or eating (for Allie... Mama and Dada ate plenty). It was an exhausting trip for all, especially Allie. She was in bed early Monday night and we headed out to work Tuesday. By the time we picked Allie up from daycare, the poor kid had a fever!

So Allie stayed home the rest of the week. At first we thought it was going to be a quick rest day, but when Allie puked on Mama Wednesday evening, we knew it was a bit more. It was my first time getting puked on, I guess I'm lucky I made it this long? But the poor kid was so upset, I think mostly because it got on me! So I had to hide my disgust so she didn't get more upset. With a bath, a load of laundry and a little Resolve, the evidence was gone. Dad had stayed home Wednesday, Mama stayed home Thursday and Dada stayed home Friday. In that time Allie slept a ton and slowly got her appetite back. I'm happy to report she's back to normal this morning.

Ahhh, Saturday. We're so glad to have no real plans this weekend. We all woke up early and headed to the farmer's market after pancakes. Allie was so happy just to be out of the house. She always enjoys going to the farmer's market and seeing all there is to see. With all sorts of activity downtown, it was somewhat difficult to get around, but worth it for what we got.

Now Allie's napping and we're sitting on the couch watching the Badgers. Life is good. All we have left on the agenda for the weekend is the grocery store, laundry and I'm planning to run 10 or 11 miles tomorrow. Aside from these activities we're eating chili and watching football all weekend. Afterall, opening weekend is a holiday in the Durso house!

Ice cream cone adventures

A video from Aunt Julie. We traveled to Carbondale last weekend to see friends and family. It was fun and exhausting. Saturday night and Sunday afternoon Aunt Julie, Cousins Carson and Cole along with Grandma and Grandpa babysat Allie so Mama and Dada could see some old friends. They made their way to Dairy Queen where Allie had adventures with an ice cream cone... this one was her second. It didn't work out well!

Note: You may need to click on the entry title to make the video appear.

Allie's wheels

A couple months ago one of our neighbors gave Allie his daughter's little bike after she got a big kid bike. We've tried to get Allie to ride it, but right now she's still more interested in pushing it. I snapped the picture of her actually riding about a split second before she jumped off to push it again! She likes her bike, points it out in the garage every time she sees it. I guess she just doesn't get that its for riding yet.

Singin' in the rain

Most days when we get home from work we all go outside. Dada takes Monk to do her business and also gets the mail. Allie and I hang out on the porch or run around the yard. Tuesday when we got home it was raining a bit, but not hard. It started raining harder while we were outside. But Allie didn't mind.

In this last picture she's feeling the wet sidewalk! It was so cute! She loves being outside and most days it takes some convincing to get her to come back inside with the rest of us. On Tuesday when it was raining, it took even more convincing.