A day of doing too much...

Stella is napping. Oh my gosh, how wonderful. I hate to admit it, but i've come to cherish each minute of the down time. Not that I'm working on the diss, mind you, but just for a second to not be "on" all the time. She is getting very good at amusing herself for pockets of time, which is nice - but I also feel bad that I let her to her lonesome. Today I attempted to: make marbled rye bread and homemade vegetable broth at the same time. She is now sort of crawling - ok - really it's a military "I'm under enemy fire, keep low to the ground" sort of drag, but it's getting her around. In between chopping tons of vegetables (really? was it really that much better than just buying a darn carton of $2.50 pre-made broth from Trader Joe's? we'll see. It certainly was a HELL of a lot more work) and proofing dough, Stella dragged herself around the living room to a variety of delights, NONE of which were HER toys. Pelican? Nope. Squishy ball? Nope. Rattle? Nope. Wooden car? Nope. Half chewed, dirty, plastic dog bone? YES PLEASE! Mud caked squeaky ball? MORE MOM! Liver-filled cow bone? OH MY GOSH WHY NOT?

Seriously folks? Is it because I take them out of reach when she goes for them that makes them THAT MUCH MORE enticing? Most likely. Now I really understand when my friend said, Aimee, it's ok that Stella isn't crawling. Really. You don't want her to yet, trust me.

Yet another reason why my post ions ago about babies and doggies and how they like a lot of the same things seems even more true. She worked her butt off last week trying desperately to drag the basket of dog balls out from under the hutch. She comprised and just chewed on the basket instead. Thank goodness I gave up being "that mom" a long time again - you know, "that mom" that won't even let their children down in the grass for fear they will get dirty. Oh no - definitely not that type. Steve and I realized the other day how dirty our house is when we picked Stella up from a particular active round of crawling/dragging and her white polka dot outfit had a big brown smear along the front. Oh dear. We try to keep up with it - but when it rains in San Diego for 2 weeks straight and you have a dog... well, you know. Do I really want my daughter to eat dirty dog toys? No. But I am realistic? Yes.

In other news, Steve was  KICKASS dad while i was gone for my two interviews and took them hiking and to the beach when it wasn't raining. Here are two pics from their hike last Tuesday. I got to meet with the Dean - Stella got to summit a mini-mountain. Guess where I would have rather been?