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Kivrin didn’t care for the giraffe even though she came over and stared right at us! Not enough fast movement I guess.
While we were watching the lions, Kivrin started blowing raspberries on my arm. She also growled at the lion, but he didn’t growl back. She thought it was hilarious, and I thought it was pretty funny too.
These porcupines were being a good example for Kivrin — they are eating their carrots!
Kivrin liked watching the lions, because one of them was moving around.
This lion walked right up to the fence to see us.
It’s just so much easier to upload pictures from my phone directly to facebook, but here are a few recent ones…
This was today on the way home from school — Kivrin’s hair was sticking straight up in a mini-mohawk even after I smoothed it down.
On the concrete ourside of our house, Kivrin was posed so cute—then she pulled up her pants leg all weird, right as I took the picture. Check out her sporty new pink tennis shoes!
TSCPL library folks will recognize these signs — each day our Event Coordinator chooses a new interesting background for the meeting room signs, and today, Kivrin was the featured baby picture. Thank you Bonnie!
Three nights in a row she has crawled over to the board book “Skidamarink” — I don’t know if she likes that we sing the words while we read, or that the book has pictures of cute babies on every page, but she ADORES this book right now.
Our coworker Helen told us some cool news — her daughter’s friend in Phoenix just had a baby girl and after hearing about our baby’s name, they decided they liked the name Kivrin too!
According to the SSA.gov baby names website, to be ranked in the top 1000 baby girl names in 2007 (the most recent year reported) a name needed at least 262 babies with that same name. We are probably still a few years away from Kivrin being a ranked name but it is very fun to hear about other people naming their daughters Kivrin! Thank you Connie Willis for creating such a wonderful role model for our kids!
On Saturday night, the library rented out Gage Bowl for an employee appreciation event. We only stayed for about an hour, since it was past Kivrin’s bedtime, but she LOVED it. Bright lights, loud music, flashing lights, crashing pins, people moving around, and lots and lots and LOTS of people smiling at her, talking to her, and tickling her toes and her belly!
Can you believe they were out of 6-12mo shoes?
Kivrin’s first bowling lesson from daddy.
Give me a turn, mommy!
Best bowling trip ever!
Kivrin and I went to the library’s Go Go Green Fair on Saturday afternoon — it was PACKED with people and very cool. I carried Kivrin in the sling, so it was impossible to take any pictures while we were there, but she got to pet some real live snakes, and watch a turtle and a barn owl up close. She saw honeybees busily working on their hive (through a glass container) and some dogs and cats that are adoptable from the local shelter. At one booth, Scarlett helped Kivrin make a happy sock cat toy. Here are some photos of Kivrin giving the toy to our cats once we got home.
I wish I could find some kitties to play with this toy…
You know, that looks really fun!
It is, it is really fun!
I could play with these for hours…
Sorry, big cat, but I need to play with this myself.
I’m too fast, and you’re scared of me! Advantage: Kivrin.
Kivrin started pulling herself up to standing this week, tried new food like whole peas and yogurt, and showed a preference for a bedtime story! 
This was taken at Kivrin’s school right after I saw her pull herself up for the first time. She is obviously pretty pleased with herself. Plus, she is looking adorable in a new outfit from Aunt Sara!
Saturday morning, Kivrin discovered the stairs (the baby gate is only half way installed still) and then when I distracted her from that, she found the plant. After an exciting morning of discovery and exploration, we didn’t spend much time at home the rest of the day…
…because every time I turned my back to work on baby-proofing one thing, the super-quick-and-curious baby managed to get into something else!
So, for several weeks now, we have been signing “more” when we talk to Kivrin about whether she wants more of something (usually more self-fed cereals like puffs or cascadi-Os, sometimes more stories, more tickles or more kisses.) Tonight, she sort of did the sign back to us, to express that she wanted more cascadi-Os. Of course, she also banged on her tray to get our attention first, which we tried to ignore!
The sign for more looks like this:
Here are Kivrin’s first attempts:
Success!
The big cat, also known as Kitty, is Kivrin’s new bff. She pursues him with a squealing joyous passion, especially now that she is crawling. Luckily, Kitty vaguely tolerates her advances and is learning to just stay a few feet away from her. He is interested in her, but cat-like, acts disinterested. This morning, they went around and around the high chair, Kivrin advancing and Kitty retreating in a neat circle on the kitchen floor.
It’s not that Kivrin didn’t have a crib before, although I admit that we mostly have used the cosleeper, the pack’ ‘n play and our bed thus far with her. But since Kivrin has started pulling up to her knees, today Dan lowered the crib mattress and turned her crib into a big girl crib. We spent some time getting used to it, and so far, as long as both mommy and daddy are around and she is wide awake, she loves it. The jury is still out on the nighttime experience, since she is sleeping upstairs in our room again tonight!
Lissa and Dan both had the day off for working the weekend, and it also worked out to be Lissa’s 31st birthday, which was convenient and also quite nice. Dan hid little (and big) presents for me throughout the house and I am still finding them. He was very sneaky — I think he must have been inspired by the whole Easter egg concept!
After helping me open some of my presents, Kivrin went to school in the morning while we continued to work on babyproofing projects around the house. After a lovely lunch at Paisano’s, we picked Kivrin up from school and headed to the mall for Kivrin’s much-belated 6-month portraits. Okay, so she is much closer to 8 months than 6 months, but at least we finally made it to the portrait studio for a great photo shoot with our favorite Sears photographer, Jeanette.
Here is a preview of the photos on flickr, although if you are related to Kivrin by blood, marriage or friendship, you will probably be receiving some of your very own prints soon!
I crocheted Kivrin an Easter bunny for her first Easter morning. She liked to chew on its ears.
We got up early on Easter to be at the Easter breakfast at Dan’s parent’s church in Kansas City by 9am. Kivrin cooperated at first, then had a huge messy diaper that we had to stop to change at the Lawrence service area, so she got dressed in her Easter outfit in the car. She even posed for a picture!
Taking pictures of toddlers together is impossible! They don’t follow directions, and they keep crawling off to do other things. Even with 6 adults trying to get their attention, these were the best shots we could get of Thomas and Kivrin together.
Kivrin crawling after Easter eggs with her Grandma.
Thomas (who started walking recently!) plays with Grandpa.
Kivrin happily ate her Easter card while Grandpa helped her new monkey attack her with kisses!
Easter is certainly more exciting with two babies!
Thomas tries on the Easter bunny ears, with help from his dad, Jon.
This picture only conveys the chaos a little bit. Notice how both kids have open mouths, then imagine them both shouting/singing/talking/babbling. Now imagine it again but louder. And put everyone in motion. Or in pursuit of the same toy.
We hope you enjoy this compilation video of a few recent Kivrin clips…
Kivrin Anne 
What folks are saying…