Juice

Juice

Baby Turtle had grape juice today for the first time and she LOOOOOOOVED it. She'd have a sip from Mommy Turtle's cup, then sign "please" until Mommy gave her another sip. It wasn't even full strength, it was diluted over halfway with soda water. And when Mommy explained that she was drinking juice, Baby Turtle learned the sign for juice right away.

Almost a year!

Almost a year!

I've been a super bad blogger, leaving 10 months between posts. I'll try to do better. Same with the photos: no uploads in a long, long time, but I'll try to improve.

Baby turtle is walking now, and talking a little bit, has started eating pureed foods (finally!) and talks a *lot* in sign language. She's very busy during the day with all her important work. There are things to put inside other things, and then to take out, there are other things to rearrange, etc. She likes to rub things with paper towels and then walk over to the trash to throw out the"dirty" towels. She even helps to brush her own teeth!

Photos!

Photos!

I've started uploading another month of Baby Turtle's photos. They should be done by the morning!

Friday: 5 hours sleep. Get up early to hold the itchy baby so Mommy Turtle can get some sleep. Work until 8pm. Laundry until 12:45am. Shower. Hold Baby Turtle so Mommy Turtle can eat dinner. 2:15am eat dinner. Sleep.

But, it's all worth it to see the big smile when I pick up one of her favorite books or start singing one of her favorite songs.

Photos

Photos

I've been working on photos of Baby Turtle from the last 2 months, and I just found an extra card with over 600 more of them. If all goes well, I should have the best of them color-corrected, cropped, and uploaded in a day or two.

I also just noticed that I haven't posted any updates in three months. It really doesn't feel like that long! I guess I've been pretty busy, with Baby Turtle and the new job. Sorry! I'll try to do better.

Mr. T.

Photo shoot

Photo shoot

Today I had a real photo shoot for Baby Turtle. We dressed her up, set up a backdrop, and used a homemade reflector to get the lighting right. I wanted to use ambient light, so I used my fast lens, but we needed a bit more light from the side, so I put aluminum foil on a big piece of cardboard to reflect the light coming in from the sliding door. The backdrop was a blanket hung from a hanger on the back of a chair. Mommy Turtle held our beautiful subject in a sitting position from behind the backdrop. All in all it was pretty effective, and I learned a lot that I can use in future photo shoots, say tomorrow.

Baby turtle

Baby turtle

Baby Turtle is getting huge! She started out at around the 33rd percentile for weight, and now is up to the 75th! At 7 weeks old, she's already getting too big for the 0-3 month clothes. In a week or two she will have gone through two entire wardrobes in only two months.

Needless to say, we're no longer buying the clothes that are the easiest to put on and take off. We're using what we have, even if it's not the most convenient, since we're only going to be using it for a few weeks.

Poop Stains

Poop Stains

For the inevitable poop stains that squirt out the back of the diaper, OxiClean is amazing. I dump the clothes in a bucket with some detergent and OxiClean in hot water, let it soak, then scrub it out. Often I can't even find the stains to scrub them, and I've only had one bad enough to require multiple soakings. I still remember that one. The explosion happened in my lap, and ended up covering almost all of poor Baby Turtle's back. It was gross, but powerful.

Overtired

Overtired

That could be Baby Turtle or me. She gets herself so worked up that she doesn't want to go to sleep. Luckily, we've found some tricks for getting her to calm down and sleep. I swaddle her and hold her sideways in my arms, so her tummy is against my tummy and her head is in the crook of my neck. Then I walk around rocking her while rain sounds play on the iPod. Usually she's sleepy in 5 seconds, but I hold her for a minute or two so she's comfortable, then put her to bed. She's often awake when I put her in her crib, but she's calm enough that she usually goes to sleep pretty quickly.

2 days later...

2 days later...

Two days after we got that fortune, it came true! The small lucky package, Baby Turtle, arrived on November 25th, 2009. She started her journey on the afternoon of November 24th, but finally introduced herself on the morning of the 25th. She's not the smallest package I've ever gotten, but she's definitely the luckiest.

My fortune

My fortune

At the Chinese restaurant tonight, my cookie held the following fortune:

A small lucky package is on its way to you soon.

That must be the most accurate fortune cookie I've ever gotten!

Tired but Productive

Tired but Productive

I'm taking a break from putting away laundry to relax in my ducky PJs.  (Yes, turtles wear PJs.  Look it up.)

Today we learned all abut caring for newborn turtles.  The feeding class was really helpful and I feel really confident in that department now, although I'm technically not head of that particular department.  The newborn care class was also really informative, especially the practice in dressing a baby, changing the diapers, and various holds.

We can now walk to almost all areas of the nest, and the pile of donations is really large now, big enough to fill up the floor of our walk-in (scuttle-in?) closet.

The Car Seat Has Landed

The Car Seat Has Landed

Just in case the baby turtle comes before we can buy a new car, I've installed the car seat in our Turtle Honda Civic.  It's very exciting.

The place is still a mess, but slightly less of a mess today than yesterday.  And the pile of donations is even larger.

Cleaning up

Cleaning up

I've been trying to clean up the place in preparation for the new turtle coming to town.  She's still resting in her egg, but we've got to make room for all her accessories.  I've also been trying to (slowly) catch up on my long email queue and send out more resumes.


Last weekend we went to the Ballet.  I was kind of sleep deprived so I had to suck on some candy to stay awake, but I enjoyed it.

I'm glad went to Europe when we did.  We went while Mrs. Turtle could still get around relatively easily, important for getting to all those hard-to-reach castles.

Babies 'R Us

Babies 'R Us

Mrs. Turtle and I went to Babies 'R Us the other day.  It was a pretty frightening experience.  I could feel my chest constricting the further in we walked...  There's a lot of unnecessary baby junk in the world, and almost none of it will fit in our tiny apartment.

Nothing much to report

Nothing much to report

We went cherry picking last weekend, but now I'm all out of cherries. :(

Chores

Chores

7 loads of laundry, 1 load of dishes, 2 scripts for work, 4 bills paid. It's been a very tiring evening.

Time to clean house!

Time to clean house!

The old nest is getting cleaner. We installed a new bookcase, and have gathered a bunch of stuff to throw out or donate. It'll be nice to finally live like a turtle, and not like a pack rat.

In other news... Well, there's really no other news. I've spent the weekend doing work and cleaning. Not very fun, but necessary.

OBAMA!

OBAMA!

This site has newspaper front pages from all over the world, from the day after inauguration. It's super cool.

I'm back!

I'm back!

Sorry, I was off visiting some relatives (leopard tortoises) in Africa, and then vising all the Turtles in SoCal.

To make up for the lack of posts, here's a movie for you to watch. It's gross but cute, and I know how the kid feels. The Zit

Lord British in Space!

Lord British in Space!

US game designer blasts into space with DNA cargo - Yahoo! News

Lord British, the creator of the Ultima games and responsible for wasting thousands of hours of my youth, has gone into space. The article mentions someone named "Richard Garriott", which must be a pseudonym that Lord British uses when traveling amongst the people. He reportedly paid $30 million to go into space.

His picture is on the right. He looks scared, yet excited.

There's video at the link. I like the part near the end where the cosmonaut uses a stick to press some buttons, because they're pressed back into their seats and he couldn't reach otherwise.

Drinking shrinks your brain!

Drinking shrinks your brain!

Does drinking alcohol shrink your brain? - CNN.com:

Overall, the more alcohol consumed, the smaller the brain volume, with abstainers having a higher brain volume than former drinkers, light drinkers (one to seven drinks per week), moderate drinkers (eight to 14 drinks per week), and heavy drinkers (14 or more drinks per week).

Yet another reason not to drink!

Awesome

Awesome

This is a crazy "ballet". I put the quotes because it's actually more of an acrobatic show in the guise of a ballet. Whatever it is, it's mighty impressive.

Why, Mr. Turtle?

Why, Mr. Turtle?

Q: Why, Mr. Turtle, are you quivering on the ground?

A: At first I thought it was because I just spent the weekend with my nieces and nephews. They are SOOOO cute! One of the babies is apparently taking Comparative Bellybuttons 101. Other people got little giggles. Whenever she would raise up my shirt to look at my bellybutton, we got gales of laughter. That's a game that anyone could play for hours!

But, no. The real reason I'm quivering on the ground is the baby pandas with bottles. I almost fainted with cuteness!

Why, Mr. Turtle?

Why, Mr. Turtle?

Today we introduce a new feature on Turtles All the Way: Why, Mr. Turtle?

Q: Why, Mr. Turtle, are you up so late?

A: Because one of my pet red-eared humans, let's call him "P.J.", got a very serious injury to his eye. He lost one eyelid and some other skin on his face, but we managed to save the eye itself, as well as his life.

For now he is in a special humarium (human aquarium) on the living room floor. Every morning and evening we replace his water with fresh, clean water, and smear silver sulfadiazine cream (1%) over his eye and nearby skin. Every other day, one of us gets the opportunity to inject his arm with 0.12 ml of Fortaz, an antibiotic.

As luck would have it, Mrs. Turtle was called away to New York city on an important project for her company. It's a great opportunity, and she finally gets to do some of the exciting traveling that she's always wanted to do. Plus, she gets to visit one of her best friends while she's there.

So, tonight was my lucky night. Again. P.J. didn't feel very lucky, though, so he threw a tantrum as I was taking him from his humarium, and got human water all over the carpet, the TV stand, and Mr. Turtle. I, of all people, understand his pain. I hate getting shots, and once punished a nurse quite harshly for attempting to do so. (I was a little kid, give me a break!) But it needs to be done.

Now, you have to understand that humans live in their own filth, so getting splashed with human water is pretty gross water, even though it's new from this morning. Of course, I had to take a shower tonight, even though I usually shower in the morning. I'm out of the shower now, as you have probably surmised, but our apartment's attic soaks up the heat during the day and lets it out into the apartment all night, so it's been really hot up here. Add that to the fact that I just got out of the shower, and I'm way too hot to sleep.

So, to answer your question, I'm waiting to cool down so I can get to sleep.

The oldest lightbulb in the world

The oldest lightbulb in the world

It's in Livermore: "At 107 years and counting, the low-watt wonder with the curlicue carbon filament has been named the planet's longest continuously burning bulb by both Guinness World Records and Ripley's Believe It Or Not."

Follow the link for the whole story.

Balloon Figures

Balloon Figures

There are some really great balloon figures in this gallery. Use the arrows to see more.

Digital Forensics: 5 Ways to Spot a Fake Photo: Scientific American

Digital Forensics: 5 Ways to Spot a Fake Photo: Scientific American

Digital Forensics: 5 Ways to Spot a Fake Photo: Scientific American

Cooooooool.

Nudibranchs

Nudibranchs

This is a really cool gallery of nudibranchs. Nudibranchs—Photo Gallery—National Geographic Magazine I've been especially interested in them since I saw a few on a coral reef whilst diving in the Galapagos. They were so colorful!

Boomerangs in Space!

Boomerangs in Space!

Yes, they work without gravity. Click for a video.