Dinner Time, Sort Of

Elise loved having her uncle Daniel stay with us this past week. Here he is, trying his hand at feeding her some green beans. She seemed to like it!

Or is she smiling because most of the veggies never actually made it into her mouth..

And here she is during a recent outing at the National Arboretum. It was cold out and everything there was brown and dead, but Elise was so happy and cozy in her little bear suit. Our friend Sarah sent this for Christmas and it's so darn cute, now we hope winter never ends.

O- so close

About two weeks ago, I was lucky enough to score two free tickets to the presidential swearing-in ceremony. For a split second, I started rationalizing whether Elise's Minnesota bloodlines would keep her warm enough for six to eight hours in 20 degree temps. But, my better judgement kicked in, and frost bite is no joke, so, my mom and brother were the benefactors of my moment of parental clarity. We knew it was going to be mass hysteria, so we put a pretty solid game plan together. I dropped them off at the metro at about 5:30am, and their journey into DC was relatively smooth. However, once they got off the metro in the heart of the Capitol and started walking the three blocks to the ticketed area, it was a totally different story.

They managed to herd themselves to the security checkpoint, only to find that it was totally blocked off. Apparently, right before they got there, hundreds of people without tickets knocked down the barricades and started seeping into the ticketed area. The police put the barricades back up, but because things were unraveling, they decided not to let anyone else in. Finally, at 11:30, when the ceremony started, they opened the barricades again, but by this time, it was full of people without tickets. So, my brother and mom just tried to move up as close as they could, and as you can see by their pictures, they didn't get very far. My mom is just over five feet tall, so she saw nothing, but she's glad she went because she can always say she was a part of history.

Elise Dowling: Stunt Woman

When people ask me what Elise is up to these days, I sometimes wish I could wow them with a major milestone, like, "She's crawling!" or "She's memorized her states and capitals!" But I have to remind myself, she's only seven months old. So, today, I proudly share with you one of Elise's favorite tricks. It's an oldie but goodie, the roll and flop.
Are you watching?

OK, here I go!

Tim-ber!

I'm O-K!

Tiny Bubbles

Chris misses out on a lot of "little things" when he's away for weeks or months. So this one's for you, dad.

I Got My Two Front Teeth!

And just like that, tooth number two. I swear it wasn't there a few days ago. Amazing. I tried to get a few more close-up pictures of the tooth, but what I got was actually a lot cuter.

All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth

So, now that we're all caught up, here's my first real-time post. It's just about 1am on New Year's Day. Chris is in Pakistan. We talk on the phone every night about this time, it's late morning for him. This is also the time when I get about two to three hours to myself every night after I put the baby down. I start her bedtime routine at about 8pm, but somehow she doesn't like to go down until about 10:30pm. Lately, she's been waking up every couple of hours and I need to pick her up, walk her around for a few minutes and lay her back in her crib. Let's hope it's just a phase and she goes back to sleeping through the night.


The big news from today is that we saw her first tooth! I knew it was coming in, but I just saw it in all it's glory today. I kept pulling down her lip in disbelief and she just kept smiling, so proud of herself.

December 2008

Chris is back in Pakistan. It's a seven week trip, but fortunately, he was here the week before Christmas, so we got to have our own celebration before he left. We even took her to see Santa. She did great. She pulled on his beard and even smiled a bit.

Right before Chris left, my mom flew in to help with the baby and I don't know what I'd do without the help. Elise is six months old and she's doing all kinds of fun things like rolling around and banging herself in the head with plastic toys. To her credit, the pain doesn't make her cry. She's a tough cookie.

October 2008

Chris returned from Pakistan, safe and sound. Meantime, I wrapped things up at the station. I had my last newscast and said good-bye to my colleagues and friends. I really do miss the people more than the job. My co-anchors and I had so much fun every night. It's hard to find people who are really talented AND really fun to be around. I was lucky to find both in Rick, Eric and Sven.


On the home front, Chris and I enjoyed some more time together before he was scheduled to ship off again in December. At five months old, Elise was getting more and more fun every day. She started sleeping through the night and laughing at her dad's funny faces and sounds. This was also her first Halloween. Dad wanted her to go as a whoopie cushion or one of those pine tree air fresheners. But, as usual, mom had to spoil the fun and turn her into a pink bunny. We spent Halloween with our friends Amy and Tommy in Connecticut. Amy is one of my dear friends from my TV News days in Fargo. Their little boy, Max, is one month younger than Elise and it was fun to see them together.

August 2008

With a summer's worth of help from all of our parents, we had made it through the first few months of parenthood. My mom came out first, then my dad and step-mom, Linda. And then Chris' parents came to stay with us and we had Elise's baby blessing at our church. Instead of getting baptized as a newborn (that happens at 8 years old in our church), babies are "blessed." So, Chris, along with some of our friends from church, stood up in front of everyone and laid a blessing upon her. She was blessed with good health, the ability to understand right from wrong, appreciate her family, a kindness for others and many other things.
I wish I had a transcription of the blessing, it was really special.


Later in the month, Chris was off on another trip, this time to Beijing for the Olympics and I was returning to work as well. Soon after returning, the station asked me to increase my hours, which I couldn't do, so I knew we were probably going to start working on an exit strategy. My contract was up in October, so we decided to let it run its course and I would move to DC full-time and find another job.

June 2008

I wrapped up my last newscast before going on maternity leave. I had to stop working one month before my due date because I wasn't going to be able to fly after the eighth month. The next morning, I saw the OB in Minnesota. The baby was still breech, but I wasn't dilated, so I got the OK to fly and hopped on my flight. I connected in Chicago and landed in DC at about 7pm. Chris picked me up, we grabbed some dinner, and went home. We headed straight for the nursery because Chris was excited to show me the newly painted room. As soon as I stepped in the baby's room, I had an urge to use the restroom. I no sooner closed the bathroom door, when my water broke. We called the doctor and she said I had to get into the hospital for an emergency C-section since the baby's head hadn't turned down yet. When we got to the hospital 45 minutes later, I was already five cm dilated and the contractions were getting intense. Fifteen minutes later, I was in the operating room and at 11:58pm on June 2nd, Elise Danielle Dowling was born. She was exactly one month early, but perfectly healthy.

May 2008

Chris was scheduled to take one last trip before he took some time off for "paternity leave." His boss figured we were still one month from the baby's due date, so Chris could sneak in one more trip-- to Southeast Asia. I was not happy. It's one thing to have to work up until your wife is supposed to give birth. It's another thing to have to work half way around the world up until your wife has to give birth. Two days before he was supposed to leave, my prayers were answered. There was a technical issue with Chris' plane ticket. They couldn't fix it in time, so they told him to just stay home. Elise Danielle was born one week later, exactly one month before her due date.

April 2008

Chris returned home safely. We had been through an emotional roller-coaster, and decided to reward ourselves with a trip to Europe. We went to Paris, Rome, the Amalfi Coast and Venice. I was almost eight months pregnant, so this was going to be our "babymoon", our last big hurrah before the baby came. Ironically, we kept wishing our daughter was already born so she could enjoy the amazing trip with us.

February 2008

Chris headed back to Iraq. It was the worst trip yet. I was feeling much better and loving pregnancy, but conditions in Baghdad were worsening. Ironically, he was almost in more danger in the protected Green Zone, than he was when he was making runs into the Red Zone. There was an increase in rocket attacks within the Green Zone, and a few Americans, who were in the wrong place at the wrong time, were getting killed. In the shower, while they slept. It was the worst two months of our lives.

October 2007

Chris left for a two month trip to Baghdad. Three weeks after he left, we were talking on the webcam and I showed him a pregnancy test with two distinct pink lines. I spent the next eight weeks exuberantly nauseated. The best/worst part was, all I could stomach was salty carbs and processed meats. As a result, our baby is made of Cheddar Ruffles and Subway sandwiches.

September 2007

I started a blog with every intention of keeping it up. Then.. life happened! So here are the highlights of the last year.