Leaving on a jet plane

We left California Wednesday last week and took off for sunny? Sweden. We have a long vacation planned and will be here for close to four weeks so farmor, farfar and faster Malin gets to hang out with Maya a lot.

Packing was a bit stressful as we wanted to make sure we had enough of everything for the long flight. In the end it went well and Maya did great on the long trip. SF to Amsterdam took about 10 hours and Maya slept for about one of those hours. KLM gave us a great crib to put her in but we ended up using it mostly for storage of diapers, bottles etc since Maya wasn't interested in sleeping. Right next to us was another family with a baby girl the same age as our litte daughter. Their girl hung out in the crib for pretty much the whole flight. I have never seen such a calm and peaceful little baby. I have to admit we were slightly jealous of them while Maya was playing peek-a-boo with the whole row behind us, laughing at/with the lady across the aisle, pulling dads skin of his face, throwing everything on the floor, bouncing of the walls etc etc, their little girl just peacefully sat there and watched our little energizer bunny.

Amsterdam to Copenhagen took just an hour and was over before we could blink. Maya completed both flights without any fuzz or ear pain. Farfar and farmor met us at Kastrup and led two very exhausted parents to the car, all the while Maya was chatting up a storm with them.

Weather has been great so far and Maya and dad are already adjusted to the new time zone. Mom is struggling a bit but getting better with the sleeping pattern.

"Titta!"

Maya is a very talkative little girl. She's said some random "mamma" and "pappa" but it's not really conscious and repeatable. However, she's now found her first real word, pronounced very clearly, "titta" which is Swedish for "look". She is sitting next to me on the floor just now yelling "titta!!!!". She is very eager to show off everything now and gets really happy when we look at her when she yells "titta!!!"

Lucia's baptism

I'm a bit behind on the blog as usual but we went to Lucia's baptism a week and a half ago at the Norwegian Seamen's Church in San Francisco. Maya behaved very well and kept fairly quiet for the hour long service.

It was great to meet Pete, Heather and Lucia and some of their friends as usual.

The view is breathtaking:


Lucia and Maya "playing":

Boxes are fun!

Weeeeeee, this box is REALLY fun!
(Note: The toy that came in this box is long forgotten and not interesting at all)


Wait! This is not how how you are planning to send me to Sweden? You DO have a seat for me too right??

Daddy's little helper

So we spent the whole weekend organizing the house and cleaning. It was long overdue after Cindy's parents left. Maya was eager to "help" and tried to be in the middle of the action at all times.....which explains why it took the whole weekend to get this done.

Maya reading cards to make sure we don't throw anything away that involves her. Just like mommy...likes to save EVERYTHING.


"Pappa, pappa, look at THIS!"

Hurricane Maya

I organized and cleaned up in our tv-room the other night. Walked out for 20 seconds to prepare some food for Maya. While I looked the other way, hurricane Maya tore through the room and it looked like this:



She can not resist pulling everything off tables and shelves. This weekend we've set aside for baby-proofing the house.

Pianist

We have played piano with Maya every now and again and she has really taken a liking to it. Last week when I was home alone with Maya we played for a while and then I had to put her down and go make some milk. While in the kitchen I suddenly heard some piano tunes.

To my surprise she had crawled over to the piano, pulled herself up and stood on her toes to reach the keys. She was really proud of her accomplishment when she saw me.

Waipo and waigong have left the building

Unfortunately it was time for waipo and waigong to go back home to China by the middle of July. It has been great to have them here with us and get a chance to get to know each other. Most of all I'm very happy that Maya, waipo and waigong got to know each other so well. I'm sure one of the reasons that Maya have grown and developed so well is all the love and care that waigong and waipo have given her. Every morning they took Maya for a long walk, gave her a morning massage/exercise and showered her with love and attention. Same procedure every afternoon/evening.

We really miss having waipo and waigong here and I'm sure Maya miss them even more. We hope we can go visit them in China early part of next year so Maya get to see her grandparents soon agin.