Notes on the life, times, and development of Miss Zoë Bromage, as recorded by her mother. Also includes minor notes on updates to this website.

Tuesday, November 28, 2000

Zoë and I just came from her one-year checkup. Developmentally, she's doing extremely well, and is even a bit ahead in some areas. She's a little on the small side, though. She's always been petite, around the 3rd percentile for weight and height, but she's dropped just below it now.

The nurse who did the exam wasn't too concerned about it. The whole time we were there, Zoë wiggled and wiggled and squirmed and chattered, and it was clear there's nothing wrong with her. She's just very active and burns up a lot of energy, and so we'll try increasing her calorie intake by adding in more high-fat foods like cream cheese, avacado, butter, and peanut butter (basically, all the things I like and know I shouldn't eat!).

After the appointment, we went to a local café and shared a honey-apricot muffin. Zoë had a small glass of milk and I had a spider (that's the Australian name for the drink; Americans would know it as an ice cream and Coke "float").

On the way home, she fell asleep in the pram. It's very hot today (91°F / 33°C) even though it's mostly overcast (or maybe because it's overcast; perhaps it's a greenhouse effect), but our apartment is always nice and cool on the first floor, particularly in the "mud room" by the back door. When we came in, I made sure she was settled and just let her sleep in the pram in the cool dark of the mudroom (I'll hear her when she wakes up; I'm just a room away).

:: posted 28.11.00 :: link

There is a very tired litttle girl in the sling on my chest. She had a very exciting day yesterday! She got lots of cool presents, ate outside, saw lots of people, had a nap on her new fold-out bed/couch with Winnie the Pooh and Tigger on it, played and played and played, had people sing to her, had cake for the first time (it crumbles really amusingly), and had an adoring audience all day long.

And yes, of course, it was Zoës birthday party. She had a great time, got fairly overwhelmed after a while, and today she's in good spirits, but a little tired still and therefore a little bit irritable. Ahhh... I think she's fallen asleep now...

:: posted 27.11.00 :: link

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you... Our darling girl is a year old today. It's hard to believe a year has gone by already! I can't imagine life without Zoë now.

At the age of one year, Zoë Elizabeth Bromage:

• Has three teeth (two bottom incisors, one top incisor)
• Pulls herself to a standing position and "cruises" on the furniture
• Can climb the stairs with very little help
• Has a vocabulary of several words she uses consistently and apparently with understanding
• Gives hugs and kisses
• Recognizes certain television shows and commercials (usually by the music)
• Is still breastfed, but also feeds herself finger food, drinks from a cup (not always successfully by herself)
• "Dances" to certain kinds of music
• Has learned to yell to express her displeasure
• Sleeps through the night almost all the time
• Recognizes and likes animals of many kinds (particularly cats and dogs)
• Finally has enough hair to be able to muss it a little, although it's still not much more than thick blonde fuzz
• Has blue-green eyes
• Is friendly and quite charming
• Loves books
• Has figured out that when Mama puts on her glasses, Mama's getting up to stay
• Will grab anything and everything, especially when tired
• Understands what "no" means, but isn't always able to comply
• Has everyone who knows her completely wrapped around her little finger and is the light of her parents' (and grandparents' and great-grandparents' and assorted aunts, uncles, and others) lives.

:: posted 24.11.00 :: link

What a weekend. All day Friday, Zoë was really miserable. Cranky, whiney, cried off and on all day. Nothing I did gave her much comfort. By the time Andrew got home, I was really frazzled and really cranky myself.

Unfortunately, the night proceeded precisely as the day had. Zoë was really irritable, and she slept really poorly, waking every couple of hours. I brought her into our bed because it was the only way any of us were likely to get any sleep at all, with the kid waking up so frequently and wanting to breastfeed to get back to sleep.

Saturday morning, we discovered she had a new tooth, one of the top incisors. She didn't have it Friday afternoon, did have it Saturday morning, so it must have been growing all night. That would explain her extreme restlessness and unusual irritability.

Saturday we went out shopping and she slept very little all day, just a brief nap of maybe twenty minutes in the afternoon. She didn't seem to want to eat much, wouldn't sleep. She was still irritable, but as long as we "kept moving" she was reasonably content (or at least quiet). Finally, around eight o'clock in the evening, she fell asleep and pretty much stayed that way (with a few brief wakings) until five this morning! When she woke up in the early dawn hours I pulled her into our bed and she had milk and went back to sleep, and then we all got up around ten.

Basically, what it looks like is she had a very bad day or so with teething pain and then, when it finally subsided, she fell asleep and "caught up" on the sleep she'd lost. This is a good thing, because all of us were pretty tired!

Oh, and she was irritable and cranky despite regular doses of children's ibuprofen (for its anti-inflammatory properties) and numbing gel for her gums. All I can figure is that it really, really hurt a lot. Having had toothaches that hurt despite regular doses of codeine, I can definitely sympathize.

:: posted 19.11.00 :: link

Last night Zoë said yet another word. She was in her high chair and was saying what I thought was "dad dad dad dad dad" but then I realized she was actually saying "down down down down down" or "done done done done done" (either one, it's hard to tell, as I use both to indicate leaving the chair). She wanted down from her chair because she was finished eating.

I'm also happy to report that she has enough hair to muss up now. It's still not much more than thick fuzz, but the other day she went to sleep and got all sweaty and when she woke up, bits of her hair were visibly standing on end. And her hair is definitely blonde. Andrew was dark from the time he was born, but my father, both of Andrew's brothers, and I were all blonde when we were little, so it's no surprise Zoë is blonde.

Her eyes are pretty much blue, but they change with the light and what she's wearing. Sometimes they're distinctively green, sometimes they look grey. Andrew's are green, and I was sort of expecting Zoë to have his green eyes, but her eyes are the same as my father's, blue-green hazel.

:: posted 15.11.00 :: link

Zoë spontaneously said "thank you" today. She was in her high chair and I brought her some cheese on toast (one of her favorites) and she said "thank you" in her little baby way. She also said "Daddy" very, very clearly and "Mama" just as clearly. My little chatterbox is on her way to being a public speaker, or at least a speaker.

:: posted 13.11.00 :: link

There is now a Bromage Family Tree online.

:: posted 13.11.00 :: link

Another tooth! The left bottom incisor has finally erupted. The top two incisors are very close to the surface of the gum, but not through quite yet. By her birthday on the 24th, she may have three (or, I guess four, but I'm not holding my breath) teeth.

:: posted 12.11.00 :: link

Zoë is talking more all the time. Lately she will sometimes say "thankyou thankyou thankyou thankyou" when I change her nappy, and she definitely refers to me as "Mama" and her father as "Daddy" (often as "mamamamamama" and "dadadadadada" but it's still clear). Today I went to pick her up and said, "Gosh, you're a stinky girl!" and she said 'girl girl girl girl girl" (well, it was actually more like 'grr grr grr grr grr' but the context and usage was fairly obvious). Last night she was sitting on her father's lap and she suddenly shouted "ba ba ba ba ba" and then laughed. Translation: "baby baby baby baby baby", or, in intent maybe something like "I'm the baby, and I'm here!"

:: posted 10.11.00 :: link

She seems to be getting the hang of this sleeping thing. Last night she slept straight through from about eleven p.m. to six a.m. I'm keeping my fingers crossed (figuratively; can't type with crossed fingers) that she keeps sleeping through the night and it becomes a habit. I don't mind the early waking because I normally just pull her into the bed with me, give her a feed, and we go back to sleep for a few more hours together.

Soon, I hope, she'll be able to sleep in her own room at night, although I don't mind at all nursing her to sleep and then putting her down there (she's not expected to just go to sleep by herself, in other words). If she would then sleep through the night, it would be a real improvement. If she wakes really early, I can always go get her and bring her to bed with me. I really quite like "napping" with her. It's very intimate and warm and snuggly and loving. I don't think I want to give it up any time soon.

:: posted 8.11.00 :: link

I went out with my best friend to lunch. Naturally, Zoë came with us. After lunch we got some ice cream and had a nice sit in the park and a chat. Zoë decided after a while that she wanted a breastfeed, and since I'm wearing a fairly loose, stretchy t-shirt that falls well below my waist, I figured I could do it there and be fairly discreet about it.

By "discreet" I don't mean "no one can tell I'm feeding my baby". I mean "none of my flesh is unduly exposed". I undid my bra strap and got the baby into position and pulled my shirt up a little and tucked her underneath. She wasn't happy with this arrangement, because she wanted to look around, but there was no way I was going to just flop out my bare breast so that she could do that. She was restless and she fought and pulled my shirt up a couple of times, and eventually I decided that she was more tired than hungry and that she wasn't going to be happy with the way we were having a feed, so I just pulled down my shirt and rocked her a little bit.

The whole time I was feeding (or trying to feed) this restless baby, the couple on a bench not far off were watching me. I don't mean "could see" me. I mean they were watching. The man, particularly, was watching, and when Zoë would pull up my shirt or struggle or whatever, he'd make some comment to the woman, who would then snicker. I somehow doubt they were saying, "How wonderful that woman is feeding her baby breastmilk, which is the best nutrition a baby can have," particularly since they kept watching even after I'd pulled my shirt down and handed the baby over to Lori so I could readjust my bra.

Perhaps it's not the most attractive thing in the world to see me tugging on my bra straps like that. Perhaps it's not the most attractive thing in the world to see a restless baby squirming and pulling on my shirt, but I was doing my best to meet my baby's needs, my needs, and avoid seriously offending anyone with my semi-nudity. But perhaps if you don't like what you're looking at, you shouldn't look. Don't like the radio station? Put something else on. Don't like the television show? Change the channel. Don't like the book you're reading? Put it down. Don't like what you're looking at? Then don't look.

This is the first negative reaction I've seen/had to feeding Zoë in public. I'm not particularly angry or upset, just mildly annoyed. The world is full of stupid people. Today I just happened to encounter two of them.

:: posted 7.11.00 :: link

Last time I wrote about Zoë sleeping through the night, I managed to jinx it and she went back to four hour stretches. However, the last two nights she has slept pretty much straight through from about ten pm (yes, we're late-night sort of people around here) to around 6am. Several times she started to wake and fussed a bit but then went back to sleep. So perhaps she's finally learning how to go back to sleep without direct assistance.

I don't mind helping her to go to sleep when she needs a nap or at bedtime, but the continual waking on my part is starting to really take its toll. I'm looking forward to having regular sleep again.

:: posted 7.11.00 :: link

Zoë is now part of bromage.org. Her father is now andrew.bromage.org and Zoë is now zoe.bromage.org. I suppose if I really wanted to get silly I could make her zoe.elizabeth.bromage.org but that seems a just a little bit excessive, no matter how much I love her name...

:: posted 6.11.00 :: link

Regarding these pages, they will be moving at some point in the near future. We have acquired a networked machine on which we'll be running a few new domains, and one of them is bromage.org. Zoë's pages (as well as Andrew's) will be moving to that domain, making her URL zoe.bromage.org (and Andrew's will be andrew.bromage.org). However, we'll be sure to set up redirect pages on her site at bonni.net.

:: posted 2.11.00 :: link

It seems that the JavaScript has fixed itself. Her age is now being displayed correctly. I didn't do anything to fix it and have no idea what caused it. It's just one of the mysteries of life on the World Wide Web.

:: posted 2.11.00 :: link

Zoë has a soft stuffed moose who sleeps with her. It's a Beanie Buddy if that helps you to visualize it. Anyway, playing with the moose is a favorite bedtime routine, and it frequently "sneaks up" on Zoë and kisses her in the face repeatedly. This is achieved by tapping the moose's soft nose into Zoë's face repeatedly while making kissing noises.

This morning Zoë was in the bed with me and she grabbed her moose (who was also in the bed with us) and made him kiss me! It was so cute. I wasn't sure at first what she was doing but then I caught on and made kissing noises and she was absolutely delighted that I worked it out.

She never ceases to amaze me with the things she can do. She's such a delight.

:: posted 1.11.00 :: link

Go to the current journal entries
Go to the main archives index

zoe.bromage.org