Gabby is 18 months!

Gabby turned 18 months old in May!

Gabby at 18 months, Mommy's favorite picture.

Needless to say, this came as a bit of a surprise. We have found that one's perception of time, as the parents of a toddler, tends to move indirectly proportional to your current level of frustration. Consequently, good times fly by while less enjoyable moments move rather more glacially ("Gabby, you need to lay down, it's nigh-night time. . . Gabby, it's nigh-night time, you can practice singing in the morning. . . Gabby, it's nigh-night time, stop putting your fingers in Daddy's ear/playing with Mommy’s hair. . . etc."). Needless to say, that the last 6 months have passed by so quickly means we have had mostly wonderful moments; hopefully someday we can remember some of them by looking at the pictures.

Gabby dumping sand over herself.

Gabby is a very busy bee, learning to walk and run, talk (both intelligibly and, more often, unintelligibly), break Mommy’s glasses, sit on Karl’s head, pick flowers for all the old ladies in our building (or any other passing stranger), store large quantities of rocks in her clothing and diaper, and gravitate towards any visible bodies of water in which she could potentially submerge (Gabby loves swimming and has no fear of charging right into it - Mommy and Daddy are a bit more fearful of this). Needless to say, this has kept us on our toes and has generated lots of laughter around our house, at least until someone's head makes contact with a large or immovable object, such as the floor, at full toddler velocity.

Gabby with flowers.

Although Gabby is an expert cat tormentor (see: sitting on Karl's head, above), she and the cat actually get along splendidly—spending many happy hours chasing each other around the house and engaging in some cooperative foraging (Karl now gets the leftovers deposited by Gabby during dinner time, although she typically out-competes him for any floor-level morsels once she gets out of the chair). Recently, Gabby has learned to bypass the floor altogether and now hands Karl her food directly from her high chair. In general, Karl lives a pretty conflicted life. While he is abundantly happy to have another human around to feed him, this must be balanced with the repeated, forceful ejections from all of his favorite napping positions. Such an internal debate must be tiring and he sleeps all the time.

As a family, we have traveled far and wide this spring—Denise was in the US in January, February, and March for interviews and then in Vienna in April for a conference. In March, we all traveled around eastern Germany with Aunt Sue and Uncle Phil and over Easter we visited the Bouwma Homeland in Frysland, The Netherlands. Gabby is an excellent traveler, other than a slight propensity to get car sick on any trip more than 5 kilometers in distance (Vomex is a wonder drug). She mostly sits in her car seat, plays with her toys, and watches the world go by in the sort of way that only a 1.5 year old can do. These trips in Europe will be our last; Denise got a position as a Research Microbiologist at the US Geological Survey in Reston, VA. We will all be moving back to the US on August 2nd and the new job starts in mid-August. While Pete and Denise are really excited to move home and see family and friends more often, Gabby is just glad that Mommy isn’t traveling as much and that there are lots of places to go swimming in the Reston area. Karl has no idea what's coming. . . at least he will be well rested for the traveling.

Family in the Wadden Sea while on our trip to Frysland.

Uncle Phil and Gabby enjoying a currywurst in Jena.

Aunt Sue and Gabby reading a book at a cafe in Dresden.

Gabby at the Zwinger in Dresden.

It has been fascinating and wonderful to watch our little girl move from baby to toddler over the last 6 months. The next 6 will be busy with packing, seeing friends, moving, and then settling into our new home in Virginia. We are going to miss Germany but are looking forward to the adventures ahead for our family.

Testing out boxes while packing

Running around in her cute dress!

Silly girl!

Pushing her Teddy in the stroller.

Explorer in training.