The Rottman Family Adventures – Page 4 – The stories of a growing family in AZ

10 Month Pictures

June 4, 2013 by Beth Leave a Comment

Clara is 10 months old! We are starting to realize that she is becoming more and more of a toddler and less of a baby. One recent development is Clara standing independently for up to a minute or so. She will even swing her arms or play with a toy while standing. Her balance is pretty amazing. She could likely take a few steps with some motivation. Crawling is just so efficient… and she is super fast. She continues to get into everything. She is curious and definitely not tentative. A favorite thing is to take things out, like laundry out of the washer and onto the floor, or diapers off of the clothesline, or toys out of a basket. Maybe next month she will enjoy putting things back in. Clara is very social. This was very evident during our recent trip to Spain as she made friends with anyone we met. She seems to know how to get people’s attention by making noises and then just beaming. This continues as we run errands around town. Home Depot has been a huge hit lately. We walk down the aisle, and she seems to get everyone we pass to notice and give her a smile back. Clara is still on the small side and is just now getting too big for her 6 month clothes (even with her big cloth diaper bottom). We are starting to see her 3rd tooth poking through on the top. Clara is clearly understanding more of what we say and is babbling often. She is saying “mamama” regularly and even “dada” sometimes now. She is attempting to repeat words after we say them. She still loves books and now turns the pages with us. She has now started crying when the book is over… not something we promote. I am glad that she likes books!

Clara helping with the laundry…

Clara has become quite the messy eater

A new favorite thing is to do raspberries with food in her mouth… in this case, beets went everywhere

This month, Clara got in the pool for the first time. She was not too sure about it but did ok as long as one of us held her.

Our house remains in flux with continued projects. Clara loves all of the wayward boxes and construction supplies.

Madrid

May 29, 2013 by Beth Leave a Comment

We went to Spain! We had an incredible opportunity to visit España again (this time with Clara) and travel with my family. We decided to go for it! Clara did amazingly well. We left on a Thursday evening and arrived in Madrid Friday night. We checked into our little apartment in the city and found a place to eat. The two pictures below are from our first dinner in Madrid at Mano a Mano. Paella, yum! Clara slept only a few hours in total on the way over and was ready to go to bed that night. Jeff and I were right there too with maybe 2 hours of sleep between us. Our apartment was on the ground floor and open to the courtyard but had little natural light. We went to bed around midnight, and Jeff and I woke up at 3:30 the next day. At that point, we woke Clara. What? Guess we all needed some sleep.

After waking up Saturday afternoon, we headed to the Reina Sofia museum. Luckily, Spain time is much later and the museum was open until 9. A highlight was seeing Picasso’s Guernica, a city in Northern Spain in the heart of the Basque Country that was bombed in the 1930’s. The bombing was actually carried out by Hitler in cahoots with the Nationalist leader at the time, Franco, during the Spanish Civil War. We later went through the town of Guernica during our tour of the Basque Country. Clara slept through most of our museum tour but her favorite part was by far this hallway with sculptures of heads. She squealed at them as if they were real and was hoping they would talk back to her.

Sunday was our 6th wedding anniversary and my first official Mother’s Day. What a way to celebrate in Spain! We grabbed breakfast at a cute cafe just down the street from our apartment and headed to the infamous Bernabéu. In case you aren’t familiar, this is the home of Real Madrid, Jeff’s favorite soccer team. Unfortunately, they were playing out of town while we were in Madrid. The second best thing was a tour of the stadium.

This was a big moment for Jeff…

View from the President’s balcony

We were even able to see the players’ dressing rooms, tunnel, and sit in the benches.

After all of the touring, we relaxed in a square in the heart of Madrid, Plaza Mayor. We drank café con leche and mojitos and people watched. Clara learned to just eat on the go wherever we happened to be.

So this thing was hilarious and creepy at the same time… It’s a street performer dressed as maybe a llama? The mouth is wooden and made a click noise as it opened and closed, and he had a bell between his antlers. Needless to say, he attracted any children nearby. We watched as kids braved getting close enough to toss a coin in the jar in front of him which caused him to break out in a dance. Clara was pretty entertained.

The rest of the family arrived in Madrid late that night, and we enjoyed dinner together at an Indian restaurant. It was so fun to see everyone! Clara made friends wherever we went, and the waiters at this place were no exception. As we left, they gave us a local bottle of wine and a bottle of pineapple juice for Clara. I’m telling you, she has fans already!

9 month pictures

May 7, 2013 by Beth 2 Comments

It is very hard to believe that Clara is 9 months old. She seems like such a big kid now. We really do have a lot of fun. She thinks Jeff and I are hilarious. We decided that we need to soak that in as much as possible now as it won’t last too much longer. Clara continues to crawl everywhere and pull up on anything. We have started to see more of her moving around the furniture, going from one thing to another, and wonder if walking might happen soon. At her 9 month checkup, she weighed just over 15 lbs and was in the 10th percentile. She still is a petite little girl. “Mama” is officially her first word. I’m thrilled. She will say “Dada” too but we just aren’t sure she has put it together with Jeff yet. Walcott even gets a “Wa” occasionally. This past month, she has started to enjoy playing in her room– sometimes even on her own for a short time. Her fisher price dollhouse is a favorite.

We have had two recent visitors checking out our pool… ducks! They have frequented casa de Rottman a few times so far. Clara and Walcott are checking them out below.

Clara’s Passport

April 26, 2013 by Jeff Leave a Comment

We got Clara’s passport in the mail today. Now we’re all set for the Spain trip next month. Her picture is hilarious. It’s funny to think this will be good for 5 years.

8 month pictures

April 21, 2013 by Beth 3 Comments

Clara is 8 months old now… as of 3/28. This post is a little delayed. She continues to amaze us. She is into everything now and crawls faster than I can imagine. I leave the room for a minute, and she has already moved on to another place. She is pulling up on furniture and toys any chance she can get. Before we left the condo, she was crawling up the stairs with ease. We are thankful we have no stairs in our new home! Bath time is a favorite now. Clara is no longer content to hang out in her seat but crawls around the bathtub splashing and pulls up on the faucet and sides of the tub. She is noticing emotions and now laughs just because we are laughing– so much fun! Her babbling has really increased, and she seems to now recognize words like milk, eat, and book. When playing peek-a-boo a few days ago, I was hiding behind Jeff and saying, “where’s mama?” and Clara clearly said “ma.” Jeff said I could claim it as her first word if she does it again… come on Clara! Nevertheless, she is growing and changing rapidly!

Moving in… a slow process

April 21, 2013 by Beth 2 Comments

Moving is a much slower process when you have a little one. We closed on the house and then spent the next week in between the condo and our new home as we painted, frequented Home Depot, and slowly moved things into the house. The POD was delivered on the Thursday before Easter. Jeff and I moved a good bit of the smaller things in that night as I held Clara and used one arm to carry. Let’s be honest, I am no longer much help. A friend of ours from grad school who is now working for Intel as well came to help Jeff move some of the bigger items in on Friday. Easter weekend was spent painting and making trips back and forth from the condo with the rest of our things. We went to church on Easter morning and spent the afternoon at the house. Our neighbors have been incredibly friendly and had invited us to join some of them in the park for a potluck lunch. We made it just towards the end to introduce ourselves to some more of the neighbors. Monday night was our first night in the house. We even managed to make a special dinner to commemorate– steaks, homemade mashed potatoes, and asparagus. We still have tons on the list of to-dos for the house but are just happy to be here now!

Pictured below is the “LumiDome.” Jeff recently located the paperwork for this gorgeous light fixture, and we found that it has a very apt name.

We painted Clara’s room a soft gray with an aqua closet and ceiling. She seems to like it.

So much space to crawl…

Our attempt at a family photo on Easter. Thanks to Jeff’s new tripod.

Mary and Beau in Tempe

April 21, 2013 by Beth Leave a Comment

Mary and Beau were our first official visitors in our new home and came all the way from Maryland. Just for that reason, right guys? It was so good to see them- as always! We only wish that they lived closer. It feels so natural to just hang out on a Saturday. Too bad we can’t do that more often!

Love you friends! We look forward to seeing you again soon!!

Our New Home!

March 24, 2013 by Beth 3 Comments

We are officially homeowners again and are thrilled about it! With our nomadic lifestyle of the last several months coming to a close, we are very thankful to have a place of our own. We closed on a home in Tempe, Arizona on Friday, March 22nd. We originally put an offer on this house on January 13th. It was a short sale with two banks involved, and we were a back up offer. It didn’t look too good… but we really liked the house. We continued to look but just kept coming back to this house on Magdalena Drive. It was an ideal location for us near the freeways, was an easy commute to work, had an awesome yard, and was right across the street from a park. Yes please! We definitely felt God was leading us to this home, and this was evident as the process went quicker than we ever could have imagined.

As we saw with our house on Prince Road, buying a home is never a dull process. Although this time was less eventful, we did have to fill the pool, deal with some inspection issues, and scramble to have all appliances in for the appraisal. After a long week, we decided to celebrate on Friday night after everything was official. We started a tradition in Tucson of having Chinese takeout and wine on the floor of our new home for the first night. We continued the tradition with this house but splurged a little with takeout from PF Chang’s (versus Panda Express) and opened a bottle of wine we have been saving from our trip to Napa Valley a while back.

Clara enjoyed some sweet potatoes and butternut squash for the celebration

And here are a few pictures of our new home…

Seven Month Pictures

March 20, 2013 by Beth 1 Comment

So… a lot has happened in the last month! Clara started crawling shortly after her 6 month birthday and is now all over the place. She is even pulling up on toys and furniture. She has two bottom teeth and has started eating solid food. We are even starting to hear more babbling. Whew… what a big kid she is. She seems to love being around people and just out and about. We are very close to the Phoenix zoo in this rental, so we take advantage of that regularly! We also frequent the park to get all of us out of the house, particularly Walcott as he traded his yard for a small patio. Clara’s interest in books has greatly increased with Brown Bear and Goodnight Moon being favorites right now. She really is a joy!

Someone was a little upset towards the end…

Foodie

March 4, 2013 by Beth 1 Comment

Clara is officially eating solid foods. It has been fun introducing her to new things! She has done well… not overly excited about it but seems to be enjoying it more and more. We started with oatmeal and now she is eating sweet potato, avocado, and banana. I am attempting to make all of her food. Thanks to friends for the inspiration!