Help! Our child has been replaced by a tiny French child -- one who vacations in the Swiss Alps and wears hats covered in Scottie dogs. As such, we've been buried in an avalanche of cute for the past few days. This is one of the outfits that make it worth getting up in the morning.

To those who believe that Vikings were never babies, we give you Charlotte the Barbarian. This tiny Norselady devours cereal with abandon and is now demanding a tribute of vegetables from her parents.

We need to get her a sword or club of some kind -- she would have had a much easier time defeating the massive orange monkey that threatened the village. As it was, she was forced to subdue the monkey through a series of squeals and gumming actions.

I never suspected I would be one of those parents that asks their infant to say hi to the other person on the line. But when it's Kate calling from work, it's hard not to offer them a chance to say hello to each other.

The phone usually begins by Charlotte's ears and mouth, but slides down after a moment towards her chest, where it is then cradled and the edge is gummed. They both then make slightly surprised noises "Ohh...oh? ohhh...awhoah" I suspect they're talking about me.

Although she will not receive a cell phone until the age of 40, she has already asked for her own phone line -- apparently wanting to stay in constant communication with sock monkey and glow worm to find out what happens downstairs after she goes down for the night in her crib. Perhaps, if she sells enough magazines this year at day care, she can get the clear plastic phone that lights up when somebody calls.

I think somebody is figuring out that we like to take pictures of her.

With the football season drawing to a close, it seems worth it to mention how we spent Sundays in our house. Over the course of an afternoon and depending on the relative performances of the Kansas City Chiefs and Chicago Bears -- both members of the viewing audience would proceed to slump further and further into the couch.

Here, the real gem is the intensity of two generations of fans -- both of us appear to be greatly concerned over the new Bears' quarterback's propensity to throw interceptions. And while Charlotte has yet to learn how to properly manage the remote control -- she has learned to squeak at the proper moments and raise her arms to signal that a field goal is good.

Both of us need to work on not crying at the end of a bad game.