New Pictures

There are a couple new pictures over at Picturetrail.

I have a feeling Anne probably won't like this one because of the look on her face, but it's a great picture of Sydney "standing."



Not too much else to report. We're trying to get Sydney started on a little more solid foods. We have had her on the "stage 2" foods for a while now. Anne tried a "stage 3" with her on Thursday night and she didn't like it. We're not sure if she didn't like the taste or if it was the texture and she didn't like it and/or was having a hard time with it. (It was macaroni and cheese.)

Attempts with giving her Cheerios have not been successful. Well, actually they have. She takes them. She just won't eat them. And if we try to put one in her mouth she spits it out. (We've actually been very lucky because Sydney so far is not a "pick it up and put it in my mouth" baby. I'm sure that phase is coming, though.)

Previous attempts with a baby cookie have been unsuccessful until Thursday night. Previous times she didn't like the cookie and didn't know what to do with it. Thursday she started the same way. Then Anne held it in her mouth (and put it back in when she spit it out.)

These cookies are designed for babies just learning to eat solids. After a little bit they get really soft and mushy to help them learn how to chew. Once the cookie got soft and mushy Sydney loved it. She wouldn't let it go. And she smushed it up and got it on her clothes. And in her hair. And on Anne's clothes. (Some of that happened on Friday when she got another one.)

I have yet to witness this, but hope to see it Saturday and maybe take a picture or two.

For those of you waiting for your professional pictures, they haven't been mailed yet. Sorry. The week didn't go as I had hoped. But doing the final packing (everything is ready, just need to be packed up and then mailed) is on our agenda for this weekend. (The first weekend in five months without football. ARGH!)

And last but not least, check out the new link over on the right. "Ask A Ninja" is a funny blog by, well, a ninja. He answers questions. The answers are in the form of videos, so this isn't something for the non-broadband crowd. It is a Blogger blog, though, so the videos are linked. You can go check out the site without any undo wear and tear on your connection.

And if you are on dial-up and have a little spare time, the videos are definitely worth downloading. They are hilarious.

Snow! Sorta.

We've been getting sporadic snow over the last few weeks. It will snow and then melt within a day, usually.

A week and a half ago I woke up on Saturday to find snow on the ground. No one told the snow it was in the mid-30s and way too warm for snow to stick, apparently.

Sydney had only had one other experience in snow, so we bundled up and headed out. Previously, Sydney had enjoyed the falling snow as it landed on her face. It had stopped snowing before we got outside this time, though. And the snow wasn't very deep and was too slushy to sit her down in to play. So we settled on taking a picture of her with Mommy outside enjoying the atmosphere the snow presented.



The snow was melted within two hours of this picture being taken.

Later that day, or maybe the next, Sydney and Mommy were enjoying looking out the front window. Sydney likes to be propped up over the back of the sofa and just look outside.



In other news, Sydney seems to be getting more and more teeth. She almost constantly has a hand in her mouth in one way or another. We haven't gotten many good looks in, but occasionally we manage to catch a glimpse. We have seen a molar on her left, bottom jaw peeking through.

Also, the professional pictures are all back and framed. They're wrapped in bubble wrap and ready to be shipped away. Unfortunately, I still need to make some copies of the photo shoot DVDs to stick in the boxes. But the pictures will hopefully be shipped within a week. If you're getting a box you will be notified shortly after shipping.

I think that's all I've got. Maybe there will be something even more exciting to report next time. Sydney seems to change a little bit everyday. We're expecting her to go mobile anytime. You never know what may come up!

Happy Birthday

January 10 is my beautiful wife's birthday. We celebrated this past Saturday, but I wanted to take this time to put this birthday wish on my blog today.



We have been married almost seven years. The time we've been together has been the happiest I can ever remember having. It is even happier with the addition of Sydney to our family nine months ago.

Anne, thank you for all you do for me and all the love you give me. Thank you for my beautiful daughter. I love you more than I could ever hope to express. I hope your birthday was happy and I look forward to sharing many, many more with you.

Nine Months

Today is Sydney's nine-month birthday. As usual, she got her picture taken with Fievel.



My goodness is she getting huge. She is wearing her twelve-month clothes now without any problem.

The outfit she's in there is the one she got for Christmas. It's actually an 18-month outfit. The legs and sleeves are rolled up a little on her. The cute sweater is almost too short for her torso.

It's another three months to Sydney's next scheduled doctor appointment. Until then we weigh and measure her as best we can here at home. We haven't weighed her recently, but we did try to measure her over this past weekend. With all her squirming, we figured she's about 32 inches long.

I looked up a length and weight chart online. (It's in a .pdf format so you'll need Adobe Acrobat Reader to open it.) You can find it here if you'd like to see it.

According to that chart the 95th-percentile in length for a nine-month old baby is just over 29 inches. Thirty-two inches is the 95th percentile for 14-month old babies. It's about normal (50th percentile) for 19-month old babies. (Not to say Sydney isn't normal.)

Wow!

Did I mention that Sydney is getting huge?

Sydney is quickly outdistancing Fievel. I think her one-year birthday will be the last Fievel picture taken together. At least for the regular length comparison. He may well get into some future pictures here and there.

Since a few months ago I have also been taking the monthly pictures of Sydney and Fievel sitting together on our bed. This month is no different, except I threw an octopus in the mix, too. It's the large octopus from the My-Oh-My Octopi that Sydney got for Christmas. (See the last post.)



In other news, have I mentioned that Sydney knows the cameras when they get pulled out? The digital camera or the video camera, it doesn't matter. She knows them, she hears them beep when they turn on and she watches Mommy or Daddy intently while they point them at her.

She doesn't have a concept of what they do, of course. She doesn't know that Mommy and Daddy want her to continue doing the cute things she's doing to they can record them. But she knows that Mommy and Daddy usually want her to smile when those weird, beeping (and sometimes flashing) things are being pointed at her.

(Amazingly, with these pictures she didn't spend the whole time staring at me. She stared at me as I tried to get her to smile, then as soon as I pressed the button to snap the picture she turned her head. They're still great pictures!)

Her two bottom teeth have come in. She still crams fingers into her mouth so we think some back teeth are coming in now. But since she would barely let us look at her bottom front teeth when they were coming in we're having a hard time being able to see if she has back teeth coming in.

Sydney's first birthday is April 5. That's a Wednesday. For all the relatives that will be coming out, we're planning on having the party the weekend before that. Probably on Saturday, April 1. (No joke. Really.)

Anne and I are taking vacation time for a week and a half after that and we'll be packing up Sydney and heading off somewhere. We're not sure where yet and we're not sure when and for how long. But we will be taking some sort of trip.

Relatives that will be staying are certainly welcome to stay at the house as long as you need. We figure you'll be renting a car and will be driving yourself back to the airport. So if you stay a day or two without us here it isn't a problem. (It might not be your ideal circumstance since you probably want to see Sydney as much as possible, but sorry.)

So make your plans and decide when you want to be here. If you need more specific information from us, let us know. We don't have it yet, but we will make sure you know when we know if you want to know.