Quick update

Today begins the wonderful part of year-round school...the two week vacation. This marks the end of my first quarter as a first grade teacher...all I can say is that I have survived :-)
I have lots of fun plans stirring in my head...from cleaning the house to working on lesson plans for the next quarter.

Seriously, though, Alex and I have some real fun planned, too. We will go to playgroup, visit with pals that we haven't seen since Alex's birthday or before, and generally enjoy ourselves. I also want to get in some beach play and a story time or two.

Here are a couple of pictures of Alex and Co. here in Hawaii. Both were taken by G-ma Bette while she was in town.


Mommy and Alex at Teddy's Bigger Burgers. I love this baby!!


Alex and Sydney...bestest friends. Alex: I love this dog!

Home again, home again...

We just returned from a fun-filled trip to Wisconsin. The main event of the trip was to attend the wedding of a friend of Dan's family, but we managed to cram in so much more :-)

Alex met many of his Grandma Bette and Daddy's friends. He met his Uncle Buddy (Grandma Bette's dog :-) ) as well as his little twin pals Ethan and Logan. This was fun for Mommy as well, as she is an avid reader of their blog and was really excited to see them in person, since our last real encounter with them was about 15 months ago....pre-Alex! In fact, Ethan and Logan's Mommy and Daddy babysat all day on Saturday and took all three of the little tykes out to the Betty Brin Children's! The report was that they all had a blast. They even sent home a CD of pictures as evidence of all the fun they had! As soon as I load those pictures on the computer, I'll share some of those with you. Cute, cute little boys!

The plane rides were interesting. The way to WI was an overnight flight. Alex understood the logic in this and complied by sleeping almost the entire time! The way back, however, was prime baby awake time, and Alex didn't seem to understand why we would plan this...we didn't either, and have made a note to never fly with Alex during the day again if possible. The last little bit of the ride was pretty bad, but Alex did manage to sleep for a couple of hours at the beginning, so we have to be thankful for that.

A couple of pictures, not of the trip, but from G-ma Bette's visit here since I haven't exhausted that collection yet. More from our time in WI later. It's bed time :-)



Look at me shopping for pineapples with my Grandma Bette. The photographer caught me looking serious...or maybe I was just busy filling a diaper...but my Grandma looks happy enough for both of us!!

Allright, here's a better smile...I love shopping!

Psst...don't tell anyone, I'm hiding behind the pineapple!

Skills

As I write this, it is already Alex's birthday on the mainland. Here in Hawaii, however, he has an hour or so to go. So I thought I'd just have one more frivolous little post before the mushy one about his first year....

Alex has been perfecting a bunch of skills recently. He will show you his tounge if you ask, "Where's your tounge?" He claps on command. He looks around to locate certain people and a special dog. He has learned to predict many things, like people coming through the front door when he hears their voices outside, he closes his eyes and turns his head when he pulls things down off the counter to avoid getting a facefull of falling stuff, he walks to the front window to wave bye-bye when people leave, and so much more.

One of the fun tricks that his babysitter Tina taught him is to make noise by clapping his hand over his mouth as he says "ahhhhhhhh." It's a sound I'd associate with the Ten Little Indians Song of my preschool years, no matter how un-PC I know that may sound in this era. Anyway, here are some photos of Alex showing off this talent. There are millions, as it was one of his favorite things to do for a while. I decided to subject you to only a few :-)


Alex: Wahh, wahh, wahh, wahh, wahh, wahh, wahh......

Alex: Did you hear me? I said, " Wahh, wahh, wahh, wahh, wahh, wahh....."

Only the Best Toys for Our Baby

You know how a baby can have hundreds of toys, and all they want to play with is the cord to the stereo? Or the diaper pail? Or your purse? Well, Alex likes all of those, but his favorite toys are Sydney's dishes. There is nothing more fun than picking up dog food, throwing it into the water bowl, and splashing the newly-made Dog Food Soup all over the floor. Sometimes he ends up actually eating the dog food, too, but I just assume that the protien is probably good for him anyway :-)

Thank you, Sydney for being the nicest dog in the world. Most dogs would probably bite my hand off for playing in their food dish, but you are too sweet. I guess it's because I always slip you some of my dinner, too. We are learning to share together.

Oh! Grandma Bette caught me playing in the dog dish again. Maybe if I close my eyes, she won't be able to see me!

Beach Bum

Alex loves the beach. He likes to splash in the water, dig around in the sand, and run around in just his little swim diaper. He likes to watch the other kids splashing and playing, too. We don't get to the beach as often as you might think, since we live about 10 minutes from the ocean...jobs get in the way of really taking advantage of our location as much as we should. *sigh*

Here are a couple of pictures from a recent trip to Ala Moana, the baby-friendliest beach we've found.


I love the beach...the sand is so tasty!


If I suck in my tummy a little and puff out my chest some more, do you think that little hottie in the swim diaper will notice me?

I apologize for hijacking that last post to talk all about me. So, some updates on Alex:

He is now walking/running everywhere. He can climb up on just about anything-babygates, the couch, the office chair, his toy box, etc, etc. Bette has been calling him a "billy goat" and that is pretty accurate. He is chattering about everything all the time. He likes Sydeny even more now that he can catch her. I'm not sure if the feeling is mutual :-) Sydney does seem to like Alex, but sometimes you can almost hear her sigh as he walks over to pull on her ear or try to take her toy. We do stop this behavior, of course, but even when he gets away from us, Sydney is the best dog ever and she just gets up, licks Alex's face several times and walks away. We really do have a great puppy.

Pictures to come....