A few more photos...

Again, not much new going on. I adjusted very well to being back in school this week, but Miss Laurie is on vacation the rest of this week, so I will miss her! She's really taken me under her wing and takes such good care of me. Her 2 year old son Zachary calls me "his baby."






















I LOVE to stand. When nothing else makes me happy, let me stand and play and all becomes right with the world :)



















Mom set up my turtle pool in the family room! There wasn't any water in it, but I had fun anyway. If it ever stops raining, maybe I'll actually get to use it outside.





















I can be so serious sometimes!

Mom and dad tell me that I get to go to another soccer game on Saturday! Hopefully I'll get to play with Gabriel and Arabelle. They also tell me that I get to go to Penn State next weekend - I'm very excited about that - apparently that's where mom and dad went to college, but they tell me it looks very different now than when they lived there. There are roads where there used to be buildings and vice versa. Maybe (but probably not) mom will let me have some Creamery Ice Cream...I hear it's fantastic!

Hope everyone is doing well!

It's been a long week!

Not much new to report here. Last Saturday, mom took me to PA for my Great-Great Uncle George's funeral. Mom tells me that he is Great-Grandpa Coble's brother. Everyone was sad, but I tried to lighten the mood a little and it was nice to see grandma, grandpa, Great Grandma, Great Grandma, Elenor, Sue and Clay. I spent a LOT of time in my car seat, but was pretty good all day. I even got to see 3 new kitties, one of which looked exactly like Raz, but about 10 lbs lighter :)

Mom also got to talk to my Great Grandma Speicher on the way home and she is now safely back at home and feeling better. I'll get to see her again and will get to meet my Great Aunt Jenny and Cousin Kaitlin later this month!

Mom ended up coming down with a bad respiratory infection and was home with me all week. She had a fever for 6 days straight, despite antibiotics, tylenol, and ibuprofen. It was (and still is) no fun for any of us. I had to go to the doctor several times to make sure that I don't have it. They don't think I do, but we'll have to wait a few weeks to know for sure. I only had a fever for a day, so it's probably just the same cough I've had for quite some time. In the mean time, dad and I are also on antibiotics and I had to have a chest x-ray, which was not surprisingly clear. I'm now 16 lbs, 13 oz. I've outgrown all of my 9 month clothes that have feet in them (guess I'm tall and skinny), so mom had to buy a bunch of new pajamas.

Since we had so much time at home this week, mom put up my play yard in the family room. It's a giant gate that we put up so I can move around and play with my toys without climbing up the bookshelves, TV or entertainment center! All I want to do is stand these days, so it was only a matter of time before I tried to pull myself up on the TV and that just wouldn't work! It's fun to have all of my toys in one place - they can't get too far away from me! But I don't like it when the kitty stands just outside of the gate and I can't get to her :)

I don't know if it's intentional or not, but I've been waving to people and giving high fives! Here's a short video from this morning - I also imitate people sometimes :) You can see my 4 teeth in the video - 2 on top and 2 on the bottom. There's a 5th that's about to come through on the top, but you can't see it here.



These aren't the greatest, but here are a few photos - one from the Washington Freedom game last Sunday and one from this morning - I didn't want mom to take my picture!














































Till later...

I'm 8 months old already!

It's hard to believe how time flies, but I turned 8 months old this week! I'm doing lots of new and exciting things and am cute and fun as ever. I now have two teeth on the bottom and one on the top too! I can't keep my hands out of my mouth and of course have had a ton of trouble sleeping, probably because of the teeth. I sleep just fine once I FALL asleep, but getting there is a battle. All I want to do is cuddle or play, not get in the crib :) I sit up very well now and really don't need a pillow behind me because when I "fall" over now, it's usually intentional and I go from sitting up to being on my belly because I'm trying to reach a toy. I can scoot and roll all over the place, but haven't really crawled yet - I think I'll learn that one really soon, though. I LOVE to stand now, so much so that if you try to sit me down on the floor or put me in the carseat, I lock my legs and arch my back. I pulled myself up to standing the other day too! I told you I was doing lots of new things! Dad had to lower my crib because I can sit on my own and pull up, but now it's hard for mom to put me down because the mattress is so low.

Mom and I ended up not going to the airshow last weekend, but dad went with some friends and had a great time. Mom and dad were questioning if it would be too loud for me and decided if they had to ask that I should just stay home. Here are some of dad's photos, though - I think he got some good ones!

Airshow

Dad emailed these to most of you, but here are some other photos that were taken on Easter and Mother's Day:

Easter

Mother's Day

And last, but not least, here are some other random photos from the past month or so.


My fingers are just as good as the food!


Eating makes me sleepy :)


I love Kona puppy


Swinging is fun, but I'm not giving up the binky


My new soccer ball


Can you see my kitty?

We went to the DC United game last night and had a wonderful time. We got there early with the intention of going to the Washington Freedom game earlier (it was a double header), but the weather was so nice and I was being so good that we ended up hanging out at the tailgate and I was able to play on my blanket a little longer. Everyone is always amazed at how good I am and mom and dad's friends always say "I hope MY kids are just like Sydney." There are 3 other kids in our section at the stadium - Gabriel is 6 months, Bailey is 4 months, and Arabelle just turned 2. Bailey and I stared at each other nearly the whole game last night. He's a cutie and is already bigger than I am and is 4 months younger!

Mom also tells me that my Great Grandma Speicher is in the hospital, so please keep her in your thoughts. She was moved from Indiana to Pittsburgh yesterday and is stable, but your thoughts and prayers would be appreciated.

Another fun weekend :)

Congratulations to daddy! He ran a 5 mile race this morning and did a GREAT job :) I'll let him give the details later, but he finished in well under an hour which is great. Mom took me over and we got to see him twice - once at the 2 mile mark and once right before the finish line. He didn't see us at the 2 mile mark, though. The race wasn't organized so well and there was also a 5K that started about 20 minutes after the 5 miler started. And the 5K was a "Girls Run" which translates to about 500 10 year old girls and their moms. Well, that started about 30 seconds before daddy got to the 2 mile mark which happened to coincide with the start of the 5K. So he got stuck in a pack of 10 year olds who had no concept of space and couldn't see us yelling and waving at him and couldn't hear us with his iPod on. But we were proud.

Tomorrow, we're going to an Airshow at Andrews AFB. I hope it's not too loud, although if it is, mom said she'd take me home. Mom and dad got me ear protection to wear, but I really don't like it too much, so we'll see how that goes. Some friends of ours went to the show yesterday (it was only for people with DoD clearance yesterday) and said it was great.

I also have a pretty bad cough still. It's been going on for a LONG time now. Mom took me back to the doctor on Wednesday and there's still nothing they can do for me. I don't have a fever and it's not in my lungs, so we just have to wait it out. It may be allergies, but I'm too young to test for that now. I guess it's good that I don't have an infection of any sort, though. I'm getting much bigger and am now 16 pounds 4 ounces. We bought a "wedge" to elevate my crib at daycare and hopefully that will help me sleep a little better there. I move around too much in my crib at home to elevate that, so we'll just keep the humidifier on. I've also started rolling onto my tummy to sleep and that makes it a little easier to breathe. Even though "Back is Best," as long as I can get to my tummy on my own, I'm allowed to stay there.

We'll try to post some more photos after the show tomorrow. Mom's new computer is sort of up and running so it should be easier to post pictures now. Hope everyone is doing well!

I love my new school!

I've made it through two weeks at my new school and I'm happy to report that I absolutely love it! The teachers and director all love me, even the teachers in the other rooms. They all know who I am and want to hold me when I come in the morning. I even got to meet another Sydney in the early morning room - she gets so excited when I get there in the morning and announces it to everyone :) There is lots of time for me to play with my new friends on the mats, although we don't always get along so well - I get a little overwhelmed sometimes when the kids don't give me enough space, but it's getting a little better. There's another girl in my class who is 2 weeks younger than me and we chatter back and forth most days. Mom picked her up yesterday because she was crying and I got REALLY mad because she was holding another baby. We read lots of books, sing songs, and take lots of pictures. May has an animal theme, so we've been learning about farm animals and they want mom to bring in a picture of me and Razmatazz! That will be fun to see pictures of my kitty during the day. We go outside if the weather is nice and I really like that.

I got to go to a place called Medieval Times on Saturday night for uncle Steve's birthday. There were real horses there and I watched the entire show! Mom and dad wouldn't let me have any of their chicken legs or potatoes, but I did get to eat my rice and lentils (in the dark)! I was really good and everyone was surprised by that :)

Dad is running a 5 mile race next weekend, so we all went over to the lake the other day so he could practice a bit. Mom and I just walked around and I got to test out my new ride! I got a jogging stroller that is super comfy - I slept most of the way around the lake, then just hung out with mom and watched the ducks until dad had cooled down. I'm also going to move into my new carseat this week! Mom took it out of the box over the weekend and set up the straps so we can install it later. It looks so much more comfortable than my infant seat and will let me sit up a bit more and look out. I've been arching my back and wanting to sit up in the infant seat, so I think this will be better. The seat will hold me until I'm 70 pounds - can you imagine??? It is law in MD that kids have to be in carseats until 8 years old unless they are 4 feet 9 inches tall AND 65 pounds! That's just crazy.

We had a relaxed, but good Mommy's Day yesterday. I even let mommy sleep in (sort of) and dad played with me for a while so mommy could nap. I don't know why she needs to sleep so much (just kidding - it's because I get her up so early every other day!) I made mommy a card at school last week - it has my photo on the front, my footprints and a sweet poem on the inside and my teachers gave me a rose to give to her - mom was very happy with it and gave me lots of hugs (she always does anyway...) :) Daddy also got me a card to give her and that made her cry. We went to the store and picked out some new plants for the deck - dad's going to build a planter box to put them in. Then we stopped and got mom sushi for dinner - I slept through that part of the trip, but tried to help her eat it when we got home - I don't know why she wouldn't let me try any of it!

Well, better get started on the day. We'll post more pictures soon. Take care everyone!

Just a Quick Update...

To let you know that dad finished the race with flying colors :) He's already planning for the next and mom may have caught the bug as well - we shall see. Will try to post pictures tomorrow.

We also had a pretty good laugh at dinner time tonight...Raz figured out how to get up on the back of the couch, which happens to be at about face level with my high chair. Well, I'm not the neatest eater yet, and Raz must have smelled the food, because she stood on the back of my highchair and tried to lick my face! I didn't finish dinner because I was too distracted trying to turn around and look at her. Silly cat!

We have a tooth!

My first tooth has finally surfaced! I won't really let anyone look at it, so you'll have to wait for pictures, but it's definitely there.

I had a great weekend last weekend and the weather was finally really nice! Grammy and Grampy Clements came to visit me and so did Aunt Laurie, Uncle Dan, and cousins Courtney and Kaylee! Since the weather was so nice, we were able to spend a lot of time outside. We walked around the neighborhood and around the lake where mom and dad used to live. Saturday night, we went to see the Washington Freedom game and this time it was thankfully a little warmer than last week. I think they all had a nice time - I know I did!

It's been a pretty crazy week! I've woken up before 4 am every morning so far and have been WIDE awake and ready to go, but mom hasn't been quite so ready... I also haven't taken more than two 15 minute naps a day in over a week and I haven't been eating or nursing like I should be. It's just not like me. Finally, on Wednesday, I fell asleep on the way home from daycare and mom had to wake me up at bedtime to feed me and put my jammies on - I was only up long enough to eat and then went back to sleep for the night, but alas was up again at 4. I had been doing SO well sleeping - hopefully I'll get back to "normal" soon!

Mom tells me that I'm starting at a new school on Monday. We had to take everything home from my old school yesterday. But my favorite teachers all agreed to babysit me sometime, so I'm glad we'll be able to stay in touch with them. I will definitely miss them!

Tomorrow, dad is running the GW Parkway Classic 5K - wish him luck! Mom made me a shirt to wear to cheer him on - stay tuned for photos :)

Here are some photos from last weekend. I'm getting so big!!!