Christmas recap

'Twas the day before Christmas, and Zoe tries to mail herself to
Grandma & Grandpa's house.

Boxes have been arriving from them for the past two weeks,
so she figures that must be where Santa's workshop is really located.


Luckily, she's a few dollars short on postage.

Christmas morning: Zoe receives books, toys,
a doll (which she opens, says 'No' to, and tosses aside), clothes, and ping pong balls.
The big hit? The ping pong balls.
But of course. Thanks Fletcher.

Zoe helps out Mom and Dad in the kitchen
in preparation for our

Christmas brunch with friends.

The guys show off their Decem-beards

And we end the day ends with some time at the park.

Grumpy Elf

Here's a picture of our elf from this morning.
A bit grumpy, cause we're teething again (of course, right?).

outfit partially sponsored by our friend Fletcher

Thanksgiving '09 Recap

We spent Thanksgiving this year in San Diego with family. Gorgeous city and weather, except for one day that it rained and was chilly, but the only one that really minded that was Zoe, since she wasn't able to play for very long outside. Zoe traveled well - Southwest airlines is really great when traveling with family during the holidays because there are so many other kids to drown out your own child's voiced complaints, as well as not charging for bags (though this time Grandma and Grandpa brought along the pack and play). The flight back was fun for all - a bit of number 1 on Kyle, some throw-up on Mo, and a little girl who was quite happy to use her newly learned word - 'No.' However, on both flights we were able to get three seats to ourselves (another perk of 'choose-your-own-seating' on Southwest - very few people would willingly dare sit next to two people with a toddler). Zoe was entertained by new finger puppets and a box of cheap band aids, first taking them out and putting them back in the box over and over, and then the wonders of brightly colored 'stickers.' After both flights she fell asleep once we got in the car leaving the airport. Ah well. Considering how many flights she's been on, we've been really lucky. Overall we consider her travels this past Thanksgiving as pretty good - we know it could have been worse.

Thanks to Martha, the house was relatively toddler proofed, provided bedroom and bathroom doors were shut. We had Thanksgiving on Friday, as Matt was working on Thursday. This worked out fine for all involved. Zoe was even able to join us at the table thanks to a borrowed travel booster seat from Aiden.
One day Kyle, Mo, Matt and Martha were able to go out brewery-hopping thanks to Grandma and Grandpa watching Zoe. We were also able to hit the zoo again (you may remember that in February Zoe slept through most of it). Zoe fell in love with a polar bear up close and personal and perfected many of her animal noises.

And of course, the obligatory visit to the beach. Shucks, I have to visit the beach? Again? Well, if I must.... At first the waves freaked Zoe out, but eventually she just started running at them full throttle, despite the really cold temps. She also enjoyed playing in the sand with Grandma. Upon return to the car Zoe received a full outfit change. Yippee wet sand!


We are thankful to have been able to spend Thanksgiving in such a great location and with family.

Happy 15th-month birthday, Zoe Bird

15 month stats

weight : 22 lbs, 9 oz - 45%
height: 31.5" - 85%
head circumference: 46.6cm - 75%

Her height supposedly shot up 3 inches, but I'm not completely positive in their method of measuring height. The other two remain in a similar percentile to last time.

Fun theory

Courtesy of The Fun Theory (where you can find more videos)

Race for the Cure 09

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!

A big thank you to everyone for their generosity and support during this year's Race for the Cure. We raised over $650, with 75% of the funds going directly to central Texas counties in support of people & families dealing with breast cancer.

We had a great time that morning walking with friends. As always, it is truly breathtaking seeing all of the people out walking together, all 'pinked out.' Over 20,0000 people is an amazing site at 7am on a Sunday morning.

The new venue at the Domain did allow for less disruption for those people with events downtown on a Sunday morning, but boy was traffic nuts up north. They were not prepared. We were parked on the highway, then the off-ramp, then the feeder for quite some time before bailing and parking the car at a completely different strip shopping center before walking 1 and a quarter miles to get to the start. While the scenery wasn't as inspiring as walking towards the Capitol, the people always are - we enjoyed the morning, glad to support this cause, and finished off with a delicious breakfast with friends at Waterloo. Here's Zoe that morning before we headed out.

check out those Wisconsin socks!

Updates

While posting has been slow, we've been doing quite a bit around here. Following are a few of the things we've learned in the last few months, in no particular order:

Zoe loves playing in a bucket of ice, which comes in very handy when we walk down to our neighborhood Little Deli & Pizzeria for dinner.

There are crazy numbers of bikes at Austin City Limits music festival - so many, there were even some hanging from trees. We biked in the first day, but didn't bother on days two and three. It reminded us of Amsterdam.

During ACL we also discovered another use for our wedding boots - protecting our feet from nasty smelling mud. If you don't already know why it smelled gross, you really don't want to know.

(This is a tame picture. By the end of day three, it was a pig sty.
Go ahead, I dare you to do a search on YouTube for Mud Boy at ACL Festival 2009.
But don't worry - thanks to the boots, we came out fairly clean.)

Mo looks really short standing in mud next to Aaron and Jessica.

(As we all could have probably guessed) Omi was awesome at taking care of Zoe and Aiden while their parents were standing in mud.

Kyle confirmed that Zoe loves stairs when he took Zoe out to the capitol building (idea courtesy of Fletcher's folks).

Zoe looks adorable in oversized baseball caps.

With a toddler, Tour de Fat is best enjoyed in a field with other toddlers.

Zoe can 'brush' her teeth(a.k.a. 'bite on the toothbrush).

And prefers it that way, thank you very much.
And only that way.
And with an adult-sized toothbrush.
Don't even think of getting in her way if you mention a
t-o-o-t-h b-r-u-s-h.
Yes, we've started spelling words.

Zoe can say 'uh-oh' (and now sometimes purposely drops things in order to say this phrase).

Happy Halloween!

As these holidays roll around, I can't help but think to a year ago and what Zoe was like way back then. It seems like such a long time ago. She's changed so much!


And, yes, blog-readers, there has been a noticeable lack in posts as of late. About to pick up as I catch up.

But first - the Austin Race for the Cure is Sunday. Friends and family have contributed over $600 this year, and I am so thankful to each and every one of you who has donated. A woman has a 12 percent risk of developing breast cancer in her lifetime, and the majority of women (90 to 95 percent) with breast cancer have no known significant family history or other known risk factors. This cancer really does affect a lot of people. This year Komen Austin is expecting 22,000 racers on race day, most of them raising funds for breast cancer research. 75% of the money raised stays in the Austin area, with 25% going to national efforts. Every dollar really does make a difference, and thank you all so much for helping me support this cause.

Post updates

There are several new posts below! Been a bit behind, but almost caught up. Also, I'll hopefully be putting a link in to the right for our Race for the Cure efforts this year. With everyone's help over the past 5 or so years we've contributed over $2500 to the efforts. Every $5 or $10 really does help. Thank you so much!

Solar Decathlon 2009

The Solar Decathlon is currently going on in Washington D.C. and Rice has a home there this year. One of these days I'd really like to make it out there during the event to see all of the home entries. Check out Inhabitat's Flickr set to view some great photos of all of the houses, as well as their article on Rice University's ZEROW house.

The fashionable woman wears clothes. The clothes don't wear her. - Mary Quant

Adventures at the Dinner Table

Food is a big deal these days in our house. Not necessarily because Zoe likes eating it, but more because we're trying to get her to eat it. Added to that, I'm trying to wean her as well, so we've been adding cow's milk to her diet. However, there seems to have been digestive issues so we have to go a bit more slowly. Though I like the quiet time with Zoe, oftentimes she's really not that peaceful when I'm nursing her - hands moving and slapping and poking, head whipping in another direction from the food source, or some occasional crying (because, honestly kid, the supply is just dwindling already!). These days she will sometimes sit still for a meal or a bottle, and prefers that water, and only water, be served out of her sippy cup. As you can see in the video, she oftentimes needs a toy during a meal. So goes it.

She does eat, even if it's while running through the house or sitting on the floor, and she will drink water, so at least she's getting something. She is just so much happier with a full stomach (much like myself), so we're still exploring ways to make that happen for our sake as well as hers ;)

(notice Lola picking up her own samples of dinner...)

How old are you? (or: Silly Human Tricks)

(and for those who haven't yet seen Zoe's wave)

the birthday gang

This weekend we finished celebrating birthdays from our birthing class. All of the celebrations were so much fun, and it was great to see the kids interact.

It truly is awesome that,
in just one year,
this group of babies

Fletcher, Bodhi, Quinn, Aiden, Zoe

has turned into this group of kids

Aiden (Sept 12), Fletcher (Sept 11), Quinn (Sept 14), Zoe (Sept 13)

One year stats

1 year stats

weight : 20 lbs, 8 oz - 48%
height: 28.5" - 30%
head circumference: 45.8cm - 75%

(and a short video of 'bark' for Grandma and Grandpa)

Happy First Birthday, Zoe!

So, Dad, do you think I should wear this to the party today?

Yumm, cupcakes....

All this food - will anybody help me?

So, I'm one today, huh? Where did that year go?

Doesn't matter!
Where have you guys been hiding this cake and frosting stuff?

happy birthday baby