Christmas Angel

Every year we create a home made Christmas Angel to top our tree. It's become a fun holiday tradition that we hope our model will tolerate as long as possible [til at least her 30s]. It's also interesting for us to see all of the changes that have come about year to year.

HoHo hack, cough, wheeze, ugh...

First cold of the season being battled and it ain't been pretty for some of us...

Lola 1                          Cold 0
Lola's parents -2         Cold 2

New table and chairs

Lola sitting in her new chair

Wetting her whistle with a friend

We found a nice solid wood table and chair set on Etsy for Lola. She needs someplace to draw, have snacks, and of course host tea parties with her favorite stuffed friends.

Here she is, playing with her new acquisition:

Face painting

Lola's daycare is great about incorporating lots of art projects into the kids' daily activities; and on this particular day, when I came to pick her up I found that she was the canvas!

Who's your Papi?

Clementine and Papi. The lovers at play.

First Visit to the Dentist

It seems like only yesterday that Lola had two small teeth emerging from her gums, we marveled over them and realized we'd need to start brushing them soon. Now, after many months of tooth growing and brushing it was finally time to go see the dentist. Lola has always had a spirited relationship with her oral care (it usually involves some restraint and thrashing around) so we weren't sure what to expect.

Lola hanging out in the waiting room with her pal Dora

The dentist asked me to hold Lola in my lap while they checked how many teeth have emerged, cleaned them, and gave us tips on how best to brush her teeth in the future. Here is Lola just after they finished.

Jelly Donut Face

Lola and I went out to get some sunflower seeds for the bird feeders and on our way we may or may not have had a snack. I'll never tell.

It has that new car smell....

After thirteen years and over 167,000 miles of faithful service, the vaunted Green Machine (aka the family mobile) finally told us it was time to move on without her.

The 99 Ford Explorer put out to pasture

We needed another vehicle that had space for dogs, baby, and assorted accoutrement - as well as some kind of better fuel economy. After much research, the result came as a 2011 GMC Terrain. It is a smaller SUV that has enough space and sipped the gas (terrain - 26 mpg) rather than quaffing great super tankers worth of fuel (explorer - 11 mpg).

Behold.....!

2011 GMC Terrain

In spite of the time it took to find it and the resulting time crunch we ended up being in to actually buy it, we came away very pleased. The Terrain has some nice features like satellite radio, OnStar, and a backup camera (very coolamondo, says the daddy.). It has done nicely on the trips up to Massachusetts and daily commutes to work and daycare.

First tricycle ride

We regularly take walks around the block and at first, Lola rode in her stroller, she then graduated to riding in a backpack on my back, and now she's able to ride on a (parent assisted) tricycle. Sing it with me... Boooooooooooooooooorn tooooooooooooooo beeeeeeeeeeeee wiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiild!!!

Walkies!

Over the past few days Lola has made the move from cruising to walking! She's making such fast progress, you can see the improvement in this video that spans four days.

Wagon Rides

Lola has been pushing her Radio Flyer wagon around like its her job and she expects overtime! She likes to give rides to her dolls, toys and even the dogs! Of course she's not above enjoying taking a turn herself.

Hummingbirds

In addition to two dogs, two [plus] cats, and two chickens, we have several bird feeders so we can enjoy our fine feathered friends. Maggie got a hummingbird feeder with red glass flowers that attract the zippy dee do das.

Splashing around

We visited with Maggie's family during the Memorial Day weekend, it was hot and beautiful weather. We decided to get out Lola's little tub and let her splash around on the deck to cool off. She had a good time.

A slow boat to Long Island

We regularly travel on the Cross Sound Ferry from Orient Point, NY to New London, CT. The ferry ride breaks up the trip nicely and we usually get to meet some nice people, see some dogs, and enjoy the views as we cross Long Island Sound.

You can see the dogs that had Lola mesmerized just outside the ferry window

On this trip home Lola went crazy for some young dogs out on deck just outside our window. She got really loud, pointing, and banging on the window. The owners of the lab mixes were very nice and let us pet them and say hello.

Sunset at the Orient Point lighthouse

We also saw a spectacular sunset just as we entered the port to land, it was nice to get back to Long Island and a good ending to our trip.

Date night

First date night post beeb, yeah we know how to be crazy!

Kissing the hardwood

Fat lip

We're up in MA visiting grandma and pepe this weekend, Lola has been excited to see everyone and is burning around the house. She had a tumble while in turbo crawl mode and got this, her first fat lip...

Still happy even with a puffy lip

Of course I know how to use my new chair

Lola has been cruising up a storm and is practicing her sitting. Once she can sit in a chair on her own she gets to hang out with the bigger kids in her day care class. To further this aspiration we got her a small wooden chair and of course she knew exactly what to do with it....

Little bites

Occasionally when we're on the road Maggie craves a Dunkin Donuts coffee and conveniently I crave a Boston Cream donut. While Lola isn't sharing mommy's coffee yet she insists on getting a healthy bite of my donut.

Class picture

Click above for a much larger version of the picture

We constantly take pictures of Lola but we haven't managed to sit her down for any professional photographs. Luckily her daycare had its annual picture day so we got a great shot of Lola for our collection.

Moooo

We got this rocking cow when Lola was just a couple of months old, now she's up and cruising around we figured it was time she give it a try. We're still working on our mount and dismount but she's having fun!

Daddy's Oatmeal is Lola's Oatmeal

Just about every morning Maggie fixes me a big bowl of oatmeal, Lola has taken notice and like clockwork she crawls over, pulls herself up my legs and holds her mouth wide open for her share of the morning brefus.

Radio Flyer

Lola has been cruising around the furniture quite a bit, and the other day, when we'd left her in the living room for a couple of minutes, we came back to see her pushing her Radio Flyer walker around the room all by herself!

We interrupt this special broadcast of spring for...

It only lasted a day and was actually very pretty. In MY opinion.

Pigtails

Many times we've been told Lola looks just like the little girl Boo in the movie Monsters Inc., her hair is finally long enough for pigtails. What do you think?

Boo

Spring ahead!

It feels like winter is finally letting go its grip on the east coast and spring has sproinged, it was a beautiful day with the temperature in the 50s. We decided to head out to the east end of Long Island, driving through the Hamptons and stopping in the very picturesque, small village of Sag Harbor.

The first signs of spring

We were pretty hungry by the time we got there and thanks to Urban Spoon, made the decision to eat at a new place called LT Burger - it's menu is mostly "upscale" burgers, fries, and shakes. Lola especially liked the fries [with ketchup!] and enjoyed her grilled cheese sammich.

Om nom nom nom nom

coloring while waiting for the food!

After lunch we walked around the town enjoying the sunny day. We fed some ducks and strolled near the water. It was a great day to enjoy the warming weather - we even spied a local cat giving it his snozel of approval.

Puuuurrrrrrrrrrrr!!

Watching Myles

We now bring you the golden lobes!

Maggie and I have been going back and forth about piercing Lola's beautiful, unblemished, tiny little ears. However, despite my misgivings, we found ourselves at the Piercing Pagoda in the Natick Mall and after about 3 minutes Lola had a lollipop clutched in her fist and a gold stud in each ear lobe!

Baby Myles!!!

What better way to beat the winter blahs than to head south? Better still to be with good friends and meet new, friendly faces? Best yet to celebrate a much anticipated new baby???

Mindy and I were thrilled to be guests of the very tall and beautiful Brown family of South Carolina. While there, we were treated to a truly delicious and authentic southern dinner of pulled pork [it cooked for 10 hours!], black eyed peas, collards, slaw and the most spectacular pound cake with strawberries - all followed by a brisk post-prandial walk.

holy cow was that good!

But the crowning event was the great baby shower brunch held at Ms. Kitty Cabaniss' home. There was much love for Peg and her Myles and lots of loot! Click here for a few shots of the party.

 

happy mama, beautiful baby boy!

I'm ready for my closeup!

We were trying to record Lola yelling loudly but she saw the camera and had her own ideas of what should be filmed

Enough with the snow already!

Lola laughs at the cold and snowy conditions in her cozy do hickey

Clementine dutifully warms her mistress

And the dish ran away with the spoon

Lately Lola has been eating anything and everything - if we are eating it she wants some, now! While she's doing really well with her hands, we've been remiss in letting her experiment with a fork and spoon. So we're letting her practice, resulting in all manner of messy fun.

Happy New Year