Bibologist

No, I don't have a license in Bibology, but I do consider myself an advanced lay-bibologist.  Here's a small sample of my credentials:

What's my position on bibs?  Well, I adhere to the 'keeps food off baby' school of thought, which is in direct opposition to 'looks cute on baby' philosophy.  As you can imagine, there have been notoriously heated debates on this subject - one such debate was responsible for the Te Kawa riots of '08.  Here's a good bib example - notice the exceptional length.

This is a bib failure.

This is a good bib - see how it bridges the gap between baby and tray?  Excellent (except for the bib logo).

And, you don't have to be enjoying a meal to wear a functional bib - this fully functional bib goes with everything.

Finally, I leave you with examples of excellent, good and 'what the heck?' bibs. 

The Thanksgiving Blog: Late as it may be

Mike & I hosted Thanksgiving this year.  Only our second time ever to host and our first one here in NZ.  It was certainly one of my favorites, just having all of our mates over, celebrating our friendship, and recounting our gratitude to God for all He's done.  I think Krystal inspired me when she said something about it being nice to have special touches, so I did some little napkin ring holders and name plates.  It was fun.  I am most proud, though,  of the turkey, which much to my utter surprise and relief, turned out really well!  Whew!  Thanks to God for oven bags!  Mike's stuffing & rolls were amazing as usual!  Here's the table & the preparations.

  

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First Wave: Caught on Film

After sneaking out of the tent to spy on the horses near our home base, Claire looked up and to my surprise, she waved at me!  I waved back and she did it again for the camera!  I was very excited and proud of my special baby girl.  She's growing up so fast right now! 
 
On December 1st, she cut her first tooth!  It took me about 10 shots to actually capture this one, hence only part of her face!

The out takes:







As this 9th month has been so huge on her development, add to the list proper crawling (perhaps the below seen horse was the best motivation to crawl!) & her first pulling up to stand!  Its been amazing to me to see she and Chloe standing next to one another....it makes me realize just how close in age they are. 
  
Happy New Year everyone!  Looking forward to sharing the coming year's milestones with you, too!

Monday-Gymnastics Day

Look closely and you may see Chloe's jumping mentor in the background of her tramp-time. And, do I see her closing her eyes on the balance beam? Future Olympian? She did get a certificate afterall and have you ever seen such excellent somersaults in a 2 year old? Guess I'm proud of my baby. The real truth is, she LOVES gymnastics. As an odd side-note, it has rained EVERY Monday morning since we started attending this term and somehow we're always running late and having to park far away. Chloe's gotten lots of use out of her gumboots whilst heading to gymnastics!

Born in the U.S.A.

Did you know that Banana bread was first made in the US?!  I just found out today!  Why didn't anyone tell me?  Here's a sampling from a recipe I found - it calls for sour cream.  I used less sugar and added cinnamon and nutmeg.  Should've sprinkled brown sugar on top before baking - dang. 

It's the best I've ever made.  Almost as good as Mom's. 

New Year's Day at the Rodeo

We've been taking every opportunity to enjoy the great outdoors over the Christmas holiday's and thankfully the weather has been cooperating pretty well. We were able to enjoy a great BBQ on the lawn with our mates last night for New Year's eve.  We did the countdown to 2009 at 9:30 - yes, we're old.  And have toddlers.  But, Kim and I did stay up 'til ~12:30 after all so I guess we still have a vestige of youth in us yet (Kim does).
This morning we drove north ~1.5 hrs (traffic was surprisingly horrific - see the last post for more details) to Warkworth (a 45min drive) for the New Year's Day Rodeo!  We all had a great time.  It seemed to be an authentic replica of Texicana if you ask me.  There was red, white and blue stuff, Texas Star stuff, Justin boots store stuff, Garth Brooks and George Straight music.  In fact, on the way to the rodeo we were trying to think of rodeo songs.  I thought of Rhinestone Cowboy by Glen Campbell, but I only knew one line from it.  Kim had a vague recollection of a Garth Brooks song about a rodeo but couldn't think of it.  Then, as we arrived to the rodeo that Garth song was playing.  It goes, 'it's boots and chaps and cowboy hats, it's spurs and a lot of gold...etc., and they call it a rodeo'.  I'd say there were about 1,100 people there.  I was a little surprised that it didn't seem to have it's own Kiwi flavor to it.  Or maybe some Aussie taint on it.  Maybe there's only so many ways to do a rodeo.  We did sing the NZ anthem, at least.  Here are the pictures:




There was also some iced cream.

And Claire's FIRST iced cream! 

Lastly, people aren't fat here because their iced cream is messed up.  It's kinda like Dairy Queen soft serve, which is good, but is it real iced cream?