Aubrey walks!

Well, just a little. Tonight we were at Mike & Julianne's and Mike and Jared sat on the floor coaxing Aubrey to walk between them. She finally got the hang of it taking a couple steps by herself a few times. I'm sure it won't be too long! Julianne got it on video and hopefully I can get it from her soon.

New Office!

In trying to get organized and the house cleaned up for the holidays (and baby proofing) we've been trying to figure out what to put in our sunroom and what to take out. We just got rid of the 2 white beds that I used for photography and for extra seating. They were just making the room look too small and they weren't portable enough to use for photos, so they're gone. The computer area was a source of frustration as Aubrey likes to pull herself up and play with the keyboard and everything on the desk, which is quite small, therefore everything is at the edge. So I knew it needed to be moved and needed a solution. I moved it into the little nook of the room which is actually and entrance to the front sunroom area, but since that's storage I put a bookshelf in the doorway to block it off and put my desk beside it. Now I have way more storage space for things that I didn't have room on the little desk for. Plus I can put up a baby gate across the front of the office area as it's only 4 feet wide. It's little, but does the trick. Now I just need to find a wooden baby gate that is wall mounted - anyone have one? The wardrobe that use to be where the bookshelf is now has been moved beside the freezer and holds all my photography props plus 2 lights - so now I can safely put them out of the way!

Also, I just got new props! The Empress was having a staff furniture sale today and tomorrow and so we bought an old leather arm chair that is quite whimsical that was from the Bengal Lounge, an ottoman and an upholstered rectangle stool - all for $40. I'm very excited about the leather chair as it will be great for a formal portrait, newborn baby, small child or for maternity.

Surgery was a success!

Yesterday I had my wisdom teeth removed plus 4 fillings. Only one of my 4 teeth removed is swollen as they had to cut the tooth/gum to remove it, so that's not too bad. I'm sick of eating soft foods and want some good food - it's our ward Christmas Dinner tonight too! Oh, well I can't complain too much!

It's finally happening . . .

Well, I've put it off for long enough and now next Thursday I'm getting my wisdom teeth pulled. After many toothaches this past month I finally went to the dentist today and it was decided that they have to come out. One has a cavity and one is half missing - there's just no more room in my mouth! They are going to knock me out and pull all 4 teeth and do as many fillings etc. at the same time in a 2.5 hour time period. I don't want my mouth being opened for any longer as last time I was worked on for 4 hours straight and my jaw hurt for a month. Hopefully this time will be better! So wish me luck!

so serious!

Aubrey has been very serious at posing lately - it wasn't until after I put on a big fro wig that I got a smile out of her! I love this pose, I just wish she was wearing something pretty and natural not hot pink!

A funny thing

So Aubrey likes doing this funny thing - she puts her head against my forehead and looks me in the eyes. She's always done this, but it has increased. Now she can be sitting on the floor and look up at me, she lowers her head slightly and looks at me from the top of her eyes if that makes sense and she's signally for me to bring my forehead to hers - she's done this constantly for the last couple of days. If I can get a photo or get it on video, I'll post it!

She Finally ate a Cheerio!

Well after months of trying to get Aubrey to eat non-pureed foods, she started to bite and chew the rice crackers in stead of throwing them on the ground and yesterday Jared gave her some cheerios and she ate them all! She does seem to have a release issue once she gets the food to her mouth though!
On another note - here are some of my favourite baby products:

SwaddleMe Blankets

Mesh Food Feeder

Super Yummy Teether from Discovery Toys

Family photo from May

Catching Up: The Summer

My Mistake...

3rd molar has already broken through! I was watching the bottom gum, when the top one has already come through!

The impossible task of brushing a 1 year olds teeth!

I'm not really sure how it's suppose to be done - brushing and flossing 10 little teeth in a mouth that likes to bite anything that enters it, including fingers and toothbrush bristles. Flossing? Forget about it, how is that possible? If you have any tips on this please let me know!
So far Aubrey has all 8 center teeth and 2 top and bottom matching molars with a nothing molar about to cut through any day. By the way things are going I think she will have all her teeth by 18 months instead of 3 years!

Finally a new seat!

Aubrey has been in a weird transition stage for her car seat - she was still too little to go to a bigger seat but now she has outgrown it in length only! She's still under 20 lbs but she's around 29" long so yesterday we bought her a convertible car seat. Who knew there were so many different kinds of seats! Do you buy a convertible, a 3-in1? We figured just booster seats were cheap enough to not bother buying the 3-in1. She still has to face backwards until she gains a couple of pounds, but now her feet don't hit the back of the seat!

Christmas Craft + Home Show

We would like to invite you to a small, intimate one-stop Christmas shopping night! Come and just drop-in between 7 - 9 pm, pick up a few gifts, see some new products, grab some refreshments and visit. No pressure, no sales pitch - we'll just answer your questions, take and orders and get them to you by Christmas.

Who will be here?

Shannon Wight Real Life Photography - Gift Certificates for Family, Newborns, Maternity and Engagement. Also featuring hand-made baby hair clips, head bands, shoes, neckties, scarves and more!

Norwex® Enviro Products Inc. - Improving quality of life by reducing chemical use in personal care and cleaning.

Tupperware® - Health. Organization. Money. Environment = H.O.M.E. - Come check out what's new, get a gift and see how for over 60 years Tupperware has made a difference.

Discovery Toys - Teach, Play and Inspire: great educational and quality built toys for children of all ages.

Beauty Control® - Specializing in Spa treatments, Personalized skin care and Advanced Anti-aging products.

Scentsy® - Flameless, Sootless, Leadless, and Smoke-free ceramic scented candle warmers that use a low watt bulb to gently melt the specially formulated scented wax. 76 different warmer styles, 80 different scent wax choices, and much more! New to Canada as of October 1, 2009.

Victorian Epicure Inc. - Over 300 high quality spice blends, gourmet food products and professional cookware - founded in Victoria!

Here is a link to our flyer: http://nels.anvik.ca/~swight/christmasflyer.pdf
Please feel free to print it off and give or email to any of your friends!

Cool, Calm & Collected

It's tough being one

Ever since we got home for our Oregon trip, Aubrey has had a hard time going to sleep on her own. A combination of travel, getting a cold and teething played a role I think. Normally I put her down for a nap, or for the night, say "it's time to sleep" and "good night" and leave, then she just falls asleep! But not anymore! She only falls asleep at being held (at night) and in her car seat during the day. I had tried letting her cry herself to sleep but she just stands in crib and cries until she makes herself sick from all the mucus! But now her cold is gone, we thought we would try it again.
2 nights ago she woke up at 2:30 am, I held her until she went back to sleep and tried putting her back in her crib with no success, so I just let her cry. After 20 mins I went back in, laid her down and left, she continued to cry for an hour straight. At the end of the hour she was still standing, holding onto the crib railing with her face on her hands, drifting in and out of sleep! So Jared laid her down and she cried for a few minutes but FINALLY flopped over and went to sleep. She slept until 8 am. The next day she took 2 naps in her crib, one for 2 hours and one for 1 hour and it only took her a few minutes of crying to get to sleep. Last night she cried for 5 mins and went to sleep, waking up around midnight and again at 5:30 when Jared left for work, but both times was able to put herself back to sleep - thank goodness!
2 weeks of sleeping on the couch with her and her in our bed are finally over, and although we were tired in the middle of the night letting her cry for an hour, it was really funny to see her sleeping as she stood there holding on to her crib - I wish I had a photo!

one

just some funny photos

We haven't played with photo booth on the computer for a while, and never with Aubrey - it was a lot of fun!

The Hunchback of the Wighthouse!

Twins!

Halloween Again!

We went out Trick or Treating with Nels and Tricia and their kids, it was lots of fun and great to see all the costumes. I finally got some better photos of Aubrey in her costume.

Happy Halloween!

I tried putting Aubrey's costume on her and she was drowning in it. She wasn't happy, and this was the only photo I got! I put it on her early in hopes of a photo as she face-planted onto one of her toys, which left a nickel-sized circle bruise on her cheek, and I was trying to get the photo before it bruised up more!

Old Photos

I was going through the memory cards on our little point and shoot camera and came across a few photos that I like, but aren't good enough quality to do anything with, so I thought I'd share them here.

Aubrey was in her bouncy chair while I took a shower one day and when I came out she was asleep but still holding the toy that hung in front of her!

This is how I managed to get so much scrapbooking done! She layed on a pillow on my lap in front of me while I worked!

Happy Anniversary!

Today is our 8th anniversary. Photo is taken on Sunset Beach near Seaside, Oregon.

Birthday Party

We had Aubrey's birthday party on Friday night for family. I was worried she wouldn't be able to stay up late enough, but she had a late morning nap (2 hours) and then stayed awake for over 4 hours and had an hour nap before dinner, so it all worked out! She opened her gifts very well and liked all her presents - thank you! She did not, however, like her cake and ice cream! I think the ice cream was just too cold!

Curiosity

Happy 1st Birthday Aubrey!

Such a good girl!

I just have to say what a good natured baby Aubrey is! She has traveled so well - she takes her naps and they somehow work into our schedule. We tried to be out the door at the time she has her first nap, around 9am so that she can sleep on the drive to wherever we are going, then she's awake for our activities. Then she has an afternoon nap while we are driving around some more. Then when we are done visiting a place for the day she has her last bottle and she goes to bed for the night on the drive home. It hasn't all worked out perfect, but it hasn't been a problem either. She did sleep through the night completely once, but that's it. But it's hard to be upset in the middle of the night when she's just so easy going and great during the day!

Oregon

We drove from Port Angeles along the coastline through Washington to Oregon

This is along the coastline in the Olympic National Park

Going across the Astoria Bridge into Oregon

Inside the living room of our beach house rental in Seaside. The sliding doors are the front door.

The little kitchen. I don't have a photo of the outside yet, as it's really stormy outside!

We drove down to Canon Beach (about 5 mins away) and it was so blustery - windy and wet. We drove out the a park that sat on a point out into the ocean and it was so windy that it probably would have knocked us over if we had gotten out. We've never experienced such strong winds!

Just to show how wet Jared was after being outside for 2 mins.

Canon Beach - you can see the wind picking up the sand and blowing it over the beach

So windy that the only thing not moving is the log

You can see the Haystack and needles (Rocks) in the foggy distance

We then drove back to Astoria which is about 15 mins north of Seaside, to check the town out a little better. Here is a view of the bridge again.

We found the house that was used in the Goonies movie, this was the sign at the bottom of the driveway, so Jared walked up and took a photo of the house while I waited in the car while Aubrey slept.

And here it is - the Goonies house

So tired!

Around 6 pm last night Aubrey was fussy because she had a early nap and was really tired. It was an hour before her next bottle, but she just couldn't wait to sleep. I put her in her highchair next to me at the computer while I worked, but she fell asleep, hunched over to the side. So I took her out and put her down on the bean bag chair next to the highchair so she could take a nap - poor thing! Jared came home shortly after and though it was so cute and got me to take the photo. He then picked her up hoping she would wake up and we could entertain her until bedtime, but she just fell asleep in his arms. He eventually put her in her crib, where she slept until just after 7pm - like clockwork it was time to eat!

Broccoli Bum

When I bring Aubrey into the sunroom to play first thing in the morning, it's a little cold so I have a knitted sweater I always put on her until it warms up. We have those plastic fruits and vegetables that velcro the halves together so you can pretend to cut them apart, which get stuck all over Aubrey and her sweater as she rolls across them. I always think it's so funny when I look at her and she looks like a salad. Well today I was playing on the ground with her, I got up and used the washroom and looked in the mirror and a half of a broccoli was stuck to my bum!

sneezing

grumpy gus

After a grumpy day and night last night we discovered not one, but two new teeth breaking through Aubrey's gums. Her first molar and her last lateral incisor has broken through. I guess she's been pretty good for having a sore mouth!

Ok, I just had to do it again

11 months

I couldn't wait to scrapbook this one before I posted it!

Aubrey LOVES looking out the window and staring at anything moving (or not!). She loves peering through the curtains. This one early morning on Jared's day off we were laying on the couch after feeding her and I couldn't resist taking a photo of her doing her favourite thing - being curious!

Casting Call was a Success!

Yesterday Julianne and I had a casting call for babies and toddlers to model our craftiness (ties, sweaters, scarves, hair clips, headbands and shoes) and it was a great success! We had 7 moms come out with their kids an although we had some chaos at one point with too many people in one room - it was all great! We needed these photos to use in our display at the Sidney Winter Craft fair at the Mary Winspear Center. The above photo is the display that will be suspended between 2 tall white bookshelves which will have all our products on them. We are doing the last 2 Wednesdays of November and the second Wednesday of December. This is the first year they've done a winter market, so we'll see how it goes!

Stand Up!

So as Aubrey woke up from a morning nap, I hear jabbering and laughter. I went in to see what she was doing and she was standing in her crib holding onto the railing! She has never pulled herself up on anything before, so this came as a surprise! We had just lowered the mattress in her crib early the same week! What great timing that was!

I just had to do it

Looking at that last serious photo of Aubrey & Owen it reminded me of this classic, so I had to try it out.

Cousins

We babysat Owen the other evening so Mike & Julianne could go to a movie, so of course I forced them to take photos together (it wasn't that hard). Aubrey pretty much mauled poor Owen.

Catching Up: 10 Months old

I'm slowly catching up on my scrapbooking as I fell behind do to a felting frenzy.