Look What She Can Do!

Look at me!  Standing all by myself!


*Note to self...buy tiny helmet for Christmas!**

Controlling An Octopus

Last night we finally had th chance to try to snap some decent Christmas pics of our girl.  You see, we've been holding off on our Christmas cards to family and friends in hopes that we might be able to include a couple of pics.  Thus began the fun.

Dress baby in pretty red dress and shiny black shoes
Place baby on floor in front of tree
Santa hat on baby
Santa hat ripped off baby
Baby crawling away
Baby back in front of tree
One shiny black shoe falls off
Pic of the back of baby's head
Pic of baby's bum
Santa hat back on baby
Mommy removes other shiny black shoe
Baby rearranged for a nice shot
Santa hat covering baby's face entirely
Headless Santa baby pic
Santa hat half off baby in pic
Shiny black shoes thrown at the camera
Baby turning Christmas tree lights off and on
Pull new sled over near the tree
Baby arranged in sled (maybe that'll contain her)
Baby twisted backwards in exorcist-like move
Baby rearranged again
Santa hat thrown off again
Santa hat idea scrapped
Baby lunging off of sled
Several pics snapped in succession - all of baby in awkward lungeing poses
Sled moved aside
Wooden horse pulled close
Baby *might* be interested enough to stay still
Horse flung around by baby
Baby attacking camera
Baby attacking mommy "Don't bite!"
Baby crawling over mommy and camera to escape
Baby rearranged back in front of the tree
Baby launches self the other way
Daddy sweating in all of the rearranging mess
Dogs jumping into pictures
Mommy lays on floor with camera and wonders where the wine is
Maybe next year.

PS - we did get a couple of cute pics but you don't get to peek at those just yet!  

Happy Ho Ho!

Where's the Snow?

Bring on Winter!  I live in the second coldest capital city in the world.  We normally have several centimeters of snow by mid November...sometimes we even have snow at Halloween.  So I ask...where is it?

We've had 2 significant snowfalls so far - the first melted within two days (not before I shovelled it all though!) and the second was last week.  Here is a pic of the first snowfall...

And the most recent one last week - love the way the snowflakes look!

There is still some on the ground but it's mostly blown away or melted as well.  It's December and it's about time - come on snow!

We went to visit my Grandma today - she was happy to hear we would be coming so off we went.  Miss Jillian wore her birthday coat and hat for the first time.  She wasn't super keen on the hat but we got a few pics.

This one is when she first got dressed - she didn't quite know she had something different on.

Realization sets in 

"What the heck am I wearing???"

Once at Grandma's, she was a bit shy but not too bad, eyeing poor Grandma as if to say, "You're okay, but don't come too close!"   I guess at Thanksgiving we forgot her pink ball there, so once she found it she was in fine form throwing it, rolling it, crawling after it and then lunging on it with her teeth out, as if to pounce on her prey.  At one point Grandma brought out a funny Christmas apron and while the hubster and I laughed, Jillian suddenly belted out a 'hahaha' from her gut.  It was great timing and we all laughed at her, which made her giggle more.

Although she's not yet walking, she is so close, and will pull herself up with one hand using my pant leg or a piece of furniture.  Right now I think she's more cautious than anything, and when she does decide to get somewhere, she gracefully drops to her knees and off she goes.  It's much better than when she first learned to stand and she would drop to her bum rather forcefully causing us to cringe...thank goodness for puffy diapers!