just to see if I can....Post from my phone while in México with only one bar of signal.

I stand corrected

No slump...just me pouting I guess!

Thank you all for your comments. I should have read only one at a time and savored them slowly, but no, I gobbled them all up at once and loved it!

I do understand the one-handed typing difficulties, and the speed-reading 2 minute vacation breaks...I probably should not be so high maintenance.

Xaris...checking *her* blog...

Poll: Are you a mac or a pc? Looks like our baby is already predetermined...she LOVES playing with Ric's computer (his keyboard clicks louder than mine).

Slump

I've determined I must be in a blogging slump.

I usually check my blog daily (typically in the middle of the night, when I'm feeding X).

The first thing I do is scroll down to see if there are any comments. I think comments must be my favorite part about blogging. While I like journalling, I must like the response even better, because I tend to judge my blog by the feedback it gets...am I writing and posting things that are interesting to others? Am I writing and posting things that others enjoy?

So, I must be in a slump, because it's been several posts with zero response. I tried to combat my steadily decreasing blogging average by posting one of Xaris' Christmas pictures...and when that didn't work, I brought out the big guns--Santa picture. And now I'm at a loss: how do I top that?

Not a clue. But you can be sure when I figure out what's causing my slump, I will be sure to remedy it. And then I will surprise and delight any of the faithful remnant who still read this blog with episodes of such fantastic bloginess that warrant abounding comments.

I will try my hardest--stick with me please!

Santa picture

We got to meet Santa last Sunday while Gramama and Taita (my parents) were in town. She was probably smiling more for my silly monkey dance than for Santa, but at least we got a great picture!

following the lead...

My friend Judy just posted the Christmas card rejects on her blog.

We are trying to get a Christmas picture too...and I love this expression, but I think this photo goes into the not-on-the-Christmas-card pile.

Not so bad

Bathtime isn't so bad when you have ducks to eat.

One year later...

This time last year we attended a Cookie exchange party hosted by friends Mark & Leslie.

There were 5 of us there who were pregnant, and we took a picture--commenting on how the following year we would need to line up the babies!

Well...we did that yesterday!

Lined up by age, Xaris is the youngest

Emily is 2 weeks older than X

Marshall is 4 weeks older than X

Jack is 7 weeks older than X

Leah is 4 months older than X

All are precious!

Ricardo with Xaris Sofia and John with John Marshall

Ricardo and John are good buddies--John and Debra were some of our very first and dearest Dallas friends. We are so happy to have babies the same age! Check out the leg chubs on Marshy--I absolutely love it! I can't keep my eyes off of him, he is so chubby and CUTE!

Still double X's weight--and he has the greatest belly laugh you can imagine for a wonderfully chubby baby! We love you Marshy! (and John and Debra too, of course!)

7

Happy seven months old today darling girl!

We love you and your adventuresome spirit and happy smiles!

It's been awhile since I blogged--no wonder, with an increasingly active and mobile baby! I have less time to type!

But here's a quick update. Ric, Xaris and I did the Dallas Turkey Trot on Thanksgiving morning. It was crazy--over 37,000 people trying to get through one street! However, it was a lot of fun, and I enjoyed walking the 5K with my friend Katie. Ric ran the 8-mile course, so we only saw him at the start and finish.

Start

On our way!

Finish. She tuckered out about a mile into it.

They were setting up the Christmas decorations downtown, so we stopped for a quick picture.

\

Oh...and I bought fabric to make us Christmas stockings. Ric and I have ugly ones I made last minute the first year we were married. This year I decided to make 3 matching ones for all of us. I just divided the fabric into 3 pieces and cut them out...and they turned out to be huge! (Fun--lots of stuffers!)

Here's Xaris having fun in hers.

Hijo de zanahoria!

So far carrots have not gone over well.

The first night, she refused everything else on a spoon (even her cereal, which she loves) after the first taste of carrots.

Now she'll eat some, but with faces and spitting and gaggies.

She is pretty cute in orange though.

bluh

Got her hair up in a ponytail!

Does that make her ears look bigger?

Grandmama came to visit!

We only got her for about 24 hours, but what a wonderful 24 hours it was!

Knitting, shopping, pedicures, and lots of snuggles and smiles.

Xaris loves her grandmama.

Other brief news/updates...

We had our big cranberry apple pie fundraiser on Wednesday.

Just imagine 40 kids making 80+ pies in just under 1.5 hours.

And then the big mess that needs to be cleaned up!

It's usually loads of fun though, and this year did not fail!

Maggie waiting on apples...

Assembly lines are set!

Apple peeling station

Filling station :)

We were in the shadows, but we got a quick family shot (in between my pie-making)

I went to breakfast with Kaitlin yesterday. She's moving back to WA state in December...jealous? Why yes I am! But wishing her well, and I'm grateful for the job, opportunities, home, etc. that we have here.

I'm also grateful for a weekend! A Friday-Saturday where I don't have to work (I don't usually, but October had a few random weekend events), and where I'm not sick (like last weekend), so I get to enjoy it! Today I played with my girl, cleaned the house, stripped her diapers, got allergy tested (yes, I win, I'm allergic. Mostly to grasses and weed pollens), and made aji and cooked dinner (two days in a row is really good for me about now). I like to cook, but the planning and preparing takes more effort than I give. So, I've decided to try harder, and the result is I have meal ideas planned and groceries for dinners for the next 2 weeks. We'll see if it works. I'd like to know your tricks if you have any!

And, a closing shot. Playing in her crib before her bath.

reposession

X is asleep so I'm catching up on writing thank you cards for a few gifts we recently received.

As I read through the cards attached with the gift, I do a double take...

They include some of the normal stuff you put in baby cards:

-congratulations

-precious daughter

-beautiful baby

And then comes what caught my attention:

-her blog is great!

HER blog?

Not until this day did I realize how my blog has been repo'd by my daughter. I suppose it's understandable for several reasons:

-she's my favorite subject

-she's growing, learning, and changing so quickly we document as much as we can (and of course family and friends want to see that)

-she's much more cute and interesting than I am

And of course we knew that our life was going to change once we had sprogs. I was totally ready for the reposession of my body, my house, my sleep, my time, etc. But I hadn't prepared myself for losing my blog, that one hit like a shock. (ha ha...not really. not at all, actually).

However, out of curiosity, I want to see how much my blog has changed with the presence of Xaris in our lives. Remember my blog post on Word Art?

Well...here's another one, just over one year later. I've pasted all the text from my blog in the recent months into a wordle...it picks out the most commonly used words and emphasizes them...as you see.

I guess she really has taken over!

10 on 10

Success!

One day I'll actually do a 10 on 10 where I capture art in photographs...but my favorite subject is still my daughter, so she's in most of these.

Good morning!

Outgrown :(

Dressed and ready to go to work

Red cup

New favorite chew toy: mama's silicone baking cups

lunch/dinner? who knows. it was too late for lunch, early for dinner...I was so hungry!

jumping

kisses for gran-grandma's dolphin

trying something new

what IS this?

Discrepancy

This morning I changed her out of her size 12-month sleeper (she's getting a little long for her 6-9 month ones) into this size 3-month denim dress (fits her perfectly) and a 3-month onesie underneath it. The Robeez she's wearing for the first time (at 6 months, 2 days old) are size 0-6 months, and they are still floppy on her.

Just saying...these baby clothing sizes are a mystery.

Yep, that's a skull she's playing with.

It's one of the Mexican sugar skulls--it's cultural. She turned 6 months old on Dia de los Muertos after all...

6 months!

6 months old and so big!

We took her cupcake shot after setting up her high chair for the first time. She didn't pay much attention to it...she was pretty tired still from our weekend, but we managed to get a few pictures.

And...yesterday she went to the dr.

Weight: 14 lbs, 7 oz (25th percentile)

Height: 25.75 inches (50th percentile)

Head Circ: 16.5 inches (35th percentile)

We have a long, lean, big-headed baby!

He said she looked great though, and we're ready to start other foods. We'll likely do rice cereal first. She is still waking up to eat in the night (trying to encourage her to skip a feeding didn't work out so well--we ended up getting even LESS sleep)! She's been a pretty good sleeper, but for the past 4 or 6 weeks she's been waking up hungry more. Since she's so active, she's burning through her calories, but the Dr. said cereal will take longer to digest, so hopefully that means = more sleep! I can't wait for her to get back to sleeping 6+ hours a stretch.

Our second option is oatmeal. It tastes better than rice, so if we start with it there might be a bigger chance she rejects rice when we want to feed it to her later. Apparently the nastiest one of all is barley--Dr. said we might not even be able to find that anymore since no one likes it! ha....

Here's her iphone picture in the Dr's office--waiting to get her shots. Not the best quality because it's a phone picture--but way too cute!

(Yes, I planned this because I liked her 4-month picture so well. I matched her bow and diaper on purpose).

She did better with her shots this time around. Tiny fever, but for the most part happy, active and playing all evening.

ninety

This is looking to be a long post...but we just got back from Santa Cruz, CA for Grandma's (now Gran-Grandma) 90th Birthday celebration. We came back with hundreds of pictures, and that's not including what we'll have once we combine Ricardo's photos with the other two photographer's pictures.

Here's a mere smattering, to give all my faithful blog readers a hint of our trip (which was wonderful and too short, by the way).

Xaris got to hang out with her uncles in the mornings

Gran-grandma's first glimpse of her only great-granddaughter!

Beougheriveraguilarodriguez girls by the beach

Being silly with Gran-grandma. X did really really well this weekend. There were so many family members there who love her, and so many new ones to meet (and of course, they love her too). She was passed around and played with constantly, and she kept responding with smiles and tongue-sticking-outing. Yesterday was our first full day back, and she was rather tired (but not napping) and cranky...I think residue from so much weekend stimulation.

Getting ready for family photos.

She's feeling pretty in her sailor dress and sailor sweater.

Don't have the professional ones yet, but you get the idea.

Of course, we HAD to do the 4 generation mother/daughter shot...within 1 year, grandma turned 90, mom 50, me 30 and X was born.

Sisters and Brothers.

Hey...when is the next Sister's day? Or is it Brother's turn?

Our family

Ricardo and I played with the camera.

He's a superhero. Really!

Having a wonderful time watching Kira run around on the beach.

Party time!

X just sat on Gran-grandma's lap and ate her shoe while everyone worked at setting up.

Notice Xaris has no name tag? That's because she found it and tried to eat it. So we made her another one and stuck it on her back. She spent the rest of the party trying to reach for mine, or anyone else's, to peel off and eat.

Gran-grandma was pretty adamant that there be 90 candles on her cake!

After the party we met Brittany and Andrew, friends from back-in-the-day. We went to the beach, where a wiped out X met the Pacific Ocean.

Enjoying Pizza with Brittany and Andrew...Xaris is wearing her monkey suit. I'll try to post a better picture of it soon!

That's all for now, it's midnight, and I'm supposed to sleep while the baby sleeps.