Merry Christmas!

What a wonderful Christmas this has been - filled with friends, food, wrapping paper, ribbons, family, music and babies!
The festivities started way back on Dec 10th, when we went to the first party of the season: Bryan's 30th birthday party (old man!). Followed closely by Lara's condo party and Cathy and Suzy's holiday luau. Sam and I braved the last two parties with our friend Sarah so David could go enjoy Cats! as an audience member. We had a lot of fun, and Sam stayed in a joyful mood until 9 or so.

We kicked off the holiday weekend on Friday, with a party thrown by Ginnie and Kevin held at Andy's houseboat. Lovely decorations, good food and a cheerful Sam. It's always a treat to see Andy, Ginnie, Kevin and Karen. We missed Dave, Richard and Kim.

Christmas Eve was wih David's family at my parents' house. It was so wonderful to have both sets of grandparents for Sam and her cousin's first Christmas. You knew we would have pictures...

Christmas morning was spent with my family - with the all too brief appearance of Tony and Stacey. Alas, there was no time for any reindeer games this year. But we did make plans to play some games on New Year's eve. So we will just have to be patient.

Sammy loved her new teddy bear and Mariner's scarf:

Here is Great Grandma holding her wee one:

I will continue with Sunday's adventures in my next blog...

What a night

Well, it's official. We have a newborn. And today, we were sleep deprived!
Not sure what was up last night, but Sam was a crying machine. The only way she would fall asleep was if she was in our arms. As soon as she passed out, we would try to put her back in her crib and she was off and screaming again. Crazy. Needless to say, it was a veeeeeery looooong day at work today.
On a different note, look at Sam's toy:

Yep. Celery.

Four months

Random thoughts on Sam's fourth monthiversary.

• This morning as Sam was nursing, my alarm clock went off and Sam popped her head up with a quizzical and slightly annoyed looked as if to say "what has the audacity to make such an infernal racket as I am dining?". I cracked up.
• I believe Sammy is noticing her hands a bit more - every once in a while I catch her studying them and when they are not in her mouth they are interlaced.

• Every week Sam watches her big-boy cousin to find out what the next neat trick is: this week it was banging her hand. She does it whether or not she is clutching a rattle.

• According to "the books", since Sam started out sleeping in our room in a co-sleeper, we were setting ourselves up for a hard time getting her to sleep in her own room. For the last couple of weeks we have moved the co-sleeper farther and farther away from our bed and closer to her room. Last night was her first official night in her nursery - granted she was just on the other side of our door. I'm not convinced she has noticed that we are missing.
• Christmas is right around the corner. I find that very hard to believe.