Sylvie's first glimpse of Santa...

We took Sylvie to visit Santa at the mall today, hoping she wouldn't totally freak out... and were quite pleased with her reaction. She spent most of the time gazing at him with an amused smile on her face, clutching his furry collar. Of course, then she would look at the camera and lose most of her smile. Oh well, at least there weren't any tears.



This is another picture taken of her today by her adoring daddy... can't believe she's almost a year already. :(

Photos taken at Millennium Park

Here are some photos Matt took during our visit to Millennium Park a few weeks ago. Sylvia is becoming quite a little character!

Life in Alaska

My Aunt Carol forwarded this to me and I just had to post it...

A family that lives on the outskirts of Anchorage , Alaska decided to build a sturdy, colorful playground for their 3 and 4 year old sons.
They lined the bottom with smooth-stone gravel all around to avoid knee scrapes and other injuries. They finished building it one Friday evening and were very pleased with the end product.
The following morning, the mom was about to wake up the boys and have them go out to play in their new play center. This is what she saw from the upstairs window:






This gives a whole new meaning to "Build it and they will come!"

Let me tell you a story...

Spooky Kitty

Ok, so it's been over a month since I've posted anything on here. So sad... Anyway, I am in the process of uploading a gazillion pictures into Shutterfly and came across this one from a few weeks ago when my dad came to visit and brought my nieces Xavia and Lynell with him. The girls look really cute, but then if you look a little further, you'll see Tweeter looking quite scary!

Here are some more pictures from that weekend...


Xavia feeding the birds at John Ball Zoo.


Xavia, Sylvia & Lynell

Sylvia & Grandpa

Lynell

Statue of John Ball

...and, asleep.

Lilypie

This is such a cute website. I used it when I was pregnant to count down until my due date. Now we can count down until Sylvie's 1st birthday.

Green to Grow

Check out this super cute bottle made by Green to Grow, an eco-conscious company formed by a husband and wife in California who were concerned about the harmful effects of bisphenol-A (BPA). A little concerned myself, I decided to do away with Sylvia's Avents and try these. They're scheduled to be delivered on Friday. We'll see if Sylvie notices the difference...

diy project: custom paper silhouettes

I stumbled upon this today and thought it would be great to do one for Sylvie's room... cute!

Trying on hats @ Old Navy

This past Saturday we stopped by Old Navy on the way to Matt's Uncle Rich's wedding...

new blog!

Ugh! I am having the best time tweaking the layout on my blog. Who knew this would be so much fun? After much searching, I finally found a website that offers nice-looking, quality blog designs. I had quite a difficult time choosing which one to go with. It was so easy though, I may switch it up from time to time. :)

Sylvie's first taste of water...

... out of an actual drinking glass too! She was going crazy over it -- even more excited than she gets for her bottle of "whey" as Matt calls it. (taken on Tuesday, July 8th)

After dinner, she likes to devour her toy as well ...

Fourth of July Weekend 2008

Ok, my first post on an actual blog. This past weekend was the 4th of July holiday and my Aunt Carol, cousin Clint and Grandma Cochell came to stay with us for a couple of nights. They arrived Friday evening. Matt made dinner (burgers - yum!) and we spent a couple of hours catching up before Carol, Clint and Grandma walked down to the end of the next street over to watch the Grand Rapids fireworks. (Matt and I stayed home since Sylvia was sleeping and truthfully, neither of us get that excited about fireworks.)

In the morning, we woke to find Grandma on the couch instead of the air mattress she had gone to sleep on the night before! Turns out, the air mattress didn't stay filled with air (thanks Clint!), so poor Grandma found herself lying on our living room floor around 4 in the morning. Carol & Clint had to pull her to her feet. Fun times!

On Saturday, we all went to the Omelette Shoppe for brunch, then headed over to John Ball Zoo. It was Sylvie's first trip to the zoo and she was a trooper as usual. No meltdowns, which is always a relief, and really makes for a more enjoyable outing. ;)

That night, we had pizza delivered and FINALLY watched the movie, Charlotte's Web, which was very cute. I'm sure Sylvie will enjoy it one day. :)

On Sunday, Matt and I made breakfast while Clint went to play basketball. Then we packed ourselves into Grandma's car and were on our way to the beach (all of us except Matt -- he was itching to get so many things done around the house, so we left him to do just that). Our original intent was to go to Holland State Park, but when we arrived, it was FULL. Or the parking lot was anyway, and there was no way we were going to drive around aimlessly looking for a parking spot that would be too far of a walk for Grandma anyway, so we decided to head north up the coastline. Not 5 minutes later, we stumbled upon Tunnel Park, and were lucky enough to find the one parking spot available! The park gets it's name from the tunnel that runs through a dune and takes you right out onto the beach on Lake Michigan without ever having to climb. It was very nice and not as crowded as the state park down the road, but the sand was very HOT (just ask Grandma)!

Sylvia had her first glimpse of the lake, but she was not so interested in taking her first dip in the lake -- except for her feet, maybe, but full submersion will have to wait for another day I guess, although I can't really blame her. The water was COLD! She sure did look cute in her suit and shades though...

... and she enjoyed sitting in the cabana with Aunt Carol and Grandma too.

We spent a couple of hours there before deciding it was time to return home. Grandma had a long trek back across the scorching sand ahead of her...

Poor Grandma was pooped!

After we arrived back home, the 3 of them stayed for a little while and then were on their way back home. We miss them already and can't wait to see them again.