Grandaddy Hal

My mom and I took Zadie to get her follow-up flu shot today and she weighed 19 lbs 4 oz.

I really love this video of my dad and Zadie. It's really sweet!

Zadie has always loved her Granddaddy Hal. In fact, he was the first person to elicit her belly laugh when she was only a few months old. She particularly likes his singing, which you'll see in the video. My dad used to sing me these very same songs. And, of course, he always told me that he taught Willie Nelson how to sing and I got in huge arguments with people, notably Pat Stender, insisting that he DID teach Willie Nelson how to sing.

Thanksgiving

I wanted to do this much sooner, but I'm finally posting a few photos from Thanksgiving. We all went to Julian and spent it in the mountains. I thought about it a long time and I decided this was my favorite Thanksgiving ever. First of all, I think the food was better than any other time. Mom, you have to make those same mashed potatoes next time! But more than just the food, it was so cool to hang out with everyone and play lots of cards, Scrabble, pool, king of the jungle, etc. I had lots of fun with my nephews and nieces -- it was a great time.

I really like this bathtub photo of Zadie and her cousins. Don't ask me why they're wearing rabbit ears -- my mom just thinks they're cute and likes to put them on the girls. The photo of me and Zadie and Tori was taken in downtown Julian and we were dancing with Zadie sandwiched in the middle. And I LOVE the photo of Zadie in the basket on my mom's tandem bike. A similar photo will be featured on our Christmas card, which I'll post later.

Zadie is mostly a really amazing baby. She's very happy and full of smiles, even though we sometimes push and wake her up by dragging her all over the place. We're very lucky. She's ten months old now and loves to stand up and hold on to the coffee table and carefully edge around it. She only has the one tooth, but she's eating lots of different kinds of solids and is pretty good at gumming stuff.

A Tooth!

I've been so overwhelmed by all the things that I want to post about that I can't find the time to write it all down. So I'm just going to start chipping away at it with this one little post.

Zadie's first tooth appeared on Monday, December 1st, at exactly 10 months. She didn't fuss at all -- it just appeared. Our little Zadie is a trooper. It's one of her bottom teeth, right in the middle and there's another one next to it that I predict will appear soon because her gum is a different color there.

Bathtub Video

I know this video is kind of long, but I just couldn't edit out any of her cute little laughs, especially when she does the crazy laugh at the end. Zadie only recently started taking her baths in the actual bathtub (she started in the bathroom sink, then progressed to the kitchen sink, and is now in the big bathtub). I've taken a few baths with her recently and it is so much fun. She has a grand old time and doesn't want it to end.

Zadie's new favorite thing is standing up by holding on to something like the couch. Her balance is really improving and I'm afraid she might be an early walker -- yikes! Then again, what do I know?

Any Resemblance?

When I first saw this baby photo of me at about seven or eight months I thought I saw a resemblance between me and Zadie, but now that I'm comparing them side-by-side, I don't see it! We tried to stage a similar photo in the bathtub, but Zadie's coloring (eyes and hair) is a little darker than mine was. Although she had blue eyes for about the first three months or so, her eyes are now a kind of hazel/greenish color. I don't know if they're finished changing yet. I kind of hope she has brown hair and not blonde, but we shall see! I'm pretty sure I'll love her either way.

People often tell me that Zadie looks like me, but then again they also say the same thing to Tori, too! Many people actually come up to Tori and say, "Well, you can sure tell she's yours!"

I do think that Zadie has my tiny ears and also my eyebrows, and other people have said that she has my lips, but I don't see that so much. I also think our face shape looks a lot different. I'll try to find another photo where we're closer in age and compare us. I think she's going to have the same super duper straight here that I had as a kid, but I don't intend on giving her such an awful bowl cut. Thanks a lot, Mom!

Beach Photos

One of our favorite things to do with Zadie is to take her to Manhattan Beach. Now that it's finally getting cooler out, we tend to go in the evenings to see the sunset, walk the pier, and get an ice cream at the Manhattan Beach Creamery. Zadie has always loved the beach, but particularly likes playing in the sand and kicking around in the water. Mama T is so proud because I don't know what she'd do if she got a baby who didn't like the beach!

Here's some photos we took this weekend at Manhattan Beach. The ones with Zadie and Tori came out much better than the ones with me. Zadie wasn't in a particularly smiling mood on this occasion, but she still looks pretty cute!

On A Lighter Note

After my last post was so heavy, I thought it would be good to brighten things up a bit with a photo from Zadie's first Halloween. In true hand-me-down fashion, she was a bumblebee (thank you, Izzy and Sophie!).

I also posted a video from when Grandma Linda was here, right before Halloween. Unfortunately, we somehow managed to have a five-day visit without taking a single photo of Zadie and Grandma Linda! But we do have this one video of how cute they are together. I don't know if all babies like to be thrown in the air as much as Zadie does, but she loves it!