the Willeys

On the 11th Syd turned 9-months. Sydney has become the expert crawler now and loves to crawl to something that she can pull her self up on. She then enjoys cruising around while holding onto something. She can also stand for short periods without holding onto something. So walking is probably going to come at any time. She has officially started to sleep all night!!!! This also includes no rocking just a blanket and pacifier and she soothes herself to sleep. She does a great job during nap time too and sleeps for longer chunks of time. This makes for one happy mama. Syd has started to eat some very soft finger foods.  She hasn’t figured out that your suppose to chew them and swallow, as every chunk that goes in likes to come right back out.   She loves to follow Colin around and play with whatever he is playing with. Also if Colin lets out a holler of excitement Sydney will join right in. It is so fun to watch them interact with each other. If they haven’t been around each other in a while Sydney always finds her way to Colin to climb up him and kiss his chest. She never seems to make it all the way to his face.

Some of my favorites:

B and I had a date night with C and so we took him to Sesame Street Live. We sat on the second balcony, center row, at the Mesa Arts Center. Colin was amazed at the theater and spend the first 30 minutes just soaking in the scenery.

His Sesame Street friends in action.

On the edge of our seats.

Syd loves to sneak out the back door and play in the nicely potted plant on the patio. She is so proud of herself when you catch her and she loves to give you this great big smile and the look what I can do mom look.

Colin, Sydney and I drove to visit some cousins in California and B joined us on the second half of the trip. This was our first stop at the Lozano’s house in Palmdale for the evening. We got to see 2-week old Owen and Colin and Grace got to play in the short while we were there.

We stopped for a picnic lunch at a reservoir on our way to visit the Bethell’s. Someone was a little happy to be out of the car.

A lot of people thought I was crazy to be driving alone with these little munchkins. But it really was not too bad at all. They did a great job on the ride there and back. I will admit that it took me almost the entire following week to get things back in order. (i.e. naps, unpacking, sleeping, ear infections, adapting to this crazy heat) This is what the afternoon drive always looked like. I think the next road trip I will invest in a little pillow for Colin.

We finally arrived in Mt. View! Colin was actually playing trick-or-treat in this photo.

We spent the next day at the park. It has been a long time since we have been at a park in AZ. It was actually Sydney’s first time since learning how to crawl and was able to swing.

The next day we went to an amusement park/zoo. Colin’s favorite ride was the rollercoaster. I liked it too as it seemed to be just the right speed for me. Brandon then flew in late afternoon noon and we headed back to the house for a BBQ.

The next day we drove to half moon bay and got some fish for our dinner that night. It is kind of cool in that you walk around the dock and fisherman are at their boats selling the fish they had caught. One of the boats was even a hair salon. Unfortunately no one was in the boat at the time otherwise Brandon would have gotten his hair cut for sure.

My brave boys were enjoying touching the octopus.

On our way out of Half Moon Bay we stopped at a farm. We did a hayride, pet the goats, and Colin rode on a pony.


Here is the real thing!

Of course a ride in the Tesla Roadster was a must while we were there. Thanks Phil for getting it for the weekend!

This is how we liked to enjoy our evenings after the kids went to sleep.

Keira, Colin, and Sydney right before we were heading out of town to head back home. Yes home, as in 11+ hours.

We then left Mt. View and headed to hit the beach in LA. Then we were back on the road to reality. Thanks again Bethells and Lozanos it was a great trip! We definitely have some good memories from this trip.

Videos from the Beach:

I put up very few photos to just give the highlights of our trip. Make sure to visit the photo folder under California.

We started the morning off with surprising B with breakfast in bed.

Presents!

We mainly just hung around the house and then ate lunch at Ted’s Hot Dog. During nap time B and his dad went and saw the A-Team. Then Grandpa, Grammy, Papa, and Mimi came over for the ultimate man meal!

We concluded by eating a cake that Colin made when he was with Grammy and Grandpa.

Happy Father’s Day!

Colin made the picture frames and Sydney worked on the cards.

So BIG!!!

This was the picture that we put inside the frame.

Outtakes:

Once again I’m a little behind on posting her pics and writing about what she is up to.  For these pictures we ate at a place called The Farm and after breakfast we walked around and took some pics.  This was the big month of movement for Sydney.  She started to crawl and can pull herself up.  She has been a very happy baby so far but you can already see how much happier she is now that she knows she can crawl to whatever she is looking at.  She has started to get a little more clingier and only wanting certain people to be holding her.  Like anything I’m sure this will pass with time.  Another thing we and specifically me would like to have pass is the waking up in the middle of the night.  She goes down great but we just can’t get her to sleep the entire night.  She is beginning to chat more and more and she might have associated da-da to dad.  She loves smooching on her brother and tugging on Toby.  They both appreciate it most of the time.