Hanging out and Swinging

Family friends gave Sydney a swing and Grandma Munz sent it to her after some very clever box improvisation. Sydney has enjoyed the swing at the park, and now there will be hours of enjoyment in the front yard.

Because we hung it from a tree, instead of a swing set, we had to add some chain so Sydney wasn't as high from the ground.
And here are some videos of Sydney testing out the swing. The lighting is hard to see well, but the spot was specifically chosen so that shade from the tree covers it almost all day.

Muppets

Sydney's first taste of The Muppets, and I have to say that she is spellbound. I still don't know what to think of them sometimes myself, genius or lunacy? If the point is to entertain, the look on Sydney's face says pure genius.

And we have taken the Maanaameenaa theme and created a Banana Hands song when Sydney eats bananas. Similar face as the Muppet theme song, but some dancing.

More Baseball Videos

The constraints of modern technology, along with Syndey doing exciting things in more than 30 second bursts, has gotten the best of us in this next post. This is one continuous video, but split into 5 segments for blogging ease. Sorry for all of you that see this a bit choppy, but feel free to laugh while the next video is loading. I (Joshua) think the hours of Sportscenter Sydney hears while we are playing together has produced a budding athlete, or she just likes to hit things with her shiny red club?

Father's Day

Joshua enjoyed a pretty low key Father's Day. Sydney and I baked him some strawberry muffins (disaster) and then a chocolate cake to make up for the disastrous muffins (yum!). We went for a walk to Happy Hollow and Sydney had a good time on the swings.

Joshua is so good at pushing her that Sydney became the envy of neighboring swinging babies.

Later in the day we went for a bike ride with Sydney sporting her shades and panda helmet. Sweet.

After that Sydney hugged (aka tackled) her Dad.

To cap off the day, Joshua thanked Sydney for the card she made for him (with a little help from me).

Happy Father's Day! Want to see what's changed in a year? (hint: Not Joshua's shirt)

Videos

Back on the Blog

I know it's been ages since we've posted or explained anything. I'd like to claim travel and being busy...but today I sent an email to a group of grad school friends here at Purdue and within about an hour my two friends who have had babies within the past 5 weeks replied. So no more excuses, here are some photos from the last several weeks. I also have some great videos and I will try to get those up in the next couple of days. I went to a seminar at WVU and Sydney and Joshua headed on to Baltimore to meet up with some of our Peace Corps friends.

Mike with Sydney and Maddy G (Madeline Grace).

Syd and Maddy G.

The usual antics.

Syd in Maddy G's hooded towel.

The munchkins less James Henry.

James Henry!

Sydney and her godmother, Mindy.

Lucy Claire and Maureen.

These next pictures are back at home. Little Miss Ham for the camera.

Smiling with her long blonde locks.

Fun times in the pool.

What do you have in the bucket, Sydney?

I love this picture!

Acrobatics.

Sydney had fun in the pool with her friend Allison. I did not manage to get any pictures while they were in the pool (of course!) but got some nice "after" shots.

C'mon dads, keep 'em still for the picture.

Just when you think pool time is "all done."

All frogged out with her hooded towel and frog shoes.

Allison and Sydney had no fun at all chasing after me with the camera.

Our neighbor's new baby girl, Claire Noel.

I will post other videos soon but this first one is Sydney looking at the screen on our new video camera. I bought it for my research project and to use with Sydney. She loved being able to see herself (surprise, surprise). The part in the video when she fusses is when I flipped the screen back toward me so I could see if she was still in the picture. The smiles at the end are when I turned it back around! The song I am singing is from a Sesame Street video that she watched during our travels. The tunes are pretty catchy. As always, sorry for the off-key singing voice.

May at a Glance

Pictures now...explanations...now...

I had a conference in Chicago and we stayed with my good friend, Julie. We were also able to catch up with our friends John and Maura and to meet their new baby girl, Maeve. Graham was also in Chicago and thankfully his wife and our good friend Ashley and Sydney's good friend Eden visited us in Indiana just after the conference. We had a bbq at our place and welcomed friends of ours and friends of Graham and Ashley's who were excited to see them upon their triumphant return to West Lafayette.

Here's the group in Chicago at John and Maura's.

John and Maeve.

The happy family. I love this picture, it's so sweet with the sleeping Maeve.

Julie was gracious enough to host us and hang out with Sydney during our stay in Chicago.

Julie sharing her love of books with Sydney as they read Sydney's favorite book. She likes it because she likes to say the "Pop" in "Hop on Pop."

Back at home with a bbq for some local and non-local visitors.

Our attempt to get a picture of Lance and Maren's sons, Spencer and Josh, and Sydney and Eden. Trust me, this is the best shot of the bunch.

Eden loves the camera as much as Sydney does.

Ashley and Eden.


Sydney, Eden, and our friends Elizabeth and Mark's baby girl, Grace.

Sydney was delighted to get a pool in the mail courtesy of Nana and has enjoyed it almost every day since then.



Firefighter in training?