9 Months + 2 days

The nine-month milestone is a little special because now it means that Baby Sis has been living on this earth just as long as she was living inside of me:-) She is 16.4 lbs (10% group) and 27.5" (50% group). The ped wants her to gain more weight but with her chunky little rolls, I don't see why. It may just be that she was sick for the last 10 days with a bad cold/cough and she lost a little. Hmm. Oh well. She's definitely more vocal about her likes/dislikes and I will soon be weaning her as she's almost lost interest in breastfeeding unless it's a random 2am wake-up or her first morning feed. Once she's ten months, I'll start feeding her whole milk.

She's not crawling yet but she rolls around the house like a champ and loves to pull up on her toys with some assistance. The big difference from Russell is her love of swings. Even now, he's not a fan of them. Her, on the other hand, is just thrilled with the motion. Ah... our wild child;-)

Perfection

This Blueberry Tart is perfection. Every berry was worth the 1200 mile roadtrip.

To Oregon for friends and berries

We left last Friday, the 2nd, on our 600+ mile roadtrip to Oregon to visit two very dear friend-families. It is a gorgeous drive in the summer but during the winter, the Oregon-California pass is a safety hazard. It's been three years (Aug. '07) since we drove up. Not much has changed with exception of the two little people in the back seat. Russell is old enough to be excited for the trip and Camille is young enough not to know better;-)

Strawberry picking in the U-pick farms. Russell and his friend did just great:-)

 Outdoors is a perfect place for small children to play. I wish we had this opportunity close by!

Our '10 Christmas picture...

During our infertility struggles, Anne was one ear that was always willing to listen and cry and pray. Both our girls are miracles babies (as each child is!) and it was so sweet to have a picture with all FOUR of us!!!

On Sunday morning- after a dead-battery-jump-start (thanks!!), we headed a little farther north and landed at the home of our other Oregonian friends. We enjoyed their hometown parade and the heat was enough to rival California's. Again, we were assisted with another jump-start and headed back to the farm. Dan and Jeff then headed off to WalMart for a new battery. Gotta love vehicle maintance!

The Cabbage-Patch doll I never had;-)

Two beautiful princesses...

... and their prince! Baby Rem is an amazing army-style crawler. I think Camille was a little envious of his freedom but she wasn't too jealous and gave his a huge smile whenever they were together. Rem is older by 17 days. Alysun was the (crazy) pregnant friend who flew down last August to take my maternity shots at the beach.

Thank-you to our gracious hosts who loved on us while we visited. I know it isn't easy to have more people in the house but Russell enjoyed the playmates and we're all looking foward to a visit in the future.

On Wednesday, we loaded up the van once again (including 5 pints of Alsyun-assisted fresh blueberry jam, 20+ lbs of freshly picked Oregon blueberries, and 5 lbs of u-pick strawberries) and in 11 hr and 52 minutes, we were home;-)