Celebrating with Nanny

It was another big birthday for our family with my mum, Nanny Christine, turning 60 on 27 April. To celebrate, just the immediate family went out for a lunch together to the Burnt Door Restaurant at the Como Hotel. It was a lovely afternoon and Riley showed off his walking skills which are getting better each day. The days of long leisurely lunches with a baby content in a pram are well over! We hope Nanny enjoyed her birthday and her extra massive birthday present!

Walking (mostly running)

I had a complete meltdown around Easter time when my little man began walking - he seems far too young to be doing so. I cant believe the tiny baby stage has already passed by. Riley has been taking steps for ages, pulling himself up on furniture and cruising around for about the past 3 months. But the transition from taking a few steps holding onto something to full blown independent walking happened rather fast. When we were away on holidays at the end of March he began letting go and walking between things like from the coffee table at nan's place to the lounge - and was most pleased with the applause he received. Full of determination he began taking more and more steps, and on the morning he started daycare, at exactly 11 months old he took 8 steps on his own. By the end of the day he was taking up to 15 steps and then two days later, pretty much walking around everywhere. He's been a bit unsteady and has taken many falls, but its so cute to watch him walking around - and rather weird to be in one room and have him just appear at the door and walk on in. Here's a video of him walking around shaking his maraccas (which were a gift from Aunty Caitlin) he loves them!

Big school

I never, ever thought I would be so emotional to see Riley go off to start daycare. It was a huge mental shift to go from spending all day every day with my little man to getting my head around him spending all day with other people. But of course I have to work and so the day was inevitable really. I had a long time to prepare mentally but it didnt make it any easier when the day actually arrived. He started when he was exactly 11 months old on 14 April. He is lucky enough to be going to a daycare centre run by his Nanna Jann so he seemed really happy when she met him at the door on his first day. He loved it and seemed very happy to walk around (yes walking coincided with starting daycare) and play with all the toys and other children. I was a mess and cried for most of the morning! But we're now coming into our fourth week and have both adapted well to the new routine. And I am lucky enough to be able to drop him off and pick him up myself so we still gets lots of quality time together. Here is a pic of us on his first morning - check out his cute school bag!

The last hoorah - holiday to South West Rocks

It was my second last week off work with Riley so we decided to hit the road for a break away before starting work/daycare. On 30 March we headed north to South West Rocks to visit my grandmother Marie and Eric. It was a great week away. Riley travelled so well in the car and enjoyed his time visiting his great grandmother and showing off his (almost) walking skills to anyone who would watch. It was a very wet week to say the least - being just south of Coffs Harbour we happened to time our trip with a huge lot of rain that resulted in bad floods. But in South West Rocks we werent flooded and we made the most of our time on holidays going on drives, walks, shopping and of course lots of eating and drinking at the various pubs and restaurants. This pic of Riley with Grandad Jeff was taken at the Smithtown Hotel where we enjoyed lunch on our last day - everyone thinks they are very alike,

Settling in well

Well as most of you already know, Riley and I made the move back to the 'big smoke' early in February - cant believe it's already been three whole months! The move was massive and certainly not something I'd like to repeat again in a hurry. It took so much work, weeks of packing and clearing out 6 years of stuff from the Canberra house. It was hard emotionally (and physically in 38 degree heat with no aircon) to be putting that part of my life behind me but I know it was the right thing to do to be closer to family and friends for support - thanks to those who helped with the move, namely mum and dad, Jann, Mike and Leonie, Matt and Mel and Doug and KJ. I am sincerely grateful and appreciate everything you did. Feeling very settled being back in the shire and loving the life - although I dont know where summer went so fast! I am now back working again, three days a week from home doing PR and media work for a friend's company who has some great Canberra-based clients http://www.threesides.com.au/. Riley is in daycare two days, and spends a day with Nanny Christine too. He is loving it. Here are a few pics I took on moving day.

Off and racing!

The little man has been up and about properely crawling for over a month now. And when he gets going he can really move. Here's a short clip of him crawling along...

Reflections - 9 months

I must be the most terrible blogger ever! I have been so slack with updates lately and have just realised my last post was from Christmas. It's now March! My, how time flies! Riley is now 9 1/2 months so I thought I better give an update on all the milestones he has reached over the past 6 months. This is just as much a record for myself (and one day for Riley) and Im sure will not be particularly exciting for anyone else.

Teeth - man this kid has teeth! He already has 8 of the suckers and teething is really the only time I have trouble with riley being unsettled. He got his first 2 on the bottom on 17 September, the next 4 at once (yes that's the top 4 teeth at one time!! on 27 November, and another two on the bottom early in January. So when he gives his cheeky grins he has a full mouth! It helps for eating solids which he is now and expert at. He is so cute to watch eating his little finger foods like vegemite on bread which he loves.

Moving - the kid can move! Riley first rolled to his side on 24 August, then did his first complete roll on 28 September. Both these milestones happened after big days out - the former after Aunty Mel's 31st birthday party, the latter after Jack's christening. He must have been stimulated after the party atmospheres! After trying for some time, and looking rather awkward folded in half, Riley began sitting up unassisted to play with his toys on 3 December. Those were the days - when I could just park him in one spot and he would sit still and just play with whatever toys were in reach. That didnt last long!

In the midst of a gorgeous holiday spent at the beach in Sydney, he started getting around commando-crawl style. He was off. This started on 6 January and was quickly followed by learning to sit up from a crawl, and pull himself up on furniture to stand. Proper crawling started just shy of his 9 month birhtday on 7 February. All this has kept me on my toes and the little man is now happily into everything. Don't underestimate a baby's brain! Riley has radar for whatever it is I dont want him to have.

This morning I took him for a check up at the clinic and as of today, just short of 10 months old, he weighs 9.5 kilos and is 73 cm long. Both are exactly average. It is incredible to see how much he is growing and changing. This pic was taken of him playing in his baby pool in Canberra mid January.

Baby's first Christmas

Riley's first Christmas surpassed all expectations! We had a fantastic few weeks in Sydney catching up with all our friends and family and generally enjoying the silly season. The festivities kicked off with putting up the old family Christmas tree at Nan and Grandad's place which Riley loved. He kept grabbing all the decorations and loved to pull on the branches. In early December I decided to make my own Christmas cards for friends and family which involved dressing Riley up in red, donning the reindeer antlers and covering him in tinsel. It made for a very amusing photo shoot with about 60 photos to choose from. In the end two made the cut but there are some most amusing outakes you can see via the My Photos link. They were, on the whole, very well received although I got a few comments like ' how could you do that to your child?!'... easy, they'll be good fodder for his 21st!

For me, Christmas Eve was spent at the old Heathcote pub (once Riley was in dreamland of course) and it was nice to catch up with friends. Although the fact that we were placing bets on when the first fight would break out probably eludes to the type of crowd that place pulls (and for the record it was at 10:30pm with Mel Sneddon taking the prize pool). Christmas Day was one of the best ever. Riley is obviously too young to understand what was going on but he definitely picked up on all the excitement and was a very happy little chap. He was showered with so many gifts (enough toys to open a toy shop!) and loved pulling on the paper and chewing the ribbons on other people's gifts. We enjoyed opening presents with Nanny and Grandad, Mike and Leonie in the morning and then headed to the Navin's for a massive Christmas lunch with both our families and the Paynes. It was so much fun but needless to say, Riley was very well tuckered out by his bed time. Boxing Day was spent out at Picton at my Aunty Carol's place with lots of family around us which was so great. There were lots of kids for Riley to play with and he even had his first ride on a horse! We also caught up with Nana Jann and Pa Terry and Joan in the following few days for more Christmas cheer and Riley was even more spoilt with gorgeous gifts. I really hope all Riley's Christmases will be this wonderful. We truly are blessed to have such loving family and friends. There's loads of Christmas pics at the My Photos link.

Off to Manyana

Mum and Dad have a lovely holiday house on the NSW South Coast at the quaint little town of Manyana. We have been visiting as a family since they bought the house almost 20 years ago, and in early December I decided it was time to take the little man for his first visit to this lovely place. We spent 6 nights there from 11 December and were lucky to get a few nice beach days in, including one which was just perfect! It was so lovely to spend the day by Lake Conjola with the water clear and blue, and not a cloud in the sky. It really was magic. And no matter how cold the water was, I just couldn't stop Riley from being excited about swimming. Each time we approached the water he flapped his little arms around in excitement. It was great to head to the beach for the day, set up the sun shade tent and spend hours swimming and relaxing. The poor little mite was so buggered one particular day that he fell asleep in my arms as I carried him across the sand. He definitely enjoyed the place and Im sure he will spend many happy holidays there throughout his life.

Water baby

Once again, apologies for the lack of posts lately but being away I have been without internet access yet again. Some updates from the world of the little guy...what a busy couple of months! With the warmer weather upon us Riley has become a real little water baby. After initially crying at the touch of the cold sea water, I finally encouraged him with a swim at Cronulla's Shelley Beach in late November. He now loves the ocean! Here's a pic of him with Aunty Leonie having a swim at Gunnamatta Bay on Saturday 6 December. His little swimming outfit is so cute! We had spent the day watching Corey racing his boats down at St George Motorboat club which was lots of fun, and after enduring the day's heat decided to cool off!