Highchairs I have known

At last

They said it should have happened by now... we feared it might never happen

They said we should try and 'encourage him'... we said 'sure... how do we do that exactly'?

We introduced him to another baby who was very good at it

We used balls

We used rattles

We used cats

We used relatives on skype

then finally... on January 24th 2011...

Our little man crawled!!!!

And here's the video evidence

watch out world...especially drawers, cupboards and low lying appliances

Eye Spy

eye spy 'puss' at the mount

 Eye spy with my little eye something beginning with C.

C for Cat. Alex has discovered his little furry feline friends with a good dollop of enthusiasm of late. It started with the somewhat fraidy-cat 'Puss' at Nanna B's house. For the first couple of months Puss has been far too terrified of baby Alex to emerge from her hiding place under the house, except when hunger provides some temporary courage. Recently she has ventured out a little more, mainly to sniff around under Alex's high chair for any tasty leftovers. This amuses young master Butler no end, and the chances of him actually eating go down to almost nothing.

Poor Violet in Auckland

During our visit to Auckland this weekend a more courageous cat provided Alex with some much needed crawling incentive. That is until Violet (the cat in question) retreated to the top of her scratch poll thingy to escape from baby Alex's advances.   

First words

Firstly, apologies for the radio silence over the past couple of weeks, we've had exciting visitors and fun trips etc. etc. no excuse really. I guess I got out of the blogger rhythm. Back on track now though.

So a little while ago Alex said his third word. He's been saying variations of 'mama' and 'dada' for a while now. Initially he would say mama in anger, when he was upset or worried or confused, while he saved dada for fun play times. Nice. These days he tends to use them when he sees us, and usually the name is directed to the correct person... well, most of the time anyway.

So what was the third word? Amma? Nanna? Alex? well... not exactly.

It was 'duck'. He was in the bath, staring intently at the bright yellow rubbery friend who normally accompanies bathtime and he distinctly said 'duck' and then he said it again, in fact several times during that bath. It definitely wasn't my imagination as we had two witnesses. He's not managed the feat since but I'm sure he's just waiting for the 'right' time.

In the meantime Nanna B is thinking of changing her title to duck so she can claim the glory.

Rolling Rolling Rolling or Attack of the giant baby

This video demonstrates the refined and relatively effective technique baby Alex's has developed for getting around. Beware anything that gets in his way, being it an innocent duck or mum and her camera.

 

Keeping myself busy over the holidays

With the unique combination of lots of free time and lots of help with bubba I've felt the desire to be productive with my spare time. Do things to better myself, and perhaps better the world as well. What could I do? Volunteer my services to a worthwhile cause? Take a correspondence course in quantum physics? Even work on my CV so I can actually get a job when we get to Australia?

No... instead I perfected the art of making a gingerbread house. This included carefully cutting out and building several cardboard models, baking a half size prototype a week before Christmas and then creating the final product as unveiled during our BBQ on boxing day.

If you're interested this is the recipe I settled on

And here's the finished product, I even roped Haydn in to do some decorating and uncle Adam to do some structural consulting when the roof wouldn't sit on the foundation...

The final product of my Christmas baking efforts

Bubba's first Christmas

Yayee - presents!

Alex discovered the true joy of Christmas on the 25th... well, sort of.

The Arden-Wood family, Grandpa, Amma and uncle hOb all arrived from Australia to spend Christmas with the Butlers, while uncle Adam and auntie Chrissy also joined us on Christmas day. So Alex was able to spend the day with all his favourite people, all competing for the attentions and the odd sneaky hug from the youngest member of our family.

Like any good Christmas there was more food that we could possibly eat, Nanna B did an outstanding job, catering for the wide and varied tastes of all the visitors. Alex had a nibble on pretty much everything, he's getting very good at feeding himself now and will generally stare at me grumpily with his big blue eyes if I'm daring to eat without offering any to him.

And then of course there was the presents, approximately 9 in every 10 gifts exchanged on the day were for baby Alex. Presents elicited responses ranging from vague disinterest through to outright fear - with the occasional smile and squeal of excitement for good measure. Of course the moments of pure Christmas joy and excitement were reserved for the wrapping paper and the occasional bow. Meanwhile I've hidden away most of the new toys so he can appreciate them a new over the next few months.

By the end of the day Alex was exhausted and more than a bit grumpy (for him anyway). Haydn and I are now looking forward to next Christmas, or perhaps the one after that when Alex really appreciates the joy of Christmas... beyond just the wrapping.

OK... I'm over presents now