Fun on the slide

Graffiti

Eoin got some bath crayons for christmas and as you can tell Daddy has been enjoying them a little more than Eoin ;-)

Climbing even higher....

Look how high I can climb now ;-)

Big boy booster seat

Eoin is officially out of his highchair and into his big boy booster seat. He loves sitting up to the table with us and is eating his food really well. The fact the he has discovered tomato ketchup helps too. If we give him his dinner with out it he asks for 'dip dip'.

Great book

Eoin's grandparents in Ireland got him a great Christmas present - a book that you can put photos in and then record a little message to go with each photo. His book is filled with pictures of his five uncles and Granddad and Sassy. So far it's been a huge hit!

Look at me....

...and the fascination with climbing continues.

Christmas Day

What a great day. We celebrated with mass in the morning and then we attacked the huge pile of presents that we had received from friends and family and of course Santa!



Andy and his Mum cooked a wonderful and tasty goose and a chicken and of course there were all the trimmings to go with it.

By the end of the day Eoin was over excited and tired but we all had a great day.

Christmas Eve

We had lots of our friends over for Christmas Eve Polish style. As tradition dictates there were many fish dishes and side dishes but no meat. We all broke and shared Oplatek bread and shared our good wishes for the coming year with each other.

Eoin got to open his stocking on christmas eve. The chocolate coins and gooey blue thing were the hits of the stocking.

Our friends Dominic and Agnes made Eoin his first gingerbread house. He had loads of fun demolishing it!

14 months old

And we celebrated with a visit to Santa.

Eoin now ways in at around 29 pounds and is 33.5 inches long so not much change since last month.

What has changed is how amazingly quick Eoin's speech is coming along. Yesterday he was running around the house shouting 'high five' at everyone. His other new words this month are bird, get down, ouie, and teddy. Eoin's comprehension of speech is huge and he will follow directions now; like get your shoes we're going to the park.

Eoin now has eight teeth in total. Four top and bottom.
He is sleeping around 13 hours at night and is down to one nap a day.

His energy is endless and he loves going to the park and sliding down the slide (which from yesterday he now does on his own).

Enjoying nature

Eoin has really been showing a huge interest in everything around him especially the outdoors. When we go for walks he stops and smells all the flowers and loves to pick up leaves and explore.

Big shoes to fill.

Eoin has been trying on everyone's shoes in the last few days. Here he is with Uncle Conor's shoes.

Christmas Visitor's

We have a full house for Christmas and we are loving it! Eoin has Granny and his Uncle Conor here to spoil him and play all day with him.

Eoin has taken an immediate shine to his Uncle Conor and loves rough and tumbling with him. And he has learnt very quickly to run to Granny if he needs to get away with something he shouldn't!

Climbing

Today I found Eoin using one of his drums to stand on to get to the top of his toy boxes. I think this might be the beginning of him learning to climb!

Discovering oranges

Hide and Seek

Interactive play

In the last few weeks eoin has really started to play interactively with us. He loves to throw and roll his balls and be chased around the house. This week he started to play hide and seek with Mommy and he loves to play with his cars with Daddy.

First haircut

Ok so I don't know who is more traumatized Eoin or me - well actually I do I am so sad to see all of Eoin's curls gone! I've told Andy that Eoin can't get his hair cut again till he is three.
Eoin was a star for his haircut and sat there like a pro. The only thing he didn't like, which wasn't a surprise, was the work around his ears. He loved the little vacuum they used to clean the cut hair of his clothes.

Last Day of trip

On our last day in England we decided to take Eoin and his cousin Mark to a local wildlife park. It was still really cold so we weren't sure if many animals would be out but we were pleasantly surprised. The boys got to see lots of monkeys, tigers, horses, raccoons, snakes, owls, eagles, lizards, fish and many other animals. Eoin loved watching the lemurs probably because his favorite show is Zoboomafoo which has a lemur in it. Uncle Cookie bought Eoin a lemur in the gift shop and Eoin has been giving it hugs and kisses ever since.

For breakfast I like to eat....

.......little boys heads. Very tasty!

(seriously though the horse wasn't eating Eoin's head it's just one of those great camera angles).

More cold weather....

.....it really was very cold and poor Eoin just didn't know what to make of it all! But we still had fun playing with James and Amy at the park. The girls even meet the boys in a game of football (soccer).

Great Grandpa

Eoin got to meet his great Grandpa on this trip. They had lots of fun getting to know each other and hanging out together.

Cousins and Great Auntie's

While in Sheffield we all hung out with our cousins and Auntie Claire and Uncle Mic. Eoin loved playing with Rebecca, Billy and Daniel.

Eoin had tons of fun playing Rebecca's recorder and playing with the boys trucks and cars.
On our last night there we had a tasty meal out and Eoin gave hugs and kisses to everyone. We'll really miss everyone and Eoin will miss having his cool older cousins to play with.

Maestro .....

Eoin loved playing on a real piano!

Rock on dude...

...maybe Eoin would look like a hard rocker if it wasn't for the pink guitar ;-)

Cold weather

While staying in the north of England the weather became really cold. There were hard frosts and even some snow. Eoin got to have his first experience of the real cold and waking on frosty grass (which he didn't much enjoy). Eoin hated wearing a hat and wouldn't keep it on until we figured out that if we put his mittens on before his hat he couldn't take his hat off.

Fun with the Argalls

We stayed with our good friends Jon and Judith for part of our trip and had fun catching up with them and their three girls Rebecca, Jessica and Emily. The girls are very excited about appearing on the blog so here you are girls - two videos of the fun to be had at the Argall house.

Playzone

While in Preston we went to a soft play area (oh how I wish we had one near us here in Palo Alto). Eoin just loved it and both Andy and I had a blast running round after him the huge play structure.

60 Years of Marriage

Wow where do you start when such an amazing couple celebrate 60 years of marriage! It was such a special day and a true honor to be able to be part of the celebration.

The day started for Grandma and Grandpa with a special mass and blessing. They were able to stand in the same spot that they got married at 60 years earlier. After mass we all headed back to the hotel for a big celebration. The amazing thing was that we were all staying at the hotel where Grandma and Granddad had had their wedding party 60 years earlier.

The party was a special celebration of the a happy couple. More than a few tears were shed when the speeches started and then we all danced them all away (though some of us failed miserably at the foxtrot and quickstep!).

The congratulations card received from the Queen was shown off to everyone! And Eoin was happy for the whole party as long as he could play with

Margaret's walking stick! It was a great day and I can only hope that Andy and I and all our family have such a strong marriage but with Grandma and Granddad as role models I think we might just be able to make it :-)

The Simpsons!

Well here are the original Simpson's (and not a blue hair in sight)! Great grandparents, their six kids and other halves, 10 (of 12) grandchildren and 1 great grandson. Then below we have the Irish branch of the Simpson clan.

Fiona made out the family tree (just the last four generations) and it was over nine meters long (or just over 29 feet long).

Warrington here we come

After a few days in Cambridge we trekked north to Warrington for the main event of our vacation; Eoin's great grandparents 60th Wedding Anniversary. There was a huge weekend celebration and time to catch up with family that flew in from all over the world. But first on the agenda was chill time for the boys as they sat and watched TV together.

Eoin loved having the space to run around the hotel and the fact that it was decorated for Christmas meant that there was a lot of fun glitter stuff to try and destroy.

The next day was time to catch up with everyone and a chance for Eoin to meet his great grandparents for the first time.

He also got to hang out with his Irish uncles who introduced Eoin to rugby and ummm beer. Well in fairness it was more the lime that Uncle JP had in his beer that Eoin was interested in (we all know that Eoin loves to chew on limes and lemons).

Cousin Mark

Eoin just idolized his cousin Mark who is a couple of years older than Eoin. It was the first time they had met each other but they instantly got on and played together wonderfully. They both loved to chase each other round the house and get each other excited (as the photo shows).

Leaving on a jet plane

Our adventure across the Atlantic started with a nighttime flight from San Francisco to London.

We got to the airport nice and early and it paid off because we were given a row of four to ourselves!
Poor Andy though wasn't feeling to hot and just before take off it was evident that he had got tummy flu (which knocked him out for the first three days of our vacation).

We really really hoped that Eoin would sleep the whole way and he sure lulled us into a false sense of security when he fell asleep during take off. We envisaged a quite flight with a glass of wine and a few movies but no just 40 minutes later Eoin woke up and played for around three hours. Eventually he did fall asleep again but on me which was a shame seeing as he had his own seat. But you can't blame the little guy for wanting to cuddle up and feel safe in a huge plane.
We landed on time and got through security and immigration very easily. The hire car was another matter but I won't bore you with the details of a 90 minute wait at Hertz for a pre booked car!!!
Our vacation had begun.

Entertainment while eating out.....

While in Monterey yesterday we had a yummy seafood lunch. Among other things Eoin learned how to dip his chips (fries) into tomatoe ketchup. We also gave him some ice to play with and well when we realised it was too slippery to pick up he worked out a novel way of eating the ice - the video says it all (we did clean the table first).

13 months old!

Eoin is 13 months old today and as the picture shows he has discovered the TV. His favorites are The Backyardigans, Wonder Pets and Zoboomafoo.

Eoin is running around and into everything! We can't turn our backs for a second. He loves to dance and has almost learned how to roll head over heels.

Eating is a bit of a battle at the moment but we are working on it and just trying to take it a day at a time.

Developments this month include being able to use his shape sorter and stacking toys. He has also started to feed himself with a spoon. Eoin's speech is coming on. This month we have added Mommy, baby, down, again and airplane.

Unless he is teething or has a cold Eoin is sleeping from 6pm to 6am and still takes two naps a day.

Oh and he has grown another inch and now stands a cool 33.5 inches tall! NBA here we come.

Aquarium

Today we spent our first day of Thanksgiving vacation taking a trip to the Monterey Aquarium. We left early and got there as it was opening and we are so glad we did this as all the feedings are in the morning. We say the otters being feed and then briefly saw the diver in the Kelp Pool. Following this was the main attraction for the day -a penguin walking the red carpet! It was so funny and we had front row seats. The penguin stopped right in front of us and at one point looked like he was going to inspect our camera. Eoin really wasn't sure what to make of it all!

As far as Eoin was concerned the best bit of the Aquarium was going outside and chasing the seagulls. He also loved the outdoor nature part where he got to watch more birds.

Now that we are back home we are going to spend the next couple of days preparing for our trip back home to England. It is Eoin's great grandparents 60th Wedding Anniversary and so family for all over the world are traveling back to celebrate with them. 60 years really is something!

So if the blog goes quite for a couple of weeks you'll know that we are enjoying seeing friends and family that we haven't seen in a long time - can't wait to see you all!