Author: joemama

  • Julia, Walking

    So Julia has been getting a bit more brazen in her attempts to walk. We finally decided to try and record one the attempts.

    Now she can walk, and has been able to for a few weeks now. The problem is the desire to walk. Right now, she can crawl faster than she can walk, so crawling wins out. I have a feeling it won’t be too long until she starts walking faster than she can crawl.

    Until then, I’m okay with Julia continuing to crawl. The sooner she walks, the sooner she is getting into even more stuff.

    Click the link below to view a video of Julia walking.

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  • Julia’s Busy Month

    So Julia has had quite the busy month. She turned 1, went to the doctor (four shots!), played at the hand lab thing, had a big birthday party, and visited with her grandparents, her great-grandma, and her aunt Susan.

    Julia has also started walking a bit, but still isn’t too confident about walking a lot. And she’s developed a bit of an independent streak as well. She has to feed herself most of the time, and she has quite the temper when she gets frustrated.

    I’ve also uploaded a bunch of pictures of Julia. Enjoy!

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  • Second Ultrasound

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    Sharon had her second ultrasound last week. Everything is looking really good with the baby. And the biggest news of all… we’re having another girl!

    We had a really hard time naming Julia. Any ideas for the second baby? Leave them in the comments.

  • Happy Birthday!

    Julia celebrated her very first birthday yesterday! Now her party isn’t for a little bit, but we gave her a couple presents anyway. There were some books and a ball popper thingy. For dinner, she helped herself to a mixture of mashed potatoes, acorn squash, and a little chicken thrown in. Then she had a really nice conversation with Grandma.

    We also have some video with Julia playing with the ball popper. I’ll try to upload that this weekend.

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  • Catching Up, Part 2

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    So continuing to catch up here, I have recently started brewing my own beer. A couple weeks ago, I started brewing my very first batch, and went with something pretty neutral. I need to get the process down first before trying anything different.

    After the brew sat for a couple weeks, it was time to bottle. The picture to the left is the finished result – 44 bottles of beer. Now they will sit for about a week, then they are ready for drinking.

    Speaking of brewing at home, I ran across a still that makes 1.4 liters of 92 proof liquor in only 4 hours. You add the material to it like a coffee maker, turn it on, and come back 4 hours later with your booze. Of course, you could take the booze and run it through again, making it even more potent. How crazy is that? And at only $300, it might pay for itself pretty quickly. Two issues, though. The company is based in Germany, so shipping could be a pain, and it might not be exactly legal around here. And I don’t see anywhere on the site where you get the mash from.

    [tags]Beer, Homebrew[/tags]

  • Catching Up…

    I haven’t exactly been writing a whole lot this month, and I really haven’t said much about Julia lately. She is doing great, and has been learning all sorts of new things. Still not walking, but cruising all over the place. Sharon lines up the furniture and some toys so Julia can cruise throughout the living room and dining room. Julia is also learning to put shapes in her shape sorter (circles so far, no triangles or squares), babbling on and on, saying Mommy and Daddy every once in a while, and ‘playing’ the xylophone. In fact, Julia absolutely loves the mallet that came with the xylophone, she crawls around with it, hitting stuff, scraping it across tables, the floor, the cat tree, whatever is around.

    I posted some pictures last week too. Here’s some I like.

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  • Frank Bastone

    My grandfather, Frank Bastone, passed away on January 14 after a long battle with cancer. I was in NY last week for the funeral. It was sad of course, but he’s in a better place now.

    Read on for the obituary.
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  • State of the Union Drinking Game

    It’s a drinking game based on the State of the Union address tonight. I know I don’t want to play it, I wouldn’t be able to keep up. Check out a sampler of what gets you a drink: Iraq, Baghdad, elections, troops, evil, and education.

    I’d be done in the first couple minutes.

  • Will it Blend?

    This has been floating out there for a while, but I just wanted to share it with everyone. I was fascinated by a series of videos from Will it Blend. Basically, a guy puts random stuff if the blender and tests to see if it blends. It always does. By the way, they are advertising for the blender, so it’s not just some random guy blending stuff because he’s bored.

    There is something just goofy about the videos. And they are a hoot to watch. There’s something about destroying stuff that is just so appealing.

    As a side note, I think putting the ads at the end of the video is a great idea. It’s amazing that people are putting ads within ads.

  • Picture Gallery #13

    Happy New Year! To get started the year off right, I’ve uploaded a bunch of pictures of Julia over the holidays. Here’s a few of my favorites.

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    [tags]Pictures, Photos, Julia, Family[/tags]