Power's Back On, Cable Isn't....

Not that we've had any time to watch TV, but it would be nice to have a faster internet connection than our DSL...

At least we're back home! Last week was definitely a week of challenges...and I was in Boston for most of them! Suki seems to have grown while I was out of town. I swear she's a couple of inches taller! And now she has opinions! Her favorite reponse to any question is a very vigorous shaking of her head....and it's very clear that that particular response means "no!"

It's endearing, irritating and funny all at the same time...try finding something that fits all of those categories when you're my age!

Aside from all of her developmental changes, she seems to have taken all of the challenges of last week never breaking stride. She's simply an amazing little girl!

Still no steps without holding onto something, but I have no doubt they're coming. Its hard to believe she's going to be ten months old next week! I wonder what Grandma & Grandpa will say when they see all the growin' she's been doing since we went to visit them last month?

We'll get more pictures posted shortly, but probably not until we get our cable connection back up. The hi-res images we've been posting to flickr just take too long to upload using our DSL line. (I know...I'm an internet diva)

At least things are getting back to normal! After a trip to the grocery store and Sam's Club, we're restocked on most of the frozen and refrigerated food that we'd lost during the power outage. The craziest part is that we'd just stocked up a week before the power went out....that was some pretty poor timing. Most of the stuff we bought today was the same stuff we'd just bought two weeks ago and never got the chance to eat!

I'd even made some homemade chicken/broccoli/asparagus dinners for Suki...but I guess she's spared from my cooking for a little longer as all of that food went to the curb. (I was desperate to find or make some dinner-type meal that had meat that didn't smell as horrible as the prepared baby foods...they make dog food smell like filet mignon!)

Those are pretty much all of the updates from the MonkShack, we'll keep you posted as anything comes up...cheerio!

Suki Loves Her Mama Keri and Mama Rachel

On Sunday Ohio met Ike... we have been out of power ever since. We are staying at Mama's Keri and Rachel's house as they did not loose power. How they managed that is unknown since 2M in Ohio lost it. Much of the Dayton area is back online but not us. We had some trees down in our yard but thankfully none went into the house as many did for others. We took pictures but have not had time to figure out how to upload them. We are very lucky as so many are much worse off, but things have not been easy. The daycare center has been closed all week as they still do not have power. Living at the ladies house but traveling back and forth to take care of the dogs. Our neighbors, Bob and Barb, helped flag down a tree guy who only charged us 150.00 to take down the large limbs that were dangling over our house. I was getting worried about taking care of the dogs as the gas stations that did have power were beginning to close as they were running out of gas. I was lucky to have filled up Sunday morning before the hoopla began.

Just Another September Saturday

And more pictures of it from the MonkShack. That's just the way we are...if there's a moment for us to escape and grab a camera, we're on it.

After the hectic ordeal early in the week with Meme needing stitches to heal a cut on her side, we were eager for a relaxing and low-stress weekend, which is exactly what we got.

Here's some new pics of Suki playing with the lion her Big Daddy got for her...She loves pressing the nose and dancing to the music. In fact, she loves dancing to just about ANY music! Is this a sign of things to come?

Playing In The Sunbeams
(Can you see my new teeth?)

Multitasking? No Problem.

Like My New "Hat"?

Yelling At Momma For Not Paying Attention

As always, there's more from this set on our Flickr account, just click here to see them all!

Ciao!

A Day Trip to Indianapolis to Meet Suki's New Cousins!

Sunday brought about another happy occasion, a trip to Indianapolis to meet Suki's new cousins, Christopher & LaTasha! She even got to see her Big Daddy & Big Momma (who spent last Wednesday and Thursday with us to get some extra Suki-time in!). Suki finally got to meet her Aunt Cindy and Uncle David (Number 2)!

Luckily we managed to catch quite a few, more than I'll include in this post, but if you want to see them all - just pop on over to our Flickr account and view your fill!

Here's Cindy & David with Christopher & LaTasha! We're sooooo happy for them all (and they look mighty happy too!)

Here's the cousins, Christopher, Suki & LaTasha, all together for the first time!

Here's LaTasha letting one fly at me...I'll give her this, she's got pretty good aim!

Here's Christopher winding up to beam me...how quickly can I snap the picture and then run for cover?

Christopher's got quite an arm! I managed to catch it in action as he was playing catch with David.

Here's Big Daddy & Big Momma trying very hard not to be completely overwhelmed! (And loving every minute of it, I suspect!)

Suki apparently wanted some quality time alone with Big Daddy...oh, and Hop On Pop was there too...

It was quite a frantic day, but we managed to get everyone to sit down long enough for a quick photo of us all!

We got so many good photos, it was difficult to choose which ones to include! You really should see them all, but then this post would be about twenty pages long!

Cindy took some pictures too, once they get them posted, I'll throw a link in here somewhere to their pics as well!

Congrats again, David & Cindy! Welcome to the family Christopher & LaTasha! We're thrilled to have you! (Maybe you'll bring some normalcy to this motley crew?)

Suki Playing Outdoors

On Saturday, it was simply too beautiful to stay inside, so we all ventured out to play on the front lawn! Why not the backyard? Well, we have dogs and Suki likes to put anything and everything in her mouth...need I continue?

We did have a special guest stop by while we were shooting...you'll have to see if you can identify hime from the photos (I'd hate to ruin the surprise!).

Here's Suki's first experience with a leaf...she must taste it, of course!

Saywer's latest "trick" is sharing. She'll give you something, giggle and then wait for you to give it back. In this photo, we captured the exchange in action...

Here's the first photo with our special guest star....

We're playing around with bows for her hair in an effort to keep it out of her eyes as it continues to grow in...

An our special guest star makes another appearance!

As usual, there's many more pictures from this set available on our Flickr site, go there to view them all, if you're interested!

Forgotten Pictures

We were loading some pictures from one of the digial cameras and realized there were some pictures we took but forgot to post from earlier this month. How on earth could that have happened? Not like August has been a heinously busy month or anything....

But just to prove we really didn't plan to hold out on y'all, we're going to go ahead an post the pictures now. Are you happy? You'd better be...

Here's one of Suki from her first (successful) dip in the pool...

Here's Suki posing with her new favorite toy - Leo the Lion! (Who make wonderful, lovely and very loud noises every time he's rolled, shaken or touched...thanks Big Daddy.)

Here's Momma tickling Suki