Relocation of Blog

Our blog has now been relocated to www.johnandsigrid.com

Where's Autumn?

Another month has almost come and gone. We're still waiting to get cooler temperatures as Phoenix keeps setting record highs. Kirsten has gone through a growth spurt and at not even 5.5 months has outgrown her 3-6 month clothing, and we discovered if we wanted her next set of clothes to last more than a few weeks it wasn't even worth investing in 6-9 month so we've gone direct to 9-12 month clothing. It's a little long on her, but if she grows like she did last month (almost 2 inches) it will soon fit.

We've celebrated Halloween since last updating the blog and Kirsten was the only one to dress up. She also learnt to roll from her front to her back on Halloween although at the moment it is a little hit and miss and she's also fairly lazy so if she screams loud enough and long enough Mum is going to turn her the right way round. She moves around by doing a caterpillar crawl on her back and has become best friends with Mohawk who constantly washes her hands in between me wiping them clean again.

Our next set of guests arrive on November 28 - December 3. Anne and her daughter, Margrethe are coming over from Norway. Anne is Sigrid's mother's best friend since childhood. John's parents then arrive with us on 13 December and stay through until New Year's Eve. We also received word the other day that Conrad and MC have already booked their trip for next year and will be coming out a few weeks later than they have for the last couple of years. As usual we continue to keep ourselves busy.

Guests Have Been and Gone

Well for the time being all of our guests have left. We thought our next set would be John's parents arriving 2nd week of December to spend 3 weeks (including Christmas) with us, but it now looks as if Aunty Anne and Margrethe from Oslo may be coming to spend a week with us at the end of November. They said they fancied a "Winter holiday". To tell you the truth I would love to see some snow, but that's going to be a fun trip up to Flagstaff in a year or so for Kirsten to see what the white stuff is.

I got Kirsten to the photographer again before the last of our guests left so get some pictures. Can you believe she's now 4 months old and over 15 lbs in weight (almost 7 kilos). She's also very long 25" (63 cm) and growing.

John goes away on Sunday morning until Wednesday evening on a business trip leaving us to fend for ourselves. We're doing quite well. I'm at long last trying to start my diet and exercise again so I start every day taking Kirsten out in her push chair for 2.5 miles. It's still a bit hot and sweaty and I'd really like the temperatures to come down another 10 degrees (into the 80s which are the low 30s C) but it's my time. Kirsten dozes in the push chair and I listen to music on the ipod. John and I then try to get out again every other evening after dinner to walk the dogs too. I'll keep you updated on how the weight loss goes!!

Mentioning No Names

So mentioning no names I've been nagged that as I have a couple of extra sets of hands currently with me maybe I can add a few extra posts. Well despite the extra hands Kirsten is currently sat on the desk next to me in her baby bouncer seeing how hard she can kick - trust me I have no wish to get in her way at the moment.

It's John's 40th birthday tomorrow, and I pulled off a surprise party for him last Saturday evening. There were about 40 guests in total so I was really pleased with the turnout and Kirsten was as good as gold all weekend. The extra surprise for John was that my best friend, Kerry and her boyfriend, Mark had both flown out on the Friday so that they could attend the party. They stayed with us on Sunday night before going off on a road trip on Monday for 2 weeks. I'd also booked the Monday off work for John knowing that we would all be exhausted after a sociable weekend.

Kirsten has spent the last 10 days learning to be picked up and handled by other people as up till now she's been somewhat of a "Mummy's Girl". She's getting there. Tomorrow night John and I are going out for dinner on our own to celebrate so we'll see how it goes leaving her with Nanny and Grampy.

3+ Months

I know it's over a month since last time. John's sister, Karen, and her husband, Guy have just been out and spent almost 2 weeks with us. They arrived on 25 August and left on Friday, 7 September. My parents arrive on Monday (10 September) and stay until 1 October.

Kirsten has hit 3 months and now weighs 13 lbs 6.5 oz (6.08 kilos). On Thursday she learnt to roll from her back to her front and gets very angry to find herself on her tummy. Now we've got to work on rolling back the other way. As you can see from the pictures we've also got her a bouncer. She has only been in a couple of times so far and lasts no more than 5 minutes. I have to admit that she already loves the television.

Kirsten also now sleeps through most of the night. She's typically asleep by around 8.30 pm and then wakes for her feed anywhere between 3 and 5 am. Usually it's around 4 am. The problem is that half the time she doesn't want to go back to sleep after that so that is something else I'm working on. In the last few weeks she has at least started to take a few naps during the day which means she's not quite as grouchy in the evenings as she has been. Not that I'm biased or anything but when she's happy she's got a beautiful smile. She's also quite a rare baby here in that she's blonde haired and blue eyed. John and I keep joking that we could make a fortune using her as a baby model!!

Anyway hope this brings you all a little more up to date. Best wishes to everyone and thanks for all your well wishes too.

John hits the big 4 0 on 22 September. I'm not really sure how he feels about that.

2 Months'

Time seems to go by so quickly. Kirsten hit 2 months old on 30 July. John was out of town at the annual Infosol Conference, and we survived the worst monsoon storm that we've seen in Phoenix since arriving a little over 6 years ago. Kirsten has survived and finished with colic now we're having some constipation issues which included a trip to the ER at the end of the monsoon storm in the early hours of 31 July/1 August.

We're now preparing ourselves for guests. John's sister and her husband (Karen and Guy) arrive on Saturday 25 August and stay until Friday 7 September and then my parents (Ross and Anne-Lise) arrive on Monday 10 September and stay until 1 October. You are all aware that my Mum was here for the first 4.5 weeks of Kirsten's life, but my Dad is coming out to bond. John's parents are then spending Christmas with us, arriving on December 9 and leaving December 31.

1 month old

Kirsten is now 1-month old. She had her monthly check-up on Monday and then John and I also weighed her on Wednesday when she reached 5 weeks. She continues to gain about 2 oz a day and as of Wednesday weighed in (although dressed in a clean nappy and babygrow) at 9lbs 12.5 oz. We'll be weighing her again today and suspect that she'll have reached 10lbs. Unfortunately she suffers very badly from colic and so sleeps very little, but still eats a lot. As you can see from the photo I'll stoop to anything to stop her from crying. It works, if only for short periods, but when she kicks it makes it very difficult to concentrate on playing the piano.

For those of you who haven't seen them yet here's a link to take you to pictures that were taken of us at the hospital when Kirsten was 2 days old. http://www.growingfamily.com/webnursery/babypage_view.asp?URLID=8W8T7J8Q0F

We then had another set of pictures taken last Wednesday when she was 4 weeks old. http://mystudio.kiddiekandids.com/viewshare.asp?c=60700148824UAJDPY

Enjoy