Noodle Slurpin'

Sofian's 2nd Birthday Mix

Just discovered how to upload it to the interwebs for you to enjoy:

 

At Jack Block Park on a cold day

Getting Back in the Groove

It seems there are some who have given up on the blog lately (that would be me) and some who are less than quietly suggesting that that's a big mistake. Thusly, it's time to get back in the groove of posting stuff to this blog as well as to my Facebook account (where I've been doing most of my virtual hanging out of late).

Here's Sofian at our local community center's mini gym from last week. He's been very interested in the big cars that they have there, but he's not been putting the coordination together to go forward until recently:



And here's Mama and the boy playing around with some trains (what else?):



Note that you can click the arrow in the bottom right corner of the YouTube video to select the HD (high definition) option to get the amazing resolution that's captured by my Flip Mino HD camcorder.

 

Things I learned from our latest PEPS gathering...

Ayana is getting taller.

Ellis still loves to hug people (to the point where she could almost be a hockey player).

Sammy can now say, "Buy it. Buy it with money. Credit Card."

And the two Dads (Charlie and Matt) without Flip Mino HD camcorders will be getting them in short order.

(for those of you not in the know, PEPS is the parents group we've been getting together with since Sofian was 3 months old)

Things I learned from our latest PEPS gathering...

Ayana is getting taller.

Ellis still loves to hug people (to the point where she could almost be a hockey player).

Sammy can now say, "Buy it. Buy it with money. Credit Card."

And the two Dads (Charlie and Matt) without Flip Mino HD camcorders will be getting them in short order.

(for those of you not in the know, PEPS is the parents group we've been getting together with since Sofian was 3 months old)

Things I learned from our latest PEPS gathering...

Ayana is getting taller.

Ellis still loves to hug people (to the point where she could almost be a hockey player).

Sammy can now say, "Buy it. Buy it with money. Credit Card."

And the two Dads (Charlie and Matt) without Flip Mino HD camcorders will be getting them in short order.

(for those of you not in the know, PEPS is the parents group we've been getting together with since Sofian was 3 months old)

Watching the fish at Mashiko Sushi

And no, the boy wanted nothing to do withsushi. Luckily we brought
some cheese.

Happy 2009!

You may have noticed that there have been a dearth of updates on the LemonDrop Kid blog of late (well, of the last couple of months). We still dearly love Sofian, but things, as many of you have heard, have been crazy. The house is under construction, my business has been brisk, the holidays came crashing down on Seattle with about a foot of snow (no exaggeration, really), I headed off to San Francisco for the Macworld Expo at the beginning of the year, etc. etc.

I'm also trying to figure out how best to get updates about the boy up through the series of tubes that is the Internet and broadcast at the right spot for folks to enjoy. The last couple of months, I've really become a Facebook addict, and have found it very easy to post short snippets of things there. We've also not been taking as many still photos as usual lately because we have a new video camcorder (which is really pretty sweet -- this tiny, tiny gadget records high-def quality video... more on that in a minute). I'm looking around at ways to easily update both the blog and my Facebook section, but if you've been thinking about joining Facebook, this is a good reason to do so. It's actually a lot of fun connecting with folks.

Anyhoo, here's what the LD looked like around Christmas time:



Mamalama and Papalapa (now known as Mayamaya and Paiapaia, as given by Sofian) made it in from North Carolina, but Tutu and Tomtom (names unchanged) weren't able to make it from Portland because of train closures. They were supposed to be here this weekend, but Washington state got flooded out this last week and their train was canceled again. Hopefully, no natural disasters will occur in the next week and we'll see them this coming Thursday.

Here's Sofian (or Tofian as he's started calling himself) and Mama out in the snow:



And here's the boy in the snow:



To really appreciate the HDness of the video, go to the YouTube page for this video and click on the Watch in HD link that appears below it lower right corner (you can do that with all the YouTube clips that are posted here).

This is probably my favorite clip from Christmast morning. We got Sofian a stuffed monkey that had lots of zippers and buttons on his clothes, but the boy was a little nervous about the introduction. Luckily Paiapaia was there to add comfort (the two of them really bonded on this trip).



Sofian has really been getting into music lately, and he's been requesting a couple of songs over and over and over. It started with Jack Johnson's "Good People" (to which Sofian would cry out "people!" during the chorus). And then, after putting together a playlist of other people-related songs, "People Power in the Disco Hour" became the next Sofian hit. But currently Number 1 with a bullet on Sofian's hit parade is the final credits song from the Slumdog Millionaire soundtrack (great movie, btw), "Jai Ho". Here's Sofian getting jiggy to the Bollywood tuneage:



And here's the song in the film (starts about a minute into the YouTube, and it's a slower mix than is on the soundtrack) -- both Parie and I are trying to learn some of the dance moves from the video to keep up with Sofian:



Alright, that's it for now. Remember, you can always see the most recent videos at my YouTube channel and catch the most recent photos at our Flickr photostream.

Testing out...

...blogging using BlogIt

Another view of the addition

with the shed for perspective

The state of the house addition

hopefully we'll get a roof next week.

Honkin'

Rollin'...

... but only backwards - five gears in reverse.

At the Delridge Mini Gym

Addition Update

Things are starting to take shape -- with wall framing taking place.





Here's the hallway that's being built outside Sofian's west-facing window; we'll be replacing that window with a doorway so the boy has ready access to the addition where our master bedroom will be.

 

Sunny Day in Seattle

We're getting into the gray and drizzly season (which last about 6 months), so when the sun came out this morning and the weather sites promised a warm morning, we decided to head out to Queen Anne. Our first stop was Urban Kids Play, a kid's store that has a good selection of shoes as well as loads of toys from our fave toy maker (Plan Toys). We stored some toy ideas for Christmas, but we did get the boy some cool new shoes. He liked them enough to ask for them later in the day.

After our shopping was done, we headed over to the kids' playground at Queen Anne Park and had a pretty good time... not playing on any of the equipment. Rather, Sofian preferred to do a lot of rock walking.









Altough, Papa was able to convince SoSo to go down the slide once.



And we did make a pitstop in the sand pit:

 

Better Under Construction Photo

don't know what my iPhone was doing in that last one.

Under Construction

The crew put up a tarp this morning due to the return of Seattle rain.
It's beginning to look like the skeleton of an addition.

Sofian at Ercolini Park

The world may have changed, but it's just another day for the boy.