Cereal

We gave Emily her first taste of solid food this past week and she didn't seem to have any problems having a different texture in her mouth.

6 months old

Another month has absolutely flown by. It's amazing how she has changed so much in one month. She can now sit up all by herself for a pretty lengthy period of time and is rolling over periodically. We started her on oatmeal cereal and she seems to really like it. She's able to give us clear signs that she's ready to eat by smacking her lips making an almost horse-like sound. Of course, we think it's really cute. And yes, we were finally able to gather enough hairs to put a clip in this time. In these pictures she was mesmerized by the falling snow.

Simple Order

SONIC America's Drive-In has finally arrived!! After being teased by commercials for years they have finally built one in Whitehall. Today, after church Laura and I decided to drive over to the new location and get something for lunch. I ordered our food and shortly it came out but Laura’s Sonic Burger w/ NO Tomato was missing. The hopper (on roller skates) apologized for missing it, and asked us to press the button and order another one and it would be brought right out. The conversation with the girl taking the order went something like this (please keep in mind the car is off so there was no immediate background noise distractions).


Cashier: Welcome to Sonic, may I take your order?
Me: Yes, I would like a Sonic Burger with no Tomato.
Cashier: One Double Sonic Burger with everything.
Me: No, I want a regular Sonic Burger with no Tomato.
Cashier: Do you want fries of tots with that?
Me: No
Cashier: One Double Sonic Burger with cheese. Do you want fries of tots with that?
Me: I don’t want any other that, I want a Sonic burger without Tomato.
Cashier: What would you like to drink with that?
Me: Nothing, I already have a drink.
Cashier: Would you like fries of tots with that?
Me: No
Cashier: You have to get fries or tots to make it a combo meal.
Me: I don’t want a combo meal, just the Sonic Burger.
Cashier: Do you want a drink?
Me: NO!
Cashier: OK, so you want a Cheeseburger with no Tomato?
Me: No, I want a Sonic Burger with out Tomato!
Cashier: Would you prefer fries or tots with that?
Me: I don’t want either, I just want the sandwich!
Cashier: You have to get fries or tots to make it a value meal.
Me: But I don’t want a meal, we have already ordered but the other guy forgot to place and other for my wife’s Sonic Burger with NO TOMATO!
Cashier: So you would like a Cheese Burger with Ketchup?
Me: N-O I WOULD LIKE A SON-IC BURG-ER WITH OUT TO-MAT-O!!!!!
Cashier: Ok, one Double Sonic Burger with Tomato.
Me: NO! Just a regular Sonic Burger with out Tomatoes!!!
Cashier: One Sonic Burger with out Tomato?
Me: Yes!!!!!!!!!!!!
Cashier: Would you like Ketchup and Mustard on that?
Me: Yes please.
Cashier: Your total will be .....


About 1 minute later, a guy skates up to the door and delivers us a Cheeseburger!

That was actually the short version. The longer had MANY more repeats in it.

God gives us all a gift! Its our jobs to find out what that gift is and use it. I don’t know what that girl's gift is but I can certainly tell you what it isn’t- Customer Service

Everyone's asking me (Laura) what burger I actually received and it was a Sonic Cheeseburger with no tomato which was very good by the way. Also, Charlie said as we drove away that the other 2 guys that served us were the most well-mannered waiters he's ever had.

Cold Cold Cleveland

This past weekend we traveled up north to visit my cousin Becky and her 5 year old daughter Nhya. We all had a really great him. Nhya had a great time holding and playing with Emily. The temperature in Cleveland that weekend was about the same is here in Columbus but the wind chill was much worse.


Here is a picture of Emily, Nhya and Becky

As you can see below, Emily can now sit up by herself....most of the time.

I took along my fishing pole in hopes of having some time to go steelhead fishing while I was there. As my luck would have it, everything was frozen solid. Things can change fast in the cold and windy climate of the Great Lakes area. Two days before we left all the fishing reports said how great the fishing was, and by the time I got there the rivers where frozen over about 95%.. I well, I will try again later! Can’t wait till we get to go up again.

While we where there me and Emily got to relax and watch a little TV. We where watching Futhure Weapons on the Discovery Channel.

Emily's First Trip to TX

Emily and I had the opportunity to go to Texas this past week to visit my two Aunts, one Uncle and also my Great Aunt. We were all packed for a warm week, but oddly enough they had about as cold of weather as Ohio did. We had a great time visiting, singing, laughing and playing Phase 10. This was Emily's first plane ride and we had no problems. She fell asleep on take off and landing and just smiled at every new face. I was surprised with the helpfulness of folks when they saw a mother with a lot to carry. One woman even asked as I was getting on the first plane where our seats were so she could help me carry things.

Here's a four generation picture with Emily's Great Great Aunt Lavelle. Lavelle is 91 years old.

Emily with her Great Aunts - Clara and Neva and Great Uncle Bob.

When we were leaving my Great Aunt Lavelle's we stopped by Buc-ees http://www.bucees.com/ to get a snack and check out what they are known for which is the most beautiful bathrooms in the whole state of Texas and maybe even the United States (Ginny Groff - I was told you would appreciate this fact). Emily fit snuggly in a wash bucket outside of Buc-ees.

Aunt Neva made these rocking chairs for Jack and Emily for Christmas.

Emily made connection with her feet while in Texas.

Here's Emily in her "robe" that one of Charlie's friends Mike Valentine and his fiance bought her. As you can see she love's it.

We were able to go to the Rain Forest Cafe before heading home to Ohio. Emily was enthralled with all the movement, lights and colors.

5 Months

Wow, how time seems to fly. Emily turned 5 months old on yesterday. Its amazing how fast she is growing. Laura was able to keep her hand out of her mouth just long enought to get a few pictures.

And so it begins

I'm not sure if Emily's gums are itching or if she's just fascinated with the fact that she can shove practically her whole hand in her mouth, but she is constantly playing with her mouth. I've started putting the cold chewable toys in her mouth and she really seems to like those and I've also finally had the chance to try the infamous "raisin rag" which also seems to help.

All smiles

We combined Christmas and New Year's with the Groff's this year and even though Emily didn't really understand what was going on, she was all smiles as usual. Here's Emily with Grammy Gin and more great pictures are to come.

New Year's Day

Chatting with Poppaw and reading with Mommaw

Christmas 2006

We had a great first Christmas with Emily this year. We had a chance to have our own family time at our house before heading over to Mommaw and Poppaw Marshall's house. Here's Emily in a Christmas outfit from Grammy Gin.

Surrounded by love

It's getting scarier each day in today's society with regard to childcare. We, however, are abundantly blessed since my sister Randa watches Emily every day. We are so grateful she is surrounded by the love of her family and gets to grow up with her cousin Jack. Jack is so affectionate with Emily and loves to hug her every chance he gets. She looks scared in these pictures, but she really had no qualms about it.

4 months old

Emily is growing by leaps and bounds. She was 4 months old on Dec. 16. She's been cooing/talking for a while now and loves to look around at everything in sight. This was the first time I put jeans on Emily. Who knew they made jeans this small.





This Saturday Charlie, Emily and I went to Hickory Farms Tree Farm to begin the tradition of cutting down our own Christmas tree. We decided to go with a White Pine since the needles are softer. Charlie only took about 5 swipes with the saw and the tree was down. It was very strange to be chopping down a Christmas tree in 55 degree weather and no snow on the ground.

Emily's first babysitter

When Emily was a little over a month old and I went back to work we had the privilege of leaving her in the trusted hands of Patty Schmidjell. Patty was pregnant with her first child and graciously offered to watch Emily for a month. Emily got lots of attention and also had the chance to introduce herself to baby Schmidjell before she was even born. I don't know if it's the military child syndrome or mere good organizational skills, but every day when I arrived there after work Patty had Emily's "stats" all written down - what time she ate, how she ate, how many diapers she changed, etc. I loved it and it will definitely be something we put in Emily's baby book. Here's just a few pictures of Emily checking out her surroundings.










Here's a picture of Daddy and Tim Schmidjell changing Emily's diaper. The caption should read: How many men does it take to change a baby's diaper? They did such a good job.

New Job

For everyone that didn't know, today I started my new job with
Chemical Abstracts Service (CAS) where I'm a computer technician. Its seems to be a really fun place. Everyone has a great personality and I'm working with computer again. I liked my old job, but the stress of working all the time and not seeing my Wife and baby girl was getting to me. Will fill you in on more later, for now I have to get some sleep.

Bath Time at Marshall/Clay home

Now that Emily has grown she seems to enjoy bath time a lot more. Randa and I were curious how Jack would respond if Emily was in his bathtub and just as expected he splashed around and wanted to get in it as well. This will be even more fun when we start including toys.