First trip to Canada!

Two weekends ago, Cameron had his first out-of-the-USA trip. We went to Ottawa for the weekend - our annual trip up for Winterlude. The three of us went, along with Mom and Dad and Matt and Gina. We got a two bedroom suite at Les Suites in the Byward Market, which was really nice. It had tons of room - besides the two bedrooms there were two bathrooms, a kitchen, a living/dining room combo and a laundry room.

We went skating on the Rideau canal, with Cameron all bundled up in his stroller. He seemed to enjoy it, although he slept most of the time. We went about 2.5 km down the canal and back. Usually we go all the way to the end (7 km) but it was bitterly cold so we didn't want Cam to stay out that long, even all bundled up. We also went over to the Museum of Civilization in Hull.

The first night we ate dinner in our favorite restaurant, the Highlander Pub. Cam was very good, he took turns sitting in everyone's laps and just looking around. He even accidentally tried a few spices because I had some on my plate and he got his hand into it and then into his mouth. I'm not sure what they were, one was red and the other was green, but they didn't seem to bother him at all. We also had a nice dinner at a Japanese restaurant, although Cam didn't like that so much. He was overtired and squeaked and squawked the whole time until he finally fell asleep.

It was a great trip and we were so happy that we could continue our tradition of going up for Winterlude every year. Below are some pictures and there are more in our photo gallery (link here).

Gina, Matt, Kristin and Cam on the canal
Everyone but Tim on the canal
Tim takes a turn pushing Cameron
Mama gets style points for this pushing!
All bundled up in his stroller
Family picture
A cool ice sculpture
The cutest little bear ever!!
Playing with Uncle Matt

Back to work for Mama and Cam's First Day of Daycare!

Three weeks ago I started back to work. It has been an adjustment, but it is going alright. Cameron just started daycare today, so for the past three weeks we have had to juggle him around. For the first two weeks, he was watched by a combination of Mom, Aunt Jen and Tim. Last week I had a business trip in DC, so Tim and Cam came along with me! More on that in a separate post. While I was at work those first two weeks, Tim would bring Cameron to his babysitting location for the day. The two of them had a nice routine, where they would snuggle together for a while when Cam woke up and give me a call. It was really sweet but it made me miss Cam so much! Tim took pictures on several of the mornings to send to me at work - they are posted below. It was a nice way to start the day, a call from Cam and then a picture of him!

Cameron started daycare today at the YMCA Sweetheart Daycare. He had a really good day, enjoyed "playing" with the other kids and was really good for the teachers. He had a few short naps, ate a few bottles and had his diaper changed a bunch of times. He played in the swing, exersaucer and bouncer. Everyone was telling us how cute and sweet he was, so we are glad that he is doing so well. Of course, we also realize that it is only day 1 and we'll see how it goes! Cam is such a sweetie though, we are sure everyone there will love him. :-D

Cam's First Hockey Game

A few weeks ago, Cameron went to his first Crunch hockey game. It was on February 2nd and the Crunch were playing against San Antonio Rampage. They lost, but Cam didn't seem to mind. He liked the game - enjoyed watching the action move back and forth on the ice, liked looking around at the crowd and he even slept a bit. We were able to stay for the whole game (including overtime and a shoot-out), which was surprising. We figured Cam might get sick of it fast. I'm not sure why we thought that, since he was born to hockey-loving parents!

Bath Time!

Here are a bunch of cute pictures of Cam from one of his latest baths. We tried to style his hair, but it is too long and thin to do much. Once he gets another haircut we should be able to style a quality mohawk or spike.

I love my bath!I don't even mind water pouring over my face. Here is my spiky hairdo. And Mama's attempt at a mohawk for me!

Finally, my little baby Curly-Q-Do.

Three months old!! (an extremely overdue post)

Cam turned three months old a few weeks back - in fact, he will be four months very soon. I want to try and record Cam's monthly progress, because I am sure that when we look back on it, even just next year, it will all run together.

So, for month three:

• Cameron found many things - his fingers, blankets, his feet, the sun and tummy time
• He went on his first airplane trip to Florida (hence the sun he found)
• Cam went swimming for the first (and second) time, in the pool at Omi and Opa's condo complex. He seemed to like it quite a bit, although he did not like floating on his back.
• Cam went to Disney World for the first time - a day trip to Magic Kingdom where he enjoyed several rides and slept quite a bit
• Being in FL was exhausting for Cameron. Every day we spent a few hours or more outside and apparently it was so tiring for him, because he would fall asleep at 6 or 7 (one night as early as 5:45!)
  
• He started chewing on his fingers like crazy, he loves them and they keep him occupied
• He got his first shots and was such a good boy, only squeaking a bit before falling asleep
• He started using his jumparoo! When we first put him in it, his feet couldn't touch the floor so we made him a little platform of duct-taped together 2x4s
• We nicknamed him Mr. Lizard because he LOVES to stick his little tongue out. It is almost like he is trying to taste the whole world.

And a few pictures from month 3....

New photo albums

A few administrative things... Links are in white.

• We have a new front page image (on the main TravelingWalkers page) - reload the page if you don't see it.
• We finally put pictures online from our Europe trip from October 2006. There are lots of great shots, take a look.
  
• Tim uploaded a bunch of new pictures of Cameron. The weekly shots are almost up to date, and Tim added new monthly pictures for January.
• Tim also added pictures from our trip to Siesta Key in 2007... soon we will update with pictures from this year's trip.
  

The rest of our Florida vacation

The first and most important thing to say is that Cameron is an AMAZING traveler. We were so, so happy and proud of him for doing so well. He did awesome on all four flights, despite the mess on the way down and then a three hour delay in the airport on the way back. On each flight, he either slept, ate or charmed the other passengers around us. He smiled and laughed at people and everyone around us talked to him. He was good in the car, he was good sleeping in places he didn't know and he was good being held by lots of different people. He is a Traveling Walker, through and through!!

In Orlando we stayed with our friends Erin and Jason, in their new house. It is a gorgeous place and we had such a good time with them. We spent lots of time chatting and just hanging out, it was great. We already wrote about going to Magic Kingdom, but besides that we also went to another cool place while we were in Orlando: Blue Springs State Park. It is a natural spring that stays around 73 degrees all year round. During the winter lots of manatees from the connected river come up into the spring and stay there to keep warm. There is a really nice boardwalk along the whole spring and we got to see a ton of manatees, including some very cute babies. We brought along a picnic lunch and ate it there - it was so nice to eat outside in January!

Manatee Mama and Baby in the spring
Cam and Daddy on the boardwalk

Cam and Mama
After Orlando we headed down to Siesta Key for a week to stay with Omi and Opa. We had a fantastic time down there - the weather was great and Cam loved being outside so much. He loved being able to wear less clothes, loved going for walks every day and most of all, he loved spending so much time with Omi and Opa!! Cameron went swimming for the first (and second) time while we were there. The pool is kept at a nice warm 84 degrees so it was perfect for him. He liked swimming, especially when we pulled him around so he could kick his legs. He was not a big fan of floating on his back, but that was probably because the sun was so bright! We also went for walks on the beach, sat outside in the sun and ate delicious food every day. It was so relaxing and we had a great time!

Happy baby!!

"Walking" on the sand for the first time

Going for a walk on the beach
Cam in his sun hat and bathing suit, relaxing on the beach

Swimming in the pool

The whole family enjoying a gorgeous sunset

A tradition - taking our picture with the pelican statue

These are only a few of the great pictures that we took, we will upload the rest to the Photo Gallery very soon!

Another First and Pics are Coming

Another first for Cameron occurred yesterday... he had his first hair cut!!! When Tim and I were giving him a bath the other day, we realized that his hair was getting really long. So long, in fact, that it looked like he had a mullet (yes, I realize that my baby having a mullet is 100% payback for all those mulleted-people in NM that I gawked at!). On Wednesday I had a haircut and Cam came along. When I was done, I showed his hair to my hairdresser and she said that she could cut it. She trimmed the back, sideburns and front a bit. He looks cute!

As for pictures from Florida... they are coming, we promise! Our laptop hard drive is almost full (mainly with pictures) so we can't offload the pictures from our memory cards. The project for this weekend is to clean up the hard drive so that we can offload the pictures and then we will make lots of posts with pictures and more details from our Florida trip.

Cam's first trip to Disney

Cam's first trip to DisneyWorld (Magic Kingdom) was Saturday 1/19. He had a great time walking all around the park and thought that it was a great place to take a nap. We went with Erin and Jason and took turns going on rides while the other people watched Cam.

Cam did go on three rides, his favorite ride was the Haunted Mansion! He stayed awake for the whole ride and was looking around the entire time, smiling. He wasn't scared at all. His next favorite ride was "it's a small world". He really liked all of the different colors and moving things but fell asleep halfway through. The other ride he went on was "Pirates of the Caribbean", but unfortunaly for him he was asleep for the entire ride.

We stopped and got pictures with Pooh and Tigger. Pooh thought Cam looked just like him (Cam had his Pooh hat on). When we are on a faster connection we will upload a bunch of pictures to our gallery from the trip. For now here is a picture of Cameron and Mama in front of Cinderella's Castle.

First trip for the newest Traveling Walker

Well we made it to Florida and are settled in, in Orlando. Cameron is loving being able to go outside! First a quick recap of the flight.

Packing was definitely an adventure - usually when we come down to Florida we would take one suitcase for everything we have. We ended up with a large suitcase, a small suitcase, a hockey bag (filled with bouncer and pack n' play), the stroller, car seat, camera bag and diaper bag!!!!

We got dropped of at the airport at 9:00AM for our 10:40 flight. When we got to the check in counter we discovered that our flight to Atlanta had been canceled and that we had been re-booked on a flight Friday morning. After a while of figuring out what our options were we finally got transfered from Delta to US Air flying through Washington D.C. to Tampa.

Kristin then spent a while on the phone and on a nice person at the Syracuse airport's laptop trying to change our Avis rental from Orlando to Tampa so we could pick the car up there and drive to Orlando. She didn't have much success and eventually had to settle for booking an intermediate SUV for more than twice our original rental price.

Our flight from Syracuse to Washington ended up being about 20 minutes late which turned out to be a bit of an issue because we only had 30 minutes between our scheduled arrival time and departure time. Also adding to it is that in Washington if there is even a hint of snow they will not run the shuttles between the terminals so we had to go back out through security and back in to get to our next flight. Luckily they were waiting to board standby passengers when we arrived. We got on the plane and everyone was already seated but we were able to get on.

When we arrived in Tampa Kristin was able to get us a better deal with the rental car and we packed up, drove through Tampa rush hour and arrived in Orlando at Erin and Jason's house around 8:00pm.

Now for the most important information. On the first flight Cameron slept almost the whole way including take off and landing. The second flight he was awake and happy for take off and intermittently along the way but was perfectly happy to smile and look at all of the new faces on the plane. He was so well behaved!!

So we have learned that even with a tough long day of traveling that Cameron still does well. Here is a quick shot of Cameron waiting for Mama to get the rental car.

Leaving on a jet plane

Tomorrow we leave for Cameron's first airplane trip! We are going to Florida for ten days - first to Orlando to visit Erin and Jason, then to Siesta Key to visit Omi and Opa. It will be very interesting to see how he does on the plane. Of course, we are hoping that he will sleep most of the time. I booked the flights for his most sleepy time of the day, so I hope that he will take a nap like he usually does in the late morning/early afternoon. I am also a bit worried that his ears will bother him when we are taking off and landing, but hopefully he will be a good flyer just like his mom and dad.

Erin and Jason just moved into a new house and we are very excited to see it (and them, of course!). We are also hoping to go to DisneyWorld for at least a day - it is about time that Cameron makes his first trip there!!

Tim and I have been going to Siesta Key to visit Omi and Opa every January since 2004 (and I went alone for another 4 or 5 years before that). Last year when we were there, Tim said to me, "Maybe next year when we are here, you will be pregnant or we will even be bringing a little one with us." Well, he was right! We are excited to be starting Cameron on one of our favorite vacation traditions.

Doh!!

Well, last night Cameron reverted back to his twice a night schedule. He went to bed at 10pm, but then was up again at 2am, 5am, 7am and 8am. I guess I jinxed it when I mentioned that he had moved onto a once-a-night schedule in my last post. Doh!!

When I go to get Cameron out of bed, either in the morning or when he wakes up in the middle of the night, it is always an adventure. He is NEVER lying in the same place as he was when I put him down. Sometimes he has just moved down a few inches, other times he has rotated diagonally or even 90 degrees from his original starting position. He also likes to get free of the swaddle that we put him in at night. Two days ago I went to get him and found one arm and one leg had gotten free. He seemed very proud of himself.

Two months old!

Last week Cameron turned two months old. We can't believe how fast the time has gone. Here are a few notes about Cam's second month:

• He has started to smile at us, and even laugh a little bit. It is so cute and rewarding!!
• This month he found his hands... well, his hands found each other and then they found his mouth. He constantly is playing with his hands, we say that he looks like he is plotting to take over the world!
  
• Cam love, love, loves mobiles. He can stare at the one in his crib or on his swing forever.
• He has had two distinct night time schedules this month. He started off on his twice a night schedule, going to bed at around 10pm, then waking up at 2am and 5am. The last part of the month, he moved on to the once a night schedule, waking up at 3am only. It is such a nice change!!
• His internal clock is insane, it is so, so accurate. Three hours after he eats, he is ready to eat again. Three hours, right on the dot! If he wakes up at 2:14am, he would wake up again at 5:14am.
• He has definite preferences on toys - some he is interested in, others he won't look twice at. His favorites have lights and make noise.
  
• He is getting quite wiggly and "mobile". He can almost roll over and he kicks his feet and waves his hand like a madman when he is lying on his back. When he is lying on his playmat, he can kick and hit the overhead hanging toys (although we don't know if he is doing it purposefully or not!).
  
• Cam is such a noisy little boy. He coos, babbles and talks all the time. He "purrs" when he is happy and squeaks and squeals when he is mad.

Cam had his two month doctor's appointment on Monday. The doctor said that he is very healthy and was impressed with how coordinated Cam was (purposely grabbing at his stethoscope). Here are Cam's two month stats:
Length: 23 1/2 inches - between 50 and 75th percentile
Weight: 12 lbs, 6 ozs - 75th percentile
Head Circumference: 40 1/2 cm - 75th percentile

So he has moved up quite a bit on the percentile scale, and is overall proportionate. Cam also had to get his very first shots, which was so sad. The nurse was very quick and did a great job, but Cam was so shocked and upset when it happened. We quickly scooped him into our arms when it was done and he calmed down quickly, then fell asleep. He spent the rest of the day alternately snoozing and fussing. Here is a picture of Cam with his matching bandaids:

Travelingwalkers.com Milestone!

A Travelingwalkers.com milestone -- We had our 1000th visitor!

On January 6th at 8:40am, Kristin's Aunt Susan brought our website visitor tally into the quadruple digits. Thanks for everyone who has been checking out the website, commenting and enjoying the posts and pictures.

Love, Kristin, Tim and Cameron

Cam's First Christmas

Over Christmas I meant to write a bunch of posts with all of the stuff that we did... you can see how well that worked! And then after New Years I meant to put a post too... again, not so good at that. So here is Cam's First Christmas Wrap-up.

As I mentioned, we went to Tim's family for Christmas this year. It was a five hour car ride each way, and Cameron did so, so well. We were so happy about that - he slept most of the way and only woke up to eat. On the way home we made a tactical error and tried to get home instead of feeding him when he was hungry, which resulted in him crying for about 20 minutes before we found a parking area to pull over in so he could eat.

In Swansea, Cam got to meet lots of family that he hadn't met yet, so that was exciting. He just loved his cousins Ella and Jack, and they loved him too. We stayed in Swansea until the Wednesday after Christmas and had a great time seeing everyone every day. We wish that Swansea and Syracuse were closer!!

Back in Syracuse, we had Christmas with Kristin's family. Cameron got to meet his Uncle Paul for the first time. Since we were home all week, they spent a lot of time together.

We went to Rochester for New Year's, spending the evening with Jeff and Jaime. It was quite fun, definitely not as crazy as New Year's in the past, but I guess that is what having a baby who wants to eat every three hours will do to you! Cam stayed up to ring in the new year, falling asleep about a minute after midnight. We were trying to get him to sleep from about 10pm on, but he persevered until midnight and watched the ball drop.

Tim took vacation from work so he was home from December 22 through January 1st. It was great having him at home; we didn't get as much done as we were hoping but the three of us had a lot of fun together.

Here are lots of pictures from over the holidays. Check out the December photo gallery for more photos (click here for a link).

Tim and Kristin work on their gingerbread house.

Mom and Dad W showing off their masterpiece

Kim putting the finishing touches on her house

Cameron and Jack - they are going to cause a lot of trouble together in a few years!

Cameron LOVED his cousins Ella!

Cam snuggling with his Auntie Cathy

A great family picture!

What a cutie!! We just love that he is smiling now.

Cameron and Uncle Paul

Cam and his stocking

Cameron is so entertaining!! Uncle Paul, Grandpa and Uncle Matt having fun with Cam.

A very cute shot of Cameron and his uncles

The girls and the kids - Kristin, Cameron, Erin, Braden and Bonnie

Cameron with his great grandma