We have curls!

Picture Archive

Ok, this is the third post of the day, what is going on with me? I updated our picture archive over this weekend. We have pictures going all the way back to 2002. I also have a link to it on my side bar. Check it out here, there are tons more pictures.

Wordless Wednesday - Static Time

Can I get some sleep, please?!?!

Daniel's sleep schedule started changing about two weeks ago. He used to take two naps a day, one from about 11am to 12:30pm and second from about 3:30pm to 5pm, and then go bed at about 8:30pm and sleep till 8:30-9am. Now, if he takes two naps a day he wants to stay up till 11pm, which does not leave any relaxation time for Stephen and I. So I have been trying to only allow Daniel to take one nap a day. But that means that he becomes VERY cranky around 7pm. We do not know what to do anymore, somebody help!

In addition to the little issue above, Daniel started to wake up at 3 am on the dot every night, hungry and ready to play. It takes us almost an hour every night to put him back to sleep. Daniel has always been a great sleeper, he slept 5-6 hours at night since birth and started sleeping 10-11 hours at 6 weeks. It is impossible to put him back to sleep in his crib, we have to rock him to sleep in his stroller. We are at our wits end! What did we do wrong? How can we change all this? He just got over a sinus infection, so maybe that was the cause. Did anybody else have similar problems? We need help!

Quiz

Today I was playing around on the internet and found this website. That website has a lot of silly little quizes. One of the quizes that I took was about what kind of bumper sticker should be on my car. Check out the result

What if the hokey pokey really is what it's all about?

What Bumper Sticker Should Be On Your Car?

I know that bumper sticker may seem a little crude, but it still made me laugh since somebody gave Daniel a dancing Elmo doll that sings the Hokey Pokey song. I did not grow up in USA and the first time I heard that song I asked Stephen what the song was all about. It does seem a little inappropriate for children, don't you think? He-he-he

Horrible License Plates

A couple of months ago I came across the Horrible License Plates blog. Mr. and Mrs. HLP (Horrible License Plates) post pictures of funny, silly, and plain stupid license plates. I really liked the idea and became one of the platerazzi, snapping pictures of vanity license plates and sending them to Mrs. HLP. Today, my first submission is up and silly me is excited! So check it out and join the platerazzi!

Daniel made me laugh so hard yesterday. I have been trying to make him hold his bottle and sippy cup but he DOES NOT WANT TO!!! I bring one of his hands up and position it and when I try to get the other one, the first one does back down. So yesterday, after a few failed attempts, I finally positioned his hands and he was holding his bottle and drinking. I was about to go grab my camera to commemorate such an occasion! My 10-Months old is finally holding his bottle! Well, after a few sucks he pulled the bottle out of his mouth and stretched his arm towards me trying to give me the bottle. I took the bottle and asked him if he has had enough milk. He shook his head no and opened his mouth. Such a funny boy. He knows how to hold his bottle but why bother if it is so much easier to have momma feed it to you! :) Here are a couple picture of Daniel holding his bottle when he was around 1 month old.

You see, he was not that lazy back then!

Ladies - Take Notice!

Married ladies, read this!! This article just may save your marriage. And unmarried ones can benefit from this in the future. It definitely can teach you all you needed to know about marriage circa 1955!!! My husband showed me this article from Housekeeping Monthly today, now I KNOW he must be a VERY UNHAPPY man! Poor Babe! (You can click on the article to see it in bigger size).

Warning! Mature audiences only!

Love-quiz ... For Married Folks Only

Another awesome tip how to please your husband!

OMG! Lysol! Really?!?!

Fifth Tooth is Here!

Yeah! That is right! Daniel has another tooth! Just couple of days after the last one! And he is not afraid to use the teeth, he bit me a few times today!

I was going to mention something else that I thought was funny, but I do not remember what it was. OOPS! Another case of momnesia.

I am going to leave you with a couple pictures of Daniel from a few days ago. These were taken during a dinner at my mom's apartment. And NO, Daniel was not drinking the wine.

Change of plans

I started Project 365 on Flicker at the beginning of January. I found it very hard to remember to take a picture and post it everyday. So instead I started another blog to be able to post pictures at my own pace. I am trying to learn to be a better photographer this year and I will appreciate and and all of your comments, suggestions, and criticisms. I will take it all! (I also added a link to the new blog on my side-bar). Check it out:

Sasha's Project 365

I have not posted in a few days - our life has been pretty uneventful. Daniel still has a runny nose but seems to be doing well otherwise. Stephen cought the bug a couple days after Daniel and has been feeling crappy. Today I woke up not feeling a 100%. I guess the bug is making its rounds in our family. I ended up taking a 3+ hour nap in the afternoon today. I do not usually take naps and I never nap for over three hours. I do feel better though. Maybe I was just tired. Well, enough complaining!

Daniel got his fourth tooth yesterday!!! He has been a three-touth pirate for a month now, and has been grinding the top one tooth on the two bottom ones all the time. I really hope that the addition of the new tooth will stop him from grinding and making that horrible noise.

I posted about Daniel LOVING to take baths with his Daddy, he will run to the bathroom when he hears the magical word "bath". If you want to watch him run, you can check it out here. I took the pictures below yesterday. I am still experimenting with my camera. The first one was taken with the flash, the second one without.

Danielspeak - a New Language!

Following the example of my friend and cousin Krystal, I added a new gadget to my side bar - DanielSpeak. He is starting to say different words and I want to remember when he said what. It is going to be very interesting to see what combination of Russian and English he is going to start speaking. I've read time and time again that children that are exposed to two or more different languages start to speak much later then their counterparts raised in a single-language home. I am not sure if that will apply to Daniel since he is saying five or six words already.

I also started showing Daniel the Baby Signing Time DVD about two months ago. He really did not seem very interested so I decided to put it off for a while. We started watching the DVD again three or four days ago and Daniel is very interested. I did not expect to use any of the signs for a while, but today, while eating lunch, he signed "all done". I asked him if he was full and he nodded his head yes and said da (Russian for yes). I was so surprised! I am one proud momma!

Finally, here are a few pictures of Daniel with Julie:

This and that...

Daniel has been cranky for the last couple of days. He woke up two days ago with his nose running, I spend most of the days wiping his nose, especially after sneezes :). We gave him a warm bath at night and his nose seemed better afterwards. He has been waking up all stuffy and slightly cranky.

The whammy came when Daniel somehow managed to bite his tongue while sitting in a shopping cart as we were leaving Babies R Us. This was his first boo-boo accompanied by blood, so it was a big deal for me. If Stephen's genes prevail in Daniel, he is going to have a million more boo-boos by the time he grows up :)

I have to leave you with this picture of Daniel. Sorry for the bad quality, I took is with my phone. The pink bow belongs to my mom's new puppy Julie. Wouldn't he make a VERY cute girl? (Just another piece of insurance for the future) hahahahaha

Daniel is 10 Months old today!

Yes, it has been 10 months, and Stephen and I still say every day: "We have a baby!" in complete disbelief. It does sound funny, does it not? We are still amazed with this little guy and how fast he is growing and developing.

Warning! Read on only if you want to hear lots of bragging from a proud mommy! :) I want to share an interesting story from yesterday about his development. He was standing next to the couch (my mom was holding him between her legs) and trying to reach for a cable on the floor. My mum would not let him lean down to grab it. So he reached for it with his little foot and dragged it with the foot closer to him. Then he hooked the other foot under the cable and raised it up so that he could grab it with his hand. It went in the mouth after that of course :) We were all amazed at how he could think through and accomplish a line of actions that lead to a desired effect. I never saw this before from Daniel and I am such a proud mommy!

Here are a few pictures from last week:

Daniel has learned to stand unassisted in his crib and pack-n-play. He is not pulling up by himself yet, but if I help him stand up, he will stand forever. Actually, he ONLY wants to stand and walk now, he is not happy when I try to sit him down. He sticks his stomach forward and stiffens his legs. I almost have to lay him down to sit him down!

Some pictures from Birmingham

My paternal grandparents and my aunt with her family live in Birmingham, Alabama. Here are a few pictures of our recent trip to Birmingham:

My Grandfather Emil, Daniel, and my Aunt Marina

Daniel in the piano room at my aunts house. Daniel listened for a VERY long time to my cousin's David's music lesson

My Grandma Inna, me, Daniel, and my Grandfather Emil

National De-Lurking Week

I just read that a "National De-Lurking Week" is going on right now. So if you are reading my blog, please go ahead and leave a comment. I would like to "meet" all my readers, and maybe find some more cool blogs to read (and lurk) :)

Daniel is RUNNING!!!

Daniel LOVES taking baths!!! And couple of days ago we found out that he will RUN (holding on to my hands) to the bathroom to take his bath. We think that he is too funny! Sorry for the quality - it was taken with Stephen's cellphone.

Daniel update

Daniel has been putting his finger in his right ear for the last week, so Stephen and I decided to take Daniel in to the pediatrician just to be safe. Well, Daniel's ears look great, "pretty as a picture" as the doctor said. The tubes are in place and doing their job. His chest sounds great and overall he is absolutely healthy right now. This was great to hear, I guess he is just discovering his body. I mean the little boy has been known to play with his "thing" during diaper changes :o)

Daniel also got weight during the visit and he is 28 3/4 lbs. as of yesterday (he will be 10 months in less than a week). This means that he managed to gain 2 1/4 lbs. in the last month and a half. Our tiny little baby! I hope he starts walking VERY soon or my back will go out!!!

Wordless Wednesday

Ok, it is Tuesday, but I had to post these photos taken after Daniel's bath yesterday.

New Puppy!

My mother bought this baby poodle on Sunday. She is just adorable. She is a 3.5 months old apricot poodle, born September 17th, 2008. We decided to call her Julie. She really does not like the leash, but will follow mum around when she is off the leash. She seems to be very smart already. Mom tried to clip her hair yesterday and she would not sit still. Today mom promised her a slice of cheese and she set still for a few minutes so that mom could clip her face and tail (to make her look like a true poodle).

We have been wanting to have a dog around for so long, but were not sure if I could handle the responsibility in addition to Daniel. I am so glad mom did, Julie is a wonderful addition to our family!

Flickr

This is a test post from , a fancy photo sharing thing.

Happy New Year!

What a busy holiday season we have this year! We are celebrating 2 Christmases (sp?) and the New Year. Why two Christmases, well, let me explain. Before the Communist Revolution in 1917, the Russian calendar was shifted by 13 days as compared to the calendar in other countries. So after the Revolution the government of the Soviet Union decided to shift the calendar to correspond with the rest of the world. However, the Russian Orthodox Church leaders resisted the change and declared that the change in the calendar does not change the date of birth of the Christ. So since then Christmas is celebrated on January 7th.

In the Soviet Union religion was prohibited so people did not celebrate Christmas. Instead, a lot of Christmas traditions were transposed onto the New Year, such as, Father Frost (Santa Claus) comes and gives out presents at midnight on the 1st, fancy dinner gets cooked complete with a turkey or a duck, families get together to celebrate and exchange presents. Since the Soviet Union collapsed, many people returned to churches and started celebrating Christmas, but the New Year traditions remain. Nowadays, Christmas is celebrated on January 7th and no presents get exchanged, instead people go to church and get together for lunch or dinner.

You can read about our December Christmas in previous posts. Stephen, Daniel and I celebrated the New Year with my side of the family. We prepared lots of gifts for each member of the family, and, of course, Daniel received tons more gifts. My Mum and Grandmother went crazy! After this Christmas and New Year, we can open a toy store out of our apartment. Stephen and I really do not know what to do with all these toys, we do not have that much storage. And he still likes his old ones. Plus we wanted to keep the ones he does not play with anymore for the next baby. Thanks to the tip from Krystal, I learned how to do collages, here is our New Year in one picture:

Project 365

If you read my long Christmas posts, you probably remember that I got a Nikon D40 and photography lessons for Christmas this year. A couple of days ago I read about Project 365, and found that there is a group devoted to it on Flickr. To participate in Project 365 you have to take one picture every day, preferably something that will remind you about that day, but it does not have to. You can go on my new Flickr account and check out the group. I only have one picture there right now since it is January 1st today :) Hopefully, with the new camera and lessons there will be some real progress in my pictures this year. Wish me luck!

By the way, I am adding the link to my Flickr account to my side bar so if you ever want to look at the progress, feel free to visit it.

Amazing Artist

One of my friends forwarded me the following link. This artist is amazing! He cannot read or write but can create sculptures inside an eye of a needle. Check it out here.