Santa made his rounds to Team Bolens' house and he was pretty generous this year. It was also V's first Christmas experience and she made out like a bandit with all of her loot! Mommy and Dad thoroughly enjoyed themselves introducing her to the traditions...even if she won't remember any of it next year.

Our present-unwrapping event actually lasted from about 10am until 4 or 5pm. Its just tough to fit a lot in when you're on a 3-4 hour eat-play-sleep cycle! V got up around 7 but by the time she was dressed and finished eating it was getting on to be her nap time again.  She isn't really what you would call a morning person. While she is on a 3-4 hour schedule during the day, she is only awake for about 90 minutes first thing in the morning. Almost as if she's getting up for a new diaper, some food, a quick snuggle and then OK, put me back to bed for a bit.

So while V was napping, J.E.B. and I ate our Christmas Breakfast (he had cinnamon buns and I had toaster strudels. YUMMMMY!) and then played some video games (what else would we do?!). Once she got up, we were prepared to jump into the gift-opening as soon as she was done eating.

We have a Santa Hat and this year it was my turn to play Santa and hand out the gifts. After the gifts were sorted, we dug in. Unfortunately a 6-month-old doesn't exactly tear into her gifts with gusto so after opening 4 or 5 with Mommy's help, she was ready for another nap! It was almost torture for me to wait until she was up to finish opening our gifts, so J.E.B. kindly suggested we open the rest of ours while she slept. Ahh, what a great husband!

Our nice Christmas morning.

Not exactly "snow clouds" are they!

V and her mountain of gifts. This was shortly before she went down for nap #1.

Silly Dad!

I've also posted some videos from Christmas and earlier in the past few weeks. J.E.B. has started or at least encouraged a habit with V that we're not sure we are happy about. He has started mimicking her as she talks to him. Well that has spiraled into her "talking" whenever she can, including as we're trying to feed her which makes mealtime a bit long. And she is really stretching those vocal cords as far as volume goes. It is really adorable, but I don't know that I like living with 2 pterodactyls! The video of J.E.B. feeding her on Christmas is a great example.

Some other recent pictures.

A new way to carry her in the wrap-thingy. She's sitting on my hip and loves this new way. I like it too.

She gets so attentive when he reads to her. While I'm not sure With The Old Breed (Eugene Sledge's WWII experiences) is a good book for a 6-month-old, at least she's interested in books! 

My friend Amanda gave us a winter jacket set that was too small for her daughter. Its still a little big on V, but she seems excited to have it!

Some others pictures of the past week or so.

She's sitting in the glider and loving the motion. However that motion makes a blurry picture!

She's loving the whole baby food thing!

Her introduction to the my favorite Christmas book growing up, The Sweet Smell of Christmas. It has scratch-n-sniff stickers which Dad obligingly sniffed for her.

I posted some new videos too. The dark one is from my camera....not the best quality pictures/videos, but it gets the job done when J.E.B. has his camera with him.

The one on 6 Dec is a little long, but I was trying to get her to crawling or inching would be more appropriate. However she seems content to just kick and laugh. Typical!

Some pics from our week in Gettysburg for Thanksgiving.





My parents found pictures of all four grandkids with the same expression on their faces....and the same Angelovich ears! I love it!

This was my dad's highchair. Pretty neat that all the grandkids have now used it too!

V seemed pretty content to let Marguerite hold her

No, that's not a bucktooth in V's mouth! As much as J.E.B. would like to say it is!

V didn't want anything to do with her namesake, Vicky!

J.E.B., V and I decided to fly to Gettysburg for Thanksgiving this year. I was curious to see how the flight would go with both of us there to occupy V and had hopes of actually taking a nap myself or being able to do a crossword puzzle--two things I love to do while on a plane but was not able to last time due to V's presence.

After the first trip to Gettysburg, I learned a lot of lessons on how to fly correctly (or incorrectly) with an infant. So with all that knowledge put to use, we loaded the car up with V and our luggage and drove to the airport. Let me just say that from the start, traveling with another person and your infant is so incredibly much better than traveling with your infant alone. Not that that comes as a shocker to any of you, but I just wanted to point out how nice it was to have another person with me.

When we got to the check-in kiosk, we actually changed our seats. I found that an aisle seat in the back of the plane is much better than a middle or window seat in the middle or front of the plane. Towards the back means I can get up as much as I want and hang out near the bathrooms which means a quieter and happier V which means happier Wendy and other passengers for the duration of the flight. So, we changed our row 13 window/middle seats to row 20 aisle/middle seats. So far so good.

Things continued to go smoothly as we made our way to the gate. We fed her and changed her trying to cover all the basics to ensure a happy baby for as long as possible. I was even able to grab a bite to eat while J.E.B. hung out with V.

It was as we made our way to the gate for pre-boarding that things became interesting, shall we say. As we made our way past the other people waiting for general boarding, an older man saw J.E.B. walking in front of me and stopped me to ask if he was active duty. A little taken aback, I muttered yeah and gave him a slight smile and kept walking (I had our boarding passes and V while he had the carry-ons). I saw the man look behind me (to his wife) and say "yeah?" Completely confused me and kinda creeped me out a bit, to be honest.

Well once we got to the attendant, that same guy came up to us and thanked J.E.B. for his service and said he was a retired Colonel. He and his wife then proceeded to tell us and the attendant that we were going to take their first class tickets while they took our seats! As a thank you for J.E.B.'s service.

We were dumbfounded to say the least. I mean, that doesn't happen. That's the kind of stuff you read about, not something that happens to you! They wouldn't think of taking no for an answer, so J.E.B., Victoria and I sat in row 3 and enjoyed huge, cushy seats with a nice hot meal while two complete strangers took our row 20 seats in the back of the plane. Incredible! Both of us were awed and couldn't believe it...we're still talking about it a few weeks later.

V did really well on the flight overall. A few fussy moments, one in particular stands out in my head. I waited to eat until J.E.B. was done so we could switch off and once we did, she seemed pretty happy and content to let J.E.B. hold her while I ate. At one point he got up to change her and once the bathroom door was shut I heard this amazing howl! I guess she didn't want her diaper changed or changed by him! I can only imagine how loud she was in that tiny bathroom if I could hear her three rows back! True to form though, she quieted down once he gave her back to me. Man, I can't wait for the day when someone besides myself can calm her down! I say that now, but I'm sure that once that day arrives I'll be pining for the times when only I could appease her!

Its been a long time since I ate something this nice on an American-run airline

Judging by my expression, I'm sure this is right after I just calmed V down from screaming.

Some new pictures of V. She's sitting up now without any support from us for brief periods of time, but those periods get longer and longer as each day goes by.

And she's talking, babbling up a storm. I don't know if there is any correlation between how much a baby moves or babbles and how soon she crawls or talks, but if there is, then V will definitely be talking first! What a chatterbox! But then that shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone considering who her parents are! :-)

I've added some new videos to dropshot as well, so check 'em out via the "the team's videos" link. I was going to start adding videos to the blog itself, but my computer froze or the Internet died or something happened that caused it to take over 5 hours and not finish downloading one video. So, we're going to stick with dropshots for now. I have to occasionally delete the older ones from the site since there is only a limited amount of space, but no big deal! She's growing right? Need to keep making room for the current stuff!!

Poor Peanut had some kind of allergy going on for a few days. Her eyes were all red and she was really clingy

V and her beloved Froggie

Another try at a family picture

I love V's expression in this one

Sitting up on her own!

Its that time of year again in the Corps. The Birthday Ball. A time when the guys get all spiffy in their stunning, yet uncomfortable Dress Blues and the gals get all glamoured up in evening dresses and uncomfortable shoes. The actual birthday of the US Marine Corps is 10 Nov but I don't think I've been to a Ball on the 10th yet. Too many squadrons and units vying for event locations means that any time within the first two weeks or so of Nov will suffice.

This year's Ball was different for me in a few ways. First, we had V to think about. She hasn't been with a babysitter other than my parents or J.E.B., which doesn't count since immediate family is family, not a babysitter! And since she has a tendency to get obstinate when she wants or doesn't want something I was nervous to get a babysitter for the night. She has, in the past, refused to take a bottle from anyone but myself. Kind of aggravating when the whole point of her taking a bottle is so I can leave her for more than an hour or two!

Luckily the second difference for this Ball made it work out. The Ball this year was held at one of the casinos in the area, so the squadron hired day care at the casino for those who wanted it. Score! We got a room at the casino (that way we didn't have to worry about driving back home and I could sample a few of the liquid wares) and were able to drop V off upstairs at the daycare for the duration of the Ball. Having her only two floors above me instead of a 40 minute drive away did a lot to help my anxiety. She did really well considering it was her first time being left with strangers and in a strange place.

The fact that it was at the casino instead of the Officers' Club on base was great. All of the previous Balls I've been to, except for my very first one when J.E.B. and I were dating, have been at clubs which required you to drive there and back. Maybe the fact that my first Ball was at a hotel skewed my view of them, but to me, requiring the attendants to drive to the Ball is crappy. So this year was great in that we took advantage of the fact that we didn't have to drive home that night. We got a room, sent V up to the daycare and then hung out at the Ball longer than we have in years.

The last difference at this Ball was that it was buffet style. All the previous ones have been served food. I'm still not sure if I liked the buffet better than being served. There is something classic about going to a formal event and having someone serve you a plate of food. However, J.E.B. had a good point in that typically the plates served don't have enough food on them while the buffet lets you get as much as you want. So...maybe I am a fan of the buffet!

J.E.B. even gave me some money to blow on the slot machines. I say "blow on the slot machines" because, really who wins at slots? Who you ask? ME THAT'S WHO!!! Yup! I won $50 on the penny slots!! We started with $20 thinking it'll be gone in a matter of minutes. We got down to about $2 left and then I hit the jackpot and my total soared up to $50. We then decided to cash out and bask in the glory of walking away $30 ahead of the game!

So, overall the Ball was fun. I had a great dress (low, open back!), I was summoned only two times to the daycare for a crying V, J.E.B. forced me onto the dance floor for about 1 song (more than enough for me!) and I won $30! Good times!

We got the photographer to use our camera for this pic too. We bought a professional one, but wanted one with our camera too!

It was a sad day when I was told that the Birthday Ball cake is mostly frosted cardboard with a little bit of cake for the ceremony recipients (guest of honor, oldest marine present, youngest marine present).

This was the second trip to see her. You can see how red her cheeks are from crying. I was there about 10 minutes feeding her and trying to get her relaxed enough to stay with the sitters. On a "funny" note, about 5 minutes after this was taken she puked down the inside of my dress. Yum.

Ryan and Amanda. Good friends of ours.

Gotta love the self-taken pictures!

We are laughing in this one because the picture before this, J.E.B. was belching on me. Yup, all class that husband of mine!

This past weekend some friends came down from San Diego to visit us and to meet V. While they were here we went out into the desert to a place called the High Tanks in the Tinajas Altas Mountains. It was about a two-hour drive through the desert to get there but only about an hour to get home, thanks to the decision to stick to the main dirt road out there. It required us to get on part of the highway for the return trip but was well worth it since it cut an hour off of a bumpy, desert dirt road experience.

Anyway, the High Tanks were not the tall, columnar things I had envisioned, but rather depressions in the side of the mountain where hundreds of years of dripping water have hollowed out areas where water collects. Some of them were smallish but one was large enough for Charlie (our friend's dog) to swim in, although the water was nasty and smelly. To quote AJ, "it smells like a zoo." Yes, yes it did. And the flies and deer poop didn't add any aesthetic appeal. At least for me it didn't.

The tanks were staggered up the side of the mountain so, since we took V, Atlas and Charlie with us, we went in shifts to rock climb and see them. I've never been afraid of heights per se, but have always had a healthy respect for them. Ok, maybe too healthy! Anyway, I was much slower than J.E.B. at climbing and walking across some of the boulders.

J.E.B. and I forgot our camera but luckily Ben was smart enough to remember his!

Ben is sitting mid-way up (I think) looking back down to where J.E.B., V and I are waiting with the dogs

 

Charlie just hanging out as is his norm. I really haven't seen a dog more mellow than him!



AJ and V hanging out while J.E.B. and I took our turn at climbing

 Gotta love trying to get a nice family picture with a dog and a baby