Something some fans wait decades for ...

... and lucky Claire got to experience a Saskatchewan Roughriders Grey Cup victory her very first year in Canada!

We watched the game with another "owner" Rod and his wife Marianne. Here's the crew looking nervous and tense as the game begins. Note: even Ryder the dog looks worried.

Marianne and Claire did their best to ham it up and ease the boys' tension!
And finally, the Riders became number 1 in the league!
The post-game victory parade:

Check out Claire's little Gainer the Gopher hat. Rod and Marianne gave it to us for Claire back in September of 2005 when we became paper-pregnant. I think they were happy that Clarie wore it with such pride (and actually kept it on) yesterday.

'Tis the season

We've had an action-packed weekend so far, full of winter and holiday activities. Last night, our city's bright lights display held its annual pedestrian night, the only opportunity to see the display on foot. We walked it for the first time ever, anxious to see what Claire would think of it. Apparently, not much! She didn't seem overly enthused until we took her out of her stroller for the last little while.

Today, Claire had her first wagon ride and visit with Santa at our community centre. Again, I'm not sure if she enjoyed either very much but she certainly seemed intrigued. After Santa gave her a pencil and a sticker, I think she felt a lot better about him!

Dancing with a new 'do

This is the girl we hang out with every day at home - the girl that most of you don't see unless you spend some time with us at our place. She may be shy in public but she's an energizer bunny at home! By the way, I apologize for my singing in this video. I remembered to stop after a few words but still, you're subjected to my warbling for too long, I know. Oh - and I'm sorry for the camera wobbling (I was dancing too).

Claire had her second haircut today (not counting bang trims) and she sat like an angel. I love her new little bob - I think it looks so chic!

ABCs (or should I say CMDKFPSGs?)

Cold turkey and some stuffing

Today is day five for Claire without a bottle. So far, she's doing great!

I decided that cold turkey was the way to go because cutting back just wasn't working: as long as Claire was getting a bottle, she expected another one again at a particular time. Also, she's been quite clingy to me for the last little while (I think her teeth are bothering her) so I figured that if she had me for comfort, she didn't need the bottle as well. She asks for a bottle about once a day but gets over it quickly when I offer her milk in a glass instead.

Claire's verbal skills continue to grow. She now says about 65 words without prompting (or being asked to repeat us). However, I think that only about 30 of those would be recognizable to someone other than us. She's starting to put two words together now too: Hello Daddy /Kitty / Mama, I do. Last week for the first time, she said "more ham". Of course, whenever we go out, she totally clams up and people remark how quiet she is. Not at home, I tell them!

She's enjoying her building blocks a lot these days, and is starting to enjoy her puzzles more and more. She likes playing with alphabet letters that we've put in reach for her: M for Mama, D for Daddy, C for Claire, K for Kitsya, G for Grandma / Grandpa, F for Family, P for Puppy and most recently, S for Uncle S. (We add a new letter every once in a while.) If we ask her to get D for Daddy, for example, she'll run to the fridge, pick the correct letter and bring it to us. We wonder if she's recognizing the letters based on their shape, their colour or a combination.

Claire still loves colouring with her crayons and markers, and has also been enjoying Play-doh a lot lately. She's also big into songs and asks to sing them together by using either words or motions: "I"m a Little Teapot", "Row, Row your Boat", "Ring Around the Rosie", "Ba Ba Black Sheep" (which she asks for as ba ba dee), "Itsy Bitsy Spider" and many Kindermusik songs.

Unfortunately, Claire-bear is becoming a bit of a TV addict. We bought her a Backyardigans DVD (the International Superspy one) and she asks for it all the time by singing "Spy!". And darn it, those songs are so catchy that Paul and I sometimes sing one of the songs without realizing it and then it prompts Claire to ask for the show. She doesn't appreciate it when we don't give in at every request!

At approximately 29 inches tall and 17.8 lbs, Claire is starting to fit into her 6-12 month clothing. Although petite, she's definitely a little lady now as opposed to a baby. She also has a mouthful of teeth to prove it: 15 now, and we're waiting for the number 16 to cut through any day. Her second year molars are giving her trouble but since her first year molars gave her trouble long before they appeared, my guess is that her second year molars won't appear until the new year.

For some reason, I didn't take new pics this week (only ones for the Christmas cards, which I won't share yet!), so no new pics with this post. However, our families haven't seen these great pics that Beth took of Claire, Ava and Caia being all smoochy back in October, so I thought I'd post them in lieu of more recent photos.