2006 Halloween bat, cat and little witch

2006-10-23 Elnorra's first hair do, she normally won't let us play with her hair.

2006-10-19 Look, I'll actually wear a hat now!

2006-10-16 Elnorra snuggling with daddy and "Sugar" bear

2006-10-14 Elnorra 20 months old sprawled out

2006-10-13 Elnorra in dangly earrings, this didn't last long!

2006-10-04 Elnorra is ambidextrous (for now anyway)

2006-10-03 Elnorra walking in mommy's shoes

2006-07-22 Elnorra jamming out

2006-07-12 Elnorra's olive fingers, yummy and fun!

2006-06-20 Building blocks

2006-06-20 Building blocks

2006-06-20 Building blocks

2006-06-20 Building blocks-look at what I did!

2006-06-20 Building blocks-last one, they didn't even fall down on me!

2006-06-15 More fun with household items. Kleenex is so much fun to take out of the box! (P.S. I can reach stuff on the table now, can you tell?)

2006-06-14 Baking fun, I found mommy's measuring cup with flour in it.

2006-06-04 Elnorra in a basket (16 months old)

2006-06-03 New teddy bear

2006-05-28 Mommy shares when she cooks, yummy! In her $3 USD princess dress.

2006-05-18 Snoozing on dad

2006-05-13 Fans are fun!

Today was a sad and difficult day for us as Windy had a miscarriage and is no longer expecting a second child in November. Though we are very sad for our loss we also accept that the baby is gone and are greatful for Windy's renewed health and the doctor's "promise" that we will be able to have more children.

2006-05-02 Happy healthy baby Elnorra with mom

2005-04-08 Elnorra 9 weeks old

2006-04-18 Elnorra at 14 months old still fit into the same Easter dress as last year! She sure didn't want to sit still for the photo because she's a toddler on the go now!

Not only did Elnorra take her first step (and until April 10th her ONLY step with out assistance) as she stumbled into her dad’s arms at the restaurant. She said her first repeated and distinct word, bye-bye, which is accompanied with her Miss America wave and sounds like “bu-bu.” She also cut her first top tooth AND most significantly she was labeled “je-je” (older sister in Chinese) since we found out that she will be a big sister in November since we are now expecting our second child around November 17th.

2006-03-15 Elnorra's first stand

2006-03-15 Elnorra's first stand

2006-03-15 Elnorra's first stand

3 before 1

Elnorra was born just before the Chinese Lunar New Year in 2005 in the Year of the Monkey. Her 1st birthday was after the Chinese Lunar New Year in 2006 (Year of the Dog). The way Chinese people say their age is by the change of the lunar year and you start out at one. So when she was a few days old she “turned” two (the Year of the Rooster). Since her 1st birthday was after the Lunar New Year in 2006 she was three years old before she was one!

2006-02-05 More cake too, yummy!

2006-02-05 Spaghetti again, what fun and oh so messy!

2006-02-04 I'm full!

2006-02-04 Elnorra's first birthday cakes

2006-02-04 Elnorra's guests

2006-02-04 Elnorra's own little cake

2006-02-02 Elnorra, mom and antique Chinese baby cradle in the "water tower house" in Chiyi.

Elnorra is healthy and happy and loves to smile and babble. She still likes to walk along furnature but doesn't seem interested in walking on her own yet. She also loves food and gets quite upset if we are eating and don't share with her! It's amazing what those 2 little teeth can do!



2006-01-02 Elnorra 11 Months Old

2005-12-31 Windy and her two Babies, Elnorra (11 months old) and "Harvey" (made in 1958)

Elnorra's first Christmas. We are at a Church Christmas dinner and our friend, Fion Tsai, saw Elnorra eying her pie and she shared quite graciously especially concidering that Elnorra ate 3/4 of that piece of pie, and wanted more!



2005-12-18 Elnorra 10 1/2 Months Old First Christmas Eating Fion's Pie

We borrowed this cute spider costume from a friend. Can you believe she's already 9 months old? Half her life has now been outside
the womb! Amazing stuff. She's friendly, cuddly and loves making motor sounds when she is playing by herself! *vroom, vroom*

2005-11-04 Elnorra 9 Months Old in a Spider Costume

Elnorra wasn't to pleased when we took her swimming for the first time! Mom and dad had fun anyway and boy was it nice to cool off and avoid most of the mosquitoes!

She is now a mobile little girl and proficient at a one knee one foot crawl as well as pulling to a stand on anything that stays still long enough. Yep, mom and dad are now Elnorra stabilizers and we have to be careful before we try to walk anywhere around the house. She can navigate over all the 3" door jams throughout the house so she can follow us anywhere she wants. She has also decided that, at 9 months, "solid" food is a good idea after all and sweet potatoes are her favorite, she'll eat those right up, but carrots, no thank you!

We just spent a week babysitting for a family of 8. Dad, mom and their 14 month old baby were in the states to help with a family emergency and we took over to make a new family. Elnorra fit right in and I'm sure she is now going to miss having all the "older siblings" around to pay so much attention to her. Ben and I will miss the 12, 10, 8, 6, and almost 4, year old children very much but we won't miss Ben's 1 1/4 hour commute and Windy's awful cold from being around 4 schools worth of germs!

2005-10-07 Elnorra 8 Months Old Snoozin with Fion Tsai

2005-09-09 Elnorra 7 Months Old "Look Ma, 2 Hands"

2005-08-27 Shaffer Family Swims

2005-08-13 Elnorra Recycles

2005-08-12 Elnorra 6 1/2 Months Old

Elnorra is now 7 months old and though it was cute to try to feed her bananas but she really hasn't taken to eating "solids", so we offer them to her once in a while. She is quite a chubby baby and no one who sees her is worried about her getting enough to eat.

We often get unsolicited advice that she should have been on solids ages ago, our downstairs neighbor even bought us bibs.....a direct hint that we are not raising our child well. We do have a very kind and thoughtful neighbor though and we are really grateful for all she has done for us. Besides one can never have enough bibs when trying to feed a baby and Elnorra will want real food soon enough!

She is showing signs that she will soon be crawling. She can move quite a bit on her tummy, and scoot backwards when sitting. Then I will really learn how to baby-proof even though I tried to start our apartment out in a baby safe manner.

2005-08-11 Elnorra's First Food (Posed)

05-08-11 Elnorra's First Food (Banana)

2005-08-06 Elnorra 6 Months (2)

2005-08-06 Elnorra 6 Months Old 1

2005-07-26

See how I have grown! The pretty pink footsie doesn't really fit any more!

See How I've Grown 2005-02-18 Elnorra 2 Weeks Old in Pink Footsie

See How I've Grown 2005-04-05 Elnorra 2 Months Old in Pink Footsie