2/11/08 - Sorry it has been so long without new pictures. Make sure to go back and look at January as well as the new pics from our vacation. We met Jackie and Craig in Florida and had a great time. It was very relaxing and so wonderful to spend a whole week with Jackie and Craig. Alyssa really loved going to the petting zoo. You can see the happiness on her face. She spent some time in the pool too, she got braver as the week went on.

Alyssa is talking all the time now. A lot of what she says we don't have any idea about but there are lots of meaningful words now too. She says "thank you" regularly now in the proper context which we think is really cool. She also really knows what she wants now more than ever and she is very good at letting us know what it is.

1/3/07 - Alyssa had a wonderful Christmas. She was sick with her first stomach virus in the beginning of the month but it cleared up in time for the holidays. She wasn't really into Santa when we went to see him at the mall but when Santa (Uncle Doug) showed up at Daddy's company Christmas lunch she changed her tune. Aunt Bridgid came for a whole week which was really great to have so much time. Espacially since she brought her new kitten Bergdorf to play with Alyssa. Finally a cat that didn't run away. Christmas was very exciting. Alyssa got lots of great toys and clothes. Her favorite is her own laptop so she can be just like Mommy and Daddy. Also Santa brought a tricycle which we had to hide so that she would open the rest of her presents. It was so much fun to watch her excitement.

12/1/07 - Alyssa was sick with a cold and cough for most of November. She's much better now. She runs and jumps now. She really likes to play outside and espacially to find pretty leaves. She is very sure of what she doesn't want and is quick to shake her head NO for everything.

11/5/07- Alyssa was a ladybug for Halloween. She was really cute!!!

10/27/07 - Alyssa is really more little girl than baby now. Amazing. She is almost running and has lots of "words" that she says. She says shoe, sock, duck, meow, (even though we say kitty 50 times every day) woof, out, and lots of other things that we don't understand.

10/10/07 -

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ALYSSA!!!!!

10/8/07 - Alyssa is almost one. Hard to believe but we had her birthday party on Saturday. It was a lot of fun. She loved the cake (homemade) and she got lots of great presents. Omie came to visit and be here for the birthday party. She brought a balloon with her. Alyssa always wants balloons when we see them at the store so getting one of her own was really exciting. Now that the weather is cooler we have been able to play outside more and Omie and Opa gave Alyssa a playgym that has stairs, a slide, and a house with a door (the door is the best part).

Since she's been walking she seems so much more like a little girl than a baby. For one thing, she has definitely inherited her Aunt Bridgid's love of shoes. After having worn shoes twice, she started wanting them on her feet. First thing one morning, before getting dressed or having breakfast, she got her shoe, sat down in my lap, gave me the shoe, and lifted her foot to put it on her. Now all she wants to do is play with shoes. She is also talking a lot now, not that we have any idea what she is saying. She has words for things and if you really pay attention you realize she is saying a word and not just babbleing. Of course she doesn't say anything when you try to get her to so its hard to be sure if she really said what you thought she said. She definitely understands a lot more than we realize which is very cool.

9/25/07 - She's WALKING!!! Yeah!!! After about three weeks of a few steps here and there she started walking for real on Sunday. We went to a birthday party for all the babies in our birth class and three of them were walking. I guess she didn't want to be shown up because halfway through the party she got up and walked across the room. She's getting better and better at it now. She's starting to think walk instead of crawl when she wants to go somewhere.

9/11/07 - Alyssa took her first steps last Tuesday, September 4th. She has been taking a few steps here and there since but doesn't yet have the confidence to really walk on her own. She sat on a pony for the first time on Sunday. Lollipop lives next door to where we are going to build our house. Alyssa was really more interested in the doggys. She was ok with sitting on the pony until it moved under her. She has learned to point now so she is pointing at what she wants and can also point to a picture of a baby when asked to. Alyssa loves books and regularly brings books out for Darin or I to read to her. It is really funny to watch her try to crawl with a book. The hungry caterpillar is her current favorite. In the afternoons now Katie comes over a lot and she takes Alyssa back to her house across the street to play. Alyssa absolutely loves Katie. She gets more excited to see her than anyone else, even Mommy and Daddy. She has a great time playing with Katie and its a great break for me to.

8/19/07 - It's been a busy August so far. Alyssa has 2 more teeth (4 total) and another that we think is on the way. She does OK with teething except for not sleeping as well. She has gotten really good at steering her walker around the house. She should be walking on her own very soon. She also understands a lot of what I say. She can sortof follow directions, when she wants to.

Darin is in a new band, Groove Pilot, which he is really enjoying. They have opened for Nantuket a couple times already and have some good stuff lined up. Check out www.groovepilot.com.

7/31/07 - Alyssa has another new hairdo today. It's really cute. She also has started clapping whenever I say clap now which is really cool. She's been kissing on request sometimes too.

7/23/07 - We took lots of great pictures this weekend. Alyssa saw her first real toad and she got to touch it. Much more exciting than touching the pictures on her wall.

7/21/07 - Happy BIG 40th Birthday Uncle Dan!!!

Alyssa is having a great time exploring things on her own. She crawls all over the house now and she's very fast. She had her 9 month doctor visit last week and she weighs 16 lbs 14 oz, which is the 40th percentile, so we have officially solved the eating problems. In fact she now gets upset if I don't share with her whenever I eat anything. She ate my whole 6oz yogurt this morning and then had her oatmeal. She also says YEA now, while she's clapping. She says DADA too but she doesn't have the meaning down, and she says MAMA sortof but only as part of crying, not really as a word on its own.

7/10/07 - Happy 20th Anniversary Aunt Jackie & Uncle Craig.

7/5/07 - We had a great trip to NY to see Omie, Opa & Uncle Greg last week. Alyssa did very well on the airplane and she had a lot of fun exploring their house. On Tuesday Alyssa saw her first fireworks display at the Fuquay-Varina Fourth of July celebration. She was interested for the first five minutes then got bored and went back to playing with her stroller latch (which she focused on for at least half an hour). She wasn't the least bit bothered by the loud bangs. Her current facination is with the operation of doors. Fine as long as I'm not outside the room and she shuts the door then stands against it so I can't open it.

6/25/07 - Congratulations to Uncle Greg for Graduating from High School!!

Alyssa has two teeth now. The first one showed up on the 13th and the second came in yesterday. She has been a little fussy but not bad considering. She has been doing really well at eating. Maybe she was just waiting for the teeth. Also it turns out she has been waving HI for a while. We didn't recognize it at first because she just holds up her hand. Darin waves hi the same way we just didn't put it together. Aunt Bridgid is here visiting this weekend. Alyssa really likes her pretty necklaces. Alyssa will be going on her first airplane ride tomorrow, She and I are going to see Omie, Opa and Uncle Greg.

6/16/07 - Happy 2nd Birthday to Cousin Gabi.

6/13/07 - Alyssa learned how to clap yesterday. She was very excited about it. She also sortof waves bye bye. She has perfected crawling and has been spending a lot of time exploreing on her own. She's fast so I can't leave her for even a second or she'll be into something. She does understand NO, which is great. We haven't taken many pictures lately so there is only one new one this week.

6/4/07 - Alyssa is crawling really well now. She crawls over to things so that she can pull herself up to standing. She has also been exploring the house since she can go where she wants now. I have had to be really on my feet this week to keep her out of the cat water and the trash. Alyssa is eating much better now. She opens her mouth for food some of the time. The feeding specialist has helped quite a bit. We have figured out that she likes to be in control. She's just like her Mommy.

5/29/07 - Alyssa started crawling today. Check out the movie.

5/28/07 - Uncle Greg came to visit for the weekend. Alyssa had a great time hanging out with him. She is still almost ready to crawl, however, she thinks she should be walking. She pulls up to standing on everything she can get ahold of. She is now standing in her crib jumping up and down when she is supposed to be going to sleep. Alyssa is also talking a lot. She says DaDa over and over but she doesn't know it has meaning yet. It's really cool anyway.

5/24/07 - This has been a very eventful week and a half. Alyssa has started pushing herself up to sitting from her belly. At first just in the crib when ahe was supposed to be taking a nap but now she does it all the time. On Monday she pulled herself to standing in her crib. I happened to be video recording at the time which was really cool. She also does a lot of rocking on her hands and knees so she should be crawling soon. She has added a lot of new sounds to her babbleing. The favorites are ga, ba and blah but she has also started saying da now sometimes. Alyssa is still not opening her mouth for food. We took her to a feeding specialist Tuesday who thinks she may have reflux. Hopefully they will figure it out soon. She is going to go to feeding therapy for a while to try to help her learn to open her mouth, chew her food, etc.

5/14/07 - Alyssa is not moving around any more now than she was last week. She makes it a few feet sometimes, mostly by accident. She got to play in the dirt in the garden for the first time Friday. She had fun. My first Mothers Day was very nice. Darin and Alyssa gave me a Harley plate for the front of my van and I got to garden all afternoon.

5/6/07 - Alyssa started moving around on her own this week. On Friday morning she did the "butt scooch" to get from the middle of the room over to the books next to the couch. We've been busy baby proofing ever since. She really prefers to stand and walk so doesn't want to practice moving on her own much. She pulls herself to standing whenever she gets ahold of our fingers. We think she may be teething since she hasn't been sleeping well the last two nights. Also I forgot to mention last week that she had her first haircut (on the 24th). I did a horrible job but luckily hair grows so it already looks much better.

4/29/07 - Alyssa went on her first road trip last weekend. We drove to NY to visit Omie, Opa & Uncle Greg. Alyssa did remarkably well being in the car for 12 1/2 hours twice. We had a great time visiting the family and Greg made a great Bishop (and a bunch of other parts) in Les Miserables.

Alyssa has started to reach for Mommy when other people have her. She is also working on learning how to walk, very wobbly while holding our hands. She is still not interested in being mobile on her own. The other big acomplishment is that she has slept all the way through the night twice now. Very nice for us.

4/16/07 - We had a wonderful visit with Aunt Jackie over the weekend. It was very hard to have her go home. We all miss her and Uncle Craig very much.

4/13/07 - Alyssa had her 6 month check up yesterday. The big news is that she gained 1lb. 5oz. in the last two weeks. She's up to 13 lbs. 14 oz. now. She's really looking very chubby, no thanks to the Banana (or Applesauce). She has learned very quickly that if she doesn't open her mouth I can't put food in it. Alyssa met the Easter Bunny last week. It was very cute.

4/2/07 - Welcome Baby Danny Borrelli. He arrived on Wednesday 3/28/07 at 10:25am. At 7 lbs 5 oz. and 18 1/4 inches he is healthy and very handsome. Alyssa will be able to play with our newest neighbor very soon. He just needs to grow a little.

We seem to have solved the slow weight gain problem. Alyssa has visibly gained weight this week. She weighed 12 lbs. 9 oz. at her doctors appointment Thursday which is a gain of 6 oz. She really looks fatter now which is a big relief. She has also started eating some banana. She's still not sure if she likes it but she's tolerating it for now.

3/25/07 - This has been a very eventful week. Alyssa only gained 3 oz. when she went to the doctor on Thursday. That's good but not good enough, so we started her on cereal. Well, we tried, she wasn't into it! She made some great faces but didn't swallow anything. We are supplementing with formula now and she's playing with the cereal. The other big news is my new van. We bought a new Honda Odyssey Friday. Alyssa needed a better ride. It's really nice.

3/18/07 - Alyssa went to the doctor again on Thursday and she gained 5 oz. in a week. Definitely back on the right track. The weather was great early in the week so we got to spend some time outside. She was really cute in her sundress. It matches her eyes.

3/13/07 - Alyssa has been sitting up really well and she also can get her toes into her mouth now. On Sunday we bought her a new exersaucer activity center. She really likes it. Today she figured out that if she drops her rattle over and over Mommy will pick it up over and over. What fun!! We went to the doctor last week to check her weight and she had only gained one ounce in the last month. She's eating a lot more now and already seems to be gaining.

3/5/07 - It was warm this week and we spent some time outside working in the garden. Alyssa felt the grass on her bare feet for the first time. She's really cute in her denim sunhat, it highlights her blue eyes. She's been working very hard on sitting up. She can hold herself in a sitting position for nearly a minute now. On Sunday we went to our birthclass playgroup, she seemed to like seeing the other babies.

2/25/07 - Alyssa and I (Carrie) are both sick with colds today. She seems to be handling being sick better than me. She's been really into her feet and toes the last few days. I would imagine they will end up in her mouth soon. We are having the beginnings of spring here and Alyssa saw her first daffodils and crocusses this week. Yesterday she spent a few hours outside with us while we worked in the yard. She really loves being out in the fresh air.

2/19/07 - Alyssa had her 4 month old doctors visit on Tuesday February 13th. She now weighs 11 lbs. 10 oz. and is 24 1/2 inches long. She's very healthy and has hit all the developmental milestones. Her current fascination is learning to put the paci in her mouth herself. She sometimes rolls over, but only when she feels like it, which is still rare. If you think we're lucky to get so many pictures of her smiling, it's not luck, it's because all she does is smile & laugh. (Especially for the camera).