Hello from Temecula, CA!

It’s been a fun trip so far. Sophia was angel on the plane. The first flight, into Dallas, presented an immediate challenge: as the pilot described it, one computer was not talking to the other, so we couldn’t take off till we figured out the problem. He powered down the plane entirely and rebooted. During the power down, everything went relatively dark, and it got really warm in the plane. Sophie just stood on my lap and looked over my shoulder behind us without getting upset at all. I couldn’t figure out what prompted this easy-going behavior until just after the plane powered up again. I looked behind me and realized a young girl had been giving Sophia a little show with her stuffed rabbit. Very cute.

Plane problem solved, we took off, and she slept through half of the flight into Dallas. She was getting a little edgy during the flight into San Diego, but we managed to keep her calm by playing her Baby Einstein video on my laptop. A few drunk people told us she was the most well-behaved baby they’d ever seen on a plane.

It didn’t take too long to get her accustomed to the new time zone. An extra nap and keeping her up a little late did the trick. She’s not sleeping as well as she does at home, and I’m up with her at 5:30 every morning, but it’s certainly not as bad as it could be!

Last night, Grandpa Ron and Grandma Kelly took us out to a Japanese restaurant. I discovered that I like eating Japanese food. Sophia discovered that she likes eating the table, the highchair, and the menus in Japanese restaurants.

Today, we’re going to the San Diego Zoo. Should be a lot of fun, and we’ll post pictures.

Leavin’ On a Jet Plane

I really need to update this thing more often. There’s a bunch of new pictures up and many more to come. A few quick stories:

Makin’ Calls

Sophia loves the cell phone. She loves it so much that she’s placed a couple of phone calls already. A few weeks ago, I got home and Tricia said, “Watch this.” She opened up her cell phone in front of Sophia, and Sophia’s face lit up as much as the phone. She reached out and took the phone. A few seconds later, my phone started wringing. I flipped it open: “Incoming Call: Tricia.”

She also called her Aunt Sarah just a couple days ago without Tricia even realizing it. Clever kid.

The Baby who says, “Ni!”

And “Te, De, Da, Ga, Goo, Di, Dit, Dats,” and “NNNNNN.” Yes, folks, she’s going crazy with the syllables now. One day she put together such a string of D’s, G’s, N’s, and S’s we were certain she had just said “Dunkin’ Donuts.”

Rolling, Rolling, Rolling

She’s not quite crawling yet, and she’s really mad about it. She can get up on her hands and knees, but she’s not quite sure what to do from there. Until she finally masters that skill, she’s getting around just fine by rolling across the room.

California, Here We Come!

Sophia will get her first experience on a plane tomorrow. We’re heading out to visit Grandpa Ron and Grandma Kelly in Temecula, CA tomorrow morning. 3 hours, 40 minutes to Dallas, an hour and fifteen minute layover, and then a few more hours to San Diego. Flight leaves at 6:30am.

We’re terrified.

We’ve got a new toy for each hour on the flight (and yes, one of them is a toy cell phone), an umbrella stroller for rolling around the airport, my laptop with all her Baby Einstein DVDs, blankets for wrapping her, bottles for feeding her, teething biscuits, rice puffs, and my iPod so we can take turns drowning out the noise should she start crying. If we can, we’ll update you from CA and upload pictures; if we can’t while we’re there, we certainly will when we get back.