Gabi Update

Gabi is doing fantastic, now! She may have been tiny when she was born, but now she almost 8 weeks old and is 10 lbs. 5 oz. She now has "happy awake time"...she is smiling at us and she wants to play and sing. We still are getting very little sleep, but we are getting used to it. I hope you like these new photos. They are from various days in the last week. The best way to view the photos when you get to the album is to click on"slideshow" at the top right of your screen.

Playing at Sandra & Lena's

Today we played at Sandra & Lena's house and the babies had so much fun! They were really showing off their personalities today....take a look at these awesome photos of Gabi & her a few of her friends. Click here to go to this album and then click on the "slideshow" button to see the best & easiest view of these photos. I know you will all really enjoy these fun pictures!!

So much going on....

So much has been going on...we have been in and out of town so much the last several weeks. We have been keeping busy visiting family in Orlando and my sister Michele's baby shower, and my mom's, Cindi, Birthday. Plus, Gabi and I have been keeping busy with our baby friends, too! Just click on the links to views photos from these fun activities...I will continue to add more photos to these albums, so keep checking back.

Updated Photos!!

Hi everyone!! Well, we finally have our wedding pictures up, so feel free to take a look. Sorry if you tried coming to our site earlier and it was down, but if you would like the "geeky explanation" go to Hank's geek site....but to make a long story short, it is all better now!

We would like to thank everyone who has sent Gabi beautiful cards, gifts, and money for her savings account. Gabriella is very lucky to have such wonderful friends and family! Thank you!! We are going to put up new Gabi pics this weekend..but here are a few new ones of her at 3 weeks and 7 pounds..check this album again over the next week for more new photos. Love and hugs to all of you! xoxoxo

Digital Camera Blues!

So, here we have this awesome little girl who we want to take tons of pictures of, and what happens? Our little super duper Sony camera starts whigging out. First, the MemoryStick develops a bad sector which requires me to do forensic analysis on the thing just to recover some photos. This was pre-Gabi. About two weeks ago, it seemed like the rechargable batteries that came with the camera were no longer holding a charge. So, I bought new rechargables. No luck. So, I bought regular batteries. No luck. Each time, I could get about 3-5 photos before the low/dead battery light started blinking. So, I bought a nice battery charger to charge the rechargables. No luck. So, is it the camera or the MemoryStick I bought a month ago? I don't know.

After looking at Sony's site, we found the two cameras we want, the Cyber-shot® DSC-S40 or DSC-L1. They are both sexy little cameras like the one we have now. The upshot is they are both 4.1 megapixels and have 3x optical zoom compared to the DSC-U30 we own that has neither feature and doesn't really work. I think Sarah was almost tempted to have me return the nice washing machine that we just ordered and get a new camera.

OK. Enough of my ranting. It is almost time to feed Gabi again. Probably, will wake her around 1:45am, change her diaper and get her eating around 2am. This is a bit of work, but sure is fun. She is such a cool baby!!!

1 YEAR ANNIVERSARY!!

Today is our one year wedding anniversary. We had a beautiful ceremony at my Mom's house in Orange Park on Saturday, June 12, 2004. If you have looked in the Gallery, it is obvious that the pictures have never been posted. I am such a slacker...well, not really since there are tons of Gabi photos online, but there certainly are not any photos of our wedding, Colorado or Hawaii trip. Keep an eye out in the "Our Wedding" photo album for updates as I sort through our 1000+ photos.

We had an exceptional evening with each other along with my Mom (Judy) and our friend Marshall. I grilled Omaha Steaks steakburgers, hotdogs, corn-on-the-cob and fried up some OreIda Crinkle Fries. After dinner, we celebrated by eating the top of our wedding cake. I have placed all the photos taken this evening into the "One Year Anniversary" album. Hope you enjoy them.

You can't get enough Gabi...

...here she is in her newest pictorial. You will get to see her sleeping, grinning, sleeping, grunting, sleeping, yawning, bathing, and sleeping. If you didn't notice, she sleeps quite a bit between feeding and making stinky diapers for Dad. Click on the title of this post or follow the white rabbit.

Mothers in Motion - Meet the Babies

Today at noon, the "Mothers in Motion" water-aerobics group had a "Meet the Babies" luncheon where all the Moms were able to bring their new babies to meet each other and let the Moms and Dads share stories. Shanna and Mark were wonderful hosts and a good time was had by all. We look forward to the next get together where maybe we can introduce the babies to swimming! :-) The photos are available under the People section in the Photo gallery, by clicking on the title of this post or just click ME.

Updated Gabi Photos & More

Wow, can you believe it? Gabriella is already a week and a day old. Time certainly flies when we arent' getting any sleep and every minute is spent with our gorgeous baby girl. We went to our first pediatrician appt on Tues, and all the staff were amazed at what a beautiful baby we have. We kept getting "good jobs" because she was so cute and well-behaved. We really our enjoying ourselves despite the lack of sleep. Gabi weighed 5 lbs 15 ozs at the appt and was 6 lbs 4 ozs today when we stopped in for them to check out her "goopy" eye. They even used that highly technical term at the doc's office. ;-) Her eye is fine according to the pros and it is simply a common occurance in newborns as their tear ducts are developing. We are looking forward to our first full weekend at home alone with just the three of us.

As promised, here are the new photos. You can click on the title above, the link in the previous sentence or navigate through the Gallery link on the right. Feel free to leave comments in the Gallery. Enjoy!

Photos of Gabriella are Here!

At long last, the moment you all have been waiting for...the photos are online! Sarah and I weeded through the 200+ photos taken over the last few days and picked 32 of them that show family and friends, excited parents and grandparents, and of course, our reason to celebrate, lots of photos of Gabriella Skye Sawyer.

We have been home for just over 24 hours with our beautiful daughter. It really and truly is a wonderful and exciting time. Gabi is so cute and fun to watch as she learns more about things around her. Each time she wakes up, she is more and more alert to sights and sounds. Her eyes are wide with wonder trying to take in everything. I could keep going but don't want to monopolize all the posts. :-) Hopefully, after Sarah gets some much needed rest, I can get her to post next time.

To find the photos, either click on the title "Photos of Gabriella are Here!" above or the link on the right, "Our Photo Gallery!!!" where you will find the "Our Family" section containing Gabi's pictures. Enjoy!

Gabriella Skye Sawyer is Born!!!

At 2:50PM on June 2, 2005, Gabriella Skye Sawyer was born at the North Florida Regional Medical Center's Women's Center. She weighed in at 6 lbs 3 ozs and 19 inches long. Sarah's water broke at 1:20 AM while at home sleeping. We arrived at the hospital around 2:40 AM and Gabriella arrived after about 12 hours of labor with a 9.9 APGAR score. It was a truly amazing experience for both Sarah and I, plus the grandparents and friends that were nearby for the blessed event. Stay tuned for updates and photos.

Spring Cleaning...sort of

Sarah and I have been planning to clean the garage for a long time, a very, very long time, such a long time, it was close to when we first moved in. Garage = Nightmare. That is a pretty simple statement to give you a clue as to the current state of our garage. My Mom (Judy) has been reminding us to clean it ever since she nominated herself as our interior decorator. Thankfully, she has done an incredible job with decorating our house and motivating us to do more even while she isn't here cracking the whip! ;-) We will say more when we finally get some photos of the living room, dining room, kitchen and nursery together. On a side note, the photos are on hold since the Memory Stick for my little digital camera decided to die. Anyways, we spent our Memorial Day cleaning our garage the best we could with the ridiculous heat and amount of stuff we've collected over the years. Goodwill was the lucky recipient to a Suburbanful of things that are still useful to people other than us. Unfortunately, we had other things that had hit their end-of-life and were placed in the back of my truck to get shipped off to the local trash collection joint when they open at 7:30am tomorrow morning. One day, hopefully before our wonderful baby arrives, we will have it cleaned up and might even post some photos of our victory over the evil garage......bwahahahahahahaha!!!

Baby Update

We are now into our weekly doctor's visits for our baby. It is getting more and more exciting every week as Sarah's body keeps changing. Unfortunately, she is still sick daily which is definitely not a highlight of the pregnancy but we are really enjoying the bonding that has taken place between us and between us and her belly. ;-) It is exciting (and nauseating for Sarah) to feel the movement of the baby as it gets ready to make its entrance to the world! If you click on the title "Baby Update" above, it links to a .wav of our baby's heartbeat that I recorded with my iPod and iTalk during Tues' doctor's visit. Maybe in another post, I will tell you why the baby's hearbeat sounds different from ours....

BBQ at the ClubHouse

We had a wonderful BBQ at the Capri Clubhouse this afternoon. It started at 2:30pm and went up until our reservation ran out at 6:00pm. There was approximately 30 friends and coworkers that showed up for burger, hot dogs, baked beans, artichoke spinach dip, deviled eggs, soda, water, beer and tons of chips. Our idea was to invite a bunch of friends and coworkers, both past and present and maybe future, so everyone could see Sarah's wonderfully pregnant belly and give her a hug! She needs it since it has been such a rough, vomitous pregancy.

Someone at the party thought it would be fun to guess the baby's sex, due date, weight and length. It's kind of funny to have so many people guessing about the sex of our baby when we are whole plan is to be surprised when it "pops" out. :-) Everyone has a 50% chance on that one...

• Becky Hamilton - Boy - June 18 - 8lb 1oz - 29in
• Marshall Pierce - Boy - June 7 6am - 8lb 10oz - 28in
• Ben & Jeanne Beach - Boy - June 16 - 8lb 4oz - 22in
• Susan Christophy - Girl - June 10 - 7lb 8oz - 24in
• John Carmean - Boy - June 3 - 8lb - 23in
• Dan Christophy - Boy - May 27 - 7lb 1oz - 21in
• Jaime Wiens - Boy - June 14 - 9lb 2oz - 26in
• Carol & Curt Franklin - Girl - June 21 - 7lb 9oz - 23in
• Daniel Franklin - Boy - June 17 - 8lb 9oz - 21in
• Kathy Bergsma - Girl - June 19 - 7lb 14oz - 21.5in
• Amy Whitworth - Boy - June 21 - 7lb 12oz - 20.75in
  

Some funny guesses there...we will know soon!! It is a very exciting time for both, Sarah and I, plus our awesomely supportive families. Thanks to everyone who came to our BBQ. We look forward to having another one in 4-5 months where everyone can come see our new baby.

May 03, 2005 - Alachua County Public School's All-County Honors Chorus videos are available

This is a little content from a static page that I had setup first. The Honors Chorus was really cool and exciting to see so many kids singing together in the University of Florida Music Auditorium. It is a truly beautiful setting to have a concert where approximately 120 kids came together to sing songs together that they had only practiced in groups of 8-10. Take a look at the video, I hope you enjoy it. Sarah had 8 girls that participated from Littlewood and they were wonderful. Congratulations on a great job!!

There are three versions of the video available:
High Quality (meaning you need a fast internet connection) - 388 MB
Medium Quality (you still need a decently fast internet connection) - 98 MB
Low Quality (this would take a long time on a modem) - 30 MB

First Post

Blogger.com rocks! Movable Type was nice and all but the fact that they moved to a pricing model and there were only hacks available to stop SPAM, Blogger.com just won out as the best option for us. :-) So, here we are!