Back in Alaska
We have had a good week back. Paul has been selling advertising for the Seward City News all around town and has lots of new advertisers. I adjusted very quickly to being back on Alaskan time and didn’t have too many problems with jet lag. Isla has been very happy to have her mum home and has been very relaxed and happy. Tomorrow is Halloween so I made Isla her first Halloween costume, expect a photo tomorrow! Isla is extremely busy and is talking and moving so much. She is getting very clear on her likes and dislikes and we hear a lot of squeals of pleasure and shouts of displeasure. Just a couple of photos from the week.
New Zealand visit
I had a fabulous time home in New Zealand! The wedding was wonderful, we were lucky with absolutely gorgeous weather and Kath looked stunning. 
It was a busy, short trip so I only got to see a few people but I had a great time catching up with the people I did see. Here is Emma and her two sweet little girls.
Emily surprised me by flying down from Palmerston North for Saturday night so I got to see her, Stewart, Kathy, Angus, Janet, Mum and Isabel all at once!
I had a reasonable flight back and managed to get through the day at school. It was great to see Paul and Isla at the airport when I got off. They both seemed to be fairly pleased to see me too!
Cheerios Challenge
Untitled from AlaskaNewZealand.com on Vimeo.
Happy Birthday April
Hello Babe and Happy Birthday! The wee one and I are well. We hope you will have a great day today. We hope your trip is going great. Will try and get you on the phone today. Love Paul and Isla
Coffee Table
Coffee Table from AlaskaNewZealand.com on Vimeo.
The scoot shuffle crawl
The second day of just the two of us has gone well. Good sleeping, playing and eating. Some of my wee plans have unintended consequences; good meal= sleeping well, both things we can do and are desirable, she has been having all she likes for a day, however the diaper usage has also increased. Ah, the indignities of parenting.
Here is a vid of her ambling SSC across the toy land that is our living room floor, sometimes.
Paul
moving from AlaskaNewZealand.com on Vimeo.
Isla and April
April and Isla from AlaskaNewZealand.com on Vimeo.
April is off
Isla and I dropped April off at the airport in Anchorage this morning for her trip to New Zealand. We have had a pleasant drive back to Seward. Isla is playing with her blocks. April has txt from Los Angeles to say she has arrived and is waiting for the next leg.
Paul
Busy Baby!
Isla is now a baby on the move, with not much time for sitting still. No actual crawling yet, but she has mastered a fairly efficient method of moving around the floor. We have numerous videos but have yet to get one up on the site. Maybe this evening. About the only time we will see her still is when she is enjoying her food, like she is in this photo with her toast. 
If you have been wondering about the lack of photo up dates lately it is because of the difficulty of getting her to be still long enough for one. Most of our photos lately have looked something like this:
Even in the bath she is constantly dropping toys out of the bath so that she can use her comically short arms to try and get them back! She has also started pulling herself partially up using the sides of the bath and likes to turn around, using the sides of the bath to propel herself.
Dressing her also has new challenges. No sooner is her nappy done up than she has undone it, rolled over and started scooting away! Distraction and speed are the key. Here she is with a partly undone nappy and her onesie on its way off… again!
Here is some of the produce from our garden that we got in the weekend. Our cauliflower didn’t work out at all, not sure what the problem was. Anyone have any tips of cauliflower growing we would love to hear them!
We have forward movement!!
Much progress was made this week with crawling. Isla has finally started to go forward, although it is still the most uncoordinated thing ever and requires much grunting and effort from Isla. But she has started to get her knees up and so we are expecting crawling any day now.
Isla spent a day helping Paul with his beer brewing.
She has also started to do a partial pull up and can now stand, holding on to something, in order to get her hands on something she wants.
This week Isla has really gotten interested in passing her toys. She will pass you a toy and then expect it back immediately so that she can pass it back to you. As you can imagine this game gets old pretty quickly for Mum and Dad!!
We also had her first word (besides Mum and Dad) when she said nana when I was talking about and passing her a banana. Very impressive, although naturally she is reluctant to say it on command.
Paul and I are away to Anchorage tomorrow to go and see the Lion King. We are having a night away from Isla and she is going to be spending the night being spoilt by her grandparents.
Another photo of our messy eater. She looks very pleased with herself and the way she managed to get food even on her eyebrows!
Love April, Paul and Isla