Visiting Isabella Alesandra

We finally got around to visit Berto and Maria's new baby. Gabriel was very funny, he was on the couch next to me and I was holding the baby, next thing I knew Gabriel's foot came out of nowhere and kicked the baby!!! If only we got a photo of that, oh well, we have this cute one of Gabriel smiling at the baby instead.

Jamal's visit

Jamal came back from Kuwait, came to visit us since Jessie was also here for the weekend as well. Here is a picture of Gabriel and Jamal, checking each other out!

Our 3rd Anniversary!!!

Wow, it seems like our wedding was not that long ago, but we just celebrated our 3rd Anniversary. In celebration we stayed at the Old World Inn a really nice B&B in Napa, our first night away from the baby! Jessie came back to help dad look after the baby while we were gone, apparently he was very well behaved, and he now has great references!!!
We went to a fancy Vietnamese restaurant :-) it was pretty good (not as good as mum's cooking of course). But they did do some interesting stuff like putting mango into the papaya salad.
The Old World Inn had free wine tasting with a nice party tray, they had fresh choc-chip cookies, they had a delectable range of chocolate desserts like choc fudge with the right amount of cinnamon, marshmallows with craisins and chocolate decorations on top and moist chocolate brownies!!! Oh, and breakfast the next day was pretty awesome too. I highly recommend staying there if anyone ever visits Napa.

Gabriel looking cute!

I just wanted to put this cute picture of Gabriel in his car seat with his strawberry hat and bright monkey toy! He is very inquisitive and knows exactly how to stare directly into the camera. Jonah likes this one better so I've included both in our blog.

Our new car

We finally got the car that met my criteria of being a small automatic hatchback. We drove all the way to Sunnyvale to get it, which meant that I had to drive it back by myself... I finally just booked myself to do the written test, so now I have a learner's permit and the earliest I can take a driving test is December 30th. It's pretty lame that my Australian license is not accepted here. Here is a picture of the new car and me filling up the tank for the first time.

My birthday celebration

My birthday was a happy event, turned 33, we celebrated over three days. Jonah took me out to dinner in San Francisco, mom made me a great pineapple cake and babysat while we went out to dinner, then the next day Renee and dad took us to this really nice Italian restaurant and Jonah took a photo of the desserts as a memento!

Our Favourite Sushi Restaurant

Our favourite sushi place is GetA in Piedmont, great fresh food at really reasonable prices. We always end up getting our favourites like seaweed salad, spicy avo salmon roll, real California roll (real crab) and agedashi tofu. Some other favourites include the tonkatsu, curry and rice, rainbow roll...so far we like everything we have ever ordered!!!
Here is a photo of Gabriel reading the menu and getting ready to place an order.

Some extras from our Dallas trip.

Here we are at the Texas State Fair and the highlight attraction is Gabriel holding his pacifier firmly in place! Need I say "clever boy"?

This was the only photo I could get of Gabriel on the plane where he was looking at the camera. As you can see he was not really impressed after my numerous attempts to get him to pose for the camera.

Gabriel's visit to Dallas

Gabriel and I are visiting my aunties in Dallas. I was apprehensive about going on a 5 hour flight with Gabriel by myself, but he wasn't too bad actually, he only cried a little bit and slept most of the way. The part I didn't like was trying to change him on the plane, and the really tricky part was using the bathroom with him in tow. But the very nice stewardess offered to hold him, so that problem turned out not to be a problem afterall. Our first day was a write-off the 5 hour flight, plus Dallas being two hours ahead, so by the time we got back to Ma Lap's place Gabriel and I were to tired to do anything else but sleep. Ma Lap lives across the road from the Recreation Centre with a lovely park around it, so everyday we go for a walk and watch people exercising, kids playing soccer, people walking their dogs etc Gabriel loves it! Today was a little windy, the breeze blowing on his face generated such a delightful expression, it was priceless...I have to remember to take my camera on our walks.

Lunch at Buttercup

We had lunch on Sunday with mom and Grandma Cretser at Buttercup! I have to say that the food portions was large and pretty good, I was pleasantly surprised and quite impressed with my turkey dinner meal.


Here is this great photo of Gabriel, since he was not allowed to order anything on the menu, had to settle for his hand instead! Poor guy, looking forward to the day when he can eat real food...

Meeting Crazy Uncle Joel for the first time!

Well, this photo is self explanatory!!!

Gabriel's first soccer game!

Here is Gabriel watching Grandpa play soccer. Note how relaxed and laid back he is!

First time on the train

Gabriel's first train trip, we are going from Oakland to Sacramento to visit Grandma Jaci for the long weekend. He slept through the trip going to Sacramento, but was awake the whole trip home. Here is a great photo of Gabriel sitting up, chillin' out on our return trip.

Raiders vs Cardinals

This is our first live football game, Oakland Raiders vs Arizona Cardinals. It was so bad, Raiders lost big time. Oh well, we had a good time, even Gabriel had a good time, even though he did sleep through most of it. We didn't stay for the final quarter, wanted to make our getaway before everyone decided to leave at the same time!

Bottle feeding

We have finally introduced Gabriel to the bottle, progress is slow, but if he's hungry enough he will take it, but most of the time he just leaves his mouth open and wait until the drops come out then he swallows, talk about lazy!
But this is such a sweet photo of Jonah feeding the baby that I had to put it up, now hopefully Gabriel can learn that daddy can feed him too! Maybe that will mean more sleep for me...

Sleep, sleep and more sleep...

One of my new favourite pastimes is to watch my son sleep, yes I've officially become the most boring person I know, but once you've seen these pictures for yourself you will see why my little man is so fascinating to watch...

Stretching in his sleep.

Surrender to sleep.

And the ever elusive smile, a hint of the future...

Renee holding Gabriel

Here is a picture to prove that Renee has indeed held Gabriel, and that she really does like him a lot!!! Renee is well known by Gabriel "as the lady with the scratchy sweater and who can put me to sleep in a matter of seconds". What would we do without you Renee?

Miniature Golf

Jessie was in town for my birthday and we went miniature golfing in Castro Valley. It was just as much fun as I remembered it and we all did surprisingly well. Gabriel slept through the whole thing in the sling, which worked to my advantage as a counter-balance :)

Birthday Get-Together at Home

This was an especially rare occasion for us as we were able to get more of my Dad's side of the family together in the same room than I have seen in many years. We had the excuse of celebrating the birthday's of Gramma Jaci, Aunt Sabra, and Jonah, but we had such a good time we forgot to take any group photos. We did however get this great action shot of Gramma Jaci whipping out a mean backhand at the ping pong table.

Celebrating Daddy's birthday at Grandma's place!

We ended up having curry with rice with Great-Grandma Cretser, Grandma Marcia and Great-Uncle Errol on Saturday to celebrate Jonah's birthday. As you can see from the pictures, Gabriel was not impressed.

Gabriel with Great-grandma Cretser.

Gabriel with Great-uncle Errol.

Gabriel with Auntie Jessie.

Dessert was a yummy lemon cake with icing, and here is what happened after...

Gabriel proves again that he really can sleep anywhere, on any surface!

Gabriel Jai Hartenstein

Well for those who don't know, after much debate we have finally named him Gabriel Jai Hartenstein!
He is now about three and a half weeks and it's hard to imagine life before him, he certainly feels like a permanent fixture in our life!
This is my favourite photo of Gabriel so far, he likes the shower, he's not afraid at all, he keeps his eyes open under water too!
We have a busy weekend coming up, we're celebrating Jonah's, Grandma Jaci's and Zaldy's birthday, so we have Jessie down for the weekend, and we're going to have lunch with Jonah's mom on Saturday, then there is a BBQ at Caryll's to celebrate Zaldy and Jonah's birthday. Then on Sunday Grandma Jaci is driving here with Andrea and Ayana, and we'll finally get to meet Jamal's daughter!
Then on Monday, is Jonah's birthday and Jessie has the day off, so we're going to try to celebrate Jonah's birthday then too!!!

It's a boy!

Born July 8th, 2008 at 8:18 AM weighing 8 lbs 3 oz
Still working on a name...