One Year Later: A Retrospective

One year ago today, Stanley Hilarius became Sydney.

It's certainly been an interesting one year and nine months. It's been a long, hard fought battle, but I must admit that Sydney has won. And I have the scar to prove it.

We've learned alot since those first shell shocked days. Mostly by trial and error, we've learned what Sydney does and does not like, when she'll sleep, and when she won't. We've also composed quite a few songs which, I'm sure, would make my operatic brother cringe but actually shouldn't surprise him too much. After all, I did come up with the words to the fantastic song: Fat Person, Sittin' on a Bike.

Chewin' on the Sydney Hands
Chewin' chewin' chewin'
Whatcha think you're doin'?
Chewin' on the Sydney Hands!

Magic Bag
Sydney's in the magic bag!
Cuz she is a baby.
Sydney's in the magic bag!
And I don't mean maybe.

Big Syd
It's the Big Syd!
The Big Big Syd!
The Big Big Big Big
BIG little Syd!

The Sockless Sydney
Sydney doesn't have any socks on!
What are we gonna do
About the sockless Sydney?

Washing
Oh, we're
Washing the face
Washing the face
Washing the face
So we can go to bed.
Cuz if we don't wash the face
then we can't go to bed
and if we don't go to bed
then the morning doesn't come.

Talent creeps up on you, you know.

In any case, we've managed to go back to our previous hectic lives, albeit with the copious help of relatives agreeing to babysit and rotating schedules which, whilst we were still in the midst of the breastfeeding saga, basically took me entirely out of the picture every two hours.

Fortunately Sydney took up the slack. That girl can stack a cord of wood in no time.

Wait, that's not how it happened. Turns out she was with me.

So today is Sydney's Big Day, and to celebrate, she decided to cry around 2am this morning, just about the time she first made noise. She's on her own journey, notwithstanding us, her parents, and we're really just following along. We try to guide her towards the carrots and the sweet potatoes of life, but more often than not they'll end up on the floor. Whatever she ends up putting on her plate isn't really up to us.

Happy First Birthday, Sydney!