I'm not so sure how I feel about this Santa Dude!

From Christmas 2008

The Deer

On the weekly trip to the grandparents JT encountered "the Deer" which has become the pet to the residents of Cunningham lane. It is a sad situation as Grandpa B doesn't think the deer will make it through the hunting season; but at least JT enjoyed seeing the deer when he had his chance.

The deer is a boy, which has been feed by some of the local residents whom also put the scarf on him as well. Attempts by Grandpa Brennan to put the fear of humans back in the deer have been unsuccessful, and he has given up on the cause:

From JT and the Deer

From JT and the Deer

From JT and the Deer

From JT and the Deer

JTs Halloween Party

Since completing the move to the new house we have been unable to locate any of the charging apparatus for the cameras and video cameras (with the exception being the Flip Mino which is built in), so photos of JT have been rather slim.

Recently we had a Halloween/birthday party for the little guy and fortunately we had guests with cameras. Even better, Caroline's dad Shannon is a professional photographer and he got some shots too!

Here is the first set of pictures

From JTs Halloween Party

From JTs Halloween Party

Mini Update

Since we have moves into the new digs I've been really bad about updating the blog and documenting JT's development. Today I unearthed my Flip Mino video camera and took the following videos of the J-man.

JT gets Religion

JT with his Godparents Samantha and Hyo



JT with the Grandparents

Flip Mino mini cam video

For my upcoming birthday, Dad sent me a Flip Mino mini camera, which is about the size of a small Cell phone. Here is its first video, a repeat of JT on the swings (one of his favorite places on Earth).

House Hunting

The search for the perfect home, still eludes us. Nothing We've seen since Moneys Corner has been even remotely interesting. Either the houses are too small, too dated or just plan smell like pee. The yards are too small or the house backs to a highway or the house is in the hood.

People trying to sell homes haven't quite figured out that a 600K house is now worth 550K. Hopefully Moneys Corner will come crawling back to us begging for an offer. Time will tell...

JT enjoying a swing

Moneys Corner :(

We put a contract in on a great house in Oak Hill, but it was not accepted. The Owners didn't even bother to counter either, feeling like they going to get their asking price. We are trying to decide if we should enter a new contract, wait or just give up on the house all together.

JT eating breakfast

Soon to be walking

All good things must come to an end

At JT's last doctors appointment we found he is no longer topping out on the growth chart, He is now 95% in weight and 90% in height. Healthy as usual, and JT even got the next round of shots without the usual baby drama. Life is good.

A funny little video

Going through the digital camera, I found a few pictures from when Hyo and Samantha joined the Greek Orthodox Church. It's a long story, but converting was the only way that they would be allow to be JT's God parents. A $300 dollar donation, some holy water and thirty minutes they are now officially kosher. Well not kosher, but you get the drift.

As luck would have it I managed to take this little video of Areti's dad consoling JT not to cry because the only other time he'd have to come to church again is when he gets baptised himself. I didn't realize that I captured the moment, enjoy:

Mom and Yaya Go to Boston

Areti and Yaya went to Boston to visit Cousin Iliana, JT couldn't go because he is too small, but here are some photo highlights of the trip:

JT and the Grand Parents do Dulles Town Center

Here is some more old JT stuff, its about a month old and is not very good.

What's Going on...?

You might be asking yourself whats going on with the lack of updates to the JT website? It's been pretty difficult to keep things up to date living out of boxes, living at the in-laws while try try and sell the condo. That was further compounded by the fact that I decided to get completely off the Microsoft grid and run Ubuntu as my operating system on my laptop. Ubuntu is great, but up until recently there was no Picasa client for Linux. Finally, and probably the reason that had the most impact on the site, I just got lazy.

I'm still lazy, not much you can do about that, but hopefully the other two contributing factors have come to an end. First, I got Picasa running so I can do everything that you windows folks can on my computer without supporting Microsoft or Apple! Secondly we have a Signed contract on the Condo. We haven't going to closing yet, but all of a sudden we don't feel like the place is never going to sell.

Details on the condo to follow, but in the meantime please click here to enjoy an unfiltered web album of JT. They are mostly from Valentines day to give you an idea how recent they are
.

Cell Phone Pictures

With the big push to get the condo on the market and living out of boxes it's been difficult to keep the blog up today. I've thrown up a few of the pictures Areti took with her camera phone, and if time permits tonight I'll try to get some of the backlog of photos up as well. Sorry and we'll try to be a little better about keeping things current as soon as we get our new house.

The incredibly growing baby!

The incredibly growing baby is now enjoying his 18th month Naval Academy gear. It doesn't fit snugly but he still manages to fill it out at 6 months. Pictures to follow

Happy New Year!

In the Greek tradition there is a ritual performed every new year to bless the house and provide all of it inhabitants with good luck. You too can perform these steps at home following these simple steps.

1. Every one must leave the house (unless of course there is a major soccer game on Greek satellite television which will decide which team goes down in divisions next year and which team gets to stay in the A league in which case everybody but Mr Gourzis goes outside).

2. Smash a pomegranate on the front step, Not the one mistakenly peeled two days earlier by the dumb American, but the the one that was bought to replace that one.

3. If you are a baby look on, confused, as people throw money (in change and small bills), rice and candy through the front door.

4. Enter the house with your right foot first, if you are unable to walk ask a buddy to carry you in.

Following these four quick and easy steps will get you good luck for the next 365 days! On a side note, make sure to pick up the candy quickly so that the dog does not eat it and get sick. Dog vomit is definitely unlucky, even if it comes out of a dog named Lucky.

All I want for Christmas is two cracked ribs!

JT's first Christmas

After receiving what I thought might be two cracked ribs, which later turned out to be just a set of severely bruised ribs, I was able to get out of doing a lot of moving at the condo leaving me with ample time to update the JT blog.

JT had a great Christmas and he has put most, if not all of gifts to use already. JT's favorites include his mini bowie knife sent by Betsy and Lorie, his bouncer from Bill and Mary and ironically a giant Penguin which Areti and I bought him (and he hasn't even seen Happy Feet!). It was a good haul for the little man however there is a general lack of photo's of him opening any presents, for which I blame myself.

I've just recently, as in today, learned how to correctly operate our new digital camera. You might notice most of the pictures taken before I got my new camera seemed to be better than my more recent shots. Well problem solved, I've learned how to use all the different picture modes and can now successfully take proper portraits.