Declan at 9 months making leaps and bounds

Hi all, its quite hard to get a pic of Declan that includes his brand new teeth without making him look a bit weird. For this pic we had to wrestle him down to the ground and apply the electrodes. Hence the goofy expression. But you can see those teeth!

He has four teeth now - two on top and two on bottom, but no sign of others yet so maybe we will get a bit of sleep (not that he's been that bad really).

We've also posted a new gallery of pics from the last month or so including Marg's visit to London and Paul and Robyn who were living here but have now returned to Queensland for keeps. Good luck with the thermal shock guys.

And best of all, we've posted some video of Declan crawling! Hope the video file is not too huge. If its too much of a pain to download let us know and we'll chop it down.

Yes the young man is progressing in leaps and bounds. At this very moment as I type he has crawled across the room and is busy consuming a copy of Crime and Punishment that he stole from our bookshelf. Does this augur badly for his future crawling-enabled misdemeanors? Only time will tell.

His progress to date includes: crawling, feeding himself finger food, waving back in response to a hello, calling me 'Daddy' when he sees me across the room, standing up very confidently when he can hold onto something for balance, and stepping around if you keep him upright. It's amazing how quickly he is learning new things.

We've just booked some tickets to visit Petr and her family in Athens before Christmas, and will be going to Amsterdam for New Year with Anneke, then to Paris in early January for Phil's traditional birthday visit and hopefully a visit to Mil. It's all go I tells you.

Back from Berlin

Here's a multifacted view of Declan and his many moods. Its hard to tell, but he is in the middle of saying 'dadadada' and 'babababa' and various hmmmpfing noises which produce these expressions on his face. For those of you who are very keen, you can click the image to see a larger version (?!!!).

Look at his great posture!

We're back in London now after a quick trip to Berlin where we met up with Nicola, Emile, Miki, Josh, Stephen and Mark. We liked Berlin a lot.

We've had Philippa's uncle and aunt Bill and Robyn visit us today, and tomorrow we're planning an afternoon pub lunch in Hampstead with what looks like becoming a very large contingent of relatives, mates and blow ins.

Big congratulations to Tess on finishing school and turning 18! We are all wishing you good luck with your exams.

Check out the new Berlin photos here

Hi everyone! Declan is so big now he can even sit up by himself. Except that when he falls over he's stuck on his back like a turtle. Though he can roll around like crazy. He can also say 'dadadada', which doesn't necessarily mean that I am his favourite (thinks Philippa). The cut on his nose is from a self-inflicted gouging episode when he was testing the sharpness of his finger nails and the solidity of his nose. He's nearly 7 months old now. Next stop is teething and crawling...

Declan and Richard dressed to impress and ready to go out. Dec can stand and hold up his own weight, but he still needs us to keep him balanced.

Declan on his rug. Note his mild chubbiness of thigh! One day he'll get past the 5th percentile of weight for his age.

Declan loves carrot and sweet potato so much that he has to share the taste with everyone, including his bib, the cushion, the sofa, his parents, the curtains, his stuffed toys...

Me and Declan at the Womad festival, near Reading