Monday, October 29, 2007

Chick-Fil-A Baby!



On October 20th a very lucky Sydney got to have a SECOND 1st birthday party...this one thrown for her by the Mishawaka Chick-Fil-A (a very family friendly local restaurant of a national chain for those who have no idea what it is)!

Yep, I said thrown for her BY Chick-Fil-A! For those of you who don't know our fondness for Chick-Fil-A let me fill you in:



In the summer of 2004, my dad and I (Danny) stayed the night in the Chick-Fil-A parking lot the night before the grand opening, so that we could receive free Chicken Meals for a Year. We did this and created a new friendship with a great staff/restaurant. We started going on many Saturday mornings for breakfast. It got to the point where when we would walk in on Saturday morning, they would ask if we want the regular and start making our food before we ever ordered. So that is where our relationship started.

Later when they found out Jamie and I were expecting they were constantly trying to get information out of me ("Tell us if its a boy or girl, we won't tell anyone!"). So, the day after Sydney was born my father-in-law and I went out to pickup lunch for everyone back at the hospital. We stopped by Chick-Fil-A, and mentioned about Sydney just being born and they gave us all of our lunches for free as a congratulations! We took the food back and fed everyone. Then I got creative and took all the boxes and set them in the basinet with tiny Sydney and took a picture. We later gave the picture to the staff at Chick-Fil-A as a thank-you, she then got the named the offical 'Chick-Fil-A Baby' :-). We had to go in every couple of months so they could get another polaroid of her for their office wall. Here is a collage they made of the results of those pictures that they gave us at Syd's Birthday party.



So, after going in with Sydney all year long "our" manager (the one we talk to the most) Jessica came over and said that they wanted to throw Sydney a party! They invited us, Sydney (of course) and her grandparents. When we got to the resturant for her party it was so cool. We were treated like VIPs or family. They had LOTS of ballons, birthday signs, and had decorated a high chair for Syd (and got her a crown and sceptre). They treated us all to a free lunch and a birthday cake with Syd's name on it. Then Jessica, the store owner Kathy, more staff and THE COW (their mascot is a cow -- "Eat more chicken") came out.



The cow helped Sydney open her presents -- yep, Chick-Fil-A and the staff even got Sydney presents (such a lucky girl!). She got books, sippy cups, a blankie, a baby doll...



...which she immediately hugged and patted on the back. AND a 3 foot Chick-Fil-A Cow of her very own!



What a party! It was so much fun and Sydney loved it. Thank you to Chick-Fil-A, you guys are awesome and we look forward to many years to family, food and fun!



Thanks again!

Monday, October 22, 2007

Tornado in Nappanee

Danny Here!
Last Thursday night (October 18th) there was a huge set of storms that came through Indiana. The tornado sirens went off at our house, but lucky for us there were no tornados that actually were too close to us. Nappanee, IN was not quite so lucky. They were hit by an F3 almost F4 tornado. Nappanee is not to far from where we live.



My dad (Jim Eggleston) has become really involved with the Red Cross. He has done local fund raising functions, helped out at some house fires, and he travelled to Finely, OH when they had the floods for 2 weeks. When the Tornado hit he was called to Nappanee at Midnight (Thursday night or Friday morning however you want to look at it), to help start up an emergency shelter for people



I let him know on Friday if there was anything I could do to help out I would. On Saturday night dad called and wanted to know if the offer was still good. I said "YEP!" On Sunday morning I headed to Nappanee with him and spent 7AM-2PM on an ERV (Emergency Response Vehicle), these are converted Ambulances. We filled it with food and then took it out and gave food to victims. What was the most amazing, and I had to share on the blog, was the number of volunteers that came out on Sunday. There is a large high school in town. The parking lot was filled with cars, including all over in the grass. These were volunteers from all over who had come to help cleanup. They had to turn people away because they had no more room in the buses or food for the people. The Red Cross ended up helping to feed these large numbers of people (probably 5000 people). What an amazing show of community support!

Keep Nappanee in your prayers!

Wednesday, October 17, 2007

Sydney's First Birthday

Yep, Sydney turned 1! It only seems like yesterday we were bringing her home from the hospital.

For the big occasion, Jamie thought she should use some of her great creative abilities and created a cake topper for the cake. (The giant bone cake and dog are what she made)



And no birthday is complete without some balloons, and boy did she love the balloons.



There is a tradition in the Eggleston household. Since I (Danny) was 1 or 2 not sure which, I have had the same birthday song (from "Zoom who lives on the moon") played for me every year. Yes, EVERY year. This year I had it played for me over a cell phone at 7:05 in the morning on the way to work. Well, we figured we might as well continue the tradition and got Sydney a personalized birthday song from Zoom for her first Birthday.


No Birthday is complete without a smash cake for the 1 year old. Here is a great video of her with her cake.



And then she had the joy of opening many wonderful gifts she received from people. But she was a good girl and read the cards (well I read them for her) first.



Overall the birthday girl was a very happy little girl!


Thursday, October 04, 2007

Frisbee Fanatic

There is a new Frisbee fanatic in our house (we have to use the word Frisbee with Syd instead of Disc, because Disc has to scary a chance to be horribly mispronouced by by an 11 month old.) As seen below Sydney found daddy's Frisbee closet and decided she wanted to rearrange all the discs.


Why is everyone looking at me? I didn't do this!

After she figure out how to get all the frisbeeā€™s out she had to at least practice throwing a one. But she decided to use one closer to her own size.


One day I shall even out-throw my dad!

Tuesday, October 02, 2007

Bumper Car Sydney

There is no video of what Sydney did this time, but we do at least have a photo.



Here is little Sydney donning a very nice black disc dog hat. As you can see there is no Sydney face in the picture. This is the way she seems to like it. In fact on Saturday night, when we had company over, Sydney took the hat and put on her head (as shown above). She would then proceed to crawl around the room at top speed (for crawling blind) and running into things. She would then change directions and do the same thing. Just like one of those wind-up toys that runs into walls! We saw her take the hat off of her head once and she was just smiling big and then put it back on and continued to run into things. If it keeps her happy more power to her I guess! :-)