Ryan James O'Sullivan

Yesterday we celebrated Paige’s 2nd birthday! It is staggering to look back and realize that Paige has been a part of our lives now for two years. What is more disorienting is it is hard to remember a time when Paige wasn’t a part of my life; she’s become such a core part of our day to day lives I couldn’t imagine a life without her.

The past year has been one full of firsts; there were probably less firsts pound for pound when compared to the first year of her life but the firsts of the second year of a child’s life feel much more definitive: Walking, talking, feats of surprising intelligence and seeming day to day more like a little person and not our little baby.

The most profound change in life with Paige this year has been a shift in the nature of our relationship.  As a baby Paige viewed Tammy and I as providers (obviously) but as she’s gotten older emotional attachment and needs have grown.  There is nothing in life more rewarding then coming home from a long day at the office and having Paige waiting at the top of the stairs yelling at the top of her lungs “DADDY DADDY DADDY… DADDYYYYYYYYYYYY I LOVE YOU DADDY”.

I cannot wait to see what this year will bring…

I’ve had serious motivation/time shortage/etc issues lately which has led to neglect of both blogs… so… to make up for that here is Paige being cute…

21 months – Thank you from Tammy O’Sullivan on Vimeo.

Real content to return soon(TM)

Spring is always an interesting time for me but this year is a little different.  I usually love the winter but I didn’t appreciate it so much this year so more than usual I am glad to see snow melting and the ugly salt tainted brown of winter giving way to the green of spring.

This year the season of regrowth/rebirth has a bit of a bonus – I am now 11 months out from my knee surgery and more and more every day I am starting to feel more mobile and able to do things I want to do.  Already this spring I’ve been able to play more with Paige and I’ve been grateful my recovery has reached the point where that is possible.

One of the overriding reasons for having the surgery in the first place was to be able to physically keep up with Paige.  When my recovery didn’t go as well as planned both Tammy and I were frustrated that it meant I was essentially limited in how I was able to interact with the baby.

The lucky thing for me is that before the baby was walking I was able to sit on the ground and play with her.  Really the biggest burden of my surgery was on Tammy – I couldn’t carry heavy objects (including the baby), I couldn’t do much other than sit around with the baby and my mobility was limited to the point where it was frustrating for both us.

So just in time for the baby getting to the point where she is getting physically demanding I feel alive & well and ready to tackle the challenges the nicer weather will bring.

Usually in the spring I am busy with helping get the Don Victoria Softball league ready to go for the spring season.  This year I am only providing marginal help as the league’s web master.  I’ve elected to focus more on Paige and getting back in to shape this spring.  There is a great new energized executive working on the league this year and it is in good hands.

I’m hoping over the next few weeks with my knee feeling better I’ll be able to throw on my glove and toss the ball around a bit.  At this point I’m not sure if I’ll ever be able to play baseball on any higher level again but I’d love to be able to just have a game of catch with my dad or sisters.  I have a feeling my constricted hamstring is going to plague me for a long time to come, so I might have to stick with throwing the ball – I doubt I’ll be much of a runner any time soon.

I’m looking forward to the cottage season – we are just over a month away!  I’m also heading to Algonquin Park for a pre-season camping weekend in three weeks as well, that should be great.

So that’s where I’m at.  Feeling better, feeling energized and looking forward to seeing what I can accomplish outside the house over the next few months.  I feel like I’ve been super couped up for the last 11 months and I’m ready to break out!

Happy Easter everyone – I hope everyone enjoyed a nice relaxing long weekend with family.

I took tomorrow off of work and I’ve decided to take Paige up to Haliburton (sounds like my Dad and Jessica are joining as well).  Want to take her somewhere out of the house.

*This was supposed to publish on December 28th – stupid Publish On function didn’t work*

I took last week off of work and as I write this I’m mentally preparing for the return to work and reflecting on the week and the great Christmas we had with the family this past week.

I decided to take the Christmas week off for two reasons: The first is that I’ve been working in the retail industry now for a few years and taking time off at Christmas in the past was completely out of the question – it just felt good to do it because now I’m so deep in the business process end of things I was able to escape for a few days. Second we are waiting for Paige’s health care provider to start (we had to wait until January 5th) and I needed to take a turn watching her (thanks to my grandparents and parents for also taking some time to watch Paige!).

Needless to say starting the vacation off by spending more time with Paige was awesome. I get very little time alone with just Paige and I together because Tammy is usually around. So the opportunity for some one on one bonding time was fantastic. Spending time with Paige really made me step back and realize what is important in life. Seeing her day by day growth up close and personal, not missing a thing was something that was worth all the vacation days in the world.

The mid to later portion of the week was spent in the family craziness of Christmas. I’ve wrote in past years in great detail about our many traditions that start with dinner on Christmas Eve at my grand parents place and go right on through to the Saturday that follows Christmas at my parents place for a take out food night (Swiss Chalet and Chinese this year – I know an odd tradition, but a goody).

Christmas itself was great. Tammy and I held back on getting gifts for ourselves this year to focus on getting gifts for Paige – we really spoiled her. Paige was also spoiled by both my parents and grandparents. She did well. My parents and grandparents also provided the ol’ hook up to Tammy and I as well! This is what our living room looked like after we got home and got all the presents in the house:

Gift highlights for me: Exercise bike (I need to get back in to shape and finish up the last mile of my knee rehab), Tivo (which Tammy and I picked up using gift cards Jessica got us!), Godfather DVD box set + Wire seasons = TV win, and a bunch more goodies.

We had a great Christmas and the time we spent together as a family was great. This was Paige’s first real Christmas (she was weeks old last time around) and she really had a blast this year (although by the time Christmas day with all its tradition and busyness was over she was ready to crash). I know each and every Christmas with Paige going forward will be more and more interesting and fun but this was for sure a great start – especially starting the week off with her.

I look forward to many more…

I just wanted to put up a quick Happy Holidays to everyone before I get knee deep in family over the next few days.

Be safe and be sure to enjoy the time with your family.

My Christmas this year can be summed up very easily:

Paige and I!

And as a bonus, look at how much she’s grown since last year:

Paige and I!

This coming week (November 28th to be exact) will mark my daughter’s first birthday. It is amazing to look back over the year and realize that it has flown by at impossible to comprehend speeds. Older parents with children who’ve moved away will often say cliche things like “enjoy your time now while you can” and for most people they take that as “when your kid gets to be a teenager they’ll be a smart ass and you’ll want to kill them” but I’m starting to appreciate that that is not at all what experienced parents mean.

Once this year is gone it will never come back, all the first and wonderful experiences will be memories to be cherished but never to be relived. I will never again get to experience Paige standing for the first time or the first day that she crawled to the gate at the top of the stairs when I came home from work and started calling out “da da da da da”. I have so many precious memories but I feel as if I’ve missed so much because of the hecticness of life that I’ll never be able to get back as well.

This year has been filled with so many fantastic moments that sometimes while they were happening the depth and impact of them were impossible to comprehend.

This pace started immediately in the hospital. One of my favorite pre-birth memories was calling my boss Dave and leaving him a voice mail message that “it” was going down. I wish he still had that voice mail because it captured how nervous, excited and truly terrified I was as the realization hit while I was on the phone THAT THIS THING IS HAPPENING.

Paige’s actual birth was also kind of symbolic of this break neck speed of life as well – Tammy’s labour was quick taking only a few hours and the actual pushing phase only took seven and a half pushes. That half push is a funny story. The doctor wasn’t even fully set up when Tammy gave what should have been the eigth push, Paige literally fell out of the womb with the doctor, the nurse and myself all diving in to catch her – it was quite a sight.

Paige is Born!

All of a sudden the world was a different place. Somehow there was a piece of me reproduced and existing as a part of this world. This beautiful little child (weighing in at only 5lbs by the time she had lost her initial birth weight) was mine. My responsibility, my ward, and my true legacy in this world.

Since that day I’ve watched with fascination as every day she has become more and more her own person with her own distinct traits. We’ve had so many incredible times one of my greatest fears is that I’ll forget some detail as I age. This whole journey has been so amazing I wouldn’t give up a single memory for anything.

My highlights from this year:

• the first night when she fell asleep in my arms
• the first time she pee’d on me (rite of pass non?)
• the first time she said da da
• the first time Tammy called me at work because the baby was overly cranky and the sound of my voice and talking to her on speaker phone calmed her down
• just in the last two weeks when she started hug and cuddling
• the first time we took a nap together. Every weekend Paige and I try and get one nap in together. I never sleep a wink because I can’t stop the urge to do everything I can to protect her when she’s so vulnerable in her sleep
• the first time she bit my nose and I realized that was her way of giving kisses (it still is – very odd)

Now as Paige approaches a year old she’s starting to become more independent, more cheerful and more loving with each passing day. She is almost always happy and those around her cannot help be drawn in by her loving smile. I cannot begin to say how proud I am of what she is becoming and I hope Paige you’ll read this one day and be reminded of how I treasure every smile, every babbled word and every minute of every day I’ve been able to spend with you.

I love you Paige – Thank you for this year and all that you have given me and your mother.

So I haven’t had a Paige update on here in a while and thought I’d share a quick update and give some thoughts on watching a human being grow up.

Paige is doing very well – she’s been sleeping through the night for over a month now (which is just insane I’m told). We haven’t had her weighed or measured lately but the growth has just been staggering. She’s been spending more and more time awake and is quickly becoming more aware of herself (more on that below). People tell you your kids will grow up in the blink of an eye, and I’ve quickly become afraid of blinking.

As I said above one of the coolest things about getting used to life with baby is watching Paige become more aware of herself. Watching Paige grow in the womb was an amazing snapshot of how we’ve evolved. Seeing her as a small little dot with no limbs, no brain – just a small organism floating around and then a few months later seeing a fully developed little person is just insane.

Now watching Paige’s cognitive and social development is proving to be even more fascinating. As you can see in the picture above Paige has discovered her hand. This is the first in a series of discoveries about herself that is proving she’s a very intelligent little girl. She’s ahead by a few months in many milestones and I cannot articulate the pride and love I feel when she sits there and stares at her hand while moving it around; developing that link between her motor skills and her ability to control it.

Having a baby and watching it grow from a peanut sized dot on an ultrasound to a smart little girl who’s just discovering who and what she is no doubt the most fascinating and touching experience anyone could go through…

We’ve been waiting to get settled with the baby before having Tammy’s mother come up here to meet the baby and all that. Tammy has been having a rough couple of days as the baby has gotten into a routine of not sleeping and today Tammy and I discussed it and we think it’ll be nice to have her mother here to help and take some of the stress off of Tammy.

It’ll be nice to have some help to be able to actually do the 101 things that need to be done around here. It will be a little odd to not have full privacy (I’m sitting here in my boxers with my shirt unbuttoned at the moment – go ahead and let that image sink in) in the house but it’ll be interesting and I think we’ll have fun showing off the baby and a little bit of the city to Tammy’s mom.

So as of Sunday the mother in law is in town!

This obviously was a big year for me. I had a great year at work hitting a few great career milestones and of course Paige entered my life. Looking back on the year I’d have to say this is probably (even if you put aside the baby) the best year Tammy and I have had married, despite some health issues with Tammy, etc.

Paige entering our lives was obviously huge. She’s a almost 5 weeks old now and already she has had a profound impact on who I am as a person and how I live my life. I think the thing I look forward to most in 2008 is the thing that made 2007 so great – Getting to know this wonderful addition to my life and growing as a person because of it.

For 2007 I had some fairly simple goals:

• Pay down my debts
  This one is going fairly well. I had large consolidation loan with my bank that is now nearing the 1500 dollar mark which is just fantastic. My credit card has managed to stay under 500 dollars and my retail cards are at an all time low.
• Have A Baby
  This was a goal that appeared on both Tammy’s and my goal lists for the last 2 or so years. This dream finally came true
• Move Towards Process Improvement at Work
  Back in the fall after some interesting job interviews and tough days I finally managed to get the position I’ve been working for since I moved to the corporate offices at Indigo – Process Improvement!
• Move Into A Town House
  Managed to knock this one out by January. Our previous apartment wasn’t bad (ish) but we really wanted to get into a house before the baby came… and we did it.
• Hit End Game In An MMO
  I hit level cap in EQ2 this year and have done plenty of raiding. Check and check

 Goals that didn’t get accomplished:

• Getting my weight back down to my pre knee injury levels
• Eliminating all debts (paid down was the achievable – eliminating was the high hope)
• Finding a project and sticking with it

For 2008 I have some goals that I really hope I will accomplish:

• Being the best father I can be to Paige
• Being the best husband I can be to Tammy
• Getting back down to my pre knee injury weight
• Eliminating all debt by the end of the year (this year I think we’ll do it… we are in a really good position)
• Starting with my annual bonus start a new fund for a down payment for a house
• Double my RRSP (retirement) contributions as soon as possible
• Take my new planned project from idea to launch… I’ll have more on this in a few weeks, I can’t wait to share what I’ve done so far I really love it (its ATV and internet related – some of you have seen it)
• Hitting level 70 in World of Warcraft

I can only hope that 2008 is half as good as 2007, a year that really gave me more then I ever could have hoped for.

In terms of my best list for 2007:

• Best books read: The Testament of Gideon Mack, American Gods, Shadow of the Wind and The God Delusion
• Best games played: Everquest 2 (both expansions this past year were amazing), The Orange Box, and BF 2142
• Best music: One Republic – fantastic album from beginning to end

Good bye 2007, bring on ’08.