This kid is a genius!

No joke.  Genius.  Here are two examples, just from this morning...

First, he takes Charley's socks off all the time (he's obsessed with socks... I know, not a super genius move).  So when I'm done feeding her, I ask him to bring me the socks back.  By this time, he has long since moved on from the socks, so who knows where they might be.  Well, he does!  He looks at me, then finds a sock and shows me, probably to make sure it was right.  When I say yes, he brings it right on over to me!  And then goes and gets the other one.  Amazing!

And if that didn't convince you, I know this will.  Right after lunch, I always tell him to go poop, so I can put him to bed and he'll have a good nap.  So today, he's playing - not pooping.  So I say to him, "Noah, you need to go over in the corner and poop."  So he runs right over to his corner, which I was pretty impressed about, and I tell him that he needs to "grunt" and push it out.  And I kid you not, the kid grunts two or three times, and then runs back over to me.  Guess what?  He pooped!  No joke, we did a happy dance right then and there.

He's a genius, I tell you, GENIUS!

Next step... toilet, not corner.

Happy New Year Nova Scotia!

We celebrated New Years Eve geriatric style with our friends Kristin and Jabe.  It was great fun, and Noah stayed up until just after 9pm.  Well done kid!  That was his limit though (it was also their kids' limit... and let's be honest, all the rest of us too).  So, we rang in the New Year with Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and a few places down in South America.  It was awesome!

In the future, we are thinking we may have to celebrate it with the middle of the Atlantic ocean and a tip of Brazil, so that Noah can go to bed on time.  He was up every couple of hours that night... apparently keeping him up really threw him off.  Poor kid.

~ 31 December 2012 ~

I ain't afraid of no bear...

Or any other wild animal for that matter.

Over the Christmas break, we took a family trip to the wilderness that is Scheels.  If you've never heard of this place, you are probably not alone.  I hadn't either, until one was built down the road a ways.  But let me tell you, what an adventure it was!  The store is kind of like Cabella's meets Foot Locker meets Sportsmans Warehouse... all on crack.  There is a giant fish tank, a ferris wheel (really!), and all these really cool animals that you can take your picture with.  Obviously, they are totally real.  Not stuffed.

 Smile!  Nope, don't worry.  Nothing is behind you.

 No joke, the kid could have sat on that elk all day.  He thought it was great fun, and was trying to bounce to get it to move.  

 Just ignore the hand in the background.

Alright, who smells?

~ 27 December 2012 ~

First steps

Hot off the press... thanks to Grandma Lou, here is Noah taking his first steps.  

~ 3 November 2012 ~

Between 12 - 14 months

Noah is 14 months old today!  So, I decided to give just a little update on the things he likes to do and a few pictures we've taken over the last couple months.

- Since turning a year, Noah has learned to climb down the stairs (backwards).  It still makes me nervous to let him do it without me being right there, but he is a pro and really doesn't need me.
- He has also learned in just the past couple of days to walk and crawl backwards, which is super hilarious to watch!  He mostly will take a few steps back and then trip over something or just fall down.  But he sure loves to try.
- He is growing teeth and has his two front teeth both nearly in!  (Finally)  If you catch his smile just right, you can see them both.  But neither one is quite big enough to see all the time.  He also has between 2-4 more coming in.
- His favorite new game is to "spin."  He will stand and spin around and around, and then obviously be super dizzy and fall all over the place.  Pretty sure he's going to hurt himself with this game, but it doesn't stop him.  What's funny is that he only has to spin about 2 1/2 times before he is dizzy.  Oh, to be little...
- He notices when Mom and Dad leave now, so he'll cry for a few minutes with a babysitter, but then be fine.  He likes to be around men way more than women.  He's definitely a daddy's boy.
- He is down to only one bottle, just before bedtime.  We'll work on giving that up after Hawaii.
- He's an awesome eater!  (in case his cheeks don't tell you that)  He'll eat pretty much whatever is in front of him.  And he always signs "all done," when he doesn't want to eat anymore.
- He's a short little thing, so his shirts are all size 18 month, but his pants are all 12.  We're going to have to start rolling up the 18 month pants soon though, because the 12's are getting a little tight.  Ha!

Trying to get Dad to give him a horse back ride... one of his favorite games!

Packing him up to send to Grandma for Christmas.  (I have this exact same picture of me, when I was just younger this Noah and my mom packed me up to send to my Dad in Turkey).
After packing him up, he decided that playing in boxes is a pretty good deal, so he would sit inside and we'd spin him around the living room.  Finally, I got sick of empty boxes all over the house.  Ha!

He also loves to bounce on knees!  Anything that involves bouncy is super fun... but not so much for my knees! 

And this is a very sad picture... he clearly doesn't love the booger sniffer.  Although sometimes he sits quite still for it.  I think he learned that it helps him.  Anyway, teething leads to lots of snot and I haven't reached that point in "mommyhood" where I allow my kid to run around with snot hanging out of his nose!  Ha!

~ 5 January 2013 ~

My baby walks!

Holy buckets... the kid is a walking machine!  I remember being so excited a couple months ago when he could do this:

9 months old, August 2012

And then this:

about 10 1/2 months, September 2012

And now, he walks ALL over!  It started the day before Halloween, when he decided to take about 2 steps to me, when I would back up and let go of his hands.  By his birthday a week later, he was up to 10 or so steps, in between Steven and I.  And now, two weeks after his first birthday, he officially walks everywhere. He doesn't crawl at all anymore... unless he falls down and has to crawl to the furniture or a wall to lift himself back up.

Today, I think I even saw him try to run a few times.  What happened to my little baby?!

** This was written 18 November 2012, but clearly I forgot to post it.  And I never did get a video of him walking the first couple of times.  Oops. **

All things Christmas

Merry Christmas!  The following is a picture field trip of all we did related to Christmas... as always, sorry for the photo overload!

 Noah helping decorate for Christmas... the kid loves beads!

 I was pretty stoked that he posed so well next to the Christmas tree. (Minus the 20 other pictures I took, trying to get this one!)  This was his Christmas Sunday outfit. So precious!

 On Christmas Eve (day) we ventured downtown to the Grand America Hotel, to see if we could find Santa.  Silly us... clearly Santa was somewhere in the middle of Russia delivering presents.  But, we did still get some nice pics and we got to go on a little "Around the World" trip to see how Christmas is celebrated in other countries.  It was pretty cool.  

(Notice we dressed Noah up for his Santa visit... good thing we did, as it seemed everyone else at the Grand America was wearing their finest apparel ~ we were way out of our league!)

 Love this picture, if only you couldn't see my hand with the pacie.  Ha!  It would totally look like he was reaching for the ornament.  

 Steven is trying to master the art of black and white photography.  

 And it TOTALLY started snowing on our way home, so here is Noah walking in the falling snow for the first time.

 So, my mom wants a picture of Noah in this Santa hat, since we are lame parents and didn't take him to see Santa.  You could always hang this one up Mom?!  ;)  But sorry... the next one of Noah is a little blurry.  Parent fail.

 Santa came!!!

 Hooray!

 Noah loves his sit and spin; thanks Grandma and Papa!  (Notice the cute belly.  Ha!)

 Checking out the dragon from Santa

 Santa brought Steven a one year membership in a Jelly of the Month club.  "It's the gift that keeps on givin' the whole year, Clark."

 Checking out the stocking.

 Cutest present under the tree

 Fits perfect!  Thanks Grandma and Grandpa!

 And because it was a white Christmas, we had to go play in the snow.  It's just what you do!

 Making a snow angel

Helping Noah make his first snow angel... Steven says it looks like I'm torturing the poor kid.  Haha! 

 So excited for snow!

 LOVE this picture.  Steven says it is one of his favorites ever.  So cute!

 Ha ~ just love how it looks like he can't get up.

I can't see!

And there you have it folks.  Our Christmas in a nutshell.  It was a great day and season.  We stuck around home, just the three of us, played ~ slept ~ ate way too much.  The perfect holiday.  

~ 24-25 December 2012 ~