Being Productive...At Midnight!

Well...I can't sleep. So I'm up late on the computer researching car seats. It's time for us to turn Miss Noelle around to face the front. Fun! She does so well facing the back, I wonder what it's going to be like now. I'm sure we'll be blogging about that soon!

I also thought that while I was online, I'd upload some of the pictures I was trying to do yesterday. It turns out that our USB cable was bad, and we switched it out for another one.

Here's Noelle "cleaning" her high chair with a sock she got out of the laundry basket. I wonder why she's playing with that when she has a bajillion toys??

This is when Noelle and Chris were reunited after a week.

Here's us taking a dip in Noelle's kiddie pool. I love her hat!

OK...now I'm either going to try to go to sleep or find some reruns on TV!

What We've Been Up To

Well, it's been a while since our last post. I figured if I didn't post some pictures soon, the grandparents would revolt! OK...Unfortunately, I'm getting an error message about my USB cable malfunctioning, so it looks like they'll be disappointed. Sorry!

I can at least blog about what's been going on. Chris and I dropped Noelle off with my parents a couple of weekends ago. We'd been wanting to paint our bedroom for a while, and figured that grandma's house would be a much better place for Noelle to be during all of that. We got it all done in one afternoon! That was great because we had the rest of the weekend just to goof off. Here's what we did with our baby-free time:

• Slept as late as our bodies would let us (which was only about 8...we're getting so old!!)
• We went to the pool
• Had a picnic at the state park
• Took as many naps as we could
• Went to a movie
• Drove to a small town about 40 minutes away and had dinner
• Ate out for every meal...no cooking whatsoever

It was awesome! But we were sure glad to see our baby girl! It had been 3 days for me, but Chris had also been at pre-teen camp and hadn't seen her for a whole week!

During all of this time, I had a cold or something that developed into a really bad sinus infection. I was really stubborn about it, and thought I would just treat it with OTC stuff. Big mistake. Once the doctor's offices closed for the weekend, it got way worse. I felt like the lady on the Sudafed commercial whose head blows up like a big balloon. Anyway, I went to the doctor on Monday and got a shot and a bagful of sample meds. (My nurse practitioner is so nice, and she knows our insurance is not great, and so she always gives us samples when she can.) I'm not up to 100% yet, but am feeling a lot better. Yea!

Noelle is doing great. She has learned new words the last couple of weeks. She says "ball" all of the time. In fact, many times when we get her up in the morning that's the first thing she says...I guess she's ready to play! She's also learned the word "more." We've been trying the baby sign language thing forever it seems, and now that she can finally say the word, she also can do the sign. She mainly says it at breakfast when she wants more banana. She's not walking yet, but can cruise and crawl really fast and keeps us very busy.

Well, I guess that's all of what's going on at our house. Hopefully I can figure out this USB error soon! Blogs aren't as fun when there aren't any pictures!

Noelle's First Birthday

Even though Noelle was sick, we still were able to have a family party for her last Sunday. (Sorry that I'm just now posting this...I'm totally being a blog slacker!) We had a great time, and Noelle enjoyed her cake and gifts very much. I made Noelle her own cake and then made a second one for the adults that I could decorate to go with the puppy theme of her party. (Noelle's was hard to decorate because of the weird frosting I had to make.) Anyway, at first she wasn't too sure about the cake and was pretty hesitant to eat it, but once she got a bite or two in her mouth, she dug right in. As you can see from some of the pictures, she sure could cram the cake in her mouth!

Birthday Bummer

Well...Noelle's first birthday didn't really go as expected. Late in the afternoon on Wednesday she started running a fever. Poor thing. She still had it the next morning, and so we made a doctor's appointment. He thought she probably had a virus and recommended that we postpone her birthday party (which was supposed to be this morning at playgroup). He jokingly said, "You could just dope her up on Motrin and not tell anyone she's sick." I'm sure the other moms would not have appreciated that advice. :-)

She has seemed to feel better today, so Chris and I thought about taking her to the pool. (Which was really more for me because I was bummed about the party.) Well...now it's raining. I mean, seriously! Can I get any more disappointed? I really need a chocolate bar.

Good news--I did find a cake recipe that works. It's a spice cake and is super yummy. It doesn't rise very tall, but at least it didn't sink in or anything. So I'm very glad that she will actually have a real cake at her family party on Sunday.

I hear Noelle waking up from her nap. I guess that's all for now!

Happy Birthday to Noelle!

It's official! I am now the mom to a one year old! That is really hard to believe. In some ways the time has passed so fast, but in other ways it seems like Noelle has been a part of our family forever. We have been so blessed by this little girl. From day one, she has had such a calm and laid-back personality. It has been really fun to watch her grow and change. It's funny to think that when she was born she couldn't really do anything except eat, sleep, and make dirty diapers. Although she's still a pro at those things, she can also sit up, stand up, walk (with help), play with toys, sleep through the night, feed herself, copy us, say a few words, and many more things. She's more than doubled her weight and has added about 9 inches to her height. (We'll know her exact stats on Friday.) It's just amazing to me! We've had a blast.
Last week, I got together with friends who have babies born within 6 weeks of Noelle. We celebrated their birthdays together with a cake and lots of play time. They were all so busy and it was hard to get a picture of all three of them.

Speaking of cake, I'm searching for a cake to make for Noelle's birthday that has no milk products, soy, eggs, or chocolate. Sounds delicious, eh? (We're trying to stay away from the major allergy foods until she gets her allergy testing done.) Anyway, my first two attempts have been less than swell. The first cake I tried sunk in pretty bad in the middle and tasted more like a shortcake. I didn't even waste icing for the second one...it was like a brick, and smelled a little bit like fish food. Today will be my last attempt, and I'll either choose it or the first cake I made. It's been pretty demoralizing for a cake decorator. :-)


We're having Noelle's birthday parties later in the week, so today will probably be pretty low-key. But if you think about her today, make sure and have a piece of cake on her behalf!

Another Memory Making Day

Today we had a lot of fun with a little less public humiliation (but there wasn't any free food.) :-) Noelle went swimming for the first time. We went to the pool at the state park. They have a great kiddie pool, although it was pretty crowded today. (And there were kids that were definitely too old to be in a kiddie pool.) Anyway, we still had a really fun time. We thought she would love swimming because she loves bath time. Noelle was pretty fussy at first. I think that it was mainly because of all of the kids that were there. There was lots of excitement and she got splashed a few times. After she got used to it, she had a fun time and was splashing around. Chris and I enjoyed being in the pool, too, although Chris had a boy come up to him and spit water in his face. (Which is gross already, but then you think about the fact that it was kiddie pool water. Yuck!!) Here are some pictures from the day.

And now--a "Moment of Ewwww." I found these teething biscuits that Noelle could actually have. (We suspect she may have more allergies, and these are completely dairy-free & soy-free.) Instead of biting on it, she sucked on it for about 30 minutes. The thing was so soggy and gross. It's hard to tell from this picture, but she had the stuff all over her and was sticky all the way up her arms. She really liked it, though, because when we took it away she cried big time. I guess if you only have 1 and a half teeth it's kind of hard to manage those things. Just when I was thinking that we wasted money buying them, I realized a perfect use for them...they'll keep her busy when we go out to eat! Maybe I did find something to control her volume. :-)

Cow Appreciation Day

Today is Cow Appreciation Day at all Chick-fil-A restaurants. Anyone who dresses from head to toe in cow attire receives a free combo meal of their choice, and Sarah and I will do pretty much anything for a free meal. It didn't make any sense for us to spend money on a cow costume just to get the free food. So, we got creative with what we had - trash bags and construction paper.




When we drove up to the restaurant the parking lot was full. We expected to wait in line a good 20-30 minutes due to the opportunity for free food. As soon as we walked in they rang a bell and the Chick-fil-A cow mascot greeted us. It was at that point that we realized that, though the restaurant was packed, we were the only ones in cow attire. We didn't let that get us down though. There was free food to be had.

We figured that if we were going to go to all this trouble, we had to at least eat our lunch in the restaurant. Why miss an opportunity to serve as free entertainment? (As you can see, the guy in the background is taking a picture of us on his camera phone.)

Noelle got in on the act too. We think she enjoyed being a cow for the day. She even got her own free kids meal - which Sarah and I gladly split between us.

Plus, this gave Noelle the perfect chance to wear her cute cow shoes.

So when it was all said and done, we were glad we did it. We actually contemplated getting a free dinner at the other Chick-fil-A restaurant in town. Here are a few of our favorite moments from our experience:

• It was raining and so our cow costumes doubled as ponchos.
• Not only did we get free food, we got a free calendar, pens, and stuffed animal.
• Noelle drank her (free) apple juice out of a straw for the first time ever.
• We were given lots of attention by the marketing director. She came by our table 2 or 3 times to see how we were doing and gave us more free stuff.
• Sarah saw a lady she used to teach science with at Abilene High. She wondered what in the world we were doing, but once we explained she wished she was dressed like a cow, too.
• There happened to be lots of teenagers there, and so we pretty much felt like we were constantly being laughed at.
• We overheard a family say that they came specifically to look at people who dressed up like cows. They made a point to sit at the table next to us.
• Chris enjoyed mooing intermittently throughout lunch.
• Our favorite part of the entire experience was overhearing employees referring to us as the "cow couple."