6 Months

Noah is 6 months old today. I can hardly believe it. According to our Wii Fit, he is 14.6 pounds and according to the cute measuring blanket that Auntie Barb gave us, he is 26 1/2 inches. Emily was 26 inches at 6 months and Ben was 27, so he is doing great on height and has caught up to other 6 month olds. He's still skinny, but I don't think he looks thin. Emily and Ben were both over 3 pounds heavier at 6 months. He is under 5% for his weight for kids his age. A little thin is never a bad thing, especially with our genes.

Here's a comparison:
3 weeks


3 months


6 months


He's the giant of the group now.

I think I need to get rid of the self tanning doll. Emily obviously hasn't played with her or dressed her in a different outfit in 6 months.

Noah is also enjoying his Bumbo seat.


And when he isn't using it, Ben likes it. I can't believe an almost 4 year old boy fits in a baby bumbo seat.


Noah has been giving us a run for our money at night lately. He is still swaddled at night, but he doesn't want to be. He ends up all over the crib and the blanket is all undone. Yet he can't figure out how to settle down without being swaddled. I'm trying to tough love it right now, but he's been crying in his crib for over an hour. Any suggestions?

Or maybe I should go back to listening to John Mayer.

Learning Something New

Ben is totally into superheros. No surprise there. But, he's never even seen one of the movies because I think they are too violent. I've tried to tape some of the cartoons on TV, but he gets scared quickly and we turn it off. For a kid with an over active imagination who already wakes up with nightmares once a week, I'm not going to have him watch anything that will scare him more.

We were at the library last week and we had already picked out 30 books. I let the kids look at the DVD's. The max they can check out is 7. So, I got a baby Einstein for Noah and the kids were allowed to pic out 3 each. Ben immediately had to get Justice League that features all of the superheros in one movie. Imagine his delight.

He was a little scared by a few of the characters, but he was more in awe than anything. He was so excited he yelled, "Mom, Mom, Superman is real!" He had never seen them come to life before. Wait until he watches the non-animated movies when he gets older.

He is now obsessed with watching this movie. And after being with my husband for 7 years, I found out something new about him. He loves the Justice League as well. He's just as fixated as Ben.

This week we learned that Superman is real and that my husband secretly loves superhero's too.

I should change my blog to Live. Laugh. Love. Learn.

Braids

Ever since I did this blog post about Quinn Fabray's side braid on Glee, my blog readers have gone from 20 a day to 80. It seems everyone is looking to find out how to copy her hairstyle. Imagine their disappointment when they find my blog.

Quinn has now taken over as the single most googled topic that pulls up my blog. Prior to that post, it was how to skin a rabbit and most of those searchers were from Australia. Do they really skin and eat rabbits down under?

Anyway, I was blog hopping today. The laundry is caught up, the dishes are put away and we are going to Costco to have pizza for dinner (can it get more exciting on a Friday night?), so I have some spare time. I came across the most fabulous blog on how to braid hair. Check it out here.

So for the 60 plus people a day who google "Quinn Fabray Glee side braid", please head to this ladies blog and learn a few things. She is amazing and even has video demo's.

I can't wait to try some new styles on Emily now that her hair is finally long enough.

Lost Photos

I have an SD card in my camera and pictures get stored there. It's easy to take the card out and put it in my computer to retrieve images. Every so often, I forget to put the SD card back into the camera and a picture or two gets taken and stored in the camera's memory. I didn't know where the cord was for the camera, so I just forgot about the pictures.

I came across the cord today and was able to retrieve some photos that were stuck in the internal memory.

Here's Emily's first day of Kindergarten with me. Her real first day, I was in the hospital in Phoenix in a drug induced stupor to avoid having seizures. There was so much going on that week with having Noah 9 weeks early and being very sick myself. I remember being so incredibly sad that I missed this special day for her. I would cry whenever a nurse asked about my kids at home. I so wanted to be there to fix her hair, pick out a dress and pack her lunch. Her Dad was with her and for that I'm grateful, but I still wanted it to be me. When I came home, I got to have my moment. It wasn't her first day, but it was her first day with me.


Here's Ben saying hi to Noah. I wonder what Noah thought of his brother, the superhero. I can't believe how small Noah was. He was 4 1/2 pounds when we brought him home, so that's how much he weighed in this picture.


Here's Noah trying a candy cane. I think he liked it.


I'm so glad I retrieved these pictures off the camera.
Special memories don't belong stuck on an internal hard drive.

Last Night

After we eat dinner, it gets VERY exciting at our house.

The Claw always makes an appearance.


Ben defeats him with his Buzz Lightyear laser.


Rocko tries to get in on the action. (He was supposed to get neutered today at the Humane Society. David waited over an hour to find out that due to an undescended testicle, we have to go to a regular vet and pay three times the amount. Figures we get a dog with a missing nut.)


Emily plays with her new Yo Yo.
(I put the Wii Fit to good use as a foot stool for Noah's jumperoo. At least somebody is using it!)


Then she asks us to play no less than 27 games of Guess Who and Who Ate The Cake (Clue Jr). I tried to teach her about having a poker face. I can clearly tell what is under each piece by her expressions. She decided to smile every time as to not give anything away.


She's perfecting her version of a poker face.


And here it is again. Gosh, she's good.


If you ever want in on all that fun, you are more than welcome to come over.

And if you need more excitement, just stay until the morning. Within 10 minutes of waking up, your shoulder will look like mine.

Favorites

David and I would never say we have a favorite child.
But, they have a favorite parent.
Don't get me wrong, everybody loves everybody, kumbaya and all that stuff.

But, when Emily comes into our room in the middle of the night, she goes to her Dad's side of the bed. When Ben comes in, he goes to my side of the bed. Emily is a Daddy's girl and Ben is a Mama's boy. It is what it is.

We both wondered what would happen when Noah came along. Whose side of the bed would he choose to go to? He can't walk yet of course, but he is already developing a preference. And the winner is...neither of us!



He lights up when he hears her voice. She can always get a smile out of him. He even laughs at her. And one day, I hope he will go to her bed in the middle of the night because Mama needs some sleep!

On to other favorites...
Emily's hair sure has grown. Seriously, look at this blog post from 18 months ago. She's had two trims her entire life, so she was due for it to really start growing. Her new favorite thing is having me straighten her hair. Flat iron and all!



Noah's new favorite thing is his fingers. Those bottom teeth are really coming through now.

First he tries one finger.


Then he gives two a shot.


There's room for a thumb too.


Of course all that chewing is accompanied with some cute little noises.


I think that's why he is waking up more at night. Is it safe to give him Tylenol every night, sometimes twice a night?

It's probably safer than me not getting any sleep.

Happy Mexican

One of my favorite types of food is Mexican. Enchiladas, tacos, tostadas, nachos, burritos, how can you go wrong? It's all good. David and I make good mexican at home. He's perfected the rice. We make some tasty refried black beans. Our shredded chicken or beef filling is pretty spot on too.

I don't want to go out for Mexican because I like what we make at home. With one exception, the SALSA. I could have chips and salsa for dinner at a Mexican restaurant and be completely satisfied. By the time the food comes, I just want to tell the waiter to put it in a to go box.

When David and I were on our weddingmoon in St. Lucia we stayed at a Sandals resort. The food is included and we'd find ourselves taking our lunch down by the beach. By day 10 of our 17 day trip, we were dying for a pepperoni pizza and mexican food. Imagine our delight when we found out it was taco day. I loaded up a big plate of chips and salsa to surprise David. He was surprised all right. It tasted like ketchup with corn niblets in it. The Caribbean has a thing or two to learn about salsa.

I'm always disappointed with jarred salsa from the store. It just never tastes right. Last week, the Pioneer Woman posted a recipe for restaurant style salsa. After how good her rolls were, I figured I had to give it a shot.

We are on our second batch now. I took the cute little photo above, but this stuff is so good you won't eat it like that. Grab the bag and bowl and enjoy!


Make it for Super Bowl Sunday and everyone will be more interested in the food table than the game. Isn't that how it usually is anyway?

***We only used half the seeds from the jalapeno as a precautionary measure. Every jalapeno has it's own spicy personality. It's always best to err on the side of caution. It was perfect.