Definitely a Toddler

Over the last couple of weeks, Noah has demonstrated to us that he is definitely a toddler. He's no longer the happy go lucky little guy who enjoys everything you put in front of him. Now he has opinions and he makes sure that we are aware of them. Lately he's taken to demonstrating his opinions by screaming and crying. We try with all our might to ignore the bad behavior so that we don't perpetuate it, but at times this can be quite difficult. Take the drive home from work/daycare today for instance... Noah was happy for the first 5 minutes peering out the window. I was thankful for these five minutes because the entire remaining trip home was filled with Noah screaming at the top of his lungs as he no longer wanted to be stuck in his car seat. No it wasn't pinching him. He didn't have a dirty diaper. He had recently had a snack so he wasn't hungry. He was a bit tired, but definitely was not willing to take a short snooze in the car. No, he just decided he was going to cry us home. I've now taken to telling Noah that his behavior is not acceptable and turning the radio up to (hopefully) help me focus on something else so I'm not ready to leave him on the curb when I arrive home each day. Today unfortunately, I had to leave him in the car for Eric to retrieve because I just couldn't stand to listen to the screaming anymore. It's not an incredibly long trip home, but it can feel like an eternity when there's a screaming toddler in the back seat.

Noah has also decided that making dinner is not an acceptable activity for his mother. Each night, while I'm preparing dinner Noah will stand or sit in the middle of the kitchen floor crying because I'm not paying enough attention to him. Sometimes Eric can distract him. Other times we just have to let him cry. I hope this phase is short.

If anyone has any ideas of how we can shorten the screaming phase, we're all ears!!! I'm particularly looking for ideas to deal with him in the car. As a last resort, I may have to order noise canceling earphones (like the ones you see in airplane catalogues) and wear them home from work everyday.

Big Cough and Diarrhea

Last week Noah caught a stomach bug from one of his friends at daycare. Beginning Thursday night, Noah began vomiting and had very bad diarrhea. Unfortunately, Noah did "The Big Cough" all over Mommy three times and Mommy caught his bug too. Since Noah aimed so well at Mommy, Daddy was stuck cleaning up the mess and throwing stinky clothes in the wash so he also caught the bug. We were a family of three sickies all weekend. In fact on Sunday we were all feeling so ill that we had to call in reinforcements. Grandma Barb came to the rescue and watched Noah on Sunday while Mom and Dad rested. Monday, Grandma Annette watched Noah while Mommy napped and Daddy went to work. Tuesday we were starting to feel a bit better and today we were all back to work and daycare. It was an icky weekend. None of us enjoyed it, but we're thankful that we have recovered before the holiday festivities will begin. Don't worry everyone, we're all well again and no longer contagious.

Special thank you to the grandmas for helping out!

Planning a Party

I've been told I have been too neglectful of the blog lately and that every one's wondering what's going on with Noah. Sorry for the lack of posts in recent weeks. Noah has been quite the busy man and hasn't been interested in slowing down so that I can blog about him. But now he's in bed and poor Eric is stuck washing the dishes by himself again... and I'm up here stealing a few minutes to give you an update.

Noah is fully walking now. He rarely crawls and when he does we remind him that he knows how to walk now so in turn he stands himself up. Now that he's mastered walking, he's interested in learning to run. He's been practicing walking very fast lately both at home and at daycare. So far, we haven't had too many face-plants but we're expecting the bumps and bruises will keep appearing.

We've picked a date for Noah's 1st Birthday party. It was a tough one because of how close his birthday is to Thanksgiving. We have landed on Saturday, November 28th for his party. We're hoping this will make it a little easier on the Great Grandparents because we hope they will only have to make one trip up to the cities, instead of two weeks in a row. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to make the decision until yesterday so invites are on order and not yet in the mail. We also picked a theme for Noah's birthday... MONKEYS. Since Noah's favorite book is That's Not My Monkey, we thought it would be appropriate to celebrate a monkey birthday. (Not to mention that Noah is turning more and more into a little monkey every day. He's learned to climb all over the furniture.)

No photos this time, friends. I'm hoping to capture some good ones of him soon as his first birthday approaches.

I found a pumpkin in the pumpkin patch...

We've had a couple of outings to the pumpkin patch lately. With Eric out of commission, I haven't had much time to sit down and blog. I'd like to write more, but we'll have to go with the short summary.

Noah's trip to the University of Minnesota Arboretum






Noah's trip to the pumpkin patch
Noah and I left Eric at home to rest and ice his knee while we headed out to the apple orchard with friends Katie, Dan, Ben and Josh. After a little bit of a detour and a trip into a coffee shop by Dan to get directions, we found ourselves trekking up a hill through the apple trees to the pumpkin patch. Ben wandered about with Dan looking for the perfect pumpkin while Katie, Josh, Noah and I stopped for a brief photo op.





Noah and Josh had a little stand off over one pumpkin. After both inspected the pumpkin and babbled about it's lovely qualities, they determined that it was much too big for either of them to carry and we abandoned it for more manageable ones. Between the six of us, we found three pumpkins named: Mr. Tutu, Mrs. Norris and Boris. We paid for our pumpkins and had them carried down to the parking lot in the tractor trailer. Katie protested about having to pick up Boris, Mrs. Norris and Mr. Tutu but the staff were very friendly and didn't snicker at her once.

Happy Birthday Great Grandma Myra

Happy birthday to my GG. I hope you have a very happy birthday.

Love, Noah

Walking!!!

Noah's been practicing a few steps at a time and this last week he's graduated to choosing to walk to travel short distances, instead of crawling. He's enjoying the applause and attention he's getting as he walks back and forth between Mom and Dad or object to object.

Here's a brief video of Noah taking his first steps.

First behind his walker...


Then walking to Mommy...

9-month Visit Stats

I just realized that I never posted about Noah's 9-month well baby visit to the pediatrician. So here's a quick run-down on how things went...

-Noah's a happy healthy baby
-Still small on the growth charts, but perfectly proportioned
-All blood work within normal ranges (blood lead level is normal)
-2 immunizations: third Hepatitis B and seasonal flu
-H1N1 was not yet available, but will be in late October
-Little bit of fluid behind his ear drum, but nothing to worry about at this time
-Mom and Dad got their seasonal flu vaccinations too

I highly encourage our friends and family to get their flu vaccinations as flu season is quickly approaching. We're trying to keep Noah healthy and happy and we appreciate your help to too.

3rd Tooth

Noah's first top tooth started to appear over the last week. He was in such a funk on Labor Day. We couldn't please him no matter what we tried, so we figured something was up. A few days later his top left front tooth appeared. Noah now has a new favorite habit which drives both Mom and Dad crazy... grinding his teeth. I cringe just thinking about the sound he makes as he mashes his three teeth together. I'm sure it's just a stage, but I hope it's a short one. I'm not sure how much grinding Mom and Dad can handle.

Sorry, still no pictures of the pearly whites. They just aren't sticking out of his gums far enough yet to capture them on film.

First Steps

Ever since Noah went mobile it's been a whole new world for him. He's become a very quick crawler who we chase after regularly. He loved to pull paper off the desk shelves and take all of his books and toys off his play shelves. Noah has also stated pulling up on everything. He will pull up on a piece of furniture and cruise his way around a room. He also finds a way to get as close to the kitties as possible, even when they jump up on furniture to get away from him. He's started to step on objects to make himself taller.

Over the last week he's been walking behind his walking toy quite a bit. He has the whole run of the main floor of the house. Behind his walking toy he navigates from room to room, walking as far as he can in a straight line and then letting us know that he needs help turning his toy so he can continue on. Lately he's been pausing as he walks along to let go and try standing unassisted. He has been standing on his own for progressively longer periods of time. Tonight he was standing holding on to Eric's knee for balance. Then he let go and stood there for 20-30 seconds. We clapped and cheered him on because this was the longest we have seen him stand. He was so excited by the attention that he decided to take one step forward. We cheered even more. Then he realized that he no longer had something to grab onto and plopped down to the floor.

It was an exciting first step. We were so glad that we both had the opportunity to witness it. We're not putting too much stock in it though as we know it could be a long time before Noah is ready to walk. He's getting the idea though and he's pretty proud of himself for his accomplishments. Of course we're very proud of him too... as any new parent would be.

State Fair

Noah had his first experience at the Great Minnesota Get Together this weekend. He enjoyed trying some new foods and people watching. He also thought the animals were pretty neat. We let him pet a horse, goat and pig. I think he was most interested in the horse because it's head was bigger than he is. He also got to meet Goldy Gopher who he thought was pretty cool.

Here are a few photos from our fun packed day.

Teeth

About a week and a half ago (Saturday 8/22), Noah woke every 15 to 45 minutes throughout the entire night. Eric and I were dumbfounded as to what was bothering him so much. We took turns laying with him, rocking him and shushing him through the wee hours of the night and morning. The next day we were both exhausted. Last Wednesday (8/26), I felt a tiny sharp object in his mouth. After much distraction and convincing, I was able to look at Noah's bottom gums and see that he had a tiny little portion of a tooth poking through. He was getting his first tooth on the bottom left-front. That explained the ugly Saturday night. A few days later, another tiny little sharp object appeared on the bottom right-front. This week, he's still working on those first two teeth. They haven't advanced much further but they don't seem to be bothering Noah quite as much now. As long as he's not in so much pain, we're okay with the teeth taking their time because he's still nursing and the teeth are not yet big enough to cause his mother much pain.

Noah doesn't like showing off his pearly whites yet. In fact he sticks his tongue out or clenches his jaw and purses his lips to prevent us for peering into his mouth. So sorry to all, no photos yet. We'll try to snap one when Noah decides to give us the opportunity.

I'm really a Twins fan...

But my Fairy Godfather decided to send me a bunch of Cubs gear. He told me that it's okay if I route for the Twins, but just remember that "Everybody loves the Cubs." He's also teaching me Latin. My new phrase is Eamus Catuli. Translation: "Let's go Cubs!"

Here I am in my new gear. Thanks, Paul!!!

Gone Mobile

Noah's officially mobile!!! He started crawling last weekend and progressively increased his speed and his endurance over the last week. Noah is now moving about the house and Eric and I are scrambling to baby-proof. Why is Noah crawling so early, you ask? Well, her name is Bailey. She's Noah's favorite family member and he wanted to be able to get a bit closer to her when she is around. Noah loves his kitties and Bailey would lay next to him (just out of his reach) while he was playing on the floor. She was just too tempting, so Noah found a way to get himself over there. He started out pulling himself across the rug while sitting up. Slowly he progressed to crawling on his hands and knees. The first night he went about a yard in 10 minutes. Now he's cutting up the rug, traveling easily across the room. He's enjoying his new found freedom. He no longer whines until we let him hold our hands and walk him around the house all evening. Now he can get himself around. So far he's found that he can pull little strings off the cat scratching post, but they don't taste too good. And he loves to take out things that we have just finished putting away.

Here's a video of Noah enjoying Bailey as she walks about his room.


And of course, here's a video of Noah showing off his new achievement... crawling.

Catching up in Video

New Foods - Noah started rice cereal a couple of weeks before he turned 6 months. He wasn't so sure what he thought about it. Then his first solid was peas. Enjoy the funny faces he made for us.

Rolling Over - Noah started rolling over in May. He became the King of Slow Motion Roll Overs. As he became more proficient, he added a signature celebration dance at the end of his roll over. He loves rolling tummy to back, but never did master rolling from his back to his tummy.

Walking - Noah has grown to enjoy walking while holding on to Mom or Dad's fingers. He starts out with a hula to gain his balance, then gets moving. It's quite cute.

Standing - Noah has started pulling up on things. He loves his Grandma's ottoman because it's just the right height for him.

Catching Up in Photos 2

Getting Bigger



Up on Hands and Knees


Love My Kitty (Bailey is the blur at the right of the photo)

Rolling Over (still only one way)

Enjoying My Toys

Minnesota Zoo with my friend Henry

Catching Up in Photos

Well, we've been very busy lately... Hence , no new posts in the last couple of weeks. So today I'm adding photographs and movies to catch you up with what's been happening. Sorry there's not a lot of text. Since I'm posting this during Noah's nap which is rarely more than 20-30 minutes, I thought it would be better to catch you up with images, rather than not at all.

Riding the Carousel at Como Park


Doing Laundry

Posing for Mommy



Okay, Mom. I'm done!

Minnesota Zoo with my friends: Julia, Ben and Josh



4th of July Parade at Daycare


4th of July with Friends