Noah's Second Birthday

Thanks to all of Noah's friends and family, he had a fantastic birthday (despite the piles of snow we received that weekend). Noah enjoyed his train themed birthday party, starting bright and early in the morning playing trains with daddy.


Then he helped Daddy shovel the front sidewalks.

After all the snow had been cleared, he watched Mommy decorate the cake. Mommy made two cakes. Yummy!


He had quite a lot of fun enjoying his birthday cake with all of his friends and family.




Now, you can ask Noah how old he is and he will respond "TWO", during which time he puts up 2 hands, instead of two fingers. It's so cute!

Santa!?!?!

We went to Bachmann's on Lyndale Saturday to see Santa arrive with his reindeer. Noah was very excited to see so many kids enjoying the holiday arts & crafts, music and treats. He also loved to talk about the lighted trees display. We waited and waited for Santa to arrive, all the while talking about him and whether Noah wanted to meet him. Noah said "yes" he wanted to say 'Hi' to Santa and "yes" he wanted to give Santa a hug.

Here's what he really thought of Santa when he arrived.


SCARED!!!

Today we ask Noah if he was happy that he met Santa and he says "yes". But if we ask him if he wants to meet him again someday, he just looks at us with fear in his eyes. Then if we say "you were scared of Santa weren't you?" Noah answers, "yeah."

So Santa is good in concept, but in reality Noah would rather stay 10 feet away and behind Mommy's leg.

The holidays are on their way!

Here's a preview of our holiday card...

And here is our other favorite photo of Noah in his holiday gear.

Halloween Fun

Here are a few images taken at a kid's Halloween Costume Photo Contest in which Noah participated. He didn't win, but we think he's a winner anyway.

He's Sleeping???

So far this week, we have logged four nights of sleeping through the night. Mom and Dad are jumping up and down with joy at the possibility that we may have achieved a regular sleep-through-the-night routine. However, we're not ready to call it. We just don't want to jinx the good thing that we have going. Regardless, it's been very nice that Noah has slept through the night several times this week so that Mom and Dad could catch up on much needed sleep to overcome their colds.

Enjoy Fall Through a Toddler's Eyes

Take a few moments to enjoy fall through Noah's eyes (photos below). He had his first experience jumping in a pile of leaves and thought it was hysterical.

Apple Picking - Second Adventure

We picked apples at Minnesota Harvest last weekend with The Mocks. Minnesota Harvest is closing after this season, so it was bittersweet. I've been picking apples there for as long as I can remember and I wanted Noah to have the opportunity to experience it at least once too. The apple selection was much better than at Ahmad's so we actually got to pick apples off the trees. Noah really enjoyed pulling the ripe apples off the trees, cleaning them on his pant leg and taking huge bites from the juicy fruit. I think he probably ate three whole apples all by himself just during the short time it took us to fill 3 peck bags.

Here are a few photos from our recent adventure.

Memphis!!!

Noah took his first (and second) airplane rides this month when we traveled down to Memphis to visit his Godmother, Laura, and her family (Ryan, Ellie and Owen). Noah thought the airplane trip was quite the adventure. He enjoyed peering out the window during take-off and landing. Fortunately, both flights were not completely booked so the adults around us were able to rearrange themselves a bit to ensure they adequately avoided the annoying toddler bouncing the tray up and down and kicking the back of the seat in front of him. Overall, we survived the flights better than I had imagined we would. We were able to keep Noah between the two of us during both flights and so we didn't end up walking the aisle throughout the entire trip.

Memphis was a lot of fun, mostly because of the company we kept while we were there. Ryan and Laura went out of their way to make us feel welcome. We were also amazed at how well Noah related and played with Ellie (5) and Owen (2). Noah and Owen butted heads (figuratively) a few times but there were not major catastrophes caused by the need to share toys and books for a few days.

We enjoyed outings to the botanical gardens and the zoo. The kids had a blast and the adults enjoyed watching them run from exhibit to exhibit, eyes wide with wonder.

Below are selected photos from our trip.



















Wish we were still there. The cold weather is starting to settle into fall here now and we miss the warm sunshiny days we spent in Memphis. But most of all, we miss our friends and can't wait until we will see them again.

Apple Picking - Noah's First Adventure

We enjoyed scouring Ahmad's Apple Orchard in Stillwater for apples with our friends/neighbors a few weeks ago. Unfortunately, the orchard with picked out so we didn't actually succeed in picking apples. We did enjoy picking already picked apples out of the bins in their barn though. And the kids had fun romping through the orchard.





The orchard also had a nice area where kids could ride all kinds of small tractors. Noah enjoyed this more than the apple hunting.

Whining

Calling all parents with success stories about how they ended their toddler's whining... Please submit your success stories by commenting on this post. We're looking for any and all possible ideas to break through Noah's newest toddler habit. Though I read on babycenter.com that whining is a common stage and a very effective way for a toddler to get attention, it does 't make it anymore pleasurable to hear while I'm making dinner in the evening. Any thoughts???

My First Letter

Noah has learned his first letter. Last weekend Grandma swore that Noah pointed out the letter "O" a number of times as they read stories. We weren't sure if we should believe her because Grandma loves to think her grandson is the smartest baby (now turned toddler) that has ever graced the planet. However, today Noah proved Grandma right when he pointed to the letter "O" in his name and told daddy "O". Amazing... He's not even two years old yet and he's already learning letters. I never thought I'd have a little guy learning letters before consistently sleeping through the night or learning to sit on the potty. Nonetheless, that's what Noah has decided to do.

Recent Photos of Noah

Just wanted to share some recent photos of Noah. It's been a while since I've posted so I'll try to get us caught up in photos now and with more words later.