happy 5 month birthday!!!

like, last week. but better late than never.

she's getting so big!

i kind of lose track of nora's achievements as they happen. just because they happen so quickly and then she's onto the next thing.

for instance. nora started sitting up on her own- as in for real and not toppling over 5 seconds after we sat her up- and then suddenly it was the only thing she wanted to do. and then she started scooting around on her bum a few days later. i'd set her up on her blanket, leave her for a minute and come back, and she'd sitting up in the middle of the living room, a few feet from where she started. it totally surprised me the first time she did that.

she will pick up EVERYTHING. and she WILL gnaw on it. and when she's not mouthing it, she's passing it from hand to hand and waving it around.  we gotta be careful, because when we eat dinner with her the first thing she tries for is a handful of food. and we don't let her have that yet.

she rolls over both ways. but she doesn't really like rolling from her stomach to her back. it scares her. so she prefers to cry to be picked up instead, when she gets stuck on her tummy.

she recognizes her name. it's so cute.

she's started babbling and mimicking us when we talk to her. her favorite is "dada" which i can't quite understand- i've been promoting "mama", but she doesn't seem to like it quite as much.

she makes the chewbacca noise. i believe she got that from her father.

she's started reaching for mama when she's tired of being held by daddy. ;)

first time in the pool with uncle brad-o. she liked it.

and the most celebrated achievement of all: we have successfully established a consistent bedtime for nora. cheers all around for sanity!

joo-lye

right now it's august. which means that i should probably post about all the stuff we did last month.

july seemed pretty busy, but really, we only did a few things. maybe having a kid just makes us feel like busy all the time. :)

the #1 cool thing of the month: chris is no longer on the night shift. thank. heavens.

chris had the 4th off so we could celebrate together. we went to my grandparents for a BBQ, and nora was a monster the entire day. hence, no pictures, and no fireworks. when we got home and she fell asleep, and we were so grateful for the reprieve, we did too.

we also took a trip over to maine this month from the 6th to the 12th for chris's sister's wedding. it's nice in maine this time of year. we stayed with chris's parents in a cabin on the shore in lamoine. flying with an infant is probably the most stressful thing ever- i will never judge the parents of a screaming infant on a flight ever again. you can hop on over to my other blog for more stories and pictures about the trip. there are a lot. seriously.

at chris's sister's wedding:

picture courtesy of Michael Gerardi

that's it for this month! cheers.

happy 4 month birthday!

well, maybe not so happy. we got shots today. we didn't like em too much. at least tylonel tastes good.



featuring the tazmanian devil this time. so befitting of her personality!


on a less traumatizing note, nora also got weighed and measured today. she's 2'1" (or 25 inches, or the height of my knees), and weighs 14lbs 12oz... not a feather-weight anymore. i would tell you that chris has started to complain of back pain when he carries her around in the "princess hold" for any extensive amount of time, but i won't because that makes him sound like a sissy. ;)

stuff that little nora can do now:

•  laugh (and promptly get the hiccups afterwards, like her father)
• grab toys, which instantly go straight to her mouth
• grab her feet (and copious amounts of her mother's hair)
• roll over.
• vocalize a tremendous amount of non-screaming, non-crying noises (although she does a lot of the other stuff too)
• make wet-raspberry noises with her mouth
• drool (a LOT)

while we were at the doctor's office today the nurse made a comment about the strength and level of physical activity this girl exudes, preceded by the word "wow" (we had a hard time measuring her. when nora's on her back, she'll either a} pull up into a perpetual stomach crunch and stare you down grunting until she's picked up, or b} roll over. flattening her out was a fun undertaking. you'd have better luck pinning down a fish out of water). then she prophesied that little nora is going to be a mover as soon as she finds out how to get around. i think i can safely say that i have the most opposite of a chill baby that anyone could ever get. apparently her dad was just like that as a kid. we just came back from visiting his parents, and the stories- oh the stories! if nora's anything like chris we are going to have an exciting time raising her, to say the least. :-)

june

this month we:

hit up some more parks. lake jennings and lindo-lake to be specific.
lake jennings: beautiful. but it'll cost you $1 to walk around. i'm not kidding.

lindo lake: nice to take a stroll around. but don't let the name fool you- it's less of a lake and more of a pond. but a pretty pond, nonetheless. and people fish in it, from what we saw. oh yeah, and there is this... faux-gym equipment chillin' around there also (kiiiiinda ridiculous. but whatever). we had a few laughs on those contraptions.

and then my sister got married. as beautiful as she was, i got zero pictures of her, because i was very busy holding little nora who was not-a-happy-camper that day. BUT i did happen to convince my big-little-bro take a few pictures of our tiny little fambily in front of the temple while we were waiting.

we will be going inside there someday soon, i think. :)

then we went to this bonfire with mr.&mrs.B and other friends/coworkers of chris. it was a good time.

the end.

happy 3 month birthday!

little nora bora is 3 months old... hooray! this is the benchmark that chris and i have been looking forward to with great anticipation- the conclusion of the "missing trimester", the age when babies supposedly figure out how to quit screaming all the time, and so forth. in celebration of this miraculous "coming of age", i drank a little bit of milk for the first time since i found out it gave her awful, demonic gas (about 11 weeks ago). verdict: it still gives her gas, but she can handle it MUCH better than she used to. awesome possum.

anyways, nora's 3 month birthday landed on father's day. and unfortunately, her daddy-o had to work that day, but we had a grand ol' time anyways.

see? grand ol' time. she is trying to eat her dress here.

nora is also a growing fiend. we're not exactly sure how big she is now (her next doctor's appointment is still a month away), but just this past week i had to retire some of her cute 3 month old clothes because she's already too big for them. awwww. but that's ok, because there ain't nothin' wrong with a sturdy, chubby baby. :)

see the chub.



some of the fascinating things she's learned to do this past month: drool profusely, nom-nom on her hands, and make a variety of different, happy noises. she's a regular little cutie pie. we love her.

may's show-and-tell.

well, we've wrapped up the month of may, and summer is well under way (yessssss!). essentially, this month has pretty much been an assemblage of doctor's appointments for all of us, but we did find time to squeeze in an outing here and there. here's where we went:

my two kids & the jungle gym

el monte park: a GIGANTIC park located in the bowels of lakeside. it's actually pretty nice. we went there on one of the hottest days in may. there was nobody else there... unless you count a skittish wild turkey. with the entire park at our disposal, chris decided to have fun on one of the many jungle gyms (like the big kid he is). oh, and although this isn't in any way related to the park, i just want to mention that on the way home, a bird hit our windshield (such a memorable experience).

shhhh... no one can tell we're trespassing, right?

el capitan reservior: not because we have a boat, or even have friends who have a boat. we went there because we wanted to see the lake, and then ended up hiking our way up a "restricted road", which, we believe, would have eventually led us straight back up to alpine. we would have found out for sure, had there not been a giant, locked gate a few miles in. so we turned around and walked back the way we came. it was nice- very pretty country back there.

chillin at the bistro

del mar: mcdonald's bistro and then the beach afterwards. what is a mcdonald's bistro? essentially the fanciest mcdonald's in the existence of all mcdonald's, with an expanded menu. we hung out with the chef there for a while and then took a twilight stroll on the beach. nice area, del mar. you know it's a nice area when you follow a ferrari out of a fast food restaurant that has a chandelier in the bathroom. {side note: ever driven directly behind a ferrari? nervewracking. that's one car you really want to avoid rear-ending if you can help it}

lake laguna. nilly nora is chris's joey for the day.

the lagunas: with our fantastic neighbors, mr.&mrs. B! it was initially their outing to begin with, but they were kind enough to invite us along with them. they happen to have a baby daughter as well, so her and nora got to ride around with us in matching front carriers all day. mr. B also had a serious looking camera, with which he took this photo (so nice of him- thanks mr. B!).

2 months!

little nilly nora turned two months old this week, and how more appropriate to celebrate her 2 month birthday by a visit to the doctor and some immunizations! :)

{scene from the doctor's office:}

nurse: "well she must look like her daddy because she looks nothing like you!"
me: "yeah, pretty much. if i didn't personally give birth to this baby myself, i wouldn't think she's even mine."

and that's the truth. but she's cute though. like her dad. ;-) so i'll keep her.

so turns out our little girl's head isn't as gigantic as i imagined it to be. i used to tease chris all the time that she had his "big giant head," but now it looks like i can't really do that anymore. turns out, her head's a rather normal size. however, as far as everything else goes, she's definitely in the "big giant" category. she's in the 95th percentile for height, and 83rd percentile in weight for her age; which explains why she's busted out of the clothes in which she should be fitting and is, instead, wearing 3-month old size clothes. but this works for me for a couple of reasons:

a) the more nora eats, the less calories i have to burn off
b) lifting and carrying a 12lb baby around all the time is totally helping me see a return in arm definition.

of course, as far as the shots were concerned, she didn't quite like those all that much- poor baby. as sad as it was, it had to be done. i had the opportunity to study most all of the diseases for which she was immunized back when i took microbiology. after learning what i did in that class, there is no way i'd let my child go without getting vaccinated. even though she had to endure a few boo-boos for it.

2 month old nora, stylin' with her bugs bunny bandaids on her legs from gettin' shots.

so far, it seems like nora is developing a bit of a personality. like, a rather high maintenance sort of personality. she seems to want a lot of attention all the time or else. chris refers to her as "princess nora" and has a special "throne hold" for when she is particularly fussy- whereby he carries her around and around the apartment, narrating as he goes. example:

"and this room is the bathroom! it has a bunch of mirrors and lights!... you like that? hmm? ... no? you don't? ok then. on to the next room..."

and so on, and so forth.

that's the hold i'm talking about.

when she's not too busy fussing, she does actually smile. she actually squeaked out a few laughs the other day. a welcome (albeit brief) respite from her usual agitation. i'm thinkin she'll be a whole lot happier once she can move around on her own- she's been able to hold her head up and steady for a while now so she can check out what's going on around her; she's doing all she can to roll over (she's almost got it down); and during "tummy time" she's already doing push-ups and trying to scoot. all a little early, i know, but she's chris's daughter- she's got places to go and things to do! i have a sneaky feeling that this child might give me a run for my money here in the future... we will have to see. :)