Natalie's Room!

We spent this whole weekend completely changing Natalie's room. It was originally my dining room, which was then converted into a nursery before she was born. The color was a darker olive green that actually worked pretty well with her nursery theme at the time. But lately, she's said that "green is a boy color" and that she wanted to change it.

So I caved. I let her pick out whatever colors she wanted and I must say it turned out very beautiful!

Mommy's Little Parrot!

Evan woke up this morning in a good mood. No, a great mood. He sat around with me and his sister and just had a great time laughing and playing. And talking.

Ok, so he's not really talking. But he is copying a few short words, which is really huge for him. Especially considering all that he usually says is "dadadadadada" or just screams as loud as he can.

I managed to catch a little bit of it on video. I had to bribe him with some Ritz Brown Sugar and Cinnamon crackers (have you tried them yet? So yummy!) but he finally gave in and started copying. His words aren't as clear as they were this morning (I think he's getting bored with saying the same things over and over) but you can tell he's trying.



Once again, he refuses to say "Mama" and instead chooses "dadadadada". Oh well... one of these days he's just going to start saying it!

And, as soon as I stopped recording, he did wave his hand in a sort of "bye-bye" motion, although I can't be sure if he did it on purpose or not. We'll start practicing that next!

((If you are getting this post via email, you may have to come to the actual blog page in order to see the video! Don't forget to turn off the music at the top right))

My Little Ever-Evers:

You are 10 months old today! My my my, how time does fly. I can't believe you are going to be turning a year old in just 2 short months. You are growing up much to fast!

You started crawling a few weeks ago. You are quite the mover and shaker! Sometimes you start going so fast that you lose your balance...

but you always manage to pull yourself back up and take of yet again!

You move at the speed of light, especially towards all the "no-no's" in the house. One of your favorite things to do is chase your big sister around the house. I love to hear you two laughing and giggling at each other!

One of your new favorite games to play is tilting your head and trying to get us to copy you. It is so adorable to watch you learn to interact with everyone! Most of the time, copying what you did sends you into a fit of laughter that is so contagious!
One day, when it was nice outside, I took your sister out to play. I heard your daddy calling and me from the screen door and this is what I found looking back at me:

You wanted to play too! I hadn't even realized that you would be old enough to play outside on the swing set. So we got you dressed and brought you out! You love being outside (but you aren't a big fan of the wind just yet). Swinging is your new favorite thing to do!

I have to tell you that one of the cutest things you do is fall asleep in your jumper.

You do this on a weekly basis! I'll hear you just a jumping away then suddenly fall silent. I swear, you go from full on jumping to asleep within seconds. I wish I could leave you in there, but I'm sure it's not comfortable after a while.

You are pulling up on everything that you can get your hands on! Sometimes, if mommy can get your attention long enough, you will stand up on your own for a few seconds. You get better at this every day! In no time, you'll be taking your first steps. Boy, is your sister in for it then! =)

You currently weigh around 20 pounds. I have no idea how long you are because you won't lay still long enough for me to measure! But I know you are tall because the outfits that fit you the best are all 12-18 months. Your feet are so big that you recently started wearing some of your sister's socks!

You have 6 teeth that have made their way into that adorable little mouth of yours and you've got 2 more on the way!

When you are hungry (which is pretty much always), you pop your index finger into your mouth. This is usually immediately followed by you yelling at us to get our attention. Waiting for food is not something that you tolerate!

You eat anything you can get your hands on (that even includes the little rocks that make their way into the house. Oh how I love wrangling those away from you!). We just moved you up to stage 3 baby foods since you were eating 2 of the stage 2's at a time. Your bootie (bottle) is still your favorite way to drink, but you are also drinking out of a straw now. You're getting more and more table foods now. Your favorite so far seems to be mashed potatoes... just like your daddy!

Speaking of Daddy, you can currently say the following words:

"Da-DAH" - Daddy
"Dee-Dee" - Natalie (we think you get it from when we call her Nati)
"DAH-da" - Dane Dane or Grandaddy. There is a definite difference between this and Daddy though.

And you have said "Mama" a grand total of........ ONE time. =( C'mon, little man! Who's with you day in and day out? I just wanna hear you say it again! If I look at you and say "Mama" you just giggle and say "Dadadadada".

I love you so much, little man. I'm so excited to see you continue to grow! It is such a privilege to be your Mommy.

(Daddy and Evan)
The two most important men in my life!

Evan - 9 months

Evan is almost 9 months old. It's hard to believe that he's been here with us now for as long as I carried him inside me!

We haven't been to his 9 month appointment yet, so I don't know his exact weight/height. At his 7 month appointment he was in the 75th percentile for height and the 40th for his weight. Looks like we're gonna have a tall boy on our hands!

He's currently most comfortable in 12-18 month clothes, but he can still wear some of his 9 month stuff.

He's learning to drink from a sippy cup and we're working on teaching him how to drink from a straw. On a perfect day, he'll eat a total of 3-4 jars of stage 2 baby foods and drink around 4 or 5 six-ounce bottles. We still get up at least once a night for a diaper change and a "bootie" as we call it.

Oh, and he learned a new trick! Check it out:



He finally started crawling on January 30th. He's doing things so much later than Natalie did, but he's on track for development. I guess it's true what they say: boys do things later than girls do.

For the past few days I've been relearning how to baby proof a house (which should have been done weeks ago). In fact, I just now put the covers on all the electrical outlets. It's been so long since it's had to be done! But he's so curious and into everything... we're chasing him around all day saying "No no Evan!"

He's also got 6 little toofers that are just too adorable for words. He doesn't like to show them, but if you put your finger in there you'll feel them for sure!

My little man is growing up!

We're Back!!

I apologize to everyone for not keeping up with this blog. Life with 2 little ones is a difficult thing to adjust to. I'm sure you can understand!

I'll be updating lots of pictures soon, but here's a couple recent ones to tide you over

Evan has begun pulling himself up on everything. We managed to lower the crib just a few short days before he started doing this. Hopefully, he'll be standing soon!

Nati and Evan playing together on the floor. You can see that Evan is able to pull himself into a sitting position, which is something he just started to do about 2 or 3 days ago.

One of Nati's favorite games... hide from Mama! She's roped Evan into her game as well.

Boy oh boy, does he look like my daddy in this picture or what? I need a good picture comparison!

I'll post some more pictures soon!

Evan Update

We got in to see his pediatrician today and he confirmed that Evan just has a cold. No ear infection, no swine flu, no bronchitis... just a bad case of the sniffles.

He said we should be good to go for our trip to Orlando!

On the way home, I got stuck in some awful traffic. It usually takes me between 45 minutes - 1 hour to get from the pediatrician's office all the way to home, but today it took over 2 hours. I got stuck behind an accident on the highway and it seriously took over an hour to move .4 miles.

UGH!

So, needless to say, my plans of getting all my laundry done today so I can pack tomorrow pretty much flew out the window.

Wish me luck!

Evan Is Sick

We've all been battling pretty mild colds over the last 2 weeks, but Evan seems to have gotten the worst of it.

He's still congested and now he's coughing. To make things worse, he's developed a low fever since yesterday. You can just tell the poor little thing doesn't feel good.

I'm waiting to hear back from the nurse now about whether or not we need to come in for an appointment.

I guess Evan's first trip to Disney will be spent inside the hotel room. =(