Nora-Bora-We-Adore-Ya

Getting back on track here! But I couldn't jump in to our day to day life without giving you all an update on our favorite little Miss! Oooh where do I begin? She is probably the silliest little thing I've ever met. If you catch her in the right mood she will just giggle non-stop, give you the brightest smile and say the most adorable things in the most adorable voice...can you tell I'm a bit of a fan of her? Since we brought her home, I remember saying to Jas 'Don't you just get so excited when you realize she's OURS TO KEEP?!" he of course looked at me like I was crazy, but I don't know, she's always just been SPECIAL - there is just something about her that I think will forever make the world, or at least MY world, extra bright.

Making the world SO bright, she has to wear shades

In my last post she was just a bit over 3 months old...and just kind of a blob. A blob that gave AMAZING facial expressions but a blob all the same. Now, she's a walking, talking, silly little hurricane that STILL has amazing facial expressions.

Awesome amazing facial expression example 1

Awesome amazing facial expression example 2

Awesome amazing facial expression example 3

She started walking around 10 months - just like her big brother. She has quite the little vocabulary with a few favorites that she says daily:

- "Bay Bay" (baby)
- Mama
- Bubba (Her name for Logan...I should note that she SOMETIMES wakes up asking for Mama, but USUALLY, she wakes up asking for Bubba...ya, she's a bit of a fan)
- Hi
- Ooooooh (When she wakes up asking for Bubba and I say "He's still asleep" she'll say "oooooh!" in a very surprised and overly adorable way)
- Whyyyyyyyy (it's actually not nearly as annoying as I typed it out there, it's once again super cute but she DOES say it after every single thing I say to her)
- Kitty (she's OBSESSED with Munchkin our cat)

You'll notice that Daddy is missing from this list - she definitely knows how to say it as she said it LOOONG before she ever said Mama. And I sincerely think she's holding out on Jason just to mess with him. She'll spout off a random roll call when we're all together; "Bubba...Mama...Baby...Kitty..." and then start again...Jas will look at her and say "What about me? Who am I?" and she'll just smile, laugh and look away! But then other times she'll say Dadee no problem! It should be noted that she calls him Daddy already - she does not call me Mommy - EVER. She has a special name for Jason already...It's hilarious. Get ready Jas...this one's a manipulator!

See what's happening here? Yes, this is Jas being wrapped around Nora's finger...

We have her 18 month appointment on Monday and I'm really looking forward to seeing how tall she is and comparing it officially with how tall Logan was at that age. She is SO long, it's crazy. I measured her on Logan's height chart in his room and it appears that she's only like 3" shorter now than Logan was on his 2nd birthday. A friend told me once that to determine the final height of your son, you double their height at age 2, and to determine the height of your daughter, you double her height at 18 months; if that's true then Logan and Nora will be the same height; 5'10" which is as tall as Jas. I will flip if I end up being the shortest member of my family! Ha!

Dreams coming true! She's finally JUST LIKE Logan!

Nora's latest thing is to play Mommy with her Baby...all day long from the minute she wakes up she wants a doll swaddled. She'll say "Thank You" to whoever helps her wrap the baby (but look out if you attempt to wrap it wrong! She will cause a FUSS and shout "No! No! NOOOO!" as she waves her arm violently at you! Kind of hysterical), then she'll carry the baby to whatever makeshift cradle she's created (Usually a small toy box). It is one of the most amusing and interesting things I've ever seen. I've never pushed dolls on to her - she came up with this obsession all on her own. And it's not like she's ever seen me acting like this with babies and she's mimicking me - she's the baby of the family so all that she's doing is completely intuitive.

Swaddling a baby for the 8 millionth time one day

 It's absolutely fascinating! I wonder if she'll always have this sort of nurturing way about her; will she be a nurse? A mommy of many kids? Will her obsession with our cat meet her obsession for caring and she'll be a Vet? Will she just be a compassionate person in general who wants to help and she'll become a doctor? This is parenthood I guess; you think far into the future based on little things your baby does from the beginning. I'm excited to see where Nora's life will take her!

She was so excited to ride in the kayak - may she always be this fearless!

Super-Double-Triple...and other Logan Updates

Sooo....Hello! We're going to completely ignore the fact that it's been WELL over 1 year since I've posted anything on this blog. Life's been busy, crazy, exhausting and all of THAT has left little to no time to write! So we're just going to gloss riiiiiiight over the fact that this blog has been very neglected! And to help gloss over the fact that we've been absent, I'm just going to sprinkle updated photos of Logan so that it feels like you've been reading this blog for the past 12 PLUS months!

Logan being quite possibly the cutest person EVER to be that close to a lion.

So on to more CURRENT topics...like LOGAN! And all that he's been up to as a fun, feisty and crazy 4 year old!

The title of this entry "Super-Double-Triple" is Logan's new favorite thing to say - he uses it daily. Sometimes it's a good thing and I am told that I'm a "super-double-triple fun Mom", sometimes it's a speed thing; "I'm going to do that super-double-triple fast!" and then other times, it's a bad thing like "Mom, you are super-double-triple not nice!" That last one is hard to not giggle at - he says it with SUCH conviction too! I have no idea where he learned this phrase, but chances are he just made it up himself and thinks that it just means SUPER SUPER SUUUUUPER ________ (whatever he is trying to say).

Logan Laub - aaaaaaalllll boy!

Logan and Daddy as Jas crosses the finish line at his FOURTH year of doing the SF 1/2 Marathon!

Aside from his new catch phrase, Logan's in his 2nd year of preschool. We changed schools from where he was at last year. His previous school was great, and he made a lot of great friends there, but i just felt like the school wasn't ENOUGH for him. I will admit that I spend way too much time worrying about what school is like today as opposed to when I was a young kid. I've heard that kindergarten is the new 1st grade and instead of it being a year about LEARNING how to write and things like that, your children now need to hit the ground running in kindergarten. So with those crazy thoughts running through my brain every day, we thought it would be best to get Logan in a school that focused a litlte more on academics. That's not to say he's being forced to write his admissions essay to Harvard this year but he is tracing his name, getting to do science experiments, learning a new letter each week and basically doing everything I'd hoped he'd be doing last year. And I will say, while I was nervous just before school started that we'd made a mistake; he is THRIVING at this new school. Is happy as can be every day when I pick him up, talks about his days on our way home and made new friends almost immediately. Nothing warms a Mother's heart more than seeing her child adjusting well to a new situation. While I think some of this has to do with the new school, I think a lot of it also has to do wtih Logan being a year older. A few months ago we attempted to trace some letters and it didn't go too well, we've also tried cutting a few times since last year and he's never done that great and he's never ever EVER done much drawing...I can no longer say ANY of that is true as of now. He brought home a paper last week where he'd traced his name and it was amazing! He also brings home different samples of papers he's cut at school and I'm SO impressed. And just this week he's become obsessed with drawing on his magnadoodle - drawing people (random shapes with legs and smiles) and even a carrot, a plumb and a grape yesterday!

This past summer Logan and our neighbor Kylie enjoyed a week at "Weird Animals Campl" which Ashleigh volunteered at as well

After slipping in the bathroom, Logan split his chin open and had to get stitches...the Dr said of the 5 other kids who were in that night for the same reason, Logan was THE BEST! Silver lining to this crazy night; Logan slipped because he stepped out of the tub onto the floor and not on the rug JUST as Ashleigh was saying "Step onto the rug or you'll slip" so now we have an amazing example to get him to listen to Mommy and Daddy! "Remember what happened when you didn't listen to mommy and hurt your chin??" Parental WIN!

He's an amazing big brother to Nora (still learning how to be gentle) but 95% of the time he's genuinely excited to be around her, to include her, to teach her, to play with her and to laugh with her. Omigosh - hearing the two of them giggle together is a sound I will NEVER get tired of hearing. Just today, Nora was beyond tired at nap time, so as we went into Logan's room to get him settled and read their story, Nora just climbed into Logan's bed an laid down. Logan got in next to her and they cuddled and giggled and it was adorable. I hope they are always this close and while I know there will be fights I hope that there are more moments of closeness like we have now. Love my two babies!

Logan loving on Nora last March for some photos we had done of the kiddos

And I'll leave you with this...which is probably the greatest photo of Logan EVER captured...nice work Jas!

Looking forward to seeing this same face, pose and cup in about 18 years!

Balance Bike!

Logan's Great-Grandpa Laub (Great PawPaw) got him an amazing present for his 3rd birthday; a balance bike! For those of you who don't know, a balance bike is a little kids bike that has no pedals and it teaches kids how to BALANCE on a bike before they ride one for reals! The theory behind a balance bike is that the child will learn how to balance and therefore will not need training wheels. So once the balance bike is mastered, they can graduate right to an actual bike! From what we've seen of Logan on his bike after just a few times, I believe it! Check it out!

Don't worry, we got him a new helmet...

He wanted to park his bike next to the other big-kid bike

Happy Birthday Logan!

I can't believe it...out "little" guy turned 3 last month!! Where has the time gone? Our 9lb 1oz big eyed baby boy has grown into a handsome, hysterical and sweet little boy!

We decided to keep things "low key" for the birthday party and just invite family over...too bad our family now consists of almost THIRTY people! But it was so fun to have everyone over here for a Pirate Party! Auntie Benzo brought some pirate face tattoos, we had a pinata and WAAAY too many presents! I'm pretty sure our family kept amazon.com and Disney in business during the month of June!

Out oh so cute pirate!

Cool dude pirate!

Believe it or not, this is our first family photo at one of Logan's birthday parties!

Go Logan, Go!

good form EE!

CAAAAAANDY!

More CAAAAANDY!

Action shot! Must jump onto coffee table!

More Jake stuff!

PURE joy!

More presents!

What is this tissue paper?! Where's the present?!

Clothes? Moving on!

Grandpa and Uncle Gary

Papa Laubster

Mommy in training (Angelique is due with baby #1 in December!)

Auntie & Uncle Bob (Uncle Adam in the background)

Gigi and Auntie

Poopy Pirate Nora

The whole family!

Clearly Nora disapproves of Logan's cake faceplant

SUGAR RUSH!!!

It's over?

The cake! I was pretty proud of this!

3 Months Already!!!

Well shoot, she's just shy of 4 months at this point, but oh well! I gotta get those pics up right!? I have been slacking on this whole blogging thing (don't even ask me about The Mommy Stop!), it's not for lack of wanting to write, its more about lack of energy and time! I'm hoping that once Nora starts sleeping through the night I'll have a little more pep in my step and will be able to think more creatively and actually sit on the couch each night (or early each morning) and type away instead of snoozing away! But, c'est la vie, thus is life with a newborn! Ain't in grand??

Actually, yes it is! Nora is a true delight. Seriously. She is the best. We love her so much and I just cannot get enough of her. She has the greatest smile (Looks a LOT like her brother's smile) that just engulfs her entire face. It's impossible to be gloomy around her. There are moments when I'll look at her and just become overwhelmed with excitement that she's OURS and that we get to enjoy her forever. I know that sounds weird, but she just seems like she's going to be a really special little thing and I am so enjoying getting to know her day by day by day.

So month 3 has brought us more of her personality, a more regulated schedule (Thank goodness!) and more time OUT OF THE HOUSE (another THANK GOODNESS!) and best of all - GIGGLES!! The cutest little chubby faced baby giggles! Logan had/has a full on BELLY laugh and it was music to my ears every time I could pry one out of him (it was not hard to do...still isn't!) and Nora's laugh is just as fantastic, but totally different. She has more of a cackle and it kills me!

I'll let the pictures do the talking for the rest of the post; starting with her 3 month collage and the rest are of random photos from this month! Enjoy! If you have a second, flip back between her month 2 collage and this one - yes that's the same bunny and no it did not shrink, homegirl just sprouted up!! Awesome!

Best Faces EVER!

Aww Shucks!

Delicious!

Happy Bbay!

So beautiful!

Had to get them both in their shirts before Homegirl outgrows hers!

Silly Logan!

See that bodyguard grip he has on her? We'll be counting on that in 15 years...

Buds

Great toy for our kicking baby girl!

Mom - don't bother me...I'm busy kicking

...and grabbing!

Ok, so none of these photos show the OUTINGS we've gone on, but I promise! We've been leaving the house regularly and it's awesome! Even if it's just out to go to the store, I'm just glad that leaving the house with both bambinos isn't as daunting as it once was :)

I wanted to note one thing about Logan and Nora and how they are together. It's clear to me already that Nora adores Logan. She will just look at him with such intensity it's fantastic. He can always make her smile, and he has never been anything short of sweet with her - it's so great. I feel so blessed!

More posts to come - Logan turns 3! Logan learns to ride a balance bike! Nora laughs! Uncle Nate, Auntie Gretchen and Cousin Luke visit!! Stay tuned!!!