HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

Happy Birthday Nora!

I'm writing this now before your party so we don't forget to post something on this milestone.

Your parents love you so very much and I hope you like your party!

Love,

Dad

Phase One

Nora is going through a phase where she pretty much just wants to be touching me at all times.  Even if she's playing with her toys she wants me to be sitting on the floor with her.  This makes it hard to take pictures so I really only find myself snapping shots of her while she's eating.  So here are a tremendous number of pictures of Nora eating and making a mess.

Quinoa was a mess.  She liked it though! 

Thanksgiving selfie! 

At the children's museum, crawling into a giant carrot

One of the walls was made of exercise balls

Stuffed turnips!

Giant magnet wall

Notice Dug's phone hidden behind his back 

Playing in the kitchen

Shoveling spaghetti in as fast as she can 

Notice the cauliflower in her eyebrows.  So stylish!

All this mess involves many baths.  Thanks Aunt Kelly for the birthday bath toys!  

Giving Thanks

This is the time if year that everyone focuses in giving thanks. Well, among many other things too numerable to recount here, I am thankful for a job that allows me to take a half-day so that I can attend a daycare Harvest Family Feast and then take a nap. The daycare principal's husband made the turkey and it was delicious!

For whatever reason the flash was on and so this picture looks pretty weird.

But then she wouldn't be still so all of the rest of the pre-dinner pictures are blurry. 

Have I mentioned that she never stops moving?  

She really enjoyed her meal though. 

The other parents were impressed by how much she loves to eat. 

And the mess that she made was pretty impressive.  

Blue joined in on the napping part of the afternoon.  

Dug finally gets around to writing a blog post! Tons of pictures included!

Hi family and friends! This is Dug. I haven't blogged in a while, just sitting idly by while Sara does all the heavy lifting. This also means that cute pictures of my kid have been stuck on my phone and generally only shared with those directly in front of me. If you were one of the lucky ones you can skip this post, or you could stick around and relive the excitement of CUTE BABY PICTURES!

They are in chronological order from newest to oldest, but not really that old, just from now until October.

Nora is crawling now, and she gets distracted by any little thing on the ground. While at a friend's (Lily's) birthday in the park we let Nora roam free, sort of. When the whole ground is made of little things it is hard to go very far.

At this same party Nora got to experience two firsts at the same time! First animal cracker and first time in a swing! She was throwing her head back and just laughing, laughing, laughing. I don't know where she gets that.

She loved this.

Nora at one my my friend's weddings (Adam, who was my training officer, he needed an officiant). Here she is chowing down on some steamed vegetables and styling in her R2-KT beanie. For more info on R2-KT see http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/R2-KT

Thanks, Kimi, for the cool hat!

Thanks, Oasis, for the delicious food!

Not only do I like my daddy's glasses, I chew on my Grammie's as well!

Nora was a Ladybug for Halloween. Here she is at the St David's NICU reunion.

Sara was a flower, and I was a farmer. We're cute, huh?

Nora pre-surgery.  She's about to get tubes in her ears.

She didn't seem to mind being up so early. Her parents did, however.

Delicious hoodie pull strings!

Nap time on grammie

Halloween Part II

So the second part of Halloween involved visits from both Grandpa Wes and Grandma Deb and Grammy Diane.  We went to three different Halloween events all over town and a great time was had by all.  Well, mostly.  Actually, Nora was a little over stimulated and pretty cranky after each of the events but otherwise we all had a great time.  Okay, pictures! 

Grandpa Wes and Nora pre-Halloween festivities

We all went to visit Aunt Margaret that weekend, too.  Grandpa and Aunt Margaret were ready for the game.
Hook 'Em Horns!

Grandpa Wes and Grandma Deb with Nora outside of the Frank Erwin Center for Longhorn Halloween

Grandma Deb trying to make Nora smile for the camera. 

In her costume before heading out on Halloween

A better shot of the cape I made 

It's getting harder and harder to take good pictures of her because she NEVER.STOPS.MOVING. 

Mommy was a flower to Nora's lady bug

Grammy came with us to the Halloween carnival at Dottie Jordan park which is just down the road from our house. 

Grammy captured Nora's first attempt to go through the dog door.  Don't they just look like a Calvin and Hobbs strip waiting to happen? 

Halloween Part 1

We went to two Halloween shindigs this past weekend. The first was the NICU Reunion at St. David's. We were able to see some of the staff that we spent time with while we were in the NICU and a few of the families that we got to know while we were all there taking care of our little ones. It was so good to see everyone and also a reminder of how lucky we are that Nora is so healthy considering her dramatic entry into the world. And then we went to a party at Dug's coworker's home in Liberty Hill. Fun was had by all. We took no pictures while we were at the events but here are a few that we took at home. Please note that they are mostly blurry because she does not stop moving.