Wednesday, December 30, 2009

9 Months Old



Baby Kate is nine months old today! It is so amazing that have already had her in our lives for nine months. It is going by so incredibly fast. She is an amazingly sweet baby girl and always has a big grin on her face as long as Mommy is close by. She has definitely hit the 'Mommy' phase. She continues to be happy just sitting, playing with her toys and is only just now starting to stretch for things that are out of her reach. She will roll onto her tummy and then just continue to stretch until she either gets it or rolls over and finds something else to make her happy. We genuinely thought she would be crawling by now, but she seems in no big rush to do so. It's nice as Rachel was in a huge rush to do everything and Noah never did crawl - he just went straight to furniture walking. In the last couple of days she has become very interested in standing and trying to pull up to a standing position while holding onto my fingers. She LOVES to eat - everything that she can get into her mouth or con the people who love her into giving her. She still loves her baby food and we have started size threes along with soft regular food. She adores peas - will eat several serving size spoonfuls if you let her. She loves green beans, asparagus, bananas, applesauce, any kind of noodles, any kind of bread, she had black beans last night, quasadillas.. if she can chew it, she usually likes it. She has moved up to size three diapers -we just finished out the last handful of Grammy's stash of two's yesterday. She is wearing 6 to 9 months and some 12 month clothing. She sleeps from about 7 pm to 8 am since Noah is out of school - next week we will transition back to 6:30 am wake ups. We've all really gotten used to that extra hour and a half! She loves to play with her toys - anything with buttons. She loves the phones and remotes as well... buttons again. ;) Her sweet smile is enough to brighten our day and we love her to bits as always. Tomorrow she has her 9 month well baby - no shots, thank goodness, but we are interested to see her percentages.
UPDATE:

Just back from Kate's 9 Month Well Baby appointment. She is 27 1/2 inches long (50%) and weighs in at 15lbs 5 oz (5%). She is a teeny thing, but Dr. Bean says she is growing in height and that is what is most important. If her bones weren't growing there would be a big problem, but she has continued with regular growth in height, so she is fine. Her development is perfect and she checks out great! She's just a petite little thing.

Monday, December 28, 2009

13 Years of Marriage


Thirteen years ago today Doug and I joined hands, hearts and lives. It's been a great 13 years so far and we look forward to many, many more together. We have come so far and feel so blessed to have each other, our children and all of our family to share it with.

Saturday, December 26, 2009

Christmas at Mamaw's























After the kids opened all their presents and we had breakfast we got everybody ready and headed over to mom's house for a day of celebrating with everyone. It was so good to see all the kids running around and playing - all of them so excited about Christmas. We all enjoyed good food, good company, a little football and a whole lot of Christmas Vacation. =) We missed you Amie and family!

Friday, December 25, 2009

A Very Merry Christmas Morning!




LEGOS!
Rachel helping Phoebe take the bow off of her bone from Santa.


The ever wanted Bendaroos!

Rachel helped Kate open her stocking and also many of her presents before she ever opened any of her own.

Finally! Something for her!

Mmmmmmm.... Santa did good!



Coal? For Doug? Never! ;)

Happy Baby



MORE Legos???


















This was one very tired and happy mama with her babies! No more staying up till the wee hours of the morning to try to catch a glimpse of Santa Claus....



Our morning started with little feet pounding up the stairs to our bedroom and Rachel calling out "Mommy, Daddy! Santa came! Santa came!... and the coolest thing is a little doll house with a Bunny family for me and Kate-Kate!! It is the coolest!". She was so very excited as was Noah after peeking in to see if Santa had come or not. After getting Kate out of her crib and letting Phoebe out to 'go' we headed for the Christmas tree to see what Santa had brought. The kids were thrilled and Doug and I loved just watching their awe as they found the gifts from Santa and then opened the gifts under the tree. It was funny to watch Doug open his gift as it was layered in wrapped boxes and he sat and opened one present to find another tucked inside and so on until he finally got to his actual gift. It was cute to see his smile get bigger and bigger at each wrapped box. It was cute to watch Rachel open Kate's stocking for her and hand her each item... then help her unwrap her gifts - not in the crazed 'must unwrap' way, but in the helpful and sweet way because she knew Kate was so little. Noah would gasp at each item and say, "Just what I wanted!"... and I know you all wish you could hear Rachel sing into her microphone.... ha... ;) We may have to post some video of that to share with everyone. It was truely a magical morning here at our house.