This month brought more laughs and new experiences as always, ending with a good reminder of all we have to be thankful for...our sweet boys, health, a welcoming and comfortable home, good jobs, and a very loving family and supportive circle of friends!
Noah has begun to enjoy spinning himself around repetitively, sometimes to the point of getting a little dizzy, which especially funny to watch. For some reason, he likes to do this when he gets out some of the costume hats he likes to play with, specifically the pirate hat...not sure why it's always that one, but maybe he's a pirate walking on a ship?! :)
We still love playing outside as much as possible, though on days that Mommy works, that time is cut significantly with it getting dark by 5:30 - so no more evening walks. :( But we usually just play outside until dinner is ready instead. Noah doesn't ride much on his wheel toys, he more so likes to push them around - just likes he sees Drew doing a lot of times! We also have fun with bubbles and soccer balls. He's also very aware of any pieces of trash in the empty lot next to us to the point that he will start walking through the weeds to get it out for me (he's seen me picking up the trash, and now this is his way of helping I guess!) He does the same thing with leaves, so that keeps us pretty busy outside! He is also oddly particular about finding the absolute smallest piece of trash or dirt on floors, picking them up, and bringing it to Mommy to deal with...I hope he's not OCD like me and it's more of a random 1 year old phase! :)
Noah has learned to glorious joy of splashing as much water out of the tub during baths - driving Drew to new heights of laughter, and a bit of irritation to Mommy and Daddy - we don't mind the splashing so much as long as it doesn't drench the walls...a fine line to teach a 1 year old - actually, seemingly, impossible! They also love to race each other back and forth down stairs, and it's getting more and more appropriate and Noah is more capable. It's funny though, Drew obviously wins, but Noah will stop 1/2 way and turn around the other way to head back to get a big head start - no one taught him that one, he figured that out all on his own! He loves to wriggle and wrestle and snuggle on the floor - an interesting combination, but he gets a kick out of it!
The last 4 cuspids have poked through this month, with 2 coming at the same time right before Thanksgiving, with the classic low grade temperature, diaper rash, irritable child complex, but glad it's over with - only the 2 year old molars left! We are happy that less and less foods are becoming off limits for Noah, as he wants what Drew has at all times! A random food note, Noah has never been a big fan of any type of noodle based meal, so spaghetti, macaroni, etc. were always a wash, until this month we happened to find that he LOVES cold macaroni and cheese! Seems silly, but being as that's one of Drew's favorites, it's nice to know we don't have to make 2 meals anymore, just need to make it ahead of time so Noah can eat his cold!
We were able to make several trips to the parks in the area this month some more, and both boys are extending their abilities, which is fun, and a little bit dangerous! But they both love it! Noah specifically likes to climb UP the slide and go DOWN the stairs - which is the hardest way to do that for a 1 year old, so he keeps us on our toes! He has little fear though, climbing up everywhere there's a place to climb. He climbs up the first step of the stairs and onto the gait frequently now, but has added climbing on the handles of the stove (we have a smaller lower stove and he steps on that handle and holds onto the top handle). It has ended badly only once so far! He also started climbing up on the child sized rocking chair, which was fine, until he started standing on it every time - so now it's in the closet...
He is learning more and more vocalizations, etc. - he sings along (kind of) to a song Nana taught us about raindrops being lemon drops and gum drops - he sings the part "ah-ah-ah-ah" for standing outside with my mouth open wide! He also claps along with "If you're happy and you know it". And he knows lots more animal sounds - elephant, monkey, lion/tiger, bear, cat and dog. He also folds his hands during prayer at meals about 50% of the time!
Noah is still so much of a Mommy's boy! While he gets excited and will now run up to give Daddy a hug after being gone for awhile, etc., he still seeks out Mommy ALOT! He gets upset when Mommy isn't the one to get him first thing in the morning and won't stop looking for me. He's always at my feet it seems, and wants to be held...I love to snuggle, but it's just not feasible all day long! :)
There were several doctor appointments this month - Noah had his 15 month check up and all was well with him! They both also had dentist appointments, which they both hated, as expected - both required Mommy lock/hold down with Mommy in the chair! But we made it through. Drew ended up having 3 cavities :( and got them filled and sealed, but had to be sedated since he fights the dentist so much, so that added an extra layer of not fun to it. Drew did well, knowing that he didn't want to be there, he was pretty cooperative, and the sedation wasn't nearly as bad this time waking up, so that was a relief. Mommy was able to stay with him during giggle juice, laughing gas, and administering anesthesia until he was out, so it was a bit weird, comforting and yet scary to watch...it's always good to be near your child, but bizarre to see him unconscious. He was pretty silly with the laughing gas - he was truly laughing at nothing for about 3 minutes! We all got a bit of a kick out of watching him! I was also able to be there when he woke up, so that was nice, and he wasn't agitated at all this time - yeah! He was a bit whinier the rest of the day, but nothing like with his tonsils and adenoids, so thankful for that! Here's hoping we've all learned our lesson and we don't have to do that again!
Both boys had special weekends with both sets of grandparents this month. The first weekend of the month, the Palmer grandparents watched both boys for the entire weekend! The first weekend for Mommy and Daddy without kids since way before Noah was born! Whew! A nice break and a fun time for the 4 of them as well - they had fun going to the park, staying up late, watching movies, and getting all sorts of yummy foods - they had a blast, but we were all ready to be back together by Sunday for sure! Then 2 weeks later we all headed down to Houston for the weekend with the Glienke grandparents. More time outside and at different parks and playgrounds and tons of attention - all good things! The drive wasn't awful, though the drive into Houston took an extra hour thanks to Houston being Houston with horrible traffic, but we made it and had a great time with them.
Drew is learning more and more every day, and with that, is repeating, saying and singing more and more things that are anywhere from cute, funny, non-sensible, and sometimes inappropriate. We hear our phrases coming back at us more and more, which is always interesting. He comes home singing bits and pieces of songs from school or Sunday school that we try to piece together sometimes. He's starting to learn the days of the week, though the concept of present vs. future is still very difficult for him, ie: Christmas is in 4 weeks...Drew "today?!"...nope! He can mostly count to 20, but almost always skips 13 and 15.
He's actually been a bit more difficult dropping him off at school lately. He says he doesn't want to go, and wants to make sure we aren't going to leave him there...we of course have never done this, but he seems more concerned with this concept of being left lately...who knows! He's doing really well at school though, the teacher has mentioned several times how well he is doing with listening and behaving well at school. We've noticed an improvement as well, with sharing toys usually being the hardest aspect to cooperative play, but we know this is very normal.
And while the majority of the time we'd probably say he's doing a much better job of listening and making good choices, there are times where the extreme opposite occurs and his defiance, temper, tantrums and pouting are off the charts. When he gets really mad, he starts throwing his toys, etc. - we are NOT ok with that! So, trying to quelch it, but harder than we thought.
He's started to really enjoy playing games and role playing - so Daddy is delighted! We play CandyLand lots of nights before bed - he's of course happiest when he gets all the candy cards! But he also loves to role play with his cars or animals, or dragons and soldiers.
His preschool is at a church that is a voting center on Election Day and when I was dropping him off that day, he saw all the people of course, so I explained what was going on. His reaction was kind of funny - "I DO NOT want to VOTE Mommy!" - it just tickled me that he had such a strong opinion about something he really has no idea about at all! HA!
He still loves his Big Wheel, but is slowly transitioning to the bike with training wheels. With the darker hours, our practice time has been cut short, but he does love to ride on wheels!
We were able to go to one of Daddy's soccer games again this month, which Drew just loves. However, we won't be going back for awhile since now it's a constant chase of Noah not falling off the bleachers or getting out of the water fountain. But Drew had fun with another boy there, and it was neat to see how he played with someone he just met...did pretty good. The other boy was about 1 year older, and they had fun. So none of us actually WATCHED the game...so yah, maybe in another year we'll go back!
Drew still takes really long naps in the afternoon (anywhere from 2-3 hours), but is taking longer and longer to go to sleep at night, so we may start to have to play with that some. However, there are some nights it's pretty interesting to hear him talk, sing and play in his bed while he's 'winding down'. He only every now and then gets up and out of bed multiple times, he just lays in bed and chats it up, sometimes for an hour or more! Kind of crazy! But regardless, he's up at 6:30am! Sheesh!
We had a nice, quiet Thanksgiving in Fort Worth with Aunt Lynne and her kids and Uncle Ted and Sydney. Grandmother was supposed to be there, as was Grandma and Papa, but there were some health issues with Grandmother, so they weren't able to join us. It was still nice to be with family. The boys enjoyed some of the Thanksgiving specials on TV - they were ok with the Macy's Parade, but were glued in on the Dog Show that followed...crazy kids!
We all had fun kicking off the Christmas season with the Parade of Lights in downtown Fort Worth - the kids certainly loved it, but the parade was WAY too long - more than 2 hours of holding wiggling kids is crazy! We decided we need to create some sort of carrier or stand for the kids to sit on instead, but be able to fold up into a backpack - ha! We enjoyed setting up our Christmas trees and decorations (though it takes forever while trying to keep the boys happy as well), and they both love playing with all of the dancing/singing stuffed animals we have - it can get pretty noisy these days now with all of them going at once! But they also love playing with the nativity sets as well, so it's fun to see them enjoying that too. They were both even really excited about all the Christmas books to read through! Should be a fun Christmas this year!
