Potty Training!

We have officially "begun potty training!" And by potty training, I mean we bought a potty seat and we're going to sit Noah on it when he wakes up, after naps, and before bath and bed time. We're just letting him get used to sitting on his little chair. No pressure. If he goes though, I'll be super excited!

So that's as much potty training as we're doing right now. In a few months, we'll be more intentional about it, but right now, it's just kind of fun and maybe we'll have a few less diapers to change. =)

That aside, we're settling in here. Noah turned 14 months yesterday. He love love loves having dogs around. He keeps pointing at them and saying "da," which makes me very excited, thinking he's going to start talking soon. But "da" seems to be his new favorite noise, so maybe he won't be talking just yet. I don't know. I'm excited for it to happen, anyway.

I've been looking at Pinterest a lot, and I have so many ideas for projects I want to do. One is to make a quiet book for Noah (2, actually). It'll have numbers, letters, some stuff to help with fine motor skills, a couple games... I'm really excited to get it together! However, I have no money with which to buy my supplies. Sad day. Pinterest is bad for my wallet.

And now.... A certain little boy needs my attention. =)

Goodbye Missouri!

I haven't posted in a while, so I don't think I've mentioned anything about moving. Our lease for our place ended at the end of October, so we moved all the way out to Chino, California. Whoah. Big change, right? We had our move-out inspection Monday morning, then Zach spent a couple hours tetris-ing everything into our car. Ran a few errands, and then headed out. We drove all night because Kansas sucks, and then got into Denver around 5 or 6 am- I'm not sure when, I was asleep- and we hung out at a McDonalds for a while. We wanted to wait until it was light out to drive through the mountains, since the drive through the Rockies is just beautiful.

After lots of driving, a two hour stop at Urgent Care for Richard (he was pretty sick), and a random snowstorm that left us with almost no visibility, we made it to Bryce, Utah Tuesday night. There we set up camp and snuggled up under a ton if blankets. It was so cold! The low that night was 12 degrees. Seriously. Cold. We had Noah bundled up, and he slept between us in the tent, then we had 4 or 5 warm blankets on top of us, with a crocheted quilt I made covering our heads. It was too cold without having our faces covered! Mali slept in the tent with us, she was snuggled by my legs for a while. If the ground hadn't been so cold, we would have been fairly comfortable. Apart from where we were touching the ground, we were warm. But anyway. We woke up pretty early in the morning, went to look at a few neat things around Bryce Canyon, and then drove on to Zion, Utah. It was beautiful! We stopped a couple times to hike to a few different interest parts. From there, we headed to Vegas. Stayed the night with Justin and Krista.

Thursday we hung out and Noah and Jake played. That afternoon, we went to visit Zach's mom at her new school. =) we left Vegas that evening and pulled into the driveway in Chino around 1-1:30 am.

And that brings us to today. We briefly introduced Mali to the dogs. It didnt go well. Merle chased her into a corner and she cowered and hissed at him. Thats going to be interesting. =)

Zach and I still need to unload the car and get settled in our room. So that's pretty much what's been going on with us. I'm pretty excited about this new adventure we're starting. I love that we can step outside and see the mountains. And we're an hour or less drive away from the beach, which I'm super thrilled about. =)

I was going to add some pictures from the trip in, but most of them are already off my iPod. All I have is a shot of the sunset in Henderson last night. So here's that. =)

Noah's First Birthday!

My boy turned the big O-N-E this past Friday. I don't know how that happened. He was just born. How can he be one? How can he be smiling and laughing and waving and walking and crawling and saying "hi" when he was just born? It's ridiculous how quickly time has gone by.

2 hours old

1 year old

This past year has been absolutely amazing. I've loved it. I love that little boy so much. I first got baby fever in May of 2008, and waiting until September of 2010 felt so long, but Noah is so worth the wait. He's such a sweet boy. I can't believe how blessed I am.

We had a small party for him this past Saturday. There wasn't much to his party, since he doesn't care right now. In the future, I'll make a bigger deal of it, but it turned out fine, and he enjoyed himself, and that's what's important. I made cupcakes, he opened presents (with help), and then got to play with his new toys, so I'd say it was a success. =)

Birthday cupcake

He liked the strawberry more than the cupcake.

Presents!

In different news, I mentioned a craft I was making a while back. It was this container that I was making pretty. Well, I made it. Was in the process of taking pictures. And then accidentally broke it. So. There goes that craft. But, for the two of you actually reading this, I just did another craft. I didn't take pictures of it in process, just the end result. But it was super easy. And it looks pretty cute. I may even get pictures of it up at some point.

Noah-specific news: he's walking. Not full-time, I think he's somewhere in the 70/30 crawling/walking range. But he's definitely roaming all over. And it's adorable. He waves, says hi, signs milk, claps whenever you say yay. Clapping is his favorite. =) He loves playing "Cat Hunting Airplane," where we zoom him around the room after the cat. Mali is not as excited about this game. And that's all that I can really think of. It's crazy to think of how much he's changed. A year ago, all he did was eat, poop, and sleep. And now he's all over the place, and communicating a little. =)

Crafting

I went to Hobby Lobby today. Pinterest has got me all up in a tizzy and wanting to craft. The problem is I don't have a crafty bone in my body, but I thought the combination of my Pinterest addiction and browsing through Hobby Lobby might inspire me. So I roamed the aisles for a while, while Noah patiently sat in the cart and tried to grab all the bows and springy decoration things he could almost reach.

I have this container that I use to store some stuff (nursing pads and stuff), and it's just a very boring clear plastic container. So I thought I'd (erm, try to) spruce it up. So I bought stuff for that, and then I got sucked into the wood frame and miscellaneous wood things aisle. I ended up buying a big frame and a lion puzzle thing that you can paint and stage around stuff. I'm hoping to make the lion sort of peek over the wood frame... and the frame will be decorated and inside will be a collage of pictures of Noah. I'm hoping to have it done for his first birthday (which is next month!). And I'm hoping, hoping, hoping it doesn't turn out like crap. Because I am not very crafty or talented, so this is all kind of a long shot.... but dangit, I wanted to try.

Tonight I pieced together the scrapbook paper to cover my storage thing in. It's all covered and looking much cuter, but man, I'm terrible at making it look seamless. I have pictures of what I've done so far, but it's not done yet, so I won't post anything. I'm hoping to finish it tomorrow and then try and get a post up, so you can all laugh at my feeble attempt at being crafty. I told Zach that if we had money, I'd totally go crazy and buy a ton of stuff at Hobby Lobby. Then I'd get home and look at everything and have no idea what to do with it. It would probably sit in a corner and be purposefully ignored for a while.

So... that's all, really. I still have Mod Podge on my fingers. Must go wash them more.

Oh, and my baby turned 11 months this past Tuesday. What? I've been totally failing on getting a good picture of him for "x-months old." Mom fails. But here you go.

Spelunking!

We went spelunking today. It was a lot of fun! Mostly because the word "spelunking" is fun to say. Spelunking. Spelunking. I'm a spelunker. Also, saying it several times and in different fonts makes it cooler. Right? Right??

Anyway... There's this state park nearby that has this cave system and there are two ways you can go once you go through the low part in the entrance. To the right is this 8 mile or so passageway with lots of water and mud, and it's a (paid) guided tour. To the left is a small passageway that just ends in this cavern with a big pool of water. We went left. It wasn't very far, only a couple hundred yards or so. I think. It's hard to tell how far you've gone when you're concentrating on finding a steady rock to step on and not hit your head (or the baby who is strapped on your back) against the rock wall.

This is from 3 years ago, but this is in the entrance. I think I'm under the low part, you can see the cave ceiling above my head. It's like a 4 foot gap to crawl through.

Also from 3 years ago, still the entrance, but past the low part. 

So we got to the end of the passage in Conner's Cave (the whole system was called Devil's Ice Box, but Conner's Cave is the short one), and we were just kind of shining our flashlights around and looking at stuff and then I think it was Richard who mentioned the secret staircase. It was just this steep set of stairs made of clay from people climbing up them, I guess. Anyway, Zach, Richard, and Karen all went up. I didn't, because my shoes had very little traction and I didn't feel like risking falling down the super slick clay stairs and hitting my head on the rocks and dying in the middle of a very dark cave. Because that just sounds like something I'd do.

There was one point where we all turned off our lights just to see how dark it was. And... it was dark. Very, very dark. Like if you didn't have lights, you'd totally hit your head on a rock and never find your way back and die because it's so dark. Suffocating darkness. Did I mention it was dark?

So Noah is now a tiny spelunker. I think he enjoyed it (except for the couple times I accidentally brushed his head against the rock entrance). It felt really good down there, it was like 55-60 degrees or so.

I think we were probably spelunking (haha!) for 20-30 minutes. Then we found our way back and hiked back out through the park and went to eat. It was a good day.

After our spelunking. Noah's chewing on the ergo. That's what he did the whole time. It was a very educational trip for him.

I enjoyed it, and would like to go spelunking again. Maybe when Noah's a bit older and can walk and actually appreciate how cool it is. =)

Pinterest

http://realmomkitchen.com/1505/baked-cheesy-chicken-penne/Have you heard of Pinterest yet? It's kind of amazing. And by amazing, I mean highly, highly addictive. There's just so much to look at. It's this virtual pinboard where you can pin all of these pictures and keep things organized. There are so many different categories- food, crafts, clothes, dream houses/setups, kids stuff. It's just this way to keep things organized, or to waste soooo much time.

One of my favorite categories on Pinterest is the food. There are so many tasty food ideas. For example, there's this recipe for ready to eat cookie dough. YUM. I love cookie dough. More than once I've made a batch of cookies, baked some, and slowly eaten the cookie dough over the course of the week, hoping the raw eggs won't get me.

Pinterest is also how I found this recipe for Baked Cheesy Chicken Penne. Karen and I made a slightly modified version of it a couple weeks ago (when our AC went out in the middle of a heat advisory), and it was pretty good! I just love that I can find so many new food ideas for dinner. It make me so hungry. Which is awful, since I'm attempting to diet (attempting being a very important word in that sentence).

Speaking of dieting, I've been working out (almost) daily doing the 30 Day Shred. I kind of like it, I have this love/hate relationship with working out. I enjoy the feeling of accomplishment after I'm done, because being soaked in sweat is oddly satisfying. But I hate getting up and actually doing it.

My whole attempt at dieting would be so much better if I weren't SO addicted to sweets. I'm able to maintain my weight, which in theory means that if I didn't have ice cream all the time, I'd be able to lose it. But I have the hardest time not eating ice cream or cookies or chocolate. But I'll get there.

Noah's up now, which means my short time to blog is done.So I'll leave you with a picture of Zach, Noah, and Boba Fett.

A new goal

I have a new goal for this blog, inspired by Erika over at Wannabe, and that goal is to not be boring. I've kind of been on this monotonous "here are the details of everything Noah and nothing else" wheel. So. The blog is going to be turning a little more family-centered and not Noah-centered, although you can be sure that there will be tons of stuff about Noah on here. Because all I do is chase the little boy around the house. So for now I'm off to look for a new theme for the blog. =)

A California Recap

We got back yesterday- ...I think? - from our California vacation. It was a lot of fun, I'm so happy we got to go! I don't think I would recommend driving 1800 miles across the country with an infant, though. Just for future reference. Noah did fine for the most part, he slept a lot, but... it was a lot of work. We tried to do as much driving as we could at night, so we were both exhausted, even when we were trying to take shifts. On our way back home, Zach drove as long as he could while I slept, and then he needed me to take over. I was able to drive for a whole 45 minutes before I could hardly keep my eyes open and was praying for a rest stop to appear, like, now. We were both pretty exhausted. So... road tripping with a baby = tiring.

I love Grover Beach. The weather is perfect. And there's the ocean. Ah. And fro-yo. I don't really know what to say right now, mostly because I just read Susie's post about it and now I feel like I'm repeating everything. So...

I had so much fun. I loved getting to spend time with Zach's family. We hadn't seen his parents since Noah was itty bitty (not that he was ever particularly itty bitty).

We were in Grover Beach until the Friday after the 4th... whatever day that was. I lost all track of time during the trip. Friday night (I'm pretty sure it was Friday...), we headed down to Chino. Saturday we drove around town because it had been 2 1/2 years since Zach was last in Chino and lots of things had changed. Sunday morning, we went to church, Zach's parents were very happy to show Noah off to all their friends, and then Noah caught a cold. And then he gave it to me. And then I was all gross and mucusy for the next few days. And that was a week ago and I'm still a bit icky. I'm sure you're pleased to hear all about my mucus. *cough*

Tuesday or Wednesday we went to see Zach's Grandma. Now Noah's met all of his great grandparents except one (Great Grandpa C. in Washington).

At some point Wynette (Zach's mom) gave me the book Handle with Care (by Jodi Picoult) to read. And I was absorbed in that. I finished it yesterday. It was very good. Next time I go to the library, I want to check out My Sister's Keeper (also by Jodi Picoult).

Zach and I played on the Wii... We were both pretty obsessed with the swordfighting game. I hurt my arm with my enthusiasm at killing the little mii people.

Oh, before we went to Grover Beach and on our way back home, we stopped in Henderson (where we'll be moving in a few months!) and spent some time with Zach's brother Justin, his wife Krista, and their son Jake.

Thursday night, we went to a concert in the Chino community center or park or something. It was pretty fun, they had an 80's band playing. And there was this awesome old guy dancing like crazy off on the corner of the stage and that was pretty hilarious. He was having a lot of fun!

And of course Zach and I went to the midnight showing of Harry Potter. And that was epic. I was sad that it's over. But I'm excited for it to come out on DVD so I can finally -finally- buy the movies. I've been waiting because I just know there's going to be some sort of collector's set of them with special features and I want to wait to get that.

We left on Saturday, made it back to Vegas. Left there Sunday night and made it home at 5 AM on Tuesday morning.

 This is what Noah thought of the drive. I'm sure this is through Kansas or Eastern Colorado. Boring, boring, boring. 

Taking a break at the No Name rest stop in the mountains.

 I'm bored... So I eat my foot.

Noah and Jake! They're 2-3 months apart.

He looks like he was on some sort of self discovery quest. "my hand.... whoah."

Noah's taken to sleeping on his tummy now. I put him down on his back, he rolls onto his side, and a while later ends up like this.

The view from the house... 

 The view from my waist...

Shell beach

 Mason and Noah

On the Pismo Beach Pier

 We went to Windmill Farms. The goat liked us.

 4 Generations of Hammer menfolk

Noah, Mason, and Great Grandpa Hammer

 I discovered Instagram. I love this picture.

 Noah and Great Grandma Cooper

 Noah and Jake again. Noah pushed Jake around in that thing. They seemed to enjoy it.

What. A. Trip.

We're going to California!

In about an hour or so, we're going to be headed to California! I'm so excited I can't hardly stand it. First we'll be in Pismo beach, then we'll head to chino. It'll be Noah's first time out there. And the first time he's seen grandma and grandpa hammer since he was brand new.

I'm so excited. I miss the beach (and I guess I miss Zach's family too. ;))

The only thing that worries me is accidentally dropping Noah into the ocean off the pier. I keep having nightmares about it. So.... No dropping Noah off the pier. That would be bad.

Pictures of our trip to come!

An update... maybe?

Noah just fell asleep... so maybe I can actually type out a blog post. Woohoo!

Noah's about 8 1/2 months now. I don't think I did a 7 or 8 month update.... so here's what's happened since the last Noah-splosion of information.

At 6 months, we started introducing solid foods, via baby-led weaning. He really likes cucumbers. He seems to like peas too.

I think right before 6 months, he started crawling a few paces at a time. Then a week before 7 months, he started full out crawling and getting into eeeeeeeverything.

At 7 months, 1 week, he started pulling himself up and standing.

A couple weeks after that, he started taking steps while leaning against things.

Currently, his favorite past times are trying to grab Mali's collar and drag her around. Her collar has a little bell on it and it's oh-so-fascinating, and he wants to grab it every time he sees her. Mali is not so enthused, but she's very patient about laying there and taking the enthusiastic abuse until we rescue her.

He's not signing yet, but he thinks any signs that I make are hilarious. I've been showing him how to sign "milk" with his hand and he cracks up laughing.

I think that's about it, Noah-wise.

Zach's not working at Shelter anymore. He's doing marketing/website stuff independently... Marketing consultant or something. I don't know. But he's much happier doing this stuff. So I'm glad for him. =)

I'm not doing much, other than chasing Noah around and trying to keep up with housework. I write articles when I can, to make a little extra cash. I'm also beginning to delve into the world of couponing... which is a bit overwhelming. There's a lot of stuff to it. Oh, and I've been working out. I have a love/hate relationship with working out. I hate doing it, but I love the accomplished feeling of it, and the whole weight loss part.

So. That's pretty much it.

And now for a Noah-paloosa of pictures.

(This first picture is of one of the first times he stood up on something on his own... I love the look on his face, he looks so proud of himself!)

Dinner is ready...

But a certain little baby is sleeping. Since said baby has impeccable timing and wakes up/needs me for something every time I try to get on and blog.... I'm hoping that by blogging he'll wake up. Although.... I probably just jinxed it. Hmm.

So for now, I'll leave you with a very cute picture of Mr. Noah and hope he wakes up. 

Baby-led weaning

Noah is a little over 6 months old now (can you believe it?). On the night of his six-month-aversary, he got to have his first taste of non-breastmilk food. We're doing baby-led weaning, so Noah gets to feed himself- which, at this point, means he gets to play with food and squish it in his fingers and drop it on the floor. I don't think he's actually eaten anything at this point, just tasted things and has made lots of cute faces. In a few more weeks, though, he'll probably start actually figuring out that the fun stuff he gets to play with actually tastes good and will fill his belly.


It's really interesting, apparently babies at Noah's age (and younger) don't know how to chew and swallow yet. When he nurses, the milk goes to the back of his throat and he swallows, but it's not something he knows or understands. When babies are spoonfed, the spoon bypasses the gag reflex, so the baby is forced to swallow. With baby-led weaning, Noah will learn through exploration how to chew and swallow.

So basically what we do with baby-led weaning is give Noah food that he can handle and bring to his mouth on his own and let him do his thing. The first night, we gave him some avocado, which he didn't seem to care for. He's also had (by which I mean played with) broccoli, carrots, banana, and mango. He seems pretty intrigued by broccoli. Bananas he likes to squish, and the mango he didn't really care about.

I know a lot of people don't really know about baby-led weaning, so I'm trying to explain it... I think most people know about the four-day rule with food, but that isn't necessary with baby-led weaning. Babies have remarkable instincts and tend to refuse food that they're allergic to (if they're spoonfed, the baby can't exactly refuse it very well, which makes the 4 day rule useful). They also tend to eat exactly what they need at whatever point, so if they're going through a growth spurt, they'll eat foods that contain exactly what they need for it. So we offer Noah food that we're eating anyway and don't force him to do anything with it. Sometimes he plays with it, sometimes he doesn't.

I think that's the basics of baby-led weaning...

So all that to say we've started (sort of) solids. Pictures of that are below!

Sea Monkey also has a little tooth breaking through (on the bottom)! He was a bit fussy for a few days while it was breaking through, but only when he was getting tired. I keep trying to look at his tooth, but he almost always has his tongue covering it. He likes to put our fingers in his mouth and bite down and then we can feel his little tooth.

He's very close to crawling. He can go backward very well, and can turn himself sideways and go backward more, but he's not so good with the going forward bit. Once in a while he'll lunge forward. He'll get up on his hands and knees and rock back and forth, trying to figure out the whole going forward motion. He also likes to do something resembling the 'downward facing dog' pose in yoga (here). Cracks me up.

I think that's about all the Noah-related news. And an update on Zach and I...

Zach has started a new job. He's doing sales for a company called DubTizzle, who does internet marketing stuff for different businesses around the area. Zach's very happy to be done with his old security job and is enjoying his new position. I'm excited for him, I think he's going to be great at this. =) This past week was his first week doing it full-time and it's been very nice- he gets to work from home now, except for when he's out at meetings making sales. He spent a few days at home this week doing research and making calls to set up meetings, and having him home, even though he wasn't interacting with Noah and I was really nice. I'm very happy for him.

I'm still rocking my stay-at-home-mom gig. In the little free time I have, I study something pregnancy/childbirth/baby/parenting- related, because it's fascinating to me (I've been studying this stuff for 3 years now and I'm still thoroughly intrigued). And I've started using my sewing machine (which, by the way, is a very pretty 60 year old machine)! I've mended some pants, made a changing pad cover, nursing cover, nursing pads, and I want to make a blanket for Noah. And curtains. And an apron! In my vast amount of free time..... :-/

One more newsworthy thing: at the end of our lease (October/November), we will be moving out of the Midwest and (probably) settling in the Las Vegas/Henderson area for a while. Where we're moving isn't set in stone yet, so it may still change, but we will for sure be moving out of the Midwest. So if you're in the area and want to see us, let us know. We've only got a few months left! (6 or 7... but still)

Soooo... that's all that's going on right now.

Tasting avocado

 He bumped his head on the stand =(

 Here's the bump =(

 Banana reaction =)

 This is posed.... but he was very excited about standing. So excited he slobbered all over the couch. =)
















THIS is wonderful. I made breastmilk popsicles to ease the teething aches and he was very surprised by how cold it was. =) He liked it, except for how cold it was.