11-Month Milestone for Mia!

Her last month with "infant" status!

Amelia:

She's officially a walker! Or, as Mike calls her in this video, "a walking machine!" She's getting more confident daily and now walks across the room on a regular basis. But when she's looking for speed, she still drops down to super-crawl!

Some of her first steps

And his first steps! (Nate at 10 months)

In other exciting news for her tired Momma, Amelia is sleeping through the night! Well, more aptly put, I'm no longer waking to breastfeed her after 7:30 pm or before 7:00 am! I decided we were both in the habit of waking up for that nighttime feeding (usually 11:00 pm or 4:00 am). So I just stopped. I'm so tired I slept through most of the crying, but Jason says she didn't ever wail, it was more of a whimper as she soothed herself back to sleep. When I've heard it turn into a wail, I've held strong! I've just gone in and patted her back without feeding her! I've learned with most routine changes for Nate or Amelia, they are fairly adaptable; it's usually a bigger deal for me than for the kids.

Amelia's not sure she likes this "weaning" idea.
Actually, she seems to be going with the flow (uh, so to speak).

She cut her top two (maybe even three) teeth this week. So she'll probably sport a set of four teefers in her first birthday photos. We'll see how fast they grow.

She's curious, curious, curious. We need to watch her like a hawk. She's an expert at finding the smallest bauble in any room. If you've lost something small, just call Mia; she'll find it! (But first you'll have to pry it out of her mouth!)

Nate:
His latest obsession is the shark--the great white (the "meanest"), hammerhead (the "silliest"), whale shark (he thinks the fact that Mom & Dad swam with this "gentle giant" in Okinawa is pretty cool), the black-tipped reef shark (I told him that there was a shiver of them swimming with us on our first ocean dive in Tahiti--again cool points for Mom!), lantern shark, cookie-cutter shark, leopard shark, tiger shark, etc. We hear trivia about all of them!

He's also in a big cars phase again. He'd been focused on trains for a good while. Now his cars are new again. The most fun is to go "tractor tipping" with Lightning & Mater, line up his collection end-to-end or smash his Hotwheels into each other.

The Goodwin Toy Store Floor

As I mentioned in an earlier post, he's big into letters, words, drawing, making cards, and finally using the easel Granna & Papa gave him for Christmas last year!

Our House (He wanted me to draw the black car, blue car & our family.)

A chart he made (he gives himself a check whenever he does one of his self-proclaimed chores--like closing the door!)

Sidewalk Letters--he's tagged most of the neighbors with his name. The masterpiece pictured here is the whole family--look closely for Nate, Kid, Mom, Mia and Dad!

Have I blogged about the hiccups? How could I forget this new social quirk?! For Christmas he received the Disney book "365 Bedtime Stories" from Mommy & Daddy! It's a really cute book, each day assigned a one-page story starring a character from one of the myriad of Disney/Pixar movies. In the August 17th story, Simba gets the hiccups. On the page in three-inch letters is the word, "HIC!" Well, that tickles Nate's funny bone. Ever since he found that story in January, he responds with a loud, "HIC!" to most questions or introductions. "Hi, Nate! Welcome to MOPS today!" "HIC!" "Nate, this is Mommy's friend Ms. Lisa." "HIC!" "Nate, can you say HI to Sarah?" "HIC!" That's why it's a good thing their Momma's love 'em!

Nate loves color--especially in his clothes! He insists on picking out his own clothes in the morning. He'll often come out dressed in every color of the rainbow (orange shirt, green sweats, bright red socks. When I try to coax him into another pair of more-neutral pants for example, he screams, "No! I don't want to match today!" It's a battle I've stopped fighting (usually).

What have WE been up to for the past few weeks?

• Jason brewed beer--an "Amelia Beerdelia" brew in honor of Mia's first birthday (Nate has an honorific beer, too. While still in Japan, Jason brewed up a "Little Boy Brew" in honor of his birth--it was a blueberry wheat beer. Get it? Blueberry, to extend the Little Boy Blue" pun!) Amelia's beer is brewed in the style of a Scottish Ale with a good underlying malty sweetness (like sugar & spice and all things nice...that's what little girls are made of!)


• Jason is a movie star. He had his last ride with the EMS ambulance on Friday. His final call was responding to a double-stabbing that made the news. As his crew was filling out the paperwork in the hospital, they saw themselves on the local news wheeling one of the victims into the ambulance on the stretcher. Autograph requests can be sent to this address.

Jason--EMT in training (at least for 6 weeks)!

The "new" digs

• We painted the front door and shutters "pool house blue" (as opposed to the dirty brick red that matched every other house in the subdivision)


• Jason planted the garden this weekend--hooray for fresh basil, spring spinach and tomatoes


• Fighting a cold-maybe-flu-turned sinus infection. I can no longer remember what it feels like to be healthy--where my head isn't crushing my skull and my limbs aren't so weak they feel like they're just going to fall off my body. Jason is getting hit with the first signs of it now, too (that tingle in the nose and chills-fever cycle). Great--both Mom & Dad are on the bench!


• Tax preparation


• Vacation planning


• Jason's been up to his elbows in the paperwork chase as he prepares to re-enter the active-duty military in June for his preliminary intern year in general surgery


• I turned on the oven 4 times this week to bake! I had a list of fellowship meals for new babies, snacks for Bible Study, our table's turn to provide brunch in the MOPS rotation and a hot meal from scratch for the family. Nate loves helping in the kitchen; so I turned many of the items into "projects" for me and Nate. (That's what he calls any planned activity. "Mom, I'm bored. Let's do a project.")
• I'm in full birthday planning mode--"Sharks" for Nate's 4th birthday party in a few weeks and "Kitty Cats" (based on her lovey) for Amelia's 1st birthday next month!

This is what it's all about!

Birthday party season continues in our neighborhood (Feb-June is packed!) Saturday the kids attended their first Chuck E. Cheese party for Kail's 5th Birthday! Amelia was not having the pizza at first, but ended up eating an entire piece! Nate was running all over the place, fascinated by the TV dance camera and having a grand ol' time (until it was time to leave--he forgot how to listen and minor meltdown ensued).

His favorite game--push the button and the monster truck smashes down on the car for a ticket. Exciting!

Waiter? More pizza please!

Hey, she had broccoli when we got home!

Oh-by-the-way, my sister, Julie, and Wes announced yesterday that they'll be here Sunday with Anna, Ashley & Adam for the week of spring break! They desperately need a Northern Minnesota escape and their other options kept falling through. This will be their 4th springtime adventure to SA (they love SeaWorld). We're happy to have them; we always have a great time, but suddenly life got busy! We leave for the lake this Wednesday, return Sunday to the Papenfuss family, entertain for the week, roll right into Nate's 4th birthday, then Amelia's 1st party, then our big celebratory vacation to somewhere and finally med school graduation festivities throughout the month of May! I guess we'll buckle up, keep our hands within the vehicle at all times and hang on for the ride!

I know, enough with the walking videos, but she's so proud of herself and I want you to see her progress! They'll stop soon enough.