She Can Walk!

She's not exclusive yet, but, by golly, Norah can walk!

 

 

Norah really started getting the hang of it while we were in Utah, and especially on the houseboat at Lake Powell, of all the unlikely places. She still mostly crawls, but it's fun to see her remember when she knows how to walk. All of a sudden she'll stand herself up and (still unsteadily) walk on over. She looks so proud of herself, with a big cheesy grin. I usually give her lots of praise to encourage the walking, and then she'll get a little overexcited and usually end up falling down. Still a work in progress, but this girl finally walks!

4th of July

Can I just say that Utah really knows how to celebrate the 4th of July, and Spokane really does not. In Utah, practically every town has at least some kind of 4th of July parade and festivities, my favorites being North Ogden's Cherry Days and Provo's Freedom Festival. The atmosphere is contagious, and there's something fun for even the littlest of littles. Spokane has nothing even close to that. Boring.

And there are no fireworks allowed in the county limits. I understand the safety issue and the fire hazard (even though this is the inland northwest, not exactly the desert), but I'm not asking for anything huge. Just little on the ground ones would suffice. Or even sparklers (nope, not even sparklers are allowed). Heck, Rich and I couldn't even find Pop-Its. The only fireworks option is the city show, which starts around 10 PM, and that was fun when we didn't have a baby. But you try taking a baby with a 7:30 bedtime along to something like that, and let me know how it goes.

So, our 4th of July was a little lame this year. We thought it would be fun to bring Norah to the splash pad again, but it was cooler this time, and breezy. She didn't last long until she was shivering.

We had our little BBQ, and that was delicious. Plus, there was watermelon. There is nothing quite as satisfying as that perfect bite of perfectly ripe, red watermelon. Mmmmmm. (Norah has inherited my love of watermelon. Atta girl!)

We did get to see some glimpses of the city firework show. We're up on a hill, so through a gap in the trees and buildings around us, we saw a little of the show (from far, far away). But since we didn't really get to see the show, we watch "The Sandlot" instead. Nothing much more American than that, right? I love that even though I've grown up watching that movie, it still makes me laugh.

Sorry, this post was more of a rant. But I'm just a little bummed about it. Moral of the story: Don't spend Independence Day in Spokane. Get to Utah if you can.

I made it through this least exciting of Independence Days knowing that soon I would be in Utah and eventually at my heaven on earth, Lake Powell.

But let's face it, you probably just wanted to see pictures of Norah, anyway. And, as I'm sure you've noticed, I love showing her off!

She's definitely got her Daddy's smile.

(She's picked up the glare again.)

Splash Pad

The only experience Norah has really had with water so far is bath time and when it comes from her sippy cup. Since we're going to Lake Powell for a week with my family this summer, Rich and I decided we needed to do something to get her a little more comfortable.

Plus, it's in the 100s here in Spokane. I know, no big deal for the Utahns and Arizonians out there, but with no air conditioning, it's been killer.

So, we went out and bought Norah's very first swim diapers and headed to the local splash pad. I was expecting at least a little meltdown, but it actually went really well! The water was freezing, even if it was 100 degrees outside, but Norah didn't seem to mind.

I don't know what Rich was looking at - I was the only camera here.

We'd get Norah a little wet, and she would kind of gasp because it was cold. So we'd take her away, and then she'd point at it to do it again.

Norah didn't LOVE it, but she also didn't cry, which is much more than I expected.

In other Norah news, we cannot get her to walk. She took 4 steps today, her new PR. But she's so content with crawling (and she's so fast at it), that we don't think she'll ever walk. She throws a fit if you try to get her to practice. She'll walk her stroller around and stand on her own for longer than a non-walker should, but she doesn't want to walk. Honestly, I think my goal now is just to have her walking before preschool.

Norah the One-Year-Old

Welp, she's officially 1 now.

We had a little BBQ party the day before her birthday with some friends at Grandma and Papa Nelson's house (our grill-less, two-bedroom apartment is hardly ideal for a gathering of more than three). We didn't have the camera out for most of the party, but we did catch the important part - cupcake time.

Norah wasted no time getting into the cupcake. She loved it. There was no epic cake smashing - you can only do so much damage with a cupcake.

Of course, she had a glare to spare for her delicious cupcake.

About as messy as it got.

We didn't get a very good family shot. Norah was getting pretty cranky by the end. Too close to her bedtime.

On her actual birthday, Norah got to open some fun presents. Turns out, birthdays are pretty cool.

Again with the glare.

Every little girl needs a baby doll.

And every good mommy drinks her baby's bottle. Right?

She loves her new stroller. I'm hoping this is the key to finally getting her walking.

So, now Norah is 1. "What's she up to these days?" you might ask. Well, let's see.

She's not quite walking yet. She can balance for a little while and can balance her way back down to the ground. She has also started standing up on her own without holding on to anything. She sneaks in a step every once in a while, but not enough to qualify as walking.

She does pretty well with table foods now. We're just finishing up the last of the pureed food we have. Her current favorite foods include carrots, cottage cheese, and vanilla wafers. She is basically done with formula - again, we're just finishing up what we have. I was nervous about the transition to milk and getting her to use a sippy cup, but she has that all figured out and absolutely loves her milk.

She's about the same as always on the growth charts. At her 12-month checkup, she was 30 inches long (90th percentile), had an 18 inch head circumference (75th percentile), and weighed 18 pounds, 7.5 ounces (25th percentile). Long and skinny, like always.

We recently transitioned to one nap a day, and she's doing pretty well with it, most days. But some days she wakes up around 5:30 in the morning, like today, and things get a little grumpy.

We love this little girl more than we ever knew we could. And now I will close this post with even more pictures of her!

She loves to sit and play the piano with Grandma Nelson.

Love this little girl.

Birthday Girl

Tomorrow's the day. My baby turns 1. How on earth did that happen?

Today has been kind of fun because we've really been reflecting on exactly what was going on at different times exactly one year ago. Like right now one year ago, we were putting the finishing touches on packing our bags because we had a pretty good feeling that our little girl would be coming within 48 hours.

I'm almost tempted to set my alarm for 12:50 a.m. because that's when I woke up in labor a year ago tomorrow morning. Okay, not really tempted, but it's fun to think of all of these different moments and emotions from a year ago.

I do know that at church tomorrow I'm going to be awaiting 9:51 a.m. because a year ago tomorrow at that time, our lives changed forever. Norah Kate entered our world. What a joy she has been. I know the other parents out there can join us in saying that there are no words to describe the love you feel for your own child. We are so blessed.

This is my favorite picture from the day Norah was born. I couldn't get enough of this face.
Still can't.

And here is the birthday girl one year later. I feel like this picture perfectly sums up her personality. Happy, active, and fun.

Have fun being 1, Norah!

The Glare

Norah has learned how to give us attitude. She knows how to throw a good tantrum (and people always tell me how happy and smiley she is). But the real kicker is her glare. If you tell her no, she legitimately glares. It used to be occasionally, but now it's all the time. I am telling you, do not get on her bad side.

I caught this while getting some birthday shots (more of those later.) I'm talking about some serious 'tude.

At first it was kind of funny. Now, it's actually starting to get to me. If this is a sign of what's to come, we're in serious trouble here.

I have to remind myself that this is one of those things we're going to look back on and laugh at. Later. Much later. When she stops doing it ALL THE TIME. I'm glad we at least caught a picture of it as proof.

So Big

When Norah and I were in Utah a couple months ago, my grandma taught Norah a new trick. When we say, "So big!", Norah raises her arms high up over her head. Like so...

It's adorable. And that pretty much sums up this post. This little girl is getting so big!

She still loves her books. She'll sit and babble to herself while turning the pages. I love it! 

She's had this red bump on her cheek since she was about 5 months old. The doctor said it's most likely a vascular birthmark, and it will go away eventually. We'll call it her beauty mark. 

It's always fun to peek at Norah while she's asleep. She moves around so much, and often ends up in odd positions. This one is my favorite. I don't know how that's comfortable, but she was sound asleep. (And do you notice that she does actually have hair?!)

 You can just glimpse her upper front teeth in this shot. The top front four all decided to come in at once, so that's been fun for no one.

She LOVES her blankie. It's so cute how she cuddles it close to her when she picks it up. She doesn't sleep without it now.

 Norah eats almost anything. Except apricots when you cut them up in pieces for her. She eats pureed apricot just fine but made the worst sour face when she fed herself these pieces. It's the exact same thing!

Oh, and she hates broccoli. With a passion.

Other than those, she eats almost anything. Her favorites are yogurt bites, bananas, and carrots.

Our poor Mariners fans. At least they're cute.

Norah had a checkup this past Monday, at about 11 months old, and I was a little shocked at her weight stat.

Height: 29 7/8" (85th percentile). Head circumference: 18" (75th percentile). Pretty consistent with her past numbers. 

Weight: 17 lbs. 12 1/2 oz. - 25th percentile! That's down from 40th at her 6-month checkup.

I know that's not incredibly small, but I thought she had gained so much weight. There is something definitely wrong with our bathroom scale because it said she was 19 lbs. Lies! She eats so well, and she does have a bit of a gut. But then, I looked again at her arms and legs, and they really are quite scrawny. And she lacks the little rolls that other babies in our family have (i.e., Kelsey and Cohen). Oh well, she's perfect the way she is.

She crawls like a champ. She conquered going up the stairs and Grandma and Poppa Nelson's house within a week of crawling, and she pulled up at about the same time. She cruises along furniture all the time. She can even balance for maybe a second on her own, but not any longer. She doesn't really have much interest in walking, so that might be a while still. I guess she needs to bulk up her legs before she can get moving!