Nate 12 to 15 Months

BABY STEPS

These are a few photos from a little photo shoot I did for Nate's One-Year Photos.  I just love this happy baby boy and I just want time to stand still because I love every moment with him.  Seriously, why does this time of life have to go way too fast?

15 Month Stats

Weight: 22.3 lbs. (19%)

Height: 32 in. (78%)

OFC: 18 3/4 in. (50-75%)

*This picture looks almost identical to one of me in my crib at the same age.  Maybe one day I'll figure out how to get it on my computer*

Nate is a light sleeper, but he is also a really really good sleeper.  I can almost never watch Nate sleep or take a picture of him sleeping (I really do love to watch my babies sleep) because he wakes right up all smiles.  The funny thing is, I take the pics and then he goes right back to sleep.  I actually enjoy waking him up because he is so pleasant.

Every time I lay Nate down for a nap or to go to bed he just smiles, waves bye-bye, and then says "Nigh, Nigh."  I love it!

Nate is a snuggler.  

He snuggles Mom, Dad, and Josh.  

He love to snuggle in blankets.  

He has recently found two new snuggle buddies: Winnie the Pooh (above) and the Giraffe (below) that I made for him.

He loves to snuggle after every nap and when he wakes up in the morning while reading books.

Loves to be outside.

Loves to Swing.

Loves to go on Walks.

The other day Nate puts his hands in the air every time the swing went forward like he was on a roller coaster.  It was so funny and cute.

*Note the train in Nate's hand*

Loves to play Cars.

Loves to play Trains.

Loves to make car Sounds.

Loves to listen to the sounds of trains or cars going by.

Loves to hold on to his trains and cars while we go on walks in the stroller.

The other day the weather was so nice and non of us wanted to go inside, so we ended up going on a 2 hour walk.  Most of the walk Nate made car sounds while playing with a car.  So cute.  He is such a boy!

Loves to say "Oo, Oo" about everything and make this cute face.

Loves the very few moments he can just play with toys without big brother interfering.

And now for the

BABY STEPS

On Your Mark, Get Set......

Stand

Nate took his first steps on February 9th.  

It is still to be determined when he starts walking officially.  

He still prefers to crawl.  His record for most steps in a row is 13 and that was a week ago. (I don't mind that he isn't walking yet as Josh was walking by 9 months and running by 10 months.  It is so much easier in many ways to have a late walker).

Nate is still obsessed with the vacuum and volunteers to vacuum for me.  Such a great helper already.  He'll stand there pushing it and even take a few steps here or there.

Since January 1st, 2010 Nate has spent most of his wake time pushing his push cars throughout the house.  He has a definite pattern and routine with it.  He has to go in and out of every room in a particular order.  If a door happens to be shut.  He'll just bang on it because he has to go in every room.  Silly, boy!

We visited John on his birthday at the hospital.  He just happened to be on-call (30 hour all night shift).  I snapped this cute pic of Nate walking and holding Dad's hand. 

This face that Nate is making is his face that he makes all the time around Josh.  Can you tell he looks up to Josh.  He literally looks up to him more that anyone.  He loves his older brother.

Nate makes some of the funniest faces.   He does this "what's up" face all the time.

Loves to Read Books 

(I'm actually getting burnt out from so much reading between these two boys.  I probably read to the boys for 2 to 3 hours a day total.  And Yes, I have all their hundreds of books memorized).  

Loves to Eat

He is still a good eater, but starting to get a little picky.

Loves to Throw

He loves throw his food (hope he grows out of this soon).

Loves to throw balls and play catch.

Love to throw any toy in his hands when he gets in a throwing mood (Yikes!).

Love His Dad 

Always excited to see Dad.

Loves His Mom

Definitely a Mama's Boy.

Love to Sing

He loves to sing with me when I sing to him.  We might have a future singer in our midst.  He also loves mom to sing to him.

Loves to Talk

Mostly babbles.  He has said many words, but after saying it about once or twice decides he doesn't need to say it anymore (this is similar to his desires for walking).  Let's just say Nate is pretty content most all the time.  I also quickly forget all the words he has said and then question if he really said what he said.

Words that he actually says often:

Jos (Josh)

Ah, Oh

Nigh, Nigh

Goo Nigh (Good Night)

I wuv you (I love you)

Mommy

Daddy 

Love to Give Everyone Kisses

Love to Give High Fives

Nate's 1st Birthday!

December 23rd, 2009

I know this post is way overdue, but I need to document it!  What can I say, his birthday is 2 days before Christmas and time seems to be going faster and faster.  It seriously feels like this happened only a couple of weeks ago.

Nate loves cake and especially frosting!  He dug right in.

I love that he was so messy and lovin the cake.  He sat there eating as much as he could for half and hour.  It's so funny how different my boys are.  Josh had no idea what to do with the cake for his first birthday.

Hailey helping Nate open one of his presents.

Now all the kids decided Nate was taking way too long, so they all decided to take over, much to Nate's dismay.  He's probably thinking, "hey wait; that's mine!"

I love this pic because it catches how all eyes are on Nate.  That doesn't happen near as much with the second child.  I'm sure he loved all the attention.

Mommy will you marry me post. Now it is all about Olivia Hansen

Kadia Comes to Visit, A Few Things to Say About Josh, and a Craft

KADIA'S VISIT

Our really good friend from medical school, Kadia, came for a visit!  It was so fun to have her!  The boys loved every minute of course.  It was so fun to visit and catch up and to have an adult around during the day!  She was so helpful with the boys and around the house.  Josh was so sad when she left and for days Josh asked over a hundred times if he could go to Kadia's house.  I explained over a hundred times that she was back at Iowa very far away.  Maybe soon we'll venture back to good-old Iowa.  We miss Iowa and all our friends there.  We do NOT miss the winters though!  We'll definitely wait til winter is over before we plan anything!

John barely made it home from a long day in the Operating Room to see Kadia, just before she had to leave back home.  So, I quickly snapped a photo.

Please come visit us again soon!!!

I just have to say that Kadia has the most awesome hair!

JOSH

I love this kid!  I love his creativity!  I love all the many wonderful things he makes!

I love that he cares about Nate so much.  Today, Nate was having a great time with pouring a cup of water all over the carpet, so I took it away from him.  Nate of course, didn't want his fun to end, so he began sobbing.  Josh immediately gave him back the cup, gave him a kiss on his forehead, and told Nate that it was alright.  In an instant Nate was beaming from ear to ear.  And I was made to look like a mean mom.  It was so cute though.

This week Josh started to put himself in "TIME OUT"!  It is so cute to me and so funny!  He is finally getting the whole "time out" thing.  It really has never worked until the last few months.

"GOOD NIGHT MOMMY!"

The last few weeks Josh has been going to bed all by himself most nights.  This is a SERIOUS TRIUMPH!!!  As Josh has had extreme difficulties with sleeping for over a year.  I mean at 2 to 3 year old who has never gotten a good nights sleep at all.  For about a year or so Josh has battled severe asthma, allergies, reflux disease, and excema.  Seriously, who can sleep when they can't breathe, haven't stopped coughing for months and eventually a year, have acid burn in their chest and throat, have stopped eating due to heartburn, and itchy skin all over that bleeds from scratching in their sleep.  Seriously, it took us forever to really figure out what was going on and to find medications that actually worked and didn't make Josh crazy, literally.  And mom crazy too.  I'm so happy that my happy Josh is back and that he is gaining weight, learning faster than ever before, and he actually has color in his face!  It's amazing what good health can do for anyone, especially a 3 year old. 

So, After we finish our bedtime routine which starts at about 5pm of dinner, clean-up, medicine, bath, more dinner, book, scriptures, prayer, and yes usually more dinner (Did I tell you that this kid eats and eats and eats thanks to acid reflux medication) and finally brush teeth.  I hear the lovely words "Good Night, Mommy!"  He always has a cute content smile and waves to me.  I think I may have to pinch myself.  Just a few months ago.  I would be laying in his bed with him, trying to help him calm down enough to sleep till about 10 or 11:30 at night.  Then he wouldn't actually sleep well and I'd worry every night with all the coughing that never ended and have to get up to give him his breathing treatments and many horrible medications that caused him to sleep less and less.  Those were crazy days and I'm so so sooooo happy they are behind us!!!

THINK SPRING!

The other day, Josh really wanted to blow bubbles more than play in the snow.  Surprisingly, they weren't frozen solid.  He had a blast! 

CRAFT

The other night while John was on-call, one of my best friends from college, Mel, came over and we did some sewing crafts and just talked.  It was so fun!  I made this Giraffe for Nate.  I had been planning to do it for months since he loves tags so much but hadn't gotten around to it!  Josh loves animals so he actually really likes it and wants me to make one for him too.  

Josh & Nate Update

Here's Josh on his way out the door to preschool.  

As you can probably tell, Josh loves preschool.  He is always so excited to go.

Today, he cleaned the entire house and got ready all by himself to go.  Josh is amazing!

Josh has been loving the snow.  We didn't think we would be getting much snow here in Indiana, but recently we have gotten dumped on.  Right now we currently have about 2 feet of snow!

Nate also has enjoyed the snow too.  He still isn't quite old enough to play in it yet.

I love this pic of Josh because he was just snuggled up in his chair and blanket watching the snow fall(it had been a blizzard all morning, and stopped just as I shot the photo and then started back up, oh well).

This was our first snowfall, back in mid-January.  It dropped about 1/2 an inch.  We still managed to make an awesome snowman.

Josh woke me up the other day saying: 

"Mommy, mommy, come look!  Come see what I made!  I made Daddy's hospital!"

I love the towers, buildings, temples, castles, etc. that he builds.

The most impressive tower in the wooden blocks in the dining room. I don't know if I could have even built that.

Every morning I am woken up to Josh saying something like this.  I love it! 

A couple of weeks ago, I was woken up to a similar tower like this.  I ran to get the camera and he nocked it over just as I had gotten back.  Josh knew I was disappointed and wanted to take a picture of it, so Josh immediately said: "Don't worry, mommy, I can build you another one really fast.  I kid you not he made this in 30 seconds.  Amazing!  His other one he had spent probably about 30 minutes on, so use your imagination!

Josh is always building creative train track as well.

Gary came out for a medical school interview in January!  Josh loved every minute with Gary!  It was so fun to have him out!  We are also thrilled that he is accepted to a few school that are within only a few hour drive!  We are excited to have him out here with us in the midwest!

              

I found some really cute chairs for the boys to read books in.  Nate really loves to sit and read.  

I love it that my boys love books so much!

Nate pretty much likes to read on his own or have another book in his had while I read to him.

Josh on the other hand will let me read for hours if I could handle it.  Josh has a book with 254 pages in it.  I have read it all the way through non-stop several times.  Usually by the end I am starting to fall asleep.  Reading does that to me sometimes.  I love reading to my boys!

Nate has an obsession with the fireplace.  He loves to sit in, crawl in and out, and play in it.  Thank goodness the previous owners never used it!

Nate at the Children's Museum

Nate is starting to get interested in playing trains!  Love it!

Josh fishing at the Children's Museum.

Look at his knee!  OUCH!  How can he sleep like that?!

I have hundred's of pictures of Josh sleeping in the funniest positions and places.  One day I'm going to dedicate a post entirely to it. 

Nate is starting to make friends.  Here he is with his friend Kale.

Here is Josh playing with his friend Olivia.  He thinks that he is going to marry her someday!

Here are Hailey, Kate, and Josh.  These girls love John!  John is always giving them horse rides and he seems to never get tired with 3 kids on his back!

Josh loves to color, paint, draw, etc. He is getting really good at it too.  He colors within the lines really well, can draw faces, loves to paint buildings, trees, and the sun.  He can also write several letters.  His favorites are Q, X, S, H, I, O.  He loves to write the numbers 2, 6, and 7.

Here we are watching a movie with Josh's friends.