Mother's Day

I just realized I never posted about Mother's Day - whoops!

The week before Mother's Day weekend was my birthday, and Omar was gone all week long. Happy birthday to me, right? Add to that Mother's Day, and basically I had the best weekend ever, potentially built out of Omar's guilt at missing my Big Day.  No matter why, let's not look a gift horse in the mouth. 

The Perfect Weekend began with a girly movie with Amy Friday night (The Other Woman - perfect girly-movie-night foder) and then got to sleep in as late as I wanted Saturday morning (take note, boys: when you have children, this is the single greatest gift you can give your wife).  

Movie night!

Then my mom, Amy, and I got our nails done, I met a bunch of my girlfriends for drinks & dinner, then came home and had some QT with Omar. 

Amy & I celebrated our birthdays together with wonderful friends

Sunday (Mother's Day) I got to sleep in AGAIN (thank you, honey!) and then we went to Omar's folks for an afternoon of family fun. 

Cousins!

Nora's first time in a baby pool - Success!

Cousin Mimi explains the ins-and-outs

This family sure does make adorable girls!

Nora checks out the water table. 

Big Sis EJ and Cousin Ingrid show her the ropes.

So much great cousin love!

 It was a wonderful weekend all around!  Especially the sleeping in part.  =)

Let It Go

Raise your hand if your child is obsessed with Frozen. If you aren't raising your hand, you either live in on a deserted island that has no WIFI or are a dirty dirty liar.

My child loves Frozen. LOVES. More than she loves ice cream or cupcakes or her stuffed lamby. Way way more than she loves me or her dad.  Every decision she makes in the day is prefaced with WWED (What Would Elsa Do?).  She has been calling her sister Anna for so long that half the time Omar and I do as well. 

We have recently started listening to the Disney station on Pandora, just so we can enjoy this amazingness. You are welcome in advance. (Side note: as soon as she hears the opening notes, she bolts out of the room to find her "Elsa dress" and her "dancing shoes" which she absolutely MUST be wearing to sing the song. True story.)

In case that wasn't enough, here is Round 2, with Ethan accompanying her. You are welcome again.

One day soon I really hope they can truly "let it go"

Happy Birthday Pop-E!

This year my dad turned 70 so we traveled to Charleston to help him celebrate.  Jan planned a wonderful party for him at their house, and the rest of the weekend we spent doing all kinds of fun things like going to the beach and taking a tour of the local playgrounds.  Happy Birthday, Dad! We love you!

Everett's first question upon arrival was
if my dad would share his cake with her.
Which meant that of course we had to
make a cake.

Luckily, Jan is always prepared and a great sous chef.  =)

During this trip, we finally figured out that
Nora looks like my dad when he was
little - they both scrunch their noses
when they smile.

Here they are scrunching their noses at each other. 

I love her fascination, wonder, and joy
with the world.

Nora had her first trip to the beach

The girls and their Bum-Bum

Nadi Family picture!

We actually managed to get some great group photos!

It was a wonderful trip and I am so glad we were able to spend that time with my dad to help him celebrate such a momentous year.  As I said in my toast, at that moment he was exactly twice as old as me, and I can only hope my next 35 years are as fantastic has his last 35 years have been. 

My beautiful girls

Summer Bucket List

Lots of things I hope to do with the family this summer.  Someone once told me that the first step to accomplishing your goals is to write them down, so here I go!

***Disclaimer: In true Type A fashion, I am including a few that we already accomplished, just so I have the pleasure of marking them off

• Go to the splash park
• Check out the free concerts at Riverside Park
• Go to Food Truck Alley in downtown Alpharetta
• Go berry picking
• Catch lightening bugs
• Make a meal out of food from our garden (I hope we get the chance to do this several times!)
• Teach EJ how to swim (ambitious? we will see)
• Build sandcastles
• Jump waves
• Go out on my dad's boat
• Check out a puppet show at the Roswell Art Center
• Walk downtown for ice cream
• Go to the zoo
• Play in the Centennial Park fountains
• Ride the ferris wheel at Centennial Park
• Go to the laser show
• Swing in a hammock
• Walk EJ to and from summer camp
• Make these amazing bubbles for an afternoon of fun
• Take Miss Beyla swimming
• Have EJ's friends over for a sprinkler playdate
• Make fresh fruit popsicles
• Have the neighbors over for a cookout
• Fly a kite
• Go to the train museum (I think this might be a good activity to do when Pop-E is visiting!) 
• Go to Alive After 5
• Have friends spend the night for Game Night

I'm sure I will think of some more as time goes by, but this is a great starting point.  I'd best get busy!

Nora P - 9 months old!

Nora has officially been an outside baby as long as she was an inside baby, which seems insane to me, I still think of her as brand new & tiny.  But this past month in particular has really made it hit home that she ISN'T a newborn, or really an infant anymore.  She is growing up!

Starting to enjoy some more "grown up" toys!

We go for her 9 month doctor visit in 2 weeks so I will have official stats then, but unofficially we were at the doctor a few days ago and she weighed in right around 19 pounds. 

Um, WHAT? She *just* learned to crawl. No stairs yet, please!

We have seen a LOT of developmental leaps this month, most notably learning to crawl. But she has also started enjoying standing up at a toy or low table to play, trying to pull-up (only recently has been successful about half the time), and saying "Mama".  <---- that one is particularly exciting because EJ said Dada first.  =)

Holding her own bottle!

She has also gotten 4 teeth, is predictably taking 2 good naps a day (each usually 90-120 minutes), sleeps around 12 straight hours a night, and in general is just a super-sweet natured baby who is willing to offer a smile to anyone who walks in the room.  

Using her 4 teeth to enjoy some corn on the cob

She has just recently started to show the slightest hint of "stranger danger" and separation anxiety from me, but she always quickly bounces back and is back to her happy, smiley self within just a few moments.

Enjoying EJ's End-Of-Year party

Hosting her first "baby playdate" and meeting Baby Charlie!

She saves her best giggles for her sister.

My favorite lunch date!

Sweet, silly girl

EJisms

Where did my little girl go?

Every day EJ gets more verbal and better at pronouncing things. And it breaks my heart. I don't want her to have perfect diction. I desperately want her to always call fish "pish" and school busses "coos busses". But unfortunately she worked those out months ago. So before all of her adorable mis-sayings are gone, I am going to write down as many as I can think of.

sprinkle ----> sprinkler

hooker -----> hanger (this lead to a particularly hysterical conversation that went something like this:

"EJ, what happened to your leg?"

"I scraped it on daddy's hooker"

<awkward pause>

"HANGER! She means hanger")

mines ------> mine

nickles ------> nipples

lello -------> yellow

locker ------> the door knob covers

amimal ------> animal, aka her stuffed animals
mishmatics camp ------> gymnastics camp
drinky -----> thirsty

She has also started using a lot of abstract phrases and sayings that seem very grown up, and yet she uses them totally correctly.  Things like "Well, actually..."  and making declarations about what she will be able to do when she "grows bigger" (this involves important items like being able to ride in the passenger seat of the car rather than her carseat and being able to eat as much bread as she wants with dinner), and "Now, listen Mommy..." (which is typically followed by the opening bid of some negotiation), and one of my favorites, when I ask her to do something for me like throw away a diaper or bring me a toy for Nora and she replies with "I can't, I am very busy."  (which, to be fair, she is)

We just adore this little person. I really hope that the days & years ahead are even more awesome because I am desperately sad for this stage to ever end. This is such a fantastic age: her wonder and joy with the world, her complete innocence and unselfconscienceness in her actions, as well as the fabulous hilarity that both comes out of her mouth and is in her facial expressions and reactions to everything.  

Where is the pause button???

Please never grow up, sweet girl!!!!

Our little Supergirl

Another truth about going from 2 to 1....

I can't believe I forgot this in my first post! One immediate, detrimental item: the new baby makes your old baby not a baby anymore. I mean physically. From the minute we brought Nora home, EJ seemed like a giant. Her previously adorable tiny feet were now neither tiny nor quite as adorable. Changing her diaper was like changing a grown man's diaper (I am only guesstimating here... I hope to never actually know what it is like to change a grown man's diaper). Omar actually said something along the lines of "Nora ruined our baby," for which I totally understood what he meant -----> we had been desperately holding onto EJ's "baby girl" status, and while she will ALWAYS be our baby, she was legitimately a little girl. But it wasn't until we brought Nora home that we truly realized it.

I'm not going to lie.....that was a tiny bit heart breaking. And it took some getting used to. But we did get used to it, and I think we are now more able to really appreciate the amazing stage that EJ is in, with how independent and verbal and truly funny she is. She is definitely a little girl now, a true little person. And I love her even more every single day for it.

New 2nd-parents-to-be: you have been warned. Be prepared. The new baby will "ruin" your old baby. But don't worry, they aren't ruined for long.  =)