Do you not know what causes that?

What's Noa mad about?

Why that would be her new Pavlik harness...

Now for something fun...

Given the not-so-happy tone of the blog lately I thought I'd provide you with some joy!  (That would be Noa pictures!)

Sorry it's a bit up close and bug-eyed.

Look at that neck control....

That's not terrible lighting, it's Noa showing you her true colors in the form of Harlequin Sign. Notice the darker side of her face (R).  This isn't the best picture of it but still you can tell.

Pilgrim Names

I love Thanksgiving!  So here is a new way to get in the spirit:

Your Pilgrim Name Is

Constance Allerton

What's Your Pilgrim Name?

Grandma Says...

That we'll have one more baby. She thinks it will be a boy.  The funny thing is that Grandma ALWAYS thinks it will be a boy.  And she's been wrong a lot! So when I pointed that out to her when I was pregnant with Noa, she said - "Oh! Really? Then it's a girl."

So I told Kevin and he asked if I was having the next baby with my new husband. LOL

A Tender Moment

I took grandma to have her cast off today.  It will most likely be the last time she leaves the nursing home alive.  I also am having trouble spending any time alone with her as my mother shares her room. It's great for them, but sometimes I'd like to be alone.

So we work out this complicated deal to get her to the doctor's office. I folded up her wheel chair and stuffed it in the back of the van and finally figured out a way with the nursing home as to how to get some pain medicine to take with us, because she gets it every hour.  There were no Handicapped spots available, but I convinced her it was okay because I merely had to push her. So I opened the back of the van and the wheel chair fell out on my foot. (OUCH!) "It's nothing, grandma," I shouted so she wouldn't think anything more about it.

We finally get upstairs despite how inept I can be.  She's so tired she is holding her head up in her hand. She says, "I never knew how heavy my head was..." I asked if I could help her. She said she didn't know how I'd manage to hold her head.  So I pulled her wheel chair really close to my chair and the way it was situated the best I could do was to lean my head on her chest and let her rest her head on mine.  We sat there quietly for a few minutes. I heard her heart beat. I could feel every bone in her body. I relished the weight of her head. I thought about all the times I'd crawled in bed with her as a child.  All this with no words. Then grandma said, "We'd better stop or people will think we're two queers..."

I love you, Grandma, I'm going to miss you for so many reasons, including all the laughs.

Favorite Quote

You're only as happy as your most miserable child...

Pumpkin Patch Rituals

One of the rituals we have is to eat at the farm after we pick the family pumpkin.  And they serve fried biscuits and apple butter. In an effort to prevent apple butter overload, a few years ago, I implemented a new strategy: Your name in apple butter! This is one of the small things I'll eventually forget but would always bring a smile to my face in the future... So here's Noa's first apple butter plate. (We helped her eat it!)

Pumpkin Patch 2008

We took our annual trip to pick the family pumpkin.  Here are some highlights:

Keeping the boys entertained waiting for dad...

 

Proof

Here is the photo proof of the thumb sucking:

Hallelujah!

Noa has finally mastered sucking her thumb this weekend.  She still has occasional trouble with pulling her thumb out of her palm to place it in, and does much better asleep than awake at keeping it in - but real progress. Now I know there is a process for getting your baby to stop sucking their thumb, but there is the same process to remove a pacifier, and guess what?  She can't thumb her thumb out of the car seat onto the dirty floor.  ;-)