This is Nora's new trick...pulling herself up in the crib!

Do you think it's time to lower the mattress?

This is Nora's normal response to having a hat on her head. Luckily I was able to get at least a couple shots with the hat on her head!

Nora and I visited the Jellybelly factory today and had a blast!

Up close and personal as Nora devoured her pasta for dinner. She loves Mommy's homemade sauce.

"I love pasta!"

It was a very hot day at the zoo!

Nora, Daddy, and Auntie Tracy visited the Milwaukee County Zoo this weekend while I was in Cleveland.

Nora LOVES goats!

Hanging out with the monkeys

On Sunday, Tracy and I took Nora to the Milwaukee County Zoo for the first time. It was a blast. I think her favorite things were feeding the goats in the petting zoo and watching the fish in the aquariums. She let loose a few of her signature happy "raptor" screeches when she saw the orangutangs swinging from one side of their cage to the next. She also really seemed to enjoy the bears and the elephants.

Pictures to follow...

First Weekend Away

I am leaving today for a weekend with the girls in Cleveland. Nora is going to stay with Auntie Pea this afternoon and then Daddy is going to be on 24 hour duty as of tomorrow morning when Pea leaves. Brian will do wonderfully, but we'll see how I do. I'm going to try my best to not call all the time. I'll keep you updated. I'm sure that someone will be counting the number of phone calls this weekend.

Nora has really started singing to herself. Her shrill shrieks are not as frequent as they used to be. Yesterday, Nora accompanied me to meet my new teaching partner and principal (oddly enough at the school I had my first job and the teacher that took over for me!) and she played on the floor for about 30 minutes with her books and toys all the while singing to herself.

Ten Months Old

Nora is officially growing up quickly. I never thought that it was going to be time to put her in daycare, but here we are: three weeks from the beginning of daycare. I'm excited to see all the new things that she is going to learn from the children in her classroom. She is really into mimicking others, so it will be interesting. Hopefully she'll only learn the good things that the others do.

I'll give you a quick update on the happenings in Nora's life:

She loves to point at everything. This includes touching things with her pointer finger. Right now her favorite thing to touch is the cat. Can't say that Sydney is too thrilled with the attention.

She has discovered her nose. Great timing considering her pointer finger is quite adept at going anywhere and everywhere.

Nora is starting to pull herself up on things. While I was disrobing her for her bath this afternoon, she pulled herself up on the side of the bath tub. Yikes.

Favorite foods: mac and cheese (organic of course ;-), watermelon, and zucchini

She has started her transition to cow's milk. She drank about 4 ounces today and we'll slowly start increasing the cow's milk and decreasing the formula! Yeah! No more stinky powder!

The changing table is a circus act. Nora is able to do flips during diaper changes.

Nora continues to get all the attention when we go out. While at dinner tonight, she had four or five people stop by to oooh and aaah over her.

Searching for leaves that were worthy of eating (tasting) was one of Nora's favorite pastimes while in Minnesota.

"I'd like to thank my Mom and my Dad for helping me win this amazing ring. I couldn't have done it without them!"

For some reason, Nora is really into 'licking' water, whether it be while swimming or in the bath tub. She is even putting her whole face in the water and then comes up coughing. I figure she'll learn very quickly that water isn't something that you can breathe.

Nora enjoyed having Grandpa put his hat on her head and then she would take it off and hand it back to him.

Nora really loved swimming at the lake. I was reminding her that she could splash just like in the bath tub.

Minnesota and FOR SALE

We just returned from a great week in Northern Minnesota with my parents and Auntie Pea. We got to go swimming in the 75 degree lake (nice for swimming but a little warm for amazing fishing), play outside with the ants, leaves, and sand, and just lay around. Ok, so Nora never really 'laid around.' We pretty much laid around and watched Nora enjoy herself.

Nora is officially in the beginning stages of crawling. She is able to get her knees under herself and push up with her arms. She made a couple moves toward forward progress but gets frustrated that she is moving slowly and quickly drops to her stomach so she can fly. She frequently just sits on her knees and rocks her little butt back and forth. Too cute!

She has also started staying the 'ma' sound! Not that she is really saying it to me, but it is amazing to hear her say "MAMAMAMA!"

The not so great part of the week was the sleeping habit that creeped up on us during the last few nights. Nora has decided that waking up at odd hours of the night is an acceptable thing to do. She isn't just waking up and then going right back to sleep. She is waking up for an hour or so at a time and then going back to sleep for a short period of time. She continued that habit last night. She didn't go to sleep until 9:15 because she slept so much in the car on the way home, then woke up at 3:30 and stayed awake until 4:45. She was very restless the whole time she was awake and we're wondering if the next set of teeth are trying to make their way through. The doctor told us the top two teeth are much more painful than the bottom two because they push through more surface area. Great. We finally gave her some Tylenol and a little milk and she kindly slept until 6:15.

Brian and Nora just left on their weekly trek to Brady street in search of coffee and people watching. I'm going back to sleep.

On another note...we have officially put our condo up for sale. We have had two showings and will have an open house tomorrow afternoon. This is the scary part, but on Sunday night we are going to look at a few duplexes. The FUN part! Hopefully something will happen this weekend, but it's not like we need to move soon. We just learned of some neighbors that sold for a pretty good price and we thought we'd jump on the bandwagon. So if you want to check out our listing or know someone interested in a condo in Brewer's Hill, check it out on www.shorewest.com (under condos) the MLS # is 773110. The good thing we have going for us is that there aren't any other one or two bedroom condos for sale in the Milwaukee area right now that have two parking spaces.

Family photo before heading for home on Friday morning. We had a great cabin with a view of the lake.

Nora is almost crawling. She took a few "steps" this week in our cabin in Northern Minnesota.

Auntie Pea and Nora enjoy some time by the lake.

Crawling

Nora is starting to get up on her hands and knees and rock back and forth. The idea of being able to move while in that position is still foreign and she flops back onto her stomach before inching forward. We have to put socks on her most of the time now because she was wearing the skin off the ball of her foot when pushing off to move herself!

Hopefully our new house will have hardwood floors for Nora to scoot around on. Yes, we have put our condo up for sale. It seemed like the right time and we've noticed our neighbors making hefty profits, so we decided to join in on the fun. We'll see where it gets us.

On our afternoon visit to the Cousin's, a impromptu photo session was enjoyed. They all put their hands on each other as soon as we sat them side by side. Ethan seemed to be enjoying touching a girl quite a bit ;-)

Taa Daa!!! I'm the queen of the world...at least of these two!

Logan sure seemed hungry today ;-)

What is this? Grass?

Nora's first popsicle

Enjoying Uncle Drew's wedding

Auntie Pea with Nora and Cousin Cooper at Yosemite.

We had a wonderful time camping this weekend. As you can tell, it was quite hot.

Nora got to enjoy her first 'tub' bath. Of course, splashing was still on the menu.

We've almost got her trained to wash herself ;-)

Rosco, Jay and Jessica's dog(g), was Nora's favorite part of the trip. Dogs always seem to fare just as well as people in Nora's book. Rosco was the recipient of many waves this weekend.

Nora's favorite things to do now is wave at people: family members, friends, and strangers alike!

New Favs

Nora is totally in love with blueberries. They have made for some very interesting poo colors! Grapes and mac and cheese are also her list of favorites as of right now.

Who knew that our floor could get so dirty in 12 hours. I've been dusting and washing the floors constantly since Nora's new found freedom. It's no fun to pick her up and find a dust cloth on the front of her shirt! Yuck!

I'm still recovering from a mishap with the Vslicer I had on Saturday afternoon. I cut a major chunk out of my right thumb and have been slowly healing. No stitches because the wound is wide and deep. Nothing could be done. Nora has been coping well to my temporary handicap.

Soaked hikers heading to the falls

Nora helped us with navigation

Crawling!

Here is Nora's new pastime...crawling "commando-style" through the jungle of our apartment. Her favorite place so far is under the table. She uses it as her own little obstacle course, weaving between the legs of the chairs. Sydney has been a bit disturbed by this new development as Nora is now starting to chase after her!

Goin' back to Cali

We just returned from a week-long trip through California for the Johnson family reunion and Uncle Drew's wedding. Nora didn't have any problems with flying or riding around in the RV. She got to meet a lot of her cousins and relatives last week...and really turned some heads at the "In and Out Burger" in Auburn, CA. Her crazy two-handed wave and smile were difficult for the folks to resist!

So many things happened on this trip. We got to hang out in the Sierra Nevadas for the family reunion, taking side trips out to Nevada City, the Yuba River, lunch with Mark Twain, and a ride on a catamaran on Lake Tahoe. Then we headed south to Yosemite National Park, where we attended Uncle Drew's wedding and spent a couple of days exploring the park on foot and with the RV. The scenery was spectacular everywhere we went.

Below are some highlights from the trip...the wedding, the hikes in Yosemite, riding around in the RV, and hanging out with the family. Special thanks go out to Grandpa for driving us all over California, Uncle Gene for sharing his beautiful spot in the mountains with us, and Auntie Pea for running interference for April and I. Nora was always in good hands.

Look Auntie Pea, I can munch on my toes!

Nora conked out from a long hike

Nora and Daddy in a self-portrait...both of us are soaked!

On the way up to Vernal Falls...we were caught in the mist

Hiking up to Vernal Falls

One of the numerous beautiful falls we were able to see in Yosemite.

We learned that Nora loves pickles on this trip!

The family enjoying dinner by the RV

The meadow in front of El Capitan.

Nora so badl wanted to grab the flower that was in Leah's hair during this picture!

Our family at Bridal Veil Fall where Uncle Drew got married on July 3rd,

Posing with Auntie Pea before Uncle Drew's wedding started.

Nora had a difficult time staying focused at Drew and Leah's wedding ... HEE HEE!

Nora got to play with her third cousin, Gavin for the first time at the reception of Uncle Drew's wedding.

Nora really enjoyed riding in the RV we rented with Grandpa, Grandma, and Auntie Pea for the week in California.

Cuddling on Lake Tahoe with the Johnson family.

Daddy and Nora enjoying a sailboat ride on Lake Tahoe.

Nora's newest face. The wrinkled nose is hard to resist!