Post Thanksgiving

Getting ready for Christmas.

Noel was a big help. She was so excited to put the Christmas tree up and help with decorating the tree.


I had a few sewing projects that I was working on before Christmas. I made some curtains for Noel's closet because she doesn't have any closet doors. I tried to match her bedding. Please note: her walls are no longer purple and green. Morgan painted them a week ago or so. We were going crazy with the purple and green.

I made these pillows as a gift for my sister and her family.

My brother Chris and his wife Kareena had a baby, Ty, just after Thanksgiving and a couple of weeks after he was born we took a picture of Samuel and Ty next to each other. What a difference huh? At this time Samuel was about 6 months and Ty 1-2 weeks old. What is fun to think about is Ty was born at 8 lbs exactly and Samuel was 8 lbs exactly when he was discharged from the NICU. So Ty in this picture was about the same size as Sam was when he was discharged (except a lot of Sam's weight was in his cheeks... and still is;))
Samuel the "Big Bully".
Random story. Noel was playing with her doll one day while Samuel's Occupational Therapist was over for her bi-monthly visit and Noel asked me to unclothe her baby, so I did. She told me her baby needed a diaper change and I told her she could use one of Samuel's. Later after the OT left, I went into Noel's room and found this on the ground.
Noel and I making play dough.
After getting back from doctor's appointments one evening, Noel cuddled up in Samuel's car seat with her "ugly bird" and watched a movie. It was too cute.
Sometimes Morgan and I will wake up in the morning to hearing Noel having her own conversations in her room. We hear all of this through a monitor. One random morning Morgan and I woke up to a knock-knock-knock on her window and then we heard, "Birdie, come here." Then again, knock-knock-knock, "Birdie, come here." Morgan got up, opened her door and she was sitting on her windowsill on the other side of her blinds talking to a little birdie friend that she made.
Best buddies.

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving with my brother and his wife Kareena. It was a blast and the food was D-elicious. Morgan made the most amazing turkey.
Noel sure loves helping out in the kitchen.


Yummy food.

Yummy pies! We had 5 different pies!

Random Samuel Updates

Samuel is smiling and cooing now. October 21st was his first smile and the last few weeks he's been smiling and cooing more and more.

He has a sleep schedule at night now (We're still working on the day one. During the day he usually wakes up whenever we put him down.) At night, usually between 1am to 2am he'll go down and most of the time he will sleep til between 6:30-7:30am, nurse and go back to sleep for 2-3 hrs. Although, last Thursday, November 17th, Samuel slept through the night. An entire 8 1/2 hours!

Samuel is all set up here to have in home physical therapy. We are very excited about that so we don't have to worry about exposing him to any illnesses.

Samuel had his first RSV shot a couple of weeks ago and will get the 2nd one in a couple of weeks. At that appointment he weighed 11 lbs 11.5 oz.

Samuel no longer has eye goop! As of a couple weeks ago it all cleared up.

Random Noel Updates

Noel isn't taking anymore naps. She started refusing to take them and so we tried her without them and she didn't seem extra whiny or tired but sometimes she'll still conk out randomly.

Noel had a close call with her life this past week. Friday afternoon I was sitting nursing Samuel in our living room and Noel was 4 feet away opening the drawer on our "tv stand" (what we use for our 100+ lbs box tv isn't really a tv stand and is much lighter than the tv itself... not too smart to use). The drawer got stuck and she was pulling really hard to open it. I watched the entire thing unfold and still can't get it out of my head. The tv and the "tv stand" started falling over and Noel was kneeling just underneath it. I leapt up from feeding Samuel to stop the tv from falling on her and crushing her. I guess I was able to deflect it enough to not full on crush her but on it's way down it knocked her in the head a couple of times. The tv crashed to the floor and Noel instantly started screaming. As I was holding Noel to see if she was okay I noticed Samuel was on the ground laying on his back and I don't recall if he rolled off of my lap when I lept up or if I laid him on the ground. He didn't seem hurt which was good considering he could've just rolled off of my lap. My brother Chris came running downstairs because he heard the crash and the screaming and he helped clean up the mess while Morgan rushed home. He took Noel to her see her doctor and it was concluded she didn't have a concussion which is a miracle. The doctor mentioned that there have been children who have died from tv's falling on their heads, so I am very grateful Noel didn't even have a concussion. She did have a few large goose eggs on her head but that was it.

A few pics as of late. If you look at the 4th picture down, you can see where Noel gets her silly faces from.










Noel falls asleep in the funniest places.



Here is a video of Samuel smiling and cooing for those interested. He is such a cutie

Make a video - it's fun, easy and free!
www.onetruemedia.com

A Wonderful Visit

This last weekend my brother Mikey came into town and we all had such a wonderful time. He came in super early Saturday morning and in the morning, Chris and Kareena came over for a waffle and bacon breakfast and in the evening we all went thrift store shopping and then we had a Taco and Nacho birthday dinner for Mikey. Later we had cake and ice cream for his birthday and after that we all just visited and talked which was hilariously fun and then we watched a movie.

Morgan holding Samuel last week.

Noel loves holding Samuel now. She asks to hold him all the time and when she does she'll say, "Can you smile Bud?" And she just giggles and gives him kisses. It's so cute!


So for Mikey's 22nd birthday I made him a dog food bowl cake. When we were little, we were best buddies a lot and me being the older sister would ask him to do things for me and his reply would be, "Only if you call me a big brave dog." So I would, and he would do whatever I had asked him. I know, not a very nice thing but we are super close now and I think and hope he's forgiven me;)


Mikey holding Samuel for the first time. He had the magic tough. He put him to sleep a couple of times.
Mikey's reaction when he saw the cake.



By the way, the "dog food" was "whoppers" (Morgan's brilliant idea).

Noel helped him blow out his candle.

Mikey took a few pictures of Noel.

Samuel getting a bath last night.

Noel wanted to watch:)

Thank you for visiting this weekend Mikey. We all had such a great time with you. You are such a great guy and we hope you enjoyed your time here. Thanks for being Mikey, the big brave dog:)