where did my newborn go?

Monday Noelle had a two week check up, which she was really 18 days old. She weighed in at a whooping 8 lb 11oz, and stretched out to 21.25 inches. This was a gain of 1lb and 7 oz from the day we left the hospital! She must like her milk, feeding on demand is going well!

A couple of her newborn sized outfits are getting hard to snap, I am glad we wore them a lot the first few weeks, even though all the pictures will look like they were taken the same day. She has received lots of cute outfits and most are 3 mo, so it will be nice to start wearing those too. She is sleeping as well as I expect her too, and loves to be cuddled. She has smiled a couple of times, but I am still not convinced it has been on purpose. Noelle also has a really strong neck, she lifts her head and even holds it up for a while when laying on her tummy. Her umbilical stump came off on day 15 of her life.
Life is still going great and has been such a blessing.

nature walk

all pictures taken by Emily (except the ones she is in, I took those)
She told me she was taking a picture of the squirrel, he is running to the left- back, by the electric thingys

She gave me these leaves to hold and had me move them around until it was just right and then she snapped the picture

Our nature walked swung by the playground

That afternoon when we were doing "school" we talked about all the things she collected, and then Emily glued them to a piece of paper to save her collection

some fall randomness

1. I think I might have a bladder infection, with no internet it has been hard to do the self diagnosis I love to do. Also do to schedule crappiness and not wanting to take three kids to probably pee in a cup during nap time, I am waiting until evening and hopefully will get an appointment during Urgent Care hours
2. I now hate those little black bugs, that seem to pinch. Seems we instantly switched from mosquito's to those.
3. The internet dude gave us a five hour window to show up today... can you say sucky, and today it is working.
4. We need a babysitter for Dallas and possible Noelle for this Sat. so we can go to the Football game
5. We went on a nature walk this morning. I let Em take pictures of anything she wanted and we collected lots of naturey stuff
6. I am still figuring out the Moby wrap, any pointers??? I feel like it is not tight enough, and Noelle ends up lower at the end of a wear.
7. We need to finish painting our house
8. I have been enjoying not cooking, and getting meals from all of my friends every couple of days
9. Our new fridge rocks. The ice cream is frozen, like really frozen, I haven't had truly hard ice cream in over a year (from our freezer)
10. The sickness might not have been all fridge, still some random churning happening with Rob and I

Photoshopped! Thanks Destri

A big shout out to my friend Destri, I don't know how she found the time with her two busy kiddos, but she merged the pictures! Ultra talented, way to go.

no perfect picture, need photoshop

A good one of Dallas
A better one of Emily

They love sitting on the shoe rack bench in the closet, hiding behind the coats

And delicious Noelle!

Bathroom update... this one is for Dana!

This is what our main bath looked like when we bought the place. Rob removed the shower doors a year or so later in a fit of rage, they never stayed on the tracks! There was significant drywall damage to the left of the toilet, probably from the shower, but Rob always teased me that it was from the previous owners missing the target!
This is our current bathroom! New vinyl, same vanity cabinet, I spray painted it a chocolate brown, I spray painted the hardware Nickel, and bought new handles. The toilet is new, but only because the other one cracked when it was removed to lay the flooring. The sink top is new with new faucet.

The big deal was getting a new shower surround and the dry wall fixed. The wall that the sink and toilet are on was completely stripped down to the studs and new board (the special bathroom kind) was put in place. Same shower curtain, I trimmed it out with some decorator fabric, we needed more length as we mounted the curtain rod much higher than before. We also used a curved rod, it makes the bath seem much more spacious!

New lights, the over head light is actually a fan/light combo. It replaced the existing fan, this new combo fixture moves a ton more air, so basically you can remove stink and moist air quickly.

We replaced the inset mirror medicine cabinet and light. I copied an idea out of Better Homes and Gardens small bathroom feature. They placed a big mirror and centered a light fixture over the sink and toilet, to expand the prep area. It gives much more room to get ready in the morning and also creates more light. I was worried I wouldn't like it since I do like this rather symmetrical, but I love the outcome. Much better than the 13 inch mirror that was centered above the sink before. I also bought little brushed nickel hooks to use for hanging towels.

We splurged and had the drywall, flooring and shower surround installed. I painted, and Rob hung fixtures and mirrors. I think a big difference was made by the shower surround since we went from dingy cream to bright white, and the flooring made a huge difference as well. We didn't buy anything to extravagant. The curved shower rod is about $15 more than a straight rod, flooring was $1.99 a sq ft but Lowes makes you buy a minimum of 12 ft, which was way more than we needed so that was a tad more of an expense. Painting the cabinet and hardware saved us some $$$ too. The fan/light combo was also a splurge, but much better than the piece of plastic that was the fan before. We scored on the mirror, finding one the right size seemed difficult, I was looking into having one made, which wasn't as cheap as I hoped, and then low and behold I found this one at World Market, $69.99 and 20% off! I love the overall look and am glad it is finished!

(it is way better looking in person, hard to photograph and add/edit lighting on such a small space, it really is bright white and pretty!)