naming colors and sucking thumbs

Noah never sucked his thumb. He started loving the pacie around 6 months and didn't let it go until last week (26 months). Jude on the other hand LOVES his thumb. We've tried giving him a pacie since he was a month old. He takes his Soothie every once in a while, but really prefers his thumb. Sometimes he sucks to put himself to sleep and sometimes, like in the picture below, just for fun. I never knew how incredibly cute it looks for a baby to suck his thumb. I will just have to worry later about how to get him to stop once it's time!

my little thumb sucker
Jude will be 4 months tomorrow!!

Noah has been absorbing information so much lately! He can count to 10 (with assistance), can do 1-to-1 coorespondence with 3 objects, speak in 2-3 word sentences, anticipate sequencing in familiar books, and can now identify at least 3 colors. This video shows him naming red, blue, and green. He's still a little shaky on yellow and orange, but he's got these other 3 down. We can even ask him, "What color are the trees? What color is the grass?" And he responds, "geen". So fun!

baby elmo

Noah has become quite attached to a friend named, Elmo. He received him for Christmas last year from Grammie and Pops. Little did we know that Elmo would become his "baby" when Jude entered the world. Elmo usually tee-tee's in the potty during the day, gets rocked in the rocking chair, takes frequent short naps, and is loved very much by a sweet boy named Noah. We have all found it funny that Noah has enjoyed being such a good pal to Elmo when he doesn't seem to know that his brother exists!

Yesterday I found Noah praying with Elmo. He was putting Elmo "night, night" for about the 5th time that morning, when he closed his eyes and helped Elmo pray for everyone in the family. Then he kissed and hugged Elmo and left him to take a nap. I thought it was pretty funny and sweet at the same time. First of all, he's pretending which means he has a good imagination. He's also nurturing which will make him a good daddy one day. Finally, he's paying attention to us. When Clay and I put him to bed at night, we always pray with him, then kiss and hug him. Even when he doesn't seem to care about these prayer times, he's learning and it's becoming an important ritual to him!

brothers and pacies

I managed to get a couple of pictures of the boys together! No one told me how hard it is to take pictures of a toddler and a newborn!

I figured it would be easiest to let Noah lay down in the floor with Jude...
... But then I discovered that Jude could sit on the couch next to Noah.

This proved to be the best way to get their picture taken. Notice how cute their matching shirts are! My mom got these for the boys a while back. Noah's been wearing his since before Jude was born, but Jude's just now wearing his. And the shirt is 12 months!! That kid is growing so fast!
A huge milestone occurred this weekend. We have been cutting Noah's pacie for about a month now, so that we can gradually get him off of it. Clay cut a little more right before bedtime on Saturday night. I asked Noah if he wanted to throw it away. He said yes. (He loves throwing things away.) We took him outside, opened up the lid, and in went the pacie! I thought it was going to be this huge ordeal, but it was quite easy. I don't think he's missed it at all!

the circus

On Saturday we took the boys to the circus! I have such fun memories of seeing the trapeze artists and riding the elephants. We wanted our boys to enjoy the excitement as well!

The circus was too dark to take any pictures, so I just have a couple.

Noah was glued to the excitement the whole time. He really liked the tigers and the elephants. He also like the motorcyclists as they raced around in a cage. I, on the other hand, didn't like that a 10 year-old boy was participating in that dangerous activity. What kind of mom would let their child do that?!

Jude mostly ate and slept during all the excitement. He did jump when the cannon fired and when a clown car backfired!
here's a blurry picture of noah riding the elephant

playdate fun

Friday, some friends came over for a playdate. There were 6 adults and 7 children. The kiddos played inside and then we all went outside for a picnic. Here's the breakdown:

*Me, Noah (2 years) , and Jude (3 1/2 mths.)

*Meg and Naomi (7 mths.)

*Maron and Carson (11 mths.)

*Meredith, Sawyer (2 1/2 years), and Jaxon (1 year)

*Stephanie and Claire (almost 2 yrs.)

*Aunt Ashley

me and my sweet baby jude relaxing on a blanket
precious naomi
cute claire mowing the grass
naomi, jaxon, and carson enjoying some snacks
noah clapping for sawyer after he made a good hit

Noah can use the potty!

We have been trying for many months for Noah to sit and use the potty. For the past couple of months, he has become very interested in sitting on the potty, only. We encourage him to tee-tee and poo-poo, but alas just sitting occurs. Lately he sits for long periods of time and even grunts. He reads his Elmo potty book in which that shrilly voice exclaims, "Elmo can use the potty!" This has gone on for a while now, but we had a break through this week. Noah tee-teed (spelling?) in his potty on Wednesday night and Saturday night! I think we're a long way from getting out of diapers, but maybe a step closer. Then I can spend the extra $40/month elsewhere- oh yea, on another couple of packs of diapers for Jude :)

school and bottles

What have we been up to?

Noah has been enjoying going to school 2 days a week. He brings home fun art projects almost everyday. Our fridge is quickly becoming full of his little masterpieces. I've kept them all so far, except one. When I picked him on Thursday there was a fun paper plate face in his cubby and I told him what a good job he did. I started asking him about gluing and then his teacher stepped in. She said that they started helping the girls by mistake and when they got to Noah he didn't want to do it, so he got up and went and played instead! I decided not to keep the face that his teacher really made.

Also, another funny Noah story. When I picked him up last week his teacher was laughing as I was signing him out. I looked up to see Noah holding a baby doll and his teacher said that he had been "nursing" the baby! Ha, ha! He also likes to hold the breast pump up to his chest and say "milk" at home. What a crazy kid!

This weekend I was stricken with Streph and was told I couldn't nurse Jude for 24 hours! Clay was a good daddy and fed Jude bottles during my illness. I decided to capture the moment because I'm not usually around when Jude takes a bottle. He didn't seem to like the formula at first, but them got used to it and liked it by the days end. He did seem really happy that he was able to nurse today and decided to eat quite often. Which was totally fine with me. I missed my little baby!