What an amazing year it has been! Nora turned two, Quinny arrived, and now we have two girls that are starting to realize they are sisters. I love how they can crack each other up. It’s usually on a level that Josh and I don’t really understand.

Which is where I’ll start with the latest little things they are up to —

• Making each other laugh. The other night, Nora was making random, rather loud nonsense exclamations at dinner. “Aaaaaaannnnnnnnaaaaaa….Dadddddddddddddaaaaaaa…” Right when I was inhaling the air for a declaration that she was being too loud and a little silly, Quinn looked right at her and started giggling. Which egged Nora on more and then it all ended up being pretty funny in the end. Who knew?

• Nora made up a saying — “Uncle Beau-coo” that will consistently, and I mean has a 100% success rate, make Quinny laugh. We don’t get it, have no idea how she came up with adding a coo to Uncle Beau’s name, or what about it is so hi lar i ous to Quinn, but it’s become totally normal for me to say, “Quick, Nora, make Quinn laugh.” “Quinn! Uncle Beau-Coo! Uncle Beau-coo!” And Quinn’s cries turn to giggles. Just like that. Why didn’t we think of it?

• We are up to our necks in Princess dress up, figurines, and dolls. Nora’s favorites are Belle and Cinderella, mainly because those are the only movies we think she’s ready to watch. (I didn’t remember so many of them being so scary at times. I mean, Snow White has a stepmother Queen who sends someone to kill her and then the trees grow claws and eyes and then the Queen becomes a super ugly old lady who is struck by lightning and then falls to her death?!? Calm down, Disney.) Cinderella, by contrast, is such a cute little story with the mice and whatnot. Although she hasn’t asked about the missing mom yet and sorta thinks the dad is “sick” throughout the whole movie. I didn’t want to tell her that the story killed him off.

Anyway, some of Nora’s favorite princess things to do:

• Wear a fancy dress and walk down the stairs to see it trailing behind her.
• Dropping a shoe on purpose. I could NOT find the matching shoe I wanted to wear to Josh’s Google party and finally found it at the bottom of the stairs. Of course.
• Randomly yell, “You can go ahead and STARVE!” like the Beast yells at Belle. It’s one of her all time favorite lines. Such great writing.
• Sing along to the songs. The one that always gets me is when she sings along to the reprise of Beauty and the Beast when a choir joins in with an “Ahhhh, ahhhh, ahhh, AHHHHHHH!” She’s right there with them. (I don’t know how to write music or choir singing parts, so I hope that “AHH” translates. It’s probably supposed to be an extended b flat or tenor or something. But I’m going with Ahh.)
• Say, “Mommy, I’m going to LOCK YOU IN HERE!” then closing the door and running away as fast as she can.

If you aren’t into those movies, all references are lost and I’m sorry. But Nora will be happy to give you a full rundown of both stories.

Meanwhile, Quinny has experienced a renaissance era of learning little tricks.

• After she learned crawling, she focused on that for about, oh, two months. And she has crawled everywhere. And has dismantled everything she can. All very, very quietly. When I go back and look at Nora’s videos at this age, she was all about the babble but didn’t crawl until much later. Quinn has been the quiet type who’s more interested in being on the move. But it seems she’s suddenly decided that she’s officially mastered crawling/exploring and is ready to branch out into other areas. Which now include clapping, waving, and high fiving. I think Nora is as proud as we are.
• Quinn also LOVES her new baby dolls. Give her anything with a face and she lights up like a little Christmas tree.
• Quinn is starting to tune in to what Nora is doing and the toys she’s playing with. She’s been doing her own thing with her own toys but now she starting to crawl towards Nora to play with whatever she has. It’s not exactly Nora’s favorite development. “Mommy, can you move her?” All those times Nora has taken Quinn’s toys away…we thought Quinny had forgotten…but she’s ready to even the score…(I’ve seen too many movie trailers lately….)
• And one thing that Quinn has definitely moved into is the Separation Anxiety Stage. By “Separation Anxiety,” I mean she cries so hard she hyperventilates when I drop her off at the church nursery. And it takes her a while to warm up when we go somewhere or have people over. It’s so sad because up until now she’s been in the stage where anyone could hold her and she didn’t seem to notice or care. So everyone expects that same laid back attitude but are instead greeted with a quivering lip warning that will quickly dissolve to tears and a red face if she isn’t returned to Mommy ASAP. But I’d be totally lying if I said it didn’t make me feel a teeny bit special. I feel sad for everyone else but it’s still touching in a very selfish way. I know she’ll grow out of it soon. Probably before I’m ready for her to.
• Somewhere along the line, Nora decided Quinn is her best friend. Josh pointed out that Quinn hasn’t really done anything to earn that status. They haven’t really played together and Quinn doesn’t even talk yet. But for reasons only she knows, Nora consistently says her best friend is Quinny. “Quinny, you my beeeeeest friend.”
• And lastly, it seems that Quinn is suddenly aware that she can get Nora to react to her if she does something to her. She’s started to tug on Nora’s clothes or hair. Sometimes Nora laughs and plays along.
  “Quinny, are you teasing Nora?”
  “I want her to tease me, Mommy!”
  Sometimes I have to intervene. But it’s fun because they’re starting to experience that special sister relationship. You live in quarters that sometimes seem too close, you have to share your toys and parents’ attention, and sometimes your hair gets pulled. But there’s someone who is always there who knows how to make you laugh. A best friend.

We are so, so, so thankful for the blessings God has given us this year and that we have our own set of little best friends running/crawling around our home.

It’s fall! It’s fall! I forgot how much fun fall is. Last year at this time, I was so preoccupied with packing and getting us ready to move back across the country that I feel like fall passed us by. And it’s such a great season. The leaves are so pretty and the weather is cooler and I start seriously craving cinnamon. Our little munchkins are growing into slightly bigger munchkins.

Nora Praise:

~ She still pronounces her name “Nah Nah” and since she is the person with whom I spend the most hours conversing, guess what? I sometimes call her Nah Nah now too. I’m not sure I can stop. So if you hear that one slip out, whoops. (She pronounces her full name as Nah Nah Pays Teague.)

~ She leaves out the preposition ‘for.’ “Here go, Mommy, this you.” “Wait me, Daddy!”

~ Oh, Little Bear. I could probably write a whole post on ways Little Bear has influenced Nora’s vernacular. Whenever we go for a walk, she will pause every few steps to ask “Are we still going the right way?” It’s something Little Bear asked Cat when they were on a walk and she loved it. How ironic that she’s inadvertently asking a very valid question, given my Superhero Power?

~Another LB: One character on LB uses a walking stick. So now, in any natural setting, Nora selects a walking stick which she proudly holds in her hand and generally prizes as a beloved, precious object for the entire walk. However, there are two problems with her walking sticks: one- she generally chooses very small sticks which are incredibly fragile. The other- she brings the walking sticks home, forgets about them, casts them aside for other playthings, only to remember her highly regarded twig after finding it in decimated pieces on the floor. Then she sobs and wails, “Oh, REMY! That was my WALKING STICK!” This has happened twice now and almost a third time before I remembered to hide her latest stick from our oh-so-eager-to-chew dog.

~ Anytime we are driving and point something or a place out to her, her immediate question is, “Can I go see it?” Every. Single. Time. On our drive to Savannah, she must have requested to see 50 different objects/places.

~ Anytime we are see an interesting place on tv or in a book, she asks, “Can I go there?” It can be Cinderella’s castle, San Francisco, the moon. Doesn’t matter if it’s near, far, real or imaginary. She wants to go there.

~ She’s started writing scribbles. When asked, “What does that say?” she almost always answers “I love you, Quinny.”

~ Read carefully, people, this one is important. All of us are now divided into two groups. There are “Very Nice” People and “Not Very Nice” people. You do not, I repeat, do NOT want to find yourself on the wrong side of that line. It is hard going to find your way back. “Mommy, is she very nice?” “Daddy, those guys not very nice.”

~ The bonus is, if you are deemed “Very Nice,” then you are decidedly not a Scary Monster. “Mommy, is that girl nice?” “Yes, she’s very nice.” “She’s very nice? She’s not a Scary Monster.”

~Nora is not one to think long and hard about a name. All of her small stuff animals/dolls are Baby ____. Baby Panda Bear, Baby Polar Bear, Baby, Other Baby (She has two baby dolls.) We recently got her two tiny frogs that she absolutely insisted on calling Baby Frogs. Collectively. Trying to explain to her that there are two frogs and we can name one frog Baby and the other one a n y t h i n g else did not work. “Their name Baby Frogs.”

~ She has this filler word that I can’t quite pronounce. It’s like, zeh zeh zeh or stha stha stha or something. It’s the equivalent of “um.” If you go back and listen to her singing Old MacDonald on the Sing Along with Nora video (you know, in all your free time) you can hear it.

~ She is going through a serious nature phase here. She LOVES collecting anything from outside. She brings in twigs, leaves- both green and shriveled brown, flower petals, pinestraw- if it’s in our yard, it’s been in the house. It’s also her way of showing she likes you. So if she brings you a dead, crumpled leaf, you’ve been accepted.

Quinn Abigail

~ Quinn is most likely the most pleasant person I have ever woken up. She will be in a deep sleep that we will have to interrupt to take her somewhere and all she does is squint, cover her eyes, and break out into a grin.

~ If she’s already awake and ready in her crib, she starts kicking with excitement as soon as she discovers you are headed her way. “THIS IS THE BEST THING THAT HAS HAPPENED TO ME, EVER!”

~ She is super interested in anything that is playing on the television. She pays equal attention to Barney, Toy Story, and CNN. Should your head be in the way, she leans way over to the side to get a better view.

~ Quinny’s really into touching faces.If you are within arm’s length of her, she holds up her little padded hand and starts stroking your cheek. It makes you feel cherished.

~ Along with a better grasp using those tiny hands has come the Klepto phase. This morning I opened a sock drawer and she somehow swiped a pair of socks out before I could. She’s getting very fast, that one. It’s a little stressful when she gets a good hold of anything containing liquid. I have to figure out how to get it out of her little Kung Fu grip without spilling everywhere.

~ She just figured out how to go from a sprawling position to a sitting position. But late at night, she can’t remember how to lay back down. Last night I went to check on her after hearing her whimpering for a few minutes. I found her sitting in bed, sniffling, half asleep and slightly swaying in exhaustion.

~ Quinn’s a Remy fan, just like her sister was. She giggles uncontrollably whenever she gets to pet him.

~ She’s also a huge Nora fan. I don’t know if anyone can make her laugh like Nora can.

~ She’s been working on this latest skill for awhile…

There are so many moments during the day that I think, “This! I want to remember that Nora/Quinn said/did this!” (Maybe not so much the “Quinn said” combo just yet, but you get the idea.) Here’s an attempt to mash a bunch of that together.

First, a totally random story that I meant to tell… wow, a year ago, now that I think about it. Better late than never?
So back when I was in my first trimester with Quinn, I was still in the “Oh, that scent is way more overwhelming than it has a right to be” phase. One thing in particular that I had a really hard time with was Josh’s deodorant. Let me be absolutely clear: no, he did not smell. It was simply his deodorant. He could have just showered and put it on and smell fresh as a daisy to everyone else, but it made my stomach absolutely churn. Add in the fact that he started sleeping with his arms behind his head at night and there was simply no safe haven for me. I would be half asleep and suddenly suppress a gag.
I finally told him about it and asked him to make a switch. Good man that he is, he agreed to. I kept meaning to thank him for it and tell him that the new one was easier for my overactive nose to handle, but it always slipped my mind. Baby Brain. Finally, it occurred to me as we were getting in the car after church one Sunday morning. Wanting to make up for lost time, with way too much excitement I exclaimed, “Hey, I keep meaning to tell you- your new deodorant is working much better!” Josh turned absolutely red.
“What?” I knew he knew what I meant. What was he embarrassed about?
“Ssh…” he indictated to our right. Where a couple was getting into the car next to us and obviously suppressing a laugh.
It’s all about timing. And volume.

Now onto the current time period.

Nora prefers to walk in stores these days. She’s been pretty good about keeping up with me and it’s easier than trying to fit both of them into a cart. The two of us have perfected a brief script. She’ll pick up a random item (such as a pair of workout shorts) and say, “Oooh, look at these, Mommy!”
To which I respond, “Oh, those are cute, Nora!”
“Thank you, Mommy!” and puts the item back where she got it. We do this every five minutes or so throughout the trip.

Quinn has a little ritual at bed and nap time. She grabs her paci, wraps her whole body around it, and turns onto her side. Like she’s wrangling it to sleep.

Speaking of naptime, who knew it could be the subject matter for one of Nora’s favorite games? She spends 20 minutes laying various dolls down on different sleeping surfaces. Her bed, the doll bed, our bed, her rocking chair. She will periodically say, “I hear my baby crying. Coming, Baby!” After holding said baby for a minute, she’ll say, “Okay, Baby, time for your nap, okay? Okay.” And she starts the whole process over. It’s completely routine to walk into a room and find a doll facedown. This morning I walked into Quinn’s room to change her diaper. Nora was less than thrilled as she warned me, “Ssh, doggie sleeping.” Sure enough, there was Poppy Dog in the crib.

So I think we all know about how Josh and I do a voice for Remy, right? It’s deep and speaks in a way that is enthusiastic, naive, trying to be dignified and just a little too eager.
Here’s another story from the past- this one goes back two years or so. Back in our apartment in Kirkland I was about to take Remy for a walk. While waiting for the elevator, some of the maintenance guys arrived. One extended a hand to Remy, which he sniffed and then backed away. Feeling bad that my dog rejected him and without considering the ramifications, I said in Remy’s voice, “Not so fast.”
Then it was the maintenance guy’s turn to back away slowly. I realized in a wave of horror that he wasn’t in on our joke and what was I going to do? Explain that sometimes I talk on behalf of my dog?
It was a super awkward elevator ride.

Anyway, so we still do this all the time. Now Nora has picked up on it and will answer for Remy. “How are you doing, boy?” “Good!” She’ll say in a deep voice. The other day while we were driving, we saw a man walking his dog. Nora went into Remy voice and said, “Hi. I going on walk.” I was so proud. Talking for random dogs! There’s even more fun to be had! Dog park, here we come!

We also have a voice for Quinn. It’s very high pitched and ladylike. Nora’s in on this one, too. I’ll ask, “How are my girls?” “Good,” Nora answers in her normal voice. “Good!” She’ll answer in a really high voice. Sometimes she laughs at herself and adds, “Quinny say that.”

This is gross. Sorry. But I’m telling it anyway. I had just cleaned out Quinn’s nose and Nora was staring at it. Teasing her, I asked, “Nora, would you like a boogie?” In all seriousness: “No thank you, I have some in my nose.”

Nora still wants to include Quinn most of the time. Last night when we were out on a walk, Nora saw a plane overhead. “Quinny! Ook! A airplane!” with an attempt to force Quinn’s head to face the appropriate direction. Sweet, but yikes.

Nora’s obsessed with Caillou. If you don’t know about it, it’s actually a great show. It follows a four year old boy dealing with everyday things like going down the big slide or figuring out what to bring to show and tell. I think the network only shows episodes from the current season because we’ve seen the same thirteen episodes over and over. So Nora’s had a chance to memorize some phrases.

We were talking about the exterminator coming over and Nora turned around at the word “bugs.”
“Bugs are icky. Have eight legs.” Along with wiggling her fingers like little legs. We both stopped and stared. We have never told her that. Was our child a genius!? (Yes, hush, bugs have six legs and spiders have eight. I mean a genius for a toddler.) But when we asked her where she heard that, she said, “Caillou say that.” Oh. Well, he’s four (and written by adults), so that’s not as impressive. Too bad.

Another time we were driving in the car and she kept saying, “My tummy feels funny.” She’d been to Sunday School recently so I kept trying to deduce exactly what she meant. “Are you hungry? Full?” (About to throw up….) A few days later I discovered that episode-as it turns out, his tummy felt funny when he went up in an elevator. We’ve hadn’t had an occasion for that, so she improvised during a car ride.

Some of the random stuff she’s picked up from shows is actually helpful. She knew exactly how to sleep in a big girl bed- head on pillow, covers pulled up to chin- because that’s how Little Bear sleeps in his bed. Nevermind that it took us a few weeks to convince her to stay in bed- she at least knew how to assume the position.

Also, being the picky eater that she is, I was floored when she loved broccoli soup that my mom made. She calls it Birthday Soup from an episode about LB’s birthday. So now everyone call it that, okay? Seriously, it’s the only green vegetable she eats. Just call it birthday soup, I beg of you.

And I’ll end with a Quinn story. Yesterday morning I heard her start talking/fussing to herself but thought she might go back to sleep if she could find her paci. Her cries escalated until I ran up there and found her on her tummy. Rolling is still a relatively new skill for her so when she’s half awake, she forgets how to roll back onto her side. But this time she was seriously stuck with her little legs through the bars. Poor thing. Read this in your head as a high pitch voice; “Why? Why won’t my legs do what I want? Rolling is so hard!” (See, isn’t it amusing to talk in dog and baby voices?)

I told Josh that I think I will always look back on this summer as being such a special season for us. We have loved reconnecting with family and friends and doing all the summer things, like going to the “big pool,” grilling out, putting some finishing touches on the playroom, and breaking out the baby toys all over again. Nora is at such a fun age where she’s really starting to talk and reveal what’s going on in her head. Quinn is a happy little camper who has charmed all of us.

Some of the things I want to remember:

• Quinn has become “Quinny.” I think Ally, her two year old cousin, is the one who really picked up this one and started running with it. Nora followed and it’s reached the point where today I said, “Good morning, Quinn!” and Nora helpfully added, “Ny.”
• Nora wants to include Quinn(y) in everything. She brings her books, necklaces and dress up clothes. The other day Nora tried on a new dress up outfit. After hearing our accolades of her beauty and princesslike appearance, she said, “Go show Quinny!” and flitted out of the room. She ran all the way to Quinn’s swing and proudly showed her outfit with a “See, Quinny?” to her baby sister who was completely asleep and motionless the whole time.
• Speaking of beautiful princesses, Nora and I watched some of the Royal Wedding highlights. So now all brides are Princess Brides. I’ve decided not to correct this misnomer. All brides should feel like princesses. Also, since Nora was a flower girl (along with cousin Faith!) in Uncle Kemble and Aunt Ashley’s wedding, all princesses are flower girls, the epitome of being girly and fancy. So brides=princess brides and actual princesses= flower girls. Hope that’s clear. =)
• Quinn likes to kick her legs up as she falls asleep. In unison, like a mermaid, a few times and then she’s good to go drift off.
• Nora hands us things and says, “Here go, phone, Mommy.” If she doesn’t know the word for what she’s giving us, she says, “Here go, Daddy, this.”
• Nora has started telling us she loves us! It melts our hearts every time. The especially fun thing is that since she’s said it as a returned statement so often, she adds “too.” So without me saying it first, she’ll come up and give me a hug and say, “I love ya, too, Mommy.” The fact that we love her is assumed- rightly so. =)
• Nora has watched Little Bear almost exclusively for months. When we were in the hospital after Quinn was born, my mom said she wasn’t quite herself unti she’d gotten her Little Bear fix in the morning. Josh and I have enjoyed pointing out the Canadian accents on the show when they say words like “soary” instead of “sorry” and “abowt.” I was a little concerned that these would also become Nora’s pronunciations.
• One day last week, Nora was watching Caillou. I tivo’d a few shows. (In the past, she might watch a different show a few times but always goes back to Little Bear. Well, she’s been on a Caillou kick the last few days. Hooray! A break from Little Bear, of which I have seen every. single. episode! Then I heard it. “Mommy, can I go to Cementine’s howse?” What? What?! A quick Google search (you know it!) and yes, it seems that Caillou is also produced in Canada. So there you go- Nora wishes she was Canadian.
• Quinn has started gumming her hands. It makes her look like she’s concentrating really hard.
• Nora doesn’t like it when Quinn is sleeping. If Quinn is sleeping in the room, Nora drifts over and starts saying hello to her or swings her swing with a little too much pizazz to guarantee she’ll wake up. “Nora, don’t wake up Quinn.” I’m usually too late by the time I notice this is happening. “Quinny wake now!” she will inform me happily. Well, yes, now she is.
• Which is part of the reason for why we moved Quinn into her own room for naps and at bedtime. Although I must say, Josh and I were both a little sad for this milestone. (“She doesn’t need us anymore!” We may have exaggerated.) So now Nora looks for reasons to go into Quinn’s room. Today’s excuse was to put a toy where it belongs. Not just any toy- the xylophone. I heard Quinn’s door open, started to tell Nora no, then heard a thump followed by several off key notes. Nora realized the mission failed as Quinn continued to snooze and shut the door with dignified resignation.
• As soon as we leave someone’s house, we are not in the car before Nora asks when we will see them again. “More Tiffany, Rex?” Same if someone comes to visit us. Including the plumber who installed our sink. She couldn’t remember his name, so she sadly watched as he left asking, “More guy?”
• Nora loves it when Quinn is on the floor and in reachable space. “Tummy time!” she’ll say happily. (Although I’m really bad about following through with Tummy Time and she’s usually on her back. But if she’s on the floor= Tummy Time to Nora.) She’ll flop right down next to her and hold her hand and curl up alongside her.

• Nora has just started singing along to songs. She only knows key words, usually the ones that are the most drawn out. But I love it. My favorite lyric of hers is to the Quinn song Annie included on the video she made for us. Nora sings “Maaaaake it!” during the chorus.
• Quinn has just started to chuckle. It may only be an extreme form of cooing, but for now we’re going with calling it her laugh.

And finally, should you end up babysitting Nora and she asks to watch something, allow me to provide a list of her frequent requests and their translations:

• “Woody Andy Andy” – Toy Story 2. In one of the first scenes, Woody has a nightmare that Andy is throwing him away. “No, Andy, no! Andy! Andy!”
• “Woody Choo Choo” – Toy Story 3. The opening action sequence takes place on a train.
• “Woody Stuck” – The outtakes on Toy Story 2, including one where Woody sits on a roll of tape and gets stuck.
• “Brr” – Little Bear
• “Tistmas New” – the most recent Christmas home movie, a la Aunt Annie
• “See See See” (accompanied with a gesture of holding her two hands up and pushing them out) – Grandpa’s Magical Toys, where they sing A Sailor Went to Sea, Sea, Sea while playing patty cake

And most recently, today, my new favorite request- Nora wanted to watch Barney. To help me understand her request, she held both her arms in at the elbow and flapped her arms around, to help recreate Barney’s little T Rex arms. I tried to recapture this impression with this video:

In case you haven’t heard, we’re moving back to Atlanta! A position has opened up for Josh in the Atlanta office, so get ready, fellow Southerners! We think we’ll be moving back late November or early December and will probably be living in Marietta.

The move is bittersweet since the Lord has provided such a blessed life for us the past two years in Seattle. We’ve made some great friends, been part of such a loving and serving community, as well as a church where it’s easy to see that lives are being changed by Christ. We will truly miss our friends and community from our time in the Pacific Northwest.

At the same time, we are so thankful and thrilled to be coming back to our families and southern friends! We love the idea that Nora will have chance to really get to know her (many) aunts, uncles, cousins, as well as her grandparents. There’s also so many awesome friends back in Atlanta who have been so great about making time for us during our visits and keeping up with us through the past two years. We are so excited to think about being able to make plans to come visit and hang out with you all again! We’re looking forward to being able to travel to see those of you who live outside Atlanta that we haven’t been able to see during our visits.

So now all we have to do is pack up! And find a place to live. And figure out if it’s worth it to ship the car and try to ship Remy as air cargo. (He may never recover.) Or if poor Josh should drive across the country with Remy in the backseat (again) while I attempt to fly with Nora on my lap with a 6 month baby bump. Or if we should all drive together even though Nora is not a huge fan of the car. And if Josh (or all of us) do drive, is it safe to drive the short route across the northern states when it’s getting really cold? Or do we lose a day and drive south first? So maybe there’s a few details we are still trying to work out…

Meanwhile, Nora’s so excited about spending more time with her extended family! Well, she would be if she understood what was about to happen. We’ve been working on everyone’s names for awhile now, but she’s finally learning a few. She’s says:
Poppa- Poppy and/or Panzy
G- g- g- Gran
Nee Nee- Aunt Annie
Ay ya ya ya- Ally
Caca Blaboe – Uncle Beau
Jee- Aunt Jeanine
EE- Aunt Tiffany

If she hasn’t learned your name yet, Family Members, don’t take it personally. A lot depends on which home movie she’s currently obsessed with and how often you’re featured in it. Right now it’s the Mexican Vacation movie from a Teague trip a few years back and she doesn’t recognize Uncles Kemble or Royal. But she’s learned almost everyone else from that movie. She’ll learn the rest of the Petrellas and Robinsons as soon as she gets back into those movies.

In other Nora news:

-She calls for me anytime she doesn’t see me. “Maaaaaa!” Yes, it sounds like someone from New Jersey.

-Her newest hobby is collecting rocks from the backyard. She brings them over to me to hold, leaves them in a pile on the steps, and balances them on top of her play lawn mower and pushes them around the yard. Like she’s throwing them a little parade.

- As a result of pregnancy, my complexion isn’t exactly porcelain-like . Nora gets very concerned about my “boo boos.” She stares at my face with a totally serious expression, puts one hand on each of my cheeks, and turns my head to inspect each and every blemish. It’s a fairly humbling experience that I get to endure several times a day. Especially when she catches ones I haven’t noticed yet.

- Nora was lifting her baby doll into a chair with a loud grunt. Josh correctly identified that she is mimicking me when I put her into her car seat. (She is 26 pounds and I have the upper arm strength of a ten year old.)

-The other day she was playing in her room and I kept hearing her saying something that ended in “eee.” For the whole afternoon I tried to figure out what she was saying. It was something like, “Uh, oo, EEE!” I finally realized she was counting to three. We made a big deal about it and now she does it because she loves our reactions. Sometimes she tries to build it up by saying about four two’s. And gets totally distracted in the process and never makes it to the big ‘three!’

-She likes to pat Remy and say, “Goo gah” for ‘good boy.’

-She gets really excited to go pick up Josh from work. She starts calling for him when we pull up to the building. “Daaaa!” As soon as she sees him, she just giggles.

-She calls stars “uh abo ya,” (‘up above the’) from her Twinkle Twinkle Little Star book. (Her favorite page reads “Up above the world so high”.) If only she knew they have a much simpler name.

-I think she thinks the word for running is go go. Because that’s what she says whenever she sees a jogger on the road. Or maybe she’s just cheering them on.

And finally, in pregnancy news, everything seems to be going really well! I’m so thankful that I’m in the second trimester and have a lot more energy. (Very helpful for packing.) I’ve been feeling the baby move at least once a day. Yay!

I have to watch what I do around Nora the Mimicker. Here she is copying my hands-on-hips study of the kitchen and packing progress.

Here are some of the little things Nora’s doing now.

I have a hard time believing that her birthday was six months ago! Looking back on pictures from her party, she looks so little! Of course, in six more months, I’ll see the pictures from now and say the same thing. :)

We’ve moved and are loving the new house! We took this video before we left but didn’t get a chance to share it before we had to pack up the computer. We wanted to remember Nora’s confidence on elevators. I think if she could have reached the buttons, she would have been more than happy to ride on that thing all by herself. It’s interesting to me that she just accepts that this is how we get outside. We go into this room, wait, and come out right where we wanted to be.

I feel like if I don’t write all of the fun things down that Nora is doing, I’m going to forget all about them. And while I have tried several times to start an actual scrapbook for her, this blog seems to have turned into a virtual scrapbook. As long as the memories are being recorded somewhere, right? So here’s some stories and little things she’s up to.

• She loves shoes. Josh started a little daily morning routine where she hands him each sock and shoe to put on. She gets really excited and starts speed crawling towards him when she seems him coming with socks and shoes in hand.

• If she sees a shoe on the floor, she tries to find the owner and give it to him/her to put on. I was humoring her this morning in the kitchen and ended up wearing one sneaker (sans socks) for half an hour. It felt weird at first, then I forgot about it.
• If Nora finds a sock in the laundry basket, she holds it up and says, “Nanan!” which is her word for pretty much anything. In this case, it means “put this sock on.” And just in case that isn’t clear enough, she’ll hold up a foot. One time she found three socks. I put one on each foot but she still wanted to wear the third.
• Speaking of laundry- Nora’s actually pretty helpful with it. She kneels near the full basket and hands me one piece of clean laundry at a time. Only she’s really fast and I have to speed up to keep pace with her. So I do my laundry folding faster now.
• Nora’s become a watcher and a copier lately. The other day she was shaking a washcloth that she was ‘helping me fold.’ I couldn’t figure out what she was doing until I realized that I was shaking the wrinkles out of each towel before I folded it. She also copies us brushing our teeth by rubbing her fingers over her lips. My favorite was during Poppy and Panzy’s visit. She was watching Poppy eat with chopsticks. She used her own set to touch a plate, then her mouth, over and over, following along.
• We think “nanan” started from her trying to repeat after us when we ask her “Do you want a….” She just shortened “want a” to ‘nanan.’ This is our current theory.
• She L O V E S to be read to. (Which we love that she loves.) She used to be happy flipping through books herself, but now she brings them over to whoever is nearby. You hear her coming, too. She gets very serious and starts saying “nanana” as she does the three limb crawl, chosen book in hand. Her current favorites include “My Dog’s the Best” (dogda!) and “Booboo.” I think Josh and I have read Booboo about 100 times. Each. She loves that book and we both have it memorized by now. “This is Booboo. Booboo is a gosling. A small blue gosling who likes to eat. Booboo likes to eat from morning til night. Every day….”
• Anything that beeps, has buttons, and is small enough to hold up to her ear is a phone. “Hi.” Including- actual cell phones, the remote, our keyless car entries and most recently, a digital thermometer.
• She hates motorcyles and anything that has a siren. I blame the siren hating on Remy. If she hears one (which happens a lot since we live near a fire station and often have our windows open) she looks at me with terror. And right as she scampers toward me so I can pick her up, what does Remy do but start howling along? She looses it every time. Once it happened at a park while she was swinging and Remy was tied up nearby. I was so embarrassed to be the one with the wailing child and howling dog.
• If I give her some kind of food she doesn’t want, she promptly picks it off her tray and hands it right back to me.
• Like all 15 month olds, she knows the word no and what it means. But she likes to pretend that she wasn’t going to do whatever she’s being warned not to do. She reaches to touch the stereo and when we say, “No, Nora” her hand veers away at the last second to land on a DVD that clearly she was going for the whole time. Or last week, I saw her reaching for what seemed to be the humidifier. “No, Nora” I may have imagined this, but she went for a book behind the humidifier and I believe actually held it up for me to see. As if to say, “It’s cool, Mom, I wasn’t going to touch the humidifier. I was just getting this book. No worries.”
• Still obsessed with doggies. Now she sees one and says “dogda!” (newest pronunciation, up from ‘doggeegee’) and then opens her mouth and says “Ahhhh.” Which is how she asks for a kiss. Not from us, no. She only asks for kisses from dogs. And yes, she’s received a few before we could prevent it happening.
• She also likes to kiss illustrations of dogs in books. It’s amazing how she spots every illustration of a dog. The other day we were in the check out line and she said, “Dogda!” I could not figure out what dog she was seeing until I realized it was on a balloon two aisles over. She also loves to look at the DVD for You’ve Got Mail because there’s a 1 cm illustration of Barkley on the bottom corner of the cover.
• Nora’s going through a very affectionate phase. Sometimes we’re the blessed recipients (“She hugged me! Sob.”) but mostly it’s inanimate objects, such as stuffed dogs. She holds them close and rocks them like they’re babies.
• She likes to stare and say “Hi!” to other kids. She notices other kids almost as much as she notices dogs. In both cases, she completely zones in until she either gets a reaction or the child/dog moves out of sight.
• She loves watching home movies. Anything animated doesn’t interest her (Sorry, Veggie Tales. Your day will come.) But she watched the video Aunt Annie made from our beach trip over and over while she was sick. And on mute during plane trips.
• Nora likes to explore and find new things to figure out. Just when I think she’s explored all she can in our apartment, she comes across something new and exciting. Like the guest room clock radio…