Hahahahahahahahaha

Wow. Just wow. SLOW news day, apparently.

Only one month left...

Sadie is eleven months old today! One month from today she will be one- NO WAY!!! I am in denial. She is doing so well. She has two more teeth- one on the bottom and one on the top, for a total of four. Maybe that's why she's been screaming at night! But speaking of nighttime, she has been sleeping through the night for the past two nights, which makes for one happy mama. I let her cry it out on Saturday night because Paul slept in the tent downstairs with Ethan that night (they had a little campout)- Paul is usually the one that breaks down and goes in to get her when she cries for an extended period of time in the middle of the night. She woke up crying twice that night, and each time I let her cry, she went back to sleep after 20-30 minutes. Not too bad! Then the next night she woke up once and only cried for a few minutes then went back to sleep. Last night no crying at all! Woohoo!!! I hope this trend continues.

We go back to the doctor this afternoon to check her ears and talk about where to go from here. I hope the infection has cleared up. And let's hope she's put on a few more pounds, too! With all the whipping cream I've been slipping into her food she's bound to be heavier.

And now, without further ado, here is a look at our beautiful baby girl at eleven months!

Cutest. Baby girl. Ever.

Look at me! I can stand all by myself!!

Just like my big brother, I refuse to keep socks on my feet.

Ha ha! Sweet freedom- I got that blasted sock off! You'll never catch me!

Sadie just loves to play in the laundry basket...

As evidenced below:

Please disregard the disgusting state of my kitchen floor, just admire the adorable baby girl crawling on it

Did I mention I am adorable??

Namesake

At the recommendation of some classmates, I Googled myself today to see if anything odd came up. I found that in Alabama, on the campus of Jacksonville State University, stands an oddly named football stadium. Cannot, for the life of me, figure out who it was named after. I am not making this up.

http://www.jsugamecocksports.com/sports/2009/1/14/FB_0114091949.aspx?path=football

Luck Be a Lady

Sadie is SO lucky. Lucky she's the cutest thing to crawl the earth. Otherwise I would probably sell her to gypsies. She is still up for hours at night, screaming her fool head off, keeping us up and making us crazy. Sigh. She's been on the antibiotics for a week now, so the ear infection should be under control and shouldn't be causing her any more pain. I don't know what her problem is. But like I said, she's lucky she's so adorable. And that I have a conscience.

Anywho, Sadie is really close to walking and it is so cute to watch. She still has to hold on to something while she "walks" and lately she prefers the little push-car popcorn popper thing that we gave Ethan for his first birthday. I finally managed to capture it on our camera's video, so here it is for your viewing pleasure! (sorry it's kinda long)

Jabba and the Voices in His Head

Spring has brought me such a nice surprise

Jabba hearing voices right before my eyes

We're aren't arguing that our pug, Jabba, is the smartest dog on the block. Lately though, we're increasingly sure he has become possessed. Over the last week, we've had highs in the upper thirties and low forties - very abnormal for this time of year. The last week we had this warm was in early October. Well, all that warm weather has brought with it some birds. Apparently Jabba cannot handle that. During my walk with him this morning, he found the cripping of half a dozen birds too distracting and wouldn't go the bathroom. The guy is far to use to the piercing silence of winter in New Hampshire. He doesn't have a six dollar hairbut and he isn't allergic to eggs but the dog definitely has problems.

Occom Pond Party Madness

The city of Hanover sponsered a party today as part of Dartmouth's Winter Carnival. Located on a pond near the Hanover Country Club, the party included tons of free food, ice skating, hockey, sledding, ice sculptures, and horse-drawn carriage rides. We had a blast eating maple syrup snow cones, roasting marshmellows and sliding down an ice castle.

Ethan playing in a castle made of ice

Ethan riding down a slide made of ice

The party at the pond

The Air Up There

A couple time a year, a tower in Dartmouth's main library is open to the public. This weekend is a big festival called Winter Carnival so we headed up the tower.

View west - facing Tuck Drive

View north

View south - facing the Green.

Notice the hidden message written in the snow in the bottom of the frame. In addition, that big pile of snow in the middle of the green was suppose to be an awesome snow sculpture. It was so warm this week though that the sculpture collapsed into a big pile.

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy V Day. Ethan celebrated by making some cookies with friends yesterday. He didn't touch the cookies though and preferred, instead, to run around dressed like a bus.

Celebrating Darwin's Birthday with the Dinosaurs

While in scenic Amherst, we also visited Amherst College. The college has an awesome natural history museum with tons of dinosaur bones. Ethan was in heaven. The museum was celebrating Darwin's birthday which was earlier this week.

The Amherst College campus was nice. Very New England-y as you can see below.

We also visited a Frank Lloyd Wright house in Amherst and tried to visit Emily Dickinson's house. Unfortunately, it was closed for the winter. Photographic evidence of the house is below.

Carousing The Carle

We drove down to Amherst, Mass today to visit the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art. It has three galleries of picture book art - think drawings from Where the Wild Things Are and collages from The Hungry Caterpillar. It was a super nice building with a sweet library, art center and auditorium as well.

Ethan with his Rocky pose in front of the museum

Sadie playing in the museum's library

Sarah completing a self portrait in the art studio

The fam in the main entry way

I Know Why a Caged Bird Sings

Third time is NOT a charm

When it comes to ear infections, anyway.

Sadie is on her third ear infection since the end of November. Poor baby. She was up screaming for hours on end Saturday and Sunday nights so I took her in on Monday morning, as that was her only symptom the last time she had an ear infection. And lo and behold, her right ear was red and full of fluid. It is the same ear that keeps getting infected every time. And since she doesn't have any of the usual risk factors that might explain the frequent infections (day care, smoker in the house, she is breastfed), it seems there is something else going on in her ears. So the doctor who saw her mentioned the possibility of ear tubes and we are meeting with her regular doc on the 24th to discuss what to do next (and to check on her ear to make sure it's getting better). I am pretty much to the point now where I just want them to put the dumb things in if it means no more pain, antibiotics, and sleepless nights. On the plus side, when they weighed her at the appointment she was up to 18lbs, 7oz- almost 2 whole pounds heavier than she was at the beginning of January! And that also put her into the 25th percentile for weight- yay!!! I guess all that heavy cream I've been putting into her scrambled eggs is working...

I'll keep you posted on the tubes. Poor little Sadester!

SO wrong

http://www.cnn.com/2009/HEALTH/02/03/kidney.vagina.surgery/index.html?eref=rss_topstories

Eww. I almost gagged when I read this. Seriously. This is a sign of the apocalypse.

I love a good deal!

A friend of mine gave me a link to a great sale at Baby Gap's website. Final sale, so everything was crazy cheap, plus there was a code for an extra 25% off. Sweet! So I scored all these adorable pieces for Sadie for next winter (plus some leggings that I didn't take a picture of) for less than $50 including shipping. I love a sale! Guess what she's getting for her birthday!

Look at these adorable snow pants- $7!

Cute little plaid jumper



Cable knit sweater dress This is my favorite item; won't this make for the cutest Christmas portraits ever?!