stephanie on the move: Noah News: Weeks 37 & 38

Sorry for my absence. While my blog is really just a report of what goes on in our lives (or Noah's life, really) I have been feeling less than inspired to write lately. That, combined with a trip to St. Louis, visitors, and a cold and I have officially been M.I.A. But, I am back and will be trying my best to find my inner writer once again. 

Hi, friends...my mom feels really bad about being a bad blogger. I'll talk some sense into her!

My Best Friend - There will be a couple of best friend sections in this post, but this one is about my furry best friend, Lola. I think this is actually why I have been avoiding writing. My Lola is a very very sick puppy and I am unfortunately facing a very tough decision in the coming month or so. To make a very long saga short, we took Lola in for some long running neck pain and after a CT Scan/biopsy it was made official that my girl has a cancerous tumor on/in her spine. We have been given a gift of time with some steroids and she is happier than she has been in weeks, but it is simply a band aid on a huge problem that will eventually resurface. So until then, I am soaking up every possible snuggle I can with my girl. 

My girl with her crooked head.

Everybody Clap Your Hands - In happier news, Noah learned how to clap! He did it the first time for his Great Grandma Koon but then seemed to forget all about his new found skill for awhile. BUT, it's back and he is a clapping machine!

I took this picture to highlight Noah's awesome new kicks and he just so happened to be clapping, too!

Little Frankenstein - We officially have a walker! Before we took off for St. Louis Noah was taking one or two steps. By the time we came home, we had categorized him as walking. While he still crawls if he wants to get somewhere really fast, his preferred form of transportation is upright these days. 8.5 months and walking...blows my mind.

Stair Master - Another fun trick Noah learned in St. Louis was how to go up stairs. Here in California we only have one little baby step for him to go up and down, but my parents have a whole flight to keep him entertained! He was a speed demon going up by the time we left. Maybe we'll master going down next time?

I only have video of his stair mastering skills so you get a picture of him in his tunnel instead!

So You Think You Can Dance? - Great show, but that isn't the point. Our little Noah LOVES to dance. As soon as he catches a rhythm, he starts busting out his moves! 

I just can't bring myself to sit through more video uploading...so a pensive Noah it is.

Violet Noah Beauregard - Noah is obsessed with blueberries. He shovels them by the handful into his little mouth and gets particularly perturbed when I cut him off. I am pretty sure he might turn into a blueberry sometime soon...

He also likes ice cream but let's focus on the healthy things I feed my son, shall we?!

 Home Again, Home Again - Sometimes I feel a little conflicted on where "home" actually is. While I obviously call my California home, home, I still call my St. Louis home, home. My parents live in the house I spent all 18 years of my childhood in so I still have some really strong emotional ties to my "home". ANYWAY, as we all know, Noah and jetted off for some fun in St. Louis. It is always so nice to back and just enjoy family and friends. Each trip back is always a whirlwind of visiting and this trip was no exception. We jammed each day as full as possible and found ourselves wondering where the time went 8 days later. Noah got to soak up a ton of quality time with Grandma and Grandpa...I'm pretty sure they enjoyed it too :-). It was really cute to see Noah recognize them on FaceTime this week! He was SO excited to see them and even tried to touch them through the iPad. I think I'll have one excited boy in a few weeks when Grandma gets here! I was once again a really bad blogger/mom and took almost zero pictures of our visit. I took a fair amount of video since our little guy was starting to walk but I'll spare you the hours of footage! Next visit, I promise to pack up my good camera and get lots of good shots to share. Suffice it to say, I love being home...the only downside was that it was SO hot and humid we didn't even want to go to the pool! But, there was a pretty great upside...

This was at about 8am...the only acceptable time to play outside!

SURPRISE - I believe I have mentioned once or twice how much I love my husband, yes?! Well, he was at it again, reminding me just how amazing he is (in case I got hit in the head with an anvil while traveling and forgot). Noah and I arrived in St. Louis on Sunday and Thursday I got a call from Scott and he broke the news that he was getting on a plane...to come and see US! I was, of course, ecstatic and anxiously awaited his arrival. I was really missing him and we were both sad he wasn't able to see Noah's walking progression so it was such a great surprise on so many levels to have him join us for the long weekend. 

It was also pretty great to have an extra set of hands on the way home ;-).

Weeeeeee, up in the sky - That's what airplanes do according to Noah's book. I will have to say, flying with an 8 month old was slightly more challenging than flying with a three month old. Especially a mobile 8 month old. I can't really complain, Noah was a trooper...no crying, just a lot of wiggling! The challenge at this age is that they want to move and explore and obviously can't, AND they are too young to be truly distracted. No iPad games or DVDs will hold his attention at this point so it was pretty much just feeding him a million Cheerios and letting him have whatever he wanted to make him happy (my iPhone headphones were a huge hit). All in all, both flights went great, but I am looking forward to being able to distract him just a bit more!

Getting ready to board our airplane!

My Best Friend: Human Edition - This whole trip to St. Louis was initiated because Allie was having a birthday and I wanted to be there with her to ring it in! It was so nice to get to spend more than just her birthday together. Noah loved playing with Eli and Jillian (if you can call staring at them playing) and I loved getting some quality Allison time. It makes me sad that we don't get to be closer so our kids can truly grow up together. AND, selfishly, I would just like more of her in my life daily. Of course, I have zero pictures of the birthday girl, so you'll have to settle for her adorable Jillian instead.

Cutie patootie!

Love them.

Update: my dad actually took some pictures before we left the house! Me and my hot date for the night.

Apparently when you wait two weeks to blog things get fuzzy and I forget all of the funny details of our week :-(. Apologies for the lackluster performance here, folks. Hopefully next week will be full of great anecdotes and smiley faces. Until then a bunch of pictures for your enjoyment (because let's face it, that's why you really visit this blog!)...