Sarah Kate--7 months

Sarah Kate has been busy lately! She is getting good at sitting on her own, and when she topples over, she can usually catch herself before she bops her head on the floor. (A very useful skill!) She can scoot backwards all over the room, and she is ready to go forward--she can push herself up on her hands and knees already! She is also babbling more, saying dada and baba. Here's a photo of her sitting and a video of the babbling: (I'm adding the url for the video underneath it, since some are having technical difficulties.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-B_qkVxPapA

Sarah Kate also has two new bottom teeth. She's enjoying all her baby foods along with those fruit and vegetable puffs that dissolve in her mouth. She will only eat them if you put them in her mouth for her. She can pick them up in her hands, but she makes no attempt to put them in her mouth. It's funny because everything else she picks up goes straight to her mouth, but not the little things she's supposed to be putting there! She will hold puffs in both hands, wave them around, and then open her mouth for you to feed her some. If you look closely at this photo, you might be able to spot her 1 1/2 teeth that were present at the time it was taken:

This month, Sarah Kate got to meet her Great-Aunt Marilyn and Great-Grandma Brewer. It was a special time! Great-Grandma had fun feeding Sarah Kate and hearing her laugh.

Here's a video of Sarah Kate's first time eating peas. She wasn't a fan!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AwCBw-wsrGo

Thanksgiving

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDwWxe78wWU

(I'm adding urls for the videos underneath them, since some are having technical difficulties.)

Thanksgiving was fun this year, even though illness kept us from
celebrating with Noel's family. Grandma and Grandpa were here,
and that helped make it special! Grandma and the boys made
headbands (Will called them handbands) and lists of what they
were thankful for. We ate a huge Thanksgiving feast--
Christopher was especially excited because we called it a feast--
and watched lots of football. I am thankful for a relaxing day with
our family!

We also got a new computer, and Noel and I have both had fun
playing with iMovie, as you can tell from this video, done by Noel,
and the peas video on Sarah Kate's 7 month post, done by me.
Christopher loves watching himself in thisvideo! Also, see below
the video for photos of our Thanksgiving celebration . . .

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rQN_x9DCrAs

Questions and Prayers

Christopher has been full of interesting and sometimes challenging questions lately. Here is a sampling of the questions he has asked in the last week or so:

Can God see Himself? (He decided "yes" since he learned from his catechism that nothing can be hidden from God.)

How does the tv read a disc if it doesn't have eyes or a brain?

Are you sure Mr. Tony can't hear you? (When I was yelling at Tony Romo on the tv.)

What do vitamins look like? (Not the pills, the actual vitamins.) How do the vitamins get into the oranges?

Also in the last couple of weeks, we've seen a change in Will's mealtime prayer habits. Recently, I talked with the boys about why we pray before meals. We talked about how everything we have comes from God, even our hot dogs and chips and milk. God gave Daddy the ability to do his job and make money. He gave us a place to live where there are grocery stores nearby where we can buy food. When we thank God for our food, we are acknowledging that our food and everything else we have comes from Him. Will seems to have taken that last part about "everything else" very seriously when it comes to prayer. He has changed from a rushed, "Dear God, thank you for this food, Amen" to a lengthy listing of everything he can think of (or everything he can see through squinted eyes). His lunchtime prayer yesterday went something like this:

Thank you, God, thank you for our food, and thank you for all the food that we have in this house, and thank you for our food that we eat for snack. And thank you for Mommy and Daddy and Christopher and me and Sarah Kate, and thank you for our drinks and for Sarah Kate's drinks, and for our cups and our sippy cups and our straw cups and the cups that Christopher uses. And thank you for our shoes and for our boots and our rain boots. And thank you for our clock, and thank you for the big clock that has numbers, and for the clock in the kitchen, and for ours, and for all the things that are made in this house. And thank you for Jesus, that He died on the cross for our sins, and for babies and for baby food, and thank you for Jesus, that He died on the cross for our sins, Amen.

Will the Smart Aleck

A recent occurrence in the life of a friend reminded me that I haven't talked to the boys about what to do if they get separated from me in a store. So yesterday, I had a chat with Will and laid out the scenario for him . . . you are shopping with mommy, you look up and she's gone, you are all by yourself in the store--what do you do?

Without hesitation: "I would go outside of the store and spit on the store."

What makes this even funnier to me is that the day before, Will had been disciplined for spitting on Christopher. I think he figured if no one is around, I can go spit on the store and not get in trouble!

Tonight at dinner, we were talking about addition with Christopher. Christopher was quizzing us with some challenging addition facts. This is how it went:

Christopher: What is 200 plus 200?
Mom: I don't know.
Christopher: 300!
Dad: No . . .
Will: 400!!!
(So naturally, at this point we are thinking this kid is a genius.)
Dad: Will, what is 2 plus 2?
Will: 4.
Dad: What is 1 plus 1?
Will: 4.
And that was the end of that genius moment! :)

Halloween 2009

Halloween was so fun this year . . . Christopher ran from every house screaming about what he got, and Will was only slightly nervous about the "big kids" in the scary costumes. :) After trick-or-treating with friends, the boys loved handing out candy to trick-or-treaters. Then they chowed down on some candy and slept in their costumes.

Pumpkins

We carved pumpkins for the first time this year. (We meaning Noel. The one who is good with knives and all.) The boys had a blast picking them out at the pumpkin patch, and then Noel drew several sketches for them to choose from. Christopher wanted a scary monster, and Will wanted a goofy ghost. Christopher has asked everyone who has come to our house which pumpkin is scarier. Much to his dismay, a couple of people have said Will's ghost is the scariest!

Counting

As reported by Grandpa:

Will says, "I'm going to count to 20. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14 . . . (pause) . . . I'm going to count to 14."

Sarah Kate--6 months old

I absolutely cannot believe my baby is 6 months old. (And yes, I am going to start all these posts this way.) We celebrated her 6 month birthday by going to get a flu shot. Sarah Kate was busy charming the nurse with her smile when the nurse had the audacity to stick her in the leg with a needle. SK got a concerned look on her face, whimpered for about a minute while I picked her up, and as soon as the nurse's face was in sight again, SK just started grinning at her. It was hilarious!

Sarah Kate is really enjoying her baby food these days. Sometimes she protests when the little plastic tub is empty! Other times she turns her head as far as she can to the side to let me know she is all done. (We're working on our sign language!) When baby food isn't available, she likes to chew on her own toes. (Just like her Aunt Amanda! I mean, when Aunt Amanda was a baby.)

And Sarah Kate is on the move! She can turn herself in a circle and also push herself backward by pushing up on her arms. I usually put her down on her playmat in the middle of the family room rug, but the other night, she managed to get herself to the hardwood floor and discovered she could really take off. I found her trying to pull up on the stone hearth and putting her mouth on it. (Note to self: time to order rubber cover thingies for the hearth.) Here's the picture: I had put her by the dog toy on her playmat, and look how far she went!



She is also making some progress with sitting up by herself. She can do it for a few seconds, but then something captures attention and she flops over to try and reach it. :) Her other new favorite activity is her exersaucer . . . check out that smile!

Christopher's Bedroom Signage

Since Christopher and Will share a room, Christopher has his afternoon rest time in our room. He loves to play his Leapster, read and draw (mostly draw). Sometimes he writes me notes and leaves them on the living room floor. This afternoon, I found this (click on photos to make them bigger so you can read them better):


This was on the bedroom door:


These two were on one wall of our room:


This was on another wall:


And these two were next to each other above our bed:



That kid cracks me up!

Silly Willly

As Will becomes more and more verbal, he also becomes more and more hilarious. He often has witty comebacks and comments, and his mischievous side knows just how to get Christopher upset. When Christopher is reading, Will is very skilled at jabbering on about nothing and peppering Christopher with mundane questions. They also had a conversation recently about how old Robin Hood is. Will was convinced that Robin Hood is 7 years old. Christopher condescendingly informed him that Robin Hood is a grown up. Will conceded: "I guess he's 7 and a half."

Will has such funny ways of saying things. His favorite restaurant is "Miss Callister's" and today he told me that his lips felt "spicy" (chapped). He doesn't have much sense of time, so every time-related question is about if it is happening until Christmas or not. "Christopher, when is it going to be my turn for the toy? Are you going to keep it until Christmas?" Lately his favorite excuse is that he is getting a "little bit sick": "Mom, if I clean up any more toys it is going to make me a little bit sick."

For a few weeks now, Will has been a cat quite a bit. He literally starts meowing as he opens his eyes in the morning. And he refers to himself as "this cat" and builds himself a cat house of pillows and blankets on the sofa. It is definitely an entertaining phase!

Sarah Kate--5 months old

Technically, Sarah Kate is closer to 6 months at this point than 5 months, but let's turn back the clock and pretend . . . Sarah Kate is so much fun at 5 months! She still loves to smile, laugh and coo. She also says fun words like "glaaahh!" She loves to lay on her back and play with her feet. She loves having a bath. She is starting to notice when I leave the room and often protests. She loves playing with her new baby doll and other toys in her crib when she wakes up from her nap.

We recently started a new adventure--rice cereal. The boys were so excited, and Christopher can't wait for her to really get the hang of it so he can feed her. She did great the first night, finishing the whole bowl. But most of it has ended up on her bib since then. We're not giving up . . . if she only knew that once she masters this, she gets to move on to sweet potatoes, I think she'd be a little more motivated!





And just because she looked so cute last Sunday in her dress and her boots . . .

Sarah Kate's Baptism

On September 20, we had the privilege of baptizing Sarah Kate. We were so happy to have all four grandparents there, along with Aunt Laura, Uncle Garland, Aunt Amanda and Uncle Brian. As we stood with the kids for the baptism, the boys did a good job of following my strict instructions not to goof off and to listen to Pastor Chris. Christopher did some gentle prodding of Will to keep his head turned the way Christopher thought it should be, and they even held hands for part of the time. (I was one relieved mama!) And Sarah Kate did a great job of not screaming when water was dumped on her head, although she did burp at one point, just like Will did during his baptism. Following the baptism, my Dad sang "In Christ Alone," accompanied by Mom on the piano.

Sarah Kate looked beautiful wearing a very special dress . . . the dress that my Mom made for me when I was baptized. Here's a picture of me, 10 months old, in my baptism dress:



It is our prayer that Sarah Kate will fulfill the vows we made as her parents by placing her faith in Christ as her Lord and Savior. We do not believe that baptism saves her--it is an expression of her place in the covenant family as a child of believers, her need for the cleansing blood of Christ, and our intention to teach her about Christ and God's Word. We are so thankful to have a wonderful church family to support us in this endeavor!

Here are some photos from her special day:


With Pastor Chris: