Cooking helper

We made some awesome cookies for Santa :)

Shopping buddies

This is the first time I've EVER taken both kids shopping by myself. Sam's double buggies seemed ideal :)

Monkey/puppy dog

This monkey is ALWAYS pretending to be a puppy dog lately. They're watching Handy Manny here, which Hank tells me is the puppy dog's favorite show.

One more ornament

"The monkey is pretending to be an ornament."
-Hank

Maggie can hold her own

Bottle, that is. She just fed herself 5oz like this watching Sesame Street.

Maggie's 9 Month Checkup

She's clapping at herself here :)


Maggie weighed in at 20lbs even (despite a recent stomach bug she still gained!) and was up to 27.5 inches tall with a head circumference of 17.75 inches. All good and normal and bigger than last time. And she's got FOUR new teeth coming in on top. Looks like they decided to come in as a group. Poor Maggs. At least she'll be able to use them to eat some more delicious foods soon.

Now she's got the green light to use a sippy cup and have up to 4oz of juice per day.

No vaccinations this time but she did get a flu shot which is just as mean. But she got over it pretty quickly.

Oh, and Dr. Cush-John declared her perfect once again :)

Christmas Tree Fun

We decided to use James's one night to not work two jobs this week and put up the Christmas tree. Hank was excited about it all day and kept asking if Santa Claus was coming too. "In a few weeks" is hard to grasp I suppose.

So we gave the kids an early bath (before supper) and set to work after we ate. Hank was awesome at hanging ornaments and put the topper on like a pro. Maggie just tried to eat every little "needle" in sight and loved playing with and tearing up all the newsprint we had used for packing.

It looks a little sparse with all of our fragile ornaments missing. And we had to spread out all the ones Hank hung at the very bottom, but I still think it's totally awesome. Now it's fenced off for everyone's safety :)

And yes, those ARE adult sized footed pajamas that James is wearing. Everyone got to wear Monkey themed pj's (or in my case house shoes). Maggie promptly overturned a pitcher of water in the bathroom right after I had put on her new Christmas pj's and got them soaking wet. So, I put her in Hank's jammers from two years ago to keep the theme going.

Hank the artist

Hank has just recently gotten really interested in writing and drawing things instead of just making random scribbles. Here's one of his best works of art so far:



This is a drawing of me, but I'm pretending to be Hank. I'm also pretending to wear his black Who Dat (fleur de lis) shirt with the number 9 for Drew Brees. Hank wore that very shirt all day, so it was easy for me to imagine it.

Earlier tonight he drew a really similar picture but added hair on the top and sides of his head. He told us he was drawing a story about when I was fixing his hair this morning. Can you get any more adorable?!?! It melts my heart. Not only was he drawing, it was illustrating a story, and it was about the two of us.

Kitchen helpers

Hank and Maggie "helped" me make some bread this morning. Hank is actually pretty good at using a rolling pin and taste testing the dough. Maggie just helped by eating cheerios.

See the flour on Hank's nose?



Now we just wait on the dough to rise. Hope it turns out :)

Metfffyuoloppjvh. Oilers

That's the subject of an email Hank composed on my phone last night. We caught him at 9:45 (over an hour after we put him to bed) in our bed watching tv, remote in one hand and my phone in the other. Luckily he hadn't called anyone or SENT any random messages. I guess we were also lucky that he didn't know enough about the remote to choose any inappropriate shows to watch.

After staying up so late he actually did sleep in till around 8 this morning. Thank goodness!

Push toys

Another milestone snuck up on us. I put away the infant carrier and got out our two push toys for Maggie. Well, really one for Maggie to use and one for Hank to use while pretending to be a baby.

Halloween, Take Two

I think this progression of photos is kinda self explanatory. We started out all dressed, accessorized and relatively collected, and then by the end of the night the excitement and candy got to Hank and it turned into him and Audrey (Jessie) pretending to be snakes, squirming and jumping all over the floor. It always amazes me how much energy a two year old has at the end of the day :)

Hank loved getting candy, but wasn't too happy that we didn't let him freely eat it the whole way home. He was excellent at saying "Trick or Treat" and "Happy Halloween". Maggie took a minute to warm up to Mimi and Grandpa but then loved it and loved watching Hank cut up. Then she fell asleep on the way back into town and missed the next couple of trick or treat stops while Grandmama stayed with her in the car.

Halloween, Take One

I literally just took 99 photos of these two squirming, crawling, running, fidgeting kids and this is the best I got! :) Notice Maggie chewing on my camera strap--I think that's what she was after with all the crawling. They got to wear their costumes to Mother's Day Out this morning, so we got a trial run for this weekend.

Hank LOVED his Woody costume, but as you'll see, he never took his hand off the pull string on the back. I added that because I thought the costume needed it, but now I'm thinking I may have to remove it before "real" Halloween. His boots are a little too big, and hard to walk around in, but he's so proud of them.

Maggie is sporting the cutest Saints cheerleader outfit ever. I'm working on making a butterfly costume for her for Sunday, but I didn't figure she wanted to hang out with wings and antenna all morning.

Hope to have more photos from our trick or treating adventure on Sunday!

Buddies

Watching Sesame Street together on a Saturday morning. Hank hopped in and patted the empty spot and said "Maggie wants to sit in her spot"

Awwww!

Bed Head

Hank typically has pretty bad bed-head in the mornings, but this was his worst case yet. It was the result of going to bed with wet hair. It just defies gravity!

Hank vs Maggie

Here's a sampling of photos of Hank and Maggie at about the same age... They look SOOO much alike, but at the same time I see big differences too.

Either way, I think it's safe to say we have two incredibly cute kids.