Vacation Time, and our little girl.

A few weeks back now, Lauri and I went away for a night to celebrate our 3rd wedding anniversary. We were headed out to Tecumseh, MI to visit a winery nad have a nice dinner and along the way we passed through Saline. They were having a street fair, so we decided to stop, walk through, and have some lunch. Here are a few shots from walking around. The guy with the military uniform and awards wrote a book about his experiences while serving overseas. Lauri and I had actually seen him at a bookstore in Ann Arbor before, but it was nice to sit and talk with him for a few minutes. He told us that everybody thinks he looks like a young Nick Cage in his service photo.

Here are some shots of Norah, since it's been so long since I posted shots of her... The second from the last image was taken for Kacy, so she could see Norah in the onesie she made for her and the last picture is of Norah in her new favorite toy, although she'll have to get a little bigger before her feet reach the ground, she still loves sitting in her bouncy seat and checking things out

Blog name change?

I'm starting to think I should change the name of my blog to "Norah's Blog"... But I guess it's supposed to show what we've been up to lately, and any parent can attest that all you seem to have time for outside of work is your baby. And we wouldn't have it any other way!

Anyways, Norah got a chance to spend some time with her Grandma and Papa Shields last Sunday, so what do you think they did together??? Took pictures of course!!! Head on over to my Dad's blog to check a few of them out.

CLICK HERE

More Norah

I just can't help myself sometimes, She's just so darn photogenic!

4 month Dr. Appointment

Our "little" girl had her 4 month doctors appointment today which means she got measured, checked out, and shot up. That's a lot for her to go through all in one doctors visit, but Lauri has informed me that she made it through with flying colors. There were some tears during the shots, but a quick bottle afterwards solved that problem.

Norah is now in the 95 percentile for both height and weight for girls at her age (16.10 pounds - 25.75" long). I guess she comes by her height honestly though.

Here's a picture Lauri sent me after their appointment, the text that went along with it was from Norah saying, "I'm ok daddy, I miss you"...

In other news,

A friend of mine from college made the paper over the past few days for a project he'd worked on. The firm he works for (Integrated Architecture) has designed a new shower facility for the state of Michigan to use in their State Parks. It's an eco-friendly design using all the latest and greatest green strategies and technologies. The project pictured in the article is at the Grand Haven State Park, and apparently they plan on building another one in a park in Gaylord, MI.

AP photo by Adam Bird

I first read about it in an email that I'm subscribed to that talks about development news in the Grand Rapids area. Their article linked to an online news source I'd never heard of. So I just figured it got some local press, still not to shabby. So I emailed him to say congrats, and he informed me that the AP picked up the story, and ran it in papers all over the US including USA Today! That's just Crazy talk!

So Congrats again Ryan.

Go Blue!

More Food!

This week marked a pretty big milestone for Norah, she started eating cereal and Vegetables from a spoon! Not only is she expanding her gastronomic interests, she's sitting in her big girl high chair too! She sure does love her some green beans.

Lauri went out for dinner with some ladies she works with tonight, so it was a Daddy and Norah Night! Tonight was the first time I had a chance to feed her in her high chair and she did great! (These pictures were from the night before)

The next two pictures were just from me playing around with photoshop, experimenting with different Black and White techniques. But I figured I'd post them anyways.

4 months!

Here are a few pictures from the last week or so of our big 4 month old little girl. It's absolutely amazing to me to just sit and watch her learn how to use her hands, or find her feet, and then figure out how to get her feet in her mouth!

Yesterday I had to call in to work because I've been a little under the weather for the last few days, but it must have been a blessing in disguise because I was home for the first time Norah rolled over!!! It was a pretty big day for all of us, and for a few minutes I forgot how sick I felt!

So anyways, here's a few pictures...

And yes, that's pink nail polish on my baby girls toes... Obviously I wasn't around when this all happened.

Special Dresses

Norah has gotten a lot of clothes since she's been around (no... I mean a LOT) and there've been a lot of outfits that are special to us, but two of her dresses were a little extra special.

The first one, from Mr and Mrs Hart is about the girliest dress you'll ever find, It just screams "I'm the cutest little girl ever, in all of this pink ruffley splendor"!

I know you can't really see all the ruffles and stuff on the dress in this picture, but I just thought it was so darn cute.
The second dress we got from my Uncle David and Karl. It's an antique type of dress that he had cleaned up and prepared just for Norah. This dress is quite different from the first one, but equally beautiful in its simplicity. The stitching and design is really something to see. I hope to get more shots of these dresses (maybe under Papa's studio lights), but we need to make that happen pretty quickly as Norah is very close to being a 4 month old girl!!! Yikes.