Big Brother

Louis is going to be a Big Brother! Our new baby is due Febuary 15th. I will be 12 weeks pregnant on Tuesday! The first trimester has been pretty rough - I pretty much felt nauseous the whole time but especially in the evenings. Today however I feel great - so I am hoping this is all over and I can begin to catch up on housework and start walking again! We are totally going to find out if we are having a boy or a girl and, for now, both of us are hoping for a girl! Louis of course doesn't understand he is going to be a big brother. If I say "where is the baby" he points to himself and smiles. If I say "where is the baby in mommy's tummy he points to my tummy and then proceeds to lift up his shirt and point to his own tummy! Louis will be 2 years and 3 months old when the new baby is born. If I think too much about taking care of a 2 year old and a newborn, I get really scared so I don't do that very much! We are really excited though!!

Zoobilee

Last Friday night Mike and I were fortunate enough to recieve tickets for Zoobilee, which is a fundraiser at the Tacoma Zoo. The tickets were 200 dollars each! Mike's co-worker and his wife were unable to go so they gave us their tickets. So in a matter of 2 days Mike rented a tux, I borrowed a formal dress from my co-worker which my boss took in that day at work and we found a babysitter. It was a GREAT night! The event was outside with multiple bands and instead of a formal sit down dinner over 40 local restaurants set up tents and offered samples of their food, beer and wine! After eating we listened to a country band for a while but then went to the main stage and danced because it was 59 degrees and freezing and I told Mike "either we go dance and warm up or we go home!" It was so much fun to get dressed up and go out! Isn't Mike cute in a tux :)

Berry Picking

Last Sunday we went blueberry and raspberry picking with our friend Katy. (Her husband Ed unfortunately had a make a last minute trip to England). We went to Remlinger Farms and picked berries. Louis had a blast picking berries (off the ground) and eating them. Unfortunately most of the ones on the ground were covered in dirt (at least they were organic)!

Pool Time!

Last Thursday it was finally warm enough for swimming! We invited our neighbor Lisa and her son Broden (who is 3 months younger than Louis) over. The boys had a blast playing in the pool!

Louis Sleeping

So this is seriously how I found Louis sleeping one morning - the blanket was actually wrapped all the way around his head - scary!

4th of July

We had a bar-b-que for the 4th and had our friends Katy and Ed and Nicki and Joe and their 3 year old boy Henry over. Mike made 3 pounds of steamed clams for appetizer and we grilled burgers and brats. We played lasso golf in the back yard and even kept Louis up for the 10:10pm Tacoma Fireworks which we were able to see from the lighthouse park right by our house! We saw Denise and Bob, our neighbors, in the backyard and told them we were getting ready to eat if they wanted to join in so they came right over! How fun!
I forgot to take pictures but Nicki got some pretty cute ones of the boys.

Summer!

Today was one of the first days it felt like summer - 80 degrees! Louis and I played outside all evening and our neighbor, Aunt DeeDee invited Louis over to pick and eat raspberries, which Louis LOVED!

Louis is 20 Months Old Today

This month Louis has been so much fun! He is starting to say words more frequently - hi, bye, rock, car, mine, uh-oh, thank you, puppy. He can identify lots of body parts on people and on his stuffed animals. He LOVES his stuffed animals now, especially his puppy. He tries to give his puppy his cheerios and milk and he pets him so gently, and he makes him bark. So cute! He also loves toy cars and trucks (as well a real ones) and he will play with them all day making a "shooo" noise to make the car go! His new obsessions though are sticks and rocks. Every time I pick him up from daycare he is playing outside and he has as many sticks in his hand as he can hold! It is always a fight to get him to put the sticks down so we can go home and usually we end up taking a stick or two with us along with a melt down. I now find sticks and rocks in my purse, car and scattered around my house. Today at daycare they told me they can't believe how much Louis eats and that he eats as much as a preschooler. Ha- he takes after his mommy! They do however tell me that he is eating his veggies and for snack they give him pureed veggies and rice cereal. One of the girls told me that the other day they were having a birthday party and Louis didn't even know that the kids were having cake so she fed him his spinach instead! Poor kid!

Camping at Birch Bay

This weekend we headed up North for a night of camping at Birch Bay State Park. Our last camping trip was a disaster with a crabby, teething toddler so we were hesitant about trying it again. This time was A LOT better, but was still hard. Mr. Louis would not go to bed in the tent so once again we didn't get any peaceful time to sit around the fire make s'mores and play cards - sad! We did however have fun playing at the beach, making burgers for dinner and Mike made pancakes and bacon on his Colman stove (which about 20 months ago he would have sworn he would NEVER own)! Louis actually slept in Sunday morning which was great since it was raining and he awoke just as the rain stopped! Louis had a great time playing with sticks and rocks (gocks) but he would get mad because he would try to hold every stick in the entire campsite in his arms all at once and then he would drop one or two! Oh yeah- I now see a problem with cute fuzzy mice depicted in most of his kids books because on Sunday morning I saw him with something fuzzy in his hand and when I asked him to bring it to mommy he happily brought me a real mouse head!!! I was completely panicked and freaking out! Gross!

MORE PICTURES

Louis Goes to the Zoo

Today I met my co-worker and his wife at the zoo with their kids, Izzy who is almost 3 and Issac who is 1 week old! The kids had a blast playing in the water fountain, looking at the aquarium and feeding the goats!

Nana in Town

This past week we had Mike's mom in town for a visit. During the week she spent time with Louis while Mike and I worked. On Friday I was off work so we took Louis to the Tacoma Children's Museum - which was basically a big play area for kids but Louis had fun. They had a play farmer's market with fruit, baskets, cash registers and even an apple tree! On Sunday, which was Father's Day we went to Northwest Trek, which is a large park that contains local wild animals in their natural habitats such as bison, black tailed deer and moose. You get to take a 50 minute train ride around the park and see all the animals. You can also hike various trails to see other animals such as bears, lynx and wolves. Unfortunately it was 54 degrees and raining the whole time. We ended up eating the picnic I had packed back at home! We spent the evenings with Nancy eating fun meals we had cooked and watching movies! We we were sad to see Nancy go but she is coming back for another week of fun at the end of Aug! This is really embarrassing but apparently no one took any pic's of Mike's mom -ooops!

Crazy Hair Day

Today was Crazy Hair Day at Daycare. I tried to use Mike's hair gel and Spike Louis' hair! He was not happy with me because I asked him to take his pacifier out for the picture and he did but he gave me this look!

We are Back

Well, sadly we haven't updated our blog for many months, mainly due to the fact that Mike has been working 60 hours a week and hasn't had time. I am embarrassed to admit this but until last night I did not even know how to take a picture from my camera and put it on the computer. Pictures were something that Mike always took care of and so I never learned. However, I had a crash course on blogging last night and now I can do very basic things. SO....I am going to be in charge of the blog for now and I am going to try to at least post some pic's weekly. We haven't had too much exciting stuff going on lately (except our trip to Hawaii in April) but we do have some cute pics.

We did rent a canoe one weekend and Louis LOVED it - even though it rained the entire time so we decided to buy a canoe on Craig's List, since Mike Loves being on the water and I can't exactly kayak with him anymore. So now we have something we can do as a family!

Louis is 19 Months Old

This month Louis has perfected his walking skills - Finally! He can even walk down inclines and he can almost run! Louis loves playing in the cul-de-sac with his Little Tyke's car and ride-on dump truck. This month our little guy has been consistently sleeping through the night, yeah! Unfortunately, Louis has been boycotting veggies. Sometimes I don't even know how he knows it is a veggie and not something else especially when I put butter and salt or sugar on them! We tried getting out the potty chair and after a few days Louis decided he didn't like it anymore so instead of making an issue of it I put it away for a few months. I am just hopping with the cloth diapers I can get him potty trained early! I love picking up Louis from work and taking him to the park now that he can climb up the steps at the park and go down the slide all by himself! Louis love playing outside so much so we try to spend as much time outside with him as we can.

Louis is 18 Months Old

Well, this has been an eventful month as Louis fell down the stairs at daycare on April 7th and ended up with a concussion. He had been doing well with the stairs at home (under constant supervision and cues to turn around and go down backwards) Unfortunately he had balance difficulty and irritability for about a week following the accident (but he has fully recovered). My mom flew up here from St. Louis at the last minute to take care of him so he didn't have to go to daycare. She took care of him 3 days! It was so sad seeing him falling down so much and so crabby but it was so nice to have help!)

Louis recovered just in time for our vacation to hawaii! We left on April 16th and my parents actually met us LA to fly to Hawaii and help us with Louis so we could go out and have some fun! Louis LOVED the sand and water and had so much fun playing with grandma and grandpa!

Louis' balance and walking is getting so much better and he doesn't really fall down anymore unless he is really tired! He is also able to play at the park and has figured out how to climb up to the slide and sit down and hold his feet up and go down the slide. Our neigbors gave us a LIttle Tykes care and he just loves when I bring it out on the drive way and he just gets in and out of the thing forever! Since it is getting nicer outside we have been going out alot! Louis has been sleeping through then night as well! Our little guy has been so much fun and we just love to laugh at him! He is starting to initiate words especially car and puppy (pu-pu) and cracker (cra-cra) and thank you and tries to repeat many words when you tell him to!

Louis is 17 Months Old

This month Louis has really been working on his talking! I started counting his words and he has 18 definite words! The best thing is when he says thank you - it sounds like "dane do" and he almost always repeats it when I ask him to - he also repeats it when I am telling HIM thank you - ha! Louis has also FINALLY figured out how to go down the stairs - I had been showing him over and over and he just thought he was funny running straight over the top of the stairs knowing I would catch him, but now he's got it! He turns around way before the top of the steps and then scoots on his belly till he reaches the top and then crawls down backwards! Today he also got down from the couch the right way took after we took his picture! Louis has been working on his molars for a LONG time, and I can tell because he chews on his fingers, drools, fusses and does NOT sleep well! Today He finally has 2 molars!!! I am hoping that he starts sleeping though the night now- he has been waking up like once a night and sometimes he will not go back to sleep!

Louis also loves the outdoors - he is constantly getting his ball or his coat and trying to open the front door - sometimes he even tries to put his shoes on! I am pretty good about taking him out, but sometimes he wakes up at like 6 am and wants to go out when it is still really cold!

Louis is becoming more and more like a person - He understands almost everything I tell him to do and he loves to play games and be silly and this month I have even started noticing that he will do something that he thinks is silly and then he will laugh at himself - how cute!

Louis is 16 Months Old

Well, the big news this month is that Louis is not only walking but he is good at it! He doesn't really crawl anymore and he can now stand up from the middle of the floor all by himself! We miss his cute little crawl around here! He is actually even starting to run a little bit - so far only when Mike is chasing him around the house - it is the funniest thing to see! The scary thing is that he has tried a few times to run off the top of the stairs - this is when I have been trying to teach him to go down the stairs backwards, but the first time he did it I caught him and now he thinks this is funny and he will not even attempt the stairs the right way!

Louis has picked up a few more signs - milk and help and all done, but he has also learned that by pointing and saying "uh,uh,uh" he can also get what he wants! He is consistently saying, mommy, dada, car, kitty cat, and his favorite "UH-OH" which he says all the time! We have heard other words here and there but not as consistent!

Louis has been really pleasant this month and agreeable - if I tell him "no thank you" he usually listens without a fuss! He loves his nap and bedtime routine and nobody believes me that when I put him down he actually reaches for his bed! He then lies real still on his back and lets me cover him up and the only 2 things he likes in his bed are his Pooh blanket and tag blanket. If he was holding some other toy or stuffed animal he will hand them to me once he is laying down - every time! It cracks me up how much he likes a schedule!!

Finally, his two new loves 1. Balls: If he sees the neighbor kids playing outside with balls he will fuss and reach toward the window. Usually I bundle him up and he sits outside with his own ball on the cold asphalt, just holding it there! He also is obsessed with my blue exercise ball and if he sees it down stairs he will say "uh,uh,uh" until I go get it for him and then he rolls it all over the house! He is perfectly happy in a grocery cart just holding a little plastic ball! 2. our Arm Chair: yes, I give him a little boost and he crawls up the ottoman and sits (or stands) in the arm chair, if I let him he will sit in that chair for like an hour just playing with his trucks or reading book after book! I have to stay right with him though or he will fall over the side of it!

Overall, it has been such a great month, and we just love spending time with Louis and can't believe how much he is learning each day!

Mike's mom in Town

Well, once again we have gotten very behind on our blog. Mike's mom arrived in town Friday Feb, 12th. As usual, we didn't plan any huge outings, because Nancy mostly wants to spend time with Louis (and us!). Saturday, between Louis' naps, we ran some errands and made beef stew for dinner. Sunday we took Louis to the Tacoma Zoo, which he LOVED! He was finally big enough to get out of his stroller and walk around a little bit and point to the animals - His favorite was the aquarium, by far - he would get SO excited whenever a fish would swim by! Mike and I worked Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Nancy took care of Louis but she said she would get bored because Louis napped so much - one day he took a 3 1/2 hour nap and then a 2 hour nap in the same day and THEN he actually slept through the night. I am sure it was exhausting for Louis to have someone to play with all of the time : ). Nancy did say that the sign language really helped her out! He has learned the sign for "help" so when Louis was getting frustrated with something she would say "let me know when you need help" and then he would try for a little longer and do the "help" sign!

Mike's mom was even so nice to let Mike and I have a date night on Monday night and Mike and I got to go to dinner! We had so much fun with Mike's mom and can't wait to see her again soon!

Pictures

Louis is 15 Months Old

The big news this month? Louis WALKED!! He took his first steps on his 15 month birthday. It was only 3 steps but it still counts as walking. His grandma and grandpa were in town to see it too! Louis was very proud of himself - I am not sure he knew why he was proud, just that everyone in the room was clapping and cheering for him!

Louis' ability to sign has also really taken off. He signs eat, more, and down. He is constantly signing eat, and then crawling over and pulling up to his high chair. Louis is always eating and will sit in his high chair for like 40 minutes if I let him! He definitely has opinions on what he eats now, vigorously shaking his head "no" if he doesn't want something. It is getting more difficult to get him to eat veggies but he still loves avocado's and tomato's.

Louis has one word that he says all the time which is "oh-oh!" His other words are still there but are less consistant -he says words daily but they are spontaneous, he doesn't repeat after you yet! However, Louis understands everything you tell him - he will attempt to take off his coat, or hat or shoes if asked, he will pick up toys if asked, I you ask him if he wants to take a bath he will crawl over to the steps, crawl up the steps and into the bathroom! He also is able to point to lots of things in he books when I ask him and when he is in the right mood!

At the beginning of the month Louis had a one week stretch of temper-tantrums - screaming, crying, flinging his arms and head around! I was getting scared that this was how it was going to be when all of a sudden he really mellowed out again! I stopped giving him my cell phone because he ALWAYS wanted it - if i got it out to answer a call he would have a melt down. Now he doesn't even care about it for the most part! I also started ignoring him when he was throwing a fit and now if he doesn't get his way he may cry for a minute or two but no head banging or arm flinging!

Louis is still doing pretty good at night but I would say a couple times a week he will wake up and want me to go into his room cover him up with a blanket and pat him on the back - it only takes a second but he was sleeping through every night!

Louis is getting more and more fun and we are looking forward to the next chapter of his life - the one where he walks!

Pictures from the month!

Grandma and Grandpa H. In Town

My parents arrived for a visit on Thursday January 28th. My parents got in at noon and took the bus to Federal Way and grabbed lunch and waited for me to pick them up. We all went to get Louis from daycare where we realized he was sick. He was sitting in his high chair staring off into space and was not in a smiling mood. He hadn't eaten all day and when we got him home and put him in a high chair he screamed and cried, pushing all food away. For lack of a better idea I put him to bed at 6p.m. where he proceeded to sleep all night and woke up back to his old self.

Friday, my mom and I ran around while Louis napped and then we all went out to dinner at the Elliot Bay Brewing Co. There was a vent blowing cold air right on Louis the whole time! We asked our server to turn it off but the only thing she did was to maybe turn it down. Louis didn't seem to mind though. It is so hard to go out to eat when the kid is used to going to bed at 6:30. Once he is tired he is a little irritable and needs entertaining constantly!

Saturday my parents were awesome! Not only did they watch Louis and let Mike and I ski (yes, that's me on my back!), they also made a fabulous dinner of pulled pork and slaw for Mike and I and Katy and Ed who finally got to meet my parents. We had a great night playing Phase 10 and eating dark chocolate cake! Right before Katy and Ed came over we had a "practice walking session" with Louis which we had been doing all along, and the day before Louis slid his foot a half a step, so we knew he was getting close, but we were elated that he actually walked on his 15 month birthday!

Sunday, we walked along Ruston Way while Mike kayaked to Ruston way. We were able to meet him for lunch (well, Mike ate lunch - a peanut butter sandwich and we watched him eat). Then my parents and I grabbed coffee and met Mike back at Dash Point park. We let Louis swing and go down the slide which he had a blast doing!


Monday morning we had to say good bye to my parents, which as always is really sad! We had a great time and hope to see them again soon! Thanks for everything mom and dad!

Alligator Skin Disorder!

There is a well known problem that plagues some members of the Heidemann clan. Maybe its a fair skin thing, maybe there's a little reptile in their blood, but one thing is for certain... they receive no sensation through their skin. Especially in the facial area. Grandpa is constantly the butt of Thanksgiving table jokes and I have personally witnessed a whole chicken wing stuck to Marcie's mouth (well, almost a whole one).

Unfortunately it has become apparent that Louis suffers from the same disorder! At first we thought it was just baby being babies. Oatmeal, potatoes, apple sauce, all the normal baby messes. But lately the pieces have been getting larger, pieces of fruit, blueberries, and now whole noodles without any appearance of acknowledgment! Hopefully they will soon develop a cure for this or else we will have to somehow mount a mirror to his lunchbox when school starts :)