Saturday, December 20, 2014

Will's First Day of Kindergarten! (Just a little belated)

Back in September, Will started elementary school, and it has been awesome.


 He lucked out with great classmates, excellent teachers, and a routine that really works for him. His favorite days are Media (library) where he gets to borrow many books about various divisions of the NFL plus a couple about wild animals; PE, where he learns new obstacle-course-type games to play and recount to me; and yoga, where he practices poses he then shows off at home.

On his first day, though, he was a tiny bit nervous. He and I went out for a breakfast date beforehand:







And when he got off the bus that afternoon, he looked like this:

We celebrated with a schoolbus cupcake, and he has been 100% "on board" (sorry, I couldn't help myself) since.

Saturday, December 13, 2014

Hadley Turns One!

Hadley is our little outlier. Our other four kids look alike, overall, and Hadley...doesn't. Our other four kids crawled between seven and eight months; Hadley crawled at almost ten. She's never been interested in standing or cruising until very recently, whereas the first four would've preferred to never sit. I joke that she was my first baby who spent months happily sitting on the floor and playing with toys...and she was of course a twin, so I couldn't reap the benefits (since I was always chasing Anders around anyway).


I referred to her as our "surprise fifth" once and my mother asked how I knew she was the "extra" twin. All I had to do was raise my eyebrows in response. Of course, she is still a Noon. Her mischief cup runneth over. 



She is so, so smiley and sociable. She wants to babble every moment she's not sleeping--sound familiar? She lights up from head to toe when someone picks her up. She has the throatiest, wheeziest belly laugh.


What Hadley looks like at twelve months old: She has brown hair that shows up ash blond in the sunlight (which is odd); hazelish brown eyes that have never gotten lighter or darker, as far as I can tell; her skin has a more golden tint to it (like Dave and Finn) than my lily-white children. She is 29.5 inches tall (61st %ile) and 22 lbs., 8 oz. (86th %ile) with a skull that knows no equal (99th %ile).



Hadley likes: Baths! People! Hugs! Dogs, cats, balls, dolls, food, getting tickled, laughing, peekaboo, talking, being held, eye contact, high-fives, tickles.




Hadley dislikes: Being put down, being woken up, running out of food on her tray (and apparently being tortured with headbands).



Who Hadley loves: Anyone who will make goo-goo eyes at her (so most people), but especially her siblings. Bridget dotes on her the most.






What Hadley loves to eat: She has the occasional disdain for green beans or peas, but she's pretty ravenous when presented with anything else. Her favorites seem to be cheese chunks, sweet potato and Cheerios.




What Hadley loves to read: Even more so than Anderson, Hadley thinks our reading to her is another of our great jokes. As I said, the girl likes to laugh. Mr. Brown Can Moo, Can You? is a book that gets her giggling, but it's when she cranes her body around to watch us make the noises that she really goes into hysterics.

How Hadley sleeps: Like Bridget, Hadley is an all-around sleeping champ. She sleeps twelve hours a night and would totally take a three-plus-hour nap if Anders would let her. (He won't.) She falls asleep in the car and then falls asleep again in her crib. She falls asleep chewing on socks and eating her lunch.



How we feel about Hadley: Like lovestruck fools--like she will always, to us, be the amazing plot twist baby who made sure we'd never argue over whether to have a fifth, because we already do. And she's awesome.

Anderson Turns One!

Anders is the funniest Noon baby--he looks like both his brothers but also distinctly like himself. (And almost nothing like his twin sister.) His chill demeanor reminds me of baby Will; his suspicion of others reminds me of baby Finn. But his open-mouthed smiles, laughs and kisses (he never closes his mouth to do any of those) are pure Anders.







What Anders looks like at twelve months old: Anders has soft, wispy dark blond hair with blue-gray eyes; he's 31.5 inches tall (96th %ile) and 23 lbs, 5 oz. heavy (79th%ile). His head is big (88th %ile), but that makes it small for a Noon kid. No, seriously. He's lean-looking with a round face and chubby cheeks and fair skin.


What Anders currently likes: Car rides (thank God); assisted walking (when left to his own devices, he takes a step or two and then drops to his knees for speed-crawling--and he shouts angrily if you try to make him walk); pulling all the books off the bookshelves; eating shoes; drumming on anything; climbing on top of Hadley to get a toy; getting tickled; high fives; peekaboo; scooching his high chair forward using a rocking motion and then grabbing the tablecloth off the dining room table; trucks, blocks, balls, music.



What Anders DISlikes: Getting buckled into his seat; taking baths; lying still for his diaper change; when Mom and Will/Finn/Bridget get out of the car for a school dropoff and leave him there; (also, apparently, when he's forced to keep a Santa hat on his head or he accidentally worms out of his clothes during a nap--see below)




What Anders loves to eat: His favorite meals, I kid you not, are broccoli and sweet potato with citrus salmon or roast chicken. He will eat anything I put in front of him, though, although he's not in love with plain pasta or, strangely, watermelon.



What Anders likes to read: Hm. Anders is not a big reader, mostly because we can barely squeeze books into our schedule. He does like it when we read to him, but he's usually interested in grabbing our faces and crawling on us as we read--it's like he thinks we the readers are more interesting than the books themselves.

Who Anders loves: Mom and Dad and all his siblings, although Finn is the biggest baby-lover of the bunch so Anders does gravitate toward him. He's started to get a little stranger/separation anxiety at the Y babysitting room, but it only lasts until I turn the corner, and thankfully he'll always have Hadley to soften the blow!



What Anders says: All done/Done, Mama, Dada, Down, Hi, More, Uh-oh, Tick-uh-tick-uh (for tickle tickle)

How Anders sleeps: At night, beautifully, a full twelve hours, after one round of "Twinkle Twinkle"--he also doesn't fall asleep unless Hadley's in there with him. Anders doesn't need long naps (sadly), so whether they get one or two on any given day, I usually split the difference in their wake-up times--I'll let Anders holler for twenty minutes while Hadley gets her extra rest, and then I'll go get him and wake her up a few minutes later.

How we feel about Anders: Like sentimental drips--like he was meant to be the third member of the Noon boy trifecta--like if we hug him too long, we might inhale him accidentally-on-purpose.



Thursday, October 23, 2014

The Noon Seven in New Jersey

This summer marked our first trip to New Jersey as a family of seven. We took over three bedrooms of Jen and Kai's house, and they hosted a big family reunion pool party, and we had an awesome time bonding with the whole clan.