Becky and Chris's Shower!

I CANNOT WAIT UNTIL THIS BABY IS BORN!! In the meantime, check out the beautiful details ala Becky. So pretty...



There was a tarot card reader, the gift bags were made from Indian newspapers, many of the decorations were hand made by our Becky. You Holdens and Menchins did a fantastic job.


Noah doesn't let anyone feed him a bottle anymore. He insists on always doing it himself. Most of time one-handed. It's great for car rides... until he throws the bottle when he's done. Literally throws it. Then you open the car door and it rolls into a dirty puddle in the parking lot.




There's our little Becky with Evan helping open the gifts. The boys bounced back and forth from the shower to the adjoining room that had the bar and all the husbands.


NoNo had some fun!


He's been sleeping through the night! And he's happy again! A big, fat front tooth had pushed through a little while ago. I think that explains his past grumpiness.


As you all know, if this baby is a girl, she's going to have to marry one of my boys so we can create one big super family. Probably Noah since I think Evan is betrothed to Jeannine's niece Sydney. It's so great to take the guess work out of that part of the kids' futures - yay!

We don't know if the baby is a boy or girl, but we do know the he or she will always be outdoors, have enormous eyes and I quote from Becky before we found out she was preggers "an appreciation for sarcasm". Yes baby, you will being a Menchin/Holden. Anyway he/she will definitely be beautiful and funny and WE'RE SO EXCITED!!

Bowling with my best friends

And here's a few days ago with Mr. Scoochie Pants, scooching along. See how sweet Evan is? He's getting his baby brother a cup of water. Don't be completely fooled... This was after he got in trouble for hiding Noah's little walking car so Noah couldn't use it. He put it behind the gate, on the steps. Oh my little Evan! Also, Noah was a little sourpuss this day. I have no idea what's eating him lately.

Noah is 9 Months Old!

And now we're celebrating another little birthday! Little NoNo



A close-up of pure cuteness. But, notice... no smile.



Ya, he's been in a terrible mood these last few days. I literally have to carry him around the house. And he just cries and cries and cries. And he's up all night. Is it a tooth? Maybe.



Brother time before Ev's haircut. Noah snagged Evan's drink.



Post haircut.



And this is a picture that Evan took of me and Noah. What a photographer!



And Evan getting a haircut where his PopPop has been getting a haircut for maybe a hundred years now. Mike goes there too now. It's literally a 30 second walk from our house. Noah dragged his pacifer there on the ground and it was covered in hair! yuck



Besides the constant fussiness, which is very unusual for our NoNo, we've had a lot of milestones this month. He climbs the steps every chance he gets, he pushes his little walker around the house now, he claps his hands all the time. He'll talk to you too. At first I thought he was saying, "Yayayayay." with an occasional dada or baba thrown in. But then I realized it was more like "Wawawawa" instead of yaya. Then he moves his mouth like he's saying it, but with nothing coming out. No Mamas at all. He's been eating different things now too. Like mushed up homemade chicken rice soup, guacamole, ground up whole wheat pasta with spinach and olive oil, scrambled eggs... And he keeps getting cuter and cuter.

Happy 4th, little monkey!

Here he is!!



... a whole month before!

And no pictures of the party? Um... well... I couldn't find my camera at the time, but I have it now! So Mommy Darling, may I borrow yours again? In the meantime check out this picture. Evan is fifth from the front on the rope...



I quote from Mike, "One of the benefits of working from home is getting to yell 'I Love You' out the window to your son, as his class walks by en route to the library."

So instead of having a full-fledged party, we had a family dinner. Thank God we did. For one, Mike was away the whole week before so we literally pulled it together the day of the event and secondly we infected everyone at the party with the deadly ebola virus.

Maybe it wasn't ebola, but we did give everyone a nasty stomach virus. It started with Evan and Noah. Then Mike and I woke up in the middle of the night of the dinner tag teaming each other at the bathroom. Everyone at the dinner followed suit a day or two later. I'm really, REALLY sorry everyone. At least we all lost a few holiday pounds, right?

So I brought cupcakes and pizza to Evan's school as his "friend" party. I got the idea from Evan's friend Naomi's mom who did the same thing a few months before. I did give Evan a bunch of funky sunglasses to pass out to everyone that they all wore for circle time. So cute!

I did this since I figured it was the last year that I could get away with it, plus we had some elaborate birthday parties for the first few years... Mac & Mancos, then the Brew Pub, then the Little Treehouse not to mention Kildare's for Ev's Baptism. Mike and I were so excited to finally have a house that could accommodate more than 5 people at time. But then Evan said, "but I thought we were having it at the water park" Because he went to Evelyn's party there 2 weeks before! Oh, dart to the heart! Okay, so next year... big blow out at Montego Bay, the indoor water park with the tiki bar, flat screen tvs and Jimmy Buffet blaring for Mike (I have a funny story to tell about that day later).

Anyway, here's to our first born! You are so smart, funny and adorable. You really are. This is what your teacher told us at the parent teacher conference "He melts EVERYONE'S heart." She said that about YOU because you're amazing. We love you, big guy!!



Evan at the birthday party at Montego Bay. Check out those muscles, right?

Bath time!

Evan and Noah take their first bath together...




It's very very hard to give Noah a bath these days. He loves the water, but you have to wrestle him to sit down.



He's so cute though hehe



Evan is roaring like a lion here. With his lion towel.

Christmas Part II

Guess who got a camera for Christmas - me ME! Yay! Now I don't have to wait to steal photos off my mom's with the creepy date stamp in the corner (she won't let me get rid of it). Well, I'm still going to need her camera for the Christmas morning shots, but here's some pictures from our extended Christmas week with Mima and PoPo.

Here's Mima and PoPo with Noah. When Noah wasn't on someone lap, he was taking off for the stairs and furiously climbing them before someone would catch him and bring him down. He climbs to the very top now and takes off down the hallway.



Yes, they bought Evan a drum set. Mima and PoPo must hate us. My dad described Evan playing like Animal from the Muppets.




The night they got here we drove into Cape May and ate at Mike's favorite restaurant - Lucky Bones! We had a delicious meal. Evan wouldn't eat his salad at all, but he made up for it with eating most of my shrimp/crabcake. Luckily I filled up on the appetizers and was already stuffed and feeling sick by the time my entree came out.

Evan has that expression on his face because he knows his grandparents are leaving in literally 2 minutes. He didn't want them to go :(


Noah pleads to bring Mima and PoPo back. How can you say no to such a cute little face?

More Christmas

Christmas dinner!




Aunt Donna and Grandmom have too much wine.



Noah is very, Very tired.



We opened our presents from Grandmom, Pop, Brittany and Josh the day after Christmas, during the snowstorm.





Snow!


Noah came out too, but I was with him.





Apparently, the snowman with the stick is me. Evan put it there.