I Love Tia's Laugh

One thing that is amazing is that although young, Tia has a great sense of humor. She has her different laughs and I find it funny when she does the deep belly laugh. I even know when she is faking a laugh, which is funny. OR when she laughs because you are laughing. Regardless, her laugh is just so sweet. I love these pictures of her and her BFF Violet. These two girls were born less than week a part and have been together almost every day for the past two years. So cute!

Our Anniversary Tradition

Chris and I are both super practical people. When it comes to gifts, we try to 'receive' things we can actually use. Mainly, because we don't want others to spend money on things we just stick on a shelf. Now, I'm a girl, so of course, I love receiving those things that I may not buy for myself and of course those super thoughtful gifts too. I'm a super sentimental person and I will always be. But for Chris and I giving gifts for each other...we always do the practical route. What things can we get that we'll use OR what things should we not get that we won't. Before we had our first anniversary, I told Chris that we need to come up with a plan for anniversary gifts from the get go. I am not a huge jewelry person and although it is nice from time to time, it seems like the 'easy' gift guys get for their girls after years together. Don't get me wrong, it is nice, but if anyone knows me well, they know I just wear it a few times and put it in my 'sentimental' keepsake box. So I came up with a plan that we could cherish, but have an annual tradition that is fun. For those who have never heard of Oneshare.com, I used to use this site to buy gifts for friends getting married. I'd get them a share of stock to Tiffany & Co and put an inscription that read 'Congrats on finding your diamond in the rough'. Very cool gift and why not do this for our anniversaries. So we established that each year, we'd take turns picking out the stock, we'd use the same format of the inscription and over time, we'd have a wall full of framed stocks that just remind us of how much our love has grown as a couple. So here is what we have so far:

Caterpillar Stock
04.30.09
Chris & Angie Norris
1 Year Anniversary
"Building a Foundation of Love"

Disney Stock
04.30.10
Chris & Angie Norris
2 Year Anniversary
"Making all of Our Dreams Come True"

Coca-Cola Stock
04.30.11
3 Year Anniversary
"Sharing a Captain n' Coke for Life"

Microsoft Stock
04.30.12
4 Year Anniversary
"Together, we Excel in Love"

We went ahead and got next year's because there was a good deal and we can't wait to get more than fifty more of these stocks over time together. How cool would that be? So this is our tradition for anniversaries. We don't buy gifts for each other, but rather buy one share of stock that we share together. Love it.

Our Little Lexi

So we decided to name our little bun in the oven Lexi. We made our big announcement of her name on our Christmas cards that went out last week. We have known for quite some time we wanted to name our 2nd little girl Lexi, but we were waiting to figure out what her middle name would be before we told anyone. Then, we also wanted to tell people fairly so the family would all find out at the same time, so what better than the Christmas card. It is so hard when our family spans four generations and is as wide as can be. We came up with Lexi more on a fluke than a true suggestion. I have always liked the name Lexi from when I heard an old friend call his sister that as a nickname, although now I think he was calling her Lexa but some how I only remembered Lexi. My coworker named her daughter Alexa and I was thinking Lexi wouldn't be good because she called her daughter Lexa and then we'd have a Lexi - but when I told Chris that, he didn't seem to care about all of my reasons why it shouldn't be a good name - he just loved the ring to it and also how it went really good with Tia. Then I said, we'll lets put that as our favorite for now until we figure something else out. Originally, we were thinking Adriana Mia would be her name. Mia because Chris always liked it and Adriana Mia because it was my first cabbage patch doll and for some reason the Italian ring to it just seemed to work. But once we said the name Lexi, it really overpowered Adriana Mia...and for a few months, we'd call my belly Lexi and it just stuck. You know how you buy a new car and then you notice that that same car is everywhere and you always wonder why you never noticed? Well, that is the way it is with Lexi. I don't know a single Lexi and either does Chris. We were at church and the girl who checked her daughter in before us left the name on the screen and low and behold, her daughter's name was Lexi. Then in the Thirty-One catalog, on one of the bags appeared the name Lexi. Then someone told me that there is a TV show character on Grey's Anatomy and another Soap show. But, really we are just so excited and we love the ring to it. So our soon-to-be baby is Lexi!

Peanut

I remember when Chris used to call Tia peanut for the first few months of her life. She was so tiny and I remember he just nicknamed her peanut. When she got a little bigger everyone would ask him if he'd call her walnut or something else because that was his thing 'she's my little peanut', so when my Assistant Allie sent this to me, I had to crack up laughing and of course send it to Chris, which he loved...

Tia's 2nd Christmas

Tia made out like a winner this Christmas. She got so many gifts from all of her family, especially her Grandparents. For being two, she is pretty lucky to have such a great family who loves and cares for her. She had a blast with her cousins, new toys, and the dogs over at Aunt Jenny's house. It is amazing how big she is getting. I'm glad she had a fun Christmas.

Oh My Belly

So on Thursday, I took off from work early and headed to the mall with Lisa to do some holiday shopping. I did good at first, but it wasn't long before I started feeling funny. I couldn't quite put my finger on it, but I just knew I didn't feel right. I thought I'd just toughen it out since I needed to do some shopping and I wanted to hang out with Lisa. After the mall, we headed over to Target where I just seemed to get worse. Standing up and walking just seemed like the hardest things. My stomach hurt as if I were sick and my back was aching too. I felt a tightness in my belly that just consumed me. I was leaning over the cart as much as I could and crouching down to pretend to look at things when really I was just catching a break from standing and walking. I ended up sitting on the end of an aisle where every seemed to think the pregnant girl was going to go into labor. We made our purchases and I bee-lined it to the bathroom. But when I got in there, nothing happened. No sickness from either end. I wasn't sure what was going on. We went to grab a bite to eat because I thought maybe if I sit down for a while, I'll feel better, but I barely made it past waiting for a few minutes and we just left. I hated to leave, but I headed home, crawled right into bed and literally stayed there for 48 hours straight. I missed work on Friday, I didn't eat much, I didn't do anything, but literally was on bed rest for 2 days. I thought I had the stomach flu, but after Chris and I talked about my symptoms, we think that I am just having signs of early contractions and my body letting me know there is a baby coming. Plus, I'm sure my body was also saying 'slow down' since I seem to be going a mile a minute the past few weeks. So call it Braxton Hicks, call it early-early labor, or just the tightening of my muscles, I had something going on. I hated to miss the Norris family Christmas reunion in Godfrey, but was so happy Chris and Tia went without me.

Tia has another Ear Infection

The poor girl is back to square one when she was a few months old. One tube has fallen out and the other is on the verge. She has already had an ear infection around Thanksgiving, and now again another one. She is back on antibiotics and the diarrhea has started up again. The poor child can't catch a break. She went to the doctor yesterday for her 2 year check up and of course she got shots too. Doctor said she is more emotional than most kids her age in reaction to the doctor's office and getting shots. And YES, she is our little emotional, wear her heart on her sleeve, sensitive, little girl...can't blame her since her mommy and daddy are both the sensitive types. She is 32 3/4 long and 24 lbs 15 oz heavy, which are both in the 30%. Her head is still in the 75%. She tested at a 2 years and 4 month old which is great. Overall she is doing great and we'll most likely have her get an allergy test so we know what she is allergic too. She seems to have picked up the allergy gene from her daddy. But as we all know this St. Louis weather does not help!

Fw: Use the good napkins

This is too good not to share. I think

we are the last generation to know what 'napkins' are.

THE GOOD NAPKINS ... Ahhhhh.

The joys of having Girls...

My mother taught me to read when I was four years

old (her first mistake). One day, I was in the

bathroom and noticed one of the cabinet doors

was ajar. I read the box in the cabinet. I then

asked my mother why she was keeping ''napkins' in

the bathroom. Didn't they belong in the kitchen?

 

Not wanting to burden me with unnecessary facts,

she told me that those were for 'special occasions'

(her second mistake). Now fast forward a few months

It's Thanksgiving Day, and my folks

are leaving to pick up my uncle and his wife for

dinner. Mom had assignments for all of us while

they were gone. Mine was to set the table.

 

When they returned, my uncle came in first and

immediately burst into laughter. Next came his wife

who gasped, Then began giggling.

 

Next came my father, who roared with laughter. Then

came Mom, who almost died of embarrassment when she

saw each place setting on the table with a 'special

occasion' Kotex napkin at each plate, with the fork

carefully arranged on top. I had even tucked the

little tail in so they didn't hang off the edge!!

 

My mother asked me why I used these and, of course,

my response sent the other adults into further fits

of laughter. 'But, Mom, you said they were for

special occasions!!!'

 

Pass this on to your girlfriends who need a good

laugh

 

Life is too short for drama & petty things, so kiss

slowly,laugh insanely, love truly and forgive

quickly...and for heavens sake, use the good napkins when ever you can!

Tia's New Bunk Beds

This past weekend, Tia inherited a nice set of Potter Barn bunk beds. My bosses from work were redoing their daughter's rooms and decided to find a good home for the bed. Luckily for us, they asked us and of course we were honored to receive it. With another girl on the way, having a set of bunk beds will come in handy. At first, we thought we'd just put them downstairs until we needed them since we had already transitioned Tia to a big girl bed which was really a full. But after discussing it a bit more, we decided why not now. So we put it instantly into her room. Boy were we pleasantly surprised of how wonderful her room looks. It is not only more spacious, but it just goes with it being a kids' room. We love it and are so excited about it. Thank you Greg and Lisa for thinking of us. Tia loves it too. She had no problem sleeping in it from the first night. She just look great in it and the bed is so comfortable. Tia did hit her head trying to jump up and down, but I think she learned quickly that you can't do that. So we are excited to have this for our girls. They look great as bunk beds or we can separate and they can be two separate twin beds. Either way - what a great hand me down!

Does Tia Hate Santa?

Baby #2

I have about 6 weeks left before this baby arrives. Crazy! I'm feeling large, but I know I still have more to go. She is so low that I feel the pressure, but her activity level is so high that I feel her every move. I do love feeling her move about.

Does Tia have OCD Like Mommy

At Tia's birthday party a few things happened that were hysterical. The hysterical part is that they reminded me of things I do. One is when we gave her the veggie tray to see if she'd eat any and the veggies got all messed up. There was broccoli where the celery was supposed to be and tomatoes where the carrots should be. When we pulled it away because she obviously wasn't going to eat any of it, she pulls the tray down and organizes them accordingly. She put the celery stick back in the celery section and the broccoli back in the broccoli section and the tomato back in the tomato section. Everyone was watching in amazement and Leslie/Lisa said 'Wow, that is so Angie's daughter'. The other funny thing she did was telling Leslie that her camera was Mommy's. Leslie and I have the same Canon camera, but her lens is a bit longer. Tia was adamant with Leslie that she had Mommy's camera and she wouldn't let go of the strap and made Leslie bring it to me. It was hysterical. Tia has a great sense of things going in their spot. She knows where the trash goes, where the swifter goes when she is done with it, where her dirty close go, and when things aren't right, she fixes it. Um, can you say clone. Both Chris and I do these things and I can see she has picked this up. It is cute but I hope she doesn't get as OCD as I can sometimes or like Chris can on his things. Guess we'll see. Regardless, she has her little personality that is just so darn sweet. I love seeing her grow up and see more and more of her personality. Only 3 more days until she is 2. Wow!

No More Superbowl Baby

Baby #2 is due on Superbowl Sunday, which is February 5th, 2012. However, after my doctor's appointment, it looks like I'll have her on February 1st or earlier. My doc is headed out of town on February 2nd and he gave me the option to just wait and see what happens which means if I went around my due date, he won't be around to make the catch during delivery OR let him induce me a few days to a week early. I'm going for the week early route. I am sure I'll be more than ready then. So she may not be a February baby after all, we'll just have to wait and see. Plus, you never know - I could go extra early which many people are predicting because of how low this baby sits. My doctor said the reason is my body shape. I have a very short torso and she is head down, so there is more pressure further down. With Tia she was so high, but was breach up until the very end. Everything looks good though and after a couple weeks, I'll be going every single week to the doctor including one week to get my last ultrasound. I can't believe I'm in the home stretch and now even closer with possibly being induced. I'm so excited to meet her. I know she'll be so beautiful and we'll be so blessed with another little miracle!

Tia Pooped on the Potty

I know Tia would not want this to be live on the web, but I can't help myself. I am so proud of my little girl. She will be 2 years old in a week and is going on the potty all by herself. So big!

She has been going at school here and there, but at home it seems like her potty is more of a play thing than the real deal. But of course, when she says she has to go, we give it a try. I was out doing some holiday shopping and while I was gone, Daddy got a real surprise.

She said she had to go poopy, so he took her in there. She took off her pants and daddy helped her with her diaper. She wanted to keep her shoes on because as most girls are, she has a shoe fetish. So she sits on the potty and daddy said 'you done' and she said 'no' so he gave her some time. Then he asks again and nope, she wasn't done and nothing was happening. So he left the room and then about 10 minutes later she comes strolling out. Chris said 'are you done' and she said 'yep'. Of course he thinks he is just going to put her diaper back on and get her dressed when he saw that she had really done it...gone both poopy and potty all by herself. Wow, what a big girl.

She was all smiles before the video camera came out and then she thought she was in trouble, but of course we are just proud parents. So hopefully she'll get the hang of it. She is such a big girl.

The best is after the video was shot she said 'pee you' - hahaha

Tia's 2nd Birthday Party

Tia had a great 2nd birthday party this past Sunday.  It was mostly family and a couple friends.  She had all 7 of her grandparents there and three great grandparents there.  She made out like a bandit with all of her gifts - she was so excited to play with all of her new toys.  I think she definitely enjoyed her 2nd birthday party and I can't wait to help her celebrate many more in all of her years to come!  I can't believe she is 2 - wow!

Tia's First Haircut

Tia didn't have much hair until she turned 1 and a half, but then she started to get more all the way around. She had the mullet thing going on for a bit, but then her bangs started to come in too. Recently though, her bangs have grown and been in her eyes. She has been shaking her head to get them out from time to time. I wondered how I would cut her hair and at first I thought I'd do it when she was sleeping, but who was I kidding. I am 8 months pregnant and I seem to go to bed at the same time as Tia does. So I just decided tonight that I'd just do it while she was sitting in her high chair distracted by food and Barney. So I did it. I just took her bangs. Pulled her bangs up in my hands and cut away. I didn't take off that much, but enough for her to be able to see. This past weekend, I was at hobby lobby and saw the cutest little pink boxes that said 'First Tooth' and 'First Haircut'. I bought one for each of my girls. So I used Tia's First Haircut box and wrote on the bottom to put the date. Perfect!

So Sweet - Here Owie

Tia hit her boo boo last night. She leaned back and hit her staple right on the corner of the crib that we have set up in our room now. Instantly, we knew what happened. We know her staple wasn't exactly in right. One side of the staple wasn't tucked under and we were afraid she'd hit it throughout the week and it would bleed. In fact, I had given her a bath earlier and noticed a long blood streak dried in her hair. I felt so bad for her. It must have happened recently while she was awake because of how it dried. So we felt even worse when she hit her head on the crib. We scooped her up and gave her lots of hugs. I wiped it off and throughout the night she was saying 'owie' while touching the back other head. It broke our hearts. The thing that really made me almost cry was when she was holding her teddy bear that she calls Bebe and she said Bebe owie and Chris said 'where is bebe's owie' and Tia turned Bebe over and pointed to the back of her head and said 'owie'. Chris and I both 'awed' at the same time. It was so precious.

Today, she got her staple out at the doctor. It came out with no problem and Tia seems to be doing pretty good except she had to skip her nap (poor planning by mommy), so she was a little tired during the day.

So let's hope that her head heals nicely and she doesn't have any big scars. Also hope that she doesn't even remember this incident and she doesn't have any more big owies like this one!

Rearranging the House

Today, we put the Christmas Tree up and Christmas decorations. It is funny because when we bought all of our decorations, we weren't quite sure how many kids we'd have so we didn't know how many stockings we should get. We wanted them all to match the tree skirt and stockings we had picked out. I remember us sitting there saying, should we get one for you, me, and Tia. OR should we get 4 in case we have 2 kids. What if we had 3 kids? When we got the stockings out today, we weren't sure how many we bought. I looked and the stocking holders were NOEL, so I knew we had at least 4 of them which is perfect for this year, since we have 4 of us now. Then I looked deeper into the tote and saw the fifth stocking and laughed. Chris said, oh yeah, I remember - we can always get new stocking holders, but it will be hard to get the same stocking later. So we were definitely thinking about 3 kids...guess we'll see if that happens. We also moved the crib into our room. It is a tight squeeze, but we are trying to think of the best scenario for our 3 bedroom house. Tia has her own big girl bed now and so her room is her own with a play area. The office is still needed to be our all purpose room with all of our bookshelves, Tia's bedroom furniture, our office computer/printer, the rocking chair, and somehow the extra full bed for our guests. My mom is moving to Thailand permanently, but before she does, she'll help me get through the end of the pregnancy so she'll stay with us for a few weeks during that time. Then my little sister will need a place to crash when she is home from school so that room will need to be available for that purpose too. We would love to have it as Baby Norris #2's bedroom and will, but we'll wait until after the summer. Baby will be still young that we want to keep a close eye on her since we have curious Tia roaming the house. So this will be our solution for the time being until our new baby gets past those first months. Tia was in her own room from day 1, so we hope we don't spoil baby #2 by having her in our room when she starts out. Guess we'll see.

Tia's Ears

So Tia has had an ear infection all last week and this week she has done great. We still have a couple more doses of her medicine to see it through, but I think she is over this infection for sure. So she went to the Ear doctor and had a hearing test. The doc said the reason why she had an ear infection the week before was because her ear has filled with fluid and wasn't draining is because her tube is no longer there. I haven't seen it and I couldn't tell you when it fell out. Her other ear's tube was about to fall out. So now we have to watch out for ear infections. If she gets a couple more in the next few months, that means more tubes need to be put in. We hope she makes it without it! We also need to watch out for Tia's hearing and if she is able to hear well. The girl can hear the lightest sounds and it seems like she is speaking the correct words when she tries, but it is always hard to know for sure. Let's hope she doesn't have any hearing impairment or loss and hopefully no more ear infections!!!!

Allergies

Doc is finally saying that Tia most likely has allergies. This is really no surprise to us, but I guess hearing from a doctor is more concrete. There is no 'for sure' about it, but all signs point to allergies. We have to watch her skin allergies because she gets diaper rash that turns into blisters that we have to use Lotramin for days. We have to put doctor prescribed creme on her belly, behind her knees and on her elbows frequently or else she gets the worst dry skin that she scratches til she bleeds. I don't really have allergies, but some mornings the past years, I've woken up with some sinus issues and clogged passages and on those days Chris and Tia sound like old men. It seems like when allergies are high among everyone, Tia is right there with them. So I have had a feeling she has allergies. I hate that she has them, but at least we know and can help her through whatever ones she has.