Well, here is our very cute little baby boy named Andrew Nolan. He was 6 lbs 6 oz, born Sep. 25. He looks just like Samuel did. He's a very sweet and mellow guy, with lots of patience for big brother who's learning (learning well, but still learning) how to help and cuddle a baby brother.










He is such a beautiful baby. He sleeps great with his dad, and okay for mom. Not horrible, and with naps, mom is hanging in there.














We very much appreciated a visit from my mother. She was a great help and was able to put life back in order for us.














These were taken on our way to Fort Ticonderoga, which we decided to visit while Mom was here. The drive was beautiful, and we stretched our legs at this pond that was beside the road.













At the fort. It's not the original fort, it's been rebuilt, but it's pretty neat all the same.














On the drive. This is Lake George. Pretty, huh?
















Okay, blogger is being annoying, so I'll explain the rest of the pictures here. Samuel loves to make messes in the kitchen (or everywhere, actually--you can see the toilet paper he dragged in from the bathroom). But he's just so happy doing it, sometimes it's hard for me to stop him.

For Halloween, we were the Wizard of Oz foursome. Mom helped me make my costume when she was out here, and it turned out great! Rich was the scarecrow (we forgot his hat), Samuel is the cowardly lion, and Andrew (though you can't tell too much) is the tin man. Aren't we cute!?

The next picture was a surprise to me--every year our ward has a chili cook off. We bring chili just to participate and help feed people--I don't like chili very much, and this is the only time I ever make it, so I'm not that great at it. I received a cookbook for my birthday, and decided to try one of the recipes in there. Lo and behold, I got first place in the cook off! Funnily enough, I hadn't even really tasted it when I won. I had some after the fact, and I didn't like it.

Anyway, we're all doing well. Happy Halloween!

Our lovely garden (freshly watered). It's growing well, and we're enjoying squash and tomatoes and cucumbers and beans, and waiting for beets and carrots.

Our apartment (in the dark). Cute huh?
















This is our crazy petunia plant--it's overrunning our sidewalk, the pansy next to it, the beans, and the cucumber plant now.















Our cute little boy.

When Grandma gives Samuel his own piece of ice cream cake....

Father's Day gift!

Thanks for the glasses, Uncle Charles!















My crafty side comes out once in a while.

We found this guy out hiking in the Adirondacks.

This is what happened to our little guy out hiking in the Adirondacks.

















This is where Thoreau's cabin was at Walden Pond!

Rich just finished a major chunk of his training (woohoo! Congrats honey!), I'm 33 weeks along, and Samuel is cuter than ever! Life is good.

One year old Samuel!

The birthday boy Samuel is walking!! He is even brave enough now to often take off on his own, even if he only gets a few steps. He's getting better and better!

















Smile!

















I think this is a dried apricot?















Sorry it's blurry, but this is Samuel's way of getting our attention--climb up the back of our legs, grab on tight, and bounce up and down and sometimes scream until he gets what he wants.















What a cute face!













Oooh! A camera!


















This is Samuel learning to use his toothbrush.

















See? All done!















This is one of Samuel's favorite pastimes--pulling out all the DVDs. He also enjoys pulling clothes out of laundry baskets, dominoes out of their case, toys out of their places, etc.









He loves to look at things, and is especially entranced by books, baby faces, and (here) a Baby Einstein DVD. (He likes to look at the cover more than he likes to watch the DVD itself).












He also loves this book in particular (animals), but loves all books and will flip through the pages real fast. In fact, he's always trying to take over when Mom and Dad read to him.














:-)










We are all doing well here. Rich is halfway done with the current training stage he's in, which means only a few more months of 12 hour shifts! We're adapting pretty well to the abnormalities of shift work. I'm hopeful that morning sickness will be over soon, and that spring will really get here so I can often go outside.

Happy birthday to Samuel this Friday!! We will post pictures from the big day (later).

Announcements, announcements, announcements!

Well, actually, just one announcement. We are again expecting! We are very excited (and Mom is nervous) for baby #2, due October 3, 13 weeks along.

In other news, Samuel is doing great, more and more mobile all the time and will dare to stand on his own for couples of seconds at a time. He always has to be very sure of his stability before he will move or stand.

Rich is doing well at his job, and he's starting rotating shift work this week. Joy.

Spring is on the way!! :-)

Snow and Suits and Samuel

Yay! Samuel made it to Boston for the second time in his life so far (and will make it much more), and had a great time being babysat by some good friends, Sarah and Spencer, while Mom and Dad went to the temple. He even got on his ginormously huge coat and we went playing in the snow!











Here he is enjoying (maybe?) his ride on a sled. He just laid there and stared up....













Here is how he likes to use his binky sometimes. :-)

















And here's what happens when you rub your eyes with food all over your hands. (Don't try this at home, kids).














January 23 (1/23) is National Pie Day that we celebrated in style. We had berry pie (my first homemade fruit pie--it turned out quite well, and Rich even helped me figure out how to do a lattice top crust!), peanut butter pie, and pumpkin pie that our friends brought. Not pictured: the banana cream pie that didn't set up at all.












Here is Samuel standing up! He loves to get around hanging on to stuff. And he loves (as you can see) to find the computer and unplug it. Which wouldn't be that big of a deal, except our battery is completely dead. Oh, well. He sure has fun doing it!



















Our new living room, complete with curtains.














Here is our new kitchen. That door goes down to our laundry room (yea!!!) and out to our garage (yea!!!).













And here is our little man this morning, all dressed up for church in his new too-big suit!! :-)

New House!

So, we are back in New York for some indefinite period of time. It's nice to be able to settle in long term, but it's a little weird not knowing what the next step is. We're definitely still in the moving-in phase (what a pile of boxes!), but it's slowly becoming a home. We're going to have curtains, which will be fun--we've never had those before.








This is what our new apartment looks like (taken from our actual apartment, but as you can see, all the buildings look the same. We have a garage and a washer/dryer!! Yeah!! Remember this tree--this is after our first snowstorm that happened while we were moving in. See that pile of snow around the tree? Apparently, this is right where they pile a lot of the snow when they plow.








Speaking of plows, here they are! I was so surprised the morning of this storm to see these great big bulldozers coming in to get the snow out for us. Wow, they know how to get rid of snow in New York. (The rest of the day had normal plows on trucks).































Remember that tree? Here it is after storm #2!














And here's Samuel trying to learn to have fun in his playpen. I don't know why his teeth look extra long.











We love being back in our ward; we both spoke in Sacrament Meeting today, and Richard has already been called as the Sunday School President. We've been to the dentist (only one cavity for me!--at least, only one that they're going to fix :-). We're figuring our way around town (and when I say town, I really mean other towns--we're kind of on the outskirts of a town that doesn't even have a grocery store). Samuel is slowly getting back to his old sleeping patterns, though he's recently been refusing solid foods unless he can use his own hands to eat, which limits his diet to bananas and those puff crackers. Anyone else had that experience? But anyway, life is good.