Heinemeyer Happenings: Happy New Year!

So its now January 19th and I am going to just now share with you about our Christmas...ahhh I did start the draft a couple of weeks ago if that counts!! Sorry! Anyways here it goes!

Hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and New Years!

This Christmas was filled with firsts for our family, it was our first Christmas home since 2007 (the Christmas we were engaged), it was Norah's 1st Christmas, it was our first Christmas with a dog (our new chocolate lab, Juno), and our first ever Heinemeyer Christmas Eve Morning Brunch Gift Exchange with Casey side of the family (I got to host it too!). Our Christmas Eve and Christmas Day were very full of get togethers and fun! Christmas Eve started off with Casey's side over at our home for brunch and a gift exchange. We had so much fun with everyone and everything was super yummy, except my biscuits didn't come out as I wished, but overall it was a nice relaxing start to Christmas Eve. Everyone left around 2:30 and while Norah took a quick nap I cleaned up the kitchen and got ready for my Aunt's annual Christmas Eve at her home in the country. This year was special too because this will be the last year we spend Christmas Eve in her house in the country because they are moving to a house they bought in town this year, so it was especially nice to be there for the last one. We enjoyed visiting with my mom's side of the family and enjoyed my Aunt's amazing lasagna she always makes for Christmas Eve. Norah had fun with all the kids and enjoyed playing with all the bows. I wish I would have gotten some pics but we FORGOT THE CAMERA!!! Ahhhh, I couldn't believe we actually forgot the camera, luckily we took plenty of photos that morning and on Christmas too. We then left my Aunt's house to go to my sister-in-law's family's party around 7. We had fun playing games and relaxing at their house until around 10:30. I brought Norah's pjs and she fell asleep in my arms around 9, it was a big day for her!

Here are some pics of Norah opening presents on Christmas

morning, she loved playing with her stocking :)

Norah went to her 9 month well baby visit last week and the doctor says she is doing great! She weighed 16 lbs. 9 oz and grew 2 1/2 inches from last time. I was a little concerned about her weight again cause she is so itty bitty, but the doctor says she is progressing wonderfully so I stopped worrying. She eats so much though so I don't know why I was so worried.

Norah is also officially walking at 9 months!!! I don't have any still shots of it yet because she gets going and then usually goes down to a crawl too fast for me to catch a picture. But she is loving the new found skill and I realized now that she is walking I needed to find her some good walking shoes so I went to our local Once Upon A Child and found her some gently used Stride Rite shoes for $8! They retail for $35! She is doing really well in them and loves showing off her walking skills. She loves pushing around her toy that has taught her to make solid steps, she loves it.

Oh no first fender bender!

Checking to make sure the wheels are aligned

Ever since she pulled herself up in her crib around 5 months old we have had to purchase rail guards because she started to chip the paint with her teeth. The other day I went in to check on her while she was getting up from her nap and I saw her throwing her rail guards over the edge and chewing on one in her crib. I watched her through the crack of the door for a couple of minutes to see how she was doing it and she first chews on it and gets the edge up and then pulls it off, what a little sneaky girl :)

She then decided to hide it in her bumper, this is where lots of her binks are usually too :)

So proud of herself :)

She has also been trying to chew on her necklace, so I have been diligently trying to teach her not to. Its kinda of an oxymoron because her necklace is a teething necklace but they aren't supposed to chew on them. The necklace is made of Baltic Amber and it has natural properties that are comparable to Motrin, but its distributed through their skin and is triggered by their body heat. It works like a dream for Norah. We had lost it for a few days and I forget how much it helps with the drooling. Plus she just cut her 7th tooth and I didn't even realize it until I saw it.

I haven't been able to do much DIY lately, but I did manage to do a little rearranging and love the results. Our third bedroom had become our office/catch all room and I got so tired of it always being so crammed and I was constantly reorganizing to fit it all, plus Norah doesn't last long anymore in the exersaucer and when she was awake I would try to go in to the office to do work while she played, but I usually got only about 10 minutes out of her and I couldn't just let her play on the floor cause for one there wasn't enough floor space and there was so much she could get into that it wasn't safe so I decided to move the office and computer out to our front room and move some things around and now I can watch Norah play and work all at the same time. Its great too because it has freed up a lot of space in the third bedroom for storage and all my projects that still need to be done. I still plan on painting the file cabinet I got at a garage sale for $5 and staining the vintage desk chair a darker color (got for $10 at a garage sale) and getting a different desk, but for now it works!

Norah loves when her cousins come over to play with her its so cute because they are like her big brothers. She just loves playing with the big boys and they love her :)