Baff timez

Norah has within the last month or so recently started absolutely loving bath time. She graduated to the adult size bathtub due to her ability to sit up with amazing posture (sometimes even better than mommy or daddy's) and also her wonderful ability to SpLaSh! :) Bath time includes chasing after rubber duckies, eating a waterproof book, shrieking with joy, and of course playing with that wonder - WATER! :)

Preview for this coming Punkin Day

What more can be said? :)

Reminiscing

We stumbled upon a sweet set of pictures from several months ago. February to be exact. Pictures of when we were blessed with a little bundle of joy. We realized that we hadn't sent out pictures of our daughter without a hat on, or at least not any that portrayed how dark her hair was or her sweet little eyes that crossed often. So with no further introduction, here are pictures of Norah Jane Priestley when only a few days old :)

A day of Firsts

July 4, 2009

Hello Dear Family!

Norah recently went in for her four month check up. She weighed in at 16.5 pounds! and 27 inches tall! She is now the average for an 8 month old! She's off of the charts in height for her age, and her weight is right on track. We were encouraged to put her in volleyball due to her expected height :). Poor babe had her second round of immunizations :(. Boy is that hard to watch. But thankfully, it's for her good. Norah had a bunch of firsts yesterday that were lovingly documented by Matthew. There's a pic there with 4 pics together which is her literal first bite of rice cereal! The doc said that due to her new stats, she's just fine to start out :). Norah thought it was odd at first, then kept signaling with her hands and lunging forward with open mouth... Give me more! Man, she's a monster when it comes to food!

Her literal first bite! :)

She also was able to pay attention to the beautiful raindrops falling down yesterday in the middle of the sunny afternoon.

As of other firsts... she has, as of the middle of this week, rolled over from her back to her belly and ever since then, will roll over every time she's down on the floor. She has yet to figure out how to roll back. She'll get there soon enough. She also is starting to push off a little with her feet, butt in air, and somehow managing to scoot backwards a little with her arms thrusts. She had a little buddy about 4 or so months older than her visit this last weekend, and ever since then due to Fiona's effervescent (and very loud! :)) self, Norah now talks a whole lot louder.

Norah and Daddy play this fun game on the floor where Daddy will softly let a blanket fall on her whole body (arms raised) and then she'll immediately drop her arms and bring the blanket off of her face. The favorite part of the game is both the funny face she makes before the blanket lands on her, and her smiles and shrieks after she takes it off of her face. :)

Well, that's all for right now :) Happy Fourth of July!!! AAAAAAAND Happy Birthday Sarah! :D

Love you all! Love, Matthew, Heather, & Norah

Cool New Trick!

June 26, 2009 Update ;)

I just started doing this today and couldn't get enough of it! :D My feet taste tho groood!

luv, Nolah (Our version of Norah saying her name ;))

PS - It's amazing how you start to talk baby talk in almost any situation once you have a child.

June 24th Update on us Beasleys

Hi there family! :) So an update on Miss Norah Jane :) ... She's now 4 months old and some change. She is getting over her first widdle code in the node. (For those of you who need a translation - "little cold in the nose") She took some pictures to show you her new trick. She'll reach for the toy with both her hands and feet and roll over, especially if it's out to the side. This morning she responded to peek a boo for the first time. Aaaand as Matthew noted this morning, something he especially loves is that she'll be sitting in her swing calmly, and she'll look at you and smile, especially if you smile; she's also giving some attempts of giggling/cackling. She especially loves her reflection in the mirror. She goes crazy, shrieking with huge smiles, when she sees herself standing up on the counter top. She's also having fun in her "jumper swing" - something by which she's suspended in air by a swing that hangs on a doorpost. She looooves it! In fact, perhaps we'll get some more pics in when she's fed and awake next for ya'll.

One of our favorite things to see Norah do is when she's reaching for a toy whether in her lap, on the floor, or in our hands, is once she's touched it and made an attempt to grab it, or even has it in her hands, she immediately brings it to her mouth. What makes it most fun is that automatically her hand goes in first :D and she seems rather satisfied :D. Mmm, good ol' fingerths!

We're so thankful that Norah is sleeping through the night smoothly now. The cold kind of gave her some troubles breathing so she's sleeping in a carseat in the closet (no light! - her favorite!) for the time being. That seems to really help. But, boy are Dad and Mom grateful to be catching some solid zzz's!

Norah's a very happy baby for the most part. Oh how her smiles are a wonderful encouragement that all of this repetition is worth it! The only time she's fussy is if she didn't get enough naptime or as of late - teething :(. Poor babe. She seems to love this teether that goes in the fridge.

Mom & Dad are getting used to the whole routine of what Norah needs and when she needs it. Communication between us seems to be getting stronger; which is fabulous!

Matthew has been getting gigs right and left. In fact check out his blog on his website: www.sevenbright.com. The latest gig was for a friend, Audrey Assad, who is a Catholic/Christian singer. There's a link to her music on his blog. She actually sent Matthew some wonderful news last night that the company scouting her out, EMI, which scouts out many performers was in love with his photography after seeing what he did for her and checking out his website! Who knows! He might get some sweet deals with these people, hooking him up with pics for many bands?! How rockin is that?! Heather is trying to now figure out what creative thing to do during Norah's naptimes. So far, other than the norm of household cleaning and such (which are wonderful in themselves! :D), she's hung some pictures and Matthew's diploma up and unpacked the final couple of boxes from the move. Now she's trying to find some sort of possible marketable hobby to do for the couple hours she may have during the day. We'll see :). Other than that, she's so thankful for the opportunity to live the dream she and Matthew had to stay at home with this butterbean blessing the Lord has given us. :) That's pretty much it for now. What's new for you all? We love you all and hope all is going well for you!

Love always,
Matthew, Heather, & Norah

Aptitude

I brought a small journal to work today with hopes that perhaps I would write down some ideas for the future. I'm still convinced that nothing we experience is as exciting as the anticipation of it. Actually, I think the memory of experience is also better than the experience, too. I think it's because those events are rarely representative of only a single emotion, yet that's what they are reduced to in fore- or hindsight.

Wow. That was kind of pessimistic. Oh well.

Anyway, I took an aptitude test yesterday that said I was "artistic-social" and suggested that my most appropriate profession would be a free-lance photographer. This was an aptitude test that my company gives us in order to direct our careers here, but I haven't exactly seen that position available on any job-posting sites here. I guess that wouldn't exactly be "free-lance" though, would it? The interesting thing is that I don't remember any specific artsy questions in the survey, but I guess I won't question the validity.

More to come. Today's a light day at work.

Full Term

We're 37 weeks and counting today. That means Heather is about 9 months pregnant, and babykins is fully prepped for life in the world. Well, except for the whole lack of motor skills, ability to speak, walk, or move apart from indirect flails. How cute. Her name is Norah. Norah, the beautiful flailer.

Meanwhile, I'm at work, and I have plenty of downtime in the afternoons. This has given me a new-found appreciation for flickr, yahoo! finance, and twitter (which is basically facebook, but just status updates.) Here's a picture for today (my friend David):



Any suggestions for stuff to do during the free times here?