Baby Girl

So after two years of silence on this blog, I thought this would be the best vehicle to announce baby girl's name.

Baby girl deserves some time on the blog after all. I often come back to this blog and reminisce about about my pregnancy with Levi and his first year and half. I know I'll be happy later if I do the same about my daughter. Plus Levi says the funniest and most profound things sometimes like what he said when we asked him what his baby sister's name means)! It'd be nice to have a record of those things.

I stressed over a name for a long time. We found out she was most likely a girl during an ultrasound at 13 weeks (way earlier than I expected). We confirmed it at 17 weeks, and the doc confirmed it again at 20, so we're pretty sure she's a girl!

I love Levi's name. It's jam packed with special meaning - it's a summary of the man I hope he turns out to be - and it's just a cool name too. You don't run into a lot of Levi's around, but it's not a strange name either. (more on why we chose his name here and here)

I was finding it very hard to name our baby girl some generic name that wasn't special. I just couldn't find a special enough name. I didn't think I was going to be able to. I spent hours on the baby name websites, and scouring meanings of names. There aren't an abundance of women to name a girl after in the bible - and our family names are all pretty dated (Brenda, Debra, Geneva, Virginia).

I have a hard time with the fact that I have to choose a name in the first place. I feel like a name should be predetermined - like eye color or temperament. It feels really strange to be in charge of what someone is called - what someone will live with for the rest of their lives. It's huge task, and one that I take very seriously - probably too seriously. After all, there are no shortage of beautiful names that I love : Hannah, Grace, Audrey, Chloe - but none of them had the meaning I was hoping for. Sure some of them mean nice things (who doesn't love grace?), but none of them had the narrative, the big story, like Levi's name.

Then Christmas season was upon us. I'm not sure if it was in part due to my hormones or the amount of time talking to Levi about what Christmas means - but it took on a whole new meaning for me this year. I could not listen to a song on the radio about the baby Jesus without winding up in tears.

I reflected a lot this year on what the birth of Jesus meant to the world. Christmas time is the most beautiful time of the year. People take great effort in making their homes look more beautiful, smell more beautiful, and taste more beautiful. I know that not everyone is doing this as an act of worship to the One who gave us Christmas - but to me as a Christian, those beautiful lights everywhere were screaming out "JOY TO THE WORLD, THE LORD HAS COME."

I think we, even devout Christians, have become desensitized to the Jesus story. Blah blah blah, born of a virgin, yadda, yadda, yadda, laid in a manger, such and such, saved the world, and so on. But think about it. The God of the universe, the one who created everything, the one who sustains everything, the one who lives in total perfection and in total comfort, left everything to become one of us. To live among us. Not only that, but in such a humble way. I'm not sure how I ever lived without the electric blanket that I got for Christmas this year - and I sure don't want to spend the night in a barn on a bed of hay! He became the least among us, fully knowing his fate - rejection and death - for a world full of sinners. It's times like these where I wish I had the gift of writing. Nothing I can write can fully express what dwelling on that truth does to my heart.

So, Jarrod and I have decided to name our baby girl Noelle. What an extra bonus for me that it's a French word! There is nothing more important, or more beautiful in the world or in human history than what happened on the First Noel 2000+ years ago.

I like to teach Levi french words, so he knows that Christmas is Noel in French. So when we told him the name, I asked him what it meant expecting him to say "Christmas," but instead he said "it means Jesus is alive and came to earth so that we could have joy in our hearts." What a great definition!

"the look"

This, in terms of photography, is not the best picture in the world - but it is an amazing shot! This is "the look," and I'm so glad I was able to capture it on film (or digital file, whatever.)


This is the look my precious angel baby gets on his face when he decides he's not going to be quite so angelic anymore. In this case, he was playing dominos at an old gas station thing in the Historical Park. He was having a great time with these dominos, but decided he would throw one. He got a firm "no," and was told if he threw another one then we would have to leave. He was good for a few minutes while I snapped some quick pictures of him. Then he slowly lowered a domino closer to his lap, gave me this look, and intentionally let the domino slip out of his hand onto the porch- just to see how far he could push me, and to find out if I meant business. I scooped him up and off we went - with a toddler kicking and screaming along the way. Did he learn his lesson? Maybe, but I know he will continue to test me and push me to see if I mean what I say. Sometimes it's really inconvenient to be consistent, but hopefully I can remain strong so that these looks become fewer and fewer as we get out of the toddler years. But I am glad I have this one to keep :-)

Here are a few more pictures from before the tantrum:



PS, to all my photography friends who read this blog (you know who you are), this would be an awesome place for a photoshoot!

Levi's Vocabulary

Here you can see most of his vocab skills. He has trouble with Tiger in this video, but that's usually his favorite:

Mother's Day

We all know Levi is not a big talker, up until this mother's day weekend his vocabulary has been:

Bath
Ball
Bubble
Apple
Kroger
Cracker
Tuba
huhuuuuh (what a donkey says)
mmm (what a cow says)
RAAA (what a Tiger says)
and his favorite, DA DEEEEEEEE (daddy, huge emphasis on the last syllable)
There may be a few I'm missing, but that's pretty much it.

I've been waiting patiently, and appropriately, Levi added another word to his vocabulary this weekend:

MOMMA!!!!

Every time he would try to say mamma before, he would put his lips together (like he does for the cow sound), but then end up saying mmmmba, or mmmmpa.

Really though, Levi? Saying Kroger, Bubble, and Tuba before momma? I guess he was waiting for this weekend.

The best came yesterday though as we were playing blocks. He stopped his stacking, put his block down, looked at me, said "momma" and gave me a hug. Then kept hugging me for the next few minutes. One of the happiest moments ever.

Pier Family

Levi is very interested in reading and identifying things right now. We can hardly go thirty minutes without reading. If he had his way, he would be read to every minute that he wasn't eating or swinging or watching the washing machine. (his grandma introduced him to the wonderful world of the washing machine, and he asks me about thirty times a day to watch our washing machine - and sometimes has pretty big meltdowns when he is denied.)

This boy can identify all his farm animals, even on pictures he's never seen before. He can also pick out circles, squares (although he does get squares and rectangles confused sometimes), ovals, and stars - he has trouble with diamonds and triangles.

I thought my family would be interested in seeing Levi point to people in the picture. This book is now Levi's book, since Phoebe already destroyed the corner. It's pretty beat up, because Levi LOVES to "read" this one!



On my youtube page, you can also see Levi saying "grandpa" and pointing to the groomsmen and the Robertson family.

Baby Shower for my Bestie!

If you want to see details of the baby shower I co-hosted for Jennifer, I have all the details up over at my other blog, Frugal Home Ideas. Oh, and if you didn't know about my other blog, here it is! Just some ideas, mostly decorating.

My Little Architect

He may not be a man of many words yet, but look what he figured out:



Pretty good, huh?