To Stinkin' Cute

This is the same girl who would have absolutely NOTHING to do with books a year and a half ago.

Norah's new do

Glen took Norah to get her haircut. There were still areas of her hair growing out from having to have parts of her head shaved from her CI surgeries and she has been really giving us a run for our money when we wash or try to fix her hair. So it was off to see Shelia, our long time friend and beautician.

This haircut just makes Norah even more cute! The only problem is I think it may have made her even sassier.

Preschool then and now and a milestone

Last years first day of school picture.

This years first day of preschool picture. You will notice that she is all bundled up nice and warm EXCEPT for her beloved flip flops. We will actually have to hide them before she will even consider wearing closed toed shoes, let alone socks.
It looks like no lips will be required for this first day back to preschool. Good thing Norah left hers in the house.

Today is also our 20th wedding anniversary.

I can honestly say that I do not know what I would do without Glen. He has been my best friend, keeper of my secrets, lover, sounding board, voice of reason, and biggest cheerleader for 2 decades now. He knows what I'm thinking alot of times just by the look on my face. As long as I have him with me any hurdles thrown our way can be dealt with, usually with sarcasm and laughter. He is an excellent Daddy! He loves my family. He reminds me alot of my Grandfathers (both of them...Henry and Willard) and my Dad (Michael). I have been very fortunate to have a lot of good men in my life to model how a husband should act. Glen is just that....a good man... and I am very fortunate to be married to him. Happy Anniversary Honey.

(Norah ate all his truffles that I bought him for today.) Ha!

(See, that right there. Above. Me finding it hilarious that Norah ate all his truffles. I realize that it's kind of mean. Glen said that he dosen't love me in spite of that stuff but because of it. It's like we were made for each other!)

Big Question

Okay. Obviously if you are here you have some idea of what Norah's background is and what we are trying to do as far as giving her a chance to learn to speak. So.....If location inside the U.S. was not an issue where would the absolute BEST oral/deaf school be? Where would give Norah her best chance of speaking?

A is for Apple, B is for Boo, J is for Jess

"A is for Apple."

This has to be the universally recognized face for homework.

Norah is hard at work tracing her A's. We are trying to introduce letter recognition and showing her that it means the same as the sign for A.
"A is also for Alligator."

There have been more crafts going on around the house. I have been looking up some new ones online recently. The weather will turn cold on a dime here. We usually go from having the air conditioner on to having the heat on within a week or two of each other. Plus Fall just seems to be a good time to do crafts.

The owl is another project from a Halloween craft book that I found at a garage sale.

Jess and Boo stopped by last night to borrow the carpet cleaner and weed eater. Norah LOVES to play with Jess.

Boo is working on putting up a blog of his own and apparently cleaning carpets and weedeating at my brother's house.

Halloween in September

We have started the Halloween crafts early around here. This is supposed to be a skeleton taking his skeleton cat for a walk. They are made out of q-tips and some foam.
The pumpkin is one that Norah HAD to have! It started out with some eyes and a mouth and then the allure of the magic marker just over took Norah and she went wild.

School starts on the 15th for Norah. She will be attending the preschool program at UALR that is run by the speech pathology department at the college. This is the same program that she was in for a while last school year. We are so glad that she is able to attend again this year. We know that she will make big strides in her language development in this program.

Sunday evening

It was finally decent outside this evening so we headed out to the backyard (ok, we really were dragged out there by Norah. If it had been up to Glen and I we would have become one with the couch). Norah likes to trim on the trees and shrubs in the backyard. All you have to do is give her a pair of safety scissors and she's off. She is also a good weeder. I sure do hope she likes to help this much when she gets older.

I LOVE the way her hair looks in the sunshine and her skin is such a beautiful gold/brown.
No, I am not biased at all......she seriously is gorgeous....it's a fact!

There was a breeze blowing and the sun was going down. Only thing missing was a frozen margarita.

She hates these exoskeletons that are all over the backyard. You can always tell when she finds one because the yelling gets really loud. I have tried to show her that they are empty but its hard to catch her and get her to calm down enough to explain. I guess they are kind of creepy.

Best swingset we ever bought. She plays on the trampolin part and twirls around the bar more than she plays on the swings or slide.

The many faces of Norah. (While making cinnamon rolls)

If your squemish you may want to pass this post up.

Seriously. Another title for this one could be Arkansas Post-op. Ok, I warned you. Scroll down.














Glen had a spinal cord stimulator put in on Tuesday for a trial run to see if it would help with his ever present back pain. We go Monday to have the temporary leads removed. So far the trial is a bust. It doesn't relieve pain where he needs it and he says it feels like he's holding his leg up against an electrified cattle fence. It also likes to shock the snot out of him if he steps down with his heel to hard, coughs, sneezes, farts, or even talks loud. Needless to say he has been a little cranky. The doctor and the rep for the device could not get the leads fed up to where they needed to be because of some sort of blockage or scar tissue in his back. They also had trouble "dialing in" the device to give him relief from his pain without shocking him to the point his legs would draw up on their own. We were really hoping that this would work and that Glen would be able to go back to work or at least have a better quality of life with less pain. For now though it appears we are going back to the drawing board.

This is Norah, trying desperately to see the tv around me trying to take her picture and get her to smile. She is VERY glad that none of the doctor stuff has had anything to do with her this week.

My Mom had her knee replaced last week. She got to go home on Saturday and we spent Saturday night and Sunday at her house. She is doing very well. Norah wanted absolutely nothing to do with my Mom while she was in the hospital bed, with everything Norah has gone through I can't blame her.

Hopefully everything slows down a little for a while because it has been non stop around here lately. I've left alot of things out but at this point the highlights are more than enough.

Lazy days of summer......HA! Fat chance!

It is actually hotter than the face of the sun today with the heat index putting it well into the 110's. So we are spending the day indoors. We went out early this morning and got movies. Came home and did a little face painting and tent building in the living room. Norah is having a ball! Even after all that and playing with some homemade playdoh she was still looking for stuff to do. Everyone keeps telling me she will keep me young, but I'm starting to wonder if she just keeps me running so much that I don't have time to think about anything else.
The next activity was to paint some eggs. That's right people it's not just for Easter anymore. I should have some pictures of that later. Then we may build a castle out of paper towel rolls. After that .......holy cow! After that we may just have to take her to Nana and Popie's house to swim or see what they have up their sleeves. I will be so glad when it cools off enough to play outside again.

Making noodles

Happy 39th Birthday!

Glen got to go to a class on saltwater reef tanks that also showed him how to aquascape his tank and take care of live corals last weekend. He got a bunch of free stuff from the raffle. We will never have to buy fish food again and he got a protein skimmer for his tank. He also bought some Duncan (sp?) mushrooms and more live rock for his tank with his birthday money. He hopes to be able to have a really big salt water aquarium one day but for now his little 24 gallon aquapod will have to do. Happy Birthday Glen!

Crafty Birdhouse Fun

Norah is always happiest when she has something to do. This little birhouse craft kept her busy for a couple of hours. It's made from a half gallon juice box. Norah painted the whole thing and then strung the bead handle while we waited for it to dry. Then she covered the front with beads and glued the sticks on top for the roof. We filled it with bird seed and hung it up. So far it has held up well, which is saying alot seeing as how the humidity has been so bad here lately that the air actually has some texture to it. We will definitely do this craft again. It was relatively easy and Norah was able to do 90% of it herself. (For those of you without 5 year olds that is a HUGE deal to them.) Good job Sister!