MooneyWeb

 
Noah:  3 years old, Makenna: 20 months old
 
I don’t think I realized what a busy month we had until I started this update and was weeding through pictures to post in the photo album.  Noah finished up his swimming lessons at the beginning of the month.  He has improved so much since the start of the summer.  He used to not want to let go of mommy and daddy while swimming, even with water wings.  Now, with water wings, he’ll jump in all by himself, blow bubbles, kick, go under water, and even lay on his back all by himself.  Makenna only did swim lessons for one session this summer but she improved too.  She’ll blow bubbles and kick all by herself.  Just a pre-warning, do not splash near Kenna, she does not like it!!  And don’t even think about putting her head under water! 
 
We also had some fun Mom’s club activities this month.  We went on a tour of a fire station, Noah LOVED this.  He went in the fire truck, wore a fire hat, and he followed directly behind the fireman during the entire tour.  We also went on a tour of Krispy Creme donuts and he found the machines and making of the donuts fascinating at well.  
 
We went to Minnesota to visit our friend, Todd and Karen (Noah’s Godparents)  this month too. It was a lot of fun.  Noah LOVED playing with their dog, Tucker.  We were able to go to the Mall of America where Nickelodian Universe is.  If you have seen Makenna and Noah lately you would know how much they love Dora and Diego and would understand what a treat this was.  I cannot count the number of Dora and Diego episodes I have watched the past few months.  Mall of America had a meet and greet with Dora and Diego… PERFECT.  They also had Dora and Diego rides… PERFECT.  They really enjoyed themselves!  And to top it all off, Mall of America had a Tony Roma’s… PERFECT (for me, of course:)!  The kids had a blast and Noah still talks about how he got to ride in the “Diego Bus.”  Karen and Todd also took us to the Minnesota Zoo.  Todd, the kids, (and everyone else) had a lot of fun there as well!  It was great seeing Karen and Todd.  We want to ask everyone to keep them in your thoughts and prayers as Todd has been fighting cancer, osteosarcoma (http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/toddandrews) for the last 7 years.  They’ve had some rough days the last couple months but he was having good days when we were there and we really appreciated being able to spend time with them.   
 
Makenna also had her 18 month doctor visit and she is a healthy girl!  We found out that she is VERY petite, 21lbs (7th%) and is 31 inches long (35%).  She is an excellent eater so the doctor said we could feed her all the fatty foods we wanted.  Her verbal skills are  EXCELLENT (she speaks like Noah did at 2.5 yrs old!).  The doctor did recommend we start to wean her off the pacci…that will be interesting as she REALLY likes the pacci.  I’ll let you know how that’s going in a few months;)  Noah is doing well this month to.  He is becoming an even sweeter big brother.  He loves puzzles and is starting to get pretty good at them.  You can tell he is on a new level of learning.  He seems to comprehend things more and will remember things that I even forgot about.

Enjoy the pictures from this month:
 
August 2010
Minnesota 2010

Noah: 3 years old, Makenna: 19 months old
 
This was an exciting month as Noah turned 3 years old!!  It was the first birthday that he kind of understood what was going on.  He knows he is 3, he knows how to sing happy birthday and he knows he gets cake.  Of course presents were an exciting plus.  Plus, he knows so many people that have celebrated a birthday in the past month (Uncle Jarrod, Julian, Piper, Christian, Avo, Grandma Mooney, Grand Aunt Mary Ellen and Grand Uncle Bob and Dominic happy birthday!) that he was getting the hang of things.  We went to Red Robin for his birthday lunch and came home, had cupcakes, and open a present from mommy and daddy.  We had Noah’s Curious George Birthday party the next day with swimming, pinatas, pizza, cake and presents.  Noah had a ton of fun!  Noah also had his 3 year old doctors appointment and the doctor says he looks good!  He’s on target for talking  and  “listening” and is a healthy boy!  He weighed in at 33 lbs (71st%tile) and was 37″ tall (40th%tile).  Noah also had another big change this month in that he is using a big boy bed!  
 
Makenna had fun singing happy birthday to her big brother.  She loves that Noah will “read” to her now.  Noah has turned into a good helper for Makenna.  I’ve seen him get a tissue so she can blow her nose, he likes to “help” wash her in the bath.  I even caught her sitting on his lap in the rocking chair today singing “twinkle little star” to her.  They are typically concerned when the other doesn’t have their juice cup so they are always making sure each other’s thirst is taken care of (ask poor Sophia on the play dates, they get worried when she leaves her cup in a different room;).  They have arrived at a very sweet age and their interaction is quite entertaining.  A fight typically ensues when one person (usually Noah) has taken a toy away and you can hear very loudly and clearly from several rooms over, “Noah, NO, NOAH NOAH NOAH!!”  And if it is possible, Makenna’s vocabulary is still growing and getting more clear!  It is so sweet hearing her say “hey noah,” “ok”‘ or sing “ring around the Rosie.”   Makenna is an excellent eater; however, you wouldn’t be able to tell because she must have an excellent metabolism as she is a petite girl.  She has had a massive amount of teeth come in the past 6 weeks, 12 to be exact!!  I will be excited when she gets a break from those running noses and random wake up at nights from teeth pain!   We’ve had to reschedule her 18 month appointment a couple times but she will be heading to that next week.  Enjoy this months pictures and I will get back to watching Curious George for possibly the 100th time;)
 
July 2010 Pictures
Noah’s3rd Birthday Pictures

Makenna: 18 months, Noah 2 1/2
 
We started off the month with the kids first swim lessons in Parent/Tot classes.  I did lessons with Makenna for 30 minutes and Noah followed up with lessons with daddy.  Makenna liked some parts of swim lessons, jumping in the pool or playing ring around the rosie.  She didn’t like blowing bubbles and going under water and she made sure everyone knew this!  On the other hand, Noah LOVED just about every aspect of swim lessons (except for floating on his back).  He loved it so much that we decided to have him try out the next clas up, Tadpoles, a class without us.  We were a little nervous with how he would do but the class only had 3 kids in it.  He did great and he loved it!  Despite having a hard time listening to the instructor when asked to stop splashing he did really good! On his first day the instructor had to drag him into the water by himself.  After a few lessons in he was running to his instructor!
 
Noah and Makenna are also starting to play really well together.  We often here “come here Kenna, come here” or even, “NOAH, come here.”  It’s so sweet.  They sometimes play a hugging game where they both say hug, then they hug and they do it over and over again.  Of course they are brother and sister and after about playing together in a room by themselves for about 10 minutes Makenna will usually come out crying.  But Noah really is turning into a pretty sweet big brother.  He’ll get her juice cup if she asks (and she’ll do the same too).  As the little sister she can be demanding too, it’s pretty funny listening to her demand for Noah to get her something, “Noah, get paci.”  Makenna’s starting to get at that independent age, you hear her say “I do, I do, I do” a lot (I’m pretty sure she picked this up from Noah).  Noah has starting having conversations with us, it actually surprises me sometimes that I am actually “talking” to him and he has something to say in return.
 
We went on vacation to Seattle to visit my family, it had been 2 years since we were there.  The kids were soooo excited to go on the airplane, there was actually a count down going on.  We stayed with my mom while in Seattle and spent time with our new nephew Joaquin, and Justin and his family visit overlapped ours.  For the first time we did some touristy things during our visit. We went to the Woodland Park Zoo, the Seattle Aquarium and went on a boat ride to Bainbridge Island.  It was a lot of fun and I think the kids really enjoyed doing it.  We also had time to visit with a lot of friends and family and were there for Jarrod’s birthday.  Unfortunately, the kids got sick halfway through the vacation but they handled it well.  It was just a bummer because we had to cancel some visits with some high school friends.
  
Well I think that just about sums up our busy month.  I do want to give a happy birthday shout out to Jarrod.  I also want to ask for some thoughts and prayers for our friend, Todd.  He’s been having quite a bit of ups and downs with his cancer lately and they could use the prayers!
 
Here are this months pictures:
June 2010 
Seattle 2010

 
Makenna: 17 Months, Noah 2 1/2 years
 
This past month we had some great weather in AZ.  Our pool was still too cold to swim in, but the kids played in the water as much as they could (running through the sprinklers, splash pads and slip n slides).  We also went to the zoo, where Noah informed us that his favorite animal is the elephant… of course he also seemed to enjoy the monkeys and turtles.  The kids went to build a bear for the first time for our service project for Mom’s Club.  They each built a bear and the following week we went to a hospital and donated them.  I’m not sure Makenna and Noah fully understood what was going on but it was fun. 
 
We went to Sedona for the first time over Memorial weekend.  Our friends, the Wolf’s,  have a house up there and they invited us.  We had an awesome time, and as expected it was very relaxing and beautiful.  Noah and Makenna had a blast playing with Morgan and Ashely!  We went to a couple parks, went on a hike (yes, you can read that again, but the Mooney’s really did go on a hike) and just hung out.  Pretty much an ideal long weekend for us!
 
Makenna still shocks us everyday with her talking, of course this means she voices her opinion quite a bit.  She speaks her mind if she is “all done” or doesn’t want to to do something or wants to eat something specific (pop tart/cereal/french fries/strwberries are among her favorites to demand).  She is still very cuddly, loving to give hugs and kisses.  She has this obsessions with Go Diego, she just LOVES that show and always asks to watch it.  When it comes on she doesn’t hesitate to sing along.  Last month I mentioned we covered her windows to try and get her to sleep in longer.  It worked a little bit.  She seems to have set her internal clock to 6am now.  Which also means she is still taking 2 naps a day… one of those does overlap Noah’s nap which makes for some quiet time for me during the day! 
 
Noah also did some growing this month.  He seems to have his coordinaion down because I feel like he is more confident jumping off things, throwing and even doing a pretty good job doing handstands.  He’s even made some promising  advances in his potty/poo poo training.  He wears undies around the house and we are just looking for the right time to transition him into undies outside of the house.  While Makenna’s favorite show is Diego, I’d put Noah’s favorite as Curious George, he always wants to watch it!
 
Enjoy this months pictures:
 
May 2010
Sedona (Memorial Weekend 2010)

 
Makenna: 16 months, Noah: 2 1/2 years-
 
We celebrated Easter this month with Grandma and Grandpa Mooney, Grand Uncle Dick and Aunt Barb and Yvonne, Sophie and Lorena.  We had dinner and the kids went on an Easter egg hunt.  I was impressed with Noah’s Easter egg hunting skills and even Makenna got the hang of looking for eggs.  Steve celebrated his 32nd Birthday on April 8th, and we took a trip to the zoo during the month too.  It was starting to get hot this month but the pool isn’t warm enough to swim in yet so we got the kids a mini splash pad to cool down in and they are enjoying it.
 
Makenna has started to say a few phrases now… “come here mommy,” and ”Thank you,” “There you go,” “wash hands,” and ”all done” are regulars in her vocabulary.  She’s very sweet but is also developing a mischevious personality… she thinks its funny when you tell her no (Mommy and Daddy do not like this).  Makenna does well sleeping through the night but has a habit of waking up aound 5:30 in the morning.  As you can guess, I am tired of waking up this early and am trying anything to get her to sleep longer!!  Just recently I tried covering her windows up to make the room dark in the morning and I’m seeing some potential hope… 
 
Noah has been doing well this month.  He has been napping so well (which I LOVE).  He enjoys watching his Disney movies, playing outside, and splashing in the water.  There is a lot of “I do, I do” because he wants to do anything he can himself!  We are trying to get him to be a better listener, but we know he’s going through his terrible two’s so we are tying to be patient.  We even notice that he is trying to get his sister to do things we tell him he can’t do… where do they learn these thing!:)
 
Enjoy this months pictures!
 
April 2010  
Easter 2010