Skip to main content

3 Years Old

Joe feeling Nora kick for the first time
Today is Joe's 3rd birthday.  It seems like a lifetime ago that he was born and we met him for the first time, and in some ways I feel like it was the start of a whole new life for me.  I can't imagine a world where I come home and don't have a familiar 'Dada!' and a big hug waiting to greet me.

Things with Joe have been wonderful lately, despite frequent temper tantrums in the evening that I think we can attribute to his changing sleep schedule.  He frequently plays on his own and often has entire conversations with his toys or other objects in the house that just crack us up.  Last night, for example, he was asking his asparagus, "What's wrong?" and petting it before eventually just popping it in his mouth and continuing on with dinner.

Joe's vocabulary has expanded significantly in the last few months, and I feel like we're at the point where he pretty much understands everything we're saying.  Last night he even pointed out Jupiter in the sky, which definitely brought a tear to this astronomy-loving guy's eyes.  We took Joe to Disney last month when we visited Florida for Marissa's birthday and unfortunately didn't get the excited reaction from him we'd been hoping for.  Most of it is likely because he doesn't watch too much Disney programming and spends most of his time watching trains or Dora the Explorer, but he did wave and Mickey and Minnie Mouse when they went by in one of their parades.

We're coming up to the last 10 weeks of Nora's pregnancy and we're getting ready to do this all over again.  This pregnancy has been going a lot better for Rachael than Joe's did to this point, and we're cautiously optimistic that everything will go well with the delivery, too.  We're scheduled to deliver at a midwife practice in Alexandria this time, which has Rachael happy about how things might go this time around.

Joe loves talking to Nora through Rachael's stomach and always talks about how he's going to hug and play with her.  We both think he's going to be a fantastic older brother, and I can't wait to see him hold her for the first time.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

The Shannons

Out at lunch with my wonderful family As always, I feel I need to add a disclaimer here about how busy I've been and apologize to myself - and whoever ends up reading this - about not keeping up with this blog.  It was easier with just Joe because my time home meant mostly quiet during his frequent naps and plenty of time to gather thoughts to put down, where now I feel I can barely keep up with sleep and other basic functions of life. Hectic life aside, I couldn't be happier with where I am right now as father.  Joe is at a wonderful age where he always wants to help us and be affectionate with Nora and we have started playing sports together rather than just hanging around the house.  He's really started taking an interest in baseball and soccer, and whenever I have the chance I try to at least kick the ball around the house a bit if I can't take him outside.  I'm hoping that once things settle down we can really spend some time together and work on some soc...
Post a Comment
Read more

Nora Caroline

Nora at 2 weeks old Nora Caroline Shannon was born on May 4th at 545pm.  She weighed 7 pounds, 8 ounces and was 20.5 inches long.  It's been quite the few months since my last post for our whole family and, while I constantly regret not being able to get here and write down my thoughts, when I look back I understand that we've been running on fumes for months.  Rachael and I both just finished our respective undergrad degrees and I spent a month doing 60-hour weeks to try to bank some money to tide us over while Rachel isn't getting a full salary for maternity leave. Rachael had the birth experience she wanted with Nora and I couldn't be happier for her.  She delivered at a midwife practice on King Street on Old Town Alexandria in a bedroom, not in a hospital hooked up to all the monitors we dealt with for Joe.  She was able to labor on her own and go for a walk with me around town early on and did a lot of her heavy labor standing or on all fours in bed. ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Happy 2016

Nora and Joe under the Christmas tree We finally got through 2015, which was a pretty long and painful year for us personally.  We've been dealing with housing issues, which are looking to finally come to an end when we move for the 3rd time in a year at the end of this month.  We also dealt with some deaths in the family and me working a significant amount of overtime, which ended with the turnover to 2016, and we're looking forward to some stability here now that I'll be home soon.  We're moving into a new townhouse in a few weeks that is just a mile or so down the road from my work.  The hope is that I'll be home a lot more being so close to work and that I'll finally get some good exercise in every day since I'll be able to walk. This weekend we're going on a much-needed vacation-a Caribbean cruise that I can't wait to take the kids on.  Joe's old enough to enjoy the on-board kids activities and understand some of the outdoor excursions...
Post a Comment
Read more