I am a manipulative Mom...and I don't even feel guilty about it.  Last night we were sitting down to dinner as my mom was on her way to our house.  Of course, with grandma on her way, I wanted to get Noah to eat some vegtables before he was showered in treats.  "Noah, eat two peas and grandma will come to our house," I told him, knowing full well that she only had 10 minutes left of her hour and a half drive.  Excited, he downed two peas.  Pleased with my progress, I told him, "The more peas you eat, the faster grandma will get here."  It worked, but now my son thinks that his pea consumption somehow impacts the speed limit.  However, I don't feel too bad...my mother-in-law (and many other adults I know) believe that yelling at the television can impact a football game, so these types of delusions seem widespread.  I, myself, believe that sleeping makes time move faster. 
 

Mail call!

Noah loves mail. We are fortunate enough to get our mail delivered into our home via a slot in the door. When the mail comes Noah runs to it and cheers, "mail, mail!" Then he'll bring me any colorful pieces and inform me, "I got mails for Noah Samuelson," and proceed to open it. This is fine as long as it is one of our numerous pieces of junk mail, but one of these days...I just hope nothing important ends up ruined. Especially since much of "Noah's mail" requires him to write back with crayon on the same letter he just opened.

Caleb is advancing SO quickly. Of course, moms and dads are biased, but he crawls everywhere and sits down unassisted. I'm not sure that many 6 month old kids are doing the same. Also, I would consider Caleb to be the happiest baby I have ever met...though my perspective may be skewed since Noah was quite fussy the first few months. As long as he is rested and fed, Caleb has a smile on his face and is ready to laugh.

Caleb has also started yelling at us. It's rather endearing, in fact. He will be playing as I am making dinner and suddenly start shrieking. When I look over, he is grinning at me and then he just chatters away in his baby language. He started doing it the other day as I was holding him on the couch and Travis and Noah were playing nearby. Caleb looked over at his dad and started jumping and shrieking until Travis looked at him. Now that he knows he can get our attention, he'll yell at us with abandon until we acknowledge him. He is certainly social, but then again perhaps he simply knows that sometimes he has to compete with big brother.

First Teeth!

Caleb, our mover and shaker, has erupted two teeth in the last week. Along with these teeth he's hit another milestone as I have started feeding him some vegetables with our dinner. Caleb's thrilled about this. If we happen to be eating as we hold him he tracks our food as we eat it, watching with an open mouth, leaning toward the spoon, grabbing at it, making mealtimes very messy. So now he has his own little meals (he eats sans clothing, so I don't run out of stain remover) as we all eat dinner together.

Noah has also tried to get into the act. I caught him trying to share his juice the other morning as I made my coffee. I looked over and Caleb was in the exer-saucer with a straw in his mouth as Noah held up the juice box for him. It's like they are in cahouts. Last week Noah took a chicken finger to the coffee table and left it there as I was clearing the table in the dining room. When I came back from dropping off dishes in the kitchen I found Caleb gnawing on the chicken finger. The little sneak had crawled over to the coffee table, pulled himself up, grabbed the chicken and began gnawing away. Of course, when I exclaimed, "Caleb, what..?" he turned and lost his balance. The left-over chicken went to Henry and I had to explain to Noah (for the hundredth time) that he can't leave his food on the coffee table. Caleb...well, he had a guilty look on his face, but as far a lectures go, I decided to save my breath for his teenage years.