Crawling, Standing, Sledding

Hello Again Everyone!
I finally downloaded some recent pictures of Natalie and made another slideshow. I'm in love with smilebox, you can download all your pictures on it so quickly. I know I always say that but it's so great and people can see how she changes and grows. This slideshow has pictures from January till now. She is still pulling herself up on everything, she's discovered the steps, she's had her first injury that drew some blood, she laughs when she sees us, and she is extremely quick. She didn't even cry when she hit her chin on the corner of the stairs. We truly believe in the whole "it's all how you respond" theory. She will completely fall over, hit her chin on her toybox, hit her head on the floor, and as she's rolling back over she'll look at us for a reaction. We avoid eye contact with Natalie, often say to eachother, "Oh man, that was a HARD fall, that had to hurt," and then look at her and say "YIPPEEE, you're such a big girl," and she's on her merry way to bonking another part of her body. When the blood incident happened I was actually downstairs doing laundry, I heard a loud bang, a uhhhhh, uhhhhh, and that was it. When I came back up I was surprised that there was blood because I would have thought she would have let out a loud scream. No reaction, no tears I guess.

Is everyone able to view this smilebox slideshow, I just realized that maybe you have to download something in order to view it. If you could let me know that would be great. You can leave a comment if you want, I only have 2 people that ever comment, Kerri Young & Christi Jensen, you two are so sweet.

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Here is a little slideshow from yesterday, we took Natalie sledding. She was not sure about the whole experience. It didn't start off so great, the first tug on the sled sent her flipping over backwards landing in the snow, kind of high centered on the sled with her head in the snow and her legs on the sled. We picked her up, held her for a bit, put her down, and off we went. Then James buried her in snowballs, we fed her some snow which she kept eating, and had her touch it. All in all, not too bad, we had fun. Enjoy and everyone have a great day.
Love, The Chalmer's Family
28 degrees and dreary

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Halleluia!

HELLO!! Here's a little slideshow for those of you who haven't seen or barely see Natalie.

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Well, in my last blog I mentioned that Natalie was sick and getting better after 5 days, well, I was wrong. She didn't get better for quite some time. Now, she is finally back to her self again and we are so thankful for that. She was sick for 2 WEEKS!! She had some nasty virus and was in to see the doctor twice, which, for those of you who know us well know that's huge because we never go to the doctor. It started with a day of diarrhea, followed by a night of throwing up and diarrhea, and then ended with another 13 days of diarrhea. Sorry if that's too much information for some of you, but hey, she's a baby. It was so sad, she would just cry and cry all day. I would put her down and she would scream. She wanted to be held for about a week and half straight. She wouldn't smile or laugh,just lay and cry. It was terrible, she would only smile when James got home from work because she apparantly thinks he's the funniest person alive. Then, in the midst of it she got a cold!! Ughhh... We had to go to the doctor because she had one wet diaper in about 28 hours and dehydration was becoming a major concern because she was only eating about 10 ounces of formula in an ENTIRE day. She was losing weight and dropped from the 10th percentile in weight to the 3rd, so now 97% of babies her age are bigger than her. Oh well, she's just our little peanut and we love her. We feel that it was only because of God's protection that she didn't have to go to the hospital for dehydration, somehow 10 ounces total was enough for her little body and she fought through it. Praise God!

Now she is making up for it and eating like a mad women, the picture above is her first time eating carrots, she's not quite sure. She is actually finishing her bottle without us having to force her to and she's crying when it's done because she wants more!! That has never happened in her 8 months of life. It's crazy! She's also eating a ton more solids which is encouraging, she's making up for lost food I guess. She is also practicing her new skill of standing up on her own. She crawls all around, following us from room to room and then she pulls herself up to standing if she's able to find something that's the right height. It's so amazing how she learns a new skill and then it kind of consumes her, that's all she wants to do. She is also great at catching herself when she falls. :) Other than that, we're doing great here at the Chalmers' household. On another note, James was recently promoted to a Franchise Support Manager at his job! He is very excited and I'm so proud of him, he's only been there 6 months so it's great to have people believing in him and his abilities. The church we are a part of, Coram Deo, that started about a year and half ago with 40 people has now grown to around 150. We are so excited about that and actually "multiplied" our current Missional Community (small group) into two seperate ones. There was a need for one to meet downtown and we are currently heading that up with other people that live downtown. We are really enjoying getting to know some new people and digging into Romans together. That's about it, everyone take care and all you teachers enjoy the snow day today!! YIPPEEEE!!!!

14 degrees and 4 inches of snow here in Omaha

Sick Baby Girl

Well, We are officially recovering from the first attack of the stomach flu and all that that entails. I wish I could say it was me but unfortunately it was our tiny 7 1/2 month old. Seeing her throwing up and suffering through constant diarrhea was pretty sad. She started getting sick last Wednesday and now we are at Monday and she's on the uphill battle. She is still pretty weak and tired and we can definitely sense a difference in her. She's not really into playing all that much and would rather be held. She woke up this morning with a runny nose so we may be starting a new fight against a cold.

On January 7th, Natalie was dedicated at Coram Deo Church by our Pastor Bob Thune. It was a great day. We dedicated to raise Natalie up in the way of the Lord and we chose these verses for Bob to pray over her.

That Natalie would not be “ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes: first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.” Romans 1:16

That Natalie would see that “The law of the Lord is perfect, reviving the soul. The decrees of the Lord are trustworthy, making wise the simple. The commandments of the Lord are right, bringing joy to the heart. The commands of the Lord are clear, giving insights to life.”

It was a great day with a fun party at our house afterwards. She was adorable!!!

First Tooth

Well, Natalie is officially seven months old and finally got her first tooth. I didn't even know she was getting one because she wasn't fussy then she put my finger in her mouth and I felt it!! Wow, big day. It doesn't seem possible that she can have teeth already. She is moving around so much. I took her up to Liberty (the school I taught at) to visit some friends and she was doing her version of crawling all around the floor. She sees an object she wants, puts her hands out in front of her and then pulls her whole body while it drags on the floor. We call it the "reach and drag." It's so cute. There's one thing that happens all the time now that she's doing the dragging thing that wouldn't happen if she crawled on all fours (she still gets up and rocks back and forth and takes one or two crawls and then falls, she prefers the reach and drag because it's much quicker). She is in the 10th percentile for weight which means that 90% of babies her age are bigger than her. Yeah, she's a little peanut. On the flip side she is in the 90th percentile for height, meaning she is taller than 90% of babies her age. So, this presents a problem for clothes, if they fit her waist they are way to short and if they fit her length they are way to big. So, when she does the reach and drag she eventually loses her pants. She drags herself right out of them. It is so funny, pretty soon, Natalie has no pants on and she's all the way across the room. Well, that's about all from the Chalmers' household. Perfect timing too because Natalie just woke up and it's time to feed her. Take Care everyone.

Christmas in Canada slideshow below

Well, we are back from our Christmas in Canada and I made a quick slideshow from our events there. :)

Big Month

Well, this has been a big month for Natalie.

You can check out a slideshow I made from some pictures this month at http://secure.smilebox.com/ecom/openTheBox?sendevent=4d6a637a4e6a45310a&sb=1

• She took her first trip to Florida and went swimming for the first time. She loved it and was splashing and kicking like crazy. It was a blast watching her.


• She experienced her first Christmas presents. All she wanted to do was eat the wrapping paper, she was very good at that.


• She sat on Santa's lap for the first time. James' work had a party with Mr. and Mrs. Clause. She was very interested in his beard and played with that for most of the time.


• We decorated the tree and, again, all she wanted to do was eat the lights and garland. She felt the tree and DID NOT like the way it felt. She made the funniest face and would not touch it again. She's never refused to touch something and put it in her mouth, the tree was the first exception.


• She ate her first vegetable. I made homemade organic green beans. She wasn't sure at first but now she eats them like a champ.


• She's sitting up and playing now, she still topples over some times but she's pretty sturdy for the most part.


• Natalie is officially pushing up on her hands and knees. She gets up, rocks back and forth, and then plops back down on her tummy. She will be crawling before we know it.

We can't believe how fast Natalie is changing. We already miss that tiny baby stage and it's only been 6 months. We love her so much and every night before bed we go in her room and watch her sleep. She's so cute!!

Well, if I don't write again, Have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!

Victoria