Genetics are hilarious.
The night after Nora was born, I sat in my hospital bed with my sleeping newborn passed out across the front of me. She had been born at 3:29 a.m. that morning, and after a day full of family and visitors, this was one of the first quiet moments that she and I got to spend together. I took the opportunity to study her features. Her hair, little face, and hands. She had been swaddled or otherwise wrapped up in a blanket for most of the day, but I uncovered her little legs and feet to take a formal peek at them. When I got to her toes, I started cracking up. They were MICHAEL’s toes. Teeny, tiny versions of his toes.
It’s not that I actually doubted Nora was Michael’s kid (this isn’t Jerry Springer, y’all), but that was the first moment where it was like, “Yep! He’s definitely her daddy!”
In those first days and weeks, people commented a lot about how Nora looked like Michael. We broke out a couple of old baby pictures to compare, and it was easily confirmed. Just check out this blog post I did when Nora was a newborn.
As she’s grown, the jury has shown more of a split when it comes to the “Who does she look like?” debate. More and more people have started saying things like, “I see a lot of Heather in her,” and I occasionally get the “She looks just like you!” comments as well. And I’m sure they’re not lies; after all, I did carry the kid for nine months and contributed half of her genes, surely I should get some kind of resemblance, right?
I think she’s a good mix of the both of us, really. I can’t clearly identify features of Nora’s that are MINE versus features that are HIS, because well, let’s face it–Michael and I don’t exactly look like night and day. We’re very similar in a lot of ways: hair color, eye color, skin tone, etc.
BUT… Last weekend, Michael visited his aunt and uncle, and she brought out some old photos. I got a text from Michael with the following photo, and I had to laugh:
I was immediately struck by the similarity. That’s Michael as a baby, but I won’t lie–he looks ridiculously similar to Nora. Wouldn’t you say?
Check out the side-by-side comparison:
What do you think? :)
P.S. We’re in kitchen renovation hell right now, so please excuse my lack of regular posting. We’re in the new drywall stage–it’s up as of Saturday, and now we’re into the mudding and sanding part, which is pretty much the worst.thing.ever. It’s bringing back horrible memories from our family room project, that’s for sure. The problem this time is that the kitchen is in the center of our home, so we pretty much have to walk through it to get to any other part of the downstairs–which is impossible since all of the doorways are taped off with plastic to try to keep the flying drywall dust to a minimum in other areas of the house. Ugh. Fingers crossed that things go smoothly and we’ll be able to take down the plastic and have some semblance of a kitchen again by this weekend.
15 Responses to Spitting Image
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About
I'm Heather. I'm 33 and have been married to Michael for seven years. Together, we have two beautiful little girls we love more than anything, and a miniature dachshund who drives us crazy. I'm a full-time working mom who has very little time for my own "stuff" these days, like home improvement, cooking/baking, cake decorating, and photography. Despite the team not making the playoffs since 1999, I'm STILL a Buffalo Bills fan, which I think speaks to my loyalty AND sense of humor. I can't wait to pick up the pace with travel again some day... you know, when we're done being ruled by tiny fists. Welcome to my blog.
Wow, that is an amazing resemblance! I saw it even before the side by side. It is crazy how it all works.
Twins!!! They look SO much alike!
I found pictures of me and my sister as kids this weekend and in one picture, I look just like my youngest niece and my sister looks just like her oldest daughter.
WOW he looked just like Nora! So cute! My Son looks exactly like my Husband and nothing like me, haha.
That is UNCANNY. The nose! It is EXACTLY the same!
Wow! That is quite a resemblance! Both very cute babies!
yes, they look so much alike! and i think it’s very fitting the shirt she’s wearing :)
That is remarkable! She’s a cutie pie!
Holy Crap! That’s awesome. I also appreciate her I Love Daddy shirt to sort of drive the whole point home :)
I didn’t even notice the shirt until you guys pointed it out–HA!
What’s funny is that if you go back to the original post I wrote about them looking alike (way back when!), I actually said that I thought from the very beginning that she had his nose. It’s so true! :)
Wow! Michaels baby pic does look VERY Nora-esque!!
Wow! She really resembles her Daddy! So precious. Also, what camera settings did you use to take that picture of Nora? I have a Nikon 3000 and still don’t know enough to even remotely take photo that looks that good! Did you use any flash? Thanks! :)
She may be a spitting image of her daddy, but she has your eyes, I think. There was this picture you posted of yourself when you were 7-8? (it was from the Halloween where you dressed up as a bride) and you totally look like Nora in that picture. :)
~Kristen
Shelly–Settings for that pic were ISO 320, f/3.2, SS 60. Yes, it was taken with an external flash; I have a Speedlite that I typically bounce off of the wall/ceiling behind me when indoors. Good luck playing around with your camera settings! You’ll get the hang of it. :)
Kristen–I’m going to have to go back and look at that pic now! :)
They are identical! It’s funny because when Kira was born she looked a lot like me, like “holy tara” alike :p however the one thing that I told people was all Dominic was her feet! Dominic is 6’2″ & needless to say has feet to match. Kira had the longest baby flippers I had ever seen & her toes were just like Daddy. It’s so funny because so many people looked at me like I had 3 heads when I mentioned this ha-ha.
That is seriously uncanny!