Gatlinburg

Two weekends ago we took a trip to Gatlinburg to celebrate my mom's 50th birthday! It was a great trip mostly because we got to relax and have good company. The house we rented was perfect for us! Here is Noah hanging out

And this picture represents what we did most of the time. Play with technology and lay around:

And this is what the kids did most of the time. Pour out all the toys and have a ball

Birthday princess!

Here is the view from our house. We didn't get to enjoy it much because there were wasps all over the porch area. We just had to admire the mountains from inside.

Here is the birthday banner that Mary and I spent a week making!

Noah would only consent to a picture if he got to keep holding the broom:)

Riding the pillow pal:

Cuties:

My ingenious cousin also had the idea to have a treasure hunt in honor of St. Patrick's day. Here is Mary opening her map:

Now they are hunting for treasure using their maps (and their moms)

Yay treasure!

Enjoying the plunder.

It was quite a good trip and I'm so glad we got to celebrate a great mom and grandma!

20 months

Noah is 20 months old now! He is more fun than ever. Loves to follow his sister around (well anyone really). I mentioned to Ian that Noah doesn't like to be alone and Ian said he had never noticed because Noah is so content to just play by himself. So I told him to get up and walk out of the room. Sure enough...Noah came following right behind us. He just loves to have people around even if you aren't directly interacting with him! And he's talking up a storm. I'm blown away by how communicative he is. If you don't have kids you probably don't care and have no idea how big a deal it is that he speaks in full sentences...but it's pretty crazy. I'm a big fan of it though. It's already rare that I can't understand what he wants, which means he doesn't whine a whole lot, which is awesome. 

This is his "earth to Noah" face, which is the face he usually adopts when I pull out the camera. For a while he was saying cheese and totally hamming it up for the camera, but he's over it I think.

He said cheese in this one though:)

And finally, after chasing him around the yard for 20 minutes I get a genuine smile!

He loves to cuddle and totally has us wrapped around his finger. When we get him ready for bed and turn out the lights he will say, "Chair mommy!" So we will sit and cuddle and rock him for a bit. He also has a few favorite songs that he will call out and we obediently respond by singing those songs to him. I wonder how this little ritual of ours will change when baby comes and Noah is sharing a room with Mary. I hope we can still preserve it at least a bit. Mary is not a cuddler...so it's really nice when Noah snuggles into us and just sits for a while. But HE decides when he's done! He will sit up and say, "Night night mommy!" and point to his crib. Usually before I'm ready, but trying to get him to cuddle again is futile.

One last note that will show you how weird we are. Noah LOVES naked time. Mary does too, but Noah gets all revved up for it. As we're getting them changed into PJ's we ask them if they want to be naked butts and they both get so excited. As we get down to just Noah's diaper he gets his feet going like the running man and chants, "diaper off mommy!!!" The moment that diaper comes off he is gone. He runs around the house like a mad man and it is hilarious. But when it's time to get PJ's on he's usually not too happy. He's too cute naked!

Fun in the kitchen

We had a little moment the other day. While in the kitchen playing. Mary has been big on things being "hers" and this stool is one of them. I noticed that Noah was trying to sit next to her on the stool and the other day she had pushed him off (grrr) so I told her to be kind to him. Well I went back to what I was doing then I heard them giggling. Here's why:

He kept trying to sit on her lap that day, but as you can see her lap is not proportionate to his body so it didn't work out too well. When they got up I opened the cabinet behind them and Mary saw the spray bottle that I let her use to spray spots on the floor. Yes I mean let. She LOVES to help clean the floor because she gets to spray the vinegar...note to moms, spray bottles are fun! Anyway, She yelled, "I get to spray mommy!" I told her no that we weren't cleaning the floors I just had to get the dishwasher detergent out. But Noah didn't hear that part. He had already sprinted over to the drawer to grab his wash cloths (that's his job) and he went right to work:

Ha! We've only cleaned the floors a couple times together so I didn't realize that they already had this down. I guess they just loved it that much. There are worse things they could want to do I guess:) But technically he's not allowed to get in that drawer by himself...I couldn't bring myself to correct him though.

Big girl

Is it weird that I almost cried the other day when Mary did this jigsaw puzzle by herself?

Every day I look at her and I just can't believe how far she's come and how big she is. Even when I hug her she just seems more substantial or something...broader? Like she's a girl, not a baby. I still call her baby girl:) And she can still fit in Noah's laundry basket:

So she's not THAT big.