Packing blah!

We are moving again. YUCK! I hate packing, especially to move across the country. When your moving in the same city, you can gradually pack and take things to the new house at random. But when you move across the country you have to have everything boxed up tight for the long trip! When we moved here from Michigan it took us 3 long days. Noah was 2 months and I was driving with him and Dennis was driving the moving truck. I had to stop every 2 hours to nurse Noah and change diapers. Now we are moving again and I will have to drive with the kids while Dennis drives the moving truck. Hopefully now that the kids are older it won't take 3 days! I am not too thrilled about moving back to michigan, I just wish we were going somewhere else new, thats all! I love Michigan of course, its my home state. Flint however is not a place I wish to go back to. Its the number one most violent city to live in the United States. I would love to go explore a new state and a new city, that would be fun. But were not. So I am packing everything I own and headed north in about 2 weeks. I am going to miss Baton Rouge, all the people I have met and call my friends and the warm weather of course! I lived in snowy cold weather for 28 years...I sure have enjoyed the heat even though at times its pretty extreme heat!! Noah doesn't seem to mind if we leave his house and all his friends. He might be sad when we actually leave.

I had Brooklyn tested to see if she is delayed in her speech. A program called EarlySteps is available to anyone from birth to 3 years. You can have a child tested even without a docs referral, so that was nice. Her Dr didn't seem to feel that she was delayed at all. But she isn't talking at almost 23 months, so I felt something was wrong. The evaluator came to the house and played with Brooklyn and tested her in every area, not only her speech. Based on her scoring on the tests she feels Brooklyn is not delayed in any area and doesn't require speech therapy at this time. She said I can always have her retested later if she still is not talking, up to age 3. She said Brooklyn is actually very smart and is advanced in most areas and probably is just refusing to talk and/or just letting her brother do all the talking (which he does for everyone!). So that is good and makes me feel better.

On our way to Michigan

We left this morning for 2 weeks in Michigan. In the truck we have Michele, baby Ethan, Noah, Brooklyn, myself, tons of snack, drinks, toys, books and movies. Should take us a couple days to get there with frequent stops and an overnight stay in a hotel. I hope we get there by wednesday night. We just entered Jackson mississippi. Right now the kids are watching cars and fighting. Brooklyn keeps hitting Noah with a book and Noah punches her back. Ethan is babbling, still facing backwards in his car seat, at the kids.

Starting a blog

Seems like everyone has a blog, everyone. So I figured why not try one out. I started this blog almost 2 years ago and only made one entry and never came back, not sure why. So I am going to try this out again!
Yesterday we celebrated Independence Day. We mostly watched TV. We had to do some much needed yard work. Dennis was not working so he mowed the yard and Noah and I picked weeds, Brooklyn watched us. Its so freakin hot outside! After sweating in the yard we came in got cleaned up and waited for it to get dark outside. Dennis bought some fireworks. The kids were so tired from being outside that they both were falling asleep watching fireworks on TV! So it wasn't quite dark out yet, but close enough that we could see them. Noah was crabby tired and not impressed at all with the fireworks, and Brooklyn was tired and scared of the loud noises. Every time Dennis lit a firework, Brooklyn would put her face in my chest and shake. She was so scared, but she didn't cry. She did like the ones that stayed on the ground and didn't make loud noises. She would "oohhhh" and clap. Noah just sat there and complained about everything and just wanted to go in the house, he is 3 going on 15!
We had a great night sleep, both kids in their beds all night, not a sound from either of them til 8:30 am!!! Maybe we should do yard work everyday???? Today the kids were in a great mood all day, no fighting or crying! We went to Target to get out of the house, they did great. Both kids are napping. Normally I don't let Noah nap because he will be up til 1-2 am. But he was really tired and seemed to need the nap. So hopefully he won't be up all night. I think we will go for a run after dinner, that should help burn some excess energy, (and fat for mama!)

Noah's naked day

Happy 21 months to Noah today!

Today Noah spent the whole day naked except for nap time, and only had one accident. He tells me in the morning he wants to be "naked boy". So he ran around the house and played naked all day. He will not tell me if he has to go potty, so I have to ask him every 15 mins or so. Luckily he did his messy buisness in the morning before he got naked! We spent the day picking up toys, well I picked them up and he would get them back out! We dusted and scrubbed toilets. He loves to help me clean, he says "clean mama clean". Then his some of his favorite shows came on TV, he like Sesame Street, Dragon Tales and he loves Caillou. He sat in daddy's comfy chair and watched TV while I vaccuumed with my Dyson. He didn't mind the vaccuum, he is getting used to it since I vaccuum every day! He actually fell asleep in watching me and the TV. I put a diaper on him and put him to bed, he slept til 4:30. Of course I went to bed too, getting as much sleep as I can before the baby arrives. After Noah's nap we played with some puzzles and trains. He then came up missing and I found him in my bedroom taking off his diaper. He had pooped so I told him he had to throw the diaper away. I thought he was taking it to the trash in the bathroom but instead he put it in the toilet!
We then went outside and played in the backyard, well he played I sat and sprayed him with the hose! He loves to run around outside chasing Oreo. He also loves to look for bugs and spiders. We start a class once a week at the Bluebonnet swamp next week to learn about bugs, he will love it! When he finds a bug he says "oh my gosh" really dramatic and then screams! I think he gets that from me!
Daddy worked all day and is still working tonight. He has been putting in crazy hours, working 2 jobs. He is only home for a few hours at night. Hopefully he will be home more. He is building a VooDoo BBQ at LSU and has to be done tomorrow for the first game! Poor Noah asks for daddy throughout the day, only to be dissapointed and then he will say "daddy work". He asked if mama worked, I said no mama stays home with Noah.
Noah requested PJ's at 7pm, so he took a bath and watched his most favorite show, Blues Clues. He loves to look for the clues and sing along. As I was getting him settled for bed he said "I love you mama" and then rubbed my belly and said "I love baby sister". So sweet! I of course started to tear up. He also said "what's baby girl's name?" and then said "Nadia Pfeiffer, Annika Pfeiffer, Brooklyn Pfeiffer." I guess those are the name he likes or the names he remembers, I was pretty impressed that he said the first and our last name!!
However he tossed and turned and was up and down, in and out of bed til 11pm! He just couldn't get to sleep, kept talking about random things that came in his head.
Baby girl is of course awake and kicking. She always is awake at night. She kicks very hard and rolls around a lot. She also gets the hiccups every hour or so, but so did Noah. I am very uncomfortable these days, at 31 weeks I don't remember being uncomfortable with Noah until the last month. But I was 30 - 40 lbs lighter and working a full time job. Well I should get some sleep too. Noah will be up saying "mama all done night night" at around 7am. Then he says "mama get up, milk". He is so demanding for a 21 month old!

Oh I do have pics from today, but they are all of him naked, so I won't post them :)