Catch up!

It's been a busy summer! I've been working more, and Noah has been having a blast at the baby-sitter's house with his friends. He talks all the time about Adam and Madison, who are Samantha's kiddos, and Noah's very best friends. And they love all love Noah too.

One day we had a friend from the Kindermusik class and a friend from church over to play and the three boys had a great time.





Noah is doing great with speech therapy and is making some strides. Nikki, our therapist, is very impressed with his memory and ability to sit still and focus when they are working together. He is adding lots of new words to his vocabulary and is doing better with asking for things and is starting to try more 2-word sentences.

When he figured out how to climb out of bed, I bought a crib tent. :) With all the sleep issues, we just weren't ready to add that to the mix. It works so well, I see no reason to switch beds anytime soon!

Also, Noah is back on the pacifier for sleep. After 10 weeks of little to no napping and very early mornings, I couldn't take it anymore. It took awhile before he even wanted to use it again but he has since resumed napping and is doing pretty well. Not sure that he is getting a lot more total sleep per day but this is an improvement and I am hopeful that he will eventually start sleeping til at least 7:00am again! And I don't care if he sleeps with a paci till he's 20. :)

We had several days over the last week with Jeremy's mom in town and it was wonderful having Mamaw around to help out. Unfortunately, this is the only pic I took but I did get a couple of cute videos too.

























Noah has developed a love for whales and dolphins since we visited Sea World. We watch the Shamu show on youtube pretty frequently. This is the part where the audience waves their arms and shout "Shamu, Shamu!" along with the trainers and the whales splash everyone. Cracks me up.

Noah has also developed a love for Kermit the Frog and Miss Piggy after seeing a little bit of Kermit on one of his Sesame videos. So Mimi bought him some DVDs and he begs to watch "The Muppets Take Manhatten" all day long! I love that he chose Kermit on his own. Most 2-year-olds love Elmo, but how many have an addiction to Kermit? What a little individual. :)

Our boy is too sweet these days. He gives lots of hugs and love and recently learned to do the "smack" when giving kisses. I personally think they are the best kisses ever.

Let Freedom Ring!

We really did the 4th of July holiday weekend up big this year, at least as far as traveling goes. But first, here are a few pics from the previous weekend, when we visited Williamson County Park on Sunday afternoon, and enjoyed riding the train and playing at the Quarry splashpad. The Quarry is Cedar Park's new million-dollar splashpad and it is pretty cool, in both senses of the word. :) Sorry, we didn't take the camera out there, so no pics. I am excited for friends/family with children to start visiting us so we can take kiddos to all the fun places around here! (Hint, hint!)

Waiting for the choo-choo train to arrive.

All aboard the Cedar Rock Railroad!

Boys just love trains.
On to the 4th of July weekend. The three of us headed out to ABIA on Thursday, after Noah got a good nap in, and flew out to Tulsa, where we were picked up that evening by the Nutt's and driven out to Grand Lake. (Side note: air travel with a 2-year-old is not nearly as easy as it was with an infant. Noah was not at all pleased that the flight attendant told him to sit in his own seat, with his belt on, at all times when the fasten seat belt sign is on. I recommend avoiding the anal retentive flight attendants at least. He did love seeing the airplanes and I think he understands now that he actually flew on one and that we went "up, up, up!" in the sky. :)

Anyway we arrived late at this amazing house at beautiful Grand Lake that was loaned to us by a friend of a friend of the Nutt's. It was a big party with us and several members of Brian, Stacie, and Rylie's family. And I think everyone had fun. Noah and Rylie got along great and gave each other lots of kisses. :) Unfortunately, we did not take too many pics out there and are hopeful that Stacie will send some our way. ;) There were some really cute ones of the 2 little ones and this was really their first time spent together.

No, he is not naked here, just looks that way!

Saturday, we drove to Fort Smith, AR, to visit with Jeremy's parents and grandparents. Mandi, Dom, and Sophia happened to be there too and the kids had a lot of fun together.

On Monday, we headed back to Tulsa for the night and flew home on Tuesday morning. As usual, it was one of our whirlwind trips but we all had a blast. Noah even did a good job sleeping! And everyone spoiled us with all the food and accomodations. :)

My only disappointment is that Noah's 3rd 4th of July has passed us by and he still has not seen a fireworks show! I've always been afraid he wouldn't make it staying up so late and this year he probably could have done it but we couldn't manage to fit a show in our schedule. A must for next year!

Happy Independence Day!